Chinese style vegetable stir fry

Finally I have time to post a recipe again! I do apologise for the blog being a bit quieter now, as I haven't had so much time for cooking and writing. Thank goodness the weekend is soon here and I'm able to cook more, maybe even bake! I'm really looking forward to that, a really quiet weekend at home.

So, now over to the actual recipe. I hope you like today's dish, which is just a Chinese style stir fry with various vegetables and tofu – one of my favourite dishes at the moment. With a little bit of spicing and fresh produce, it's very easy to make such a dish. It's light, yet filling and full of flavour. Have a look below, how I made this. You can also get creative and variate the vegetables at will.

Ingredients

300 g tofu

Groundnut oil for frying

3 bell peppers

150 g shiitake mushrooms

1 onion

3 garlic cloves

3 cm fresh ginger (about the same amount as the garlic when chopped)

1 small red chilli

2 spring onions

100 g baby pak choi

85 ml soy sauce

85 ml Shaoxing rice wine

3 tbsp sesame oil

2 tbsp maple syrup

200 g wholewheat noodles

Method

Press the excess liquid off the tofu and cut it into cubes. Start frying the cubes in hot groundnut oil and in the meanwhile prepare the vegetables. The tofu cubes need to be firm and bouncy, at least that's the way I like it. And they can be set to side once you're happy with the texture.

Make the sauce by mixing the soy sauce, Shaoxing rice wine, sesame oil and maple syrup together. This will be added to the stir fry towards the end.

Chop the onion, ginger, chilli and garlic finely. Cut the bell peppers, shiitake mushrooms, spring onions and pak choi into suitable sized slices.

Quickly fry the pepper slices in the hot pan and set to side. Repeat the same for the shiitake mushrooms.

Start also cooking the noodles.

Heat a little groundnut oil in a pan and cook the onion, garlic, ginger and chilli until soft.

Add the spring onions, tofu, pre-fried peppers and mushrooms to the pan.

Pour the sauce on the vegetables and add the pak choi just before serving. I added my pak choi a bit too early, that's why the greenery looks like it has disappeared.

You can then either mix the noodles to the vegetables or serve them on the side.

Enjoy!

Your VegHog

Lazy Sunday lunch

I have been suffering from some winter tiredness lately. I have no strength whatsoever and that also shows in the kitchen. Last week and weekend were so hectic that I just couldn't be bothered to make a proper Sunday lunch this time. Normally that's my favourite time of the week to just dwell in the kitchen and cook for ages. Now I wanted to be quicker in order to get relaxing faster. I chose ingredients that had been lying around for a while without specific cooking plans and combined them in a lazy Sunday lunch.

 
This lunch consisted of:

Roasted sweet potato and butternut squash wedges – these were first roasted normally and then overbaked with cheese.

Broccoli and cheese Quorn escalopes – an easy ready meal, but nice to be combined with such dishes. I haven't been eating much Quorn for years, but now I have redetected it a little bit.

Mixed salad – just mixed salad leaves, pumpkin seeds and a pomegranate molasses dressing.

Fried onion rings – quickly fried shallot rings are a good addition to Schnitzel & co.

That was it. Next time I might be posting something slightly more inspirational.

Have a great week everyone!

Your VegHog

Smoky freekeh with peppers, beans and sweetcorn

Freekeh is quite a new acquaintance for me, but I'm already head over heels for it, not just for its health benefits. Freekeh is an ancient grain, unripe wheat that has been through a process of roasting, where it has obtained a lovely smoky flavour. It's full of fiber and protein, which makes it a perfect veggie supplement.

Last week I made this spicy freekeh dish with beans, sweetcorn and peppers (please note that the recipe is for quite a large amount and can be scaled down). I think that this was a perfect mid-week dinner, which transformed into a great lunch for the next day. I will be making much more this kind of dishes in the future now that I'm hooked. This basic recipe is vegan, I only added halloumi to the serving, but it's optional.

Ingredients

1 cup smoky freekeh

1 tbsp vegetable stock powder

1-2 bay leaves

2 bell peppers

3 shallots

3 garlic cloves

240 g red kidney beans

240 g sweetcorn

1 tbsp olive oil

½-1 tsp chilli flakes

1 tsp smoked paprika

1 tsp ground cumin

1 tsp ground coriander

A sprinkle of salt

Fresh coriander to taste

Method

Rinse the freekeh and cook it in water with added vegetable stock powder and bay leaves until it's done. This takes about 20 minutes.

Chop the bell peppers, shallots and garlic and start cooking them in olive oil.

Add the beans and sweetcorn to the pan with the spices (chilli flakes, smoked paprika, ground cumin, ground coriander and salt).

Let it cook until you're happy with the flavour and textures.

Add the freekeh to the vegetables and cook for 10 minutes more.

Just before serving, add the fresh coriander.

On the side I served just a little bit of salad and fried halloumi slices.

Enjoy and have a good week!

Your VegHog

2nd blog anniversary + G&T with L&B

I almost missed the blog anniversary this year, even though it's only the second one! It was always in the back of my mind that I'd want to make a special post for it in January. However, time then flew and before I knew it, the 7^th was here. The lack of time and preparation made me choose a quick option to mark the occasion and I thought that a celebratory drink could be a nice idea (more my style than a cake any day).

The idea for this Lemon and basil gin cocktail came when I was flicking through The Forest Feast again and saw the Lemon-Basil Mojito (p. 70-71). Since I had just purchased a new bottle of Kyrö Distillery Company's good rye gin called Napue (my review here), I decided to go more into the G&T direction today. So I just threw gin, tonic water, lemon wedges, fresh basil and ice together without any further measurements. It became a very refreshing drink – simple and good!

Hereby I raise a glass to you all, my lovely readers, and thank you for reading my blog, commenting and being nice! Let's hope that there will be many more anniversaries as I'm really enjoying the blogging.

Thank you!

Your VegHog

Spelt Spätzle with smoky leeks

I have posted Spätzle recipes here a couple of times before. Please also see my Cheese and shallot Spätzle bake and the original Spätzle post. Those posts include a bit more detailed instructions for the making, if you're actually up for it. I am also very keen in answering any questions you might have about the process. I can't basically stop talking about this, if only anyone is interested.

Spätzle are Swabian egg noodles, a southern German classic dish. I love them and always want to find new ways to combine them in veggie dishes. One day I thought how great it would be to try Spätzle made of spelt flour, and I made a half and half mix. That was quite successful, so I went even bolder this time and only used spelt flour for this Spätzle. They stuck together just as well as with wheat flour and were wonderfully earthy and tasty.

In order to add even more to the earthiness of the recipe, I baked the Spätzle covered with cheese and hugged by a smoky leek sauce. If you got interested, read the recipe below. It's surprisingly straight forward even though you're making your own noodle batter.

Ingredients:

2 leeks

4 shallots

2 garlic cloves

1 tbsp butter

50 ml dry cider

2 tsp vegetable stock powder

100 g smoky cheddar

½ tsp salt

½ tsp pepper

A few fresh thyme leaves

200 g mozzarella and cheddar mix

Spätzle dough:

400 g spelt flour

4 eggs

1 tsp salt

250 ml water

Method:

Chop the leeks, shallots and garlic and cook them in butter at medium heat for about 10 minutes.

Add the cider and vegetable stock powder.

Finally add the grated smoky cheddar and season with salt, pepper and fresh thyme.

Then mix the Spätzle dough ingredients together into an even batter.

Bring water to the boil and press the Spätzle dough into the water through a potato ricer to make thick noodles.

Cook them until they float on the surface.

Mix the Spätzle with the leek mix and place into an oven dish.

Cover with the mozzarella and cheddar mix and bake until the cheese has melted and is golden brown.

Enjoy the yummy winter flavours!

Your VegHog

New Year's Day veggie roast

I prepared a vegetarian roast dinner yesterday to welcome the new year. As you can notice from the heaviness of this meal, I'm not planning to have a diet or anything... well but seriously, these are all quite healthy things on the plate, aren't they. I didn't make anything new or experimental, these are all components I make fairly often, but maybe in other combinations. I have already posted some of these recipes, so I have added links below to the old posts.

Here are the components I had on the plate yesterday:

Sweet potato and bean Schnitzel – Recipe here 

Redcurrant and chilli jam – Recipe here 

Roasted potatoes – Brush small potatoes with olive oil, paprika and sea salt and roast in the oven until done.

Steamed flower sprouts – Steam the flower sprouts until done.

Cauliflower and cheese bake – Steam or boil the cauliflower florets a little. Cook finely chopped garlic soft in olive oil and add little vegetable stock, salt, black pepper and thyme and pour on the cauliflower florest. Cover with cheese and bake until done. This can of course also be made with cream, recipe for example here.

Chestnut mushrooms with onion and garlic – Simply cook the onion, garlic and chestnut mushrooms in olive oil until nicely done. Season with sage, salt and pepper.

Tomato and mixed leaf salad with pine nuts and pomegranate molasses dressing – Dressing recipe here and otherwise just throw in whatever you like in a salad. This combination is probably my most used as a side salad.

Roasted mini shallots – Peel the shallots and brush them with olive oil. Roast in the oven covered with a foil at low temperature until fully cooked.

That was it! Did you have a special meal for New Year's Day?

Your VegHog

My Cookbooks Part II – New Feast by Greg & Lucy Malouf

Happy New Year everyone! It's a New Feast for the New Year. I haven't made any resolutions as such, but I would like to be able to continue cooking and blogging as thus far and lead a healthy and balanced life. Hopefully that's not too much to ask.

Now after Christmas I haven't been cooking much anything that takes an effort, therefore the first post for this year won't be a recipe. However I am planning to make a vegetarian roast dinner today, which might appear here later. I started My Cookbooks series in November last year and Part I can be found here. Now I wanted to continue the series with a book that I got for Christmas: New Feast, Modern Middle Eastern Vegetarian, by Greg and Lucy Malouf.

I haven't had time to cook anything from this book yet, but it is showing promise and I can't wait to try some of the recipes and learn new techniques and ways of spicing. In general there are so many very good Middle Eastern veggie dishes and I enjoy the seasoning and choice of ingredients in that style of cuisine. This book has a massive choice on different recipes and suggestions for menu ideas for different occasions.

I'm particularly keen on trying to make some of the breads, such as the griddled flatbreads (p. 36) or Middle Eastern pizzas (p. 46-49), and the flavoured butters would make a wonderful addition to those (p. 52-57).

I'm also very interested in making some of those vegetarian dips and spreads, as there can never be enough in your selection. These could go so well with different fritters, and for those there is also a whole chapter in the book.

The roasted tomato and chickpea curry with coconut and coriander (p. 208-209) looks and sounds so tasty that it might be one of the first dishes I try to cook from here. Or then it will be the tomato and bean soup with harissa and honey (p. 94-95), as I do like the sound of that as a good winter dish.

And how about this wedding couscous with herbs and flowers (p. 218-219) – it just looks so great!

I will make sure I'll post any cooking attempts from this book in the blog and refer to the book as always. I can't wait to get started!

Your VegHog