Spring into Action - Part 2 - Meditteranean Chickpea Spread

I don't know about you but I'm getting pretty fed up with this weather. Were almost in June and I'm not feeling the Summer at all. Where I live in the Midlands its either raining or cold (I've even put the heating on at night!)

I thought if Summer isn't coming to me I'll go to Summer and I set to in my kitchen to make a summery sandwich spread. Before I transferred to a vegan lifestyle I used to love the Mediterranean Cheese Sandwiches I could buy at work. You can't get more summery than the Mediterranean can you so I thought I would try a vegan version. 

I was very impressed with this spread and I'll even go as far as saying that it beat the Mediterranean Cheese Sandwiches from work - hands down! These are far more healthy too even if they do use a little vegan mayonnaise. The spread can be made in minutes and it will easily feed 4 hungry people in some form of sandwich.

Ingredients
I Tin of chickpeas
½ Red pepper, finely diced
1 Stick celery, finely diced
4 Spring onions, finely diced
15g Nutritional yeast
Salt & Pepper
1 Tbsp vegan mayonnaise

Method
Rinse the chick peas well with cold water and pat dry. Transfer to a bowl and mash with a fork.

Add the red pepper, celery, spring onions and nutritional yeast and mix until well combined.

Add the salt and pepper to taste. Finally add the mayonnaise and fold through the mixture.

Use the mixture to spread onto bread to make sandwiches or spread onto flour tortillas to make wraps.

You can add more vegetables if you like and the spread would go further but I liked the ratio above, just enough to taste the summer!

Jasmine x

Specials Board: Chickpea & Lentil Taco's

As you know already there are some weird and wonderful days to celebrate throughout the year, and today is no exception, its a fabulous day. It's "Independence from Meat Day" and one I think we should all celebrate!

I'm loving Mexican style cooking at the moment, if you haven't guessed already. Today was my first day off work for a 10 day break - Yay! So I had something double to celebrate. So Mexican style cooking it was. I was feeling a little tired after a mad few weeks at work and believe it or not I haven't even been in the garden today, other than to pick a few lettuce leaves, so this recipe uses store cupboard ingredients for this meal.

Ingredients 
1 Tbsp Olive oil
1 Onion, diced
3 Garlic Cloves, crushed
1 Tin of chickpeas
1½-2 Tsp Hot Chilli powder
½ Tsp Dried Cumin
½ Tsp Smoked paprika
2 Tsp Porcini powder
1 Tin Green lentils
1 Tin chopped tomatoes
2 Tsp Balsamic vinegar
1 Tbsp Tomato puree
Salt & Black pepper


Method
Saute the onion in the olive oil until translucent, about 3 minutes, then add the garlic and saute for another minute.

Meanwhile drain and rinse the chickpeas and tip into a bowl. Using a potato masher squash the chick peas, you don't want a smooth paste you want some texture. Add the chilli powder, dried cumin, smoked paprika and porcini powder and mash once more so that ll the spices are combined with the chickpeas.

Add the chickpea mixture to the pan and pour over the tin of chopped tomatoes, give everything a good stir. Add the lentils and give everything another stir.

Slowly bring to a simmer and add the balsamic vinegar and tomato paste and simmer for 5 minutes. Add salt & pepper to taste.

Heat the Taco shells in the oven for 3 minutes and spoon the taco mixture into the shells. Serve with homemade guacamole and a little drizzle of vegan mayonnaise. Devour!

Ready Steady Cook Challenge 1

A few days ago I asked readers to either facebook me or leave a comment on the blog which listed three ingredients and I would post a recipe which I believed showcased these ingredients. Now I haven't had hundreds of people suggesting three ingredients, phew, but I have had a couple and the first person to challenge me was Kiera.

She listed the following ingredients:

• Tofu
• Chickpeas
• Beetroot

She also told me that she wasn't a huge fan of tofu and wanted something to tempt her into trying it again. The only time she had tried chickpeas was in houmous and beetroot didn't tempt her at all! This was a hard challenge, I needed to make something tasty which included three ingredients that Kiera wasn't very keen on.

Now, you will recall that I have been reviewing ready made vegan burgers and I decided that I should be making my own instead of buying processed food. So I thought I could roll the two challenges into one and make a burger with the ingredients Kiera had challenged me with. Everyone likes a good veggie burger don't they? The ingredients may not be showcased as such in this recipe but I thought to tempt Kiera back to the wonderful world of tofu we had to take fairy steps.

Well, Kiera here is the recipe that I hope tempts you to try tofu again.

BCT Burgers - Ingredients

1 Tbsp olive oil
1 Small onion, thinly sliced
150g Tofu, pressed and grated
1 Cooked beetroot
80g Mushrooms, chopped and fried
50g Chickpeas
½ Carrot, grated
1 Garlic clove
2 Tbsp Garam flour (chickpea flour)
1tsp Smoked Paprika
½ Tsp Dried thyme
½ Tsp Chilli flakes
2 Slices jarred jalapenos
Salt and Pepper


Method
Fry the thinly sliced onions in the olive oil until they start to turn a caramel colour, add the chopped mushrooms and continue to fry until they have released their liquid and cooked through. Meanwhile grate the beetroot, tofu and carrot into a bowl and add the spices, garlic, herbs and salt & pepper. Mash the chickpeas and add to the bowl along with the cooked onion and mushrooms. Sprinkle over the garam flour and stir to combine thoroughly. The mixture should start to form a dough like ball, if not add more flour. With damp hands shape the mixture into two large patties and place on a greased baking tray. The mixture does make two very large patties so you may choose to divide the mixture into three or four patties. Bake in a moderate oven for 30 minutes turning once.