vegan products Archives - Vegan Family House

September 8, 2021September 8, 2021

Roast Butternut Soup with Lemon Thyme

This roast butternut soup is perfect for autumn. Season of beautiful leaves, mushrooms in the grass and an abundance of apples. And squashes, let’s not forget them.

Timely then that Oatly sent us some of their products and a recipe for roast butternut squash soup with lemon thyme. The apples really add a seasonal fruitiness to this dish, don’t miss them out!

Roast Butternut Soup Ingredients

250 ml Oatly Organic Creamy Oat
1 butternut squash
2 tbsp. olive oil
a couple of onions, diced
2 cloves of garlic, thinly sliced
1 tbsp. minced ginger
1 minced red chilli
2 sprigs of lemon thyme
2 green apples, diced
800 ml vegetable stock
1 lemon
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
Toasted pumpkin seeds to serve

Method

Preheat the oven to 240C/475F
Halve the butternut squash and scoop out the seeds using a large spoon. Place the halves on a large baking sheet with flech side up. Drizzle over the olive oil and season with salt and pepper. Roast in the oven for 30-40 minutes, or until the squash is tender.
Heat a large pot over a medium high heat and add the oil. Add the onions, chilli, ginger and apple and cook gently until soft.
Using a large spoon, scoop out the flesh from the butternut squash and add it with the thyme to the pot.
Pour over the vegetable stock. Bring to the boil and simmer for 10 minutes.
Remove from the heat and blend using a hand-blender to desired consistency.
Add the Oatly Organic Creamy Oat and squeeze over lemon. Let it simmer for another 10 minutes and season with salt and freshly ground black pepper.
Serve with toasted pumpkin seeds. We didn’t have those but we did have homemade potato wedges which made up for it.

Recipe credit: this recipe was made with Oatly Creamy Oat – a great dairy free, healthy alternative to single cream. For more delicious recipes and further information about the Oatly way of life, visit facebook.com/oatlyab

Creamy Oat is also great with puddings such as apple pie, it comes out of the fridge with the consistency of double cream. Pie recipe over on frugal.org uk

August 21, 2021August 22, 2021

Carrot Turmeric Soup: golden and nutritious

This carrot and turmeric soup is rich and nutritious and golden, perfect for the start of Autumn! Turmeric is rich in iron and also anti-inflammatory. The olive oil and black pepper in the recipe are there to make the most of these properties.

Carrot Turmeric Soup Ingredients

1 thumb sized piece of ginger, peeled
4 or 5 small new potatoes, skins on, chopped small
5 large carrots or equivalent, scraped and chopped
1 large onion, peeled and chopped
5 cloves of garlic, chopped
a handful of cashew nuts
1 to 2 heaped teaspoons of turmeric (we used this one)
about 1 teaspoon of black pepper, freshly ground if possible
1 tablespoon of olive oil
water to cover ingredients well
seasalt to taste

Method

Place the ginger, potatoes, carrots and onion in a large pan and cover well with boiling water. Bring back to boil and add the cashew nuts and garlic. While the vegetables are cooking mix the turmeric in the olive oil with the black pepper and leave to stand.

Once the vegetables are tender, add salt to taste and place everything – veg, liquid, nuts, turmeric/oil mix – into a blender and blitz until smooth.

Pour into bowls and squeeze some lime juice over the top. Yum!

See all our vegan recipes here

Montbretia by the pond:

August 18, 2021August 19, 2021

Vegan Creamy Mushroom Puff: roast dinner

Mushrooms in a rich creamy sauce topped with flaky puff pastry. This Mushroom Puff is perfect for Christmas or just about anytime at all!

Mushroom Puff Ingredients

A third of a cup/60g/2oz of vegan margarine
4 tablespoons of plain white flour
1 onion
4 cloves of garlic, crushed or very finely chopped (this can be reduced or left out if desired)
3 cups of mushrooms, sliced
half a litre/500ml of soya milk
1 glass of white wine (or stock)
handful of chopped parsley
salt and pepper to taste
approx. 500g/18oz of frozen puff pastry (this even comes ready-rolled now for extra laziness!!!)

Method

Melt the margarine and cook the onion and garlic in it for a few minutes and then add the sliced mushrooms and cook for a couple of minutes more. Add the flour and stir well. Gradually add the soya milk stirring all the time and then the wine and keep stirring on a low heat until the sauce thickens. Once thick remove from the heat and add your seasoning and the parsley.

Allow to cool slightly while you prepare the pastry. Roll out into 2 wide rectangular shapes reserving some pastry for decoration. Place one sheet of pastry on a greased baking tray. Heap the slightly cooled sauce onto it leaving a space round the edges. Place the top sheet on and seal up the edges with some soya milk or water (fold over if needed). Make some small slits on the top of the puff and let your artistic side shine with the reserved pastry! I usually make holly leaves to place on the top but do whatever you like. Glaze with soya milk and then bake in a medium hot oven for about half an hour or until the pastry seems cooked (no soggy bits and nicely puffed up!)

Nice served with gravy, roast potatoes, stuffing, vegan sausages, cranberry sauce and vegetables of your choice – a feast!

See all our vegan Christmas recipes here

Or go the easy route and get a turkey style roast from vegan supermarket GreenBay or other health food shops.

GreenBay sell a variety of other gourmet vegan products that would be great for Christmas treats such as cheeses (including Camembert), steak and bacon etc.

Vegan herbes de Provence cheese for Vegan Christmas

May 31, 2021May 31, 2021

Vegan Cake Mix and Hazelnot Gnawbles

vegan chocolate cake mix from Creative Narure makes a wonderful cake!

The cake above was made with the cacao rich vegan cake mix from Creative Nature. The little round sweets are their Gnawbles which are basically vegan Maltesers!

The mix makes a gorgeous, sweet and luxurious cake – you just add oil and milk of your choice – and the Gnawbles are delightfully crunchy and delicious.

Creative Nature also make snack bars which are great too. See the whole range here. It includes many different types of vegan cake mix and numerous varieties of Gnawbles and bars. Particularly innovative is the Hazelnot flavour, containing no nuts.

Use code VEGANFAMILYHOUSE10 at the checkout for a 10% discount.

Everything is gluten free, vegan and nut free too.

cake made with a vegan chocolate cake mix from Creative Nature

See our chocolate page and cakes page for our own recipes.


  
    
    

    
      
      
      
      
      

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May 25, 2021July 10, 2021

Easy Vegan Meals with Free Sausages

We made some scrummy and easy vegan meals with the free sausages mentioned earlier (now 15% off). We highly recommend them, they’re a really nice product and well-priced even when not free. Above is a mega salad consisting of: the braised sausages, tomato and sweetcorn; Greek baked beans (Lidl baby!); stuffed vine leaves (also Lidl); potato salad made with left-over baked potatoes; baby cuke and a red cabbage/onion/soy sauce salad.

Next – less photogentic, but no less delicious – pitta pizza with the salami and a homemade sauce that included lots of oregano from the garden.

Then – the last of the easy vegan meals for now – a baked tattie topped with hummus, pointed red pepper and sweetcorn and paired with soused red cabbage (similar recipe here) and the tofu & quinoa sausages.

Lots more meal ideas over on our Instagram .


  
    
    

    
      
      
      
      
      

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May 12, 2021May 12, 2021

Free Vegan Sausages, Primroses on Soup

Roll up! Roll up! Get your free vegan sausages here! Well not here exactly but over at Green Bay Vegan Supermarket. Their new range of plant based braised sausages, quinoa and tofu sausages and salami slices is totally free with any order of £10 or more.

Add the free vegan sausages to your basket here

It’s a limited time offer, while stocks last.

The pretty picture at the top is another cream of nettle soup – like this one but no broccoli – topped with primroses (they are edible, and sweet).

Fireflies and Chocolate by Ailish Sinclair

FIREFLIES AND CHOCOLATE, inspired by the 18th century kidnapped children of Aberdeen, is out now!

The paperback is currently reduced on Amazon. Available on Kindle and Kindle Unlimited too.


  
    
    

    
      
      
      
      
      

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March 25, 2021March 25, 2021

cream of tomato soup #vegan

Ingredients for the cream of tomato soup:
2 tins of plum tomatoes
about a cup of water (rinse out tins with it)
1 onion
5 cloves of garlic
2 medium sweet potatoes, peeled and chopped
1 or 2 handfuls of cashew nuts
a few fresh sage leaves
seasalt to taste

Place the tomatoes and water in a pan and bring to the boil, adding the onion, sweet potato, sage and garlic as it heats. Once it boils, turn down to a simmer for 10-15 minutes, until potatoes are soft. Place soup in a blender and add the cashew nuts. Blend and taste for seasoning, add salt as desired.

If your blender is not very strong, try soaking the cashews in water overnight to soften them before using.

We had the cream of tomato soup with a cheese and onion pasty made in a similar manner to the basic pasties on frugal but using Kamut flour in the pastry and filled with chopped red onion, cubed potatoes and vegan cheese all cooked in a little soya milk first, also very good 🙂

See all our soup recipes here

February 2, 2021February 2, 2021

banana raisin teabread (gluten and sugar free)

Teabread Ingredients:
250g of Doves Farm Gluten free Self Raising flour
1/4 teaspoon of xanthan gum (flour already contains some)
1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
4 mashed bananas
2 generous tablespoons of coconut oil (melted)
300g of raisins
juice of one lemon
2 teaspoons of vanilla extract
unsweetened soya milk to mix (quite a lot, flour is very absorbent)

Mix dry ingredients and then beat in the wet ones and fruit. Bake at 200C/400F for at least half an hour or until a skewer comes out clean.

Lovely with Booja Booja Vanilla ice cream or just with a bit of marg and a cup of tea.

Chocolate variation!! Add 50g of cocoa powder to the flour and liquidise 100g of pitted dates into some soya milk instead of raisins… delish 🙂

Enjoy this teabread after an icy loch-side walk… and see all our cake recipes here.

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Escape to 1596 with THE MERMAID AND THE BEAR! Exchange lockdowns for witchcraft accusations! Live in a castle, visit the stone circle and taste the Twelfth Night Cake…

January 7, 2021January 20, 2021

Burns Night: vegan haggis and Scottish recipes

FAIR fa’ your honest, sonsie face,
Great chieftain o’ the pudding-race!

So said Robert Burns of the haggis. Good word ‘sonsie’, it really should be used more. You can get a sonsie vegan haggis in many shops now to serve with neeps and tatties.

You could make some sonsie Cranachan for afters, recipe taken from our cakes and puddings page.

Cranachan
This is often served at Burn’s Suppers in Scotland.
Ingredients: half a cup of porridge oats; 1 small box of soya cream; 1 tablespoon of Agave Nectar; 1 tablespoon of whisky (or whisky flavouring if you don’t take alcohol); 1 punnet of fresh raspberries

Lightly toast the oats in a frying pan on the stove. Remove from heat and pour in the cream – it will bubble and thicken a bit with the heat. Stir well and add the agave and whiskey, and mix in. Add most of the rasps, keeping a few back for garnish. Place in dishes and chill in the fridge until pudding time.

The perfect Burns Night pudding: Cranachan

Other Scottish recipes that might be of use or preferable to haggis:

Scotch Broth
Balmoral Pie can be found on the main courses page (scroll down a bit). It’s a lovely dish of beans and sausages topped with mash.
Scottish Macaroons are a feast of sugar and potato.

Whatever you do, have an honest, sonsie time this Burns Night 😀

Experience a perfect Scottish escape with THE MERMAID AND THE BEAR! Exchange 21st century lockdowns for 16th century witchcraft accusations! Live in a castle, visit the stone circle and taste the Twelfth Night Cake…

See more recommendations for vegan books from us here.

January 4, 2021January 4, 2021

Two Vegan Books! One Novel!

The first vegan book is Fat Gay Vegan: Eat, Drink and Live Like You Give a Sh!t by Sean O’Callaghan of the well known Fat Gay Vegan blog.

We LOVE this book. It’s political but it’s also deeply personal, containing many stories from the lives of Sean and other contributors. The book is about how to be vegan, but it’s more about how to be a better vegan, and really it’s about how to be a better person. And we can all work on that.

It’s refreshing to read a vegan book that tackles how minorities and traditionally oppressed voices are treated, even within the vegan community. We have experienced and witnessed shocking able-ism and racism in our 21 years as vegans, and yes, sadly, sometimes from vegans. It weakens the movement. It weakens the world. It needs to end.

And we can all check our privilege. We can all watch our language. Some in this house have, upon occasion, described various unfortunate things as ‘crazy’. Not good, Vegan Family House, not good.

So it’s a challenging book, a personally challenging book, but it’s in no way downbeat or depressing. Although forthright, it’s written with a compassionate sense of humour. It’s empowering. Why should we shut up and put up about our veganism to please or appease non-vegan friends and relatives? At the end of each chapter there are little refuelling stops with delicious and simple recipes and food suggestions. And in the final chapter Sean predicts a world that continues to become more vegan, and perhaps more importantly, more kind.

Here it is on Amazon (out tomorrow Jan 4th).

And now, for a practical guide from Veganuary!

For those who don’t know, Veganuary is a charity that encourages people to go vegan for January and the rest of the year. And this is their compelling guide. It’s so persuasive that apparently the proof-reader went vegan!

The book has sections on why you should be vegan, with warnings of graphic content that you can choose to read or not, and then being vegan at home, when out, visiting friends, answering questions, and everyday foods you maybe didn’t know were vegan. It’s a very good starting point for anyone who is thinking of going vegan and wondering how to go about it and how hard/easy it will be.

And here it is on Amazon.

Enjoy your vegan reading!

And… not a vegan book, but it’s by a vegan:

The Mermaid and the Bear, a novel by Ailish Sinclair

Escape to 1596 with THE MERMAID AND THE BEAR! Exchange lockdowns for witchcraft accusations! Live in a castle, visit the stone circle and taste the Twelfth Night Cake…

See more recommendations for vegan books from us here.