New Orleans Eats, Part 1

I spent the last several days in New Orleans for an Association of Alternative Newsweeklies conference. In real life, I write for the Memphis Flyer, the city's free alt-weekly, and our paper belongs to AAN along with about 130 other free weeklies from across the country. Folks from papers like the Nashville Scene, Mountain Xpress, Portland Mercury, and Washington City Paper gathered in NOLA for several days of news and design workshops.

Of course, I found plenty to eat ... so much that I'm splitting my photos into two posts. When my editors Bruce and Susan (also a vegetarian) arrived on Thursday afternoon, we were starving. The easiest option was lunch in the hotel restaurant. It was a fancy joint inside the equally fancy Ritz-Carlton Hotel on Canal in the French Quarter. No vegan options on the menu, but there was a chicken salad with quinoa, chickpeas, kidney beans, and seasonal greens. So I asked for the chicken salad with no chicken:

For dinner on Thursday, Susan and I wandered around the corner to one of my fave New Orleans restaurants — the Country Flame. It's a hole-in-the-wall Cuban place with Fried Plantain and Yuca Vegetarian Fajitas. I ordered my usual fried yuca (my parents and I always eat here when we're in town):

And Susan ordered the fried plantains. Then we shared:

Afterward, we hit up Bourbon Street for Mango Daiquiris:

On Friday, I ate leftover fajitas in the room for breakfast. We only had a quick 30-minute break between workshops for lunch. So we went to the closet place to the hotel — the China Wall, a sort of forgettable fast food Chinese place. I got the Vegetable Fried Rice, which despite its lack of vegetables (except for three pieces of broccoli), was actually pretty tasty ... mainly because it was salty and greasy. You cannot go wrong with salty and greasy:

On Friday night, I grabbed a Subway Veggie Delite before heading out to the Republic for the AAN-sponsored burlesque show open-bar party.

On Saturday morning, Susan and I trekked over to Nosh on Dauphine Street. They have portabella sliders during lunch and dinner, but breakfast was the typical egg and meat affair. I did score some spicy Hash Browns and Plain Grits:

For lunch, we went to the Green Goddess in Exchange Alley. My VegOut app showed this place to be the nearest veg-friendly restaurant to our hotel:

This tiny cafe was so adorable inside. There were only a few tables, so it had an intimate vibe. Plus, they had an iced tea of the day and a "tea sommelier"! Susan ordered a vegetarian Cuban sandwich made with collard greens. I opted for the Indian Pancake with Coconut Cabbage Slaw and Tamarind Sauce:

The pancake wasn't quite enough food for me, but it kept me full enough for a few hours. I knew we wouldn't be eating dinner on Saturday until after 7 p.m., so I snacked on this cute ready-to-eat meal that I'd brought from home. I found this St. Dalfour Whole Grain & Bean Salad at Whole Foods. It came with a tasty pineapple juice and oil sauce and the tiny fork!

I have a ton of photos from Saturday night's cocktail party and dinner. So I'll stop here and share those tomorrow night.

Tomorrow is the last day for my Zukay giveaway! Click here for more info.

Cherry Bomb!

Having a blog has its perks ... like two big ol' bags of free cherries from Whole Foods to use however I see fit. The Memphis store (5022 Poplar) is hosting a Cherry Fest on Saturday, July 23rd from 1 to 3 p.m., and they're hoping to spread the word about cherry season. Cherry Fest features a cooking demo by Sri Srinivsan and lots of recipes and samples of cherry-centric foods.

The marketing department asked me to cook up some fun cherry-based dessert for my blog and share the recipe. I didn't want to do a pie because that route seemed too obvious, but honestly, I've rarely worked with fresh cherries. I don't own a cherry pitter, and I assumed pitting by hand would be a pain.

But not so. I pitted three cups worth in less than 15 minutes for this Cherry Pudding Cake:

Since I wasn't familiar with many fresh cherry recipes, I googled and stumbled upon this recipe from AllRecipes.com. It was easily veganized, and it sounded pretty yummy. It's a cakey cobbler dessert made from fresh cherries dropped into a thick vanilla cake batter. The cake cooks around the cherries, and the fruit gets all melty and awesome.

Here's a slice before my co-workers gobbled it up:

And here's the recipe, adapted from AllRecipes.com.

Cherry Pudding Cake
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2 cups unbleached, all-purpose flour
1 cup evaporated cane juice
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 cup soymilk
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 cups pitted red cherries
3/4 cup evaporated cane juice
1/4 teaspoon almond extract

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Grease a 9x13-inch baking dish. In a bowl, stir together the flour, 1 cup of evaporated cane juice, baking powder, soymilk, vegetable oil, and vanilla to make a smooth batter; scrape batter into the prepared baking dish.

In a separate bowl, stir the cherries with the other 3/4 cup of evaporated cane juice and the almond extract; spoon the cherry mixture over the batter.

Bake in the preheated oven until the cake is lightly browned and a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean, about 40 to 50 minutes.
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Don't forget to enter my Zukay Ginger-Beet Kvass giveaway here. And I'll see y'all again on Sunday night (or maybe even Monday). I'm headed to New Orleans for an Association of Alternative Newsweeklies conference for work.

Peanut Butter and Beets

Not together, silly! That would be disgusting. I had peanut butter for breakfast in the form of Peanut Butter Waffles from Vegan Brunch:

I've had my eye on these since I bought the book forever ago, but for some reason, it's taken me an age to make them. The batter is made with 3/4 cup of chunky PB, so every bite has a little peanut crunch surprise. The maple syrup on top really takes these over the edge of awesomeness.

Now, for the beets. Remember my Zukay Kvass review a few weeks back? If not, click the link to read all about Zukay's new fermented vegetable drink. It's good if you're into fizzy kombucha-like drinks, and I am.

Zukay wants to give away a six-pack of their Ginger Beet Kvass to one lucky reader. Just leave a comment here on your favorite way to eat beets. Link to the contest on Facebook and leave a separate comment letting me know you did. Ditto for Twitter. That's a total of three comment entries per reader. Be sure and leave your email in your comment if yours isn't listed on Blogger. I'll randomly choose one comment next Tuesday night.

Falafel Girl!

Remember Party Girl with Parker Posey? That was the first time I'd heard of falafel. Nobody was serving falafel or hummus or anything remotely Middle Eastern in my small Arkansas hometown in 1995. But Parker Posey had a crush on her neighborhood falafel vendor and that was enough to convince a 14-year-old, newly-vegetarian, tiny punk rock Bianca that falafel must be delicious.

I didn't get a chance to try the fried chickpea patties until years later ... maybe not even until I moved to Memphis in 2002. But now I'm a little sad I missed out all those years. We have this fabulous place in Memphis called Pita Wraps, and they stuff the BEST falafel in the world into giant pitas, along with hummus and all the fixins.

I've got no problem with the occasional fried food, but since I've been pigging out on all sorts of junk lately, I figured it was high time I try the Baked Falafel from Appetite for Reduction:

Yep, that's a tiny baked falafel ball hiding out in my pita. And it was pretty damn good for health food. Was it as satisfying as a fried falafel ball? Not quite. But the guilt-free feeling more than made up for the lack of a greasy bite.

I also made a batch of Isa'a Horseradish-Dill Hummus from Appetite for Reduction to spread inside the pita. It's tahini-free, which means far less calories and fat than regular hummus. To tell you the truth, I didn't even miss the taste of the tahini. But I know tahini is super-good for you, so I did feel a little like I was cheating myself in the nutrition department by leaving it out.

That white sauce is a homemade tzatziki sauce: 1/2 cup plain soy yogurt, one grated cucumber, one minced garlic clove, and lots of dried dill and black pepper. Can you guess what the red stuff is? Yep, sriracha!! Of course.

On the side, I made some of my Summer Tomato Salad:

I talked about this in my Jazzy Vegetarian Radio interview last week, and you can find the super-simple recipe here. It's juicy summer tomatoes, green peppers, Vidalia onion, and cucumber marinated in olive oil and vinegar. Yum!

Rockin' Ramen

As you probably already know, I'm obsessed with ramen. Sitting down to a steamy bowl of noodles is a near-religious experience for me. I like the instant packages, but nothing beats a bowl of noodles with a lovingly-prepared, homemade broth.

So naturally, I freaked out when I saw the "Rockin' Ramen" feature by Melissa Feineman in the June issue of VegNews. The feature offers a recipe for homemade Veggie Ramen Stock, Shoyu Sauce, Sesame Ginger Seitan, and two types of ramen — Classic Shoyu Ramen and Comforting Miso Ramen.

I plan to try both types, but I opted to start with the Classic Shoyu Ramen:

The broth is combination of homemade stock (made from carrots, celery, kombu, and shitake mushrooms) and shoyu sauce (a ginger-garlic infused sesame soy sauce). I used plain ramen noodles from the Asian market, and I added the sesame seitan and extra dried shitakes for fun. The bowl is topped with nori and green onion.

I literally made myself sick on this stuff! It was so good that I ate way more than I should have, and then I was so full, I had to lay down for awhile. Tomorrow, when I eat the leftovers, I'll try a little better to stop when I'm full. But I'm not making any promises.

In the past when I've posted about ramen, I've had a few comments from people wondering where they can find vegan instant ramen. Try your local Asian market, if you've got one. The place by my house has hundreds of ramen flavors, and I'd say, nearly one-third are vegan. Many are artificial beef or artificial chicken, and some have lower-cal rice noodles over the traditional fried ramen. But if you can find plain noodles, try making your own broth free of MSG and other additives.

Crunk Teaser!

It's been awhile since I've made anything from my own cookbook. Any readers who were around last year might remember that nearly every post featured something from my cookbook. That's when I was busy testing recipes. Now that we're in the editing phase, I've been taking a break from my own stuff.

But green tomatoes are in season! And I have been craving a Fried Green Tomato & Tofu Sandwich! So I made one of the recipes in my upcoming Southern vegan cookbook (due in January ... yes, I know I've said it a million times ... but I'm slamelessly plugging wherever I can):

That's a big ole sandwich with two cornbread-coated fried green tomatoes, two slabs of marinated smoky tofu, and a yummy Dijon-mayo sauce. I used Miso Mayo this time because I LOVE that stuff!

On the side, I made a helpin' of my Southwestern Corn Salad:

This balsamic corn/pepper/olive salad is also in the book. I'm not sure how Southwestern it is, but sometimes, in the South, we like to give foods names from other places. My Granny invented this salad for a Thanksgiving a few years back.

Speaking of my cookbook, I was actually interviewed yesterday on "The Jazzy Vegetarian" radio! Host Laura Theodore talked to me about the book, my blog, my day job as a newspaper reporter, and eating out as a vegan. I even shared my recipe for Summer Tomato Salad, which you can also find here.

Laura also interviewed Rob Ventre on the show. He's the vegan men's crossfit champion and gold medalist in the IKFF/IKSFA New York Open Kettlebell Championship! My interview is about 10 minutes into the show. Listen here.

Shirataki Alfredo! And a New Look!

So what do you think about the new look? My blog has had the same damn design since, oh, 2008. I've been meaning to re-design forever, but I hate working in PhotoShop. So I just kept putting off designing a new blog header. I finally got my ass in gear this week and used a photo of my BBQ Tempeh & Carrot Sandwich (from my cookbook, due out in January) for a new banner. Tonight, I played with colors and fonts. I think I'm finally happy with it. Let me know if there's any issues with reading the links or font colors. I can always make adjustments.

Now on to the food. I don't have the Food Network, but I sometimes watch it at my parents' house. When I visited them a few weeks ago, my mom had recorded an episode of the Hungry Girl show, in which she made a quick microwave version of fettucine alfredo with tofu shirataki noodles. Her version wasn't vegan, of course, but it was a great concept.

If you've never had tofu shirataki noodles, you're totally missing out. They're so low-cal, it hurts. One package of two servings only has 40 CALORIES! Yet two servings equals well over one cup of pasta. I never eat a single serving of this stuff because it's so light. Granted, the noodles, which come water-packed, are pretty smelly when you first crack open a package. But rinsing and heating takes the smell away. They taste NOTHING like they smell.

Hungry Girl's recipe is actually printed on the back of the House Tofu brand shirataki noodles. But rather than veganize her version, I took an even easier route. I used Lindsay Nixon's Fettucine Alfredo Sauce from the Happy Herbivore cookbook:

Her low-cal sauce is made from silk tofu, soymilk, and nutritional yeast. And I added peas and parsley for good measure. This bowl was only 200 calories, and I really piled on the sauce.