Showing posts with label meat-free. Show all posts
Showing posts with label meat-free. Show all posts

Vegan Christmas: VBites Turkey Style, Leek & Blue Cheezly Bites

VBites Turkey Style, Leek & Blue Cheezly Bites

Festive sides / nibbles in the VegiDeli range from VBites (formerly Redwood). We're not quite sure what these are replacing, but they're bite-sized hot nibbles made from soya, with turkey and blue cheese style flavours. Should you feed these to your guests, at your festive drinks party?

Review: Taifun Tofu-Wieners

Taifun Wieners vegan hot dog sausages

Smoked vegan hot dog sausages made from tofu. We're working our way through all the brands of vegan hot dog sausages available in the UK. Taifun's Wieners are one of the longest on the scene, pre-dating Frys, Viana, Vegusto, Plantbasedfoods and maybe even Redwood (VBites). Taifun's smoked tofu won our tofu Taste Test, but does 76% tofu make a good wiener?

Guest Review: Blueberries does Divina Teresa: 'Atlantic'

Divina Teresa: 'Atlantic' vegan range

From Spain comes leading veggie meat company Divina Teresa. The company are considering a UK launch and asked us to review just some of their huge product range. We asked Barcelona-based blogger Blueberries of VeganButNotScary to do the honours for us. She kicks off with the company's 'Atlantic' range of Fingers, Burgers, Wonders and Delights:
 
NOTE: The star ratings are not working on Internet Explorer 11, so we've put the score in brackets. You should be able to see them fine in Chrome / Firefox / Safari until we fix it.

Review: Mediterranea Ragu di Soia - bolognese sauce


Meat-free ragu sauce with soya mince for lasagne and bolognese. Another sample sent to us by MozzaRisella partner Mediterranea. This is the second Italian faux-meat ragu we've tried recently, with the first being the wonderful one that came with the Relasagna lasagne-in-a-box kit. This one is sold separately, on the MozzaRisella online store. We made a lasagne with it, topped with what else, but MozzaRisella vegan mozzarella:

Review: Mediterranea range of mock meats

Mediterranea vegan range of mock meats

Italian Sausages, Burgers and Seitan Slices from MozzaRisella partner Mediterranea. To promote the launch of the MozzaRisella online shop, the company sent us a range of their deli mock meats. Alongside their fantastic vegan mozzarella, and excellent ravioli, you can also now buy these italian tofu and seitan specialities:

Review: Dee's Vegan Sausages


Serendipity + Vegfest = Opportunity to try sausages not widely available in the UK. We happened to be in the right place at the right time to be one of the lucky few to get a Vegfest handout of Dee's vegan sausages. Dee's is an Irish wholefood company run by Dee Collins, specialising in healthy burgers, sausages and meal pots. We've been wanting to try these sausages for ages... and fate intervened last Sunday. Are they worth the wait?

Review: Wicken Fen Carrot & Coriander Sausages

Wicken Fen Carrot & Coriander Vegan Sausages

Gluten-Free vegan sausages made with soya...and 11% carrots. The Wicken Fen brand has been around in the UK for over 20 years, but seems to come and go depending on the weather. Currently stocked in Sainsburys as well as health food shops, the range includes falafel and various types of veggie sausage (not all vegan). The carrot and coriander ones are some of the very few vegan and gluten-free sausages you can buy:

Review: Vegusto Farmhouse Sausages

Vegusto Farmhouse-style sausages

Big fat vegan sausages from @vegusto_uk in a 'Farmhouse' or 'Cervelat' style (if you're Swiss). Two in a pack, and as usual from Vegusto, ABSOLUTELY NO INSTRUCTIONS on how to prepare them... There's no point googling how to prepare the dead pig/cow version of Cervelat either, so you're on your own. We boiled ours, and they may be the best sausages we've ever eaten:

Review: Viana Bonanza Veggie Steaks

Viana Bonanza Veggie Steaks are vegan

Meat-free 4oz steaks from German firm Viana. These are slightly spicy wheat/soy protein patties of 105g (4oz) each. You get two in a pack. They can be pan-fried or cooked in the oven, or even on the barbecue. We served some up with french fries and petits pois for a vegan steak-frites:

Review: Viana Picknicker Veggie Snack

Viana Picknicker Veggie Snack

Vegan meaty sausage snack, sort of a vegan pepperami. These are similar to Topas Space Bars - they're both meaty finger snacks, offering a flesh-free meaty hit while away from home:

Review: Viana Bratwurst Sausages

Viana Bratwurst Vegan Sausages

Thick, meaty, vegan sausages for frying, from TofuTown company Viana. A limited range of Viana products are available in the UK, and these sausages are one of the more common lines. Bratwurst are traditionally pork sausages, but these are naturally a blend of tofu and gluten:

Review: Vegusto Luncheon Roll, Lyon-style

Vegusto Luncheon Roll, Lyon-style

Slicing sausage from the Vegusto range of vegan meats and cheeses. We've been sampling some of Vegusto's range recently and the idea of a good slicing sausage appeals greatly. Lyon sausage is apparently a highly-seasoned smoked pork sausage with a bit of garlic, but we've never tried it so can't comment on authenticity. Let's review it as a versatile vegan slicing sausage:

Review: Vegusto Wieners

Vegusto Vegan Wieners

Vegan sausages, German/Austrian style, from Swiss firm Vegusto. The definition of Wieners or Vienna sausages varies wildly, and this is even more the case with vegan versions. German firm Taifun produce tofu wieners which are now widely available in the UK (even in Waitrose), but those and these have nothing in common except the name:

Review: Vegusto Sandwich Slices, Deli-style

Vegusto Sandwich Slices, Deli-style

Meat-free deli cuts from Swiss firm Vegusto. Since arriving in the UK in 2011, Vegusto's range and reach have continued to expand. We found a large selection of Vegusto's vegan meats and cheeses at Out of This World in Nottingham, which is a sure sign of the push into the provinces. Amongst other things, we grabbed a pack of deli cuts which are gluten-based and dubbed 'sandwich slices':

Review: Fry's Hot Dog Sausages

Fry's Original Meat Free Hot Dogs

More vegan hot dogs, to show Granovita how it should be done. The Frys Family range of frozen vegan food is now rebranded and looking great. It's worth noting that VEGAN gets the top spot in the dietary claims on the front of the pack, without the need for the word 'vegetarian' to appear anywhere...  Consumers can now be assumed to know that 'vegan' covers both. These not-dogs come frozen, in packs of 8. How do they compare to the Redwood hot dogs we reviewed last week?

Review: Fry's Traditional Burgers

Fry's Family Meat-Free Traditional Burgers

The perfect burger for our earlier review of Violife vegan cheese.  Frys are the South African family firm that produce a fantastic range of frozen vegan foods. The packaging for their meat-free goodies has recently undergone a bit of re-branding and they do look a bit more sophisticated as a result. We haven't reviewed their burgers before, so we took the opportunity to do so along with the Violife cheese.

Four things you can do with nufu (peanut tofu)


We've finally got through those four blocks of nufu and here's what we made. Just like tofu, nufu is pretty versatile, but here's what you should know, if you're going to make it. Firstly, it tastes of peanuts.. this sounds obvious but it's a contrast with tofu which is pretty bland. It's also quite crumbly and delicate, a little like lopino (lupin tofu) if you've ever tried that. Lastly, it's also quite astringent and a little bitter, which probably comes from the double coagulators we used (nigari and gypsum). The bitterness can be offset with a touch of sugar and a pinch of salt.

Review: VEGANDELI Mortadella and Morcilla sausage


More vegan slicing sausage from Deli-Frys...or should we say VEGANDELI as they will now be known. We recently reviewed their mock ham and mock smoked chorizo sausage and now it's the turn of two other types of slicing sausage...Italian Mortadella and Spanish Morcilla. These types of sausage might be familiar to you if you frequent New York delis, but are less well known in the UK than the ubiquitous Chorizo. Mortadella is a garlicky sausage, while Morcilla is...well, more of a bloody concoction in the manner of black pudding.

Review: Lima Seitan Pieces...Bottled Seitan


What have the Belgians ever done for us? Well they've certainly made seitan much more accessible...by putting it in a jar. You can make your own seitan...in a couple of hours, or you can buy chilled seitan...but what if you want it in the store cupboard, ready to go? Lima has the long life solution you're looking for. These large jars are sold across Europe for seitan worshippers everywhere:

Review: Deli Fry's Mock Meats


If you've been to a recent VegFest you might have sampled Bute Island's range of mock meats, sold under the Deli-Fry's label. That's not to be confused with Frys...our favourite frozen mock meat producer. Deli-Fry's stuff is all ambient packaged in vac pacs and ready to eat. We put the mock ham and mock chorizo to the test: