Friday, March 28, 2008

Food Update

As I said, I’ve been busy lately. But I want to get these photos up now because on Sunday I’m heading off to Brisbane for 9 days. I’ll be stuck in the State archives, the State Library archives, the University of Queensland archives, and the Museum of Brisbane archives. I think by the time I come home I’ll have had my fill of historical documents. I don’t expect to be posting until at least next Tuesday, so I’ll see you all then! Now for the food.

Sloppy Joes, based on the recipe in Hot Damn and Hell Yeah. These had tvp chunks (cut up a bit after rehydration), mushrooms, corn, and capsicum in a sweetish tomato sauce. We served them over garlic toast, which was a bit lost under all the sloppiness. These were good, but not great.

We ate the sloppy joes before heading off to the Townsville Cinema Group’s showing of the film September. The film is about two families, one white and one Aboriginal, living on a wheat farm in Western Australia in 1968. I think it’s definitely worth watching, because it shows the complexities of life for Aboriginal and white people alike in that era. It doesn’t paint all white people as evil or racist (though some are, like the shop keeper), but it shows the incredibly unfair treatment of an entire race of people. If you ever get the chance, watch September and let me know what you think.

One night I came home from a meeting to this dinner. It is based on the recipe for “Vegetable mountain with gravy” from Hot Damn and Hell Yeah, with a few changes. Instead of the gravy from HDaHY, though, Andy whipped up some “Easy Cheezy Gravy” from The Ultimate Uncheese Cookbook. On the side, some chickpea cutlets. The mountain was fantastic, though far too big for me. It made a good lunch the next day, too. And the cutlets were, as usual, great.

We also had our usual pasta, which features a veggie-full sauce. All these things…

Went into a pot and became this:

At the market last Sunday we saw a woman selling persimmons. They were $5 a kilo, which is a bit dear, but not too much to try them out. She let us have a taste before we bought them, and we liked it, so we got two. One looks like a butt.

When I was feeling a bit sick at uni last week, all I could think about was vegetable soup. This turned into a bit of a clean-out-the-fridge soup, perfect for the end of the week. It has onions, garlic, potato, carrot, zucchini, tomato and spinach, which were all blended up. After blending it, I put in fresh corn and a whole lot of fresh dill. The result was a creamy, hearty and green soup which was probably really good for us.

Another night I was helping Andy to revise a lit review he’s getting published in a major journal soon, so he cooked. Vegetable Mountain with Gravy’ came back out because we had lots of potatoes and it was easy and yummy. This time, the gravy was ‘Punk Rock Chickpea Gravy’ from Vegan with a Vengeance, which I *love* but haven’t had in 2 years or so.

And finally, last night we had Kumudha’s Indian Chickpea Omelette, but changed a bit. On the side, a salad smothered with avocado dressing, and orange-plum-cinnamon glazed beetroot.Have a good week, everyone!

12 comments:

Lori- the Pleasantly Plump Vegan said...

hehe, i love the persimmon butt.

ChocolateCoveredVegan said...

“Easy Cheezy Gravy” looks so creamy. If it really IS "easy" like the name implies, I'm going to have to open up my Vegan Vittles and make some.

Anonymous said...

I love your pasta dish! My favorite thing to do is to put a whole bunch of stuff together in my pasta.

Theresa said...

It was easy, CCV! Whipped up in a second!

LizNoVeggieGirl said...

so many delicious dishes, as always - yum!


oooh, have a LOVELY time in Brisbane!

Liz Ranger (Bubble Tea for Dinner) said...

I *really* need to get this Hot Damn book.

the little one said...

Best of luck with the dissertation research. (I'm assuming that is what it is.) That stuff can be so fun. Hard for some people to believe, but I think hours and hours spent combing documents can be really fun. Hope it is super fruitful.

And, as always, great looking food!

TB said...

Wow, everything looks so amazing, I don't even know where to start! What a lot of good eatin' you two have had. And can you believe that I STILL haven't tried the punk rock chickpea gravy? What's wrong with me???

TB said...

p.s. enjoy the diss research! like the little one said, some people don't believe it, but many of us fantasize about holing up in archives! ;) hope you find lots of great stuff.

Vegan_Noodle said...

I've never had a persimmon, much less one that looks like a butt!

Food all looks great. Would you recommend hot damn? Not that I need another cookbook...

Hope you have fun in Brisbane!! When I was a kid I obsessed about living there and working at the lone pine koala sanctuary. I even sent them a letter and told them so.

urban vegan said...

I am always astonished by the wonderful, colorful and varied diet you two consistently consume.

bazu said...

hee hee- your fruit has a butt.