» Archive for August, 2008

Chickpea-Quinoa Pilaf, Sauteed Green Beans and Mushrooms

Friday, August 22nd, 2008 by cyn
Chickpea Pilaf, Green beans with Mushrooms Pilaf from Veganomicon, Green Beans from Vegan with a Vengeance Neither the boyfriend or I are fans of the quinoa, but I keep making it anyway because 1. I have a jar of it in the pantry that does not seem to be getting any emptier and 2. everyone keeps talking about how it's amazing and wonderful and has more calcium than milk and blah blah blah wonder grain. I'm not the biggest fan of the chickpea (in non-hummus form) either, but I'm getting better about it. So when I made chickpea-quinoa pilaf and the boy and I were both like "Hey, this is . . . pretty good, actually," it was surprising. Deliciously surprising. This recipe might eventually turn me into a quinoa lover. The green beans were a recipe from VwaV I'd made once a long time ago, and remembered since the CSA sent us a huge bag of purple beans. (Which sadly turned green when cooked. What's the deal with that?) It calls for a huge, must-be-a-typo amount of salt, which I significantly cut down. The result was delicious. These guys have a would-be-perfect-at-Thanksgiving-dinner kind of vibe going, in the tastiest possible way.

Arugula Puree with Walnuts and Tofu Ricotta

Thursday, August 21st, 2008 by cyn
Arugula Puree Pasta from Pasta e Verdura Basically an arugula pesto, the original recipe called for goat cheese but I subbed tofu ricotta. This was really easy to make - it was basically just sticking various things in my food processor and mixing them together, plus making some pasta. The arugula gave a really nice spiciness to the pesto. I gave this to an unsuspecting victim without letting him know what was in it (I also didn't tell him it was tofu! Mwahaha.) and he was like "This is great! Is it just a ton of pesto?" This was also a great way to use up my arugula that was getting a little too sad and wilty to throw into salads. I made a salad to go with this that was CSA lettuce, tomatoes and radishes with leftover caesar dressing and croutons. Local: Arugula, tofu, salad fixings

Mashed Carrots and Potatoes, Golden Gravy, Italian Marinated Tofu, Bok Choy

Tuesday, August 19th, 2008 by cyn
Mashed Potatoes and Carrots, Tofu, Bok Choy Mashed Potatoes and Gravy from The Real Food Daily Cookbook, Italian Marinated Tofu from Vegan with a Vengeance Hey, you know what's awesome? Gravy! I would probably eat cardboard if it had a lot of delicious, delicious gravy on top of it. The carrots gave the mashed potatoes a really nice sweetness (which was delicious with gravy). I should have cooked the carrots a little longer, since they didn't completely mash in with the potatoes, but my friend Liz said she liked them this way, so I'm calling that a feature instead of a bug. The Italian Marinated Tofu from Vcon and VwaV is a recipe that I make a lot, because it's always tasty, and it is also delicious with gravy. I cooked the baby bok choy with leftover marinade from the blackened tempeh. It was pretty tasty, but the marinade turned out a little too thick. I didn't try gravy on this, but it would probably be good.

White Bean Soup with Caramelized Leeks and Onions

Monday, August 18th, 2008 by cyn
White Bean Soup from The Real Food Daily Cookbook More from the new cookbook! It took the beans way longer to get soft than the recipe claimed, but once they were finally done this turned out so delicious. There was just so much depth of flavor with the leeks and onions and beans and miso. It was definitely a hearty, filling soup too. The leeks and onions looked so pretty cooking that I had to take a picture! Leeks n\' Onions Local: Leeks, onion

Caesar Salad with Blackened Tempeh

Sunday, August 17th, 2008 by cyn
Tempeh Caesar Salad from The Real Food Daily Cookbook I decided to use up some of my copious CSA lettuce with this caesar salad. The boyfriend pouted a little bit because he's not really down with the "salad as entire dinner" concept, but I thought it was delicious. I really enjoyed the blackened tempeh - it's marinated in this sticky marinade involving brown rice syrup and tons of spices, and then you roll it in a spice mixture and bake it. I used some of the left over tempeh in a delicious, delicious sandwich for lunch the next day, too. I used half tempeh made by one of my fellow grad students, and half store bought tempeh, and you could really tell the difference in deliciousness between them. The RFD caesar dressing is really tasty too - the nori in it makes it super delicious and ocean-y tasting. Local: Lettuce, tomato, radishes, half the tempeh

Creamy Asian Pear and Tempeh Salad with Wasabi Dressing, Biscuits

Saturday, August 16th, 2008 by cyn
Tempeh Salad Tempeh Salad from Veganomicon, Biscuits from Cupcake Punk This meal is brought to you by mayonnaise and the color beige. I got Asian Pears from the CSA (for some reason I got tiny, tiny adorable Asian pears rather than the normal huge ones), and I had fresh homemade tempeh from a guy in my department, so I was like "Yes! I know exactly what I will make with this." It turned out delicious, the boyfriend was like "There are so many flavors in this but they all work so well together." The homemade tempeh is totally spoiling us on store bought tempeh, and we may have to figure out how to make it ourselves now that we're hooked. (It's just so much better! Much less bitter and mellower.) I had been jonesing for biscuits for about a week for some mysterious reason, and when I saw these I was like "Yes, I will make those immediately." So easy to make! So delicious when used to sop up the wasabi dressing from the salad! My boyfriend ate about seven of these with dinner. Local: Asian pears, tempeh

Super Quick Tomato Basil Cream Pasta

Friday, August 15th, 2008 by cyn
Vegan Yum Yum Creamy Tomato Pasta from Vegan Yum Yum First I saw the recipe on Vegan Yum Yum, and then I saw versions of it on a whole bunch of vegan blogs and I was like "WANT." And then the CSA sent me a bunch of tomatoes and it was clear that this pasta was meant to be. I doubled the recipe, and I don't know what kind of crazy-ass huge tomatoes Lolo is using, but it took me about seven tomatoes to get 4 cups of chopped tomatoes, not two. I didn't have any fresh basil, so I threw in a couple of cubes of frozen basil. This turned out super creamy and delicious. I threw some halved cherry tomatoes in the pasta at the last minute, just to get a little bit of interesting texture in there, and it turned out really nice. The boyfriend and I have this running joke that the pasta I make never has enough sauce. (I love pasta with olive oil and chunks of veggies and no real sauce at all, or with pesto which he claims is not sauce either.) When I made this I was like "Baby, I think I finally made pasta with a real sauce," and he was like "Finally!" So, make this pasta and your sauce-loving boyfriend will be so happy he won't even mind that you used whole wheat spaghetti. Local: Tomatoes

On Vacation

Thursday, August 14th, 2008 by cyn
I'll be at Burning Man for the next week, so I won't be posting. Instead, you can just image a picture of a can of soup that's been heated in the sun all day, eaten directly out of the can, for every post next week. With a side of playa dust and larabars. It should be awesome.

Stir-fry

Tuesday, August 5th, 2008 by cyn
Stirfry with Tofu, Chard and Bok Choy Just a stir-fry thrown together with veggies from the CSA. I first steamed the beans by putting them in the skillet with a couple tablespoons of water and covering the skillet. I let them cook until tender, and then added the tofu. I threw in some soy sauce and rice vinegar and about a teaspoon of chili-garlic sauce with the tofu. Once the tofu looked pretty good, I threw in the stems from the chard and the bok choy and covered the pan again, and cooked everything for a couple of minutes until the stems were tender. Then I threw in the leafy parts of the chard and bok choy, and cooked everything for a couple of minutes until they were wilted. I served this with a salad that had lettuce, tomatoes and avocado from the CSA and the Veganomicon Caesar dressing, and sticky rice from A Year in a Vegetarian Kitchen. Local: Chard, bok choy, yellow beans, lettuce, tomatoes, avocado

Heirloom tomatoes and Cucumbers, Zucchini and Eggplant Parmesan

Monday, August 4th, 2008 by cyn
Heirloom tomatoes & cucumbers Tomatoes, cucumbers, olive oil, balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper Heirlooms, cukes and bread The same, with bread Zucchini and Eggplant Parmesan Zucchini and Eggplant Parmesan from Nonna's Italian Kitchen I'm not going to lie to you: I fucked this one up. Which is unfortunate, because I think if I hadn't fucked it up, it would have been really, really good. Even with me fucking it up, it was decent. I didn't cook the veggies enough, so they were still kind of unpleasantly chewy/crispy/raw. I used too much tomato sauce, so it was pretty soggy. Still, the tomato sauce and the white sauce were still very tasty, and the veggies were tasty even though they weren't cooked enough. (The zucchini was better than the eggplant.) This recipe is actually pretty similar in concept to the moussaka from Veganonicom, so I might use that as a guideline for how much sauce to use and how long to roast the vegetables. The heirloom tomatoes and cucumbers were really tasty, possibly because there were only five ingredients and very few places I could mess it up. Local: Tomatoes (the ones in the tomato sauce too!), cucumbers, zucchini, eggplant