If you want to read the article, click on the link below. I posted the article in my primary blog because I felt it belonged there more than here. It's a heavy rant speaking of my reasons for becoming a vegetarian and some people may find it offensive. It's not a good entry to post alongside my recipes.
Here's a quote pulled right out of that entry:
I don't want to have to kill sentient beings to live because, as far as I'm concerned, I can maintain a perfectly healthy existence without relying on the death of living, breathing beings. Animals can have a fruitful existence and serve an ecological purpose for the Earth without me killing and eating them.
Pure Honey gathered by Cultured Bees sold at the Bohol Bee Farm
Before you go ballistic and scream at me telling me honey isn't consumed by vegans, let me give everyone a full disclosure: I never said I was vegan.
I'm actually an ovo-lacto vegetarian and I happen to love honey. On the ethical side of this discussion, however, I must say I'm particular about where the honey comes from and whether or not bees had to die.
You see, I only buy honey if I know bees were not killed in order for it to be collected from their hive--that means only cultured honey harvested by bee keepers who house honey bees in wooden boxes and methodically extract the golden juice of the gods without having to commit mass murder. I believe the consumption of honey is okay as long as bees don't get slaughtered for it.
Anyway, I'm done justifying myself. I like honey. Deal with it! Now, let's move on.
I'll be answering Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) here so do feel free to email me if you have additional questions.
Will my honey ever go bad?
No. Pure honey will NEVER EVER spoil as long as you keep it pure and secure. It is the only food item in the world that will never go bad. Sealed jars of honey have been found in a number of tombs of Egyptian Pharaohs and they were all found to be edible even after several millennia.
Honey will only spoil if you do something to make it impure such as add things to it like lots of sugar or water. It may also ferment with prolonged exposure to humidity. I'm talking about an extremely long exposure to extreme humidity so no worries about leaving the jar open if you're in a tropical country.
Another way to ruin honey is by dropping considerably large amounts of food items that have high microbial content into its container. Things like mouldy cheese and milk are to be kept away from honey. Then again, the process of fermentation would be inexplicably long so the honey will have been eaten before the impurities you brought upon it will cause it to ferment.
Is it true that honey has medicinal properties?
Yes. Honey has antiseptic properties, particularly antibacterial and antiviral. It can be used as a topical treatment for wounds and cuts. It may also be taken orally as treatment for sore throat and coughs.
Should honey be heated before bottling to kill off microbes and such?
No. Pure unheated honey contains propolis, pollen, antioxidants and enzymes that have positive physical benefits when taken in. However, they may die with considerable heat so the honey is best kept away from your cooking devices.
Honey is not meant to be heated at all! Again, pure honey has anti-microbial stuff so why would you need to heat it? You'd be wasting your time and risking to render its good organisms useless. It's only supposed to be filtered.
What kind of vegetarians eat honey?
There are a number of vegetarians that eat honey.
Ovo-lacto vegetarianism may include the consumption of honey.
Kosher or Jewish Vegetarianism permits honey.
Sattvic or Yogic Vegetarianism,
Sufi or Mystical Islamic Vegetarianism,
Hindu Vegetarianism, and
Buddhist Vegetarianism all permit the consumption of honey provided that no bees were harmed in the process of collecting them.
Why does honey crystallise?
Honey naturally crystallises in certain conditions. The idea that only impure honey crystallises is completely bogus so it would do you well to remove it from your noggin this instant. Crystallisation is a natural state that most honeys are quickly reduced to after they are removed from the honeycombs of the hives. In fact, honey may even crystallise while still in the honeycombs if temperature drops low and the bees are not standing over it to provide heat. Here are the major factors that cause your honey to crystallise or speed up the process:
1. Glucose is a major catalyst in its crystallisation. Honey is composed of a number of sugars including fructose, maltose, sucrose and glucose. Most of the rest of it is water. Depending on what flowers the bees landed on to collect nectar from, there may be a higher concentration of one particular sugar over the others. The higher the glucose content, the faster your honey will crystallise especially at low temperatures.
2.If you store your honey in a plastic container, it will crystallise faster than if you put it in something made of glass because the former is significantly more porous than the latter. Thus, air could more easily permeate.
3.If your honey was not thoroughly filtered before storage, it will most likely contain pieces of pollen, propolis and beeswax that are larger compared to the bits left after filtration. They will likely be large enough to catalyse crystallisation.
4. If you store your honey in a fridge or outside your house when it's snowing, it will crystallise more rapidly than if stored in tropical/summer room temperature. When exposed to temperatures around 20-10°C (68-50°F), it will crystallise much faster than, say, 21-35°C. The latter range is ideal if you don't want granulated honey.
How do I liquefy honey once it has crystallised?
Expose it to a warm temperature not higher than 37°C (100°F). If it goes beyond that, its antioxidants and enzymes are at risk of getting killed and it will be nothing more than a bottle of sweet gunk. We consume honey for its health benefits not merely because it tastes good so please keep this tip.
Ideally, you could keep the honey close to your body (like under your pits or in the depths of your underpants). You could also simply put it by the window on a sunny day--removing it periodically so it doesn't get too hot. I wouldn't advise any other method.
The catch here, however, is that once your honey has already crystallised and you've managed to liquefy it, it will relapse once its temperature normalises and crystallise again. That's just how nature works so deal with it! I personally don't mind if my honey crystallises. In fact, I sometimes do it on purpose.
How can I tell pure honey from impure/diluted honey?
A lot of people tend to blank out when talking about how to tell whether their bottle of honey is pure or not. There are a number of ways to determine if honey is pure. I'll be giving you three methods in this article.
1. Drop a teaspoon of honey into a glass of cool (or room temperature) water. Never use warm or hot water.
If the honey disintegrates and dissolves immediately, it is IMPURE.
If it stays intact and forms a lump that settles at the bottom, it is PURE.
2. Dip a piece of cotton (or candle wick) onto some honey and try to light it.
If it does not burn properly, it means water content is high, meaning it is IMPURE.
If it burns for more than 3 seconds, it means it is PURE.
3. Put a single drop of honey on your thumbnail.
If it spreads around or spills right away, it is IMPURE.
If it stays intact on your thumbnail even if you move a little, it is PURE.
Here's a video of me testing honey purity:
I am in no way associated with the proprietors of the Bohol Bee Farm.
I've recently discovered I actually like asparagus so I bought a lot of it last Saturday while shopping for groceries. The downside, however, is that they don't like to linger in my crisper for a long time. They tend to wilt and become stringy and inedible if you leave them hanging around for more than three days in your fridge. Three various stir-fry recipes later, I was at risk of causing myself to become sick of it. I was so intent at consuming it quickly before it went past its keeping period that I almost began to dislike it.
The solution? Soup. I don't know what it is about vegetable soup that seems to make everything better for me.
If you follow the recipe strictly, you'll come up with a bowl that will serve:
- 1 person if he/she isn't having anything else,
- 2 people if they're eating other stuff
You will need:
- 5 asparagus stalks (To prepare: Chop off and throw away the woody part at the bottom of each stalk. Finely chop 2 whole stalks. Halve the three remaining stalks crosswise. Chop the bottom halves and leave the top halves intact.
- 1 medium sized potato, boiled and mashed or blended
- 3 cups of vegetable stock or water
- ¼ cup of chopped onion
- 2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
- 1 tablespoon of olive oil
- 1 pinch of chopped fresh/dried marjoram leaves
- 1 pinch of chopped fresh/dried parsley leaves
- salt for seasoning
- black pepper for seasoning
- 3 tablespoons of sweet-salty flavouring sauce (Lee Kum Kee Vegetarian Stir-Fry Sauce or any vegetarian oyster mushroom sauce if available)
If you don't have pre-made flavouring sauce, you can use this:
Mix 1½ tablespoon of soy sauce, ½ tablespoon of molasses or brown sugar and 1 tablespoon of hot water.
Let's make some soup:
1. In a saucepan, sauté the onion and garlic in olive oil for half a minute.
2. Drop in the chopped asparagus and sauté for another 30 seconds.
3. Pour in your vegetable stock (or water) and drop in the intact asparagus halves.
4. Bring to the boil and simmer covered for 5 minutes over low heat.
5. After 5 minutes, remove the intact tips and set them aside for later.
6. Sprinkle in your marjoram and parsley leaves.
7. Add in the mashed potato and pour in the flavouring sauce.
8. Bring to the boil with continuous stirring to fully mix the ingredients.
9. When it comes to the boil, simmer covered over low heat for 10 minutes with occasional stirring to scrape anything that sticks to the sides (because, yes, it will definitely happen).
10. Season with salt and pepper to your palate's desire.
11. Before serving, garnish with the intact asparagus tips like I did in the picture above. And if you're wondering, of course you can eat them!
It's a modified version of something I've cooked hundreds of times before but never cared to post a recipe of. It's just such a no-brainer that any run-of-the-mill Filipino could whip up a wok full without having to scream every three minutes asking their mums for help. There's basically no chance this recipe could go wrong when it's cooked in a Filipino home.
If you're a Pinoy vegetarian living in the Philippines, I'm quite sure you've tried Adobong Kangkong. What I'm about to teach you how to cook is simply a westernised version of it where I've replaced kangkong with real spinach and brought broccoli into the picture.
If you follow the recipe strictly, you'll come up with a bowl good for:
- 1 vegetarian, or
- 14 meat eating nut jobs who think it's good enough that they swallow half a teaspoon of vegetables once a week after gorging on fancily prepared dead animals for the rest of it
You will need:
- 1 cup of broccoli flower
- ½ cup of broccoli stalk (without the woody/stringy outer coating)
- 1 fistful of spinach leaves
- 2 cloves of crushed garlic
- 1 tablespoon of finely chopped onion
- 2 tablespoons of soy sauce
- 1 teaspoon of vinegar
- ½ teaspoon of molasses (1 teaspoon of brown sugar will do, too)
- 1 tablespoon of olive oil
- salt for seasoning
- black pepper for seasoning
NOTE: If you don't like broccoli stalk, you may do away with it and replace it with one more cup of broccoli flower.
To cook it:
1. Mix the soy sauce, vinegar, molasses and garlic in a bowl, and then marinate the leaves in it. Don't leave it to soak right away, though. Get your hands dirty by squeezing the spinach like a sponge. Let it absorb the marinade.
2. Cover the bowl and allow it to sit in a warm place for 15 minutes while you take a shower or watch a shady short flick. ;)
3. After you've showered or watched your 15-minute flick, heat a tablespoon of olive oil in a pan and drop in your onions and broccoli stalk to cook for about a minute.
4. Remove the spinach leaves and garlic cloves from the marinade and drop them into your pan. Don't you ever dare squeeze the marinade off it! The idea is for some of the liquid to go with it when you drop it in. Cook for about a minute with continuous stirring using a spoon to keep the ingredients from sticking to the pan and burning.
5. Take a tablespoon of your marinade and it add to the pan. You may throw the rest away.
6. Add 2 to 3 tablespoons of water to the pan and allow it to simmer covered over low heat for 5 minutes.
7. After five minutes, drop in your broccoli flower. Stir to coat it with the sauce.
8. Add two more tablespoons of water and simmer covered for another 5 to 7 minutes. Note that the broccoli flower will cook a bit slower here than most other recipes because it's not completely covered with liquid. It's more like it's being steamed than simmered. With the tiny amount of sauce in this dish, it usually just sits on top of the spinach.
9. Remove the cover and season with salt and pepper to your taste buds' delight. You may add a teaspoon of vegan stir-fry sauce if you like.
10. Serve with a side of chilled black grapes and a glass of cold apple juice.
I got hungry and I had all the ingredients to make pancakes... except eggs! "Darn it," I said to myself. "But wait, this is a very good opportunity to come up with vegan pancakes."
Don't be fooled. That's not butter melting on top of the pancakes. That's actually dairy-free margarine!
If you follow the recipe strictly, you'll come up with:
NOTE: The photo above has 6 pancakes. I simply doubled all the ingredients! HAH!
You will need:
- 150 grams (1 cup) of plain flour
- 180 millilitres (¾ cup) of soy milk or coconut milk, coconut in my case
- 2 tablespoons of melted dairy-free margarine
- 1 tablespoon of brown sugar (or 2, depending on whether you like your pancakes sweet)
- 1 egg's equivalent of vegan egg substitute: either banana-based or flax seed based←<<CLICK ON THOSE LINKS!!! (In this case, half and half of puréed banana and flax seed is best because sweet pancakes are awesome.)
- ¼ teaspoon of salt
- 1½ teaspoon of baking powder
- 1 teaspoon of cinnamon powder
NOTE: If you don't like cinnamon, you can omit it. However, in that case, you can no longer call them "Cinnamon Pancakes."
Let's flip some:
1. Mix all the dry ingredients in a bowl.
2. Mix the egg substitute, the margarine and the soy/coconut milk in a second bowl.
3. Use a mixer if you have one and let it run on the bowl with the liquids. If you don't have a mixer, use a whisk. A fork is NOT acceptable.
4. Slowly add in the dry ingredients to the bowl with the liquid ingredients while the mixer is running on it (or while continuously mixing it with your whisk).
5. Mix it well. And I don't mean make a suspension. Mix it really well!
6. Put a non-stick flat pan over medium-low heat. You DO NOT need a greasing agent.
7. Divide the mixture into 3 equal parts and cook them individually. You got that right! ONE BY ONE!
8. To do this, pour the mixture onto the centre of the pan and allow it to spread by itself to form a circle. Don't worry if it's not a perfect circle. That's life!
9. Allow about a minute of cooking and then check the underside. If it's brown (like the photo above), flip it using your spatula or, if you're a kitchen diva, toss-flip it using the pan. If you don't think it's brown enough, leave it to cook for a couple of more seconds but make sure you don't burn it because there's nothing more awful than burnt pancakes.
10. After flipping it, cook the other side until you think it's done. Channel your inner chef and you'll be able to tell intuitively. Hahaha! By the way, it's important to note that the other side looks completely different from the original underside. It has more bubbles and it has a cake-like curve. I call it the "puffed side."
11. When cooked, remove from the pan and serve hot with margarine or maple syrup. Or you can let it sit on a plate while waiting for the other pieces to cook so you can stack them and eat them all at once like a boss.
This is the second of two vegan egg substitute recipes I'm sharing. While the first one was for sweet things, this one is for not-so-sweet things like simple breads and the like.
You must bear in mind, though, that neither of the two sauces will enable you to make sunny-side-up or scrambled eggs--not even mayonnaise. I already said in the previous recipe that these are only good for breads and cakes, remember?
Flax Seed-Based Egg Substitute
The Finished Product
Raw Flax Seeds
Flax seed can be found in most grocery stores and health shops. It is considered a health food item since it happens to be very rich in omega-3 fatty acids. I bought mine at Healthy Options, SM City Cebu. There are brown seeds and golden yellow seeds like in the picture above. Both are equally good for making egg substitute--it just depends on whether or not you like your food to be dark.
You will need:
- 1 tablespoon of ground flax seed (grind it using a coffee grinder)
- 3 tablespoons of water
To make it:
1. Simmer the ground flax seeds and water in a small pan or metallic cup for 5 minutes until you achieve a consistency similar to an egg white's.
2. Put it on a cup and let it cool completely before you use it.
NOTE: This amount is equivalent to one egg but you may easily make more using a ratio of 1 part ground flax seed to 3 parts water.
The most difficult part of making vegan versions of breads and cakes is coming up with an egg substitute.
Let me teach you how to make them. If you're a vegan yourself, this is something to live by. If you're not a vegan, then perhaps you could purposely learn how to do this and brag about it to your vegan friends so they'll be more gracious to your future dinner invitations. HAH!
This is the first of two recipes of vegan egg substitutes I'll be sharing. This one is for sweet things like cakes and pastries.
Banana-Based Egg Substitute
Mashed
Puréed
You will need:
- 1 large ripe banana
- 1/2 (half) teaspoon of baking powder
- 1 teaspoon of corn flour (corn starch)
To make it:
There are two ways to make it.
1st Method: If you want it chunky, put all the ingredients in a bowl and use a hand masher or a fork to mash it thoroughly until it becomes like the picture above. Leave it to rest in a cool dry place (such as your fridge) for 30-60 minutes before using so the pectin could activate.
2nd Method: Drop all the ingredients in a food processor and whiz it until it turns into a purée. Leave it to rest in your fridge for 30-60 minutes before using it.
NOTE: ¼ (a quarter) of a cup of this substitute is equivalent to one egg.
