Vegan Grilled Cheese and Sausage Sandwich

This rates pretty damned high on my list of grilled cheese sandwiches, and is, in my opinion, essential junk food to learn to make. You can use any vegan sausages you like, though I currently have a preference for the Quorn vegan Cumberland variety. This is a greatly satisfying lunch or supper that the kids…

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Rhubarb and Red Onion Chutney

Chutneys are not something I make that often, and when I do they are usually the quick variety that don’t require hours of cooking. This one is somewhere in the middle. The cooking time is about 90 minutes, the majority of which is just gentle simmering that frees you up to get on with something…

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Roast Portobello Mushrooms with Cannellini Beans

Roasting large, flat mushrooms in the oven captures their natural flavour in its entirety. A rub of olive oil, a little salt and pepper and twenty minutes on a medium-high heat is all it takes to achieve simplistic perfection. I created this dish around that desire for simplicity, with the addition of beans and leaks,…

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No Bake Lime and Spirulina Cheesecake

For me, spirulina is one of those ingredients you buy with good intentions, use a little of, and the rest lies at the back of the cupboard waiting to be discovered in some future archaeological dig. With that in mind I was faced with either writing a secret message for future generations to unearth, or…

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Easy Chestnut Mushroom, New Potato and Leek Pie

I’ve created this pie with ready-to-roll pastry to make it as easy and non-time-consuming as possible. You can, of course, make your own pastry if you prefer, but the idea behind this is to keep it simple. Chestnut mushrooms are easily accessible and a perfect size for a chunky pie, when cut either in half…

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Three Ways with Pizza

I was thirteen years old when I first learned to make pizza. I was visiting family in Leicester when, on a visit to a book store, I came across Antonio Carluccio’s An Invitation to Italian Cooking. I bought the book, published the year before, after a brief flick-through of its glossy pages, and set to…

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Pumpkin and Lemon Drizzle Cake

If you had frozen any pumpkin from the autumn season, then you’ll be able to get some out of the freezer for this recipe. If not, butternut squash will make a good substitute. The squash won’t be quite as moist as the pumpkin, so you may need to add a little more moisture into the…

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Coffee, Banana and Walnut Pie

This is a wonderful chilled, sweet pie that uses tofu as its base. Tofu is great for taking on the properties of eggs when baking tarts and pies as it sets firmly, like an egg-based pie would. The dessert is gluten-free, but you can use a standard vegan pastry base if you have no issues…

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Vegan Cheese, Ham and Sundried Tomato Slices

These are basically vegan pasties, which is kind of like the Holy Grail of vegan junk food. At the time of writing this I haven’t been able to find any that you can buy (although the recent arrival of the Greggs sausage roll is a welcome step in the right direction). So, until the day…

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