Long time no see

Hello readers!
I know I have been very absent from this blog for almost a year, but I have decided to take a new step and try and be more active again!

This is what has happened while I have been gone:
School took the best of me. I have been very stressed with school since May 2015. I have during this time also been moving, and working a lot. Basically I have been focusing on keeping my head above the water for a long time.

During this time I have also met a guy. A wonderful person who I'm now sharing my every day with. This means that I have picked up my love for cooking again as well since I have someone close by that appreciates it every day.

While I've been gone I have also gone from being vegan to pescetarian and then back to eating meats again. This is mainly because I felt that going fully vegan didn't work out too well for me. I felt tired a lot and it was mainly because I didn't get the right nutrients and proteins that I needed. So I went back to eating some meat, which turned out to be great. Then when I met the hubby it became clear to me that he was too much of a meat lover so I decided that.. meh.. as long as I keep healthy and cheap, then what does it matter for me personally.

This will happen in the future:
Mainly focusing on the blog I will try to upload once or twice a week. The only thing is that this time I will be making some changes on the format of the posts that I am making. This is mainly because its a bit more time-saving and I can work on making a better description rather than having a lot of pictures.

This means that progress pictures on the blog won't be as many, I might shoot a few but I will not shoot as many as my previous posts have had. Instead I will be focusing on writing the process instead. This is to save time and for me to be able to be a bit more effective in my work.

I hope these changes will be good and if you have any objections please leave a comment!

Steamed veggies with flavored rice and homemade tomato salsa (vegan)

This is something that I wanted to test out, it turned out great! This is what you need 

broccoli

cauliflower

carrots

chili

soy-beans

rice

salt

thyme

lemonjuice

Start with putting the rice to boil. I added thyme and a bit of lemon juice to the water along with some salt. Then just follow the instructions on the package for how to boil the rice. Peel the carrots and cut them up to your liking and put them in your steamer together with the rest of the veggies. cut the chili into pieces, removing the seeds and place them with the rest of the veggies in the steamer over some boiling water with salt. Let them steam for about 10-15 minutes depending on how soft you want the carrots and the other veggies. 

To make the salsa you need 

1-2 tomatoes

spring onions

salt

pepper

a tiny bit of sugar

lemon juice

and olive or any other vegetable oil

Cut the tomatoes and the spring onion into small pieces and put them in a bowl together with the restof the ingrediens and then mix well.

Place the rice and the steamed veggies. I places the chili on the rice for some garnish and to add flavor. Add the salsa to the plate and enjoy a fully vegan dinner.

Super yummy!

Yogurt with berries

Lately I've been swamped in school but in my absence I've been enjoying some light lunches and dinners. This is a popular one, you see it on instagram and other sites and it's really easy actually. There are several variations of this and it all depends on what fruits and berries you like. I used this:

bananas

strawberries

blackberries

yogurt

oats

chia seeds

Just slice the fruits and add them to the yogurt. you can use apples, pears, other kinds of berries and other fruits. I find bananas to be one of my favorites. 

Sweetpotato and chicken wrap

This recipe started out as an experiment, I'm just happy I shot the pictures so that I could post this right away. I wanted to make a wrap, but while I was making this I was thinking to myself that... naah this can't be a wrap because it's basically like a regular meal? But then I did some more thinking and thought that regular wraps that you buy off the store is like a sallad wrapped in a bread of some sort. Anyway, this is what you need: 

1 tortillia bread or any other bread you'll like

1 chicken breast

½ sweet potato

½ tomato

1 avocado

cucumber

orange paprika

lime juice

greek yoghurt

spring onions for garnish

Start by slicing everything into thin slices, season the chicken or marinate it if you want to, depending on what kind of flavour that you'll want. I decided to marinate mine for about 10 min with some soy, oil, hoisin sauce and some spices like black pepper and chili. When you've done that fry the chicken in some oil until it's done, mine took only a couple of minutes on medium/high heat. 

After that add some more oil to the pan, you don't have to clean it in-between since the spices of the chicken can give some seasoning to the potato as well. Add the potato to the oil and fry them on medium/high heat as well. If you cut the slices too thick you might have to blanch them for a minute or so before doing this, otherwise they won't be cooked through

After that just add everything onto your flat bread of choice and mash the avocado on top, add some yoghurt and and garnish with some spring onion. Enjoy a fresh really tasty and healthy wrap! 

Creamy pasta with pesto

This was a request from a friend of mine! I posted a picture of this the other day and I decided why not, it's a really simple recipe! This is what you need: 

2-3 mushrooms, depending on size

2 tbsp crème fraiche

2 tbsp pesto

pasta for one

butter

pepper

thyme

Begin with putting some water in a pot on the stove for the pasta, and then boil it following the instructions on the packet. Slice the mushroom after your taste and then fry them in a pan with some butter on medium/high heat. 

When the pasta is done boiling, and drained of  water and the mushroom has been fried according to your taste add them into the pot with the pasta and along with the creme fraiche, pesto and spices.  

Stir it and heat on log heat and then serve! It's super simple and super tasty! 

During my absence

I would like to start off with saying sorry for my absence. Before easter there was a lot to do in school an then during easter I was visiting my parents in an other town and wasn't responsible for the food we were eating. When I then returned home to my apartment I became ill.. However there is one thing that I have been enjoying a lot during these weeks off. and that is avocado on bread with different toppings!

These are some things you could use!

bread

avocado

tomato

egg

salt

lime juice

It's really simple you just boil the egg to your liking, slice some tomato and then mash the avocado. Put everything on a slice of bread and enjoy something really good!

During my leave I did this several times, and during easter when there was a lot of leftovers such as salmon and lamb and other good stuff I used those things as toppings. My favorite to have with the avocado is tomato since it complements the creamyness of the avocado. Except the examples below you can also add tuna, smoked salmon (instead of boiled). other types of yummy fish, shredded cooked chicken, ham or other kinds of meat. Different veggies are nice too, onion, shallots or other things alike! 

Poor Knights

It's the end of the month and your bread is stale and you only have a few things and low on cash. In Sweden this dish is called fattiga riddare, direct translation is poor knights. This is what you need: 

a few slices of bread, stale and dry doesn't matter

milk

eggs

sugar

cinnamon

raspberries

How much milk and eggs you need is depending on the amont of breadslices. 2 eggs and 2 dl of milk works batter for about 4-5 slices of bread.

Start by mixing milk and egg in a bowl or alike in which you can dip the bread. I decided to gut the edges off of my bread and make breadsticks out of them. Dip the edges in the batter so that they are completely soaked. Place them in a pan with some butter and fry them for about 2-3 min or until they get some nice color all over, remember to flip them so all sides get some heat. 

When they are done roll them in some sugar and cinnamon and you can have them as a sweet dessert later on.

After that it's time to do the poor knights. Dip the edgeless slices of bread into the batter until they are completely soaked, and then put them in a pan on medium high heat. Fry them for about 3-5 min on each side so that they get some nice color. When they are done plate it and serve with some frozen or fresh berries of some kind! 

I chose raspberries but you can easily take any other berry or maybe some jam!

Enjoy