Chocolate Soy Ice Cream

It was quite hot over the past week (possibly over 30 degrees Celsius just after 5pm last Tuesday), so it was decided this morning that we were going to make a batch of ice cream at work today (amongst everything else that we're doing, and it also doesn't take that long to prepare the ice cream to freeze).  The coffee machine that we have used is the Gaggia Gelatiera, which is available to purchase from here, and we have used Maison Routin 1883 chocolate syrup, Alpro Soya Original milk and Alpro Soya single cream to make the ice cream.  This batch turned out to feel a bit watery and was so solid after being left in the freezer until the next day that I needed a knife to remove it.  The ice cream is completely dairy-free and vegan-friendly.  I've included a comparison below of the nutritional content of both the soya milk and the semi-skimmed milk we normally use.  I think that the soya milk turned out to be healthier overall and also cuts out the cruelty to animals, and I hope to experiment with other plant-based, dairy-free milks (i.e. almond, hazelnut or coconut milk) and maybe even make the switch permanently in the future!


Alpro Original Soya milk (per 100ml)
Energy - 161kJ / 39kcal
Fat - 1.8g (of which 0.3g is saturated fat)
Carbohydrate - 2.5g (of which 2.5 is sugars)
Fibre - 0.5g
Protein - 3.0g
Salt - 0.06g
Vitamin D - 0.75µg
Riboflavin (B2) - 0.21mg
Vitamin B12 - 0.38µg
Calcium - 120mg

Morrisons British Semi Skimmed milk (per 100ml)
Energy - 206kJ / 49kcal
Fat - 1.7g (of which 1g is saturated fat)
Carbohydrates - 4.8g (of which 4.8g is sugars)
Fibre - 0g
Protein - 3.6g
Salt - 0.1g

Ingredients

300ml soy single cream
300ml soy/plant-based milk
100ml chocolate syrup

Instructions

1. Pre-freeze the ice cream machine according to manufacturer's instructions.
2. Pour the soy single cream and soy/other plant-based milk into a large jug.
3. Add chocolate syrup to the jug of milk and cream and mix well.
4. Pour the mixture into the ice cream machine, and freeze-churn for approximately 1.5 to 2 hours until the ice cream is cold, smooth and creamy before serving.

Vegan Sausages and Mash

Last Friday night, my dad and I were left to cook for ourselves (as opposed to me just cooking for myself), and we had 4 leftover Linda McCartney red onion and rosemary sausages from when I'd cooked myself a veggie hot dog the previous night.  Dad had suggested making mashed potatoes, so I looked up how to make vegan-friendly mashed potatoes, with a preference of a recipe that didn't involve using a milk alternative, and I found this recipe from the Minimalist Baker that is completely vegan and doesn't use a milk alternative.  These mashed potatoes were actually pretty tasty, and to preserve how they should look, I've taken pictures of the meal.  When put together, the sausages and mashed potato make a really easy vegan meal (apart from the fact that I really struggled with peeling the potatoes with a really rubbish peeler!

Ingredients (serves 4)

6 Linda McCartney Red Onion and Rosemary Sausages
6-8 potatoes
3 tablespoons vegan-friendly margarine, such as Pure or the new dairy-free Flora
a pinch of salt
1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
lettuce

Instructions

1. Cook the sausages according to packet instructions, adjusting the temperature and time of cooking in accordance with whether you are using an oven, a fan-assisted oven or a grill.
2. Peel the potatoes, and if they're large, cut them into halves.  Bring them to a light boil over a medium-high heat, add 1 teaspoon of salt, cover and cook for about 20-25 minutes, or until very tender.
3. Once tender, drain the potatoes of water and transfer the potatoes to a large mixing bowl.
4. Using a potato masher or a hand-mixer, mash the potatoes until fluffy.  Be careful not to overmix to the potatoes when using a hand-mixer.
5. Add the margarine, salt and pepper and mix into the mashed potatoes well.
6. Serve mashed potatoes with the sausages and lettuce.

Veggie Hot Dogs

In Rent (one of my favourite musicals), during the song La Vie Boheme, in which the characters have gathered in the Life Café for dinner following Maureen Johnson's protest and are mocking Benny's idea that "Bohemia is dead" and celebrating the bohemian lifestyle with mention of ideals, trends, icons, symbols of bohemianism.  Their dinner order is "5 miso soup, 4 seaweed salad, 3 soy burger dinner, 2 tofu dog platter and one pasta with meatless balls" (and wine and beer), so when I had to make dinner for one (myself) last night,  I decided to make veggie hot dogs (inspired by the 2 tofu dog platters)!

Ingredients (serves 3)

6 Linda McCartney Red Onion and Rosemary Sausages
3 bread buns or 6 bread finger rolls
lettuce
3 salad tomatoes, cut into slices
tomato ketchup

Instructions

1. Cook the sausages according to packet instructions, adjusting the temperature and time of cooking in accordance with whether you are using an oven, a fan-assisted oven or a grill.
2. Cut each bread bun or finger roll in half, and add slices of tomatoes and lettuce on the base half.
3. Once the sausages are cooked, divide them between the bread buns or finger rolls, using 2 sausages per bread bun or 1 sausage per finger rolls.  Squirt tomato ketchup along the sausages to serve!

Teddy Bear Sandwiches

Some really bad stuff has been happening this month, so for this post, I'm only going to talk about the positives and then move on to the recipe.

Last night, I finally received my official degree classification results, after having friends from other faculties receive their own from Wednesday onwards.  I've achieved a BSc Honours 2:1 in Web Design and Technology, which I feel is really good for me because there was a point in January/February where I knew I'd passed but hadn't done very well in one module but hadn't yet received the results in another module where I thought I'd done really badly, so I had been panicking about getting a 2:2, but then my hopes of a 2:1 were reignited again when I actually got a good result in the other module.  So I have a 2:1 now, and I will be graduating at 10am on Wednesday 13th July.  Sadly, most of my closest friends at uni (BUSOM friends) are in different faculties and will be therefore graduating in different ceremonies, but I'll still have a couple of media friends who might not be on my course, but who I've shared modules with.

Although I haven't recently been at Disney World or Disneyland (I visited the former last July), I am still pretty Disney-obsessed practically all the time.  This morning, I was reading a Winnie the Pooh book (an original A.A. Milne one with illustrations by E.H. Shepard) and I decided to look around my bedroom for some of my Winnie the Pooh merchandise:

• I have Winnie the Pooh pyjamas, T-shirts and jumpers in my wardrobe.
• I have a Winnie the Pooh rug on my floor that my mum and I made using a pattern when I was 9-12 years old.
• I have a Winnie the Pooh clock on my desk that currently doesn't work, but I might get new batteries for it soon.
• I have Piglet and Tigger pictures (from an amazing Winnie the Pooh stationery design studio CD, which was also used to make bookmarks and birthday party invitations when I was little) that I coloured in a while ago and stuck on my bedroom wall.
• A Winnie the Pooh album, including songs like The Wonderful Thing About Tiggers and Forever and Ever.
• A ceramic letter K figurine with Kanga and Roo flying a kite.
• Two keyrings.
• A necklace that my best friend gave me for my 18th birthday.
• A piglet mug which I drink water from almost every day.  It also has a matching Winnie the Pooh mug, and we also have plenty of other Winnie the Pooh mugs around the house.
• A Winnie the Pooh toy.
• More Winnie the Pooh bookmarks and notebooks.
• There's also even more Winnie the Pooh things around the house, including a candle!

On top of all this, there's even more Disney things in my house including lots of videos and DVDs, mugs, CDs, a Monopoly game, jewellery-making kits, pins from the parks, books, LOTS of other things.

You'll probably wonder why I'm discussing how much I love Disney?  Well, today's very simple recipe is for teddy bear-shaped honey sandwiches, inspired by Winnie the Pooh's favourite food.  Sadly, unless you want to use marmalade instead of honey, they're not vegan (but are vegetarian-friendly), but they could be a great idea for kids parties!

Ingredients (serves 8)

8 slices of bread, either white or wholegrain
honey or marmalade

Instructions

1. Toast your slices of bread using either a toaster or a grill.
2. Spread honey or marmalade on your slices of bread and put them together to form sandwiches.
3. Using a teddy bear-shaped cutter, cut shapes out of the sandwiches to serve!

Vegan Chocolate "Cup" Cake

There are probably many shop-bought chocolate cupcake mixes out there, where you can put a small amount of the mix into a coffee cup (rather than one of those big mugs), add a liquid to it, and microwave it for a minute or two to get a cupcake.  One of these mixes that I've had was from Foodness, where you spoon a couple of spoons full of the cupcake mix into a cup, add a bit of milk, cook it in the microwave, and then eat it.  Sure, you could use a plant-based milk such as almond, hazelnut, oat or soy milk as an alternative to dairy for making this, but this unfortunately still won't make the cupcake vegan as there is actually egg in the dry cake mix itself.

While I was trawling through the World of Wanderlust website (a travel website founded by Brooke Saward), I came across the recipes section of the site, which included recipes inspired by her travels.  The recipe that the one I'm going to share with you was inspired by was under the title of "A Single Girl's cake for Valentine's Day" because the recipe yielded enough to make just one cupcake (plus a very small amount left over).  While this recipe didn't need milk to be added to it for cooking, it still contained one egg yolk.  Back in October, I made some Oreo cupcakes for a film-watching afternoon with my friends (featuring Rent and playing a Hobbit card game), which used mashed up banana as an alternative to eggs.  Surprisingly, my family still thought it tasted nice even though it contained no eggs and was completely vegan, so I knew that a banana could be used again in this recipe.  I've also skipped the espresso that was in the original recipe on the World of Wanderlust website!

Ingredients

3 tablespoons plain flour
2 teaspoons cocoa powder
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1 tablespoon sugar
dash of vanilla essence
1 tablespoon oil (I used olive oil)
half a large banana, mashed

Instructions

1. Mix the flour, cocoa, baking powder and sugar in a mixing bowl until well-combined.
2. Add the mashed banana, oil and vanilla essence, and continue to stir until all the ingredients are combined.
3. Pour the mix into a well-greased coffee cup.
4. Cook in a microwave on medium high for 90 seconds, until the cake has risen and cooked through, but avoid overcooking.
5. If you wish, serve with vanilla ice cream, strawberries, caramel or a dusting of icing sugar!