Sunday Brunch, @ Small Block

poached eggs on toast w/ mushroom ($6.90 + $2 or 3, I’m not sure)

Baked beans and feta ($9)

It was raining all day on Sunday, it was actually a nice change from very hot last few days. I was meant to go to Vic market, but with all the raining, I decided to go on Tuesday instead. However, lunch time came by, but we didn’t have anything to eat, or to cook. So we headed down to Small Block around 1 pm, I thought it wouldn’t be as packed due to the rainy day. But I was wrong, it was busy when we got there, but luckily we didn’t have to wait to get a table. The service can be quite slow on busy weekends, but it was worth the wait, it’s Sunday anyway, whats the rush? We didn’t wait too long for our soy lattes to arrive, they were good, not too strong (I’m not good at describing coffee, it’s either good, bad, strong, or weak). About 20 minutes later, our food arrived, I had poached eggs on toast with mushrooms on the side. The eggs were poached perfectly with oozing orange yolks, the mushrooms were generous serving of swiss browns. My hubby had baked beans with feta, served with toasted Turkish bread. The beans were rich and sweet, paired perfectly with the salty marinated feta. We share our meal, I gave him one of my egg, and 1 piece of mushroom, and I got to taste the beans and feta. It was really filling meal, and we left as soon as we finish our meal, due to the number of people waiting for a table. I’ve yet to try the french toast and ricotta hotcakes, but the hot cakes looks yummy on this post.

Small Block :   130 Lygon Street, Brunswick East  (9381 2244)

Pumpkin and Spinach Lasagna

My husband has a tomato paste sensitivity, every time he eats something with tomato paste in it, he would have a sore and burning feeling on his tongue. Strangely, he’s not reacting to fresh tomato, tomato sauce, or sundried tomato.  Therefore, I tried to find a good lasagna recipe that has no tomato paste in the recipe. This tomato-less lasagna recipe is taken from vegie food cookbook, with a little changes. The original recipe was actually a free-form lasagna, meaning that you assemble the lasagna individually, I decided to bake it in the a baking dish, and I also add grated mozzarella cheese on top. Next time, I will mashed the pumpkin, and place it on the upper layer, cause what happened was, when I tried to slice and transfer a piece, it just disintegrate, which is not pretty, but still yummy though. I will not skimp on the mozzarella cheese either to glue the layers properly. I had the lasagna with some baked kipfler potato wedges, and broad beans salad with some ricotta, olive oil, and lemon juice dressing (oh my God,  peeling the broad beans shell was such a ‘fun’ chore!). The lasagna was alright, I will definitely perfecting it in the future. I’m still in search of a perfect vegie lasagna recipe, if anyone has one, please share.. . By the way, this is the recipe..

ingredients :

• 4 fresh lasagna sheets
• 1 package frozen chopped spinach
• 350 g pumpkin, diced
• 500 g / 2 cups ricotta cheese
• 1 1/2 cup grated mozzarella cheese
• 1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese
• salt and pepper to taste

place pumpkin in baking dish, drizzle with olive oli and bake for 20 min in the oven or until tender

defrost the spinach in the microwave, and squeeze excess water

mix in ricotta and parmesan cheese to the spinach, season with salt and pepper

boil about 4 cups of water in a big pot

oil a baking dish

cook 1 lasagna sheets in boiling water for a few seconds until tender (don’t overcook, or the lasagna will rip, and that’s really annoying..!)

place in baking dish, spread with spinach mixture, sprinkle with grated mozzarella cheese

cook another sheet of lasagna, and put no top of spinach

arrange the baked pumpkin on top of it, and add some more grated mozzarella

repeat with another sheet of lasagna, and top with the spinach mix, mozzarella, and the last sheet.

sprinkle with the remaining of grated cheese, or add some more mozzarella cheese to cover all surface.

bake for 15 minutes or until the cheese is bubbling and browning a little bit.

soy bombs with smoked paprika couscous

These soy bombs were awesomely delicious..! they were not bland at all, (which I thought thy would be), they surprisingly hold their shapes together while cooking, it is worth the effort. I’ve got the recipe from Cindy – where’s the beef? , and she got it from post punk kitchen, which they got it from..somewhere else.., well anyway, considering the long thread of comments, I decided to try this bombs. I actually made them twice this week.  My first attempt, some of them didn’t hold together, I think it was because I didn’t chop the onion properly.  We had them with spaghetti and tomato sauce. I changed the recipe a little bit, instead of peanut butter, I used free nut butter (sunflower seeds butter), I used 2 tbsp of soy sauce, and I leave out the basil leaves, just because I didn’t have any.

Two days later, I made the second batch. This time, I chopped the onion super finely, crumbled , and mix the tofu by hands, so the free nut butter mixed evenly. I served them with couscous, and grilled capsicum. I personally like them better with the couscous. Here’s the recipe for the smoked paprika couscous :

ingredients :

• 1  1/2  cups couscous
• 1  3/4 cup vegetable stock / water
• 2 cups cauliflower, chopped, very small
• 2 carrots, diced
• 1 small onion
• 1 red capsicum, halved
• 1 green capsicum, halved

spices : (mix in small bowl)

• 1 tsp smoked paprika
• 1/2 tsp ground cumin
• 1/2 tsp turmeric
• salt and pepper to taste

preheat the oven griller, lined a baking tray with tin foil, put the capsicum, cut side down, and grill until they charred, placed in glass bowl, cover, and let cool.

meanwhile stir fry the onion, cauliflower, and carrots until the cauliflower bits caramelized, add the spices, stir until all the vegies well coated, and fragrant.

add couscous, mix with the vegies, and add the stock / water (be careful, the couscous might splatter), cover, remove from heat, and let sit for 3 minutes.

remove the skin from the capsicum under running water, and sliced the capsicum lengthways.

fluff the couscous, stir in the grilled capsicum, transfer to plate or bowl, serve with soy bombs.

 

 

high protein banana – berries smoothie

(please ignore the mess and the overloaded book shelf behind them..)

I recently bought a tub of 500 g protein powder from the clinic, just to experiment with myself, and just to know how it tastes. Just in case, if i prescribed to my patients in the future, and they asked how does it tastes like, I can give them a real answer. Anyway, as soon as I got it, I mixed it with cold water, gave it a strong stir, they just DIDN’T mix evenly. I still found some lumps after stirring for a few minutes. So I thought, oh.., how bad could it be? and took a sip. mmmm….yuuu..ck..!!!! this is NOT the taste of “smooth vanilla” (as the label says), it was really thick, lumpy, and milky rich (not in a good way for me, cause I hate the taste of cow’s milk). So then I added some ice cubes, just to make it icy cold, and thus, numb my tastebuds.

The next day, I bought some bananas, frozen berries, and soy milk to turn the yuck powder into yum powder. I peeled and froze the bananas as well. Guess what, IT WAS AWESOME..!! yaay.. the banana takes over the flavour,  and the berries give the smoothie it’s freshness.

ingredients : (2 tall glass)

• 4 tbsp protein powder (I used whey, but soy, rice, or pea protein powder with neutral flavour will work as well, or, 1/2 block of silken tofu will give a boost of protein)
• 1 cup of water
• 1 cup soy milk
• 1 handfull frozen mixed berries
• 1 frozen banana
• 3-4 small – ish  ice cubes

put all the ingredients in a blender, and blitz until smooth.

transfer into 2 tall glass.

 

dinner out @ vegie bar

Last week we celebrate our 9 years anniversary (we’ve only married for 2 yrs, but we’ve been together for 9 years), that means, a good reason to eat out! we decided to eat at good old Vegie bar, because this place is never disappointed us. they serve reasonable price foods, with generous amounts of food, and yummy desserts. I had the special meal from the board, funghi pizza, the mushroom marinated in red wine, topped with feta cheese. My hubby had seitan burger with chips. The seitan was good, but a little too thin, the burger was slathered with the yummiest satay sauce, and a mountain of vegie.

and for dessert we had flourless chocolate cake with 2 large scoop of vanilla ice cream..! (yummmm…) the chocolate cake was really rich, after I ate it, I felt like I couldn’t eat any more chocolate for a month! (by a month, I actually mean 1 day). If you ever watch the movie called ‘Matilda’, there’s a scene where a student forced to eat a chocolate cake by his evil school principal, I imagine the cake would taste like vegie bar’s.

stir fry snake beans with tofu

very easy. very-very quick. The type of dish when you feel I-can’t-be-bothered-to cook-but -I don’t-want-to eat-crap-either-and-I’m-too-broke-to-eat-out. we ended up waiting for the rice to cook after I finished cooking it. Snake beans tastes pretty much like green beans, but less sweet, and without annoying strings that stuck in between your teeth after dinner. The Asian basil gives the whole dish a lift in flavour, so I recommend you to not skip it. I imagine a squeeze of lime juice would be great, but I didn’t have any at that time.

ingredients :

• 1 bunch of snake beans, trim ends, cut 4 cm lengths
• 1 bunch of asian basil, chopped
• 200 g firm tofu or half a block, diced
• 1 clove garlic
• 1 tbsp sambal oelek (you can add more or less, depends on your love-ness to spicy food)
• 1 tbsp vegetarian oyster sauce
• 2 tsp vegetable oil
• 1 tsp sesame oil

heat 1 tsp veg oil in the frying pan, fry the tofu for a few minutes, transfer into a plate

heat another tsp of vegetable oil, add sambal oelek, and garlic, stir fry until fragrant

add snake beans, if too dry, add 1 tbsp of water, add the fried tofu to the frying pan, cook until the beans turned bright green but still crunchy (around 2 – 3 min)

drizzle with vegetarian oyster sauce, and sesame oil, add the asian basil leaves, cook for another 30 seconds

serve with rice

(my version of) spanakopita

I called this my version of spanakopita, because it has broccoli in it (yes, I sneak broccoli in a lot of my cooking). I’m using frozen spinach because it cuts cooking time massively. I’ve tried  with fresh spinach in the past, I personally found it’s  too time consuming, and the result was a bit gritty, maybe i didn’t wash the spinach leaves properly. However, you can always replace it with fresh spinach if you prefer.

ingredients :

• 1 package of filo pastry
• 1 package frozen spinach thawed or microwaved 1.5 min, squeeze excess water (important!)
• 1 onion diced
• 1 clove garlic
• 1 small – medium head of broccoli (chopped very finely)
• 1 1/2 cups ricotta cheese (or 1 small tub)
• 1/2 cup feta cheese, crumbled
• 1/3 cup melted butter / oil spray
• salt & pepper to taste

saute onion until just cooked, add garlic broccoli and spinach, cook until the spinach dries up a little bit, transfer to a bowl

mix ricotta cheese into the spinach, add feta cheese, salt and pepper,  you don’t have to add lots of salt, feta cheese it’s quite salty as it is

melt butter in a microwave (~seconds), add 1 tbsp olive oil

brush pastry with butter, or spray with oil, top with another pastry, repeat until you have 3 – 4 (or more) layers

do another  3 – 4of filo – butter layers

oh yeah, don’t forget to cover the rest of the pastry AND the buttered pastry with tea towel, otherwise they will dry up, and believe me..you don’t want to have flakes of filo pastry storm in your kitchen

transfer 1 set of  filo layers to baking dish, if its overhang, that’s fine, spoon the filling in, and top with anther set of layers

tuck the hanging pastry, you dont have to do it neatly, just make sure you cover all the edges

brush the top with butter / spray with oil

bake in the oven 180 C for 20 min until the pastry turns golden (it varies, depends on the oven, just make sure you check it every 10 min or so)

let it cool for 10 – 15 min (if you can)

serve with mountain of salad

 

 

 

 

world vegan day festival

Hi… feels good to be back in blog world.. I’ve been really busy last week, doing my super-massive-huge-assignment..but, it’s done now..wooohoooo….!!! I promise, no more procrastinating next semester! (well, slim chance though, it always seems that there’s not enough adrenalin if the due date still long way to go..)

well, enough about my assignment.. back to WVD. I arrived at the convent around 1 – 1.30 ish, and the venue was already packed with people!! it’s a good thing though, it shows that vegan-vegetarianism is getting more and more common, and people pay more attention to what they eat, and where their food comes from.

I was starving when I got there, and I was thinking of getting a pie but, the queue put me off, it was really3x long..!!!! so I got myself a plate of falafels from himalaya bakery ($8), the falafels was good, not too garlicky, the salad were barely there, but the sourdough toast was the winner..!! it was soooo good.., chewy, a bit moist, not too sour,yummm…. (I could never do low carb diet!)

I bought some goodies to take home, a bar of loving earth raw chocolate ($8) w/ activated almonds – best chocolate in the world, lindt, move over..- (sounds fancy isn’t it? ‘activated almonds’, hehe.. basically the almonds was soaked to make it more digestible, and easier to absorbed), some larabars ($2 each – key lime pie, and cinnamon something- couldn’t remember it..), and 2 slices of cakes ($10 for 2slices, beetroot chocolate cake, and chocolate torte) from naked treaties

when I got home, and took pictures of my stuff, I just realized that they were ALL sweets..! hmmm… and I’m wondering why i never lose any weight..

 

 

 

broccoli pesto and fruit salad

I really3x love broccoli (hence the blog name),  I always buy them every week. Unfortunately, my friend told me that, unless organic, they are heavily sprayed, and the tiny florets catch all the chemicals. So from now on, I always buy organic broccoli, they cost a bit more, but I think it’s worth it. They tend to be a bit smaller, just like other organic produce i suppose, they look cuter, and it actually saves chopping time , which is a good thing.  I don’t buy all my vegies organic, I can’t really afford it, I wish I could. For now,I get, maybe 2 – 3 types of organic vegs in each shopping trip. This recipe is inspired by 101 cookbooks recipe, with a little changes.

Ingredients :

• 1 small – medium head of broccoli
• 1 handful basil leaves
• 1/3 cup parmesan / soy cheese
• 1 clove garlic (i regreted it, it gave me garlic breath all night!)
• salt and pepper
• 3 – 4 glugs olive oil
• salt and pepper
• 1/3 cup cream / silken tofu

steam / boil the broccoli for 3 min or until bright green, chopped half of them into bite sized pieces, and chuck the other half in the food processor (don’t process them yet)

put basil leaves and garlic (if you prefer) in the food processor, blitz them together with the broccoli, add parmesan cheese, olive oil, and cream, process until creamy

season with salt and pepper

toss with hot cooked pasta, and the chopped broccoli florets

or you can also use it on a pizza base, a nice change from the usual tomato based pizza

 

For dessert, I had some fruit salad with grapefruit syrup, and yogurt / soy yogurt.

ingredients :

• 2 medium grapefruits
• 1 lemon
• 2 punnets of strawberries
• 1 large mango
• 3 tbsp sugar

juice 1 grapefruit and lemon, add sugar, stir, heat it up in the microwave for 30 seconds, stir, and microwave it one more time for 30 seconds

chopped all the fruits bite sized pieces, (1 grapefruit, strawberries, mango, I imagine it would be good with kiwi fruit, but my husband hates kiwi fruit) transfer into a large bowl

drizzle with the grapefruit syrup, cover with cling film, and refrigerate for 2 – 3 hrs

serve with yogurt, ice cream, or you can even have it for breakfast, with muesli, and soy milk.

oh yeah, if anyone know how to diced mango perfectly, please share…

 

lunch out @ dondon

Don Don, 321 Swanston St Melbourne VIC 3000 - (03) 9662 3377

Today was a really warm and humid day, felt like summer is coming to Melbourne   After finished my clinic class, I felt like something cold and fresh, and quick.. cause I was starved to death… I was meant to eat at CJs lunch takeaway @ hardware lane (the laneway that runs between Lt Lonsdale and Lonsdale St), but unfortunately, they didn’t serve lunch special after 2.30 pm. So I decided to head to Dondon. They don’t have a long list of menu, but they always packed, esecially during lunch hours. The service was really fast.. I mean REALLY FAST!! I’ve got my food before I’ve even finish collecting my change!

I ordered a bowl of soba salad (I think it was $7.20 or 7.40?). Although they call it salad, it was pretty much a meal for me. The soba served with tofu, inari (sweet tofu), seaweed, mixed leaves, and some vegies (broccoli and tomato), and strangely, I’ve got a tiny piece of watermelon as well. The soba were served with sesame oil and soy sauce cold dressing (In the picture, you won’t be able to see the soba, it was covered with mountain of vegies). It was a perfect lunch for summer-y day. I wish I get more of the miso paste smeared on top of the tofu though. But, overall, it was a nice, quick, and cheap lunch.

Oh yeah, beware of the pigeons if you’re sitting outside, they won’t hesitate attacking your meal. The girl who sat next to me was a victim.