Thursday, March 20, 2008

Happy Spring! Happy Meatout!

Today was the first day of spring, and man, was it beautiful! With temps in the upper 60s and lots of sunshine in Memphis, it felt like the perfect beginning for a new season of growth and re-birth. Can you tell Spring is my favorite season? It's also National Meatout Day!

I celebrated with a veggie-heavy dish — Cauliflower Creole:



I used a typical Shrimp Creole recipe (tomato paste, bell pepper, celery, thyme) but replaced the seafood with yummy white cruciferous veggies! I'm going to include this in my vegan soul food cookbook. It felt pretty unhealthy and unprocesseed, which was a nice change considering how much tofu and other faux meats I eat. It's strange to have a veggie dish as the main entree — but strange in a good way.

The original Shrimp Creole recipe came from a cookbook that the Haas side of my family put together a couple years ago and sold at the family reunion. Everyone was asked to submit recipes (I submitted Kimchee Soup, Tofu Manicotti, and Vegan German Chocolate Cupcakes). This one came from Hazel Haas Roemmich, the daughter of Pearl and Julius Haas (my great-grandparents). That would make Hazel my great-aunt, I guess.

Anyway, have a wonderful first weekend in Spring and enjoy the Full Moon!

8 comments:

Kelvin Oliver said...

That looks good. I must be hungry right now. It is always good to find new recipes to cook.

J said...

Happy Spring to you too! It even FELT like spring here.

Your cauliflower dish looks perfect. I adore cauliflower. Mmmm, and add to that the rice, I'm sold! Ooooh, a vegan soul food cookbook, eh? You'll have to keep us up to date on your progress.

ChocolateCoveredVegan said...

Oops, I completely forgot about Meatout Day :o(.

Oh well... of course I didn't eat meat anyway!

Anonymous said...

oh that looks very good! i like cauliflowers now, but it took a while to get used to them...

Veggie said...

I wish it felt like spring here, we're in for a cold weekend. But, at least it isn't snowing.

madeinalaska said...

hey, I saw your question about good pressure cooking cookbooks over at melomeals. I have had great success w/ great vegetarian cooking under pressure by larna sass.

Marisa L. S. said...

Looks delicious. If you ever come up to New York, there's a great veg soul food cafe called Red Bamboo!

Anonymous said...

Thanks - yeah, being laid off sucks, but I'm hoping it just means there is something better in my near future!

And wow, does that Soy Delicious Turtle Tracks sound good! I have been indulging my sweet tooth a little too much this last week, but if ever I needed to, now is the time.