Halloween party food

I didn't manage to make a range of spooky foods this year even though I was determined to manage it. I won't be having a Halloween party either, but I've been eating some nice Halloween-themed party foods lately nevertheless. I wanted to collect them to a post and share with you. All of these dishes are vegetarian and one of them is vegan.

I made these loaded vegetable nachos, as I think that nachos are always great party food whatever the occassion. These nachos were topped with char-grilled and roasted crown prince squash and red bell pepper, tomato-pepper-chilli sauce, black lentils and cheese. The best thing however will have to be these cheerful ghost plates.

I got the inspiration for this black garlic mac'n'cheese from my blogging friend Shaheen from Allotment 2 Kitchen blog, who posted a Black Garlic Macaroni Cheese Bake a few days ago. I showed Shaheen's recipe to my partner, and he wanted me to make this dish, so I did. I made mine slightly differently than Shaheen, as I didn't use any milk, but the pasta cooking water instead, and I didn't bake my mac'n'cheese either. I really loved the flavour and richness that the black garlic added to a regular mac'n'cheese. I might be adding some always into my future macaroni and cheeses, as it was such a good combination. I served some homemade black garlic breads on the side, and I also think that the wormy looking pasta worked well for a spooky result. Thank you so much Shaheen for this brilliant idea, my partner is also very grateful!

This is just an orange pizza that I made the other day, but I think it would fit well to some Halloween festivities. It's a cheddar, onion and red bell pepper pizza on a spelt thin crust. I pre-fried the onions and bell peppers for this pizza. I don't always do this with toppings, but these ones definitely benefited from it. Here are photos pre- and post baking.

These vegan mini hot dogs were surprisingly filling. I really liked the smaller veggie sausages from Aldi. They are incredibly cheap, and I have made a couple of vegan English breakfasts with them too. I only added some grated carrot and fried onions on the top of these hot dogs, as I didn't happen to have any suitable sauces at the time.

I'm going to write an own post about this crown prince squash soup and caramelised onion bread later, but also wanted to include it here, as it fits the theme. The soup was made from the same crown prince squash as the nacho toppings. I got a third dish out of the squash as well, that's how huge it was, and it was also very cheap.

I hope that some of these ideas could inspire you for Halloween-themed veggie cooking. Now I would just like to wish everyone a happy Halloween!

Your VegHog

Chanterelle pasta + Fruit park

Chanterelles are my absolute favourite mushrooms, and luckily this year the season still continues and there are good ones in the market. I made just a basic pasta with pan-fried chanterelles, onion, garlic and grated cheese. I used carrot tagliatelle in this dish to make it even more orange and yellow. This is the true colour of this season's food.

I also wanted to share some photos from this delightful little park, or actually a childrens' playground that we stumbled upon last weekend. It's not very far from my home, but I have never seen it before. Aren't those wooden fruits just so cute! This is what Copenhagen is all about, surprising semi-hidden places all over the city for the locals to enjoy and for the visitors to admire. I would like to take some dishes to be photographed here, for example on that cut apple, but maybe that goes too far.

This Saturday morning started cloudy and a bit drizzly. I'm going out soon anyway for a little walk and visit to the vegetable market. Later we will probably also go to a local beer release party and a street food market. But otherwise I think I'll prefer pottering around at home today. It's so cosy to stay indoors and light a couple of candles.

Have a wonderful weekend everyone!

Your VegHog

Spicy onion squash soup

Halloween is approaching soon, and if you need cooking ideas for the season, a nice pumpkin or squash soup is always a good idea. This is my favourite soup of the season. It can be made with various squashes or pumpkins and it contains a lot of warming Thai style spices and coconut milk. The soup is vegan and oh so comforting.

Spicy onion squash soup

Ingredients

1 small onion squash

3 carrots

2 onions

1 cloveless garlic

2 red chillies

2 cm fresh ginger

½ cup red lentils

Vegetable oil

½ tsp ground cumin

½ tsp ground coriander

1 tbsp vegetable stock powder

250 ml coconut milk

2 bay leaves

1 tbsp white miso

2 tsp palm sugar

1 lime

Fresh coriander

Method

Peel and chop the onion squash and carrots. Chop the onions, garlic, chillies and ginger. Soak the lentils.

Start cooking the onions in the vegetable oil. Once they are soft, add the squash and carrots, followed by the garlic, chillies and ginger. Then also add the lentils to the pot.

Season with ground cumin, ground coriander and vegetable stock powder. Then add the coconut milk, bay leaves, white miso and palm sugar and let simmer.

Purée the soup once all ingredients have cooked nicely.

Add fresh coriander, lime and a little bit of grated lime zest to the soup and serve.

Your VegHog

Pea and lentil nuggets

It's a wonderful autumnal weekend. It has gotten slightly chillier here, and it could also rain today, but I think it's gorgeous with all the autumn colours going on at the moment. I started the day with cleaning the flat and will go to a Oktoberfest party later. That should be fun. I heard that they might even have some German veggie food, but they will definitely have good German beer!

I made these crunchy pea and lentil nuggets and served them in different combinations on consecutive days. On the first day I served them in sandwiches with pickled red onions and cabbage slaw, and on the second day I served them with cheesy tomato pasta and cabbage and peanut salad. The nuggets themselves are vegan, and they turned out quite good. They were easy to bind together and got crispy on the surface after the frying.

Pea and lentil nuggets

Ingredients

1 cup dried pea crush

½ cup puy lentils

1 onion

2 garlic cloves

1 tbsp vegetable stock powder

1 tsp salt

½ tsp ground black pepper

½ tsp smoked paprika

2 tbsp wheat flour

Vegetable oil for frying

Method

Cook the pea crush and puy lentils until they are done.

Chop the onion and garlic finely and cook them in oil until soft.

Mix the onions with the pea and lentils and season. Also add the flour as an extra binding agent.

Let the mix cool down. Shape nuggets from it and fry them in oil until they are crispy and golden brown.

Serve with your favourite sides and enjoy!

I'm sharing this recipe with this month's My Legume Love Affair #121 hosted by Jagruti's Cooking Odyssey. The challenge was started by Susan from The Well-Seasoned Cook and continued by Lisa from Lisa's Kitchen.

Have a nice weekend!

Your VegHog

Stuffed potato skins with leeks and cheese

It has been an incredibly warm and sunny weekend here in Copenhagen, so we've been a lot outdoors. Today I also want to go for a walk around our local lake and to the botanical gardens. Then I'm planning to cook a Thai curry with squash for dinner. But first I wanted to share a recipe for my favourite kind of comfort food.

When the weather was slightly colder I made these twice-baked oven potatoes, or potato skins, with a leek and cheese filling. I quite often make these potatoes, and in my opinion the leek filling is the superior one. I like how the potato skins are crispy, but the filling is soft and fluffy. These potatoes contain cheese, but they are also easy to veganise by substituting the cheese with vegan cheese, or even by leaving it out. Here's my recipe, have a look!

Stuffed potato skins with leeks and cheese

Ingredients

4 large baking potatoes

sea salt

Vegetable oil

3 leeks

1 large onion

3 garlic cloves

1 tsp fenugreek seeds

½ tsp smoked paprika

1 tsp salt

½ tsp ground black pepper

1 vegetable stock cube

Fresh thyme

2 tbsp margarine

150 g grated cheese

Method

Pierce the potatoes several times with a fork. Then roll them in oil and salt mix and bake in the oven at about 180 C for at least one hour, but this of course depends on the size of the potatoes. Mine were very large, so I baked them for 1,5 hours.

Make the filling by slicing the leeks, and chopping the onion and garlic finely. Cook them in oil until soft and add the seasoning. Add little bit of water and let simmer under the lid. If you have some dry cider to add, it's better than water, but I didn't have any this time.

Season the mix with fenugreek seeds, smoked paprika, salt, ground black pepper, vegetable stock cube and fresh thyme. Also mix in the margarine.

Once the potatoes have baked, cut them in halves and scoop out the soft flesh. Mix the potato mash with the leeks and cheese and fill the potato skins with the mix.

Return the potatoes to the oven and bake them for about 30 minutes more.

Serve the potatoes with the sides of your choice (they are always great with a fresh salad) and enjoy!

I'm sharing this recipe with this month's Eat Your Greens hosted by Shaheen from Allotment 2 Kitchen, and co-hosted by me.

Your VegHog

Fried rice with cabbage

Happy weekend to everyone! I hope you are having a good and relaxing time. We had an eventful evening last night when it was culture night in Copenhagen with hundreds of events taking place all over town. We managed to visit quite a few of them, and they were all exciting. We got to climb on a railway control tower with a magnificent view over town, went down to the new metro tunnel which is under construction (new line and stations are due to open in July 2019), stumbled upon a camel and donkey in the middle of a street, saw light displays, visited quite a few galleries and ate the tastiest pumpkin soup from a street stand. Today we will walk some more and go for a countryside walk by the seaside and in a nearby forest.

Before we do that, I wanted to post a recipe with you. I've been enjoying many cabbage dishes lately, as it's in season, it's cheap and there are lovely variants available. This vegan dish contains cabbage two ways: stir fried and quick pickled. The pickled cabbage actually worked pretty well on the side to add something special to the dish. This is just a handy and quick weekday meal, but it's still quite special. There is of course also smoked tofu in the dish.

Fried rice with cabbage

Ingredients

125 g smoked tofu

Vegetable oil for frying

1/4 cabbage

3 carrots

1 onion

2 garlic cloves

2 cm fresh ginger

1 red chilli

1 tbsp white miso

2 tbsp soy sauce

2 tbsp mirin

2 tbsp sesame oil

1 cup jasmine rice

Pickled cabbage on the side (optional)

Method

Cut the tofu into pieces, and fry them in vegetable oil until golden brown.

Cook the rice.

Slice the cabbage, onion and carrots, and chop the garlic, chilli and ginger finely.

Fry the onion and carrots in oil, shortly followed by the garlic, chilli and ginger.

Add the cabbage and the sauces to the pan, and let it simmer.

Also stir the tofu and rice into the pan.

Serve with the optional pickled cabbage on the side and enjoy!

Your VegHog

In My Kitchen in October

I have made a seasonal table display with edible and ornamental squashes and pumpkins. It started as an accidental display, because I just started buying more squashes, but then I also added the ornamental ones to them. I just love the look of these squashes and they really cheer me up.

I've also had nice flower arrangements around the flat, like this pink peppercorn bouquet. It has now dried, but looks just as magnificent, as the colours haven't faded. Do you think that I could eat the peppers?

I bought a new organic spice blend called Cabbage Karma by Mill & Mortar and Ditte Ingemann. She is a Danish food writer and photographer, and I absolutely adore her cookbooks. Cabbage Karma contains coriander, fennel, sumac, garlic powder, black pepper and lemon thyme. I already used in these Savoy cabbage roulades, and will surely be using it in many more autumn recipes.

I finally have a new blender! I donated my old one away before moving to Denmark over a year ago, so I've been without a blender for that long. Now I just can't wait to make my own hummus and some puréed soups! This blender is only small, but I think that it'll be just fine for my purposes.

We went to Sweden again, where I get these various food items in lovely small shops: bean crisps, miso soup cups, vegetable stock powder, umami vegetable stock cubes (very nice in savoury autumn dishes), flying saucer squash, ciders, black bean burgers (these were amazing and huge!), fermented tofu and veggie nuggets. It was quite a good haul of interesting items.

Here are also some recent dishes from my kitchen.

Chanterelle mushrooms with vegan ravioli

Chunky chips with sweetcorn and halloumi

Spaghetti squash and halloumi lasagne (I already published this recipe here)

My partner's pulled jackfruit sandwich

I'm sharing this post as usual with Sherry from Sherry's Pickings. She is hosting the In My Kitchen challenge.

Your VegHog

Vegan sausage and rice casserole

I have started the weekend in a relaxing way. I just spent yesterday evening at home cooking and watching some series. And today won't be much different. I think we'll go to the market and briefly visit a new local pub, but then return home again to make a Saturday night pizza. I also have a selection of squashes and pumpkins waiting to be cooked. I will try to make something with them tomorrow. What are your plans for this first October weekend?

I'm sharing with you today a simple vegan sausage and rice casserole with black beans and tomatoes. This is a great and filling meal that isn't too complicated to make.

Vegan sausage and rice casserole

Ingredients

4 vegan sausages

1 fresh onion with the stalk

2 garlic cloves

Vegetable oil

200 g tomatoes

1 cup black beans

1 cup rice

1 tsp smoked paprika

1 tsp salt

½ tsp ground black pepper

1 vegetable stock cube

Method

Cook the rice.

Cut the sausages into pieces and fry them in oil.

Chop the onion and garlic and add them to the sausages.

Chop the tomatoes coarsely.

Add the tomatoes, black beans, rice and the seasoning to the pan.

Let simmer under lid for at least 20 minutes, but you can also slow-cook it longer so that the flavours blend nicely. Add some additional water, if the casserole gets too dry.

Serve and enjoy!

Your VegHog