Showing posts with label 1000 vegan recipes. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 1000 vegan recipes. Show all posts

Sunday, November 21, 2010

Johnston St Fiesta & Casa Iberica- Vegan Mofo Day 21

We stopped by Case Iberica yesterday to get some more essential ingredients to make dishes from Viva Vegan. We got some hominy, Harina pan(masarepa) and Epazote.



The Johnston St Fiesta was on and they had a big dance class:


Toby got a can of Inca Kola, which he said that he didn't like.

And I got a cup of Horchata which I've always wondered about. It tasted like a watery rice milk with cinnamon flavour but has a slightly powdery feel. I liked it and it has inspired me to try making it. I also got a potato swirl, which was like one massive deep fried and salted potato cake swirled around a stick which was awesome. 



Johnston St Fiesta is on again today, so feel free to go check it out. There was much more food but we had just had lunch so didn't have much room.

Casa Iberica 
25 Johnston St
Fitzroy
9419 4420

Monday, November 8, 2010

Loving Hut, Richmond- Day 8

Loving Hut opened on Sat in Richmond. Yes it is part of the bigger loving hut chain of vegan restaurants around the world and affiliated with the supreme master.

We rushed in for lunch on Sunday. They had about 5 bain-marie style take away dishes to choose from for a cheap $7 but we chose to order off the menu. The menu consisted of about a dozen photos with some mysterious sounding names. The staff said that they will be adding more to the menu soon and that the current menu is temporarily. Which explained why the dumplings that Shauna tasted weren't available when we went. We chose 'five heaven tofu' dish ($12), pine nut fried rice ($12) and 'taro delight' ($10).

The tofu was delicious, although Toby commented that the sauce was a little gluggy in parts.




Next up we ordered the pine nut fried rice. We used to love a version of this that we got at a restaurant in Hong Kong, so hoped it was the same. It was quite peppery which was fine with us since we love white pepper but I know a couple of people who hate it and wouldn't have been able to eat it.




We also got the 'taro delight' which I imagined to be just deep fried battered taro. Unfortunately it was kind of mock fishy with seaweed in it. Mock fish/seafood is one mock that I can't stand. So Toby ended up eating this by himself but he enjoyed it.




Overall the food was fine and the staff were really friendly. Although, I get the impression that they are still finding their feet and perfecting everything.  I really think that they could benefit with some descriptions of the dishes to avoid disappointment. Toby and I also thought the meals were a tad on the pricey side for the serving sizes. I kind of felt bad for them, I heard them apologising to other customers and explaining that they only just opened. I look forward to going back in a few weeks or so to see how it's going then.


Loving Hut
10/242 Victoria St
Richmond
9427 8916
Tuesday-Sunday
11.3am0-9pm.


While in the neighborhood you should check out Minh Phat, massive Asian supermarket at 178 Victoria St:


Sunday, July 11, 2010

Disco Beans Cafe and Art Space

My vegan friend from New Zealand is in town with his Swiss partner and his English/French speaking three-year-old daughter. A good excuse to eat out.

So K and I took them to Disco Beans Cafe and Art Space last night. The brightly coloured Japanese cafe has only been open for a week.
It has a large communal table and some small tables. From what I remember, it was a sock shop and performance/gallery space.

The walls are covered with a colourful collage of Japanese and Chinese magazines


Be nice! We are new!

They do "home style Japanese food". You can pick from "Dream Bean Curry" (black bean pumpkin curry), Udon noodles, noodle soup, "Belly Plate", raw vegan strawberry frozen cheese cake (called "Strawberry Fields Forever"!!!) and a mochi sorta thing with aduki bean paste. You can choose the vegan or fishy version for most of their dishes. K was super excited that they could make most things gluten free.


The vegan rice noodle soup (gluten-free) is THE BOMB. I like the combination of black sesame, enoki mushroom, snap peas and seaweed. There are also some sliced tofu sheets, similar to the Inari sushi type, in the noodles. I couldn't pinpoint what is in the Shoyu style broth but it is very tasty and authentic.


The "Belly Plate" consisted of a mixture of rice, millet and quinoa, pan fried tofu with a miso-ish plum sauce, marinated mushrooms and a fresh salad with pickled cabbage.

The non-gluten-free version has a different sauce.

We all wanted to try the "Strawberry Fields Forever" but it was sold out. We decided to save room for CocoLoco and give the other desserts a miss.

Check out their Facebook page and threethousand's review.

Disco Beans
238 High St, Northcote
Open Wed-Sun noon-3pm and 5.30-9.30pm

On my walkman:
Yes I'm a Witch - Yoko Ono VS Cat Power, Jason Pierce, Le Tigre...etc


Sunday, June 6, 2010

Vietnamese style noodle soup from 1000 vegan recipes

As promised here is the recipe from 1000 vegan recipes, we made quite a few adjustments to make it gluten free:

1 tablespoon canola oil
1 onion, chopped
1 serrano or hot green chilli, seeded and chopped (we used dried chilli flakes)
1 tablespoon of ginger, chopped
3 tablespoons soy sauce (we used tamari)
2 whole star anise (I couldn't find star anise at the supermarket so left it out)
5 cups of vegetable stock
2 tablespoons of barley miso paste (we used white miso paste without barley so it was g/f)
2 tablespoons hoisin sauce
1 tablespoon fresh lime
1/2 cup hot water
4 ounces (113 grams) dried rice noodles
6 ounces (170 grams) dried seitan (we used smoked tofu but like Batgirl's idea of using fried tofu)
1/2 cup fresh bean sprouts (we left this out since apparently you used eat bean sprouts when taking traditional Chinese medicine)
3 green onions chopped for garnish
1/4 cup chopped coriander for garnish

1. In a large soup pot, heat oil over medium heat. Add onion, cover and cook until softened, 5 minutes. Add the chilli and ginger and cook unitl fragrant. Stir in the soy sauce, anise and broth. Simmer, uncovered for 45 minutes to allow flavours to blend. Strain the soup and return it to the pot discarding the solids. (Toby skipped the straining stage)
2. In a small bowl combine miso, hoisin, lime juice and water and add to the soup, stir in the noodles and the seitan. Cook until the noodles are soft about 10 minutes.
3. Ladle the soup into 4 bowls and garnish with bean sprouts, green onions and cilantro.

Enjoy!

Monday, May 31, 2010

1000 vegan recipes

After many glowing reviews from Tahn and the cooking from 1,000 vegan recipes blog. I decided that despite my cookbook bookshelf overflowing with cookbooks I had to add one more.

The first recipe that Toby made was the Vietnamese noodle soup. Batgirl described it as pho and so Toby was disappointed that it was isn't pho like at all. Yes it isn't authentic, but I adored this dish in it's own right, and I normally get bored with soups. This dish was absolutely punching with flavour, with miso paste, hoisin, lime and lots more, perhaps because it takes a lengthy 45 minutes to simmer. We used smoked tofu instead of seitan which I think works well. I do agree with batgirl that this recipe alone makes the price of the cookbook worthwhile. This really is a perfect winter meal.
Next up, we made tofu jerky with the help of Lidia who has a dehydrator, I think we left it too long in the dehydrator like 3 hours too long. The flavours were nice but the texture was just weird and rubbery. But then I've never been a jerky fan. Toby, however, couldn't stop snacking on it.

Toby made country fried tofu with golden gravy, which he served with polenta. We have big issues with frying tofu in any batter because our nonstick frypan has lost its coating and so everything sticks to it and it just isn't the same in a wok. So by the time had tofu finished frying he decided to skip blending the gravy which left the chickpeas intact as you can see in this photo. This didn't really work, so I quickly blended it. This was delicious and filling. Toby liked the dish despite the wok disaster.
Now on to the failed dish- the pomegranate infused lentil and chickpea stew. In fairness, perhaps the pomegranate syrup that we purchased was actually just juice. The bottle said syrup but later when I looked at the ingredients I noticed it just said pomegranates. This dish was so tart that it wasn't edible and we didn't know how to fix and so in the end had to throw it out. I hate waste, so such a shame. I would love to know if others have issues with this dish or with the so called syrup.

I will post one recipe from the cookbook, but you get to choose which one?