Monat: September 2018

My favourite vegan chocolate chip cookies

There are a lot of great vegan chocolate chip cookie recipes out there. I’ve seen some made with refined coconut oil, which yields a similar richness to butter. However, this is still my favourite.

Before I was vegan, I would always use this recipe. But for some reason, after I went vegan I was determined to find a different recipe to use.

Little did I know that this was easy to veganise.

All I did was replace the eggs with flax meal mixed with water and replace the butter with vegan butter. Then I added a bit of nondairy milk because I had a hard time incorporating all the flour at the end. I highly recommend that you use Miyoko’s vegan butter here. Other options would probably be fine, but Miyoko’s definitely gives the best result. If you don’t have access to Miyoko’s, try to find a vegan butter that is as similar to butter as possible, or you could also make your own (recipe courtesy of WorldofRandomStuff).

Recipe adapted from smitten kitchen

  • 1 1/4 cups (280 grams) Miyoko’s vegan butter, at room temperature
  • 1 1/4 cups (240 grams) light brown sugar
  • 1 cup plus 2 tablespoons (225 grams) granulated sugar
  • 2 tbsp flaxmeal + 5 tbsp water
  • 2 teaspoons (10 ml) vanilla extract
  • 1 1/4 teaspoons baking soda
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons coarse or kosher salt
  • 3 1/2 cups plus 2 teaspoons (yes, really) (445 grams) all-purpose flour
  • 1-2 tbsp plant milk
  • 3 1/2 cups vegan dark chocolate chips/dark chocolate chunks
  • Sea salt

Combine the flaxmeal with the water in a bowl and leave to stand for 5 minutes. It should thicken substantially.

Cream the vegan butter with the sugars by hand or with a stand mixer. Then add the flax mixture and the vanilla extract.

In a separate bowl, combine the dry ingredients (baking soda, baking powder, salt, flour).

Add the dry ingredients to the rest and combine. If you cannot incorporate all of the flour mixture, add plant milk until you can combine all of it. Then add the vegan chocolate chips.

Chill the dough in the fridge for at least an hour, ideally 4 hours or even overnight.

Take out of the fridge and leave at room temperature for about five minutes until it softens slightly.

Shape pieces and place them on the baking pan. Bake at 180°C for somewhere between 15 and 25 minutes, depending on the size of the cookies. I make mine quite large, and hence it often takes 25-28 minutes for mine to bake.

When you take them out, they should seem firm but not too golden – they should still be pretty light coloured. If they are golden brown, they will become crispy as they cool. So if you prefer that, then leave it in the oven until golden brown.

Immediately after taking them out of the oven, sprinkle sea salt on the cookies if you like them that way. If not, omit. Leave to cool for five minutes on a cooling rack. Then eat!

The end for the Warners?

In the past month, we have lost not one but two Warners – first Frank and now Finn. What is going on?

In fact, we haven’t just lost Frank and Finn. Today Becky decided to switch back to working at Central after a very amicable breakup with Curtis, and I am pretty sure this is the last time we will see her. No big loss there, the character was pretty dull.

I have to say, I’m pretty gutted about Finn’s departure. Not as much as Zoe was, though.

Lately, there haven’t been any casting announcements, so it’s never clear whether the actors have decided to leave or whether they were written out.

Either way, this is a huge loss for the show. Finn became a rather despicable character when he started abusing Esther, but was redeemed in what I thought was a pretty convincing way, which I think the actor can take credit for. This storyline made him into a pretty compelling character who desperately wanted to move on from his past, but would probably never fully forgive himself for what he did.

Anyway, the actor is very talented and I wish him the best.

However, what’s the plan now? They spent quite a bit of time setting up Zoe and Finn as a pairing, but now he’s abruptly left.

And what about Chris? It’s hard to imagine what role he will play on the show without any of his kids around. There have always been some people in that house- the triplets, Harry Warner, Rachel up until late 2016, Phoenix until 2013, etc.

Anyway, I hope they have plans to bring in some new core characters, because we have lost many in the past few months (Finn, Vinnie, Frank). Kawe too, actually.

I hope this new babysitter isn’t part of those plans. I don’t think she is going to cut it.

Thoughts?

My attempt at making vegan inside-out lamingtons

Last weekend, I attempted to make chocolate lamingtons with a vanilla icing on the outside. I kind of munted them.

I used this chocolate cake recipe, and made a vanilla icing with icing sugar, vanilla extract and a bit of plant milk.

I baked the chocolate cake batter in a rectangular baking pan and cut the cake into square pieces.

Then I sliced them in half and put some seedless raspberry jam in the middle.

It was all going fine until I tried to dip the cake into the icing. I thought I had to make the icing really thick, and then heat it up so that it would be liquidy, but then rapidly solidify after cooling.

The result was that the jam layer heated up, causing the cake layers to slide. Dipping the cake into the icing munted its shape as well.

They tasted great though! Next time I will definitely just make normal vegan lamingtons. Stay tuned!

No, it can’t get any worse

Can we spare a moment to talk about how horrible the past two years have been for Esther?

Let’s summarise:

October 2016: Curtis breaks up with her after being sent to prison for a drug offence.

February 2017: Esther is diagnosed with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy after experiencing arrhythmias

August 2017: Esther is kidnapped by Jason (Finn’s stalker), and she experiences arrhythmias as a result, causing her to pass out.

December 2017: Esther is again kidnapped (this time by a prisoner who escaped) and she almost dies as her heart stops from the stress.

June 2018: Esther is brutally beaten up by her husband, Finn Warner. Her marriage dissolves afterwards.

September 2018: Kawe, her boyfriend, starts selling drugs while bartending at the I.V. Esther finds out about this and breaks up with him.

Also September 2018: Esther finds out that her heart is failing after yet again being threatened with a knife by two drug people who she was trying to help.

She’s so desensitised that she doesn’t even care anymore about Kawe’s drug dealing, because “at least he doesn’t hit me, right?”

Kylie isn’t having it

“I just have to keep looking at the good stuff, ignore the alarm bells, put them on mute.”

Yeah (!), that sounds like a great plan, Esther (!)

Jack’s p-addiction + some thoughts on Dylan & Kylie

Several weeks ago, Jack found out that Lincoln does p (meth).

Jack ended up accidentally trying it while at Sebastian’s re-birthday, thinking it was E, and he enjoyed it a little too much. It’s a bit strange that Lincoln, who does meth semi-regularly, doesn’t seem to be addicted, yet Jack appears to be heavily dependent on it after only doing it only a couple of times.

Jack was really a wreck in today’s episode.

To which I say – what the hell is wrong with him? He saw what a drug addiction did to Charlie, so what is he thinking? Plus why are the writers doing this? We’ve already been put through this type of story with Charlie, who was not only abusing prescription amphetamine but also selling it. Lincoln does appear to be discouraging him, but of course it isn’t working.

He opted to take even more p after barely functioning at work.

I hope they don’t ruin Jack’s character with this storyline. P addiction is pretty gruesome. And they delved into this in 2012 with Hunter.

On the bright side, Jack and Lincoln kissed after Sebastian’s party.

I guess they’re together now, though it’s not entirely clear. I like the idea of them being together, but this drug storyline kind of sucks.

Lincoln’s great, though.

On to other things… Dylan and Kylie.

It looks like Kylie would also like to take a crack at strangling Dylan.

I don’t have any idea what is going on with this storyline. It looked like the main story was going to be Frank vs. Dylan, but then Frank was quickly written out. I guess the main focus now is on Dylan manipulating situations by faking emotions, but Kylie’s feelings for Dylan seemed to come out of nowhere. It looks like he somehow managed to use her grief over Julia’s death to manipulate her. Ugh.

Also, we really need to talk about Julia. Namely, was it really worth sacrificing her for this odious Dylan character? She was Kylie’s only family connection on the show – her only close family member with her mum gone and her dad who-knows-where/nonexistent.

They had an interesting, volatile relationship which they could have explored. Anyway, ugh.

Also, did anyone bother to tell Toby that his mother died? I know he and Julia weren’t close, but come on. It’s not like he’s in Antarctica, he’s only across the pond in Christchurch.

Toby

There wasn’t even a mention of him after she died. Mate, I get that she forced you to live on some strange commune, then ditched you to move to Sweden, but still. In fact, the only mention of him during Julia’s return was when she told Kylie how easy giving birth was for her.

Other things that irritated me: how come Miranda came to give Julia a stern warning about Dylan, but never bothered to directly state why she hates him?

Also, why did she disappear so abruptly? It does look like she’s going to return later this week, which should be glorious.

Wild rice with farro and dried cranberries, lentils with balsamic reduction

This weekend I decided to make a meal with mostly whole foods, and I came across some recipes that I learnt from a family friend.

For the lentil dish:

400g cooked French lentils
1 large onion
3 cloves garlic
olive oil
200g sliced mushrooms
A few handfuls of spinach
Diced roasted kumara/sweet potato (optional)
High quality balsamic vinegar

Combine some olive oil, the onion, garlic and mushrooms in a pan over medium-high heat. Cook for a few minutes until the mushrooms soften and become aromatic. Add in lentils and spinach as well as a few tablespoons of the balsamic. Cook for only a couple of minutes. Add kumara/sweet potato if using. Serve warm.

For the farro/wild rice:

1 1/2 cups farro
1 cup wild rice
~1/2 cup dried cranberries
1-2 bell peppers
Zest of one orange

Cook farro with 3 cups of water. Cook wild rice with 2 cups of water. Combine and add the cranberries and bell peppers as well as the orange zest.

Cheers!

Pumpkin scones with icing

After a long and rather hot summer, it finally feels like autumn here in the northwestern US. We had our first real rain storm yesterday. To mark the beginning of the new season, I decided to make pumpkin scones. 

I’ve become very attached to this recipe from Sarah’s vegan kitchen, which I made several times last autumn as well. I doubled the recipe and increased the amount of pumpkin slightly. The recipe was unfortunately in imperial units, so I’ve converted it. See below for metric conversion.

For shaping the scones, I used a scone pan, but I think you can just shape them properly and put into a baking tray as well. I skipped the kneading process, so that is excluded in my version of the instructions below. My dough was definitely more wet/moist than hers, so perhaps that’s why kneading didn’t make sense for me. I also omitted the ginger and cloves.

For the scones (doubled relative to Sarah’s recipe):

-512 g all-purpose flour
-200 g brown sugar
-2 tablespoons baking powder
-1 teaspoon salt
-2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
-1⁄2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
-180 ml coconut oil or cold vegan butter
-400g tin pumpkin puree
-2 tablespoon molasses
-2 teaspoon vanilla extract
-120 ml unsweetened plant milk

for the icing:
-400 g icing sugar
~100 ml unsweetened plant milk (just make sure it’s the right consistency)
-1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1) Preheat oven to 220°.
Line baking tray with parchment or a silicone baking mat.
2) Combine dry ingredients. In a separate bowl, combine pumpkin puree, molasses, vanilla extract and milk.
3) Using two knives, your fingertips, or a pastry cutter, cut in cold coconut oil or vegan butter to create a crumbly mixture with pea-sized bits.
4) Pour wet ingredients into flour mixture a few tablespoons at a time, tossing with a fork between additions until dough comes together in a loose ball.
5) Place scone-sized pieces of dough into scone pan or shape into scone shapes in a baking tray.
6) Bake scones for 20-22 minutes, until golden brown on the bottoms. Allow to cool on mat for 5 minutes before transferring to a cooling rack. Allow scones to cool completely before icing.
7) Combine powdered sugar and milk to create the icing. Dip scones face-down, and return to drying rack to harden. Store in an airtight container.

Cheers! Enjoy the autumn/fall.

Roasted eggplant sandwiches

A long time ago, I found this recipe. Like many other recipes that I find, I bookmarked it and promptly forgot about it. Today I finally decided to make it. I’m glad I did, because it was delicious.

For the eggplant:

  • 2 medium eggplant, quartered & cut into 0.5 cm slices
  • 2 red onions, quartered & cut into 0.5 cm slices
  • 1/4 cup olive oil
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • Juice of 1/2 lemon
  • 2 tablespoons chives

Preheat the oven to 230°C. Slice the eggplant and the onions and combine with the other ingredients. Then spread on a baking sheet.

Bake for 20 minutes, and then flip over the slices and bake for another 10-15 minutes.

Chive pesto

  • 1 garlic clove, peeled
  • 1/4 cup cashews, toasted (I used pine nuts)
  • 2 cups chives, chopped
  • Juice of 1/2 a lemon
  • 1/4 cup olive oil
  • salt, to taste

Combine all ingredients in a food processor and process until the nuts are finely chopped.

For bean spread:

  • 400g tin cannellini or white beans, drained and rinsed
  • Juice of 1/2 lemon
  • 2 teaspoons fresh rosemary
  • 1 garlic clove, peeled
  • 1 tablespoon olive oil
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt

Mash beans or process them until chunky or mostly smooth, depending on your preference. Combine with other ingredients in a pan and cook for a couple of minutes under medium heat.

Spread chive pesto on one piece of toast and the beans on the other piece.

Add eggplant pieces on one side, then put pieces of toast together and slice in half.

Freezer full of crazy (9 September episode)

You guys, we need to talk.

Eve made a brief return. It was amazing, other than the end. But we’ll get to that later.

Eve revealed that Remus has Hirschsprung’s disease, and that that was the reason for her return. He needed a bowel resection, and she couldn’t get him the treatment. Eve also told Boyd that she was going to turn herself in.

Dylan was very understanding of her situation – “for a straight white cis male, he’s extremely open-minded.” He pressured Boyd into not turning her in to the police. It wasn’t hard. In the course of one day, Boyd warmed up to her, and wanted to hide her in his apartment.

It was complicated to get Remus the surgery, since bringing him to hospital would make the police aware of Eve’s return.

Dylan convinced them that they could pass Remus off as some other baby called Oliver who was Dylan’s patient, which was absolutely insane. Then they discussed it loudly with the door open, of course. And Drew walked in on them, to their shock.

Boyd managed to get him to keep quiet about this.

They decided to go through with this insane plan.

Oh, I’m just holding this baby that I’ve decided to operate on last minute. I’m very protective of him, and his parents happen to not be around. But he’s totally not my son.

Nicole immediately noticed that something fishy is going on, but decided not to prod Boyd about it. She had some great facial expressions, though.

Of course, Eve insisted on showing up. What is wrong with these people?

She sees Lincoln, and immediately tells him that he must have children – “Oh my goodness. Wow, you are beautiful. If you have not sired offspring yet, for the love of humanity, please do.” Oh my god, how we’ve missed you, Eve.

Yes, you’re really going to fool everyone with your “disguise”, Eve.

She wasted no time in threatening Dylan. Nothing gets past Eve.

“On the contrary, people only see what they expect to. You of all people should know that.”

“Remember that you’re speaking to a former sociopath.”

“You’re so deep in your own lies, you’re even lying to yourself.”

“But if you through action, inaction or inattention, cause my family any harm, I will kill you.”

Eve, you’re amazing. (Yes, that was her “disguise”.)

But then it gets infuriating. At the end of the episode, Boyd tells Eve to flee town with the kids, again, and she does. “I’m determined to become the woman that you once thought I was.” “They need their mum, not me.” What the hell?

So they had the opportunity to bring back the most compelling character of 2017 and provide closure for one of the biggest stories of that year, yet they decided to rush through it in one episode? (It was a double length episode, but still).

There was so much juicy material that they just rushed through. You’re telling me that within the course of one day, Boyd goes from hating Eve and preparing to turn her into the police to wanting to protect her and thinking that the boys need her? How is that possible?

Even if he did pull that 180, now he is perfectly content with his children being raised by a woman on the run? Will she send them to school? Where is she even planning to live? Will she be shuffling them around to a different part of the world every couple of months? And that’s not even mentioning that he won’t be able to ever see them again. And why would they need their mum any more than they would need their father? Give me a break.

They could have explored all of these plot points, and also allowed her to have more interactions with Dylan. The story could have lasted a week, at least. But none of this was explained, and instead she was quickly shuffled offscreen. And now the children are gone too. So what was the point? It doesn’t give Boyd any long term story, and everyone who knows about it has decided to keep it under wraps. So we’re back to where we were before this episode, with Eve on the run with the kids.

My expression after seeing the end of this episode.

Rant over.

Endless flowers

Over the course of the second half of this week, Te Rongopai received three bouquets of flowers – two from Pita, and one from Boyd.

It’s pretty hilarious. I guess Pita thinks that if he sends enough flowers, then she’ll forgive him for the affair? Yes, sending flowers is much better than actually visiting in person and making an actual effort. Good riddance, though. Pita was a terrible character.

Boyd also regaled Te Rongopai with some cookies decorated like different planets, which she wasn’t too enthusiastic about either.

Esther also received a bouquet of flowers from Kawe for some reason. She wasn’t terribly impressed.

Does anyone think that Sebastian might secretly be the one buying all these flowers? He’s always so thrilled when he passes them along.

In other news, Frank hired a goon to attack Dylan, but then Dylan paid him off. Then Frank took a crack at attempting to kill Dylan as well after seemingly becoming possessed. He then skipped town after saying goodbye to Kylie.

What the hell was that about? I know Frank can be dodgy, but I thought this was totally out of character. Plus it was played like Dylan was capable of some sort of mind control by egging him on until he cracked.

If this was meant to be Frank’s exit storyline, I’m going to be pissed. I guess Vinnie’s exit storyline was pretty shitty, so I wouldn’t put it past them to do something similar here. Not that I’m at all rooting for Kylie and Frank as a couple. I’ve never bought their “great love” story.

Remember when Frank was just that hot barman at the IV?

It would have been much more realistic for them to have a disastrous breakup shortly after marrying, since they rushed into marriage after being together for barely two weeks. Yet instead they shoved this ‘great love’ storyline down our throats. Ugh. I feel like they never really knew what to do with him, because his storylines have been all over the place.