recipes for prana

Welcome to the recipes for prana page. Here you’ll find simple, super-tasty, wholesome vegan yogi recipes for home cooking. Find out more about the yogic diet here

Sicilian caper and aubergine stew – Caponata

This dish can be made any time of the the year but in high summer aubergines are ready in the UK, most likely grown in a polytunnel: support your local producer! This ‘Long Finger’ variety comes from Down Farm, near Winkleigh, just up the road from Viveka Gardens. Organic growers Liv and Henry grow top …

vegan brownies

I’m not certain this is the complete holy grail of vegan brownie (soooo many options), but it’s certainly very popular on retreats here. I like the slightly grainy chia, but you could use ground flax seed which would be smoother as a binder. Flax contains a lot of omega-3 (great!) but I can never quite …

Old-fashioned? Unusual? Yummy, though. I don’t know what inspired a wondering/yearning for seed cake but a bit of research and a couple of experiments yielded this. Plus a bit of jiggery pokery to source the key ingredients, caraway seed (closely related to cumin, but don’t use cumin!) and diced mixed peel. Absolutley brilliant with a …

Fennel and orange salad

Super simple but packed with Mediterranean sunshine and Italian tastes. In February, when it’s citrus season from Sicily, I really love this with ‘blush’ or as they used to be called ‘blood’ oranges, because the flesh is mottled or completely dark red and somehow less acid than your big orange oranges.  But as oranges store …

green lentil soup

Green lentils are a quick and non-soak easy way to get your pulses in. They take about 40 minutes to cook*. But in this soup I feel the star is herbes de provence. You can substitute other herbs (see below) but the key here is a kind of bitterness, great for gut health and digestion, …

Applesauce Pound Cake

  This is a delicious cake to slice and have with a cuppa. The mid morning break for the apple pressing team was lovely. The apple sauce is the binding agent and it works to a T. Ingredients (a loaf tin 10 x 25 cm, 10-12 slices) 150 g applesauce (cook down 3 or so Bramley apples …

Parsnip and Apple Soup with Herby Chickpea topping

  Tangy, sweet and earthy with protein added via salty, herby, slightly chewy chickpeas. Well, the Thursday Night Practice Class loved it. Fenugreek is quite a pongy spice, but it just seemed right for this combo, and not overdoing the spice element. It can usually be found in the supermarket, but it can also be …

Baked Apples

I’ve cooked these and posted about them on facebook and EVERYONE comments, ‘my mum used to make these’ (which makes me think perhaps that the people I know are rather old because many grown ups that would be grandmother age). Anyway, being mum is part of what happens here quite a lot. Bramleys uniquely fluff …

chocolate chia pudding

This is a simple but super nutritious and tasty pudding. A pudding of a pudding but quite a grown up taste. Chia is full of minerals and protein, plus is cleansing for the gut. Cacao is rich in magnesium and bitter for the gut. Maple syrup, well, sugar by another name and aromatic. Serve with …

coconut chutney

On the popular Eat like a Yogi and Eat for your Dosha cooking workshops this is a favourite to prepare as we make our feast. Goes great with chana dhal or kitcheri, for example. Ingredients makes about 8 servings of a desert spoon  100g desiccated coconut 2tsps grated ginger 3tbsp lemon juice 4-5tbsp water enough to …

tiffin

Very sweet and very fattening, but sometimes needs must! Plus you can cut it into 16 pieces which are judicious morsel sized, therefore ok. Ingredients serves 5-6 150g vegan ‘butter’ cubed, plus extra for the tin – Pure do a good one, or flora too, or use vitalite or pure marg otherwise 3 tbsp caster sugar 3 …

oat and banana pancakes

This is a  quick and yummy weekend breakfast that you could make lots of toppings for and people choose what they make. Here you can see them made on a Teachers’ Retreat Ingredients makes ten 350 g porridge oats 40g milled flax seed quite a useful fridge-stored ingredient to help cakes bind and has good fats …

Apple chutney

Previously a secret only revealed to people attending the vegan cooking workshop here, this is a tangy chutney that helps out in an apple glut and can be frozen. It complements dhal really nicely. Oooh, that’s nice is a typical response. And here’s how you make it. Here featured in autumn with  golden dhal, roast …

This is a quick, easy and super proteinaceous pancake that goes a long way towards meeting the pancake yearning, and carb craving but without being made of wheat or having too many calories. WIN WIN WIN! You can adapt it by for example adding herbs to make a pizza base, as here, topped with tomatoes …

bean pate

This is not the most glamourous dish. It is brown, like vegan food of the 1970s, as noted in the brilliant future history mockumentary Carnage by Simon Amstell. However, it is very yummy and nutritious. It’s a favourite of peeps doing work exchange here: a lunch with bread and salads. Here pictured waldorf salad (apples, …

Soda Bread

This makes an easy and traditional yeast-free bread. It takes 5 minutes to prepare and 30 minutes to cook, making a loaf crusty on the outside and crumbly soft on the inside. Lovely fresh with soup (such as bean and butternut), or bean pate and is great ftoasted the next day. Traditionally made with buttermilk, …

parsley-tastic buckwheat tabouleh

Parsley has such a fresh chlorophyll yet earthy taste that just feels like it’s doing you good. And it is: very high in vitamin C it’s a great food for blood vessel health and general infection combatting at winter time. Get a good big bunch from a mediterranean or Asian shop, or grow it yourself. …

vegan golden cauli dhal soup & parsley mash

Having a starch with dhal supports a diet with the full range of amino acid to form complete proteins, important in a vegan diet. Warming spices aid digestibility and are just plain TASTY. Vegan Souper Soup in many varieties is a key feature after classes and in workshops here at VG. This one is a …

Blackberry Muffins

This is a great recipe to make the most of fruit in season. In August I had some lovely nectarines, could also be lightly stewed apples in autumn and the classic supermarket blueberries all year round. Right now we have some beautiful blackberries here. Ingredients 12 big muffins (in deep muffin tin) or 24 buns …

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