In "My" Kitchen # 2

Anyone remember this post?

Well- this time- I don't have much of a sous chef. I AM DOING MOST OF MY OWN COOKING!!!!! I still need help with a few things- but I AM DOING A LOT OF IT ON MY OWN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

How cool is that? 

Although slightly annoying when my Dad comes into the room and says things like "Don't you want a roast potato for tea?". Well- no- because if I want to cook for myself then I need to plan and so you can't just turn up and say "Don't you want a roast potato for tea?" because if I have roast potato for tea then when will I have the stir fry? :( 

So what is not in "my kitchen" is a roast potato. :P 

Sigh. 

I like stir fry better anyway. 

:)

So, I wanted to give you a overview of what I had been eating lately. Basically- noodles and oatmeal. And date bars but I don't have any pictures of them. So...

This isn't actually a proportional representation- this is more just a collection of the more interesting/noteworthy things. Or just the things I photographed for one reason or another. These aren't 'posed' photo's- and so they are completely unedited. Just to warn you. One even includes a laundry basket in the background. 

And this plate is what I affectionately like to call "how to eat your veggie burger when you have run out of anything but white bread". Cut out circles of bread, and cut the crusts into "chips". Yes, we really did need to go shopping. Yes, I should of chosen something other than veggie burger that night. Yes, it did make me obsessed with the white sliced bread and chilli sauce combo because it is AWESOME. 

This was one of my favourite meals until it got to the point where I couldn't buy Linda McCartney Fish Free Scampi anymore. The 'nuggets' added a really nice contrast to the thai red curry coconut stir fry. Don't suppose anybody knows where you can buy the scampi from now that Sainsbury's have stopped selling it?

This is some Paella that Mom and me made from a packet (a really long time ago now). You can't really see it that well in the picture- but it was really colourful. And also the first time that I'd had paella. It was good. I should make it again sometime. Though not from a packet. (Recipe possibly coming soon for serves 1 paella!)

I got a squash!!!!! To be honest, I have no idea what a harlequin squash is- I have never heard of it before, but they had one and it was so pretty and I just had to try some (obviously- who could turn down a squash as pretty as that?) It tasted yummy too :D

 Yes I am overusing emoticons in this post. Sorry. 

I had nooch on my risotto and roasted veg instead of parmesan! I'm not quite sure which I preferred, but I'd always been a bit afraid to try this and now I have. I was a very brave big girl :P And plus, as mentioned above- what doesn't taste good with squash?

And here is a mushroom sausage and sweet potato hash. I've decided that I need to eat stuff like this more often, because it's brilliant- no knives and forks!!!! (Okay, so there's a fork there but that's because the chopsticks were in the dishwasher). And plus, I had it with applesauce, and yum... applesauce!!!

And here are some noodles. Because I eat a lot of noodles. And noodles. :) 

And here is onion ring salad. Which is officially a thing now. Because I'm trying to clear out the stuff I don't want that is 'mine' from the freezer (because it is in a perpetual state of being full) and there was a big bag of onion rings in there from... a long time ago. And so I had onion rings with everything for a while. And so onion ring salad was a thing. 

So- that is a snap shot of what I've been eating lately. But really, I've been eating noodles and oatmeal. This was just the interesting stuff. 

Oh, and chocolate raisins. I've eaten a lot of chocolate raisins. 

Okay... au revoir. Next time I will include less emoticons... I promise. 

In "My" Kitchen

I have a sous chef. Normally, this is an honor reserved for only the most revered of chefs who have at least two Michelin Stars, but you also get a sous chef if you are unable to get about in the kitchen due to physical restrictions. She's called your mother. 

We've been getting up to a lot in our little kitchen recently. When I say a lot, we really haven't been doing all that much. When I say we, I obviously mean mainly Mom. Basically, I can sit at the table, read the recipe and chop stuff up. If I'm very lucky, I get to measure stuff out too! This isn't a comprehensive list of what we've created, just what I remembered/could be bothered to photograph.  

We're currently on the hunt to perfect the cheese-less pizza. So far, we've tried putting jarred sauce and toppings on a brought base, and adding vegetables to a garlic pizza bread with sun dried tomato puree (Dad found those in Sainsbury's). The main issue with both was that the topping fell off. It was like eating bread and salad. Not good. Choosing between the two, I'd say that the pizza sauce on a pizza base was my preferred option, it was just more pizza-y. Also, I prefer thick based pizza's to the uber-thin crispy Italian style bases, so the garlic bread was not even close to what I wanted. 

The trouble with baking is; whilst I really enjoy doing it, at the moment I just don't want to eat what I create. Most credit for these mini Victoria Sandwiches goes to my friend, which is a perfect solution to the baking issue, she did half (and more) of the work, so she gets to take half (or more) of the end results home. Happily, she lives in a household of four, who will actually eat the cake. 

P.S. Is it supposed to be icing sugar or caster sugar on the top?

Another way to solve the baking issue is to bake for someone else. Like the nurses at the hospital. And the doctors. And the pharmacists. And whoever else magically finds themselves in the office. It can fit a lot of people in, believe me. 

And yes, I know it is a bit bright, but the icing was reduced. And it looks so pretty...

Apparently chemo makes you want to eat salad... Or it makes me want to eat salad at any rate. Trouble is, you're not always aloud to eat salad when your on chemo, so when you are, it better be pretty damn fine. 

By the way Mom, this one doesn't have enough lettuce to carry all the other vegetables.  

Samosa French Toast Sandwich anyone? This is a recipe we sort of followed from Vegan Richa's blog, but we didn't have all the spices, so we followed the general idea by mixing curry paste into instant mashed potato, and then used that as the sandwich filling. It did turn out to be a bit of a carb fest for me at the time though, I didn't manage all of it. Curry ketchup did help though. 

Kale chips. I miss kale. The kale season has just ended in Morrison's. When does it start again? 

(Kale chips are pieces of kale that have been seasoned and lightly oiled, then baked until they go all crispy. It's a bit like a massive piece of that crispy seaweed you get in Chinese restaurants, but not as sugary/salty and much nicer.) 

Spaghetti and meat Quorn(TM)balls. 

Yes Dad, I want actual spaghetti noodles, not pasta shapes. 

Yes I want the brown spaghetti. 

Well it's not like you're gonna eat it. (Dad won't eat Quorn(TM) )

Welcome to the most gigantanourmous mushroom pasty you will ever see. Let's call him Norman. Why not? I fancied a mushroom pasty. Not a chicken and mushroom pasty (for obvious non-veggie reasons) or a cheese and onion pasty (I don't care if it's veggie, it is not a mushroom pasty). I wanted a mushroom pasty. The problem was that it just quite literally didn't seem to exist. So we made one. It just turned out a bit bigger than I was expecting. Like 3 times as big. I ate all the mushrooms, and some of the pastry. And no, Dad is not too old to turn Norman into a smiley face with the brown sauce. Wait till you see the giraffe shaped pizza's he cut out for my brother. My brother now insists that Mom cuts up his pizza. 

The warm weathers here (?) so veggie kebabs anyone? Cooked in the oven and not on the barbecue of course. And those pieces of sweet potato that you can see lying around? If someone had told me that sweet potato is too hard to skewer before I'd chopped it up I'd be a happy bunny. 

Noodles with spinach, mushrooms and chicken style Quorn(TM) slices. 

Nicer than a pot noodle, and still made in less than 5 minutes. 

And finally this is...

This is... 

This is ...

This is something that doesn't have a name. Because we really can't keep calling them 'Fish-less Fishcakes' forever. Even calling them 'Vegan Fishcakes' is wrong. 

So... We've been making them a lot recently... Anyone know what to call them?