Archive

Catering!

AsterFliers

Friends had a housewarming. And we catered. I only had time to snap some quick iphone pictures of the sweet stuff, but it looked good! Also, it does give me a chance to review some cookbooks.

Housewarming

The brownies are from Vegan Chocolate. I used to make the Deluxe Cocoa Brownies from Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar, with extra chocolate chips, but then I tried the Very Fudgy Chocolate Chip Brownies from Fran Costigan’s Vegan Chocolate. They are wonderful, especially if you top them with caramelized walnuts or hazelnuts. It’s a question of wanting a cake-mix-box-type brownie, or something that is mostly melted chocolate with added sugar. Right now I am very into the latter, it’s especially good when you eat it out of the oven, still hot and therefore pudding-consistency. One of the things I hope to master in the near future is tempering chocolate, so maybe we’ll see more of that.

The other cake is actually a different version of the Blueberry Bliss Cheesecake from Vegan Pie in the Sky. When I say different version I mean I kept the whole tofu-banana-base, but went a bit nuts with the berries. Also with the topping. And the leftover pomegranate was too beautiful not to put on top. The cheesecakes from Vegan Pie are perhaps my favorite ever, although there’s a raw strawberry cheesecake, one of the very first raw cakes I ever made, that has a special place in my heart as well. The Raspberry Lime Rickey Cheesecake is actually more my thing than the blueberry one, but the blueberry is easier to adapt to whatever fruit is in your garden or freezer.

To come to a conclusion on this topic: Vegan Chocolate is an excellent book and I’d recommend it to anyone who’d like to get into fancy desserts. Or who’d like to get someone else into bed. Just speaking for myself: chocolate is a very good place to start. Vegan food in general, but the partner who bakes me Bittersweet Chocolate and Lemon Tartlets is a partner I am keeping. Ok, that’s nonsense, the partner that’s respectful and right for me is the one I am keeping, but tartlets and chocolate ice cream to go with that would be very nice…

Pilgrimage…

AsterFliers

At the end of january, I went on a little pilgrimage. And only just rediscovered I had pictures. When we had art history in high school (it was my best subject, by miles), the thing that stuck with me was Modernism. I was also really into Post-Modernism, but the whole thing about Manifesto’s and trying to keep up with an ever-changing world that’s too different to capture in a traditional way, I get that. And Post-Modernism to me always felt like what happens when we give that up and just accept that we can never ever ever catch up anymore. Which is equally important, but I loved the ambition of having one outspoken vision and then striving to get there.

So I went to the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam to pay respect to the artist who got me interested in art history in the first place. I saw a quote from Malevich at the exhibition that really spoke to me.
“I have transformed myself in the zero of form and have fished myself out of the rubbish slough of academic art.” Kazimir Malevich, Suprematist Manifesto, 1915.

If you ever get the chance to see Malevich’s work in real life, you should. I was surprised to find that the paintings actually moved me, it was more a tribute to my love for his ideas that made me decide to visit the Stedelijk. And I thought that black square on white canvas would be great to see. It was. What I hadn’t expected was being moved by white cross on white canvas. Like, being moved to tears by it. And there was work by other Suprematists, and that was lovely.

There were a lot of people, probably pensioners, making lots of noise and standing for incredibly long times in front of pictures. It’s why I don’t always like going to museums, when there’s that many people on a Tuesday morning. And then there were the old white men talking self-importantly about art to groups of women of a similar or slightly younger age. This seemed to be a kind of deal where the women had to endure this now the men could no longer feel self-important because of their jobs. And also, the men claimed to understand the art and then proceeded to explain it to the women, and this was ridiculous and sexist. Because why were only the men being self-important, and how can you ever decide that art is something you can analyse and then it’s just true. Stop talking, and look at it!

Redecorating

AsterFliers

So I moved house over the summer. It was a busy time, first graduating and re-evaluating life and friendships and such. It took most of the time since september. To be honest, it feels like things are just now looking up. But what did happen was moving from the room I’ve slept in for the last 21 years, to a newer, much bigger one.

I don’t have the money to move out of my parents house. So right now I am like one of those science fiction nerds who live in their parents basements, although I am not 40, not overweight, and not sporting a beard with nachos. Somehow in my mind I turned into Comic Book Guy Jeffrey Albertson. No, seriously, this is a great room, with my own balcony, and I’ll keep you updated on how many tomatoes will grow there.

The glass table is an upside down Äpplarö Footstool, painted green. Added some wheels and the top of an old dining table that is so old no-one remembers where it came from. And you already knew about the lovely new chair. It’s all a combination of Ikea and things found around the house and in second hand shops. And a few way too expensive design things that I hope will last forever. Like the lamp you see reflected in the table. That is great!

Only thing is the cats. The cats are delightful, but one of them insists on waking me up in the early early morning by either licking my face or mewling in my ear. It’s Betty, the one in the picture. It is basically more her bed now than mine. Same goes for any coats I don’t hang up immediately. The other one comes screaming at 2 a.m. until I call her and she can run around the other one (or on my head) until they fall asleep. She’s no longer fat, but she is very insistent. At some point this has to stop, because 2 a.m. to 8 a.m. is not a lot of sleep.

Smoothie to tie you over…

AsterFliers

In the past weeks I did a lot, without realizing it. It started with knitting a scarf in an attempt to relax. I am planning to move on to sweaters when finances permit me. Anyway, then came the making of really nice vegan marshmallow fluff, going to Paradiso for a really wonderful evening about visual arts and music (check this guy and this magazine out, both are absolutely worth the read, especially the book Culture Club), and then I got to work on an unfinished thesis from last year. Then I built part of a shed and hung two different doors (and repaired another). There’s still stuff in need of hanging and painting and repair, but if I can hang a beam from a wall strong enough to hold our “adopted” extra family member, well, then I can fix anything non-electrical around the house. I also spent lots of time being sat on by cats (because they finally feel safe enough with the people they see regularly to be an absolute pain in the arse) and reading new cookbooks. Will probably share some of that too. But I don’t have any pictures to prove it all.

I will spare you my Eccleston-Tennant Rewatch, and give you the easiest smoothie recipe ever to tide you over until new-post time. Maybe we will drift from the theme and not do vegan food, but do art-related theory. It depends on what I’ll be doing with the coming weeks, it’s not altogether certain. I do know that there’s now 73 books in need of reading, and that is without the novels. Keep you posted!

The recipe is self-explanatory. I usually make it for 3 or 4 people, but it’s also doable for 2 (if I remember my non-single days correctly). I add half a tablespoon of chia, half a tablespoon of flaxseed per person. I also add half a tablespoon of almond butter per person. Basically: one glass of greens, one glass of bananas, two glasses of frozen berries, add the seeds and the butter, add some sweetener (stevia drops work for this, though not for much else), fill with water, blend on high in the vitamix so all the seeds are drinkable. This can be scaled down and up! And it’s really tasty. It’s not so much a recipe as a guideline with endless possibilities. I like the texture and it is a healthy breakfast, so now I blend for the entire family.

Remembering Summer!

AsterFliers

Some time back there were all these random picture I found on my computer? Well, this post was from way back last summer, but it still has to become properly cold over here. The rest of the world is tortured by polar blizzards, but I am typing this sitting next to a cat napping blissfully in the sun. If it were any warmer, I’d go out for ice cream.

Still, last summer we had courgette flowers, so we stuffed them. With the wonderful VegEZ recipe for herbed tofu cheese ricotta. And then we breaded them in this batter sans sesame seeds, fried them, and it was delicious. I had to share, otherwise I’d have eaten all of the flowers.

IMG_2491

I definitely recommend frying. I’ve also seen raw versions, and I’d definitely experiment with different fillings if you have a favorite vegan ricotta or some other creamy stuffing that holds its shape. But the crispy, fatty outer part, just go for it. I wouldn’t say so if I didn’t think it was worth the oil :). We don’t have a deep fat fryer, so it takes time, effort and actively ignoring health concerns to fry stuff, but this time it was very much worth it.

PS. We also had fresh fava-beans.

Party Planning!

AsterFliers

So, I just realized why I am a complete failure at blogging. I recently hosted a party that, I don’t know about the guests, but I loved it. It was a hit. First I forgot to take pictures, and then most of the best bits would take so long to explain that it would become boring at best, oversharingly-awkward at worst. Also, I rediscovered this music video from my childhood (this will make me sound terribly young as the clip isn’t thát old) that my dad also loves, because he remembers the people from the 80’s. How strange is that?

IMG_3424

I couldn’t be arsed to take pictures even though I spent 4 days in the kitchen, almost all the guests I wished for were there (my old maths teacher and his equally brilliant artist wife are the nicest people ever and there were also some people I hadn’t seen in ages and also some new friends) and cats sat on lots of people and then refused to move.

IMG_3436

Back on topic: I am a bad blogger and don’t really care, because being at the party is much better than being through a smartphone at the party. I like writing to you, my small and unknown audience of 12, but it is also important for me to get out and meet people. Otherwise all I’d do is read critical analyses of Doctor Who episodes mixed with art-history books. So I hope you’ll celebrate my failure as a blogger with me, and hey, my sister turned 21. That’s a big deal. How could I not fill 60 mushrooms, top 120 potato slices with mayonnaise, roll 55 spring rolls, bake 60 miniature lemon meringue pies, bake an amount of brownie I am still nauseated by, and then watch her choose a bag of chips instead of the above mentioned feast. A friend also baked 75 tiny breads, my mum made soup and 40 other tiny pies (this Tiny Treats ebook is simply amazing), my dad roasted nuts, it was amazing!

IMG_3439

Also, my present was really nice! Yeah, my birthday is the day after my sister’s, so I am not that big on the whole thing, it has always been first and foremost her birthday. To say I got a chair would be a lie, since my cats spend more time in it than I do, but it is a really lovely chair. It was comfy, relatively affordable, and some Dutch vintage or other if the sticker on the bottom isn’t a lie. It also has a colour really similar to a mix of tortoise-and-white-cat’s hairs. So you don’t really see the amount of cat stuck to it, and I do go over it with the tiny especially-designed-for-removal-of-animal-hair-hoover once a week. The wine was a present from the above mentioned artist-teacher-couple. It was homemade and delicious! Like sweet grand marnier with a sour kick. Lovely!

I will leave you with this other video. It is the best video I’ve seen in years, and I really love the album. It’s in a way less aesthetically pleasing than just looking at Pharell singing “Get Lucky”, or him interviewing Spock for that matter, but it is more how I’d do things. I will try and post more regularly, not just one overwhelming ramble a month.

Quicky Dinner: Noodle Bowl.

AsterFliers

There’s a few of my go-to recipes so simple that you can hardly call then recipes. I make them quite often, sometimes a few times in a row. They all take a maximum of 20 minutes? I think they do, I’ve never checked. And they’re not exactly measure and weigh recipes, more throw together and bake. But seeing how this is a big part of the cooking I do, I though’t I’d share. It’s practically impossible not to like the recipes, because if you don’t like them you can adapt them as much as you like without any chance of failure. They take only slightly longer than getting chips from the shop around the corner, but it makes up for those few minutes by being really tasty, not cooked in the presence of large slabs of animals corpse and way more healthy.

IMG_3455

For those of you thinking: “But Aster, where are the vegetables in this?”, I’d like to point out that herbs are really good for you and if you feel the need to add broccoli, go right ahead. Coarsely grated carrot is also really nice. Tofu, regrettably, didn’t add anything, and I say that as someone who feels even plain baked tofu with a bit of salt on top is delicious.

On with the recipe. It’s a variation on the endless miso-soup theme. Since I dislike almost all miso and miso soup, I left it out. If I were to have natto miso on hand, I’m pretty sure I’d add some. Natto miso is one of the tastiest things ever invented by man, as it has seaweed shreds! I would definitely always add the ginger and garlic, the soup becomes bland without it. Spring onions are really nice, but a small yellow onion is also quite nice. Pea and maize-vermicelli is the best, I got it at the Persian store around the corner. Brown rice vermicelli also works well, but is less chewy. Be sure to check your noodles for eggs.

IMG_3449

The recipe is ridiculously straightforward. Fry the onion with the garlic and some grated ginger (along with the optional carrot) in a tiny pan while you cook the vermicelli in another one. Use the water cooker if you’re really impatient (I am). Add some tamari, vegan wochestershire sauce and mirin and let it simmer. When the pasta is done, and I add that, along with half a bouillon cube. In the meantime I have grated the zest of a lemon and chopped some fresh herbs. Then I add some sriracha sauce, put it in a bowl and add the zest and herbs. Voila, almost instant pan-asian-fusion for one. I prefer mine spicy and very lemony, but you could try the opposite. I disliked it without ginger and without lemon zest, so I’m recommending you add those. Roasted sesame oil is good, but not a must.

Pictures of 2013…

AsterFliers

Cleaning up my photo-library turned up some pictures I never posted last year. All of them were iphone pictures, but a few were good enough to deserve a post. “Remembering Summer” or something. The rest of them are a bit of a jumble, but I’ll post them here anyway. They’re surprisingly lovely for something photographed on a phone! So what can we, after seeing these pictures conclude about 2013?

IMG_0169

First of all: summer pictures are always way better than winter ones. The lighting is just much better. So I am looking forward to spring and longer hours of sunlight. And compared to camera photo’s in winter, I actually prefer making phone-pictures in summer.

2013

And then there was the obsession with the fruit pies. There were a lot, but I only have pictures of the time we got a truckload of berries from the garden of friends and the time I made cheesecake for my mother’s birthday with all of the leftover berries from the freezer. They were all made from some (heavily adapted) recipes from Vegan Pie in the Sky. It taught me a lot about crusts and thickening huge amounts of fruit.

pie2

There were also quiches:

IMG_2708

Roasted French vegetables with home-made herbes de provence:

IMG_2637

Some purple cauliflower:

IMG_2566

And a whole new composter:

IMG_2532

There were also things you could either call stuffed courgette flowers or squash blossoms, depending on where you’re from. They’re called courgettebloemen over here, so I guess I’ll go with the first one. I’ll try to post about them fairly soon, with a recipe and nice pictures.

Oh, and I even forgot the cat pictures. There was a really good one of the face of evil, cutie pie :). I still miss her sometimes. And a rather regal one from the cat we call Fatty, back when a friend brought us a huge amount of potatoes.

2013a

Let me end with a recap of the year in sms, between my dad and me (in Dutch, sorry). It turned out we really agreed on the whole topic of “feel good” radio (which is a contradiction in terms, especially if they play Michael Jackson’s “Bad” or “Tragedy” by the Bee Gees). I love my dad!

tragedy

The Social Network?

AsterFliers

So it turns out this tiny social network (membership: 2, hi mum) is actually a much larger, albeit one-sided, network than I thought. Membership: 2, readership possibly more than 9. Which means I’ll have to make more of an effort, because, unlike my mother they won’t shout from downstairs what pictures they particularly enjoyed or which the thought looked thoroughly disgusting. Thank you for reading this, it’s fun to know that someone out there is of the same mind as me. Then again, with over 7 billion of us, how could there not be.

Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls 1

Today we’re making cinnamon rolls. Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls. Consider it a present. Not so much a gift from me; the original (which is an adaption of another original) is Deb Perelman‘s. You could consider it a welcome gift if you have so much pumpkin you long to eat something besides pumpkin soup but still need to dispose of roughly 10 kilos, or consider it a present you can give a friend for whatever holiday or birthday they might have coming up. Because our current situation is the first, and I gave it these to a friend, unbaked, as a thank you for baking an unholy amount of crackers for us one afternoon. It went down well. He said it made his house smell really good (as did the crackers with ours). Maybe I can get him to do a guest post.

Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls 2

This gift has the added benefit of making the receiver look a really accomplished baker, of basically being a sugary cake you can somewhat seriously have for breakfast, of being very easy to prepare by people with very very limited baking skills (you need an oven and perhaps some minimal amount of common sense) and it can be frozen, so you could even prepare them in the weekend. I would recommend overnight fridging to freezing for a week, but it can be done in the freezer and the taste won’t suffer that much. I am still looking for an environmentally (somewhat) friendly disposable baking form, so I don’t gift the trouble of returning the form along with the present. Let me know if you’ve seen those somewhere.

Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls 3

That’s it for the praise. On with the recipe! I followed it “exactly”, using margarine instead of butter, using sucanat instead of sugar (that almost always works when sugar of the brown variety is involved), adding 3 teaspoons of orgran no-egg to 3 tablespoons of water and using that as a large egg. I only used half the amount of sucanat (but the same amount of cinnamon and margarine) the recipe for the filling called for, and it was still incredibly sweet and sugary and crunchy. I sometimes drizzle with maple syrup, I find the icing way too much. I also usually triple the recipe, otherwise it doesn’t make even a tiny dent in the pumpkin-mountain.

It’s quite a straightforward recipe, but it helped that I learned a lot about baking and (enriched) yeasted doughs recently. I highly recommend watching the Great British Bake Off (Mary Berry has become a bit of a role model and it’s roughly 83 times better than the Dutch knock-off) and Paul Hollywood’s Breads. The first few times (pre-Berry/Hollywood) rolling cinnamon buns proved a bit of a mess. The last three (post-Berry) times went without any overspilling of the sugar. I used the Vegan YumYum technique for cutting, it gave the prettiest result. My pictures aren’t nearly as vibrant as Deb’s are, but mine do have a cat, so that’s a plus. It’s one of my favorite recipes in a long time.

Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls 4

Also, if anyone knows of a Kirk-accompanying counterparts to above-pictured socks, I’d be forever grateful. Then I could wear Spirk in daily life, how’s that for fan fiction come true…

Of politics and sprinkles.

AsterFliers

I think the last shred of Dutch civilization died this week, with an exasperated sigh. One of our politicians (albeit of the always-to-be-ignored nationalist variety) started by quoting from the Dutch version of the Daily Mail, only to end with a quote from “Geer and Goor”. One of those recently made very inappropriate race-related comments (because you can’t call those remarks jokes, although I suspect they were intended as such), and the other one I know very little about because I don’t think he has recently been involved in any kind of scandal and I don’t have a television. I do know he’s a disturbing shade of orange. So, what to do on the day you finally have to concede that your country no longer has any shred of credibility left? You discuss sprinkles. It feels more pertinent.

Sprinkles1

About a year ago we switched from agar-agar to something German called GellierFIX by the company BioVegan. It’s still just agar powder, but it comes in a carton cylinder and not in those tiny packets that you always need about two and a half of if you are trying to make coconut crème brûlée. I love GellierFIX, so I was pretty sure I’d also adore BioVegan sprinkles, chocolate harts and colored sugar. Even though the price is astronomical. It turns out I was partly right, because I like the sprinkles, but they’re not worth the money. I can make better colored sugar with some beet juice and sugar, and have never in my life felt the need for chocolate covered biscuit-harts, be they pink or brown. Also, the sugar was so hard and clumpy I would not call it decoration. But do go for all of their jelly-making stuff. That stuff is really good.

Sprinkles2

In the end I used the sprinkles in the martini-cupcake recipe from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World. I particularly liked the extra lemony frosting, and thought the cupcakes were fine but otherwise unremarkable. I didn’t have any tequila, so there was no booze in anything. You can judge for yourself if you’re willing to pay 2 euro’s for 35 grams for something that will eventually look like these pictures. I did like the idea of super-tiny cupcakes. They were one-bite. I also love brownie-bites, mini-tartelettes and huge tray-bakes cut to bite-sized squares. You can make 48 cupcakes from a recipe that makes 12 normal ones. Next time I might actually do them with a salt/sugar rim and a curl of lime zest in top. Or lemon. Just so they’re proper tequila-shooter- or martini-cupcakes.

‘Tis, finally, the season to be jolly!

AsterFliers
Ravioli

The past few weeks might have been a bit too hectic for my liking. But that’s all over know, and it’s time to chill out, calm down and work on everything that got pushed to “I’ll deal with that later”. The last few weeks were a blast, though. We found some new people who will join us in the Moon’s Organics kitchen in the new year, I read a few really good books, and we finished the year with kerstpakketten and a workshop. I don’t know if those are typically Dutch, because they’re like a Christmas bonus, but no money and lots of cheap wine and horrible meat- and/or cheese-products are usually involved. We just gave everyone a pasta maker and ravioli shapes, a lot of recipes and then we spent the evening discussing the past year. We got two bottles of wine and lots of chocolate as a gift for the new year, so that was really nice!

Date Voor 2

Also, I’ve decided to take a page from the book of Frasier for the upcoming vacation. Or, as he puts it: “Truth is, I’m a pretty terrific date. I know when to arrive, I know when to call it a night, and frankly, I always leave myself wanting more.” So am I: I never bring myself unethical chocolate with milk, I absolutely love watching the kind of movie that might make the wrong kind of straight man uncomfortable (I highly reccommend both Shelter and Worried About The Boy) and I never use too little nutritional yeast on my popcorn. So I am now on my second (lemonade-sized) glass of Pizzolato Vacanziere. I have always been one of those vegans who, in public, ignores wether or not wine is vegan, just as I tend to disregard the pig’s hairs in otherwise vegan bread, so as not to scare the omni’s (“Those vegans, they can’t eat ánything!”). But apparently the mountain did come to Mohammed, or the vegan wine to the atheist girl, because I’ve recently discovered a plethora of beer, wine and cider labeled vegan friendly (and one labeled “contains lactose”).

3

Also, I just found out James McAvoy sometimes has a terrible beard, is a Star Trek fan and owns a crappy motorbike. There’s also something about asparagus and pineapple. I think I’ve found my new David Duchovny. Enjoy the pictures of workshops, booze and ravioli. Also, we recently adopted 30 kilos of pumpkins, and then 10 more, so I veganized Deb Perelman‘s recipe for pumpkin cinnamon rolls. They do really well in the fridge, you can give them away as gifts, and I might have eaten half a pan in one sitting. They don’t use as much pumpkin as one would like when trying to use up 30 kilos, but it’s more then nothing. So next time: pumpkin rolls :).

More life & death.

AsterFliers

doortje1

It seems the only time I make time to write on this blog, is when family members die. A little less than a year after the passing of her brother, the face of evil herself was in too much pain to carry on. She was a brave and sometimes happy kitty that last year, even without her brother, and I’m so very glad that she has been around for almost my entire childhood. In the end I guess she was more “mine” and her brother more my sister’s kind of cat. So I miss her, but it’s fine. The other fluffy household companions are doing really well (she wrote, accidentally kicking the cat that had curled up in a very inconvenient spot under the desk). They’ve settled in nicely, but I indulge them too much, so now and again they climb on my head when I sleep. It’s actually rather sweet.

doortje2

Other things to report? Website redesign and new plans which I can only share with you the coming summer. None the less, I can take more time to blog here. Why? Because it’s my own private social network (current membership: 2) and I’d love to share some of the things I cook. And not only in the “shouting short sentences into the abyss that is twitter”-way, I’d like to shout much more eloquently and elaborately into the abyss that is the internet in general.

doortje3

And then, maybe, in the summer, once the things I am working on have taken shape, I’ll share with you articles about the morality of adding to an inexhaustive amount of art in this post-modern society of ours. Or about the theory of why people respond to some theatre and not other kinds. Because I’ve been thinking about those things for years. Really. In the middle of getting a grip on my raging hormones, trying to deal with intense awkwardness and failing to understand philosophy (seriously, is there anybody who can actually understand it all?), I also thought an awful lot about everything around me, and listened to Hilary Duff. I recently picked those old habits back up, because they go together quite well, and sometimes you just need to listen to the musical equivalent of bubble gum. So I’ll eventually share with you how that went. That’s it for now!

Back, finally!

AsterFliers

And happy to tell you that I am now a Bachelor of Theatre Design, though not a studier of Theatre Sciences, because the new Dutch system is getting to be about as fair as the American one. But no use complaining, instead I will just work and bake pies. There are never enough pies.

But before all of that, it’s my sad duty to inform you of the passing of one of our family members. The brother of the face of evil is no longer with us due to horrible cancer of death. It was sad, and it’s still very difficult for the face of evil. She’s less welcoming to the new cats than we are, but still, she’s a brave kitty. And then we traveled all the way to the other side of the country to collect Betty from the pound. Once there, this slightly fat tabbycat approached me, I thought it was Betty (she’s a tabbycat too), and she was the cutest cat ever, and I was soo happy we had already signed for her. But it turned out to be Ciska. Everyone wanted to take Betty home, 5 people that day, and Ciska had been there for half a year because nobody wanted a dumpy eye-infected tabbycat. But somehow none of that mattered and we took two cats home and I am happy to report that Ciska has lost some weight and most of her eye-puss and that she’s getting along swimmingly with Betty. They have this weird obsession with the bathtub, and they insist on sleeping in my bed, which I, as it unexpectedly turned out, don’t mind at all and actually find calming.

Enough about my cats. I will be working on theatre-related things, which you can all see on the portfolio and I’ll be baking. I have devised some recipes over the past year, but some of them will need to stay mine, because some secret pies should remain secret (if your sister’s income as a catering service depends on it). Maybe there’ll be more cookbook reviews, there’ll be home remodeling, movie reviews, you name it, I’ll do it. Actually, you can always email me with requests.

PS. If you were wondering, the worms are now in two containers. I just moved them to their bigger place. I am such a proud worm-mother. And very happy that Betty and Ciska are unaware of the existence of my babies, although Betty looked suspiciously interested when I fed the worms with her in the same room…

Byebye! (Maybe see you in a year?)

AsterFliers

I have decided to stop posting for a while. Although I love it, I find I don’t have the time to post, and then I feel guilty for not posting. The coming year I have an internship and will be graduating, as well as some other projects, so I’ll probably be even busier then in the past year. I am also planning on having a social life. So this is it. I will miss you, I will miss posting recipes, but I’ll say goodbye to you with some rather lovely pictures.

I wish I had something more eloquent to say. The only thing I can tell you is: bake your meringue as Mrs. Hubmle suggest (maybe a tad longer), go watch Star Trek Next Generation and have a wonderful end of the holidays. And my sister has a twitter now, so you should follow her. My pictures are better, but she actually posts!

Bobby!

AsterFliers

Remember how Bobby was dying? He was on his last legs. And giving him a little gut-supporting pyjama wasn’t enough. He just didn’t feel as nice, texture was lost. And stuffing sortoff leaked out through the legs. I was having serious anxiety issues about his leaving me. So after weighing all my options (getting over it, finding a professional to help with either his issues or my issues, learning how to knit) I decided to re-knit him entirely.

I then deconstructed and reconstituted him. It seemed a daunting task, but it turns out the difficulty of knitting round with 4 needles is overrated, as is knitting in general. He hasn’t felt this firm since I was 4. I do have to confess that counting the stitches was arduous, and that the first attempt at knitting his nose was different than expected. But in the end, it wasn’t that impossible. So now he and I will be together forever! Or in any case as long as I will live and am able to re-knit him when things get tough.

As you can see Bobby is reclining atop some very nicely coloured books, cookbooks: Clean Food and Clean Start. And not all that expensive, considering the photographs and invaluable information. They reminded me of Gezond en Lekker Eten, with some macrobiotic tendencies, but they’re certainly more modern (also some nutritional information has been updated in the last printing). It’s the food I grew up with, healthy and delicious, only vegan and with really nice pictures. The basic how-to-cook-a-pulse-and-why-is-this-vegetable-good-for-me information is all there. Better than Veganomicon by a mile, as far as I’m concerned, or at least more like how I normally cook or would like to cook when I cook something other then pasta with veggies and salad and tofu.

Back when it was summer…

AsterFliers

At the start of this lovely summer (ok, those 3 days that weren’t a rainy mess), we had tomatoes. And lots of them. Very ripe, almost too much so. So I added horribly-tasting soy cheese. And just as some sour soup recently proved: no product so foul that it can’t be made deceptively delicious by fresh herbs. And what better fresh herbs than those from your own garden?

The garden has gone really well recently, we now even have artichoke (turns out to be a one-year plant, damn it), lavender and olives. Although most of those won’t exactly thrive in Dutch conditions. But the tomatoes are doing fine for now, and so are the courgettes.

I can recommend making some sandwiches now harvest time is upon us. Before it’s too late and we’re stuck with roasted parsnips for 4 months. With the occasional bit of leek for diversion. As always, everything’s better with (vegan) Worcester sauce.

Vegan Ghent

AsterFliers

I went to Ghent. Ages ago. With the Paddington Raincoat, some different classmates and sensible walking shoes. It was wonderful. Because Ghent is vegan capital of Belgium, or so it seems. And getting there cost next to nothing. If I ever find myself there without nonsensical schoolassignements, I’ll definitely eat more, at different places.

There were very nice museums, it was truly a lovely lovely city and it’s well worth a visit. A few websites to help you with that: Vegan Backpacker. Happy Cow‘s always good, and I also found this Belgian restaurant guide, but there was much more than the ones mentioned there. I loved Bio Planet. Their tofu-salad was exquisite. We went to a school cafeteria, and even there vegan food was to be found. It’s never more than a stone’s throw away! Also, good beer was everywhere. I love Belgium!

Alaska

AsterFliers

I’m warning you: this post will be rather self-congratulatory. See, I baked an Alaska. The internet usually overhypes the difficulty of recipes, and probably any gimmicky cook with an ounce of self-respect can out-alaska-bake me in a second. However, their alaskans are not vegan. But mine is, and I’ll assure you it’ll work just as good. It’s not that hard, it just takes some patience and some kitchen gadgets.

It’s pretty damn straightforward. You just bake brownies from Vegan Cookies, then top with chocolate ice cream. That ice cream in itself was quite the victory: it’s probably the best chocolate ice cream I’ve ever eaten. In my life. Even beating a strange chocolate-amaretto flavor I once had in Rome, both vegan an non-vegan store bought and, dare I say, my dad’s home made chocolate ice cream by a mile. Did I mention it’s sugar-free, fiber-rich and full of almondy goodness? I probably shouldn’t have, but if you plan on being healthy, you could skip the alaska and go straight for the ice cream.
The same isn’t true for the rest of the alaska. Granted, there’s no egg or dairy, but it consist mostly of margarine, sugar, white flour and powdered sugar. Also potato starch.

But this is decadent-dessert-time, not health-food-obsession-time. This’d be the perfect recipe for a formal dinner, if you have the time to bake and serve for dessert. As always, I’d advise you to check out Ms. Humbles post first. It’s full of useful information, although the baking of our vegan meringue is slightly different from regular meringue in this case. You’ll need to bake it slightly longer, until the tops turn brown. The ice cream won’t melt if you make sure it’s cold to begin with.

The Recipe: Baked Alaska

Vegan Lemon Meringue Pie!

AsterFliers

Today, I’ll give you two versions of one recipe: the big traditional one and some smaller deconstructed pieces of heaven.

None of these pies would have been possible without Ms. Humble (or Orgran No-Egg). Ms. Humble’s picture of a pie wetting itself, along with her explanation of the internal struggle of the lemon-part of the pie inspires greatness. Read her entire post before you attempt this recipe. And Orgran No-Egg just kicks ass. I adapted/invented this recipe a week before Vegan Pie in the Sky came out and I was deeply worried they’d have me beaten to the punch. They didn’t. This is still the best Vegan Lemon Meringue Pie I know of.

This isn’t the easiest recipe you’ll ever master, so you might want to follow it somewhat carefully. However: once you have mastered it, vegans will worship the ground you walk on, just as those with egg- and gluten-intolerance (if you use GF-crust and certified GF ingredients). Of course I wholeheartedly encourage everyone to use their favorite recipe for the crust. I’ve taken a new shine to the shortbread tart-shell from Pie in the Sky. If you want it really fancy, blowtorch you meringue, or put it under the broiler for a minute or so. I have yet to meet an omnivore who notices it’s egg-less, but I’m not sure if this is what one expects from Lemon Meringue Pie. I’ve never had a fondness of meringues, but since it could be done, I felt it should be done.

A vegan Baked Alaska, also based on Ms. Humbles instructions, will follow shortly. It turns out it’s all so much easier to make than I could ever have imagined. Oh, and the “decontructed pies” were a solution because I had to feed people pie without plates or forks or napkins. So after making a big fancy one I just stacked a second batch onto biscuits and added miniature poofs of meringue.

One last word of warning: don’t slice the pie before it’s completely cooled. I did. The following mess came about. Once it did finally cool, it sliced beautifully, none of the pie wetting itself business, but by then it was dark, so no pictures. Which was the reason I started slicing way too early in the first place, the impending darkness (otherwise known as twilight, the natural phenomenon, not the pathetic hysterical cultural one). The crust stayed perfectly intact as well. The pie was gone that same evening. It’s that good. You’ll just have to trust me on the brilliance of the filling. Or rather, trust Ms. Humble on the brilliance of hers. She will not let you down. And neither will Orgran.

Vegan Lemon Meringue Pie

Birthday Party, or: Cake of DEATH!

AsterFliers

I planned on making three cakes. Then my dad made some ice cream. And so there were three kinds of soup, three kinds of bread, two types of spread and 5 desserts. And two kinds of juice. Let’s just say there’s still some leftover food, but our guests managed to eat quite a lot of it and we love them for it. Also, everybody checked out worm-city and it was glorious.

The most impressive cake of all has now been aptly named Cake of DEATH because it has to be kept away from the person with the nut allergies at all cost. Granted, the sugar free nut-mousses don’t pipe as easily and regular frosting, but it still looks rather good and no frosting in the world can beat hazelnut-cocoa-mousse. A little tip: I made the cake on thursday and then froze it. And while gluten free chocolate cake beats regular chocolate cake any day of the week, it won’t if you freeze it. It didn’t have the texture of brick exactly, but it wasn’t as fluffy as I like it. Taste-wise there were no complaints whatsoever. It was just a bit sad because it could’ve been better. So don’t freeze your gluten-free baked goods.

The party itself was awesome fun. I did not know I had such nice friends! They even brought presents (though I’d forbidden it), and all of them were wonderful. I really couldn’t pick a favorite. I usually discourage present-giving, because people give awful presents that one has to subtly get rid of, but this year ALL OF THEM were spot on. There is of course a special place in my heart for the yellow-submarine-tea-eggs, but good literature, movies, organics showercream, soap and cream that smells of lemon, and chocolate are never a bad thing. YAAAY!

Oh, what cakes did I make? Well, I made the Babycakes Covers the Classics German Chocolate cake with Cashew and Hazelnut topping and chocolate mustaches made with homemade ganache (no recipe, just rice milk and chocolate). Then there were Peter Berley‘s Coconut Creme brûlée puddings on which the broiler brûlée failed miserably. They were still lovely lovely puddings. And then there were the Strawberry field Hand Pies. With random homemade lemon glaze. They’re from Vegan Pie in the Sky. My sister ate 5. If that isn’t an endorsement I don’t know what is!

A Quick Rundown (or: Paddington Bear Does Berlin)

AsterFliers

Before christmas I was working my butt off, preventing me from being tired, skulking around and being a depressed little bunny. And after that I was just being a very sad bunny. That is not to say I didn’t cook. I baked the alaska, meringue’d the vegan lemon pie, sharlotka’d some apples, cashew-cheesed the mac, read 4 new cookbooks, went to Berlin, and just today I finally started designing some serious theatre things. I also did web-design whilst bunnying around, as evidenced by the changes in this website and the portfolio, the changes to moonsorganics.nl website.
For now you’ll have to do with a picture of Paddington Bear in a German elevator. The classmates with whom I traveled took to calling me Paddington Bear, even though he clearly wears blue in almost any picture. But they do have a point.

If you ever find yourself in Berlin, just use the Berlin Vegan website or app. It makes finding good food breeze a instead of a small military heist. Places I visited and can wholeheartedly recommend: Factory Girl,Rootz, Sorted Clothing, Cafe Morgenrot, Cupcake, Yoyo Foodworld‘s one for the pizza and NOT the fake animal-stuffs, Veganz supermarket with the best cosmetics and chocolates and booja-booja ice-cream and catering and next-door vegetarian shoes. I should also mention that Berlin people are extremely friendly and courteous (one even bothered to compliment me on my thoroughly rubbish German), speak perfect English 98% of the time, don’t look at you strangely if your look is non-mainstream but look at you with eyes of burning hate when you wear (real-looking) fur and vegan/organic is everywhere and usual in a understatedly cool way. I bloody love them! Friedrichshain is a great vegan neighborhood.

Oyster Mushrooms Do It Again!

AsterFliers

Oyster mushrooms can do anything. They are heavenly delicious in a ragout and, well, in anything. And they cost about their weight in gold, which is expensive for something you’re gonna eat. Well, they’re worth it, just like almost any good but somewhat expensive food-item. But I did add some button-mushrooms for variety, which turned out great. I just halved or quartered them, and I can definitely recommend it, even when they don’t look as cool. It’s the only thing I’ve tried from the books so far, but I’m definitely ready for more. The dessert section is astounding.

The books are spec-ta-cu-lar. Also with regards to health and low-fat, but mostly with regards to taste. Waaaahhh, the taste. It is so fucking amazing. Millennium has 2 books. I wasn’t really impressed when we first received The Artful Vegan. I didn’t get around to reading it, some of the recipes didn’t immediately speak to me, they seemed somewhat farfetched. And then I saw a picture of the kalamari. And had to make them. I did away with the stir fry, and we had it with some rice and the mayonnaise. And that’s the brilliance of the millennium cookbook (besides the healthfulness). Almost all the recipes have some component that is outrageously good, and the introduction actively encourages experimentation. For those people looking for something more than a generic recipe to sheepishly follow: get those books, NOW.

Photographing mushrooms pretending to be dead squid is quite the challenge. Photographing that attractively I mean. They don’t really do colour, or variety. Just texture. And taste, but I can’t capture taste on picture. Go with the Revisited Cashew Mayo, maybe substitute all the vinegar for lemon juice and add zest, and definitely add capers, the mushrooms go wonderfully with capers. But in all fairness, assuming these oysters have anything in common with squid is blasphemy. They do have a chewiness and a deep deep lovely fried taste of succulence, but the squid can’t hold a candle to the oyster mushroom. Just remember that. And let the squid swim, swim freely!

Toby the Targ

AsterFliers

I have a confession to make. It is somehow related to Toby the Targ, B’Ellana Torres‘ stuffed targ. Now, I know Bobby isn’t a targ. But he is stuffed and if I were to go on an away mission for more than 3 days, I probably would take Bobby. I am not sure why I keep comparing Toby and Bobby, I think it’s because I can identify with a grown woman being attached to a plush toy.
Bobby and I have been through a lot together, and with the exception of my immediate family, more than anyone. He was with me when I was in the incubator and has been ever since. I hate traveling because that means he stays home (don’t want to lose him on the other side of the globe, now do I?).

I always thought Bobby would last until I’d started living together with somebody around the age of 30, which would mean him automatically losing his spot in the bed to Mr. Fliers (although I have since decided that mr. Fliers will just have to learn to live with Bobby). Or if there weren’t any candidates it’d just be me and Bobby forever, which was a serious upside to becoming Crazy Sheep Lady.
However, after 20 years of fateful friendship, his knit is coming apart. I’ve sort off fixed it with some regular sewing thread, but it could come apart any minute. To be honest: hugging him would be murder.The cotton is so old that it’s coming apart inside the thread, just breaking in places.

So as a last honor to Bobby: he disappeared for 3 horrible months when I thought he was lost forever, when I was 4, only to come out from under the wicker costume basket. When I was 7 he performed the lead in an all puppet cast of Hair (in English, he was wise for his age). That one night when I was 16, I felt so sad and lonely that people couldn’t comfort me but he could. Both moments of great joy or sadness never frightened him. And while I love my camera and computer and name them as well, attribute a personality to them etc., I’d gladly trade Oscar (who is worth, in fact, 6 months wage) for the rest of my life with Bobby. Bobby is irreplaceable.

Worm Diaries: Tiny Brown Dot-problem under control!

AsterFliers

YEAH! The bastards are (almost) gone. They’re spider mites or some such. They thrive in moist Wormcities. So I added some dry newspaper and cardboard, the condensation in the lid stopped and tiny brown dot populations effectively shrunk (though not completely abated). Now, I have a great deal of trouble with timing the whole feeding thing. The need food 2 to 3 times a week now, because the last time I gave them only one portion a week, they ate all the newspaper. The levels of compost have significantly risen, as well as the fluid in the sump. Remember the therefore intended brick? It now serves its purpose with regards to swimming worms. As always, here are the visuals. More and more people are pointing out that it is gross, worms and food together. But they’re all part of one very big ecosystem, so deal with it. Also, I find that they have a strange, slick, shimmery charm. When they do not disgust me to the core. Yucky tiny worms.

Testdriving the New Camera with Sheep

AsterFliers

We went to a Pizza Party, but even with the capitals, that doesn’t do it justice. Not that I didn’t have any good pizza, I did, I had one, it was vegan, it was toasty and roasted and salty and sour and tomato-y and there were mushrooms atop, but I preferred the sheep. I have found my calling as crazy sheep lady (and I am not posting the home-movie that proves it). Sheep are like dogs, but then as god intended. They might sniff your crotch and bump you over and wag their tails, and pant because they are genetically designed production units for whool, they are mostly just nice.

The big sheep who knocked me over just as I was taking her picture (thats why we only have her mouth on film) was by far the nicest, although I can’t say I disliked the others. They were just a bit more jumpy. In short: I spent the afternoon either running in designer pantyhose (15 fucking euro’s) without shoes in a field consisting of 60% sheep shit, or on the trampoline. It was like being 6, but better. Also, there were massages, and organic amaretto (I told you, better than when I was 6).

I brought my camera because it’s always nice to send people pictures if they manage to throw a party this awesome. Normally I hate taking pictures of events as they are happening. It’s so facebookesque, people photographing themselves pretending to have fun. But I have to say that the surroundings were so beautiful they just begged to be photographed. I didn’t get people, just farm animals and plants. So call me crazy sheep lady, I don’t mind.