Newish Aussie Veg bloggers

I've noticed a couple of newish Melbourne veg bloggers that I think are worth mentioning. First up a friend of ours has started a new vegan blog here, he adds to one of the few Aussie male veg bloggers.

And secondly a 8yr old vegetarian food blogger called Orla, talks about eating out and her life in general here.

If you know of any Aussie veg bloggers that have updated in the last month and who generally blog about food or any gluten free veg bloggers from anywhere then please let me know so i can add them to the list on the side.

Hotluck and awesome nature of blogging

Steph has nicely summarised the hotluck nicely here, so has Tahn but I thought I would talk about what we made.

Toby made two types of sushi, one was the avocado and tempeh sushi from Tempting Tempeh and the other was cream cheese and cucumber sushi inspired by cucumber sandwiches as shown below. We discovered however that rolling sushi is actually harder than it looks. It was his first time and neither of us were sure if he was doing it right, so we sadly had to watch a few utube videos. I preferred the cream cheese cucumber sushi.

I made my friend Dan's amazing chickpea pate recipe, I normally put cajun spices around the edges but at the last minute realised that we didn't have any so settled on dry parsley which didn't quite do it justice.


I also made the cheesecake truffle recipe that Tahn kindly posted here, these were so easy and delicious and I will certainly be making them again, I've reposted the recipe just in case something happens to her blog and I've left without the recipe:

Chocolate-Macadamia Cheezcake Truffles from 1000 Vegan Recipes by Robin Robertson


2C vegan semisweet chocolate chips (I used 2 blocks of lindt dark chocolate)
1 container vegan cream cheese
2C confectioners' sugar
2T pure vanilla extract (I used only 1 since our vanilla extract sucks)
1C ground macadamia nuts (I used ground cashews)

Melt the chocolate chips.
In a food processor, combine cream cheese, sugar and vanilla and process until well mixed. Add the melted chocolate and blend until well mixed. Transfer the mixture to a bowl and refrigerate until chilled, at least 2 hours.
Roll the chilled mixture into 1-inch balls and place them on an ungreased baking sheet.
Roll the balls in the nuts, turning to coat. Transfer truffles to a serving platter, refrigerate for 30 minutes and serve. Cover and refrigerate any leftovers.

And lastly I made raspberry lemonade:
I've been obsessed with old fashioned American style lemonade since I made the Lebanese lemonade from wheres the beef months ago and while I was in London I fell in love with a bottled raspberry lemonade which I have since discovered that they now sell in Coles. I simply altered the Lebanese lemonade recipe:

Raspberry lemonade

5 1/3 cups water
1 cup castor sugar
1 1/3 cups freshly squeezed lemon juice (around 7-8 smallish lemons or a bag of lemons)
1/2 cup of frozen raspberries

Stir together the water, sugar and half dozen raspberries in a saucepan over low-medium heat, until the sugar is dissolved.

Transfer the sugar syrup to a serving jug using a mesh strainer and a spoon to squeeze the raspberry juice out and keep the raspberries out. Stir in the lemon juice. Chill in fridge. I then added some frozen raspberries to act in place of ice since I was taking it to the park.

I think I might try the lavender lemonade from here next. Lemonade is just so refreshing!


It was a great potluck, with so much great food and great to have some new friendly potluckers present who will hopefully become regulars. Danni made the oreo truffles which were a big hit and reminded me how awesome blogging can be, recipes are a bit like fashion, and can become circular in nature but with a much shorter circle. The oreo truffles were a huge blogged about recipe a little while ago, that I was influenced by and then SJ posted the recipe and the circle started again with Danni and Vicki and others making them and no doubt it will do the rounds again in the near future because it is an easy and yummy recipe. It's great how influential blogging can be and just when you start to forget about a recipe, it does the rounds again and you think ok yeh I forgot about that, I should make them again. By the way there is also an awesome peanut butter version, where you substitute peanut butter for cream cheese that are equally yummy that I blogged about here. And there is also a gingersnap version which I haven't tried but look good.

Introducing a new blogger here....

I was talking to Mr T about how I can't really blog this month because I really need to concentrate on my thesis and asked if he would be a guest blogger for a month and he agreed.

If things go well, I might make him a permanent co-blogger. So we could become a blogging couple like Cindy and Michael at Wheres the beef?

Although I would need to look at changing the title of my blog, something I've been thinking about for a while anyway. I just can't think of any good foodie titles yet.

Our bikes together

Hit me with your vegan travel tips

So Mr T and I will have a smallish holiday in Nov-Dec in Hong Kong, London, ATP (Minehead), Brighton (for only a day or two) and Berlin.

We still haven't decided if we will go to Manchester.

If you have any must eats or other tips like cool second hand shops/markets/handmade stuff please share.

Hong Kong is the only place that we are actually familar with.

Also, if you know of any bloggers based in those areas please send me links, I haven't actually come across many London food blogs but I'm sure they exist. I'm hoping to meet up with a couple of veg*n bloggers from those areas too.

So hit me with you tips..............

Want to read all of the Melb veg blogs in one place?

Steph and D have put together a Planet vgml with a collection of melb veg blogs in one place. It is already starting to take shape and look great.

Go check it out here.

To have your blog added just contact D or Steph on the site link above.

Questions

I have have 33 Aussie vegetarian and vegan blogs now listed on the side.

But am I missing any?

Also, where have all the vegan dark choc chips gone?