Thursday 23 August 2012

Roast Sweet Potatoes with Salted Spinach

Here's a nice vegan recipe that takes very little effort to prepare. A great alternative to the standard baked potato.

Ingredients-
Sweet Potatoes
Oil
Salt
Spinach

Method - Preheat the oven to 180°c. Pierce the potatoes several times with a fork, brush evenly with olive oil and a light sprinkling of salt before placing in the oven. The potatoes will take around 40mins to 1hr to cook through depending on size. The best method for checking if they are ready is to pierce the skins with a fork again, if the fork goes through to the centre without too much force, they are ready to serve. 

To cook the spinach, simply add to a pan, add around 4-6 tablespoons of water to the pan and heat gently for around 5 minutes or until the spinach begins to wilt. 

Serve the potatoes with the spinach on top, a little salt to add to the flavour and a side salad. 


  
Served with a seasonal salad, British green beans and roast vine ripened tomatoes.

JAB

Tuesday 21 August 2012

Quesadillas and Homemade Guacamole

First up on Rocket Bean is an awesomely tasty recipe for quesadillas and homemade guacamole that serves 4 people. This also makes a great snack that can be eaten cold.



I'm currently looking at ways to make this recipe vegan friendly without the use of vegan cheese (not a huge fan of it) so watch this space. As with any recipe using fresh chilies, increase/decrease the quantities to your own personal taste and leave in the chilli seeds if you want it really spicy. Also, fresh coriander makes a huge difference to the taste of the guacamole and so it's worthwhile seeking out.


Guacamole
Ingredients-
2x Avocados
10-12 vine ripened cherry tomatoes, chopped
½ bunch of coriander, finely chopped (or 2tsp of dried coriander leaf)
3x cloves of garlic, finely chopped
1-3 chillies, finely chopped
1x lime, juice only
Salt and pepper, to taste 
Note: you can also add spinach to make the mixture go further.



Method - Very quick and easy to make. Halve and stone the avocados and spoon out the flesh into a blender (or a container suitable for use with a hand blender), add in the rest of the ingredients, squeezing the lime juice over the top of the contents. Now blend and the guacamole is ready to serve. Salt and pepper can be added after blending to taste. 

You can also simply mash all the ingredients together using a fork if you prefer a more chunky dip.




Finely chop the garlic and chillies before adding to the blender.




Chilli Mushroom and Bean Quesadillas

Ingredients-
8x flour tortillas
1x onion, grated
2x garlic cloves, grated
chilli powder
olive oil for frying
1x can of kidney beans, drained and mashed
1x can of butter beans, drained and mashed
1x chilli, finely chopped
1x red pepper, sliced into strips
200g strong cheddar, grated
250g mushrooms, sliced
tin foil






Method - Add the olive oil to the pan and heat to a medium temperature.



Next, add the grated onion, garlic and chilli powder to the pan with a little salt and fry gently for 10 mins, allowing to brown over the heat. Add the chopped chilli and mushrooms and continue to cook for around 5 mins until the mushrooms soften.


Preheat the oven to 180°c.







Drain the beans and mash together in a pan. 

Canned beans will generally not need to be cooked for this recipe and will be soft enough to mash straight from the can. Dried beans can be used instead but will need to be soaked overnight before being cooked and mashed. 


Once cooked place a tortilla onto a sheet of tin foil and then layer on the mashed beans, chilli mushroom mix, peppers and grated cheese spreading evenly across the tortilla and top with a second tortilla. Now place another sheet of foil on top of that tortilla repeating the layers until you have used all tortillas and filling (making a stack of 4 quesadillas).






Place the stack in the preheated oven for 15-20mins until the cheese has melted and the tortillas have started to go crisp around the edges. Remove from the oven and cut into quarters, serve with guacamole and side salad.






Enjoy, and feel free to leave feedback or let me know your thoughts should you try any recipes out!


JAB

Sunday 19 August 2012

Welcome to Rocket Bean!


Welcome to Rocket Bean, a place for me to keep track of my Veggie-Vegan recipes and to share them with the world.

Enjoy!

JAB