More Than I Can Chew

Oops! I've been taking an unexpected blog break, sorry for that! Life's been busy and I've been trying to (as Donny Hathaway sings) hang onto the world as it spins around. I've been singing, swinging, working, AND cooking a lot. I am also very pleased to announce that I've been hitting the gym again and (inspired by The Fruit Pursuit's Sabine) finally decided to try out Bikram Yoga classes starting this monday. For those of you who are not in the know: it's 90 minutes of doing 26 yoga poses in a heated room (approx 40 degrees celsius). Yep. I'll let you know how that went, IF I survive and don't drown in my own puddle of sweat.

All very well and all, let's talk FOOD. Good, lovely, comforting and nourishing veggie food that makes you feel like you've been hugged by a fluffy unicorn. I don't feel like typing out recipes so you'll have to do with a bunch of pictures. Food porn, as we bloggers like to say. Well if my pictures are food porn, I do hope they are on the classy side, not the cheapo german mustache kind.

We vegans love our tofu scrambles, this one's with tomato, mushrooms, garlic and fresh parsley.
(crumble tofu, fry in a pan and season with salt, pepper, turmeric and nutritional yeast)

My friend Marieke came over and because I love her very much I made her raw zucchini pasta with cashewsauce, grilled eggplant and oven baked sweet potato fries.

I visited my sister and because I love her very much as well I did a rerun on the raw zucchini pasta. She watched and learned and is now as hooked as I am.

Almost every single day I start off with a Green Monster. Yeah, that's the kind of health freaky girl I am. This particular one was a spinach, banana and coconut water mixture.

Some days my Mexican roots speak up and scream in my ear about baked black beans, guacamole, jalapeno peppers and cilantro (and green beans, and vegetarian nuggets). There is no escaping those cravings, so there.

And last but not least, a pasta (actually, a very fancy wild garlic spelt spaghetti) with parsnip, rocket salad, tomato and sunflowerseed pesto.

That's it for now people, I'll try and be a better blogger and be back soon.

'Almost Perfect' Broccoli Burger & Baba Ganoush

There was a large eggplant in my vegetable subscription bag this week, and it must have found it's way into my dreams because this morning I woke up with the irresistable urge to make baba ganoush. So at ten o'clock in the morning I found myself roasting the incredible vegetable in the flames of my gas stove. After putting all the lime & cumin flavoured goodness in the fridge to rest I had to think of something to pair it with for dinner. Something falafely. I also wanted to cram in as many vegetables as possible knowing I would probably not be eating home for the next three days (and I predict a lot of fun but not a lot of greens on the upcoming wedding bbq and music festival). I decided to create a broccoliburger. Yep.

Actually, it turned out great, green and delicious, with a nice bite because of the TVP (in Dutch we call it 'sojabrokjes' which sounds even more appalling than 'textured vegetable protein'). The taste was what I had been craving since morning (and probably what I dreamed about last night). Only thing is, the damn burger would not stay together. It fell apart while baking, so next time I'll make it a bit less moist by adding some chickpea flour. It will work, the burger will see my power and submit to my will! You can see on the picture how I niftily got the deconstructed burger out of sight by bringing in some slices of cucumber. Looking good, aaight?

Broccoli Burger (4 patties)

1/2 head of broccoli
1/4 cup red lentils, cooked
1/2 cup TVP, soaked & drained
1/4 cup cilantro, chopped
1 small red onion
1 clove of garlic
2 flax 'eggs' (2 tbsp of ground flaxseed, combined with 4 tbsp of water)
juice of 1/2 lime
1 tbsp sunflower oil
1 tbsp harissa paste
1 tsp ground cumin
2 tbsp chickpea flower

Baba ganoush:
1 eggplant
1 tbsp tahin
juice of 1/2 lime
ground cumin
cayenne, salt

For the baba ganoush: punch some holes in the eggplant with a fork. Then stick the fork into the bottom and put directly into the flames of a medium gasfire. Keep turning around until all blackened. Then put in a bowl with a lid on it for about 15 minutes, and after the skin should be easy to peel off. Chop up or process in blender with tahin and lime juice, and season to taste. Let sit in the fridge for at least a few hours.

For the burgers: chop the broccoli and put in a foodprocessor with the cooked lentils, cilantro, onion and garlic. Put in a bowl. Then let the foodprocessor work it's magic on the tvp and flax eggs. Mix everything together in a bowl with the remaining ingredients and form into 4 patties. Bake for 5 minutes on either side, in sunflower- or coconutoil. Serve with the baba ganoush on some salad or in a whole wheat pita.