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Monday, January 30, 2012

A bunch of brunches

Tofu scrambles have been a habitual weekend brunch item for such a long period when I have the time to cook something up. Although I adore a good scramble and love how it can be changed up in a multitude of ways, I reached the point where I grew tired of cooking and eating scrambles. My last few brunches have been a lot more interesting to eat and photograph so I decided to post about them.

My first effort was centred around trying out some Mexican styled home-made baked beans. The beans had a great flavour although they were tainted by the odd chewy bean here and there. Making up the rest of the plate was avocado, steamed spinach with a drizzle of lime and garlic, a grilled home-grown tomato and some delicious mushroom chicharrones. Last year I made tofu chicharrones from Viva Vegan and loved their taste but not how oily they were. Mandee from Cupcake Kitteh gave me inspiration to try this wonderful marinade out with mushrooms and I have been making them like this since as they are seriously delicious without the guilt.      


I gave the home-made baked beans a miss the following weekend and opted to use some tinned ones instead. The man prefers the sweet chilli variety with a bit of hot sauce added. Some of the same elements from the following week were on our plates again and there was also tofu bacon and some fantastic faux eggs. The faux eggs are adapted from one of Terry Hope Romero's testing recipes so I won't be sharing my version of this until the book is released.


On Australia Day, I decided to cook us up an Egyptian styled breakfast for something even more different. I bought some tins of ful medames from a Middle Eastern store a while ago after being slightly disappointed with my previous ful medames attempt when I cooked fava beans from scratch. The instructions on this tin said to "heat and eat" but I found that the beans needed some lemon and garlic to perk them up. The ful medames were topped with faux eggs, chopped home-grown tomatoes and parsley with some home-made pita bread on the side. The man wanted to know why he wasn't getting the full spread he was becoming accustomed to but I really loved this breakfast.


To appease the man, I went back to a full spread last weekend. Tinned baked beans, tofu bacon, spinach and home-grown tomatoes with a huge dollop of home-made pesto. I usually photograph my own plate but had been snacking along the way and wasn't very hungry by the time everything was prepared, so this is the man's enormous serve of the lot.

Instead of making up a chiccharone marinade for the mushrooms this time, I threw them into the remaining tofu bacon marinade which worked quite well. I also made some tattie scones which I have seen Johanna of Green Gourmet Giraffe and more recently Theresa of The Tropical Vegan post recipes for. I loosely followed Theresa's recipe although I didn't measure any of the ingredients and just made them by feel. Tattie scones are served for breakfast in Scotland and are made up of mashed potato, flour, salt and oil which are rolled out flat and fried on each side. Tattie scones will included in these types of brunches every so often as they were really nice and quite easy to make.      


These brunches haven't been the fastest meals to prepare but I have enjoyed having so much variety on my plate. They are generally consumed very late in the morning which means there is no need for lunch, a small afternoon snack normally sees us through until dinner. And after all this time without a scramble, I'm really starting to crave one again!

10 comments:

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    1. Thank-you Laktoowo, and thanks for dropping by!

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  2. Wow, what beautiful brunches! I never have enough energy to cook up more than 1 or two things at a time--love the beans for breakfast though!

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    1. I used to get a bit overwhelmed with cooking so many things in the morning but as long as there is someone to clean up after me I don't mind as much. :) Beans are great for brekky!

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  3. This is awe inspiring. I never cook breakfasts or brunches! The most labour-intensive things to come out of my kitchen are things that prepared themselves over night (oats in yoghurt, or some such) or something whizzed up into a smoothie! I'm really impressed.

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    1. I've always loved a cooked breakfast on the weekend. I'm not a cereal lover at all and usually have a smoothie and a piece of toast on weekdays so it's nice to mix it up a bit when I have more time.

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  4. I love your colourful plates of food - I haven't done many of these sort of brunches lately but this makes me want to - glad you liked the tattie scones - they are so yummy and easy and great if you ever have leftover mashed potato. I must try the tofu bacon - it always looks so good when you make it

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    1. The tattie scones were great, had been meaning to try them for a while but I never have spare mashed potato around. My son fills himself to the brim with mashed spuds when it's around. I had to make a bit of mash especially for the tattie scones. We are all totally hooked on the tofu bacon, not sure that it's a good thing. ;)

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  5. Ah, brunch! The best meal! Those tattie scones look gorgeous, as do all of these meals, really.

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    1. I concur that brunch is the best meal, especially when you have one so big then there is no need to eat until dinner! Thanks for reminding me about tattie scones recently, I've been meaning to try them for ages. :)

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