Baking

VEGAN MERINGUES

Published on May 2, 2018March 3, 2025 by simplycarinaxo21 Comments

Good evening beautiful souls,

If you follow me on Instagram (@simplycarinaxo) you will already know that I made vegan meringues the other day!!

If you’re a meringue fan but are like myself a vegan and can’t eat eggs or are allergic to eggs or even just fancy trying something new, then this recipe is for you.

I’ll warn you in advance, although easy it takes almost 3hs to make these meringues, but they are super tasty and so it’s totally worth it!

Now you might be wondering how on earth you can make vegan meringues when one of the main ingredients is egg white. Well I’d heard ages ago that chickpea brine could apparently be used as an egg white replacement and so when I stumbled across this recipe I was eager to test it.

I was a bit skeptic at first but apart from turning out somewhat hollow and crisp rather than chewy, they were very tasty!!

If you’re not drooling already at the thought of a meringue dessert then here’s the recipe for you to test yourself :

Makes 6-8 meringues

400 g can of chickpeas which should yield

100g of aquafaba (brine)

110g of caster sugar

Vanilla seeds

Whisk the aquafaba at high speed until stiff white peaks are formed; this will take about 15-20 minutes.

Mix the vanilla seeds into the sugar before adding the mixture to the aquafaba a couple of spoonfuls at a time, making sure the sugar is whisked in properly before adding the next few spoonfuls.

When all the sugar is mixed in and the meringue is thick and glossy, it is ready.

Preheat the oven at 130 degrees centigrade and line two baking trays with grease proof paper.

Spoon the mixture (I’d say a large heaped tbsp) onto the baking tray well apart as the will grow quite a bit.

Now bake for 1 3/4 – 2 hours until the meringues are fairly firm unto and on the base. Take out of oven and leave to cool completely.

Once cool, you can enjoy this delicious treat however you like. I suggest some vegan vanilla ice cream and a fruit compote or fresh berries!

Now enjoy!

If you give these a go do let me know how they turn out!!

BEETROOT BROWNIES

Published on April 8, 2018March 3, 2025 by simplycarinaxo19 Comments

Good evening beautiful souls,

It’s time for me to share one of my favourite recipes with you – I hope you are excited!!!

This recipe is from the beautiful vegan cookbook Peace & Parsnips. I love this book and everything I have tried so far has been super tasty, so I can’t wait to try more recipes in the future!

I’ve made this beetroot brownie recipe a couple of times now; the brownies are super easy to make, perfectly moist and of course taste amazing! So no excuse not to try this recipe for yourselves!

I have altered the original recipe a little, but it is quite flexible so don’t worry about experimenting. Anyway, let’s jump right into it!

Ingredients:

300g dark chocolate
150ml vegetable oil
125g Flour
100g Prunes
100g Nuts
200g Silken tofu
125g Beetroot, finely grated
150g Unrefined brown sugar

(I also added some dried apricots and a little rosewater – although apparently not enough of the latter as I couldn’t taste the rose flavour – I need to experiment more with this I future)

Method:

Firstly, melt the dark chocolate carefully in the microwave on a low heat/defrost setting making sure you don’t burn it. Once melted stir in oil. Leave to cool.

Preheat oven to 190 degree.

Whisk tofu and sugar together in a bowl before stirring in the cooled down molten chocolate. Next add the beetroot, Prunes, and nuts (as well as apricots or whatever else you want to add) then slowly fold in the flour until all is combined.

Pour the mixture into a ca. 27×17 cm tin lined with banking paper and level out.

Pop in oven and bake for 25-30 minutes on the middle shelf.

Leave to cool in tray then lift out onto wire wrack and cut into squares. The brownies should be nice and moist with a slight crust on the outer edges.

Best served warm with vegan vanilla ice cream or fruit compote.

And there you have it! Brew yourself a nice cup of coffee, sit down, pick up your favourite book and enjoy this yummy treat!!

Please let me know if you try these as I’d love to see what you think!

GINGERBREAD BISCUITS

Published on December 23, 2017December 25, 2017 by simplycarinaxo4 Comments

Good evening beautiful souls,

A couple of days ago Jessica and I decided to bake some gingerbread biscuits and apart from placing them too near one another on the baking tray they turned out fab. They were super easy to make and I thought you might like to have a go too, so here is the recipe!

Ingredients

350g plain flour – 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda – 2 tsp ground ginger – 2 tsp of ground cinnamon – 115g butter – 175g of dark muscovado sugar – 4tbsp golden syrup – 1 egg

Method

Preheat the oven to 190 C / Gas mark — Lightly grease or line two baking trays.
Sift the flour, bicarbonate of soda, cinnamon and ginger into a bowl. Rub in the butter with your fingertips until it resembles coarse breadcrumbs; stir in sugar.
Beat syrup into egg then stir into flour mixture.
Knead the dough until smooth. Roll out to 1/2 cm thick on a lightly floured surface; stamp or cut out desired gingerbread men shapes.
Bake in the preheated oven until golden and puffed, about 10-12 minutes. Let them sit on the tray for a few minutes before moving to a wire rack.
Cool completely before decorating with icing.

Love Carina xo

ORANGE PUMPKIN CRISPY CAKES

Published on October 29, 2017March 3, 2025 by simplycarinaxo1 Comment

Good evening guys,

On Friday I hosted a Halloween games night and made these cute pumpkin crispy cakes. I thought you’d like this easy recipe, so here you go.

You will need:

Silicone moulds (these pumpkin ones were from Lidl)
195g mars bars
90g butter
3 cups of rice crispies
Orange extract
200g milk, dark or white chocolate

Melt chocolate in the microwave and pour a little into each silicon mould. Pop into the fridge to cool. Now chop up butter and mars bars and melt on a low heat until smooth. Add a couple drops of orange extract. Once smooth take off heat and stir in rice crispies. Take moulds out of fridge and fill with rice crispy mixture. Leave to cool down before putting moulds back into fridge to set. You’ll be able to enjoy them after an hour or two.

Love Carina xo