alessioisonfire

A little gem I baked before starting an awful week at work..

Ingredients:
3 ripe bananas
175g spelt flour
120ml maple syrup (or agave)
3 tbsp sunflower oil
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 + 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
a good pinch of salt

Directions:
1. in a large bowl mash the bananas with the maple syrup, sunflower oil and vanilla extract (I also blended them to make sure the batter was extra smooth, I like mine so but you don’t have to)
2. in a separate bowl sift the flour, salt, bic. of soda
3. transfer the wet ingredients into the dry ones and mix well. remember the batter should not be very liquid
4. pour into a lightly greased loaf tin and bake for 45 mins at 200C

Whoever knows me knows how much I love Canada and escpially the province of Québec.. This is a little tribute to the days spent in Montréal. My last meal there was actually a non vegan poutine with my dear friend Malorie somewhere on Rachel Est

Here is what you’ll need (I believe this is a lower fat version compared to the original dish! haha)

For the potatoes:
About 6 small to medium white potatoes
3 tbsp sunflower oil
salt

For the gravy: *you won’t even need all of this*
250ml vegan stock
1 tbsp sunflower oil
1 tbsp plain flour
1 tbsp cornflour
1 tbsp soya sauce
1/2 tbsp nutritional yeast

+ your favourite shredded vegan cheese (I used the Redwood’s Cheezly mozzarella)

Directions:
1. first off, make the gravy. heat up a small saucepan and add the oil, then the flour and stir well until combined.
2. wait until the flour has gone golden brown and then start whisking in the stock
3. then add the soya sauce and nutritional yeast, simmer for another 5 mins or so
4. peel and cut the potatoes in chip-like shape and fry them in the 3 tbsp of sunflower oil
5. once they’re golden and soft inside lay them on a couple of kitchen towels to get rid of the excess oil and salt them
6. shred your favourite vegan cheese on them and chuck them in the oven for 5/10 mins so that the “cheese” will melt
7. once that’s done cover with a couple of tablespoons of gravy and you’re good to go

Tonight I’ve refreshed my dough another time, with 1 tbsp of water and one of flour, stored it in my glass container and left it to rest in the oven..

There are no pics this time, pretty much the same look it had the last time, apart from the fact it starts to smell quite strongly, which is perfectly normal..

The next refresh that need to be done will be in 24 hours this time, then 12 and then 8.. then we’re ready to bake! Remember to refresh the dough always with the same technique we’ve used up to now.
I won’t be updating any more until I actually bake the first loaf of bread, so read more on Wednesday for the bread recipe.

Links to previous two posts about this:
Part 1
Part 2

Sometimes things just go wrong despite looking nice.
I used rice milk and a soya based margarine instead of soya milk and sunflower oil which I normally opt for.. and the consistency is just awfully wrong.. No recipe, haha.

My baby is growing, look at how many bubbles after 48 hours ^_^

So after having prepared the dough two days ago (48 hours) I had to refresh it.
By refreshing I mean a process you will go through a few times before the dough will be ready to be used for baking.

The ingredients for refreshing at this stage are:

1 tbsp sifted flour
1 tbsp water

Pour the dough into a clean glass bowl and add the tbsp of sifted flour and water. Mix well with a fork and then work with your hands, it will have to be of a very thin but gluey consistency a bit a crêpe batter.

Like so:

Once you’ve done that, store it again in a glass container away from swings of temperature (I keep mine in the oven) and leave it there for another 48 hours.

For convenience here is the link to the first step of this journey:
Part 1

Read more in another 48 hours

Ingredients *serves one*
For the rice:
100g jasmine riso
a stalk of spring onion
a handful of coriander
a pinch of salt

For the aubergines:
1 nice and plump aubergine
1 tbsp white miso (shiro)
a bit of cane sugar
a bit of water
soya sauce
olive oil *optional*
sesame oil
sesame seeds

Directions:
1. wash the rice in cold water and cook with a pinch of salt
2. in the meantime cut up your aubergine lengthwise and heat up a quite wide frying pan
3. when the pan will be hot enough add the aubergines and add a few sprinkles of olive oil although it’s not necessary
4. once they are nice and grilled melt the tbsp of miso with some water, brush the aubergines and place them back in your pan, then add a sprinkle of cane sugar
5. lay them on a plate, sprinkle some soya sauce and sesame oil and add the seeds
6. then serve with rice mixed with the chopped coriander and spring onion

Ingredients
Dough:
250g plain flour
120ml water
60ml olive oil
1/2 tsp salt

Filling:
500g hokkaido pumpkin (peeled and seeded)
100g seitan
1 courgette
1 carrot
1 shallot
2 tbsp olive oil
salt (just taste the filling to see how much you need)
a few splashes of soya sauce
a bit of water
rosemary
marjoram
a few pinches of powdered veg bouillon

Directions
1. start by preparing the dough, sift your flour and salt in a large bowl
2. add the oil, water and mix with a fork to get rid of lumps
3. then work it with your hands for a bit and shape it into a ball
4. on a floured surface stretch the dough with a rolling pin and then lay it in a cake tin of about 28cm
5. for the filling, peel and seed the pumpkin, cut it into small chunks and do the same with the other veggies (apart from the courgette that i don’t peel)
6. heat up a frying pan, add the olive oil, carrot and shallot
7. let them sweat a bit and then add the rest of the cut up vegs, the seitan, a few splashes of soya sauce, the veg bouillon, the rosemary and marjoram
8. add some water once you see they start getting a bit dry, this will help them stay soft and prevent them from sticking to the bottom of the pan
9. blend everything and add more salt if needed as the pumpkin will make the filling very sweet
10. smooth the filling on the dough, then bake for about 40 mins in a preheated oven at 200C

*i must admit the filling of my quiche was rather soft even after setting for a few hours, you may want to add a couple of tbsps of cornflour to the filling to make it firmer once it bakes*

Here is something I was recommended to try out to make bread and pizza.
It works like yeast although there will be none added to your final dough as this is a fermented product. It’s supposed to make bread taste amazing and also a lot more easy to digest. It is a quite long process to go through the first time, but once it’s done you will have it virtually ready for use forever (this will be explained in the next posts.)

The ingredients are:
100g flour
100ml water
1 tbsp rice malt

Directions:
1. sift the flour in a bowl
2. mix the water and rice malt
3. add the wet to the dry ingredients and work with your hand for a while
4. once you’ve done this place the dough in a glass container, cover it and make sure it’s stored in a warm place
5. leave to rest for 48 hours

(This was the first step, read more in 48 hours..)