Vegan Cooking Guide
Vegan cooking is so easy once you know about "veganisation"! Grab a recipe and veganise it with vegan substitutes and voila! A vegan meal which is tasty and can satisfy the most sophisticated taste buds.
I can sum up vegan cooking in one or two sentences: Take any non vegan recipe which doesn't ask for too many eggs - use vegan substitutes in place of the animal derived ingredients - and you can veganise almost any recipe.
This is the main secret to vegan cooking. Once you have decided which is your favourite vegan cream/milk/chocolate/egg replacer etc, you have it in the bag!
It is extremely easy to veganise dinners which use mince in the recipe, such as moussaka, shepherd pie and spaghetti bolognese. Vegan mince is easy to find at health food stores and some supermarkets.
Here are some examples.
This book details cooking with vegan seafood.
With all the vegan meat replacement products, it is easy to make lovely and healthy vegan stews. Have with mashed potatoes (soya spread is used in place of butter) or chips, potato wedges or roasties. You can use the vegan meat products to make curries and other dishes, so you do not have to miss out on the "meaty" side of being a vegan.
The two ingredients/products which are hard to replace, are eggs and cheese. BUT there is a new amazing UK vegan cheese on the market which you can only get online at the moment. You will find that information and all my other favourite vegan foods on this page.
Then we have soya products. Tofu is very versatile but you either love it or hate it. It is important that you know how to cook this wonder food though (very high in protein and great for weight loss in my opinion) as if you don't, you may never go near it again and I think you will be missing out. I have detailed below how I like my tofu, but you can grill it and have it plain in a salad if you like it that way. You can buy tofu in most supermarkets but you should also try buying it from chinese supermarkets too as you may prefer it that way.
(I will be updating this page soon)
There are many ways to cook tofu but to get you started I am going to tell you how I cook the most easily available supermarket tofu.
I take this out of the plastic packet it comes in and drain the water away. Then I squeeze as much of the water out of the tofu as I can by pressing it between a cloth kitchen towel. I then wrap it in a t towel and place it on a warm/hot radiator for a couple of hours. This ensures the water evaporates out of it and makes it more "spongelike". Another way is to drain the water away and cut the tofu into cubes or strips (whichever you prefer for your chosen recipe). Then place the tofu in a hot skillet without oil and heat through on both sides. You will see the water seeping out. Then you can either marinate the tofu in your marinade of choice or just fry it in oil:
The photo below is a tofu chilli:
Many supermarkets are labelling their foods as being vegan nowadays so it is easy to choose vegan products to help you along. For example, Ive noticed that some brands of cooking sauces are being labelled as vegan if you just havn't the time to make your own.
Of course, all the healthy food items such as fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds and grains are all vegan foods too and the recipe/snack choices with these are endless. You can also eat foods which you wouldn't normally think of as being vegan too - so whatever your needs are, you do not need to feel deprived. Heres a tip to give you some ideas for meals you want to make to impress someone: Keep an eye on cookery programmes which rate the food. If you see something that gets rave reviews - try to veganise it with your favourite substitutes.
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It is all about getting to know what
For scrambled "eggs", most vegans substitute eggs for tofu which is mashed up with a sprinkling of turmeric spice. In my opinion, this tastes nothing like scrambled eggs but tastes fine all the same. Especially if you have it on toast with a slice of vegan ham, a few mushrooms and a slice of vegan cheese (the ones you can buy in individual plastic wraps made by Toffutti) and a dollop of vegan mayo!
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