VeganMoFo Day 18 ~ C-C-C-CSA week 43, 2012

Lots of C’s in this week’s CSA haul. Elstars, leek and salad greens rich with vitamin C, and carrots, corn salad and cilantro starting with it… No-one’s laughing, I know. ;)

• Carrots
• Cilantro
• Corn salad
• Leek
• Elstar apples
• Fennel

My fridge is pretty full with open tins, leftovers and even more vegetables, so here’s my plan to use up as much as possible.

Menuplan Friday October 26th  – Tuesday 30th

• Noodles with leftover takeaway garlic tofu from Soy with additional vegetables (carrot, leek, yellow pepper, borlotti beans) and mushrooms. [Friday]
• Pea soup (freezer stash), pasta salad with leftover avocado pesto and sun-dried tomatoes, Caesar salad (dressing from La Dolce Vegan! p.93), bread and dip. [Saturday – DEXTER DATE]
• Leek & potato soup with cilantro (La Dolce Vegan! p.109), tasty tempeh chili for NVV-forum La Dolce Vegan! cookbook challenge (p.163) and bread.
• Potato salad with avocado pesto, balsamic vinegar, onion and sun-dried tomatoes, coconut-carrot soup with cilantro (La Dolce Vegan! p.112 half recipe).
• Fennel salad with tomato, basil and olives, roasted sweet dumpling pumpkins stuffed with Gyro seitan from my new Terry Hope Romero cookbook Vegan Eats World (p.54 & 253), leftover dill sauce.

Last night I went to the Terry Hope Romero cooking demo, Q&A and book presentation of Vegan Eats World (more about that soon). We got to taste the gyro seitan with creamy cashew sauce and a banana-chocolate ‘cheesecake’. Both were awesome so I bought the book and put the seitan on the menu right away! It’s my first time making seitan, so fingers crossed…

Planning Ahead (organic CSA vegetables week 39, 2012)

I’ve got a busy week coming up with the start of VeganMoFo on October 1st. I haven’t been able to blog much lately and now I’m supposed to post daily and share the wonders of eating without animal products for a whole Vegan Month of Food! But more about that later.

As usual I’ve planned my meals for the next few days so that I won’t have to think about that any more, nor run to the shops at the very last minute. Every little bit helps in finding time and peace to participate in the blogfest!

Now here’s our veggie haul.

• Red Batavia lettuce
• Leek
• Santana apples (hypo-allergenic)
• Rucola (rocket)
• Corn cob
• Patisson pumpkin
• Fennel

Other stuff in/around my fridge: carrots, chickpeas, roasted paprika, cauliflower, coconut milk, pumpkin & butternut squash, zucchini, cabbage, mushrooms, cilantro and some leftovers.

So here’s the menu.

Menu plan 28 September – 3 October

• Lettuce soup, leftovers lentil-beetroot salad and Greek chickpea salad, bakeoff bread [Friday]
  
  
• Seitan stroganoff, minty bulgar with leek (A vegan taste of Greece p.76) or Oven-braised potatoes and leek (p.67) [Saturday]
  
• Dal Tarka with cauliflower (possibly peas) but without sweet potato, roasted butternut squash with coriander seeds (Veganomicon p.112), basmati rice and (prefab) papadums. Maybe some mint dip [Sunday]
  
  
• Patisson soup and casserole with potato mash, leftover sautéed cabbage & roasted pepper, blue ‘sheese’ and a nutty crumble on top [Monday]
  
  
• Something improvised from the pantry, leftovers, takeaway – what ever’s easy [Tuesday]
• Stuffed courgette, fennel-avocado salad (A vegan taste of Greece p.89), bakeoff bread [Wednesday]
• Sometime during the week I also hope to make some roasted pepper houmous.

You’re welcome at our table if you see anything you like! :)

I edited last week’s menu with photos of my meals.

World Vegan Day Bento (#161)

Here’s the bento I had on November 1st to celebrate World Vegan Day. Apologies for the bad pic: quinoa seems to be camera shy.. ;)

Left tier
Quinoa salad with tomatoes, cucumber, spring onion, corn, bell pepper and more on a bed of lettuce. Cute red paper container with orange-basil tempeh as salad topping.

Right tier
Radish, fig, half a kiwi fruit, another kawaii container from Japan (sakura print) containg nutmix for salad (sunflower seeds, pepitas, pinenuts and pecans), apple bunny (usagi ringo) and cinnamon almonds.

The almonds had sweated and gave my apple a sweet spicy taste — nom!

Lots of proteins in quinoa, tempeh and nuts! :)

Now where did I get those nice new paper foil containers? My friend MaaikeB and her family went shopping for me in Japan! Here’s a picture of the goodies they brought back. I’m one happy grrl!

Find more bentos at Shannon’s What’s for Lunch Wednesday  (week 75).

This food-related post is also submitted to Beth Fish’s Weekend Cooking!

Fall Greens (CSA vegetables weeks 43 and 44, 2011)

I’ve got a lot of vegetables left over in my fridge, so it’s time for some serious menu planning!

Amelishof CSA vegetables week 43

Last week’s veggies:

• red Batavian lettuce
• cilantro
• pointed paprika
• (Batavian) endive
• leek
• celery

Amelishof CSA vegetables week 44

This week’s greens:

• pumpkin
• lollo bionda lettuce
• Elstar apples
• parsley
• kohlrabi
• green beans

Menu plan Wednesday November 2nd – Tuesday 8th

You’ll even find vegetables on the menu from my CSA loot further back!

• Wednesday: eating out with birthday boy @variomatic in Hotel de Goudfazant (Amsterdam)
• Thursday (Mr Gnoe’s piano night): leek-fennel soup (veganized version of Vega Gerechten p.134) & veggie dog with greens
• Friday: spicy sweet potato soup, chili con ‘carne’ tacos and fennel-orange salad with black olives (Vega Gerechten p.150 & 179)
• Saturday: Indonesian dinner! Osèng-osèng kohlrabi, sambal goreng tofu & green beans with white rice (Vegetarisch Indonesisch Kookboek p.50 & 94)
• Sunday (Dexter-5 Night with Elsje): garlic-Jerusalem artichoke soup, garlic or rosemary bread from Vlaams Broodhuys, 2 types of hummus (red beet & pumpkin), cooking pears and red beet salad with walnuts and balsamico (Vega Gerechten p.81, 61 & 188)
• Monday: Ethiopian lentil dish (cutting from Leven, lente 2011) with ‘faux sour creme‘ (La Dolce Vegan!), pita bread and kohlrabi salad (Groentegerechten p.32) OR Indonesian leftovers with nasi goreng
• Tuesday: eating @ mother-in-law’s

Fall Fruit First for VeganMoFo

AAARGH. I had totally missed that October was going to be VeganMoFo: the Vegan Month of Food, a month-long blogging event revolving around animal-free eating!

Well, maybe it’s better I’m not officially participating since I would never be able to post daily, but I can still join in the fun ;)

Starting off with a short one: a picture of my current fall fruit loot. It’s just apples and pears, but what a variety!

This weekend I’ll be cooking St. Remy pears into some lovely dessert and make apple sauce of the Bramley Seedling cooking apples. I wish I had an excuse to bake apple pie though! ;P

Part of the apple sauce will probably end up in some vegan baking anyway, as it is often used as egg-replacer.

All of the fruit is organic and came from my two local CSA distributors. The eating pears are Conference and Doyenne de Comice (which I like best). Accompanied by star apples, Ingrid Marie apples and two quince. I’m looking for recipes for the latter, because I have never eaten this fruit before and have no idea what to do with it! Your recommendations will be HIGHLY appreciated :)

Thanks to Eating with the Rabbits for reminding me of VeganMoFo.

The Last (CSA vegetables week 51, 2010)

Our third season of CSA has come to a closing. Now we’ll need to decide on which veggies to buy all by ourselves again… Not an easy task! #lazybums

• purslane
• leek
• thyme
• red cabbage
• choggia beets
• apples
• variety of onions: shallot, red and white

When I got beets last time I made Nigel Slater’s Beetroot Seeds Cake and it was goooood!

Clicking on the picture will bring you to Flickr, where I’ve put up the link to the on-line recipe and some adaptations I made.

Yesterday was another Meatless Monday (Plantaardig Maandag) and supposed to be December’s #twitterfoodparty about squash, so I made a vegan Indian curry with basmati rice and (prefab) mango chutney with last week’s hokkaido pumpkin. The picture didn’t turn out too great but it tasted better than it looks. ;) Anyway, the food party got postponed due to too many ‘twabsentees‘…! If you want to join in, just make something with squash on January 10th, use the hashtag and tweet a picture!

So, no more CSA (b)log posts until the first week of May 2011. Some of you might think that a good thing… But hopefully not all???

The End is Nigh

We’re halfway December and the end of our CSA season is nearing. Next week’s bag will be The Last!

But you haven’t even had a chance to enjoy any of this month’s organic vegetables… So, here are my veggies of weeks 48, 49 and (freshly picked up today) 50.

Amelishof organic vegetables week 48, 2010

• leek
• kale
• capsicum
• corn salad
• red beet (waiting for me to make Nigel Slater’s red beet cake…)
• pumpkin

Amelishof organic vegetables week 49, 2010

• brussels sprouts (on the stalk, just for fun!)
• parsnip
• corn lettuce
• kohlrabi
• onions (red & white)
• Elstar apples

Amelishof organic vegetables week 50, 2010

WOW, what a mega bag of vegetables we got today! Remember the Invasion of the Broad-Leaved Endive Heads? This time there were even more! It makes a nice green background for the rest of the veggies ;) And Ringo totally went for it… Crazy cat :)

• kale
• endive
• carrots (not washed, so they’ll keep longer)
• root parsley (on the left of my pile of carrots, hiding behind the…)
• kabocha pumpkin!
• celeriac
• cooking pears
• Jerusalem artichoke

I’m not planning our menus and we’ve been eating out, visiting relatives et cetera so next to this HUGE new batch we still have some veggies of the previous weeks to use up: beetroot — but like I said; I’ve got great plans for that ;) — parsnip, kohlrabi, leek and 1 small pie pumpkin. Maybe I would be wise start planning again ;)

Say, Elsje: if you see anything you’d like to use for our 24 mini-marathon dinner next Friday, just give a shout!

Invasion of the Endive Heads

This week’s organic vegetable packet did not bring us one, not two, but THREE heads of endive!

Wow. I guess it’s obvious what we’ll be eating this week… ;)

• lollo rossa lettuce
• pumpkins
• endive
• topinamburs
• fennel
• Elstar apples

I considered changing plans and serve yesterday’s guests potato mash with endive for dinner instead of the planned hutspot but decided against it: the idea of cooking the dish I hated so much as a child was way more exciting! Up until this week I have never, ever made it myself. So it felt like a real challenge to try this new recipe.

I won’t keep you in suspense any longer: I liked it! We caramelized some onions and toasted some pecan nuts for topping, and had vegetarian ‘meatballs’ and fennel-tomato salad as side dishes. (*) There’s just one BUT.. If I’m completely honest I wouldn’t really call this dish hotchpotch: the carrot and potatoes aren’t mashed together — it’s just a mix of cut up parsnip, potatoes and carrot, like my oven-roasted root vegetable dish with honey. I even used honey instead of the required maple syrup since my cupboard lacked the latter. So I’ll need to re-challenge myself another time ;)

Do you have a dish you hated when you were young and still won’t eat today?

(*) Side note for Dutch readers wanting to make the hutspot recipe: it took the vegetables 45 minutes at 200 °C (gas oven: 5) instead of 30 to get done.

De snoepzak van de week

Ook in week 34 kregen we weer een fijne tas van De Aardvlo!

Maïs behoort tot mijn favoriete groenten — ik zou wel iedere dag een maïskolf lusten maar dat is niet zo goed voor me ;) En ook courgette staat hoog in de top 10; wisten jullie dat ik die groente pas heeeeeeel laat heb ontdekt, in 1990 of zo?!

Biologische prei smaakt geweldig, veel beter dan die van de Appie (oooooh daar komt weer een preek van mijn broer ;) en die fris en fruitige zomerappeltjes komen ook als geroepen!

Tel daarbij de spekbonen en romainesla op en je weet: dit is een superweek! :))

A wolf in sheep’s clothes bento (#52)

Oops, it took me a whole week to post about bento #52! It came to work on Wednesday May 20th — and it’s been my last bento up until today. I was too busy! And I don’t have to go to the office for a while now, so bento’s will be sparse in the next few weeks.

In the picture my lunch looks quite cute — but don’t be fooled! The hint is a packet of Smint…

The red stuff you see in the left hand tier is Mediterranean bean paste, which erm.. had a bit too much garlic in it :-o I don’t like tasting garlic all day, so I came prepared.

Here’s another one of Gnoe’s tips: natural & healthy remedies against garlic smell (and taste) are drinking milk, eating an apple and — last but certainly not least — chewing on a bunch of parsley. That’s after you’ve eaten garlic, not before ;) In my experience these solutions work best if you don’t apply them immediately, but after you’ve brushed your teeth without result.

Well, my apple is not in the picture but it did come along. And in the photo you can also see some fresh parsley (not enough though, LOL) — and the before mentioned package sugar free Smint for emergencies ;)

What else could be found in bento #52?

• red leaf salad (hiding)
• 3 conchiglioni (pasta seashells) with herbs, slightly greased with olive oil so they wouldn’t stick together
• black olives
• slices of orange sweet bite
• capers, small & large
• yellow cherry tomatoes
• parsley (like I said)
• yogurt coated apricot
• roasted sunflower seeds as topping for:
• leek salad (leeks marinated in a basil-garlic dressing)
• Mediterranean bean paste made of white beans, tomato, red bell pepper (paprika), onion, olive oil and oven-roasted garlic (to eat with the pasta)
• grated cheese for the conchiglioni
• pistachios and cashews
• cranberries

Both the leek salad and the bean paste were easy to make. But… the bean spread was best on the day it was prepared. Next day it had gotten a bit ‘watery’ and needed the salty & sour addition of capers and olives.

So, bento #52 was like a wolf in sheep’s clothes: looking cute, but with a sharp bite! Well, I got a lot of work done that day with few colleagues disturbing me ;) Which is good — is it? It was really my day off… :\