Tofu-ricotta cheesecake

May 12, 2013

This cheesecake is my May calendar recipe. It's a funny one, a tofu cheesecake that isn't vegan. It is full of protein; the tofu is backed up by ricotta and eggs. And it's sweetened with honey rather than white sugar (though there's no doubt some of that in the biscuit base).

I made a few substitutes for convenience - I didn't have the full quantity of almonds so supplemented them with cashews, I likewise topped my quarter-cup of honey up with maple syrup, and I used canned rather than fresh passionfruit. All of this worked out just fine. The use of a food processor for both layers made construction awfully easy, yet the major revelation was the baking technique. There's a water bath, but you don't put the cheesecake in it. Instead the water sits in a tray in the bottom of the oven, creating humidity. I have never seen such a serene cheesecake, smooth and barely coloured by the heat, gently pulling away from the sides of the tin all on its own.

The recipe includes the kind of sour accents I like - a gingernut base, limes in the filling and passionfruit on top. The more unusual ingredients still assert themselves effectively - there are overtones of tofu and honey (even at a half-quantity of the latter), while the tofu and ricotta team up to create a light and velvety texture I have not previously experienced in a baked cheesecake.

Tofu-ricotta cheesecake
(original recipe on the Woolworths website)

155g packet gluten-free gingernut biscuits
50g almonds
70g butter
500g ricotta
250g silken tofu
finely grated rind and juice of 2 limes
1 teaspoon vanilla
3 eggs
1/2 cup honey
170g can passionfruit pulp

Line a springform tin with baking paper.

In a food processor, grind together the gingernuts and almonds; transfer these crumbs to a bowl. Melt the butter and pour it into the crumbs, mixing thoroughly. Press the mixture into the base of the springform tin, smoothing it out with the back of a spoon. Refrigerate.

Preheat an oven to 140°C. Fill a deep baking tray at least half-way with water and place it on the bottom shelf of the oven.

Clean out the food processor, then use it to blend together the ricotta, drained tofu, lime rind and juice, vanilla, eggs and honey. Keep blending, occasionally pausing to push down anything unmixed on the walls of the container, until the filling is smooth.

Retrieve the base from the fridge and pour over the filling. Bake the cheesecake for 1 hour, it should be smooth, just barely golden and pulling away from the tin at the edges, and a bit wobbly in the middle. Turn the oven off but keep the cheesecake in there for a further hour. Next, let the cheesecake come to room temperature on a bench and finally, cover it and refrigerate it overnight.

Pour the passionfruit over the cheesecake before serving.

Madame K's Vegetarian III

May 11, 2013

We had poorly thought through dinner plans with AOF and Lisa on Saturday night, and found ourselves flapping about trying to come up with a venue late in the afternoon. After finding a few more hyped up places booked up, we ended up going for Madame K's in Fitzroy. We called ahead and booked a table before turning up, which turned out to be wise - it's pretty full on a Saturday night. It's a lovely place, with a stylish blue fit-out and a massive and varied menu.

We decided that the best way to sample from the menu was to share dishes, so we ordered three starters and three mains between the four of us. The starters (from left: Japanese spiced tofu with salad and vegan wasabi mayo, $11.90; steamed wontons with mushroom, mashed potato and water chestnut, $7.90; pan-fried chive dumplings, $6.90) were excellent, with each of them named as somebody's favourite. The chive dumplings probably won it for me, although the wasabi mayo that came with the tofu was the pick of the condiments.

We mixed up the mains as well, starting with the prik khing (stir-fried crispy tofu with red curry paste, beans capsicum and chili, $15.90).

I love the way Madame K's loads their dishes up with veggies - this was full of fresh capsicum, zucchini and snow peas with a few spongy bits of tofu to really soak up the mild curry sauce.

We embraced the mock-meat with our other two mains - the nasi goreng ($16.90) comes with skewers of satay 'chicken' and mock prawns.

I really liked this - the rice was nicely fried and the satay sauce hit just about the right balance between spicy and sweet. 

Our final main was Thai spicy salad (spicy and sour salad with musrhroom made lamb, fresh herbs, lemon juice, lemongrass, fresh chili, cucumber, tomato and green salad, $15.90).

This was the spiciest dish of the night - I've been disappointed by overly mild Thai salads at loads of places, so it's nice to get one that cranks things up a bit. The 'lamb' wasn't to everybody's tastes, but the fresh veggies and sharp dressing more than made up for it (for the record: I was pro-lamb, as I'm pro- almost every kind of mock meat).

We somehow found room for dessert, and Cindy and I split a black sticky rice with lychees and (soy) ice-cream ($10.90).

We've more often sampled black sticky rice at breakfast, but the addition of ice-cream was enough to make this desserty. It's not the most exciting dessert in the world (no chocolate for starters), but it was a warm and satisfying end to an excellent meal.

Madame K is a reasonably safe bet in the veg-heavy northern end of Brunswick St (where it competes with The Vegie Bar, Yong and Lord of the Fries). We've had patchy service in the past, but things ran pretty smoothly on this busy Saturday night, so they might have got themselves organised these days. If forced to choose I'd tend to favour Yong, but Madame K's provides a bit of variation and is well worth a visit.

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Read our previous reviews of Madame K's here and here. How I See It, A pretty health life and veganopolous have all enjoyed their visits since our last blog post, while Mel: Hot or Not was less impressed. 

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Madame K's Vegetarian
367 Brunswick St, Fitzroy
9415 6909
snacks & mains $4.90-16.90
http://madamek.com.au/

Accessibility: There's a small step up on entry and tables are quite densely laid out. We ordered at the table and paid at a medium-high counter at the back. We didn't visit the toilets.

New Day Rising III

May 11, 2013

We had lunchtime business around Brunswick East and tossed up our options: a trip back to Milkwood? CERES Cafe? Trying something new at Piano Piano? Nah, we couldn't resist the lure of bagel-based good times at New Day Rising. It's still tiny, still popular and yet somehow, we still managed to grab a table without having to wait. The staff are friendly and pretty efficient, keeping the small room buzzing and getting takeaways out the door before anyone gets impatient.

I finally got around to trying the Valoumi (bagel with grilled haloumi, mayo, chilli, tomato and rocket, $11).

This is outstanding - salty, spicy, juicy and just spot on. Bagels really are an excellent vessel for brunch.

Cindy cranked up the spiciness with the jalapeno, provolone and manchego toasted sammie ($9).

New Day Rising were short on jalapenos, so they subbed in some other small peppers. Which were hot. Super hot. Still, the creamy cheese and acidic, spicy peppers made for a fine, simple sandwich. One we're intending to whip up at home sometime soon.

New Day Rising is pretty fantastic - a veg-only cafe doing brilliant, cheap meals (nothing over $13) and combining ludicrous hipness with friendly, upbeat service.

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Nobody seems to have blogged New Day Rising since we last visited. Check out our first visit here.

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New Day Rising
221d Blyth Street, Brunswick East
veg brekkies $5-13
facebook page

Accessibility: A small step up on entry into a fairly crowded interior. You order at the table and just pay whoever you can grab by the coffee machine. The bathroom is accessed from outside somewhere - we've not checked it out.

Creamy spinach & soy bacon fettuccine

May 10, 2013

This Friday night pasta dish is a rearrangement of some other favourite recipes on this blog. I guess it's a little like carbonara, except that I ignored the eggs in our fridge and made a cashew-based vegan sauce, and smuggled in a bunch of spinach.

Creamy spinach & soy bacon fettuccine

Several hours (up to a day) before you want to eat this meal, marinate a generous handful of dried beancurd pieces in a bacon marinade.

When you're 20 minutes away from wanting to eat, bring a large pot of water to the boil. Add 500g fettuccine, cook until tender and drain.

While the water is boiling and the pasta is cooking, wash a large bunch of spinach and remove the leaves from the stems, discarding the stems. 

Blend up a batch of Hurry Up Alfredo sauce, replacing the 3 tablespoons tamari with 1 teaspoon 'chicken' stock powder. Saute the marinated beancurd in a frypan over medium heat, adding a little extra marinade and being careful not to burn anything.

Once the pasta is drained, return it to the pot with the spinach leaves, tossing to combine, so that the heat of the pasta wilts the spinach. Pour over the alfredo sauce and stir to combine. Sprinkle in the beancurd 'bacon', tossing it through lightly so that it doesn't discolour the sauce too much.

Scoop into pasta bowls and eat, eat, eat.

Parc

8-9 May, 2013

I've been spending a bit of time in Sydney for work lately - mostly hanging out around Randwick and Coogee, far from the veg delights of the inner-west. Dinners have been simple if unexciting, sampling the innumerable decent Thai restaurants in the neighbourhood (with the odd trip to Java to mix things up). But my real quest has been to find a good breakfast place - somewhere to stop off on my wander to work and get the day started right. I've had reasonable experiences at 22 Grams and OneSixNine, but it was only this week that I found somewhere I could be bothered blogging. Parc Cafe is tucked away on Clovelly Road in a small little strip with a few other cafes. It's heaving on weekdays, with lots of school drop-off breakfasters and commuters grabbing fortifying coffees.

The menu is brief but effective: there's your standard eggy options, a mushroom dish, avocado on toast, porridge, muesli, pancakes etc etc (plus a few other meaty choices). Vegans will struggle, but they do have plenty of gluten-free options available. On my first visit I was bafflingly in the mood for sweets, ordering the poached plum, ricotta and pistachio on grain toast ($14).

This was unsurprisingly delicious - squishy sweet plums, crunchy pistachios and some really lovely bread generously smeared with ricotta. I could probably have eaten two.

I figured I couldn't really write a blog post just about sweets, so I went back again the next day to try something else. This time: smashed avocado, radish, feta and black sesame on grain toast ($15).

Another success! Perfect avocado loaded up with chunks of creamy feta with a nicely dressed pile of rocket and radish on top. One slice of toast for $15 is a bit rich, but this was stacked pretty high and hunger didn't really bite until lunchtime, so it's hard to really complain.

Speaking of lunchtime, Parc do a nice range of pre-packaged meals (including a roast veggie and cous cous salad) plus sandwiches to takeaway. I grabbed a roasted eggplant, goat's cheese and tomato roll ($10), which hit the spot nicely.

Parc has easily been the best breakfast option I've turned up so far - the coffee is great, the service friendly and the food excellent. It's quite possible I'll be there again tomorrow morning.

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There are couple of other positive reviews out there of Parc - check out brekkie quest and petit macaron

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Parc Cafe
30 Clovelly Rd, Randwick
02 9398 9222
veg brekkies $7-17
facebook page

Accessibility: There are some footpath tables and then a flat entryway into a fairly crowded interior. You order at the table and pay at a low counter. I've yet to visit the toilets.