THE VEGAN NEWS 

WINTER 2002/2003

 In This Issue:

• Recipes
• Vegan Product Review
• Don't Miss! This Month's Article - Parrots in Danger
• In the Veganic Garden
• In the Compost Heap
• Websites
• Book Review(s)
• The Wildlife Database

Carob Balls

Ingredients

• 1 cup of ground almonds
• 1 and a half cups of carob powder
• 2 tablespoons of pine nuts, or sunflower seeds (Optional)
• Half a cup of desiccated coconut
• Approx. half a cup of water
• Carob powder, coconut and whole almonds for decoration

Method

1. Place the ground almonds, the carob powder and the coconut in a bowl. Add the pine nuts/sunflower seeds (these can be ground first in a coffee grinder if you have one, otherwise you can just chop them up roughly before adding them).
2. Mix the ingredients well, stirring in enough water to bind the mixture together.
3. Knead the mixture until a dough is formed. Divide the dough into 24-30 pieces and roll each piece into a ball.
4. Roll a third of the balls in desiccated coconut, a third of the balls in carob powder and decorate the remaining balls with a whole almond, pressed into the dough.

Makes 24-30 balls

* Raw carob powder can be purchased by mail order from The Fresh Network for £3.50, plus £2.00 postage (1lb) or £8.99, plus £3.95 postage (3lb). Ring 0870 800 7070 to order. However, if you do not follow a raw food diet, this recipe can be made using ordinary carob powder, available from many health shops.

Pineapple Le Beau

Ingredients

• 16 large dried pineapple rings
• 1 cup of currants (or sultanas)
• 2 cups of ground almonds
• 1 cup of coconut
• 1 tsp grated lemon peel
• 1 date, 10 shelled whole almonds for decoration

Method

1. Soak eight pineapple rings for one hour in 3/4 cup water. Then drain, reserving the soak water.
2. Puree the soaked pineapple in a blender or food processor, adding some of the soak water if necessary.
3. Cut six of the remaining dried pineapple rings into small pieces, using scissors.
4. Place the pineapple puree, dried pineapple pieces, currants, ground almonds, coconut and grated lemon peel into a large bowl. Knead well, adding a little more of the soak water, if necessary. Form into a loaf shape. Decorate with the two remaining pineapple rings, placing half a date in the centre of each ring and surrounding each date with five almonds, arranged like rays. Refrigerate for up to one month. Any leftovers can be made into balls or cut into squares and eaten as cookies or sweets.

Pineapple Le Beau makes an interesting alternative to a traditional Christmas cake. It is made from natural ingredients and does not contain any added fat or sugar. A further advantage is that it does not need to be cooked! Other raw cakes that would be nice at Christmas include: Carob and Apple Cake and Mark Anthony Carrot Cake. But if you prefer a more traditional cake, then try out my vegan Christmas Cake recipe.

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Winter Product Review

Lush make a wide range of cosmetic products based on ingredients such as fruit, fresh fruit juice, vegetables, cold-pressed organic oils, wheatgrass, seaweed and flower petals. Lush products are handmade and they are tested on humans, not on animals. All Lush products are suitable for vegetarians and a high proportion of Lush products are suitable for vegans. In addition, Lush use smaller quantities of preservatives in their products than many other cosmetic companies. (Updated February 2009 -  All of these Reviews have been removed because the products were no longer available.  For up-to-date  information on Lush Products please visit their website - see below.)

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Winter Sowings:

If you would like more detailed information on what to plant in your garden this season, then please consult the Gardening Diary.

Crops Available this Winter:

• December: Leeks, Brussels sprouts, kale, endive, winter cabbage, swede, chicory, Jerusalem artichokes, spinach, celery, cauliflowers and parsnips.
• January/February: Leeks, Brussels sprouts, winter cabbage, kale, endive and Jerusalem artichokes.

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Vegetable compost is a natural fertiliser, containing all the nutrients that plants need. It is easy to make and its goodness revitalises the soil. Many different materials can be composted including grass cuttings, torn up newspapers, fruit and vegetable peelings, pea, bean and sunflower haulms, tea leaves/coffee grounds, hay and straw, young weeds, clean sawdust, cardboard (including empty loo roll tubes), leaves, human hair and even the contents of your vacumn bag! Local councils often supply composters and many offer free advice on the subject to help you get started. As well as gaining an excellent garden fertiliser at minimal cost, by composting your household and garden wastes you will also be helping to reduce the pressure on our rapidly filling landfill sites and to reduce the amount of waste material that needs to be transported about.

Right, you have obtained a composter, added your waste materials and replaced the lid. Soon your composter should be filled with a nice, friable, clean-smelling substance that resembles soil. But have you ever wondered how this happens? How all those bits of cardboard, grass cuttings and carrot peelings are magically transformed into this great, free resource known as compost? Well inside your compost bin there are many small, hard-working creatures who spend their days dragging materials around, chewing and grinding them and tearing them up into smaller pieces. Allow me introduce you to some of the workers! First of all there are the ants. Ants help to move materials around inside the compost heap, so that the compost doesn't need so much tossing. If you have ants living in your compost heap this usually indicates that it is too dry. Ants don't like water, so water your compost well the day before you want to use it and the ants should leave.

Earthworms also live in composters and in mature compost you often find masses of small, red worms with yellow bands. These are known as tiger worms or brandlings (Eisenia foetida). They feed on vegetable remains, converting them into worm casts, which are high in humus and have a fine crumbly texture. Wormcasts are a good souce of nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium. Look out for flat worms (platyhelminthes) too. These usually live on the edge of the compost heap and it is thought that their slime may help in the decomposition of vegetation. Woodlice (slaters) also play their part in the breakdown of vegetable matter by working over the yeasts and fungi. Their presence indicates that the moisture content of your heap is just right. So if you have plenty of woodlice in your heap, then well done!

You will probably also get plenty of slugs living in your composter. Although much maligned, slugs are vital to the composting process and should be treated with respect! Their rows of sharp teeth, or radulae, rasp away at the vegetable materials and cardboard in your composter, breaking down the cellulose. The large leopard slug is especially useful in the heap, eating well wilted material, dead vegetation and paper and other types of slugs eat fungi and decaying leaves. Mice sometimes take up residence in composters too, but their presence usually indicates that the heap is too cold. Try adding more grass cuttings in order to produce more heat and they should go elsewhere to live. Other decomposing organisms to look out for in your compost heap include mites, centipedes, millipedes, springtails, beetles and various flies. It is not uncommon for fruit flies to take up residence in composters. I can only recommend that if you do get fruit flies living in your composter that you stand well back when you take off the lid in order to avoid getting clouds of them in your hair! All of these creatures work well together in a team, breaking down the compost into smaller pieces so that the micro-organisms - the bacteria and fungi - have a large surface area on which to do their work.

There are three main types of bacteria, which live in compost heaps. Firstly, there are the psychrophiles - these work at temperatures below 15 degrees C. Then as the heap heats up to between 15 and 40 degrees C they die off and the mesophiles take over. Finally as temperatures go over 40 degrees, the thermophiles are left to do all the work. Bacteria use their enzymes to digest the organic materials, releasing heat, carbon dioxide and ammonia in the process. Anaerobic bacteria will be present in the heap if there is no air and these also heat up the heap. They form sulphur compounds that smell like rotten eggs.

The characteristic earthy smell, present in well-made compost, is produced by actinomycetes bacteria. Actinomycetes bacteria look like cobwebby fibres in the heap and produce antibiotics that inhibit bacterial growth. Finally in the last stages of decomposition, the fungi take over from the bacteria. The fungi look like white threads in the compost and play a vital role in the break down of plant residues. Certain toadstools and mushrooms also live in compost heaps.

Further Reading:

• The Compost Book by David and Yvonne Taylor (Reed New Holland, 1998).
• Compost by Charlie Ryrie (Gaia Books Ltd, 2001).

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Other Interesting Websites

The Vegan Society (UK)

An excellent site and a particularly good source of information for the those who are new to veganism, or anyone who is thinking of going vegan. You can now also shop online.

Organic Health and Beauty (USA)

All Natural Health and Beauty produces organic/wildcrafted nutritional supplements and herbal preparations. Their products are produced without any chemical/ animal/petroleum/synthetic by-products. Check out the health and beauty articles here too.

Living Tree Community Foods (USA)

Living Tree Community Foods sells mainly organic living foods, including almond butter, various nuts and dried fruits and olive oil. There's also a raw recipe section and you can meet the growers.

The Compost Resource Page

A web site covering many aspects of composting, including home composting, worm composting and composting toilets. Don't miss the Composter's Forum, an interactive bulletin board with lively discussions on composting and don't forget to check out poetry corner!

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Winter Book Reviews

Plant a Natural Woodland: A Handbook of Native Trees and Shrubs by Charlotte De La Bèdoyére (Search Press, 2001).

If you are thinking of creating a new woodland or hedgerow, then it is well worth consulting a copy of this book before you start planting. Beautifully illustrated and a pleasure to read, this book contains many useful hints to help you with the planning and planting of your woodland area. It's a complete guide to our native woodland species, offering advice on their propagation from seed and giving some indication of their expected final size, as well as many other interesting snippets of information about each species. There's also an interesting chapter on the forest floor, which provides a glimpse of the many attractive native woodland plants and the kinds of mosses, lichens and fungi that will thrive in woodland conditions. So if you are too impatient to wait for your woodland floor to be colonised naturally, you will know exactly what to plant beneath your trees! A list of tree organisations and suppliers is given at the back of the book.

Price £19.99.  ISBN 0-85532-983-1.

Creating Small Habitats for Wildlife in Your Garden by Josie Briggs (Guild of Master Craftsman Publications, 2000).

I was most impressed with this book on wildlife gardening. The colour photos are superb and the text is clearly written and inspiring. Incidentally, you don't necessarily need a large garden to take part in wildlife conservation - a mere window box or container can be attractive to wildlife, provided it is planted up carefully. A woodland habitat in a container? This sounds incredible I know, but Josie Briggs reveals exactly how this can be done. And why stop there? In containers next to your woodland (complete, of course, with its woodland flowers) you could have a pond, a marsh, a flowery meadow and a seaside habitat. And all of these wildlife habitats could fit onto your patio, or balcony, if you don't have a garden. However, I must emphasise that this book isn't just for the container gardener, anyone who is interested in creating wildlife habitats on a small scale would find it invaluable. Covering woodland, wetland, grassland and rockland habitats, it also contains garden plans, lists of wildlife plants, advice on which containers and compost to use, a glossary, a further reading list and a list of useful addresses. Price £12.95.  ISBN 1-86108-188-X

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