I started off the week on Sunday making vegetarian Haggis as it was Burns Night on Monday. I’d never eaten the meaty version in my pre-vegan days but I tried some of the veggie stuff when I visited Glasgow for work last year and bought a tin home with me. I decided to make some from scratch as I hadn’t seen it sold anywhere nearby. I did end up seeing some for sale at Vx near Kings Cross but I’d already picked out my recipe by then! I used this recipe from the lovely Sareta and then I stole an idea I saw on twitter and layered the haggis with neeps (swede) and tatties (potatoes) so it was sort of like a shepherd’s pie. I really liked the haggis with its spicy, peppery flavour and as its quite dense it was really filling.

For dessert I finished up my vanilla Swedish Glace ice cream with some chocolate agave syrup I had in the cupboard and saved on the washing up!

I had half a tin of kidney beans left from the haggis recipe so I ate them for breakfast the next morning mashed with some onion and garlic and a couple of samosas that needed using up.

As I now have an open jar of hoisin sauce from my mock duck dish (see last week’s round up) I had some in a roll for lunch on Tuesday with a couple of my oaty sausage patties and some cucumber and spring onion. This is was so tasty and such a treat at lunchtime!

I had a doctors and a hair appointment on Tuesday so didn’t have time to cook when I got home so it was more haggis pie, this time with baked beans.

On Wednesday I had dinner over Mum’s after swimming and she had made a recipe from “A Vegan Taste of India” which I had bought her partner for Christmas. Its always good to buy cookbooks as Christmas presents as hopefully the recipients will make you something from them! This is okra and peanut hotpot which was lovely and filling after a good swim.

On Thursday I made one of my now favourite quick dishes! This was so easy to make and tasted amazing! You simply put most of the ingredients which have been chopped and peeled etc into the pan, fast boil for 9 minutes and then add the cabbage to wilt at the end and you have a tasty pot of sweet chilli vegetable noodles. Dinner was served in less than 20 minutes (and probably eaten in about 3!) Find the recipe to try for yourself here.

At the weekend we traveled down to the coast to stay with my cousins Dan and Amanda. Amanda loves to cook and had picked out some vegan recipes to make especially for me! On Friday we had three bean chilli with some coated sweet potato wedges. The chilli was very tasty and not too spicy and the wedges were a nice change from rice.

On Saturday we went into town and did a bit of charity shop shopping (post to follow!) and stopped for lunch in a local cafe. I had jacket with beans (no butter) with a side salad. Unfortunately they’d put coleslaw on it right in the middle but I managed to eat around it!

For dinner Amanda made a great roast with a mushroom loaf as the main event for me. I love a good mushroom and this also had parsnips running through it which was gave it a lovely sweetness.

Later in the evening we were playing board games and eating snacks. I had a good few tortilla chips with this new Cucumber, Gin and Mint relish from Marks and Spencer. It says on the jar to have with fish but it is quite sweet so I’m not sure if that would go. It was also good on the garlic bread we were munching on. It’s £1 at the moment as an introductory offer so I woulld recommend you try it out although you may get addicted to it!

I had an almond milk hot chocolate before bed with this rocky road edition from Whittards, I enjoyed it and could taste the vanilla in it but I wouldn’t recognise it as rocky road if I didn’t know. I didn’t really taste anything particularly marshmallowy or cherry-like.

Over the weekend Amanda unfortunately developed a cold so made an Asian noodle dish she had found online to try and clear her sinuses. With the amount of chili she put in it I’m surprised she didn’t blow her head clean off! I am pretty much a weakling when it comes to spicy food and although this had some really lovely flavours I did have to glug down my drink afterwards!

When we went to Deal in November (you can read about it here) Amanda gave me some rose lemonade tea to try. I love anything rose flavoured (or scented) so this really hit the spot. She bought me a box to take home with me today and I can’t wait to have some with my breakfast tomorrow!

I can’t believe it’s the end of January today and of course also the end of Veganuary. I’m really interested to see the feedback from the campaign this year and how many people will be continuing with their vegan journeys. I challenged my Mum to go veggie for January and she has decided to carry on with it so I’m a very happy bunny! I’ll have her vegan in no time 😉

Plumes x