Cuppies and Sammies

I don't have much time for this post, and I'll be visiting my boyfriend through Monday. But until then, I'll leave you with this tasty Reuben-Esque from Skinny Bitch in the Kitch:

It's basically a tempeh bacon reuben with the traditional sauerkraut, some melted Teese, and homemade Thousand Island dressing. Tasty, filling, skinny-ish.

And for dessert, have a Strawberry Cupcake from The Joy of Vegan Baking:

I made these spur-of-the-moment for Stephanie (a.k.a. Poopie Bitch's) birthday on Wednesday night. She texted me at noon that day to let me know it was her birthday! What's a friend to do with only a couple hours to spare? Make these tasty cupcakes, that's what. Even though it was VERY short notice, I couldn't let a birthday go by without sweets.

Gumbo!

Hey ya'll! Because no Southern cookbook is complete without a gumbo recipe, I developed this tasty Tempeh Gumbo last night:

Honestly, it was my first time making gumbo, but I followed some roux-makin' instructions from an omni recipe. Then I added no-chicken broth, the mandatory okra and tomatoes, some other yummy veggies, and my favorite faux-meat-of-the-moment, tempeh. I love how a good roux creates a thick, hearty stew. Perfect for warmin' my bones on these cold winter nights. Memphis actually got a light dusting of snow Tuesday night — a rariety in these parts.

My friend Greg came over last night to try and connect my borrowed computer to the internet, but no luck (something about a missing network driver? I dunno ... I don't speak computer). But while he was there, I fed him a bowl of gumbo, and he gave it a thumbs up. He's picky, so his approval is a good thing.

No soup or stew is complete without bread. So I baked a loaf of Whole Wheat Beer Bread for gumbo-dippin':

This recipe will also be going into the book. But it's so simple that I'll share you all now.

Whole Wheat Beer Bread
------------------------------
3 cups whole wheat pastry flour
3 tsp. baking powder
1 1/2 Tbsp. evaporated cane juice (or white sugar if you please)
1 tsp. sea salt
12 ounces of tasty vegan beer (I used New Belgium black English ale, but PBR will work too!)
1 Tbsp. soy margarine

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Mix dry ingredients. Add beer. Stir to combine. Pour into a lightly greased loaf pan. Bake for 30 minutes, and then brush margarine over the top. Bake an additional 20-25 minutes or until a tooth pick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Third Time's a Charm

Remember my twice-failed Dijon-Pecan Seitan recipe? I had a vision of creating a pecan-encrusted, dijon-flavored faux meat for my cookbook a few months ago, but I kept getting it all wrong. First, it started as a fried Dijon-Pecan Tofu, but the tofu texture was too light for the heavy pecan topping. Then, I used the pecan and mustard breading on seitan, but the wheat meat soaked up too much grease in the frying process.

So I decided to change the breading up a bit and bake the stuff. Now I give you Dijon-Pecan Seitan with a Maple-Butter Glaze:

By golly, I've finally done it. This variation is definiately a keeper. The seitan is breaded in a dijon-pecan batter, baked, and then rolled in a maple-soy margarine glaze. It has the sweetness of a honey mustard with the delightful crunch of toasted pecans.

I served the seitan with Orange-Ginger Beets from The Complete Vegan Kitchen:

I can't believe I used to hate beets! I mean, as recently as a few months ago. Beets have been the final frontier for me. After I went vegan, I learned to like every vegetable I used to hate in my lacto-ovo days ... except beets. They always tasted like dirt. Ick! But apparently, you just gotta know how to cook 'em. Now I love them roasted, in borscht, or boiled and seasoned using the above recipe which accents beets' earthy flavors with fresh ginger and fresh-squeezed orange juice.

Here's the whole plate. I also opened a jar of my Granny's home-canned green beans:

Skinny Chocolate Pancakes!!

When I eat anything from Skinny Bitch in the Kitch, I can't help but feel good about it since the recipes are low in sugar, loaded with nutrient-rich food, and made with whole wheat pastry flour. Even though I only use whole wheat pastry flour for everything I bake and I never, ever use white sugar, there's something nice about having Rory and Kim's seal of approval.

I had that good feeling when I ate these Chocolate Pancakes this morning:

The only sweetener in the batter is a couple tablespoons of maple syrup, and as you can see, I've drizzled a little more on top. But maple syrup is vitamin-rich, so I don't feel bad about that. The chocolate part comes from 1/4 cup of cocoa powder. And since I used a non-stick skillet (thanks mom, she gave me one of her gently-used non-stick skillets over Christmas to make room for her new set), I didn't even use any oil to fry these up. There are a couple tablespoons of safflower oil in the batter, but that's good fat.

These were perfect with a couple slices of my Tempeh Bacon and a glass of fresh orange juice. I made a whole batch of mini-pancakes on Sunday night, and I've been re-heating a couple each morning. It's the first time I've pre-made pancakes (got the idea from another blog but I can't remember which one), and they heat up wonderfully in the microwave for about 30 seconds. They taste just as fresh as if they'd just come out of the skillet.

Curry In a Hurry

I've had a major craving for Indian food for months. I can't seem to fulfill it. I make Indian food, buy Indian food, it doesn't matter. I want more, more, more. That was the case with this Coconut Curry Tofu on Green Jasmine Rice from Hot Damn and Hell Yeah:

I made it last week and finally finished off the leftovers yesterday, but I still want more Indian food. Not that this didn't hit the spot. It was just a temporary fix. I think Indian food is probably a bit like crack.

But back to this curry dish, all I can say is, um, hot damn. Yea, it's that good. The tofu is fried on high heat with Indian spices. Then it's simmered with coconut milk and canned tomatoes. It's served over jasmine rice mixed with a herb puree and shredded coconut. Yummy, yummy!

By the way, does anyone know if they make brown jasmine rice? I hated to buy white rice, but I couldn't find a whole grain version at Whole Foods. And jasmine rice has such an awesome flavor.

Absinthe Cupcakes!

Last night, my friend Greg celebrated his 29th birthday. He hates sweets (yes, he is crazy), but I discovered last year that he will eat cake if there's booze in it. Last year, I made Bacardi 151 cupcakes. They were a huge hit, but I didn't wanna repeat myself this year. So I scoured the internets for ideas and found a recipe for Vegan Absinthe Cupcakes:

Lucky for me, the people who used to live in my house left behind a bottle of Absente brand absinthe. I'm no fan of the stuff since I hate the licorice-y flavor of anise. But Greg prides himself on a prized bottle of absinthe that he snuck onto the plane back from Scotland a couple years ago. So I knew he'd appreciate these.

The verdict? Greg ate two, so he must have liked them. And the anise flavor wasn't overpowering like I thought it'd be. Not my favorite cupcakes, but not bad. Other people raved. You either love licorice flavors or you hate them.

On another sweet note, I woke up early today to make Lemon Bars from The Joy of Vegan Baking:

Food Awareness, our local veggie group, held a meeting and potluck today to discuss our plan to get vegetarian options on the menu for Memphis City Schools lunches. My contribution were these bars, and man, were they good! I adore lemon-flavored everything, and the buttery shortbread crust was to die for. I'll be making these again.

Two awesome surprises came in the mail this week - copies of Kittee's Papa Tofu and Amey's (of Vegan Eats and Treats) Gastronomus Maximus cookzines!

I had to re-order Papa Tofu since I gave my old copy away, and Amey was super sweet and offered to gift me a copy of her adorable little zine. I can't wait to make her borcsht and Kittee's stuffed tofu pockets and injera.

Cookie Monster

I've been craving cookies lately. And on Tuesday night (a.k.a. Barack Obama night), I realized I had an unopened bag of vegan white chocolate chips lurking in my pantry. I also realized that the next day (Wednesday) was my co-worker Mary's birthday. So I made a quick run to Kroger for macadamia nuts. An hour later, I was licking the bowl while these tasty Vegan White Chocolate Macadamia Nut Cookies baked in the oven:

Yum, yum! White chocolate macadamia cookies were always my fave in my pre-vegan days. But I haven't been able to find cruelty-free white chocolate around here. Thankfully, my super-cool dad placed an order from Vegan Essentials for these chocolate chips and some Teese last month.

I wasn't sure what I wanted to do with them at first, so I stored them away for a rainy day. Then it hit me — I must use my chips for cookies! I used the Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe from Vegan with a Vengeance, but subbed 1 cup of white chocolate chips for the regular semi-sweet chips. And I also folded in 1/2 cup of chopped macadamia nuts. And as usual, I used whole wheat pastry flour in place of the all-purpose.

I brought a batch to work for Mary's birthday and I still have a secret stash at home that I'm working my way through. That recipe makes a crap ton of cookies!

Note to testers: I'm still off-line at home. Grrr! I've tried using different modems and all kinds of stuff. But nothing seems to work. My dad says the computer that I'm borrowing from him may have something wrong with it that's preventing me from being able to connect to the internet. I'm really ready to get back to posting recipes on the tester site! Hopefully, it'll be resolved soon. I will keep ya'll posted.

Brown Rice Breakfast

Before I make it to the office every morning, I ALWAYS eat a big ole' breakfast. Whether it's pancakes, scrambled tofu, steel cut oats, or cheezy grits, I make sure I get plenty of fuel to get me through the morning. One of my long-time favorite day-starters is a variation on Bernard's Brown Rice Breakfast from The Garden of Vegan:

It's just crumbled tofu and brown rice, seasoned with a little soy sauce or Bragg's, served atop sprouted grain toast and drizzled with flax seed oil and organic ketchup. It sounds weird, I know. But it's so darn good. I love the way the flax oil lightly soaks into the bread and melds with the ketchup. And I love that it's a protein/whole grain-packed breakfast to start the day off right.

I always make a big batch of the tofu-rice mixture and heat up a little each morning to serve over two slices of toast. This morning, I ate my Brown Rice Breakfast with a cup of iced green tea and a glass of fresh-squeezed orange-grapefruit juice. Yum!

Homemade Ravioli

I've had my eye on the White Bean Ravioli with Caramelized Onion Sauce from The Complete Vegan Kitchen for months now. I finally made it on Monday night:

What was the holdup, you ask? I had the hardest time finding vegan-safe wonton wrappers. Every package I picked up contained eggs, but I finally located egg-free wrappers at an Asian grocery store. They came frozen, so I bought them a few months ago. But I forgot they were in my freezer until recently. Now I'm attempting a bit of a freezer purge because I've reached the point of overflowing.

Though the picture looks a little funky, these were so tasty. I filled the wonton wrappers with a white bean paste made with garlic, onion, and herbs. They were boiled and served with a tasty sauce of caramelized onions, white wine, balsamic vinegar, and toasted walnuts. I felt pretty fancy eating these!

BSAT Sammich

Sorry for the long absence. Even though my dad loaned me a computer, I can't get online with it right now. Its not recognizing my modem, so I'm going to have to spend some time on the phone with my Internet service provider ... blah! I hate that.

In the meantime, I'm posting a quick entry from my work computer. I made some of the Tempeh Bacon from my cookbook over the weekend, the same stuff the testers have been making lately. I had big plans of trying a Vegan Elvis Sandwich, a variation on an omni sandwich with peanut butter, banana, and bacon. Yep, bacon. Sounds kinda gross, but I had to try it.

The verdict? Gross as it sounds. Luckily, I had plenty of bacon left for this tasty BSAT Sammich (a.k.a. Bacon, Spinach, Avocado, and Tomato):

This really hit the spot with these plain Baked Kettle Chips. If ya'll haven't tried these chips, I highly recommend them. They're baked, not fried. But unlike Baked Lay's, these actually taste like regular fried chips. Yet a serving of 20 chips is only 3 grams a fat.

Happy Inauguration Day! I woke this morning and it was SNOWING!!! That never happens in Memphis. It's a beautiful day — awesome new president, snow ... it doesn't get much better!

It's a Wrap

First, I wanna thank all of ya'll for your kind words and support about my stupid burglary situation. It really sucks, but your comments made me feel better.

Before all that crap happened, I made some awesome Breakfast Veggie, Fruit, & Nut Wraps:

I had extra Tofutti cream cheese lying around, and I wanted to eat in some way other than smeared on a bagel. So I did a little Google search for cream cheese ideas and stumbled on a recipe for kid's healthy breakfast wraps. I don't remember where I found it, and I really didn't use the recipe — just the idea — so I can't link to it. But the wraps were touted as a way to get kids to eat their fruits and veggies for breakfast.

I'd planned on using up some extra Food for Life Brown Rice tortillas, but discovered they were kinda moldy. Ick! So I made my own whole wheat tortillas using Jessy's recipe on HappyVeganFace. These were awesome and super easy to make. And it felt good knowing that I made my own tortillas.

The insides are stuffed with Tofutti cream cheese, shredded carrot, organic raisins, dried apples, and raw walnuts. These made me feel all healthy for the beginning of my day. And I think they'd also make a great pre-workout snack in the afternoon.

I Got Robbed ... Again

So the bastards that broke into my house this past November have struck again. This time, they took off with my precious iMac and my printer.

They smashed my back window, leaving a huge hole for my six kitties to escape through. But luckily, I came home and all my fuzzies were in the house. So I'm very thankful for that.

But still ... they took my freakin' computer! The cops came but couldn't find any finger prints. They didn't find any last time either, so we assume they're using gloves. And the cops (and I) are almost 99.9 percent sure the culprits are my crackhead next-door neighbors. But with no real evidence, there's not much that can be done.

Fortunately, after the November incident, I got renter's insurance. So I should be able to replace my computer. But it still sucks. Bad.

My awesome friends Michelle and Wes came over as soon as I discovered the break-in. And my super-duper awesome parents drove in (they live an hour away from Memphis) immediately. My dad brought one of his extra computers for me to use while I wait for a new one. So I'll still be blogging while I wait! Yea!

Skinny Bitchin'

I love Skinny Bitch. Love the book (it changed my nasty high-frustose loving, white flour-eating ways). Love the cookbook. Love the workout videos. I'm pretty sure Rory, Kim, and I would be fast friends if we ever hung out.

I've been doing the Skinny Bitch Boot Camp workout video at least once a week (to supplement my gym schedule), and that got me in the mood to pull out Skinny Bitch in the Kitch. After flipping through a few times, I settled on Steamed Veggies and Tofu with Brown Rice:

So simple - just a plate of steamed cauliflower, kale, cabbage, and carrots with Soy Boy smoked tofu and brown rice, topped tahini sauce and pine nuts. So delicious. Not that I couldn't have dreamed this dish up on my own, but sometimes it's nice to let someone else tell you what to put in your dish. I probably wouldn't have thought to top this with a tahini sauce (a mix of tahini, sesame oil, and soy sauce), but it was perfect. Oh, and I added a little sriracha at the table to kick things up a notch.

Testers: The new recipes are up on the test site. I forgot to remind people yesterday.

Dirty South Supper

This meal was mostly inspired by Jessy over at happyveganface, who always makes the yummiest-looking from-scratch everything! It all started with her post a few months back about Katie's Tempeh Hot Wings from Don't Eat Off the Sidewalk. I'm a huge vegan hot wing fan, and I had to give these a try:

Hot damn! These are so amazing. I have my own Seitan Hot Wangs recipe that'll be going in my cookbook, but I like these tempeh wings even better. They're coated in a flour batter and then dipped in panko bread crumbs, which give these babies that extra edge. The hot sauce is spicy sweet combo accented by agave nectar. Totally finger-lickin' good.

On the side, I tried Jessy's standard to-go veggie — Steamed Broccoli with Pine Nuts:

Love the pine nuts! I'd never tried them on a steamed veggie, but Jessy does it all the time, and I keep making a mental note to give it a whirl. They add an extra crunch and a subtle flavor boost (and probably some extra nutrients).

On the other side, I created this Dirty (South) Rice for my cookbook:

I love dirty rice, but I'm a sucker for traditional Spanish rice. So I combined the two flavors into one. Call it Dirty South fusion cuisine or something. I dunno. But I'm definitely happy with this recipe, so it's a keeper.

Thank You, Duncan Hines

Since I finally got my much-coveted KitchenAid stand mixer and this awesome vintage cake carrier for Christmas, there was no question as to what I would bring to today's Ethical Eating lecture and potluck at the Unitarian Universalist Church. A layer cake, of course!

My parents found this on eBay! It's all metal and I love that it has a lid holder.

You may remember my Granny's yummy vegan Coconut Icebox Cake picture from my Thanksgiving post. It was a moist yellow cake topped with a frosting made from fresh coconut, cream of coconut, and sugar.

I knew I wanted to include her recipe in my cookbook, but since I didn't have the recipe, I gave Granny a call. She revealed that her secret yellow cake recipe was actually Duncan Hines Yellow Cake Mix (which is vegan, by the way)! Since I didn't want to put Duncan Hines in my cookbook, I attempted to develop my own vegan cake recipe.

Not such a good idea for a last-minute potluck cake. Though the taste was spot-on, the cakes were gooey in the center. I know I used too much liquid since the batter was soupier than it should have been. But I'll tweak that recipe for the cookbook later. In the meantime, I had to act fast. So I ran to Kroger and bought the Duncan Hines. The layers baked beautifully and tasted like heaven.

I frosted the cake with coconut mixed with evaporated cane juice and Tofutti sour cream (even though Granny used cream of coconut last time, she advised I try vegan sour cream since the cream of coconut was hard to work with). Here's the result:

Admittedly, it's not the prettiest cake. The top layer broke in half when I flipped it out of the pan, so I tried to mask the flaw with frosting. And then since I used extra frosting in the ugly spot, I ran out for really filling in the sides.

But the cake was a hit at the potluck. Oh, and I didn't tell anyone it came from a box. :-)

Pita Pizza!

My pal Leslie gave me a copy of Vegan Bites: Recipes for Singles as a Christmas gift, as well as a jar of her amazing homemade Jasmine Peach Jam. The book is great for folks like me who live alone. I always end up with days and days of leftovers any time I cook. Sometimes that's awesome, especially when a dish is freezable. But my freezer is at the overflowing point now, so this book came just in time. Vegan Bites features recipes with 2 to 3 servings (just enough for the next day's lunch).

Last night, I made my first recipe from the book — Pita Margherita:

It's just a simple pita pizza version of Pizza Margherita with Ezekial pita bread, mozzerella Teese, tomato slices, Parma, fresh basil, and a drizzle of olive oil. These were perfect with a side salad. Such an easy week night meal. I'll definitely be making this again and again.

W.I.P. Wednesdays

Before Christmas, Shellyfish over at Musings From the Fishbowl started a little thing called W.I.P. Wednesdays (or Work In Progress Wednesdays), during which folks would post their crafting projects. At the time, I had a few crafty works in progress, but since they were meant for gifts, I couldn't blog about them. Now that all the gifts have been handed out, I'm taking this W.I.P. Day to show ya'll what I made.

This past fall, my co-worker Shara told me about an awesome website devoted to sassy and crude cross stitching sampler patterns, and even though I didn't really know how to cross stitch, I ordered Julie Jackson's book Subversive Cross Stitch. Learning was really easy since the book has step-by-step instructions right up front. After making the designs, I bought unfinished wooden frames at Michael's and painted them to match.

I made this one for Stephanie, a.k.a. Poopie Bitch, a vegan pal and pro cake decorator:

I made this one for my cynical friend Nathan, whose mood is often summed up by this sentiment:

This was given to my pal Wes, a dear friend who just so happens to be gay as the as the day is long:

And this one was made for Vaughan, my veggie buddy and part-time drag queen:

And finally, this was perfect for my long-time bee-yatch Misti:

Ya'll should definitely check out the Subversive Cross Stitch website. You can order all sorts of awesome individual patterns (complete with a kit of floss, fabric, and a hoop) or opt for the book.

Rawsome Tuesday

Another Tuesday night, another Raw Day gone by. I started this morning's uncooked cleanse with a veggie-packed glass of V5 Juice in my cool "I Voted for Barack Obama" Glass:

The juice contains two tomatoes, three celery stalks, one green bell pepper, two carrots, the juice of half a lemon, a dash of salt, and a pinch of cayenne pepper. I made it in my trusty Jack Lalanne juicer. Though I typically opt for a heartier breakfast on raw day, I thought it'd be nice to start with a healthy dose of liquids. I drank a giant cup of water with lemon, two glasses of the V5 Juice, and my usual iced blueberry green tea (I drink tea on raw days).

Of course I was starving by 10:30 a.m. Luckily, I packed plenty of between-meal snacks at work. First, I noshed on this Coconut Cream Pie Larabar:

I've seen this flavor on other blogs, but didn't know my Whole Foods carried it. OMG, this is totally the best one! And it satisfied my cravings for coconut bread.

For lunch, I brought this Raw Caesar Salad from Jennifer Cornbleet's Raw Food Made Easy:

The dressing is a raw ranch made from soaked cashews, onion and garlic powder, and dried basil and dill. It's pretty chunky and tastes surprisingly like tofu ricotta. This is the best raw dressing recipe I've found so far. It's nice to feel like you're eating tofu on raw day.

For dinner, I made Cornbleet's Spring Rolls. Here they are before rolling:

The wrappers are savoy cabbage leaves and the insides are filled with cucumbers, carrots, lettuce, and Cornbleet's Mock Peanut Sauce. It's made from processed almonds with garlic, ginger, and even maple syrup (which I doubt is raw, but the book called for it and I'm not that picky). IT IS SO GOOD! After filling these, I ate more of the sauce by itself. Here's how they looked all rolled up:

As usual on raw day, I stayed super hungry all day long. In between meals, I ate a whole mango, an apple, an orange mixed with fresh pineapple, and a couple of raw brownies that I froze a few raw days ago. It feels good, but I cannot wait to wake up tomorrow and eat some more coconut bread.

Cuckcoo for Coconut

I love coconut more than life itself. Okay, maybe not that much. But if I was stranded on a deserted island and could only have one fruit, I'd pick coconut. Lucky for me, coconuts just so happen to grow on deserted islands.

When I saw Lucious Coconut Bread on Krys' Two Vegan Boys blog a while back, I asked Krys for the recipe. She copied it from VegWeb and e-mailed it to me and I put it aside for a future breakfast treat.

Check out the cool vintage snack tin with cracker, potato chip, and pretzel flowers in the background. My mom got it for me for Xmas!

I finally made it last night and it is so super good. The coconut is toasted in a skillet before adding it to the batter, so it has that special magic that only toasted coconut can have. You can find the recipe here, but I subbed whole wheat pastry flour for the all-purpose and added a 1/2 tsp. of coconut extract.

Now I'm just a little sad cause tomorrow is Raw Food Day, which means I don't get to eat any coconut bread tomorrow. Of course, I'll consume the rest every other day this week ... just not tomorrow.

Also tester friends, the new recipes are up for this week! Happy Testing!

When It's Chilly, Eat Chili!

Brrrr ... the temperature in Memphis has dropped from 70 degrees yesterday to a chilly 40 degrees tonight. And it's also drizzling and windy. Ick! The best solution to staying warm on a cold, cold night? A steamy bowl of my Chipotle Chickpea Chili:

This is another one of my cookbook recipes. I developed it last winter, but haven't made it since. After consuming the above bowl a few minutes ago, I'm not sure why I waited so long.

It contains all my favorite chili ingredients: chopped chipotle peppers, cubed tofu, chickpeas, and mushrooms. So tasty! I served it with Garden of Eatin' Organic Corn Chips, the natural version of classic Fritos. If you haven't tried these yet, you gotta pick some up. They're my new favorite chip!

By the way, if you're a tester, this recipe will be up tomorrow on the tester site, along with a couple of others. And for everybody else, I should be back to regular posting now. Sorry I've been so sporadic. I didn't cook much over the holidays, but I have plenty planned for this week.

To Health and Wealth!

In the South, we celebrate New Year's Day with black-eyed peas (to ensure health in the new year) and cabbage (for prosperity). My Granny always fixes a big dinner of the traditional foods, but she also makes hog jowl (some nasty pork product that looks like really fat bacon). I used to dine with my family on New Year's Day, but for the past several years, I've stayed at home and made my own traditional foods.

Today, I took the opportunity to develop a new recipe for my cookbook. It may not be that pretty, but here's my Hoppin' John Veggie Sausage Bowl:

Instead of serving cabbage on the side (as is customary), I boiled the cabbage with my black-eyed peas and tomatoes. I also threw in some veggie sausage chunks for added flavor. Served over brown rice, this one-pot dish was wholesome and yummy. And hopefully, I'll stay healthy and get wealthy (fingers crossed) in 2009.

Some Hoppin John trivia: According to , Wikipedia leftover Hoppin' John eaten the day after New Year's Day is called Skippin' Jenny. So I'll be having Skippin' Jenny for tomorrow's lunch.