Vegan At Home - Pitango Pumpkin Soup

This soup was on special at the supermarket for only $5. I'm a sucker for pretty packaging, plus I was feeling lazy so I bought it.

Made in New Zealand, this soup is almost 100% organic. It contains pumpkin, potato, carrots, onions, water, sea salt, black pepper, sugar, garlic, ginger, olive oil, fennel seeds and coriander seeds. The only ingredients that aren't organic are the ginger and the seeds. Plus, it's amazingly delicious, especially with toast.

Pitango Organic Pumpkin Soup - $5 at your local supermarket.

Snack time - Muffin

This is a muffin that my wonderful housemate bought me as a surprise. Because I'm a vegan, and she's studying nutrition, together we are always checking labels in the supermarket. We always get looks of pity from people who think we're watching our weight. Bah. Anyways, I got home and Heidi had bought me a muffin!
This muffin was, I think, walnut and cinnamon flavour, and it was amazing. It was denser than most muffins, but not quite cake consistency. It was delicious - perfectly moist, and I'm super into cinnamon, so that totally did it for me. Perfect afternoon tea.

Malvern Central, Malvern (upstairs opposite the supermarket and near the juice bar and the Donut King)

Wholefoods

OK, so I understand Wholefoods isn't a viable option for most people. Firstly, it's in Clayton. Secondly, it's on a uni campus and therefore isn't really open outside of uni hours and months. Also, did I mention it's in Clayton?

All that aside, if you do happen to be in Clayton, Wholefoods is pretty nice. It's a mostly vegan co-op run by a student collective, and the whole place is covered in hippy graffiti. Sometimes they have belly dancers or maudlin Bright Eyes wannabes playing music.

The food, to be honest, isn't the best in the world. But I really love being able to go to university and know I'm going to get a cheap vegan meal at lunch. They generally offer 3 salads, soup, garlic bread, a curry, rice, dahl, pasta/noodles/bake of some sort, plus a dessert.On this particular day, I got fried rice and dahl. The dahl is best heavily salted, fyi. The other amazing thing about Whole Foods is that it's really fucking cheap. The above meal cost me about $3.80. Wholefoods also have a cafe where you can get vegan muffins, sometimes cakes, tea and coffee. (Stay away from the chai though, it tends to be lukewarm).

Not the most accessible place, I know. But I still thought it warranted inclusion.

Wholefoods, Campus Centre, Monash University, Clayton

Plush Pizza

My sister was surprisingly agreeable when I suggested Plush Pizza for dinner. I realised why when we got there and she surveyed the menu, and then turned to me and asked, in all seriousness "Where are the meat options?" She was less than impressed when I explained that Plush is all vegan and vegetarian. However, she was a convert after choosing the anti-pasto pizza and loving every bite.

I got the Three Cheese Delight.

To be honest, this wasn't the best pizza I've had from Plush. I think its downfall was in the mustard. When I was ordering it, I forgot that I actually don't like mustard. At all. Generally speaking though, Plush is pretty amazing, and I can fully endorse the Leaf Eater, the Mushroom Medley and also the Satay Sublime, which is the vegan pizza to end all vegan pizzas.

Plush Pizza, 85 Burwood Road, Hawthorn. 9819-1188