Vegan Chicks Rock

Roasted Potatoes & Field Roast Sausages

2011-11-10T10:15:00.001-08:00

This was one of those meals that came from trying to get rid of a few odds and ends of things and turned into something really delicious. I've actually made this again since because I liked it so much. The best part is that you pretty much just throw everything into the oven and forget about it until the timer goes off. You could use this as a side dish for dinner or brunch or just eat it as a meal for breakfast. Either way, it's filling and hits the spot.

Just throw whatever you want in here - anything you're trying to use up the last of. I do think that the tomatoes kind of make it, though. I've been big into roasted slices of tomatoes lately so maybe that's just me.

Throw in some clean, chopped potatoes (I don't know how much I used, pretty much just enough for an 8" x 8" pan.), dice a few shallots or an onion and a few cloves of garlic and toss them with a bit of olive oil. If you're adding any other veggies, put them in now as well. Put the dish in the oven at 425 F for about 25 minutes. Remove the pan from the oven, stir in a chopped Field Roast sausage (I used the chipotle flavored ones), some herbs (fresh or dried - herbes de provence is a good choice here if you're unsure) and stir everything up a bit. Add some sliced tomatoes to the top and bake for another 30 minutes. Let everything cool for 5 minutes before you start eating. Add some hot sauce or nooch or whatever you like.

Nacho Bar Madness

2011-11-06T07:19:00.000-08:00

Nachos are one of my favorite food groups. I love them so much that sometimes if we're out at a bar or something I'll order no-cheese nachos just to have them. I always get weird looks when I do that, but whatever. I make nachos at home sometimes, too. Those are usually those lazy nights when I'm staying in and watching some stupid movies or a Vampire Diaries marathon or something. Nachos are good for that.

Please ignore the timer in that picture. I forgot to remove it from the table when I took these. We were doing laundry and timing the loads, not timing how long we had to eat. haha

Of course I was totally stoked when Sara Beth had some nacho bar ingredients listed for her recipe testing. Oh, yes. I am so on board with this. It's really not that hard to convince me to eat nachos, though, so to be honest.

The only bummer about this meal was that I forgot to buy avocados earlier in the week so they'd be ripe for guacamole. Also, I was supposed to make some pico de gallo, too but the tomatoes at the store looked skeezy so I just bought salsa instead. No matter, everything was still awesome.

The nacho cheese is the star of the show. James almost lost it when he tried this. It's cashew based witha secret ingredient to give it that awesome tang that nacho cheese has with some spices added in to give it a bit of something extra. I am so in love with this stuff. I will be making this quite often.

This is tempeh taco "meat". I've always just used one of those flavoring packets when making something like this so it was super cool to make the flavoring totally from scratch. I love tempeh, so this was extra wonderful in my books. We had some leftovers from all of this and made some sandwiches out of the tempeh and nacho cheese. That stuff is pretty awesome to put on a sandwich or in a wrap, actually.

Last, but not least, I made some sour cream. This was crazy simple and really delicious. It went so well with everything else. You could easily make this the day before if you wanted to, which is always a cool thing. Also, I think this could stand in for any kind of store bought sour cream you might use. Score!

Braised Tempeh & Fluffy Couscous

2011-11-03T15:44:00.000-07:00

I've been cooking up a storm these last few days. I have this week and next week off work in between contracts. Yay for staycations! I've been way busier than I thought I'd be between renewing my drivers license and running to the market and cooking and all those fun errands I finally have time for. I can't believe this week is already almost over. This is really the best time that I could be doing some recipe testing, though. I've been making an average of 2 different things each day right now. So awesome. It's been a blast, I hope I get to keep doing stuff like this.

One of my favorites from Terry Hope Romero's upcoming international vegan cookbook is the Braised Tempeh with Green Olives and Preserved Lemons. Tempeh and I are good buddies already, so any excuse to do something new with it and I'm in. This stuff was fantastic. I've been wanting to try preserved lemons for a while (the recipe for this will also be in the book) and I already love olives. So delicious. So there's tempeh, some caramelized onions, green olives and preserved lemons and a few other things. It's easy to put together and so good. I was excited to eat the leftovers.

I decided to pair this with Terry's Fluffy Spiced Couscous. This is a cool recipe because you can customize it depending on what else you're making. I haven't made couscous in ages. I don't think I'll wait so long to make it again, though. This came out fluffy as promised and full of flavor. I put dried apricots, preserved lemons and pistachios in mine. Yum!

Between testing for Terry and Sara Beth, we've been eating so well lately. It's awesome because I never have that problem where I have no clue what to make for dinner. I just find a recipe on the list that I haven't tried yet and there you go. I'm going to try making some granola bars this weekend. Awesome, right?

Walnut Spice Sticky Cake

2011-10-31T15:04:00.000-07:00

It's the season for recipe testing! I'm also testing for Terry Hope Romero's upcoming international vegan cookbook. It's a delicious job, let me tell you. Doing all of this testing for Terry and Sara Beth have really put me on a mission. It's so much fun trying new things. I've been inspired by different techniques and flavor combinations and will definitely carry some of that over into my own recipes.

I totally took a bite out of this before I took the picture. I couldn't resist.

Today I made Terry's Walnut Spice Sticky Cake. I don't normally make cakes because it's just the two of us here and it's sometimes hard to eat a whole one. The sacrifices you make sometimes! This cake is not one that's likely to sit around going bad, that's for sure. I literally just finished eating a piece of this and I'm holding myself back from having a second piece. I will definitely have another one after dinner tonight.

Fresh from the oven!

This walnut cake is made with spelt flour, which I love and has just the right amount of spice to give it flavor without being hot or too overpowering. There's a bit of orange zest in it and an orange syrup poured on top after it comes out of the oven. I much prefer cakes like this to the kind with frosting. I'm not a frosting hater, but normally I scrape most of it off because it's too much sugar for me. I feel like I could eat a piece of this for breakfast and not start the day off on a sugar high.

Okay, maybe I will have another piece. Just a small one.

Veggie Fritatta and Sunshine Smoothies

2011-10-30T18:58:00.000-07:00

I've been recipe testing for Sara Beth Russert's upcoming cookbook for the past few weeks. I've been really loving everything I've made so far. I think you guys are going to love this cookbook. I've already found some things that will definitely be making it into a regular rotation at our place. Two of these are the Veggie Fritatta and the Sunshine Smoothies.

As I'm sure you can tell from the photos, there are greens in the smoothie being all sneaky and stuff. You can't taste the greens at all, which surprised me. It was so yummy, I've made these a couple of times since I originally tested the recipe. Perfect for an afternoon snack or with your morning breakfast. These smoothies aren't frozen, which is the way I typically make mine so no brain freeze first thing, either. Just lots of fruits and greens and vitamins and yumminess.

This veggie fritatta was crazy awesome. I don't know how many this is supposed to serve, but we ate half of it between the two of us for breakfast along with our smoothies. Then, a few hours later, I was still thinking of how good it was and ate the rest of it all by myself. I can't say enough times how good this was.

Maybe you shouldn't try and eat this all in one sitting like I pretty much did. You'll sure want to, though.

Simple Brown Gravy

2011-10-29T17:11:00.000-07:00

I just realized that I said I'd post a simple brown gravy recipe and then never did. Oops. I don't have any pictures of, but it pretty much looks like you'd expect a brown gravy to look. This is great to go with the Vegan Holiday Roast or stuffing or pretty much anything you need gravy for.

Here is a picture of two of my cats instead. These two are sisters and I always catch them snuggling. This was probably one of the funniest contortions they've been in.

Here's the great thing about this gravy. You can make it just bare bones and it tastes great or you can add a thing or two to jazz it up a bit if you want. I like to add mushrooms to mine so I'm going to give you the recipe with the mushrooms added. If you don't like mushrooms or don't want to do that, just leave them out. Add some fresh herbs if you want. Thyme, marjoram or sage would be nice with this. Also, if you're out of vegetable broth you can either add in some broth powder with water or just use water instead.

Brown Gravy

2 tablespoons olive oil
1 small onion, chopped
3/4 cup mushrooms, chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
1 cup flour
3 cups vegetable broth
2 1/2 cups water
1/2 cup soy sauce

Saute the onion, garlic and mushrooms in the oil over medium heat until the onions are transluscent, about 7 minutes. Meanwhile, mix together the broth and water and whisk in the flour.

Slowly add the flour mixture to the pot with the onions and mushrooms. Turn the heat up to medium-high and stir constantly until the mixture comes to a boil. Turn the heat down to simmer, still stirring often as your gravy starts to thicken. Add the soy sauce and cook for about 5 more minutes.

Remove from heat and blend the gravy until it's almost smooth. (Or make it totally smooth if you don't want any bits of onions and mushrooms in your gravy.) An immersion blender is great for this but if you don't have one, a blender or food processor would be fine.

Return the gravy to the pot and cook for another 10-15 minutes as your gravy finishes thickening. Whisk in some more water if you find it's getting too thick.

A Halloween Round-Up

2011-10-28T07:57:00.000-07:00

I've been thinking about making something fun and festive for dinner on Halloween night. Those cute little pepper jack-o-lanterns I discovered yesterday might just be the thing. If I make that, I still need something spooky for dessert. I've done some neat cupcake things in years past so I might do something like that again. As I've been thinking about all of this, I decided to do a bit of a Halloween round-up today. Here are a bunch of things that I've made before and I'm seeing on other people's blogs right now. Are you making anything Halloweeny this year?

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Spiderweb Cupcakes and Chocolate Spider Mini Cupcakes - I brought these to work a few years ago and they were quite the hit.

Vampire Cupcakes! They "bleed" when you bit into them. These are really easy to make, too. I included the tutorial on how to do this in the blog post.

Hannah made these adorable little pumpkin candies over on Bittersweet.

Ghosts are popping up everywhere at Fancy Flours!

VegSpinz made her own Candy Corn last year and now you can, too!

Aren't these falafel spiders just the cutest?! There's a great recipe for falafel on this page from Veggie Bellly's site, too.

How about some sweet potato-chocolate swirl muffins from the Vegan Cookbook Afficiando?

I would swear there were some more Halloween things popping up in the MoFo this year. Maybe I'll do another round up this weekend if I find some more.

The Cutest Jack-O-Lanterns Ever!

2011-10-27T07:51:00.000-07:00

Is this not the cutest Halloween dish you've ever seen?!

These are Spabettie's Carrot-Ginger Quinoa Pepper Jacks. Otherwise known as the most adorable jack-o-lantern food ever! That's her picture, not mine. I just can't get over how cute these things are and I had to share.

Edit: I just realized these are in a Halloween recipe contest. You can vote here if you want.

A Wayward Brunch

2011-10-26T19:37:00.000-07:00

After getting quite a few great suggestions for breakfast in Seattle, we decided to try out Wayward Vegan Cafe. Seriously, holy cow. I will definitely be going back there again. The food was amazeballs. I want to try one of everything on the menu. I also always forget how large the portions are in the US so we ended up with a ton of food. I can never say no to grits with my breakfast, though so that's partially my fault. Ah, well.

This was my plate. Country fried seitan steak with hash browns and tofu scramble. So good. The gravy was really good, I kept scooping it onto my hashbrowns to eat it with them, too. I think that if I ever order this again, I'll ask for extra gravy just for that very purpose. I don't eat a ton of seitan because it has a tendency to set off my allergies, but sometimes I like to throw caution to the wind. The delicious wind. The seitan was lightly breaded and crispy and tasted great. I really liked it, but I think I actually prefer the country fried steak at Georgetown Liquor Company more. No worries, there are tons more things to try on this menu so it'll be a while before I get back around to this, especially considering that I don't live in Seattle.

Now let me speak of this tofu scramble. At first I was all oh, yeah, whatever. Boring tofu scramble on the side. But no! Even though this is just plain tofu scramble with no frills, it was really tasty. It's really fluffy and light and full of flavor. I think I mowed through that first, actually. I couldn't get enough. Yum, yum, yum!

James ordered the seitan hash. The blurry seitan hash as it were. I've learned my lesson about trying to take photos in the morning before I've eaten. This is the second time in a week I've done this. But, I digress. Here's the thing about the seitan hash. We were tricked! It doesn't look like anything all that special, but it tastes amazing. Somehow they've mixed the seitan in with the tofu so you barely notice it in there when you're looking at it. They used some kind of tasty herbs and spices when making the seitan to make it even more awesome. There are also huge chunks of potatoes, green peppers and onions. He kept saying how good the toast was, too. It'll be hard not to get this and try something else next time we're there.

And, of course, I can't go without my grits. You can pretty much tell what was going on with the grits. I mixed it all together, added some salt and pepper and a little nooch and ate until I thought I might burst. Good times.

As I'm trying to write this, James is sitting behind me reading some old song lyrics that he wrote in 1992 in high school. He just found this notebook that has written on the cover: "DO NOT: read, look at, take, open, abuse, touch or go near this book" Greatness. So if none of this post makes any sense, you can blame him.

Is It Like Trick-Or-Treating If You Pay For It?

2011-10-25T18:29:00.000-07:00

We were in Seattle this past weekend, where I always get into so many kinds of trouble with food. And I mean trouble like sneaking out at night to go the best party every and not getting caught sneaking back in trouble. Eating is one of the highlights for sure. I always go to Mighty-O on my way out of town on Sunday mornings so I can grab a dozen donuts to take back home with me. Sadly, I came down with the flu on Sunday morning so we had to skip it this time even though that totally breaks my heart.

However, we did go for an awesome breakfast at Wayward Vegan Cafe on Saturday morning (more on that tomorrow) and then got pulled in by Sidecar across the street. Since it's the end of October I sort of felt like we went trick-or-treating after we left that place. I bought so many delicious goodies. The funny thing is that we don't typically eat sweets except for every now and then. I think this'll keep us set for quite a few months.

Some of this stuff I can get in Canada, but only if I make the trek out to New Westminster where the only vegan store is. It's a bit far so I don't end up going there as much as I'd like so I'm honestly not sure if they now have some of the flavors/brands that we picked up. I know that some of this stuff I've never seen in Canada at all. I pretty much bought a bunch of stuff that looked delicious that I can't easily get up here. This is what happens when I go into a vegan store on a whim, I guess.

I can't wait to be done with this flu so I can get to eating some of this stuff! I'm really excited to try the Nacho Mama Queso. We're big fans of tortilla chips and salsa and/or guacamole at our house so this'll slip right into our snacking quite well. I always say that nachos are one of my favorite food groups! The peanut butter cups we tried when we were in Hawaii and I regretted not buying a bunch more to bring home. That explains why we bought an entire box of them. I mean, come one. Organic, dark chocolate peanut butter cups. What isn't to love?!

Vegan Holiday Roast

2011-10-24T16:38:00.000-07:00

I've had quite a few requests for the Vegan Holiday Roast recipe, so here it is! I originally got this online but the recipe isn't there when I go back to my bookmark. I can't remember exactly what it was called before, so Vegan Holiday Roast, it is! Luckily, I have a little notebook where I copy down recipes from the internet, so I still have it.

I've been making this for just over 4 years now and it's been a hit every single time. Even the omnivores end up having seconds. Personally, I think that one of the keys to success with this is to have a really delicious gravy with it. My favorite for the past couple of years is the Punk Rock Chickpea Gravy from Vegan with a Vengeance. If you don't want to bother with making your own gravy, the Simply Organic Mushroom Sauce packets are quite good. You'll just want to make sure to buy 3-4 packets so you have enough for the entire roast. I'll put up a brown gravy recipe tomorrow if you want something that's more traditional.

You can make this roast stuffed or not. I've never made it not stuffed, but I imagine it would be sort of like a big slab of seitan if you did it that way. Not that this is a bad thing, necessarily but for me, I think part of what's great about is that it doesn't seem so heavy with the stuffing in the middle and it's not nearly as scary for any non-veg*ns you might be eating with. If you're not going to stuff this, you can just put it in a loaf pan to bake if you want it to retain its shape. Otherwise, you can just form it a loaf shape and put it in a baking pan like you'll do with the stuffed one.

If you're stuffing this, and I think you should, you can always use my stuffing recipe. It's fast and super easy and tastes great with this roast.

Vegan Holiday Roast

roast:
2 cups wheat gluten
1/2 cup soy or chickpea flour
1/2 cup nutritional yeast
2 teaspoons onion powder
1 teaspoon garlic powder (not garlic salt)
12oz firm tofu
1 1/2 cups water
3 tablespoons soy sauce
1 tablespoon olive oil

broth: (use 1 1/2 times the amount of broth if you're stuffing the roast)
2 1/3 cups vegetable broth
2 tablespoons olive oil
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 teaspoon each, fresh chopped sage, thyme and rosemary

Preheat your oven to 325 F.

Mix the dry ingredients in a mixing bowl. Add the tofu, water, soy sauce and olive oil to a food processor and blend until combined. Add the dry mixture to the food processor. Mix it until a ball forms.

If you're not stuffing this, form into two loaves and place them in a baking pan.

If you are stuffing this (my favorite way), divide the dough in half. Roll out half onto a clean surface using a wet rolling pin. You want to make about a 15" circle. Mound 3 1/2 cups stuffing in the middle. Fold dough up and around the stuffing into a loaf shape, pinching to seal. Repeat with the second half of the dough and place your loaves into a baking pan.

Pour 1/2 cup of broth over the top of your roasts and cover the pan with foil. Bake for 30 minutes and remove the foil. Add half of the remaining broth. Bake for another 30 minutes, basting occasionally. Remove the pan from the oven and flip the loaves over. (I usually need to use two spatulas together to do this without tearing the roasts.) Pour the remaining broth over the loaves and bake for 30 more minutes, basting often.

Your roasts should completely soak up the broth by the end of the cooking time. If they don't (and mine rarely do), just cook in 30 minute increments, basting every 10 minutes or so until there is little or no broth left. I usually end up needing another 60 minutes.

Remove the roasts from the pans, let cool for at least 5 minutes then slice it up and serve.

Coconut Milk Yogurt for the Win

2011-10-23T10:00:00.000-07:00

I've been hearing about all of these great coconut milk products from people in the US. I've been waiting patiently for them to start appearing in Canada. We've had the coconut milk drink for about 6 months or so, I think, but we haven't had any of the yogurts (that I've seen at least) until just recently. The market near my house started carrying it last week, so of course I nabbed some.

I really miss yogurt. I used to eat soy yogurt all of the time. I love the Nancy's soy yogurt so much. I've been trying to limit my soy intake so that's gone off the menu except for every now and then. I'm stoked to finally have a replacement. This stuff is so good. It's thick and creamy and delicious. Just like you'd expect from it. I'm pretty sure that everything I've had that's been made with coconut milk has been awesome. Coconut milk ice cream, I'm talking to you.

So far I've only tried the vanilla flavor, but there were a few others at the market that I'm definitely going to grab when I'm there next week.

Things that are Awesome: Holy Crap Cereal

2011-10-22T10:00:00.000-07:00

I remember about a year ago James telling me that he heard something about the woman who started Holy Crap cereal on the CBC (that's like NPR in the US). Apparently it was so popular that it was backordered for months. I think the popularity took her by surprise. There was some other stuff, but I forget exactly now and I don't want to spread lies, so just check out the google if you're curious. Anyway, I remembered that discussion when we saw it at the market the other day. Intrigued, we decided to buy some.

Immediately I was struck by just how friendly this cereal is to a variety of diets. It's vegan, gluten-free and nut-free. How cool! Plus, the package says it's "the world's most amazing breakfast cereal". If the packaging says so, it must be true.

So what you do is add 2 tablespoons of cereal to 4 tablespoons of liquid. I've been using almond milk, but it even says you can use yogurt or something if you want. After you mix it, you let it sit for about 5 minutes. There are tons of chia seeds in this so they absorb a ton of liquid as it sits and turns into an almost pudding-like consistency. That may seem a little odd, but I actually kind of like it. It's different than normal cereal, that's for sure.

Now you're probably looking at these pictures and thinking it looks kind of grey and bland. But no! It's actually really tasty. There's some dried fruit in it which adds a bunch of flavor. This is my first time eating hemp hearts and I think I like them. They have a nice nutty flavor with just a tiny hint of chocolate to them. Oh, and speaking of pictures, I'm sorry that these are so blurry. It was really early in the morning before work when I took these and I clearly don't know how to focus before I've eaten my breakfast.

I kind of love that it's called Holy Crap. Just the name makes me giggle. I like to say it like an exclamation even if it's in the middle of a sentence. To me there's always an exclamation point on the end. I usually like to add some fruit to my bowl of Holy Crap! as well. We've been putting blueberries and strawberries in with it this week.

Vancouver Food Trucks: Mom's Grilled Cheese, the Sequel

2011-10-21T10:00:00.000-07:00

I went back to Mom's Grilled Cheese on yet another gorgeous fall day to enjoy a sandwich and the nice weather. The truck was still mobbed, but not quite as much as the last time I was there. Good for them that they're doing so well! The food is really delicious.

I got my sandwich in a cute little cone this time. There are some potato chips at the bottom under the sandwich. So cute!

I had the same thing as last time: marble rye with Daiya cheese, pickles, onions and tomatoes. I got mozzarella Daiya this time, though. That's my favorite. They had all three flavors this time, which is pretty rad. My sandwich had a little bit of olive oil brushed on it before grilling this time. That definitely gave it a bit more of that grilled cheese texture and flavor. So good!

Cindy was nice enough to give me a sample of the tomato soup. It's made vegan, but it comes with cheese on it, so just ask for no cheese if you order it. The soup was really tasty! It had such a nice flavor with some definite Italian herbs in there. I really liked it. I can see myself going back for a big cup of soup on a particularly blustery day or a day when I'm not feeling quite so great. This is not some crappy, boring tomato soup.

My sample cup of soup is balancing on top of my ginger tea.

I also ordered a ginger tea this time. It's pretty much just ginger and a bit of demerra sugar. Absolutely wonderful. I will probably stop by just for some of this tea sometimes. It's gingery without being too spicy and just a touch sweet, not too much sugar. It was a wonderful thing to have on a day with a crisp wind blowing.

Weekend Brunch

2011-10-20T12:49:00.000-07:00

I've been looking through some of my older photos on Flickr and I came across this triad of brunch photos. This might be my absolute favorite thing to eat for brunch. I know I've said this before, but just looking at these pictures is making me hungry. Good thing it's almost lunchtime.

The Tofu Bennies, Temphe Bacon and Diner Home Fries are from Vegan Brunch and the chard is from the ground. I know, I'm hilarious. I'll be here all week, folks. Oh, and did you notice that huge slice of heirloom tomato? That's right, there's no playing around when it comes to tomato slices at my house. I've been making the Tempeh Bacon recipe from Vegan with a Vengeance for years now and love it. The one in Vegan Brunch is pretty similar, but has some different stuff in it. I'm not sure which one I like better, I've never done a side by side taste comparison. But there's a fun idea for breakfast! If I know I'm going to make this in the morning, I try and marinate my tempeh slices overnight just to give it a little more flavor.

Okay, so I didn't cut the bennies into cute little circles. It looks super cute, but then I have all this leftover tofu and really squares and circles taste pretty much the same. I usually wait for company to get fancy with my tofu cutting skills. This was just a weekend at home. I've made a bunch of things from Vegan Brunch, but the bennies are one recipe that I keep going back to over and over again. I make them on english muffins sometimes, but I actually prefer them just like this - on a bed of potatoes.

And speaking of potatoes, these Diner Home Fries are delish! Back in the day, I used to buy hash browns from the freezer section of the grocery store. I would always get the one with the onions and green peppers in it because that was my favorite. I never really tried to add those things to my potatoes at home until a big "duh" went through my head when I was reading the recipe for these. So good. If I'm not feeling so hands off that I just want to roast my potatoes in the oven and forget about them until the timer goes off, I make them this way. The hollandaise sauce from the bennies goes great on them, too. So good!

Vancouver Food Trucks - Off the Wagon

2011-10-19T14:50:00.000-07:00

The food truck journey continues today with Off the Wagon. This place was actually recommended to me by Cindy from Mom's Grilled Cheese. All I had to hear was vegan tacos and I was sold.

Yes, I loaded up on the habanero sauce. I love that it's yellow!

Off the Wagon is in a cute little school bus painted red right at the corner of Burrard and Dunsmuir. It's right by the Burrard Skytrain entrance, which is handy if you're coming from across town. And who wouldn't cross town for a yummy taco?! If you're at the winter farmers market at Nat Bailey Stadium, you can also find this food truck there with even more veggie options I'm told. The tacos are all $3. The special today was 3 tacos and a drink for $10. I think that saves you $.50 or something like that. The truck downtown only has 3 tacos every day, one of which is a yam and black bean taco. The third taco changes and is sometimes also a veggie taco. I was told that sometimes they'll use pumpkin! I would love to try a pumpkin taco. Yum!

I ordered 3 of the yam and black bean tacos for lunch today. These babies have yam, black beans, onions, guacamole, salsa and cilantro. If you're a cilantro hater, I'm sure you can ask for it without, they make them fresh as you order. There's a bottle of habanero hot sauce to add some heat if you want it, which I surely did. The tortillas were soft and didn't fall apart. The ingredients all seemed really fresh and quite flavorful.

These little tacos were quite good. I would definitely go back here again. The person that took my order was very friendly and immediately told me that the tacos were vegan when I asked about dairy. That make me happy and I'm much more comfortable about my food. I do typically go to the farmers market quite often and I'm excited to try some of the other tacos they'll have this winter.

Cheap and Easy Noodle Soup

2011-10-18T19:48:00.000-07:00

There are some nights when you just don't feel like cooking. We typically have a stash of things to reheat in the freezer for nights like this, but right now it's pretty much all chili and tomato rice soup. I love both of those things, but sometimes I'm just not in the mood for something thick and tomatoey.

These are the days that we have ramen for dinner. I'm lucky that I live in such an international city. The market that I go to has a plethora of different types of food, including tons of different flavors of ramen. The sesame oil flavored one is the only one I've found that's vegan. That's totally cool with me because this one is actually super tasty. Even just on its own, this is pretty good. There's a spice package inside and also a little pouch of sesame oil to add in to your soup. Neat!

See, it even says on the package that it's yummy!

Another great thing about these noodles is how cheap they are. You are definitely not going to break the bank by buying something like this for dinner. Plus, these noodles are a great vehicle for those leftover veggies that you don't know what to do with. I'll typically just add some of whatever we happen to have in the fridge. This time we had a bunch of spinach, shitake mushrooms and green onions so that's what went in. On other occasions I've added ginger, carrots, celery, or James's favorite, broccoli. Pretty much anything goes. Do you like it spicy? Just add a spoonful of some chili paste or a dash of hot sauce and you're good to go.

Quick, cheap, easy and delicious. If you have any kind of Asian market near you, check it out, you might luck out and find something like this. It's also awesome because on the nights we're short for time or don't have much of anything else to eat in the house, we can always make ramen and it doesn't feel like we're settling for something not as good.

Vancouver Food Trucks: Loving Hut the Sequel

2011-10-17T15:33:00.000-07:00

I spent a beautiful fall day last week surrounded by gorgeous leaves and eating yummy junk food. Most of the leaves still haven't gotten around to changing here. It seems like it always happens all at once. Green leaves, then brilliant colors then a few days later, the streets are full of piles and piles of brown leaves. The fall colors are something to enjoy while they last, that's for sure.

Speaking of enjoying things while they last, that's exactly what I did with my lunch at the Loving Hut food truck! The sun was really bright and I wasn't sitting on the best bench for photos. I couldn't get any decent pictures of my sandwich and I took tons from all different angles. Oh, well. Just imagine some extra yumminess in there if you can.

I'm kind of cheating by visiting Loving Hut's food truck again. It's just around the corner from my office, which is pretty rad. There are more to discover, but some days I just don't feel like traipsing around the city at lunch, you know. That sometimes depends more on what kind of shoes I'm wearing than anything else, I'm afraid to say.

I'd been really looking forward to trying the crispy chik'n sandwich so that's exactly what I ordered. There are sides now, too, which is great. You can choose between zucchini sticks or yam fries. Zucchini sticks sounded quite a bit different than what you can normally get with your lunch, so I got some of those, too. This stuff may be vegan, but it's definitely junk food.

There were so many zucchini sticks, they were definitely not being chintzy on that. Thick, fried pieces of zucchini. I don't eat fried stuff all that often so it was a bit much for me. I don't really care for mayonnaise based sauces (or mayonnaise at all for that matter, usually) so I tried the dipping sauce but didn't really eat it much after trying it. I think most people would like it, it's just not my thing. It's also a bit sweet which I also don't tend to care for. Keep in mind that I think things are sweet that most people think are not sweet at all, so you can't judge too much by that. I think there are some red peppers or ketchup or something mixed in there that gives it that sweetness.

The crispy chik'n burger was doused in that same sweet mayo sauce. I bet most people would like that stuff, it looks to be the same color as the "secret sauce" that you see on things all the time. Though, how secret can it be if everyone knows about it? There was also some guacamole, lettuce, tomato and this yellow apricot/jalapeno relish along with the sauce and the chik'n burger. I ended up getting quite messy. I saw another guy eating his with it still partially wrapped up in the paper. I should have done that instead of taking it out like I did. I really liked this, but I think that next time I'd get it without the sauce for sure. It was delicious and I think it would be even more delicious without that. But, again, it's just not my thing, you might like it with the sauce.

I noticed they're still selling those cookies, but now instead of $2, they're $2.50. Each! Yowza. Guess what I'm never buying with my lunch?

Hot Cereal with Raspberries

2011-10-16T16:51:00.000-07:00

This is Bob's Red Mill 8-Grain Wheat Free Hot Cereal with raspberries and agave nectar. A delicious way to start the day.

It's always nice to start the day with something hot and hearty, especially as the weather starts to turn colder. We had a huge amount of frost on the roof yesterday morning and this morning. Looks like fall is finally starting to come out full force. I'm loving the gorgeous, crisp, sunny days we've been having lately.

More Flour Than You Can Shake a Stick At

2011-10-15T16:17:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I wonder who coined a certain phrase. Who was the first one to say that something was more *insert word here* than you can shake a stick at? Because what does shaking a stick at something have anything to do with it? Upon googling this, the internets seem to be unsure where exactly this came from, but apparently it has something to do with shaking sticks at people meaning they're worthy opponents. Ummm... okay. So how did turn into meaning there's an abundance of something? These are the things I think about.

I wish I had a stick so I could shake it at all of this awesome flour that we just picked up! Earlier in the summer I signed up for a local wheat CSA from Urban Grains and everything was harvested and packaged and ready for pickup this weekend. I found out about a potato CSA a little too late, but I'm definitely going to do that one next year, too.

Paige is inspecting the flour

Yes, apparently it meets her standards. She seems pleased with the 20kg of flour on the table.

Here's what's awesome: this flour is local, organic and ends up being cheaper than buying this same amount at the market. I like supporting local farmers and have been trying to eat as local as possible for the past few years. I'm lucky to be living in British Columbia for that. There are so many wonderful small farms in this province. The farmers markets here are pretty great and there's even a winter market so you can get local stuff year-round.

I go through quite a bit of flour so I'll have absolutely no problem using it up. I wonder if I'll even make it to the new year? There are two kinds of flour: soft white and hard red wheat. The soft white is supposed to be especially good for pastries and cookies and that sort of thing. The hard red I'll probably use as my main bread flour.

While I was taking pictures of the flour, this is the kind of tomfoolery that was going on behind me. Now I wonder where tomfoolery came from...

My girls are always hanging out on top of the refrigerator. Phoebe especially likes to sleep next to potted plants for some reason. She really likes this one and a little pine tree we have in the bedroom. Sometimes we call her Jungle Cat because of it.

Looks like Paige is about to head up there to join the fun. More like she'll make one of them move so she can sit up there. That's my little crotchety old lady for you.

Lunch Salad in the Park

2011-10-14T20:43:00.000-07:00

When the weather is nice, I really enjoy eating my lunch in the park. I like to read at lunch and it's quite nice to sit in the fresh air and relax for a bit in the middle of a hectic work day. I wish I remembered to bring my lunch more than I do.

We don't have anywhere to eat lunch in the building where I'm currently working so it's either bring something cold to eat in the park if it's nice weather or go out to eat somewhere. That pretty much negates bringing leftovers for lunch like I used to do. Sometimes I cheat and go to a coffee shop and order a cheap tea and eat a sandwich or something in there if it's raining. Luckily, we've had some amazing weather out here in Vancouver lately so it hasn't really been an issue.

I get tired of sandwiches after a while and I've never been a huge salad person. I like my salads full of stuff with just a bit of lettuce as an accent, not as the main ingredient. One thing that really makes salads awesome for me are those Gardein Crispy Tenders. The plain ones or the newer chipotle lime flavor are both great. I'll cook them in the morning while I'm getting ready for work or even sometimes the night before and then chop them up and put them on a salad. That really adds a bit of jazz to the salad!

These things are really great at room temperature and add some extra goodness to wraps, too. Oh yeah, that's another favorite thing to do with those, but I never remember to take a photo when I do it. I eat them too fast. These Crispy Tenders are also really great on a caesar salad if you want a little something extra.

Disclaimer: I totally took this photo over the summer and forgot about it. Vegan MoFo is great for getting me to blog about photos I keep shuffling around on Flickr.

Vancouver Food Trucks: Mom's Grilled Cheese

2011-10-13T15:30:00.000-07:00

Thanks to Twitter, I found about this really cool food truck that just opened this week in Vancouver. This discovery has actually inspired me to try and take the next two weeks of the MoFo and discover more vegan yummies at food trucks around town. Stay tuned for more of that! It's going to be like a delicious scavenger hunt.

Anywho, I wandered on over to the Vancouver Art Gallery and found Mom's Grilled Cheese right there on Howe at Georgia. That's a really great location for them. It's quite pleasant to sit on the VAG steps and eat lunch. I see tons of people hanging out over there all day long. It's great to have a place to sit (or stand if you want) and eat from a food truck without feeling like you have to eat while walking or you don't really have anywhere to chill out for a minute with your food. So A+ for location, for sure.

Even better, though, Mom's Grilled Cheese has vegan stuff! Well, obviously they do or I wouldn't be talking about it, right? I guess that was a bit of a given. For vegans, you have two options. You can order the tomato soup, hold the marscapone or you can order a grilled cheese sandwich with Daiya. I haven't tried the soup, yet, but I was told it's made vegan, so just ask for no cheese on it. I'm going to go back and try it one day next week, I think.

As for the sandwiches, you can choose from a bunch of different types of bread, even a gluten-free one! I love that they're offering that. I know so many people with gluten intolerances, it's nice to see more places offering options like that. When I went yesterday they had pepper jack and cheddar Daiya, so you can have either one you want. I got a mix of both on my sandwich. For an extra 50 cents per extra, you can add onions, pickles or tomatoes to your sandwich as well. I added all 3 because I'm crazy like that. You'll get some chips and a pickle spear with your sandwich. They're usually served in this really cute cone of paper, but since the Daiya doesn't really stick together, they put mine in a clamshell so it didn't get too messy.

Extreme closeup of my delicious sandwich with Daiya, tomatoes, pickles and onions on marbled rye.

I had never had these before, but I've heard tales of Pop Shoppe sodas from lots of Canadians. Apparently it's something they used to have back in the day that had all but disappeared. Recently they've started resurfacing in a few places. Mom's Grilled Cheese has a ton of different Pop Shoppe flavors and even though I almost never drink sodas, I decided to try a root beer just because.

Served with chips and a pickle spear, though my pickles are hiding behind the sandwich

One note - make sure you specify that your sandwich is vegan when you order. They usually brush butter on the bread, but they won't do that if you ask them not to. Pretty awesome. They were all working so fast and were quite friendly and very nice. I pretty much liked everything about Moms Grilled Cheese and will definitely go back there again.

They were jammed when I was there yesterday so I had to wait a few minutes for my sandwich, but that's really not that big of a deal. Cindy, (the Mom of Mom's Grilled Cheese) was offering so many of us a complementary soda or ginger tea or soup as a thank you for waiting for our sandwiches. She even offered for a few of us to come back another time for a free sandwich. I'm looking forward to collecting on that in the next few days. If you're in Vancouver, check them out if you're downtown and feeling hungry, even if you just need a homemade ginger tea (I can't wait to try that, actually).

You can check out their menu here if you're curious.

Green Bean Casserole and the Rest of Thanksgiving 2011

2011-10-12T17:38:00.000-07:00

Mostly I want to post the recipe for my green bean casserole, but I thought I'd also give the rest of Thanksgiving dinner a bit of time in the spotlight.

I make this homemade vegan roast every year at Thanksgiving. Even the omnivores get seconds, sometimes even thirds. It's quite good. I found the recipe online. ~~(Edit: The recipe page isn't online anymore, but I have it written down. If anyone wants it, let me know and I'll do another post with the recipe.)~~ (Edit: You can get the Vegan Holiday Roast recipe here.) I found that it needs about an hour longer of cooking time than it says to soak up all of the broth. Keep that in mind if you make it. It's so good and everyone will think you're a genius for making it.

I found the recipe for these Harvest Pies over at Vegan Dad's blog. I wish I had taken some photos of them without the tops on. They're full of butternut squash and potatoes and carrots and stuff. I think tempeh would be a great addition to theses as well. I'm going to try that the next time I make them. These are especially good with a bit of gravy.

Speaking of gravy... what Thanksgiving would be complete without it?! Stuffing and gravy are two of my favorite parts of the Thanksgiving meal. I've started making the Punk Rock Chickpea Gravy from Vegan with a Vengeance every year. The first time I made it, I was in heaven. I could probably eat this gravy with a spoon by itself and be happy. Quite a few people commented on the tastiness of the gravy this year, too. The only thing I do differently from the recipe is puree it. I like my gravy smooth so I stick my immersion blender in at the end and puree the heck out of it.

The mashed potatoes are almost gone! You know how to make mashed potatoes, I don't need to tell you. My secret ingredients are Earth Balance and vegetable broth. Yum!

And now for the green bean casserole! James was nice enough to top and tail them for me while I was doing other things... like finishing up that Sm'love Pie you see in the background there. The thing that makes my casserole special is the homemade mushroom soup. It's not hard to make and it freezes well so you can always make it in advance or make a double batch and stash some in the freezer for a rainy day. I also find it quite delicious on its own. You can make cream of pretty much anything using this recipe. Just substitute the mushrooms for whatever you like. Cream of asparagus, anyone?

Green Bean Casserole

Note: If you're making this for a crowd, double the recipe to fill a large rectangular baking dish. That's what I did for Thanksgiving. You might end up with some leftover soup, especially if you double it. I usually just freeze it and eat it later as a soup with some asparagus or something added to it.

3 cups of green beans, topped and tailed and cut in half (I'm guessing here. Use however many fill a small 8" square baking dish. When I buy them from the market they come in bags, so I usually just buy one bag for a little bit and 2 bags for double this.)
Cream of Mushroom Soup (recipe below)
1 can of fried onions

Preheat your oven to 350 F.

Mix the green beans, the soup and 3/4 of the can of friend onions and pour it all into an 8" square baking dish. Top with the remaining fried onions. Cover with foil and bake for 45 minutes. Remove the foil and bake for another 10 minutes. Remove from the oven and let cool for at least 5 minutes before eating.

Cream of Mushroom Soup

1/2 cup raw cashews, soaked for at least an hour, up to overnight
2 cups vegetable broth
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 small onion, diced
half a head of cauliflower, chopped
1 clove of garlic, chopped
1 generous handful of oyster mushrooms, chopped
1 generous handful of another kind of mushroom, your choice, chopped
2 cups water
2 bay leaves
1 teaspoon dried thyme
1/4 teaspoon white pepper, optional
1/2 teaspoon salt (you might want to leave this out if your broth is salted)

Add the broth and cashews to a food processor or blender and blend until smooth. This will probably take from 2-5 minutes. Set aside.

Saute the mushrooms over medium heat in their own pan for about 5 minutes then turn off the heat and set them aside. You'll use them in a minute.

Add the olive oil to a large pot over medium heat. Once the oil is warm, add the onion and cauliflower. Saute for about 5 minutes. Add in the garlic and saute for another minute. Add in about 3/4 of the mushrooms, the cashew mixture, water, bay leaves, thyme, pepper and salt. Stir everything up and cover your pot. Bring to a boil, then reduce the heat and simmer for 15 minutes.

Remove the bay leaves. If you have an immersion blender, stick it in the pot and blend until everything is pretty smooth. If you're using a food processor or blender, puree the soup in batches, being careful not to burn yourself and also being careful to let the steam escape as you're doing it or you'll have a big mess on your hands. Now add in the remaining 1/4 of your mushrooms. Taste for salt and add more if you think you need it.

Lemon Cream Pie and Other Stories

2011-10-11T19:01:00.000-07:00

I can't quite remember which year I started this, but it's a tradition for Thanksgiving to have 3 pies, now. I always make the Sm'love pie every year because everyone always asks about it and then proceeds to get this blissed look on their faces while eating it. Who am I to deprive people of their chocolatey Thanksgiving goodness? I try and shake it up a bit with the other two, though. I like to do one fruit pie of some type and the other can be whatever I feel like making at the time.

All that was left of the Lemon Cream Pie at the end of the night

How can you not love the Sm'love Pie?

I've made my award-winning Hazelnut Apple Cider Pie two years in a row because it was requested this year. That's kind of awesome, actually. I couldn't find any pink lady apples so I had to make do with Granny Smith apples instead. It was still great, I just prefer the pink ladies for my pies. They have such a great combination of sweet and tart and crisp.

I actually ended up having to send James to the store at the last minute to get more apples for me. I wasn't paying attention when I was simmering the apples in the cider and all of a sudden I had applesauce. Well, not all of a sudden, more like 20 minutes too long while I sat on the couch checking my email with one of the cats in my lap. What a bummer. Now I have to find things to eat applesauce with for the next few weeks to use it up. I put it all in jars and then realized that I didn't add any lemon juice so it won't be shelf-stable. Dang it.

The remnants of the Hazelnut Apple Cider Pie

For the third pie, I wanted to do a lemon cream pie. I got inspired by the Coconut Cream Topping that Vegan Dad made. For some reason I was thinking the coconut cream would get super fluffy and it didn't really. It wasn't runny or anything, though. I think next time I might try adding a bit of arrowroot or cornstarch or something and beating it for a long time to see if I can get it any stiffer. Experimenting can be delicious! Also, I know that sometimes when you buy cans of coconut milk it's separated into milk and cream in the can, but mine wasn't like that this time so I just chucked it all at the beginning of the recipe and it seemed to turn out fine. So if you make this and have that same thing happen, don't worry, it's all good.

I used to love my Grandma's lemon meringue pie when I was a kid; though I remember loving the lemon part way more than the meringue. I'm going to have to do a bit more experimenting to get the lemon part of the pie a bit more like Grandma's was but this was still quite good. I got the recipe from the Fat Free Vegan Blog. I noticed that a few people commented that the recipe was too sweet as is and I generally like things less sweet than most people so I heeded their warning and reduced the sugar a bit. I ran some lemons through the juicer for fresh juice and I think that really made quite the difference, too. Oh, did I mention that there's no baking at all involved in making this pie? Just heating up some stuff on the stove and then refrigerating!

I only have two large pie dishes so I ended up using a springform pan for my lemon cream pie. You can use whichever you like, but the pie dish is probably best if you expect to have leftovers.

It looks so cute just out of the springform pan, but I still think a pie plate would be best.

Copied and Pasted, here is the recipe for the lemon cream pie:

Make whatever kind of pie crust you like. I just used a graham cracker crust. Just get some graham cracker crumbs (about 1 3/4 cup) and add a few tablespoons of canola or coconut oil. Mix with a fork until the graham cracker crumbs are all moist and hold together. Add more oil one tablespoon at a time, mixing after each addition if you find your crumbs are still too dry.

Lemon Pie Filling (reposted from the Fat Free Vegan Blog)

1 1/2 cups sugar (I only used 1 cup)
1/2 cup + 1 Tbsp. cornstarch
1/4 tsp salt
1 1/4 cup water
1 cup non-dairy milk
3/4 cup lemon juice
grated rind of 2 lemons (about 2 Tbsp.)

Combine sugar, cornstarch, and salt in saucepan. Stir in water and soymilk and bring to a boil over medium heat. Cook 3-4 minutes, stirring constantly. Remove from heat and slowly add the lemon juice and grated rind.

Pour into a pie crust and chill for a couple of hours until set.

Coconut Cream Topping (reposted from the Vegan Dad blog)

1 can coconut milk
1 tablespoon agar flakes or 1 teaspoon agar powder
3 tablespoons sugar (I ended up using 6 tablespoons of sugar total to get it sweet enough)
1 teaspoon vanilla

Separate coconut cream from coconut milk and add the milk (i.e. the watery stuff) to a small saucepan. Sprinkle afar flakes over and let sit for 5 mins. Add sugar and bring to bubbling over med hi heat, whisking constantly. Cook for 3-5 mins, or until all the agar has dissolved.

Remove from heat and whisk in cream and vanilla. Adjust sugar to taste then pour into a bowl, cover, and place into the fridge. Allow to fully cool.

When ready to use, whisk the cooled mixture and spread over your pie. Place pie back into the fridge until ready to serve.

Thanksgiving Bounty

2011-10-10T16:06:00.000-07:00

I have another Thanksgiving dinner to go to this evening and I've pretty much spent most of the day chilling out after cooking for 2 and a half days. More recipes later in the week. For now, check out what we had for Thanksgiving dinner yesterday.

Green Bean Casserole and Homemade Tofurkey

Harvest Pies, Cranberry Sauce and Stuffing

Kale, Mashed Potatoes and Chickpea Gravy

Lemon Cream Pie, Hazelnut Apple Cider Pie and Sm'love Pie

Thanksgiving Cranberry Sauce

2011-10-09T16:09:00.000-07:00

I found local cranberries at the farmers market this year! So cool. I don't think I've ever had cranberries that didn't come in a little bag. Apparently BC is one of the largest producers of cranberries. The things you learn when buying produce.

If you don't know how to make cranberry sauce, it's simple. 1 cup of water, 1 cup of sugar and a bag of cranberries. Mix it all together in a big pot over medium high heat and cover it, stirring occasionally. As soon as it starts to boil, turn the heat down to a simmer. Simmer for about 45 minutes, stirring every now and then. Remove from heat and chill.

You can add all kinds of different things to change the flavor if you want. I like to add orange juice instead of some of the water and some orange segments. Though that part's a pain in the butt because you have to open up each little segment of orange and get rid of the white stuff that holds it together. It tastes good, though! Some people add maple syrup or cinnamon sticks to theirs. Try it and see what you like. Once you try homemade cranberry sauce you won't want to buy that canned stuff again.

Super Fast and Easy Anything Goes Stuffing

2011-10-08T18:33:00.000-07:00

Thanksgiving rocks. I think it might be my favorite holiday. That probably has nothing to do with how much I love cooking and having people over. When I moved to Canada from the US, it took some adjustment to get used to Thanksgiving being in October with only a 3-day weekend! I still pine for a crisp Thursday in November being the holiday.

I would always take Wednesday off as well so I could start cooking the day before. Hello, 5-day weekend. Or is that even a weekend anymore at that point? No matter, it was awesome. I always made a point to stay in on Black Friday but that is usually the day I'd start decorating for the winter holidays. Actually, sometimes I'd even start putting up my tree and decorating it after Thanksgiving dessert. I'm sure my guests were quite amused that I'd get so excited to do that, but hey - it's the little things sometimes, right?

Chestnuts ready to go into the oven

So Canadian Thanksgiving is this weekend. People up here don't tend to stick to actual day to celebrate like we did in the US. That actually makes it easier, anyway. I have my dinners on Sundays so I can spend Monday eating leftovers and doing nothing that requires me to be on my feet like I am for the two days previous. I'm taking a break with a glass of wine to write this right now. I have a more things to make tonight so tomorrow's not too slammed. Vegan MoFo has given me a great excuse to come sit down for a bit. I don't typically stop moving until the very end of the evening when I'm about to fall into bed. So yay, MoFo for that!

I'm usually so bad about remembering to take photos of things for Thanksgiving, but I've been doing alright with it this year. I want to make a separate post about everything I'm making. Tonight, let's talk stuffing!

I make a homemade vegan roast and I actually do use this to stuff it, but I'll also serve some of it just in a dish on the side. I used to always buy those bags of super dry bread cubes and then try to make something wonderful out of it. I've actually discovered that I like stuffing better made from fresh bread. It's quite easy and takes almost no time. If you've never done it, try it sometime. The texture is a bit different, but that's because your stuffing is already moist and you're not trying to soak up everything with it.

No more hard stuffing! Sprouted grain bread is especially great for this.

Another great thing about my stuffing recipe is that you can pretty much add whatever you want to it and it tastes good. Though I don't know if you want to take me too literally and start adding weird things like peaches or something. That might not be the best. I typically always use onions or shallots, carrots, celery, chestnuts and shitake mushrooms in mine. For the herbs, I'll just grab whatever looks freshest. I went to the farmers market this morning and bought savory, thyme, sage and rosemary so that's what I'm using for this particular batch.

Roasted and peeled chestntus

I'm a huge fan of chestnuts in stuffing. They really add a bit of an extra punch of deliciousness. They're just slightly sweet while still being savory enough to blend in well with everything else. The texture is a bit softer than the carrots and celery while not being as soft as the bread. If you can't get fresh chestnuts, you can use canned ones, it's totally fine. Sometimes it can be hard to find fresh ones and when you do, sometimes they're old and yucky. I usually eyeball how many chestnuts I add to the stuffing so I'm just guessing at how much are in there. If you're using canned ones, just use a whole can. If you're buying fresh ones, just use whatever looks like enough. I always roast them all and then freeze whatever I don't put in the stuffing to use later. There are a couple of really great recipes in Veganomicon using chestnuts that you could make with the leftovers.

Roast Chestnuts

Preheat your oven to 425 F.

Cut a little slit in each of your chestnuts so the steam can escape when you're baking them. Arrange them on a shallow baking sheet and cook for 25 minutes.

Let the chestnuts cool on the pan for about 5 minutes and then pour them onto a kitchen towel. Gather the towel up at the sides so that no chestnuts can escape and mash them around a bit to loosen the shells. Peel them as soon as they're cool enough to handle without burning you. If you wait until they're too cold, they'll be really hard to peel so try and do it while they're still warm.

Stuffing

1 loaf of bread (I use sprouted grain bread)
4 tablespoons olive oil
1 large onion or a handful of shallots, diced
3 cloves of garlic, minced
2 large carrots, diced
3-4 ribs celery, diced
3/4 cup mushrooms, chopped (I usually use shitake, but use whatever kind you like)
2 tablespoons each fresh herbs (I usually use rosemary, sage, savory and thyme or you can buy one of those "poultry blends" That works well for this.
1 1/2 cups roasted chestnuts, chopped
2 cups warm vegetable broth

In a pan over medium heat (I use my cast iron skillet for this) heat the olive oil. Add the onions or shallots and cook for about 3 minutes. Stir in the garlic and cook for another minute or so. Add the celery, carrots and mushrooms and cook for about 10 minutes or until the carrots just start to get soft. Add in the fresh herbs and cook for another 2 minutes.

While you're cooking the veggies, cut the bread into cubes and toss them into a large bowl. You'll probably have to do this just a few slices at a time.

Once the veggies are done, add them to the bread cubes along with the chestnuts. Stir gently to evenly distribute the veggies and chestnuts. Pour the warm broth over the mixture and stir.

If you're using this to stuff something you can stop here. It'll cook more when it's in the oven. If not, you'll want to transfer your stuffing to a baking dish and cook for about 20 minutes in a 350 F oven.

Pizza Pie

2011-10-07T21:00:00.000-07:00

Canadian Thanksgiving is this weekend. We always have a bunch of people over for dinner so I get to cook for 2 days to prepare for it. I love it. Everyone's favorite pie is the Sm'love pie from Veganomicon. The first time I made it James made fun of me for wanting to make a chocolate pie instead pumpkin at Thanksgiving. And then he tasted it. Now that pie is explicitly requested for both Thanksgiving and Christmas. We have to have it when there are other people to help eat it because it's way too rich for just the two of us to finish.

Please ignore my dirty oven. A clove of garlic exploded in it when I was roasting garlic last weekend.

While the pie is baking, I'm eating leftover pizza from Vegan Pizza House. Thank goodness for leftovers! It's been a busy day of working and planning and grocery shopping. I definitely didn't want to have to add making dinner on to that . Tonight's goal was to get the base of the pie done and then I can sit back with glass of wine and watch Fringe. I'm going to be on my feet in the hot kitchen for the next 2 days straight so I need to get my relaxing in tonight while I still can!

The browned bits are all me. I reheated this in the oven to make it crispy and gooey again.

Tomorrow morning I'm going to get up and be at the farmers market by 9am to get the rest of the stuff for the feast. The market is just about a block from my apartment so I can sort of just roll out of bed and walk over there at least. I can't wait to see kinds of goodies they have. I got some local cranberries last week!

Tuno Sandwiches

2011-10-06T21:23:00.000-07:00

I've been having some great lunches lately so there will probably be quite a few posts about what I had for lunch this month. I'm going to make a point of wandering around and finding vegan options at the food trucks around town, too. That sounds like a fun little scavenger hunt, actually.

This lunch I actually ate at home last weekend, but it was still awesome. We had just been to the farmers market the day before so we had so much wonderful produce in the fridge to use. We had some chickpeas in the cabinet so I thought a tuno sandwich was in order. We usually end up scooping up the tuno with crackers or tortilla chips, but whenever we can manage to make it last past the first 30 seconds, we'll make sandwiches out of it.

The great thing about the tuno sandwich is its versatility. You can have a cold sandwich and it tastes great or you can grill it or toast it and it also tastes great. Sometimes I'll put some vegan cheese on bread and make a sort of grilled cheese with tuno on it. Sort of like a tuno melt. haha. Yummy!

This particular sandwich has lettuce, heirloom tomatoes and rainbow radishes. The recipe for the tuno itself is super easy. I've posted about it before, actually. You can go by the recipe or you can just wing it. I make it so much that I tend to just throw random things together. You always want the base to be mashed chickpeas and vegan mayo with a tablespoon of soy sauce and a tablespoon or two of nutritional yeast. I also always add a bit of dulse flakes, but if you don't have that, it's not the end of the world. Beyond that you can add whatever you want that's sort of crunchy and chopped up. Some things I've put in are: pickles, celery, cucumbers, radishes and carrots. I think there have been a few other things here and there, but I'm at a loss at the moment. You can also add in some fresh herbs if you want. I added in some lemon thyme since we'd just bought a bunch of it at the market and I was throwing it in everything.

Tuno

1can chick-peas, drained
1/8 - 1/4 cup vegan mayonnaise
1/3 cup minced celery or any other crunchy veggies you want to add
2 1/2 Tablespoons minced dill pickle or kosher dill relish (about 1 pickle-slice, give or take)
1 Tablespoon nutritional yeast
1 green onion, chopped
1 teaspoon soy sauce
1/2 teaspoon kelp powder or dulse flakes
fresh ground pepper, to taste

In a medium bowl, mash the chick-peas coarsely with a fork or a potato masher. Mix in the remaining ingredients. Eat on crackers or on a sandwich.

Vancouver Food Trucks, Part 1

2011-10-05T19:23:00.000-07:00

Earlier this year (or maybe late last year, I forget), Vancouver passed a city ordinance allowing food trucks. We already had hot dog stands but that was it. I think it's taking the city a little bit to get used to the food trucks for some reason. I don't really know why, I think they're pretty awesome, personally. There are a few that have vegan things, but not very many. The ones that do pretty much just have veggie burgers, but that's okay. Those particular ones also set aside a spot on the grill just for veggie burgers so they never come into contact with the meat. Pretty awesome. I'm going to try and visit some of those for lunch this month, too, so more on that later.

While this is awesome, what everyone has been waiting for (at least I have been) is the Loving Hut food truck. I guess they had some trouble getting the truck built so they missed out on all of the awesome summer weather when people are most likely to be walking around and buying street food. Bummer. No more waiting! The Loving Hut food truck is open as of today! I'm super stoked because I work right around the corner. I'm only there for another few weeks, though so I'm going to have to hit up the street food while I can.

They're starting out with just a limited menu, but it all looks excellent to me. When you include tax in the prices, they round up to the next dollar so you don't have to worry about having a bunch of random change, either.

I tried the Ruben Sandwich today. It was pretty good. I was starving so I think I might have eaten it in record time. I kind of wish I had gotten two of them, actually. The only bummer about the sandwiches is that they're kind of small. They're delicious and not tiny, don't get me wrong, but not huge either. I wish there was some kind of side to order with the sandwiches even if it was just a bag of chips or a small prepared salad or something. Hopefully that's the kind of thing that's on its way as they get going a bit more. There were some gluten-free chocolate chip cookies, but they were $2 each. I wanted a cookie, but I didn't want to pay that much. $1, I would have paid, but not $2 for just one cookie.

The vegan "ham" on my sandwich was really thin and the sauce was yummy and not too messy. I was worried about that; I have the worst luck at getting sauce all over my fingers when I eat things like that. I didn't have that problem with this at all. The bread was toasted just right and the caramelized onions were a nice touch and added a nice extra flavor to the sandwich. I do wish there had been a bit more sauerkraut, though. But maybe that's just me, I like that stuff and it's part of what makes a reuben really awesome. I've only ever had vegan reubens and everywhere seems to make them differently. This is the best one I've had yet. Just a bit more sauerkraut and it's perfect.

If you're out and about in Yaletown, you can find the Loving Hut food truck in front of the Roundhouse Community Center at the corner of Pacific and Davie. They open at 11:30am, but I'm not sure what time they close.

Make Your Own Infusions

2011-10-04T19:44:00.000-07:00

Since I've been canning so much this summer I thought I might also try my hand at making some infusions. Summer canning is partially about having fun, partially about having some delicious food for the rainy, grey Vancouver fall and winter (and spring, too, who am I kidding) and partially about making holiday gifts. I'm thinking that people might be tired of me giving them jam and such (even though my apple butter is the bomb). That prompted me to try my hand at infusing. I think some homemade flavored alcohol might make a nice holiday gift. I know I'd think that's pretty rad if someone gave it to me.

This is way easier than you'll ever guess that it is. Seriously. Even your cat could do this if s/he had opposable thumbs. Though your cat would just infuse everything with catnip, so maybe we're all better off this way, anyway.

You can infuse vinegar or alcohol in pretty much exactly the same way. You can use almost any fruit to do it, too. I bet there are a few veggies that would be kind of awesome in an infusion, too. Cucumber vodka could be really refreshing and delicious, I think. Vanilla beans would also work pretty much the same way as the fruit if you want to go that route.

Step 1. - Choose your weapon. Err... I mean flavor. Try and choose the best looking produce that has the least amount of blemishes. Blemishes can bring bacteria when it comes to preserving food so that's why you want to be a bit more careful about what you're choosing.

Step 2. - Scrub a dub dub. Wash your produce really well. If it's not organic, give it a little splash of vinegar to help get the yuckies off and then give it another rinse.

Also wash the heck out of your jars! Oh yeah, you need some 1 liter mason jars or those cool glass jar things with the rubber seals. Wash these in super hot water. If you have a dishwasher, run it through there on the hottest setting to make sure you've sanitized the glass. Yes, you need to use glass for this. Metal will end up tasting like metal and could put some rust into your final product which is gross either way. Plastic is not your friend, either. Plastic can leech mojo into your final product and I feel like it absorbs flavors. Glass is best. Just trust me on this.

Step 3. - Mix everything together in your newly cleaned jars. You're going to use 2 cups of produce for 2 cups of liquid be it alcohol or vinegar. If you're doing two kinds of things at once, make sure you label things so you don't accidentally give Aunt Edna the gin when you meant to give her the vinegar.

A note about your liquid choices. If you're using vinegar, just get the plain old white vinegar, that's best for this. If you're using alcohol, you can just use the el cheapo brand since your final product will taste like the fruit anyway. That is hard for me to say. I'm a bit of an alcohol snob. I refuse to drink the cheap stuff because it tastes like crap, but this is one exception. You're making it taste better right now, anyway!

Step 4. - Mash! At this point you can either take a wooden spoon and mash the crap out of your produce or you can blend it up a bit. You'll decide this depending on what kind of thing you're using as your flavor. For example, if you're using roasted garlic or cucumbers, you'd probably just want to smush them with a wooden spoon. If you're using berries, you could blend them if you want. It doesn't actually make much difference which way you choose. I tried one batch of blended and one batch of mashed fruit and they came out pretty much the same in the end.

Step 5. - Put the lids on tightly and shake!

Step 6. - Put your jars in a dark place and take them out once or twice a day to shake them. That helps to keep the flavors blending together and makes a better infusion. Usually 1-2 weeks will do the trick.

Step 7 - Strain! I used a jelly bag, but you can use a sieve or some cheesecloth if you want. Strain your shiny new vinegar or alcohol into a super clean glass container. You can use another jar, the original bottle or get some fancy containers, however you want to do it.

The jelly bag in action

Squish the liquid out of the fruit as you're straining it. I ended up almost filling up that other half of the jar with liquid from just what was in that bag.

Step 8. - Sit back and admire your awesomeness.

Herbivore Cheese Scones

2011-10-03T19:27:00.000-07:00

Daiya is probably one of the coolest things to happen to herbivores since Field Roast. I can still remember the first time I had it. I was shocked that it really and truly did melt. Other non-dairy cheeses have claimed this before, but it was all lies. Lies, I tell you! I don't really think Daiya actually tastes much like real cheese did from what I can remember, but that's okay, it's still pretty awesome and it works just fine for me. It's pretty cool to be able to order pizza with cheese again, too. There are a couple of places in Vancouver that have it, which is pretty rad. (Rebellious Tomato and Vegan Pizza House if you're curious.)

I usually prefer to use the mozzarella style Daiya (or "the white one" as I call it) in most things. It seems to have a more neutral flavor than the yellow one. I use the pepperjack sometimes, too, but I think I like that one the most on nachos or enchiladas or anything else Mexican. That's probably pretty much the point of that flavor anyway. (Yes, thank you, Captain Obvious!)

Since Daiya works so well for so many things I decided to try it out in scones. This is probably one of my better ideas. These scones are kind of great. They're wonderful fresh from the oven, but they're actually also really good after they've cooled completely. Whenever I make them, I'll stash some in my purse for snacks. I might or might not have snuck some into the movie theatre last night when I went to see Dream House.

The scones are fluffy and moist and stay soft even the next day. You should really use the white Daiya in these, though. This is the first time I've made them with the yellow one and they aren't as good as with the white one. You'll just have to trust me on this. They're still good either way, though, so no worries. Okay, so really these are sort of a cross between a biscuit and a scone, but I like to call them scones.

These are also really versatile. I like to add some chopped chives to mine, but any fresh herb is pretty fantastic. Rosemary or thyme would be especially delicious in these.

Herbivore Cheese Scones

Makes 6 scones

1 cup flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar
1/4 teaspoon sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup non-hydrogenated margarine like Earth Balance, cut into chunks
1 cup Daiya Cheese (the white one is best for this)
2 tablespoons chopped fresh herbs (I like to use chives)
1/4 - 1/3 cup non-dairy milk

Preheat your oven to 425 F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

Sift the dry ingredients into a bowl. Cut in the margarine until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Fold in the the Daiya and herbs.

Add the non-dairy milk just until you get a cohesive dough. You don't want a dry dough for these. It's totally fine if you end up needing to add more liquid and it gets a little bit sticky. The scones will still turn out just fine. I actually like these best when the dough is just a bit sticky.

Divide the dough into 6 pieces and form them into little fat discs. It doesn't matter what shape they're in, just don't try and make them into perfect little balls or anything. You want the dough to be thick.

Bake for 12-18 minutes or until the scones are just starting to turn a bit golden in places.

I know it's hard, but let them cool for 5-10 minutes before eating.

Cowboy Cookies

2011-10-02T16:06:00.000-07:00

I'm doing it again. As I was looking through my photos to decide what to talk about today, I started getting hungry. I really want to make some cookies today after thinking about how great these tasted.

I was feeling like making some chocolate chip cookies one day but I kind of wanted something with a twist. These Cowboy Cookies were perfect. The cookie base holds together quite well and isn't too cakey or greasy. It's not overly crunchy, but has that perfect cookie bite to it. Enter in some chocolate chips, toasted pecans, oats and coconut flakes and your mouth is pretty darn happy. I was sad when we had finished the batch of cookies.

I don't make cookies all that often so sometimes I forget just how great they are. They're not too big, so it's usually okay to have 2 or 3 of them. They're portable so they're easy to grab and take to work for a snack later or for sneaking into a movie theatre.

This recipe came from Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar. I know, I know, it seems like I'm always posting about other people's recipes. It's because I usually forget to take photos when I make my own things. Typically when I cook, I just throw things together and about half the time I forget to write down what ingredients and quantities I was using.

Hopefully I have some time to make cookies before I'm out and about this afternoon. October isn't just Vegan MoFo, it's also my annual Month of Horror where I try to go see every horror movie that's in the theatres. I usually end up seeing a one or two movies a week all month. It's a lot of fun, actually. I think this year I'm going to add in some movie nights at home with friends as well.

Canadian Thanksgiving is coming up next weekend as well. I've been procrastinating making my menu plans. I really need to get on that. Only a few more days to shop for everything before the big dinner on Sunday! I definitely need some cookies to help me think.

Zucchini, Olive, Millet and Tomato Casserole

2011-10-01T18:38:00.000-07:00

It's officially Vegan MoFo! That's the Vegan Month of Food to you, bub. I'll be posting as close to every day as I can this month to celebrate. Oh yeah. It's about to get real up in here.

There are going to be lots and lots and lots of posts for Vegan MoFo and one thing I've had lots and lots and lots of lately is zucchini. We only planted one zucchini plant but it's been producing like crazy. We had so many at one point that I made pickles from 5 of them. More on those later this month. It's a good problem to have, having too much of something from your own garden. We cooked them all different ways, but one of my favorites is this Zucchini, Olive, Millet and Tomato casserole.

This is one of my favorite recipes, anyway. I tend to make it quite often. You might be wondering why this sounds vaguely familiar. Well, this pretty much the zucchini boats from Vegan with a Vengeance turned into a casserole. Don't get me wrong, I like the zucchini boats. They're so cute and look super impressive if you're having people over. Sometimes I just don't feel like going through the extra steps, though so I'll just throw it all together.

I love the tangy flavor that the kalamata olives and capers add to the tomatoes in this dish. The millet is a nice touch, and makes this a bit different. I like to try and eat a variety of grains anyway. This recipe was actually my first foray into the world of millet. It's pretty awesome and takes on the flavors of everything else while giving you bit of fiber and bulk, too. The millet ends up soaking up quite a bit of the tomato juice when it's all said and done.

My mouth is watering just thinking about this. If you haven't tried it, you definitely should. It might become one of your favorites, too.

Here's my version of the recipe. It's pretty much the same as the one in Vegan with a Vengeance, but with a few minor changes to make it a casserole.

Zucchini, Olive, Millet and Tomato Casserole (adapted from Vegan with a Vengeance)

1 medium sized onion, chopped
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 cloves of garlic, minced (or if you're like me, use 4 cloves)
1/2 cup millet, rinsed
a few dashes of black pepper
1/2 teaspoon dried rosemary
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
1/2 teaspoon dried marjoram
1/2 teaspoon dried basil
1 teaspoon Hungarian paprika
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 22 oz can of whole tomatoes (you can also use a can of diced tomatoes if you want)
2 cups vegetable broth
4 medium sized zucchini, ends trimmed
1/2 cup kalamata olives, pitted and chopped
1/4 cup capers

Preheat your oven to 350 F.

Saute the onions in the olive oil over medium heat for 5-7 minutes, until the onions are translucent. Add the garlic and saute until fragrant, about a minute.

Add the millet, herbs, spices, and salt; saute for about 3 minutes. Add the tomatoes, crushing them with your hands as you add them. Add the remaining tomato juice from the can and the vegetable broth. Cover the pot and bring to a boil, then lower the heat and simmer for 20 minutes.

Meanwhile, prepare the zucchini. Slice them in half lengthwise and then chop each half into little discs. Once the tomato mixture is done simmering, add the zucchini, olives and capers. Simmer for about 5 more minutes, until the millet is tender.

Pour the whole thing into a baking dish and bake for about 20 minutes. Let it cool for 5-10 minutes before serving.

An Ode to the Farmers Market

2011-09-27T11:58:00.000-07:00

It's been a bit quiet over here on the blog front, lately. I've been quiet here, but busy at home. I've spent most weekends canning my heart out trying to capture the freshness of summer. I'm pretty lucky that I live just a block or so from the farmers market. It's great because I can just roll out of bed and walk over there first thing as they're opening. It's not quite as busy at 9am, which is nice. There are also a few things that always sell out pretty much immediately so getting to the market early is in your best interest if you're looking for something like dill heads or green tomatoes or sometimes strawberries.

dill pickles, hot sauce, barbecue sauce, chinese plum sauce, vanilla peaches, cinnamon pears, whole canned heirloom tomatoes, tarragon mustard and bourbon brown sugar mustard

The jars in the cabinet in the background are just my rice and dried beans and grains and nuts and things. The stuff on the table (minus 3 jars that I gave to a friend the day before) was all canned in one weekend. There are actually 3 more large jars that you can't see. I have a huge stack of boxes of jars on the floor from all of the canning I've been doing this year. I've been giving stuff away and trading jars with friends, but it's still starting to take over the house. I need to get a cabinet to put all of this stuff in so it's not just stacked up on the floor.

I have plans to highlight a few individual things that I've made during October's Vegan MoFo. I'm quite looking forward to opening some of the jars and trying what's inside. A few things I've made have been things I've made before and some have been made for the first time.

This cucumber... well... I don't even really know what to say about it. I get a good giggle when vegetables and fruits have a strange shape or try to grow a second one of themselves, but this one... Hmmm. I think this cucumber was a bit too excited to become a pickle.

Garlic is one of my favorite things. I put it in everything. Usually if a recipe says to put 3 cloves of garlic in, I'm pretty sure they really mean 6-7 cloves so that's what I do. This giant garlic bulb made my day. I ended up roasting it and putting it in some roasted garlic and sage bread that I made. Delicious. I realized a couple of years ago that I'd never actually had fresh garlic before. When it's newly picked, it's so juicy and crisp, it's incredible. I think we're going to try and grow some of our own garlic for next year because I get so excited about it. I can't wait!

This huge box of strawberries was actually a spur of the moment purchase. I was thinking about making jam or something and then saw one stand that had this one huge box of strawberries left. When they told me that these berries had been picked the day before, how could I resist? I started out making jam with these, but it didn't quite set like I wanted so I decided it was strawberry sauce instead. Put a banana in a bowl with some vanilla coconut milk ice cream and then top it with that strawberry sauce and you have instant awesome. Sometimes when things don't turn out the way you expected, it's a blessing in disguise.

Okay, so the onions weren't from the farmers market, but the garlic and peppers are! (Do you see that crazy red pepper in the front middle?) I love the way sofrito flavors things so I decided to make a bunch and can it. I was clearly out of my mind. I ended up buying about twice as much of everything that I meant to. That happens when everything is so fresh and awesome, sometimes. Well, that just means I'll have sofrito for quite a while.

What is sofrito, you ask? I'll do a post on it soon. I discovered it from Terry Hope Romero's Viva Vegan!. I don't want to eat beans without it anymore.

Yes, that is two large pots full of chopped onions. 10 pounds of onions to be precise. I have no idea how I did that in one sitting. (Well, actually I was standing, but still.) It's definitely something to be proud of living through.

Eggplant Bacon

2011-09-07T07:58:00.000-07:00

Okay, so it doesn't really taste like bacon, but it's pretty good all the same. I've been intrigued with the Eggplant Bacon recipe in Appetite for Reduction for a while now. I just kept forgetting to buy eggplant or I'd have tried it a while back. You end up with this nicely flavored roasted eggplant that goes really well on salads or sandwiches. We put it on a salad this first time but then there was leftover so we just kept eating it off the plate. I think it's the liquid smoke that's the secret.

It's still gorgeous summer weather out here right now so I'm thinking there will be a few more lunches and dinners like this one. If you can stand turning your oven on for the time it takes to bake the eggplant, I think this is something that would go well with all sorts of things. You could maybe make it early in the morning when it's not so hot yet if the heat is an issue. Eggplant Bacon is super easy to make. You just slice up some eggplant, mix together the marinade, dip the eggplant in the marinade and bake it. Easy peasy. Even better - even some of our omnivore friends loved it.

Hey Ladies!

2011-08-25T15:42:00.001-07:00

Makeup
Originally uploaded by Scripter81

I usually try and keep this blog exclusively about food. I'm going to break my own rule for a minute and ask for a little assistance from the ladies.

Do you wear makeup? Even just a little bit? Would you mind filling out a short survey for me?

http://beetsandtwigs.com/makeup-survey

The details are going to be under wraps until certain things are finalized and ready to be public, but for those that don't know, I'm about to start my own line of makeup. That's right, ladies, a completely vegan makeup line that isn't some hippie dippy stuff and actually has great pigment and nice colors.

I'm still in the beginning stages of some of this so any input you could give me would be very helpful. I know what I like and what I look for, but I want to know what you think.

Coconut Glen's Coconut Milk Ice Cream

2011-08-15T13:41:00.000-07:00

I have a whole bunch of stuff saved up for talking about all of the awesome vegan stuff in Maui, but Coconut Glen's really deserves a post all its own. It's just that neat. In searching the internets before leaving Canada, I kept finding mentions of this place and was quite intrigued. If you're driving on the road to Hana, I highly recommend you stop and sample the ice cream. It's really delicious and so fresh!

Aren't these bowls just the greatest?! You can get ice cream to go in little paper cups as well, but really, why would you pass up the opportunity to eat out of a coconut bowl. That's just silly. The spoons are made from the outer husks of coconuts. You just throw the spoon into the yard when you're done with it. Sadly, you have to return the bowls to the counter when you're done. I'd have loved to have had a few of those.

You'll see this sign between mile markers 27 and 28. If you don't stop, you'll be sorry. If no one is out there, just honk and someone will come out of the house behind the stand.

We saw this sign in the grass near the parking area. It definitely made me giggle.

Such a cute little ice cream stand in the middle of nowhere.

Just to the right of the stand is this bit of coconut carnage. You can't get much fresher than that.

You can buy just a coconut if you want. Someone will grab a fresh one and chop it with a machete right then and there for you. So cool. The outer husk pieces become spoons for the ice cream. Neat!

There are so many flavors, it was hard to decide. I forgot to write them all down or take a photo of the menu board, so from memory, this is what I think you can choose from: original (plain coconut milk flavor), chocolate aloha (chocolate with coconut candy), pineapple banana, chipotle chocolate (spicy!), lilikoi (passionfruit), coffee toffee, and there were a few more that had combinations of papaya, banana, pineapple and other Hawaiian fruits. I really wish I had remembered to take that photo!

I pretty much just remember which flavors we ordered. They were so delicious, I was scraping the bowl with the coconut spoon trying to get every last bit of ice cream out of the bowl. On the left is the lilikoi (passionfruit) and on the right is the pineapple banana. Don't you just love the presentation?!

James loves his lilikoi ice cream. We buy coconut milk ice cream at home all of the time, but it's never like this. Oh man. It's worth the drive to Hana just to have some of this.

When you first roll up, you'll also be offered a sample of the coconut candy. It's quite delicious. It's just coconuts and sugar. We liked it so much we bought a bag of it. Some of the ice cream flavors have bits of this sprinkled on top so you can sort of get two treats in one that way.

Happy Summer From the Crazy Pepper

2011-08-11T10:43:00.000-07:00

I've been trying to find the time to write some blog posts all week but the busy keeps getting me. Dang it. Well, it happens to the best of us. I guess this is the perfect time for this, then. I got this crazy siamese pepper at the farmers market a few weeks ago. I almost didn't want to cut it because it was so funny.

I'm leaving for a 2 week vacation tomorrow so if I'm quiet for a bit, that's why. I can thank my friend Suzanne for getting married in Maui for the first week of it all. If she wasn't getting married there, we probably wouldn't have gone to Hawaii. So yay for that! It's going to be extra awesome because it's still pretty cool in Vancouver right now. I'm hoping to find some interesting vegan food to talk about while I'm there. Someone told me about this place that makes coconut milk ice cream from fresh coconuts. Yum!

Happy summer!

Gingery Blueberry Peach Crisp

2011-08-07T15:45:00.000-07:00

It's been so wonderful since it finally decided to turn into summer in Vancouver lately that I've been everywhere except the internet. Summers here really are spectacular, but some years we only get about 6 weeks to enjoy it. It's one of those things where you try and cram in as much summer fun as you can since it's going to turn back into grey skies soon.

Speaking of cramming in as much as you can, check out how many blueberries I crammed into this crisp! I'm out of control at the farmer's market lately. I really need an intervention or something. We moved this past spring and our new place is only about a block and a half from one of the local farmer's markets. That is super awesome and something that gets me excited to get up early on a Saturday morning but it's sort of like being a kid in a candy store for me.

There are blueberries everywhere right now. Well, not literally everywhere, it's not like there are blueberries rolling down the sidewalks or anything. We have so many great farms around BC that grow berries that it's so easy to get inexpensive, local and organic berries right now. I might turn into a blueberry soon, actually, I've been eating them so often. I bought a huge basket of them last week, planning to make a pie. Then I didn't feel like making a pie anymore and I realized I hadn't made a crisp in quite a while. I had a few peaches hanging around, too so I decided to add them in with the blueberries. The result was amazing. Okay, so having the oven on when it already felt like a million degrees inside my apartment wasn't so great but it was all worth it.

If you make this, you can really use any fruit you want. Any kind of berry, peaches, apricots, apples, pears or even plums would be great for this. Mix it up if you want. It's hard to go wrong. If you don't want to make as much as I did, just use a little less fruit and use a smaller, square pan or a pie dish. I actually meant to make this just a little square's worth of crisp, but I had way more blueberries and peaches than I realized. Usually I'll dump all of my raw fruit into the pan I want to bake it in and judge how full the pan is. You want a little bit of room at the top so the juices don't bubble over onto the oven bottom when you're cooking. Depending on how much of the yummy crisp topping you like, you can really just use the same amount no matter which size dish you're using.

Make sure to taste a bit of your fruit before you add the sugar for this recipe. Sometimes I skip the sugar altogether if my fruit is sweet enough on its own. I'll usually add about 1/4 cup of sugar for fruit that's sweet and ripe and up to 1/2 cup if it's still not quite as sweet as I wish it was.

I think the crisp was awesome as it was, but if I had some crystalized ginger I would have chopped some up and added it in when I added the pecans to give things a bit more zip. Some freshly grated ginger would have also been fantastic to add in with the fruit.

Now go get some fresh summer fruit and make a crisp! Don't forget to grab some vanilla ice cream to spoon on top. I especially like the vanilla bean flavored coconut milk ice cream that Soy Delicious makes.

Gingery Blueberry Peach Crisp

4 large or 6 small peaches, chopped

1 large basket of blueberries or 3-5 small ones

1/4 cup sugar

1 teaspoon ginger

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon nutmeg

1/2 cup flour

1/4 cup sugar

1/4 cup brown sugar

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon ginger

1/4 teaspoon nutmeg

pinch of salt

6 tablespoons non-hydrogenated margarine like Earth Balance, chopped into pieces

1/3 cup rolled oats

1/4 cup chopped pecans

Preheat your oven to 375 F.

Gently stir your fruit together in a bowl until it seems like it's a pretty even mixture of the different fruits. Add in the sugar, ginger, cinnamon and nutmeg and stir gently again until things are mixed up uniformly. If you care about this sort of thing, you can also add 1/4 cup flour to thicken the fruit juices. I do that sometimes, but this time I didn't bother.

Put your fruit mixture in your pan and set it aside while you make the crisp topping.

Stir together the flour, sugar, brown sugar, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg and salt in a bowl until everything is combined evenly. Cut in the Earth Balance with a pastry blender, two table knives or a fork. (You can also freeze the Earth Balance and grate it in which is kind of a cool way to do it if you don't have a pastry blender.) Stir in the oats and pecans. Give everything one last stir to make sure you've incorporated everything things are mixed well.

Dump the topping on top of your fruit in the pan and spread it around until it's covering most of the fruit. You can use your hand or a spoon or whatever. You just want to make sure every bite has some of the awesome crisp topping in it.

Put the pan in the oven and bake for 45 minutes. Remove the pan from the oven and let the crisp cool for at least 10 minutes before you start diving into it.

Raw Almond Frangipane Cream

2011-07-31T08:39:00.000-07:00

There are berries galore out there right now. Peaches and cherries are also starting to show up at the markets. So much fruit, so little time! If you're like me, your fridge is full to bursting with awesome produce. At the moment, I have blueberries, cherries and peaches waiting for me to eat them. The cherries we usually eat like candy. They're so sweet and amazing right now; it's hard to stop eating them once you start. You can't eat just one!

As for the blueberries and peaches, I think they'll do quite nicely mixed together as a cobbler or perhaps just as they are with some raw almond frangipane cream on top. I love this stuff. It's the recipe I've made the most out of Ani Phyo's Ani's Raw Food Desserts. Though, I refuse to spell it the way she does. It just reminds me of chatspeak and I really can't abide that. I get that she's trying to differentiate between foods made with animal products and the raw, vegan versions, but I still just can't get behind it. But that's a whole other discussion.

This almond cream is so easy to make and tastes great on pretty much any kind of fruit you can throw at it. Though maybe don't actually throw things at it or you'll have a fun afternoon of cleanup on your hands. I haven't met a fruit that didn't like this almond cream, so put it on whatever you want. It's also great as a whipped cream substitute on pies and ice cream sundaes and the like.

The only downside to this recipe is that you need to plan ahead. You really need to soak the almonds for a good while before you blend them or it won't be very creamy. If you have a high-speed blender like a Vitamix, you should use that. Otherwise, just use your food processor or regular blender; you'll just have to blend for a few minutes longer. Unfortunately this won't work with an immersion blender so if that's all you have, maybe try to borrow a food processor from a friend in exchange for some of your almond cream?

Raw Almond Frangipane Cream (recipe from Ani Phyo's Ani's Raw Food Desserts)

1 cup raw almonds, soaked at least 8 hours, but preferably overnight.
1 cup filtered water
2 tablespoons agave syrup
1 tablespoon vanilla extract or the seeds from 1 vanilla bean

Combine all of the ingredients in your blender or food processor. If you have a high-speed blender (lucky you!) then you'll only have to blend for about 30 seconds. For the rest of us, you'll want to blend in your food processor or blender for 3-5 minutes, stopping to scrape the sides at least once.

This will keep for 3-4 days in the fridge or for several weeks in the freezer. Why not make a double batch and freeze some for later?

Things That Are Awesome: Bob's Red Mill 8-Grain Hot Cereal

2011-07-24T11:31:00.000-07:00

I'm one of those few people who doesn't like oatmeal. I know, I know. It's supposed to be so good for you and all that. I've just never been able to stomach it. I've tried and tried over the years and I still just don't care for it. And yes, I've tried just about every different brand and type of oatmeal you can imagine with all different toppings. Still not a fan. I've finally stopped trying to convince myself that I might one day wake up and have a hankering for oatmeal. Not gonna happen.

I do, however, love me some grits. I am a Southern gal, after all. Grits, however awesome, aren't always as filling as I'd like in the morning, especially when we don't generally take our lunch breaks at work until 1pm. I was buying flour at the market one day when some of the Bob's Red Mill hot cereals caught my eye. They have so many different kinds, all named things like 10-Grain Hot Cereal and 8-Grain Hot Cereal. I think there are two different kinds of the 10-Grain one, even. How many grains are the right amount? Who knows. I decided to try the 8-Grain Hot Cereal. That one's wheat free, but not totally gluten-free. Though they do have a couple of gluten-free hot cereals.

Now I've been eating this hot cereal for breakfast for a few years now. It's pretty awesome. I like to add some dried fruits and nuts and a little bit of agave nectar or maple syrup. I've been doing a bit of experimenting with Traditional Chinese Medicine here and there lately. One of the things I was doing had me eating or avoiding certain foods to help balance my qi. I was off sugars so I didn't want to add my usual sweetener. Molasses was on my list of recommended foods so I decided to try a spoonful of that on top of my cereal instead. Cherries and coconut were also supposed to be beneficial and I just happened to have some of each in the cabinet. (The dried cherries were from the Cherry Chocolate Oatmeal Cookies which I heartily recommend you try if you haven't already.)

I was a bit suspicious about how this weird looking concoction would taste, but to my surprise it was kind of great. I've started using molasses on my cereal sometimes now just to shake things up a bit. Even better blackstrap molasses is a great source of calcium, magnesium, potassium and iron. The nutrients are basically packed in there; you get a pretty good amount of each of those minerals from just a tablespoonful. Awesome! Also, dried cherries are crazy amazing in hot cereal. I dare you to try it, but maybe do it on this kind of hot cereal not that icky oatmeal.

Polenta Stuffed Peppers

2011-07-14T09:30:00.000-07:00

I got inspired by The Reduction Project's use of the Polenta Stuffing in Appetite for Reduction and decided to do a bit of the same. What can I say? I'm a sucker for anything with a bit of a Mexican flair. It's all of those years I spent living in South Florida and Texas that have changed my palette forever. Maybe that explains my love (lust?) for nachos. It really is kind of out of control how much I get excited over nachos. Though not the fake kind with that gross, bright yellow Teese nacho cheese. What is it what that stuff, anyway? I really wanted to like Teese, but their nacho cheese flavor just tastes like plastic. Yuck.

But I digress, back to Polenta Stuffing. I think this is a great way to use up leftover polenta if you have some. If not, just go buy one of those tubes of polenta from the grocery store. That's what I did. I actually think those polenta tubes are really well suited for stuffing. They're already quite firm and easy to slice and you don't have to do any polenta prep! Awesome!

Ideally, you'd probably want to use poblano peppers if you're going to stuff them like this. When I went to the market the poblanos were smallish and next to them were these amazing anaheim peppers so that's what I bought instead. Anaheim peppers will still work beautifully, but they do have a tiny bit of heat to them. Not even as much as a jalapeno, but you'll want to make sure you're wearing gloves when you cut and deseed them so you don't burn your fingers. I usually just wear my dish gloves.

Polenta Stuffing Stuffed Peppers

One recipe of Polenta Stuffing from Appetite for Reduction
6 large peppers (poblano or anaheim are probably best)
1 can of diced tomatoes (or use fresh ones if you want, it's just faster to use canned)
A handful or so of Daiya cheese, any flavor (I used pepperjack)

Preheat your oven to 375 F.

This is crazy easy. First, make your stuffing and set it aside. Wash your peppers. Give them a nice slice down the middle and a perpendicular slice at the top just near the stem to make a T. Carefully with a small knife, cut out the seeds and the white bits inside. You'll want to be gentle so you don't tear the peppers while you're doing it.

Now, depending on how you want to do this, you have a few options. You can steam the peppers for about 5 minutes before stuffing them or not. It all depends on how soft your pepper to be at the end of things. I just didn't really feel like adding another step to this so I didn't steam mine. Carefully spoon the stuffing inside of the peppers. One recipe of stuffing filled 6 peppers for me, but it'll depend on how large your peppers are. Just smash it inside of them, don't worry about keeping things loose and fluffy.

Now that your peppers are full of polenta stuffing, it's time to add the tomatoes. Spoon them on top of the peppers. I used the entire can for the 6 peppers. Sprinkle some Daiya cheese on top. I like the pepperjack flavor for this. I find with the Daiya, a little bit goes a long way, so you won't need much. Just add however much you like.

Cover your pan with foil and put it in the oven and bake for about 30 minutes. Remove the foil and bake for another 10-15 minutes. Let the peppers cool for at least 5 minutes before you start eating them.

Summertime Tempeh Pasta

2011-07-01T10:29:00.000-07:00

Okay, I'm being optimistic calling this summertime pasta. Mostly I just wish Vancouver would act like summertime. But if it was warm here, I bet I'd want to eat this.

This was pretty much born from me trying to clean out the fridge and make a healthy dinner from the remnants. I still have too many peas in the freezer so I knew I had to try and build a dinner around using peas somehow. I'm a big fan of pastas like this. They're easy, super flavorful and so good for you. You can really add whatever you happen to have on hand. I bet some chard or kale would be great in this. Some diced heirloom tomatoes added just at the end of cooking would be pretty awesome, too. Get crazy!

Just use whatever kind of pasta you like. I had some rice fettucini so I used that. I'd actually avoided eating it because I remember how gross and mushy rice pasta used to taste. When did rice pastas get good again? I couldn't even really tell that the noodles were that different from wheat noodles. That's kind of awesome. I do like to buy corn pasta sometimes, but I find that sometimes has a bit too much of its own flavor if you're making it with something that doesn't have really strong flavors already.

I didn't write down what I did when I made this, so this is just a guestimate, but really, you can't go wrong making something like this anyway. I think the fresh herbs really add something special to a simple pasta like this. You can use whatever you happen to have on hand. If you don't have any fresh herbs, no worries. Just use about a half teaspoon each of dried thyme and oregano. That'll do the trick.

Summertime Tempeh Pasta

1 block of tempeh, cubed
2 tablespoons olive oil
3-4 cloves of garlic (or however much you like. I probably actually added way more than that because I'm a garlic fiend.)
a handful of shitake mushrooms, chopped
1/2 cup vegetable broth
2 tablespoons fresh thyme, chopped
about 4 fresh sage leaves, chopped
1 cup peas, fresh or frozen
pasta of your choice

Steam the tempeh cubes for about 10 minutes. You want to get it soft and remove some of the bitterness.

In a pan (cast iron if you've got it) over medium heat, heat the olive oil for a minute and add in the garlic. Saute for about 3 minutes. Add the mushrooms and tempeh and saute for 5 - 10 minutes or just until you start to get some browned bits on the tempeh. Add the broth, herbs and peas and stir. If you're using frozen peas, make sure to cook until the peas aren't frozen anymore! If you're not, just give the mixture a stir every minute or so for a few minutes until the peas aren't raw. Maybe about 5 -10 minutes?

Turn off the heat, spoon over pasta and serve. You might want to add some salt and pepper to taste. A dash of balsamic vinegar on top would also be pretty stellar. Maybe sprinkle on some nutritional yeast if you want a bit of extra zing?

A Weiner and Other Randomness

2011-07-01T10:06:00.000-07:00

Goodness gracious. I do apologize that I've been MIA for so long. Yikes. I should have announced the contest winner last weekend. So much has been going on around here lately that it's amazing I'm able to keep my head on straight. I've been thinking about food quite a bit lately, but I've either not really had much to say or I haven't had the time to say it. I have such a backlog of photos, I really have no excuse.

Thanks to everyone who entered the contest to win a copy of the Joy of Vegan Baking! I appreciate the suggestions so much. I'll try and incorporate as many as I can in future posts. I've been looking for more portable foods to take for lunches and snacks during the day, so it's kind of good that so many of you want more of that, too. It'll help me get my butt in gear and get it figured out.

Congrats to Emma who is the weiner! Erm, I mean winner. So says the random number generator! Hey, Emma, send me an email at veganchicksrock [at] gmail [dot] com with your address and I'll send the book on over. :) Thankfully Canada Post is delivering mail again after the strike so that's a good thing.

It's just starting to act like summer here in Vancouver. I guess I should be glad that it's not crazy hot. Most people I know in other places seem to be completely overwhelmed with heat at the moment. The cool weather keeps me distracted from wanting an ice cream maker. I have way too many gadgets as it is, but wouldn't it just be so awesome to be able to make homemade ice cream and sorbet? I've been really wanting some cantaloupe sorbet lately so I think I'm going to have to improvise. I think if I just blend some frozen pieces of it that might do the trick.

Speaking of gadgets, my immersion blender died on me this past week. It was a sad day. I've used that thing almost every day for about 4 years so I can't really complain. The poor thing was just not interested in making one more smoothie for me. So much thick smoke started pouring out of it. I could hear some crackling inside, too. I was so nervous that I unplugged it and tossed it in a sink full of water. Yikes! It's never a good sign when your appliances catch on fire from the inside! I guess I'm in search of another immersion blender this weekend. Hopefully there will be some good Canada Day sales going on.

More food talk soon! :)

Cherry Chocolate Oatmeal Cookies

2011-06-16T20:28:00.000-07:00

I don't make cookies all that often but when I do, I wonder why that is. They're delicious and portable! You can have just one (good luck with that one) or a handful depending on your appetite and your sweet tooth. They travel well and make a great mid-afternoon snack when the work day is dragging and you think 6:00 will never come.

So now that you're on the bandwagon, go make these cookies. These Cherry Chocolate Oatmeal Cookies are no joke. Seriously, they're what's missing in your life. Or at least what's missing from your cookie jar. They're chocolately, soft, and full of awesome. If you don't already have a copy of Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar, go buy one. Or borrow one from a friend or get one from the library. This is just the first of many exciting new cookie discoveries.

At first you think, whatever, this is just some kind of boring chocolate cookie. But no! This is a chocolate cookie with chocolate chips in it. And this doubly chocolately cookie also has dried cherries in it. Oh yeah. And just in case you were starting to feel a little guilty, there's some oatmeal thrown in for a bit of texture and to add a bit of the healthy to your cookie. Well, they're still cookies, the oatmeal isn't magic. But still.

Here's another thing that's cool about these cookies. I think you could easily substitute the dried cherries for another type of dried fruit if you wanted something different or just plain didn't feel like buying dried cherries. If you're one of those people that like white chocolate (bleck) you could just use white chocolate chips instead of the regular chocolate chips. Or get really crazy and use peanut butter chips! I know, I'm out of control right now.

Personally, I love the chocolate and cherry flavors together. Dried cherries are about twice the size of a dried cranberry so you get a bit more fruit in each bite. I bet dried strawberries or blueberries would also rock these cookies. Heck, mix them up if you want, the cookie don't care and neither does the honey badger.

And hey - you still have about a week to enter if you're interested in winning a copy of the Joy of Vegan Baking. Just go to this post and make a comment to enter!

Poppy Seed Pull-Apart Rolls

2011-06-12T09:43:00.000-07:00

I think Vegan Brunch is becoming my favorite cookbook. I adore a nice home-cooked breakfast. There's just something comforting about waking up on a lazy weekend morning and starting to cook something delicious. We all get so busy, especially during the work week that it's rare to have a hot breakfast anymore. It's so hard to find the time. I think that's what makes it feel a bit more special, really. For a while there we were making a point to make a nice brunch for ourselves every weekend, but between forgetting to go to the market the night before and getting busier as the weather gets warmer, it doesn't always happen now. There's always breakfast for dinner, I guess.

One of the things I really love about Vegan Brunch is the nice variety of recipes. There are quite a few in there that I've used for lunch or dinner. (The Chesapeake Tempeh Cakes being one of my favorites of that kind!) There are actually quite a few recipes in there that would be a great side dish for a potluck or even a summer picnic. I'm excited to try a few more of those this year.

I was flipping through the book last weekend looking for a recipe I hadn't tried and came across Poppy Seed Pull-Apart Rolls. I usually bake bread every weekend, but I had too many things to do on Saturday last week so I didn't get around to doing it. I haven't made a yeast bread in ages so I thought this sounded like a fun one to try.

I'm so used to using a starter now that I've forgotten how slow yeast doughs can be. Even though I had just bought my yeast a couple of months before and always keep it in the fridge, all of the risings took about twice as long for me. Keep that in mind when you're making this. You could try using the rapid-rise yeast, that would probably speed things up a bit. You also want to make sure to keep your dough in a warm area, away from any drafts because that'll slow it down quite a bit, too. I wasn't in a rush when I was making these, but I was kind of bummed that it took so long to rise. No problem, though. It was such a nice day that day that we went and hung out in the park for a bit as the dough was rising.

These rolls were quite tasty. Goodness, I can't even remember the last time I made rolls of any kind. I especially liked these with a little smear of Earth Balance on them. They were good for a few days after baking, but I think they were best when they were still warm from the oven. The cool thing about this recipe is that you can easily cut it in half and just use a smaller pan to bake them in. I used one of my springform pans which seemed to work out quite nicely. I took the sides off and then didn't have to deal with transferring the rolls to a plate.

I bet these cute little poppy seed rolls would be really good for making tiny sandwiches, actually. It would be something cute for a picnic or as finger food at a party. I would definitely make these again. I probably will, actually, but next time I'll just make half since it was hard for just the two of us to eat them all.

Win a Copy of The Joy of Vegan Baking

2011-06-08T08:24:00.000-07:00

Who doesn't like free stuff? I've decided to have a few contests to give away some cookbooks that I don't really use or that I have doubles of. I'm still deciding how often to do this, but I might make it a monthly thing. Awesome!

This month you can win a copy of The Joy of Vegan Baking by Colleen Patrick-Goudreau. I've had this one for a while and only used it once or twice. It should definitely go into the hands of someone who would use it more than I do!

All you have to do to enter is post a comment on this blog post telling me what kinds of things you'd like to see on this blog. Is there something that you'd like me to do an instructional step-by-step thing for? A cookbook you've been wanting to try, but are curious how the recipes turn out? Is there some vegetable or fruit that you're not sure what to do with and you need ideas? Do you wish I posted more soup recipes? Let me know and you're automatically entered to win the book.

I'll use a random number generator to choose the winner. This is open to everyone, no matter where you live. Yay for international contests! :) The contest ends on Sunday, June 26.

If you have this cookbook, you can make brownies and stuff. Doesn't that picture make you want brownies? (The one in the picture is the Fudgy Wudgy brownies recipe from Veganomicon made with raspberries instead of blueberries with some vanilla soy ice cream on top. Yum!)

Spring Greens and Rice Soup

2011-06-05T18:07:00.000-07:00

So it's spring and summer's right around the corner. I'm loving that the summer farmer's market is open again. We moved a few months ago, too so now the market is in the park just a block from our place. It's pretty awesome to walk over there first thing in the morning on Saturdays and get some fresh produce for the week. Right now there's a plethora of greens and not a huge selection of much else. It makes sense, unless people are growing in a greenhouse it's not the season for harvesting many things for a bit. I'm not complaining, though, I love greens of any sort. It's amazing what wonderful varieties there are to choose from.

So many beautiful, local, organic lettuces are available right now. It can get tiring having salads all of the time, though, as delicious as they can be. Did you ever think of cooking the salad greens? I know, I know. It sounds kind of weird. I thought that at first, too. But, really, when you think about it, what's the difference between steaming some chard or spinach and steaming some spring greens that you'd typically use for a salad? I definitely recommend trying it sometime. You can get such a wonderful varieties of flavor into your greens this way.

I especially like adding some salad greens to soups, much like one of my favorites, the Spring Greens and Rice Soup. I got the idea for this soup from reading something online that talked about adding romaine and butter lettuce to a soup. I was intrigued and immediately concocted this recipe. It's the perfect soup for spring or summer. It's not heavy at all and you can alter the flavor profile by changing the lettuces that you decide to use.

Using risotto rice instead of regular white or brown rice makes the soup taste a bit creamy. It adds quite a bit of awesome to the pot. I would suggest not substituting a different kind of rice. You want the creaminess in the broth and the softness of the arborio rice. Trust me, it's a big difference in this recipe.

If you're not able to get some fresh greens from the farmers market, you can totally use some of those bags of baby lettuces. I've done it that way before and had great success. My favorite combination doing it that way is to use two of the big boxes of lettuce. One of spinach and one of the Earthbound Farms Herb Salad Mix. If you use that one, you don't need to add any fresh herbs because there are already some in there. A nice shortcut, especially if you're trying to make something quick after work. If you're using heads of lettuces, butter lettuce, romaine, radicchio and escarole are all good choices. Maybe use 3 small heads of varying lettuces in addition to some spinach or chard if you're going that route. Just make sure to chop the lettuce leaves coarsely to make them easier to eat.

Oh, did I mention that this recipe comes together is almost no time? Yeah, it's awesome for making on a night when you want something homemade but just don't have the energy to spend an hour chopping and stirring. Plus, this is a one-pot recipe. Not a ton of stuff to clean up, either.

One more thing, use this recipe as a guide. You can add more or less carrots, celery and herbs as you like. Feel free to substitute different herbs or even just buy one of those multi-herb packs and use whatever's in there. This is a really adaptable recipe. Just make sure to keep the broth and rice at the same ratio as I have here since the rice will soak up a bunch of broth, though feel free to add more broth if you want a thinner soup.

Spring Greens and Rice Soup

2 tablespoons olive oil
2 tablespoons non-dairy margarine or olive oil (I like the buttery flavor that Earth Balance lends to this, but go ahead and use just olive oil if you'd rather.)
1-2 carrots, finely chopped (about 2/3 cup)
2 ribs celery, chopped (about 2/3 cup)
1 small yellow onion, chopped (about 1 cup)
1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley
1 tablespoon chopped fresh dill
1 tablespoon chopped fresh thyme
1 teaspoon salt (if you're using salted vegetable broth, you might skip this and just taste and add salt at the end)
1 bundle of spinach, coarsely chopped (or one of those boxes of spinach leaves)
1large bag of mixed salad greens, any kind, chopped if the leaves are too big (or one of those boxes of mixed greens like these)
6 cups vegetable broth
1/4 cup nutritional yeast
1 cup arborio rice

Heat the olive oil and margarine in a large soup pot over medium heat. Saute the carrots, celery and onions for about 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add the herbs and salt and cook for another minute. Stir in the greens and cook for 5 minutes.

Add the broth and nutritional yeast and stir. Add the arborio rice and raise the heat to medium-high. Once the soup is just starting to boil, cover and reduce the heat to a simmer. Simmer for about 20 minutes.

The Pizza Box Cat Bed

2011-06-02T20:38:00.000-07:00

This is what my cat, Piper, does when we bring home vegan pizza from Rebellious Tomato. I think she just likes that the box is super warm. Clearly that means we brought it home as a new bed for her.

So cute, isn't she? She slept on this box for hours. Even after I moved her to get some more pieces of pizza out of the box, she got right back up there. Hilarious.

I've been super busy with a bunch of stuff lately, so I promise a real post soon. Plus - I'm going to do a few giveaways to get rid of some cookbooks I never use. Sweet!

Spelt Johnny Cakes

2011-05-29T10:05:00.000-07:00

I'm really enjoying trying all of the recipes in the Babycakes cookbook. It's kind of fun to get a bit more practice at gluten-free cooking. I always enjoy varying the textures and flours in the things I bake anyway and now when I need to make something for an event that includes some gluten-free people, I'm quite a bit more capable of doing so. Well, some of the recipes in Babycakes are made with spelt flour, so I know those don't exactly qualify as gluten-free, just lower in gluten than wheat flour. I do really enjoy the flavor of spelt in a lot of baked goods, though. I think muffins are especially great for it.

As a good Southern girl transplanted into Canada, I often miss some of the foods I was used to growing up. I mean, seriously. How has no one here ever tried grits or okra or collards?! When I saw the Johnnycakes recipe in this book, I knew I had to try it. Just looking at the ingredient list I could pretty much tell right away that these weren't going to be very authentic. Healthier, yes, but authentic, not so much.

The Johnnycakes are made with a base of spelt flour and cornmeal and drizzled with agave nectar after baking. I think that frying these in a little bit of oil in a cast iron pan would probably give them a bit more oomph, though you'd definitely be removing some of the healthy from them by doing that.

I don't know. I didn't hate these, but I didn't love them, either. I don't really like to write about things I don't totally love, but I was in the middle on these Johnnycakes. I think they ended up being a bit too dry for my taste. They really needed something else to make them shine. Maybe the addition of some fresh corn kernels would have given them a bit more moisture. If I try making these again, I'll probably bake them for just a few minutes and then fry them for the rest of the time. I just expect Johnnycakes to be a bit greasy, you know? It's like eating grits with no Earth Balance. It's just not done in polite society. I'm sure there is a way to still bake these and keep the calories down and improve the flavor, I just have this particular expectation in my head, you know?

If you decide to make these Johnnycakes, make sure to eat them right away when they're warm. If you end up needing to reheat them, toss a few sprinkles of water on them before you do. They're even drier when they've cooled down so you need to add a bit of that fresh from the oven steam back in.

Fresh Orange Juice

2011-05-22T17:04:00.000-07:00

Well, we've had our juicer for a little while now and we're still using it quite a bit. Our favorite juice is definitely the apple-carrot-beet-ginger juice but I think fresh orange juice is a close second. We've become completely spoiled now. I don't ever want to drink juice anymore unless it's one we make ourselves.

I'm wondering if we're getting any extra vitamins since some of the white part of the orange gets juiced doing it this way. I think that's where bioflavanoids and stuff like that hang out. I don't know, but it sure tastes delicious.

The coolest thing about orange juice made through a juicer instead of just being squeezed is the frothiness. It sounds kind of odd when you think about frothy orange juice, but it's awesome. It tastes almost creamy or something. I mean, just look at those awesome little bubbles!

I think my cats like juice, too because they always seem to be hanging out when I'm taking pictures of it. I think I might go make a glass of carrot juice right now, actually.

Pie Fillings and You

2011-05-17T20:20:00.000-07:00

Now that you've unlocked the secrets to flaky pie crust you probably need something to actually put in that pie. This is going to be about fruit pies, but I might do another post about other types of pies.

Strawberry Rhubarb Pie with some pieces cut from it

I almost feel like I'm cheating or something by writing about this. I've been making fruit pies for so many years that it's like second nature almost. Fruit pie fillings are crazy simple to put together. Seriously, even if you're one of those people that gets a bit nervous if you don't have a recipe, you can do this. Many times I'll decide I want to make a pie and then head over to the market and see what kind of fruit catches my eye and that's what type of pie I'll make.

I highly recommend buying fruit that's in season, especially if you can get to a farmer's market or something like that. The great thing about buying from a farmer's market or one of those pick your own places is that you're getting fruit that's been ripened naturally. Even when you're buying in-season produce from your local grocery store, it might have been shipped in from somewhere else and it's likely been picked when it was green. You'll get the best flavor out of your fruit if it's been allowed to ripen before it's harvested.

But what if it's the middle of winter and you're just dying for a blueberry pie? Go for frozen fruit. The great thing about frozen fruit is that you can get it any time of year from pretty much anywhere you might live. It's a great solution when nothing's in season or all of the produce looks a bit dodgy at your local market.

When you're deciding on a fruit for your pie, don't be afraid to be creative! Combine a few and see what happens. Strawberries and mangos go together quite nicely in a pie as do apples and blueberries or figs and strawberries. (Fresh figs are pretty awesome in pies, actually.) If you're combining fruits, think about the flavors of each. Do you want an equal amount of strawberries and rhubarb or do you want just a little bit of rhubarb to complement your strawberries?

Now that you've got that down, you need to know how much fruit to buy. Keep in mind that fruit shrinks a bit when you cook it so get a little bit more than you think you'll need. Also, it's totally acceptable to pile up the fruit into a mound that goes a bit taller than the edge of your pie dish. I do that with apple pies most of the time, actually. It'll cook down a bit and besides, the crust will keep your filling in there nice and snug. Here's a good trick to figuring out how much fruit to buy. Just pile it up inside your pie dish before you do anything to it. Account for the spaces that aren't being filled since your fruit isn't cut yet when you're doing this, though. If you're already at the store and your pie dish is at home, just go to the aisle with those aluminum pie pans and pile some fruit in it when you're in the produce aisle, then put the pan back when you're done. Most grocery stores have those hanging around somewhere.

Now you want to think about sweetening your pie filling. Taste a little piece of your fruit. How sweet is it already? Sometimes I'll leave out the sugar entirely if I'm using really sweet fruit. If you're adding sugar, you want to start out planning to use 1 cup of dry sugar. Depending on how sweet your fruit already is, cut that amount down a bit. The rhubarb in the pie I just made was quite tart and the strawberries were greenhouse strawberries and not quite as sweet as I would have liked so I went ahead and added the whole cup of sugar. If you just plain old like things super sweet, then go ahead and always add the whole cup. No worries.

You can also switch up the type of sweetener that you're using. Use brown sugar, white sugar, sucanat, agave nectar, maple syrup, etc. Different sugars will give a touch of a different flavor to your pie. If you're using liquid sugars, you may not need an entire cup. I'd start with about a half cup of those and maybe mix in a bit of granulated sugar with it so everything doesn't get too soggy.

What else to add to your pie? I like to add a bit of vanilla to mine, pretty much all of the time. Sometimes I'll use real vanilla beans, but mostly I'll just use some vanilla extract. You can also experiment with using some other extracts as well. Lemon, orange, chocolate and maple extracts can be especially delicious in a pie. Add them along with your vanilla or instead of. I usually add 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla with 1-2 teaspoons of whatever other extract I'm using.

Lemon juice is your friend! I find that adding a bit of something acidic like lemon juice gives your fruit such a fresh boost. Sometimes I'll use apple cider vinegar instead if I'm feeling crazy. You only need a few tablespoons. Usually I'll use the juice of one lemon or 2 tablespoons of vinegar. If you're making an apple pie, I would especially say to use the lemon juice. It'll add so many nuances to the flavor.

You're going to want to add a thickener of some kind as well. I usually add about a 1/4 to 1/2 cup of flour or a few tablespoons of arrowroot or cornstarch. Why? Because this will mix with the fruit juices that get released during cooking and give you a nice thick sauce around your fruit. Just make sure to mix it into your fruit evenly and you're good to go.

Adding a pinch of salt is usually a good idea, too. Not much, just a touch. If you have some of those flavored salts, that might be really awesome in a pie. Someone was telling me about lavender salt the other day, I would love to try that!

Now you can get creative and add some more stuff. Lemon zest, orange zest, cinnamon, nutmeg, hazelnuts, raisins, cranberries, chocolate chips... anything!

Sometimes after I've put the filling in the pie dish and before I put the top crust on, I'll dot a bit of Earth Balance on top. It adds a nice bit of flavor to your pie. I've never met a pie that didn't like that little addition. I don't always do it, mostly because I forget, but it's delicious when I do.

Really, it's that easy!

For the strawberry rhubarb pie that I made the other day I used 2 containers of strawberries, 3 stems of rhubarb, 1 cup of sugar, 1 tablespoon vanilla, the zest of one orange and a pinch of salt.

How to Rock a Flaky Pie Crust

2011-05-15T15:37:00.000-07:00

Pie is pretty much one of the most awesome desserts ever. You can use any kind of crust you want and you can usually just wing it with the fillings. If you're making a fruit pie you're even getting a few vitamins in there, too. That's kind of rad. That being said, I know there are a bunch of people out there who are intimidated about making a pie at home. Or maybe you do make pie at home, but you always use a store-bought crust or only make pies with graham cracker crusts because it's easier. I want to change that.

Here's the thing. Pie crust is actually pretty simple once you understand a few things about how it works and what makes it behave the way you want it to. It took me years of trying recipes for pie crust that tastes like cardboard before I finally had my "Eureeka!" moment. Now, I can pretty much rock the pie crusts every single time. It's easier than you think it is.

There are about as many recipes for a plain old pie crust as there are types of pie fillings. It can be overwhelming. Try this one if you're looking for a simple, flaky crust. The ratios in this recipe make the dough easy to work with and it comes out flaky every time if you keep a few things in mind while you're making it. Here's the overview: don't overwork the dough and keep it cold. Did I mention keep it cold? Because that's the big one here.

Super Awesome Flaky Pie Crust (I got this recipe from somewhere on the internet a while back, but I can't remember where)

This makes enough for two crusts.

2 cups flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon sugar
1 cup (2 sticks) non-hydrogenated margarine like Earth Balance, cubed, divided
1/4 cup (1/2 stick) non-hydrogenated shortening like Earth Balance
1/4 cup ice water
small amount of non-dairy milk of your choice (any kind is fine, I usually use rice or almond)
1 tablespoon sugar (or you can use one of those cool packets of vanilla sugar)

Before you begin, go ahead and cut up the margarine and shortening and put it in the fridge until immediately before you're ready for it. I put half of the margarine on one plate and the other half with the shortening on another since you'll add them that way. The cubes don't have to be small, either. I usually just cut lengthwise twice so each slice will give you four little cubes.

In a medium bowl, combine the flour, salt and sugar. Add half of the margarine.

Using a pastry blender or a fork, mix this until you get a coarse meal. You don't want any large pieces of margarine left at this point. Aim for something like in the photo above.

Take the remaining margarine cubes and the shortening out of the fridge and dump them in the bowl.

Make sure your hands are clean and dry at this point. If you need to wash them, put the bowl in the refrigerator while you do it. Now, use your hands to mix everything. You want to use your hands because you'll have more control over the size of the chunks of margarine this way. A pastry blender or a fork will end up making everything a bit more uniform and that's not what you want. Just keep squishing everything through your fingers for a minute or two, it doesn't take long.

You're aiming for the dough to look like this. I know, there are probably bigger pieces than you might expect in the bowl. Resist the urge to make everything uniform and just stop mixing. This step right here is part of what makes a flaky crust act flaky. Keeping everything super cold until it gets into the oven is another part of that. You want to keep the fats as separate as possible within the dough until it gets shocked into baking when you put it all in the oven. I don't really understand the science behind it, but I do know it works.

Now you want to go ahead and add the ice water to the bowl, a little bit at a time, mixing gently with a fork to incorporate it. I always end up needing the entire 1/4 cup of ice water, but if you don't need that much to get a nice, soft dough, don't add the rest. Basically you want the dough to be soft and smoothish looking. It shouldn't be sticky or tough. (I forgot to take a picture when I was at this point, so just pretend that you know what my dough looked like here.)

Divide the dough in half and flatten each half into a little disc. Wrap it up in parchment paper or plastic wrap or even just put it in a little container if you want and put the dough into the refrigerator. You want to let it cool for about 4 hours. You can even let it chill overnight if you want, but you don't need to do it for that long. I know. 4 hours is a long time, but you really want to make sure that this dough is cold, cold, cold. You can try putting it in the freezer for part of the time if you're in a hurry, but sometimes that doesn't chill it all the way through or it ends up freezing the margarine too much and you don't get the same results.

Preheat your oven to 450 F. Go ahead and get your filling ready just before the 4 hours is up. I decided to make a strawberry-rhubarb pie. I'll get more into fillings in a second post tomorrow.

Take one of the discs of dough out of the fridge and roll it out on a lightly floured surface. Sprinkle just a tiny bit of flour on top and rub some on your rolling pin, too. You don't want much, just enough that your rolling pin doesn't stick. Try and get it round and just a bit larger than your pie dish. Don't worry if your dough isn't a circle. Mine never is. Perfect circles don't taste any different than my crazy shaped dough, anyway, I'm pretty sure.

Gently fold the dough in half and put it in your pie plate like this. Unfold it to cover the entire dish. Try and get the dough as flush with the sides of your dish as you can so there won't be any giant air bubbles between the crust and the dish when you're baking it. You want the dough to be just a bit larger than your dish right now so you can fold it over the top crust. Add your filling, then put your pie plate in the fridge and take out the second disc.

If you want to make a lattice crust, you can cut the strips out with a pizza cutter or a sharp knife. I usually like to use the pizza cutter. Don't worry if your strips are uneven, no one will notice once it's all assembled. If you have a strip that breaks, just put that part underneath one of the other strips when you're assembling it on the pie. I have 4 broken strips on this particular pie, but I bet you can't tell where they were. That's the great thing about a lattice crust. It's very forgiving and it looks great.

If you're making a flat crust, follow a similar procedure to how you made the bottom crust. Make sure to cut some holes in the top of the pie so the steam has somewhere to escape. If you don't, your pie might explode all over the oven and you really don't want that.

Now you want to fold the overlap of the bottom crust over the top one. I've never really been very good at making this part look pretty. I envy the people that can make cute little ripples in their pie crust from pinching it. I just sort of suck at that for some reason. No matter, I just use a fork and press it all in place. Cut away any extra dough with a knife.

Brush the crust with your non-dairy milk and sprinkle it with the remaining sugar. I really like using those little packets of vanilla sugar for this. It adds a nice bit of extra flavor to the pie.

Put your pie in the freezer for 15 minutes. Yes, I just said freezer. You want to make the top crust just as cold as you possibly can before it goes into the oven. It also helps to keep the filling from making the bottom crust soggy before it can start to bake.

Take the pie directly from the freezer and put it into the oven. Bake for about 10 minutes and turn the heat down to 375 F and bake for 45 more minutes. At this point your crust should be a nice golden brown with crunchy sugar bits baked into it.

You want to bake the pie at the higher temperature first to give the crust a nice toasting right off the bat. That'll keep it from getting soggy.

Tomorrow I'll talk pie fillings so you have something to put between this awesome flaky crust of yours.

Tomato Caesar Salad

2011-05-13T19:23:00.000-07:00

It's been a gorgeous day in Vancouver today. The sun was shining all day trying hard to warm us up despite the cold wind. It's still a bit cool, but today was the first day so far this year that it's been warm enough to eat my lunch in the park. Awesome. I'm definitely looking forward to many more lunch breaks like that.

For dinner, I think I'll just stick with something simple and fresh and think about those warm summer days on the horizon. I just chopped up some romaine lettuce and heirloom tomatoes and topped it with some balsamic croutons. There's a homemade caesar dressing as well, but I put it on after I took the photos. The salad looks prettier without it, anyway.

I'm looking forward to the farmer's market tomorrow, too. I now live just a block or so from the market at Trout Lake so I have no excuse not to go every week. I'm quite looking forward to seeing what goodies I can discover. I'm hoping to find some fruit for a pie or even some sweet, organic, local strawberries to use in making some strawberry shortcake cupcakes.

My absolute favorite thing from the farmer's market is the garlic. Oh, goodness. Fresh garlic is where it's at. I'm going to venture into making some more sourdough bread this weekend and I'm thinking of filling the dough with loads of roasted garlic cloves. Yum! I can't wait to see how that'll turn out.

Olive Lentil Burgers

2011-05-09T22:37:00.000-07:00

Summer's coming. That means cookouts by the beach and backyard barbeques are coming, too. I know I'm kind of tired of always having the same old veggie burgers. Don't get me wrong, I like veggie burgers and all but sometimes the packages ones aren't so great. Not to mention that they're pretty high in sodium and usually even the best brands contain ingredients that you can't pronounce. So now you're getting all bummed because you know I'm right. Stop planning to cry in your mojitos, I have a solution - olive lentil burgers!

Okay, seriously. I've always been super intimidated by the idea of making my own veggie burgers for some reason. I know, I'll totally go crazy and make some super complicated dinner that takes all day, but I'm scared of a little veggie burger. Or, I used to be at any rate. I don't know why, but one day I got the urge to try and make some from scratch for the first time. I think it was because we had one of those first gorgeous Vancouver days that made me think about lounging around on the beach with friends and food and a few beers. But I digress.

These puppies are so easy to make and they come together fast. I got this recipe from Isa's blog, which is probably not a surprise to anyone who is used to reading about me making something or other that she came up with. I think what drew me in at first was the kalamata olives. Oh, man do I love those. These veggie burgers are full of flavor, hearty and they don't fall apart when you're eating them like so many do!

Someone in the comments over on the PPK (I think that's where I read that at least) suggested using the o-ring from a wide-mouthed mason jar to shape these if you don't have a mold. (You know, the screwy top part of a canning jar.) Seeing as how I have a ton of those lying around, that's what I used and it worked like a charm. One tip - wet your hands and the mold when you're doing the shaping and you won't get veggie burger stuck to either.

The recipe calls for canned lentils, but since I had a bunch of lentils already and they cook fast, I just made some. Just simmer the lentils with a crushed clove or two of garlic and a bay leaf until they're soft and you're good. I think it only took about 45 minutes for mine. I didn't time them, I just started tasting them after about 30 minutes until they seemed like the right texture to me.

Here's something else that's cool. You can totally make these ahead of time and freeze them for later. Just put a little piece of parchment paper in between them before you put them in the freezer so they don't stick together.

We just added some sliced heirloom tomatoes, lettuce and pickles in addition to the usual vegan mayo, mustard and ketchup. Well, James used ketchup, I didn't. I'm not really a fan of ketchup on veggie burgers. You could really put anything on these, though. Keep it simple or make it fancy, they'd be great either way. You might recognize the potato salad from my Potato Salad to Rule the Universe recipe. Yeah, that goes nicely with these, whether you're eating at home or transporting food elsewhere.

Olive Lentil Burgers (recipe from Isa Chandra Moskowitz, copied and pasted directly from her site here.)

Olive oil (from 1 teaspoon to 2 tablespoons, your choice)
1 small yellow onion, diced medium
1/2 pound cremini mushrooms, thinly sliced
3 cloves garlic, minced
Fresh black pepper
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
1/4 teaspoon dried tarragon
1/2 cup pitted kalamata olives (really, use any pitted olive you like)
1 15 oz can cooked lentils, rinsed and drained (1 1/4 cups)
1 cup breadcrumbs, divided
2 tablespoons soy sauce
2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice
1/4 teaspoon liquid smoke (optional)
Cooking spray

Preheat oven to 350 F.

Preheat a large, heavy bottomed pan non-stick (preferably cast iron) over medium high heat. Saute onion for about 3 minutes with a pinch of salt. Add mushroom, garlic, black pepper, thyme and tarragon and saute for 7 to 10 minutes, until mushroom is cooked.

While mushroom is cooking, place olives in food processor and pulse until they are finely chopped (not pureed.) Remove from food processor and set aside. (No need to clean it out for the next step.)
When mushrooms have cooked, add mushroom mixture to the food processor. Add all other ingredients except for 1/2 a cup of the breadcrumbs. (Did you hear me? Reserve 1/2 cup of the breadcrumbs, this will give them better texture.) Pulse until mostly smooth, but there should still be a little texture. Transfer to a large mixing bowl. Add the remaining 1/2 cup breadcrumbs to the burger mixture, along with the chopped olives, and thoroughly combine.

Divide burger mix into 6 equal pieces. An easy way to do this is divide it in half, then cut each half into 3 basically equal portions. You can do that right in the bowl if it’s large enough.

Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and spray with cooking spray. Form mixture into patties, spray with a little more cooking spray and bake for 15 minutes. Flip burgers and bake for 12 to 15 more minutes, until nicely browned.

Breakfast in Tofino

2011-05-03T21:29:00.000-07:00

We took a little trip up to Tofino, BC this past weekend and made a sort of mini-vacation of it. We realized that we probably won't get to take an actual vacation this year so we thought we'd just make a 3-day weekend a few times between now and fall since that's much easier to do sometimes. Besides, there are still a ton of places in BC that James and I both would like to explore.

Funny enough we were trying to decide between Tofino and Jasper for our first long weekend when the internets helped decide for us. I get a ton of emails every morning from all of those coupon sites like Groupon, Ethical Deal, Living Social, etc. One morning a coupon for a half-price stay in a really nice little resort in Tofino came up. Perfect! Half price made it about the same as what we would have paid to stay anywhere else and now we get to pretend we're all fancy and stuff.

The place we stayed was sort of like a little condo on the beach. We had a little living room and kitchen, which was really nice. I love being able to cook when we're traveling. It makes it a bit less stressful to find food, especially first thing in the morning when you're barely awake anyway. As you can see, we did pretty well for breakfast while we were there.

It was kind of amazing how awesome this breakfast turned out to be. Not that I didn't think it would be good, but wow. This was so delicious it's not even funny. We found a little organic market in Tofino thanks to some help from my Twitter friends. We got a bunch of veggies for breakfast and some stuff to make a quick and easy dinner, plus a jar of pickles. Because really, we like pickles quite a bit. It was a bummer to find that these dill pickles had sugar added to the brine. I'm not a fan of sweet pickles, and especially not sweet pickles pretending to be savory and tricking me. To be fair, James didn't really think they were sweet, I just pick up on that like crazy in things that I expect to be savory.

Isn't that little kitchen cute?! The oven was full sized, too! Living in Vancouver, I've almost forgotten what full sized appliances look like. Everything is miniature here since the apartments are so small.

We ended up just buying a tub of Earth Balance instead of olive oil for cooking everything. That way we could also have a loaf of garlic bread with our dinner and not have to shell out for both Earth Balance and olive oil. I wish I had thought to bring that stuff with me. Oh well, it's not like we won't use it.

James spotted the fiddleheads right away at the market. I've never had them so I was quite intrigued. Thankfully there was a little flyer thing that gave a short run-down on how to cook these or I would have probably steamed them, though I'm sure that would have turned out just fine, too.

First you want to clean all of the brown bits off of the fiddlheads. It's hard to get it all, but just get as much as you can. To cook them, basically you want to slice up some garlic, saute it in olive oil for a few minutes then add the cleaned fiddleheads. Saute for 5-7 minutes and you're done. It's really that simple. They were quite fantastic.

The fiddleheads tasted quite unique. Sort of like asparagus or broccoli with just a tiny, subtle hint of bitterness. Sauteed for just a few minutes like that they were just soft enough and retain a bit of crunch. Yum! I'm going to check the local farmers market for some more of these for sure.

Oh, the rainbow chard. I have no idea what made these so stellar. I just lightly steamed the chard, I didn't even add salt or anything. They were so good, I couldn't stop eating them. As much as I love kale, I had forgotten how delicious this stuff can be. Wow.

We rounded everything out with some roasted yellow potatoes and sweet potatoes. I don't normally throw in a sweet potato with my breakfast potatoes, but I think I might do that more often from now on. Not only did it look cute, it was tasty, too!

We pretty much made all of this on the stove top, too. The potatoes I boiled until just soft and then stuck them in a 350 F oven with some Earth Balance, salt and pepper while I finished cooking everything else. Keep that in mind when you're traveling. A hot plate or a kitchenette or even a camping stove can bring you a wonderful, healthy meal that'll put a smile on your face (even if you haven't had your coffee yet) and keep you going all day. I know I was thrilled to have had such a great breakfast before a day of searching the beaches for starfish and looking for whales.

We didn't get any photos of the whales, though we did see 3 humpbacks! We did take a lot of photos at the beach while we were climbing on rocks and peering into tidepools. Though, here's a tip for you. If it's a really sunny day, but it's still cold and you're out playing around on the beach, think about not wearing your scarf. I had my scarf on all day long in the sun because it was cold, especially the wind. Now my face has a ton of color but my neck is stark white. It looks like I'm one of those women who wears too much face makeup of the wrong color for her skin or something.

Edit: Yes, these are my own photos. A couple of people asked me about them. We took a seaplane tour, that's how I got that shot of one of the islands. :)

Zucchini Spelt Muffins

2011-04-26T08:00:00.000-07:00

I was feeling like I wanted to bake some muffins one morning last week. With no idea what kind of muffin I wanted, I started flipping through some cookbooks. That might have been a bit of a mistake because then I wanted one of everything just about. When I opened to the Zucchini Spelt Muffins recipe in Vegan Brunch, I started thinking about how much I used to like zucchini bread when I was a kid. Then it hit me that the last time I had zucchini bread was probably also when I was a kid. That just seemed wrong, somehow.

I've been trying to use different types of flours when I'm baking lately instead of just using plain old wheat flour all of the time. The fact that these muffins were made from spelt definitely didn't hurt. In fact, I think it made them a bit tastier. The spelt flour gave the muffins a bit more of a wholesome sort of flavor that went so well with the zucchini and spices. Oh, the spices! These muffins smell so wonderful when baking with the aromas of cinnamon, allspice and nutmeg filling the air. I almost want to bake them just to smell them!

The recipe is pretty bare bones, just zucchini and the muffin batter, but I added a cup of chopped, toasted walnuts to mine. If you like nuts in your muffins and breads, I definitely think it's a welcome addition. I like the bit of added texture and flavor. The recipe says to let the muffins cool for 10 minutes before eating them. I recommend doing that. If you don't they'll likely stick to the muffin papers. Your muffins will still be warm 10 minutes after being removed from the oven, so don't worry.

Overall, the muffins were absolutely delicious. They turned out nice and fluffy and quite tasty all on their own. I did cut my muffins in half and add a bit of Earth Balance as I was eating them a few times. They seem quite good for that sort of thing if you're into it.

These freeze really well, too! If you're not familiar with this trick, here's what you do. (I got this from one of the side notes in Vegan with a Vengeance. Such a great idea.) Go ahead and put paper muffin cups in an entire muffin tray. Fill them up with batter just as you would if you were going to eat them all right now. Put the entire tray in the freezer. Once everything is frozen, take the muffins and transfer them to some sort of freezer-safe food container or a freezer bag. Now you have muffins ready to go whenever you want just one or two at a time! When you bake them, set the temperature to the same as you would if they weren't frozen and just cook the muffins for 10 minutes longer than the regular cooking time. I suggest labeling your muffin container with the kind of muffin, the baking temperature and the length of cooking time when frozen. That way you won't have to wonder what they are or go look it up every time you want to bake one.

It's a pretty sweet way to go if you want to make a bunch of muffins and you can't eat an entire dozen or if you want freshly baked muffins in the morning before work or something. I do that frequently. It's nice to have something freshly baked on a dreary Monday morning when you're not really feeling like going to work.

Upside-Down Lentil Shepherd's Pie

2011-04-20T08:53:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure exactly what led me to make this shepherd's pie. I've actually never really cared for that dish before. I think that maybe I've just never had a good one. Shepherd's pie usually brings to mind overcooked vegetables topped with flavorless, gummy mashed potatoes. Even when presented with a recipe for a shepherd's pie, I'll typically pass in favor of just about anything else. Associations are hard to break sometimes, I guess.

Whatever possessed me to want to try the Upside-Down Lentil Shepherd's Pie in Appetite for Reduction, I'm glad for it. My mind has been forever changed. It's funny, too, presenting this as "upside-down" somehow makes my brain think it's less work than the other way. Really, I think it's pretty much the same amount, you're just not layering until you're ready to serve it. There's where the end of the overcooked veggies comes in, too.

This dish is full of so many good things: lentils, shitake mushrooms, zucchini, carrots, celery, peas, Caulipots. Oh, Caulipots. OMG, Caulipots. Seriously, Caulipots are like a revelation. It's pretty much just half and half cauliflower and potatoes mashed up together with a little bit of olive oil and vegetable broth mixed in. Much less fat than regular mashed potatoes and a truckload more flavor. I swear I could sit down and eat an entire bowl of Caulipots just by themselves.

I didn't feel like searching the city for du Puy lentils, so I just used plain old green lentils for this. I also added some beet greens because I had some that needed using and adding a few extra greens to a dish never hurt. You can conceivably make this using just two pots. One for the Caulipots and one for the lentils and veggies. Easy cleanup and easy to make. It's pretty quick, too. You could make this after work one night if you have everything on hand already. Who wouldn't like coming home to a nice meal like this, anyway? The thyme and tarragon simmering away with the veggies and lentils gives off such a wonderful aroma. That'll put you in a good mood if you weren't before.

This recipe calls for Worcestershire sauce. I definitely think it adds a nice bit of flavor to this dish. If you're having trouble finding a vegan brand, check the ingredients on the store brands. I was surprised to find that some of the local chain grocery stores around here have a vegan store brand Worcestershire sauce. That's kind of cool. If you can't find any or don't want to spend the money on something you might not use again, (what- you're not making a bloody mary for weekend brunches?) you can just use a bit of soy sauce and lemon juice or apple cider vinegar instead.

This is definitely a keeper recipe. I will for sure be making this again. It reheated really well and was a great leftover dish to take to work for the week. Your tummy will thank you.

Stuffing Our Faces at Edible Flours

2011-04-18T11:41:00.000-07:00

Vancouver has an awesome new bakery! Edible Flours opened this past Saturday and boasts all vegan and some gluten-free items. If you're in Vancouver, I highly recommend making your way over to Kitsilano to treat yourself to a cupcake or muffin or scone or cookie or whatever. You won't be sorry. You'll find the bakery at 2280 West Broadway at Vine, right next to the London Drugs. They're open every day except Mondays. You can get more specific directions and hours here.

I really wanted to get down there on Saturday, but the day was chock-full of other things so we didn't get to help celebrate opening day. We did fit in a snack break while running a bunch of errands on Sunday, though. Sunday was such a warm, sunny, gorgeous Vancouver day that even running errands was quite pleasant. Stopping for a little sugar rush didn't hurt the enjoyment of the day, either, that's for sure.

Here's the deal. You can walk in and buy anything in the case and you can get a tea or a smoothie or a coffee or something to go with it. There are a few seats so you can eat inside if you want or take it with you. If you need a whole cake or a dozen cupcakes or something, you can also place orders for those things, which is super awesome.

We bought one of almost everything. In our defense, we were also picking up a few things for a friend who had to work and couldn't make it over. Also, I was just really excited and I wanted to try everything.

On this plate of yummies, you have a strawberry scone, a vanilla cupcake, Sunday's special - the maple glazed cinnamon doughnut and a bunch of chocolates. We'll talk about the chocolates in a minute.

First, I need to say that I am incredibly picky when it comes to eating other people's baked goods. Usually whenever I've been presented with a vegan cupcake that was purchased somewhere it's dry and dense and doesn't really taste very good. That makes me sad because that's not how the cupcakes I bake turn out and it's disappointing that there are people selling vegan cardboard and passing them off as cupcakes. The frosting is something I typically find full of sugar and tasteless. I usually just scrape it off because I'm not a fan of eating a pile of greasy sugar. No wonder the omnivores think our vegan treats won't taste very good!

None of those things are true about Edible Flours. I think this might have been one of the best cupcakes I have ever eaten. For reals. The cake itself was light, moist and fluffy and full of flavor. I can tell that maple syrup is being used to sweeten it and that gave it such a wonderful taste. The frosting had a faint lemon flavor. Not overpowering, just a hint that went so well with the vanilla-maple goodness of the cake. It wasn't just a greasy pile of sugar, either! The frosting was creamy and light and didn't taste overly sweet. So good! James got the cupcake for himself and gave me a bite just to taste. I kept making him give me more, it was so good. I actually spent most of the afternoon reminiscing about how good that cupcake tasted. Holy cow. There were a bunch of cupcakes, some gluten-free and some made with wheat flour.

The scone wasn't overly sweet and trying to be a muffin as I find most scones to be. It was a real scone with real pieces of freshly sliced strawberries in it. Delicious. The doughnut appears to be a baked doughnut if I'm not mistaken. It was quite tasty, a little bit like cake in itself with a nice maple glaze and a dusting of cinnamon on top. There were a few other flavors of doughnuts, but we only tried this one.

Yes, this is a picture taken inside the chocolate bag. James thought it was funny that I took the picture this way. I haven't eaten the chocolate yet. I'm saving these for an afternoon tea break today. The round one is a chocolate chai thing, the rectangular one is chocolate raspberry and the lumpy one is chocolate peanut butter. They look amazing, I can't wait to try them.

Here are some of the things we took to go. Another one of those glorious vanilla cupcakes for Erin, a chocolate gluten-free cupcake, a chocolate chip cookie and a lemon cookie. I haven't eaten the cookies yet, either. Those are probably going to be dessert tonight after dinner. They look fantastic, though. We'll see if I can hold out that long before eating them.

We ate the chocolate cupcake last night and it was also delicious. You won't believe this is gluten free. I mean, it is, but it doesn't taste like it. I can faintly taste a bit of rice flour in the mix, but just barely. This is a fluffy, flavorful cupcake. If you're avoiding wheat, you've just found the best thing ever about living gluten-free in Vancouver.

I will definitely go back here again and get some more yummies. It's funny, our old place was only a 15 minute walk from here and my old workplace was just down the street. Now I'm across town so I'll have to make a special trip to go to Edible Flours. It'll be so worth it, though. Yum!

Vegetable Lasagna with Cauliflower Ricotta

2011-04-16T09:38:00.000-07:00

Anytime I tell James I'll make anything he wants for dinner, his response is almost always lasagna. It's one of those great dishes that can hide so many veggies and usually makes leftovers for at least a couple days. I don't know why I don't make it more often. It's not really all that time consuming and it's definitely not hard.

The beauty of a lasagna is that you can make it however you want. I usually throw in whatever vegetables I have in the fridge that need to be used up. It's never turned out bad no matter what I put in there, either. My usual lasagna recipe is a culmination of different things. One thing that I think makes it really stand out is that I always make my own sauce. It not only tastes better than store-bought, it's really simple and easy to make.

I also typically use Isa's recipe for tofu ricotta from Vegan with a Vengeance. I've tried other ways to make the "cheese" part of the lasagna, but that one is always a winner. That's why I was really excited to try the cauliflower ricotta recipe in Appetite for Reduction. I'm in love with caulipots, and I've recently discovered pureed cauliflower to be an excellent secret ingredient in creamy sauces and soups. Why wouldn't cauliflower also be awesome in lasagna?! It's like I'm discovering the wonders of the cashew all over again or something.

I decided to make the lasagna pretty much exactly like the recipe in the book. I'm loving everything in Appetite for Reduction so far so I figured it couldn't hurt to change up my usual methods a bit since I was already changing up the ricotta. One note if you're doing the same - I was using dried thyme in the red sauce, not fresh and since I was trying to multi-task a bit too much while I was cooking, I added 2 tablespoons of dried thyme. Yikes. If you're using dried, maybe go for 2 teaspoons. Fresh is always better if you can get it, though. I just forgot to pick up some thyme when I was at the market.

All in all, I think this recipe was great! I will definitely be using the cauliflower ricotta recipe again. You pretty much just roast some cauliflower then mash it together with some tofu and nutritional yeast and a few other things and wham! you have cauliflower ricotta. I think it would also be good to add in some fresh basil leaves like the VwaV recipe. I always love fresh basil in pasta dishes; it adds such a wonderfully fresh flavor.

I added some zucchini, carrots and shitake mushrooms to the spinach as well. Again, you can really add whatever veggies you want, I'm sure it'll be fantastic. Though I'd be unsure how peas would go in lasagna. It would probably still be good, but maybe a little unexpected, I guess. I also added some sliced garlic-stuffed olives to the top since I couldn't be bothered to pit any kalamata olives that day. It was a really nice addition, actually.

One more thing: At our house, no lasagna is complete without some capers sprinkled on top. I highly recommend doing the same. You'll never go without again.

Brunch at Bandidas Taqueria

2011-04-03T09:54:00.000-07:00

James and I are moving in a few days. Right now our apartment is full of boxes. Some are packed and taped, some are half-packed and some are still waiting to be filled. It's like a bomb went off in here or something. We're hoping to get the rest of the packing done today, which would be wonderful. If not, because of the packing and moving and waiting for the internet to be hooked up in our place next weekend, the blog might be silent for a week or so. I'm going to try and pre-write a few posts so I can just post them throughout the week. That all depends on how much time there is in between trying not to pack a cat in a box with the silverware and all that jazz.

I'm pretty excited to move for a few reasons. We'll be in a new neighborhood, which is awesome and we'll be closer to awesome brunch places like Bandidas Taqueria. I've become a bit addicted to that place lately. Now we'll be just a few short blocks away instead of across town. I can't even put into words how excited I am about that.

The last time we were at Bandidas we had brunch with a friend and in usual SJ style, I asked everyone to wait to start eating until I could get a few photos with my phone. I should have written down what everyone had, I'm just going to guess from looking at the menu online, but suffice it to say that we all thoroughly enjoyed our meal.

Everyone gets a teapot of their own. That's great for someone like me who will most definitely drink the entire pot.

One of the things I like best about Bandidas, besides that it's a cool vegetarian restaurant, is all of the great vegan options. I feel really lucky to live in Vancouver where there are a plethora of places that offer a tofu scramble as a breakfast option. But you know, sometimes you just don't really want to eat another tofu scramble. At Bandidas, you can replace eggs in any entree with a butternut squash-tofu combination. They also use Daiya cheese as a substitution for dairy cheese, as well. Always a bonus. There are so many different things to choose from, it's almost overwhelming. All of the plates are full of veggies, too. I feel like I've had a really healthy meal when I've eaten there.

The Alan's Breakfast, veganized

I'm pretty sure I had the Alan's Breakfast. It's pinto beans, corn tortillas, fresh salsas, guacamole, and butternut squash replacing the eggs with a bit of daiya in there underneath, purple cabbage and a little salad. I know, that's a lot of food. I ate every bite of it and loved it. I also got a side of the roasted potatoes and yams that James and I shared. I can't resist potatoes even though I only ate a few of them, James seemed to really feel like they added something to his meal.

The Vegan

The vegan. It's not just a label for people anymore, it's also a brunch dish at Bandidas. That's what James had. I should have tasted some of it. It looked really great. More of the yummy butternut squash-tofu combo over some daiya cheese and tortilla strips with some sauteed red peppers, onions and jalapenos with a red sauce on top. There are also some pinto beans in there on the far side of the plate next to the purple cabbage.

The Breakfast and The Vegan

Since it was a typical, rainy, grey Vancouver day, there wasn't much light over in our corner of the restaurant. I took a few pictures of Andy's plate, but none of them came out very well. You can see his over there with the cornbread stacked on top. I think he got what's called The Breakfast. That name kind of amuses me. You can see the potatoes and yams all piled up being awesome.

This was so good. It's not too bad price-wise, either. It's $10-11 for a plate piled up with food. Many times we end up taking leftovers home. This particular day we were pretty hungry and ate every bite. Yum! If you're in Vancouver, I definitely recommend checking this place out. I like their lunch/dinner stuff, too, but I feel like Bandidas really shines at brunch, especially for having interesting and different vegan options. If you don't live around here, then maybe this will be a bit of inspiration for you. I know I would never have thought of having butternut squash for breakfast before this. Now I can't get enough of it.

Chocolate Chip Cookies Invade My Belly

2011-03-30T19:42:00.000-07:00

Have you ever noticed that there are about as many chocolate chip cookie recipes as clouds in the sky? Seriously, it's kind of crazy. It's interesting, though. So many different ways of creating virtually the same thing. My favorite is usually a veganized version of the old school Toll House cookie recipe. It's a nice cookie that's just a bit fluffy and not too crunchy or oily and doesn't fall apart. I always add pecans with the chocolate chips. Without the pecans it's good, but just not the same if you ask me.

When a chocolate chip cookie craving set upon me a few weeks ago, I decided that I'd try a new recipe just for kicks. You never know when that new recipe might suddenly become your old favorite, right? It's always worth it to shake things up a bit here and there. Enter Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar. Someone suggested I make a cookie pie instead of individual cookies. My willpower was not strong that day so I opted for a smaller serving size. I was afraid I'd eat like half of the cookiepie in one sitting!

These cookies turned out great! They didn't rise quite as much as my usual recipe, but not in a bad way. These are definitely more of a crunchy cookie. But not like super crunchy, just not like eating a pillow or something if that makes any sense. Again, not in a bad way! These were super yummy.

I pretty much always have all of the ingredients for chocolate chip cookies on hand, so that's a score. I even had the tapioca flour. I've been baking gluten-free stuff quite a bit more often so I've been stocking up on some of the more out of the ordinary flours. If you don't have any of that and don't want to buy any, you can substitute arrowroot powder. (Or so says the internet at least! I haven't tried doing that in this particular recipe, but I can't see why it wouldn't work just fine.)

Another cool thing about this recipe is that there's no margarine in it. Great for those days when you're out of Earth Balance but you really want to make some cookies. That's also great if you're trying to avoid soy or palm oil.

I just realized Isa and Terry put this recipe online, so yay for you! I copy/pasted it from here.

Chocolate Chip Cookies (recipe from Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar by Isa Chandra Moskowitz and Terry Hope Romero)
Makes two dozen two inch cookies or about 16 three inch cookies

1/2 brown sugar
1/4 white sugar
2/3 cup canola oil
1/4 cup unsweetened almond milk (or your favorite non-dairy milk)
1 tablespoon tapioca flour
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt

3/4 cups chocolate chips
3/4 cups chopped pecans, optional

Preheat oven to 350 F. Lightly grease two large light metal baking sheets.

Mix together sugars, oil, milk and tapioca flour in a mixing bowl. Use a strong fork and mix really well, for about 2 minutes, until it resembles smooth caramel. There is a chemical reaction when sugar and oil collide, so it’s important that you don’t get lazy about that step. Mix in the vanilla.

Add 1 cup of the flour, the baking soda and salt. Mix until well incorporated. Mix in the rest of the flour. Fold in the chocolate chips and pecans. The dough will be a little stuff so use your hands to really work them in.

For 3 inch cookies, roll the dough into about ping pong ball size balls. Flatten them out in your hands to about 2 1/2 inches. They will spread just a bit. Place on a baking sheet and bake for about 8 minutes – no more than 9 – until they are just a little browned around the edges. I usually get 16 out of these so I do two rounds of eight cookies. Let cool on the baking sheet for about 5 minutes then transfer to a cooling rack.

For 2 dozen two inch cookies roll dough into walnut sized balls and flatten to about 1 1/2 inches and bake for only six minutes.

And Then They Bought a Juicer

2011-03-27T16:39:00.000-07:00

Last weekend we bought a juicer. It's one of those things that I've been wanting for years. As I'm trying to find ways to cram in more servings of fruits and vegetables in my day, I've been buying more fresh juice. I've also been really interested in making some juices with greens added to them. I can't really find anything like that locally so our answer was to suck it up and go buy a juicer.

This thing is awesome! The first juice we made was an apple-carrot-beet-ginger juice. We had no idea how much juice would come out of the produce so we actually ended up with about 5 huge glasses of juice. I know it's best not to refrigerate the juice and drink it later, but that's what we had to do with most of it. So crazy. I'm still getting the hang of how much fruit and veggies to put in to get just one or two glasses of juice.

So far we've made the apple-carrot-beet-ginger juice quite a few times, once with some kale added even. We've made lemon juice, apple juice, orange juice and pear juice, too. It's amazing. We realized that we'll never have to buy store-bought lemon juice again. That's something we use quite a bit at our place, too. The pears actually ended up making a bit of a pear puree. We cut it with some apple juice, simmered it all with a couple of cinnamon sticks and had the most amazing hot pear cider. Yum! I froze a bunch of the pear juice to use later. I think I might make a raw pie with that as the top layer.

Phoebe was posing, too so I thought I'd get a photo of her as well as the juice.

If you've never had freshly juiced oranges, woah. Putting an orange through a juicer is much, much different than just squeezing all of the juice out of it. The juice is really foamy and so delicious. I like it so much better this way than out of a carton from the store.

We've been juicing pretty much every day now. I'm looking forward to trying some green juices. We've gotten a couple of recommendations from friends and I'm reading Crazy Sexy Diet right now and I think Kris Carr has a few recipes for them as well.

Vegan Bennies

2011-03-22T10:03:00.000-07:00

I really love brunch. I especially love making brunch at home and enjoying it on a leisurely weekend morning. I know, I've probably said that a few million times before, but it's something I really look forward to. Sometimes we get so busy on the weekends or we forget to go to the market so there aren't enough ingredients. Usually those are the days we end up having biscuits for breakfast.

My new love, though, is vegan bennies. When I first brought home my copy of Vegan Brunch, that recipe immediately caught my eye. For some reason I brushed it off as too much trouble. I mean, look how cute it is in the book photo! That's kind of a silly way to think about it, really. These babies are super easy to make and don't really take that much time. It's just a matter of marinating some tofu and making a sauce. So easy.

I forgot to take a photo before we started eating so I made James stop mid-bite so I could get this one.

The first time I made these I really wanted to make the Potato Spinach Squares so I served them the english muffin way. I'd never had a benny before anyway, so I figured I should just go for the most common configuration for the first go-round anyway. The Potato Spinach Squares are super awesome, by the way. I make them as a side dish for dinner sometimes, too. I also did the whole thing of cutting out the tofu into little round pieces to fit on the english muffins. They were super cute, but seeing as how we don't really eat tofu that often at home anymore, I don't think I'll do it that way again because of how much tofu is leftover from the cutting.

The second time we made the bennies, I also made the Diner Home Fries from Vegan Brunch and just cut the tofu into little triangles perched on top of the potatoes. Okay, seriously, I should have just done this from the beginning. Not only were there no leftovers but holy cow, these potatoes are tasty!

I always end up with leftovers when I make these which is just fine by me. That means I can do a quick reheat the next morning and have a really nice breakfast on a Monday morning before work. That really helps get the day started nicely. We don't own a microwave so I can't vouch for that, but the bennies reheat nicely on the stovetop and in the oven. If you've been feeling intimidated by this recipe like I was, you really should try to make it. It's easy and comes together fast.

I think next time I'll add some spinach and maybe avocado to the bennies. Yum! Vegan Brunch, you win again!

Julia Child's Apple Tart

2011-03-18T20:29:00.000-07:00

I've been meaning to blog about this for ages. I don't know why I keep forgetting. This is probably the best apple tart I've ever had. Not just the best that I, personally have made, but the best that's ever been in my tummy.

I was having a bunch of people over for dinner and wanted to make a fancyish dessert. It was fall and the local apples are plentiful in Vancouver at that time of year so I tend to want to bake them constantly. I had also just seen Julie & Julia and had been thinking that I'd never even looked at a Julia Child recipe. I rather like veganizing recipes from well-known chefs. It makes me kind of excited that I can make something just as awesome as they did without using any animal products. That actually makes my version even more awesome if you ask me.

So anyway, I came across this recipe for an apple tart and decided to go for it. I followed the instructions to the letter. I know Julia Child is very specific in how everything should be prepared. I do think that kind of attention to detail can make all of the difference sometimes when baking. I don't usually arrange my apples so neatly, either. I'm more of a throw it all together and move it around later kind of gal, especially if I'm trying to cook a bunch of stuff at once.

This tart was flipping amazing. The crust was so flaky, it melted in your mouth. I have never made a crust like this before. You see all of those cute little apple slices on the top of the tart? Under those is another layer of apple. It's like a smooth apple butter consistency or something, maybe a little thicker. That different texture really added an extra bit of oomph to the tart. I felt like my tastebuds were singing and dancing when eating this. I can't wait for a reason make this tart again.

I used a combination of Pink Lady and Granny Smith apples in this. I firmly believe that the type of apple you use when baking makes such a big difference in the final product. I almost exclusively use those two types of apples in cooking. Pink Ladies are also one of my favorites for just eating. That apple has sort of a sweet-tart flavor. Not nearly as tart as a Granny Smith, but just as firm and crunchy. They hold up well when baking. Granny Smith apples are tart and slightly sweet, but sweeten up a bit more when baked. They're even firmer and hold their shape nicely. I've never had either of these apples get mushy on me when I cook them.

Check it out. You can see my cat, Phoebe eyeing the tart from across the kitchen. She was doing that the entire time I was taking these photos. I almost didn't notice! It cracks me up whenever I look at this picture. I love the way she's staring at it with those big eyes of hers. haha

Apple Tart (adapted from Julia Child's original recipe, which you can find here)

You can use a pie plate, but a tart pan with a removable bottom is best. I used a 9" tart pan.

Crust:
1 1/4 cup flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
4 oz cold Earth Balance, cut into little pieces
1/4 cup ice water

Filling:
6 medium to large apples, peeled and cored, Granny Smith or Pink Lady are best
1/3 - 1/2 cup sugar
1 tablespoon flour
pinch cinnamon
1/2 fluffy bread crumbs (you can always tear up some bread and toast it in the oven for this.)
2 teaspoons lemon juice

Topping:
2 large apples, peeled and cored, preferably Granny Smith or Pink Lady
1 tablespoon lemon juice
2 tablespoons Earth Balance, melted
1 1/2 teaspoons sugar

Crust:
Mix the flour and salt together in a bowl. Cut in the Earth Balance with a pastry cutter or your fingers until the mixture resembles a coarse meal. Using a wooden spoon, stir in the ice water a little bit at a time until it's all incorporated. Be careful not to mix it too much. You don't want to get the dough too warm. Now turn the dough out onto a clean surface and gently knead it a few times just to get it to be a bit more like a dough. Be careful not to overdo it. You don't want to start forming gluten strings or make it too warm. Form the dough into a fat disc and wrap the dough in wax paper and chill for 2 hours.

On a lightly floured surface, roll the dough out to about 1/8" thick for a 9" tart pan. Gently press the dough into the tart pan. Chill again for about 30 minutes. Preheat your oven to 400 F.

Line the inside of the dough with foil and pie weights (or you can use dried beans). Cook for 20-25 minutes or until the dough is just starting to get golden brown. You can take the foil and pie weights out now. Cool the crust on a wire rack while you're getting the filling together.

Filling:
Preheat your oven to 375 F.

Cut the apples into quarters. In a bowl, mix together the sugar, flour, cinnamon and bread crumbs. Toss the apples into the sugar mixture until everything is combined and the apples are a bit coated. Add the lemon juice and mix it up until it's incorporated.

Spread the apple mixture onto a rimmed baking sheet. Bake for 15-20 minutes or until the apples start to release some of their juices and start to form a sauce. You want them to be soft enough to mash.

Remove the apple mixture from the oven and transfer to a bowl. Mash with a potato masher until smooth. Let the mixture cool for about 15 minutes. Once it's cool, gently spoon it into the cooled crust, smoothing the top so it looks even.

Topping:
Preheat your oven to 375 F. Line a baking pan or sheet with foil or parchment paper. You want a pan that's big enough to put your tart pan inside. This is to catch any drips or in case anything cooks over.

Quarter, then slice the apples into 1/8" slices. Gently, toss the apples with the lemon juice so that you get as much of the apple surface coated as you can.

Arrange the apple slices in a well-packed circle, starting with the center and working your way out. Brush with the melted Earth Balance and sprinkle evenly with the sugar. I also ground some fresh cinnamon on top of mine.

Bake for 25-30 minutes or until the top is glazed and the apples are edged in black. Dust with confectioner's sugar just before serving.

Isa's Mac & Shews

2011-03-17T08:49:00.000-07:00

I can tell you the exact moment my life changed. It was when I read Isa Moskowitz's blog post about Mac & Shews. I will never be the same again. Well, dinner won't be at least.

So Isa had this crazy awesome idea to add sauerkraut to a creamy cashew sauce to get that tang that vegan cheeses substitutes are missing. I just happened to have a jar of Bubbies sauerkraut in the fridge leftover from veggie dog meals from the summer. I've never really used it for anything else so I figured that if nothing else, this would be a great way to get rid of that jar. Also, I totally love making things from cashews.

Here's a funny thing. Even in my vegetarian days, I never really cared much for macaroni and cheese. (Or as they call it up here in Canada - Kraft Dinner.) For some reason, though, since becoming vegan, I love experimenting with different mac and cheese recipes. With the exception of Veganomicon's Mac Daddy, I've rarely made a recipe for this twice. It's always been sort of the same noochy flavor. Don't get me wrong, I love me some nutritional yeast, but I don't really care one way or the other for a nooch sauce of that type. I'll eat it, but I don't sit around thinking about it or anything. This stuff, though... oh, man.

Isa's photos are prettier than mine, so maybe go look at her post, too.

I will most definitely make Mac & Shews again. And again. And again. We steamed some broccoli with ours and added some hot sauce and it was amazing. James and I each had thirds. Thirds! I don't think either of us have ever done that. And even Mr. I-Refuse-To-Eat-Leftovers was looking forward to eating leftovers of this stuff. The sauce is creamy and tangy and full of wonderful flavors.

I've been told that the Bubbies sauerkraut has a slightly different flavor than other brands. I forget why. Maybe they don't add as much vinegar or something. So keep that in mind. However, I don't think you'd ever know sauerkraut was the secret ingredient in this if someone didn't tell you. James likes to try and guess what I put in things and he was totally stumped on this one. I was so gleeful when I told him it was cashews and sauerkraut. Seriously, try this stuff even if you never liked mac and cheese before.

One thing, though - this makes a huge pan worth. I think next time I'll half the recipe since it's just the two of us at home. If you're cooking for one or two, you might want to do that as well.

Once again proving my copy/paste powers are strong, here's the recipe direct from Isa's blog to mine to you.

Mac & Shews

Recipe notes:
~You really need to blend the beejeezus out of the cashews and sauerkraut. Although it won’t be completely creamy until after it’s cooked, it should still be relatively smooth, with absolutely no chunks, when it comes out of the food processor. I think a Vitamix type thing would work here, too, but I don’t have one myself.

~Make sure that the roux is cooked and toasty before streaming in the veggie broth. It really makes a difference in the final flavor, so get your roux a really beautiful gravy color.

~You can use any smallish pasta. I love to use chiocciole because it can hold plenty of sauce, and I just find the shape pleasing. Small shells or traditional macaroni are both great choices, too.

~To soak cashews, just place them in a bowl and submerge with water. Soak for at least an hour, preferably two, or up to overnight.

~And lastly, the type of veggie broth you use makes a huge difference. If I use my own homemade broth, I make sure it’s super assertive. If you use the type of broth that comes from a powder or concentrate, that is totally cool, just make it a bit stronger than you usually do.

1 lb small pasta like shells, macaroni or chiocciole

1 1/2 cups cashews, soaked (see recipe note)
4 cups broth, divided
4 tablespoons olive oil, divided
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 small onion, diced
2 cups sauerkraut

1/3 cup all purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon tumeric
Several dashes fresh black pepper
2 tablespoons nutritional yeast (optional)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

First boil salted water for the pasta. Cook pasta and drain. In the meantime, prepare the rest of the recipe.

Place the soaked cashews and the vegetable broth in a food processor and blend until smooth, scraping the sides of the food processor with a spatula occasionally to make sure you get everything. This could take 5 minutes.

In the meantime, preheat a large pan (preferably cast iron) over medium heat. Saute the onions and garlic and a pinch of salt in a tablespoon of the oil, until onions are softened.

Drain the sauerkraut in a sieve, pushing it into the sieve to remove as much moisture as possible. Add to the pan just to heat through, a minute or two.

Transfer sauerkraut mixture to the food processor with the cashew mixture. Once again, puree until relatively smooth. There will be some texture, just make sure it’s not chunky.

Wipe out the pan that you sauteed the onions in and preheat it over medium heat once again. Add 3 tablespoons of oil, along with the flour. It should become a gooey clump. You’re now making a roux! Add a little bit more olive oil if necessary. Toast the roux for about 15 minutes, until it smells toasty and turns a medium brown. Stir practically the whole time so that it cooks evenly.

Now stream in remaining 2 cups of broth, whisking constantly so that it doesn’t clump. Whisk until thick and smooth, about 2 minutes.

Stream in the cashew sauerkraut mixture, and whisk until well incorporated. Add the tumeric, black pepper, nutritional yeast if using, salt and fresh lemon juice. Heat through and stir occasionally, allowing the mixture to thicken.

Preheat oven to 350 F and lightly grease an 11 x 13 casserole with olive oil.

Add the cooked pasta back to the pasta pot and pour in the sauce. Taste for salt and pepper. Mix to coat, then transfer to the casserole dish. Cover casserole with tin foil and bake for 20 minutes. Remove tin foil and bake an additional 5 minutes. Serve hot!

Gluten-Free Apple Cinnamon Muffins

2011-03-15T17:41:00.000-07:00

I've been wanting to try adding in some more gluten-free options to my diet. I'm not Celiac, but gluten gets to me if I have too much of it. Not to mention that it's probably a healthy idea to have a wider variety of grains in your diet, anyway. I have a few friends who are strictly gluten-free as well so it's always nice to be able to make treats that they can enjoy, too.

I recently acquired the Babycakes cookbook and I've been excited to try so many of the recipes in there. I was kind of dismayed to find that most of the book isn't actually gluten-free, but uses spelt flour. Spelt is fine for me, but for people who have a gluten intolerance, it's not really an okay substitute most of the time. No matter, I'll just make sure to bake those things when it's just me and James eating them.

I did have to make a couple of trips to get all of the ingredients for these, but it was worth it. I didn't even know where would have Xanthan Gum. Thank goodness for Capers!

The first thing I made were these awesome Apple Cinnamon Muffins. I love the big chunks of apples that are in the muffin for one thing. What a cool idea to cook the apples a bit before adding to the batter. I was pleasantly surprised when I tried the warm muffins. They didn't taste like anything gluten-free that I'd had before. You know that typical dry, grainy texture that gluten-free stuff tends to have? These are not like that at all. I could tell they were made with regular wheat flour, but not in a bad way, you know?

James even really liked them. He grabbed some to bring for a quick breakfast at work a few times, too which was an indicator of how much he liked them. He doesn't usually think to bring food from home to work unless he really likes something. I did find that these are better warm. Once they were room temperature they were still good, but lacking a little something that warming them up definitely adds.

I can't wait to make more things from the Babycakes cookbook! If these muffins are any indication of how delicious the rest will be, oh man.

Oven Baked Onion Rings

2011-03-13T18:55:00.000-07:00

I've never really cared much for onion rings. For some reason in the past year or so I've started to want them. I'm generally disappointed with how greasy they are. I have this vision in my mind of what I wish the onion ring was and it never really quite lives up to my expectations. It's like I have some weird romantic chick flick in my head starring an onion ring or something.

When I first got my copy of Appetite for Reduction, I was immediately intrigued by the OMG Oven Baked Onion Rings recipe. Today I put on some Joan Jett and finally made some and let me tell you, they did not disappoint. Even James liked them and he doesn't generally like onion rings or anything with onions at all for that matter. Eat this with ketchup, barbeque sauce, hot sauce (we liked ours this way) or whatever.

These babies are really easy to make. I discovered that while Vidalia onions still made me tear up a bit, they aren't nearly as noxious as regular onions. So yay for that! This was actually a really fun recipe to make, too. Now I've just finished the bowl of onion rings that were in front of me as I was writing this so I guess I should get on with giving some practical information and whatever.

Here are some SJ tips if you decide to make these:

When you take the baking sheet out of the oven to flip the onion rings, give them another spray of oil. It'll keep them from being too dry.
Don't try and pick up that same baking sheet with your bare hands to put it back in the oven. (Trust me on this one. Ouch!)
Don't worry too much about getting a huge amount of bread crumbs on each onion ring. If you put too thick of a crust of bread crumbs, the coating will be a tad too dry. Not inedible or anything, though, so don't stress. Just if you're thinking everything is failed because there is just a thin layer, relax. They'll taste fine that way.
These are best eaten while hot. Let them sit for a minute or so after they come out of the oven just to firm up and then start loading them into your mouth like a champ.

Since Isa is awesome and posted this recipe on her blog, I'm going to repost it here for you guys. My copy/paste skills are out of this world.

OMG Oven Baked Onion Rings

2 vidalia onions (about a pound), or other sweet onion like Walla Walla

1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons all purpose flour
2 tablespoons corn starch
1 cup cold almond milk
1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar

1 cup whole wheat bread crumbs
1 teaspoon kosher salt
2 teaspoons olive oil

Cooking spray

Slice onions into 3/4 inch thick rings. Separate the rings and place in a bowl. Cover with a kitchen towel or something, to keep the onioniness out of your eyes.

Preheat oven to 450 F. Line a rimmed 12×18 baking sheet with parchment paper, spray with cooking spray and set aside.

Now you’ll need two bowls for batter and breading. If you’ve got large, wide cereal bowls that’ll do the trick. In one bowl, dump in the flour and cornstarch. Add about half of the almond milk and stir vigorously with a fork to dissolve. Add the rest of the almond milk and the apple cider vinegar, and stir to incorporate. Set aside.

In the other bowl, mix together the bread crumbs and salt. Drizzle in the oil and use your fingertips to mix it up well.

Assemble the onion rings:

Get a conveyor belt going. From left to right, have the onions, the flour mixture, the breadcrumbs mixture and lastly the baking sheet. Dip each onion slice into the the flour, letting the excess drip off. Transfer to the breadcrumbs bowl and use the other hand to sprinkle a handful of breadcrumbs over the onion, to coat completely. This may take a bit of practice. Carefully transfer each onion to a single layer on the baking sheet. Make sure you use one hand for the wet batter and the other for the dry batter, or you’ll end up with club hand.

Spray rings lightly with cooking spray and bake for 8 minutes. Flip, and bake another 6 minutes. Rings should be varying shades of brown and crisp. Taste one to check for doneness. Serve as soon as possible. With ketchup if you must.

Polenta Pumpkin Seed Bread

2011-03-09T15:18:00.000-08:00

I'm on this bread-baking kick now that I understand what to do with a starter. It's all kind of exciting. That is so dorky of me, I know. I actually got up early this past Sunday morning all excited to start baking bread. I'm out of control.

Look, you can see the little pieces of polenta in the bread!

I made olive bread the weekend before and it was quite delicious. I especially like the way it smelled. Adding the lemon zest was definitely a good move. Adding lemon zest to most things that you'd want to add it to kicks it up a notch, though. I think it also makes things seem fancier or something.

The Tartine Bread book has so many great variations on a simple loaf of bread. I want to explore some of the ones in the book before I start getting experimental. That's partially because I want to really get a handle on this kind of bread before I start tweaking it. Each time I notice little things I could have done differently to make the bread just a bit better.

Every time I open Tartine Bread, the book falls open to the Polenta Bread page. I would have never considered making bread with polenta in it. I figured the universe or Cthulu or whatever was trying to tell me something so that's the kind I made this time. Holy hell was that a good move. Polenta adds such a great texture and so many more nuances of flavor to the bread. I highly recommend trying it. You add some boiling water to your polenta in a 2:1 ratio and let it sit there and soak up the water before you add it to your dough. Just be a bit more patient than I am. I was so excited for bread that when the polenta hadn't quite soaked up all of the water, I didn't wait a bit longer like I should have and just dumped the whole pot into the dough figuring it would all work out in the end.

It did work out, but not as well as it could have. Now my dough is a bit too wet. That made my end loaf a bit heavy and denser than I would have liked. Granted, this was also probably because I used an older starter this time, too. I wanted to see if I used a starter that had been fed a few days before instead of the night before or morning of, if the bread would taste a bit more sour. It didn't. I think using a newer starter would have given the bread a bit more lift and resulted in a lighter loaf. It was still delicious, though. James and I have been really enjoying having a slice of bread with our meals or having some toasted for breakfast. I am most definitely going to be making polenta bread again. The flavor is so unique; I love it.

The one loaf had a funny ridge pattern on it from the towel that was in the bowl it was rising in.

The Best Biscuits In the World

2011-03-07T08:04:00.000-08:00

You guys. I made the best biscuits in the world. I mean it. I've never made biscuits like this before in my entire life. I think I've been given the key to biscuitry or something. I don't know, but these are damn awesome.

Here's what happened. I decided to go back and watch some old seasons of Good Eats. In season 1, Alton Brown does an episode on biscuits and even brings his grandma on the show! So awesome. Alton and Ma Mae taught me a thing or two about biscuits that day. Here is what I learned that made a HUGE difference in my biscuit making.

1. Use your fingers when you're adding the fats to the flour. Just make sure your hands are clean, right? It's not that messy, either, really.

2. Your dough should be pretty wet, actually.

3. Make sure your biscuits are touching when you put them on the baking sheet. I had always heard to give them room and space them evenly. I don't know where I picked that up, but it's wrong! Make like one of the middle biscuits is Justin Bieber and the rest are tween girls.

Oh, look, I just found this episode on YouTube. Go watch it and get some learnin.
The Dough Also Rises Part One
The Dough Also Rises Part Two

Now you have lots of new-found knowledge to make the fluffiest, most awesome biscuits in the history of ever. Now here's Alton Brown's recipe that I veganized that you can also use:

The Best Biscuits in the World

2 cups flour
4 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons Earth Balance
2 tablespoons non-hydrogenated shortening
1 cup non-dairy milk, chilled (I used almond milk)
1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar (even plain white vinegar is fine, though)

Preheat oven to 450 F.

Combine the non-dairy milk and the vinegar and set aside for 10-15 minutes. It's probably good to just put the mixture in the fridge to keep it cold while you do other stuff.

In a large mixing bowl, combine flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Using your fingertips, rub Earth Balance and shortening into dry ingredients until mixture looks like crumbs. (The faster the better, you don't want the fats to melt.) Make a well in the center and pour in the chilled non-dairy milk. Stir just until the dough comes together. The dough will be very sticky.

Turn dough onto floured surface, dust top with flour and gently fold dough over on itself 5 or 6 times. Press into a 1-inch thick round. Cut out biscuits with a 2-inch cutter, being sure to push straight down through the dough. Place biscuits on baking sheet so that they just touch. Reform scrap dough, working it as little as possible and continue cutting.

Bake until biscuits are tall and light gold on top, 15 to 20 minutes. After you take the biscuits out of the oven, you can brush them with some melted Earth Balance if you want them to give them a bit of extra buttery flavor.

Olive Bread

2011-03-04T08:08:00.000-08:00

A few months ago a friend gave me some starter. I'd tried to make a starter from scratch once and it was an epic failure. I pretty much pushed it to the back of my mind after that fiasco. Now I'm all about the bread baking! It took me a while to get the hang of how often to feed the starter and all that jazz. I even sort of almost killed it once but luckily I was able to bring it back to life. This stuff is resilient! Apparently this is a really old starter that originated in San Francisco decades ago. I don't know if that's true or that's just what he told me because I would get more excited about starter. Either way, I like believing it.

I wish I could eat this picture. I need more olive bread.

I made bread once a few months ago with this crazy convoluted recipe that took 3 days to make a loaf of sourdough. Yeah, I said 3 days. You pretty much had to be at home for all 3 days, too. It was such a pain in the butt that I didn't want to make bread anymore. I mean, really, who has that kind of time?! Then another friend of mine told me about Tartine Bread.

This book is greatness if you're wanting to start baking bread and aren't sure where to begin. Not only does it tell you how to create your own starter, but there are a myriad of recipes for bread. I haven't even started looking at the middle and end sections. I've just been focused on the Country Bread and variations. This is pretty much a basic bread made with starter. Here's what's cool about this particular book. There are a TON of really, really helpful photos for every single step of the way. The instructions are very detailed and so wonderful if you're unsure of what you're doing. This is probably the most instructive cookbook (without being confusing) I've ever seen.

The only caveat is that you need a scale. I'm heading out to buy one this week so I can make polenta bread this coming weekend. In the meantime I just googled how much flour and water were the weight it said to use. I had to guess at how much starter to use. Even though my bread came out alright, I know that my dough was much too wet. If I had weighed my ingredients it would have come out even better. Next time!

Waiting for my dough to rise.

So now I have starter and I have instructions. What's a girl to do? Obviously the answer was to make olive bread. If you don't live at my house you probably don't know how much James and I love olive bread. And really if you're not him or me or one of our cats you don't live at our house, so how could you know?! There is a local bakery in Vancouver that makes olive bread that we can get at the market just down from our apartment. We can devour a loaf of that stuff in no time flat. Some days we both just sit there wishing we were eating olive bread until finally one of us goes and gets some. That stuff is like crack. You can understand why that was my first inclination upon buying this new bread book.

Make olive bread I did! I chopped up a mixture of green and kalamata olives, threw in some lemon zest, and herbes de provence. Basically I followed the recipe for olive bread in the book. I wouldn't have considered adding the lemon zest on my own, but wow, it was a great addition. The bread came out so delicious. I can't wait to make it again. I forgot to take a photo of a cut piece of bread, but it had those awesome big air holes in it! I've never really had bread do that before so it was pretty exciting.

Morning light bathing my olive bread in awesomeness.

Making bread with starter is a whole new world for me. I'm excited to try different things to make the bread taste more sour and adding different things to the bread. Many moons ago when I worked in restaurants, one of my jobs at this one particular place was to make bread every day. I can make yeast bread without even thinking about it now. I just throw together flour, salt, yeast and water and eyeball it. That's what happens when you do it every day, I guess. I got really feisty and just started throwing random things into the bread. I remember tossing in some leftover chili once and making chili bread. hehe I'm looking forward to getting to that point with starter breads. It's going to be a fun adventure. My friend that suggested the Tartine Bread book bakes bread constantly. He and his wife have got the basic country loaf nailed. We're on the food bartering program now so I've gotten to take home some of their loaves before. Practice makes perfect, that's for sure.

I wonder what kind of bread I'll make next?

Raw Chocolate Orange Cupcakes

2011-03-02T14:03:00.000-08:00

I know right. Raw cupcakes. How awesome. I think the greatest thing about raw food is probably the desserts. You can eat something that tastes completely sinful yet is actually deceptively healthy. I see what you did there, raw food, and I like it. This kind of thing is perfect for where I am in life right now. I'm trying to be more conscious of what I'm eating. I'm making more of a concerted effort to add in fruits and vegetables instead of processed foods. I think I eat pretty well overall, but I think I can always do better. Raw desserts help me stay on track without eating a bunch of junk. It doesn't hurt that they're so full of good stuff!

A couple of recipes in Ani Raw Food Desserts were the inspiration for these awesome cupcakes. If you don't already have this book, I would recommend getting it or at the very least perusing it at the library. I posted about the Raspberry Ganache Fudge Cake before and really, if that's not enough to persuade you on its own, I don't know what else to say.

I wanted something fruity, but it being winter it's difficult to get many fresh fruits right now except for apples and oranges and bananas. I sort of combined two recipes and tweaked one of them to make what I wanted. I used the Chocolate Crunch Cupcake recipe for the base. I took the lemon pudding part from the Lemon Pudding Filled Coconut Cupcakes and used orange juice in place of lemon juice. Because there were organic blood oranges at the market, I decided to candy some orange slices to put on top of the cupcakes. So, okay, the candied orange slices aren't raw, but they're tasty and they go SO well with these cupcakes.

Basically you mix together the cupcake part and then smoosh it down into a cupcake pan, leaving little dips in the middle for the pudding. Add a few spoons of pudding on top of each one and your cupcakes will look like this:

This being the first time I made these, I think it was overall pretty successful. Next time I think I would add a bit of orange zest and maybe even some smashed orange pulp to the pudding. It wasn't very orangey even though I used fresh juice. The cupcake itself is awesome, though not extremely sweet. Personally, I like it like that, but if you like things super sweet, add a few more dates.

Now for some info about the candied orange slices. Take note of this. Candying orange slices or strips of peel or even lemon or grapefruit peel is ridiculously easy. It's also something that people usually find really impressive. You can even just candy orange peel strips and dip them in chocolate for a crazy awesome treat. I love those so much.

Here's what you do. Cut your fruit into whatever side you want. Get a pot and add to it equal parts of sugar and water. How much depends on how many pieces of citrus you're candying. I did two oranges, a big regular one and a small blood orange so I went ahead and did 3 cups sugar with 3 cups of water.

Turn the heat to medium and stir a bit until the sugar is totally dissolved. Be patient and let the sugar water heat up until it starts to simmer. Add your fruit, give it a gentle stir with a wooden spoon and turn the heat down to low. You want it to be just barely simmering. Leave it alone for about 45 minutes. Remove the pan from the heat. Line a baking sheet or a plate or something with some parchment paper and carefully arrange the fruit on the baking sheet to cool. You'll want to make sure none of it is touching too much or it might dry sticking together. After they've cooled for a bit, you can either dip them in chocolate, roll them in some superfine sugar or just use them as is.

Here's another cool thing. You've also just made some flavored sugar that's great for adding to iced teas and ice coffees and things like that. Strain the sugar water you used to cook the citrus in and put it in a mason jar or something like that and stick it in the fridge. Now you can pour in a bit whenever you need a bit of sweetness. This is also a really great simple syrup to use when making homemade lemonade.

Oatmeal, Pecan and Date Sticky Biscuits

2011-02-12T13:12:00.000-08:00

I woke up super early this morning. That kind of blows when it's a Saturday and I have nothing planned and can sleep in if I want. I started to get hungry way earlier than usual since I got up so early. I was craving tofu bennies and home fries but I don't have all of the ingredients to make that. Usually I can just send James to the store to pick up whatever I still need as I'm cooking the rest of it but seeing as how he was still soundly asleep that didn't happen. I know, I know. I could have carried my butt out to the market, too. I just didn't feel like it, especially since it was super early anyway. I don't actually think the market is open until 9am, anyway. So what's a gal to do? I needed one or two things that I don't have to make pretty much everything I was wanting. I decided to start digging through old recipes that I'd cut out of magazines or printed out from the internets and then I found inspiration! I didn't really want something sweet for breakfast. I'm more of a savory type, but I had everything I needed to make these.

Enter oatmeal, pecan and date sticky biscuits. This recipe is seriously cool in a lot of ways. For one thing, you can hide all kinds of good for you stuff in them and it still tastes sinful. Also, these are sort of like sticky buns, but using biscuit dough. I can't believe I've never thought of doing this. Making sticky buns or cinnamon rolls usually takes hours because of all of the dough rising. Don't get me wrong, it's usually totally worth the wait, but for those days when you're impatient or don't have the time, just use biscuit dough instead. What a fabulous idea! Also, everything I needed I had in the cabinet pretty much. I even threw in a few extra things I found.

This recipe is about half mine. It's based on one I found in the October 2008 issue of Bon Appetit. I veganized it and tweaked the ingredients a bit. I strongly urge you to have fun with this and do the same. (Except it's already veganized, I did that part for you.) You can really add anything to the filling along with the brown sugar. Just make sure you chop it up really well. Maybe add some chopped nuts or fresh berries or crystallized ginger or hell, chocolate chips. I might try making these again, but instead of making them sweet, add things like sundried tomatoes and kalamata olives in the middle with pesto and a vegan cream cheese topping instead of a sugary one. Yum! We'll see what I have in the fridge when that urge strikes me.

Straight from the oven before flipping over onto the plate.

These are super tasty and soft and fluffy and gooey and quite sweet. They're also really easy to make. The original recipe called for dark corn syrup in the topping, but I don't have any of that so I used some sweetcane syrup because I have a jar and need to use it up. That made the topping get hard like candy after a bit, though. I think you could probably just use agave nectar or maple syrup or something, though.

I ended up using a springform pan to cook these in. I didn't really think that through. My topping bubbled through the cracks and made a huge mess on the bottom of the oven, so don't do that. Looks like I'm going to be spending the afternoon scrubbing the oven. Just use a square or rectangular baking pan or even a dutch oven if you don't have a cake pan. You're not making these for the Food Network or something, so who cares.

Sticky, gooey, yumminess

Oatmeal, Pecan and Date Sticky Biscuits

1/2 cup (packed) dark brown sugar
1/4 cup (1/2 stick) Earth Balance, diced
1/4 cup agave nectar or other liquid sweetener
3/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups pecan halves

1/3 cup (packed) dark brown sugar
1/2 cup diced, pitted Medjool dates
1/3 cup chopped dried cranberries
3/4 teaspoon cinnamon

2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup oats (not instant or steel cut, the rolled oats)
2 Tablespoons sugar
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
3/4 teaspoons salt
6 Tablespoons (3/4 stick) chilled Earth Balance, diced
3/4 cup (or more) non-dairy milk (I used almond milk, but use whatever you like)
1 Tablespoon apple cider vinegar.

3 Tablespoons melted Earth Balance

Preheat oven to 375 F. Spray a 10-inch diameter cake pan (one with high sides, at least 2 inches) with cooking spray. (I use Spectrum spray canola oil.) Add the vinegar to the almond milk and give it a quick stir. Set aside to curdle.

In a saucepan, combine the 1/2 cup brown sugar, Earth Balance and agave nectar. Whick over medium heat until the sugar dissolves and the syrup is bubbling at the edges, about 2 minutes. Remove the pan from the heat and whisk in the vanilla. Spread the syrup evenly in bottom of your oiled pan. Arrange the pecans on top of that as evenly as you can.

Mix the 1/3 cup brown sugar, dates, cranberries and cinnamon in a small bowl until everything is combined. Set this aside while you make the dough.

In a mixing bowl, stir together the flour, oats, sugar, baking powder and salt until combined. Add the diced Earth Balance and with clean hands, smoosh it all together using your fingertips until a coarse meal forms. It's okay, really. Using your fingers will give you a better biscuit texture, trust me on this one. Add the almond milk mixture a little bit at a time, and mix using a fork until you've incorporated it all. Add more if the dough is still dry. You want a moderately sticky dough, so don't be afraid to use up to 1 cup of liquid. Once it's combined, make a little ball out of the dough (don't knead it, just get it into one pile for rolling.)

Flour the heck out of your countertop or some parchment paper. Knead the dough once or twice into the flour just so it's not too sticky to roll out. Roll the dough out into a rectangle, roughly about 16"x8". You won't be tested on this, so don't worry about being exact. Brush the dough with the melted Earth Balance all the way to the edges. Sprinkle the date and sugar mixture evenly over the dough, pressing it down lightly but firmly so you don't have a bunch of loose sugar hanging around. Starting at one of the long sides, start to roll up the dough like a jelly roll. Cut the dough into 8 equal pieces (you can even get 12 out of this if you want smaller pieces. Keep in mind the dough will almost double as it cooks.)

Place the dough, cut side down in the pan as evenly spaced as possible. It's totally fine if the dough is touching or if it isn't. Press each roll down a little bit to slightly flatten it. Brush some more melted Earth Balance on top or just give the tops a quick spray of oil.

Bake for about 35 minutes. Remove from the oven and let the pan sit for about 1 minute. Place a plate or platter over your pan. Using oven mitts, hold the pan and plate together and invert. Lift the pan off and scrape whatever syrup and pecans are left back onto the tops of the biscuits. Let them cool for at least 5-10 minutes before eating.

Saturday Vegan Brunch at Perch

2011-01-23T08:31:00.000-08:00

James and I went out for the most awesome brunch yesterday. Perch is doing vegan brunch on Saturdays from 10-2 now! It's super exciting. And this isn't just one vegan option mixed in with a bunch of eggs and meat brunch stuff, it's an all vegan menu. Some of the items are soy-free and gluten-free, too, which is pretty awesome. I found out about the Saturday brunch from Vegan Mischief.

blueberry-ginger pancakes

I've found tons of great vegan brunch stuff in Seattle, but Vancouver usually just has the same old tofu scramble made slightly differently at various places. It's funny because there are quite a lot of options for vegans in this city for lunch and dinner, but not so much for breakfast or brunch. It's kind of a bummer, but I'm glad that someone is finally doing something about that. I can't wait to go back and have brunch at Perch on a future Saturday. I wanted to try everything!

Yesterday was a perfect day to be out and about, too. It's been raining non-stop for the past few weeks here in Vancouver (as it tends to do in the winters here) but it was a gorgeous, warm, sunny morning. We sat right in the window and soaked up some sunshine as we drank our tea and ate our breakfast.

James went for the vegan bennies, which is no surprise because he loves those things. I've been making the Vegan Brunch version of the vegan benny at home every now and then, but these are a bit different. The sauce is rich and creamy and I think made with some kind of nut, which I think is so great. I love having sauces and dips and things from nuts. The tofu tasted like it was marinated a bit, too. James seemed to really like the taste of it. There were tomatoes and tofu on the english muffin under the tofu and sauce and a nice little bit of greens off to the side next to the potato cakes.

vegan bennies with greens and potato cakes

I went for the blueberry-ginger pancakes. These babies are not only vegan, but also gluten free. Let me tell you, you'd never know it. The pancakes were fluffy and full of flavor. There's freshly grated ginger in there, too, not just some powdered ginger. I love that! I haven't had pancakes in a restaurant in eons. I seriously can't even remember when the last time was. It was definitely in my pre-vegan days. So that was pretty exciting to have something I hadn't been able to order for so long. Tasty, too!

I had to get a side of some potato cakes with my pancakes because I have this thing about having potatoes for brunch. It's like some sort of rule or something. It's just not brunch without potatoes in some form or other! The potato cakes were yummy. They were made with grated potatoes and onions and probably a few other things and cooked up so the inside was nice and moist. They were full of flavor, I didn't even put hot sauce on them. Though, really, that's mostly because I forgot to ask for hot sauce. I really can't be stopped from putting hot sauce on breakfast potatoes. It's like an addiction or something.

Overall, I think the experience was a great one. We had a really nice meal and the prices were good. We'll be going back for sure. I like the atmosphere in Perch, as well. James says it has a bit of a Seattle vibe to it and I agree. If we lived closer, I'd definitely go there more often.

James was making faces for the camera. I think this is his tea drinker face. ha ha

Oh, I should mention that there are also vegan caesars for $6. We didn't have one, mostly because we didn't think about it until after we had paid the bill, but I think next time we will for sure.

Cajun Beanballs over Angel Hair Pasta

2011-01-21T13:36:00.000-08:00

I finally got my copy of Appetite for Reduction. After reading the entire thing, I'm even more excited to start cooking from it. This book reminds me so much of Vegan with a Vengeance. The recipes aren't complicated and everything requires mostly whole foods that are easy to find no matter where you might live. I have a feeling that I'll end up making just about everything in this one just like I did with VwaV.

I think my favorite thing about Appetite for Reduction is that Isa made not only awesome recipes, but recipes that I can easily put together after work without planning to eat dinner at 10pm. That rules. I like good food that comes together quickly. So yay for a healthy selection of quick to prepare stuff.

The first thing I made was the Cajun Beanballs. I love the beanballs from Veganomicon so much that they've gone into my regular rotation. I have some recipes that I make once a year or so and some that I make much more often. Beanballs have my heart. I've actually been craving them lately, too so it was an easy decision to try the black bean and tempeh cajun beanballs from this this cookbook.

These beanballs are baked instead of pan-fried, which right there puts a huge load of good for you into them. I love tempeh and any excuse to find new ways to prepare it is a win for me. They're so tasty and they hold together no problem. James says these are his new favorite beanball. He likes the other ones, too, but apparently these hit it out of the park.

I also really love the idea of dumping the zucchini into the boiling pasta to cook those two things together. A great idea and it saves from having to wash an extra pot. As a bonus, when you dump the pasta and zucchini into the colander, it all gets mixed together pretty evenly which is kind of cool. I had never considered combining steps like that before, but I love it! I also love the addition of veggies to what is usually just pasta, sauce and beanballs. Don't get me wrong, that's still awesome, but this is a great way to integrate some extra veggies.

So far I say way to go, Isa! I can't wait to make some more awesome stuff from this cookbook.

I apologize for the crappy photo, by the way. I took it with my phone and didn't do any color correcting.

Raw Chocolately Awesomeness

2010-12-29T09:41:00.000-08:00

Man, oh man, do I have some good news for all of you chocoholics and dessert lovers out there. There is an amazing chocolate cake that is not only vegan, it's actually - wait for it - good for you. For reals. Yeah, yeah, I know what you're thinking. Either I'm delusional from eating too much holiday Field Roast or this so-called cake is going to be crappy tasting or hard to make or something. NO! Rejoice, dessert lovers. This cake is full of awesome with a little bit of awesome spread on top to boot. I know, right!

One of my new year's resolutions last year was to try to incorporate more raw food into my diet. I really didn't end up eating raw nearly as much as I was originally hoping, but I have learned a bit more about it and made it much less scary to try. I realized that raw desserts are a really, really good place to start. I have a few raw food recipe books. (It's hard to call them cookbooks when you don't really "cook" raw stuff. hehe.) The most recent one that I purchased is Ani Phyo's Raw Food Desserts book.

You know how most raw food books are kind of irritating because they all assume we all own a high-speed blender like a Vita-Mix (I wish!) and we all have a dehydrator (I do have one of these, but most people don't.) and we all have a juicer (again with I wish!). Yeah. It's annoying because the average person who is new to raw food will think it's all super hard to make and you have to buy all of these mega-expensive appliances to make it. That's why this book is so great. I have one of Ani Phyo's other books and almost every recipe needs a Vita-Mix and my food processor doesn't really get things to the same consistency. This book, however, only uses one of those in one or two recipes. Most recipes you do need a food processor or blender to get things going and lots you only need your hands and a knife. Cool, huh?! I've made a few things out of here and all are super tasty. The Almond Frangipane Kream is a favorite (though I really dislike that she spells cream and milk the way she does.)

This is the first time I've made the Raspberry Ganache Fudge Cake and it certainly will not be the last. The photo just makes it look so yummy that I've been wanting to make it ever since I got this book. I thought this was a fitting dessert for a big holiday dinner, especially since most of us have been eating lots of cookies and cupcakes and chocolates and stuff for the last few weeks.

Don't be fooled by this being a raw cake. This bad boy is rich and sinful tasting and sooooo good. I've always been a bit skeptical about using avocado in desserts. I've heard so many people say they do it with good results, but to me that just sounds weird. I'm a convert, now. Don't be scared by the avocado in the frosting. Trust me on this, you won't taste it and it'll come out amazing. One note when making this: you really need to use raw walnuts. Roasted ones will not give the correct texture. They're not that hard to find, though, so don't worry. Okay, I've rambled on enough. Here's the recipe. Go make it. You can thank me later.

Raspberry Ganache Fudge Cake from Ani's Raw Food Desserts by Ani Phyo

3 cups raw walnuts, dry (It's best to soak the nuts if you have time. Overnight is best, but a few hours is okay, too. Just dry them off before you start making this.)
2/3 cup unsweetened cacao powder or carob powder
1/4 teaspoon sea salt
1 cup pitted Medjool dates

1/3 cup semi-soft pitted Medjool dates (just soak them in cold water for a little bit to soften if yours are hard)
1/4 cup agave syrup
1/2 cup ripe avocado flesh (from about 1 medium avocado)
1/3 cup cacao powder or carob powder

1/2 cup raspberries

To make the cake, combine the walnuts, cacao powder and salt in the food processor and pulse until coarsely mixed. Avoid over-processing. Add the dates and pulse until mixed well. Shape into 2 stackable cakes of desired shape and set aside. (I found it easiest to use my smallest springform pan to shape these. You might also want to use a cut circle of parchment paper in the bottom of whatever pan you're using so they're easier to get out.)

To make the frosting, combine the dates and agave syrup in the food processor and process until smooth. Add the avocado and process until smooth again. Add the cacao powder and process until smooth yet again.

To serve, frost the top of one of the cakes with half the frosting and top with the raspberries. Stack the second cake on top and frost the top and side. Serve immediately, or place in the refrigerator for a couple of hours to firm up.

The cake on its own will keep in the fridge for many weeks. The frosting will keep separately in the fridge for 1 week. The assembled cake with raspberries will keep in the fridge for up to 3 days.

Everyone's Favorite Edamame Dip

2010-12-23T18:43:00.000-08:00

Okay, for reals. This is everyone's favorite edamame dip. I'll bet you didn't even know that you had a favorite dip. Or maybe you didn't realize that your favorite is this one. I think the only way you didn't know is if you haven't tried it. I swear this stuff is like magic or something. Every single time I make it, I get umpteen people asking for the recipe. And umpteen is a lot of people!

I wish I could take the credit for this awesome recipe. I was watching Good Eats one day and it was the one about soy. Alton Brown made a bunch of neat stuff and did a few crazy antics and spouted off some interesting facts, as per usual. Then. He made this dip. I was intrigued and thought I might like to try it. Holy frijoles. This stuff is awesome. Even better - pretty much all you do is dump a bunch of stuff into the food processor to make it. Seriously. It can't really get any easier than this.

Just get some crackers or some fresh bresh or heck, even just some carrots and celery and dig in. It's delicious and nutritious. You really can't beat that.

So do yourself a favor and go make your new favorite dip. Then share it with some friends so they can try their new favorite dip. Oh, and be sure to have the recipe on hand. People are going to ask for it. Umpteen people!

There are two variations to this recipe. You can either use lime juice and cilantro or lemon juice and flat leaf parsley. I'm sure you could use many other variations as well, but those are the basic two. I like them both, but prefer the lime/cilantro version, personally. I might also be a little heavy handed with the chile sauce. :)

Edamame Dip

12 ounces shelled, cooked, and cooled edamame, about 2 cups
1/4 cup diced onion (I usually use a small onion or half of a larger one)
1/2 cup tightly packed fresh cilantro or parsley leaves
1 large garlic clove, sliced (A little extra garlic never hurt anyone. Add more if you're a garlic fan.)
1/4 cup freshly squeezed lime or lemon juice
1 tablespoon miso, any type
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 teaspoon red chili paste (I use Sambal Oelek)
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
5 tablespoons olive oil

Put everything except the oil in your food processor. Process for about 15 seconds or until things are smoothish. Add in the olive oil and process again for up to 30 seconds. Enjoy!

Chocolate Sugar Cookies

2010-12-23T10:32:00.000-08:00

The holidays are a great excuse to make cookies. I don't make cookies that often for some reason and whenever I do make them I wonder why it's so infrequent. They're perfect little snacks for when you want just a little something or if you need something portable. And there really is no shortage of types.

During the holidays, I typically make sugar cookies and gingerbread cookies every year. I have such fond memories of going to my grandmother's house at Christmas and having her cookies. They were amazing. She would make sugar cookies, chocolate chip cookies, ranger cookies (think oatmeal cookies with raisins and chocolate chips) and jello cookies.

Okay, I know. That last one sounds really weird. There were these cookies she'd made that had a package of lemon jello in the dough. It sounds strange, but they were always my favorite. I've been trying for a few years to make a vegan equivalent but so far, I haven't had any luck. These were the kind of cookies that you need a cookie press for and then you'd sprinkle colored sugar on them before putting them in the oven. My favorite were always the wreath-shaped ones. They tasted a bit like shortbread, but with a nice tang of sweet lemon flavor. One of these days I'll figure out the secret and make cruelty-free versions of jello cookies every December like my grandmother used to.

Until I can get that worked out, I'll settle with making some other yummies like these chocolate sugar cookies. I got the recipe from the VegNews newsletter. I found the dough to be really, really dry and I had to add a lot of extra liquid so that I could even roll out the dough. If you make these, do it by the recipe and then at the end if your dough is super dry and crumbly like mine was, go ahead and add a bit of extra liquid until things are sticking together a bit better. I'd also suggest adding some more sugar. These weren't sweet at all, so calling them sugar cookies is a bit of a stretch. You really need the chocolate on top. I made a chocolate ganache by melting some bittersweet chocolate with a little bit of rice milk and spooning on top of the cookies. I wouldn't make these without doing that. They seem to need a bit of an extra punch.

Chocolate Sugar Cookies (from the VegNews Magazine Newsletter)

1-1/2 cups non-hydrogenated margarine
1 cup unbleached cane sugar
10 tablespoons water
1 tablespoon vanilla
4-1/2 cups unbleached flour
3/4 cup tapioca flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup cocoa powder

In a large bowl, beat together the margarine, sugar, water, and vanilla until light and creamy. Add the remaining ingredients and stir well to form a smooth dough. Cover and chill for 1 hour or until firm. Divide the dough in half, work with one half at a time, and keep the remaining dough covered.

On a floured work surface, roll the dough out to desired thickness (1/8-inch for crispy cookies or 1/4-inch for soft), cut into shapes with a knife or cookie cutters, and carefully transfer the cookies with a spatula to ungreased cookie sheets. (I lined my cookie sheets with parchment paper so the cookies wouldn't stick.)

Bake at 350 degrees for 8 to 10 minutes or until lightly browned around the edges. Allow cookies to cool slightly before transferring to a rack to cool completely. Cover in melted chocolate or some kind of icing.