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stephthevegan
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| We had Banana Rabanada today from Vegan Brunch, and it was awesome! Instead of a plain french toast, the bread soaks in a banana custard and, once cooked, is dusted with cocoa powder and cinnamon instead of icing sugar.
Also made a strawberry sauce for it.
Sooooo good. | comments: Leave a comment   |
| I used to go to this diner near my work that was only open to serve the local steelworkers. It looked it, too. But they had this addictive sandwich I used to always get before I turned vegan. The Miss Universe. It was so junkfoodlicious, with fried egg and mayo and white bread and cheese slices...kind of like a BLT, but with egg instead of bacon. Served with fries...mmmmmmmm.
Today, using the magic of vegan technology, I recreated it. Using Vegenaise, vegan cheese slices, Earth Balance and Isa's marinated tofu from Tofu Benny from Vegan Bruch sliced nice and thin, I got to revel in that sandwich again.
I present to you, the infinitely better (animal-free) Ms. Universe (because whose business is it anyway?):
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| This month, I also made:
Pumpkin Pancakes and Buckwheat Pancakes from Vegan Brunch. I could not for the life of me get those pumpkin ones to cook right - the middle wouldn't cook, it was always gooey. But I doubled the recipe, I may have messed up the measurements. The buckwheat ones, which were excellent, are shown below:
I had Mexican night again and used up random vegetables from the CSA box. Spaghetti Squash Mexicana with Avocado & Fruit Salsa from the Veganomicon, and Chipotle Corn & Black Bean Stew from Vegan with a Vengence. They went well together. The squash recipe was good - it was similar to my standard quick tortilla filling, with squash. I maintain that some vegetables, like zucchini, are "filler" vegetables. Spaghetti squash is, too. The saviour of this recipe was the salsa - it made it sing. The stew I make regularly, it's great. The lime and cilantro added at the end DO make such a difference in the depth of flavour, but it's serviceable if I don't have them around.
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| My first post of the month talked about our Supper Club and the first menu.
The Pine Nut Ravioli and Basil Aioli dish was fantastic! It was from the Millenium Restaurant's The Artful Vegan. I eliminated the Tomato Ragout from the recipe, as some of my guests were not fans of tomato and the test run of the dish proved the ravioli could more than stand on its own. We ate all of it before I could take a picture. I'm lying, I didn't take pictures that night, the ones that follow are when we had the leftovers.
The White Bean-Filled Phyllo Purse over Soft Garlic Polenta with Portbello-Zinfandel Sauce was from the Artful Vegan as well. It was excellent, and a great dinner party dish because the sauce, purse filling, and veg can all be prepped ahead of time. The assembly goes nice and quick, especially if you're familiar with phyllo pastry. A True Vegan Entree. Here's a picture:
The Individual Smlove Pies are a variation of Isa & Terry's recipe from the Veganomicon. The first time I made this recipe, I served it after a five course New Year's Eve meal...and we had already been eating for four hours. I learned my lesson that night about portion sizes, and I thought the individual pies (made in muffin cups) were a nice touch to end the Supper Club meal.
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| I finally uploaded my pictures to flickr. This first post will be a bunch of recipes I've mentioned this month, but didn't have pictures for:
( Delicious Food Ahoy! ) | | comments: Leave a comment |
| Feeling a little under the weather. That usually means one thing - soup. Last night we had Hot and Sour Soup from The Garden of Vegan. It's a family favourite - everyone I've ever made this soup for loved it. It also helped me in my quest to learn to enjoy mushrooms. Every time we get a bag of beautiful shiitake mushrooms in the CSA share my mind turns to that recipe. And it's spicy enough to calm the sniffles. I like adding green onions, sometimes chopped greens, and regular peas when I don't have snow peas.
And in a not-so-coincidental overlap of ingredients, we also had a version of Chef At Home's Asian Salad Wraps. I substituted a 1/4 lb of firm tofu for the meat, and let it marinate in the dressing while I made the soup. I added julienned green onions, too, because I love them. They were delicious! I find when filling rice paper wrappers I need a hearty, tasty filling, otherwise it's too boring - I'd rather have just the salad with the ingredients and save myself the trouble (not the case here). I learned, too, that drying off the wrappers after they've been softened makes all the difference when handling them.
Aside: Chef At Home Michael Smith (who all the girls have a foodie crush on - I suppose in that way he's like a Canadian Jamie Oliver) has a new book out (which I'd better see under the Christmas tree...ahem!). It has the meaty dishes, but alongside good veg dishes, including Scrambled Tofu. Well done, Chef Smith, well done. If it's possible, you're integration of veg cuisine into "normal" cuisine makes me <3 you more. | | comments: 3 comments or Leave a comment |
| Today I'm making baby food. I have a big pile of vegetables and fruits from the organic CSA box, all the right kinds for making baby food - sweet enough for first foods and easy to cook and puree. Why pay for added chemicals and packaging?
Sweet potatos, carrots (a mix of orange, yellow and white), pears, apples, bananas, butternut squash, and pumpkin (why not?).
So easy, and so good to get the little guy started off right. Now, to convince everyone that cow's milk is truly unnecessary... | | comments: 1 comment or Leave a comment |
| Thursday we had a nice Italian meal. Bruschetta, garden salad and Tempeh Caccitore from Vegan Planet.
The bruschetta mix was diced onion and tomato with fresh basil, minced garlic, olive oil and red wine vinegar, piled on ciabatta toasts. Excellent.
The caccitore was not as good as I had hoped. I like my caccitore to be saucier and have a rounder flavour. It tasted like it hadn't simmered long enough. It is definitely a recipe that can be tweaked to suit, though. Saucy is easy to fix - I'm just the right amount myself :) | | comments: Leave a comment |
| Tonight we had leftover spinach dip with Penne Puttanesca and Creamy Watercress salad.
The Penne was from Vegan Planet, and perfect for using up the half can of crushed tomatoes in the fridge. Puttanesca is always a hit. The first time I heard of it was while watching Restaurant Makeover - Massimo Capra made spaghetti puttanesca. I always watch RM and see if there are vegan/adaptable recipes. Some of the best recipes we've had are my guessimations from the show. Certainly some of the most anticipated.
The salad was from an episode of The Main I saw today (scroll down a bit). It was a creamy, lemony, watercress and apple salad. I had some watercress from the salad mix from the CSA box and some leftover sour cream, so it felt like fate. It was delicious!
One more Food TV comment: they've been playing a lot of shows that have used beets in the last few days. Two Thumbs up. | | comments: Leave a comment |
| Mmmm...soft taco leftovers for dinner...
Tomorrow I'm going to a family potluck and bringing something I'll use any excuse to make: pumpernickle & spinach dip! I love this stuff. It's based on this recipe, but I use Vegenaise instead of tofu. Hollow out a pumpernickle and we're ready to rock and roll.
Incidently, my other secret weapons are Dreena Burton's Bad But Good Bars, and potato salad. These always win over the tentative eaters entering Steph's "crazy vegan land." My potato salad really just uses Vegenaise, but I use dijon mustard, vinegar, s&p, along with steamed potatos, onions, pickles, sometimes capers, & peas. This salad was a big hit at both my sister's rehersal dinner, and my son's baptism. No one was the wiser ;) | | comments: 1 comment or Leave a comment |
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