Almost like Christmas

 It's been a hectic, happy few days. 

My grandson visited for two, then my youngest daughter for three.

With my grandson, we planted cabbage and sweet pea seeds from the February Mud and Bloom box, played animal dominoes and the Postman Pat board game, and got fooled into watching Peppa Pig.

With my daughter, we went out to Shipley for a snowdrop walk, played more board games, vicariously shared the excitement of her going out for the evening, had a movie night in with La La Land, and I got to show off my new clothing purchases to someone who might be interested.

 In between, there was a lot of fun and laughter, both daughters went out for the evening, there was a family dinner, and a birthday tea.  It was almost like Christmas.

We're now into the lull before New Year, as next weekend sees another family birthday

Veganuary 22

 I enjoyed Veganuary last year. It gave me something to do during that post-Christmas lockdown (how long ago that seems!), proved to be quite fun and not difficult to follow, so I decided to join in again.

My reasons were more or less the same as last year - mainly to use the huge amount of allotment produce, harvested through summer and autumn and which fills the big chest freezer till spring. Also because planning vegan meals and then preparing food occupies dull winter afternoons and the early evening. 

We always eat a lot of vegetable based curries, chillies, pasta dishes, stir fries (though careful of the egg noodles!) but for veganuary I included vegetable hotpots with sourdough dumplings, lentil 'shepherd's pie', enchiladas with melting vegan cheese, pizza (sourdough and vegan cheese again), plus more 'substitute' food - fishless fingers, minced beef pie, sausages, chicken nuggets, even a vegan haggis for Burns Night.

The haggis was lovely, the sausages okay, but the others didn't impress me so much.  

As last year, I found lunches the hardest part. I'd normally just grab a cheese or ham sandwich. Vegan lunches always seem to take preparation, whether it's a veg soup, sourdough foccacia or mashed chickpeas and pickles masquerading as tuna (that's actually quite nice, and might replace a lot of tuna sandwiches). So I ended up eating LOT of coleslaw salad, with vegan mayo and homemade chutney, and found I didn't miss the slices of ham I'd normally add. 

Snacks were also a bit tricky. I made a lot of cakes - sourdough cinnamon rolls, and several variations with rhubarb or blackberries of this shortbread-based, macaroon-topped tray bake for which I used vegan spread and aquafaba to replace butter and eggs.  And partway through the month I discovered some 'own brand' crisps which were accidentally vegan. They're maybe not quite as good as 'named' brands but okay.

One week into February I seem to have eaten nothing BUT cheese, which can't be good. As I said, it seems to be an easy option for lunch but I'm not sure it's good choice health-wise.  So going forward I want to make a real effort to reduce the amount I eat of both cheese and meat - and maybe get the freezer empty!