1000 Vegan Recipes - Quick Herb Bread

I wanted a bread to go with my lunchtime soup this week and decided to try one from one of my favourite recipe books - 1000 Vegan Recipes.

What the hell was I thinking!?  I know I can't make bread!! And even worse, I decided to sub some of the plain white flour with wholemeal.

Admittedly this bread was quick to throw together but the dough was so so dry and dense so I knew it wouldn't work out - I stupidly didn't allow more liquid for the wholemeal flour so I guess this was why.

The end result?  I dense, dry bread with a lovely flavour.  Really the flavour of the herbs was really nice, but the bread just sucked.  I don't know if this entirely my fault because after I made it (why didn't I look before) I Googled it and found others had also experienced a dry dough.
I may try this again written as is.....but I may not.

Final verdict: a dry, dense bread but easy to put together
Score: 2 out of 5 (but the low score may be my fault)

1000 Vegan Recipes - Curried Pumpkin Soup

So we have an abundance of butternut squash in the garden and so wanted to make some sort of pumkin soup for our lunch this week - in winter I make a big batch every week for Niall and I to take to work.

Now any soup that isn't my usual leek, lentil and barley soup has a lot to live up to - Niall and I are happy to eat that soup every day for lunch for the entire winter!!  But I needed to use up that pumpkin so.....

First of all the recipe calls for 2 cups cooked pumpkin and after chopping and deseeding one of ours, I probably had over that amount but I didn't measure (it was a med-large butternut).  I then cooked / roasted it in the oven with a bit of water (instead of oil) for about half an hour until most of it was tender.

The recipe uses chopped garlic and grated ginger - both of which I doubled because of the extra pumpkin.  It also calls for some curry powder and after getting halfway though the recipe I realised I had run out - *gasp*!  So after a quick google for homemade curry powder I used a blend of cumin, coriander, ground ginger, cayenne, mustard powder and turmeric.  But overall used double what the recipe called for to up the spice/flavours.

The rest of the recipe I followed, except adding a bit more water to get to the consistency I knew Niall would be happy with.

The end result?  We LOVED this soup!  So much so that Niall said I can make this again during the winter instead of the usual leek lentil & barley soup!

Final verdict: easy to make, really tasty.  A keeper
Score: 4.5 out of 5 (losing a half a star because as written the recipe may not have had enough spice)