Chocolate Crunch Peanut Squares

Ingredients 

• 2 Cups Smooth Peanut Butter 
• 3 small pears, peeled, chopped
• 1 banana
• 25 dates soaked in boiling water to cover
• 3/4 cup quinoa, rinsed and toasted
• 3/4 cup of SR flour
• 3/4 cup oats
• 2 tsp Vanilla Extract
• 3/4 cup cocoa
• 1/4 cup oat milk
• 1/2 cup coconut sugar
• 3/4 Cup Vegan Chocolate Chips (Optional) (135g)

Method

• Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F) and line a 9"x13" baking dish with baking paper and set aside
• Combine the peanut butter, pears, banana, dates and hot water in a food processor until smooth
• Add the flour, coconut sugar and cocoa and mix
• Rinse your quinoa and toast it in a hot dry pan until it starts to pop.  Stir it to make sure it toasts evenly
• Pour into the prepared pan and place in the oven to bake for 20 minutes. The middle will still look under baked but you want them like this so they are fudgy
• When they are almost done, if you are using the chocolate, scatter pieces on top and put it back in the oven allowing the chocolate to melt.

Lentils with Rice and Celery

 

Lentils with rice is a traditional high protein dish that has different names and slightly different flavours in cultures all over the world.  In Cyprus, it is Fakes Moutzentra or in the Middle East Mujadara.  I guess here in Ireland the closest thing would be the soup mix pack that has barley and lentils or maybe in England a traditional Pease Pudding but neither of them are as tasty as lentils with rice from other parts of the world.  I became familiar with it in Paphos, Cyprus, as I spent a lot of time there when I was younger and vegetarian.  It weas always a relief to find traditional food that was cruelty free.  Maybe that’s why this dish and others that remind me of those times, like the lentils with orzo we ate night are my comfort foods.  Here is my take on it.  Easy and tasty.

 

This was easy to make in the Instant Pot and it is high in protein and tasty.  I served it with a sliced tomato, sliced radishes, a yogurt dressing made from Lidl natural Soya Yogurt with diced cucumber, garlic, salt, and window-ledge cress.  I had two onions just for me, fried in my cast iron pan until they were brown and crispy that I put on top of the lentils and rice.

The reason I needed a comfort food today was it is the first time since last year that I have not had my 13-year-old daughter with me to share food at lunchtime.  All the children have been sent back to school today even though our vaccine programme is behind schedule and there’s only a few weeks left of term.  Shout out to all the other mummies or guardians out there who are home alone today for the first time in months. 

 

Here is today’s recipe that will make 4 lunch time portions.

Lentils with Rice

1 cup of brown rice

1 cup of brown lentils

2.5 cups cold water

½ head of celery

2 bay leaves

4 cloves garlic

Dessert spoon cumin

A pinch of salt

Olive oil - optional

2 onions (at least one per son – I used two just for me and I felt spoilt!)

Yogurt Dressing

¼ pot of natural yogurt

½ cucumber

Garlic

Salt

Side salad

Tomato

Radishes

Method:

1. Rinse the lentils and rice together in water and drain.

2. Add them both to the instant Pot with cumin, bay leaves, water, salt, and sliced celery.

3. Set the Instant Pot to 23 minutes at High Pressure.

4. When this has finished, I did a Quick Pressure Release and added a little olive oil.

5. I sliced then onions thinly and fried them in a large and hot cast iron pan.

 

To plate up – and it looks lovely plated – put your lentil and rice mixture in the middle of the plate and the yogurt dressing to one side.  The tomato and radish to the other side.  The fried onions go on top.

Breaded Garlic Mushrooms

 Here's a link to my Instagram Reel because it's easier than typing how to do it :)

Dandy Lions

 

Dandies

 

Oh so beautiful 

Majestic magnificent 

Ferocious in protecting your deeply rooted territory 

But you are welcome, you know, always,

with your yellow heads of happiness

feast for bees and for my eyes

As you cautiously peer and then erupt with a roar

In a brave show of beautiful colour

It's hard to believe we once

Shot to kill, uprooted and exiled you

I'm grateful for your forgiveness and for your return

-You are always welcome here-

And later, when your fancy fades to fairy dust

-As happens to us all-

I will watch in wonder as you drift up, leading the way

And I will pray for your return when the sun warms

The bones of us all

 

©Louisa Moss April 2021

 

You'll never achieve anything by going vegan

 Well you know what, turns out that there is power in personal spend.

In recent weeks, myself and @yesdaveitsvegan have been conducting a shopping experiment.  Going to our local branches of Lidl or Aldi or Tesco and M&S and seeing if we can buy the same products and if possible, looking at the price differences. 

Ireland, as you'd know, if you live here, is generally more expensive.  The biggest difference was in week 1 of our challenge when Aldi Ireland was a whopping 28% more expensive that it's UK counterpart.

But looking a little closer and there seems to be other interesting facts emerging

1) Ireland is more expensive for processed foods and prepared meals but cheaper for a lot of ingredients - split red lentils are cheaper in Ireland in every store we visited

2) The UK has a larger population and a bigger target market and with that we expected to find a better selection of products in the UK.   This wasn't always the case.  Aldi Stores in Ireland stock tofu, Karen couldn't find it in any UK stores.  Lidl Ireland had a bigger vegan range in the fridge section which included salads, burgers, tofu and meats 

3) Packaging - there seems to have been more steps taken to tackle packaging and plastic waste in Ireland than in the UK.  For example, Lidl has introduced paper covers and reduced plastic on their potted herbs.  In the UK they are still wrapped in plastic in standard containers

4) Way To Go chocolate - I have been going on about this for a while because I think it is brilliant that there is an affordable vegan chocolate that is made of  Fair Trade ingredients that pays an additional premium on top of the Fair Trade premium to farmers.  There is a section on the Lidl Ireland website about this.  Karen couldn't find this in the UK stores although it is supposed to be sold there too - it launched last year

 We have many weeks ahead of us to shop- I hope - but to me, it looks like stores here are reacting to consumer pressure.  We have a high percentage of vegans and people on the vegan journey here and I think we are quite vocal about telling stores what it is we want them to sell!

What do you think?  

Annual Vegan Bake Sale - Online for the second year running

 The VSI Annual Vegan Bake Sale first took place in 2010 in Dublin.  Here's a link to a blog I found about it.  

The first one I attended was in 2011 and there's an article about it in The Irish Vegetarian from that year.

It was such a great event because buying vegan sweets, treats and cakes and other bakes was nearly impossible back then. It was so lovely to be able to go to an event and buy things that were all vegan.   It was also a great opportunity to meet other people who were on the same journey at the the same time as you and to raise money for animal charities.

Last year as we went into lockdown, Grace, Sarah and I decided to host a vegan bake and donate online and we have just hosted the second online bake and donate.   We suggested vegan animal sanctuaries and rescues as beneficiaries Back Into Daylight, Eden Farmed Animal Sanctuary, Heartstone Veganic Sanctuary,  Furry Friends

Vegan sanctuaries provide a safe-place for their residents to live lives without exploitation, separation and slaughter.  This is not about providing high standards of welfare for the non-human residents, it is about recognising that the residents have a right to live their lives with guardians who will protect them and not exploit them rather than owners who view them as property for exploitation and profit.

I made a Pear Upside Down Cake and a Choc Chip Cookie Cake for the event.  There were some fantastic other makes - I really liked the look of Amy V Annabel's Chocolate with fresh berries and seeds and I will definitely be trying that out. 

Here are the recipes for the cakes I made.  I used a Vegan Richa recipe for the pear cake and I adapted a recipe from another one I had for the Choc Chip Cookie Cake - here it is

2 cups of self-raising flour

3/4 cup of coconut sugar

1/2 cup of maple syrup

1/2 cup of soya milk

2 teaspoons of vanilla extract

pinch of salt

3/4 cup of choc chips 

1/2 cup of blended raw pear

a lined 9 inch round tin

1.  Mix all the dry ingredients

2.  Mix all the wet ingredients

3. Make a well in the dry ingredients and slowly add most of the wet mixture.  You should have a thickish mix.

4.  Pour mixture into the lined tin.   I have a very old wonky gas oven and I baked it at gas mark 4 for 30 minutes.

a slice of choc chip cookie cake

Pear Upside Down Cake

The reason I chose pears as the fruit around my bakes was because pears were on offer in Lidl - so I had a punnet for 49 cents to use!

Fixing Nursery Rhymes - Mary Had a Little Lamb

 Mary Had a Little Lamb by Louisa Moss

© louisamoss2021

Mary had a little lamb

They used to laugh and play

But when it came to Eastertide

Her lamb it went away

Mary searched the fields by day

She asked her friends at night

Had anyone seen lamby round

She hugged her teddy tight

Mumma where's my Lamby gone

Mary said with tears

Lamby must be scared outside

Of wolves and other fears

Easter Sunday came around

They sat down for their lunch

Then Mary saw Lamby was found

Pain hit her like a punch

She screamed oh how could we do this

She felt the pain inside

When she looked upon the plates

That's where her lamb did hide

Oh mumma how did we do this

Lamby was my friend

I never will eat animals

Until my life does end

#govegan

Is Dublin 7 the vegan capital of Ireland?

Is Dublin 7 the vegan capital of Ireland?

It might come as no surprise that vegan restaurants and options are opening in Dublin all the time, but did you know that Dublin 7 is the vegan capital of Dublin?

There are so many excellent vegan options in the area whatever your vegan food tasted may be.  Is this because Dublin 7 has more vegans that any other Dublin area? Maybe!  There certainly seems to be quite few vegan families!

Dublin 7 is home to two excellent vegan bakeries, Buttercream Dream and Indigo’s Spoon.  Buttercream Dream formerly known as Buttercream Bakery, has won multiple awards for their excellent bakes.  Starting with a competition win at the Vegetarian Society of Ireland Focus Point Cook off with an amazing Loveheart Cake.  Buttercream supplies many restaurants and shops all over Ireland, is a regular at many local markets and has weekly deliveries all over Dublin.  Check out their Instagram page for more details.   Indigo’s Spoon is a more recent addition to the vegan baked goods scene and very welcome they are too with their monthly goodie boxes, always filled with tasty surprises and special occasion cakes. 

 

Image credit:  Buttercream Dream

Check out Indigo’s Unicorn cake and other amazing bakes on Facebook and Instagram.

 

Image credit:  Indigo’s Spoon

Dublin 7 is home to the most vegan restaurants of any area of Dublin.  Is it because Dublin 7 is the most hop and trendy area of Dublin?  Is it because Dublin 7 is filled with ethically minded early adopters?  Is it because Dublin 7 people are super smart and super healthy?  Who knows and I do not really care why but I am very happy to live her and to be able to get my paws and my jaws around all the vegan goodies! 

Veginity and Vish Shop are of the same family.  Vish shop was a vegan breakthrough when they opened, making vegan ‘fish’ from cassava.  Vish shop grew out of this breakthrough dish that was served from a food truck in the city centre.   Truly delicious. We recommend the smoked version. Veginity does amazing cakes, coffees and has a regularly changing themed menu.  They say of themselves ‘We offer world-inspired plant-based cuisine.  Where street food meets fine dining’ It was always a treat to visit their comfy restaurant in pre-covid times and we hope it’s not too long before we can grace their seats again!  

 

Image credit:  Veginity

V Face on North Brunswick Street is all about ‘Animal Burgers made with Plants’.  We recommend their vegan hotdog, and we cannot wait to try out their new vegan donuts!  They look so amazing!

Not too far from V face, Jenny and Rebecca opened Kale and Koko in Stoneybatter in February 2019.   Their ‘mission is to engage the Irish population in a conversation around food; to create a conscious eating culture; to build a platform where people feel comfortable exploring new foods and to provide fast, on-the-go, healthy food options for the busy people of Ireland so that they can fuel themselves to continue pursuing their own dreams. And do it all with a smile.  We recommend the Chia Puddings. 

The Vegan Sandwich company was started by food obsessed Sam Pearson and has grown from being a tiny market stall to opening their first shop in their first year and they will be launching our first ever retail products very soon so watch this space!

As well as these dedicated vegan spaces, there are a host of other eateries with excellent vegan options.  Token does some mean burgers, Shangri-la Asian Cuisine restaurant has a special vegan menu and very helpful staff.  

Fortunately, Dublin 7 also has some great walks and from Broadstone Park to the Canal and Phoenix Park so you can walk off all this great grub – once you have tried it you will be back for more!

With all these great eateries, there is no doubt though that Dublin 7 is vegan heaven!  I rest my case for Dublin 7 being the vegan capital!

Have I missed any vegan foodie beauty spots in Dublin 7? Have you found any other gems in that deserve some attention?  Let us know!  

Mushroom Soup

 I don't make this often because I'm the only one in the house who eats mushrooms. It is a treat!

Ingredients

Oil Spray

1 onion, finely chopped

2 cloves of garlic, chopped

1 punnet chestnut mushrooms, washed or peeled and sliced.

1 dessertspoon cornflour

100ml reduced salt soya sauce

Water or plant milk (I used cashew milk today as it was open, I would normally use oat milk)

Method

I bought a set of cast iron pans last year and used the largest one to make this soup.

Start heating your pan.  Add a spray of oil.

Add the chopped onion and stir in the oil.

Add the garlic, stir.

Add the mushrooms, stir with the onions and garlic.  Add a spray of oil if needed.

Add the soya sauce.  Stir and leave to cook for a minute or so.

Add the cornflour.  Mix so it doesn't go lumpy, your soya sauce should start to thicken.  Add the milk or water. 

Serve!  

Baked Tofu with Broccoli and Spinach

This is a nice easy recipe.  It is oil free but is tastiest enough and feels naughty enough to be your Friday night treat.  Family approved!

523 calories per serving.  This is loaded with vitamins and minerals and never mind where do you get your protein - tofu take a bow!

Ingredients

1 block of tofu (I used Cauldron tofu tonight but any firm block tofu will be fine)

2 tablespoons of cornflour

1 cup of rice

salt

1 onion

2 cloves garlic

1 inch ginger

1 chili

2 plump vine tomatoes

1 tablespoon soya sauce

1 head of broccoli

60g or so of fresh spinach

Method

Turn your oven on high.

Squeeze the excess liquid from the tofu and cut it into chunks.

I use a Ziploc plastic bag for this next bit - put the tofu chunks into the bag with the cornflour. Zip the bag and toss them together until the tofu is completely covered.

Put the tofu onto a baking tray and bake in the hot oven until it's crispy.  Check after 20 minutes and turn it.

While this is in the oven, make your rice.  White Jasmine rice takes eight minutes in the IP at High Pressure.  Use 1:1 with water and add a little salt.  Leave to SPR until you are ready for it.

When your tofu is nearly done, make your sauce;  blitz the onion, garlic, ginger, chili and tomatoes in a mini-processor and add to a large frying pan on a medium heat.  Stir and add the chopped broccoli, add the soya sauce, stir and cover.  Leave it to cook for a minute.  Add the tofu - the cornflour on the tofu will thicken your sauce.  When you the broccoli is cooked and the sauce is thickened, add the spinach and let it wilt. 

Stir through.

Plate the rice and add your tofu dish :) 

Review of the Plant Kitchen Green Thai Curry and Jasmine Rice

 

loumosslovevegan

From our #supermarketchallenge earlier today, the Plant Kitchen Green Thai Curry and Jasmine Rice.
We had them with the sweetheart cabbage also picked up this morning in @marksandspencerireland
They usually retail at €5.50 here, with the yellow sticker this morning they were €3.85 each. The sweetheart cabbage was .72c, we had half the sweetheart cabbage each. Total dinner cost was €8.42 or €4.21 each.

This was a fair bit more expensive than cooking from scratch but a lot cheaper than a takeaway.

The fat content is quite high at 37%. Anything over 17.5% fat is considered high fat so this really is well over that. The saturated fat content is more than 50% of the daily recommended intake.
Salt content is also very high.

Taking all of that into consideration, we really enjoyed the food. The Green Curry was absolutely delicious, spicier than I thought if would be. The vegetables were lovely and crisp, the rice was perfect. I can still taste the sauce in my mouth, delicious. I could probably eat it again right now even though I don't have room...
I'd probably buy it again but I'd feel guilty about the fat content and I'd want a yellow sticker!

I went to the Mary St branch at just after 8am on Thursday 25th March.  There were a lot of yellow sticker items and if I had a bigger backpack and a bigger freezer, I'd have bought a lot more!

Asparagus and Cashew Nut soup

Asparagus and Cashew Nut Soup

Must admit I would not have come up with this soup if Lidl Ireland hadn’t had Asparagus on offer for €.49 a bunch which is just such excellent value. 

I probably wouldn’t have made a soup if I had just been cooking for myself but as I am catering for younger people who aren’t always very keen on some vegetables, soup was an excellent compromise and what an excellent compromise it was.  This soup is delicious, nutritious, and luxuriously comforting as well as being very easy.

Serves 4 medium bowls.  Easy recipe

 

Ingredients

1 onion

2 cloves garlic

1 bunch of asparagus

2 small potatoes

100g split red lentils, rinsed

Handful of cashew nuts

Cashew milk

Water

Salt and pepper

 

Method

Prepare your vegetable and add them to your pot along with the cashew nuts and lentils.  Add a pinch of salt.

If you are using an Instant pot, add enough water to almost cover the veggies and then set to High Pressure for 8 minutes.

If you are using a stove, add enough water to cover the vegetables.  Bring to the boil and then simmer until everything is cooked.

Blitz with a hand-blender until smooth and then add cashew milk to the consistency that you like.

Season to taste.

 

We had this soup with toast and salad.

Spicy tomato sauce

This isn't a sauce we use for pasta.  We have been making this for years as a quick, easy and tasty dish.  If you have this with white rice you can get the whole meal from prep to plate in about 20 minutes.

I'm going to give you this evening's version which was very nice

3 cloves of garlic

1 inch of ginger

1 chilli

Blitz them in a mini-chopper

Add them to a frying pan and saute in a little water.

Add about half a tube of tomato puree

Add a tin of coconut cream (I usually use Alpro soya cream but we didn't have any)

Mix the tomato and coconut together.

Add a tin of mixed beans, drained and rinsed.

Add 100g of fresh spinach and cook long enough to wilt.

Serve!

Tonight we had this with potatoes that were cooked in the Instant Pot and shredded cabbage.

Instant Pot Potatoes

Scrub your potatoes.  Keep the skins on

Add a cup of water to the Instant Pot

Place a trivet in the Instant Pot

Place the potatoes on top of the trivet.

I cooked 4 medium sized potatoes for 12 minutes today and then forgot about them so they did a very slow pressure release.

Instant Pot makes the nicest potatoes!

Lentil and Red Pepper Sauce

200g split red lentils

2 red peppers

1 onion

garlic

olive oil

5 plump tomatoes

salt

Rinse your lentils and strain

Add a little oil to the pot and set it to saute.

Chop the onions and garlic and add to the oil

Stir, add a little water if needed

Chop the red peppers and add to the pot, stir.  Add a splash of water if needed.

Blitz the tomatoes in a chopper.  Add to the pot and stir.

Add the lentils and enough water to nearly cover.  

Stir.

Set to High Pressure for 3 minutes.

Serve with wholemeal pasta and a green vegetable

If using a hob, this will take about 30 mins, bring to boil and simmer :) 

Courgette and Carrot Falafels

We picked up courgettes for 49c in Aldi last week and they aren't the favourite vegetable in this house.  I am  going to make chutney with some of them but I wanted to try some in a falafel recipe today.  Usually when I make falafel I use soaked chickpeas but I didn't have time today. 

This made 12 falafels at a cost of  about 80 cents 

Ingredients

Tin of Chickpeas - drained and rinsed

Onion - chopped

Garlic

Cumin

1 carrot - chopped

1courgette - chopped

Wholemeal Flour

Salt

Chili pepper

Sesame seeds

Method  Add everything to your food processor except the flour and blitz until smooth.  Add enough flour to get to a consistency where you can shape the mixture into balls but wet enough to easily coat in sesame seeds.

Bake in a hot oven for 20 mins,

We had these with crushed chips, salad and a slaw made form even amounts of celeriac and carrot

Quick and easy homemade pasta sauce

You will never buy a jar of pre-made sauce again!

What you need

Food

One punnet of cherry tomatoes

One clove of garlic

A handful of fresh spinach

A handful of fresh basil

A pinch of salt

A tin of mixed beans (I used a tin from Aldi, 59cents on 18/03/21)

Pasta

Equipment

A large saucepan

A mini-chopper or small food processor

A colander

Start cooking your pasta as per package instructions

Put tomatoes and garlic into the mini chopper and blitz.  Add spinach and basil and blitz.

Set aside

Drain and rinse the tinned beans .

When the pasta is cooked, drain it and return it to the saucepan.  Add the blitzed tomato mixture.  Add the beans.  Heat through and serve.

Easy Stir Fry with Sauce

You don't need  packet sauce.  This is easy, tasty and good for you 

What you need -

Garlic - I used four cloves

Ginger - I used one inch

Chilli - 1 with seed

6 Cherry Tomatoes

Whizz all of this in a mini-chopper and add to a wok or a large pan with a little water

Veggies

Chop your veggies - today we used one yellow pepper thinly sliced, a bunch of spring onions, one courgette, a large bag of spinach.

Add the veggies to the pan and stir.  Add a little soya sauce or tamari and if you need a little more water add it now.

Noodles

We always use wholewheat noodles.  Put them in a bowl, cover with boiling water and microwave.  Strain them, rinse them and then add them to the wok.

Going Shopping. A vegan lament

I wrote this poem the other day.  I feel this every day.

Please humans stop being so vicious to each other, other animals and the planet.
 

Food Art and Porridge Art - this week's Instagram Project

I didn't mean it to become every day, it was just one day.  But you know, we have to take one day at a time.  And it's been a week.  Only a week.  

Anyway, time has an ethereal quality right now.  Caught in lockdown to lockdown and not knowing when it is going to end, it feels almost like life is on hold but my mirror tells me that life is very much ongoing as I see my hair growing longer, my wrinkles deepening and my daughter overtaking my 5 foot 9 inch height.

Anyway again, this post isn't about my musings of time, this post is about the art I've been creating this week on my morning porridge.  I wanted to put a post together so I would have all the photos together.  So here goes.  

Friday 19th March

Why is it Froggy Friday? Well, it's Friday and it's that time of year when you're likely to see frogspawn in ponds. Froggy says she's happiest when her spawn is left alone.

Frogspawn is always laid in clumps, and shouldn't be confused with toadspawn (which will appear in a long pearl-like chain, rather than a bundled mass). Remember, if you do spot any, it's always best to leave them alone - don't move them from pond to pond and definitely don't collect them in buckets.

Have a lovely Froggy Friday 🍏

Thursday 18th March

This little bear is out for a walk with his big green balloon.
I couldn't get him to smile for me. I asked him why so sad little bear.
He said he was worried about the plastic in the balloon, if he lost his grip and it floated away it could end up somewhere and cause dismay.
I said it's okay bear, your balloon's made of kiwi but very good point about the plastic. We should all be more aware. Please smile little bear, it's not down to only you to save the world ❤️💚

Have a lovely day! If you supermarket shop today, leave your plastic behind 💚🌿

Wednesday 17th March

Greetings from Ireland
Today is the day
We celebrate st Patrick
Driving the snakes away

Lá Fheile Sona Daoibh
Happy St Patrick's Day to you!

Don't forget to eat some extra green fruit for Ireland today!
☘️🍏🥝🍐🍈💚☘️💚🍈🍐🥝🍏💚☘️
P.S. there were never snakes in Ireland because the ice land-bridge with Europe melted before they got here
P.P.S. snakes are a metaphor for paganism. Too bad it's not a metaphor for sneaky politicians!

Tuesday 16th March

Happy bunny says have a lovely day and asks you to eat an extra piece of fruit for her, if you can, on this grey day ❤️
If you overslept, like me, this morning, I hope you're not late for anything other than breakfast

Monday 15th March

What's on your #veganmenu today?

Our household has been vegan for years and our daily menu, in its simplest form mostly looks like this

1 Porridge
2 Soup and sandwich or toast and salad
3 Root vegetables/wholegrain carb green vegetables or salad, bean or lentil dish

Snacks - fruit with yogurt, chocolate, tea, coffee, plant milk, water

Wise porridge owl says it's easy peasy!

Sunday 14th March

Sunrise

Saturday 13th March

A Butterfly but it didn't really work out!

Friday 12th March

Hearts

Thursday 11th March

Happiness