kidney bean pies

Pictures as promised. I froze half of them, they defrosted and reheated very well.

A successful experiment

We had a stressful week last week , illness in the family and a visiting mouse meant no time in the kitchen all week. Last night I managed a couple of hours to bake.
The date and orange cookies went down a storm so I made another batch of those, this time I had all the right ingedients and I'm happy to say they taste just as good as my adapted version. :)

Next I made some wholemeal pastry using Pure margarine. What do you put in a vegan pie?
I had a bit of a blank moment, usually a pie filling would involve cheese. After looking in the larder, I grabbed a tin of kidney beans and a selection of vegetables.
I used a muffin tin to make individual deep pies, that way I could freeze some for another day.

Vegetables I used were, Leek, red onion, carrot, sweet pepper, a bit of vegan marigold stock and a spoonful of Marmite, then half a tin of kidney beans.

Pictures to follow

Cookies!

I went to our little library yesterday and browsed the recipe shelves. I found the only Vegan book in the whole place. It turned out to be a gem.
There are some really great recipes in it. I just had to try the Date and Orange Cookies.

They are absolutely delicious. I made a few minor changes as I didn't have any oatmeal or wholemeal flour, so I used white flour and rolled oats.

Here it is...
150g soft dark brown sugar
150gvegan margarine (I used Pure)
150g Self raising wholemeal flour
1 tsp baking powder
75g medium oatmeal
75g chopped dates
finely grated rind of an orange

1. Cream together the marg and sugar then add the orange rind.
2. Mix in the flour, baking powder and oatmeal.
3. Add the dates.
4. Place well spaced apart on greased trays and cook for 15 - 20 minutes.
This made 20 good sized cookies.

The title of the book is Vegan recipes, Edited by Nicola Graimes, published by Southwater


I would like to thank Jennifer Airs for the Rose Elliott book she sent me, another very helpful tool for my venture.

So far, not bad

Well a week in and it's not going to badly. I am craving sweet things but not fruit unfortunately. So tonight after my yummy tea of lentil and butternut squash bake, made by my own fair hands,
I chopped and apple into a saucepan, added a few blueberries and a little water and boiled it down. In another pan I put a couple of spoons of oats and a sprinkle of sugar, then heated until the oats were nicely toasted and the sugar had covered them with a crispy coating. With the oaty topping on the fruit it made a delicious pudding and satisfied my very sweet tooth. I wish I'd taken a picture as it looked pretty too.

I've been browsing the web and found some great, helpful vegan sites.
Indestructibles -some really good recipes

This site has some helpful information for new vegans

And some great blogs too from this site

New Year, New Start.

2011, the year I become vegan.
Well it started off a bit wobbly as we had some chocolates left over and some cream in the fridge, it had to be finished and I hate throwing things away. But it's all gone now, I'm off to the shops to stock up on Tahini, Tofu, Gram flour and Carob etc.
It's going to be an exciting if scary journey. I'll need help from friends and books and other bloggers.
Hopefully, this year I will have a little more time for making more polymer clay beads as they have been sorely neglected lately and I miss them. As soon as my work room is cleared of all the clutter and I can actually get into the room I will be in there like a shot.
Back to work on Tuesday though :(