VeganMoFO Post#3: A letter to Chloe

My youngest daughter, 'Bean', had a “Tweet convo” with Chloe Coscerelli (www.chefchloe.com) who mentioned that she was coming to the UK in a few weeks and did we have any suggestions. This is a reply I put together for her which I thought may make a good blog post to share. Please leave comments with any additional ideas.

Hi Chloe,

You mention your trip to the UK on your Tweet to so here are a few ideas.

I am assuming your trip will be to London (most are!) so I would recommend:

Manna restaurant in Primose Hill. It is the oldest Vegetarian restaurant in London that turned fully Vegan a few years ago, the food is gourmet and yummy. Primrose Hill is great too, very trendy and “in”, where a number of our “celebs” live. www.mannv.com

;

If it's on the menu its vegan

The previous Head Chef from Manna left and now works at a couple of pubs (very English) called the Coach and Horses in Greek Street, Soho and The Smithfield (by the famous meat market!) both of which are now fully Vegetarian (the Vegan options are very good I am assured). I haven’t eaten at either yet but they are definitely on the list for my next trip. www.coachandhorsessoho.co.uk and www.thesmithfieldtavern.co.uk

;

Tibits in Heddon Street just off Regent Street is lovely. Vegetarian serve yourself lots of Vegan choice and the food is so fresh and there is such a selection of both hot and cold dishes (you pay by the weight of the plate when you have finished filling it). Our favourite place for lunch when shopping. www.tibits.co.uk

So, so much choice!

Mildreds in Lexington Street, Soho, again Veggie but loads of Vegan options. Very small and you can’t book a table so we always arrive early (6.30 ish) www.mildreds.co.uk

Whole Foods Market on Kensington High Street (yes, we have a few WFM over here!) have a Vegan/Raw restaurant upstairs called Saf which has a good menu, we have eaten there once and enjoyed it. http://www.safrestaurant.co.uk/

The Vegan “personality” in London at the moment is Ms Cupcake in Brixton. Haven’t tried them so I can’t say how they contrast/compare to yours. www.mscupcake.co.uk

Let's hear it for Ms Cupcake.

Should you venture out of London then Brighton is the place to go for Vegan food although Manchester (near where I live) is getting better.

That’s a few to get you started, I shall be interested to follow your reports on your trip to see if you find some places that I haven’t heard of (very likely!).

Enjoy your trip and keep up the good work.

Love and Peace

Carol

xxx

Vegan Mofo Post 2; Vegan Toolkit workshop part 2

When you left us we had met the Tutor (Jane) and the other 2 participants on the course and were heading into the kitchens for demonstrations and cooking:

The kitchen had been totally refurbished since my last visit and it was now kitted out very commercially however it wasn’t intimidating for domestic cooks, I approved J

Firstly we had demonstrations from Jane for dishes that she felt constituted a “toolkit” that could all be easily adapted as your confidence grew:

Mayonnaise

Cashew Crème

Pesto

Tofu “Meat”balls

Pancakes

Yellow pancakes without eggs?

It was getting quite late by now, we were ALL talkers so it was a good thing there were so few of us or else we would never have eaten! But after frying our own pancakes we tucked into them with a cup of coffee and planned the rest of the day.

There were 8 recipes for us to cook and we were going to do 2 each:

Creamy Mushroom and Herb Pate and Thai Mushroom Soup with Crispy Wontons for Starters

Paella, Crispy Sweet and Sour Tofu and Roast Vegetable Plait for Mains

Blueberry Muffins, Cheesecake, and M’Hanncha (a Moroccan filo filled “snake”) for dessert.

I was assigned the Thai Mushroom Soup and the M’Hanncha both of which I enjoyed making, the soup took me out of my comfort zone because, for some reason, I rarely cook Thai food.

Lesson - if you take a photo over a steaming pot you get a picture of steam!!

Jane and I have fun rolling the snake

Kate made the Mushroom Pate and the Roast Vegetable Plait both of which she found easier than she anticipated. Could there be a dinner party coming up?!

Pride and Pate!!

As there were so few of us and we had to cook two dishes each we were VERY late eating lunch (past 2.30)but we must have been fed on our “trying each other’s dishes as we went” because it didn’t seem to matter as much as I thought it would. All the food was delicious and you could see ways to develop each recipe for your own taste.

So much delicious food, it would be rude to leave any

The only negative thing I would say is that this is the only cookery school I have been to where you do your own washing up. I didn't mind in the past when I was working towards the Diploma (they stopped doing it before I had finished) because as a student I felt it was right to clean up after yourself as you go but for “leisure” course that you are paying good money for it seems a bit much. Moan over!

I won’t finish on a negative point because that wouldn't be fair as I thoroughly enjoyed the day, I have cooked a number of the recipes since and they all worked well, I can definitely see them being developed in the future. Plus we made some new friends – bonus!

VeganMoFO Post 1. Vegan Toolkit Workshop, Vegetarian Society

And so this is MoFo, let the blogging begin …..

I have wanted to start blogging for a long time, partly in answer to all those people who know me  and my cooking/cookery book obsession saying “you should write that recipe/tip/info down”, “write a book”. A book is far too onerous a task (heavens, a month’s blogging is looking mammoth at the moment!) but a blog should be do-able. Kate (Female Offspring to add to her titles) will be joining me but I guess in more of a behind the scenes or guest appearance capacity.

Becoming involved with VeganMoFo this year appealed to me because of the discipline it provides of “having” to make at least 20 blog posts in the month and also, co-incidentally, Kate and I have a number of “vegan related” activities occurring in October so it seemed to fit nicely.

The first event didn’t quite make the cut as it was held last Friday, 28^th September, but I will begin with the beginning of its review and will finish tomorrow otherwise it will be much too long (this may become a recurring theme!)

Vegan Toolkit Workshop held at Cordon Vert Cookery School, Vegetarian Society HQ, Manchester.

Both Kate and I have attended a number of Courses and workshops at the Vegetarian Society in Manchester. In the past but they only offered Vegetarian course (they are the Vegetarian Society after all!) but they have always catered for Vegans and given variations to recipes etc.. They have now introduced two courses the Toolkit and a Party one that we are booked on in November.

We arrived, on time “Thank You Traffic Gods”, at 9.15 for a 9.30 start which is quite early for a workshop where people have had to travel, most are 10.00 for 10.30. However, I was excited about the day and pleased to get there and meet the other participants, it was also the first time I had been at the Veg Soc for a number of years so it was a little like a homecoming with lots of hugs and catch ups with the staff.

My hope had been that Vegan courses were now on offer because of the growth in interest so I was disappointed to find there were only four participants, Kate and I plus a married couple who had travelled from Ireland. This does give me a general cause for concern that the message of how to “think Vegan” that I struggled with for so long isn’t reaching as many people as we would like. However, on a selfish level, it was nice to have a chance to chat and swop experiences and ideas. The couple were very friendly, I am sure we will stay in touch, and although not Vegan themselves it was an area of interest especially as she was embarking on a course on Nutrition.

Over coffee and drinks in the lounge we met out Tutor for the day, Jane, who, again was not Vegan herself (she did spend a month following a Vegan diet last year) but is a committed Vegetarian of many years and “knows her stuff”. She is the Editor of the Veg Soc’s magazine and Secretary of the Food Writer’s Guild, definitely a “done that, got the tee shirt” woman who I could have happily sat chatting to for the rest of the day, but, there was cooking to be done.

Tomorrow I will tell you about the recipes …

Carol and Chloe

My first post in a Vegan Blog has to be about my favourite cookery book at the moment, Chloe's Kitchen.

Chloe trained at the Natural Gourmet Institute in New York and really knows her stuff. She was the first Vegan to win Food Network's Cupcake Wars which proved to be a bit of a "Susan Boyle" moment. Everyone assumed, wrongly, that with such a disadvantage she couldn't possibly win but, in fact, she blew them out of the water and showed the world how good Vegan baking can be. "You would never know it wasn't 'real' baking" my cheeky friend Barry (himself a chef) said in response to my rendition of the award winning "Ginger Nutmeg Spice Cupcakes". My son says you can't be 'that good' if you are that young and pretty - Chloe is.

I have become quite obsessed with cooking from the book, even though I own hundreds (literally) of recipe book this is my favourite at the moment, it's getting a little like Julie and Julia with the ages reversed. But, enough of the chat and on to the recipes, these are some of the ones I have cooked so far:

• Black Baby Bean cakes - my favourite beans and these are delicious little patties, it is served in the book with Pineapple Salsa but I didn't have time so left it out.
• Double Double Drive-Thru Burgers -  Tempeh Burgers (she steams the Tempeh first and now I do that I haven't looked back, any bitterness disappears). Served with a lovely "Special" Sauce, tofu based and remarkably (my children inform me) like the MacDonalds sauce on Big Macs - I'll take their word for that.
• Falafel Sliders with Avocado Hummus  -  Falafel as good as you'll get with an interesting Hummus (where Guacamole meets Hummus but it kinda works) and with a Tahini sauce that keeps in the fridge and goes well with other things like chips. This meal is a "Protein Fest" - who says we never get Protein?
• Thai Chickpea Burgers with Sweet 'n' Spicy Sauce -  she calls them Fusion Burgers which is very accurate, I cut the chilli down because we are 'woozys' when it comes to heat.
• Best ever baked Macaroni and Cheese. Last night's dinner and today's lunch as it happens. Can't decide whether it tasted better first or second time.
• Fettuccine Alfredo. Amazing, why would you ever want cream.
• Penne alla Vodka. never mind which Pasta you have in the pantry this is such a tasty sauce, like most tomato dishes it is better the nest day.
• Wild Mushroom Stroganoff Fettuccine. Rich and creamy sauce and so so tasty.
• "Orange you Glad I made Crispy Tofu". With rice and a stir fry you have a perfect dinner.
• "Pancakes for Dinner". ... or brunch, or lunch. Light and fluffy Blueberry pancakes, I have bought extra Blueberries for the freezer so I can make them whenever and they work beautifully. Gluten free works well too. These are what you want when you get an attack of the munchies.
• "Tempeh Piccata" - which showed me I liked Tempeh and my daughter she liked capers.
• "Banana Cupcakes with Lemon Icing". Can't make enough of these. My youngest daughter's "go to" cupcake.
• "Ginger Nutmeg Spice Cupcakes" - Award winning, what can I say :-) (they are pictured on the book cover but without the toffee sauce.
• "Iced Apple Cake Squares". The only recipe that hasn't gone right for me but I was frazzled and didn't have all the correct ingredients and, in fairness, it was delicious but not what Chloe had in mind, more of a Streusel than a cake - I will try it again and see what happens.

Having looked at these 14 recipes I now feel that I should give some other author and book a chance, I would think there are only a few that I have cooked that many recipes from.

But who and in which book ? ........

Welcome.

Firstly, the name, why veganmotherandfemaleoffspring? We plan (if we are accepted) to participate in Vegan MoFo 2012. Our MoFO is 'Mo'ther (Carol) and 'F'emale 'O'ffspring (Kate). 

We both eat as Vegans but we are not 100% strict when we dine out as sometimes you wouldn't eat, at home though we make our own choices.

We have a number of Vegan related activities in October to blog about and lots of books we have cooked from, restaurants visited, blogs enjoyed and cookery courses attended to fill in the gaps.

That's all for now, looking forward to getting started.

Carol
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