Flans and "quiches": retro food 80s style!

I sometimes fondly remember the days of my early adulthood in the 80s and those trendy vegetarian cafes like Cranks: those were the days of quiche and salads with iced Perrier and a carob flapjack for lunch, discussing our latest anti-Thatcher demo or hunt-sabbing exploits... before Subway, Starbucks and Greggs took over every high street in England every town seemed to have its little independent veggie cafe tucked away down a sidestreet where everything was served in earthenware bowls and the salad bar was bigger than the seating area. There would always be a large noticeboard with adverts for yoga classes and alternative gigs and a stack of fanzines, flyers and leaflets to peruse. Am I the only one who misses these places with their DIY-culture sincerity and their wholesome fare? One day recently I decided to revive the "quiche and salad" lunch idea, and was gratified that my family received it so well bearing in mind they do not necessarily share my predilection for small, old-fashioned wholefood cafes. Of course, my "quiche" does not contain any egg. I've included a vegan option in the following 3 recipes, made with tofu, which is actually my favourite.

All these recipes make 8 portions, in a 10"/ 25.5cm loose-bottomed flan dish.
Broccoli and cheese flan:
50% wholemeal shortcrust pastry, made with 175-200g butter and 300g flour
About a cupful (250ml) of gram flour (garbanzo/chickpea/ baisen) and cold water to mix
1/2 a head of broccoli (calabrese), cut into small florets
About a cupful sweetcorn 
3-4 tomatoes, sliced (or halved cherry tomatoes)
100g (or more if you like!) grated Cheddar cheese
A few black olives  
salt, black pepper, paprika, turmeric, hing, dried oregano

• Roll out the pastry to about 5mm in thickness and press into the oiled flan dish. Blind-bake at 200C until just solidified.
• Steam the broccoli until just tender.
• Meanwhile, mix the gram flour with the water, salt, paprika, hing and a generous pinch of turmeric with a balloon whisk until it is smooth and not lumpy. Stir in the cheese, sweetcorn and broccoli.
• Fill the pastry case with the mixture and top with the sliced tomatoes and the olives. Sprinkle the oregano and black pepper on the top.
• Bake at 200C until the filling is set and the tomatoes tender
• Serve with your favourite salads and oven-baked saute potatoes/ steamed new potatoes.
• After you have offered it to Krishna, pour yourself a large Perrier or Shloer, and eat while listening to "Meat is Murder" by The Smiths for an authentic 80s experience!

Broccoli, cheese and sundried tomato "quiche"
Pastry as above
4oz grated cheddar cheese/ vegan "cheese"  (such as Scheeze or Cheezly) plus extra for topping
61/2tabs (30g) Orgran "No Egg"/ gram flour and soya flour
150-160ml milk/ soya milk 
A handful of broccoli florets, blanched
10 sundried tomato halves, soaked and coarsely chopped
A pinch each of salt, black pepper and turmeric

• Spread the cheese onto the pastry case (which has been blind-baked, as before).
• Add the sundried tomatoes and broccoli.
• Beat together the rest of the ingredients and pour on top.
• Sprinkle with the extra grated cheese
• Bake for 30 mins at 180-190C.
• This goes well with a good chutney and a green salad.

Tofu and roast vegetable "quiche" : vegan
Blind-baked pastry case, as above, but made with vegan unhydrogenated margarine (you can use oil, but it's harder to handle the pastry)
1x250g block of firm tofu
250-300g sweetcorn
a handful of roasted vegetables such as peppers, courgettes (zucchini) and aubergine 
200ml soya milk
2x tabs lemon juice
black pepper, hing, herbs
1 tab soy/tamari sauce/ liquid aminos
turmeric 
sunflower seeds and/ or pine nuts 

• Line the pastry case with the roasted vegetables
• Reserve a handful of sweetcorn and the seeds/ pine nuts and whizz everything else in a blender until quite smooth.
• Add the rest of the sweetcorn to the blended filling.
• Pour into the pastry case and top with the seeds and pine nuts
• Bake for 20 mins at 200C (or 225C if you don't have a fan oven).

Ekadasi Mozzarella Burgers- gluten free

Burger and chips... a children's favourite!

Usually we make veggie burgers with some sort of beans or grain like rice flakes, oats or quinoa, but it' also good to have a burger recipe for days when you're not eating grains (like Ekadasi) or if you are cooking gluten free. I made these variations on the veggieburger using mozzarella cheese and I must say they have a great texture; crispy outside and soft inside- and refreshingly free of potato. They hold together very well too. Having just acquired a deep-fryer, I couldn't resist serving them with chips made from our organic home-grown potatoes; as you can see if you look closely at the picture above, I don't peel them. The quantities given below make seven good-sized burgers:

1 large courgette
230g vegetarian mozarella cheese (drained weight)
100g ground almonds
a handful or two of buckwheat flour to bind
turmeric powder (haldi), seasalt and black pepper to taste

This is the sort of consistency you need the mix to be for shaping.

Two Luscious Eggless Birthday Cakes- white chocolate fudge and toffee fudge

When two of my stepsons celebrated their birthdays within days of each other, they  both asked for very different cakes: A turned 15 and asked for "Toffee Fudge" and Yadu turned 24 and asked for "A white cake of some sort..." so I had my work cut out! Here's how I made them:

 Y's White Chocolate Fudge Cake. An ordinary vanilla sponge filled and topped with white chocolate fudge icing, which consisted of equal quantities of buttercream icing and melted Belgian white chocolate (400g of chocolate in all went into this cake!) I didn't have quite enough to  cover the sides of the cake, but next time...the decorations were dried strawberries, which I coated in white chocolate.

A's Toffee Fudge Cake. This time I adapted my basic cake recipe to be more caramel-y by using dark brown sugar and swapping 1/8 of the sugar for golden syrup, added with the liquid ingredients. The filling was a jar of dulce de leche (Argentinian spread of boiled down milk and sugar- they also have it in Normandy,  France, where it's called confiture de lait) but you could make your own by boiling a can of condensed milk unopened for a couple of hours; when you open it, you should get virtually the same thing. The frosting is chocolate fudge icing, made like the first cake only with milk chocolate. The decorations are fudge pieces. Suffice it to say you don't need a big slice of this one...!

Eggless pancakes and Cajun-Style Eggless Pancakes

I was served eggless pancakes with golden syrup for Mothers' Day!

My daughter Radha is very fond of pancakes: she used to sometimes make them as a snack when she got home from school or for weekend breakfasts and has definitely perfected the art. In fact, I would say she is The Princess of Pancakes- in our house, anyway. She likes to make them thick, with sugar and spice in the mixture so you don't need to add anything afterwards. Here's the basic recipe:

1 cup self-raising flour
1 cup milk
1 tab icing sugar
2 tsps mixed spice
1tab melted butter

• In a bowl, mix flour, milk, melted butter, spice and sugar.
• Beat thoroughly with a balloon whisk until bubbles start to appear.
• Fry the mixture in a buttered/ oiled nonstick frying pan over medium heat, turning/ flipping halfway through.

Radha will have them with a little golden syrup on top, but this isn't really necessary. I suspect they would be brilliant served with something like fresh blueberries and a dollop of creme fraiche or Greek yoghurt.

Cajun- Style Pancakes
 The Princess of Pancakes has been at it again! Bored during the holidays, she decided to make lunch one day as we jaded adults could not decide what to cook. She came up with a really yummy dish, which was all gobbled up way too quickly to get pictures, I'm afraid.
She made savoury pancakes wrapped round a filling of sauteed vegetable sticks mixed with grated Cheddar cheese, but it was the spicing in the batter which really made it. Eventually, I managed to prise her "secret" blend out of her to share here:
Salt, black pepper, hing, mild chilli powder (the kind for Mexican chillis, with cumin in), paprika, Chinese 5-spice (a blend heavy on the allspice), dried oregano and dried basil. A couple of days later I was in a shop looking at Cajun spice blends, and found one almost identical to my daughter's, only it contained garlic powder and no basil.
To make the pancakes, simply follow my daughter's basic recipe, above, omitting the sugar and mixed spice, and add generous amounts of the above herbs and spices. To make handling easier and avoid breaking up the pancakes once cooked, wrap the filling while the pancake is still in the pan. Happy snacking!

Belgian Chocolate Flapjacks

Tempting, aren't they?

We have developed innumerable recipes for various kinds of flapjack over the years, but if you're looking for one that's sweet, crunchy and sticky, then my mother's old recipe -which I have now converted to metric measures- is the winner every time. 
Mum would make them plain, so I added the chocolate. I remember these being cut into triangles and served up when family came over for tea. (Mum would usually bake a chocolate cake decorated with crystallised violet petals as well...)

This recipe makes 16 squares:
500g porridge oats

250g butter

190g sugar (I find that demerara is best)

125ml golden syrup

200g Belgian chocolate (I use milk but you can use plain or white)

• Melt butter, sugar and syrup together until sugar has dissolved- but do not allow to boil for any length of time or you'll end up with something like butterscotch sauce.
• Stir in the oats
• Press down well in a rectangular swiss roll tin which has been well oiled
• Bake at 180C for about 20 mins, or until top is as browned as you want it. Bear in mind that the longer you cook them, the crunchier they will be.
• When you take them out of the oven leave to partially cool for 10 minutes, then, while they are still warm, break the chocolate into small squares and place evenly all over the top. Wait about 5 minutes for the chocolate to soften and then use you finger to gently spread it all over.
• Leave to cool and set... you will have to be patient! You can mark them out before they are completely cooled, but don't cut until they are cold unless you want a lot of crumbs.

*For vegans: Use a vegan margarine instead of butter, and either plain chocolate or one of the vegan brands made with soya milk. Or take a look at one of the many flapjack recipe on our blog "The Yogi Vegans"...

Date and Apricot Slice- no added sugar

Crumbly on top and moist inside...yum!

This is our take on the 80s wholefood classic. A bit crumbly on top, but succulent inside. I used to use a recipe from "Entertaining with Cranks" -I think; it's been a long time- but mislaid the book, so I worked out the quantities myself. It came out really well, as the above photo (I hope) shows.

400g wholemeal flour

100g porridge oats

275g unsalted butter

200g semidried apricots

200g dried dates

100g desiccated coconut

150ml water

cold water to mix

• Chop the dried fruit and simmer in the water until you get a thick, paste-like consistency suitable for spreading. (Add a little more water if necessary.) Mash coarsely with the back of a spoon and set aside.
• Meanwhile, rub in the butter with the flour and oats. Set aside about 1/3 in a separate bowl.
• Add enough cold water to the remaining dough to make a pastry-like consistency, and press into a swiss roll/ baking tin (standard size). It may take a bit of work to get an even layer. It works out at about 2-3mm thick.
• Mix the desiccated coconut with the set aside mixture.
• Spread the fruit paste on top of the oat pastry
• Add a little water to the coconut mixture, so that it feels like crumble topping. Press down well on top of the fruit.
• Bake in an oven preheated to 180C, for 20-30mins, until the top is browned. Take care not to over-brown it.
• Cut into 12 bars and remove from tray when thoroughly cooled. As it is very crumby, I recommend wrapping each slice in clingfilm before storing- if they don't all get eaten immediately, that is!

Cheese, Celery and Walnut loaf with Tomato Chutney

Last night, as we all arrived home from school or work, it began to snow. As darkness fell, an icy cold wind blew up, sending temperatures quickly down below zero...so what to cook for dinner?- Something soothingly warm, bright and colourful to celebrate the good things about this time of year (there are some good things, aren't there??)
I came up with:
Cheese, celery and walnut loaf with tomato chutney, served with mixed roasted vegetables and brown rice with peas.
Plenty of calories here to keep you warm. The quantities I give here served 5 of us.

The loaf: 
200g walnuts, ground or crushed
2 or 3 grated parsnips/ sweet potatoes (to replace 4 or 5 small carrots)
2-3 sticks of celery, thinly sliced (should be about half the quantity of the grated veg)
about 225g of any creamy, English vegetarian cheese (I used double Gloucester, but I suspect white Stilton would be even yummier)
1 large English apple (like Cox's), grated

salt and pepper

• Lightly fry half the grated vegetables with the celery in extra-virgin olive oil.
• Mix with all other ingredients in a bowl; keep the seasoning simple and subtle.
• Put into a lined loaf tin and bake at 175-200C until top is browned but not burned. (You could also cook it in individual ramekins as the loaf is quite soft and not good at holding its shape when sliced.)

Simple hot and sweet tomato chutney:
Credit to my husband here for this recipe; he invented it to go with pakoras. It's a kind of oriental-meets- Mediterranean flavour fusion.
2 cans chopped tomatoes, or cooked down fresh tomatoes
1 dsp gour or brown sugar
hing (asafeotida)
2 or 3 bay leaves
1 tsp chilli powder
1 dsp dried oregano
1 dsp extra-virgin olive oil

• Combine all ingredients, bring to the boil then simmer to reduce. 
• When thickened, adjust seasonings if necessary. You can let this bubble away while you prepare the loaf.

To make the meal even more quintessentially English, you could always serve it with a dollop of fluffy mashed potato instead of the rice.

Sweet Potato Muffins

These are a bit like carrot cake, a bit like passion cake. The frosting turned out a bit runnier than desired, but firmed up in the fridge overnight. I have another recipe which uses wholemeal flour and natural yogurt, but this just uses my standard  cake recipe as a base, so is ultra-quick and easy. 

Makes 12 standard-sized muffins (not the smaller fairy cakes)
400g self raising flour
4 tsps baking powder
200g sugar/ 200ml agave nectar
400ml milk
150ml coconut or rice bran oil/ melted butter
150g grated sweet potato
50g chopped walnuts
50g sultanas
2-3 tsps ground green cardamom (aka elaichi)
Frosting:
200g full-fat cream cheese
a few drop natural orange essence
3 tabs cooled melted butter
4 tabs icing sugar
orange/ lemon zest/ chopped nuts to decorate

• Combine the wet and dry cake ingredients in separate bowls, then add the wet to the dry and beat for about a minute. The grated sweet potato counts as wet, and the dried fruit, nuts and cardamom as dry. If using agave as sugar, then that counts as wet.
• Spoon into prepared muffin moulds/ tins (you may want to use paper cases) as quickly as possible and bake in an oven preheated to 180C for about 20 minutes, until springy to the touch. you can use a thin skewer to test if you want. The skewer will emerge with no mixture ion it when the cakes are done.
• Meanwhile, beat all frosting ingredients together and chill.
• Top each muffin, when cool, with a blob or swirl of frosting and decorate with peel and/ nuts.

Millionaire's Shortbread

Base:        9oz plain flour (3 white, 3 wholemeal)

                 6oz unsalted butter

                 5oz unrefined caster sugar

Caramel: 2oz unrefined sugar

                 2oz unsalted butter

                 1x405g tin sweetened condensed milk

                 natural vanilla essence

Top:         150g good quality chocolate/ carob  (I prefer continental dark chocolate in this recipe as                                 a contrast to the creaminess of the caramel)

• For the shortbread base, mix flour and sugar together and rub in the butter. Press down well in a rectangular baking tin, prick all over and bake for about 15 minutes in an oven preheated to about 180C.
• Leave to cool: do not be tempted to over-brown the top as the shortbread will crisp up as it cools.
• Meanwhile, make the caramel: melt the butter and sugar together in a thick-bottomed pan over a low to medium heat. Stir until the sugar has completely dissolved. Add the condensed milk and bring to the boil, stirring constantly to avoid scorching the caramel mixture. Continue until the caramel is a light brown colour and will form a soft ball when a little is dropped into cold water.
• Add the vanilla.
• Spread on top of the shortbread.
• Melt chocolate and spread on top of the caramel shortbread. Mark into 16 rectangles before it sets.

Tip: For an easy way to make the caramel, simply put the can of condensed milk, unopened, into a pan of boiling water and simmer for about an hour. When you open the tin you will have "caramel"! Just stir in some vanilla essence.

If my memory serves me correctly, I used to make vegan caramel by making the equivalent of a can of  condensed milk  using powdered soya milk, icing sugar and water. I then substituted soya milk for the cows' milk, and vegan margarine for the butter, and proceeded according to the recipe.

Spinach and Cheese Pasties

I know I should have got a shot of the filling too, but I was in a hurry and using my phone...

I made 7 pasties from this recipe, but it will vary according to the thickness of the pastry you roll out and the size of your circles.Shortcrust pastry made with 250g salted butter and 250g each of wholemeal and white flour

400g Cheddar cheese
A carrier bagful of fresh leaf spinach
Salt, hing, black pepper and paprika to taste (hing helps you digest greens)
A large handful of porridge oats (if needed)
I made 7 pasties from this recipe, but it will vary according to the thickness of the pastry you roll out and the size of your circles.

• First make the pastry and leave to chill
• To make the filling, wash the spinach and cook until soft in only the water left on the leaves after washing; DO NOT let it get too wet! (Like I did...!)
• Cube the cheese and stir in with the seasonings, breaking the mixture down as you stir.
• At this point, if it seems too soggy to use, either forget the pasties and make a pie in a pie dish, or you can rescue it with a handful of oats. If you leave it a few minutes after mixing the oats in, they should absorb the excess moisture. The one thing you don't want to do is drain that liquid off, as it contains most of the nutrients from the spinach.
• Roll out the pastry on a floured surface and use something like an upturned plate or bowl as a guide for cutting the rounds.
• Put a generous dollop of filling into each circle, wet the edges and pull up the sides, crimping with finger and thumb to seal it up in a pasty shape. (My pasties in the picture were left before being put in the oven, which is probably why they flattened out a bit.)
• These are great served with salad and a spicy relish/ chutney. My family tell me that they work better hot than cold though, so choose another filling for picnic or lunchbox pasties!

Healthier Sweets

A few years ago, my husband and I took on the very great responsibility of temporarily being pujaris to our local temple deities, who resided in our home for two 2-week periods while Their new temple was being made ready. This meant following a much stricter schedule of worship than we would normally do at home, and was a wonderful and joyful full-time occupation. I was the one who got up very early for the morning puja, and was responsible for making a pre-breakfast snack. 
This is traditionally cut-up fruit and Indian milk sweets such as pera (penda) or sandesh. With children to look after and a part-time job, I felt I didn't have the time to be boiling milk down for ages every day (this is actually often done at night, ready for the following morning) so I discovered the less traditional but nonetheless delicious art of healthy sweets made quickly and easily from dried fruits, nuts and seeds and a few other basics. I could easily make these in a few minutes while cooking the evening meal or even in the early morning. I don't have any set recipes as such, but here is a list of possible ingredients and combinations.  One essential for making these quickly and easily is a grinder; I used the attachment which came with my blender.

• nuts: unsalted shelled peanuts, almonds, cashews, desiccated coconut, etc. Only grind nuts as you need them, as they can rapidly go rancid. Even peanut butter (I prefer to use the smooth kind) can be added.
• seeds: sunflower, sesame and pumpkin seeds, ground or whole. I prefer to grind the larger seeds.
• dried fruit: raisins, apricots (the Hunza kind if you can get them), cranberries, dates etc.
• other sweeteners: try out carob powder, honey or gour
• Additional ingredients: milk powder (whole milk if you can get it; Indian grocery shops often sell this) , ground cardamom seeds (elaichi), unsalted puffed rice (mamra) and your own imagination...

 Combinations I tried: 

• Peanut, coconut and cranberry: Grind the peanuts and mix with dried cranberries and a little desiccated coconut. form into balls and roll in more coconut. Also really delicious made with almonds instead of peanuts.
• Apricot, almond and honey
• Raisin and sunflower seed: (Remember Shepherd Boy bars from wholefood shops? -Well that's what this is.) Grind up raisins with a little water to make a sweet paste, and add ground sunflower seeds and/ or peanuts. Simple and yummy.
• Carob and peanut butter "fudge": Carob powder and peanut butter, firmed up by adding powdered milk and/ or ground peanuts. If you want them sweeter, you could add a little powdered gour. Finish by rolling in more carob.
• Date sweets for ekadasi: Credit to my husband for this one: he once made them at a feast for several hundred people; a group of volunteers were chopping and rolling for ages, but the result was  well worth it! Chop stoned dried dates finely and combine with powdered milk and finely-chopped cashews. Roll into balls.
• Sesame sweets: These take a little cooking, but are still in the "quick and easy" category. Melt gour gently in a small thick-bottomed pan; it does not need to boil. Add ground sesame seeds to make a thick, doughy consistency (it will thicken as it cools). When cool enough to handle, form into balls and roll in whole sesame seeds.

I would love to hear about any other combinations you have made....

Enchiladas with guacamole and "refried" beans

This dinner came about last week partly through a desire to please the kids and partly because supplies were running low and I only had certain ingredients left in the fridge and cupboards. I found cheese, tinned tomatoes, vegetables and a packet of flour tortillas...
Some years ago, I used to work in the kitchen of a very busy and popular vegetarian restaurant in Glastonbury. On our evening menu were several Mexican dishes, enchiladas being one if them. Pancakes were used instead of flour tortillas, and the filling was spinach and cream cheese., but here, I am using flour tortillas and a mixed vegetable filling. As I did not have pinto beans to hand, I used a combination of red kidney beans and kala channa (dark brown chickpeas) for the "refried" beans, and limited the amount of oil I "refried" them in quite drastically. I also did not make pico-de-gallo (a relish of finely-chopped fresh chillis, coriander/ cilantro and de-seeded tomatoes) this time because I had no fresh tomatoes that day; otherwise I would have, as I had kept the rest of the preparations quite mild and not really hot. I provided some salted corn tortilla chips as well as a green salad for extra-hungry people, and there was additional chilli powder as a seasoning for those who like it spicy.
My efforts were nonetheless greeted enthusiastically by my family, with requests to make it again, and it is for this reason I am sharing it here with you: I would normally regard this kind of dinner as way too rich for everyday eating; (In fact, I made 2 enchiladas without cheese for myself and my husband).
The following is less a recipe, more a cooking memo; you will have to work out exact quantities for yourself, according to how many people you want to feed and how spicy you like it.

Filling:
I used whatever veg I had to hand, chopped quite finely and steamed lightly: that day it was green beans, bell peppers, broccoli and sweetcorn. I then stirred in a good amount of grated vegetarian medium Cheddar cheese.
Tomato sauce:
Not having fresh tomatoes, I used 2 or 3 cans of chopped tomatoes. In the pan, I added salt, hing, a little brown sugar, paprika and some chilli powder (not much) and simmered it until reduced to a sauce-like consistency; not too thick, though, as it will dry out in the oven.
"Refried" beans;
I mashed the cooked beans coarsely, and added salt,  hing, coriander powder, a little chilli and some olive oil. Instead of frying them, I heated them gently in a saucepan, stirring in a little water now and then if they dried out. (Thinking about it, smoked paprika and liquid aminos/ soy sauce would be a great addition too.)
Guacamole:
To mashed avocado I added lemon juice and salt, and left it at that since the tomato sauce and beans were spiced. You could always add chilli and/ or fresh coriander leaves.
Assembling and cooking the enchiladas:
I placed a generous dollop of filling in the centre of each tortilla and folded it in half. I lay them in a roasting tin and poured the tomato sauce over the top, ensuring the tortillas were completely covered. Next I grated more of the Cheddar cheese over the top of that and baked in a medium oven until heated through and browned/ bubbling on top.
I served them with a green salad of shredded iceberg lettuce and cucumber with black olives, with the beans and guacamole on the side. I decorated each enchilada with a blob of natural low-fat yoghurt (instead of sour cream) and an olive.

Ultimate Veggie Lasagne

We had a houseful that week; 6 of us plus three guests, two of whom had just returned from several months in India. It was Friday night, we were all home from work and school and the mood was celebratory...
...What else to do but make a huge dish of lasagne? This recipe is definitely not vegan, but you could substitute the cheese sauce and grated cheese with soya cheese and a soya/ tahini white sauce.
To make a large deep roasting tin full (makes about 10 generous portions) you need:

• About 750g Cheddar cheese
• 1 1/2 litres milk
• 12 fresh tomatoes
• a tube of tomato puree
• a little wholemeal flour
• seasalt
• 1 dsp gour
• paprika
• coarsely ground black pepper
• 2tsps hing
• 2 bay leaves
• dried basil
• about 3 cups dried split mung dal
• 1 tsp Marmite/ yeast extract
• 1 tab dark soy sauce
• Extra-virgin olive oil
• 3 red and yellow bell peppers (or you can use courgette, aubergine etc.)
• 1 1/2 packets spinach lasagne sheets (no pre-cook; and ensure it doesn't contain egg)

1. Chop the tomatoes and cook gently with salt, pepper, gour, hing, bay leaves and paprika until they are the consistency of canned tomatoes. Add the tomato puree and simmer until reduced to a thick sauce.
2. Chop peppers and saute in a little extra-virgin olive oil.
3. Meanwhile, cook the dal in as little water as possible (keep a close eye on it!) until just softened and not mushy. Drain off any excess water and stir in the soy sauce and Marmite. Add the peppers and most of the tomato sauce, reserving a little of the sauce.
4. Bring the milk to boil in a saucepan and then pour into a blender (you may have to do this in 2 batches, according to the capacity of your blender.) While the blender is running, add a little wholemeal flour and the cheese, cubed. Set aside some cheese for the topping.
5. Put the lasagne together in layers: I started with the tomato dal, then pasta sheets, then a thick layer of cheese sauce, more pasta, the rest of the tomato dal, and a final layer of pasta. Water down the reserved tomato sauce slightly and pour over the pasta. Grate the remainder of the cheese over this.
6. Bake at 200C for about 20 minutes, or until the top is nicely browned and the pasta feels soft when a knife is inserted.

I served the lasagne with roast potatoes and a green salad with black and green olives and ume plum dressing (ume plum seasoning, lemon juice and extra-virgin olive oil.) You could easily just serve it with the salad; it's filling enough without the potatoes.

Hello and Welcome!

Welcome to our new place, where we will be putting all the Yogi Vegetarian recipes from before we went vegan. This might take a while, so keep coming back and you should find more each time !