Vegan "Milk" Chocolate! First attempt!

A while back, I bought (fair trade and organic) cocoa butter and powdered almond milk (well, basically powdered almonds - since it's solely made from almonds). For all of you German speakers: I got the almond milk powder here and the cocoa butter as well.

Today, I felt Christmas-y and ready to try something new, so I tried to make some milk chocolate. I am not 100 % happy with how it turned out, so I won't release the recipe yet, but I promise, I will once it's good enough!

It's not bad... it's just not perfect yet.

It's a wrap!

I love wraps because you can fill them with whatever you like, they are great if you want to bring lunch to work or school and you can also use them to use up leftovers.

Ingredients for six wraps:

most of the ingredients are optional, of course. If you happen to hate red cabbage, I would suggest you don't use it.

Nacho "Cheese" Sauce

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Do you know this sad feeling when you have nachos, but decided to skip the cheese sauce because of the dairy? Oh. The sad feeling. I just found the holy cheese grail for you!

Welcome to a perfect Sunday night! X-Files and nachos <3

So creamy!

Kitchen Basics: Hazelnut Milk

My favorite non-dairy milk is a specific brand of oat milk (Kölln Smelk in case any one is interested). It's more expensive than the average soy milk, but I like it because it tastes great, and the ingredients are not shipped across the world, as the oat is grown (and then also processed) in Germany. I'm absolutely willing to pay that price (usually €1.79 to €2.19 for a liter), but when I saw Jérôme Eckmeier make hazelnut milk, I knew I had to try this myself. It's really easy, too! And cheaper. And tasty!

Ingredients:

• 1l of water
• 2 table spoons of sunflower oil
• 100g of hazelnuts (soaked in cold water over night)
• 1 table spoon of unrefined cane sugar
• a pinch of salt

Our Three-Course Dinner!

We had a lovely time with some of our friends last night! After spending the occasional hour or two eating vegan things together, both in different restaurants and in our friends' private vegan guerilla café, we decided it was time for us to put together a full dinner evening, once at each couples' home. There's a tv show in Germany ("Das perfekte Dinner" - goes by "Come dine with me" in other countries") which inspired us to have a three-course meal, nice decorations and good drinks.

Here's what we did:

Some nice edible decoration, candles, vegan fair trade wine from the local fairtrade shop, friends, a bit of freshly baked bread with herb "butter"...

The simple things in life: Pasta Bolognese

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Party Food or why Silken Tofu is Awesome!

Our friends know that we always serve food when we invite people. Yes, if they spontaneously drop by, I may not have anything prepared, but when actually invite people, they know they shouldn't eat before showing up.

Yesterday, we had some friends over for a whisk(e)y tasting and of course, we needed something to go with that. Sorry for the poor picture quality.

The boyfriend and I made Frikadellen (meat balls), roasted peppers with a herb/dried tomato cream, some small tomato rolls with a herb "butter," and mousse au chocolat.

The Frikadellen recipe originates in Jérôme Eckmeier's blog, but of course, we always make our own little adjustments.

Fried Noodles with Tons of Veggies! (and maybe some mock duck)

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I love to cook for other people... and for myself. But I think eating ought to be a social activity. So today I made some food for the boyfriend and a friend who does not have the time to cook.
And who would say no this:

Celeriac Soup with Herbes de Provence Bread Rolls

As I mentioned in a previous post, I get a box of assorted organic veggies + fruit from a local organic farm once a week. This week, it came with two celeriacs. Since there was so much of it, I decided to make a soup! And because there is nothing better than fresh bread, I decided to make some rolls to go with the soup.

Ingredients:

For the soup:

• 1.5l of veggie stock 
• 1 onion
• 4 smallish potatoes
• 2 celeriacs 
• 250ml of white wine
• 1 leek
• Dried herbes de Provence (thyme, rosemary, oregano) (These herbs were actually picked in southern France by my friend Caro! Thanks again!)
• salt
• 1 pot of soy cream
• a little bit of olive oil
• a little bit of freshly ground black pepper to garnish

I intentionally didn't put any exact gram measurements with the different veggies used. If you happen to have two leeks and one large piece of celeriac that should work just as well as the combination I had. 

Vegan Kitchen Staples

Since my friend Joni (who is new to exclusively plant-based cooking) asked for some explanation of the things that appear to be more exotic to those who cook conventionally, I decided to collect a few things that I find in my pantry to explain them.

Firstly, I would like to mention that you can easily cook awesome vegan food without using soy, seitan, and all these other things. The main ingredient in my kitchen will alwaysdesc be vegetables, fruits, legumes, nuts, etc. There is nothing wrong with tofu etc., but in my kitchen vegan cooking does not have to mean that I copy conventional recipes and replace meat with tofu. I do that sometimes, because I used to enjoy eating meat. I do not think that there is anything wrong with the taste of it, I just no longer see the necessity to use meat/dairy/eggs in order to get a great meal.

So. The main ingredient that should be available anywhere near you is this: