Wintery Waffles

Sunday, fun day! Or in this case, Saturday, euhm..., Caturday? You know where this is going. It's the weekend! Time to relax, chill and stuff yourself with sweets for breakfast, lunch and dinner! I'm here with another amazing, if I may say so, breakfast recipe. These warm, pumpkin spice waffles, combined with maple glazed apples are just sweet enough to get you going and spicy enough to warm you to kickstart your day. I tried making the apples with oats and that was also a huge succes. I will gladly admit that this recipe is anything but healthy. But having a little treat once in a while won't do you no harm. Enjoy your weekend kiddos!



Ingredients:
For the waffles
1 1/4 cup all purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
2 tbsp dark brown sugar
1 tbsp maple syrup
1 tbsp sunflower oil
1 1/4 cup water
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp Pumpkin Spice (Recipe here)

For the apples
1 big apple (The ones you use for baking)
1/4 cup of soy butter
2 tbsp maple syrup
A pinch of cinnamon



Method:
For the waffles:
Combine all the dry ingredients really well. While stirring, add all the liquid ingredients. Mix well so you don't get any lumps. Preheat your waffle iron and bake your waffles. These need about 5 minutes each at medium to high temperature.

For the apples:
In a pan, melt the butter. Chop the apple in slices and cover them with cinnamon. When your butter is fully melted, add the apple slices and drizzle some of the maple syrup over them. Bake for about two minutes. Turn the slices, add the rest of the maple syrup and bake until golden brown. You'll see that there is a lot of butter / maple mixture left, you can use this as a syrup on your waffles.



Let me know if you tried these waffles or apples, or both. You can leave me a comment below or use the hashtag #deathstaronamission. Thank you!

Veganize it: Tompouce

Last week I had a discussion with my boyfriend about veganism and the hardest parts about being vegan. I came to the conclusion that off all thing containing milk and eggs, I miss pastry most. Tompouce has always been my favourite and I used to think that every occasion was a good one to celebrate with tompouce. My boyfriend, who used to work at a bakery, made me this vegan version of my favourite pastry and on popular demand I am sharing his recipe here. They are really easy te make so please let me know if you tried these. I must warn you though, this is highly addictive and very bad for you. Enjoy!

Pop Tarts!

While there is still some rhubarb left, I present you pop tarts filled with a rhubarb/strawberry compote.
Ofcourse you can replace this with any compote you like. Let me know if you gave this one a try!




Ingredients:

compote:
2 cups rhubarb, cut into pieces
2 cups strawberries, cut into pieces
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup grapefruit juice
3/4 tsp almond extract
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 tbsp cornstarch

Pop tarts:
2 cups all purpose flour
1/4 tsp salt
2/3 cup cold vegan butter





Method:

Compote
Place all the ingredients in a saucepan over medium heat. Let cook for at least 10 minutes, or until soft.
Stir and smash down with a spoon to muddle the fruit regularly. Transfer to a bowl to cool.





Pop tarts
Preheat the oven to 180°.
Mix flour and salt in a large bowl, cut in butter with a fork until well combined. Drizzle ice cold water over the mixture and mix with a wooden spoon until it forms a dough. Your dough must me moist enough to form into a ball.
Place your ball on a floured surface and shape it into a disc. Use a floured rolling pin to roll into a large rectangle.
Cut into equal squares and transfer them carefully onto a baking sheet. If you reuse your scraps you should get at least 10 squares out of your dough.
Place about 1 tbsp of compote on half of your squares, leaving room on the sides to seal the edges. Use your finger to run water around the edges so the both halfs stick together.
Poke a few holes in the top of each pop tart. Bake them for 20 - 25 minutes until golden brown.
Let cool and finish of with some powdered sugar.





Leftover compote can be used to make this lovely treat!

Enjoy!!

Energy Bomb!

These weeks are the last weeks of school. So for me, as a teacher, this means lots of work and no play. Every now and then I am in a desperate need of an energy boost and since I can't keep sipping coffee I needed something else. This smoothie is an excellent energy booster. It's sweet and kind of healthy and it contains peanut butter (!!). Here's the recipe, enjoy!

'Rhubarb-Coconut Heaven' for breakfast

It's rhubarb season, so I'll be spoiling you with two breakfast recipes in which this vegetable perfectly fits. This week a layered treat, next week poptarts. Rhubarb is one of those ingredients you'll most likely find in a crumble or a pie. But you can do way more with it than just that. Since it's so versatile, you can even use it to make ice-cream or lemonade. Search for rhubarb recipes on Pinterest, you'll find loads of 'em.
I discovered that the rather sour flavour of rhubarb matched with the sweet flavour of coconut way better that I had expected. So I used Provamel's new Soya Coconut to create this layered treat. The new Soya Coconut also works great to create dressings, smoothies and morning 'yoghurt' bowls. Hope you enjoy this one. Let me know if you've tried it!

Carrot cake with lemon buttercream

I must admit, the idea of using vegetables in a sweet pie rather seemed repulsive to me than 'hey, let's try this'. Until a few weeks ago someone put (without my knowing) carrot cake in my mouth. I was sold. The texture, the flavours, the contrast with a sour cream on top, carrot cake has it all. So here's my version and recipe of this lovely pie. I used flaxseed eggs as an egg replacer. This might scare you at first, but they're rather easy to make. Enjoy!





Ingredients
300 ml canola oil
300 g all purpose flour
3 ts gingerbread spice
1/2 tl baking soda
275 g brown sugar
2 flaxseed eggs (2 tablespoons ground flaxseed + 4 tbsp water)
150g grated carrots
60 g raisins
100g slices of pineapple
60g butter (I used Alpro)
200 g icing sugar
lemonjuice
zest of a lemon
1/2 tl vanille flavour


1. Flaxseed eggs



Add 2 tbsp of ground flaxseed with 4 tbsp of water, combine well. Set aside for 10 minutes. (Told you it was easy)

2. Carrot cake



Preheat the oven for 170°.
Mix the dry ingredients in a bowl. Mix the canola oil and flaxseed eggs, add this to the dry ingredients. Add carrots, raisins and pineapple. Place in a round form and bake for about 45 minutes, or longer when necessary.


3. Lemon buttercream



Whisk the butter until creamy. Whisk icing sugar through it.
Add lemon juice, zest of lemon and vanilla. Spread over your pie evenly.







This recipe is adopted from Quinn, S. (2014). ‘Mon premier dîner Végétalien’, Marabout: Hachette Livre.

Cinnamon Rolls

Cinnamon is usually linked with autumn and those first really cold nights. However, spring mornings can just be as cold and dreary as autumn morning. So it's okay if you still serve cinnamon for breakfast in May.

"Something Pink'' breakfast smoothie

This breakfast smoothie is perfect to kickstart the first warmer days of spring or those hot summer days. It's refreshing, sweet and bright coloured. Or you can use it as a mocktail on your summer parties, succes guaranteed!

Oats for breakfast!

Oats are good for you. Not only are they gluten-free, they contain a lot of vitamins, iron and fibres that are good for your body. Plus, you can do so much more with them than just warm them with warm (soy)milk. Like for instance, make oats-pudding for breakfast.





You'll be needing:
- 1 cup oats
- 1 1/2 cup oat milk - I used Oatly's oat milk
- 1 cup yoghurt - I used Provamel's Nature sweetened with agave
- 1/2 tblsp chia
- 1 teaspoon agave
- Cinnamon
- Fruits and nuts to top

Here's the easy part. Mix all the ingredients, except the fruit and nuts to top, and let them cool overnight in your fridge. The next morning you can top your pudding with your favourite fruits, nuts and granola. Easy to make, healthy and yummy in your tummy. You can thank me later!







This recipe is originally from Alpro's Creative Kitchen booklet.

Lemon Poppy Seed Muffin

Lemon Poppy Seed Muffins are my all time favourite muffins. They are just the right amount of sweet combined with just the right amount of sour. They are perfect for spring/summer days. And you can either have them for breakfast and pretend that they're healthy due to the lemon, or you can have them with your afternoon tea. Top them with a lemon based icing and I can guarantee you that everyone will love you. Here's the recipe*:

Green - greener - green breakfast smoothie

Vegetables for breakfast? I admit, at first I thought it a bit funny as well. But having veggies for breakfast is quite good for you! Especially when we're talking veggies such as spinach. Here's the recipe for the green breakfast smoothie I made this morning:



Ingredients:
2 cups of spinach leaves
1 green apple
Half a melon
1 tsp spirulina (optional)


Blend everything.

Sunday brunch

Ever heard of BE Vegan? No? Well if you're vegan and based in Belgium, you should have!
BE Vegan is a (relatively) new organisation whose main goal is promoting and informing about vegan lifestyle in Belgium. Do take a look on their Facebook page because they have a lot of interesting things going on over there such as information about this new vegan store, Veggieshop, opening in Ostend, but also a lot of fun events. Such as the one I attended last Sunday.

Breakfast with Sense

Last week I attended a workshop on vegan breakfast hosted by Sense. Sense is a vegan organisation focused on (university) students (in Ghent). Their main goal is to inform these students on veganism. They do this by organising debates and discussion evenings, screening documentaries and movies on animal rights, organising workshops,...

How to: Vegan strawberry mousse

When I think about summer, I think about strawberries and strawberry mousse. I picked up this recipe on a family gathering and have sticked to it ever since. It’s a simple, easy to make recipe that lends itself for other varieties. Think about all the fruits you could use for this one.

You’ll need:

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-Fresh strawberries (500 g)
-Vegan whipped cream (I used Alpro Soya for this one) (250 ml
-Some sugar (3 teaspoons)

You can make about 6 portions with these ingredients.



Recipe:

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First of all you put the strawberries in a blender so you’ll get a smooth, hot pink juice. Then you add the sugar and cream and whip them up till you get a nice and smooth substance. Last of all you add the strawberry juice to the whipped cream and whip up some more.

I do recommend putting the strawberry mousse an hour or two in the fridge before serving.





As I’ve said before, you can make this with practically any fruit that blends nicely into a juice.