South Island Vegan Road Trip - Part 1

When Nick and I arrived on the South Island we were both feeling a little lost, we hadn't had time to sit down and plan our South Island road trip at all and we had no idea where we were headed - just that we had a car and the freedom to go anywhere. The very first thing that we spotted as we were checking into our hostel was a flyer for tours of a peanut butter factory! That was clearly a sign and we were sold. I was on the phone booking our spots in seconds. Coincidentally someone I knew from Brighton was in the area housesitting so we hooked up with her and her husband and headed to the Pic's factory in Nelson the very next day.

Pic's are actually a super cool peanut butter company, the founder started making PB in a concrete mixer in his garage and selling it at farmer's markets and it's grown into a bit of a peanut butter empire with stockists all over New Zealand and a chunk of the rest of the world. Pic seems like a cool dude, he's all about employing local people and keeping the business local as it grows. Pic is blind and him and his lovely seeing eye dog made a great video about the cool PB journey he's been on.

Oh Hey 2017!

Hi friends! I thought it was about time for a little life update. I'm still working at Lush - they offered me a permanent position after my temporary contract ended and I had to say yes. I have no idea how long we're going to be in this part of the world for but earning some money and seeing one of my favourite ethical brands from the other side seems like a good thing to do with my time. Unfortunately the major downsides are the commute into London - I spend around 3 hours a day getting to and from work - and, it turns out that I'm super allergic to Lush! This doesn't surprise me, I'm allergic to everything from dust to chilli and from cats to pineapple but finding the right meds that work and don't make me drowsy has taken a while and a lot of my days off have been spent in bed dealing with hideous sinus pain. Stupid body! The major bonus, and I mean major, is that my work is only a ten minute walk from Yorica!

This Soho vegan ice cream spot just gets better and better, I can confirm that the crepes are blooming excellent and I will be going back for more soon.

Cooking With Friends.

I'm currently feeling super excited that I get to watch the seasons change from autumn to winter. This time last year I was in Thailand and I definitely missed all things autumn and winter; from bonfire night to drinking glasses of mulled winter punch on cold nights at home. The leaves are falling from the trees and the nights are drawing in and I'm loving spending evenings snuggled under a blanket reading by the fire at my sister in law's place.

When I've managed to pull myself out of my blanket cocoon I've been spending days in central London getting reunited with my old favourite food joints (and checking out some new ones), interviewing for the Christmas temp job of my dreams (cross your fingers for me friends!), and having a tonne of fun hanging out and eating with friends. Last week Randi and I made pizzas with the Miyoko's kitchen mozzarella I brought back from New York and whilst I didn't take any decent pictures you can trust me when I say that they were delicious. My favourite combo was pesto, potatoes, rosemary and mozzarella. So. Damn. Good.

My cooking adventures didn't stop there though, I hung out with Sal from Alien on Toast last weekend and we made both lasagne and lemon meringue pie. Two of my favourite foods ever. The lasagne was a true lazy person effort involving jarred béchamel, two blocks of Sainsbury's vegan cheese, and a homemade tomato sauce with sneaky hidden carrots and courgette. It was super good and I hope that we make it again someday. I didn't take a decent picture so here's a photo of my breakfast the next day. Yes, I am basically a genius!

The lemon meringue pie recipe we settled on was this one from the blog Seitan Beats your Meat, we chose it because you can always trust Kelly not to put a shitty recipe out there in the world. I'm kind of a renegade so of course I didn't read the recipe directions before I shopped for ingredients or before we started throwing things together in the kitchen so the 2 1/2 hour cooking time came as a bit of a shock especially as this was after "cooking" the pie crust (um, warming store bought pastry. Thanks Jus-rol!) and suddenly our lemon meringue pie dreams seemed doomed.

Vegan in Inawashiro, Japan

Not a single person who I've mentioned Inawashiro to has known where it is so this probably isn't going to be my most searched for or most shared blog post but it'll be relevant for any vegans coming to volunteer at Japan Cat Network, ski on Mount Bandai or to take in a slice of rural Japan. If it can help even one person then I'll feel like I'm doing my travel blogging job right.

Before coming up here I had no idea whether eating vegan would be a challenge or plain sailing. I suspected it'd learn towards the tougher end of the spectrum so I arrived with two tote bags filled with snacks, burger mixes, vegan mayo, chocolate, and margarine collected from various health food stores in Tokyo. Despite there being no veg friendly restaurants in the vicinity eating here hasn't been difficult at all. Luckily the Japan Cat Network kitchen is tooled up with gas burners, a microwave, an oven and two kinds of blender as well as some more unusual items like a takoyaki pan, and Japanese supermarkets always, always, always have tofu, rice, and exciting veggies so I was never gonna starve.

There's actually a 7/Eleven just across the road from the shelter so I've been able to find inari sushi, plain onigiri, ume onigiri, ume and sakura onigiri, Chipstar crisps, plum crisps, sweet sugared sweet potatoes, edamame, and tofu very easily. If you're planning a trip to Japan check out my Pictorial Vegan Convenience Store Guide to find out what you can eat at 7/Eleven, Lawson and Family Mart stores all over the country. A couple of weeks ago these vegan Soy Joy bars appeared on the shelves of 7/Eleven which was pretty exciting. Despite the name the majority of Soy Joy products aren't vegan but these are and whilst I didn't love the pink wrapped bar, it tasted really artificial, I was very into the one in the white wrapper which reminded me a little of shortbread.

There are two supermarkets in Inawashiro and York Benimaru is the better of the two. It's always well stocked and has a great produce department as well as must have items like soy milk, Kewpie egg free mayo, nori, potato starch, pasta, noodles, and almond meal.

The Taco Cleanse Review and Giveaway

I'm hungry! I'm often hungry, at least three or four times a day, and when I'm not hungry I could always eat. I'm munching on onigiri as I write this. When everyone's rolling around clutching their bellies after a big lunch and talking about how there's no way they'll have room for dinner I know that an afternoon snack is probably in my future. In our fucked up society this is something that, as a woman, I'm meant to feel ashamed of and it's bullshit. Diets, cleanses, detoxing and clean eating are shoved in our faces at every turn especially at this time of year and more and more of my peers seem to be jumping on the bandwagon. It makes me sad. Why are we made to feel guilty for needing, no, wanting, to eat? Why are we made to feel like we need to "cleanse" ourselves after a food based celebration? Why is eating associated with guilt and "being naughty"? I'll tell you why, it's because as women we're meant to make ourselves as small as possible, to take up the least space and to conform to societal beauty ideals so that we don't offend anyone with our fat or body hair or perceived ugliness. I don't want to see food as "a treat", as something to reward myself for "being good all week" or because it's my god damned birthday and I don't want to try to diet & exercise my body down to a certain size or weight because that's what society deems acceptable. I've been there and done that and I don't want to do it again. Food is a necessity damnit! We need to eat at least three times a day if not more and I want that food to be filled with nourishing and tasty carbs, proteins, fats and sugars and I want it to be delicious. I'm not suggesting that health is unimportant, I try to get my 10,000 steps in most days whilst I'm exploring the world and I actually enjoy going to the gym but that's because these things are good for my mental health as well as my physical health. The way most people seem to be approaching cleanses, detoxing and "new year new you" diets seem far from okay from a mental health perspective.

That's why I decided to embark upon a New Year Taco Cleanse! I think that regular me is pretty rad, belly fat and all, but life can always be improved by more tacos. I want to show people that cleansing can be about fun rather than about restricting fun.

Learning to Cook Vegan Thai Food with May Kaidee

Before coming to Thailand I had an ever growing list of must-do activities and right at the top was "Take a Cooking Class", more specifically a May Kaidee cooking class, which had been recommended to me by two experts in the cuisine, Kip from Messy Vegetarian Cook and Jess of Get Sconed / Vida Vegan Con fame. There was only one small hiccup in my plan to take the class, last autumn I was diagnosed with an allergy to peppers. After almost two years of struggling with worsening joint pain issues that doctors were finally associating with my stomach / digestive concerns, a combination of tests and an elimination diet that saw me quitting potatoes for a month, resulted in me feeling a million times better. Almost as soon as I quit peppers, including chilli peppers and paprika as well as the classic bell pepper, I was able to exercise again, I could sit cross legged, I could type for more than five minutes at a time and I could walk up and down the stairs of my own house without being in excruciating pain. It was a pretty amazing transformation and after months and months of worry I was honestly pretty okay with the diagnosis - when words like Lupus are being thrown around an allergy doesn't seem so bad. But then I remembered Thailand. Thailand without chilli was surely going to be impossible / boring but there was no way I was cancelling or changing plans. This trip, and the beginning of a whole new life on the road, had been in the works for so damn long that nothing was going to hold me back. There have definitely been a few chilli mishaps resulting in some less than fun pain issues but on the whole I've been managing... I've been a little sad to have more of a limited eating scope because when you want to order the Thai green curry you can't just ask them to hold the chilli because it's the base of the dish, it would be impossible. I was basically totally over the moon when a quick e-mail exchange with May Kaidee confirmed that they'd be able to modify a class for me using peppercorns instead of chilli. Amazing. I could finally get stuck into Thai cuisine.

Nick and I showed up at the class not quite knowing what to expect and were greeted by Duan, May Kaidee's sister, at the meeting point just across from her restaurant Morning Glory. She's super friendly and a joy to be taught by and we dived straight into an introduction to the flavours needed to make some classic Thai dishes, minus the chilli of course! Kafir lime leaves. Galangal. Lemongrass. Garlic. Thai basil. Coriander. Lime. All flavours that I love but that have always been overpowered by chilli before. We used fresh green and red peppercorns to create something a little left of mainstream that was perfectly suited to me.

Next we met the veggies and I learnt some valuable chopping skills, I cook but I've never paid attention to the knife skills and now I can cut a squash with confidence. Pro tip: you need a crazy sharp knife, it does't even need to be that big, just sharp. Also am I the only vegan on earth that didn't know you could steam both pumpkin and potato?! I've always seen these as things that needed roasting, or boiling in the case of the potato. I am very excited to have learnt that there'll be a way for me to enjoy pumpkin whilst I'm living the van dwelling vegan hippy life this summer.

Apologies for this horrific picture, but how cool is that steamer?!

After a swift lesson in fresh peppercorn filled red and green curry pastes, the base of so many of the foods we created in class, we whipped up a quick batch of pumpkin hummus in the pestle and mortar.

I was blown away by the fact that we could create something so delicious so quickly and this feeling quickly became a constant during the class!

Pumpkin soup two ways came next followed by peanut sauce and fresh spring rolls. The spring rolls were filled with crunchy veggies and the freshest herbs and we ate them dipped in the peanut sauce. I've never worked with fresh spring roll wrappers before, they're definitely slightly superior texture wise, but Duan insisted that the dried kind we can find at home are a-ok.

Next up a fast Pad Thai and some fried veggies with cashew nuts. Again I was blown away by how fast these came together!

Soups were next and we created two variations of Tom Yam soup to illustrate how one small change of herb can greatly impact the flavours, as well as Tom Kha soup from one base recipe. The creamy Tom Kha was my favourite and I pretty much devoured the whole bowl right there and then.

Now I have pretty much never eaten curry, I've always been super sensitive to chilli (now I know why) so it's not something I've ever really enjoyed and when making curry at home I always just left out the chilli paste entirely and added a tiny splash of über mild chilli garlic sauce which, of course, resulted in super bland uninspiring dishes. We made both Masaman Curry and Green Thai Curry and whilst I enjoyed both dishes the Green Thai Curry blew me away with it's depth of flavour. I've always been a pumpkin fan so I guess it's no surprise that this was my favourite but it was so good that I've been craving it almost constantly ever since.

We went on to make a beautiful fresh crunchy Green Papaya Salad, something else I've always wanted to try, and not one but two desserts. Mango Sticky Rice and Pumpkin in Sweet Coconut Milk. My pictures of these are best left in my iPhoto library rather than out there in the world but rest assured that they were delicious.

The class was an absolute joy and I'm adding myself to the chorus of endorsers. At the time of booking I wasn't aware that we'd be in a class on our own or that we'd be cooking in a real restaurant kitchen rather than a test kitchen set up for students and I'm not sure if these things are the norm or the luck of the draw. 

As we decided to hang around Chiang Mai for just a little longer we were lucky not to have to miss the amazing food we cooked for too long because a day later we paid another visit to Morning Glory for dinner where Duan thankfully still had fresh peppercorns knocking around. She was able to make us another perfect Green Thai Curry and she even insisted I come back into the kitchen again to help pound the green peppercorn paste!

It's perfection in a bowl and I finally understand what people have been raving about all this time. I can't wait until I have a kitchen again so that I can make Green Thai Curry over and over.

We also ate fried and fresh Spring Rolls with the latter being served with Peanut Sauce.

I looooved the tomato based peanut sauce we whipped up in class and this one was no different, I could eat it by the spoonful but I think a fresh spring roll is probably a more polite instrument! The fried rolls were great too but I'm totally on team fresh if you're going to make me choose.

Morning Glory is definitely on my must-visit list for Chiang Mai and the class, as well as being a whole lot of fun, was a totally transformative experience for me. Ten out of ten!

Freedom Mallows

If you've spent much time with me (either online or in real life) then you probably already know how much I love marshmallows. When I was a teenager I used to stick them on the end of a nail file and toast them over a candle whilst obsessively re-watching Clueless and wishing I had Cher's life. I'm different now, classier, I have skewers. I'm also switched on to what gelatine actually is these days so vegan mallows are the only way to go.

Freedom Mallows have been a favourite of mine since they first appeared in stores and I was stoked when they agreed to send me their new repackaged and rebranded marshmallows to try and review. 

I've always been a bit of a mallow purist picking up the white Vanilla Mallows every time. When something's this good it's hard to break away from it. These are perfectly sweet and pillowy and I love them. They aren't as puffy as Dandies, which aren't available in the UK yet, and they remind me a little of flumps, remember those? I loved those.

Next I tried the yellow coloured Vanilla Mallows which, if I'm totally honest I don't quite understand. I've always been unsure about purchasing these in the past assuming they must taste strange but they taste exactly the same as the white version. Do people have childhood memories of yellow marshmallows that I've missed? I have puffy pink mallow memories but nothing's ringing a bell with yellow. Do the people at Freedom Mallows just think yellow's a fun colour? I don't know, I do know that it didn't stop me eating them.

The Strawberry Mallows turned out to be a total revelation. Whilst I had fond teenage memories of eating pink marshmallows I had no recollection of them tasting like strawberry. In fact I found the idea a little odd at first but after my first taste I realised I'd been so, so wrong. I ate the whole bag in one go, they're so freaking good.

I was ridiculously excited to try the mini mallows but I wanted to hold out for an occasion, mini mallows aren't just for shoving into your mouth in handfuls y'know... Okay, okay, I totally did that but only with half of them.

I took the mini vanilla marshmallows along to my favourite local hot chocolate spot, Chocaffinitea. They do spanish style single origin hot chocolate which is always hot, always vegan and always and ready to go. It's pretty great as is but the marshmallows make it extra special. I kept adding more and more.

I had something special in mind for the mini pink & white vanilla marshmallows too, Krispie Cakes. I hadn't made Krispie Cakes for a long time, probably ever since Kellogs screwed up all of the vitamin D in their cereals and made them non-vegan, and I'd never had them with mallows. Randi and Sal were coming to sleep over so I veganised this recipe but with added mallows and chocolate krispies so I think I've changed it enough to feature it below.

Double Chocolate Marshmallow Krispie Cakes

• 90g Doves Farm Cocoa Rice Cereal
• 100g Dark Chocolate (try to find something hovering around the 50% cocoa mark)
• 60g Margarine cut into small pieces
• 3TBS Golden Syrup
• 1/2 bag Freedom Mallows (divided)

Melt the chocolate in a bain marie stirring constantly to avoid burning. Add the margarine and stir until melted. Add the golden syrup and stir in. Gently fold in the cocoa rice cereal and just under half of the bag of mini marshmallows. Spoon into 12 cupcake cases and top with the remaining marshmallows. Leave in the fridge to cool for around an hour and then eat. 

The finished product! Nick, Sal, Randi and I devoured these pretty fast. They were most excellent.

Freedom Mallows are available from Infinity Foods in Brighton, The Health Store in Nottingham and Edinburgh's Real Foods as well as UK wide at Holland and Barrett, Whole Foods UK locations and many other independent retailers. Online stockists include Vegan Store and the Viva! Shop and if you're in Aus you're in luck because Freedom Mallows can be purchased online from both Vegan Perfection and Green Edge. Freedom Mallows have recently made it to Sweden too, you can pick up a bag from Astrid Och Aporna or some ICA and Coop supermarkets, hopefully the rest of Europe won't be far behind. 

If all of this marshmallow talk has your craving a s'more or yearning to whip up a batch of my marshmallow krispie cakes then I have good news for you. I'm giving three people the chance to win two bags of mallows (white and strawberry) and a promotional Cedric the Sloth shopping bag. Yay!

To enter just leave a comment telling me what you'd do with your marshmallows. Winners will be picked at random. The giveaway closes on December 19th at 12pm GMT. This competition is open to residents of the UK and Sweden only. Please be sure to leave your contact details, e-mail, Twitter, Instagram, or your blog profile work for me! 

The giveaway  is now closed, congrat's Imogen & Loz.

MoFo '14 Day 30 - S'mores Cookies

I got tattooed earlier (check my Instagram for a pic) and I know that what I need during a tattoo appointment is sugar so I made cookies to share! I heard about this recipe for S'mores Cookies on Lindsay's blog Vegan Chai but it originally came from Amanda at Will Draw for Cookies. You should definitely check it out because it's an illustrated recipe and it's super adorable. 

Now when both of these ladies made them they turned out super well, they were all perfect and round, y'know just how you'd expect a cookie to look. Here are mine pre-oven...

...and here they are post oven. 

I think that Freedom Mallows maybe melt less well than Dandies and by that I mean they melt like craaaaazy, everywhere. Either it was the fault of the mallows (which I totally did cut in half to make mini mallows) or I'm a terrible baker...I'm going to keep blaming the mallows. I subbed rich tea biscuits for the Graham crackers because we don't have those here, I was planning to use digestive biscuits but every single kind at the supermarket I went to had milk.

I realised after taking the first two off of the tray that I was going to need to let them cool completely before popping them on the cooling rack, ten minutes wasn't quite enough. Ooops!

A good 75% were attractive enough for sharing which actually worked out wonderfully because it meant that the other half needed eating stat. That was really tough for Nick and I because we totally hate cookies*! *we do not totally hate cookies. Despite not being the most beautiful these were super delicious. I'd definitely make them again.

I'll leave you with two pic's of what these cookies are meant to look like!

Photo Credit Amanda

 Photo credit Lindsay

It's been a super fun VeganMoFo y'all. I can't believe it's over. I'm feeling a little emotional about writing the very last round up on the official VeganMoFo blog later! If you've enjoyed my MoFoing rest assured that I still have plenty of posts in the works for after MoFo and I'll be posting regularly for the rest of the year and beyond!

MoFo '14 Day 29 - Cheezish

It's my favourite day of the week, Mac & Cheese Monday! Yay! I wasn't quite sure what to make today and then I remembered Cheezish! If you read my pal Lindsay aka Vegan Chai's blog then you must have heard of Cheezish. It's her favourite! I knew I had to try it and what better day than today. The recipe comes from the Glad Cow cookbook and it's also here on the cookbook author's Facebook page. It was so easy to make, you just whiz the ingredients together in a blender and then stir in some margarine at the end. As well as being ridiculously easy it was also totally delicious. 

This stovetop mac is tangy, creamy and cheesy and the recipe makes a tonne of sauce which is the best. It has both roasted red peppers (pimentos if you can get 'em, I couldn't) and a tonne of nooch which are two of my fave' mac & cheese ingredients. I left out the hot sauce. I wanted to get cavatappi (or spirali as they seem to call it over here) because it's Lindsay's favourite but the supermarket I went to didn't have it so I got Pipe Rigate instead which is still an excellent vessel for cheesy sauce.

I will definitely be making this again soon. Probably tomorrow.

MoFo '14 Day 25 - Vegan Parmesan

Yesterday afternoon I was nearing the end of my to-do list when I felt a familiar rumble that signalled dinner time was fast approaching. For the last few nights Nick and I have eaten cereal, microwaved some Amy's mac & cheese and yesterday I even made Nick grab us take out on his way home from work. Whilst these were all fine and filling dinners I felt like I should probably cook something proper today. I was racking my brain for something easy and decided to head over to my cheese board on Pinterest to see if anything simple but theme worthy jumped out at me. Right there at the bottom was this pin, 5 Quick and Easy Vegan Parmesan Pasta Recipes from Maple Spice, one of my favourite blogs.

Now I was super tempted to go for the really, really easy option of the Buttery Parmesan Pasta but I had a courgette calling my name so I decided to go for the Vegan Lemon Parmesan Spaghetti becuase Debbie suggests mixing in courgette to add some veg, good call Debbie!

The parmesan recipe itself is SO easy to throw together, easier than any other parmesan recipe I've tried and that's saying something. I think it's because it calls for ground almonds which I always have on hand anyway. You don't even need to get the blender out.

I whipped up a quick single serving batch in my pestle and mortar.

As soon as the pasta was ready I mixed in the margarine, parmesan, garlic powder, pepper and a little pasta water and added the courgettes to my portion - no way was Nick going to eat courgettes!

This was such a great easy meal, it literally came together in ten minutes. I'll definitely be trying the other four quick and easy pasta recipes from Debbie's post, the spring vegetable pasta sounds particularly delicious and even Nick will eat asparagus, peas and green beans these days!

MoFo '14 Day 14 - International Cheese Sandwich Party

One of the many things I love about Sal is that she's always up for doing stupid things like hanging out all day making and eating as many cheese sandwiches as possible. This was a particularly awesome plan as it not only fitted in with my International Cheese and Chocolate Month theme but also with her dirty sandwiches theme. Brilliant!

We started by popping to M&S and Infinity Foods to grab the ingredients we needed to go with the ones I'd brought back from the US.

We bought two kinds of bread, VBites ham, a tomato and some Violife original slices that I forgot to photograph. I had the soya milk and the Vitalite already and the Earth Balance Mac & Cheese and Daiya Provolone Slices came from Austin.

We decided to make the sandwiches in order of perceived awesomeness in case we got full and didn't enjoy the final sandwiches so much. Smart logic! Obviously that meant that the mac & cheese toastie was up first. I love my toastie maker and I don't use it anywhere near enough. Cheapo white bread is the only sensible toastie bread, that's what this machine's built for people. Don't fight it!

If you aren't familiar with the humble toastie (or jaffle as they call it down under) it's a staple of students and lovers of hot filthy sandwiches everywhere and you butter the outside of the bread just like when you're making a sandwich in a cast iron pan. The toastie maker seals up the sides and makes pockets of cheesy melty deliciousness that are usually hotter than the sun. Classic toastie fillings across the UK include cheese, cheese and ham, cheese and pickle and cheese and baked beans. Basically cheese is important so why not give mac & cheese a whirl?

Unsurprisingly this was freaking awesome, just look at it. And it's my favourite combo - carbs on carbs! Or really, in this case, carbs in carbs.

I'll tell y'all more about the mac tomorrow when I do a full review (and giveaway!) of both kinds of Earth Balance boxed mac & cheese but so far so good, we'll just say it lived up to my expectations! You could totally use any mac and cheese here, I think two big dessert spoonfuls would be the right amount, any more and you'd end up in a serious overflow situation.

Grilled Cheese number two involved another of my ridiculous kitchen gadgets, the panini press. This sandwich was a little fancier so we whipped out the multi seeded bread. This had the Daiya provolone slices, VBites ham and sliced tomato inside. Here's Sal capturing the bubbly meltiness of the cheese.

Unfortunately looking at the bubbly melty cheese was the high point of this sandwich experience. Daiya provolone is, um, gross. Seriously. Why is is so sweet? Blurgh. Even the meltiness couldn't win us round here!

Posh sandwich, thumbs down. Neither of us will be eating the rest of the cheese and that says a lot. We decided to gift it to Sal's dad who will literally eat anything including dried hunks of TVP. Don't ask.

Next up was Sal's recreation of a pre-gan sandwich she used to make whilst drunk many years ago. It's a cheese and ham sandwich and she used Violife cheese slices and VBites ham and to say that I was dubious about it would be a massive understatement. Why? You ask, cheese and ham seems pretty normal right? Well alarm bells started ringing when she said she was planning to use my microwave to make it. Yup. I was highly suspicious. Bread...in the microwave? I think I may have accused her of being a disgusting dirty savage. I totally ate my words in the end though because this was a DELICIOUS dirty sandwich. It's not gourmet, it's not fancy and sure, the bread was a touch soggy but look at the hot melty deliciousness.

As you can tell the melting potential of the cheese is very important here and Violife was a clear success. This also only takes one minute in the microwave and, a definite bonus for a sandwich that is apparently best enjoyed drunk, you don't need to turn on the grill or the oven or even mess with anything remotely likely to burn down the house. All you need is to be able to exercise patience and not burn your tongue on the cheese! This is a definite win my friends so don't knock it 'til you've tried it! Disclaimer: We are both kinda gross. Your milage with the soggy bread may vary. You cannot hold us accountable if you try this and aren't a fan. Good melty cheese is totes essential.

MoFo '14 Day 7 - Amisa Organic Cheese Review

Late last month I was wandering around Infinity Foods picking up essentials, tofu, broccoli, Amy's mac & cheese, etc when I spotted a new brand of vegan cheese out of the corner of my eye. Obviously I had to grab some!

This new cheese is made by Amisa Organic and it's coconut based and palm oil free. I picked the slices because they were slightly cheaper and I had sandwiches in mind.

Somewhere between Infinity Foods and my kitchen sandwiches morphed into cheese on toast and as I wanted to see how the cheese would melt it seemed like the perfect plan. It turns out that this is an excellent meltable cheese, look...

It got really gooey and bubbly, not stretchy though but I'm fine with that. Taste wise it was mild and it was definitely more flavourful melted. I couldn't tell you how it compares to gouda, it's been too long. The only issue I had was that the slices crumbled as soon as you touched them, there is no way the serving suggesting pictured on the front of the pack would work. Not at all! When I was making this cheese on toast I had to transfer the crumbled pieces from the pack to the bread with a fork and then squish it so that it didn't all fall off. I definitely wouldn't buy the slices again, Violife is still my go to there, but I will be buying the bag of grated gouda style cheese. I have a sneaking suspicion that with this level of meltability it'll be an excellent pizza cheese.

MoFo '14 Day 1 - Favourite Mac and Cheese Recipes Redux

Mac and Cheese, or Macaroni Cheese, as we call it here in the UK, was always up there with my favourite foods before I went vegan and it's still right up there now. Hence the Mac 'n Cheese Monday theme! I wrote the original version of this blog post during VeganMoFo last year but my favourite macs are a constantly evolving thang so I wanted to update y'all on my favourite mac and cheeses as of right now.

As a student I used to eat the kind that comes out of a can and when I met my husband it was one of the only things he could cook so he made it for me a lot. When I first went vegan I avoided trying to make a macaroni cheese for fear of disappointing myself but once I threw myself off of the nutritional yeasty deep end I realised I didn't need to worry, vegans can have cheesy pasta fun too!

Here are my favourite macaroni cheese recipes in no particular order...

New Farm Cookbook Mac and Cheese

One of the first vegan mac recipes I ever tried and still up there with my favourites. This recipe is all over the internet and it's totally worth making.

Mac and Trees - Appetite For Reduction

I eat a lot, both when I travel and when I'm reviewing restaurants and eating out locally, so when I cook at home I occasionally eat foods at the low fat end of the scale, y'know, for balance. AFR is by far my favourite healthy cookbook and the Mac & Trees is one of my go-to dishes when I need to make a fast healthy meal, I love the high broc content and easy to throw together sauce.

Mac Daddy - Veganomicon

Only the second Mac recipe I ever tried and still a favourite today. I love the creaminess of the tofu ricotta, the cheesy sauce and the overall creamy baked deliciousness of the recipe. I like to add peas to this one!

Five-Cheese Baked Macaroni and Cheese - Hearty Vegan Meals for Monster Appetites

This book, now known as Home Cooked Vegan Comfort Food, contains one of THE MOST EPIC macaroni and cheeses in the history of veganism. You really do need five cheeses to make it, Daiya (or FYH / Veganic Pizza Cheese), Toffuti Cream Cheese, noochy sauce, a tofu ricotta and walnut parmesan sprinkles. It's insanely delicious and totally worth the effort. If I had these ingredients to hand more often I would have made it many more times than I have currently. Joni posted the recipe for this on her blog, here's a link. Go make it!

Best Ever Mac and Cheese from Crafty Earth Mama

Photo Credit : Crafty Earth Mama

This recipe was posted during Vegan MoFo 2011 and it's seriously one of the best mac and cheeses I've ever made. It's also Nick's absolute favourite. We'd eat it more often if laziness and bad planning didn't often prevent us from buying and roasting a red pepper!

Cheezy Mac - Vegan Diner

Similar in style to Crafty Earth Mama's mac this creamy cashew based sauce gets the majority of its flavour from smoked paprika rather than roasted red pepper. It's delicious and one I come back to over and over again.

Last year I wrote about a whole host of mac's that I hadn't gotten around to making yet which included Isa's Chipotle Mac & Cheese with Roasted Brussels Sprouts (minus the chipotle's!), Isa's Mac & Shews, Allyson Kramer's Smokey Butternut Mac and Cheese and VegNews' Vegan Macaroni & Cheese. I still haven't made the majority of these (c'mon Jojo, sort our your mac game!) but I did make...

Isa's Mac & Shews from The PPK Blog

Whilst this was similar in texture to the Mac Daddy from Veganomicon it had a much deeper flavour thanks to the sauerkraut. It even made Nick admit that sauerkraut isn't all evil! You can find the recipe online here.

One recipe that hadn't come into my life last year is this next one, also from Isa.

Roasted Red Pepper Mac & Cheese - Isa Does It

This new cashew based mac recipe has quickly become a favourite in my house, it's rich and creamy and I find it impossible to stick to the portion size! The sauce also comes together super easily in the blender which is a bonus and makes me inclined to gravitate towards this recipe when I fancy something quick, warm and comforting. Luckily Isa has posted the recipe for this one on her website so even if you don't have Isa Does It yet you can give this recipe a whirl. 

I really need to try the Sunflower Mac from Isa Does It too, it looks and sounds delicious and I've heard rave reviews. The BLT Mac & Cheeze from the PPK blog also looks fantastic. I think Isa might be a mac & cheese machine! Did I list your favourite mac here? I'd appreciate any and all mac recipes that you can bring into my life so do let me know what yours is in the comments. Happy MoFoing!