My sundays.

Sundays are a working day for me now since I started the bakery. In fact the weekends are so much busier as most  fairs and events I have stalls at are on Saturday and Sundays. But every Sunday I have to bake all my orders ready for Monday morning deliveries! Here are some pictures from today. I did manage to make a great lunch for Kyle and I too, as I still think it's important to take a break and eat well even on a work day, and hell that's one of the reasons I went self employed, to make my own rules! 
You will also be pleased to know that I have been awarded 5 in my kitchen inspection from Norwich City Council. I needn't have stressed about it as I was told that I was 'one of the best kitchens' they had seen.
I am now waiting for my little sticker with a 5 to come through the post so I can proudly stick it on my front door!

Wonderful and quick cashew nut 'cheese'.

This is an amazing little recipe that I put on my pizzas all the time, but it's also great on crackers, in sandwiches, as a dip with chopped up veggies and you could also make it as an extra indulgent white sauce in a lasagne or moussaka.

This recipe will make enough for the top of a couple of large pizzas, be sure to double or triple the recipe for white sauce! If you want a smoother sauce, soak your cashews for a few hours or overnight to make them extra creamy. I tend to make this spare of the moment, when Kyle has been on a night shift and he gives me those little puppy dog eyes, which means please feed me, I need pizza. (It's one of his favourite) And when I am busy making yummy cakes for lots of other people, I guess I have to be a good girlfriend and make something yummy for him too so he doesn't feel hard done by!

Ingredients:

1 cup of cashews

1/2 cup of water

3 tbs of nutritional yeast flakes

1 garlic clove

4 sun dried tomatoes (the ones in oil)

3 tbs of the tomato oil

1/2 teaspoon of cider vinegar

Pinch of salt

Measure out each ingredient and pop it in a food processor and simply blitz until it becomes smoothish! Check for seasoning and then spoon it on your pizza or what ever you decide to use it in or on! 

It's that simple but mighty delicious!

Vegan MOFO

Deerly Beloved Bakery is pleased to announce it will joining 800 other vegan bloggers for the 2011 Vegan MOFO! I am so excited to be taking part in this amazing event! The vegan MOFO was originally created on the Post Punk Kitchen website by the woman, inspiration, and who is like a vegan goddess to me, Isa Chandra Moskowitz. 2011 will be it's 5th year and is it's biggest yet!
I will be trying to blog about food and recipes about 5 times a week for a month, so if there is any recipes, topics or questions you have or would like me to blog about please leave a comment below!
Now lets get this show on the road!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!



Foraging recipes; perfect pancakes and courgette flower fritters.

Just before my holiday to Yorkshire I spent the afternoon at my mum an stepdads and had a great time foraging in their beautiful garden! Kyle and I picked all sorts and I made some courgette flower fritters and a wonderful wet walnut (wet walnuts are walnuts that have just fell from the tree and are yet to be dried. They have a much softer texture and fresher flavour)  and beetroot top salad, delicious!

This recipe for my fritter batter also makes the perfect pancakes, light, fluffy and golden. They rise quite a bit too and are wonderful with stewed berries or pears!

Ingredients for perfect pancakes:

2 cups of flour

1 cup of soya milk

1 tsp of baking powder

Pinch of cinnamon.

To make the basic batter, mix all the ingredients together to make a thick treacle like consistancy. You want it quite thick but so it can still run off a spoon.

Then heat up a pan, get it really quite hot and add some sunflower oil. Then place a ladle full of the mix into the pan. It will bubble up and rise quite quickly. When golden turn over with a palete knife. When the otherside is cooked keep warm in the oven until all the other pancakes are made. Serve with fruit and my vegan icecream!  Recipe here! http://deerlybelovedbakery.blogspot.com/2011/05/ice-cream-and-news-article.html

Ingredients for courgette flower fritters:

6 Courgette flowers

2 cups of flour

1 cup of soya milk

1 tsp of baking powder

Good pinch of salt and black pepper

To make the basic batter, mix all the ingredients together to make a thick treacle like consistancy. You want it quite thick but so it can still run off a spoon. Wash the courgette flowers and gently pat dry with kitchen paper. Then dip them in the batter mix and lay on some grease proof paper. Pop them in the oven at around 190c for 15 mins or until golden. For a less healthy version shallow fry in sunflower oil until crispy and golden!

Illustration by Sarah Hoyle

My wonderful friend Sarah Hoyle has created this amazing illustration for the recipe zine I am working on. Check out her wonderful work here!http://sarahhoyle.co.uk/#1954324/Deerly-Beloved-Bakery

Vegan Yorkshire

The last week and a bit I have been away on a family holiday. I have had a wonderful time with my folks however my vegan diet has been limiting on where and what I could eat. I have to say that I did find a few places offering vegan meals and a couple of great vegan cafes!

First up is The Retreat in Grassington. A great vegetarian cafe with a good selection of vegan meals, snacks and the best sticky toffee pudding I have tasted in a long time! The owner is a vegan himself which is always a good thing in my book, as they make things with a vegan palate in mind. I think to make a dish vegan is the easy part, to make it taste great I feel you need to at least be a veggie! As your taste buds really change when you cut out the meat and dairy! The owners also have a back ground with animal rights and have volunteered at a animal sanctuary for many years too, so really believe and practice what they preach. The food was reasonably priced, and it had a warm and friendly atmosphere! We had the home made Brazil nut pie which was flavourful and very filling. Find out more info at http://www.theretreatcafe.co.uk/

Next we went to The Veggie Cafe in Ilkley. It was easy to find on the main street running through Ilkley and it was a warm welcome from the rain and strong winds that had hit Yorkshire! Again there was a good selection of vegan dishes, I was in the mood for a chickpea and lentil burger and spicy potato wedges. It was beautifully presented and was yummy, perhaps a little more seasoning in the burger as it was slightly bland but the hummus was delicious and the salad had baby beet leaves? and coriander stems which was lovely. My mum had the soup which was spiced sweet potato and lentil and she said it was delicious. We then had a wonderful piece of chocolate orange cake which was moist and was just what I needed and turned out to be the only piece of chocolate cake I had on the holiday!!! It was a little more expensive but it is an organic cafe and I don't mind spending a little more on organic produce and it was definitely worth it. Find out more at http://www.theveggiecafe.co.uk/

A mention has to go to Chaste at Hawes which has a good selection of vegetarian meals. It does have meat and dairy on it's menu, but made a special effort to make us a vegan lunch and it is all locally sourced.

 We also found two vegan meals at The Old Granary Tea Shop at Pateley Bridge! I had a vegetable chili jacket potato and Kyle had the Moroccan vegetable stew. It was all fresh vegetable and pulses, no soya TVP in sight and it was actually really tasty and they do great gluten free options too!

A lot of these restaurants and cafes were a car drive away, and as we were staying in a cottage in the middle of  nowhere, there was a lot of cooking in the cottage! (Not that Kyle minded)

Avocado and red pepper sushi.

Today I made some avocado and red pepper sushi for lunch, and it was sooo delicious! I have really missed veggie sushi (I have never had the fish variety) as both M&S and Pret have egg in theirs and I don't know where else you can buy vegan sushi in Norwich. I decided on avocado for it's creamy texture and it's flavour works really well here but you could use alfalfa sprouts, cucumber or green beans. I also used normal white rice, I find it works just as well as special sushi rice for half the price. You could use brown rice but it might not stick so well, or even quinoa for an even healthier lunch!

Avocado and red pepper sushi.
This amount makes around 15 sushi depending on how large you cut them.
Ingredients:

Half an avocado cut into slices
Half a red pepper cut into slices
1 cup of White rice
2 cups of water
1 tsp sugar
1 tbs of rice wine vinegar
Pinch of salt
Nori sheets

Pop your rice on to cook. They are all different, just follow the instructions on the packet. Usually though it is 1 cup of rice to 2 cups water. Cook until the water is nearly all gone, then give it a good mix, the remaining water in the pan will help make the starches come out of the rice and make it a little sticky. Add the salt, vinegar and sugar and mix, leave to cool while you prep the rest of the sushi.
Slice up your avocado and pepper.

Then spread some of the slightly cooled rice on a nori sheet.

Leave a slight gap along on edge, then lay some avocado and pepper in a line down the middle of the rice.

The gap you left along the edge can now be moistened with some cold water to help the edges stick together once rolled. Your fingers are the best tool for this!

Then from the top edge gently roll it towards you, going as tightly as you can.

You will then be left with a long sushi roll.

Then just slice it up into bite size pieces and enjoy with tamari, pickled ginger and wasabi!