aquaprofunda | Entries tagged with recipe

Migrated to https://highproteinvego.wordpress.com/

My latest riff on hummous, which is unsurprisingly amazing:

Ingredients

2 eggplants

2 cans chickpeas

2 wedges of preserved lemon

One head of garlic

Minced garlic from a jar

Couple of lemons worth of juice

Salt and pepper

Loads of olive oil

Method

EGGPLANTS:

Turn on big gas burner, sit eggplant on top until charred on that side, turn over and repeat on all sides of the eggplant

Put on a baking pan and roast in 200 degree oven for 1 hour

DO NOT PEEL!

GARLIC:

Chop the bottom off your whole head of garlic. Put the whole thing in a little tin foil parcel with a generous amount of olive oil.

Roast for 1 hour

Allow to cool!

BABA GANHUMMOUS

Chop tops off eggplant, squeeze roasted garlic out of skin, put in food processor with drained & rinsed chickpeas, roughly chopped preserved lemons (rinsed etc), lemon juice, salt and pepper and some olive oil

Blitz until texture starts to look good. Add olive oil as you go to get the right consistency, could be heaps.

Keep tasting as you go – add salt and pepper, minced garlic, olive oil and more preserved lemon to taste.

Makes a huge batch, enough to make all your coworkers try it as you eat it throughout the week, until they force you to write down this recipe.

The best things about carbonara are:

The sweet caramelised onion and garlic

The meaty texture and umami of the bacon

The creamy richness of the cream and egg

So how to recreate this with a vegan diet? Surprisingly easily. I saw a recipe for white bean alfredo elsewhere, so riffed on that - caramelised mushroom slices are amazingly delicious and great “meaty bits” substitute, and the white beans when pureed go surprisingly creamy. Add tonnes of garlic, salt, pepper and onion, and you’re absolutely set.

This recipe serves two people, or one very hungry person.

Ingredients

Olive oil

150gm mushrooms - I used a mix of swiss brown and field mushrooms - sliced

1 medium brown onion, finely diced

1 can of cannelini beans, drained & thoroughly rinsed

2 tablespoons of minced garlic (the jarred minced garlic is already pretty sweet and mellow - I find it perfect to add in huge quantities to things like this.

Vegan stock
Savoury yeast flakes (optional)

Salt & pepper

Fresh parsley (garnish)

Equipment

Blender

Frying pan

Method

Fry the onions and mushrooms in olive oil on medium heat until caramelised. This may take a little while (20ish minutes), but is so worth it.

Blend the cannelini beans with the garlic and a splash of stock. I usually put in about half a teaspoon of Massel powdered stock and a dash of hot water.

Pour the bean mix into the pan with the mushrooms. Mix well and simmer lightly for about 5 minutes, until it thickens up. Add salt, pepper and yeast flakes to taste.

Mixed thoroughly with your cooked pasta and garnish with lots of fresh parsley.

Adapted from Mark Bittman’s wholegrain flatbread recipe. NB: photo shows a different variation I tried with more vegetables - but the mushroom-only variation is much tastier :)

vegan omelette

Ingredients

1 cup besan (chickpea flour)

1 medium onion

300-350 grams of mushrooms - I used a mix of swiss brown and field mushrooms

Olive oil

Salt & pepper

Equipment

Large cast iron skillet that can go in the oven

Method

Put the besan in a large bowl and whisk (to avoid lumps) in 1.5 cups of water. Cover and set aside for up to 12 hours.

Turn on oven to 200 degrees celsius.

Put sliced onions and mushrooms into skillet with a generous serving of olive oil. Put skillet into oven.

Keep an eye on the skillet, stirring occasionally, for about 20+ minutes - or until the mushrooms and onions are approaching caramelised. The oven - and pan - should have well and truly heated up by now.

Take out the skillet, stir around the contents to “even them out” across the pan, and season then whisk the besan batter one more time before pouring it carefully into the pan. Try not to let it slosh up the edges.

Return to the oven for 30-40 minutes (with my oven: 40). When it’s done it’ll be an even, golden brown and the edges will have lifted away from the sides. Take out of the oven and allow to cool for five minutes or so so you can get it out of the pan easier.

I serve it quite messily by using the spatula to chop it roughly pizza-wise and scoop the pieces out to eat with a fork. It tastes AMAZING.

I'm on a bit of a health kick at the moment - moving into the vegan camp and trying to avoid all processed sugars and flours, as well as consciously trying to meet my protein and other nutritional requirements. So far it's going well and I'm really enjoying playing around with new ingredients, inventing new meals and discovering delish new flavours.

Breakfast this morning is something I'm calling a "muesli pancake". I had it with peanut butter and honey, but I actually think it would go amazing with some stewed fruit - e.g. pear and rhubarb. If you're into lashings of maple syrup I think that would be great too. The pancake itself is a bit too dry and not sweet enough on its own, so I look forward to playing around with different toppings in future.

Muesli Pancake

Serves 2.

Ingredients

I think you can use any variety of nuts, seeds and dried fruit in this - I just recommend chopping them down to muesli-piece sizes. I think next time I'll make sure to include dates.

1/2 cup chickpea flour (besan)

1/2 cup water

1/4 tsp baking powder

1 tbsp chia seeds

1 tbsp hulled hemp seeds

1 tbsp walnuts, broken into small pieces

1 tbsp pepitas

1 tbsp sunflower seeds

1 tbsp sultanas

1 tbsp dried cranberries

Flavourless oil to lube the pan

Equipment

Cast iron skillet.

Method

Measure out all your fruits, seeds and nuts and set aside.

Start to heat the skillet up on high.

In a medium bowl, put the chickpea flour and baking powder. Whisk in the 1/2 cup of water, making sure to eliminate lumps. Whisk a bit more to get it more aerated.

Into the batter, whisk in the fruits/nuts seeds.

When the skillet is ready, drops of water on it will immediately sizzle. Spray on a generous amount of oil (being careful not to create a fireball, as I did this morning), and pour the batter onto the pan into two pancakes. (If you only have a small pan, naturally you'll probably do one at a time.)

Cook each side for about 4 minutes each. The edges should be looking cooked and you should be able to easily slide a spatula under when they're ready to flip.

When done, serve with toppings of your choice - I recommend something sweet and wet, like maple syrup, stewed fruit or honey.

A Minor Place is one of the cafes in the inner north that everyone knows, and the most infamous dish on their menu (for vegos, anyway) is the white beans.
beans on toast

Yesterday I gave them a go and am quite pleased with how they turned out! Very tasty, and complemented with the vego sausage I ate them with. Nom.

Ingredients

3 cans cannelini beans, drained and well-rinsed

1 cup vegetable stock (I used homemade)*

A couple of sprigs of rosemary and thyme, stripped into leaves

Salt and pepper to taste (I only needed salt because there was none in my stock)

Method

Put everything in a saucepan over medium heat and bring to the boil, stirring occasionally, then turn heat down to simmer. Keep stirring periodically so it doesn’t stick to the bottom. Once all the liquid has been absorbed (it might take a while) and the beans are all mashed up, it’s ready!

* I suspect part of the tastiness of this dish is due to the fact that my stock is mostly mushroom, onion and parsley.

This is half-arsed because it's SO GOOD that I'm typing this up while still eating.

1. Make a tomato sauce by cooking onions in butter for a good long while, then adding tomatoes and cooking for a good long while, then straining

2. make a macaroni cheese sauce - roux with lots of cheese added at the end

3. when 1 & 2 are done, remove all from heat anfd stir them together. Add salt/pepper and a generous spoonful of minced garlic

4. stir this sauce into cooked pasta and a handful of quartered baby tomatoes

5. put in heat-proof bowl, sprinkle a generous helping of cheese over the top, put in oven under grill until cheese is proper grilled

6. devour ravenously.

Another riff on Bittman, as per last weekend.

These muffins aren't too sweet, and the chunks of jam throughout (especially while hot) are delightful.

muffins

Ingredients

1/2 cup chocolate chips

Few spoonfuls of a nice berry jam (try to go with something tart like raspberry or blackberry)

80 grams sugar

45 grams melted butter

250 grams plain flour

pinch of salt

1 egg

3 teaspoons baking powder

240ml milk

Method

Pre-heat the oven to 190° celcius. Line a 12-cup small muffin pan and spray/grease the liners

Mix together dry ingredients and chocolate chips

In a separate bowl, mix the wet ingredients (excluding jam) together well (whisking the egg)

Make a well in the dry ingredients, pour in the wet ingredients. Fold in gently only until all dry ingredients are wet - just before it's done, add some spoonfuls of jam, and gently fold in. You don't want to blend the jam through, but leave nice chunks (!IMPORTANT).

Spoon mixture into muffin pan

Bake in pre-heated oven for 20 minutes, test with skewer/toothpick

Cool in pan for 5 minutes, then transfer muffins to cooling rack

Eat while they're still warm!

Firstly, OM NOM NOM.

Preserved lemons are one of my favourite preserves. When I ask people if they like them, most of them have no idea what they are or what to do with them. I always tell them to use them like a spice or a seasoning - to add amazing flavour to a dish, that's more in the "spice" realm than fresh lemon zest/juice flavouring would be. I like to add preserved lemon to any 'moroccan'-style dish I'm doing (eg with loads of garlic, tomatoes, and chickpeas), to home-made hummous, to cous cous salads (with roasted capsicum and moar chickpeas and olives and parsley and tomato).

Basically, yum. A couple of months ago I jarred up a huge amount of lemons and put them in the back of the cupboard; this morning I transferred them to smaller jars to give to friends. the smell was amazing.

OK, so, enough gushing. Here's how you do it: ( Read more... )

Based off Mark Bittman's basic muffin recipe:

muffins

Ingredients

1/2 cup of grated zucchini, squeezed/pressed to get as much moisture out as possible

1/2 cup of grated cheese - a good tasty/cheddar

1/2 cup corn kernels - frozen, fresh, canned, wevs

45 grams melted butter

250 grams plain flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

Generous grind of cracked pepper

1 egg

3 teaspoons baking powder

240ml milk

Method

Pre-heat the oven to 190° celcius. Line a 12-cup small muffin pan and spray/grease the liners

Mix together dry ingredients

Add cheese, corn and zucchini to dry ingredients, mix well

In a separate bowl, mix the wet ingredients together well (whisking the egg)

Make a well in the dry ingredients, pour in the wet ingredients. Fold in gently only until all dry ingredients are wet, spoon mixture into muffin pan

Bake in pre-heated oven for 20 minutes, test with skewer/toothpick

Cool in pan for 5 minutes, then transfer muffins to cooling rack

Eat while they're still warm!

This one is known colloquially amongst friends as “crackberry jam", and I have to say it definitely is the best in my repertoire of preserves. Often people seem very impressed with the fact that I make my own jam, and express awe as if it’s a great effort - it isn’t! It’s enormously easy. Easier than cooking most meals. And the recipe basically comes off the back of the pectin packet. Here’s my version of it.

( Read more... )

Berry Jam Recipe by Emily Turner is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported License.

This is a recipe from a coworker's mum, and I have to say it's the best chocolate cake I've ever made. The cake itself is still warm, and I'm just wiping off the crumbs of my first slice!

I'm not a fan of sweet/rich cakes, and this one is perfect. Just chocolatey enough, just sweet enough, dense enough to hold together without being gooey.

Ingredients

2 cups sugar

2 cups plain flour

half cup cocoa

one teaspoon carb soda

quarter spoon salt

2 eggs

three quarters cup milk

three quarters vegetable oil

1cup hot water

1 teaspoon vanilla essence

Method

Sift all dry ingredients together

Mix together liquids (beating eggs in process)

Add liquids to dry ingredients, mix well

Bake in oven 200 degrees 9x9 cake tin for one hour or until cooked (mine took about 1.5 hours)

Chocolate Cake Recipe by Emily Turner is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported License.

Another re-post from doublejoint. Keeping the commentary this time :)

Dear

anatsuno,

I hear you have some overripe bananas, so I'm sharing my banana cake recipe. It hales from my childhood--I think I had some at my friend's house (age 5? 6?), and Mum made sure to get the recipe, and it's been made hundreds of times since.

I made another one of my own last night, after finally purchasing a thermometer for my increasingly decrepit oven. The first time I tried to use the oven after I moved into this house, the temperature knob came off in my hand; another time when I opened the door the glass panel on the front fell right off (it's since been repaired).

At one point a few months ago I tried to cook a honey and spice cake, but within about 15 minutes of being in there the top had started to burn while the bottom remained liquid; by the time it was no longer raw I had to saw 2 inches of charcoal off the top of it.

So, upon installing the oven thermometer, I discovered that ~160°C on the thermometer = ~120° on the dial. Thus I was able to set it accordingly, and lo and behold, my banana cake turned out awesome. I forsee more baking in my future.

At any rate, here's the banana cake recipe. Measurements are Australian (I believe there's a slight difference in US/Aus cup & spoon sizes, I'm not sure how we compare to European measurements).

The cake itself is rather 'mild' for a cake, I suppose--leaning towards banana bread, but I think a bit too soft and sweet for that. But not too sweet for my tastes! It doesn't need to be iced--the browned top sort of caramelises deliciously, it really is just perfect as it is. But don't make the same mistake I did and take it out of the pan too soon--I ended up peeling the top and the bottom of the cake off because I didn't let it cool for long enough. (On plus side, it meant I got to eat all those delicious scrapings aaall at once.)

( Read more... )

Yet another re-post from double joint.

Fried Gnocchi with Mediterranean 'Vegetables'

( Read more... )

It is SO DELICIOUS. The caramelly garlic and olive oil goes perfect with the texture of the gnocchi, and the various flavours with the antipasto is a perfect complement. Having everything the same bite-size makes for a great balance of flavours when you're eating, too. Usually when I make pasta I make a tomato-based sauce that I throw things into, but I absolutely love this method of just tossing big chunks of things in with the chunks of gnocchi without glueing it all together with any sauce. And it is so damn easy, and antipasto vegetables can hang around the fridge (and/or cupboard) for months and months.

Fried Gnocchi with Mediterranean Vegetables by Emily Turner is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported License.

Another re-post from double joint!

Lemon Slice

( Read more... )

I had a "wild mushroom soup" at my favourite gastro pub some time ago and have been craving it again since - finally while browsing the How to Cook Everything app I came across a cream of mushroom soup recipe that seemed pretty easy.

And so, fluey and dying for a tasty soup, I hobbled to the supermarket and back again, experimenting with a couple of variations on Bittman's recipe.

It turned out pretty damn great, and there are very few tweaks I'll make the next time I do a batch. So, sharing.

( Read more... )

Another re-post from double joint. No CC on this entry because it's not mine to licence :)

This recipe is kind of circular in its origins. A British friend tweeted about it, I begged for the recipe, she emailed it to me. She sold it as "cake in a saucepan", but it's really just mixed in a saucepan and cooked in the oven. For a very short amount of time, I learned! So basically, it's a super-simple recipe that you can throw together usually with things already in the pantry, and very quickly. And quite delicious without being too fancy!

( Read more... )

Hullo gentle readers,

anatsuno and I have decided that though we gave it a good go, we're terrible at keeping up with joint projects so we're (sniff!) quietly shutting down doublejoint. I am, however, going to migrate my recipes slowly over here, and hopefully continue to post more on

aquaprofunda in future.

Here's the first:

Chai Pear Cake (with bonus Pear Chai!)

Oh my goodness. I just improvised the most amazing cake.

This is based on my banana cake recipe - I figured that if I kept all the quantities in the right place, I could add different flavouring and just switch out the type of mushy-cooked-fruit.

Pears are in season right now, so pears it is! Most pear recipes I found were all about keeping the pears whole (and stewed), or layering them for an upside-down cake, or leaving whole chunks in. But I needed a mushy mass of them, so I decided to stew them and make a puree to go into the cake. And what better to stew them in than CHAI?

The cake I wound up with is so amazingly delicious. Somehow moist and fluffy at the same time, with the perfect amount of richness with the brown sugar and spices to offset the freshness of the pears. I am so very pleased with it!

There are a few steps to this, but it's totally worth it.

( Read more... )