Stuffed purple sweet potatoes and cherry blossoms

I'm very sorry about the misleading title that possibly got me some curious clicks, but no, the cherry blossoms weren't in the potatoes. However it turns out that at least some cherry blossoms are edible. I didn't know that before! The reason for the title is rather that we are having a wonderful sakura, cherry blossom, season in Copenhagen and have been able to admire those beautiful blooming trees for a couple of weeks now. I just wanted to share a couple of photos of them. 

This vegan dish on the contrary might not look too nice, but I can assure you that it was quite tasty. I only very recently made my first stuffed sweet potatoes, and thought that they were quite nice. And this second attempt was made with the lovely purple sweet potatoes that I can now get from my local market.

I stuffed these purple sweet potatoes with green lentils, green heirloom tomatoes, carrot, onion and garlic, but only the sky is limit what could be put into these.

The benefit is that sweet potato roasts much quicker than a normal one, so this is also more convenient dish to make regarding the waiting time. It's also nice change to have the sweetness as contrast with a savoury filling. But I still have to say that nothing can beat a “real” spud. Anyway, it's nice to have some change every now and again. What do you think of sakuras and spuds?

Your VegHog

Eat Your Greens welcoming May recipes

Isn't it fabulous that it's already May! I like it a lot, even though I do feel that this year is just flying by too quickly. We've had some nice spring days here already and I can't wait to have more warmth and nice plants and flowers around.

What I'm also very excited about is Eat Your Greens in May! I'm hosting the challenge in May, and as usual it's co-hosted by Shaheen from Allotment 2 Kitchen. I would like to see many dishes cooked with nice green spring vegetables and herbs. So get creative, cook and share the goodness with us! Find out here more details about how to take part, if you are not familiar with the challenge yet.

You should also definitely check out the Eat Your Greens April Round Up in Shaheen's blog, as it's once again a wonderful collection of green recipes. It's nice to see all those creative ideas come together, and remember that it's all vegan or vegetarian made by your fellow food bloggers!

Have a nice month of May!

Your VegHog

Green nuggets

I'm very happy at the moment. We had a sunny public holiday here yesterday, and now the rest of the weekend is still ahead. Saturday has also started with a lot of sun, and we will soon be heading out. We'll need to do some vegetable shopping, and go for a walk in the botanical gardens that are now really coming to life. There are a lot of blooming cherry trees all over Copenhagen so there are a lot of pretty sites to see. I also love the giant magnolia trees in the botanical gardens. Also a new small street food market opened yesterday, and I thought that it would be good to check it out on a sunny day like this.

Now to these green nuggets that I was inspired to make by the juicy round courgettes that appeared to my local vegetable market. I like this sort of nuggets and Schnitzel made from grated vegetables, especially in the spring and summer, but I haven't made any for a while. It's easy to make them when all this lovely vegetables are available, and you can choose basically any combination you like. I decided to go with all things green this time. I made quite a large batch in order to be able to eat the nuggets all week in different combinations, but of course you can also just make a small batch, as these aren't so much work at all.

Green nuggets

Ingredients

2 round courgettes

1 green bell pepper

1 small kohlrabi

2 fresh onions with the stalks

1 jalapeño

1 cloveless garlic

½ cup dried broadbean crush

1 vegetable stock cube

1 tsp sea salt

½ tsp ground black pepper

1 egg

6 tbsp spelt flour

Oil for frying

Method

Grate the courgettes, bell pepper and kohlrabi, and cut all the other vegetables into very fine pices.

Cook the dried broadbean crush. You can alternatively use pea crush or maybe even soy.

Mix the vegetables with the seasoning, egg and flour until it's an even paste. Add more flour, if needed to get a firmer texture.

Heat oil in a frying pan, and place about 2 tablespoons of the batter for each nugget to the pan.

Fry the nuggets on both sides until golden brown.

Serve with the sides of your choice and enjoy. They are great with mashed potato, pasta, salad and even as burgers.

I am sharing this recipe with this month's Eat Your Greens, and the challenge is hosted by Shaheen from Allotment 2 Kitchen and co-hosted by me every other month. Go and check out the challenge and take part, if you're a food blogger yourself. It's always great fun!

Have a wonderful weekend!

Your VegHog

Mexican rice tortillas

I haven't been cooking that much in the couple of last weeks, as we've had a weird unusual stretch of business dinners and trips at work, so I've been eating out quite a lot. It can be nice, but I also want to do my own cooking, and all this socialising can be quite draining too. It still feels like you are working, even when eating a meal with colleagues or customers. One meal was really excellent though, cheese ravioli with asparagus and sage butter sauce accompanied by a crispy dry white wine. That I could eat at anytime again! But anyway I hope that it will calm down now a bit after completing a few projects, and I can do more in my own kitchen again.

I managed to make this meal one night, and even though it's nothing spectacular, I enjoyed it very much. Mexican rice is one of my absolute favourites. It's easy, it's cheap and it's very tasty. I made the rice this time with sweetcorn, lentils, red pepper, onion, garlic and chilli, and I served it on a tortilla with lambs lettuce and vegan chipotle mayo. It was a very nice meal, and I will be cooking more this sort of meals towards the summer. Mexican food is also brialliant for a picnic, as the al fresco dining season has now started even in Copenhagen.

Enjoy your Sunday!

Your VegHog

Thai curry with fennel and beetroot tofu

Remember that beetroot tofu I bought in Finland? Well, now dish number one has been made with it. I had two tofu steaks, so I can still cook something else with the other one. It was a really nice firm tofu with a subtle hint of beetroot, and it really added a nice splash of colour on top of that vegan Thai curry. There were some small chunks of beetroot inside of that tofu as well.

I made my pretty basic golden Thai curry with fennel and carrots. I used fresh turmeric for the first time, which was interesting. I think that I'll be buying it much more now. I didn't even manage to colour my whole kitchen yellow with it.

I'm looking forward to more colourful bowls of food towards the spring and summer. Yesterday I saw the first local asparagus appearing on the market. I can't wait to cook with it. 

Thai curry with fennel and beetroot tofu

Ingredients for the curry paste

1 red chilli

1 cloveless garlic

2 cm fresh turmeric

2 cm fresh ginger

1 tomato

1 lemongrass stalk

1 lime's juice

2 tbsp white miso

2 tsp palm sugar

1 tsp white pepper

1 tsp ground cumin

1 tsp ground coriander

½ tsp ground cinnamon

1 vegetable stock cube

Other ingredients

125 g beetroot tofu

1 onion

1 fennel bulb

2 carrots

Vegetable oil for frying

400 ml/1 can coconut milk

1 cup Jasmine rice

Method

Make the curry paste first by puréeing all paste ingredients into a smooth paste.

Chop the fennel, carrots and onion.

Cook the onion in vegetable oil until softened, then add the fennel and carrots to the pan.

After a while of cooking, also add the curry paste.

Cook for a couple of minutes, and then add the coconut milk.

Let simmer until the flavours have blended nicely.

Cook the jasmine rice.

Cut the tofu into generous chunks and fry them in vegetable oil.

Serve the curry with the tofu chunks on top and with the rice. Enjoy!

Your VegHog

Spicy pitas

Happy weekend everyone! I hope that you have some nice plans for the weekend. Mine has started quite relaxed, and I'm trying to keep it that way. At least for now the sun is shining here in Copenhagen, and it's about +13C. It should be a good weather for a little stroll in town. There are already nice spring flowers everywhere, which is quite uplifting.

I made these spicy pitas just as a quick weekday dinner. They contained vegan “chicken” chunks, red cabbage, tomatoes, onion, garlic and vegan chipotle mayo, and they were wrapped in wholemeal pitas. Is there anything better than Mexican food on a weekday? It always feels like a feast. Alright, pita is not exactly Mexican, but it made a nice wrapping for this spicy filling anyway.

The whole dish was vegan, and quite tasty. I like these chunky vegan “chicken” pieces that are made from wheat gluten and soya protein. They are very versatile to use.

Have a nice weekend!

Your VegHog

In My Kitchen in April

As you may know, I spent Easter in snowy Finland. See the photo below taken on a frozen river just behind my mum's house, and it tells quite a lot about the general atmosphere. The weather was perfect for walks in the snow, as it was so sunny the whole time. We also enjoyed some spectacular sunsets. It was a good break to relax, but a little bit too short. I cooked vegetarian Easter dinner for my family: stuffed sweet potatoes with lentils and pepper, stuffed courgettes with cheese, pulled oats balls, potato mash and salads, and a lot of chocolate eggs as dessert.

I did some shopping while I was there, my usual cheese and some chocolates, but I also got this birch tea towel and serviettes there. 

 

These food items are also from Finland: beetroot tofu steaks and two dry mixes to make a seitan roast and veggie burgers. I may not eat the tofu as steaks, but chop and fry and add them to some dish as an additional colour splash. I'm especially excited about the seitan roast, but will need to wait for some festive occasion to make it.

Here at home in Copenhagen my Easter flowers are still growing, but now I should be getting more spring flowers. This week it has actually started to be a bit warmer. I think I'll ditch my winter coats today and change to something lighter when going out!

I recently bought this vegan chipotle mayo, and now I've been adding it here and there. It's not too hot, but has just a nice warming heat. I ate it among others with these Mexican fried potatoes. They don't look so pretty, but it was a tasty dish.

I somehow got excited again by those really easy ready meals, where you just add some hot water and let them settle for a few minutes and they are ready to go. Do you know the type? I now have some extremely busy weekdays and I really appreciate this sort of dinners sometimes. I think that these products have also come a long way from my student days in the late 90s. I still remember that German cheese pasta that I had quite often. I'm not sure how I would like it today. I've already tasted the Pasta Napoli, and these are still waiting for me to try: Miso ramen noodles, Chili sin carne and Quinoa & Chickpea.

As usual I'm sharing this post with Sherry from Sherry's Pickings blog, who is hosting the In My Kitchen challenge.

Have a nice rest of April everyone!

Your VegHog