Vegan Asian style roasted carrots

I had some adorable dutch carrots in my fridge (the small ones with the stems and leaves still attached) and I wanted to do something fancy with them. 

I had a look on Google to see what I could find, but a lot of the recipes were the same old honey glazed recipes, and I thought that might be a bit boring. Plus I don't eat honey. 

I wanted to try something different but wasn't having too much luck. I eventually found a recipe on The Greedy Pepper for maple and sesame glazed dutch carrots. This gave me some inspiration to come up with my own new spin on roasted carrots. 

I pretty much just threw some of my favourite Asian flavour combinations to make a lovely glaze. When they came out of the oven, my brother was lured into the kitchen by the sweet aroma. When I asked if he wanted some, he wasn't too keen because they were carrots and he's not a huge vegetable fan, but he still had a bite anyways.

He ended up really liking them and even ate a few more carrots afterwards. I love it when kids eat their veggies. 

Asian style maple glazed carrots (vegan)

Serves 4

Ingredients
1 bunch dutch carrots, washed (leave a bit of the stems on the carrots for display)
3 tablespoons maple syrup
1 teaspoon freshly grated ginger
1 teaspoon freshly minced lemongrass
1 teaspoon sesame seeds
1 tablespoon olive oil
Salt and pepper to taste

Directions
Preheat oven to 180C (350F). Line baking tray with baking paper.
Combine all ingredients into a bowl and coat carrots.
Transfer carrots onto baking tray and cook in oven for about 20 minutes. 

These carrots would go great as a side to pretty much any dish. I just threw together some red onion, tomatoes, vegan sausages and spaghetti as my dinner tonight.

Vegan Carrot Ginger Soup

A few months back, I borrowed out a cookbook called Clean Food by Terry Walters. The recipes in here are all just amazing. They sound so delicious. 

Nights here in Perth have been so cold lately and so I found a recipe for Carrot Ginger Soup. Perfect for warming me up. 

This is one of those recipes where you read down the ingredients list and think to yourself, "I like all those ingredients separately, but would they go together?". If this is what happens to you, then try really hard to shoosh that part of brain and just start cooking before you chicken out. 

I really enjoyed this recipe. With each spoonful, I tasted the miso, but then there was this lovely sweet aftertaste from the orange and carrot. This is definitely something for all the gutsy people out there who love eating clean.

Vegan Carrot Ginger Soup (from Clean Food by Terry Walters)

Serves 4

Ingredients

• 1 tablespoons grapeseed oil
• 1 onion, chopped
• 1 tablespoon grated fresh ginger
• 4 cups chopped carrots
• 1/2 cup oats
• 1/2 cup orange juice (preferably freshly squeezed)
• Water or vegetable stock
• 2-3 tablespoons mellow white miso (depending on how much you like miso)
• Chopped parsley for garnish (I used chopped spring onion)

Directions

1. In a large pot over medium heat, saute onion and ginger in oil for 3 minutes
2. Add carrots, oats, orange juice and enough water or stock to just cover the carrots
3. Bring to boil, reduce heat, cover and let simmer until carrots are soft (about 20 minutes)
4. Turn off heat and puree with handheld blender. 
5. In a small bowl, dissolve miso with 1/2 cup room-temperature water and stir into soup
6. Garnish with parsley and serve

Polenta with vegetable ragout and roasted radish, carrot and cauliflower

As I'm sure you all know, I love cooking. I love experimenting with new vegan recipes and ingredients I haven't tried before. It's even better when my friends get in on it too.

I caught up with Ruth and Nhi today for a blogilates session (I feel like I can refer to my friends by their names now because I've already mentioned them a lot in previous posts and I can assure you they will be along side me doing new things in posts to come). We also decided to cook up dinner using whatever was in Ruth's kitchen, plus some mushrooms Nhi brought along. 

We jumped on a great recipe search engine called Yummly. What I really like about this website is that it searches pretty much every recipe there is on the web. What I like to do is find an ingredient in my kitchen which I will make the star of the dish and then search this along side other search words like "vegan". 

We found some radishes in Ruth's fridge, and because none of us have ever cooked with radish before, we decided to do a search for "vegan radish" in Google which lead us to a search for "vegan carrot radish" recipes on Yummly.

We scrolled through the recipes and found a recipe for polenta with spring vegetable ragout and roasted radishes and carrot. We had to make some changes to the recipes because we didn't have all of the ingredients...and we really wanted to eat the mushrooms so we added those to the ragout. 

It was so much fun cooking with the girls, and before we ate the food we did some blogilates workouts. Abs, thighs and asses were on fire afterwards!

The reward for all exercise was a delicious meal. We really enjoyed the recipes and we were so proud that we were able to cook this recipe from what food was available to us. What also really surprised us was how good the radishes tasted! I've always thought they were a bitter tasting vegetable, but when it's cooked, it actually has a lovely earthy taste with texture similar to that of any other root vegetable such as cooked parsnip. So go on and give radish a try today :)

Polenta with Vegetable Ragout

Serves 4
 
Polenta:
4 cups light vegetable broth or water
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup polenta or yellow cornmeal
1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil

Ragout:
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
3 garlic clove, minced
8 baby carrots (4 large carrots cut to desired size), trimmed and cut in half lengthwise
6 radishes, trimmed and cut into quarters
1/2 cup light vegetable broth or water
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup slices mushrooms
1 1/2 frozen peas and corn
Any herbs (we used rosemary and a all purpose seasoning)
1 teaspoon lemon zest
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
Additional olive oil and herbs for garnish

To make the polenta, bring the vegetable broth or water to a boil in a 2- to 3-quart pot over moderate heat. Add the salt and then slowly add the polenta while whisking. Reduce heat to low and continue whisking until the polenta is thickened. Cover the pot and continue cooking. Every 10 minutes, stir the polenta vigorously, scraping the sides of the pan. Continue cooking for 30-40 minutes until polenta reaches desired thickness and creaminess. Stir in the olive oil. Serve within 15 minutes.

Make the ragout while the polenta is cooking. Heat the olive oil in a large saucepan over moderate heat. Add the garlic and cook, stirring, for about a minute until fragrant. Add the carrots, radishes, vegetable broth or water, and salt. Cover the pan and cook for 5 minutes. Add the mushrooms and cook until they are soft. Add the frozen peas and corn, cover, and cook for another 5 minutes. 

Remove from heat, stir in the herbs and lemon zest, and season to taste.

To serve, spoon the polenta into a shallow serving bowl or individual bowls. Make a well in the center of the polenta and spoon the ragout on top. Drizzle a little olive oil on top and garnish with herbs.

 

Roasted carrot, cauliflower and radish

Serves 4

Prep time: 5 minutes

Cook time: 20 minutes

Ingredients

1 bunch small to medium radishes, about 12
12 baby carrots

half head of cauliflower cut into florets
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 teaspoon dried rosemary

1 teaspoon paprika 

1/2 teaspoon cumin
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
Directions
Preheat the oven to 200 degrees C.
Place the radishes, carrots and cauliflower on a baking sheet and toss with the olive oil, rosemary, paprika, cumin, salt, and pepper. Roast until tender yet firm in the center, about 20 minutes. 

 

 

Flourless carrot and banana muffins

I've just finished a pretty insane workout with two of my very close friends, and although I need a shower so (so so so so) badly, writing up my post before the day ends takes greater precedence :)

Not only did I try something new today, but so did my two lovely workout buddies. Today we baked a recipe for flourless carrot and banana muffins which our favourite fitness blogger Cassey Ho posted up on her instagram (check out the recipe here).

We also made a vegan friendly version of the icing which tasted so delicious! All three of us totally recommend it:
1 Tablespoon Tofutti brand of Better than Cream Cheese (vegan cream cheese)
3 Tablespoons Soy Life vanilla yogurt (I recommend this brand because it's so yum! With some brands of soy yogurt, you can really taste the tofu, but this one is creamy and has a nice vanilla flavour)
1 teaspoon agave (uh-gah-vey) nectar. Maple syrup could work too.

I've never been super keen on working out, but I think the Blogilates videos by Cassey Ho have changed me. She works you so hard, but I can feel myself toning up and just feeling great! If you've got 15 minutes to spare, give her videos a go!

Ok guys, it's seriously time for me to shower now :)

This one will kill your arms, but it's worth it!