This is the best vegan ragu recipe, adapted from our family authentic Neapolitan style of adding a little parcel full of flavour that erupts into the sauce.
The flavour bomb adds a deep flavour full of fruitiness, tanginess and richness from the vegan cheese.
This one is worth making up in batches so that you save some for days to follow. Trust me you will want to smother everything in this sauce!
Vegan Ragu – Neapolitan Style with a Flavour Bomb
Vegan, Vegetarian
Vegan Ragu Neapolitan style. The best vegan ragu you will ever come across! Rich, vibrant, tangy and fresh.
5 from 1 vote
Family friendly – Less washing-up – No fridge – One-pan – Prep ahead – Solo travel – Stove top meal – Tinned food
Chop up the carrot, celery and onion. I use the Zyliss food chopper to chop it all mess free and easily.
Add a good drizzle of olive oil to the pan and add the sofrito veg mix. Cook over a medium heat so the veg softens and becomes aromatic.
Take 2 portobello mushrooms and pull the large stalks out of the middle.
Load up one mushroom with pine nuts, cheese and sultanas.
Place the other mushroom on top to form a burger. Use butchers string to tie the mushroom together. Be aware that the mushroom will shrink when cooking so make sure it is tight.
Place the mushroom bomb in with the sofrito.
Pour over a glass of wine and simmer until the wine has evaporated.
Add the passata, sugar, salt, basil and the tomato puree and give it all a good mix.
Turn the heat down as low as it goes, place the lid on and leave to simmer for 2 hours. After 1 hour 45 minutes take the lid off to let the sauce thicken.
Serve with pasta or just about any dish that needs a rich vibrant tomato sauce.
This Potato Gnocchi recipe is a total game changer! If you thought the store bought stuff was good then this will be a reality check for you.
I am not going to lie, this can be a messy recpe and it is hard to get the right consistency so that the dumpling doesnt have too much flour and does not stick to everything. Practice with a left over potato sometime by adding a little flour until you form a fluffy non sticky dough.
The less flour means the fluffier the dumpling but the less flour also means the harder it is handle the dumplings!
The other thing to be prepared for is the amount of space you will need. When sperating the dumplings you do not want them to touch one another as they will stick together easily. I often find it easier to place the dumplings on a tea towel so its easier to to tip them into the water to cook.
Once you get the nack you will thoroughly enjoy making these!
Potato Gnocchi
Vegan, Vegetarian
Some store bought pasta isn't bad. However, store bought Gnocchi doesnt cut the grade for me! This is because I know what it is supposed to taste like. Try this recipe and you will too :)
No ratings yet
10 Ingredients or less – 5 ingredients or less – Family friendly – Leftovers – Less washing-up – No water – One-pan – Quick cook – Solo travel – Stove top meal
Peel and boil the two potatoes in seasoned water. You could always use some leftover mash if you have some.
When the potatoes are soft, remove from the boiling water, mash and allow to cool. Keep the potato water.
When the mash is cool spread it out on a tray or worksurface.
Add some of the flour and combine it together. Keep adding the flour until the potato forms a dough like consistancy. You want to use as little flour as you can but make sure the dough is not too sticky or else you will not be able to work it into dumplings.
Seperate the dough into 8 and take each portion and roll it into a finger width sausage. You probably want to do this one at a time if you are limited on worktop space.
Cut each sausage into section about the size of a fingernail. Use plemty of flour to stop them sticking to each other and the worksurface.
Take your pasta board if you have one and roll each little pillow across the board pressing with your thumb to form some grooves and a curl in the pillow. You will end up with many grooved little dumplings everywhere. You may find it easier to place the dumplings on a tea towl or two. This stops them sticking and also helps off loading them into the water.
Boil the potato water you saved earlier and when it reaches boiling point you can add the gnocchi. You will know when it is cooked because the gnocchi will rise to the surface of the water.
Scoop or drain the gnocchi from the water and serve on a plate.
The popular and delightful sauce known as Pesto alla Genovese comes from Genoa in Italy and has found a cherished place in the heart of Italian culinary traditions as well as finding popularity in every country in the world. Even kids love pesto!
Among the various types of “pesto” found throughout Italy, the basil variation has become the most well known, securing its position as the King of pesto.
This recipe is the most popular amongst Italians and is a stand out winner amongst other variations.
If you are familier with the store bought pesto then this will blow your pallet away! It is far more superior and I can’t stress enough the importance of using the best quality olive oil you can afford.
Pesto alla Genovese
Vegetarian
Pesto alla Genovese is the best pesto on the planet. Feel free to carry on using the supermarket jarred (made with sunflow oil)… err.. stuff! But if you are a fan of pesto then you must try this simple quick easy recipe. Trust me, its a game changer for your menu.
5 from 1 vote
10 Ingredients or less – Family friendly – Leftovers – Less washing-up – No cook – No water – Prep ahead – Solo travel
When I said I was going to make a cake in the Omnia, everyone was shocked! However, my cakes are not quite the same.. trust me.
I chose to make a savoury cake made of creamy cheesey mash potato filled with salty prosciutto ham and with a crunchy top. YUM!
This is a take on an Italian cake called Gattò di patate. Of course cooking in a tiny kitchen like that of a campervan has its limitations and one of ours is that we have no oven.
We do have and love our trusty Omnia stovetop oven that keeps dishes such as this on our van menu!
By the way, if you do have an oven then simply use a deep oven dish and make the layers in that.
Omnia Mashed Potato Cake
Meat Based
Here is an awesome recipe for a savoury cake using mashed potato, cheese and ham. The Omnia allows you to bake the cake until crispy on top with runny cheese running through the middle. This is also a great recipe if you have left over mash from the day before.
5 from 1 vote
10 Ingredients or less – Family friendly – Leftovers – Stove top meal
On February 22nd 2024, we were lucky enough to be presenting at Vanlife summit about vanlife cooking tips and hacks. For any of you that tuned in you will know there was a lot of information and gadgets that we shared. Although we were available to answer any questions during the session we decided to create this page full of all the relevant information. Access to vanlife summit was free and meant you could view any of the live sessions. If you missed out this time, be sure you don’t miss out in the future!
If you would like to try the recipe we made, you can find it here!
Please note: this article contains affiliate links. When you purchase via these links there is no additional charge to you but we receive a small commission.
Vanlife gadgets demonstrated at vanlife summit
If you were impressed with our manual hand held food processor, you are not alone. We quite often whip our Zyliss Easy Pull when we do cooking demos. At one event Mark almost got a standing ovation! This bad boy can blitz vegetables in seconds, and is great for chopping onions, carrots and other veg.
We talked about our pan, the Flavorstone was an impulse buy from a TV shopping channel that Mark couldn’t resist at 1am one morning! The flavorstone is a great vanlife gadget as it is multi-purpose, light-weight and works on gas and induction hobs. It can also be used in an oven if you have one.
One of our smallest and cheapest gadgets in our van is a blowtorch. We use this to light our hob as we have never connected the ignition, and also for many meals in the van. It is the best gadget for perfecting pan pizzas as it means you can get the bubbly crispy crust without an oven.
We also spoke about our Ridgemonkey sandwich toaster. We actually have quite a few products from Ridgemonkey as they are good quality & well suited to vanlife. The XL compact we showed you in the video
Mark is a one pan man in a van and so we do not have an oven. Another gadget we spoke about at vanlife summit was our Omnia oven. This has enable me to bake cakes, bread and pies when in our van. It means I can still do the baking I love. You can see our Omnia recipes here.
Gadgets, gadgets and more gadgets
The vanlife gadget list continues. We have room to sit and eat in our van with all these gadgets, I promise! Which leads is on nicely to our next gadget, the wonderbag! This thermal slow cooker is a great way of cooking meals without using gas. Simply get your meal to a heat where it’s cooking on the gas and then place it in the wonderbag. A few hours later you will have a deliciously cooked meal. However, it is quite bulky, so it has its advantages and disadvantages in vanlife.
Next up is a great gadget for meat lovers. Meater is a wireless thermometer. Pop this little gadget into the meat you’re cooking and bring up the app on your phone. Select which meat you are cooking and how you like it and this clever thermometer will send you a notification when your meal is ready.
Do you know what goes well with steak? Wine! We love our Silwy wine glasses and they have really stood the test of time. These glasses have a magnet in the bottom which allows them to be hung upside down using the magnetic strip they come with. We have travelled down the bumpiest of roads and they have stayed stuck! It’s also a great party trick to stick them on the van when empty but don’t forget to take them off before you drive away!
Ice, ice baby. You may have seen us use ice cube trays for something other than you expected. We use silicone ice cube trays to store van made curry paste, or pancake mixture. This divides it into portion sizes ready for use. This is great for solo vanlifers as it helps use only what you need.
Cooking hacks and tips for vanlife
Ventilate
Be less like us, and make sure you ventilate properly when cooking. If you saw our video you will know we didn’t think ahead when cooking onions ðŸ˜. We have a really useful article on how to ventilate your van, ideally you need to get good airflow. We have a window by the kitchen and a ceiling van to create a good airflow and ventilate the van. If you aren’t stealth camping and the weather is good then you can open the doors, otherwise the window and fan work well. These may need to be things you need to consider when converting your van.
If like us you aren’t prepared and need to get rid of cooking smells, we’ve got you covered too, with this article.
Clean & tidy
In small spaces mess can build up quickly. None of us vanlifers want any friends of the scurrying, squeaky, furry, four-legged variety. It is really important to tidy up as you go along. Not only does this make it easier at the end allowing you to enjoy your meal, it also clears up counter space for you to use. We use an enamel tray in our van to put all our peelings etc on so we can tip it in the bin at the end. Being enamel it doesn’t matter if it drops on the floor when driving!
Happy knife, happy life
A good quality sharp knife can really help when cooking in a van. When using a sharp knife it is actually less likely to make mess with bits of chopped food flicking off in all directions. We like to use our custom Savernake knife. Password is vanlifeknife if you use this link for a secret discount :-)
Space savers
Any space saving products can be great for vanlife. We like to use collapsible measuring cups that can store safely on the wall. We also have a collapsible mixing bowl, which again hangs on the wall. If you home base you may want to consider leaving some things there, do you really need a full cutlery set or 6 plates?
If you are a part-time vanlifer consider partially prepping meals and ingredients in advance. For example, if I know I am going to be baking while we are away in the van I will often weigh the dry ingredients out at home. I put them in a tub or ziploc bag rather than bringing a handful of ingredients which can be bulky.
Multi-purpose
We have already mentioned our Flavorstone pan. This is a great multi-purpose gadget in the van as it can be used for a number of things such as shallow frying, deep frying and steaming. This has meant we got rid of second pan in our van, saving on space and weight. Any products that can be used for multiple things are great vanlife gadgets. It can even be as simple as using a wine bottle as a rolling pin!
Finally…
One of our favourite vanlife cooking hacks is to make some recipes from this very website. There are recipes from vanlifers from around the world
Share your favourite vanlife cooking tips and hacks with fellow vanlifers in the comments below. You can also add your favourite thing to cook in your van so that other vanlifers can try it.
When we were asked to do a cooking demo for Vanlife Summit 2024 we were over the moon! However, I have to confess, I was just as excited to know we have pasta fagioli for dinner!
We made pasta fagioli whilst chatting about cooking in our van and showing off our favourite cooking gadgets. Whilst finishing up sitting down at the table having pasta fagioli and a glass of pinot grigio. Heaven!
This is one of those southern Italian dinners families go crazy for! Its simple, nutritious and delicious.
It is a perfect vanlife recipe as it uses little resources and cooks in one pan and certainly puts a smile on your face…or is that just the beans whispering. 🤔
This recipe is for 4 but you can halve it if its just the two of you but trust me, its worth saving an extra couple of portions for lunch the next day. Hot or cold it just seems to taste even better the following day.
This is also easily adaptable for vegan diets just replace the cheese.
Pasta Fagioli
Vegetarian
One pan, minimal mess, quick cook and little water…could this be the perfect Vanlife recipe? Its certainly one of the most delicious!
5 from 1 vote
10 Ingredients or less – 30 minute meal – Family friendly – Less washing-up – One-pan – Stove top meal
Transport yourself to Northern Africa and make yourself some Moroccan Msemen Flaky Pancakes.
These flaky, golden pancakes are a perfect alterntive to traditional pancakes yet they also work as a delicious alternative to flat breads. The crispy flaky layers are ready to soak up all the sweet or savory goodness you desire.
This ain’t your average pancake. Msemen has a unique texture, crispy and flaky on the outside and impossibly light within, thanks to a special folding technique that traps sprinkles of semolina between each layer.
If youv’e ever been to Morocco you will see this popular streetfood in every food market. It is classically served with a butter, honey and lemon syrup and served as a popular breakfast of as a snack.
Sweet or savory? The world is your oyster (or, well, pancake). Drizzle msemen with honey, or go full-on wanderlust with a dollop of harissa and a sprinkle of za’atar. Feeling adventurous? Stuff your pancakes with spiced lamb, creamy avocado, or tangy olives – the possibilities are endless.
Msemen Moroccan Pancakes
Vegan, Vegetarian
These authentic Moroccan streetfood snacks are a must try! Fluffy, flaky pancakes cooked to golden perfection, ready to be dipped in honey, drizzled with melted butter, or stuffed with any sweet or savory delight you can think up.
5 from 1 vote
10 Ingredients or less – Less washing-up – One-pan – Prep ahead – Quick cook
4tbspSunflower OilFor the pan and for the rolling surface
4tbspExtra Semolina FlourTo sprinkle in between folds
1/4tspBaking Powder
Instructions
Mix the plain flour, semolina flour, salt, sugar and yeast in bowl.
3/4 cup Fine Semolina Flour, 1/4 tsp Dry Active Yeast, 1/2 tsp Salt, 1 tsp Sugar, 1 cup Plain Flour
Gradually mix in the water. Be very careful here as you do not want the dough to be sticky. I mix with a spoon until the dough has formed and then I can start kneading with my hands. If it ends up being sticky then add a little more flour.
1.25 cup Warm Water
Lightly flour your work surface and start kneading the dough for a good 5 minutes. The dough should feel smooth, soft and springy.
Extra Flour
Divide the dough into 6 balls and leave to prove on a lightly oiled surface for 30 minutes. Cover with a damp tea towl to stop the dough drying out.
4 tbsp Sunflower Oil
Mix the small amount of baking powder into a little bowl of semolina. This is to sprinkle in between layers and is the key to getting flakey layers in your pancakes.
4 tbsp Extra Semolina Flour, 1/4 tsp Baking Powder
The dough should have slighly increased in size and now you can take each ball at a time and on a lighly oiled surface press or roll it into a super thin rectangle.
4 tbsp Sunflower Oil
Spot a little butter onto the surface. (about 6 spots each the size of a pea).
2 tbsp Butter
Lightly sprinkle on a small amount of the semolina and baking powder mix.
1/4 tsp Baking Powder, 4 tbsp Extra Semolina Flour
Fold the top long side to the middle of the shape and then fold the bottom longside so that it overlaps the middle. It should look like an envelope.
Sprinkle with some more semolina.
4 tbsp Extra Semolina Flour, 1/4 tsp Baking Powder
Fold in the first side so that it covers to half way and then fold in the other side so that it layers over the top. You should have a small square parcel.
Repeat this process for each ball of dough until you have a pile of 6 parcels. Cover to keep them from drying out.
Heat a pan to medium heat and add a splash of oil.
Take one parcel at a time, and on a lightly oiled surface press it out to form a larger pan sized square. Sprinkle the last of the semolina over the top.
1/4 tsp Baking Powder, 4 tbsp Extra Semolina Flour
Fry on one side for 2 minutes and then flip and fry the other side for 2 minutes. I often flip these again so they get an extra minute on each side. They should puff up and go golden on the top. Keep an eye on them so they do not burn!
4 tbsp Sunflower Oil
Repeat the process for each pancake until you have your stack of crispy, flaky, layered pancakes.
Traditionally these are served with a butter and honey syrup but you will find that they go with just about anything.
As 2024 begins so does veganuary, we have lots of exciting vegan recipes for veganuary. Vegan cooking doesn’t have to be bland and boring. The vegan recipes in this article are packed full of flavour and colour. Veganuary can be a great opportunity to try new meals and ingredients you may not have tried before. Let’s delve into these exciting vegan recipes then!
1. West African peanut stew
This vegan West African peanut stew is hearty and delicious, with a little heat from the chilli and the tang of the lemon. The sauce is so good you will definitely want to mop it up with some bread. We serve ours with some flatbreads, you could also serve it with some rice which would mop it up beautifully too! The great thing is that it can be cooked in one pan, reducing the washing up. A blender is needed for the curry paste, a great tip is to make this in bulk and freeze it.
2. Spiced red lentil mini burgers
These mini lentil burgers are great for making ahead of time. They are perfect for making ahead and reheating when required, and can be a great snack or as part of a main meal. They can be cooked in an oven or a frying pan, making them a versatile vanlife dish.
3. Raw chocolate & peppermint tarts
What better vegan dish for vanlife, than one that doesn’t require cooking?! These raw chocolate & peppermint tarts are incredible. This recipe requires a blender or food processor for the base, as well as a fridge for it to set. If you have these in your van then this is a recipe you will not regret trying it.
4. Everything tofu sauce
Ready to get saucy? This tofu sauce is a great recipe to try this veganuary. You can serve it with pasta, use it in a lasagna or even use it as a dip! It’s versatile and super, super easy! You don’t even need to cook it. You do need a blender though, so if you don’t have one, this recipe may be the inspiration you need to buy one.
5. Butternut squash, apricot, chickpea and chard curry
The next exciting vegan recipe for veganuary is another delicious curry! Curry is a vanlife staple for many so we just had to have 2 on the list. This butternut squash curry is full of colour and flavour and can be cooked in just one pan. Less washing up is always a winner in our van, especially when you get a delicious meal at the end of it.
6. Bejewelled couscous salad
What could be better than a couscous salad? A bejewelled couscous salad of course! As with some other vegan recipes featured here this recipe is no-cook. All you need is a kettle. Another great thing about this recipe is that it is delicious warm or cold. This is great if you want to make a big batch and have leftovers the next day. It’s also good for taking on picnics, hikes etc.
7. Orange Omnia cake
We have to finish this round-up of exciting vegan recipes with this orange Omnia cake. We do not have an oven in our van, and I couldn’t give up baking. So baking in my Omnia stove top oven has meant we can still have cake on the menu. I actually prefer baking vegan cakes now as I find they come out perfectly every time!
Well vanlifers, there we have it. 7 exciting vegan recipes for you to try this veganuary. Let us know in the comments which one you want to try. You can find more vegan recipes here. If you want to share your own vegan recipe you can do that right here and share what you like to cook in your van with others.
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