Here's a spicy, zingy Indian style sprouted bean salad which has been my default lunch option for a few weeks, because it ticks all my boxes for a great lunch. It's simple to make (once you've got the sprouts), it's ridiculously tasty with the combination of seeds, spices, lemon and chilli, plus it's got a big tick next to all the major nutrients we need. All this alongside it being completely vegan, it really couldn't be more versatile and all satisfying.

Indian Sprouted Bean Salad with Avocado

Gavin Wren Recipes, Salads, Vegan, Vegetarian

Here’s a spicy, Indian style sprouted bean salad which has been my default lunch option for the last few weeks, because it ticks all my ‘great lunch’ boxes. It’s simple to make (once you’ve got the sprouts), ridiculously tasty with the combination of seeds, spices, lemon and chilli, plus it’s got a big tick next to all the major nutrients we need. Alongside it being completely vegan, it really couldn’t be more versatile and all satisfying.

Social Sprouts

Sprouts say one thing to me. Brussels. I’m not talking about the cosmopolitan city, lying a mere 121 minutes away from London St Pancras, rather the bitter green orbs of distaste which I was deigned not to like well before one had ever crossed the threshold of my trap. Society seemed constructed for little children who Don’t Like Sprouts. Perhaps it’s their bitter flavour, or perhaps there’s an entire social… come and read more…

Melanzane in Saor is an amazing vegetarian and vegan aubergine (eggplant) dish in a sweet and slightly sour sauce, which is unique to Venice and follows a proud history of Italian food using love, respect and time to get the best of the ingredients. It's a serious make ahead dish, needing 2 days to mature but worth the wait for those fantastic flavours and perfect for buffet spreads or picnics.

Melanzane in Saor (aubergine)

Gavin Wren Recipes, Side dishes, Vegan, Vegetables, Vegetarian

Today I’m recounting an amazing Italian dish called ‘melanzane in saor’, or aubergine ‘in Saor’. It’s a very simple yet beautifully balanced Italian dish that has sweet and sour flavours that work just beautifully together. The age is the important thing, you need to make this dish well in advance to let the flavours develop, it’s perfect to make a day ahead for a buffet spread or to take along to a picnic, but don’t …

A sweet and spicy bulgur bake with turmeric, cinnamon, Harissa, dried apricots, wholemeal bulgur and more to create a warm and glowing vegetarian and vegan one pot tray bake which is a perfect meal to use up all those spare or leftover vegetables that you might have laying around. Full recipe on brainfoodstudio.com

Sweet and Spicy Bulgur Bake with Harissa

Gavin Wren Main Dishes, Recipes, Vegan, Vegetables, Vegetarian

This post is one of those leftover dishes that’s amazingly versatile and will eat up any leftover veggies you might have laying around at home, don’t be afraid to experiment, just chuck in whatever you’ve got! It also puts a slight spin on the traditional tray bake recipes, using wholemeal bulgur wheat to create a bulgur bake that’s a highly tasty and filling not to mention vegetarian and vegan to boot. Semantic. I once heard …

How to cook onions and how recipes lie to us

How to Cook Onions and How Recipes Lie

Gavin Wren Basic Ingredients, Food Education, Food Techniques, Writing

Today I’m looking at how cooks and chefs around the world have lied to us about how to cook onions, misusing terms like sauté, caramelise, sweat and fry along with frankly ridiculous suggestions of cooking times. So if you really want to know your onions, read on, and I will expose the real truth about onions. Hold the Front Page! It’s time for a News of the World style exposé of the food world. Time …

Golden, light and flaky vegetarian sausage rolls made with spelt rough puff pastry and filled with onion, garlic, mushrooms, thyme and oozing, molten Comté cheese. Perfect for the dinner table or the picnic basket.

Vegetarian Sausage Rolls with Mushroom and Comté

Gavin Wren Baking, Side dishes, Small Bites, Spelt & ancient grains, Starters, Vegetarian

Sausage rolls. This recipe presented me with a very complex, difficult and hard to resolve problem. It demonstrated the depths of philosophical wrangling that I have to endure, just to bring to you what seems, on the surface, a simple recipe. Take this particular little gem. It’s got 8 ingredients, an average amount by most standards, half of those being day to day ‘store cupboard’ items. There are no complicated process involved and if you …

Black rice and wild mushrooms are the star of this one pot cooked on a base of onion, garlic & ginger, mixed with miso paste, mirin and vegetable stock then garnished with chilli, sesame seeds and coriander. It's a dark, rich and mysterious vegetarian and vegan one pot!

Black Rice with Miso Mushrooms

Gavin Wren Main Dishes, Recipes, Side dishes, Vegan, Vegetarian

Black rice is the mysterious, dark, hidden jewel of the rice kingdom. A jet black, enveloping chasm of colour, a deep unknown place of hidden beauty, sparkling in the shadows. Black rice – the forbidden fruit. It was the forbidden fruit, a royal treat stored only for the Chinese Emperor, his family and concubines. A mere peasant such as myself could be put to death for laying his hands on black rice, a very dark …