Caramalised Onion & Roasted Aubergine Marinara by Lauren Ulm.

I just made this for my dinner and it was super nice.

Shopping Basket:

2 large Aubergines

Olive Oil

Onion

Black Pepper

400g tin of chopped tomatoes

Salt

1/2 teaspoon basil

1/2 teaspoon oregano

1/2 teaspoon thyme

3 cloves of garlic

pasta of your choice - I used wholemeal spaghetti

1/2 tablespoon of vegan margaine (I use "Pure" Soya or "Pure" Sunflower which is available in pretty much all of the large UK supermarkets).

Kitchen Activities:

1. Preheat oven to 210 degrees C

2. Cut the aubergines into circles, then cut further into strips. Lay these strips onto kitchen paper on a tray and cover with a light sprinkling of salt. Leave for 10 minutes.

3. Lay aubergine pieces onto a baking tray and cover generously with olive oil. Bake in the oven for 20 minutes.

4. Meanwhile, cut up the onion into half moon pieces. Caramalise these in a splash of olive oil for 10 minutes so that the onion becomes soft and brown. Careful not to burn.

5. Add garlic, and the herbs and cook for one minute.

6. Add the chopped tomatoes and vegan margaine and stir well. Season to taste.

7. Check your aubergines....stir on the tray to ensure they are well coated with oil and cook for a further 10 minutes. Add your aubergine pieces to the tomato and onion sauce.

Serve with your spaghetti.

I had lots of sauce left over. This can be frozen or refrigerated for use in further meals.

This recipie is taken from the book VeganYumYum by Lauran Ulm which I recieved this Christmas from my sister. This is the first recipie I have made from this book. Can't wait to try out more!

Animal-Free iphone App

Sometimes its easy to shop animal free and stock up the Kind Kitchen with delicious products particularly with fresh product, fruit, vegetables, seeds, nuts but other times it can be a minefieldwith  prepackaged goods, tins, boxes....especially if there no Vegan Society stamp of approval.

I was downloading some vegan applications on to my iphone and came across the Animal-Free app, which was free!

Effectively it lists a whole bunch of ingredients which are animal derived and a list of vegan friendly, plant derived ingredients, for both food, beauty and houshold products.

It also features a barcode scanner which apparently will tell you if the product is safe for vegans...I just tried this on a box of matzo crackers but it didn't recognise it...however you can add it to a database and this is shared with all other users...

p.s I will be back at in the Kind Kitchen, donning my new Miss Scarlet Cluedo apron I recieved as a present this Christmas and I will be posting a caramalised aubergine pasta recipie on Saturday!



Keep Calm, and Go Vegan

I made this today....

Passed this on to a friend who passed it on to a Mr Jona Weinhofen who apparently has posted it various online social networking sites....so far its been reblogged and copied and passed on a bunch of times....which is pretty cool.

 I'd like to think that maybe one additional person who sees this, and isn't already vegan, might just consider the idea ;)
Positive thinking :)

Goodnight

Happy New Year

I wanted to share one of my New Year Resolutions for the coming year...

For one reason or another I have neglected this blog over the past year or so, however I really want to develop The Kind Kitchen this year. I aim to post more animal friendly recipies as well as additional information on things concerning animal welfare, campaigns and how we can all positively take action, however small, to improve things for those that cannot speak out.

"Forward is the only way" - xcurraheex