Banana Bread

Usually I buy lots of the bananas in the hope that some will have time to get good and over-ripe before they get eaten.  The riper (ie blacker) the better.  But bananas have been quite expensive in Perth this year due to the tornado and floods in Queensland, so I have not been buying as many.

Fortunately I still had a few over-ripe bananas in the back of my freezer from last year.  So when the banana bread cravings set in I had a handy stash.

For my first attempt at vegan banana bread I decided on the The Post Punk Kitchen's recipe - and I was not disappointed.    The Post Punk Kitchen - Banana Bread

Surprisingly there is no photo on the website so perhaps Isa could use mine ;)

The banana bread is delightfully moist, with a wonderful texture and a sweet, spicey taste.  It is a little bit too sweet even for my sweet tooth, so next time I will reduce the sugar a bit.

The only changes I made:
- I used regular soy milk instead of the vanilla soy milk in the recipe
- I added 1/3 cup of sultanas and 1/2 cup of walnut pieces.  (My husband loves sultanas and walnuts in banana bread.)
I know that the sultanas would have contributed to the sweetness, but even without the sultanas I would prefer to scale back the white sugar a little.

I have a question:  What effect does the apple cider vinegar have?
I looked at quite a few vegan banana bread recipes before deciding on this one and found that a lot used apple cider vinegar.  Is it something to do with replacing the eggs?

Whatever the role of the cider vinegar - the recipe works!  And I will definitely be making it again.

Easier than it looks!

Thanks MaliceInWickedland for the photo.

Progress report on my vegan apprenticeship:

✓ Taste buds adjusted to soy milk in tea.

✓ Taste buds adjusted to soy milk on cereal.

✓ Trying new vegan recipes and loving the results.

✓ Finding alternatives to replace old non-vegan grocery items.

✓ Discovering that Oreos are vegan :)

So far my vegan apprenticeship is proving much easier 

than I thought it would.

I used to think that it would be very hard to be vegan.  I thought that a vegan diet would be boring and difficult to maintain.  But I am happy to report that I was wrong!  I also thought that vegans would be skinny - how could they possibly be fat?  Seems I was wrong about that too - there are plenty of options for vegan pig outs.

So what is the next step for this for this vegan apprentice?  I am still sticking to my strict vegan day once a week on Mondays.  And I am also finding that I am naturally making vegan choices on other days too.

Should I just focus on stretching to 2 then 3 strict vegan days etc?  I think the tricky thing is going to be sticking to the plan when not at home.  So many restaurants/cafes etc have a good range of vegetarian choices, but vegan - not so much.  And I can't really expect all my friends and family to keep soy milk on hand just in case I pop in for a cuppa.

Perhaps it will be easier to focus on making all my meals at home vegan first.  That should not be too hard.  I can manage without eggs in meals and baking at home.  But there are plenty of useable items in my fridge and pantry that "contain milk products".  Wasting them would not be environmentally friendly!  So I will use up what is already in the fridge and pantry, but have started reading all the labels carefully when I am shopping.  Reading labels is a pretty scary enterprise.  I had not realized how many basic foods have "flavors" and "colorings" added.  Hmmmm!  So I am trying to avoid artificial nasties like that too.   Admittedly Oreos have the ubiquitous "flavor" added.  But I have to have some vices.

So here goes:  My next goal is to be totally vegan at home.   I am aiming to tick this box by the end of June.

Dinner tonight - barley, split pea and vegetable soup, with a good splash of Chardonnay.  Smells delicious!  Just perfect for a cold, rainy day.

Best Burgers - Seriously!

Everyone loves burgers right?  I sure do.  And these burgers really are the best.  And by best I mean delicious, nutritious, satisfying, versatile and very easy to make.   I think that even die-hard meat eaters will love these, especially if you don't mention they contain soya beans and chick peas!  They really are tasty and the texture is just perfect.

I have the wonderful Dame Alison Holst and son to thank again for this one!  I have made just a few changes to the original recipe found in "Meals Without Meat".  Unfortunately this fantastic cook book is currently out of print.  I got my copy in a dusty second hand book shop in Christchurch a few years ago and have baked many delicious dinners from it.

Vegan Best Bean Burgers

Makes 8-12 depending on the size.

Ingredients:

½ cup (80gm) chick peas

½ cup (75gm) soybeans

½ cup (60gm)sunflower kernels
½ cup (35gm)rolled oats

¼ cup toasted sesame seeds

¼ flour

1 tablespoon dried parsley

1 teaspoon marjoram

1 teaspoon salt

About 1 cup water

1½ tablespoons sweet/dark soya sauce (30ml)

2 cloves crushed garlic

Optional - ½ onion very finely chopped

Oil to cooking them in

Method

1. Use a food processor, or blender, or coffee grinder to grind the first 4 ingredients to the consistency of dry bread crumbs.  Depending on the machine you use, it will probably be best to do a little at a time.  I found that my blender worked best, especially on the "ice" setting.  The chickpeas and soyabeans do take a bit of grinding (and therefore noise making).  Process the oats just a little - not too fine (or you could just use quick oats instead). 

2. Mix together all the dry ingredients.  It comes to about 3 cups of dry ingredients.

3. Add most of the water, soya sauce, garlic and onion if you are using it.   If the mixture doesn't come together easily then add a little more water.

4. Allow to stand for at least 15 minutes.

5. Shape into burgers.

6. Generously coat a fry pan in oil and bring to medium heat.

7. Cook the burgers for 5+ minutes on each side.  It is best to cover the pan with a lid as the steam will ensure that the burgers cook through properly without burning the bottom.

8. Enjoy!

You can prepare these burgers up to step 2 and then store the dry ingredients in an airtight container until required.  So next time I am going to grind up multiple batches worth while I have the blender out so that I can have the burger mix ready to go for quick and easy dinners.

Also, I only cooked 4 burgers the first night and then cooked the rest fresh the next night.  The mixture held together even better when it had soaked over night.  We had the burgers with jacket potatoes and other veggies the first night.  And then we had them as "burgers" in buns with lots of salad.  The bean burgers worked really well for both these meals.

If you use onion it really does have to be chopped finely.  The onion is weakest link in the binding of these burgers.  So leave the onion out if you will find it distressing to have a little piece crumble off.  I think I would leave the onion out if I was taking these burgers to a BBQ so I wouldn't have to worry about a heavy handed burger flipper possibly damaging my creations.

The original recipe calls for pea flour.  Pea flour!!  Certainly not at my local supermarket.  But a sweet lady at my local organic store kindly ground up some split peas to flour consistency.  I think the pea flour does add to the flavour but don't worry if you can't get it - the burgers will still be wonderful with regular flour.

Ginger Kisses

I fell in love with ginger kisses while living in New Zealand.  But then one fateful day I bothered to read the ingredients and was disappointed to see they contained "animal fat".  This imprecise description could mean that the fat came from just about any animal.  And it almost certainly indicates inhumane and disgusting slaughter house practices.  Yuck!!!!  So I have been meaning to try making my own for years.  

Warning!!  This recipe is:
- unhealthy

- addictive

My next sweet vegan recipe will be far healthier.  Promise.  I am thinking maybe a protein pumped version of Anzacs with some nuts and seeds.

I spent a lot of time over a couple of days reading about ginger kisses on line.  (Embarrassing really!)  So I garnered clues from lots of sites.  The recipe that I followed mostly is here.  And for help with veganifying it (ie replacing the eggs) I decided on a suggestion on the PETA website.

Vegan Ginger Kisses:

Makes about 24 complete kisses.

Ingredients 

185gm non-dairy margarine (⅜ of tub)
⅔ cup brown sugar
¼ cup golden syrup
3 tablespoons* (60ml) of water
2 tablespoons (40ml) oil - I used canola
¼ teaspoon salt

2 cups plain flour
1 tablespoon ground ginger
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Method
1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius.
2. Beat the margarine until soft.  Add the next 5 ingredients and beat on high speed until fluffy.
3. Sift together the 4 dry ingredients.
4. The gradually add the dry ingredients to the marg mix and beat on low speed.  I sifted the dry ingredients again as I added them.
5. Shape into half walnut sized balls.  If you want to roll them into balls you might need to refrigerate the dough for ~20 minutes.  And if you want to press down with a fork you may need to dip the fork in flour to stop it from sticking.
6. Bake for ~ 8 minutes.  Do not over cook. 
7. When cool sandwich together with mock vanilla cream filling.
8. Refrigerate for a couple of hours before serving. 

I often don't bother to sift ingredients, which for some recipes is ok.  But sometimes sifting will make a big difference.  I think that the double sifting probably adds to the lightness of these cookies.  So I suggest you take the time to sift in this case.

Vanilla Cream Filling 

Ingredients:
65gm margarine (⅛ of a tub)
1½  cups icing sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla essence
1 tablespoon soy milk

Method:

1. Beat the butter on high speed until soft.

2. Add the soy milk and vanilla essense and beat until fluffy.

3. Add the icing sugar and whip the hell out of it.

I tried a few different ways of shaping my cookies, including piping them.  But the pipped ones were fussy, messy and frankly looked a bit too much like doggy do-do.

Blobs - shaped using two spoons and then a little patting to smooth them a little. 

Rolled into balls, flattened and marked with a fork.  I liked these best.

The ginger kisses are still delicious before refrigerating.  I know this because I ate 2 at this stage - greedy, greedy!  But they were a little more like a melting moment (ginger moments?).  After a few hours in the fridge they acquire a softer, moister, more cakey texture which is more similar to the traditional kiwi ginger kisses.

 

*An Australian tablespoon is 20ml, as opposed to everywhere else in the world where a tablespoon is 15ml.  We like things big in Aus!   :)

The Big One - B12

Overall a vegan diet is very healthy and can lead to reduced risk of heart disease.   However a "lazy" vegan diet can lead to specific nutritional deficiencies.  By far the biggest nutritional issue for vegans is B12.  B12 is important!  Every cell in our bodies needs B12 and you cannot live without it. 

Our daily requirement for B12 is 2-3 micrograms.  That doesn't sound like a lot, right?  But the problem is that humans, and all other animals, cannot produce B12. 

So where does the B12 in animal products come from?  It is either produced by helpful bacteria in the animal's gut, or they get it from eating other animals.

Plants also cannot produce B12.  Plant food does not have any B12.  It is possible that you can get some B12 from eating unwashed vegetables due to the dirt and bacteria on the skins.  But an exclusively vegan diet does not contain enough, if any, naturally occurring B12.  So vegans need to either take a B12 supplement or eat foods that are B12 fortified (ie foods that have a B12 added).

Only certain bacteria, and some algae, are able to produce B12.  The B12 in supplements comes from bacterial fermentation.  It is not artificially synthesized.  It is vegetarian and vegan friendly.

Many foods are now B12 fortified:
- most soy milks and many other non-dairy milks
- many cereals
- marmite and some other yeast spreads (but not good old Aussie Vegemite!)
To see what percentage of your daily B12 you will get from a "serve" just check the label.

But what about mushrooms?  "Meat for Vegetarians" the add calls them. That may be stretching it slightly.  Mushrooms are not a plant and yes mushrooms do contain some B12.  However you would have to eat literally bucket loads every day to meet your B12 requirements.

FAQ about Mushrooms

A typical serve of mushrooms may contain as much as 5% of your daily requirements so you would have to eat 20 serves of mushrooms every day.  Now I like mushrooms but surely no one likes them that much!

For further discussion about possible (but definitely not proven) vegan sources of B12:

Vegan Health - B12 discussion

But beware, some foods that are said to contain B12, like spirulina, actually may contain a pseudo-B12 molecule that can lower your metabolically active B12.  This can potentially be dangerous for vegans.

The good news is that most people have a lot of B12 stored in their body and the liver is very good at recycling B12.  So if someone switches from a traditional western diet to a strict vegan diet they probably have a starting point of 3-5 years worth of B12 in their body.  Meaning that they won't have to stress to much about B12 for a while and can focus on other issues of adjusting to their new diet.  Also people who just reduce their animal product intake (rather than being strict about it) probably do not need to worry at all.

The Take Home Messages:

1. Vegans (and some vegetarians) need adequate B12 supplementation, either from a pill or from B12 fortified foods.
2. Mushrooms can provide you with a little B12 but not enough to live on
3. If you are a vegan or vegetarian I recommend that you see your GP every 2 years or so for a blood test to check your B12 level.  While you are at it I also recommend that you get your iron and Vit D level checked too.

If you want to read more about B12 check out Vegan Health - B12

I will have mine with Soy Milk thanks!

Hooray!  It is official.  I now like my tea better with Soy milk than with cows milk.

I have been drinking tea with soy milk when at home for the last 3 weeks as part of my vegan apprenticeship.  My taste buds protested for only a couple of days, then became apathetic, and now are enthusiastic converts!

But I have still been drinking my tea with regular milk while away from home.  Today I am at uni and ordered myself a cup of tea.  I didn't even think about stipulating what kind of milk I wanted.  Now here I am sipping tea with cows milk and not really enjoying it.

Just goes to show how adaptable we are.  For anyone else out there who has ever thought of making a change in their diet, I would say "Give it a Go".   You just might surprise yourself!  Whether it is to reduce salt, or sugar, or to go dairy free, I am convinced that you will not only adjust but come to love your new and healthier diet. 

In other news my one day per week of strict veganism is going really well.  I have changed my vegan day to Monday as it suits better with other things I am doing.  Yesterday was a breeze!  I even tried vegan chocolate and really liked it.

My next challenge:  adjusting to soy milk with cereal.  So far I love it with porridge but haven't quite come to love it with cereal.  But I am sure it won't take long!