More Cupcakes!

These are the peanut butter cupcakes from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World. For some reason they came out a lot darker than the ones in the book, I suspect it's a combination of darker molasses and the peanut butter I used. They are incredibly tasty, in a peanut buttery way. Not extremely sweet, but with a nice tang. I was unsure wether to use salted or unsalted peanut butter, in the end I opted for salted and judging by the taste that was the right choice. Although it would be interesting to see what they taste like with plain unsalted nut butter. And maybe next time I'll get over my fear of making buttercream frosting...

Altogether, I'm very pleased with Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World. All the cupcakes I've made so far came out great and no one can tell that they're vegan unless you tell them.

Restaurant Review - Imli (SoHo)

 
The time had come for me & a dear friend to have a major catch up session. She has got one of those Taste London cards that give you either a 2 for 1 meal deal or 50% discount for selected restaurants. Seeing that I'm the one with the "special needs" in regards to food I did a bit of searching on their website and found Imli. They advertise their food as Indian tapas and that's pretty much what you get. Small taster portions of extremely tasty Indian food. I had the roast vegetable salad and aubergine masala for mains and a mango & basil sorbet for dessert. My friend (who's omni) had the stuffed paneer and chicken makhani with Indian caramel custard for dessert.

We went there on a Thursday evening and it got very busy very fast, with people queueing for tables. They must've hated us, because we took ages to decide what to eat and then kept eating very slowly because we had so much talking to do. The waiter got a tiny bit impatient, which made the dining experience only 4 instead of 5 star for us. Also, when I inquired about the dessert the waiter was unable to tell me if the caramel custard had dairy in it (it said it was made with coconut milk, but I thought I'd better check) and pretty much clueless what vegans eat. I would've expected a bit more of an Indian restaurant, which goes through the effort of labelling their dishes vegetarian and gluten free.

That said, we were both very happy with our choices and would definitely go there again. With the Taste London card we paid around £12 for the food and a non-alcoholic drink (drinks are not included in the discounts).

Fall Foods

The weather has been grey & cold for a while now, which is making me crave warm & carb rich foods. I'm a huge fan of butternut squash, so the Caramelized Onion & Butternut Squash casserole from the Veganomicon looked like just the right thing.

I was a bit worried about the time & effort it would take, as much as I love butternut squashes, peeling & cutting them is just a pain. I cheated & bought peeled & roasted chestnuts, which cut the prep time a little. And in the end, preparing the squash wasn't too bad. I even managed to prepare roasted brussels sprouts (with balsamic vinaigrette & garam masala) as well!

The casserole was all I wanted - rich, tasty fall food with great textures. It makes about 5-6 servings, so I will be eating it for a while :)

Cupcakes!

Recently, a friend of mine cut my hair. She didn't want any money for it, so I baked her some cupcakes.

As she is lactose AND wheat intolerant it gave me a good excuse to try the Chocolate Gluten Freedom cupcakes from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World (which, by the way, is excellent). I made the Chocolate Ganache frosting & managed not to eat it all before putting it on the cupcakes. Despite me being slightly sceptical about using such weird flours like rice, quinoa and tapioca, the cupcakes came out incredibly yummy.

I'm still working on those decoration skills, though.

Oh, Hi!

Starting a new blog is awkward, don't you think? A totally blank canvas that doesn't have direction just yet.

Argh.

I guess it's probably best to start with who I am, right? I'm in my late 30s, live in London but am originally from Germany. I love travelling and cooking. And eating :)

I made the decision to go vegan after a particularly meat-heavy bbq weekend end of June 2009. I simply didn't fancy meat anymore and being lactose-sensitive lead to the decision to cut out dairy as well. My friends told me I'm crazy and how would I ever manage to survive without cheese?! I'm doing fine so far. No cravings at all. I don't even miss it. Cutting out eggs and honey is harder, they seem to be in everything.

I'm not 100% strict, but try to be as good as possible. I just feel better without dairy and meat in my life.

This blog will be about my adventures in London and as a vegan. Here we go...