In case you didn’t know, winter is not, I repeat: not, my favourite time of the year. I crave brightness and warmth, beaches and forest hikes amidst sun drenched foliage, weather worthy of serious summery picnicking.

Alas I do like a hot beverage, and rarely are they as satisfying as on a cold wintry day (except every morning, when I’m capable of anything to get some caffeine pumping through these here veins, but that’s a whole different story).

Apple cider isn’t something that’s available in the UK, a tragedy in so many ways, and something I miss from my American youth. This spiced apple drink has been my solution, despite its not really coming close to that beloved beverage, and it’s something I’ve been drinking every winter since moving to England nearly ten years ago.

Apple sauce is one of those things, much like peanut butter, that doesn’t seem to have entered into the British repetoire of foods until recently. Even still I face raised eyebrows and averted eyes when I mention my love of apple sauce. “You… you eat it plain?” they say, like it’s a crime. Yes, yes, yes, and so should you! I figured with traditional Pimm’s, probably the nation’s second drink (next to tea, naturally), maybe someone would give it a go. This is an easy recipe, perfect for a warm summer’s evening, an easy vegan applesauce with strawberries and spices.

Recipe Notes

A few weeks ago, I picked up some Saigon cinnamon and have since been keen to try it out. It’s the strongest and sweetest cinnamon you can buy, so a little goes a long way. You may have correctly deduced this means to use more cinnamon if you’ve only got the standard variety on hand, but I highly recommend seeking the Vietnamese stuff out.

Popular in the U.K., Pimm’s is a gin-based alcoholic drink with spicy citrus undertones, often consumed with fizzy lemonade mixed with fruits and mint. Here it’s used as the main base in cooking down the apples, and complements the final flavour well. If you don’t have any Pimm’s on hand, try a mix of gin and orange juice, or wholly the latter. You may want to cut down on sugar if you use all juice.

If you want a real treat, layer strawberry apple sauce with vanilla soy yoghurt, topped with ginger cookie crumbs!

I currently have a refrigerator overflowing with so many glorious root vegetables and soup is one of my favourite ways to use them when I find myself in this state. Plus after a long day soup is both an easy and nutritious meal which can be prepared easily while planning a holiday on the phone with my mother.

People underestimate soup. Too many people think of it as a tinned (canned) emergency food, the sort of thing you plop into the microwave and give your kids as an easy afterschool snack or chuck into food drive boxes at the supermarket. This is soup that’s often heavy in salt, sugar, and who knows what other preservatives and colourings. Not that I’m completely against this (confession time: tinned tomato soup + grilled cheese (non-dairy of course) is a junk snack craving I get about once a year that must be filled).

What I’m saying is I don’t really get the idea of tinned soup for ease of preparation, because there aren’t many things you can do in the kitchen easier than making soup from fresh ingredients. Sure you have to wait a little while longer past the simple process of using a tin opener and pressing some buttons on the microwave, but it’s worth it in the end. I promise.

Did I mention we got rid of our microwave?

Recipe notes

This is, like most soups, a recipe easily prepared by even the greatest kitchen novice. I usually use my pressure cooker for soups, but if you don’t have one that’s okay too; it will just take a bit longer to prepare. If you aren’t using a pressure cooker simply follow the same instructions, only in a large pot, cooking the vegetables until tender.

This ice cream machine recipe is perfect for anyone with a ridiculously cold freezer, the kind that freezes your cream into a solid block that even the deadliest ice pick couldn’t touch. Why did I choose custard apple? Because a few years ago I had custard apple ice cream in Vietnam, and it’s one of my fondest ice cream memories ever. I have since been determined to create a unique custard apple ice cream recipe that would be acceptable in both flavour and texture. I think this is it.

I recently visited Gelateria Danieli in Richmond, a delicious experience recommended by a close friend on more than one occasion. Complaining at how hard my home made ice creams became once in my freezer (like a block of ice, not scoopable by any means), it was suggested that I try using alcohol in the recipe! But of course! Why hadn’t I thought of this before?

So my mom bought me a pressure cooker while I was in the states. It’s not a kitchen appliance I’d ever used, nor is it one I’d ever given much thought to owning. But then, when my mother handed me this monstrous thing to go into my already crammed suitcase, I remembered some dish my parents used to make when I was little. This was of course when I still ate meat, but it was at the time of my favourite meals. All I remembered was that it involved pork, potatoes, and carrots. When I mentioned this to my mother, she said that it was something she had in fact done in the pressure cooker. Awesome, because I loved those potatoes and carrots! I graciously and greedily packed my new toy away in my evil basement den (i.e. my mom’s work room in downstairs).

And now I’m experimenting with it. I tried a recipe a few months ago (I can’t remember exactly where from, sadly) that involved covering a saucepan with damp wax paper and a lid so to better steam the soup ingredients inside. Well what better way to keep the steam in the cooking container than with a pressure cooker?

Had I more time, I’d have used my own pre-made vegetable stock. I just used up the last frozen batch last night, so that’s on this week’s to-do list!