Waldorf Salad

Apple harvest in Finland is great this year, and many people have more apples than they can eat.

Apple pie and jam are of course delicious, but if you’re already getting bored of them, try this salad. Celery, walnuts and raisins are combined with apples and the salad is finished with vegan mayo dressing. Yum!

6 celery stalks
3 apples (4-5 if they’re small)
2 dl raisins
3 dl walnuts (about 100g)

dressing:
1 dl vegan mayo
2 dl plain soy yogurt
2 tsp mustard
2 tbsp lemon juice
pinch of salt and pepper

Slice or dice the celery, save some leaves for garnishing. Dice the apples. You should have approximately same amount of celery and apples. Coarsely chop the walnuts. Mix all the salad ingredients in a bowl. Mix the dressing ingredients in another bowl and combine with the salad. Garnish the salad with celery leaves. Preferably refrigerate a while before serving.

Vegan Tallinn

The summer is very hot and nice, and it was finally time to take a couple of days off from work. A good way to celebrate that is to go on a daytrip somewhere, and we opted to travel to Tallinn, the capital of Estonia. We left very early in the morning and came back late night, so it was very essential for us to find something to eat.

After some shopping, we first headed to African Kitchen (homepage) which we already knew to be a nice, cheap and fast place for a quick bite. Vegan/vegetarian friendly too. I had some african fried rice with soya (the portion was bigger than I expected, so much for a quick bite!) and while madame Tofuhead entertained herself with some fresh orange salad. Both were very nice, affordable and helped us to survive many hours in the blazing heat outside.

 

After some more hours of shopping, enjoying local craft beers and wandering around, we decided to test our luck with Vegan Restoran V (homepage, Facebook). We had heard before the place is very popular (how awesome is that for a vegan restaurant, eh!) and it might be a bit hard to get a table without a prior reservation, but luck was on our side this time… Popped in, asked if it’s possible to get a table for two for an hour or so (before we had to head back to harbour to catch out boat), and ta-dah – a table we got. Pretty much all the tables were reserved for early evening, so if you’re planning a visit there on a tight schedule, do place a reservation ahead.

It’s a rather small restaurant, nicely low-key decorated with a great atmosphere. The waiters are very friendly and overall the service was top class. Being the burger enthusiast I am, I had no chance but to order a chickpea burger, while Tofuhead had some stuffed zucchini with a tofu broccoli salad. The burger was great, the chickpea patty had a very nice texture and fit in nicely with a slice of tomato, some mayonnaise, onion and everything else stuffed in the burger. And it was very big! Served with some baked veggies on the side, I have no chance but to give it 5 stars out of 5, possibly the best veggie burger I’ve had so far!

Zucchini slices had a lentil and tomato filling and they were served with fried tofu slices and broccoli. A hint of orange gave nice freshness for the tahini sauce. There were also a few hot pepper slices on the plate, enough to bring some extra spiciness to the dish, but not too many, since dish wasn’t supposed to be hot.

PS. Sorry for the potato quality pictures, they were taken with a cellphone camera.