A Minor Place and Darth Vader

Just a few things before tonight's main event:

1) Light n i n g BO LT: Secret Show (at) Irene. \m/
2) Check out Photos of Vegan Fitness Week Melbourne. (Photos by Noah)
3) Dean Wareham, from my favourite band Galaxie 500, blogged about his recent Melbourne tour and the "memorable in-store at Pure Pop Records in St. Kilda".
4)Matt Preston wrote about Trippy Taco.
5) My heart is broken: Bulmbers is not veg*n. And guess what? Also most apple juice brands are not veg*n neither.

"It's not you, it's me."

Kristy and I rode our bikes to A Minor Place (103 Albion Street, Brunswick) for breakfast last Saturday. The Soy Latte was pretty good.

The pretty Bonsoy spiral

What did we eat? Henry's Beans. It is made of Cannellini Beans (Kristy's favourite), garlic, rosemary (Kristy's pet hate) topped with dukkah, and served with lemon. They were not bad in my book. *pointing mic to Kristy* "What do you think about the beans, Kristy?". Kristy: "I was reluctant to go just for one bean dish, but I was pleasantly surprised."

This is pretty much the only vegan option. They also stock Crumb's vegan muffins.


Pip, the cooking god, tried to make it at home. Her version looks like the lost twin of Henry's Beans, but I haven't tried it though.

I bought an all black Keepcup. It has saved quite a few paper cups since I bought it two weeks ago. I call it Darth Vader.

Coffee: My Drug of Choice

As most of you might know, I love my coffee. A cup of proper coffee is office workers' best friend. The scent, the taste and the caffeine gives you a good kick in the morning and helps you to carry on with the 8 hours of mind numbing/draining work.

Having a Soy Long Mac(chiato) at Brother Baba Budan(BBB) before work is like my ritual. I have never had a bad coffee there.

Soy Long Mac @ Seven Seeds , mother store of Brother Baba Budan

My recent favourite is the little deli/cafe Superfino (275 Flinders Lane, Melbourne). The non-hipster Barista makes a good Soy Long Mac and Soy Latte with Coffee Supreme Organic Fairtrade Blend with bonsoy. They are also pretty close to my work and don't have long queues like BBB.

When you are in the city, you can also get good coffee at Jungle Juice, Switchboard (they also sell vegan Anzac cookies) and Pushka. I have also heard raving reviews of Collins Quarter and Dancing Goats.

This is a food blog so let's talk about food. Away from the city, you can enjoy a vegan moussaka (replace Feta with Hummus) or baked beans with a nice cup of coffee at Ray (332 Victoria St Brunswick). One of their waitresses is vegan and she went through all the vegan options with Kristy and I.

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Soy Long Mac from Ray

Bomb Cafe (229 Johnston St Abbotsford) make one of the best vegan breakfasts in Melbourne and their coffee is not bad either.

Soy Long Mac from Bomb Cafe

In other news: I'm doing my first Critical Mass tomorrow night! See you at 5:30pm outside the State Library at the corner of Swanston St and LaTrobe St.

Pancake weekend

A couple of weekends ago I had to knuckle down and spend a weekend working on my thesis, to try to make me feel better on sat morning I made these 5 minute pancakes. I didn't have regular soy milk but had choc and then made Vegan Dad's easy blueberry sauce.

The pancakes were super easy, slightly sweet, and yummy although I probably wouldn't recommend using choc soy milk. The sauce was delicious and well kind of healthy too.



The next morning, I made them again with regular soy milk, and served them lemon and icing sugar. Mr T said that he had never had them with lemon and sugar before. I think it is my favourite way to eat them and you can also eat them with your hands when there is no sauce or sticky maple syrup.


I will be making this quick pancake recipe again and again and again.


5 Minute Pancakes

• 1 cup flour
  
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup soymilk
• 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
  

1. Set out all your ingredients.
2. Set a stove element with a pan to medium heat.
3. Combine the 4 dry ingredients (flour, sugar, baking powder, salt) in a bowl.
4. Add the soy milk and vegetable oil to your mixture.
5. Mix until smooth.
6. Now the pan should be ready for your batter, so spoon one pancakes' worth of the mixture into the pan.
7. Flip [carefully] when you see bubbles in the middle of the pancake, or if the edges are looking stiffened.