Omelette. Yeah.

I know vegan omelets seems like an impossible concoction , but I think this has turned out really great. There is something comforting about eating food so similar to the things your mother has made you, or you have gotten at random diners years before. Not that I find eggs particularly comforting, but a nice fluffy, tofu and veggie omelet mimics its counterpart in a nice way. For this I basically followed the recipe over on FatFreeVegan and just added a 1/4 tsp of xanthum gum for an extra eggy texture. I also doused my omelet with black pepper.

In the pan, bacon bits, and sauteed spinach

On the plate, roasted red pepper hollandaise.


What you don't see is that I toasted an english muffin, buttered it, and made tofu benedictine.
( eggs Benedict + eggs Florentine = eggs benedictine)

For the hollandiase i just followed a recipe with some minor adjustments, like added roasted red peppers, tomatoes, and more butter, all vegan of course.

pizza YO!

So this week I have been a little busy but i was able to put together a few meals. The winter weather has been wreaking havoc on my bicycle co-op trips, so the produce has been a bit limited. Whats a midwesterner to do?



Beet, apple, walnut salad

Inspired by Russia and the Cold I decided to make a batch of this pink and purple madness.

Ingredients
2 smallish beets, raw, grated or sliced into matchsticks
1 large carrot made into strips with a peeler
1 fuji apple, matchsticked
1/2 cup walnuts toasted and spiced
lemon juice
1/4 cup vegan mayonnaise
salt and pepper, to taste

mix it all together and walla. Marvel at the colors of your food.


Pizza dough Recipe ( prepare this the night before or in the morning)
Use whole wheat flour and agave nectar in this recipe.
I topped the pizza crust with some basic marinara, FYH cheese and sauteed spinach. SO good.

No-work (knead) bread

So i have been using the ever so famous no-knead bread recipe from the NY times . It has worked out amazingly well, even when I use all whole wheat flour. The fermentation time of 24 hours gives the bread an amazing flavor. I used wheat bran on the outside of the loaf and kind of free form shaped it into a cast iron skillet before baking. I use two loaf pans filled with boiling water to create a steamy environment in the oven, and the bread comes out with the most amazing crust. I can't believe how easy it is!



Check out that crust!!!

Food for a Freezing Night

Today was a lazy day spent reading and watching TV because it was 8 degrees outside! I took advantage of this time at home and made some seitan.

2 cups gluten flour

1 cup no-chicken broth

tablespoons of onion and garlic powder

tablespoon salt

2 tablespoons soy sauce

Combine all dry ingredients. Add broth to make a dough. Form into a log and cut into large chunks. Boil 4 cups water and add the soy sauce. Put the chunks of seitan in their bath. Simmer on low for about 30-45 mins until the seitan expands and becomes firm. I keep my seitan in the fridge in some of the broth.

Mashed Potatoes, Sauteed Broccoli with Lemon-Dill Seitan

and Mashed Sweet Potatoes, Sauteed Broccoli and BBQ Seitan

1 head broccoli

3 red potatoes

1 sweet potato

2 chunks seitan

fav. BBQ sauce

juice of 1 lemon

smilk

dill, salt, pepper

I made 2 different dishes because my lady loves red potatoes and I love sweet potatoes. You could put any kind of sauce you like on the seitan and I just chose our faves. Dice potatoes and boil in salted water until fork-tender. Mash with a tablespoon of butter and a tablespoon of smilk. Steam broccoli. Slice seitan thinly and cook in pan with a little bit of olive oil. Season seitan with salt and pepper. Sprinkle with lemon juice and dill when it had browned on both sides. Do again with more seitan but add BBQ sauce at the end. I need ranch with BBQ seitan, I mixed 1 part sour cream and 1 part mayo, added lemon juice, dill, onion powder, garlic powder, salt, and pepper to taste. To serve I put the potatoes on the bottom and topped with the broccoli and seitan and added extra sauce if needed.

My girlfriend also made apple pie today!

We used the recipe from The Joy of Vegan Baking but just used whole wheat flour and agave instead of the flour and sugar.

LonG tiMe nO UpdAtE

So again it has been a long time since I have updated the blog but here is a crazy amount of photos of food I have cooked over the past few months.

Brown Rice Sushi

1 cup brown rice, 1 avocado, 2 green onions, 1 cucumber, 1 carrot, package of baked tofu or any fillings that interest you

Bowl 1 cup brown rice. Make vinegar - agave - salt mixture (tablespoon of apple cider vingear, tablespoon of agave, teaspoon salt.) After the rice is done cooking, about 40 minutes, let rice cool for at least 20 minutes. Then add mixture and slice it through the rice to evenly coat each grain. Prep veggies, I used a mandolin, but you could also slice things however you desire. Then wave the nori over an open flame until it turns bright green. Lay out on sushi mat and wet your hands. Grab some rice and make a thin layer leaving a little strip of just nori at the end. Then put your fillings in the middle and roll it up! My first roll was not a success. But by the second one I had got the hang of it.

Shredded Carrot Jesus ( or my friend Mickey)

Funfetti!!! ( I am actually fist-pumping right now)

My girlfriend made these cupcakes for a vegan potluck our friends were having. She is a cupcake freak, her favorite book is Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World, honestly, the pages are falling out. So you can buy this excellent book and use the plain cupcake recipe and add sprinkles to the batter. We made frosting using butter, powdered sugar, vanilla, and soymilk. Basically, just use a handheld mixer to cream room temperature butter then add a little vanilla. Put in the powdered sugar slowly until you get the desired thickness. I usually just use the smilk if it gets too thick.

Mock Duck Confit, Napa Cabbage, Oyster Mushrooms, Creamed Cauliflower Puree

mock duck seitan (1 can, found at asian grocers)
2 cups cabbage

1 package oyster mushrooms

1/2 head cauliflower

Heat 3 tablespoons olive oil in pan, add drained and chopped mock duck. Cook over low heat for 5-10 minutes, until browned. Take mock duck out of pan. Add 1/2 an onion chopped finely, 2 cups cabbage, 3 cloves of minced garlic. Cook until cabbage is translucent. Meanwhile, steam 1/2 head of cauliflower, until very tender, then break up and put in blender with salt and pepper to taste and 2 tablespoons smilk to get the puree started. Puree should be thick though in the end. Then crisp the mushrooms in a pan over high heat with lots of oil. To assemble, put puree on the bottom, then mock duck and cabbage, and top with crisp mushrooms. Our cat Oliver really wanted a bite of this meal.

Whole Wheat Soft Pretzels!!!!

3 cups whole wheat flour (more if needed)

1 package fast rise yeast

1 teaspoon salt

1 1/3 cup water

3 tablespoons vegetable oil

1 tablespoon agave

Add yeast to the warm water. Let sit for 10 minutes until bubbly. Add the rest of the ingredients, mix until combined. Put on floured surface and knead for 8 minutes. Then put into ball and into a bowl covered with a wet towel. Let sit in a warm place for a couple hours until it doubles in volume. Then punch down the dough and let it rise again for 30 minutes. Then you can cut it up and make the pretzels! (Or instead of making this dough, you can buy pizza dough and let it rise. I sometimes buy Trader Joe's dough if I am feeling lazy.) After you have shaped the pretzels, to get the brown crispy outside you need to put then in a baking soda water bath. To make this, you add a couple tablespoons to 6 cups of boiling water. Put the pretzels in this bath a few at a time, boil them for 1-2 mins, they should get puffy and darker brown. The put them on an oiled baking sheet and bake for 450 for 10-12 minutes.

Kale and Potato Enchiladas with FYH cheddar

My girlfriend made this for dinner one night, it is from Veganomicon.

Crusted Tofu and Roasted Cauliflower "Steaks" with Shiitake "Bacon"

topped with Cauliflower Puree and Cashew Paprika Sauce

1 head cauliflower

1 package extra firm tofu, drained and pressed

3 tablespoons nooch

2 tablespoons smilk

1 small package shiitake mushrooms

1/2 cup raw cashews

1 roasted red pepper

1 tablespoon paprika

1/4 cup water

3 tablespoons soy sauce

salt and pepper

Cut head of cauliflower in half. Steam until tender. Remove one half from steamer and cut into "steaks" (large flat pieces). Leave other in steamer to cook until extremely tender, probably another 5-10 minutes. Brown cauliflower pieces in pan with some oil, season with salt and pepper. Meanwhile, set oven to 425ish, coat shiitake slices with a little bit of oil, salt and pepper. Put in oven until crispy and bacon-like, about 15 minutes. Brush or dip tofu with soy sauce, then dip in nooch, put in pan and sear on both sides. For the sauce, puree the cashews, red bell pepper, paprika, water, and salt to taste in the blender. Put this aside. Then put the rest of the cauliflower into the blender with the smilk, salt, and pepper. This should come out thick. Assemble with cauliflower puree on bottom, then put on "steaks" and tofu, top with "bacon" and cashew sauce.

Seared Seitan Cutlets, Braised Napa, Shiitake "Bacon"

Asparagus with hollandaise

Cut seitan into thin pieces, sear on both sides in pan. Meanwhile, cook napa cabbage in another pan. Make shiitake "bacon" like in the previous recipe. Boil asparagus for 2 minutes. To make the sauce use 1/2 package silken tofu, a couple tablespoons lemon juice, 1 tablespoon nooch, salt, dash of cayenne pepper, dash of tumeric, and a tablespoon of butter. Put in blender until smooth.

Pink SnowBall CAKE !!!!!

I made this for my girlfriend's birthday in the summer. She gave up processed sugars so I had to find a recipe online. I used a maple syrup chocolate cake recipe. For the frosting I used Ricemellow, agave nectar and earth balance. I made pink coconut by mixing it with cherry juice concentrate, just a little to make it light pink and not give it a cherry flavor.

Tofu Scallops from the Hezbollah Tofu website. ( I want to bathe in that sauce)

http://hezbollahtofu.blogspot.com/

Wilted Spinach Salad with Roasted Chickpeas and Tomatoes, Quick Fried Mushrooms and Fresh Mache with an Avocado Cream

Wilt spinach in a pan. Put chickpeas in another pan with tomatoes, salt and pepper. Roast in a 425 degree oven for 20 minutes. Fry mushrooms in a pan with lots of oil until crispy. Make avocado cream by pureeing avocados in the food processor with salt.