Gow Gees and Gyoza

Hello There! Today I am making gyosa, and I am very excited. I have always loved asian food. I find all the flavors, textures, and methods SO AMAZING. This recipe is for the filling and the dough itself, which are both pleasantly easy to make. I loved the process of making them too, as I felt it was so relaxing. These dumplings are soft, smile worthy, and really pack a punch. The recipe for the filling is a little loose as you can adapt it so easily. If i'm being honest, any leftover vegetables you have lying around will work, throw into a saucepan, sauté, a spice here and there, and its perfect! These are just my suggested ones. You must try them. With no hesitation.





Prep and Cook Time: 3- 4 hours
Makes: 40 Gyosa
Virtuousness Level: 8/10

Ingredients:
(Dough)
2 cups all purpose flour
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 cup boiling water + 3 tablespoons

(Filling)
(as much as you want of each)
Purple Lettuce
Bean Sprouts
Onions
Mushrooms
Pepper
A little oil for sautéing
Chili
Garlic
Salt
Pepper

1. Sift the flour and salt into a big bowl. Put the kettle on.



2. Slowly add the water to the flour until it forms a rough dough, using chopsticks.



3. Cover and let sit for 1 hour.



4. Bring dough out and knead for around  5 minutes. Yes, 5 minutes.

5. Roll into a long log, and cut into 40 slices. Like little dough balls.

6. Take the great pleasure of rolling each one out individually and and cutting them into circles with a glass. Spoiler Alert: VERY time consuming. But relaxing.







7. Pile up on a plate, and leave to rest while you make the filling. At this point you are probably tired from all there kneading and rollin and cutting and laying. But you must make the filling anyway. Trust me. They're worth it.

8. Chop up all vegetables and sauté the mushrooms and onions in a little bit of oil on a hot pan first, until the onions are see-through.





9. Add in everything else (should all be chopped), with the spices.

10. Set to the side, and get a work station ready, for the assembly of the gyosa. This includes: a bowl of water, the gyosa wrappers, a single plate, and trays to place finished gyosa on, the filling , and a pastry brush.

How to Wrap:
This process is actually fairly simple once you get used to it.
Here is how you make the Gyosa:
Place a tsp. full of filling in the middle of the wrapper, and wet the sides with water.



Bring the two ends together and crimp all the edges with your fingers.

How to make the Gow Gee:
Place a tsp. full of filling in the middle of the wrapper, and wet the sides with water.



Bring all ends together in the middle and pinch were they come together.





11. Either place on a tray in the steamer for 15- 20 minutes, or set a big saucepan of water over the heat, and let it boil.

12. Set a colander over it, place the gyosa and gow gee inside, cover, and let steam for 20 minutes.

13. Enjoy! These are best served with sweet and sour sauce, and a side of edamame beans.

XXVL

Food Diary 2

Saturday, August 20, 2016
Breakfast:
For breakfast, I had multigrain toast with some vegan butter.  When I say some "some", I mean a lot. I also had a mug of tea, which is perfect for my slight soar throat. My perfect mug of tea consists with an english breakfast tea bag (left in for only a few seconds), a spoonful of sugar (teaspoon, don't worry), and the slightest amount of milk, the amount were it actually seems pointless to even put any in there as it will not effect the taste in the slightest. But it does. To me at least. And, I did have a little piece of a vegan jam tart my aunt made me, which was VERY good. And no, I did not eat all the tarts in the picture, just one. Was it the biggest one? Yes, indeed it was.








Lunch:
I went to Ocean Basket for lunch, with all my sisters and cousins. It was really fun, I stuffed my face, ate fried stuff, and was overall a great big pig! YAY! But, all jokes aside, the fish was very good (Yes, I eat fish), as well as the chips. ESPECIALLY the chips. I also had an ice tea. It was a good time. Sorry I didn't manage to take a snap. It was eaten way to quick! By me.




Dinner:
Since we had a big lunch, we had a small dinner. Just kidding. We ordered in pizza, but I didn't eat too much of mine. I had a calzone without cheese, but it was filled to the brim with mushrooms, which was nice. Overall, all food of the day was VERY good.


Hope you enjoyed todays food diary!
XXVL

The Best Chocolate Chip Cookies

Hi guys! This recipe might just be the holy grail of everything chocolate and cookies. The base of this is from the minimalist baker book, but I have made tweaks that suit me personally. I absolutely adore her book "Everyday Cooking", and it is an absolutely amazing book to have as a vegan. Everything is so fast, simple, and yummy. I have taken some more pictures this time in order to give you very clear step to step instructions, as all steps are necessary and important in this recipe.These cookies are crispy on the outside, soft on the inside and cover inside AND outside your mouth with chocolate. What more could one possibly wish for? As soon as this touches your tastebuds, your frown will MOST definitely turn upside down.





Prep and Cook Time: 50-60 min.
Makes: 15 cookies (various sizes)
Virtuousness Level: 2/10 (apple sauce? Nope)


Ingredients:
2 1/4 cups flour
1/4 cup caster sugar
1/2 cup soft brown sugar
1 1/2 tsp. cornstarch
1/2 cup of any vegan butter (softened)
3 tbsp. HOMEMADE applesauce (I will explain)
11/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1 500g Dark chocolate bar (My fav is Bournville)
1 tsp. Vanilla Extract
1 tsp. Salt

1. Take your chocolate bar , and cut it up into chocolate chips. Aim for a range of different sizes, small to VERY BIG. Once you have achieved the desired size, plop HALF into a bowl, and send to the freezer. This is so that half of your chocolate chips melt into the cookies and half don't melt, and stay big chunks of chocolatey goodness. This gives a really great texture to the cookie.



2. Now to make the apple sauce. It is important that you make this yourself as it gives you the perfect compliment of cinnamon with your cookies, rather than store bought ones that give another sweet element to the cookie. My recipe for the perfect apple sauce will be linked here.

3. Now to start on the actual cookies, you will need your butter to be in a big bowl. Whisk this for around one minute with an electric mixer and 3 minutes by hand. It should be a lot lighter at this stage.



4. Now add in your sugars, and your vanilla, and mix for the same time as before, one minute with an electric mixer and 3 minutes by hand.



5. Add the apple sauce to the mix and beat until incorporated.



6. Set a piece of parchment paper down and and sift your flour, baking powder, baking soda, cornstarch and salt on top of it. Then pour it into the mix and whisk until incorporated.





7. Add in both chocolate chips, fold in, and place the bowl (with some clingfilm over it) into the freezer for around 15 minutes (Now, you CAN place them in the fridge for 30 minutes but thats just another 15 minutes without cookies, and who wants that?)





8. Once the long 15 minutes have gone by, take the dough out and shape into balls around 1 tablespoon full, place on a tray around 1 inch to 2 inches apart. Flatten slightly.

9. Sadly, you must part way with your cookies once more and place them into the freezer again, for another 15 minutes, so that they do not spread too much in the oven, and instead give you a really nice, thick, fudgy cookie instead of a flat one.

10. Preheat oven to 175 degrees celsius.

11.  YAY! Take them out of the freezer and plop them into the oven. Let bake for 12 -13 minutes. Give them time to cool on the tray for around 3 minutes and then transfer to a cooling rack. Don't worry if they are a little soft before coming out of the oven, they will harden when out.



These are so good! I highly recommend that you make these sometime. Today. RIGHT NOW.

XXVL

Apple Sauce

Hi guys! So a few weeks ago I was making Chocolate Chip Cookies and needed to make applesauce for them. I found that making it at home was so easy, and made the cookies even better. So, I thought I would share my recipe for an extremely simple applesauce that spreads the smell of love through your kitchen. Here it is!

Prep ad Cook Time: 5 mins

Makes: 6 tbsp. Applesauce

Virtuousness Level : 10/10

Ingredients

1 apple

2 tsps. cinnamon

A few drops of water

1. Chop up the apple into pieces.

2. Put in a microwave safe bowl, mix with cinnamon, and microwave at 30 second intervals until VERY soft.

3. Blend with a few drops of water until gloopy, but still reasonably thick. It doesn't have to be perfect!

There it is! You can either add it to a recipe or eat it alone (it kind of tastes like baby food). It is a really good recipe, that I se often! Hope you enjoyed!

XXVL

Food Diary 1

Wednesday, August 10, 2016
Breakfast:
I had a reasonably healthy breakfast today, especially since I normally have none at all. 2 peaches and an apple, thrown into a bowl gives you a lot of energy for the rest of the day. Excuse wet hair, as I had gone for a morning swim, not a usual venture, if you must know.





Lunch:
I have had the same lunch for the past couple of weeks, but, I must say, this NEVER gets boring. It is so yummy.  Traditional maltese bread, Conserva (a version of ketchup but better), olives, and spinach. All the different colors ad flavors work so well together, and it is such an easy thing to do. Afterwards I had a cheeky little popsicle. This was one of my childhood popsicles, and brings back so many memories. There is no other way of describing the popsicle, other than: blue. Take from that what you will. 







Dinner:
I ended up going out with my family to a pizza place for dinner, which was extremely pleasant. I had a pasta with clams (I eat seafood as a vegan), which was not that great, but company was lovely. But for some reason, the picture couldn't upload, so I cant show it you.... THESE DAMN ELECTRONICS. 

Hope you guys enjoyed! When I cant bake, I'll do food diaries. Please comment and subscribe!

XXVL

Chia Eggs

Hey guys. I'm going to be giving you some basic how to's for how I make simple vegan things like this. Chia eggs are really helpful to know how to make when cooking vegan. While they may look like literal goop before mixed into the batter, they really do provide that perfect rise in cakes, and I use them a lot. I have found the perfect way to make them, so, I shouldn't be selfish. Let me explain how to make the easy, yet essential yolk like chia egg.

Ingredients:
1 tbs chia seeds (no need to blend!)
5 tbs water (room temperature)



1. MIX TOGETHER AND THATS IT.
2. Oh, and leave for 5 minutes before use.









You really do want that gloopy texture, just like an eg yolk. In a lot of other recipes I have seen, they put around 3 tablespoons of water, but I always put 5, as I find it gives a lot of a less stiff chia egg, as they soak up a lot of the water in 5 minutes.

I hope you guys enjoyed this kind of basic post, if you want to learn more, leave a comment down below. Please subscribe!

XXVL

Vegan Pantry Essentials

Today I will be sharing some of the things you should always have lying around in your pantry and your fridge, what you should buy when going vegan. These things are pretty simple, and you should be able to find these cheeky little things at most supermarkets. If these are too expensive for you, I will be giving out a few alternatives, but I really do recommend using the initials. I will be giving you the price range they are normally in, how good they are for you, how much to have of them at your house at a time, as well as my favorite brands. I hope you guys enjoy using this , and it makes things a tad bit easier, as it can be overwhelming in the beginning.

Vegan Butter

Virtuousness Level: 3/10

Favorite Brand: Alpro Soya

Always have: Around a tub (250 g)

How Much?  1-2 euros

This is something I need in my fridge a lot. While some people might be insanely healthy all the time, thats not me, and if I want to make vanilla cake, I'm probably going to use some of this. One of the good things about this butter is that it is half the calories of regular butter. I know calories is not everything, but its not nothing either! It is great for cakes, pastries, and even just a little on toast. It opens you up to a lot more recipes than just ones involving bananas. Alternatives could be oil, but you must make sure that the liquid to dry ratio is no tipped over the edge. It might react differently with the ingredients. By the way, sorry about the price tag, I forgot to take it off!

Maple Syrup

Virtuousness Level: 5/10

Favorite Brand: Buckwud

Always Have: One Bottle

How Much? 6 euros

Maple syrup is a really great thing to have in the kitchen. It is a lovely sweetener to use, instead of sugar, and actually has some really great health benefits. I definitely recommend it for using on pancakes, in cakes and all that fun stuff. I use it in most of the the things I bake. Alternatives could be agave, but that does not have as much nutritional value as maple syrup does and is the same price.

Vegan Snacks

Virtuousness Level: 1/10

Favorite Brand: (N/A)

Always Have: A packet or so

How Much? 2.50- 3 euros

This is something that I really like having at home in my pantry and can really be interpreted any way. I love to have a really nice easy snack at hime, whether its a pack of raisins, these crackers, some ryvita, anything you want really. It shard to always WANT to have fruit as a snack, so I always like to have a not SO healthy snack running around, ready to go, just in case.

Peanut Butter

Virtuousness Level: 5/10 (Depends)

Favorite Brand: Whole Earth

Always Have: A jar

How Much? 3-4 euros

This is great, not only in cooking but on any type of vehicle. A piece of fresh bread (swoon), a slice of apple, celery, and more. It makes everything good.

Dark Chocolate

Virtuousness Level: 5/10

Favorite Brand: Bournville/Lindt

Always Have: Half a bar

How Much? 2-3 euros

Dark Chocolate is everything. Even if you do not like dark chocolate, keep at it, and you will forget al about milk chocolate. As a starter dark chocolate, Bournville is really nice, because it is sweet. If you really like dark chocolate, Lindt is also nice.

Apple Cider Vinegar

Virtuousness Level: 8/10

Favorite Brand: None

Always Have: Half a bottle

How Much? 2-3 euros

You will soon notice that in basically all vegan baking apple cider vinegar is needed. It is mostly needed in order to create a buttermilk with soy milk, and to help replace the missing eggs. Tis is a very healthy thing to have, as it  prevents colds. In fact, doctors recommend you take shots of this when you have colds coming on, in order to send it off. Substitutions are things like lemon juice or brown rice vinegar, but they don't have the same types of health benefits.

Frozen Strawberries

Virtuousness Level: 8/10

Favorite Brand: None

Always Have: A bag

How Much? 2 euros

These are really great to have. Whether they are for smoothies, popsicles, or anything of the sort, strawberries go with everything, and are such a beautiful and vibrant summer fruit to always have on the go-go. And they are good for you.

Coconut Oil

Virtuousness Level: 7/10

Favorite Brand: Biona

Always Have: Half a jar

How Much?  6 euros

This si really great for cooking. I use it in a lot if my baking, and it is a lot better for you then other oils are. I definitely recommend getting this. If it is too expensive you may use canola oil, but that does not have any health benefits for you, so try not to.

Coconut Milk

Virtuousness Level: 5/10

Favorite Brand: None

Always Have: A can

How Much? 3-4 euros

This is a really nice substitute for milk, that you should really use in ice-cream to achieve a lovely texture, popsicles, and in many baking endeavors. 

Chia Seeds

Virtuousness Level: 9/10

Favorite Brand: Bio Organic

Always Have: A packet

How Much? 7 euros

These are a really great egg replacer in cakes. They have SUCH good health benefits and bring a really great rise to cakes. Find out how to make the perfect chia eggs for my recipes on my blog ( I will link below). You could also use flax, but I prefer chia.

Cocoa Powder

Virtuousness Level: 2/10

Favorite Brand: Cadbury

Always Have: 1 cup

How Much? 2-3 euros

I love having cocoa powder for baking. It a very simple and great thing to have around the house. If you find yourself without you may use chocolate milk powder, but of course, it is not as good. In this picture I show kakao powder which is different (more healthy), and not as sweet as cocoa, but both work pretty well with cakes. Kakao is also more expensive.

Brown Sugar

Virtuousness Level: 1/10

Favorite Brand: Silver Spoon

Always Have: Half a Packet

How Much? 2 euros

Great for baking and sweetening, and is a pretty great price. If you do need to substitute,  just use caster sugar.

Almonds

Virtuousness Level: 9/10

Favorite Brand: none

Always Have: A few handfuls

How Much? 2-3 euros

Almonds are a great healthy snack to have, as well as a great thing to make a trail mix with or sprinkle over things. Other great nuts are cashews.

Almond Milk

Virtuousness Level: 5/10

Favorite Brand: Alpro Soy

Always Have: A carton full

How Much? 2-3 euros

Almond milk is a REALLY great thing to have in the pantry because it is such a great replacer for milk. It is good for you, has  a lovely taste, and stays good for a while. Alternatives can be vanilla soy milk, rice milk, or quinoa milk. This, I have found, is the best though.

Bananas

Virtuousness Level: 10/10

Favorite Brand: Dole

Always Have: 5/6 bananas 

How Much? 2 euros for 5

These really are the ultimate thing to have at your fingertips while you are a vegan. They make great things greater. They are the lord of all food. Not only are they amazing in smoothies, but you can make them into cakes, ice creams, add them to popsicles, freeze with dark chocolate an donuts..... THE WORLD IS YOUR OYSTER. They are amazing and you should ALWAYS have some by your side. When bananas are getting to ripe, or are not ripe enough peel, and throw into a ziplock bag into the freezer, and then you have bananas whenever you want. I always have some in the freezer and in the natural state. Sorry but there aren't any subs for this. These are the ONE AND ONLY.

I hope you guys enjoyed! Any questions that may pop into that beautiful brain of yours, leave down below!

XXVL