Flicking the Vs: October 2017

Stray food round up: Corn muffins, cime de rapa, and billionaire's shortbread

It's time for one of those posts where I just round up a load of food that's been taking up space on my phone or my camera, because ...

When the new term started last month, I had a plan to dream up loads of vegan, student-friendly recipes, for any vegans going to university for the first time, or anyone that's turned vegan since starting their degree. (FWIW, there are at least two other vegans in my year on my course, which pleases me no end.)

Only, that didn't happen. Instead of spending time in my kitchen creating simple recipes, I was in the library, or the lab, trying to shove facts into my uncooperative brain. The best food I could manage to make in those first few weeks was sandwiches.

Given that lunch is the highlight of most of my days, I wanted to make sure I had a decent sandwich to look forward to when I ran out of the lecture hall. But after too many years of hummus and roasted vegetables, or avocado and salad, I couldn't say I was exactly looking forward to weeks of sandwiches.

After a while, I found myself googling 'vegan sandwich fillings'. Then I thought, if I'm googling this, there may be other vegans with bread-based dilemmas? So, fellow vegan and vegetarian travellers, may I present a quick rundown of the sandwiches that have got me through the first few weeks of my new school year.

Nut cheese and beetroot

Doesn't the colour of that golden beetroot look gorgeous? Open up your lunchbox, and there's a little bit of sunshine in there for you. And some nut cheese. Because everything is better with nut cheese, even a half-hour lunch break before a two-hour lecture on diarrhoea. Yep, really.

Corn fritters and salsa

Kari at Bite-sized Thoughts, among others, has awakened me to the growing numbers of readymade vegan sandwiches available of late, and their weird tendency to have some sort of fritter as a filling. I didn't want to be left out of this strange trend, so I made myself some corn fritters. If you make them in a toasted sandwich maker, they're the perfect size for your sanger. Also, add a bit of rice flour to the batter for extra crispness.

Beetroot, apple, celery

Beetroot can do no wrong in my eyes when it comes to sitting in bread. Beetroot, celery, apple, bit of yoghurt, and enough walnuts to keep a scurry of squirrels sated all winter (I did have to Google the collective noun for squirrels there. Every day really is a school day, thanks to vegan sandwich fillings.) Apart from the fact this sarnie filling gave me a chance to learn about squirrels, it's also purple, and who doesn't relish the opportunity to eat more purple?

Coronation tofu

I say coronation tofu, but it could be the 'nada egg' filling recipe from Crazy, Sexy Kitchen, which has been a staple in my sandwich rotation for many years, and I still love it. If you haven't made it yet yourself, go down the library, get yourself a copy, then be prepare to find a sandwich filling you like more than some of your relatives.

Sausage and onion chutney

I reckon each and every vegan has their favourite brand of sausages, and mine's Linda McCartney: not only are they rich and juicy to the taste, there's no unnecessary plastic packaging - hooray! I grant you, they look weirdly anaemic, but don't blame Linda for the sins of your humble cook. The onion chutney here is provided by Mr Flicking the Vs' mum. Not sure if she's got a supermarket distribution deal yet, so you'll find an alternative chutney til her plans for world pickle domination come to fruition.

Tofu salad

I've mentioned my burgeoning love of Tofoo before, and it's given me no reason to doubt my affections since then. Get your bit of oh-so-thinly sliced smoked Tofoo, dab it in a bit of potato starch, and fry into wonderous crispiness. Serve with your salad of choice, if you manage to stop yourself eating it all out of the pan.

Tofu slaw

And if you've managed not to eat all that crispy tofu, then you might as well go buy a lottery ticket because you're already a winner. I swapped out the salad for homemade coleslaw, which I've previously filed away in my head as 'things that never turn out as good as the shop-bought versions'. Having upped my coleslaw game by making a shedload of it repeatedly, I've now refiled it under 'things that should be given away for free on the NHS, because they're that good for your mental health'.

sandwich

Vegan sandwich fillings: Plant-based delights to put between your bread

When the new term started last month, I had a plan to dream up loads of vegan, student-friendly recipes, for any vegans going to university ...

Our kitchen has been gradually falling apart for years. The hob only has three rings working instead of four, the extractor hasn't worked for as long as we've been in the flat, and there's been a weird leak that's been around so long it's almost old enough to vote. All the kitchen cupboards are victims of my various repairs over the years, and they're more nails and glue than wood now.

So, when I got the news recently that the kitchen is going to be updated, it was pretty well received around these parts. It'll be nice to have a kitchen where everything works and doesn't look sketchy, grey and peeling. But a kitchen renovation does have its downsides: it means 1) no usable kitchen -- none, not even slightly -- for three whole weeks and 2) as part of the renovations, we have to clear everything out of the kitchen -- every last plate and cup, packet of rice, biscuit cutter, knife and fork -- and find it a temporary new home somewhere else in our flat.

Before the repairs officially start, I've been trying to thin down our kitchen stuff, as anything that's left has to come out of the kitchen and live in our living room while the repairs are done. As I've been cleaning everything out, I've been discovering all those weird packets of stuff, exotic ingredients, and other gubbins - here are a few things that I've been cooking with all that gubbins.

I've had a dried bergamot in my a jar for a while (I have a horrible feeling it's been there since 2016), so Project Less Kitchen Crap claimed its first victim. The dried bergamot got run through the spice grinder and then turned into bergamot and ginger biscuits. They were actually superb (yes, I'm always surprised when things turn out good.)

Inspired by the success of the biscuits, I thought I'd tackle the box of rice cereal and the bag of marshmallows left in the cupboard to make... rice cereal marshmallow bars! Turns out three ingredients can actually make something really good with only minor effort.

I'd never made vegan marshmallow bars before, because I think the last time I tried to find a recipe, they all involved ingredients that I didn't have, like date syrup or coconut oil, or pieces of moonrock or something. So I mentally filed the recipes on the 'not today, Joey' folder, never to be looked at again.

Then, thanks to the impending kitchen chaos and a forlorn box of cereal, I decided to revisit the idea. Turns out they're not hard to make and they don't need any moonrock at all.

I just melted 20g of vegan margarine and 50g of vegan marshmallows over a low heat, then added 25g of puffed rice, stirred it thoroughly, popped into cupcake moulds and allowed it to set. Once it was cold, I shoved my face in it.

I'm still working through my never-ending supply of coconut flour. It seems to have found the secret of eternal life, as no matter how much I use it, it never seems to diminish. Still, I'm making my way through it, having discovered Vegan Richa's recipe for coconut flour brownies to be very good indeed.

In the spirit of clearing out the cupboards, I threw in the rest of the vegan marshmallows, and some raisins for good measure. Strangely, the amount of coconut flour hasn't changed at all, so you can expect to see these being made again. And again.

I'll be honest, coconut flour brownies are not my favourite brownies. They're not even my second favourite. They're probably not even in the top ten. But if you have two bags of coconut flour that have inexplicably turned up in your kitchen to use up, I'm not sure there are much better ways to use them up.

Flour I'm more fond of is bread flour. I never thought of myself as someone that can bake bread (though I'm happy to dapple every now and again), I've recently started baking more of my own to cut plastic consumption. The bread I generally buy comes in plastic, but bread flour comes in recyclable paper, which I can live with. Plus it actually tastes better (no, honestly -- even if you're as cack-handed in the kitchen as me!) than the shop-bought stuff.

I've finally managed to work out a recipe that works, so I can make a loaf in about 15-20 minutes -- well, a couple of hours if you factor in all the proving and cooking time, but there's only 15 minutes of actual hard graft.

I used up the last of my bread flour with a heavy heart -- having got used to making my own bread, I'm going to have live without an oven for three weeks. Anyone know a good recipe for something you can make without a kitchen?

What I've been cooking as I say goodbye to my kitchen

Our kitchen has been gradually falling apart for years. The hob only has three rings working instead of four, the extractor hasn't work...

borough market

Borough Market for vegans

I last published a post about Borough Market 's vegan options a few years ago, and it's been really popular ever since. Rather than ...

When someone's tired of London, they're tired of life (well, that's what Samuel Johnson reckoned anyway, and he was a guy that knew a thing or two). One rainy day a few weeks ago, I thought I had finally become tired of London.

While it poured down outside, I set about looking for something - ideally something indoors - that could while a way few hours. I checked out the usual listings for an event or exhibition, but nope, nothing was calling my name.

The best I could find was a small exhibition of Canadian photography at the British Library. After having the pleasure of meeting Canada for the first time earlier this year, I thought we should get better acquainted.

I realised when I stepped through the door of the British Library that this was my first visit. Nearly 15 years in the capital, and I'd never found my way here before. It took me about five minutes to realise this was a bit of a dim move on my behalf - it's amazing.

I mean, check out the view for a start - look at all those books!

It's a huge building set up for people to read and work, and there's no shortage of exhibitions (both free and paid) to spend time on. I came in looking to view a few photos, and left having seen three exhibitions: Canada Through the Lens, Gay UK: Love, Law and Liberty, and Treasures of the British Library (everything from Angela Carter to the Magna Carta is in there - how cool is that?).

I had a quick nosy around the cafes, but couldn't find much in the way of vegan fodder except Ten Acre and Eat Real crisps. Luckily, having read The Vegan Word, I knew there was a cheese shop selling vegan cheese spitting distance from the library.

Having picked up a couple of Cheezelo's vegan cheeses - one with dill and one with peppercorns, both delicious - I needed to find myself some lunch.

Keeping with the literary theme, I headed down to the London Review Bookshop's Cake Shop. I love the London Review of Books but I'd never been to its physical book store, despite rumours that the attached cafe has vegan cake.

After browsing around the shelves and acquiring a book on neuroscience and one on a legendary talking mongoose, I sat down to feed and read.

There, I found this little beauty of a vegan dish on the menu:

It's rye bread with tempeh, herby celeriac remoulade, and sweetcorn, with a rice, aduki bean, and apricot salad on the side, and a tarragon puree. It was a creative meal, full of flavours I don't get to eat often enough (tarragon! tempeh! apricots!) It made a fine accompaniment to my reading, especially by a big mug of lapsang souchong tea. The soy milk came on the side and there was extra hot water to refresh the leaves - now that's a cafe that treats its tea right.

I wouldn't have said no to a vegan cake to keep that tea company, but alas it was not to be. While the LRB Cake Shop Twitter feed shows there's vegan cake with regularity, there was no sweet treats to be had when I stopped by. I guess that's another place I'll have to return to then.

That's London for you - just when you think you're tired of it, there's always more to see -- and there's always more to eat.