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!