Chilli, you may be thinking, isn’t that impressive as a meal. It’s pretty standard. So why do I think it makes a great conversion meal? Well most people care about animal suffering and they’ll admit that vegan food tastes good but a lot of people think being vegan is impossibly hard.

Chilli is not impossibly hard. It’s easy. It’s tasty. You can save extras for leftovers, scale up for a large group, cook it on an open flame, cook it in your kitchen, serve it with rice or spuds, or spaghetti. It’s also ridiculously easy to convert your existing recipe to be animal free. You can use one of the meany veggie mince substitute on the market, fill it with veggies, or do what I do and bean it up.

Black Bean Chilli

1 tbsp oil
1/2 onion, diced
2 cloves of garlic, minced
1 tbsp ground cumin
1 tbsp ground coriander
2 tsp smoked paprika
1 tsp chilli powder
1 tsp oregano
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1 400g can of chopped tomatoes
1 400g can of black beans (or one cup dried beans cooked)
Salt to taste

1. Heat the oil in a pan over a medium high heat and add the onion, cook until translucent.

2. Add the garlic and spices and cook for 30 seconds or so until the spices are fragrant

3. Throw in the tomatoes, then fill your tomato can half full with water (or half empty) and pop that in the pan too. Add the can of black beans and simmer for twenty minutes.

4. Salt to taste and serve.

And that’s how easy it is to be vegan.

The worst catered meal was a butternut squash risotto. It was bad. It was the vegetarian option for a ball with over a hundred participants. By the time it got to me it was more like paste. As in wallpaper paste. The rice was almost disintegrating and I can’t even remember it tasting of butternut squash. To add insult to injury it also had kale in it. Rather than adding some texture and variety to my bowl of slop it just added to the sadness of it all. The kale was so overdone it was grey. I don’t even know how you overdo kale like that.

I still can’t eat butternut squash risotto. I basically just stick to my tomato one. But I thought I’d experiment with this one. Bringing in the fresh flavours of Thai Green Curry Paste and stirring in spinach right at the last minute so it still has some bite.

Thai Green Risotto with Spinach
(serves 3 realistically, 2 greedily)

2 tablespoons Olive Oil

Half an onion, diced

4 tablespoons Thai Green Curry paste

2 cups risotto rice

1/2 cup coconut milk

4 cups Vegetable Stock

2 cups baby spinach 

First set the instant pot to saute. Heat the olive oil and fry the onion until translucent, then add in curry paste and fry for a couple of seconds until fragrant.

Add the rice to the pot, and stir. Let the rice toast until most of the grains are translucent. Keep stirring to stop it from sticking.

Add the stock and coconut milk and stir it all together. Pop on the lid, press manual and set the timer for five minutes. 

Once the time is up open the valve for a quick release. Open up and stir in the spinach, allow it to wilt and then serve.