Party Time Vegan Cupcakes

YOU GUYS. These cupcakes are so, so good. I used this cupcake recipe and this frosting recipe. (Both from the Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World cookbook.) And I am never going back to buying store-bought frosting. And I am never going to stop licking frosting off of spoons. I brought these to a party and everyone got super blissful expressions on their faces as they ate them. I know because I stood in the corner behind the food table and creepily spied on people, okay?

Cupcake Ingredients:

• 1 cup soy milk
• 1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar (I just used white vinegar)
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1/3 cup canola oil
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/2 teaspoon almond extract, chocolate extract, or more vanilla extract (I used almond extract and it really did add a nice hint of almondy flavor. Definitely worth it.)
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/3 cup cocoa powder, Dutch-processed or regular
• 3/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt

 First off, add the vinegar to the soymilk in a bowl until it curdles. I KNOW, this is gross. Don't even worry about it.

I too was skeptical of a recipe that starts out with curdled soy milk, but seriously, these cupcakes are amazing.

Then stir in the sugar, oil, and assorted extracts. Meanwhile sift together the dry ingredients in another bowl and then add them to the wet ingredients and stir until all the big lumps are gone. Pour the delicious batter into 12 cupcake cups and bake for 18-20 minutes. Lick some batter off your finger.


Frosting ingredients:

• 1/2 cup nonhydrogenated shortening (This is the first time I've ever bought shortening! It made awesome frosting so that's cool)
• 1/2 cup nonhydrogenated margarine
• 3 1/2 cups powdered sugar
• 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1/4 cup plain soy milk or soy creamer
• Optional: some crushed-up cookies to make cookies n cream frosting! I used the Meijer store brand of chocolate Teddy Grahams. They are Dinosaur Grahams which is obviously way better.

 Cream together the shortening and the margarine until they're blended. Then add the powdered sugar and beat it for 3 minutes. Add the vanilla and soy milk and keep beating for 7 minutes. (Says the recipe. I gave up earlier because I don't have a mixer and my arm hurt.) Add crushed cookies at the end if you want. And you DO.

Mmm, frosting.

Cookies n cream frosting! This is like 30 dino grahams mashed up in here.

Then after the cupcakes cool, frost them! The frosting recipe makes enough for probably 50 cupcakes. So if you don't make that many cupcakes, you'll have plenty of delicious frosting, which you can put on dino grahams, pretzels, or fingers.

The worst part about this recipe is that it only makes 12 :(

Dessert & a movie: The Social Network

For The Social Network (which I liked, by the way, although I don't think it quite lived up to all the Best Picture of the Century hype), we went with a fancy college food theme. We had a salad and a delicious homemade pizza, which I unfortunately didn't take pictures of. And for dessert, I made Vegan Milanos from the Post-Punk Kitchen! I was a little afraid they would be above my skill level, but they turned out pretty well. If I do say so myself, they were a hit. Not as big of a hit as Facebook, of course, but if I had a bigger kitchen 500 million people might want to eat these cookies.

Ingredients:

• 1/3 cup rice or soy milk (I used soy)
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup canola oil
• 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
• Scant 1 teaspoon finely grated orange zest (I didn't use this but I bet it would make the cookies even awesomer)
• 2 cups flour
• 2 tablespoons cornstarch
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 6 ounces bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, chopped (or use chocolate chips)

1. Preheat the oven to 350 F and grease two cookie sheets.
2. Mix the sugar, oil, milk, vanilla, and zest.
3. Add half of the flour, along with the cornstarch, baking powder and salt and mix well.
4. Add the remaining flour and mix until you have a soft, pliable dough.
5. Set aside a little bowl of flour and dust your hands before making every cookie!
6. Take a small spoonful of dough and roll it into a log in your hands. Then squish it flat until it's like, the shape of a Milano.
7. Keep making Milanos until you use all the dough, then bake them for 10-ish minutes.

8. Meanwhile, melt the chocolate. I use a makeshift double-boiler of a small pot inside a slightly larger pot of boiling water. If you don't melt chocolate often, let me stress... stir the chocolate like there is no tomorrow or it will burn and be horrible! Also don't let any water splash in there or it will also be horrible.

9. OK, so the recipe advised you to dip each cookie facedown in the chocolate and then push them together to make a sandwich, but I was afraid I'd drop the cookies or something. So I just dropped about a spoonful of chocolate on a cookie and then squished another one on top of it.

10. Put them on a tray in the fridge for an hour or so. Then let them get back to room temperature before serving them.
11. Hurrah!

Vegan Garlic Lentil Thing

A friend of mine raved about this Salmon with Lentils recipe from Ina Garten, so I decided to make it. Without the salmon. And leaving out ingredients I didn't happen to have lying around.

• 1⁄2 pound green lentils (it called for French lentils, but I am a patriot)
• Olive oil
• 1 yellow onion
• 1 tsp thyme (it called for fresh, but I used dried)
• 1 tsp minced garlic
•  4 chopped carrots (it called for carrots and celery but I didn't have celery, so I just used extra carrots)
• 1 1/2 cups vegetable broth
• 2 Tbsp tomato paste
• 2 Tbsp balsamic vinegar (Ina specifically called for "good red wine vinegar," but I didn't have any red wine vinegar. Also, I'm not sure if my balsamic vinegar is good. It's probably just "average.")

This was pretty cheap vinegar, but it does appear to have survived a volcanic eruption.

 Anyway. First, soak the lentils in boiling water for 15 minutes.

Meanwhile, start cooking the onion with the oil, thyme, and salt & pepper until the onion turns clear. Then throw in the garlic for 2 more minutes.

Then drain the lentils and add them to the pan. Then add everything else except the vinegar and simmer for 20 minutes.

Finally, add the vinegar and take it off the heat.

I ate this over brown rice, but if you are interested in serving it over salmon, you can consult Ina Garten.

I find that I don't really have the photography skills to make lentils look appealing, but this was easy to make and really good! The vinegar gives it a really good flavor kick.

Dinner & a movie: The Birds

Another exciting dinner and a movie night! With The Birds. And what do birds eat? Human flesh? NO. Sunflower seeds.


So I made this awesome sunflower seed spread and pita chips!

I adapted it from this recipe which I found from a Google search for "sunflower seed recipes." It was SUPER DELICIOUS and the hardest part was cleaning out the blender afterward.

Ingredients:

• 2 cups sunflower seeds
• 1/2 cup tahini
• 1/4 cup lemon juice
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 2 Tbsp soy sauce
• 1/2 cup water

I made it with raw sunflower seeds from the local co-op, but some of the reviewers on AllRecipes said they used salted & roasted ones. Also, following the advice of the AllRecipes reviewers, I dropped the onion and celery from the originally posted recipe.

1) Toast the seeds in a frying pan on medium heat for 8-10 minutes, stirring constantly until the seeds turn they brown.
2) Mix the seeds with the tahini in a bowl. Then, spread the seeds out on a baking sheet and let them cool to room temperature.

3) Meanwhile mix the garlic and lemon juice and set it aside.
4) After the seeds are cooled, put everything in the blender or food processor and blend it!!

Seriously! So delicious! It's kind of like hummus, but nutty and savory-er.

Also by the way, last year I learned how easy it is to make pita chips! Did you know how easy it is to make pita chips? All you do is cut the pitas into triangles, spritz a baking sheet with olive oil and then spritz the tops of the pitas with olive oil, and bake at 400 for 10 minutes. Sometimes I put garlic salt on them, but I just did plain ones to go with the sunflower seed spread.

vegan corn chowder

Here's how good this soup is: I made it yesterday, ate it for dinner, put some leftovers in the fridge, and froze the rest. I ate the fridge leftovers for lunch and thawed the freezer soup to eat tonight. MMMM.

I got the recipe from Food.com.

Also, I used my brand new Pampered Chef knife and it was AMAZING. I'd never used a good knife before and cutting with it made me feel like I had super chef powers.

Anyway. Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 teaspoons olive oil
• 1/2 yellow onion, diced (I used a whole one)
• 1/2 red bell pepper, diced (I used a whole one)
• 2 small carrots, diced
• 1/2 teaspoon dried sage (I used oregano instead)
• 1/4 teaspoon dried basil
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• fresh black pepper
• 2 cups vegetable broth
• 1 1/2 cups frozen corn
• 2 small russet potatoes, diced
• 1 bay leaf
• 1/8 teaspoon cayenne (I used 1/4)
• 2 teaspoons lemon juice
• 6 tablespoons soymilk
• 2 teaspoons maple syrup (I used honey)

Directions:

1. Sautee onions, pepper, and carrot in oil over medium heat until onions are translucent. Add herbs and salt, sautee a minute more.
2. Add corn, stock, potatoes, bay leaf, and cayenne. Cover and bring to a boil for 3 minutes.
3. Reduce heat and simmer for about 15 minutes, uncover and simmer for 7-10 minutes more.
4. Puree half of the chowder. Add soy milk, lemon, juice, and maple syrup. Stir to combine and serve.

 
  

Completely excellent.

peanut-yam soup

Recently, I attended a potluck where this was far and away the star dish. Everyone, myself included, raved about it. The chef confessed it was from a Moosewood cookbook, and I immediately went online to look for it and attempt to replicate it.

I ate leftovers of it today for both lunch and dinner and I'm still excited about it.

Anyway, here's the recipe. It's a little messy to make but totally worth it. And it makes a lot so you can freeze some for later. Or just bring it all to a potluck and show up everyone else.

Ingredients:

• 2 cups chopped onions
• 1 tablespoon peanut oil or 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
• 1/2 teaspoon cayenne
• 1 teaspoon grated peeled fresh gingerroot (you can peel ginger with the back of a spoon, if you had not already learned that from the Food Network!) 
• 1 cup chopped carrot
• 2 cups chopped sweet potatoes (up to 1 cup white potatoes can be substituted)
• 4 cups vegetable stock or 4 cups water (I used half stock and half water, cuz I ran out of vegetable stock. It was fine)
• 2 cups tomato juice
• 1 cup smooth peanut butter
• 1 tablespoon sugar (optional... I used honey)
• 1 cup chopped scallions or 1 cup chives  (I didn't use these)

 So... first cut everything. I tried to cut it as I went along and it ended up a little chaotic. Then start sauteeing the onions in the bottom of your soup pot for a few minutes. Then add the cayenne and ginger. Then add the carrots and sautee for a few MORE minutes. Then add the sweet potatoes (and regular potatoes if you are using them) and the stock or water and bring everything to a boil, then let it simmer for 15 minutes.

Then blend all of that with the tomato juice with a food processor or immersion blender if you have one, or with a shitty regular blender if you are like me.

Ugh it looks disgusting in this phase. It gets better, I swear!

After it's blended, put it back in the soup pot and stir in the peanut butter. Taste it and add sugar or honey if you think it needs it. (I did.)

Then eat it because it will be so delicious!! Oh yeah and the recipe called for topping it with fresh chopped chives or scallions, but I had it that way at the potluck and I personally feel like it's better without them. But you can add them if you think you will like them.

Mmmm!

Seriously, I know I said the other spicy sweet potato soup recipe was the best soup ever, but I think this is the NEW best soup ever until further notice.

Creamy Portobello Mushroom Soup

This is from the Student's Go Vegan Cookbook and it is way, way better than canned cream of mushroom soup. Which, who even eats that? No one.

Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1/2 onion (you guys know how I feel about the partial vegetable issue... I used a whole onion and it was FINE. But I just thought I'd let you know that the cookbook says a half)
• 1 minced garlic clove
• 1 thinly sliced carrot
• 1 diced celery stalk
• 1 chopped portobello mushroom
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1 tsp dried marjoram (I didn't have marjoram and I looked on the Internets and found that you can use ~1/3 the amount of oregano in place of marjoram, so I did that)
• 2 cups vegetable broth
• 2 Tbsp flour
• 2 cups soy milk
• 2 tsp soy sauce (I think I might reduce the it to 1 tsp next time I make it--to me it tastes a little too soy saucy as is)
• 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper

I bought these cute Porteenie mushrooms since they were cheaper, and I was going to cut them up anyway! I used three of them instead of 1 grownup portobello.

Also, I just used all the leftover carrots and celery from a veggie plate at party so I think it was too much carrot and not enough celery, but whatevs! It tasted great and got all those veggies outta my fridge.

Anyway, what you do is heat the oil in the bottom of your soup pot and sautee all the veggies with the garlic, salt and marjoram (or oregano) for 10 minutes, stirring frequently so they don't burn to the bottom of the pot.

MEANWHILE set aside 1/4 cup of broth. Add the flour and stir into a paste.

After the vegetables have sauteed, add the rest of the broth, the milk, the soy sauce, and the cayenne. Bring it to a boil, and then slowly add the flour paste while stirring. After all the flour is stirred in, lower the heat, cover and simmer for about 10 minutes. Yum!

AMAZING spicy sweet potato soup

OK this is from The Student's Go Vegan Cookbook, which called it "Chilean Two-Potato Soup" but I renamed it spicy sweet potato soup. I doubt it's even from Chile. Whatev. It was reallllly good. Probably the best soup I've ever made. Maybe the best soup I've ever eaten. So good.

Ingredients:

• 1 Tbsp olive oil
• 1/2 cup minced onion (I just used 1 average sized onion, IDK if it was 1/2 a cup or not)
• 2 minced garlic cloves
• 1 cup diced sweet potato (again, I just used 1 sweet potato. Who the fuck would cut up a potato, measure out a cup, and then save the rest? For what? Whatev.)
• 1 diced red potato
• 1 4-oz can green chilies
• 1 cup corn kernels (I used a little can)
• 4 cups vegetable broth
• 1/2 tsp thyme (but I didn't have any)
• 1/2 tsp cumin
• 1/8 tsp cayenne pepper (but I didn't have any so I used a couple shakes of crushed red pepper)
• 1/4 tsp salt
• Fresh lemon or lime juice

Heat the oil in the bottom of a big pot and sautee the onion and garlic for a few minutes, then throw in everything else except the lemon juice. Bring it to a boil and simmer for 30 minutes ish. Add a little lemon juice to the soup as you serve it. (Except I didn't do that part either because FUCK LEMON JUICE. Yeah, I said it.)

 This is perfect for the winter. Warm and filling and spicy and colorful. Make it today! Make it RIGHT NOW.

awesome vegan chocolate chip cookies

OK, I've been dabbling with different vegan chocolate chip cookie recipes and I hit the jackpot with a slight variation on this one.

Ingredients:

• 2-1/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup Earth Balance*, softened (although Earth Balance is the best, you may use any other non-dairy butter/margarine)
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 3/4 cup brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup plain applesauce
• 2 cups chocolate chips

I think the real key was my vegan semi-sweet chocolate chips. I got them from the bulk bin at the local co-op, and they were delicious. And I didn't measure them, I just used a whole big scoop of them which I think was more than 2 cups. Lesson learned: don't use crappy chocolate chips! You deserve better!

Anyway, preheat the oven to 375. Then mix the flour, salt, and baking soda in a small bowl. In a bigger bowl, mix everything else except the chips. Then add the flour mix, and finally the chips. Spoon out the dough onto an ungreased cookie sheet and bake for 10 minutes-ish.

I am serious, these cookies were awesome and everyone I gave them to flipped out about how awesome they were. They were a little soft and cake-y but also a little crispy. And, again, excellent chocolate content. Mmm.

LARG

So, in my college dining hall we had this one delicious soup on the menu rotation. It was called "lentil and roasted garlic soup," but we referred to it as LARG. I realize "LARG" is not an appetizing name for a soup. LARG also did not have an appetizing appearance. It looked a lot like sewer sludge. However, it was DELICIOUS. One of the very best things on the (admittedly mediocre) dining hall menu rotation.

And then, my junior year I think, they changed food providers and WE LOST LARG. Until now, kind of? My friend Molly found a LARG recipe in a cookbook and she & I both made it and have been discussing how best to recreate the LARG of our college days.

Ingredients

• 1 whole head of garlic
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 large onion, chopped
• 2 celery stalks, chopped
• a couple of carrots, chopped
• 2 teaspoons dried rosemary
• 2 bay leaves
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1 pound French lentils
• 8 cups vegetable stock or mineral water (I used vegetable Better than Boullion to make the stock)
• 1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar 
• 1 teaspoon minced fresh garlic 

Disclosure: I didn't have any rosemary or balsamic vinegar. I'm not fancy, gosh.

Anyway, first heat the oil in a big pot and add the onions, carrots, and celery for a few minutes. Then add the s&p and bay leaves. And the rosemary if you have any. Then add the broth and lentils, bring it to a boil and let it simmer for an hour or until the lentils are tender. (If this happens before your garlic finishes roasting, take it off the heat.)

MEANWHILE roast a head of garlic. I used elephant garlic and it was pretty awesome. I realized I didn't have any foil so I put in in a bread pan and covered it with a cookie sheet and some olive oil. Kind of ghetto, but it worked!

Then, put the roasted garlic in a blender or food processor, maybe with a little water. Once it's blended add it to your soup along with the fresh minced garlic and the vinegar (if you have it) and bring it back up to a boil for a few minutes.

And then it's done, hooray! I made it when my college friend Julia was here and we both agreed it would be more college-authentic if you blended the whole thing to make it more sludgey. However, your mileage may vary, because maybe you don't want your soup to resemble sewer sludge for some reason??

Needs to be sludgier.

My cat Duarte approves. Or at least does not blatantly disapprove.

vegan butternut squash bisque

Oh my God, this was so delicious.

Ingredients:
1 butternut squash
3 cups vegetable stock
2 diced onions (or 1 big one)
1/2 cup soy milk (or cream)
1 Tbsp Smart Balance (or butter if you want to un-veganify this)
Cumin, curry powder, and cinnamon
Salt & pepper
Olive oil (I use the spray)

So, first cut the squash in half (lengthwise) and put it flat-side down on an olive oil'd baking sheet and bake it at 375 for 45 minutes or so. 20 minutes before the squash is done, start cooking the onions in the butter or fake butter at the bottom of a pot. Let them turn brown but not burnt. It should take about 20 minutes. Like I said. Pay attention, jeeze.

After the squash is done scrape all the squash off the skin with a spoon and put them in the pot with the onions. Then add the vegetable stock and spices (OK I didn't measure these, I just did like three good shakes of each one. I used this recipe as a base and it suggested using only nutmeg, but I didn't have any nutmeg, and also some of the comments on the recipe suggesting using the spices I ended up using). Bring it up to a boil and let it simmer for half an hour or so.

Then, be super careful and put it in the blender with half a cup of soy milk. (Or cream, if you want it to be, well, creamier, and don't care about un-vegan-ifiying it. By the way, I used vanilla soy milk since that's what I keep around. I was a little worried it would make my soup taste too vanilla-y, but it didn't really come out in the soup at all.) If it's still hot, you should put a dish towel over the top of the blender and hold it down, because blending hot liquids will make the top of the blender fly off!! It's true, I read it on the Internet. Or wait until it cools. Or get a fancy immersion blender. Whatever.

I tried really hard to get a photo of this that made it look delicious but it is not a terribly photogenic food. TRUST ME IT'S AWESOME.

Anyway, this soup tastes totally super awesome. I ate it with some of the bread I made from the recipe I made last week and it was like being in a restaurant. A super awesome restaurant.

PS I also toasted the squash seeds in olive oil just like pumpkin seeds. They were a little smaller than pumpkin seeds but tasted basically the same.

"too lazy to go to the store" tomato sauce

My mom's garden has infinity tomatoes right now so I've been trying to use them up! I made gallons of chili and some salads and stuff and then I thought: pasta sauce?! So I looked up some recipes online and they all called for basil and oregano and whatnot, which I don't usually keep on hand because... I don't really make Italian food that much. And, as the title implies, I was too lazy to go to the store.

6 tomatoes
1/4 cup olive oil
4 chopped cloves of garlic
1 diced onion
1 tsp garlic powder
salt & pepper

I chopped the tomatoes and cooked them in the oil for like 15 minutes. And then I threw in everything else and simmered it for another 15 minutes.

And then I ate it with some whole wheat penne pasta and it was yummy! Oregano? Basil? Who needs 'em?? Another time I ate this over some couscous and it was good. Another time (this recipe made a lot) I sauteed a zucchini and some mushrooms and put sauce over it and it was also good.

bread!!

You guys, I totally made bread. From scratch! With yeast and everything! Not going to lie, I'm pretty impressed with myself. I followed the recipe from here pretty exactly.

• 4 cups of all purpose or unbleached flour
• 1 1/2 teaspoons salt      
• 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• 1 package dry yeast     
• 1 3/4 cups hot  water

First: mix the flour, salt, and yeast in a big bowl. Then it said to "form a well" in the dry ingredients and stir in the water and then the oil until it looks like dough. It specifically said to use a wooden spoon but I don't have one so I used a plastic one?? It turned out okay. I don't know what effect a wooden spoon would have but use it if you've got it, I guess.

Then, on a "well-floured" work surface knead the dough for 10 minutes or until it feels "elastic." I have no idea what that means because if you ask me it was elastic to start out with? So I just set a timer for 10 minutes and did that.

Then I put it in in a big bowl (the same one from before but I rinsed it out and then sprayed the inside with olive oil spray) and covered it with Saran wrap for an hour and a half.

Here again I diverged from the recommendation of that website because I don't have any "bread bowls." I have one metal loaf pan. And after the dough has risen for an hour-ish, you're supposed to divide it in half and put the halves in whatever you're going to bake them in (greased) and let them rise again for 20 30 minutes. But only one batch of the dough went in the loaf pan and the other half stayed in the bowl. It turned out okay I guess?

I forgot to say, pre-heat the oven to 375 and bake it for 20 minutes or until it turns "golden brown."

OH and I decided to make one loaf of cinnamon bread so I just mixed 1/4 cup of sugar and a couple good shakes of cinnamon in with the dough. There is maybe a more scientific way of doing that but it turned out pretty tasty.

It is tasty! Kind of dense and I wondered if maybe I didn't knead it enough, or whatever, but my friend Mary (who is an accomplished breadstress and sent me this recipe) says the recipe is for kind of dense bread and if I want something lighter I should try this recipe. WHICH MAYBE I WILL.

Oh and Mary says this recipe also makes good pizza dough which I will definitely try in the future. 

Also I have to say that clean-up after this was a bitch and there is still bread dough stuck to my sponge. Worth it? I guess?

PS I consulted with Mary and she said I should leave it out longer for the second rising and it will be fluffier. I made another batch of bread and left it out for more like 30 minutes on the second rising and it totally worked. Yeah bread!

Thai Tofu Curry

I just made this curry for lunch and it was amaaaazing. And pretty simple, despite the pretty long list of ingredients. I sort of mashed up this recipe and this one and altered it according to what I had on hand.

Sauce:
1 can coconut milk
4 cloves of garlic
2 Tbsp Thai chili sauce
Juice of an orange
Juice of 1/2 a lime
2 Tbsp soy sauce
1 Tbsp brown sugar
1 Tbsp cumin powder
1 Tbsp cumin seeds
2 tsp curry powder

Then I blended it all in the blender and set it aside.

Tastes better than it looks

OK then I cut up:

1 onion (I think next time I make this I would do 2 onions. But the one I had was pretty small so maybe just 1 big onion. Whatev.)

1 yellow pepper

1 tomato

1 portabello mushroom (because it was about to go bad, otherwise I would definitely just use brown mushrooms or something cheaper)

1 pack of cubed tofu

(The recipes I cribbed from suggested: cauliflower, snow peas, chick peas, yams... I think you could put pretty much whatever vegetables you have lying around into this sauce.)

I started cooking the onions and peppers in a little bit of oil and then poured on the sauce and brought it to a boil.

 

Then I let it simmer for a few minutes and then dumped in everything else and simmered it for like ten minutes.

And then I ate it and it was AWESOME.

I ate it with some Minute Rice because I acquired a box of it when we closed down the camp kitchen for the summer. It was fine even though you are supposed to eat Thai food with jasmine rice. Whatevs.

Vegan-ish Chocolate chip Oatmeal Cookies

These are almost vegan except I used regular chocolate chips. If you get vegan ones, or just use raisins instead, they will be vegan! Whoaaa.

I kind of made this recipe up based on the oatmeal cookie recipe that came on the Meijer brand oatmeal package. They are delicious, if I do say so myself!

Ingredients:
1 cup applesauce (just the regular kind from a jar. I thought using my homemade applesauce would make it too apple-y and cinnamon-y, but who knows, maybe it would have been awesome)
1/2 cup Smart Balance spread
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 1/2 cups flour
3 cups oats
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
1 cup chocolate chips

So, first I creamed together the sugars, applesauce, and Smart Balance. Then I added the vanilla, flour, salt, and baking soda. Last I stirred in the oats and chocolate chips! I baked them for like fifteen minutes at 350, but I like my cookies crisp and golden brown. Start checking them after 10 minutes if you want them softer.

PS this makes really delicious dough that you can eat without fear of salmonella! Yeah!

Vegan "Buttermilk" Biscuits and "Sausage" Gravy

I'm not going to even pretend this was my idea -- I found this on the VegWeb site and made them this morning...AMAZING. Seriously. I'll just copy and paste. :)

Ingredients:

"buttermilk" biscuits:
2/3 cup non-dairy milk
2 teaspoon lemon juice
3 tablespoons canola oil
1 tablespoon apple or orange juice
2 cup unbleached white pastry flour (wheat flour just won't make fluffy biscuits, I have
tried)
2 teaspoons non-aluminum baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
gravy:
1/2 tube Gimme Lean, sausage flavor
salt and pepper
2-3 tablespoons non-hydrated margarine (or olive oil)
2-3 tablespoons flour
1 1/2 to 2 cups water

Directions:

Start with gravy. Put margarine or oil in pan and turn on medium. Add Gimme Lean and break into very small pieces. Sprinkle with pepper and stir fry.

Preheat oven to 400*F. In a glass cup or bowl, add lemon juice to non-dairy milk and let it rest for a few minutes to thicken. In a different bowl mix oil and juice and beat them together with fork.

Place flour, baking powder and salt in a bowl and stir together. Add oil mixture and mix until it resembles bread crumbs. Then stir enough of the reserved soured milk so the dough leaves the sides of the bowl and SLIGHTLY sticky (not enough and biscuits will be dry).

Place on a floured board and roll or pat to 1" thick and cut into 2 1/2' round biscuits and place on dry baking sheet. Place in oven and bake until light golden (10-12 minutes).

Right before biscuits are done make gravy. Make sure Gimme Lean is nice and browned. Deglaze pan with 1 cup water for 1 minute then mix remaining 1/2 cup water with flour to make thin paste. Add to sausage pan, stir constantly until thick. Season with salt and pepper.

**Note: pepper should be very prominent in the taste! Add enough to really taste it. Fresh cracked pepper is the best for this.

Take biscuits out of oven and cut in half and spread liberally with margarine and top with ample amounts of gravy.

This serves 2 people with gravy on four half biscuits. This can feed more people if you use a whole Gimme Lean, and double the other gravy ingredients.

Serves: 2-4

Preparation time: 20 minutes

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I used all-purpose flour, and they turned out great. Strongly recommend this!

call for simple vegan-ish recipes

Hello food-bloggers! I have been having some stomach pain lately and my doctor recommended that I stop eating eggs, cheese, and fried food for awhile until we figure out what's causing it. I'm a vegetarian with somewhat limited resources, so eggs and cheese constitute a pretty large portion of my diet. Especially eggs! So cheap and so filling! Now I am going to tell you a list of what things are commonly available in the DR and you, perhaps, will provide me with a delicious recipe I can make?

- Fresh vegetables: carrots, onions, peppers, eggplant, cucumbers, potatoes, auyama squash. (Not quite the same thing as pumpkin, but for recipe purposes I think it will work in place of pumpkin.) Sometimes tomatoes.
- Fresh fruit: bananas, pineapple, papaya, apples (sometimes).
- Pretty much any canned vegetable.
- Bread.
- Any type of canned bean. Also dried, but I don't have a pressure cooker and I am too impatient to cook them forever.
- Brown rice, white rice.
- Pasta.
- Tomato sauce.
- Most basic spices and condiments.
- Flour, baking powder, other baking necessities.

With these things, mostly I eat: some combination of those veggies stirfried with rice or noodles, or in a sandwich. Or pasta with sauce. And hummus with everything.

I can only bake in a Dutch oven.

Oh and only cheese is banned for me, not other dairy. So if you have a recipe with milk or yogurt, that is okay.

OK go! Feed me!

Roasted Garlic and Pumpkin Seed Pesto

I got this from vegweb.com's recipes; it is AMAZING.

Ingredients:
1 head of roasted garlic (I bought mine pre-roasted from Sunflower Market)
1-3 cups of basil (up to you how much you want; the original recipe called for three cups, but there's no way I was fitting three cups into the magic bullet)
1 cup + a smidge of Olive Oil
2 cups pumpkin seeds
1 cup walnuts (or other nuts)
salt and pepper
1/2 cup nutritional yeast (which makes it cheesy-like)

Blend all ingredients, gradually adding the olive oil and garlic -- make sure it's the right amount of garlic for you (I would guess I used about...10 cloves? Roasted garlic is milder than raw, so don't be afraid).

Use on pasta -- though we're considering also trying it on the vegan eggplant I posted about a few days ago!

I didn't measure the olive oil, just kept adding, and I think I added too much -- but it was so delicious. Highly recommended, and our new favorite vegan "thing."

Vegan Taco Dip

This literally takes 10 minutes to make. Mmmmm, and it's delicious.

I used the smallest baking casserole dish I have because I don't need a GIGANTIC TACO DIP for two people. But, next time I go to a party, I'll use a bigger one to share.

Ingredients:
1 can red kidney beans OR chili beans if you find them (I got mine at Sunflower Market)
1 package of mexican tofu "meat" -- I'll edit the note when I'm home and can tell you the brand
Vegan sour cream (Tofutti is the best)
Vegetables -- I used cucumbers, tomatoes, and avocados, but feel free to use what you have
Black olives (optional, of course)

I cooked the beans to heat them up, then blended them and used them as the bottom layer.
Heat up the tofu using the package directions and use that as the second layer.
Cucumbers, tomatoes, and avocado came next. If I had olives, they would be on top.
Sour cream on top of the vegetables.

You can chill first, or you can dig right in! It's seriously delicious. I bought corn chips to use, and made them into nachos, essentially, and there are plenty of leftovers.

Fried Eggplant

If you love fried eggplant like we do (Nicole misses eggplant parmigiana...), you will love this recipe, ESPECIALLY the grapeseed oil part.

INGREDIENTS:
Eggplant
Flour
Cornstarch
Breadcrumbs
Salt
Pepper
Paprika
Water
Grapeseed Oil
Lime (optional)

We peel our eggplant, but you can leave the skin on if you'd like. Slice the eggplant -- not too thick -- and soak in salt water. I probably soaked the eggplant for about thirty minutes or so.

Pat dry the eggplant with paper towels.

There will be three steps before you get to the frying pan:
Step 1: Flour, paprika, a generous amount of salt and pepper
Step 2: Cornstarch and water (You want this more liquidy than gooey, I learned)
Step 3: Breadcrumbs (if you're trying vegan, make sure your breadcrumbs don't come with cheese inside!), salt, and pepper

Dip, dip, dip, set aside. I liked doing all of them at once and then frying, but that's a personal decision.

Heat a generous amount of grapeseed oil (trust me on this one: tastes SO MUCH BETTER than olive oil) in a pan, and fry accordingly.

Make sure you don't burn them! If you've done everything right, you should have a delicious, soft, fried eggplant patty.

I put a little lime on top, but I'm sure there are other things you can use. Tomato sauce, perhaps?