Sometimes we get caught up in making perfect looking food, adding ingredients to improve on the taste of what we are eating or serving and photo editing to improve our food photos.

Today I wanted to celebrate pure, natural, whole, imperfect looking food. Often the most delicious way to eat food is in its natural unadulterated state (apart from in this case a little boiling!)

These gorgeous photos were taken by my friend Shane, of Taewa (Riwai) - Māori Potatoes. The word Taewa refers to a collection of varieties of potato cultivated by New Zealand Māori for at least 200 years.
Taewa have cultural and historical value in New Zealand with traditional varieties of Taewa preserved by Māori and passed down through generations so they’re still available today in their original form. Māori treasure them as a link to their early ancestors.
You won’t find these in a large supermarket, as unlike modern potatoes they have not been bred to produce a high yield.

Like modern potatoes however, these purple Taewa are full of of Vitamin C and fibre. To top it all off they also contain potassium, thiamine, folate and magnesium.

How to cook these babies?

You can cook them just like a standard potato, but they are particularly suited to boiling and steaming. You don’t need to peel them.
My pick – served just as in the picture above – boiled, and finished off with rock salt. Pure and simple.

So here’s to imperfect looking food, which is of course, perfect.

                                                            Lou’s Four Bean Salad

We have been (get it, been/bean)really lucky over here in New Zealand and had a public holiday today, meaning a lovely long weekend. We packed up the kids on Friday night and raced off for a quick break with family, about a four hour drive away to Napier. The weekend and time out was fantastic, but it meant we got home late tonight, still with homework, unpacking and ironing to do ready for the week. In the midst of the general chaos of lost homework sheets, and discovering our dog had wet my daughter’s bed!!!!!, a quick dinner was needed. Now be warned – this involves canned veges, but this blog is after all about making vegan simple.

This protein packed power salad includes Red Kidney Beans, Green Lima beans, Butter beans and Chickpeas so is super colourful. Add mint and avocado, and you have a picture worthy salad.

To whip up this culinary delight you will need:
3 Cans of mixed beans
1 Can of chickpeas
1 Red Onion
1 Avocado
Salt and Pepper to taste
A few handfuls of chopped mint

Dressing
Juice of one lemon
1/2 tsp ground cumin

Directions

• Finely chop red onion
• Chop avocado into small cubes
• Rinse, drain and add the beans to a bowl containing the avocado and onion
• Sprinkle though chopped mint ( I like mine roughly chopped)
• Add Salt and Pepper to taste
• Combine the juice of a lemon with the cumin, and mix through the salad.

We served ours cold, over brown rice.

Question: Do you ever use canned vegetables?