18 Dec
For dinner tonight we had the Holiday Tart from VegNew. I had to make my own crust, because you cannot buy pre-made vegan crust in Woodstock. I also left out the cranberries, because that does not sound delicious. I think it would be better with a reduced-fat crust. Maybe Fat Free Vegan’s rice crust, because this is very good, but the flaky crust has so many fat and calories. I guess as a holiday treat this would be worth it, but for a Sunday dinner it was a bit too much.
13 Dec
We had tacos on Monday. This was super easy: 1 package of Trader Joe’s Beefless Ground Beef, taco seasoning (make sure there is no milk hidden in the ingredients), jar of salsa, box of taco shells, shredded lettuce and guacamole. Sauteed green pepper mixed into a can of Amy’s refried black beans. It was good. I loved having tacos as a kid and the flavoring and texture reminded me of the beef tacos I ate way back in the day. I’ll have to pick up some more beefless ground beef the next time I’m as Trader Joe’s because this earned an H’s favorite award.
I saw this recipe on Twitter this morning, Tofu & Miso Roasted Squash over soba noodles, and had almost all the ingredients at home. I used butternut squash instead of pumpkin and I think it worked okay. Maybe a little sweeter than the pumpkin would have been? The miso glaze and broth are amazing; H, in particular, liked the broth and once again called it his favorite. I’m looking forward to leftovers tomorrow.
27 Nov
The only turkey that was part of my 100% vegan Thanksgiving was Antoinette , who I adopted at Farm Sanctuary.
Teese Ball with crackers
Spinach Artichoke Dip with crackers, chips and veggies
Roasted Butternut Squash with Apple Cider Vinaigrette
Mushroom, Lentil, and Wild Rice Timbales with Mushroom Gravy
Polenta, Sausage, and Mushroom Stuffing
Agave-Mustard Green Beans
Sweet Potato Casserole with Sweet & Sara Cinnamon-Pecan Marshmallows
Apple Crisp with Caramel-Cinnamon Ice Cream
Truffles
Barnie’s White Christmas Coffee
We worked up an appetite at the 5K and dinner would take a while, so we filled up on a vegan cheese ball made with Teese. So delicious!
The spinach-artichoke dip tasted healthier than your typical mayo-filled restaurant dip, but it was flavorful. The lemon and the arugula are a nice touch. I did the bean version and added a can of artichoke hearts. Super easy.
I messed up the cocktails by adding 6 ounces of pomegranate liqueur when I should have been adding 6 ounces of apple cider. I threw in more cider and bourbon, so in the end it still tasted good, just a tad more pomegranate-y than the original. It’s a very pretty cocktail.
My mom made this salad. The butternut squash was perfectly roasted and the warm cider vinaigrette was a nice touch. The recipe calls for parmesan cheese, but that is not needed at all.
I made a couple things from my new cookbook, Vegan Holiday Kitchen. The polenta, sausage and mushroom stuffing includes a shortcut by using pre-packaged polenta, but I couldn’t find that at Whole Foods or Jewel (I didn’t look that hard at Whole Foods, because I knew they sold it at Jewel). Jewel was sold out until this weekend, but it was a sun-dried tomato version and I’m not sure that would have worked. Anyway, I had to make my own and I used this recipe, subbing Earth Balance. I should have halved it though, because I ended up throwing a lot of polenta away. It’s a good, and very easy, recipe.
My sister made her favorite Thanksgiving dish, sweet potato casserole. I always avoided this dish, even before I was vegan, because it was too sweet for me. My sister did not use all the sugar my grandmother does. I still didn’t eat more than a bite, but it was the best sweet potato casserole I’ve had. Better than what I made last year. The Sweet & Sara cinnamon pecan marshmallows were our modern twist to the classic recipe.
Mushroom gravy: easy and versatile – could go over the stuffing or the timbales.
Instead of green bean casserole, we had agave-mustard green beans. Nava stresses the importance of keeping the beans bright green, but I got a little distracted by the martinis. They were still good.
My only problem with the timbales was using a little too much non-stick spray in the ramekins. I was worried about the dish getting stuck in the ramekin (hence the overspraying), but it came out easily. It tasted great and the mushroom on the top was cute.
Dessert, the best part of any meal. I made a chocolate swirl version of Peta’s pumpkin cheesecake, but I used the graham cracker crust from Vegan Pie in the Sky. Honestly, I think I like a store-bought version better. The crust was too buttery and it competed with the cheesecake.
I also made truffles from the candy article in the most recent VegNews. It was a coconut truffle, but I made half without coconut, because my sister and I do not like coconut shavings.
And finally, apple crisp, a Thanksgiving tradition. I did a test run of this last weekend after a trail run at Veterans Acres and it went fast. It’s from Vegan Pie in the Sky. It went perfectly with the caramel-cinnamon ice cream from Bittersweet.
12 Nov
I’ve had this cookbook for a while, but this is the first time I used it. For this week’s Alabama game versus Mississippi State, we had jambalaya, fried “chicken” tofu, and greens. Except for the greens, it was really good. And I think the greens were fairly authentic, because they were overcooked and slimy.
For the jambalaya, I used the chicken seitan from Fat Free Vegan, which is probably the best seitan I’ve ever had! It’s my new favorite recipe.
29 Sep
The low-fat guacamole was surprisingly good, but for some reason it was brown. The lima beans, green beans and avocado were all green when I put them in the food processor, but kind of turned brown after being blended. H thought it was hummus. So it’s a good dip – a decent substitute if you are watching what you eat (and it is better than guaca-edamame), but it is definitely not the real thing.
27 Sep
This is confusing. So I saw this meal on Fat Free Vegan’s Facebook last week and it sounded delicious. I decided that if I could find mint at the farmers market on Saturday, I would make it, because I had everything else. I did snag the second to last bag of mint at the farmers market, but I read the recipe wrong and thought I didn’t have enough red lentils. I used 1/2 cup of red and a 1/2 cup of black, when really the recipe called for 1/2 cup of red. Regardless, this tastes amazing, but the black lentils made everything gray, so these weren’t as pretty as Susan and the blog, Albion Cooks, that Susan used to make the recipe. The shredded coconut I had was sweetened (also, I don’t like shredded coconut). Instead, I googled “coconut mint sauce” and found this amazing recipe.
Spicy Coconut-Mint Sauce:
In a blender, combine the coconut milk, mint leaves, ginger, garlic, lime juice, jalapeño and cilantro and puree until smooth. Season the sauce with salt and pepper if you’d like.
After I made the recipe, I read Susan’s blog post and she also didn’t have the ingredients and made a few adaptations. My adaptation of her adaption was closer to the original recipe. You might want to triple check the ingredient list before you try this one. I do strongly recommend it though. It’s a super easy recipe, especially if you use a rice cooker, and the flavor combination (cumin, red pepper flakes, mint and jalapeño) is phenomenal.
15 Sep
By Melissa Camacho
Use Kathy’s Vegan lemon curd recipe
Directions:
For the basil sugar, I did not understand her directions (dry in a off oven for 20-40 minutes? How is an off oven different than a counter top and how does sugar dry in an off oven?), so I just mixed basil and sugar together and rolled the fritters around in the mixture.
The basil and lemon flavor combination is actually quite good. The lemon curd is delicious! I need to make more of it with lemon poppy seed muffins.
Last night’s show was amazing! What kid hasn’t wanted to be in Willy Wonka’s factory where everything is made of candy. Plus Charlie Bucket (who got out of the chocolate business to become a veterinarian), Veruca Salt, Mike Teevee and Violet Beauregarde were there! No Augustus Gloop (maybe they were afraid he would eat everything before the judges got it).
There were some very imaginative ideas (chocolate waterfall, edible wallpaper) and some not so good ones (giant edible-ish gummy bears). Craig finally went home, as did Melissa (your beignets are good, but I guess your doughnuts are not). Chris was pissed his chocolate waterfall didn’t even get him in the top (but besides some creative engineering, he just made chocolate milk). Katzie won with a beehive and a carrot patch. They were very cute and apparently tasted great, too.
It’s been a while since I made something from Fat Free Vegan. I found this recipe while looking for something to do with seitan that expired on 9/14 and the eggplants I bought at the farmers market last weekend. Susan’s recipe for seitan looks good, so I’ll have to try that the next time I make this. Not surprisingly, Jewel does not sell pomegranate molasses, so I made my own with this recipe.
1 Sep
I found this recipe for pizza on Sunshine and Smile (her pictures are great!) and thought it was an absolutely brilliant idea. I was looking for a pizza recipe to use the pizza dough I bought at Trader Joe’s, so I didn’t follow the crust recipe. The eggplant takes a while to roast, but other than that it is a pretty easy recipe (especially with store bought crust!). The only adjustments I made were using Cheddar Daiya and parsley because Jewel was out of cilantro.
8 Aug
Tonight on Martha Stewart Monday: Grilled Vegetable & Tofu “Lasagna” with Pesto. The tomatoes, zucchini and squash came from the Woodstock Farmers Market.
This was good, but there is a lot of olive oil in this recipe. I did not use as much as she suggests and it was plenty flavorful and nothing stuck to my stovetop grill. I also made an arugula pesto because Jewel was out of basil. If you have a real grill, this is a great summer night meal. Grilling inside makes it really hot and smokey. The smoke alarms went off and we turned on all the fans in house, but it was worth it.
For dessert we had this amazing strawberry daiquiri sorbet from Vegan Dad. I’m usually not one to get excited over sorbet, but this stuff is delicious!
16 Jun
I bought some garlic and scallion scapes at the farmers market last week. (The farmer was surprised I knew what they were. Sad.) I made a White Bean and Garlic Scapes Dip from Ciao Chow Linda, which is super easy and tasty.
I had it with pita bread for breakfast and in a wrap for dinner (H is still eating leftovers from his extravagant meal on Monday).
Tonight I made naturally gluten-free peanut butter cookies from One Green Planet, my new favorite blog. I’m always looking for great recipes for gluten-free baked goods for H to bring into the office. My gluten-free cupcakes aren’t quite there yet, but these are fabulous. Just 5 ingredients, so it’s easy to whip together. And who knew you could make cookies without flour?
