Vegan Napoleon cake and Couchsurfing birthday party

When you are far away from home, it's hard to feel lonely. How come? Because of CouchSurfing!

I have been on CouchSurfing since 2007, I have hosted people from all over the world, I have been hosted in three continents and two islands. And I have always had one rule about it: if you are a guest, please, share a nice dinner (breakfast, lunch, etc.) with your host/hostess. So as soon as I started traveling and using CS, I've cooked a lot of vegan meals for my vegan/vegetarian/omnivore hosts - starting with the very first soy goulash in Helsinki (2007).

Now my obsession with food and CouchSurfing went even further and I am using this platform not only for traveling and meeting people, but also for sharing food. That's probably the easiest way to travel the world and try foods from all the planet Earth without even stepping outside.

CouchSurfing goes well with birthday parties!

While spending my spring of 2015 in Amsterdam (Netherlands), I met a lot of amazing couchsurfers and shared some nice meals together. Even my birthday party was related - almost all my guests were couchsurfers. And of course the food was vegan - we ate in the friendliest squat in A'dam - Joe's Garage. Every Monday and Thursday they serve three course vegan meal for only 4€. That's probably the cheapest you can get in whole city. 

Main course @Joe's Garage: sweet couscous with tahini sauce, salad and grilled veggies.

Every year I cook a vegan cake for my birthday. This year, however, I did not have any proper tools and equipment for cooking or making a raw nut cake. So I came up with a solution - "Napoleon" cake. You don't even need an oven to make layers for this cake!

Vegan "Napoleon" cake, yumm!

The recipe:

BATTER

3 cups of flour

200 g vegan margarine

3/4 cup of soymilk

a pinch of salt

CREAM:

0,5 l soymilk

1 cup of sugar

2 spoons of starch

250 g vegan margarine

vanilla (optional)

Preparation:

Mix all the ingredients for the batter. Knead it well and put in the fridge for an hour. Then separate it into 6-7 parts and roll each into a round sheet, ~2 mm thin. All the sheets must be the same size, so cut off extra batter from edges.

Heat a big pan, do not add any oil. When it's heated, add one sheet of batter and bake it. Pop the bubbles if you see any. Turn it around. It's done in a couple of minutes, so be careful and don't burn it!

All the leftovers cut from the sheets should also be baked. Then when it gets colder, crush it to crumbles.
Prepare the cream.

Mix the soymilk, sugar and starch. Bring it to boiling temperature while constantly stirring. Boil it till the mass becomes creamy. Turn the heat off and let it cool down. Add the margarine and whip it well.

Make the cake by spreading cream over the layers. Add more cream on top layer and sprinkle with crumbles.

Allow the layers to get softer. It's better to put something a little heavy on top of the cake and keep in in the fridge during the night.

Malta: a great vegan vacation destination in Mediterranian sea

View in Valletta

Malta is a small archipelago in Mediterranian sea. The biggest islands are Malta, Gozo and Camino. You can easily order one-day cruise and visit them all. 

The landscape in Malta is really beautiful: blue sea, colourful flowers and houses in a color of sand.

People in Malta speak Maltese, but English is widely used as well. Most of the supermarkets offer food from UK and Italy, so it is really easy to be a vegan in Malta.

Italian vegan pizza

Look at this beauty!

I always try some local foods as well. In Malta's case it was some nice vegan spreads, called quarjoli and bigilla. The first one is made of tomatoes and bread crumbs, while the second one is made of beans, garlic and herbs. Both were really delicious and perfect for my first breakfast in Malta.

Bigilla - maltese bean spread

If you enjoy vegan ice-cream as much as I do, Malta is the right place to go. From simple vegan ice-cream in big boxes you can find in any supermarket, to amazing home-made ice-cream bought in one of many gelaterias. From ordinary vanilla and chocolate, to fresh cherry and pistachio soy ice-cream - everyone will definitely find something suitable!

Vanilla and chocolate vegan ice-cream

You can spot many gardens everywhere. The soil looks dry and poor, but it seems that all these veggies do not care about it : )

A thing I have really missed in Malta was the markets. There is none. Well, there are a few, but it has nothing to do with grocery shopping. Only some local foods (honey and cheese) as well as some souvenirs are sold there. So everytime you want some fresh fruits and vegetables, you buy it from mobile markets - farmers selling food from their customised trucks, or from small shops.

Coffee with ice-cream, fresh tomatoes, apricots and Sicilian oranges - perfect and healthy breakfast for a hot Mediterranian summer day.

To sum up, Malta is a great destination for vegan travelers: it has perfect climate, good variety of vegan food, beautiful sea and fresh fruit and vegetables almost all year round. What else can one wish for?..

Blue lagoon

Israel: a promised land for all the vegans of the world

Today Israel is considered to be the most vegan friendly country in the world (and it is the first country to introduce vegan diet in its army meals). About 5 % of the population is vegan and about 8 % - vegetarian.

Plenty of vegan and veg-friendly restaurants, great falafels and hummus, lively markets offering fresh fruit and vegetables whole year makes it a place worth paying a visit.

Even if you come to Israel during winter (December-January), the temperatures in Tel Aviv do not usually fall below 5°C and if you are lucky enough, you may even enjoy a swim in the Dead sea in January: sometimes the temperature jumps up to 26-28°C at the coast, and the water warms up to 20-24°C, even in January.

Summer and fall is great for veggie-lovers, but winter is the right time to try oranges, lemons, grapefruits and pomegranates. 

January - kumquats are almost ripe!

The market in Tel Aviv is the heart of the city: bustling with life, full of smells and sounds.

It is hard to resist and not to buy huge and perfectly ripe avocados, not to try local olive oils or home-made tahini halva. 

One must be careful and look what is going inside the bag: the vendors like to add more than asked (and of course, charge more as well).

It's best to speak Hebrew while shopping in the market, Russian also works OK. You may find some difficulties in using English (or maybe it's just an excuse when the seller wants to add an extra fruit to your bag : )

If you like cats, you should walk around the butcher's where you can make many huge and well-fed feline friends.

Spices sold in Jerusalem

Everytime you feel hunger, all you need to do is to look for a sign:

פלאפל

That's right, it says "falafel" - a great levantine snack made of chickpeas, served in pita bread with vegetables and tahini sauce.

Falafel in pita bread, bought in Tel Aviv. You can usually stuff your sandwich with pickled vegetables by yourself. I was pleasantly surprised by purple tomatoes which were marinated in beetroot juice.

It probably does not look amazing in a picture, but hummus is one of the greatest joy in a vegan world. And Israel is famous about its hummus - you can get some fresh hummus in snackbars or buy hundreds of different hummus with herbs, spices, pepper, garlic and etc. in any supermarket.

Sabich - Iraqi sandwich with grilled aubergine is also a must try. Just make sure you ask not to put an egg in it to make it vegan!

Treasure from Warsaw, Poland

From left to right:

1st column - vegan sliced sausages (ham, with cranberries, with veggies, salami, with prunes)
2nd column (top->down) - soy lard, vegan pâté (French, veggie, Hungarian), vegan tortellini with smoked tofu
3rd column - vegan wieners (natural and chilli), chilli tofu, marinated tofu
4th column - vegan jello, vegan toffee candies, vegan pâté (Mexican, with champignons, oriental)
5th column - vegan pâté (with tomato, rice and veggies, Tatar, Mexican, ham, with pepper
6th column - vegan pâté with garlic, tofu with pepper, dill.

Secret vegan paradise in Ukraine (2013)

In August, 2013 I went on a hiking trip in Crimea, Ukraine with a group of fellow vegans and vegetarians. The plan was to hike all the way from Bakhchysarai to the sea. All the food cooked on the trip was vegan!

Nice "propaganda" poster, telling to eat more fruit and vegetable: 500 grams / 5 portions a day!

Ukraine is a secret vegan paradise: you can get fresh fruits and vegetables everywhere in the markets or from some vendors just on streets. And the prices are so small!

Nice lady selling veggies and fruits on the street of Bakhchysarai

Dried fruits, berries and chalva in Simferopol. The vendors knew some words in Lithuanian!

Amazing watermellons in the market in Crimea. You need to learn a few tricks to pick the best and a ripe one!

Don't miss churchkhela - amazing fruity "sausage" candy made of wallnuts and fruit juice.

Spices sold in Simferopol

Honey, nuts and weird fruits sold in Simferopol.

Since vegan and honey does not go together, I got myself the fruit.

Momordica charantia, or a bitter melon looks really nice, but the taste is not so good.

 

When you go to the market, everyone tries to sell you their products, so before buying, you can try almost anything.

We saw a small vietnamese stand where a nice lady was selling pickled food. She had a variety of pickled or grilled veggies and mushrooms, was waving us and inviting to see what she has to sell.

We could not resist : )

The vendor gave us a lot of food to taste, so after stuffing our stomachs with a piece of each veggie, we left the market with two boxes of grilled eggplant, korean carrots, pickled mushrooms and pickled garlic sprouts.

Yes, it was the day when I fell in love with pickled garlic sprouts - it is so sad that these are hard to find!

 





Our friends told that it is hard to find vegan food outside in Kyiv. So we tried the foods that the capital city of Ukraine had to offer.

The day we arrived to Kyiv, we were invited to a birthday party with vegan shashlik made of fresh veggies, spiced tofu and marinated soy chunks. Tofu is great and cheap in Ukraine!

 

You can buy some vegan sandwiches in kiosks. They are made of rye bread, olive oil, fresh veggies and smoked seitan sausage. 

I believe that this vegan sausage was the best I have ever eaten im my whole life!

If you prefer a proper lunch, you should look for Eco Buffet restorant. They serve vegetarian food and have vegan options as well.

The chain is more of a canteen style, but food is nice, delicious and cheap. At least the bean "steak" with veggie mix (on the left) I ate!

Vegan food from a supermarket in Tallinn (2013)

Top:

vegan sausages, soy ice cream, tofu spread with garlic, 

tofu dessert with lemon and vanilla

Bottom:

hummus, tofu spread with herbs, soy yogurt with cranberries

Market in München, Germany (2012)

Herbs

Exotic fruits