so nice to be home...

BBQ Seitan Medallion w. Roasted Beets

Everytime I serve beets I tell Peter or whomever I am feeding them too to remember that they ate beets the next day when they go to the bathroom. But guess what? I never remember and I alway's fear that I'm dying or that my crazy kidney infection has returned. So dumb.

So remember that you ate beets!!

I made seitan cutlets the other day. Normal size ones not just the one giant one. The giant one is good for slicing and dicing. The normal size ones make for a much nicer presentation. What is above couldn't be simplier. It is my new go to food for lunch when I have extra cutlets soaking in the fridge.

Dip the moist seitan into panko (not much will stick but that is ok).
Pan sear on both sides for a minute or two.
Pour some BBQ sauce on top of the seitan and place in the oven 400 degrees for about 10 minutes. (i just put the pan I've seared them in in the oven.)
Eat.

So satisfying.



Crab Reno (almost 11 months!!!!)



While sitting on the beach last week I noticed a crab crabbing along on the beach that looked a lot like my daughter. It turned out to be my daughter. She loved the beach and the ocean water. More of that to come in another post.

Ocean Grove

Jenna + Peter (not really)

So that ain't us. But it could be! You never know! I'd give you all nightmares if I put a pic of myself in a bathing suit.

We are leaving, at some point, today for Ocean Grove, New Jersey. It's a little over an hour away but Traffic.com is telling us it's going to take 2 1/2 hours. So we are just hanging out until it says otherwise. Lucky for us we also live right next to the Parkway so we just have to look out our window to see what the traffic conditions are like.

We will be back next friday. Earlier if Weather.com has it's way. Thunder storms are scheduled for the ENTIRE WEEK!

Have a great week everyone!!

What the....?

Mustard-Tamari Glazed Seitan w. Asparagus and Simple Potato Pancakes

Really..what the fuck?? I had made such a commitment to myself that I was going to post everyday up until our beach vacation this Saturday and I've failed. Summer has gotten to me and Reno has gotten to me. She is needing my undivided attention lately and is only happy if I'm laying on all of our couch cushions on the floor watching her stand and raising our arms over head going "TA DAAAA...TA DAAA...TA DAAAAAAA!" She is "napping" in her play yard rignt now. By "napping" I mean laying down, singing to one of her toys. She will fall off soon and then it's off to the land of many dirty dishes for me. While I have these few precious seconds....




...I've still been obsessed with mustard and seitan. I took the rest of the GIANT cutlet from a post or two below and sliced it in odd shapes, to make it look more appetizing, plus I like odd more then even and can even get a little OCD about it. Enough into this glimpse of my crazyness..I sauteed the seitan w. garlic and then added the asparagus towards the end. I like my aparagus crisp once it starts getting too soft I'm turned off. At the end of cooking I made a mixture of whole grain dijon mustard w. tamari and a little bit of olive oil and poured it over the seitan/asparagus mixture and stirred until everything was completely coated. The result was delicious!! The texture of the seitan was perfect and meaty and complemented the sauce perfectly. Asparagus and mustard are a perfect combination as well.



Simple Potato Pancakes

Before I decided to make the seitan for this dinner all I was really planning on making were Potato Pancakes. I love them. Peter loves them even more that I do. I usually add all different types of stuff to my pancakes but decided to kept them very simple (and thick.) I also HAND GRATED these suckers! Now that's love and you can taste it!

Simple and Thick Potato Pancakes

makes: I have no idea

2 large red skinned potatoes
1 medium onion, thinly sliced
3 cloves of garlic, minced
1 cup all purpose flour
1/2 tea salt
fresh black pepper to taste

*grate the potatoes with a box grater into a bowl and drain most of the liquid when finished. (if I grate these is a processor I don't drain because they become nice and moist...with a box grater they seem to become way more liquidy)

*add to potatoes the thinly sliced onions and minced garlic and combine. Then add the flour. If the potatoes are still really moist after adding the flour keep adding a few tablespoons more of the flour at a time until the mixture holds together nicely.

*add salt and pepper.

*pour enough canola oil into the biggest pan ya got until it covers the bottom of the pan. When oil is heated I take a big spoon and scoop up a pile of potatoes and gently drop them into the oil. Don't press them flat at this point. When the bottom is golden brown after 3-4 minutes flip the pancakes with a spatula and then press them flat and cook another 3-4 minutes or until golden brown.

*remove the pancakes from the pan and place on a plate or baking sheet tray lined with paper towels or a brown paper bag to soak up some of the oil and sprinkle with salt. Keep them in a warm oven while you cook the rest of the potato pancakes.

*Serve with cold applesauce (room temperature just won't do) or tofu sour cream.

That's one BIG cutlet ya got there!

Mustard-Tamari "Crusted" Seitan w. Sweet Potato Chips and String Beans

Before I get to the BIG cutlet let me show you what I made with 1/2 of it. I was thinking about how much I like mustand and how much I like seitan so I decided to combine the two. Earlier in the day I made a GIANT cutlet instead of making separate ones. The only reason for that is that I didn't feel like wrestling with 4-6 pieces of gluten that didn't want to stretch. I only wanted to wrestle with 1 piece of gluten that didn't want to stretch. When it was time for dinner I was trying to think of a way to combine the mustard I so love with it and came up with a crust. The thing is though I went about "crusting" the seitan completely wrong and I knew it before I even started and just continued to do it anyway.

Friends of our came over just to shoot the shit with us while I was making dinner. It was around 8:30 at night and I didn't want to set up my 3 bowl make even a bigger mess method. I just decided to add all of the crust ingredients together into one bowl with the seitan and mix. Now while I'm doing this I know that the crust WILL NOT STICK! but I do it anyway it's fun to be rebellious and it was a moment of madness. Needless to say I was correct in my crazy thinking and it didn't stick at all. When it came time to cook it I just threw it all in the pan together and sauteed it. Some stuck (because I forced it to). Most of it didn't. It was still damn delicious and I was eating the rest of the "crust" out of the pan after our friends left around 11.

Crust ingredients: panko, whole grain mustard, tamari, olive oil. I will be adding additional ingredients to the crust the next time I make it and I will crust it properly. Bad me. Bad bad me.

Sweet Potato Chips are thinly sliced and tossed in olive oil and salt and baked in the oven on parchment paper.

Stringbeans are blanched in water.


BIG Seitan Cutlet

Ahhhhhhhh the cutlet! I think this is now my new favorite way of making seitan. One GIANT cutlet simmered in the over (i always write over instead of oven.) with broth made from one of those broth cubes. I never use those unless if I'm making this seitan. I've made it before with both homemade broth and store bought broth and it's just not the same. It must be made with broth cubes. Not any ol' broth cube at that...Rapunzel Vegan Vegetable Bouillon w. Sea Salt is the only way to go. I don't know what it is about it but it just makes the seitan taste perfect.

The cutlet recipe by the way is from the mighty Veganomicon.

It was bound to happen..

Doesn't Deserve A Title Curry

I pride myself on knowing how to cook. I also know that I cook well, most of the time. Even when I don't cook well the food is still passable. That dish up there was not passable. The son of a bitch didn't even want to photograph well. Jerk! At least give me something you no good for nothing curry!

I really wanted curry. So I made a curry. I use to make curries all the time. For some reason this one didn't want to taste good. I did all my usual tricks to make it passable but nothing worked. Was it the almonds that I used instead of the cashews that I usually use but wanted to save for another dish? Was it that I didn't put tomatoes in the curry this time? Curry powder old? Did I forget a secret ingredient? What was it? Maybe the red pepper was bad? I'll never know and I guess that's OK. Cooking a bad meal has made my brain wake up again and I've been thinking about food nonstop ever since and have come up with some new ideas for some new recipes. That makes me excited. The fact that this curry is still in my fridge doesn't make me excited. Peter says he will eat it...NEWS FOR HIM..if he doesn't take it to work on Monday it is in the TRASH!



B-A-N-A-N-A-S

How does that song go? "The shit is bananas B-A-N-A-N-A-S!"

Reno thinks bananas are the shit! She put this one to a slow death the other night. Some got in her mouth. Some was plastered all over her body, clothes and face. The rest was on her chair. Oh yeah. Some was also in her hair. At least she didn't throw it on the floor.

She also thinks Avocado Sandwiches are the shit.

PRO BAR

PROBAR

The lovely people at PROBAR contacted me awhile ago asking if I wanted to try out some of there new products. Never to turn down free food I said "YES!" Peter was pretty excited as well when the package came.

We received 5 bars. Not included in the picture is the Maple Pecan bar. We ate that one right away before I even thought of taking a picture. It turned out that the Maple Pecan was my favorite of the bunch. My least favorite, and I new it would be before even trying it, was the Kettle Corn. There is just something about the name Kettle Corn that turned me off. It just wasn't for me. For the other flavors they were all equally good. They were very filling and very high in fat. Even though they are meant to be a whole food meal replacement bar I'm thankful Peter was all too happy to split each one with me.

I would buy these if I came across them in the store. I'm sorta wishing I had a Cocoa Pistachio one right now.

Lunch..

Chipotle Split Pea Soup (Tester) w. Sunday Salad

This was our lunch on Sunday and it was perfect. Joanna has giving us testers another great recipe to try out for her. The soup was slightly spicy and split pea tasty. Best of all is that there is basically no fat used at all and you wouldn't know it unless someone told you. That type of cooking makes me happy.



Sunday Salad w. Garlic-Lemon Vinaigrette


This is called Sunday Salad pretty much because I made it on Sunday. It was nice using non bagged salad for once with baby spinach, which was bagged. Some blanched string beans and chopping red bell pepper thrown on top and then drizzled in a garlic and lemon vinaigrette which I created while the soup above was cooking. For me this was a very satisfying meal.

Lost and Found: Tempeh

BBQ Tempeh w. Sauteed Mixed Vegetables

A lot like Tofu, up until recently, you never really see Tempeh on my blog. It is one of those proteins that I purchase quite a bit that gets lost, has his picture put on a box of soymilk and is then eventually found in the back of my fridge..but it's too late by then. He's gone and there is nothing that can be done. To me this is very funny because when I first became a vegetarian waaaaay back when, tempeh is what I tried, liked and ate quite a bit. How I lost this love a fare with the fermented product is beyond me. A few weeks ago I purchased another 2 packs of tempeh! What? I decided I will not let him see yet another fridge death and cook him up.

I first need to admit that I've never made my own BBQ sauce. This time is no different. That tempeh up there is marinated and baked in a store bought jar sauce who's name escapes me. It isn't anything special but it's still good. I'd like to make my own sauce but when the mood strikes I don't have any ingredients on hand and don't want to go to the store to buy them.

The tempeh was first steamed for about 10 minutes. Then placed in a square glass baking dish and covered with the BBQ sauce and marinated for about 30 minutes before being put in a 400 degree oven until it became all sticky and gooey flipping once or twice. The tempeh was succulent and sweet and I couldn't stop eating it. I have a few pieces leftover and am wishing that I had a ciabatta roll and some coleslaw to make a yummy sandwich.

The veggies were just sauteed with oil and WHOLE CLOVES of garlic! That was nice.

Pizza aint a swirl no more..it's a roll.

So Improved Pizza Roll

So this is my exciting post. I realize it might just be exciting to me. After a Street Fighter II Pizza Party in May I found myself with a leftover piece of dough and made a Swirl out of it. It was fun and delicious. The problem was that the dough inside the swirl didn't bake as much as I wanted/needed it too. I didn't have a problem with it since I'm a rawish dough lover but to share it with people I needed to do something else. Thats when I got to thinking about Cinnamon Rolls. The process of making and rolling these up are pretty much the same.

This time I used a multigrain dough that I purchase from Whole Foods. I love making my own dough but with Reno it's hard to do during the week (and even weekends). I rolled the dough into a large rectangle. Spread on a really thick cashew ricotta and then topped it all of a mix of sauteed veg: broccoli, peppers, onions, garlic, zucchini, thyme. Rolled it up and sliced it about 2 inches thick. These are then carefully moved onto a parchement lined baking sheet (dusted with cornmeal) cut side up not touching one another. You have to shape them a bit if they get all wonky while transferring but wonky can also add some charm to these rolls.



The last time I made these I was able to get all of my cashew ricotta into the roll. this time I wasn't. I wasn't sure what to do with the extra since I knew if I saved it for another use it wouldn't get used. After standing in the kitchen with the ricotta in one hand and a spatula in the other for a minute or two I decided to mix it into the tomato sauce I was making. After I mixed it in I though I made a big mistake. After I tasted it I knew it was the right thing to do. It made for a nice thick and creamy pink sauce and added an extra depth of flavor to the whole dish.

For a fancy presentation I poured the sauce into the bottom of the bowls and placed one Pizza Roll on top. One roll was enough for all of us especially with the extra ricotta in the sauce. I was very happy to have leftover rolls for lunch the next day.

So there is my exciting post. It's not rocket science but I was excited I made it better. This will be a great dinner to serve to guest.

Burgers, BBQ + Measurements (not mine! dirty!)

Butternut, Red Bean + Quinoa Burger w. Chipotle Aioli

This is a version of my most favorite veggie burger recipe of mine. I was out of a few things so I had to do with what I had. This is usually made with millet and has leeks and peppers in it as well. The original inspiration for this burger was from one of the weekly specials at my last job. I was craving it one day when I wasn't working and set out to make my own version since I wouldn't ask for the recipe. It's more fun experimenting I think. It's changed here and there over the past 2 years but I'm really happy with it and am going to set out getting proper ingredient measurements, since you can't write recipes without measurements! I'm really trying to get better at writing things down especially since I'm aiming for self publishing a book or zine at the end of the year.




Reno (basically 10 months)

With the craziness that is Reno I'm finding it hard to do, but it will happen. She is standing now, attacking the cats (one of them decided to attack her back yesterday.) I thought it was a good experience for her but she went right back to it this morning. She's eating big girl foods now (including the above veggie burger without the aioli, and avocado sandwiches.) It's all so crazy. Oh yeah and some of her babbles are curse words. At least they aren't ones that we say so we can be assured she is just babbling and not calling us horrible names or vodka.

More food...



Maple-Hoisen Grilled Seitan and Brooklyn Deli Macaroni Salad

I'm pretty sure I haven't posted about this before. I think it was one of my forgotten meals. If you've seen it already well then you get the pleasure of seeing it again.

We went to a friends house to see a friend who was visiting and had a BBQ. I brought along the V'Con macaroni salad above. Which I need to say now if you haven't made this yet you must make it now. I love it. I've always loved macaroni salads but never "deli" ones. I love this "deli" one -the peas! You will never see the peas.

Since I was the only non meat eater there I also marinated some Seitan in my Maple-Hoisin Marinade. This is a recipe that I'm actually writing the measurements down for and I am almost satisfied with it. One more go at it and I will post it.

p.s. I have a very exciting post planned for tomorrow. It's a newer version of something people got really excited about a month or so ago. I'm really excited about sharing it.

Breakfast and Cupcakes

Tofu Scramble + Sausage Breakfast Burrito

It's Tuesday so I have to bring you some Tofu goodness. I've become quite the tofu connoisseur over the past 2 months and it's not going to stop just yet. We were at my parents house this weekend with my sister and our friend Rachele. On Sunday we decided to have a nice breakfast. While the others dined on eggs and bacon Rachele and I dined on VwaV "inspired" Tofu Scramble with some sorta veggie style sausage. It was very good and hit the spot. My father even tried some after asking what is was and being told it was "fake eggs" or "feegs". I yelled out it was scrambled tofu. Don't call my shit fake. It's real people...real!!



Buckwheat Pancakes w. Bananas


Fathers Day breakfast for Peter. Yellow Rose Recipe's Buckwheat Pancakes. Peter's been asking for them for ages so he got em. My favorite thing about this recipe is that there is a mashed up banana in the batter. They were so good. Since I now have a big bag of the flour in my posession we will be eating these more often.



Chocolate Cupcakes w. Vanilla Buttercream

I'm on the phone with my sister. Another call is coming thru..it's Peter's Grandma. She asks if I can make dessert for the dinner she was hosting that night. I said "Yes." I call my sister back 25 minutes later and tell her that "I had to make cupcakes." She says "You made cupcakes?" "Yes." I said, "They will be out of the oven in 5 minutes." I then had to explain that I can't help it if I can whip out a batch of cupcakes in 15 minutes from scratch. It's just something I can do. It's something you can do to if you baked a lot.



So good. They were from VCTOTW.

Salads...Tofu Tuesday! (on tuesday!!)

Buffalo Tofu Salad w. Candied Pecans and Ranch Dressing

Back in the day when I would frequent a theme restaurant beginning with the letter H and ending in hans I would devour a Buffalo Chicken Salad. Oh it was so tasty and good. I finally decided to make a vegan version after all these years. Panko crusted Tofu drenched in a tangy hot and sweet sauce. Cinnamon, cayenne and maple candied pecans. Homemade Ranch Dressing. Crispy tortilla strips. If only I had some vegan blue cheese to crumble on top. I added some red bell pepper and cucumbers (the latter of which I had to remove because of a funky taste). All that was missing was some tomatoes. With the recent tomato problem and local restaurants not serving them I've just decided to stay away for a bit until I can get to the farmers market and get some local ones.

In the end this was just as good, if not better, than the theme restaurant version. I think the secret is the pecans and tortilla strips. This will be a favorite salad for dinner meal for the rest of the summer I think.



Balsamic-Basil Marinated and Grilled Portobellos


I generally don't eat mushrooms but will still buy them occasionally. However, made this way I'd eat them at least once a week. It's such a great marinade that I've been throwing together for a year or so. (I swear I will measure all the ingredients the next time) Balsamic vinegar, shallots, garlic, basil, tamari, olive oil, salt = incredible flavors. Especially thrown on top of a mesclun salad with walnuts, raddishes, cucumbers, tomatoes and red bell peppers. The salad is just dressed with some olive oil, lemon and salt so that it isn't dry. The marinade that coats the mushrooms flavors the whole dish when eaten.

Tofu Tuesday? Thursday

Tofu + Vegetables w. Orange-Peanut Sauce

This post was meant for Tuesday. Unfortunately on Tuesday night around 9 pm the craziest storm I've ever been apart of hit our area. The badness lasted only a few minutes but we were feeling the after affects for almost 24 hours. Since that's about how long we went without power. Luckily it came back early evening on Wednesday, real lucky since they were saying we wouldn't have it until Sunday!! Sadly I have to throw away A LOT of food that was in the fridge and freezer. We ate out last night and will eat out again tonight. By tomorrow (friday) we should be all stocked back up with food and condiments so I can start cooking and baking again.

Enough of my storm story.

Above you will see another of my new "lets eat more non hidden tofu" meals. Lightly fried Tofu, just pressed and fried, with a big mix of vegetables including string beans, red bell peppers, broccoli, scallions and garlic. The sauce is one I've been working on for awhile now which is a peanut sauce with orange juice. I love the combo of those two ingredients. They work so well together that I now want a toasted bagel with peanut butter and a big glass of OJ for breakfast. I have no edible food or OJ in the house right now...the storm!!!! Curse you!!!

I'm off to clean out my sad fridge. See you in a day or two.

Wild Blueberries

Blueberry + Chocolate Chip Scone

Jeez! I wanted to take the holiday weekend off from blogging about food and almost 2 weeks has past. Time flies I suppose. Good news for you is that I've been cooking + baking during my brief hiatus. Today I bring you some baking.

Trying to save some bucks I've been making us breakfast on the weekends and extra baked goods for Peter to eat during the week before work. I'm not a big fruit eater and if I'm going to eat fruit, especially berries, they almost always are frozen. I've been really enjoying some frozen Wild Blueberries I bought at Whole Foods a few weeks ago. Good news for me I spotted them at Costco's so I'm sure the bag there is twice the size for the same price.

Above is the basic scone recipe from VwaV which I added blueberries and chocolate chips too, yes we eat chocolate for breakfast! I cannot recommend that combination enough. Peter loved them. I just liked them but enough to make them again. They were very biscuity and not too sconey for me. I'm now on a hunt in my apartment for a scone recipe I used in a restaurant I baked for.



Blueberry Corn Muffins

Another VwaV recipe. I believe they are called "Sunny" or something like that because of the lemon used in it. The book isn't readily available for me to confirm the name. I'm sure you all have the book. If not, buy it. We LOVE these muffins. A blueberry and corn muffin all in one with a lovely lemon zest flavor added. I prefer these warm, split in the middle with some Earth Balance spread on them. Peter eats them as is.

past few

Indian Croquettes w. Lemon-Garlic Stringbeans and Broccoli

First I was going to make my favorite veggie burger then realized that I didn't have kidney beans after I already started cooking the food. All I had were chickpeas and I didn't want them in my veggie burger. The meal quickly took a turn to being Indian inspired. I sauteed butternut squash w. garlic and onions until soft then added the chickpeas and mashed it all together in a wooden spoon. Added some ready to be tossed cilantro, slivered almonds and just cooked quinoa and mashed some more. Too help hold it all together I added some vital wheat gluten. All this together made a perfect moist croquette after lightly frying them in some olive oil. Since this wasn't a planned meal I didn't have anything to make a nice little curryish sauce for it so I just topped it off with fresh cherry tomatoes. Turned out that was all that was needed. These were even good the next day out of the fridge cold and then later for lunch warmed over some mesclun with a lemon and olive oil dressing.





Last Minute Enchilada's

Last night was our last Wednesday Night Potluck for a few months. The weather is getting nice. The sun is staying out to at least 8:30 so we need to do other things besides eat and watch reality tv every Wednesday.

I had know idea what to bring this week. Friends were already bringing a potato dish and all I could think of making was Potato Pancakes which would make no sense because we would all be in a carb coma. 30 minutes before I was to leave I had an idea. I don't think I've ever made enchiladas before but that is what popped into my head. I had leftover Kabocha Squash that I roasted a few days before and have been feeding to Reno since then. She was getting sick of it as was I serving it to her so I used it in the Enchiladas.

I chopped up some garlic, onions and jalapeno which were then sauteed in olive oil. Then I added a can of drained and rinsed black beans and the leftover squash. I felt it needed something tomato-y so I added maybe 2 tablespoons of this hot salsa that we had leftover from the pizza party. (That salsa was HOT! Just the 2 tablespoons heated up the dish to incredible levels!) I stuffed it all inside some corn tortillas and topped it off with 1/2 a jar of Salsa Verde and baked, covered with foil, in the oven for about 20 minutes. Took it out and dumped the rest of the jar onto the tortillas and took it to my sisters and just kept it warm in her oven until dinner time.

I'm happy to say it all went over well except that it was just a little bit too spicy for some. I'm happy that one was left so that I can eat it for lunch today.



Pesto

Some homemade Parsley-Pinenut Pesto tossed into cute little pasta topped with string beans and zucchini sauteed with garlic. I for some reason love zucchini with pesto pasta dishes. I highly recommend that you give it a try.

oops!

Pizza Swirl

So I made a big oops! this weekend. I had a pizza party and didn't take any pictures. It also wasn't just any ol' pizza party. It was a Street Fighter II Pizza Party a la my husband's wish. We had a lot of friends over, ate a lot of homemade pizza and had a Street Fighter II competition which I lost miserably and my husband won. It was surprisingly a good party. It was actually the first party we have ever thrown in either of our apartments!

Anyway I had a leftover pizza dough and some topping left in the fridge and used it up with the help of cashew ricotta to make a completely new dish for dinner last night.



I rolled out the leftover dough into a rectangle and spread a layer of a really thick and creamy cashew ricotta on it. Then topped it with a leftover mix of sauteed onions, orange, yellow and red bell peppers, zucchini, broccoli and herbs de provence. Carefully rolled it up into a log (like if you were making cinnamon rolls). Then rolled the log into a ball. Which kinda reminded me of a sleeping kitty.



Inside shot close up

At first I wasn't sure how to cut the thing after it was done. We then decided that cutting it into wedges was the best and obvious way to go. Let me just say that this was great! You have the crusty outer layer of pizza dough and then creamy layers of ricotta, veggies and dough inside. I served it with a Red Wine Tomato Sauce.

Swap.

I took part in the May Care Package Swap on the PPK forums this month. It was my first time participating and I'm so happy I did. Below is what I received from my partner Catalina!



Asian Grocery Goodness



Baked Coconut Rolls



Soursop Candy



JACKFRUIT!!!



Spices

I'm really looking forward to using the sausage seasoning.



Rice Cake



Asian Grocery take II



Chocolate and Cashews



Cabernet Conserves



The whole lot all together.

Tofu?

Southern Fried Tofu w. Sauteed Spinach, Carrots + Zucchini

I do eat tofu. Usually it's blended into a sauce, or made into ricotta, or desserts. It's rare that I actually squeeze and press a block of tofu, cut it up, cook it and eat it. Since my sister really likes Tofu I've been experimenting with it the past few Tuesdays (she's comes over every Tuesday). Last Tuesday I just cooked it Buffalo Style like I do with Seitan all the time. Which turns out to be a great way to serve Tofu to a Tofuphobe.

This Tuesday I fried it up Southern Style with a thick coat of crispy batter. It was really good. It was a last minute decision to make it this way so we just had ketchup to dip it in. Next time I'll make a Chipotle Aioli or even an Agave Mustard to go along with it. I'm slowly becoming a drain it, press it, slice it, cook it, eat it tofu girl.

To get the batter nice and thick I first dipped it into some soy milk mixed with Dijon Mustard (whole grain mustard).

Then into a flour mixture of:

unbleached white flour
paprika
cayenne
nutritional yeast
salt
pepper
i wanted to add onion and garlic powder but couldn't find it for the life of me so add those as well. I eyeballed everything so I can't give you even approximate amounts at this time. Next time It will be all measured out.

Dip it back into the milk/mustard and then again into the flour mixture. This will give it a nice and thick coating that will fry up really well in oil.

I'm looking forward to eating the leftovers pieces in a wrap or on a roll with some greens and mayo.



Chickpea Salad w. Avocado on WW Pita

I love making Chickpea Salads. I've been making them for years and each time they are completely different from the last time. Sometimes I put cornichon pickles into it. Sometimes I go heavy on the mustard and mayo. Sometimes there is curry powder added. Sometimes non of the above and I go a completely different route. This one was heavy on the mustard and mayo and made for a nice spicy mix w. red onions, celery and garlic.

Happy Mothers Day (after)!

Blueberry Pancakes w. Tempeh Bacon

Happy momma's day to all you mom's out there!

I made Mothers Day breakfast for us yesterday which included Blueberry Pancakes from VwaV and some store bought Tempeh Bacon. I love making breakfast but it's something I don't do very often. By the time Reno is fed and ready for the day Peter or myself just drive to Whole Foods to get some breakfast pastries and some Starbucks coffee's. It's a waste of money and gas especially since I have all the ingredients I need to make us breakfast and morning caffeine drinks, an espresso machine (for me) and a French Press (for him) at home. So I'm hoping to bring you more breakfast goodness to look at each weekend.

oh yeah..I need to tell you what blueberries I used for these pancakes. I picked up some Wymans Frozen Wild Blueberries. They are the best and I will never use another type!!



Chocolate Chip-Walnut Brownies

Mothers Day dessert! We went to my in-laws for mothers day along with my parents yesterday for a nice sit outside BBQ. I brought along the 3 bean salad w. warm cumin lime dressing (yellow rose tester that I posted about a few post below) AND some of brownies! I love these brownies. These are a version of another version of another version that I make all the time. The recipe still needs some work before it's the perfect version of the original brownie recipe.



Reno (8 1/2 months)

Ms. Reno enjoying her first Mother's Day celebration w. her Dad. What was she saying all day mothers day?

DADADADADADADADADADADADADADA!

What a little punk!

sigh.

View outside my kitchen

Yesterday I woke up to another rainy-go no where day.



Gorilla Espresso A Go Go

The type of day where you need a double shot of espresso with a bit of Green + Blacks Hot Chocolate mixed in. (an ever so slight amount)



Lunch

You also need some Shells and Chreese for lunch.



Dinner

Then some Chili w. Kidney Beans, Cashews + Chocolate.