james test

November 21-22, 2015 Paula Deen's website does hold a few memorable dessert recipes but I wasn't confident that my friends at the Celebrity Chef picnic potluck would actually want to eat them, vegan or not. I switched over to the more staid Martha Stewart and picked out a gingerbread cheesecake , ripe for the veganising. Stewart does have her own fussy way of overdoing it. In this recipe she would have us bake a half-batch of Molasses-Gingerbread Cookie dough, only to blend most of it into crumbs for the cheesecake base. I was not so inclined, particularly given that a packet of crushed LEDA gingernuts would guarantee me a gluten-free as well as vegan dessert. For the filling, a few containers of Tofutti Better Than Cream Cheese and some blended up flax 'eggs' saw me through. I respectfully disagree that Tofutti's product tastes Better Than Cream Cheese, and made sure to increase the molasses and spices to mask it. Some website commenters recommended baking the c...

November 22, 2015 We joined a gang of veg*n bloggers and associated hangers-on for a potluck picnic in Edinburgh Gardens this past weekend. The potluck was organised by Steph , who added the fun/complexity of a 'celebrity chef' theme. The easy option would have been to fall back on one of the many crowd-pleasing Ottolenghi or Isa recipes we've made before, but we decided to embrace the spirit of the theme more thoroughly and veganise some unlikely celebrity chef dishes. Cindy had oodles of fun trawling her way through the slightly terrifying Paula Deen archives , weighing up options like the bacon cheeseburger meatloaf and the banana split brownie pizza - this Guardian rundown outlines just how horrifically unhealthy (and unvegan) Deen's cooking style is. In the end, after weighing up the picnic-appropriateness and veganisability of various mad recipes, we settled on these mini cheeseburger puffs , which basically involve wrapping the fillings of a cheeseburger in p...

November 15, 2015 We had a few friends around for dinner on Sunday night and decided that an Indian feast was the way to go. We fell back on some old favourites - palak paneer , samosas and kulfi - and included this Ottolenghi-inspired dal as something novel. It uses urad dal - black lentils - which are firmer and hold their shape better than some of the other dals we've used before. The downside to their firmer texture is that they need to be soaked overnight, so you need to be a bit organised. The recipe is otherwise straightforward - it's a simple one pot meal that just needs a bit of time to get the liquid thickened up. The dal itself is lovely, with the garam masala giving it a nice warmth and depth, but the toppings are what really make this stand out. It's definitely worth tracking down fresh coconut if you can - we found frozen shredded coconut at Mix Supermarket in Brunswick, which was an easy solution. The recipe below makes tons of food - we were eating lefto...

November 14, 2015 We've been angling for a visit to A Fan's Notes since our friend Will talked it up as a super vegan-friendly addition to the strip of cafes on Nicholson Street in Carlton North. We were too early for them a week ago , so we took no chances on Saturday and wandered up for a late lunch. It's a cluttered little cafe, immediately winning me over with posters of The Chills and The Clean , along with an impressive bookshelf and general scruffy-hipster vibe. The menu is full of vegetarian and vegan options, with five vegan or veganisable dishes (an enchilada and a quesadilla along with the scrambled tofu, bircher and burrito discussed below) and another five vegetarian dishes across the brunch and lunch menus. Coeliacs are also well catered for, with six dishes to choose from. I was almost lured in by the vegan scrambled tofu, with polenta, asparagus, burnt eggplant, roast peppers and snow peas ($17), but instead went with the vegan option on the black bean bur...

November 8, 2015 Sweet and sour pork was a childhood Chinese takeaway staple for me, and I still love the tangy sauce and juicy pineapple pieces just as much as Michael hates them. I occasionally order vegetarian versions around town but I've only just tried making it for myself for the first time. With Michael away on a work trip and the leftovers of a can of pineapple in the fridge, I was surprised how easily it came together. Some mock pork pieces and canned pineapple chunks were mandatory, of course, and I filled the meal out with red capsicum, snow peas and a carrot cut into half moons. I looked to blog Rasa Malaysia for a sauce recipe - it has a tomato ketchup base, then builds up the sourness with plum sauce (I had homemade plum jam on hand) and rice wine vinegar, saltiness with vegan Worcestershire and oyster sauces, and that trademark texture with a little cornflour. The sauce glistened thickly against the mock pork pieces, but wasn't so abundant as to pool in the ...

November 8, 2015 Back in August, fitzroyalty noted that an Indian restaurant was likely to pop up on Brunswick St next to Madame K's , where the vegan-friendly Frolic had previously offered froyo and waffles. Vegan About Town got in as soon as Mukka opened, thrilled to access veg-friendly Indian street food so close to home. She went on to invite me there for lunch just a few days later and I was out the door in 30 minutes. The restaurant lets in plenty of light, and the interior is cheerful, casual and clean. I'm accustomed to Indian restaurant menus running to several dozen pages; the food here is listed on a single compact sheet, but maintains the high proportion of vegetarian and even vegan options, all clearly marked. I love me a lassi, and a Mukka they come in two flavours, mango and rose-cinnamon ($6.50). Even better, they offer vegan-friendly analogues ($7, rose-cinnamon one pictured), made slushy and refreshing with blended almond milk and ice. Steph and I shared a ...

November 7, 2015 Michael was keen to have Saturday breakfast at a fan's notes on our friend Will's recommendation, but at 9am they still weren't really open yet. Instead we crossed Park St to Carolina. We've visited before for breakfast and for drinks in the evening, so we were confident of a pleasant experience even if we hadn't seen the latest menu. Vegan and gluten-free items are clearly marked but sparse on said menu, and other dishes look adaptable (e.g. remove feta from white beans, and goats cheese from herb-oiled avo on toast). The vegan and gluten-free Okay, Carolina fritters stand out as the most unusual offering, done okonomiyaki-style with pickled ginger, nori, chilli, Japanese mayo and a side salad with white miso dressing ($15). Michael was tempted by those fritters, but ultimately went for the Carolina white beans ($13) with poached eggs ($4). They were fragrant with smoked garlic and sage, then topped with feta and fresh green herbs, almost but not ...

November 4, 2015 We've had our eye on Shop Ramen and its vegan bowl a long time, but only recently made our first visit after 9pm on a Wednesday. Although we didn't get to witness their noodle-making in action it was the right time to comfortably snag a seat - two years after opening there's still often a queue out front. The menu is reasonably simple, living up to the neon sign out front advertising RAMEN, BUN & PIE. While dietary requirements aren't clearly coded, key ingredients are listed after each dish and the staff are on hand to help. We started by sharing a bun ($4) stuffed with special sauce-smothered tofu, sauerkraut, peanuts and coriander, and almost too steaming-hot to handle. Michael dipped into the widely lauded vegan tofu ramen ($14), piled with broccoli, pickled shitake mushrooms, edamame, cress and sesame (the standard version includes egg, but they're happy to exclude it). The excellent cashew milk broth is the novelty of this dish, but the fr...

November 1, 2015 We've been giving Community a good workout lately and having some very successful meals . It was our go-to book again for a healthy Sunday night dinner, with Cindy picking out this soba, edamame and eggplant salad. We made a few changes to the recipe, first adding in some tofu to make sure we had lots of leftovers for lunch, and second switching the edamame out for broad beans because that's all we could find at the shops. There are a few processes involved in making the dish - you've got noodles to cook, eggplant to roast and a frying pan full of tofu and beans to manage - but everything can be done while the eggplant is roasting and it all comes together easily in the end. The pay-off is a massive saucepan of delicious noodly salad, with a mildly spicy sauce and a nice mix of textures from the tofu, beans and eggplant. This version of the recipe makes a lot of food, so it's probably worth rescaling things a bit unless you want to eat it every day ...

November 1, 2015 Last weekend our friend Natalie invited us to skip the World Vegan Day crowds and eat breakfast nachos at her place. It was an excellent decision - we layered up plates with corn chips and scrambled tofu, black beans, potatoes, avocado and cashew cheese, met her cat, hung out in the shed and did newspaper quizzes. I brought over a watermelon salad as a fresh dessert we could pick at with forks. The big innovation here is that I made my own vegan almond-based feta. I've had a few vegan feta recipes stowed away for years and I based this on the one at In The Mood For Noodles . Since it was intended for dessert, I skipped the garlic and the marinating in herb oil and relied on just the lemon juice and salt for flavour. I cut some corners, reducing the soaking time and the water involved in the original, but making sure that I got a smooth grind on those almonds.  I was very pleased with the results, though you can see that this baked feta gets a little golden around ...

October 31, 2015 The latest incarnation of the Gasometer has been open a year and a half, offering a steady stream of gigs and gastropub meals ... except that the kitchen's just been rebranded Gas-Light Izakaya! We stopped in early for dinner before swinging around to the band room for Dan Kelly's album launch . The menu doesn't pay much mind to special dietary requirements - there are more than enough dishes to sate vegetarians, but vegans and coeliacs are likely to have a tougher time of it. The fried cauliflower florets ($9) were huge and hard to maneuvre with chopsticks, but had the right balance of crunchiness and tenderness. The accompanying sweet and sour sauce only left us hankering after the spicier version we've made at home. The jalapeno and cheese korokke ($5, foreground) was also expertly fried, though we were ambivalent about the warm mushy filling ( Smith & Daughters has really spoiled us for any other croquette!). We were more taken with the tofu ...

October 31, 2015 Michael and I both had good news at work on Friday, and he insisted that we breakfast somewhere fun to celebrate on Saturday morning. I suggested we check out Stagger Lee's, which our friend Lisa recommended a few months ago as a good spot for vegan options. With exposed bricks and bulbs, two communal tables and serious, single origin coffee, Stagger Lee's fits the inner-north cafe mould. The menu is annotated with Vs, VG, VGOs and GFs (including the wine list!) but we couldn't see a corresponding legend. The V*s were all over the place, on lemon curd-covered crumpets, granola and bircher bowls with coyo and almond milk, ricotta-spiked avocado with corn and jalapenos, and a herby omelette. Michael exclaimed over how great the coffee was, then tucked into the vegan version of the green garden ($20), a medley of cashew cheese, broccolini, avocado, fennel, radish, herbs, pomegranate seeds and sprouted lentils. The smoked ocean trout and poached egg of the orig...

October 5 and 29, 2015 Since our office move a couple of months back I've been continuing to explore the food options around the neighbourhood (while missing Sonido and Smith & Deli of course). I had a tip-off from a mate that Kitchen Inn had a surprisingly decent range of vegetarian options, so I dropped by to check it out. It's a short menu section with just five dishes, featuring Kitchen Inn's house-made noodles, rice, vegetables and - in all five dishes - vegetarian BBQ pork. Each dish is super affordable - just $8.90, for plates so big you'll struggle to finish them. Vegans will be well served by most of the options (the egg noodle dish is a no-go, obviously), but will need to let the staff know to exclude the egg that comes standard in dishes like the fried kueh teow and fried rice (I failed in the noodle dish on the left below, but excluded the egg successfully from the fried rice on the right). The fried kueh teow was fantastic - excellent noodles, wok-fri...