Let me start by saying if you haven’t watched the vlog and want to see that before knowing what we made, you can do that here now.

We were contacted recently by our good friends Maggie and Ryan from the YouTube Channel - Narrowboat Chef. and they challenged us to a ‘blind’ cooking of a mystery recipe. Obviously we couldn’t meet up and do this as we are still in Lockdown due to the Covid-19 pandemic, so it would have to be conducted over Skype.

Shell, uses Skype in her work regularly but this would be the first time we had used it in this context, so after a little fiddling and uploading we set it up on an iPad. Other preperations included ensuring we had the ingrediants that Maggie had messaged us a couple of days before the filming.

So we what we needed:

1 tin 400g chickpeas
1 small brown onion
100g walnuts
4 tbsp ground linseed/flaxseeds
1tbsp oats
1tbsp dried mixed herbs
1tsp basil
1 tsp paprika
1tsp ground black pepper
1/4 tsp salt
3 cloves of garlic
2 tbsp soy sauce
2 tbsp veg oil
1 sheet of puff pastry (check it’s vegan, most are)
3tbsp of plant based milk

The equipment you needed:

Food Processor
Chopping board
Sharp knife
Oven tray
Baking paper
Pastry brush

Method:

Chop Onion and Garlic roughly
Add ALL ingrediants to your food processor except the pastry and milk.
Blitz until the ingrediants form a sticky paste
Unfurl your pastry and cut in half lengthways
Add half the mixture to bottmom half of a half!
Use the paper of the pastry to roll and seal edges around the mixture.
Cut each tube into 4 and cut through pastry on top 3 times width ways
Brush milk on to each of the ‘rolls
Bake in the middle of a pre-heated oven on gas Mark 5
They will take between 15-30 minutes, check after 10 minutes
Use tin foil to cover if the tops are burning.
Should be flaky and golden all the way around when cooked.
Shove in your face!

So one thing that we always try and promote are quick and easy vegan recipes, people are often daunted by some of the incredible images they see of these wonderful and incredible creations that you are inundated by on Instagram and other socials. But its really not like that! I know this may be a little disappointing but it’s the truth. The reality is you will be eating beans and rice in one variant or another the majority of the time.

That aside, to have a few treat recipes in the bag will allow you to continue your life without food becoming an overwhelming focus. And this little gem is ideal. great as party food or with chips and beans. Being vegan isn’t always synonomous with healthy eating, sometimes it is living a cruelty free life, and that is just as important to you, animals and the planet.

Obviously you could wait and add some vegetables to make a meal, we would recommend some home made chunky wedges and beans or broccoli.

So hope you enjoy this recipe and a very special thanks to Maggie, Ryan their pooch pixel and Maggies Mum whos original recipe this is….. Thanks to you for being here too.

Peace and Love and Plants XXX

US Vs Narrowboat Chef