Guest recipes

Plum Pie in the Sky

For christmas, all the way from Katy in Scotland, I received a new recipe book 'Vegan Pie in the Sky' 75 scrumptious vegan pie recipes, yum.

In our back yard we have a monstrous plum tree and this time of year we always have an abundance of plums, so to make rid of a few of them I tried out one of the recipes from my new book.

Ginger Plum Pandowdy

1 recipe of vegan pastry (see below)

1 kg of plums, pitted and skined

2/3 cup sugar

3 tablespoons cornflour

3 tablespoons finely diced candied ginger

2 teaspoons lemon juice

1. Preheat oven to 180C and roll out the pastry in to a pie dish, put in the refrigerator to chill until ready to use.

2. Slice the plum and pour into the pie dish. Sprinkle with the remaining ingredients and toss to completely coat slices then slide or roll crust on top. Gently press crust on to filling and bake for 20 minutes.

3. Remove the pie from the oven and smash the pie lid with a spoon and press the pieces of broken pastry into the pie filling; some of the juices should seep over the crust. Return the pie to the oven and bake another 35-40 minutes or until the top is golden and the fruit is actively bubbling through the crust. Move the pie to a cooling rack for 20 minutes.

4. Spoon pandowdy in to bowls and top with your favourite vegan ice cream. Yum!

Pastry:

In New Zealand Pams does a sweet vegan pastry, or you can make your own substituting the butter for a vegan spread or a combination of vegetable shortening, coconut oil, and oil that has been chilled in freezer until solid.