Choc Chip Cookies with Peanut Butter Ice Cream

I told you, it wouldn't be long til I tried making the gluten free chocolate chip cookies that I blogged about a few weeks ago. In fact it was only a week later but I thought it would be kind of boring to hear that I made the same cookies in one week. I do think it's worth sharing though because I made some changes, this time I used regular white agave and a mixture of white and dark chocolate. But I discovered that the strong after taste wasn't the dark agave but was the 1 tablespoon of vanilla extract, next time I will try with only 1 teaspoon to see how it compares. I do love the texture though and general flavour. I took some to a friend's house and then used the remaining leftovers to make peanut butter ice cream sandwiches using the recipe from vegan scoop. It is seriously my most used cookbook and this ice cream was another winner.

I told you, it wouldn't be long til I tried making the gluten free chocolate chip cookies that I blogged about a few weeks ago. In fact it was only a week later but I thought it would be kind of boring to hear that I made the same cookies in one week. I do think it's worth sharing though because I made some changes, this time I used regular white agave and a mixture of white and dark chocolate. But I discovered that the strong after taste wasn't the dark agave but was the 1 tablespoon of vanilla extract, next time I will try with only 1 teaspoon to see how it compares. I do love the texture though and general flavour. I took some to a friend's house and then used the remaining leftovers to make peanut butter ice cream sandwiches using the recipe from vegan scoop. It is seriously my most used cookbook and this ice cream was another winner.

reade more... Résuméabuiyad

G/F Chocolate HoneyComb Ice Cream Cake

Cindy had a ice cream potluck for her birthday on Sat. So I made her this gluten free chocolate honeycomb ice cream cake with chocolate crackle base. I took inspiration from two online non-vegan, non-gluten free recipes and combined them. The chocolate crackle base idea was from Koali's life blog and the inclusion of honey roasted nuts was from the Eat Drink Live version of nigella's cake.

First I made the honeycomb, unfortunately I had tried a few more honeycomb recipes which all failed. Maybe due to the humidity before finally returning to the original recipe that I made last time. I covered in chocolate again and cut it into small chunks.

To make the chocolate crackle base. I simply copied Koali and followed the same recipe but substituted the chocolate for dark chocolate and the rice bubbles for g/f version of rice bubbles. YES STUPIDLY REGULAR RICE BUBBLES AREN'T G/F!

1 250g dark chocolate
roughly 1 1/2 cup of g/f rice bubbles
1. Line a 20cm spring form cake tin with baking paper (I didn't do this but it didn't seem to matter)
2. Melt the chocolate in a double boiler
3. Add rice bubbles a large serving spoonish at a time. Mix through until you get the consistency of chocolate crackles. You want enough chocolate to set but enough rice bubbles to give a constant crunch.
4. Spread the mixture over the bottom of the cake tin.

Then I made honey roasted nuts, but instead of roasting them or using honey. I followed this recipe from the sweet and salty life for agave walnuts and substituted peanuts:

Agave Glazed Peanuts

4 TBSP Raw Agave Syrup
2 TBSP Margarine
1 Cup Peanuts

Pour it all into a medium pan and sauté on medium heat.
When the Peanuts are hot, lower the flame and allow the nuts to simmer until the glaze has become thick. You will know the Walnuts are ready when there is no liquid in the pan and the nuts have completely soaked up the Agave and Earth Balance. Let them cool and then store the nuts in an air tight container to keep them soft and moist. I then cut them into chunks too.

For the ice cream, I just followed the vanilla ice cream recipe in Vegan Scoop but instead of adding vanilla essence I added a whole vanilla pod and cooked it with a combination of rice and coconut milk.  I don't think the vanilla was needed though and probably wasted with alll the other flavours combined.

In the last few minutes in the ice cream maker I added the chopped honeycomb and nuts. Then spread it over the chocolate crackle base.

And decorated it by making a C with some honeycomb and nuts that I had put aside.

I was pretty happy with the end result, especially given that it was a big experiment and I wasn't sure how it would all go together.  It was pretty sweet and had loads of crunch. I think you could easily reduce the nuts and/or honeycomb and just get rid of the chocolate crackle base or the nuts if you wanted to.

Instead of taking pictures like I normally did, I just relaxed and ate and ate and ate. There was so much amazing ice cream and g/f penguin waffles! Toby will talk about his ice cream dish next.

Cindy had a ice cream potluck for her birthday on Sat. So I made her this gluten free chocolate honeycomb ice cream cake with chocolate crackle base. I took inspiration from two online non-vegan, non-gluten free recipes and combined them. The chocolate crackle base idea was from Koali's life blog and the inclusion of honey roasted nuts was from the Eat Drink Live version of nigella's cake.

First I made the honeycomb, unfortunately I had tried a few more honeycomb recipes which all failed. Maybe due to the humidity before finally returning to the original recipe that I made last time. I covered in chocolate again and cut it into small chunks.

To make the chocolate crackle base. I simply copied Koali and followed the same recipe but substituted the chocolate for dark chocolate and the rice bubbles for g/f version of rice bubbles. YES STUPIDLY REGULAR RICE BUBBLES AREN'T G/F!

1 250g dark chocolate
roughly 1 1/2 cup of g/f rice bubbles
1. Line a 20cm spring form cake tin with baking paper (I didn't do this but it didn't seem to matter)
2. Melt the chocolate in a double boiler
3. Add rice bubbles a large serving spoonish at a time. Mix through until you get the consistency of chocolate crackles. You want enough chocolate to set but enough rice bubbles to give a constant crunch.
4. Spread the mixture over the bottom of the cake tin.

Then I made honey roasted nuts, but instead of roasting them or using honey. I followed this recipe from the sweet and salty life for agave walnuts and substituted peanuts:

Agave Glazed Peanuts

4 TBSP Raw Agave Syrup
2 TBSP Margarine
1 Cup Peanuts

Pour it all into a medium pan and sauté on medium heat.
When the Peanuts are hot, lower the flame and allow the nuts to simmer until the glaze has become thick. You will know the Walnuts are ready when there is no liquid in the pan and the nuts have completely soaked up the Agave and Earth Balance. Let them cool and then store the nuts in an air tight container to keep them soft and moist. I then cut them into chunks too.

For the ice cream, I just followed the vanilla ice cream recipe in Vegan Scoop but instead of adding vanilla essence I added a whole vanilla pod and cooked it with a combination of rice and coconut milk.  I don't think the vanilla was needed though and probably wasted with alll the other flavours combined.

In the last few minutes in the ice cream maker I added the chopped honeycomb and nuts. Then spread it over the chocolate crackle base.

And decorated it by making a C with some honeycomb and nuts that I had put aside.

I was pretty happy with the end result, especially given that it was a big experiment and I wasn't sure how it would all go together.  It was pretty sweet and had loads of crunch. I think you could easily reduce the nuts and/or honeycomb and just get rid of the chocolate crackle base or the nuts if you wanted to.

Instead of taking pictures like I normally did, I just relaxed and ate and ate and ate. There was so much amazing ice cream and g/f penguin waffles! Toby will talk about his ice cream dish next.

reade more... Résuméabuiyad

Ginger Lychee Ice Cream & Posting Cookbook Recipes- Vegan Mofo Day 17

Yes it didn't take me long to continue with my ginger summer dessert theme. This is from Vegan Scoop I actually stuffed this up, I followed the recipe which consisted of heating a mixture of ingredients, adding arrowroot (mixed with soymilk) and then discovered that I was missing 2 cups of soy milk that were supposed to be heated before I put in the arrowroot mixture. I whisked it in though while it was still hot and it worked, yay!

I only used about half the ginger the recipe asked for, which I think is the perfect amount. The heat from the ginger just works really well with cold desserts. Why haven't I thought of ginger in ice cream before? Plus, it's so soothing for my sore throat. The lychee flavour is quite subtle though, so i think next time I might add more chopped lychees or just serve it with with lychees on top.

I'm not going to post the recipe since I've already posted a few from Vegan Scoop and it just seems wrong to post more. Actually I've been rethinking posting recipes from cookbooks. I never used to and then I started because I figured if people try recipes online from the cookbook it might inspire them to buy the cookbooks. Also I tend to skip over some posts without recipes. But if most are the best recipes from cookbooks are online, than don't some people think what's the point of buying it? Also I think vegan cookbooks are a niche market and most of the authors don't get enough money from the sales. I think I would probably be pretty annoyed if I was an author. What do you think?

Yes it didn't take me long to continue with my ginger summer dessert theme. This is from Vegan Scoop I actually stuffed this up, I followed the recipe which consisted of heating a mixture of ingredients, adding arrowroot (mixed with soymilk) and then discovered that I was missing 2 cups of soy milk that were supposed to be heated before I put in the arrowroot mixture. I whisked it in though while it was still hot and it worked, yay!

I only used about half the ginger the recipe asked for, which I think is the perfect amount. The heat from the ginger just works really well with cold desserts. Why haven't I thought of ginger in ice cream before? Plus, it's so soothing for my sore throat. The lychee flavour is quite subtle though, so i think next time I might add more chopped lychees or just serve it with with lychees on top.

I'm not going to post the recipe since I've already posted a few from Vegan Scoop and it just seems wrong to post more. Actually I've been rethinking posting recipes from cookbooks. I never used to and then I started because I figured if people try recipes online from the cookbook it might inspire them to buy the cookbooks. Also I tend to skip over some posts without recipes. But if most are the best recipes from cookbooks are online, than don't some people think what's the point of buying it? Also I think vegan cookbooks are a niche market and most of the authors don't get enough money from the sales. I think I would probably be pretty annoyed if I was an author. What do you think?

reade more... Résuméabuiyad

Chinese Radish Cake and Asian Ice-cream

Steph hosted a Chinese New Year's Eve potluck last Saturday. Kristy loves Chinese Radish Cake and insisted that I should make it. I found a recipe from Irene Wai's blog (It is in Chinese) and veganized it. To make Chinese Radish Cake, you only need to get one or two big juicy Chinese Radishes, commonly known as Daikon, and some very common ingredients:

- 1.5KG Chinese Radish/Daikon
- 4 Shitake Mushroom, finely chopped.
- 1 pack of Blue Lotus smoked Tofu, finely chopped
- Conola Oil (or Peanut Oil, if you wanna be more Chinese)
- 250g Rice Flour
- 150ml Water
- 2 tbs Sesame Seeds

Seasonings:

- 2 tsp Sugar
- 2 tsp Massel "Chicken" stock powder
- to taste, white pepper powder
- to taste, tamari
- to taste, liquid smoke
- to taste, salt

1. Wash, peel and grate the Daikon. Drain the grated Daikon and save the liquid in a bowl.

2. Fry the smoked tofu and mushroom on medium/high until your smoke alarm goes off, season with tamari, salt and liquid smoke. You want it to taste A LITTLE BIT TOO SALTY.

3. Mix rice flour in the Daikon liquid until it reaches a gravy-like thickness. If it is too thick, add some water (little by little) but no more than 150ml.

4. Heat oil the wok or fry pan, fry the grated Daikon on medium/high for a couple of minutes.

5. Lower the heat, add the seasoning and cook the grated Daikon with lid on til soft

6. Add the smoked tofu/mushroom to the Daikon and fry medium/high for around 5mins

7. Turn the heat off, add rice flour paste to the pot and mix

8. Pour the whole thing to a greased cake tin and steam on high fro 1.5 to 2 hours. (Put a toothpick into the cake and if the toothpick is clean, it is ready.)

9. Sprinkle with sesame seeds.

10. Let it cool down and settle.

11. Store the whole cake in a big airtight container and consume within 10days.

And then, you slice and pan fry the cake:

Voila!

Kristy made not one by two types of ice-cream from Vegan Scoop: Green Tea and Red Bean. We put way too much Green Tea powder in the first one but tried to fix it. But it still tasted way too bitter. We also used Chinese Red Bean Paste instead of the fancy Japanese version and Kristy thought it tasted like a generic sweet flavour.


Also read what other bloggers made for the CYN potluck:

Johanna's CYN potluck round up, pearl ball and Apricot Goodness Balls . (Both Gluten Free)
Steph's potluck blog post and her vegan pineapple tart. (Gluten Free)
Vicki's delish gluten free sponge cake. (Gluten Free)
Cindy's Orange Szechuan Pepper Ice-cream(!) (Gluten Free)
Michael's "Disaster" Dumplings (Almost Gluten Free)

On my walkman:
Teen Dream - Beach House

Steph hosted a Chinese New Year's Eve potluck last Saturday. Kristy loves Chinese Radish Cake and insisted that I should make it. I found a recipe from Irene Wai's blog (It is in Chinese) and veganized it. To make Chinese Radish Cake, you only need to get one or two big juicy Chinese Radishes, commonly known as Daikon, and some very common ingredients:

- 1.5KG Chinese Radish/Daikon
- 4 Shitake Mushroom, finely chopped.
- 1 pack of Blue Lotus smoked Tofu, finely chopped
- Conola Oil (or Peanut Oil, if you wanna be more Chinese)
- 250g Rice Flour
- 150ml Water
- 2 tbs Sesame Seeds

Seasonings:

- 2 tsp Sugar
- 2 tsp Massel "Chicken" stock powder
- to taste, white pepper powder
- to taste, tamari
- to taste, liquid smoke
- to taste, salt

1. Wash, peel and grate the Daikon. Drain the grated Daikon and save the liquid in a bowl.

2. Fry the smoked tofu and mushroom on medium/high until your smoke alarm goes off, season with tamari, salt and liquid smoke. You want it to taste A LITTLE BIT TOO SALTY.

3. Mix rice flour in the Daikon liquid until it reaches a gravy-like thickness. If it is too thick, add some water (little by little) but no more than 150ml.

4. Heat oil the wok or fry pan, fry the grated Daikon on medium/high for a couple of minutes.

5. Lower the heat, add the seasoning and cook the grated Daikon with lid on til soft

6. Add the smoked tofu/mushroom to the Daikon and fry medium/high for around 5mins

7. Turn the heat off, add rice flour paste to the pot and mix

8. Pour the whole thing to a greased cake tin and steam on high fro 1.5 to 2 hours. (Put a toothpick into the cake and if the toothpick is clean, it is ready.)

9. Sprinkle with sesame seeds.

10. Let it cool down and settle.

11. Store the whole cake in a big airtight container and consume within 10days.

And then, you slice and pan fry the cake:

Voila!

Kristy made not one by two types of ice-cream from Vegan Scoop: Green Tea and Red Bean. We put way too much Green Tea powder in the first one but tried to fix it. But it still tasted way too bitter. We also used Chinese Red Bean Paste instead of the fancy Japanese version and Kristy thought it tasted like a generic sweet flavour.


Also read what other bloggers made for the CYN potluck:

Johanna's CYN potluck round up, pearl ball and Apricot Goodness Balls . (Both Gluten Free)
Steph's potluck blog post and her vegan pineapple tart. (Gluten Free)
Vicki's delish gluten free sponge cake. (Gluten Free)
Cindy's Orange Szechuan Pepper Ice-cream(!) (Gluten Free)
Michael's "Disaster" Dumplings (Almost Gluten Free)

On my walkman:
Teen Dream - Beach House

reade more... Résuméabuiyad

The greatest gluten free vegan ice cream EVER

This is my fav ice cream, EVER, yes really EVER!!!!! I'm a little obsessed with the amazing peanut butter chocolate combination, and have tried it in lots of forms like peanut butter truffles, and peanut butter oreo truffles, peanut butter chocolate cupcakes , cannonballs/buckeyes and peanut butter cups but I have finally found my favourite way to combine peanut butter and chocolate with ice cream. The melted chocolate gives it a lovely rich flavour which really compliments the crunchy peanut butter, I heart ice cream with a bit of crunch rather than regular smooth ice cream. It is soooooooo good that it seriously makes gluten free living seem easier because I could easily live on this ice cream. I'm a little embarrassed to admit that this ice cream only lasted me 4 days and Toby didn't even have any since he is a little over the peanut butter-chocolate combination which was fine since it meant that I could eat it all.

Chocolate peanut butter swirl ice cream from the vegan scoop:

1 c. soy creamer (i used soy milk)
1c. soy milk
3/4 c. sugar
2 T. arrowroot
1 T. vanilla extract
1/2 c. chocolate chips (I used dark chocolate)
3/4 peanut butter (go crunchy for the awesome nutty texture)
1/4 cocoa powder

Mix ¼ cup of soy milk with the arrowroot and set aside.

Mix the soy creamer, remaining soy milk, sugar, cocoa powder and chocolate chips in a saucepan over low heat. Bring to a boil. When the mixture has just started to boil, take off the heat and immediately stir in the arrowroot cream. This should immediately cause the liquid to thicken.

Stir in vanilla extract.

Set the ice cream mixture aside to cool. It will take at least a few hours in the fridge. Freeze according to your ice cream maker’s instructions. Add peanut butter during the last few minutes of freezing.

My ice cream maker didn't swirl it very well though, so I mixed it up with a fork.

I am so going to work myself through the other recipes in this awesome book, but since I have already posted two of the recipes online, I really should stop there.

This is my fav ice cream, EVER, yes really EVER!!!!! I'm a little obsessed with the amazing peanut butter chocolate combination, and have tried it in lots of forms like peanut butter truffles, and peanut butter oreo truffles, peanut butter chocolate cupcakes , cannonballs/buckeyes and peanut butter cups but I have finally found my favourite way to combine peanut butter and chocolate with ice cream. The melted chocolate gives it a lovely rich flavour which really compliments the crunchy peanut butter, I heart ice cream with a bit of crunch rather than regular smooth ice cream. It is soooooooo good that it seriously makes gluten free living seem easier because I could easily live on this ice cream. I'm a little embarrassed to admit that this ice cream only lasted me 4 days and Toby didn't even have any since he is a little over the peanut butter-chocolate combination which was fine since it meant that I could eat it all.

Chocolate peanut butter swirl ice cream from the vegan scoop:

1 c. soy creamer (i used soy milk)
1c. soy milk
3/4 c. sugar
2 T. arrowroot
1 T. vanilla extract
1/2 c. chocolate chips (I used dark chocolate)
3/4 peanut butter (go crunchy for the awesome nutty texture)
1/4 cocoa powder

Mix ¼ cup of soy milk with the arrowroot and set aside.

Mix the soy creamer, remaining soy milk, sugar, cocoa powder and chocolate chips in a saucepan over low heat. Bring to a boil. When the mixture has just started to boil, take off the heat and immediately stir in the arrowroot cream. This should immediately cause the liquid to thicken.

Stir in vanilla extract.

Set the ice cream mixture aside to cool. It will take at least a few hours in the fridge. Freeze according to your ice cream maker’s instructions. Add peanut butter during the last few minutes of freezing.

My ice cream maker didn't swirl it very well though, so I mixed it up with a fork.

I am so going to work myself through the other recipes in this awesome book, but since I have already posted two of the recipes online, I really should stop there.

reade more... Résuméabuiyad

We all scream for ice cream

The day before I got my blood test results I made the mint choc chip from Vegan Scoop. I decided that I had to have the cookbook after trying Rachel's amazing peanut butter ice cream.
Mint choc chip was my fav flavour ice cream growing up, so I couldn't resist. I was super relieved to find out that 1) my soy milk is g/f and 2) arrowrooot is also g/f so that I could still eat it. Especially since I can no longer eat the so good ice cream in our freezer.

I followed Rachel's advice and used a little less peppermint and just tasted it until I felt that it had just just the right amount of peppermint. This seriously rocks unless you are one of those crazy mint-choc haters and has been so refreshing on the super hot days we have been having lately.

2 c. Silk soy creamer (i used more soy milk)
1c. soy milk
3/4 c. sugar
2 T. arrowroot
1 1/2 T. peppermint extract (I used about 1 T)
1 T. vanilla extract
3/4 c. chocolate chips (I used dark chocolate chopped up which wasn't as good)

Mix ¼ cup of soy milk with the arrowroot and set aside.

Mix the soy creamer, remaining soy milk, and sugar in a saucepan over low heat. Bring to a boil. When the mixture has just started to boil, take off the heat and immediately stir in the arrowroot cream. This should immediately cause the liquid to thicken.

Stir in the peppermint extract and vanilla extract. (I actuallly decided to heat it with the sugar)

Set the ice cream mixture aside to cool. It will take at least a few hours in the fridge. Freeze according to your ice cream maker’s instructions. Add chocolate chips during the last few minutes of freezing.

You could add green food colouring, if you want.

The day before I got my blood test results I made the mint choc chip from Vegan Scoop. I decided that I had to have the cookbook after trying Rachel's amazing peanut butter ice cream.
Mint choc chip was my fav flavour ice cream growing up, so I couldn't resist. I was super relieved to find out that 1) my soy milk is g/f and 2) arrowrooot is also g/f so that I could still eat it. Especially since I can no longer eat the so good ice cream in our freezer.

I followed Rachel's advice and used a little less peppermint and just tasted it until I felt that it had just just the right amount of peppermint. This seriously rocks unless you are one of those crazy mint-choc haters and has been so refreshing on the super hot days we have been having lately.

2 c. Silk soy creamer (i used more soy milk)
1c. soy milk
3/4 c. sugar
2 T. arrowroot
1 1/2 T. peppermint extract (I used about 1 T)
1 T. vanilla extract
3/4 c. chocolate chips (I used dark chocolate chopped up which wasn't as good)

Mix ¼ cup of soy milk with the arrowroot and set aside.

Mix the soy creamer, remaining soy milk, and sugar in a saucepan over low heat. Bring to a boil. When the mixture has just started to boil, take off the heat and immediately stir in the arrowroot cream. This should immediately cause the liquid to thicken.

Stir in the peppermint extract and vanilla extract. (I actuallly decided to heat it with the sugar)

Set the ice cream mixture aside to cool. It will take at least a few hours in the fridge. Freeze according to your ice cream maker’s instructions. Add chocolate chips during the last few minutes of freezing.

You could add green food colouring, if you want.

reade more... Résuméabuiyad