Frittering away the summer.

Every now and then, Andy and I make fritters, trying to find the key to a firm but flavourful patty of veggies or mashed potatoes. We've tried gluten flour, chickpea flour, egg replacers, mashed tofu, and a range of other ingredient combinations, but we couldn't seem to find anything that worked.

That is, until Christmas when we got a cookbook from Andy's brother. The book is rather uncreatively titled Vegan, by Tony Weston and Yvonne Bishop. As a British cookbook, it has a combination of familiar Aussie foods as well as things I've never heard of before (but want, like banoffee pie).

One of the recipes is obviously for fritters -- corn fritters, in fact. It basically involves making a savoury pancake batter and stirring in corn kernels. Our first attempt was a resounding success...

With a stuffed capsicum and a salad.

...so of course we decided to experiment. First, I used the batter with grated potato. This had potential, but the potato didn't quite cook properly.

With a chickpea cutlet and a snow pea shoot salad.

Next, we tried mashed potato + mashed sweet potato. This was the winner.

With Thai Style Pineapple Fried Rice (from The Tropical Vegan cookbook), and fat-free garlic bread.

In the past month, we have probably eaten these mashed potato fritters 5 or 6 times, because we both love them that much. And, they reheat really well the next morning for brekky. Our search for the perfect fritters has finally come to a rest.

Fritters:

1/2 c. flour
1 t. vegetable stock powder
1 t. baking powder
1/2 c. soy milk
1 t. apple cider vinegar
1 T. garlic chives (or regular chives, or garlic), minced
1 c. mashed potatoes (or sweet potatoes, or whole corn kernels, or other veggies minced finely)

Combine flour, stock, and baking powder, mix well. Stir in soy milk and vinegar until well combined, then fold in chives and veggies. Heat a large, preferably non-stick skillet over medium-high heat, and add enough oil to thinly coat the whole pan. Drop heaping tablespoons of the fritter mix into the pan, flatten, and fry until browned on both sides. Keep warm in the oven until they are all cooked.