recipe – Vegans.UK

Spaghetti Bolognese

February 13, 2017 by Tofu Temptress 2 Comments

So, one of the easiest and most filling recipes I do is also one of the most flexible. I’ve written a basic recipe here, but you can experiment with different vegetables, or put in cooked lentils instead of soy mince, whatever you like. I hope it goes without saying that the level of seasoning and garlic are merely to my taste, so adjust those as you see fit too. This recipe feeds two hungry people, or more if you throw in a bit of bruschetta to start or something.

I find red onions more flavourful than white ones.

Ingredients

One small red onion

Soy mince is easy to get hold of in supermarkets.

3 cloves of garlic

One can of chopped tomatoes

1 cup soy mince

1 cup frozen mixed veg

Half a can of kidney beans

2 teaspoons oregano

2 teaspoons basil

Half a tablespoon of hot sauce

Tablespoon of ketchup

200g Spaghetti

Here’s how I do it:

Put a pan of water on to boil for the spaghetti and while that’s heating up, prepare your ingredients.

Chop your onion into half moons and mince the garlic. Pop them into a frying pan with a few splashes of water and heat them gently.

Once your water’s boiling, put in the spaghetti and cook for ten minutes or whatever the package instructions say.

Empty the can of tomatoes into the frying pan and add the mince and frozen veg. Give it a good stir.

Cooking the veg and mince only takes a few minutes.

While that’s bubbling away, drain and wash your kidney beans using a sieve or colander and add them to the pan after a few minutes.

Add your oregano, basil, hot sauce and ketchup and stir again, making sure everything’s mixed well.

Pop the cooked spaghetti into warmed bowls.

Simmer away until your spaghetti is cooked. Drain the spaghetti and make sure it’s dried off before adding to warmed bowls.

Your bolognaise should be cooked by now, so spoon it over the top of the spaghetti.

Serve with cracked pepper and maybe a grating of vegan cheese. Enjoy!

Melting Moments

October 27, 2015 by Tofu Temptress 3 Comments

This is, hands down, the most indulgent thing I make. I mean, the sugar content is pretty much off the scale. However, if you’re looking to have an incredibly rich, biscuit-y, crumbly, crunchy treat that oozes smooth sweet filling as you bite into it, this may just be the recipe for you. You don’t have to put chocolate butter icing in the middle though (as I have). This recipe works just as well with any flavour of butter icing, or if you prefer, a thick jam will do the job nicely. Happy baking!

Ingredients

Cream the marg with icing sugar to start

200g vegan margarine

125g icing sugar

155g plain, white flour

85g cornflour

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

For the filling:

100g vegan margarine

320g icing sugar

2 tablespoons cocoa

Some warm water, just in case

Here’s how I do it

Preheat your oven to 180 degrees or gas mark 4.

Cream the margarine and icing sugar together until they’re light and fluffy.

Sift in the flour, cornflour and baking powder and mix well. Now, as you’re mixing, it may begin to look a bit like crumbs, but that’s ok. It should eventually come together to form a dough, so keep going till it does. There’ll be a few crumby bits at the bottom of the bowl but not to worry.

Roll the dough into balls with your hands

Divide your dough evenly into 16 balls. I do this by roughly halving the dough in the bowl, then halving again so you have four blobs. Out of each of the blobs, make four balls by rolling the dough between your hands and placing on a baking tray that’s been sprayed with a bit of oil.

Once you’ve got your sixteen balls, gently flatten them off with a fork. Remember, the biscuits will spread and swell a bit while baking, so space them out with at least a couple of finger-widths between them.

Pop them in the oven to bake for 20 minutes.

Give them a minute or two out of the oven and then transfer them to a cooling rack.

Make the icing while the biscuits are cooling

(Start to make the icing and then they should be cool enough to sandwich together once you’ve done that.)

The amounts I’ve given should give you plenty of icing, so feel free to make a half to three quarters of the recipe if you don’t want to go mad.

Cream the margarine and sugar together and then gradually add icing sugar. Pop the cocoa in at this point to if you’re using it. The icing should slowly come together as your beating it, but if it really is too stiff after a while, add half a tablespoon of warm water at a time until you get the consistency you want.

Make sure your icing is the right consistency

Be warned, icing can get too runny very quickly, so if this should happen, just pop a bit more icing sugar in to firm it up again. Beat the icing until there are no lumps and it is stiff enough to sandwich the biscuits together.

Sort your biscuits into eight lots of two, trying to match similar sizes. With the best will in the world, they will not all be perfectly uniform in size, so just do your best.

Take the flatter one of each pair and put a generous dollop of icing (or jam, whatever you’re using) onto it, placing the other as a lid on top.

Repeat until you have eight melting moments.

Melt into the moment... — Melt into the moment…

Have a sit down as you’re going to have the mother of all sugar rushes…

Gingerbread

October 20, 2015 by Tofu Temptress Leave a Comment

An autumnal favourite, gingerbread is an easy, comforting treat to bake at this time of year and will make your kitchen smell fantastic. The best bit is that you probably have all the ingredients at home already.

This recipe is enough for TWO standard loaf tins, but you can do it in one 20cmX20cm cake tin if you like. If you’re feeling really indulgent you can cover your gingerbread with icing (when it’s cool!) and add some little bits of caramelised orange and lemon, but for this recipe, I’m just doing it straight up, as it were…

Ingredients

Vitalite is nice and soft and easy to cream

125g vegan marg such as Vitalite

100g caster sugar

350g golden syrup

75g applesauce

330g plain flour

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 1/2 teaspoons bicarbonate of soda

2 teaspoons ground ginger

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

250ml water

Here’s how I do it:

Line your tin (or tins) with greaseproof paper and preset your oven to 180 degrees (slightly lower for a fan assisted oven) or gas mark 4.

Cream the marg and sugar together in a bowl till they’re light and fluffy.

Heat the syrup in a pan gently until it’s runny, then add to the creamed mixture, mixing well.

Adding in the syrup to the creamed mixture

Once that’s incorporated, add your applesauce and mix again.

Sift the dry ingredients into a separate bowl

Sift the flour, salt, bicarb, ginger and cinnamon together into a separate bowl, then add them gradually to the mixture bit by bit alternating with adding the water. The resulting batter will be quite runny, but don’t worry, it’ll firm up nicely while baking.

The mixture is runny, but that's ok! — The mixture is runny, but that’s ok!

Pop the mixture into the tin (or divide it equally between loaf tins) and bake for 50 minutes. (Loafs should be ready 45-50 mins in, depending on your oven, while the cake tin may take up to an hour. Just keep an eye on things.) When you put a skewer in, it should come out dry. If it doesn’t, give it a few more minutes and try again.

When you take your gingerbread out of the oven, give it a good five minutes to reduce slightly before turning it out onto a cooling rack. Remove the paper, let it cool.

Let it cool completely if you're going to ice it — Let it cool completely if you’re going to ice it

(If you fancy doing a bit of decoration, go for it, but I prefer just to tuck straight in as it’s pretty sweet already.)

All that's missing is a cuppa — All that’s missing is a cuppa

Slice and serve!

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