Chocolate beer waffles!

This morning, I got a copy of Vegan Brunch by Isa Chandra Moskowitz. The American brunch foods aren’t common in the UK – we have our own tradition of enormous breakfast later in the day – but I developed a fondness for them through the Sunday afternoon brunch at the late, lamented Country Life in Boston.

The recipe that caught my eye almost immediately was one for chocolate beer waffles. Three of my favourite things in one recipe! I have a waffle machine, and nearly all of the ingredients in stock, so I’ve been making them. I also made the chocolate drizzle – a rich sauce – from the same book to go with them.

The very first thing that impressed me about the waffles section was the list of problems you might have and how to fix them. It included the one that had been bugging me about my own waffle iron – waffles splitting horizontally – and the fix worked.

Anyway, I made the waffle mix with Black Isle Brewery’s organic porter and Green and Black’s cocoa. I had to buy in almond milk, which is a wee bit expensive, and in future I’m pretty sure I can make it in the soya milk machine anyway. The sauce recipe included a variation involving liqueurs, so I made it with Wynand Fockink Bitterkoekjes. My friends and I have already exhausted all the jokes surrounding the distillery name on our many visits to their proeflokaal just off Amsterdam’s Dam square.

The waffles were lovely, but it was all a bit rich. I learned it’s really important to remember to spray the waffle iron every time, and that it’s not a good idea to forget you have a waffle in there. For this recipe alone, I recommend this book. I’ll check some of the others in due course.

The Post-Punk Kitchen website, home of Isa Chandra Moskowitz.

Japanese tofu article

Kimiko Barber goes In search of traditional Japanese tofu in today’s Financial Times.

Oslo: Mamma Afrika

I forgot about one of the better meals I had in Oslo!

Mamma Afrika (Schweigaards g 12, Oslo 0185) is located in a unit on the first floor of a bus station–not the most appealing of sites, but this restaurant is warm and welcoming. My local guide warned me that it is just round the corner from what passes for a crime-ridden and generally dodgy area in Norway.

The vegetarian choice on the tiny menu is limited to a platter of various vegan items, served on one injera and with another, but there’s more food then than you might think. I got two different lentil wats, spinach, cabbage and a potato dish, all individually seasoned and distinct from one another. There was also no compromise to local tastes, and the food was as spicy as you will find in Ethiopian restaurants all over the planet. Best meal I’ve had so far in Oslo.

There are a number of other Ethiopian and Eritrean eateries in Oslo, all of which appear to be vegan-friendly.

Nottingham: Dotty’s Café

This weekend I’m in Nottingham for Novacon, and as well as the usual place, I have found The Vegan Nottingham Guide, the latter far too late to make a printout, alas, but England is not abroad (yet) so I can afford data on my phone.

On arrival yesterday, the partner and I went to Dotty’s Café (197 Mansfield Road), which is not too far from the hotel. It’s a bizarre take on the greasy spoon, harking back to a 1950s where your average housewife was Amy Winehouse. Even the staff dressed in theme, and the furniture was all period pieces, mostly melamine.

The food was mostly sandwiches, with burgers, falafel and a few other options, and was 70% vegan. Vegan cheese is available as an option on many items, and all mayo used is vegan. I went for a spicy burger, and my partner had a (not vegan) cheese and Marmite toastie. Hint to vegetarian eateries – if you want to keep my omnivorous other half happy, something involving cheese and Marmite, especially Marmite, will fit the bill. The more Marmite the better. Both were enough for lunch and thoroughly satisfying. Dotty’s also had a range of vegan cupcakes, and I had to have one to round things off perfectly.

One observation: children, however small, are welcome at Dotty’s. The staff will engage with them, too – they seem to really like children, rather than seeing them as a nuisance. There are books and games available for them. The children who were there yesterday appeared to reciprocate by being very well behaved.

I plan to return.

Oslo: The Fragrance of the Heart

Fragrance of the Heart has two vegetarian cafés in Oslo, and before leaving for the airport I visited the one inside GlasMagasinet, a department store on Stortorvet. The café is located by the entrance to the store on the corner with Møllergate, by the large ochre-coloured half-timbered building.

A department store café is never going to score highly on atmosphere, and I think they’d done pretty well, but it still felt like eating in the staff canteen of a New Age hobbit hole. Decorating a vegetarian eaterie with dangling slices of seashells was also a little odd.

Fragrance offers a set menu at lunchtime for 99Kr, which is outrageously good value in Oslo. It consists of a small bowl of soup and the curry of the day. The soup was lentil, and was thick, rich in flavour and warming. The curry was probably curry by Norwegian standards, but I would have called it a pea and mushroom stew. There was no detectable chilli in it, though the rest of the tomatoey sauce was rich with other spices, and contained plenty of coconut. It too hit the spot on a frozen November day.

Dessert is not part of the set menu, but knowing the odds of eating anything substantial for the rest of the day were quite remote, I had a slice of the wholemeal apple pie. There did not appear to be any vegan cream options to go with this, so I had it on its own, but it was moist enough. The coffee is also good, and the meat-eating partner was more than satisfied with the omelette baguette which was apparently much larger and more filling that it appeared.

Oslo: Vega Fair Food

Sunday is a bit of a dead loss in Oslo, but Vega, located in a former hydrotherapy baths run by the Seventh Day Adventists, is the one exclusively vegetarian place that is open that day (but not, obviously, on Saturdays).

It’s a bit tricky to find. You need to go in the main entrance to the baths (Kurbadet), which looks locked. It isn’t – you just need to turn the knob. Turn left, though the most spectacular Arts and Crafts corridor and turn right just before you get to the door of what used to be the men’s bath.

English is spoken, and they will guide you through the options available to you, and let you know which few dishes in the buffet are not vegan. This afternoon, the only things that weren’t were a pasta salad containing feta, and the lasagne. The lunch buffet was 125 Kr., drinks other than tap water extra.

There was a creamy asparagus soup, and a wide variety of salads to choose from. The hot dishes were the aforementioned lasagne, stir-fried mixed vegetables and rice – I didn’t bother as the salads were more than satisfying. By the bread were a couple of chutneys–a fantastic banana one, and an Indian style one consisting of large pieces of green chilli and whole cloves of garlic. I liked that one even more.

The atmosphere is exceptionally peaceful and relaxed. There are no windows in the dining area, yet it didn’t feel like I was in a hole in the ground. The loos are worth mentioning, too. Outrageously clean is the default in Oslo, but considerable care had been taken in their decoration too.

Oslo: Indian House

Oslo is the most expensive city I’ve ever visited, more so even than Tokyo. Never mind that beer that’s worth drinking is about £9 a pint, my native guide informed me that if I could find a main course for less that 100 Kr., that would be regarded as incredibly cheap.

On arrival, I didn’t have much time to decide where to eat, so we decided to play safe(-ish) and go for a curry. A quick search indicated that Indian House (Fred Olsens Gt. 11) had a reasonable vegetarian selection and it was close to the tram from our hotel, and the pub where we’d arranged to meet a friend. I had the mixed vegetable pakora to start, and followed it with Rajmah Masala – a red kidney bean curry. We were warned that Norwegian tastes tended to the bland, and they offered to make the dishes a little hotter for us.

I’d neglected to ask for no dairy (I was knackered, okay?) so the pakora came with a yoghurt sauce as well as a very tangy tamarind one. Okay, that was my fault, but the bigger surprise was discovering that cheese is apparently a vegetable as the pakora were cauliflower and paneer. I invoked travel rules, and made a mental note to check next time. I think the restaurant might make their own paneer, as it had a much better texture than the commercial stuff. The main course had been made hotter by simply adding chili. As the other spices were also under-represented, this just led to an unbalanced flavour, with the chilli dominating everything. Pity, as the dish is one of the standards that is rarely served in British curry shops.

To continue the bad start to the trip, the pubs we were hunting, Gambrinus, was not at the address we had for it, and there was no evidence that there had every been anything other than a jewellery shop there. Our friend had found an alternative address, but that was occupied by a loud rock bar. This suited us fine, and the beer wasn’t entirely bad (Leffe Bruin and Bedweiser Budvar in bottles) or excessively expensive so we stayed there.

On Haggis

This is a comment I made back in 2006, which is interesting in its own right.

Vegetarian haggis has been around for at least 100 years, and there is evidence to suggest that the original was veggie – it really is just leftovers plus oatmeal and spices. The oldest example I know of comes from Reform Cookery Book: Up-To-Date Health Cookery for the Twentieth Century by Mrs. Mill, published in 1904. Apart from the butter, which is easily substituted with another fat, the recipe is vegan.

Scotch Haggis.

“Fair fa’ yer honest, sonsy face,
Great chieftain o’ the puddin’ race.”

It is to be hoped the shade of Burns will forbear to haunt those who have the temerity to appropriate the sacred name of Haggis for anything innocent of the time-honoured liver and lights which were the sine qua non of the great chieftain. But in Burns’ time people were not haunted by the horrors of trichinae, measly affections, &c., &c. (one must not be too brutally plain spoken, even in what they are avoiding), as we are now, so perhaps this practical age may risk the shade rather than the substance.

For a medium-sized haggis, then, toast a breakfastcupful oatmeal in front of the fire, or in the oven till brown and crisp, but not burnt. Have the same quantity of cooked brown or German lentils, and a half-teacupful onions, chopped up and browned in a little butter. Mix all together and add 4 ozs. chopped vegetable suet, and seasoning necessary of ketchup, black and Jamaica pepper.

It should be fairly moist; if too dry add a little stock, gravy, or extract.

Turn into greased basin and steam at least 3 hours. An almost too realistic
imitation of “liver” is contrived by substituting chopped mushrooms for the lentils. It may also be varied by using crushed shredded wheat biscuit crumbs in place of the oatmeal. Any “remains” will be found very toothsome, if sliced when cold, and toasted or fried.

Interestingly, this recipe is almost identical to modern vegan haggises, which usually involve lentils and kidney beans, plus mushrooms.

Nut Rissoles with savoury rice

Last night I made a couple of dishes from Rupert H. Wheldon’s No Animal Food. First published around 1910, this was the first book to advocate veganism and it contains 100 recipes at the back. The ones I tried last night were:

12.–Nut Rissoles
3 ozs. mixed grated nuts, 3 ozs. breadcrumbs, 1 oz. nut butter, 1 chopped onion, 1 large cupful canned tomatoes.
Mix ingredients together; mould into rissoles, dust with flour and fry in ‘Nutter.’ Serve with gravy.

28.–Plain Savoury Rice
4 ozs. unpolished rice, 1 lb. tin tomatoes.
Boil together until rice is cooked. If double boiler be used no water need be added, and thus the rice will be dry and not pultaceous.

My versions:

Nut Rissoles
1 cup mixed nuts, chopped in food processor
breadcrumbs made from 1 slice wholemeal bread
2 tbsp vegan margarine
1 chopped onion
1 can tomatoes, blended.

Mix the nuts, breadcrumbs and onions together in a large bowl. Melt the margarine and add it. Use your hands to mix it all together and add just enough tomato to bind it. Make into four burgers. Dust with flour and fry slowly – they’ll burn if you’re not careful.

Plain Savoury Rice
1 cup long-grain brown rice
the remains of the tomatoes from the nut rissoles
enough water to make 2 cups liquid

Bung all of the above into your favourite rice pan. Bring to the boil and simmer, with the lid on tightly, until all the liquid is absorbed. Remove the lid, stir quickly with a fork, then replace the lid and let it sit, off the heat, for a couple of minutes or until you need it. Alternatively, put the ingredients in your rice cooker, and cook according to the instructions.

I served all of the above with my mushroom gravy, and can recommend both recipes. The rice, especially, was delicious, even though it’s so simple.

I’ve visited the Nut Rissoles before.

What I had for lunch

Nut cutlet, roast asparagus and pineapple salsa

Today’s lunch was made very quickly using a grill pan. The main protein was a Goodlife Nut Cutlet, which is really best done on a George Foreman-type grill (but you will be horrified when you see what comes out in the oil tray). This takes by far the longest time to cook, and went on first.

Next to that, I placed 8 narrow spears of asparagus. I love asparagus, but like to keep it as a special treat for when it’s in season, but my partner decided I needed a special treat anyway and bought me some regardless. When they were done, I moved them to the lowest part of the pan (our kitchen does not appear to be level) and braised them in a splash of sake before serving.

The pineapple salsa was based on a recipe in the June edition of Waitrose New – a free magazine produced by the supermarket to emphasise seasonal and new products. It uses their Organic Sugar Loaf Pineapple, which contributes to the Waitrose Foundation, a scheme which (according to Waitrose) complements Fairtrade whereby they put a proportion of profits into projects which improve the lives of the producers.

My version of the Spicy Pineapple Salsa (I’m not sure why they call it a salsa) recipe is incredibly simple:

200g pineapple, cut into large chunks
a few tiny chillies, rehydrated and chopped
1 tsp coriander leaf (frozen, in this case)

Grill the pineapple on a high heat in a grill pan, until nicely brown in places. Mix with the chilli and coriander. Serve.

The Waitrose version included palm sugar, but I can’t see why as it comes out more than sweet enough without it.

Edinburgh Farmers’ Market

The location for the farmers' market is spectacular, especially on a good day like this.

The Edinburgh Farmers’ Market is a weekly event, which is unfortunately on the wrong side of town for us. The withdrawal of the number 17 bus has made getting there by public transport impossible, and the fact that it’s on top of a car park isn’t an encouragement to use public transport either. So, when we go, unless we’re feeling really fit, we take the Volvo and then buy enough veg to justify it.

At first sight, the market doesn’t have much to offer the vegan, with an excess of meat stalls, and a couple of cheesemakers. They even have leaflets on the market information stall from the Meat Marketing Board promoting industrially-produced meat! But it’s not all unhealthy stuff, don’t worry.

Phantassie organic vegetables

Phantassie is an organic vegetable farm in East Lothian, and they are at the market a couple of times a month. This time round I bought red spring onions, smoked garlic, pea shoots (a green leafy veg), broad beans, white turnips and shiitake. Another regular is East Coast Organics, another East Lothian farm, who are at the market every week. Their stall provided me with a bunch of onions, another of carrots (carrot greens make good soup), one of radishes, a knobbly cucumber (good for Japanese recipes), a red kohlrabi and yellow courgettes. Meanwhile, my partner bought some fantastic plum tomatoes on the vine, and some baby plum tomatoes from the adjacent J & M Craig (one of the last remaining Clyde tomato growers) stall. The aroma from them is fantastic.

A couple of my favourite stalls weren’t there today. Ardnamushrooms grow shiitake and other fungi, and were the source of our organic shiitake block, an experiment in very local food we’d be glad to repeat some time. Carrolls Heritage Potatoes are only there on the first Saturday of the month, when tatties are in season, but they produce potatoes that I like — ones that taste of something. They have blue potatoes, purple potatoes and loads of flavoursome spuds from days of yore. I note they are now selling online, though, and have a stockist in Leith (if I can bear going into a fishmonger — I might have to send himself).

Cheery staff at the Good Soup Group.

All that shopping can be hard work, so we had a couple of snacks whilst there. I ignored him having his pig in a bun (which he complained wasn’t very good – ha!) and chose a spicy noodle soup from the Good Soup Group — the noodles were rice noodles, making the soup both vegan and gluten free. Special dietary requirements seem to be a particular concern at the Good Soup Group, and they try to source everything locally wherever possible. And then there’s The Chocolate Tree, lurking ready to ruin all of your healthy eating intentions. They do a massive range of chocolate bars, vegan chocolate hazelnut spread and vegan chocolate sorbet. The cones for the sorbet are not vegan, but they are more than happy to serve it to you in a cup instead. Messy, and delicious, afterwards my face resembled that of a three-year-old after a bath in cocoa. And I don’t care!

Eat and Two Veg

Note: this restaurant has now closed down. Bugger.

Look at all that lovely spinach!

Last week, at home in Edinburgh, my partner and I had been pondering where to go for breakfast that could both cater to me, and keep himself happy. We forgot about the one place that has build-your-own breakfasts (the Auld Hoose) and so ended up having something completely different instead.

This week, we were in London, so things should have been better. I admit I’m surprised that Eat and Two Veg was the only place coming up on searches to do vegan breakfasts, but it wasn’t too much out of the way, so we went along.

It fit the bill. I got a completely vegan breakfast which consisted of some grilled smoked tofu, beans, mushrooms, toast, lots of spinach –something I’ve only seen in Australia (and one posh cafe in Belfast) before — and half a large, half-cooked tomato, which got handed over to my partner before I took the photograph. I like raw tomatoes, and ones that are thoroughly cooked, but there’s a halfway stage I really dislike, and it seems to be a standard part of cooked breakfasts. Fortunately, he likes them that way. He got his eggs, (veggie) sausage etc. We both came out satisfied and happy. There was neither too little nor too much food, it was nicely cooked, although the toast was more like warm bread, and it tasted great.

Vegan breakfast choices could have been improved if they used vegan sausages, and the main menu looked almost bereft of vegan options. We’ll go back, but only for breakfast.

Eat and Two Veg, 50 Marylebone High St, London, UK, London W1U 5HN. (Warning: the restaurant website is all Flash, so presumably they do not welcome customers with visual disabilities).

A couple of scary links

A vegan blogger in LA decided to go completely over-the-top and test food from their local allegedly-vegan eateries, and the results were terrifying. 10 of the restaurants came out okay, with no evidence of contamination with egg, caesin or shellfish in their food. Most of the others showed some contamination, usually egg (which is an especial problem for me), but one of them was a massive FAIL!, with the blogger concluding that it might be deliberate deception rather than accidental cross-contamination.

The main problem seems to lie in fake meats imported from Taiwan, where the labelling rules are less strict than in the US (or Europe) for that matter. The ingredients lists are usually translated directly from those on the packaging for the local market. The good news is that the Taiwanese government is aware of the problem and is in the process of implementing some of the strictest laws in the world regarding the packaging and labelling of vegetarian food. The Taiwanese “meats” might be dodgy right now, but in a few months things will be much better.

The other link is to a site which is the antithesis of vegan, but is still interesting from a general foodie point of view. The author of Fancy Fast Food takes standard meals from fast food places and messes around with the presentation to make them look like haute cuisine. Nothing is added to the meals to achieve this except the occasional simple garnish.