Puy Lentils

I had a go at using puy lentils and now I highly recommend them.
Firstly I made a salad for college using them. I based it on a salad that marks and Spencer do. Again, this was really simply to make.
I first baked some butter nut squash chunks and bits of pepper.
While they were baking, I boiled up the entils. It takes around 20 mins. So just boil until soft.
You for sure need a dressing on this so what I did was combine a balsamic vinegar I all ready had with lemon juice and chilli. It went perfect with it. Mixed it all together and put it in some tuber ware.
:)
A healthy lunch!

Puy lentil lasagne. I first came across a puy lentil lasagne while flicking through the Irish Vegetarian Society magazine. Now this was so yum and not to hard to make either.
I started off by roasting off some vegetables along with lots of garlic and chilli. I used peppers, butter nut squash(what else do I use?) and mushrooms but you can add whatever. While they were roasting, I boiled up the lentils.
I also made some tomato sauce by frying off some garlic and a finely chopped white onion and then added 2 tins of tomatoes and left to reduce. I would in future though use 3 tins. I also made a cheese sauce, which didn't turn out amazing as I didn't use a recipe and just guessed. When everything was done I pilled it all up and covered with cheese and baked for around 30 mins.

Cheesy lentil bake

I had a lentil bake a while back in The Happy Pear and thought it was so tasty so I tried to make my own. I made this weeks ago so I can't remember exactly how I made it.

I boiled some red lentils ( don't ask me how much.. just enough to cover the dish I was cooking it in.

Added various curry powders and spices to it.

Boiled until all the water had gone.

Mixed in some grated cheese and a beaten egg.

Topped with breadcrumbs and grated cheese and baked until brown on top!

It was extremely easy to make

Lentils are great for a vegetarian diet because they are very high in protein and iron and apparently voted one of the top 5 healthy foods by Health magazine!

It went pretty well with a salad and chilli sauce.

Cheesy Chilli Butternut Squash Quesadillas

So yum and easy.

I got this inspiration from a similar recipe I saw on another blog. Some people aren't aware of what a Quesadilla is. It is basically 2 wraps with cheddar cheese in the middle that is fried until the cheese melts. That's the most simplyist version. Of course you can add whatever to it.

My version contains, cheddar cheese, chilli, rocket and a butternut and pepper mash.

I just cut some butternut squash and red pepper into small chunks and grill until soft with a little oil. I add the chilli in there too. When it's all soft, I mash it all up.

Turn your pan on a low heat and place one of the wraps down. On the wrap, spread some of the mash along with the cheese. Place the other wrap on top and grill on a low heat until the cheese has melted!

Avoca-Powerscourt noms

Out in the extremely lovely Enniskerry is Powerscourt House and gardens. The views and house alone are worth going for. What makes it even more attractive is that there's an avoca restaurant there :). The restaurant runs nearly the whole length of the back of the house. Several huge bay windows run the whole way down the restaurant. I wasn't lucky enough to get one of those tables. There's also a very large patio out the back with unreal views.

Blue skies make me happy.

I got a vegetarian Pastie which was AMAZING!

The Happy Pear II

This was my 2nd time going to The Happy Pear. I don't know why I don't go more often because it's quite near me. Anyway I went on Friday

They just do specials everyday, as far as I'm aware. I got the Cheesy Lentil Bake, which was unreal. It was so tasty. It was kind of curried as well. I need to try make it sometime. I also got 2 side salads. I went with a potato salad with semi sundried tomatoes that was all in some dressing along with some stir-fried vegetables.

Purple potatoes!

After the meal, I drank some really shit coffee that just tasted like warm soy milk. And went on some house creeping around Greystones. SO MANY amazing houses.

Cookies/Picnic

I got a craving the other night for some sort of an oaty/peanut butter cookie. So I looked through some cookbooks and found a recipe for just an oaty cookie. So I made that but added peanut butter. They tasted shit anyway.

I went to Airfield on Thrusday with Lisa and Stacey. We had originally planned to have a little picnic but it was way to cold for that. So we went back to Stacey's house. I made some pasta with pesto, chilli, grilled slices of peppers and grilled cherry tomatoes. And brought some left over of 'The Bean Thing' from the previous nights dinner. It's always so yummy. Oh and a few cupcakes I had made the day before. I made them vegan again but tried a different recipe that used chocolate soy milk instead of oil. They weren't the best. Really heavy and not as moist.

Cornucopia Whole food vegetarian restaurant take 2!

I went on a little adventure into Town yesterday with my Mom. There are a lot of areas she isn't really aware of or just hasn't been to in years. We had intentions of doing a lot more exploring but it started to rain.

I firstly brought her on my daily route to college. Across the bridge from tara, up Eden Quay and then up marlbouragh st. I promised her she would see a million pikeys because I'm always telling her about them always been on that street. But of course there was not ONE! Typical. I showed her my college anyway.

We did a bit more exploring and then for lunch. We went to Cornucopia on Wicklow st. I have only been there once before, with her.(http://walkingdogsandwritingblogs.blogspot.com/2010/07/cornucopia-whole-food-vegetarian.html) I need to go more but don't having friends who are up for eating pricey vegetarian food over something cheap is hard to come by.

I don't have great photos of our meal on me right now. I didn't have my digital camera with me, only my film one. I took some photos on my phone though.

I went with the Sweet potato, celeriac and spinach ragout with organic brown rice.

side salads-Garlic potatoes with roasted hazelnuts and a barley salad.

My mom got a Tomato, mushroom and puy lentil soup. She got a herby bread that came with a butternut squash and almond puree/pate thing. She also got a side of ceasar salad and some other simple salad.

The food here is so flavorsome and tasty. So many flavors going on at once. I wish I could cook food like this. The food served here is a fine example of how vegetarian/vegan food isn't bland and boring, as some people may think. I always get asked 'what the hell can/do you eat?'.

I was way to full to get a dessert. I took a fair bit of my meal to take a way. You get very large portions.

This all cost around 20 euro. Not to bad. Well not bad when you're mom is paying :D.

I think I am going to The Happy Pear in Greystones on Friday for the 2nd time. I will report back.

First time vegan baking

I wanted to try vegan baking. Apart from the obvious healthier benefits from vegan baking (less saturated fat from the eggs and butter), I'm always conscious of my use of eggs in baking. I don't use them or like using them in anything else. I'm reading a book called 'Eating Animals'-http://www.eatinganimals.com/ , that has really opened up my eyes to the factory farming industry out there that I had always thought about. Every time I read it I'm thinking, go vegan go vegan. Maybe someday. I know one girl who read it and she turned vegetarian. If you are vegetarian or vegan allready, I recommend you read it! It's extremely interesting. Although most of the content in the book is based on US animal and agriculture standards. As far as I'm aware, EU laws are a lot more strict in the raising of animals in factory farms. I've been trying to find out some information on standards on certain EU websites but not to much luck, or just lengthy reports of small writing.

Anyway, I took a bit of inspiration from Glauce- (http://foodinmylife.blogspot.com) and decided to make cupcakes. I found a recipe for vegan cupcakes that was extremely easy.

I thought it was going to be very complicated and involve me having to buy vegan butter and egg replacer. But it was far from it. While researching I discovered that the stork block is vegan and the stork in the tub isn't, it has buttermilk in it.

All it involved with water,oil,vanilla extract, vinegar and caster sugar in a bowl. And then adding flour and cocoa powder to that. All ingredients I all ready had in my kitchen. They however, weren't fully vegan. The icing I made contained normal butter. I didn't have any vegan butter. So that kind of ruined it a little bit.

The cakes themselves turned out lovely and moist though. I am going to make them this way from now on. A lot easier, cheaper and healthier option :)

Blazing Salads Buckwheat burgers/salsa

So as I mentioned in my previous post, that I got the Blazing Salads cookbook. I decided to make the Buckwheat and vegetable burgers.

So I headed down to Dalkey to Select Stores to find some Buckwheat. Turns out, it is really good for you ' Like other wholefoods such as brown rice and oats, Buckwheat is high in fibre. It is also adept at taking nutrients from the soil, so you'll find an array of useful minerals. It contains high levels of calcium, magnesium, phosphorous, and iron.' -
http://www.independent.ie/health/diet-fitness/real-food-nutty-buckwheat-will-boost-your-nutrition-2115497.html

I wasn't to impressed with how they turned out. You have to boil the buckwheat with some vegetables and then mix it together with brocolli and a small bit of ground up pumkin seeds.The mixture was extremely wet so I put some breadcrumbs in to hold it together. The recipe said to fry them, so I did just that. Again, they were still horribly soggy, so I baked them. That did a better job, still soggy though. I had one left this morning and found that it had hardened up a fair bit over night. I've had these burgers before from the store and they aren't much like what I made.

After I fried them.

After baking them. A lot more crisper.

The recipe also involved some salsa. I had never made salsa before but it turned out well. I will for sure make some again. It was Tomato, onion, chilli and coriander.

And I served it all up in a pitta bread!

Resources

I go to DIT Cathal Brugha Street, which is the school of hospitality, tourism and food. So there is culinary arts students and pastry arts students in the building I also study in. You can always smell amazing things coming from the kitchens and see them in the kitchen. Makes me a little jealous. They also sell a lot of the food they bake for really low prices on a Thursday.

Anyhow, since there's food students, there's so many cookery books in the library. I always go look at them when I'm bored in the library. An easy distraction. I was looking at some of the vegetarian cookbooks yesterday. I found a Blazing salads one. I am dying to go the store on Dury Street. In select stores, Dalkey you can find the salads there along with some burgers. Any how, I took the book out on loan. There's a lot of really good recipes I will for sure be trying out when my exams finish.

The library also has a subscription to the good food magazine, which I love. They break down at the front what pages have vegetarian/vegan recipes and what pages include baking. I have so many photocopies of recipes I have yet to try.

Upside down pictures. DUNNO.

I plan on use my week and half off productively, so hopefully involving some cooking and baking. I really want to try and make a vegan cake just to do it.