As I made my way home, I started thinking about what to do with my find: syrup, a healing elixir or jam? More research was needed, so I had to preserve the goodness to buy myself some time. I rinsed the berries and gently stuffed them into a freezer bag, stems and all. The next day I shook the frozen berries off, (I have read that freezing helps a lot) and I was left with an almost-full bag.

On Saturday morning I veganized this recipe for Petits Gâteaux au Sureau (elderberry muffins). It’s extremely rich (read: greasy) due to the 150g of margarine I used. That, or the fact that it is a European recipe that uses weighted measurements. Still yummy, though, I’ve started working out again so I’m trying to be careful of my junk food intake.

While the rest of the elderberries stay chilly in the freezer, I’ve decided to make a bit of (raw) tincture for treating winter colds or flus (even though I can’t be 100% sure they’re true sambucas nigra) and the rest will be turned into jam.

Here’s the grow list: San Marzano tomatoes, sweet basil, Cayenne peppers, eggplant, kale and ground cherries. A lot less than last year, when I over-stuffed the raised bed, in order to give everything enough space.

It feels like everything is growing slowly and under producing. The basil crop has definitely failed and I’ll be pulling out the plants soon. On the flip side, the garlic harvest was a resounding success. It seems that garlic is truly my no-fail crop. [knock on wood]

As like other gardeners, I’m learning from my mistakes and I’m going to starting most of the 2013 garden in February with plans to transplant everything into large pots. I figure that, this way, all my plants will be big and strong before going into the hoop house.

So, if you’ve been to ChuChai before, you’ll remember that every “meat” had a menu page of its own. The new menu is condensed to a cardboard fold-out and there seem to be less options per “meat”. I noticed that the Pad Thai has changed to “Royal Pad Thai”, consisting of various mock meats and “shrimp”. I didn’t order it, so I didn’t ask if the shrimp were vegan. Next time.

I actually ordered a set meal from the lunch menu, which includes a starter (vegetable soup or fried imperial rolls), entrée, and Thai tea to complete the meal.

Starters: The wrappers used for the imperial rolls were much too salty, and the soup was unforgivably bland.

Entrées: For $15, my entrée was chicken and eggplant in a spicy sauce, served with a side of mixed vegetables and rice. The verdict: just ok. The spiciness was what made it just ok. The mock chicken was the same old limp stuff, not fried to give it a bit texture or marinated to taste like anything. Needless to say, I regretted my choice immediately.

For $17, my dining companion opted for the “duck” that was much tastier and had a nice texture. Even though it cost a bit more, it seemed like better value.

The tea at the end was a nice touch, though it took a few minutes to get used to the strange aroma. All in all, I don’t think this was money well spent — unusual, since I’ve been previously known to order extra dishes for leftovers.

Obviously, I’ll give them another chance since the eventual re-opening of Chuch, ChuChai’s little brother next door, will bring me back to the neighbourhood. I’m hoping that they don’t change Chuch too much, since both restaurants share a kitchen. I liked the laid-back atmosphere, the bring-your-own-wine option and those irresitible soya brochettes.

Strike one!

—
ChuChai is located at 4088 rue St-Denis in Montréal. Reservations for lunch are not required, but are a must for dinner. Alcohol is served on the premises.

The first half of the year was really good, however, mostly focusing on the preparation and execution of my first garden. But my energy for writing was fading. Then I got really discouraged and pissed off at how the winner of a Vida Vegan Con giveaway was chosen without any explanation as to why or how. Shortly after, I finally lost my blogging mojo right at the beginning of Vegan Mofo; a task I half-heartedly took on but knew I wouldn’t complete.

I was hoping to bounce back to blogging after my trip to London but that obviously didn’t happen. I still have photos saved, and will definitely write about that soon. I promise! There’s just too much good stuff to share.

Over the last half of the year, I’ve become dependant on processed convenience foods to quickly cobble together meals. I’ve also been vegging out in my limited free time, not exercising at all. Last week I decided that I couldn’t continue on like that and started juicing again, after watching Fat, Sick & Nearly Dead. While I’m in no position to do a juice cleanse, I’m trying very hard to keep things like Yves veggie meats and Daiya non-dairy cheese to a minimum. I’m also finding it difficult keeping myself from baking naughty things like chocolate-chip cookies and cinnamon buns. I try and stave off those cravings with banana & peanut butter smoothies. (Okay, fine, I admit that I slip a tablespoon of chocolate chips in there…) As for exercising, I definitely need to start up again because, physically, I don’t feel ok. I plan on tackling the Couch to 5K program with full force within a month’s time. I must.

Looking further, forward…
I’ve only now just started to decompress and shift my attention back to the blog, starting a bit of theme renovation and re-arranging of content. It’s a slow process since I’m customizing things to my needs, but I’ll be happier blogging in this space once it’s done.

In the meantime, why not have yourself a nice, freshly-made Tonique?

This time, I brushed plain soy milk on the formed dough and coated them in granulated sugar before baking. I got the idea from this video (warning, I only watched and didn’t listen to the audio). You can probably skip 2 minutes into it. I tried forming the dough like demonstrated but it didn’t look right. I ended up curling the little V-shapes to look more like a palmier.

In true palmier form, the underside of the cookies were sticky-brown and sugary. This batch turned out really light-textured and crispy too. This is definitely an easy treat to make for guests — they’ll be super impressed when you tell them they’re homemade.

This thing looks fancy but it’s really easy if you’ve got prepared puffed pastry in the freezer. Besides having to think ahead to thaw the pastry, it makes for a fairly quick and light lunch option, or side.

One day, if I ever get the courage, I will try my hand at making puffed pastry from scratch. VeganDad’s recipe looks neat.

The recipe for 10-minute steel-cut oats keeps well in the fridge should give you a good breakfast base for the next several days. Simply scoop out a portion of oats into a bowl, mix in a splash of soy milk and re-heat in the microwave.

At this point you can let your imagination go wild: I set a handful of whole raw cashews and sliced almonds in the toaster oven while cutting up a nectarine from the fridge. Take the warmed bowl and top with the nuts and fruit, drizzle with maple syrup and enjoy.

That said, you can expect at least three posts per week from me. Let’s get into what’s to come:

• Week 40 (October 2 – 8): Eating in
  I’ll look at stuff I grew, made from scratch, and more.
• Week 41 (October 9 – 15): Eating out
  Keeping vegan while on the go or travelling abroad.
• Week 42 (October 16 – 22): Organic Week 2011
  I decided to participate in this national Canadian event through the scope of VeganMofo! Read more about it here.
• Week 43 (October 23 – 29): All eyes on the potato
  This week will be dedicated to the lowly root vegetable, and a few (yummy) things you can make with these starchy lumps of comfort.

So there you have it; my commitment to VeganMofo 2011. Looking for ways to keep tabs on me?

• Subscribe to my RSS feed.
• If you’re on Twitter, follow me where I talk about food (& more) in 140 characters or less.
• Don’t have an account but are Twitter-curious? There’s a RSS feed of my tweets!

I’m also super excited to see what all the other VeganMofo’ers are up to — I love reading and discovering new-to-me blogs. Good luck to all the participants!

After a lot of research, I had started 9 seedlings indoors about a month before the last frost. Since the first blooms appeared in late June, I collected orange flower heads, dried them and carefully plucked the petals off. I eventually had enough to fill a 500 ml canning jar and recently covered the dry mass with olive oil. It now sits on a window sill as I impatiently wait. This is the folk method of making an oil infusion, from James Green’s book, “The Herbal Medicine-Maker’s Handbook: A Home Manual”, where no measuring or weighing of ingredients is involved.

The plan all along was to use this calendula oil and blend it along with both shea and cocoa butters to make a whipped body cream. Though I really wish I had more petals. I would have liked to make a tincture or infusions for over the germ-riddled winter season. My only excuse is that I had gotten lazy near the end and let many flowers go to seed. The advantage to my laziness is that I collected a lot of that seed. I spread it over various parts of my land, hoping for “volunteer” plants to pop up next year.

Next season, I plan on keeping the entire dried flower head for medicine-making en lieu of just the petals. I noticed that the heads contain a lot of sticky resin that’s full of the healing properties calendula flowers are known for. I’ll also reserve a small jar of dried petals in the kitchen to use as “poor-man’s saffron”.

Check these write-ups on Calendula:

- Calendula: Plant Sunshine (PDF), by The East-West School for Herbal & Aromatic Studies
- Calendula – aka Superherb, from Whispering Earth
- July is Calendula Month!, from the Urban Herb School
- Calendula, University of Maryland Medical Center

But it’s not just about what these flowers can do for us… Calendulas are bright, cheery and simply a pleasure to look at.

Disclaimer: It should be said that, if you’re planning on delving into herbal healing, you should perform your own due diligence and research the hell out of whatever it is you intend to prescribe to yourself or others.

I took advantage of the today to get some stuff out of the garden: Tiny Tim and Early Girl tomatoes, jalapeño peppers, ground cherries, eggplants, lemon thyme, pole beans, coriander seeds and a tiny Spanish onion I accidentally pulled out.

I now realize that I need to bone up on succession planting in preparation of the next growing season. Had I been more knowledgeable on the topic, I’d still have pole beans coming in. I’ve taken the seeds from some of the dried-on-vine pods and threw them back into the bean row. Though it’s merely a test, with no added inoculant, it’d be neat to get an extra crop before it gets too cold.