Snow Ice Soup Wedding

Went for a walk today with a friend in Jenisch Park. It started to snow, later the sun came out and the light was just beautiful. It did feel a bit early in the season for ice on the walkways.

The cold didn't bother me too much, since I had fortified myself with miso soup for lunch, made with olive oil, garlic, ginger, chard, rice, wakame, and silken tofu marinated in lemon juice, shoyu and ume su.

Here's a picture of my friends' wedding on November 5th. I also meant to post photos of the really good Vegan food I had at the reception (being the only Vegan present they made it especially for me) at the historical wine bar and restaurant "Zur Traube" in Ottensen, but as lovely as it looked on the plate, the pics didn't turn out well at all.

Pasta with Pumpkin-Peanutsauce

Pumpkinny goodness. I used ready-made Sate-sauce, a recent addition at the local healthfood store, added freshly baked pumpkin pieces, seitan sausage, and basil, and served over spaghetti.

Pumpkinbread

Yesterday I tried to bake pumpkin pie for the first time, and I didn't like the result too much, it was fairly bitter. So today I decided to make pumpkinbread instead, also a first.
I based my recipe loosely on this one: http://www.nomeatathlete.com/vegan-pumpkin-bread/, using vaguely half the amount. I was not very precise with the amounts, but the outcome is very good.
TS = Tablespoon. ts = teaspoon.

Ingredients:
about 1 cup baked (hokkaido) pumpkin (1/4 of a 1 kg raw pumpkin)
1 TS soyflour + 2 TS water (substitute for 1 egg)
200 g flour (I used mostly whole spelt, some 550 wheat)
30 ml canola (raps) oil
75 g raw sugar
half a banana
100 g apple-blueberry sauce
30 or 40 g of pecan nuts, chopped or broken into pieces
1 ts Lebkuchengewuerz (allspice?) contains cinnamon, anise, cloves, koriander and cardamom
good extra dash of cinnamon
2 pieces of candied ginger, diced into tiny chunks
1/2 ts baking soda (natron)
1/4 ts baking powder

I had baked the pumpkin the day before, by cutting it into quarters, removing the seeds and strings, and baking it for 30 minutes at 175 degrees Celsius. (350 F)

After removing the skin, puree the pumpkin in a blender along with half a banana and 2 TS water. You can skip the banana, I just happened to have one sitting in the fridge that needed a happy ending. Mix the pumpkin puree with the other ingredients in a bowl.
Put into a baking form, and bake for about 40 minutes at 175 C.
It does make it easier if you add the sugar before putting the form into the oven, by the way. At least I did remember very soon after, so it wasn't a problem to just add the sugar into the mixture in the form.

Miso Soup!

Every time I make this soup, I wonder why I don't make one every day, like I did for a while during the summer.

Here's how I made it today:
Dice a clove of garlic and a piece of ginger, and slightly roast it in a pan with olive oil.
Break some broccoli into smaller pieces and add. Add hot water. Add dashes of salt, nori, tarragon, cilantro, turmeric, chili pepper. Add several spoonfuls of quinoa and lentils from the day before. Mix a teaspoon of miso paste with hot water, add into the soup, let simmer for several minutes.

Easy. Especially when you have precooked grains and pulses in the fridge.

Polenta Stew

I've got to write this recipe down, so I don't forget this great easy dish I came up with today.

I heated some olive oil in a pan, added a small diced onion. Added hot water, a veggie bouillon cube. Added two small red beets, diced. Six heads of brussel sprouts. A sliced carrot. Turmeric, tarragon, koriander, salt, pepper, rosemary. Textured soy protein. A dash of nori. And, towards the end of the cooking time, a healthy dose of polenta meal aka cornmeal. I let it simmer for a while, till the mixture thickened.

This dish turned out delicious, and nice to look at, the beets give it a great color. The polenta gives it an interesting texture. Sorry no pic, I couldn't wait to eat this.