Happy Garlic Day!
I absolutely love garlic, I can't get enough of it, I probably eat some most days, its great at adding depth of flavour to a dish. I use fresh garlic, garlic granules, garlic salt and garlic purée and sometimes all of the above!
Then there is always the pleasure of foraging for wild garlic also known as ramsons. You may have come across it whilst walking through a wood or along a stream. It has pretty white flowers and luscious green leaves. You will find it in most places where you find bluebells, it thrives in damp woodlands and partial shade.
Although it looks very similar to lilly of the valley, which is poisonous to eat, you will never get the two plants mixed up because of the pungent smell in the air when you're walking through it. If you're still in any doubt bruise the leaves slightly and if it doesn't smell of garlic then leave well alone!
Although you can eat the bulbs and flowers, the leaves are what you're looking for. The leaves are not as intense as domestic garlic, and taste great raw or cooked. As soon as I get my hands on some I'll post some recipes for you to try.
Meanwhile, on with the great garlic show, this isn't a recipe as such, more like a refresher on how to make the most tasty homemade vegan garlic bread ever!
Ingredients
Bread of your choice, homemade or bought
6-8 cloves of garlic, depending on how strong you like it
A few glugs of good olive oil
Handfull of finely chopped parsley
Sprinkling of salt
Method
Slice your bread any which way you choose, I tend to slice it length ways as that's the easiest to soak up the garlicky oil.
Finely chop the garlic with a knife, adding a little salt as you crush it. Finely chop the fresh parsley and mix it into the chopped garlic.
Add a few glugs of good quality olive oil and mix it into the chopped garlic and parsley, spreading it out on the board to the same length as your cut bread.
Soak up the garlicky oil by pressing the cut side of the bread into it, mopping up every last bit. Place the two sides of cut bread together and if there is any oil left on your board run the bread through it before wrapping in silver foil. Bake in a moderate oven for 15-20 minutes depending on the crunch you prefer.
Enjoy!
No, the title doesn't mean I've been drunk and now sobered up!
With all the fresh vegetables I bought on Wednesday I was excited about cooking tonight's tea. I randomly chose some vegetables from the fridge and decided to challenge myself to make something yummy. I was really pleased with the results.
The vegetables I chose were, mushrooms, carrot, onion, celery, red pepper, green pepper, baby corn and courgette.
After looking at the vegetables for what seemed ages, I decided I was going to make a vegan version of spaghetti bolognaise, no fake meats allowed. To do this I needed to add some standard store cupboard ingredients, which were, Vegetable bouillon powder, chopped tomato, paprika, oregano, herbamore salt, pepper, tomato puree and garlic.
I finely diced the onion, garlic and most of the peppers and then through all the other vegetables into my trust food processor to chop up.
I processed and pulsed until all the veg looked like this
I fried the onions in a little olive for about 5 minutes before adding the garlic and cooked for another two minutes before adding the chopped peppers and cooking for another 5 minutes. Then I added the processed vegetables to the pan and let them cook for another 5 minutes.
Next I added the chopped tomatoes and a little tomato passata and stirred to combine. Next came the tomato puree, herbs and spices (including a pinch of chilli pepper), salt and pepper. I also added a little sugar, parsley and about a teaspoon of balsamic vinegar. I let this mixture simmer slowly whilst I boiled the soba noodles.
After boiling the soba noodles for about 6 minutes drain and rinse with cold water, this will stop the cooking process. Pour into a dish and top with the veganiase sauce.
Eat it up! Even though I say so myself this dish was amazing and one that I will make time and time again, it truly was delicious. It turned out far better than I'd hoped.
Today I wanted something simple for lunch and after doing the rounds of some of my favourite vegan bloggers I came across Maple Spice's recipe for Mushroom Pasta. Her photographs wanted me to cook and eat it straight away. I just wish she had been in my kitchen making it for me herself! I still feel pretty lousy and having my own personal chef would have been perfect, but no such luck!
After checking my cupboards for the ingredients, I soon realised that to make her recipe would have been impossible, I had no soy, rice, coconut or almond milk! But what I did find lurking in my cupboards was a packet of vegan cheese sauce powder,which I bought when I first tried veganism 3 years ago!
My mind was set on mushroom pasta, so I boiled up some wholewheat pasta and made up some cheese sauce according to the instructions on the packet, which just required water. But I also added garlic granules, nutritional yeast and parsley to the sauce, as per Maple Spice recipe. I also added some garlic puree to the sauce too for that extra garlicky loveliness. Meanwhile I fried 2 field mushrooms in a little vitalite and once cooked added some cooked frozen peas. Once the pasta was cooked I added to the mushrooms and poured over the cheese sauce. The cheese sauce was extremely thick (even though I added the recommended amount of water) so I also added about half of the pasta water to loosen everything up.
The verdict: it wasn't the greatest cheese sauce in the world but the added parsley and garlic made it edible! As soon as I've been shopping I will try the recipe of Maple Spice, because it does look so tasty.
