Starting 2013 Afresh

I did some extra cleaning for the turn of the year, but that’s not what this post is about.

Maybe you noticed I haven’t been writing much lately; I even stopped (b)logging my weekly vegetable haul. Furthermore, I failed to make photos since December. O_o I guess I fell into some sort of winter slump.

CSA season ended the week before Christmas but there are still many greens left in the fridge… Not that fresh any more. :\ So now that the new year has begun I’m resolved to take up menu planning again — and actually started a few days ago. The pantry and refrigerator need to be emptied of 2012’s remains!

November 2012 CSA vegetables (week 45-48)

In stock

Veggies

• Pumpkin
• Parsnip
• Potatoes
• Carrots
• Leek
• Brussels sprouts
• Red cabbage
• Savoy cabbage
• Sunchokes
• Avocados
• 1/3 courgette
• Thyme

Leftovers

• Chilli-tomato sauce
• Stewed pears (Yogi kookschrift: Bord 1-5)

Other

• Pickled Seaweed
• Blue Sheese
• Tempeh
• Tofu
• Open package of silken tofu
• Open package of soy cream
• Open package of oat cream

Once we’ve depleted this surplus we’ll get organic Odin vegetables till our local veggies return in May.

Menu plan December 30th 2012 – Januari 2nd 2013

• Roasted parsnip & carrot salad with thyme (Ecofabulous 151), mashed potatoes with celeriac, Asian “lemon chicken” and stewed pears, red grapefruit for dessert [Sunday]
  
• Tomato soup (freezer stash) and pita bread with bean-corn-avocado salad with leftover chilli-tomato sauce, homemade oliebollen (Ecofabulous 167): traditional New Year’s fritters [Monday]
  
• Spicy red cabbage with tofu and gingerbread… (Ecofabulous 138), mashed potatoes and salad [Tuesday]
• Microwave teriyaki, yuzu scented winter vegetable tsukemono and Brussels sprouts with sesame [Wednesday]

Further planning will follow on Thursday. Now I’m hopping into the kitchen to cook dinner!

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Some More CSA (week 44, 2012)

So. VeganMoFo has ended and I didn’t meet my goal of 20+ posts… I got to 19! Not bad for a newbie, I think. Especially considering I’d planned to write some in advance but didn’t have the time. I also didn’t live up to the promises I made about travel-friendly recipes and how I survived my holiday in France as a vegan. Don’t worry, I still mean to make good on them! But now it’s back to normal with my weekly veggies and menu plan.

For some, CSA season has already ended. Not here though: our local organic vegetables will continue until the week before Christmas. Lucky me. :)

Here’s this week’s fall haul.

• Kale
• White cabbage
• Tomatoes
• Garlic
• Celeriac
• Radicchio

Menu plan Wednesday October 31st – Wednesday November 7th

Including veggies we didn’t manage to eat up yet (green cabbage, fennel, leek, sweet dumpling pumpkins) the following will arrive on our dinner table.

• Wednesday: Nigel Slater’s peppers & chickpeas with harissa (adapted) with Sarah Kramer’s cumin spice quick bread (freezer stash) and fennel-tomato-olive salad with fresh basil (Groentegerechten p.32).
• Thursday: stuffed mini pumpkins with rice and gyro style roasted lemon olive seitan with dill sauce (Vegan Eats World p.54, 253); radicchio Caesar salad.
• Saturday: dinner @ my aunt’s!
• Sunday: kale-celeriac-potato mash with leftover veggie dogs & chorizo tempeh (VEW promo card), cabbage salad with coriander-mayo dressing left over from Sarah’s spiced potato salad.
• Monday/Tuesday: Nigel’s spicy stuffend pittas and soup (probably freezer stash or pantry).
• Monday/Tuesday: leftovers or improvising.
• Wednesday (when @variomatic is joining us for dinner): Chloe Cascarelli’s pasta ‘Alfredo’ & salad.
• Possibles: apples from the oven with chocolate sauce (still have some left!) and Chloe’s cinnamon-espresso chocolate chip cookies..!

Bon appétit!

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…

VeganMoFo Day 13 ~ Coleslaw with Avocado Dressing Recipe for Meatless Monday

Once upon a time… I promised you a category on Graasland intended for Cabbage Recipes. It did appear, but fell into a slumber after I’d only shared three dishes with you. Well, now’s the right season to revive it!

Here’s a vegan version of coleslaw that I adapted from the Dutch vegetarian cookbook Gezond genieten: Groentegerechten by Jan & Ineke Stevens.

This salad is a kind of tsukemono (preserved vegetable) recipe, so it holds well and is perfect for travelling, like in this Goodbye Bento.

Coleslaw with Avocado Dressing

Ingredients
Serves 3-4.

• 350-400g white or pointed cabbage
• salt

• 1/2 avocado
• 1 green onion
• 2 sprigs cilantro
• 1/2 tbs lemon juice
• 2-3 tbs vegenaise, soygurt or faux sour cream
• salt ’n pepper

1. In advance

Cut its core from the cabbage, discard wilted outer leaves and thinly slice the veg. I don’t have a fancy machine to do this so I use my mandolin or a big, sharp knife and heavy wooden cutting board. Of course you can also buy pre-chopped cabbage…

Put the cabbage in a bowl, scatter some salt over it and weigh it down with a pan filled with water, supported by a saucer. Let it rest for a while until water comes out, preferably for a few hours.

2. Dressing

To make the dressing, scoop out the avocado, slice the green part of the spring onion in rings and put these aside. Chop the rest of the onion in small pieces and blend with avocado, cilantro, lemon juice, veganaise (or substitute). Add pepper to taste but refrain from adding salt until you’ve tasted the cabbage in step 3!

3. Assemble

Put the cabbage in a sieve, rinse and drain, pressing out excess water by hand. Now taste! Decide whether your dressing needs any more salt – if so, add it.

NOTE: if you do not intend to eat all of the coleslaw at once, just drain the cabbage you’re reserving and put it in a Tupperware box in the fridge. Only rinse and wring the veg when you’re ready to use it.

Place the cabbage on a nice plate or in a salad bowl, spoon the dressing in the middle and sprinkle the remaining onion rings on top.

As you can see I added some tomato and olives to the salad last time. Possibly it’s better without to let the smooth avocado dressing come to its full advantage.

Enjoy!

VeganMoFo Day 9 ~ What’s On The Menu?

I had to play truant for a couple of days, but now I’m back at VeganMoFo with my traditional CSA (b)log post and menu plan.

• Red, yellow & chioggia beets
• Silver beet
• Lollo Bionda lettuce
• Hokkaido pumpkin
• Doyenné pears
• Parsley

I still got last week’s runner beans and will be getting cauliflower and purple kale tomorrow from another local organic garden. So what’s up this week?

Menuplan Thursday October 11th  – Wednesday 17th

• Thursday: homemade tomato soup, leftover pasta with pesto, and leftover saag with chickpeas made into a pasta sauce with mushrooms, leek and baked onions.
• Friday: rice with chili (freezer stash), avocado, home-made salsa picante and steamed silver beet.
  Baking pumpkin crumb cake with pecan streusel from Veganomicon (p.255) for my friend Loes’ birthday. Will adapt the streusel to a nut mix as I don’t have enough pecans.
• Saturday: Turkish beans (taze fasulye), carrot-walnut salad with soygurt dressing (cevizli havuç salatasi) adapted from Lokanta cookbook and pide bread or a grain dish.
• A variation of The Green Cuisine’s pumpkin-paprika soup -another VeganMoFo inspired dish!- and beet-potato salad
• Baked potatoes, veggiedogs and sautéed silverbeet with creamy cauliflower ‘queso’ from Cadry’s Kitchen.
• Quesadillas with leftover cauliflower ‘queso’; autumn salad with beetroot and baked pear/apple adapted from Baking Made Easy.
• Dessert: sugared puff pastry with pear and chocolate syrup.
• Snack: kale chips (or this VeganMoFo spicy kale recipe from The Green Cuisine).
• Sandwich spread: eggless salad with last week’s celery. Recipe recommendations really MUCH appreciated!

VeganMoFo Day 4 ~ “Don’t Eat Animals Day”

It’s World Animal Day today, coinciding with VeganMofo! Not only that, in the Netherlands it’s also unofficially “Don’t-Eat-Animals-Day”: EetGeenDierenDag. All Dutch are called to refrain from eating meat or fish today, even if it’s only for a single day in the year. If every inhabitant rose to this challenge, that would save 400.000 animals in JUST ONE DAY.*

So I hope all my fellow countrymen are joining! Several canteens from major companies will also only serve vegetarian food – yay! I wish they would do that every week for Meatless Monday though… There’s always a next step. ;)

I was too late in realising I should have invited a bunch of people for dinner and now I’m going out tonight. But I’m putting it in my calendar for next year, which will be a Friday!!! Nothing wrong with early planning. ;)

Back to the present. Here are the organic vegetables we scored in our CSA this week and the meals I plan to cook with it.

• Lollo rosso lettuce
• Carrots
• Runner beans
• Red mustard
• Corn cobs
• Celery
• Tomatoes

Menuplan Thursday October 4th (World Animal Day!) – Tuesday 9 th

I still had some carrots so they’re priority no.1! This is what I came up with. World cooking!

• Thai carrot soup, cumin bread (freezer stash) and salad.
• Indian saag (spinach), leftover dal tarka (lentils), basmati rice and papadums with chutney or soygurt-mint sauce.
• Turkish beans (taze fasulye), carrot-walnut salad with soygurt dressing (cevizli havuç salatasi) adapted from Lokanta cookbook and pide bread or a grain dish.
• Pasta avocado, peas and seaweed (instead of pickleweed) from Puur Plantaardig (p.82).
• I plan to make a dessert with some local pears that are ripe now — any suggestions?
• And with this week’s celery I finally hope to try my hand at some eggless salad.. Recipe recommendations much appreciated!

So, what will YOU be eating tonight?

Tonight I won’t be eating at home. I’m going to watch ‘Japalicious’ foodie films on the Camera Japan festival in Rotterdam: Eatrip (documentary) and Our Homeland (fiction). Alas, neither will be vegan but there is a Buddhist monk in the first one… And of course I won’t be eating animals today anyway! ;) On Saturday I’ll be going to the festival again, with Mr Gnoe and friends. Then we’ll be eating at a world restaurant, Bazar!

Any eggless salad recipe you can recommend? Or a pear dessert?

I’d love to hear it!

Last week’s menu is pimped with pictures, if you care to have a look.

* According to the host of EetGeenDierenDag, Wakker Dier.

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.

Back to Normal (CSA vegetables week 37, 2012)

It’s Monday, our holiday is over and things are back to normal. That means having more healthy meals at home and making my menu plans. Highly necessary because there’s a HUGE haul of veggies in the fridge.

Here’s this week’s addition to it (apologies for the bad pic).

• silverbeet
• green beans
• garlic
• mini plum tomatoes
• red beets
• red Batavia lettuce

We still got lots of veggies left from last week, and from another type of CSA haul. From the top of my head: tomatoes, potatoes, corn on the cob, leek, fennel, radishes, sprouts, spring onion, spinach, white paprika, courgette, turnips, pumpkin, pointed cabbage, carrots, string beans.

So let’s dig in and make a dent!

Menu plan September 16th – 19th

• SUN ~ Saffron garlic rice (Veganomicon p.119) and Italian style sautéed spinach & tomatoes  (p.106) with a tofu burger that’s a souvenir from France and radish salad with sprout greens and mustard dressing (inspired by Zonnig zomers tafelen p.21).
  

  

  foto

• MON Indonesian ~ Nasi goreng and leftover tofu tausi takeaway (= black bean sauce) with some extra veggies added, simple cabbage salad (Feestmenu’s p.68) and emping.
  
• TUE Mexican ~ Chilli with tortillas and a little leftover rice, corn on the cob, guacamole and coleslaw with avocado (Groentegerechten p.58). Change of plans: Indonesian ~ rice with sambal goreng boontjes á la Mr Gnoe.
  
• WED ~ Sautéed silverbeet (Veganomicon p.106) with smoky tempeh (p.130) on mashed potatoes and a sweet beet salad (Feestmenu’s p.68). Yesterday’s plan: Mexican ~ Chilli with tortillas and a little leftover rice, corn on the cob, guacamole and coleslaw with avocado (Groentegerechten p.58).
  
  
• THU ~ Sautéed silverbeet (Veganomicon p.106) with smoky tempeh (p.130) on mashed potatoes and a sweet beet salad (Feestmenu’s p.68).
  

I hope Wednesday’s loot will be on the small side! ;)

Colour Combinations (CSA week 28, 2012)

I love the subtle colour combination of fresh greens, purple and white.

• Pointed cabbage
• Leek
• Romaine lettuce
• Cucumber
• Courgette
• Marrowfat peas

And here’s how it’ll look on the menu!

Menuplan 11-17 July

• [Wednesday] Leftover night: courgette soup with baguette, lentil salad, broad beans, fennel beans with tomato-paprika sauce and cajun potatoes.
• [Thursday] Chilli with guacamole and rice.
• [Saturday or Sunday] Indian cuisine -to be decided- with leftover rhubarb chutney and papadums.
• Sambal goreng boontjes & kool (cabbage & beans) with nasi goreng (fried rice).
• Spaghetti al (faux) ‘tonno’ with marrowfat peas.
• Veggie roti (potato, carrot, green beans, bell pepper, tofu).

Most meals will be accompanied by salad.

Also: courgette soup (again), EVA’s cucumber spread that Uniflame recommended, ‘tuna salad’, broad bean spread and I have yet to make those rhubarb-strawberry muffins! I didn’t feel like baking this morning. :( Maybe tomorrow?!

Veggies on the Menu (CSA vegetables week 27, 2012)

• pak choi
• red scallions
• basil
• lettuce
• broad beans
• turnip tops

Another bunch of awesome greens to plan this week’s menu with! In addition I got some green beans, carrots, marrowfat peas, courgette and fennel from another organic farm nearby.

Menu plan July 3rd – 10th

• [Wednesday] ‘Hokkaido pumpkin soup’: made up from kombu dashi & Japanse pumpkin out of the freezer, rice with Teresa’s garlic shoot stir-fry (La Dolce Vegan! p.138), using mizuna instead of chard and marrowfat peas for sweet.
  
  
• [Thursday] Batavian endive ‘sajoer boontjes‘, nasi goreng, tempeh asem manis (Vegetarisch Indonesisch Kookboek p.116), emping.
  
• [Friday] Tomato soup, lentil salad (Bonenkookboek), bake-off baguette and faux tuna salad.
  
  
  
• [Saturday] Tip-top tofu loaf for La Dolce Vegan! for cookalong on NVV forum (p.154), broad beans and cajun potatoes (Groot Vegetarisch Kookboek). Red berries and cherries for dessert.
  
  
• [Sunday] Fennel beans (Puur plantaardig), pasta marinara with fresh basil.
• [Monday] Thai carrot soup, pak choi stir-fry (Groentegerechten) with spring onions & marrowfat peas, spring rolls (freezer stash) & noodles.
• [Tuesday] Tomato soup, pasta zucchini cream wine sauce, salad.

Also:

• Courgette soup
• Rhubarb-strawberry muffins