Vegan Picnic Food

Here are a couple of quick ideas for picnic food. I needed something suitable for vegans which meant that my usual sausage rolls and the like were out - also I wanted a healthier option. So I made a pasta salad and potato salad.

For the pasta salad:
Cook some pasta according to pack instructions - I'm not specifying quantities here. Chop some red pepper and spring onion and halve some cherry tomatoes and add into the pasta. In a jar with a lid mix a little white wine vinegar with agave nectar and some dijon mustard and toss with the pasta.

For the potato salad:
Cook some potatoes until just tender and cut into cubes or large chunks. Chop some red onion, spring onion and fresh herbs such as basil or parsley and toss with the potatoes. In a jar with a screwtop lid, mix a little olive oil, lemon juice and wholegrain mustard and drizzle over the potato salad.

These are also nice as a side dish if you are eating at home; if you are taking them on a picnic use good tupperware with tight-fitting lids!

I'm sending this to the Extra Veg challenge, hosted by Allotment 2 Kitchen, who is looking for savoury vegetarian recipes. The challenge was launched by Helen at Fuss Free Flavours.

 Lisa's Kitchen is hosting No Croutons Required this month (co-founded by Jacqueline at Tinned Tomatoes) and is calling for vegetarian soups and salads.

Slimming World Potato Salad

I often make potato salad but haven't included a recipe on my blog before. This month's No Croutons Required challenge from Tinned Tomatoes is the potato salad, so I thought it was a good opportunity to take part.

This is a Slimming-World style potato salad, that is my own recipe and is either low syn or syn-free. It's also very straightforward.

Boil some potatoes so they are not too soft

Apparently the duration of an episode of How I Met Your Mother is too long to let them boil... they were a little softer than I would have liked. Chop into cubes or chunks.

Quark is a popular choice for people following the Slimming World plan; it's a virtually fat-free soft cheese that has such a subtle flavour I don't think it tastes of cheese at all. You can use it as a sweet or savoury ingredient; I used to eat it a lot when I lived in Germany as a dessert simply mixed with sugar with maybe some fruit on top.

Mix some quark and some crushed garlic or garlic puree with the potatoes. You can also add a tablespoon of light mayonnaise which does give a nice taste and doesn't add too many syns.

Stir through the potatoes. I also added some raw red onion, which I love, though you do have to be careful who you breathe on afterwards! Finally I added some parsley on top; chives would have been good here but I didn't have any.

I had this for lunch for a couple of days with some thick-sliced ham and a Babybel light for a virtually syn-free lunch. I used a cool new lunchbox I got from Poundland or somewhere similar that has different compartments so keeps the different elements of your lunch separate.

I am sending this to the No Croutons Required February challenge hosted by Tinned Tomatoes. I'm looking forward to seeing the other potato salad recipes and trying a few of them out in future. I know you can make a far more interesting potato salad than this but I think mine is pretty good for a low-fat quick and easy version.