My favourite band are back!

OK, this post has absolutely nothing to do with food, baking or animals. Instead it's about my favourite band, The Jayhawks. I've loved their music for the best part of 25 years and I never tire of them. Maybe I'm the only person in the world with a Jayhawks tattoo on my arm, who knows.

The two main band members parted ways in 1995 but now they've fully reformed and are back to the same line-up they had when they were at their best. They have a new album coming out in September called Mockingbird Time and I'm seeing them play live next month - can't wait!!!

If you like what you see in this video, I thoroughly recommend any of the Jayhawks' albums for further listening, particularly Tomorrow the Green Grass and Hollywood Town Hall.

Trip to Wales

I spent all last week with my Mum and Nan, who live in the Welsh hills in a beautiful house that overlooks both the Brecon Beacons and Black Mountains. They have views to die for and I never tire of looking out of the window. Unfortunately, being Wales, it's fair to say that it rains a lot. It's also fair to say that whatever week I choose to visit in the summertime, the weather is always much better the week after I leave there. So, despite it being "flaming June" I spent most of last week wearing jumpers and my winter jacket!

Nonetheless, we (my husband and I) managed to get out and about quite a bit and were generally quite lucky to avoid the rain. Where my folks live they're lucky enough to have miles of open countryside just up the lane and so we'd go for a walk after dinner. As we were walking up the lane we spotted some wild strawberries! I've only ever seen them once before (in the Elan Valley) but on this occasion I decided not to scoff any as although the lane gets relatively little traffic, I still didn't fancy eating from where cars and tractors pass close by.

We went on quite a lengthy walk one afternoon and ended up along a forestry track where they are sadly decimating the landscape with logging. Although it technically meant we had a better view of the surrounding hills it was still awful to see all the devastation that logging creates and to think of all the animals killed or displaced during the process.

My Mum has the sweetest Springer Spaniel called Meg. She has a lovely temperament and has the most beautiful little face but she has had bad legs for much of her life. She's still perfectly happy in herself and full of life, but she can't go on long walks these days. Although she is so photogenic, she can't stand being photographed and it doesn't matter if you pull out a DSLR or a little point 'n' shoot, she can instantly tell what it is and looks the other way. On this visit I was lucky enough to point my camera at her when she was unaware and managed to take a snap just as she realised and began to run off!

I found another little friend on this occasion, a lamb that I've named Bert. Apparently his mother wasn't producing enough milk, so he was bottle-fed for a while. He's obviously retained his connection with humans, because while all the other ewes and lambs either ignored me or ran away when I went to the gate, little Bert would bravely run up all by himself for a rub behind the ears and a tickle on the chin. Such a sweetheart. Bert belongs to my Mum's tenant, but he's assured her that his future is safe.

My Mum has had a few lambs from her tenant, Neil, over the years and some have lived to a ripe old age. Fred is still going and he must be aged around 15 or 16. Daisy I found as a lamb abandoned all by herself in a remote field, just hours after being born (the farmer must have moved his flock without realising he had a late lamb) and my Mum also has Jim. They are all big fatties and enjoy nibbling carrots and the odd biscuit. They may "only" be sheep, but they all have their own personalities which is yet another reason why you shouldn't eat them. I secretly hope that my Mum will end up with Bert too, but as long as he won't be going anywhere that'll have to do for now.

We climbed a mountain one day which was incredibly steep but we had the whole place to ourselves, so the effort (and frightening drive along incredibly narrow roads) was worthwhile.

Just to finish, here's another photo that I took from a high and winding road on the way to a rather depressed, downbeat town called Ebbw Vale. I hate to say it, but a lot of the people there looked like they were on benefits and I believe that when the steel works closed down the unemployment figures probably went through the roof. The town itself has nothing to redeem it apart from a Wetherspoons and an ice cream parlour (dairy, of course), but the journey there is spectacular in places.

Low-Fat Chocolate Tray Bake

Oh dear, I bought a block of Cauldron firm tofu ages ago, it sat in my fridge for yonks and it was only the night before I was due to go to my Mum's for a week that I realised the Use By date would come up while I was away. Being such a skinflint, I really didn't want to throw away an unopened packet and I'd already had my dinner, so I really wasn't sure what to do with it.

I had a quick search online and found a recipe for Low-Fat Brownies which had originally come from RecipeZaar. I had all the ingredients to hand, except that I'd searched for "firm tofu" and the recipe did indeed call for that, but in brackets it had "silken lite". Oh well, I decided to give it a go anyway. 

Aside from using regular firm tofu instead of film silken tofu, I also used regular plain flour rather than wholewheat (the only wholewheat flour I can ever find in Tesco is wholemeal bread flour), cut out the almond extract and added a little extra oil to help with the blending (to be honest, I thought that 1 tsp oil in the original recipe must have been a typo). Upon tasting the mixture I found it was nowhere near sweet enough, so I bumped the sugar up a lot. 

To be honest with you, I'd be in no rush to make this recipe again. Although it cooked up just fine and was nice and moist, the chocolate flavour was nowhere near as pronounced as it needed to be and despite the increased sugar, it still wasn't sweet enough. Bearing this in mind, if you give it a go you might want to swap a little of the flour for extra cocoa - say 1/8 to 1/4 cup. I baked my brownies for 25 minutes because when I inserted a skewer at the 20-mins mark they appeared to be underdone. However, at the 25-mins mark they were definitely of the more cakey-brownie consistency, so you'd be wise to err on the side of caution and not leave them in a minute longer than necessary.

Ingredients

1 1/3 cup plain flour

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp cinnamon

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 cup applesauce

1 tbs sunflower oil

1 1/8 cup caster sugar (original recipe called for only 3/4 cup)

12oz firm tofu (eg Cauldron, original recipe called for firm silken tofu)

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1/3 cup cocoa (needs more in my opinion - swap out some of the flour for extra cocoa)

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 175C/350F/Gas Mark 4 and line a 7" or 8" square tin with baking paper. Make life easier for yourself by using one long strip to fit the base and overlap two sides so you have a "handle" to lift the brownies out with.

2. Combine the flour, baking soda, cinnamon and salt in a bowl.

3. Use a blender or food processor to blitz the applesauce, oil, sugar, tofu, vanilla and cocoa until smooth.

4. Pour the blended ingredients into the flour mixture and stir until combined.

5. Pour into the prepared tin, smooth the top and bake for 20-25 mins.

Tip: I used my Bullet blender to combine the tofu etc but it wasn't nearly big enough and I had to do everything in batches, then stir it all together and this got quite tedious and messy. You'll need to use a decent-size blender or food processor (or have more patience than me).

Makes: 16 squares

Chewy Lemon Crinkles

This week, as usual, I wanted to bake something but I wasn't quite sure what. When I went to Tesco I realised it had been ages since I'd bought any lemons, so they went in my basket and then I just needed to come up with something.

I found a recipe for chewy lemon cookies that looked great. The trouble was, they made an enormous number and they contained eggs as well as a lot of butter, so I had a lot of changes to make if I was going to give it a go. My aim was to make a lower-fat, vegan version but it was a real experiment as to whether or not I'd be successful. Well, successful isn't the word because I amazed myself with how well these turned out! Just opening the tub they're in creates a wonderful waft of lemon and they have the most awesome, soft, fluffy texture and look fab... even if I do say so myself! I had to put some straight in the freezer because I couldn't trust myself not to scoff the whole lot in one evening!

Chewy Lemon Crinkles

Ingredients

1 1/4 cups + 1/8 cup (2 tbs) plain flour

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

28g (2oz) vegan margarine

1/4 cup applesauce

3/4 cup caster sugar

1/2 tsp egg replacer powder

1 tbs water

1/4 tsp vanilla extract

Zest of 1 large lemon

2 tbs lemon juice (1 lemon should easily give this amount)

1/4 cup caster sugar

 for coating cookies

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 175C/350F/Gas Mark 4 and line two (three if your oven has the capacity) baking trays with baking paper.

2. Stir the flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt together in a small bowl.

3. In your main bowl, cream together the sugar, margarine and applesauce using an electric whisk (whizzing the ingredients in a blender or food processor for a few seconds also works well).

4. Whisk the egg replacer powder and water together until foamy, then add to the creamed ingredients along with the vanilla, lemon zest and lemon juice.

5. Set aside your whisk and use a fork or spatula to fold in the dry ingredients, stirring only until combined.  The dough will be soft and sticky.

6. Put the 1/4 cup of sugar in a small bowl.

7. Use a small ice cream scoop (4cm) or a spoon to scoop out a ball of dough approx 1" across and drop it into the sugar. Roll the ball around and spoon sugar over the top so that it's covered all over. As the dough is sticky, you may find it easier to either chill it for a little while to firm up a little, or just drop "blobs" into the sugar and form the balls once they've been coated.

8. Add each ball to the baking trays. There's no need to flatten the balls, but spread them out fairly well.

9. Bake for 8-10 minutes until set on top. The cookies are not supposed to take on any colour - they're meant to stay pale.

10. Leave to firm up a little on the baking trays for a couple of minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool.

Makes: 18-20 cookies (based on 4cm scoop)

Breakfast Muffins

After a couple of days over-indulging in Chocolate Semifreddo I thought I'd look for something healthier to make instead. One of my recent book purchases has been Vegan Bake Sale by Carla Kelly and I'll have to find the time to post a review of it one of these days because, aside from the recipes, it's really excellent for people new to baking with so much information in it.

Anyway, I flicked through the book and Good Morning Muffins caught my eye because they contained pineapple and I had half a can in the fridge to use up. They also contained my pet hate, raisins, so as I decided to make another couple of substitutions and reduce the fat I essentially ended up with my own version of the recipe and I thought it worked out pretty well. With all the oats you get quite a dense, substantial muffin that is chewy, juicy and crunchy, all in one bite - can't be bad! They're not too sweet, but they're quite filling and good as a little breakfast. I decided to sprinkle oats and a little sugar on top to add a little more visual interest and sweetness, but you can leave these out if you like. As usual, I only wanted to make enough for the two of us, so I cut everything down to make 6 muffins - it's easy to double-up to 12 if you're feeding more of a crowd (or just super hungry!).

I thoroughly recommend silicone muffin trays. I got mine ages ago from Tesco and they've been consistently brilliant. I never have to worry about liners or greasing because the non-stick quality of silicone and its flexibility means that muffins come out with almost no effort at all.

Don't be daunted by the long list of ingredients because you'll probably have most of them in your cupboards anyway and it's really only a case of mixing dry, mixing wet then mixing both together as per usual, so the recipe isn't any more time-consuming than others.

Breakfast Muffins

Ingredients

1/2 tbs ground flax seeds

1 1/2 tbs pineapple juice (from canned pineapple)

3/4 cup plain flour

1/4 cup caster sugar

1 tbs cornflour

1/2 tbs baking powder

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/4 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

1/2 cup rolled oats (not instant porridge)

1/4 seeds (eg pumpkin and sunflower seed mix)

1/8 cup chopped pecans

1/2 cup soya milk

1/4 + 1/8 cup crushed pineapple, drained (see tip below)

2 tbs sunflower oil

1 tbs applesauce

1 tsp vanilla extract

A few more rolled oats and a sprinkling more sugar for decoration

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 190C/375F/Gas Mark 5 and, if not using a silicone muffin tin, spray your tin with low-calorie oil spray.

2. In a medium bowl, stir together the flax seed and water.

3. In a larger bowl, stir together the flour, sugar, cornflour, baking powder, cinnamon, baking soda, salt, seeds and nuts (all the dry ingredients, basically).

4. Going back to your medium bowl, add the soya milk, pineapple, oil, applesauce and vanilla extract to the flax seed gloop and stir together.

5. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and stir until just combined (don't overmix).

6. Spoon into the muffin tray - if the holes are the same size as mine you'll find the mixture will go right up to the tops.

7. Decorate the tops by sprinkling over a few rolled oats and a little sugar, if desired.

8. Bake for around 20 minutes until the tops are browned and a skewer inserted into the middle of a muffin comes out clean.

9. Leave the muffins in the tin for a few minutes, then transfer to cool fully on a wire rack.

Tip: The original recipe called for crushed pineapple but I've never seen such a thing so I used regular canned, chopped pineapple and just squished up the chunks with the bottom of my measuring cup before draining the excess juice back into the can.  Finely chopping the chunks should work OK too.

Makes: 6 standard-size muffins

A Smooth Slice of Chocolate Heaven

OK, it looks like a house brick but in this case appearances are definitely deceiving as behind the dull facade lies a slab of chocolate ambrosia. This was another recipe that I saw in Vegetarian Living magazine that was taken from a book called Simply Gluten-Free & Dairy Free by Grace Cheetham. In my opinion the author missed a trick with this one, because she used honey rather than a vegan-friendly sweetener. OK, so her book isn't necessarily aimed at vegans, but to veganise this one was a no-brainer. One simple swap and voila, possibly the most delicious vegan chocolate ice cream I've ever tasted! I used agave nectar for its relatively neutral taste, but maple syrup would probably work really well too.

The recipe called it a semifreddo, which means "semi-frozen" in Italian. This is no soft-scoop ice cream but a rich, decadent and super-smooth slice of chocolate heaven. Despite the name, it sets rock solid in the freezer so you'll need to get it out a little while before serving in order to be able to slice it.

This semifreddo is extremely tasty with great mouth-feel, but you won't be able to scoff much of the stuff in one sitting (well, not without feeling poorly afterwards), so it's just as well that my halved recipe makes a relatively small amount. The original recipe said it served 10 and used a 450g loaf tin as a mould. I cut everything in half and used a cute mini loaf tin (one of a set of four that I got for a great price from TKMaxx) which was the absolute perfect size. The slices you get are quite small, so if there are more than two of you at home you'd probably do better to double up and use the normal-size loaf tin. As I'm only treating me and my husband, the dinky slices are just fine.

Ingredients

150g dark chocolate (70% cocoa solids)

50g agave nectar

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 tsp caster sugar or extra agave syrup (optional - to taste)

1 x 250ml carton soya cream (I used Alpro)

1 tbs cornflour

1 tbs water

Method 

1. Break the chocolate into pieces and melt it gently, either in the microwave or in a bowl over lightly simmering water (if you do it this way then make sure the base of the bowl doesn't touch the water).

2. Stir in the agave nectar and vanilla. Taste and add a little caster sugar or extra syrup if it's not sweet enough for you.

3. Heat the soya cream over medium heat until bubbling.

4. While you're waiting for the cream to heat up, combine the cornflour and water in a little jug.

5. Once the cream is bubbling, add in the cornflour mixture and continue to bubble for 2-3 minutes until thickened slightly.

6. Pour the cream into the chocolate mixture.

7. Line a mini loaf pan (around 5" x 2") with enough clingfilm, ensuring there's enough of an overhang to fold over the top once you're done.

8. Pour in the mixture, leave to cool then fold the clingform over the top and freeze.

9. Remove from the freezer for 10 mins or so (depends on the temperature in your kitchen!) to enable you to slice before serving.

Tip: Whisk the cornflour mixture before adding it to the pan, then whisk as and after you add it in order to fully blend it into the cream without leaving any little lumps. If you do still happen to end up with some, just whizz the mixture in your blender for a few seconds before pouring into the mould.

Makes: 2-3 servings

Spanish-Style Rice & Butterbeans

I'm such a foodie that I've always got my nose in either my newest recipe book (I have an insanely large and ever-growning collection) or a food magazine. I read Good Food, Delicious and Olive, even though the number of meat and fish recipes they have annoys me. Even though they insist on marking recipes with Parmesan cheese as vegetarian (Delicious even published the letter I wrote them to complain, but they still do it!). 

To this day I still miss the BBC Vegetarian magazine but at least I now have Cook Vegetarian and Vegetarian Living to keep me going. Even they annoy me, though, because they pull most of their content (especially Cook Vegetarian) from books and manufacturers instead of creating their own recipes. 

A case in point is this month's Vegetarian Living magazine, which features recipes from a book called Simply Gluten-Free & Dairy Free by Grace Cheetham. There were two recipes that caught my eye - this one for Spanish-Style Rice & Butterbeans and a Chocolate Semifreddo (more on that in my next post!).

The recipe was supposed to serve 4, but the quantities seemed massive - 8 peppers, 6 tomatoes, 600g butterbeans as well as the rice? I halved everything, slightly simplified the recipe and found that it still made plenty for 3 people. It was easy enough to make but to me the end result tasted of smoked paprika and not much else. I have a bad nose and often have no sense of smell, so that might have affected my judgement because my husband thought the dish was delicious (but then he seems to say that about almost everything I cook). The recipe also included black olives which I don't like, so you might prefer the dish with a handful thrown in. Oh, and it also called for several tablespoons of olive oil but I managed to cook successfully just by using an low-calorie oil spray and a decent pan.

Anyway, recipes like this are only ever a guide to ingredients and you are free to make substitutions or additions as much as you like. If I make it again, for instance, I'll probably use chickpeas instead of butterbeans as they're more to my liking. I'd also add more garlic and some additional herbs.

Spanish-Style Rice & Butterbeans

Ingredients

3 vine tomatoes, halved

2 red peppers, quartered

2 yellow or orange peppers, quartered

1 onion, finely chopped

1 clove garlic, finely chopped

2 tsp smoked paprika

2 tsp dried parsley

1 tbs tomato puree

150g basmati rice

300ml vegetable stock (made up according to box)

175ml vegan dry white wine

1 x 400g can butterbeans, drained

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 175C/350F/Gas Mark 4 and lightly spray a baking tray with low-calorie oil spray.

2. Arrange the tomato halves and quartered peppers on the tray and give them a little spray over the top.

3. Put them in the oven and roast for 25-30 mins while you're getting on with the rest of the recipe. You want the veggies to be lovely and soft with charred areas on the skins.

4. Spray a deep pan with low-calorie oil spray and fry the onion gently for 3-4 minutes.

5. Add the garlic and fry for 30 seconds.

6. Add the rice, tomato puree and smoked paprika, stirring to coat the rice.

7. Pour in the stock and wine, stir and bring to the boil.

8. Reduce to a simmer and cook for 10-15 mins until the rice is tender (not overdone), adding a little extra stock or water if necessary to prevent sticking. End up with a moist mixture, not too dry.

9. By this time your veggies in the oven should be done, so remove them from a tray to a bowl, cover the bowl with a plate and leave them to steam for 5 mins or more - this will make it easier to remove the skins.

10. Once cool enough to handle, peel the skins from the tomatoes and peppers (I didn't worry too much about stubborn bits on the peppers) and chop into smaller strips/chunks if preferred (I quartered the tomatoes and cut the peppers into strips).

11. Add the veggies to the rice, together with the butterbeans. Stir together over low heat to make sure the veggies and beans are hot enough before serving.