Journey to a vegan diet

For my health but also to reduce my carbon footprint, I wish to eat more vegan.  Eating raw food also means using less fossil fuels to cook.

This recipe I put together from about 4 or 5 recipes found online. The result was delicious! Better than any banoffie pie I've ever had.

Some of the pie was frozen but it was definitely better fresh.  And healthy too!

Banana Caramel Pie

Raw, Vegan, Nutritious, Refined Sugar free

Crust: Hazelnuts

            Coconut

            Dates

            Flax seed

            Coconut oil

            Salt

            Cinnamon

Filling:            Cashews, soaked overnight

                        Coconut oil

                        Agave syrup

                        Coconut Cream

                        Vanilla

                        Salt

                        Lemon

Caramel:        Dates

                        Peanut Butter

                        Agave syrup 

                        Coconut oil

                        Vanilla

                        Salt

           

Topping:        raw chocolate

                        Almond milk

Kick off 2012

So christmas was fun, I got fully busy making stuff, and not just of the food variety.
I got inspired to give it a go with Terrariums, and so made a couple of gifts and a couple for myself.  This one was for a friend.
 

Can you see the little succulant?  It looks like a little stone, but is actually 2 petals!

 

My fern needed repotting, so a 2nd hand vase was just the spot.

 

This one is a tribute to all the cats who like a little garden to sleep in.

For christmas gift and celebrations:

Sunflower seed & dried apricot Almond Bread

Moreish savoury snacks - olive palmiers and cheese & nigella biscuits

My gift - an elephant planter from Oxfam.  I filled it appropriately with a Brahmi plant ( memory herb).

A very special gift from friends - homemade vanilla extract!

Complete with personalised label - Wow!

For my neice, new bed linen was the go, but I couldn't leave it alone...

A personalised pillowcase & and one with a portrait of Karen O.

Rainbow Stiching! I hope that as she grows she enjoys this more & more.

Recently my folks celebrated their 40th wedding anniversary. I wasn't going to let it go unnoticed, so I sent them some afternoon tea!

Personalised tea cups, pure assam tea leaves and some chocolate biscuits (not shown) from Simon's french cookbook

Lastly:

 Last year I 'made my own merch' to show my appreciation of the band !!! (that's the band chk chk chk)

Gingerbread Architecture 2011

This year's house was a replica of the Penola House, a recently-completed 9star energy-rated sustainable home in Preston, built by Positive Footprints.  This was a gift for my employer's as they won the best new home for this house at the BPN awards.

The owners kept a blog during the construction of their home.  The house will feature in the January issue of Sanctuary magazine.

Day 2: 1:50 Plans cutout

Day 2: Baked, maybe a little too much baking powder...

Day 3: Iced

Day 4: Construction

Off-cuts make great mini houses. Thanks BlackArts

Grey-green icing for painted FC Sheet

Brown Icing for architraves and battens

White Chocolate for colorbond cladding and roofing

Chocolate biscuit decking

Dark Chocolate Solar Panels

Plain gingerbread timber post & verandah

The House

Sketch ideas for Quilt Cover Competition

What been occuring lately...

I've been finishing off various projects, unfortunetly forgot to take photos before posting some of them, but I may get some after shots.

There's been some tapestry...  too late to enter the small tapetstry award from  ATW this year

Some 'photo-shopping' for a colouring book for a 5 yr old friend...

Some knitting...

This one should be up for sale on Yesfia's House soon

Some baking with Mars Bars...  it's been a year and the year's supply hasn't run out

mars bar slice

mars bar mud cake

Some building a box... to house my lovely Georg Jensen cutlery (designer Arne Jacobsen)

Some signage... although technically I made this a while ago, I fixed it up and added to it for Blackbird Markets and the upcoming North Melbourne Market

Some cutting...  these too will be on the shop soon, next to other Ripped T's

A little bit of stitching...

 

 

And, of course, some cooking - strawberry icecream to kick of spring!