vegan MoFo Day 27: Lemony Mixed Bean Hotpot

I adapted this recipe from one of those recipe cards that you can pick up at the supermarket. I brought the card home and used it as a bookmark and then finally rediscovered it in one of my cookery books a couple of years ago. Since then it has been a firm favourite. You can use any tinned or cooked beans that you have at hand. When I'm cooking beans for a recipe I cook twice the amount I need and freeze the rest so I usually have quite a variery of cooked beans in the freezer. If I don't have enough for this recipe, then I supplement them with a handful of lentils.

Lemony Mixed Bean Hotpot
1 medium onion, peeled and finely sliced 
2 cloves of garlic, crushed
2 sticks of celery, finely sliced
2 carrots, peeled and cut into thin sticks
1 red pepper (capsicum), deseeded and diced
1 Tbsp ground coriander
1 Tbsp ground cumin
390 g/14 oz tin of chopped tomatoes
340 ml/1 1/4 cups vegetable stock
205g/7 oz/1/2 can borlotti beans
205g/7 oz/1/2 can cannellini beans205g/7 oz/1/2 can pinto beans
1 lemon, thickly sliced
20 g/1 handful of fresh coriander (cilantro), finely chopped
 
Saute the onion for a couple of minutes in 2 Tbsp vegetable stock. Add garlic, celery and carrots and cook for about 7-120 minutes, adding more stock if needed. Add pepper and spices, cook for another minute and then add tomatoes, vegetable stock, beans and lemon and cook gently for 10 minutes. Just before serving, remove the lemon slices and stir in the fresh coriander (cilantro).

              

Vegan MoFo Day 26: Vegetable Pilau

All the MoFo cooking must be getting to me, because today I found myself in M&S buying tarka dhal and bombay aloo for my dinner tonight, after I realised that they are inadvertently vegan. Their rice however is not vegan so I decided to make some spicy vegetable pilau to go with it.
 
Spicy Vegetable Pilau
225 g/1 cup basmati rice, washed, covered in water and soaked for half an hour
1/2 tsp cumin seeds
1 Tbsp sunflower oil
2 bay leaves
1 clove
1 onion, finely chopped
1 carrot, finely diced
50 g/1/3 cup frozen sweetcorn
50 g/1/3 cup frozen peas
25 g/1/4 cup cashew nuts, lightly toasted
475 ml/2 cups water
1/4 tsp ground cumin
1/4 tsp garam masala
salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

In a large frying pan, saute the cumin seeds for 2 minutes, add the bay leaves, cardamoms and clove and saute for another 2 minutes. Add the onion and carrot and saute until softened. Stir in the drained rice, sweetcorn, peas and cashew nuts and cook for a further 2 minutes. Add water, ground cumin, garam masala, salt and pepper, bring to the boil, cover, turn down the heat and simmer for around 15 - 20 minutes until all the liquid has been absorbed. 

I served mine with the tarka dal and bombay aloo, plus a vegetable pakora, onion bhaji and vegetable samosa and a couple of poppadums. 

          

Vegan MoFo Day 25: Mushroom/Brazil Nut Patties

Today I had a pack of leeks that needed to be used up and so I made vegeburgers, or to be more precise, brazil and mushroom patties.  This is an old favourite whch I adapted from a recipe I found in a supermarket vegetarian cookbook from the 80s. The patties freeze well and are quick and easy to make.

Brazil Nut and Mushroom Patties
175 g/6 oz leeks, cleaned and finely sliced
1 tsp celery seeds
175 g/6 oz mushrooms, sliced
100 g/4 oz cooked brown rice 
125 g/4 oz brazil nuts, ground
25 g/1 oz pecan nuts, chopped
50 g/1/2 cup vital wheat gluten
1 tsp yeast extract
2 Tbsp fresh parsley, finely chopped
1 tsp paprika
salt and pepper

Saute the leeks in 2 Tbsp of vegetable stock for about 5 minutes, add mushroom and celery seeds and saute for another 5 minutes, adding more liquid if necessary. Remove from the heat, mix in remaining ingredients and knead until strings of gluten form. Divide into 8 and form into pattie shapes. Shallow fry for 7-8 minutes or bake in a pre-heated oven at 350F/180C/Gas Mark 4 for 20 minutes, turning after 10 minutes.


I served mine with mashed potatoes and petits pois. They are nice with a tomato sauce but I had no energy to make a sauce this evening so I made do with some tomato ketchup instead.

                 

Vegan MoFo Day 24: Smoky Lentil Sauce

I wanted something quick to eat this evening so I went for my favourite quick meal of rice, steamed veggies and a sauce. I have a basic lentil sauce that I make and then create variation by changing the spices and adding different herbs and vegetables. So I have a Creole lentil sauce, Cajun lentil sauce, raunchy red lentil sauce (based on the Raunchy Red Lentil Soup from La Dolce Vegan), lemony red lentil sauce etc etc. There are as many possibilities as your imagination can come up with.Today I decided to try a variation on the theme of yesterday's lentil soup.

Basic Red Lentil Sauce
1 small onion, finely chopped
2-3 cloves of garlic, crushed 
1 small red chilli (optional and if appropriate)
100 g/1/2 cup red lentils
150 ml/3/4 cup vegetable stock
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
Other herbs and spices to taste


Saute the onion, garlic and chilli (if using) in 1 Tbsp vegetable stock (or olive oil, if you prefer.) Add lentils and vegetable stock plus spices as desired. Bring to the boil, cover, turn down the heat and simmer for between 10 and 15 minutes. Blend until smooth with a hand (immersion) blender.

Today I added 1/2 tsp smoked paprika and 1 Tbsp fresh parsley, finely chopped. I also added the almond mush left over from making almond milk the other day - 1/2 Tbsp ground almonds would do as well. After simmering I added the juice of half a lemon.

I served the sauce over steamed vegetables and a portion of Monday's seeded spicy rice. I think it would be better with plain brown rice so that the smoky paprika flavour could reign supreme without fighting with the spices in the spicy rice mix.

I divide the remaining sauce into single servings and freeze, ready for a really quick and easy dinner.

      

Vegan MoFo Day 23: Lentil Soup

I love lentil soup and have quite a few lentil soup recipes in my repertoire. I wanted to use my slow cooker today so I adapted a recipe from A Vegan Taste of the Middle East by Linda Majzlik. This turned out to be really tasty and different enough from my other red lentil recipes that I will definitely be making it again.

Spicy Middle Eastern Red Lentil Soup 
1 onion, finely chopped
3 cloves of garlic, crushed
1 red chilli(or more/less to taste), finely chopped 
100 g/4 oz tomato, skinned and chopped
150 g/6 oz red lentils
650 mls/22 fl oz vegetable stock
2 Tbsp finely chopped fresh parsley
1/2 tsp paprika
freshly ground black pepper
Juice of half a lemon
         
Saute the onion, garlic and chilli in a tablespoon of vegetable stock until softened. Add the skined and chopped tomatoes and cook for a few minutes more. Transfer to the slow cooker, add lentils, stock, paprika and parsley, season with black pepper and cook on low for 5-6 hours. Blend with a hand blender, add lemon juice and garnish with some more  chopped fresh parsley.  

 

Vegan MoFo Day 22: Seeded Spicy Rice

Often my dinner is a bowl of brown rice with steamed veggies and a lentil sauce of some sort. Usually I have plain steamed rice, but sometimes I really want something more flavourful. This is one of my favourite recipes - tasty, quick to make and using ingredients I usually have at hand. The recipe calls for white basmati rice, but I imagine that any long grain white rice will be fine. I have made it using brown basmati which takes an extra 10 minutes and more water to cook.

Seeded Spicy Basmati Rice 
1 tsp sunflower oil
1/2 tsp ground turmeric
5 cardamom pods, lightly crushed
1 tsp coriander seeds, lightly crushed
3 cloves of garlic, crushed
200 g/1 cup white basmati rice
400 ml/1 2/3 cups vegetable stock
115 g/1/2 cup natural soya yoghurt
1 Tbsp sunflower seeds, toasted
1 Tbsp sesame seeds, toasted
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
Fresh coriander leaves (cilantro) to garnish

Heat the oil and gently saute the spices and crushed garlic for 1 minute, stirring continuously. Add the rice and vegetable stock, bring to the boil, cover and turn down to a simmer for around 15 minutes. Stir in the yoghurt and toasted seeds, season to taste and serve garnished with chopped fresh coriander leaves (cilantro).

When I am out of yoghurt, I mix in some almond milk and the juice of half a lemon instead. Today I served this with steamed broccoli, cauliflower, sugarsnaps and brussels sprouts, topped with a lemony lentil dal with some mango chutney on the side.

Vegan MoFo Day 21: Split Pea soup

No energy for cooking anything too elaborate or time-consuming today so I went for one of my favourite soups instead. I adapted this recipe from A Vegan Taste of East Africa by Linda Majzlik. I have found some of my favourite recipes from the Vegan Taste of books:

 

Ethiopian Spicy Green Split Pea Soup
225g/8oz split green peas

1 onion, coarsely chopped
4 garlic cloves, crushed

1 green chilli, deseeded and finely chopped

2 Tbps vegetable stock
1 tsp ground ginger

black pepper
900ml/1½ pts vegetable stock

finely chopped fresh coriander

Saute the onion in 2 Tbsp vegetable stock. Add split peas, garlic, chilli and ginger and season with black pepper. Add 900 ml/1½ pts vegetable stock, stir well and bring to the boil. Cover the pan, reduce heat to a low simmer and cook for around 30 minutes until the peas are well done and the soup is thick.  Puree with a hand blender, adding more water to get the consistency you prefer. Serve garnished with chopped coriander.