(Something vaguely like) Mincemeat for Mince Pies
09 Dec 2011 Leave a Comment
in Miscellaneous, Recipes Tags: afternoon tea, Christmas, DIY, recipe, recipes, thinking ahead, traditional, vegan, vegetarian
After having a bash at making my own pastry for mince pies last year (though that post dates from March, no idea who I thought would be making mince pies at that time of the year), this year the problem to be solved was mincemeat.
Alien to France, as is the suet which is the main ingredient, I thought I might as well have a stab at making my own after having been given some ready-to-roll pastry courtesy of a cooking class where they told us how bad it was to buy the prepackaged stuff and we all should make our own all the time. Still, waste not want not!
I couldn’t find any candied-peel, wouldn’t have used a whole bottle of brandy, wouldn’t have used a whole pack of almonds, couldn’t find currants, and suet is non-existent here, so the recipe search was… interesting. In the end I assembled a random assortment of likely-sounding ingredients and tossed them together. Its resultant appearance looks something like chutney, and it reminds me a bit of apple crumble pie filling, just with a bit of a kick. Feel free to add more orange or lemon juice, or indeed liqueur, before draining at the end.
If my scenario sounds up your street, or you just want a veggie-friendly mincemeat, read on…
Pizza
08 Jul 2011 1 Comment
in Meals, Recipes, Vegetarian Tags: easy, meal, pizza, quick, student meal, thinking ahead
If you make a batch of pizza dough, split it into bags and freeze it, this’ll sort your meals for ages. Take out some dough in the morning, roll it out in the evening, cover with some tomato sauce or passata, some cheese, and whatever veg or other toppings you want – chorizo is especially nice.
Tomato Pasta Sauce
26 Apr 2011 1 Comment
in Recipes, Vegetarian Tags: meal, recipe, sauce, student meal, thinking ahead
If you’re in the middle of revising and don’t have time to spend many hours each day slaving over a hot stove, because if you leave your seat in the library for 45 minutes at quarter to 8 in the morning then it’ll get stolen (true story), here’s your answer 
Make up a big batch of this sauce, store in jars [sterilise first by shaking some boiling water about in them - with the lids on], seal when warm, keep in fridge, spread on pizza, add extra veg and serve on pasta, brown some mince and add this and some carrots for making spag-bol, schlop a bit into chicken fajitas… it’s is amazingly versatile.
