Putting Birthday Presents to Good Use

A friend and I have this tradition of getting each other very belated birthday gifts, usually when one or the other of us decides there's something we would really like. I recently cashed mine in; there were a couple of cookbooks I was very excited about owning and I'm on a shopping for myself ban.

I requested Vegan Richa's Indian Kitchen and The Homemade Vegan Pantry which is Miyoko Schinner's latest book. They duly arrived and they are gorgeous, they're both stunning books with beautiful pictures and I am so exciting about working through both of them and documenting it here.

I started with Vegan Richa's Indian Kitchen, I'm a touch intimidated by Vegan Pantry and I have been craving a good curry for a while now. It took me three thorough readings of the book to decide what I wanted to make, everything looks so tasty and nothing seemed complicated or time consuming.

The first thing I had to try was the naan bread, it's something I love and my local shop used to do a very nice vegan one but they stopped selling it a few months back and I have been left bereft of the rare and elusive vegan naan bread. I decided on the avocado naan because they're green and I love me some funny coloured food.

They were very simple to make, they took a couple of hours to make but it was almost all down time and making bread makes me feel like a culinary genius. I decided to do them in the frying pan and they got appealingly toasty. 

I needed something to eat my naan with and the cumin scented rice and broccoli kofta with yoghurt gravy sounded like just the thing. I am horrible at cooking rice, it terrifies me but this recipe was so detailed I felt confident and was so pleased with the results, I had fragrant and fluffy rice.

The koftas were simple and although I think I left the yoghurt gravy too thick the resulting dish was flavourful and thoroughly impressed The Boy. I've also never received more compliments or questions about my lunch when I took the leftovers to work.

Disclaimer: The names of recipes might be misremembered or otherwise mangled and there is no natural light in my house so excuse the clumsy photo and naughty tortie in the background of this picture.

I cannot wait to make more from this cook book, I think it's going to become one of my most regularly used books. Just need to brave Vegan Pantry now, does anyone have any recommendations?