Double Chocolate Brownies with Berries. 

For quite a while now I've wanted to make some vegan brownies. Actually, I ought to clarify something there - what I really mean to say is that for quite a while I've wanted to eat some vegan brownies, which then brought about the need to cook them. Just thought I'd declare my true priorities first....

Now, obviously chocolate is good and essential to any brownie, but it's even better when you double the quantity, which is precisely what happened here. You're welcome.

Then, in what may seem like an attempt to add some fruit for 'health purposes', I added some blueberries and some raspberries. As you may or may not be aware, fruit, and indeed berries, are rather healthy with all those antioxidants and other things your body needs. Whilst the berries do certainly make this already relatively healthy brownie healthier, that was not the primary motivation for their addition to the chocolate creation. See, adding berries in takes the humble brownie and makes it truly amazing. Again, in case you are unawares, berries are freaking delicious and, when you add them to a brownie, make things oh so delicious and moist and flavoursome and wow that you cannot stop. I know because I did this, and I did not stop eating until all brownie was gone. Trust me, add the berries.

Chocolate. Doubled. Berries. Brownie.

And that my friends, is a short synopsis of why these brownies are great.

Ingredients;

80gm vegan butter (I used Nuttelex)
20gm almond butter (approx. 2 tbsp) 
1/2 cup raw sugar
2 cups flour (I used organic white flour)
3 heaped tbsp raw cacao powder
3 tsp baking soda
1 1/2 cups unsweetened plant milk (I used almond milk)
250gm dairy free chocolate chips
1 cup frozen raspberries
1 cup frozen blueberries


1. Preheat a fan forced oven to 180 degrees Celsius.
2. In a mixing bowl, beat the vegan butter, almond butter and sugar with an electric mixer until it is light and fluffy.
3. Add in the four, cacao, baking soda and plant milk and mix using an electric mixer unit everything is really well combined. If the mixture is a little too sticky/solid, add in a little extra plant milk. Add in the chocolate chips and two types of berries and gently fold them in using a spatula. 
4. Take a baking tin (I used a square tin, but any works) and line it with non-stick paper. Pour the brownie mixture into the tin and spread evenly. 
5. Bake for approx. 35-40 minutes. When cooked, a skewer inserted into the middle should come out clean and the brownie should be relatively firm to the touch. 
6. Allow to cool and then remove from the tin.
7. When serving, melt some dairy free chocolate to drizzle over the top along with some extra berries. Store in the fridge in an airtight container! 

Lime, Mint, Matcha, Kiwi and Coconut Popsicles.

Like every good culinary creation, these popsicles have a story. And, because it's a public holiday and I am bored, I shall share it with you all. You're welcome.

One day I was feeling a little bored, so as always in such a predicament, I found myself in the kitchen. I kind of secretly love being bored and in the kitchen because that's usually the time that my favourite recipes come to be - when I'm playing around with flavours and there's no time pressure (I would mega fail on any kind of cooking show for this reason!). Relaxed creating and cooking is definitely more my style.

But the story of these popsicles begins a few months back from that afternoon of boredom. See, one day I received a delightful email by a lovely little company based in Melbourne called - wait for it - Matcha Company, asking if I would like to try their product. It was super exciting for me because it was actually the first product that any company had sent me to try. Coincidently, or you could call it fate, I had only three days before that lovely email came through, been looking online to buy some matcha. It's one of those things that seems to majorly trend on social media and amongst the foodies and I have never even heard of it, let alone tried it. What is it you ask? Well.....me too. So, what a perfect chance for me to try some I thought!! So, the matcha made it's way via Australia Post to my kitchen. But that's where this story hit a little snag, because now that I had the matcha I quite frankly had no idea what to do next with it!

Fast forward a few months and there I was, very bored, in the kitchen, wanting ice-cream. This is a very, very frequent occurrence, because I flipping love ice-cream, so it was not entirely out of the norm for me to be there thinking about frozen snacks. Foolishly I had only just been to the supermarket that very morning and I had, most regretfully at that point in time, forgotten to buy any (dairy free) ice-cream for myself. So, as any good foodie in this situation would do, I decided to make some myself! Rarely for me, I did not feel like chocolate ice-cream, which is what these popsicles owe their existence to. Basically what eventuated that afternoon was some random blending of random things I hoped would taste good together, and here we are, a few months later with me having consumed far too many of these to count because, not meaning to toot my own horn, these taste downright delicious. They're definitely a favourite in my kitchen, and, delightfully, put that matcha to perfect use!! Double win!!!

*N.B. I AM SO SORRY THAT THIS RECIPE IS SO LATE IN COMING! I GENUINELY THOUGHT THAT I HAD UPLOADED IT BUT I EVIDENTLY BECAME DISTRACTED EATING POPSICLES THE AFTERNOON I WAS SUPPOSED TO TYPE IT UP AND BASICALLY ALL I HAVE TO SAY IS WHOOPS (and that the popsicles are legit that good that they possibly induce amnesia).

Ingredients;

1 400mL can coconut cream
2 tbsp matcha powder (available through Matcha Company or in most health food shops)
Zest and juice of 2 limes
1 large handful fresh mint
4 tbsp pure maple syrup
1 kiwi fruit

Toppings
Approx. 4 tbsp coyo (recipe here)
1 80gm block dairy free dark chocolate (I used Loving Earth)
Handful crushed pistachio nuts

1. Remove the leaves from the mint and place in a blender. Peel the kiwi fruit, roughly chop and also add to the blender. First remove the zest from the limes, then juice (far easier doing the zesting first - trust me!) and also add that to the blender, along with the matcha powder, coconut cream and maple syrup. Blend on high speed for a few minutes - you want this to be really well combined with no large chunks of mint leaves, the smoother the better!
2. Take some popsicle moulds* and carefully pour the mixture into the moulds. Place in the freezer for a few hours until fully set.
3. When set, remove the popsicles from the moulds. Some hot water on the outside of the mould helps to make this easier, otherwise brute force it is!
4. Melt the chocolate in a small bowl and then, take a small container and place the coyo in there. Dip each popsicle into the coyo to coat the top half (or third). Lay the dipped popsicles out on some non-stick paper and then drizzle (generously) with the melted chocolate. Sprinkle with some pistachio nuts and then return to the freezer to set. Store in an airtight container in the freezer if they even last more than 30 minutes (unlikely...).

How To Travel with a Particular Dietary Requirement or Preference.

This is literally my favourite sight in the world - looking out the plane window over the clouds and the undiscovered places below. I'm definitely a window seat girl to the core.

I have two addictions in life that become quite strikingly obvious within the first five minutes or so after you meet me; food and travel. But, sometimes those two loves don't exactly cooperate nicely given that I have a dietary preference for vegan food. Whilst I will go to fairly great lengths to only eat vegan friendly food, for some people, eating a certain way can mean life and death - such as for a coeliac. I'm fairly blessed to have travelled quite a lot in recent years, from Europe, to Asia, back to Europe and closer to home in the Pacific, so I kind of like to consider myself a bit of a pro when it comes to finding places to cater to niche food requirements and preferences. For many, this is the nightmare of travel, but it need not be that way because finding food you can and will eat isn't as hard as you might think! Here's a few tips and tricks that I've learnt along the way;

1. Ask your Friends who've Travelled There Before/Friends who have the same Dietary Requirement/Preference as you.
Without fail the easiest way to travel with a dietary requirement or preference is to ask for advice from others in the same position as you who might have been to the city/country you are heading before. See, usually your gluten intolerant friends who've been to Paris themselves will have battled the food scene there and they'll know exactly where you ought to head to get your gluten free fix. The benefit in friends advice is that they've obviously been there beforehand, so if it was god-awful then they're the unfortunate souls who had to eat the food, and they'll likely tell you it is or isn't worth the trip!

The spread at Sadhana Kitchen in Newtown, Sydney. I had a friend who had been here before and she insisted that I absolutely MUST go. That raw vegan lasagne was the actual next level. I'm still dreaming about it and its been 5 months....

2. Ask Google.
In the place of having no friends who might've been to the place you're heading (hello trip to Riga earlier this year...), ask everybody's best friend, Google. As the famous proverb goes, Google knows everything, including where the good vegan restaurants are and whether gluten free is a thing that exists in Thailand. The downside to Google? Well, it won't always tell you if the restaurant is good or bad as a friend might, so sometimes its a bit of a gamble, but half the fun in travelling is the stories of failure you can share later on!!! Happy Cow is my go-to website for all things vegan and veto - 11/10 would recommend! You simply search the city/town you're in and voila - there's a lovely little list with all the places you could go!

Cheers to Google for enlightening me to the fact that in Krakow one can get vegan ice-cream and sorbet. LIFE IS GOOD.

3. Check Instagram, particularly Hashtags.
A lot of people aren't aware that Instagram is actually kind of like a food encyclopaedia to basically everywhere and anywhere on the planet if you know how to navigate your way through the various insignificant hashtags to the ones that matter when travelling. In actual fact, I think I've probably found more places to eat through Instagram than friends, books and Google combined! See here's how it works. Say you're going to travel to Greece and you'll be in Athens and you're a vegan. What you want to do is jump on Instagram, chuck a sneaky follow to me over at @young_rebecca and then jump on the search page and type in #veganathens and see what comes up. Sometimes you'll be inundated with home chefs who coincidently call Athens home, but frequently you'll also find pictures people have posted from restaurants around the city, and, if they're really helpful, they'll have also tagged/checked in at the restaurant itself, so all you have to do is click on the location tag and voila! You have yourself a vegan or a vegan friendly restaurant. Oh the power of social media!!! Also keep in mind that if you have found somewhere vegan or vegan friendly and you post a picture of the meal there, also tag the location and #vegan__ <-- city you're in so that other people can use this trick too! Helpful hashtags include; #vegan(name of city), #glutenfree(name of city), #(name of city)vegan, etc.

4. Ask the Locals!
No body knows a place like someone that lives there. So, the best people to ask for food suggestions, especially if they're a little less common, are going to be the locals. Determining who is a local and who is not is probably the hardest part to this, but you'll never know unless you do ask. Speaking the language is also potentially a barrier here but when you have nothing to lose you may as well be polite and ask if they speak the same language as you and if the answer is yes then proceed with asking where the best vegetarian food in town can be found!!!

I'm that strange person that asks the hotel receptionist if they can recommend their favourite supermarket juice to me. Weird? Yes. Good juice? YES. Would recommend 'Giraffe' juices for anyone ever in Lithuania. 11/10.

5. ASK.
In addition to asking the locals, also just ask anyone and everyone, even if they're also carrying about a massive digital camera and guide book with a large neon flashing sign saying 'tourist' on their head just like you - who knows, maybe they share your funny dietary quirks too. I recently travelled for over a month across north-eastern and central Europe completely alone. Yep, just me, myself and I for company. And, if there is one thing that I learnt in the whole experience it was that you just need to ask! I've always had a fear of asking strangers things, which is becomingly increasingly enhanced the more and more we rely upon the Internet, but when I found myself completely alone with no one to give me judge-y side eye (a fear of mine), I suddenly found myself asking people everywhere for things and some of the best experiences, restaurants, day trips, transport options and more were shared this way! The worst that someone can do is either say 'I can't help you', not understand you in whatever language you ask and give you a kinda funny look (but hey, you never have to see them again) or say no. No one grows a second head to eat you, no one yelled at me (in my experiences) and 9.8 times out of 10, people gave me advice and answers that were actually helpful! So, if you are after a gluten free restaurant, politely ask a passerby if they know where you might find one, and if they don't know, then ask the next passerby, or your hotel receptionist, or a tourist information desk, etc.!

So I really wanted this falafel wrap this one time in Helsinki but I wasn't sure if it was vegan and it was all very stressful and then I was just like 'Stuff it! I'll ask!' So I did ask, and as all good happy endings go, it was vegan, so I ate 8 in the space of 2 days.

6. Google Translate your Particular Needs/Preference BEFORE YOU LEAVE THE WIFI.
This one day not too long ago, I found myself in Northern Thailand, and, you guessed it, I was hungry and eagerly attempting to hunt down a restaurant that could make me something vegan. But, I do not speak Thai, and the small town I happened to find myself was not overly Westernised, meaning that English was rarely understood and spoken. In Thai, (as far as I am aware) the word 'vegan' roughly translates to sound something along the lines of 'Mangswirati' - i.e. NOTHING AT ALL LIKE THE ENGLISH WORD. With the gift of hindsight I can tell you this, but at the time I had no idea at all, so I actually ended up eating some plain rice and stir-fried veggies, which was fine, although I very much believe that had I been able to accurately express what I wanted, I could've had many more options. So, the moral of the story here is that Google Translate is your friend, and if you are travelling to a country where you do not speak the language, always translate your dietary requirements/allergies/preferences and save them as a note in your phone beforehand so they are easily accessible when you're out and about without wifi!


7. Hit up the Local Farmers Markets and Supermarkets.
I LOVE FARMERS MARKETS. I feel this is part of the reason I am so in love with Europe because they always just seem to pop up all over the place and it's honestly one of the best things ever! Farmers markets usually stock a whole heap of fresh, easily identifiable, and, most importantly, CHEAP, produce meaning that if you are intolerant of something, because the markets haven't yet crafted something into a dish with about 50 different ingredients, you can be certain that the raspberries do indeed only contain raspberry whereas the meal in the restaurant could be hiding things. One of my top tips for all travellers, not just those with food fetishes, is the classic picnic - first stop always being the famers market. I mean, look me in the eye and tell me with full conviction that there is something better than fresh berries grown in the countryside, a crusty loaf of fresh sourdough and some other bits and pieces under a shady tree in the summer. You cannot. No body can. Because there is nothing better. And, if you're doubting me then you evidently have not been to the farmers market in summer, in which case I refer you to this little paragraph!

Fresh German raspberries at the market in Bamberg? YES PLEASE.

Being the curious mind that I am with the never-ending desire to see more and go to more places, these points will no doubt be added to in the future, although I do think they make an excellent starting point!! Travel freely fellow wanderlusting souls!!! Not all who wander are lost.

Pear and Avocado and Candied Walnut Salad.

It may surprise you to hear that I am not a fan of salad. This is obviously kinda contradictory to my site given everything I share here, and indeed everything that I eat, is meat free, dairy free, and vegan, which lead most people to think that the only possible food that could be all those things, and therefore on this site, is salad. I hate to break it to you all, but that is WRONG. In actual fact, I'm known to be quite anti-salad, with the exception being for tasty salads only. No boring lettuce allowed.

This salad was a creation initially conceived for my family Christmas lunch in 2015. We were having a big gathering and everyone was tasked with bringing a plate to share, and I was put on salad duty. Whilst initially less-than-impressed with that, turns out it was good fortune because it is from that obligation as salad-lady that this delicious creation was born, complete with candied walnuts (yum), avocado (YUM) and a wickedly good hummus/avocado dressing (YUMMMMMMM).

Ingredients;

(makes 1 large salad)

Several large handfuls mixed salad greens (approx.)
2 handfuls rocket (arugula)
1 red onion, finely sliced
1 whole avocado, finely sliced
Handful fresh coriander
4 shallots, thinly sliced (spring onions)
1 pear, finely sliced (I use a julienne slicer, but thin strips with a sharp knife also works)
1 cup walnuts
3 tbsp pure maple syrup
1 tbsp coconut oil

The Dressing
3 tbsp hummus
1/2 avocado
2 tsp sesame seed oil
1 lemon, juiced
Small handful fresh spinach

1. Preheat a fan-forced oven to 150 degrees.
2. In a small bowl, mix the walnuts, coconut oil and the maple syrup. Then, take a lined baking tray and spread evenly over the tray. Place in the oven for approx. 10 minutes, or until slightly crunchy.
3. While the walnuts are cooking, take a large bowl and combine the mixed lettuce, rocket, onion, coriander, shallots and pear. Then, add in half the sliced avocado and use your (clean) hands to mix everything together.
4. In a blender, combine the Dressing ingredients (hummus, avocado, lemon juice, sesame seed oil and spinach). Blend on high speed for a minute or two until well combined and beautifully green.
5. To serve, mix the candied walnuts through the salad. Plate up the salad and served garnished generously with the hummus/avocado dressing, some extra avocado (no such thing as too much avo) and if you're feeling particularly fancy, some micro herbs!