Pavlova

I can't believe this worked.

It's a vegan meringue topped with coconut whipped cream and berries. The meringue had the texture contrast you want for pavlova: crisp on the outside and marshmallowy on the inside. 

On the PPK, everyone was having lots of success with flaxseed meringue. I gave it a go, but it didn't work out for me. I think I might not have cooked the flax goop down enough. When I whipped it, it did increase in volume somewhat, and got sort of frothy, but not enough. I added the sugar even though I was doubtful it would work, and nothing much happened.

To the 100g flaxseed goop, 100g sugar, and pinch of cream of tartar of the original recipe, I decided to add another more high-tech whipping agent: Versawhip 600K, along with some xanthan gum. (I used 2 grams of versawhip and .5 gram of xanthan.) And, presto, it whipped up beautifully.

I decided to try making pavlova style meringue. I remembered that some people (Mr Nice Guy Cupcakes, I believe) have had success using agar for marshmallow-style meringue (like the topping on lemon meringue pie), so I added some (I think about 1/3 teaspoon of agar powder). If I remember the Mr Nice Guy recipe correctly, the idea was that the agar would activate during the baking step.

I baked the meringue for 30 minutes at 100C, and then as customary for pavlova, left it in the turned off oven to cool. When it was cool, I tried some, and found that at the very centre it was still somewhat liquid. So I baked them again for 30 minutes, and then let them cool down in the oven overnight. Next morning they were perfect.

Banoffee pie

Banoffee/Banoffi pie, veganized:

The crust is the shortbread tart shell from Vegan Pie in the Sky (but with some of the margarine replaced with coconut oil). Then there's a layer of soy 'dulce de leche', then a layer of sliced bananas, and then it's topped with coconut whipped cream (1 cup coconut cream, 0.5 g xanthan gum, whipped in the cream whipper) and there's some chocolate flakes on top. (I decided to skip the coffee from the original because I wasn't sure how it would go with the coconut.)

Whipped cream experiments

This is a variant on Isa Moskowitz's  Rad Whip, whipped in a cream whipper. I'm pretty impressed that it worked so nicely!

I replaced the original recipe's cashews with tofu, mainly to avoid any danger of clogging the cream whipper -- my blender is not the best at pureeing cashews.

The recipe I used:
84 g firm silken tofu
76 g coconut cream (i.e. coconut milk with about 30% fat; I bet regular coconut milk would be fine)
1 cup soy milk
1.5 g agar powder
3 T sugar
2 T plus 2 t coconut oil (liquid)
1 t vanilla

1. Puree the tofu with the coconut cream and half the milk (in a blender).
2. Heat the other half of the milk with the sugar and agar, bring to the boil and simmer for about 5 minutes. Add the coconut oil.
3. Stream the agar mixture into the tofu mixture with the blender running. Add the vanilla.
4. Transfer to a bowl and place it in the fridge to cool.
5. When it is cold and firm, scoop it back into the blender and puree. Now it's ready to put into your cream whipper. (Mine is a 500ml whipper, which means that its capacity is actually 250ml or about one cup, which is about half of this recipe.)
6. At least an hour before you want whipped cream (preferably even longer, like a day before, because it seems to get better the longer it sits), add the mixture to the cream whipper, close it up and add the N2O. Shake it a few times, then put the whipper in the fridge. (Some people suggest laying it on its side, but I don't know if that matters -- I haven't noticed a difference.)
7. When you want whipped cream, turn the whipper upside down and shake downwards firmly (like you would if you were trying to get the last bit out of a shampoo bottle). Then squeeze the trigger. My results haven't always been quite as pretty as in the photo, but I'm not sure why.

For a simpler, straight coconut whipped cream, my current best recipe is:
1 cup coconut cream
0.35 g xanthan gum

Disperse the xanthan in the coconut cream with a stick blender, or by pouring the xanthan into the vortex while running the regular blender. The mixture is now ready to put into the cream whipper. As mentioned above, this needs to be at least an hour before you want the whipped cream, and preferably a day or more before.