Chocolate Speculoos mini cupcakes

These are pretty quick & easy. This is partly because they're mini, so they take half the time to cook (and to cool!), compared to regular cupcakes. It's also because you use pre-made speculoos spread instead of having to make icing. Yippee!
If you're not familiar with it, speculoos is a caramelised biscuit, and it's delicious.

I just use my regular chocolate cake recipe for the cupcakes, which is...

1. Mix the following in a large bowl:

• 4oz plain flour
• 4oz caster sugar
• 4oz dairy-free margarine
• Egg replacer for 2 eggs
• 1 rounded teaspoon (tsp.) of baking powder
• 1.5 heaped tablespoons cocoa powder
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1 tsp. almond or chocolate extract
• Generous pinch cinnamon

2. Gradually add unsweetened soya milk, stirring well with a fork, until it becomes a thick batter of about the consistency of custard. This should be from 3/4 of a cup to about 1.5 cups of soya milk.

3. Spoon the mixture into mini baking cases, filling to 3/4 full. Use a mini cake pan, or silicone cups, to help them cook more evenly and retain their shape.

4. Bake at 180°C for 12-14 minutes.

When they're fully cooled, spoon a healthy dollop of speculoos spread on top of each and sprinkle with grated/curled dark chocolate. I topped these with mini spiced biscuits I got in the Netherlands, but you can always use large broken chunks of speculoos biscuits.

Jen x

Easy Raw Salad

This makes a quick and easy lunch, or side salad.
You can grate, chop julienne or use a julienne peeler to do this. Just use whatever you have!

1. Julienne your vegetables: One red pepper, a carrot & a 10cm piece of cucumber.
2. Add the juice of half a lemon, half a tablespoon of extra virgin olive oil and a teaspoon of agave nectar. Then mix it all together well, with a fork.
3. Eat.

Jen x

Red rice & smoked tofu risotto

This is delicious and healthy...and pretty easy. Yay!

Recipe

1. Pre-boil the red rice for about 20 minutes, then drain. Use about 80g of uncooked rice per person/portion.
2. Finely-chop, or crush, about 2 cloves* of garlic (*all given amounts are per portion being cooked).
3. Wash and chop half a red pepper, one carrot, a handful of green beans and a handful or so of broccoli.
4. Chop a block of tofu into cubes. I used a smoked tofu, with almonds and sesame seeds.
5. Throw the vegetables, tofu and garlic in a wok with olive oil, on a medium heat. Add sweetcorn too.
6. Cook for a few minutes and then add the rice.
7. Crumble one or two vegetable stock cubes (to taste) over it, and stir in. Also add about 1 tablespoon of madeira (or white) whine per portion.
8. Continue to cook on a medium heat, stiring continuously, until the rice is fully cooked. Add a handful or so of raw spinach about one minute before finishing, and stir it in until wilted.
9. Stir in some sundried/slow-roasted tomatos and EAT.

Jen x

Spinach and Ricotta Cannelloni

I recently got a load of Toffuti 'Better than Ricotta Cheese' from Vx (aka, Vegan Cross), in central London.

So I started off by making the obvious classic: Spinach and Ricotta Cannelloni. I made it pretty lazily, so this is an easy recipe. It just takes some time.

1. Mix one tub of 'Better than Ricotta Cheese' with a fork, in a large bowl, with the following...

• the juice of half a lemon
• one crumbled vegetable oxo cube (or similar vegan stock cube).
• 1 teaspoon (tsp.) dried oregano
• Handful fresh basil leaves. Washed and torn.
• 2 cloves of garlic, minced/finely chopped.

2. Stir-in 500g fresh spinach. Washed and torn.

3. Use a teaspoon to fill the cannelloni with this mixture. This is the time consuming part!
Don't worry about making it too neat. You're going to cover these with sauce and bake the crap out of them soon!

4. Line a baking dish with tomato sauce (I used this lovely stuff) and place the cannelloni in it, in rows.

5. Cover it with more tomato sauce. Top with a melting vegan cheese, such as Teese vegan cheddar sauce, or Wilmersburger 'Scheiben' gouda-style, both also found at Vx.

6. Bake at 220°C for 25-35 minutes, or until golden brown and crispy on top.

I served this with sundried tomatoes, and various green vegetables.

Jen x

Healthier banana bread!

Okay, so it's not the healthiest thing in the world, but it's certainly a lot better for you than regular cake, and tastes divine! This is also a great way of using up bananas that are getting overripe.

I adapted my old banana bread recipe to, to get rid of the refined sugar and pack it full of goodness!

1. Mix the following ingredients in a large bowl, and stir with a fork...

• 10oz plain four (I used a gluten-free flour blend)
• 1 teaspoon (tsp.) bicarbonate of soda
• Pinch salt
• 4oz dairy-free spread (I used Pure Olive spread)
• 2.5oz date syrup
• 1.5oz agave nectar
• 2 tsp. egg-replacer (I used "No Egg")
• 3 large or 4 medium bananas - Mashed first into a thick pulp, in a separate bowl.
• pinch cinnamon
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1 Tablespoon (Tbsp.) oatbran
• 1 tsp. ground flax seed (linseed)

2. Add 1/2 to 1/3 of a cup of soya milk. Stir/whisk with a fork, adding extra soya milk if you need, until it becomes a thick, but still pourable, batter.

3. Pour into a greased loaf tin of around 20 x 13cm and bake at 180°C for 40-45 minutes. It will be quite brown in colour, due to the date syrup, so ensuring it doesn't burn can be quite a challenge. Just don't open the oven within the first 30 mins, at least!

4. Leave to rest for 2-3 mins, then loosen the edges all the way around with a narrow, sharp knife. Leave for a further 15 mins, then turn-out onto a wire rack and leave to cool fully.

Cut in slices and EAT.

Jen x

Nutty Chocolate Fudge Protein Bars!

I've fallen in love with exercise lately. And, with that, my dietary needs have changed too.
So I've been working on making some of my old recipes healthier, and coming up with new ones.
So what's today's healthy and delicious vegan treat? Nutty Chocolate Fudge Protein bars!

There are various vegan protein bars commercially available nowadays, but if you're looking to save a little money and avoid refined sugar and scary processed ingredients, this is the recipe for you!
These are easy and quick to make too, so what are you waiting for?

1. Throw the following in a blender. Blend intermittently, stopping to stir at intervals of 1 minute or so, until it resembles fine breadcrumbs...

• 3 rounded tablespoons (Tbsp.) of whole almonds
• 1 rounded Tbsp. cashew nuts
• 1 rounded Tbsp. brazil nuts

2. Remove about 1/4 to 1/5 of this mixture and put in a bowl. Put to one side for now.

3. Add these to the nut mix in the blender and continue blending as before. Aiming again for a fine breadcrumb texture...

• 60g protein isolate (I used soya, but pea, rice, hemp or other proteins would work too)
• 1 teaspoon (tsp.) vanilla extract
• 2 heaped Tbsp. cocoa powder.
• 2 rounded Tbsp. oatbran
• 2 rounded Tbsp. oats
• 2 rounded Tbsp. peanut butter
• 3 Tbsp. Agave nectar

4. Scrape all the contents of the blender into a large bowl and add 7 Tbsp. of unsweetened soya milk.

5. Knead the mixture thoroughly with your hands, then tip into a large rectangular dish (or several smaller ones), lined with greaseproof paper.

6. Press the mixture down until it is roughly 1-1.5cm thick throughout the dish. Then using a rolling pin to flatten and compress it more evenly.

7. Drizzle a little extra agave nectar over the top and spread it out as evenly as you can. Just enough so the surface is sticky. You can use a spatula for this, but I actually found it easier to use a square of greaseproof paper.

8. Sprinkle with the remaining nuts and chunks of dark chocolate. Instead of dairy-free chocolate chips, I find it cheaper to just buy cheap dark chocolate and chop it up.

9. Refrigerate for 20-40 minutes, until cool throughout, and firmer.

10. Cut into squares or rectangles. These can be a bit crumbly, so avoid making the sides of each longer than about 5cm.

You can wrap them in greasproof paper or clingfilm (or just in a tupperware box) in the refrigerater.

And most importantly, enjoy!

Jen x

Cocoa, Peanut butter & Cranberry bites.

For a relatively healthy and deliciously indulgent snack, try these!

Now, there are endless energy ball recipes out there, but these are slightly different. They don't contain cocoa butter or coconut oil. Instead they use peanut butter as a cheaper and easier alternative, with a higher protein content.

These are also amazingly easy to make. Just throw the following in a blender, and blend on max. for a few minutes.

• 2 Tablespoons (Tbps) wholenut peanut butter
• 1 teaspoon (tsp) ground linseed
• 1 Tbsp. dessicated coconut
• 1 Tbsp. date syrup
• 4 Tbsp cashew nuts
• 2 tsp. mixed seeds
• 2 Tbsp. currants
• 2 Tbsp. cocoa powder
• 2 Tbsp. dried cranberries
• 1 tsp. unsweetened soya milk
• Pinch cinnamon & a few drops of vanilla extract

Stop and stir with a fork every 20 seconds or so. It should end up as a coarse crumbly paste.

Tip/scrape into a bowl. Then use your hands to squash and roll it into balls of about 2cm in diameter. Then roll in cocoa powder.

Jen x