Monday, January 07, 2013

What a (mostly) vegan Christmas and festive feast look like


Marieke blogged recently about what a vegan Christmas looks like, so I thought I’d add ours to the blogosphere as well.

This year we had nine at the table – this included two vegans, two pescaterians and two who only ate meat (and vegetables didn’t grace their plates). Quite a challenge when it came to writing a menu. The omni end of the table was (literally) fleshed out with a roast chook, barbecued turkey sausages, ham and prawns.



Now onto the good stuff.

Vegan Christmas lunch

Eggplant rolls, via my Russian odyssey earlier in the year 
Tofu/vegetable kebabs (barbecued)
Potato salad
Garden salad

Chocolate
Fruit platter
Tony Chiodo’s carrot, cardamom and coconut cake (ours looked so much better than the one in this photo. The SE’s mum came up trumps with this surprise dessert).

There was polenta with sundried tomatoes set and ready to go on the barbecue if we needed more but the table was full, with enough leftovers to feed a couple of friends who turned up for dinner.

A couple of days later, friends put on a thoughtful and utterly luxurious vegan feast, cooking all day from Jerusalem. What a treat. I wish I’d taken photos and annotated the whole thing but the conversation and Compari got the better of me. Who’d have thought I’d finally become grown up enough to enjoy Campari and soda, and effectively kid myself that the bitterness of the aperitif meant that it was indeed good for my health and so I should have two, if not three, before dinner.

Everything they cooked was fabulous but a couple of stunners stood out and are already earmarked for the vegan festivities later in the year.

Medjara - who knew that rice and lentils could taste this good? Also the visual treat of orange roasted sweet potatoes plated with purple figs. 


What rocked your table this festive season?





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2 Comments:

Blogger Johanna GGG said...

happy new year aof - sounds like you have had some fine festive feasts - and like Jerusalem has some great recipes

10:42 pm  
Blogger GS said...

And Happy NY to you too Johanna. What was on your table this season? I still have issues with Ottolenghi (as my Ottolenghi cook along post demonstrates) but the culinary influence of Sammi in this collaboration is a bonus. However, that said, Jerusalem is a very meat and dairy-rich cookbook and so few of the recipes are doable for my household.

8:39 am  

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