Masterchef round-up and vegan meals in 5 minutes or less

It's been a little bit since I've blogged.  I've been busy on a few other projects, including renovating my home over a geological time-scale.  This installment: Lovely curtains for my sun-room/library!

I'll confess, the only reason that throw-rug is folded so nicely is because my cleaner did it last week.  I can't bear to touch it now.

I'm loving Masterchef this week.  Tonight I perched on my couch, eating my 5 minute noodle salad (recipe to follow in this blog) when they put on a food challenge that couldn't possibly be more opposite than the meal I was eating.  The "dude food" challenge was completely awesome. 

Can dude food be vegan? Sure!  Dude food isn't just stuff wrapped in bacon and deep fried.  It's also stuff coated in sugar and deep fried, or even deep fried food on a stick.  In my opinion the ideal dude food should go great with a beer, or go great after about ten beers.  It should be prepared with absolute disregard for caloric content or nutritional balance.  It should have intense flavour. 

 So, if I were making dude food vegan:  I would make: mini  okonomyaki (fried japanese vegetable pancakes), beer-battered whole button mushrooms and mini-deep-fried pumpkin cakes.  I would serve it with vegan mayo, that has teriyaki sauce swirled through it; topped with fried shallots and garlic.  I'd provide extra-long cocktail sticks with it so the "dude" could load each of the three bite-size items onto a single stick and chow the whole thing down with mayo coated goodness. 

Why am I not making this rather than just describing it? Because I live by myself (with three cats). I can eat a lot for a small(ish) person, but even I have limits.  Amina made sushi and got sent through to the elimination round tomorrow; rightfully so.  Amina, I love you to bits and think you're an awesome cook but sushi is not dude food and dude food is not your thing.  It's all good though as I'm sure she'll use the opportunity to absolutely mop the floor with "Andrew" and make sure that silly bloody twit goes home.  That guy could fuck up toast I have no idea how he's managed to hang on in the competition this far.

Earlier in the week the Masterchef team catered for a Hindu wedding.  I'm not going to re-create or blog any of their dishes here as Hindu culture is a vegetarian (but not vegan) culture already.  Some of the recipes in that episode looked like they would have been vegan by eye: The Aloo tiki, Gobi 65, Eggplant chips, and the okra tamarind curry.  Google Masterchef, they usually have the recipes on their website.  

The challenge recently that really caught my interest though was the "5 minute challenge" Can you walk into your kitchen, and walk out 5 minutes later with a meal that's completely ready to eat? It's actually a tough challenge.  Even making a salad can take longer than 5 minutes if you're not prepared and organised in the kitchen.  I'll break down my work into 1 minute intervals so you can see how I did it.  I'm lucky that when I bought my house, I basically bought the kitchen size and layout I wanted, and am slowly dealing with the rest of the house that's around that kitchen. As a result My layout of fridge, pantry, preparation area and stove-top are perfectly arranged to cut down on excess doubling-back across the room while preparing food.  You may struggle to get this done in 5 minutes or less if your kitchen is cramped, poorly laid out, or if you're not totally organised.

Here's my  first 5 minute meal, a Japanese style spinach salad.

Minute 1:

Turn on a stove element to high heat, place a fry-pan on the stove to heat up.

Go to your pantry and get the following items.

-Wallnuts (about a hand full will do)

-Sesame seeds (about half a hand full)

-Rice wine vinegar

-Sesame oil

-vegetable oil (I used rice bran oil)

-Soy sauce

-Nori sheet (1 sheet)

Go back to the stove top.

Place the wallnuts and sesame seeds in the fry pan to toast.

Place the other pantry items on the bench.

Stopped the clock for a 1 minute progress check.

Minute 2

Go to the fridge and get the following items.

Fresh spinach leaves

pickled ginger

lime juice (squeezy bottle)

Take these items to your bench/preparation area.

Go to your cupboard and get the following items

Chopping board

Salad bowl.

My knife is on a knife block at my prep area, if yours is somewhere else go and get it now.

Quickly wash the spinach (I just ran it under the tap in my hands)  shake it dry and place it in the salad bowl.

Give the fry-pan with the nuts and sesame seeds a quick shake and make sure nothing is burning.

Progress at 1:45, 15 sec to wash spinach and put in salad bowl.

Minute 3

Remove a few pieces of pickled ginger from the jar, place them on your chopping board. 

Dice them finely, then add to the salad.  

Take one nori sheet and crumble it, using both hands over the salad.  

Turn off the stove, leave the nuts and seeds to cool.

Go to a cupboard and find a screw-top jar.

Minute 4:

In this minute we are making a salad dressing; you don't need to measure the ingredients accurately to get it right.  Salad dressings are most often a 3:1 oil:acid mixture.  Other stuff you add to it is usually just seasoning.  I didn't measure my dressing, I just added the components by eye, gave it a good shake and tasted it to make sure I was happy with it.

Into your jar place

6 drops sesame oil.

Make up to "3 parts" with rice-bran oil.

Add "1 part" rice wine vinegar (ie if you used 100ml of oil, then you will need about 30ml of vinegar)

Add a small splash of soy sauce

Add a small squirt of lime juice.

Put the lid on the jar, shake.

Remove lid, taste, adjust if needed.

Forgot to stop the clock, also forgot to rotate the image. Sorry.

 Minute 5

Tip the nuts and seeds from the fry pan over the salad.

pour some of the salad dressing over the salad. (I made a lot of extra dressing in that jar, as I know it will keep to be re-used in other things)

Give it a quick stir-through.

I used the last thirty seconds to get myself a glass of OJ to go with the salad, and to take this picture.

Nutritious, satisfying meal in 5 minutes or less.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Voila!  If you can stand spending 7 minutes in your kitchen, you could have thrown some tofu or tempeh into the fry-pan with the nuts and seeds for a bit of extra 'oomph'

But wait, there's more.

I can also make a noodle salad in 5 minutes or less.  I used some of the left-over salad dressing from the Japanese style salad (with a slight modification)

Minute 1.

Put about 500ml of water in your kettle, put it on to boil.

Get a bowl and place it on the bench next to the kettle.

Go to your pantry and get the following items.

Vermicelli bean thread noodles.

Place the noodles in the bowl

This is enough noodles for a big batch, each 'bunch' of noodles is enough for 1 serve.

My neighbour's cat was so intrigued by my efforts he decided to have a peek at what I was up to. 

He's not here to borrow a cup of sugar.

Minute 2

Go to your fridge and get the following items.

Bean shoots

1 Carrot

1 red capsicum

spinach leaves

Your left over salad dressing from the Japanese style salad

Fresh ginger

1 fresh chilli

Place them on your bench.

Get your

chopping board

knife

grater

a plate

Take 1cm of ginger, cut the skin off and grate it
Finely dice the chilli
Open the salad dressing jar, place the chilli and ginger inside, put the lid back on give it a shake.

Minute 3:
Grate the carrot
Finely chop the capsicum
roughly chop the spinach leaves.

Minute 4
drain the noodles
place a hand-full of bean shoots on the plate (or a bowl is fine if you like, it doesn't matter.)
top with the noodles
add the other vegetables, stir/toss with a fork.

Minute 5
pour the salad dressing over the top.  Again, if you can spring for 7 minutes in the kitchen you could do some grilled tofu or something similar to chuck over the top to add a bit more "oomph"

5 minute noodle salad.

Done! you now have the knowledge needed to produce a healthy meal in 5 minutes or less.  Just think about the amount of time it takes to get "fast food".... You have to drive to the shop, order... collect food, pay, drive home. Even if you lived next door to a fast food shop you'd be hard pressed to get door-to-door with a meal in under 5 minutes.  I actually had this one done in 4 minutes 10 sec; as I saved time by using the left-over salad dressing from yesterday's Japanese salad.  The last 50 sec in minute 5, I used to put the extra noodle salad into plastic containers to take into work for lunch during the week. 

I'll count this one as another vegan win.  2 meals, completed in 5 minutes or less. Both tasty and satisfying.  Give them a go and let me know how it went for you?  Can you take the 5 minute vegan meal challenge?

Megan makes Masterchef pub food challenge vegan

I love a good pub meal.  Who doesn't?

Traditionally a pub meal was one of three things: Banger's n' mash (and gravy if it was a particularly good pub) Rissole'n'veg (there's something about the sound of that word... go on say it out loud, with an Aussie accent. "Rissole")  or steak.  Either on a plate, or in a sandwich.

Over the years pub food has gotten a bit fancier; but overall has stayed true to several very clear concepts.  A pub meal is a generous portion of satisfying food that's easy to make and appealing to just about everyone's tastes, and is best washed down with a pint of your favorite beer.  Usually with some form of chips on the side.  I'm serious.  I once had a pub meal that consisted of :sweet and sour deep fried tofu (and in a country pub too!) with rice... and a side of chips'n'salad.

I toyed with the idea of blogging something for the Masterchef seduction challenge earlier this week; but then quickly realised a couple of things.  Firstly, me giving advice on seduction would be like... well like me giving you advice on how to cook the perfect steak.  Clearly, a lady who lives alone (with her cats) is not the one to be suggesting the perfect seductive dessert.

Also, the ingredient combinations on offer were a struggle... Option 1, Strawberries and cream is out... I can't use the cream.  Option 2, Champagne and Caviar, I can't use the caviar, and if I need to resort to copious amounts of alcohol to to seduce someone then I might just go for the time honoured technique of a long island ice tea and the light switch. (the long island ice tea is for them, the light switch is for me)  Option 3, chocolate and roses.  My most promising yet.  Sadly, one hiccup.  My blog rules require me to only use food available from a regular supermarket.  Your local woolies does have flowers at the front of the shop for sale, including roses.  Unfortunately the roses sold for visual gifts are not good for eating.  I don't have any roses (of decent size and appearance) in my yard yet, so couldn't use roses either.

I suppose I could leave a Hansel and Gretel style trail of chocolate bits leading all the way to my bedroom, you know... just on the off chance?....

Luckily for us all, another episode of Masterchef came out before I could order the ACME "catch yourself someone beautiful and amazing" kit.

So, my vegan pub meal is going to tick all the boxes.  It's easy to make, delicious, suits a wide range of tastes and goes great with a frosty cold beer.  I'm going to show you how to make a tempeh burger with satay sauce, and a side of really great potato wedges. Perfect way to kick off the Queens birthday long weekend in our nation's capital.

The first thing I do is get the potato wedges going.

I pre-heat my oven to 180C then put a pot of water on the stove to boil.

Potato Wedge preparation.  Frosty cold beer in the background.

Then you need to cut your potatoes into wedge shapes.

Be generous, I used about 500 grams of potatoes here. If you end up with left over potato wedges at the end they freeze and re-heat just fine.

Once you've cut your spuds, the water should be boiling by about now.  Put the potato wedges in for about 10-12 minutes.  This will pre-cook the potatoes before baking them, and help them have a really nice fluffy texture inside once they're finished.

While the potato wedges are boiling you can get started on the satay sauce.  I used a commercial thai red curry paste to get the balance of chilli and spices just right.  If you're not in the mood for cooking you could just use a commercial satay sauce if you want; but I find them a bit insipid... nowhere near enough chilli kick for my taste.

I put a pot on the stove, turn it up to high heat and add 2 dessert spoons of the Thai red curry paste.  If you're cooking this for a vegan, or with the intent of making the dish completely vegan then check the labels when buying the curry paste, traditionally it will contain non vegan things like shrimp paste and fish sauce.  Happily I've found a brand at the local woolies that's okay for vegans, it's in a jar in the Asian food aisle.

Follow the curry paste with 1 cup (250ml) of coconut cream.  Stir until combined.  Mine looked like this.

No satay sauce is complete without some peanutty goodness.  I add a very generous quarter cup of peanut butter to my sauce.  I want it to be really thick and rich.  Stir the peanut butter through until the sauce mixture is completely homogeneous.  You can then turn the stove element under the sauce off.

By now, the potatoes should be boiled.  Drain the water, give the pot a shake with a forwards-backwards arm motion.  This will rough up the surface of the potato wedges a bit and help them have a nice crispy outside when cooked.

Dump the spuds into an oven/roasting pan and drizzle with a generous amount of oil.  They don't need to be swimming in it, but you want all of your wedges nicely coated.  I sprinkled mine with a bit of salt, parsley and dry/powdered garlic, gave it another vigorous back and forth shake, then put it in the oven.

I'm sorry but here's the bad news.  These spuds will take anywhere between 40 minutes and one hour to cook.  They are worth the wait though.

Go away for between 20 and 30 minutes.  The rest of this dish is really quick to put together.  Have a beer, put your feet up, you get the drill.  I used the time wisely; watching my cats stalking each other.

I probably should have gotten the shopping bags out of shot first huh....

Once you're back in the kitchen check on the potato wedges and give the roasting pan a bit of a shake.

Then, it's time to prepare the Tempeh.  WTF is tempeh? I hear you say.

It's this:

Tempeh

Tempeh is made from soy beans.  It was invented in Indonesia.  Tempeh is great grilled and fried and some people say it has a slightly nutty flavour.  To me, it just tastes like tempeh. I really like the stuff.  If you give the recipe on this blog a go you can find out what it tastes like for yourself.

I cut the tempeh to make my ideal burger shape.

I actually take the piece in the foreground, and slice it down the middle (like the way you cut a sponge cake before you put the cream in the middle)

The great thing about tempeh is that it's perfectly fine to eat raw if you want.  You don't need to worry about cooking times.  In fact, I put mine in my sandwich press to grill it on both sides at once.  It took just a few minutes, not long at all.

While the Tempeh is in the Sandwich press I got a turkish bread roll and cut it in half.

Hey Megan: I just stopped worrying about losing my 'domestic goddess' crown to you.

You'll keep Nigella.

I sit the roll on top of the sandwich press to warm the bread up a bit while the tempeh is cooking.

Turkish bread... I love you so much.

Then I prepare some quick salad ingredients to go with the burger.  I use baby spinach, grated carrot and tomato.  You can use anything you like or have handy.  I also turn the stove on low for the satay sauce, giving it a quick stir through and making sure it's warm.

Finally, my long awaited potato wedges are ready.  I assemble my meal.

Megan makes the masterchef pub food challenge vegan.

There it is in all it's basic but satisfying glory.  Perfectly cooked potato wedges, crispy on the outside, fluffy on the inside.  Grilled tempeh burger with some salad, smothered with freshly made satay sauce.

This meal, a frosty beer and the L-word made my Friday night pretty awesome.

Give this recipe a go, it's pretty easy to do and I promise you won't be disappointed.