Cauliflower Base Pizza

I had heard of this several times and wanted to try it but never got round to it (or had any cauliflowers!). I also was a bit skeptical as to whether Little Miss' dad would even give it a go but when meal planning this week I decided to bite the bullet and go for it! 

I used this recipe from detoxinista for the base: http://detoxinista.com/2014/02/vegan-cauliflower-pizza-crust/ 

I forgot to order ground almonds so put some nutritional yeast in instead. I'm not sure that they had the same effect but the cheesy taste was yummy! 

We topped our pizza with tomato purée, roasted courgette and aubergine, kale, silken tofu, cherry tomatoes and finally some grated vegan cheese. 

I must admit that I didn't leave myself enough time to make the base to the letter. The cauliflower was still warm when I pressed it into the baking tray and I'm pretty sure I did not get enough water out of it be ause it didn't stay together as well as I would have liked. However, it was very delicious! Little Miss is still being ridiculously fussy with food due to teething (bread and fruit is almost all she'll eat at the moment) however she was spooning this up so quickly! Despite being very healthy it did not taste too different from regular pizza. The consistency of ours was definitely different but as I said before I didn't do it completely right.

This is such a great way to get lots of veg into your little ones and not at all difficult to make (and not too time consuming if you plan it well unlike me). I was amazed by how much I liked it so even if you are having reservations I definitely think you should try it; I'm sure you'll be surprised!

This is our very unprofessional looking pizza!:

Enjoy!

JULES XOXO

Party food part 1: Mini Quiche

Over the next few posts I will (finally!) be showing you some of the recipes I used for Little Miss' 1st birthday party when she had her mini friends over to play. These include mini quiches, green falafel, spinach and bean triangles and the sugar free cakes I made too.

As well as these we had houmous, cucumber, carrot, red pepper slices, mini breadsticks, mini rice cakes, melon, satsuma and dried apricots for the mini people as well as some naughty sugary cupcakes for the exhausted parents!

The feast for the little ones

Fuel for the parents (mint chocolate, caramel coconut, ginger & lemon and pistachio & rosewater)

Today's post will be about the mini quiches. The basis of the filling is tofu, non-dairy milk, nutmeg and turmeric. To this you can add the fillings you like. For me a quiche needs onion which I like to fry before it goes in the mixture. In ours we also put peas and curly kale. Previously, when we made a big quiche, we used red pepper and broccoli which resulted in a fantastic mixture of colours and tastes.

Any shortcrust savoury pastry recipe will work with this and I tried a few out. You could even buy ready made pastry if the thought of making your own scares you (but it really is not hard to do!).

Here is a pastry recipe that you could use:

225g plain flour

100g margarine

2.5 tablespoons of COLD water

(usually this would have salt added but I left this out for the sakes of the mini people)

Mix the flour an margarine together (really helps to have a machine) and then mix in the water so it comes together as a dough. If it doesn't come together, add a little more water. If it is really sticky (it should be more firm than sticky) then add a little more flour.

Grease a bun tin (what you would make fairy cakes in). Roll out the pastry on a floured surface with a floured rolling pin until it is a couple of mm thick. Cut out circles that will fit into the bun tin using pastry cutters and press into each depression. Put a little greaseproof paper onto the bottom of each one and then put a few baking beans onto this. Blind bake (i.e. without the filling) for 10 minutes in a preheated oven at 180 degrees celcius.

While these are baking you can prepare your filling.

Essential Ingredients:

400g block of firm tofu

1/3 cup soya milk

1/2 tsp nutmeg

1/2 tsp turmeric

Pepper to taste (salt too if you want to)

What I used as well:

1/2 large red onion, chopped

Cup of frozen peas

2 cups of curly kale

Fry any vegetables which you think need it. I did this to the onion and lightly fried the kale also. I would be inclined to fry or even roast red pepper to release that lovely flavour even more.

In a food processor, blend all the essential ingredients together. This doesn't have to be completely smooth (I like it a bit chunky). Then add the vegetables and blitz for a few seconds (but still to leave plenty of chunks).

Fill the pre-baked pastry shells with the filling (to the top). I froze some at this point. Bake for around 20 minutes until they start to brown and are piping hot all the way through.

I do think a bit of red pepper in these ones would have made them more visually appealing but they went down a storm with both the children and the parents and can be eaten hot or cold. 

JULES XOXO