Purple Sprouting Broccoli and Sweet Potato (with Vegan Black Pudding)

I no longer have an allotment plot and presently I don't have much growing in my back garden plot at the moment, so I have decided to trial Riverford Organic Farmers Vegetable Box for a month.

The Riverford Vegetable Box scheme began when Guy Watson began delivering vegetableses locally to 30 friends in Devon. It now delivers around 47,000 boxes a week to homes around the UK.  Riverford delivers to most of England and South Wales.  

I chose the medium vegetable box which has eight organic varieties which was recommended for 2 - 3 people. This week the vegetable box contained: Purple Sprouting Broccoli, Fennel Bulb, Sweet Potatoes, Carrots, Courgettes, Onions, Oakleaf Lettuce and Tomatoes.  It was hard to know what to cook with first, I finally settled on the Purple Sprouting Broccoli - a seasonal star, I should know I used to grow some and the sweet potatoes.

I decided to make a Warm Purple Sprouting Broccoli and Sweet Potato Salad with Hazelnuts that were given to me by a friend. To make this warm salad more of a substantial dish, I finished it off with some sliced of vegetarian black pudding, but that is optional. This certainly made a welcome change from our boring lettuce, cucumber and tomato salad. 

I am sharing this Purple Sprouting Broccoli and Sweet Potato Salad with Soups, Salads and Sammies hosted by Kahakai Kitchen. 

Warm Purple Sprouting Broccoli and Sweet Potato Salad with Hazelnuts
Serves 3 - 4 as a starter; or 2 - 3 as a main dish
Ingredients
2 medium sweet potatoes peeled and chopped into bite size cubes
1 tablespoon olive oil
250g purple sprouting broccoli
3 tablespoons hazelnuts, lightly toasted and roughly chopped
salt and pepper to taste
Optional: Sprouted alfalfa for garnishing
Optional: vegetarian black pudding
For the dressing
4 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
1 teaspoon maple syrup (or honey)
2 cloves garlic, crushed
Salt and pepper to taste
Method
Preheat the oven to gas mark 6/200oc.
Toss the sweet potato cubes with the oil and spread onto a baking tray.  
Roast for 20 minutes, remove from the oven, gently stir and return it to the oven until soft and beginning to brown around the edges.
Steam the Purple Sprouting Broccoli as you would do asparagus, until tender.
Drain of excess liquid. Transfer to a bowl. 
Put all the dressing ingredients into a small bowl and whisk well. 
Pour over the steamed purple sprouting broccoli and gently stir with a spatula to coat well.
To serve
Evenly distribute the Purple Sprouting Broccoli between the plates.
Then pile on the sweet potato cubes and sprinkle over the chopped hazelnuts.
Season with salt and pepper to taste.
Finish off with optional: alfalfa and cooked black pudding. 

If I have tempted you to try a Riverford Organic vegetable box, then please visit the Riverford website. The Riverford website is very extensive and has a FAQ to answer your questions in relation to having a vegetable box delivered to your front door.  For those of you who live overseas there may be something similar happening in your country; or there is always the farmers market. 

Riverford in South Wales is run by Jon and Janet Mier.  You will often find them and their knowledgeable staff at food events across Wales.  If you would like to keep up to date with news from Riverford South Wales, then follow them on Facebook and Twitter.  

Disclaimer: I was kindly given the medium vegetable box worth £14.85 by Riverford South Wales, in return for a plant based recipe using seasonal and organic vegetables from the box.  All views and opinions are my own. 

Savoury Mosaic Polenta Cake with Black Pudding

Its been a while since I have cooked with polenta.  Its often Polenta Chips or my favourite Mexican style Tamale Pie , and then other times  maybe a gluten free Polenta Pizza, or simply as polenta bites a sort of free-style rough gnocchi. 

I wanted to be creative with this time round and decided to make a Savoury Polenta loaf studded with diced red, green and orange pepper.  Then I remembered having picked up a vegan Black Pudding and decided to incorporate that into the loaf and this was the result.     

It looks just like a gold churned butter slab or Mexican style cheese, but wait .... 

Slowly slice into it and surprise.

D loved it and said I could even try these with the vegan chorizo I make at home.  Or if you must other sausages would work too I am sure; or not, you can make this Savoury Mosaic loaf without the vegan black pudding.  Just experiment that is what I do. Sometimes they work, sometimes they do not.    

Ramiro Pepper and Harissa Tomato Potatoes with Black Pudding

I do love the superman red vibrating from this dish naturally.  

Red from the tomatoes (and yes, tomatoes are a fruit) and red from the peppers.  I actually made this dish around the same time as the Ramiro pepper and Black Bean Chilli last month, 

I had originally planned to make these Portuguese Potatoes, but got distracted by the pointy red peppers  and fabulous fat tomatoes caressing each other in my bowl, that i had to throw them in the pot together - not to have done so would have just been plain wrong.  

These days I always seem to have some vegan VPud Black Pudding in my fridge too.  Every time I go into the city of Cardiff I pick some up.  I decided just to simply pan fry the slices to finish off this rather red dish. Its not essential for the recipe, but I think it makes it more of a hearty meal or bunch.  It was really quite delicious. 

Sauteed Edamame Beans with Vegan Black Pudding

I picked up some vegan VPud Black Pudding the last time I went into the city of Cardiff.  

I had no ideas of what I was going to do with it, but I knew I had developed a liking for it especially at the weekend for a greasy veggie fry-up.   It makes for a nice change from the usual veggie sausages. 

This is a brunch dish, though you could happily have it in the evening.  The potatoes are chopped small into little cubes, then baked in the oven with a little oil until golden crispy,  a bit like hash browns or crispy croutons.  The final dish reminded me of one of those meals that would hit the spot if you had a hangover from the night before, if you get my drift.  But its a little more healthier, or seems that way - instead of baked beans we have edamame, soya, broad beans and peas sauteed and instead of veggie bangers we have pan fried vegan black pudding. If you can't find VPud Black Pudding where you are, either omit it or sub it with something else. 

Vegan Black Pudding and Sweet Potato Spelt Flour Galette

I am not a lazy person when it comes to making pastry from scratch. I make pies all the time, but I wanted to make a different style of pastry this time, both easier and perhaps lighter. I've been enjoying making sweet Galettes with homegrown fruit, so a savoury one was just waiting to be eagerly made.

Its my first time baking with spelt flour, and I thought it would be a lot more sturdy to hold the filling,, but the recipe I followed from a blog that I hadn't previously used a recipe from, sadly the pastry just collapsed and crumbled.  Despite the spelt pastry falling apart, the pastry was crisp and biscuity in texture and this balanced well with the sweetness coming from the roasted sweet potatoes.

As I had really enjoyed VPud 'Black Pudding' last time, I was very keen to get my hands on some more to make this particular galette as I have been imagining this combo would work well together. And it did, the vegan Black Pudding surprising spice  kick offsets the sweetness from the orange sweet potatoes beautifully, and the red onions just give it that additional contrast. I would be more than happy to make this again, just with a more reliable spelt pastry recipe. I have recently made one with a mixture of plain flour and spelt flour, so the recipe which I share below is still in its testing stage, so subject to change.

I think the colours in this Galette compliment Vegan Mofo's prompt today which happens to be 'Autumn Equinox Eats'.  The colours are orange, gold, and dusky dark brown - the colour of changing autumnal leaves.  Autumn is my favourite season. I look forward to pulling on my jumpers and cardigans, gloves,  crochet mitts and various knitted hats. I am sharing this Galette with Fabulous Foodie Fridays. and The Pastry Callenge as my Galette base, although an unsucessful one was made from scratch. It is hosted by United Cakedom and Jen's Food. 

Ratatouille with VPud Black Pudding and Polenta Cakes

As much as I enjoy watching Ratatouille the animation movie, I have to confess that I have never ever actually liked eating ratatouille.  Every time I have ever had it its been overcooked, maybe it is mean't to be that way, but then I find it not pleasant and mushy suitable for children.  

I've even tried the Cypriot version known as Briami and the Turkish version known as Turlu and I still wasn't converted.  

That was well over 5 years ago, and  I am always willing to give things another try, as tastes mature, dont they?!. 

Truth is I had not intended on making ratatouille, but I found myself with vegetables that just shouted make ratatouille with us.  

So these vegetables were chopped and stewed with some herbs and chopped tomatoes transferred to a casserole pot to simmer away slowly.   

I know squash is not traditional in a Ratatouille, but I had half a butternut squash in the fridge that had to be used, so I added it to the post.  Its an optional extra.

It was suggested to me to serve the ratatouille with crusty bread, but I opted to make some griddled polenta cakes cut in the shape of flowers of course.  Let me assure you that the above (pictured) polenta did not go to waste, it was enjoyed the following day.

When I placed the polenta in the fridge to set,  I was reminded of this V Pud - Vegetarian Black Pudding that I picked up a couple of weeks back.   I've had V Pud - Vegetarian Black Pudding  a few times when I lived in Scotland  see here.  I have to admit I was not overly keen on it then as I found it a little powdery, but for old times sake (Thankful for my time in Scotland) I decided trying it again.  I had not expected to use it an an accompaniment to this meal though, but it worked.  For me the star of the dish was actually the VPud - it was much spicier and textured than I remembered.  It was very reminisce of vegetarian haggis too.   I wondered if the recipe has been improved, if so - so much the better as I will definitely be picking some more up when I see it again.   

As for the ratatouille,  do you remember at the start I said I didn't like ratatouille.  Well, honestly I still feel the same about it.  Its not a dish I will be making again in a hurry. 

For those of you who have not watched Ratatouille here is the link to the trailer.

The 'Vegetarian' Black Pudding

Now any tourist who has had the joy of ordering a full English or Scottish fry-up breakfast will have seen their plate embellished with a burned piece of disc known as black pudding, this normally gets pushed to the edge of the plate. This is not unusual, alongside jellied eels and tripe, the black pudding is reputed to be one of the least palatable dishes amongst us British. Black pudding is a fat, round sausage-like product. It is traditionally made from fresh blood, pork back-fat, oatmeal, barley, flour, rusk, onion and a blend of herbs and spices.
So you can imagine my surprise when I learned in 2006 that a Vegetarian Black Pudding had been launched by The Real Lancashire Black Pudding Company's. Now the vegetarians amongst us may have felt a bit smug that something had been invented with our diet in mind, but the truth was the ingredients of fresh pig’s blood and ox intestines in a black pudding put off even the most hardcore of carnivores, so the aim of the inventor was to create an alternative that would win back this squirming audience.

In an interview the company's owner, Andrew Holt, explained how he substituted the meat components of the pudding, namely the fat, blood and ox intestines. 'We tried to make a liquid which would simulate the properties of blood and get the right colour as well. We used beetroot and caramel for the colouring, with GM-free whey and soya powders for the protein'. Just reading that made my stomach turn, anyway, the feedback received from regular black pudding connoisseurs and celebrity chefs was that the 'V Pud' was very similar in taste to the real stuff.

Many of you will be interested to note that The V Pud is approved by the Vegetarian Society in the U.K. I know many vegetarians and vegans, who have made a conscious choice about their diet, will be bewildered as to why would a person who prides themselves on eating vegetables would even consider buying something specifically created to resemble meat. But at the same time, I know of many vegetarians and vegans, including myself whom have products on their plate which impersonate meat such as: seitan (wheat gluten) meatloaf; tempeh bacon, TVP meatballs, Quorn ‘chicken’ or Tofu Turkey, as was the case over Christmas. I have even come across a vegan version of black pudding by Linda Majzlik's. The truth of the matter is that many vegetarians and vegans object to the rearing conditions of the animal, not necessarily the taste or texture.

I consider myself an adventurous diner (as long as it is suitable for vegetarians), so after years of ignoring the 'V Pud' – Black pudding in the refrigerated section of specialist shops, I finally succumbed primarily out of curiosity. As with most of these products, the ingredients are a guarded secret, but the 'V Pud' does contain wheat gluten, beetroot powder and some milk products. I found it soft, moist, a little oozy with a powdery aftertaste. It is not particularly spicy and has a flavour of its own, something that I cannot compare. Would I purchase the 'V Pud' again? Yes, I think I would and perhaps moreso as a talking point for when friends and family were over, for the novelty factor of a vegetarian Black Pudding (much in the same vain as the Macsweens vegetarian Haggis which is more popular than the 'real' haggis).

So that you know, this particular vegetarian product is being sold by large meat-based company whose focus is not the vegetarian’s diet, but a marketing strategy. Perhaps this 'vegetarian' and 'vegan' dietary gap should be redressed by a small business that wholeheartedly has vegetarians and vegans in mind. But I fall in between these two as I think we should praise the forward thinking of these companies. These companies are in an influential position to mainstream vegetarian products; and by doing so encourage other large companies to produce quality vegetarian and vegan alternatives.

I know this vegetarian black pudding does not contain an ounce of fresh vegetable, however I am a firm believer that vegetable based dishes should be made available to everyone who wishes to try it, not just those who choose to wear the labels.

To end, have you tried 'V Pud' black Pudding? If not would you? I would love to hear from you.