Hibiscus Happiness

I was so, so happy to discover this recipe. I haven't yet figured out how to make it without an ice cream machine, but I'll either buy one at Christmas, or do it sorbet-style. I have a hibiscus flower tree and a lime tree in my compound - coconut tree is just outside the house, and what kind of aid worker would I be without a constant supply of white rum (and gin... and dark rum... and vodka... and tequila... erm). This was made for me!
Credit goes to Laura Friendly, recipe originally posted on HelloGiggles!: http://hellogiggles.com/vegan-hibiscus-ice-cream

Vegan Hibiscus Ice Creamby Laura FriendlyPrep Time: 30 minutes
Ice Cream Maker Time: about 25 minutes
Makes: about 4-1/2 cups

• 1/2 cup dried hibiscus flowers
• 1-1/2 cups water
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 tbsp fresh lemon juice, optional
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 2 13.5-oz. cans coconut milk (full fat)
• 1 tbsp gluten-free vodka or white rum

1. In a small saucepan, bring water to a boil and add dried hibiscus. Turn water off and steep flowers for 15 minutes.
2. Strain the hibiscus water through a fine mesh and return to the saucepan.
3. Add in sugar, lemon juice and salt. Bring the liquid to a boil and allow to simmer for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally (sugar should be fully dissolved).
4. Allow syrup to cool completely.
5. Transfer hibiscus syrup into a blender. Add in coconut milk and vodka. Blend well.
6. Pour liquid into your ice cream machine bowl, and churn for about 20–25 minutes, or according to manufacturer’s instructions. Serve immediately.
7. If you’d like a firmer consistency, transfer into a freezer safe container with lid, and freeze for about two hours to thicken.

note: the hibiscus syrup is a bit tart, so you can start by adding half of the syrup and increase to your desired taste

Fruity Coconut Salad

I haven't posted much lately, for a few reasons - I've been super busy at work - I went on holiday to Japan and Australia for 3 weeks - and, I've just been really uncreative with cooking. So in an attempt to get back into it, I'm embracing coconuts again...

Fruity Coconut Salad
2 cups grated coconut
2 cups grated carrot (if you can find them)
1 shallot, chopped
1 pawpaw, chopped
1 small cucumber, seeds removed and diced
1/2 pineapple, diced
1 large tomato, diced (or about 6 small ones, chopped in half)
2 mangoes, diced
Mint leaves, chopped (might need to rely on your own garden for this one...)
1 tbsp lemon (bushlime) juice
1 tbsp coconut oil

Mix together the first ten ingredients. Refrigerate if not serving straight away. Mix the lemon/lime juice and coconut oil to pour over the rest, just before serving.

Pumpkin Curry

Today was a very exciting day - there was a pumpkin at Ngossi Market. I bought it straight away - best AUD$2 ever - and got cookin' curry.

Simple Pumpkin Curry

One diced onion 
About 4 cloves garlic
Chunk of ginger
Lime/lemon
A s**tload of chillis (that's the technical term) 
Pumpkin
Cumin, turmeric, salt, pepper

I'm rediscovering the beauty of a mortar and pestle, so I smashed together the garlic and ginger. I put that together with the onion and, because I ran out of olive oil yesterday, threw them in a pan with the chopped birds' eye chillis, squeezed lime and a bit of water to steam cook. After peeling and cubing the pumpkin (a pain in the arse), I threw that in with the cumin, turmeric and salt, sauteed, covered with water and let it go while I drank a few glasses of wine.
After remembering I was cooking dinner, I came back and it was all nice and mushy. Added pepper and ate with Solrice (godawful cheap white rice, but what can ya do). Nom.
 

Veggie Chap Chap

At some point a few weeks ago, I decided it would be a good idea to buy a "serving" (pile?) of ginger. It cost next to nothing and I've barely touched it. Time to embrace the ginger...
(only amusing if you know me, therefore knowing I'm a ranga.)

Vegetable Chap Chap
1 tbsp oil
1 clove garlic
1 tbsp grated ginger
1.5 kg greens - bok choy, cabbage - whatever was lookin' good
2 tbsp soy sauce
1/4 cup water
1 tbsp brown sugar (I use raw)
2 tsp crushed chilli (I've currently got a massive bundle of birds eye chillis... about 5 of those)

Heat oil in the pan and fry the garlic and ginger. I add onion, cos I like onion.

Add everything else. All of it.

Serve!



One thing I'm loving about Solomon kukim... simplicity.  

I've got a lovely bunch of coconuts...

While in the Solomon Islands, I've committed to learning how to make my own coconut milk. Despite my apprehension, or any encouragement from friends who don't understand why I don't ask my housemaid to do it (oh it's a hard life here), I want to learn how to make this funny looking fruit into creamy white deliciousness, the only white deliciousness here that I'm not dependent on a shipment from Australia from (on a happy note, the last boat brought in chocolate soy milk! JOY!).

I'm the proud owner of a coconut scraper - a wooden board with a jagged circular metal saw thing on the end. This weekend I will be purchasing a bushknife, and a strainer, and then we'll see what happens!

For anyone else who wants to take this journey/cluck in sympathy at my stupidity... here's what my Solomon Islander friends told me to do (in between giggles and asking if they could come and watch):

Step one: whack the coconut open with the blunt edge of the knife. Do this over a container to try and capture as much of the water/juice inside as you can.
Step two: Scrape, scrape, scrape. I've been assured this will take me, the weak white novice, up to an hour to do. I've also been told that I will probably cut my hands with the scraper multiple times and put blood in the coconut, therefore ruining it for anyone else to eat.
Step three: Put all the coconut "meat" into a strainer (with a container underneath) and push, push, push. Mix with the coconut juice if you want it stronger.

Tadaaa... coconut milk.

Now let's just see how brave I am...

Pawpaw goodness

Pawpaw (or papaya for you Americans) is simply amazing. Rich in Vitamin A, Vitamin C, B vitamins, minerals and fibre, you can't really go wrong with a good pawpaw! And they're plentiful and cheap in the Solomons.

Sometimes you get sick of them as a fruit - and that's when it's time to turn it into a vegetable.

Curried Pawpaw

2 pawpaws, de-seeded and cubed
1 onion, finely chopped 
Milk from one coconut (get out that coconut scraper...)
1 tbsp curry powder
(I also add garlic, but I add garlic to everything.)

Fry the onion (and garlic), add the pawpaw and coconut milk and curry powder. Boil and eat. Tadaaaaaa. 

Edit: I made this the other night and only had one pawpaw; I added chilli, capsicum (bell pepper) and tomato. All cheap Sols ingredients! Tasted delicious. (Eventually, I will start taking photos and adding them here too - but as we know, internet runs somewhere between turtle and snail speed here, so maybe that can be done after I go to Australia on holidays!) 

Urap Piyai

My first post contained slippery cabbage, and I haven't really explained why it's so great. Slippery cabbage is like the wonder nutrient food of the Solomons. High in minerals (especially magnesium, potassium and calcium), vitamins (specifically Vit A) and protein, this stuff grows like a weed, has that lovely "mmmm green stuff makem mi helti" taste and is easy to cook.

Another veggie here that is used a lot is fern. There are a few different fern leaves that are eaten, I think the one I've been buying is pucha. High in protein and potassium.

Then there's water spinach - kangkong. This isn't anything new, I've had this a lot across Asia. Good source of protein and quite high in calcium, iron, Vit A and Vit C.

Altogether, makem urap piyai.

Urap Piyai

1 bunch fern leaf
1 bunch slippery cabbage
1 bunch kangkong/water spinach 
5 shallots
1/2 coconut, grated
4 tbsp coconut oil (cheap cheap at the market)
chilli peppers
Garlic - I go overboard on garlic

Wash all the leafy material, boil and put aside. Slice the shallots thinly, and lightly fry them with the chilli, garlic, grated coconut and coconut oil. Mix in with the cooked leafy stuff and serve.

Hem tasti.

Masi Masi

This has been my most exciting Solomons discovery. First had it at the markets in Gizo, and always had in the back of my mind "really? Really, is it vegan? You promise?" - it's that good. Once I got the recipe out of them, I proceeded to pig myself out on the stuff every night. AUD$2 buys me more than I can actually eat.

Solomon Islands version:

Slippery cabbage (taro leaf if you're desperate - I recommend against that)
3 or 4 taro
Enough baked ngali nut to make 1 litre of paste
Water
Salt to taste
Banana leaf for wrapping in the oven

Slice taro about 1cm thick. Mix together nuts, water and salt to make a paste. Heat the banana leaf over the fire so it's soft enough to wrap. Lay banana leaf out on cutting board, so it's big enough to wrap the entire masimasi. Layer one cabbage or leaf, spread nut paste over the leaf, put a slice of taro over the paste. Repeat for about thee or four layers. Fold and wrap in the softened banana leaf, and bake in motu (stone oven) for approximately 3 hours.


Waetfela version:

Slippery cabbage - if you don't know what it looks like, ask. When they've stopped laughing they'll show you.
3 or 4 taro, or miscellaneous potato-shaped roots that you can't quite discern between in the market...
Ngali nut. Lots of ngali nut. Make up the packet you get from Bulk Store and see if that does the job.
Water
Salt
Casserole dish of some kind

Slice taro about 1cm thick - or as thin as you can get without slicing your fingers (for me... about 5cm). Mix together nuts, water and salt to make a paste - mortar and pestle great for this. In the casserole dish, layer one slippery cabbage bit, spread nut paste over the cabbage, put a slice of taro over the paste. Repeat for about thee or four layers. Cover in baking paper if you brought it with you from Australia. Cook in gas oven for about 1 hour.

About six weeks ago, I packed up my life in Australia and moved to the Solomon Islands for work.

The last six weeks have been brilliant. I've met some amazing people, travelled to the provinces for my job, seen some pretty amazing projects and in my spare time get to do everyday activities like snorkelling over beautiful reefs and lazing on a beach in a hammock.

But.

I've been a vegan for 10 years. Vegetarian for longer. I have travelled every continent (sans Antarctica) and have always managed to live fairly well, with a few exceptions (the occasional night of rice with soy sauce, repeated; or a dinner consisting of a mango - not many complaints on that). However, most of my living experience outside of comfy Australia has been either Europe - easy easy - or Asia - more easy easy. Suddenly I am without my dozen varieties of fresh fruit and vegetables - without my constant supply of tofu and/or tempeh - without my precious soymilk and nutritional yeast and TVP and tinned beans... Everything that arrives in the Solomon Islands arrives by boat, it is unreliable, inconsistent and unpredictable.

Which is a bit exciting.

I still love the Solomons even without being able to satisfy my food cravings. But one thing has struck me is the total lack of recipes available that use the most common ingredients in this country. Let alone recipes that have been veganised. Fish is your basic essential ingredient here, and failing fish, there's chicken. Even trying to clarify with the waiter whether she means she put "milk from cow" or "milk from coconut" in your food is harder than it should be.

So, I need a library of all my Solomon Islands-friendly vegan recipes. And if any other vegetarian or vegan, recently moved to the Solomons, navigating the craziness of Honiara Market, strolling alongside Gizo Market, or staring in puzzlement at what's available in Auki, benefits from this... then great.