A week of dinners made simple (and cheap)
 
Do you struggle to decide what to cook for dinner each night? Do you end up reaching for the freezer or just chucking spuds in the oven and having them with baked beans from the can? We’re going to bring you a week’s worth of meals on a budget. The only thing you have to promise us is that you’ll go and find yourself a fresh market to get your veggies from. Not only will they be fresher and last longer in your fridge (saving you precious shopping time), they’ll be heaps cheaper too.
 
We shop once a week. A quick fly around Coles/Woolies/IGA for the essentials such as bread, rice milk, school lunches, cans of beans and frozen peas, on to the Asian deli for tofu of varying kinds and some spices and then to the fresh market for a trolley full of veggies. It’s about 15 mins further to drive to the fresh market rather than just going to our local Coles/Woolies/IGA but the fact that we can shop just once a week and have everything we need (plus the amazingly cheaper prices) makes that extra time totally worth it and still a massive saving when it comes to time AND those precious dollars that we all work so hard to earn.

Do you know what’s trending right now in food? Neither do I. But these balls are great and you can eat them at any time of the day or night. And they’re almost a little bit good for you.
 
So, what goes into them?

This stuff is so easy it almost makes itself and so delicious everyone will want to eat it, all the time. It’s GF, vegan and waaaay better for you than shop bought toasted muesli. Get amongst it!
 
¼ cup honey
¼ cup olive oil or Nuttlex or other vegan spread
2 ½ cups buckwheat groats
½ cup sunflower seeds (hulled)
2 cups puffed rice

​I don’t want to exaggerate but shop bought vegan yogurt can be one of life’s greatest disappointments. When I first saw it for sale I was a little bit surprised by the cost but I decided that taking out a second mortgage and selling my first born child into slavery was ok because…yogurt. So, I threw it into the trolley and hurried off home with my prize. Only to discover that it tastes like blended up shoes with a side order of insecticide and artifical sweetener.
 
They say that the best way to get over getting bucked off a horse is to get right back on, so since that devastating moment I’ve tried pretty much every brand of vegan yogurt that I can buy. And while some have been pretty good (thank you coconut yogurt) they are generally rather underwhelming.
 
Our journey into making vegan yogurt has so far been paved with coconut cream and we have left behind us the ghosts of failed batches, though their memory lingers on. But fear not, gentle reader, for you can learn from our mistakes and hopefully in no time you too will be whipping up beautiful batches of dairy free yogurt.

Granddad loves to come and visit the kids and being the healthy man that he is he always brings a watermelon for us all to snack on (quite often along with a bottle of champagne but we'll pretend that's healthy too!). We love it, but every now and then the watermelon gets the better of us and we just can’t finish it despite our best efforts. That was when we discovered this beauty! It is the most simple and delicious snack you’ll ever make yourself – so simple, in fact, that you’re going to have finished reading this blog (and making yourself a watermelon smoothie, if you happen to have a water melon hanging around waiting to be eaten) before you’ve finished your cup of tea!
 
Chop up the water melon, or break it up, or spoon it out, in to pieces small enough to fit in to the blender but big enough to still make the blender do some work – it’s more satisfying that way. I think this is what Jamie Oliver means when he says “clank it up [proceeds to cut said ingredient] clank, clank, clank”. I love it!

 This is the perfect salad for those days when you'd really like to sit on the lounge and stuff yourself with potato gems washed down with champagne... The days when you're starving and an ordinary green salad just won't do.
 
This salad is filling and tasty and, if all else fails, serves as a great, healthy appetiser for a meal of potato gems and champagne.
 
Turn your oven on to 180.
 
Start with a cup of Puy lentils – the small dark coloured ones that don't cook to mush unless you forget you're cooking them. Pick them over to remove any rocks and wash in a strainer. Put them in a pan with a couple of bay leaves and three cups of water. Bring to the boil. You can start testing to see if they're ready after about 15 minutes. You might have to add more water as they cook, but you're going to strain them so it won't matter.

One of the things that I thought I would miss went I became a vegan was pizza. I used to love cheese – blue, cheddar, Swiss, processed, melted... I wasn't fussy. But here's the thing, I hate vegan cheese. I've tried to like it, honestly I have, but it tastes like a combination of armpits and the tennis shoes of a teenage boy. And plus, I'm not big on food substitutes. Cheese and eggs are from a long-gone part of life's journey and I don't want to eat facsimiles that undoubtedly taste inferior. I'd rather just let them go and move on.
 
This is why I like this vegan, pumpkin pizza. It's pizza but it's so different from the pizza of my past that I don't miss the cheese. You could put cheese on it, but it's probably redundant.
 
We use gluten free, pre-made bases but you can use regular bases if you're not a celiac. You could also make your own dough which I have done lots in the past. I love bread dough, every single time it seems like a miracle. You make it and it rises, smells amazing and tastes even better. Every time I make it I show it to the kids and try to get them to join in my marveling. They humour me but I don't think they really get my excitement at the wonder and mystery of bread.

​Most people think that vegans eke out their miserable, sugarless existence foraging on a mixture of grass, leaves and salad. Hell no! These biscuits are really delicious and they're packed with sugar, fat and refined flour. They're almost definitely just as unhealthy as traditional short-bread biscuits. They also use gluten free flour which I don't think is any healthier than normal flour – unless you are a celiac. And coconut oil which gives them a bit of bite and a very mild coconut flavour but won't make you any healthier! They do, however, taste delicious and they would make a great treat for that special high maintenance vegan celiac in your life.
 
Preheat the oven to 180 degrees.

​On our way home from Sumatra we spent some time in Kuala Lumpur which is a great place to visit if you love food, amazing public transport and crazy festivals. Because Sophie is a coeliac she can only eat gluten free food, a fact that complicates matters a little, particularly when you pair it with a vegan diet. To help us out we downloaded some cards with the coeliac dietary guidelines on them in both Malay and Bahasa. These were great because, as we have discovered in the past, when there's a language barrier it's really hard to mime "please don't serve me food that contains either wheat or barley".
 
On our first night in KL we decided to eat at an Indian restaurant that specialised in Southern Indian food as it's often vegan and gluten free. The restaurant Annapuurnam was within walking distance of our hotel, the staff were cool and really coeliac friendly. As a definite bonus the food was delicious and we made disgusting pigs of ourselves and ate way too much.
 
When we came home we decided to make our version of our favourite dish. It's really easy but you will need to buy some curry leaves from an Asian deli.

Chop and partially cook about 6 large potatoes in boiling water. When they're almost done, add half a head of cauliflower that you've chopped into bite sized pieces and keep on boiling until both are cooked. Don't cook them too much or they'll turn to mush. Drain and set aside.
 
In a big pan or a wok, fry an onion and two chopped carrots in a couple of tablespoons of whatever oil you've got in your pantry. (We don't bother with coconut oil because it tastes too much like tanning lotion and gives me flashbacks to the 1980's.) Throw in some mustard seeds – about a tablespoon, star anise, a cinnamon stick, a bay leaf, two dried chillies, a few cardamon pods and a couple of cloves. When that smells really good add in a tablespoon or so of cumin and coriander powder, some tumeric, black pepper and about two sprigs of the curry leaves that you've stripped and roughly chopped. Spices burn really easily so keep a bit of water by the pan and throw some in if you think it's getting too hot. Trust me, don't throw in some of your gin and tonic, it doesn't really affect the taste of the dish, but you'll miss your drink when it's gone.

When I hit my late 30's I felt as though I was too old to be chowing down on another mammal's breast milk. It's just personal preference. I have no problem with other people doing it (in fact two of my kids do it by the litre) but it's not for me.
 
After weighing up the pros and cons of other types of milk (like soy and almond) we decided that rice milk was the best fit for us as it was less processed and not as greedy on resources as other milk alternatives. We're really happy drinking rice milk - it's not too expensive, requires no animal welfare considerations and tastes nice in a cup of tea.
 
After drinking shop bought rice milk for a few years we decided to make our own. If you have five minutes and a decent blender, you can too. It's definitely not rocket science. Here's how it goes...
 
Put one cup of cooked rice, four cups of water, a pinch of salt and a teaspoon of sugar in your blender and whizz it all around for a couple of minutes - basically until it looks like milk and not like small chunks of rice floating in water. White rice makes a pretty, white milk while brown rice milk is slightly less sparkly but way better for you. And how does it taste? To be honest, quite a lot like watery rice that's been whizzed in a blender. I have to admit, we are not DIY rice milk converts - but that again, is a matter of personal preference. If you're into alternative milks you might just like it and it certainly saves money. But we reckon we'll stick with shop bought rice milk for now.

​PJ