Who knew...

...that Esquire runs recipes? And vegan recipes from celebs to boot?

I think I'll make that enchilada bake the next time I've got a pot-luck to go to. Plus, if the soy cheese I test out from the co-op sucks, I can just throw out the leftovers without feeling as bad for wasting food because who wants to keep pot-luck food that's been sitting and getting funky at room temp for hours? If I made it at home I'd feel compelled to make at least one lunch of it, even if it was horrible.

Or I could just skip the soy cheese.

And we're back!

So, a little housekeeping. Things are back on track at home. This is very good news, and to commemorate that here's a nauseatingly cute photo:

It might be a bit before it's back to regularly posted food ramblings, but to kick things off again I just scored some sweet DallasWare/TexasWare dishes at St. Vincent DePaul. The guy sorting the shelves asked what I was looking at (as I was turning over every cup and mug in the hopes of finding some more vintage pieces to match) and when I explained he pulled down 4 more sectioned plates from a top shelf I was too short to see.


I will admit to being a little sad at the check-out though. The girl who rang everything up commented on the dishes and said she'd never seen that material before, well, except for that morning when she sold a set of three large speckled bowls to someone. Drats! I was a few hours too late for the big find.

And she sold them for $1.50 each! What a steal! Oh well. I originally went in to try on a bright green IZOD tennis dress from the 80s hanging in the window, but when that turned out to be way too big for me I really wasn't expecting to find anything else.


Apologies if this is anyone's dad. I tried to get a better shot just as he was taking a huge bite but we were both moving. This is why the road is a scary place. Not only is that Big Mac slowly taking him out, clogging his arteries and whatnot, but he's driving with BOTH HANDS ON THE BURGER! Is it wrong that I think people shouldn't be allowed to eat and drive? I'll take the cellphone crazies any day because at least they have one hand left for the wheel. (FYI - I wasn't driving. Jeff was. And we'd already stopped at Qdoba for lunch.)

No new posts.

An indefinite hiatus begins as last night I found out that I need to move byt hte end of the month, and vegan cooking for one doesn't seem like it's going to be that entertaining to photograph. So, no new posts until I get myself sorted and my head screwed back on.

A vegan Reuben.

I was in the bookstore last week and scouring the used cookbooks for something interesting. The restaurant next door (Monty's) has a cookbook and I picked up a copy and thumbed through it. I didn't really need a vegetarian meatloaf recipe or anything, but I was curious about a couple of my favorite veggie dishes. (The restaurant is not exclusively vegetarian, they just offer decent veggie selections.)

Sadly, the recipe in the book for the "Sheldon" (aka vegetarian Reuben) listed honey as an ingredient in the marinade. This was a little bit heart-breaking, so I resolved to marinate my own tofu, sans honey, and make my own Reuben.


Basically I marinated slices of drained firm tofu in soy sauce, a dash of vegan worcestershire, a lot of minced ginger and garlic, pepper, a little sugar, and water. After a night in the fridge I sauteed them in a non-stick pan for a few minutes, grilled a little pumpernickel/rye with Earth Balance, and layered it together with some tomato slices, sauerkraut, and Vegenaise.

It was quite tasty, although I think I've had my fill of Reubens for the moment.

Roman Candle Pizza

Last Friday Jeff and I took a walk. We were planning on just walking and leaving it at that, but bumped into some friends (Mark and Sarah) on their way to The Weary Traveler and invited us to join them. Jeff was hungrier than he thought, but when we go in there it was a little busy. We didn't want to interrupt our friends' date or make it harder for them to get a table, so we decided to head further down the street to Roman Candle Pizza.

Mark is an ex-vegan and gave us the suggestion to try the "fireworks sauce" with roma tomatoes, fresh basil, and walnuts. He was spot on. It's probably the tastiest combo I've ever had on a pizza. (And trust me, I've eaten a lot of pizza, vegan and non-vegan.)

I'd eaten the "Animal Lover" pizza before, but this was way better. Great fresh lemonade as well. Jeff wanted to go back for dinner a few nights later, but we hit up the Weary instead. I don't want to go to the same place twice in one week, it's just my silly neuroses coming out.

Birthday follow-up

The day after my birthday I went to see my grandparents and my father had the great idea to stop out at Cushman's Greenhouse on the way back so that I could pick out some plants. (My balcony was bare.)


Dad was at work, but Mom and I picked up some herbs and some sort of multi-colored leafy decorative plants, both of which he planted for me when we got home. (He also gave me a couple of cherry tomato plants he'd been growing from seeds inside the house all spring.) This is one of the best, useful birthday presents I've gotten in a long time. (Ok, I also got a gift certificate from Mom to the salon I go to for a haircut. That was pretty nice too. She and Dad both did well.)


After that, mom and dad took Jeff and I out for Laotian for a day-after-my-birthday dinner.

Unrelated to birthday stuff, I saw this huge full rainbow last night shortly before sunset.

26.

I'm 26 today. To celebrate I slept in, watched daytime TV, took some allergy meds (because the pollen and sunny weather makes my head want to explode), and went to dinner at Bunky's with Jeff.

I had some falafel, lentil soup, and a tasty okra dish with couscous (leftovers pictured below) while Jeff opted for a not vegan pasta dish. He'd called ahead to see if there were any vegan desserts tonight (as there sometimes are) and when he was told no he sought out some brownies and cookies from Mother Fool's. I'll admit I'm not a huge fan of cake anyway, so it's not a big deal to have a birthday brownie instead.




And I got some exciting "loot" too, including Slaughterhouse and The Mediterranean Vegan Kitchen. Tomorrow I'll go visit my grandparents (and parents) and then Thursday it's back to work for 2 whole days before the 3-day weekend. It's been a good week.

Baby shower BBQ

Yesterday was Jeff and Viv's baby shower. I nearly went blind in the baby aisle at Target trying to identify which teething ring "TFY CP" was. Apparently it stands for "The First Years - Classic Pooh" but I'm not up on my baby accessories, so it was harder than finding wheat bread without honey.

Anyway, they were doing a BBQ and picked up some veggie burgers and brats and had a lot of fruit and veg and other vegan snacks (thanks, guys!), but I also brought along a salad and cookies.

Soba noodle/peanut salad


Chewy chocolate chocolate chip cookies


Have you ever seen someone so happy about onesies and foam bath toys?

A long summary

We'll start with Sunday. Jeff and I went to see the Madison Symphony Orchestra with his father, after which we went to a lovely restaurant I'd never been to before where my menu options totalled two possibilities in modified green salads. I choose the mache. Nice restaurant, but each menu item required at least 3 animal products, so modification was going to be nigh unto impossible. At least I wasn't alone in my troubles as I overheard the vegetarian couple to my right having a similar conversation with their server.

I honestly don't remember Monday, other than a headache. I may have made dinner, but I have no recollection of it. (I think I asked Jeff to boil some pasta.)

Tuesday was a dinner out at a nice Indian place downtown, Maharani. I brought home a nice lunch-sized portion of chickpea curry for work the next day.


Wednesday I needed sushi in the worst way, so an hour later we had:






And tonight I decided to use up several veggies going bad in the fridge and a packet of Boca crumbles I found in the back of the freezer. In honor of every potluck of my childhood, I present: goulasch.

Willie Street Co-Op

We took a walk tonight down Willie Street for sandwiches from the deli case. I got a marinated tempeh and Jeff had a BBQ seitan.


We sat out on the little patio area outside the co-op and watched the sparrows before walking back home up Jenifer. It was a really lovely night, and our apartment is about 80 degrees right now so we wanted out. Our neighbors must still have the heat on because we can't understand why it's been warmer inside than out this past week.


Jeff insisted on a photo on the way back home, and it took three tries just to get one where I wasn't blinking. I'm just not destined to be a model.

I've created life!

So, incase you ever wondered what a couple slices of Tofurkey can do in the back of the fridge in as little as 2 months, I present you with this.

(It's a little gross, hence the link only.)

After cleaning out the fridge I settled in with a bowl of (thankfully fresh!) berries and waited for Jeff to get home to whip up a stirfry and noodles.

Muramoto

Airhead that I am, I left my camera in the car and then forgot that I could use my cell phone camera, so I don't have any photos, but I would like to say that although a very not vegan Japanese fusion restaurant I just had a very nice vegan meal at Restaurant Muramoto on King Street. There's only one vegan item on the menu (fried tofu in spicy peanut sauce) but the cole slaw can have its dressing subbed out from an egg-based ginger dressing to a vinegar based one.

They also informed me that, although not a menu item, they could make me a vegetable roll. (Or rolls if I was really hungry, but they do serve dishes sized to share.) That was excellent. An inside out roll filled with tempura battered asparagus, topped with sweet carmalized mushrooms and micro greens. I really should have brought a camera, even though it is a little weird to snap photos mid-meal, and it would have been strange once I thought of it to run from the restaurant to the car to get my camera.

They were also kind enough to tip me off that, as in most authentic recipes, the miso soup contained bonito flakes. Well, what in Japanese cooking doesn't?

My dinner tonight also reminds me that I just picked up an excellent, beautiful cookbook at Frugal Muse on Saturday. Shunju is far from a vegan cookbook (if photos of skewered whole fish and liberal bonito use wig you out, you'll want to pass) but there are accidentally vegan items, interesting uses of homemade tofu and soymilk, and great inspiration to be had in the the presentation, cooking styles, and unusual ingredients. (I envy Japan's vegetable choices.) Most recipes are simple, although the ingredients make the dish hard to create at home. (Are any of you able to harvest fresh bamboo shoots in the morning? I can't without a 16-hour plane ride first.) Like The French Laundry, I won't make these foods on a daily basis, but it's fine food porn.

Curse you, cold virus!

So, that whole healthy vegan thing was absent this week. Apparently veganism can't stop a wicked cold virus. It started as a sore throat over a week ago and morphed into a horrible sniffling, ear-aching mess by Wednesday.

As a result, this was the bulk of what I ate this week:


Instant noodles and veggies.


Peanut butter and jelly.

Last night things were picking up though (my cough was subsiding), so a group went out for Mexican and Spider-Man 3. I've got the leftovers from my veggie fajitas for lunch today.


And because I've been to this restaurant (Laredo's) I already knew they put cheese on the beans and remembered to ask for it to be left off.

No surprizes like Friday night when Jeff took my coughing/sneezing self out in public for dinner and my curry arrived with a parmesan garnish. Um. It's totally my fault that I didn't mention cheese, but I'd never seen cheese on curry before. It totally caught me off-guard, so Jeff and I did a little division and swapping of entrees. I could have asked for a remake, but it was not their fault in the slightest and there were other vegan items we'd ordered.

America's Test Kitchen Hot & Sour, modified

The nice thing about recipes from America's Test Kitchen is that they're solid recipes, usually short on ingredients and quick to make. The bad thing is that most (if not all) contain animal products.

I happened to listen to their episode Staying in for Chinese Take-out on Saturday (I say listen because we lack TV reception) and their hot and sour soup seemed like a good idea. (I'll make their stir-fry recipe another day.)


In my version a few things had to change. First, I'm serving 2 people, and although I like leftovers, I didn't need enough food for 6 people. Here's what I did (leaving out the pork, chicken stock, and egg a hot & sour purist would probably want, but I don't think the final product was adversely affected.)

Heat:
4 C vegetable stock
Add:
1 C sliced shiitake mushrooms
1/2 small can of bamboo shoots (they said to cut them into matchsticks, I didn't)
1/3 block of firm tofu, drained/pressed, cut into small cubes
Stir into simmering liquid:
3 T corn starch in cold water, the soup will begin to thicken immediately
Simmer for a bit, then add:
1/2 t ground white pepper
1/2 t hot chili oil
1 T rice wine vinegar
1 T red wine vinegar
1 t sesame oil
3 T low sodium soy sauce (if you're using canned bamboo and pre-made stock it will already be salty enough)
To serve, garnish with some green onion.


I also served a salad of chopped napa cabbage, dried banana, fresh banana, pineapple chunks, and cashews. I wanted to add fresh cilantro but the grocery store was actually out.

For a dressing I blended 1/4 c olive oil into 1/2 mashed banana, 1 t grated ginger, 1 T rice wine vinegar, 2 t brown sugar, and a squeeze of lime. I forgot 2 things in my haste. A pinch of kosher salt and a bit of minced jalepino. I had the pepper sitting right there on the cutting board and somehow overlooked it.

Saturday morning, non-food post.

I would post the lovely salad I made for dinner last night, but that plan never actually came through because I've been sick. I've just been sort of sleeping off and on, and never ended up eating anything for dinner last night (except for some Rice Divine ice cream which made my sore throat feel infinitely better.)

Today though I've been up to the Dane County Farmer's Market, where I ran into Erik's cousin Mark, and a host of other people I either happily waved "hi" to or ducked away from, disappearing into the crowds celebrating good weather, fresh food, and the Crazy Legs Classic Run/Walk.


I didn't take any pictures of the market itself. First off, it's early in the season, so most things being sold are seeds, seedlings, honey, cheese, organic beef, ostrich, bison, European red deer, pork, etc. I decided I'd rather not get my panties in a bunch on such a nice day by photographing the signs proclaiming their "humanely raised" "grass-fed" animal products. Another day. Maybe when it's rainy or something.


I had a nice leisurely walk home after the market. If anyone has a spare half-million they'd like to give me, I'd like one of those tin can-looking condos, please.

Check it out: Giant emu/ostrich sculpture on S. Paterson St. There are two of them, and I don't even reach their knees.

Jeff's out of town this weekend which makes cooking less fun, but later in the week I fully intend to make and veganize the recipes I just happened to catch on America's Test Kitchen for hot and sour soup, and stir-fry with noodle cake. We don't have cable, and barely get any reception, but I didn't decide on a DVD or anything quickly enough and got suckered into listening to PBS while I ate lunch. (lunch = leftover curry) It all sounded delish except for the pork and chicken and egg... but I can fix that.

A sort of Asian pasta dish.

Today I really wanted spring rolls, and rather than go next door and get take out ones (and risk a repeat of that one time there were two Heathers waiting for orders, and I got the right entree, but my spring rolls got mislabeled and I came home with shrimp...) I decided it was time again to make my own.


I was definitely out of practice rolling. The first one looked like a wet plastic bag, washed into the gutter. But from then on out I got the hang of it again.

Inside each roll was a little shredded carrot, green onion, bean thread noodles, mint, and some firm tofu that had been seared off with garlic, ginger, and a touch of curry. Jeff came in while the block of tofu was on the stovetop and began giving me grief because it looked like scrambled egg. I served it with some coconut milk/peanut sauce stuff, that I admit, came from a dry mix. Yes, I have chilis and peanuts in the cupboard, but there is something to be said for the ease of opening an envelope.


Here's Jeff trying to look hard-core or something over dinner. You can see the two goldfish make guest appearances over his left and right shoulders. (Sigfried above his left shoulder, Ari above his right.)


And lest you think we just ate appetizers for dinner, we also had a soba noodle pasta thing I threw together with some sesame oil & vegetable oil, ginger, garlic, green onion, snow peas, and napa cabbage. The soba noodles I boiled first for 4 minutes, drained, rinsed with cold water, and then added to the sauteed veggies. The noodles and veg stuck a bit to the pan, and I threw in a splash of rice wine vinegar to add a little tang to it and to help release the noodles that were sticking.

Overall, I think it was a rousing succes and definitely worth making again. The speed and ease of the main dish was a relief after cursing and sputtering as wet rice paper slipped out of my hands over and over on the first roll.

Recapping the week thus far.

After an amazingly lazy weekend (17 hours of sleep in one "night") with Jeff away, I really out-did myself cooking. No, I shouldn't lie. Rather than cook I rediscovered my old college dinner favorite: cold cereal.


These days I'm eating my cornflakes with soy milk and no honey, but it tastes the same and takes the same effort. Between that and rootbeer/rice cream floats I had a great weekend. :)

Monday night was another Jeff night in the kitchen. He chose vegetarian corndogs. I thought he and I agreed that those smelly semi-food products were not to be cooked unless I was out of the apartment, but at least he opened the patio door while they microwaved.


Last night I made an entirely too soggy baked veggie and seitan dish with quinoa. That seitan I made for gyros found a home in this dish too, but the spongey texture just didn't work for me and held more moisture than I thought. I wanted my veggies to roast in wet heat, but the ingredients (plus a splash of veggie stock) made for more of a bath than a sauna.

On the bright side though, all of the other veggies, herbs, and spices (I threw in a lot of odd things, starting with saffron, which I think was the kicker) made the carrots almost pretty tasty. For a carrot-hater such as myself that was an accomplishment. I'm getting excited to get some good fresh carrots at the Farmer's Market this summer and see if I can cultivate a taste for them.


And finally, tonight was another yellow curry. Tofu, onion, celery, mushrooms, chickpeas and tomatoes, over brown rice. Not bad, although it could have used more spice. We'll see how the flavors develop by tomorrow when I have leftovers for lunch.

Sometimes it's good to like "weird" stuff.

A patient gave one of the receptionists some Dagoba chocolate bars today. She tried the spicy one with cocoa nibs and promptly made a weird face. She then tried to get some other people to test it out but noone wanted any of it. One of my co-workers on my end of the room told her, "Yeah, give it to Heather, she likes that weird, organic stuff."

Damn straight. She wasn't sure what nibs were (I tried to explain) and the chile pepper thing definitely weirded her out, but I was quite happy with my free snack.

I'm glad to have the rep as the girl you can come too with any dark chocolate you need taken off your hands.

Tomorrow we're having an ice cream sundae party for one of the girls about to take maternity leave, I'm bringing the berries and Neopolitan Rice Dream. I'm hoping at least someone will get curious and try it.

Jeff's been cooking.

Jeff's been doing the cooking this week, hence the lack of updates. We've had pasta/spinach/fauz sausage, faux-chicken nuggets in buffalo sauce, dinner out at Lao Laan Xang, and finally, I had dinner w/ Ronald McDonald (seriously, dude in a clown suit) last night at the annual RMHC-Madison volunteer dinner.




All complaints about the McD corporation aside, our local Ronald McDonald House does really great things for families of ill children and I've been volunteering there for at least 4 years. I'll not knock the buffet dinner, but clearly my query last month about vegan options was not understood. Oh well, I had leftover Laotian food waiting for me at home.

Farmer's Market on the Square kicks off tomorrow, so you know I'll get some more cooking done this weekend.

And in unrelated to cooking news, the headline Century-old fish found off Alaska is irritating me. She wasn't "found" but rather netted and dragged to the surface, then carted off to be dissected. And is anyone else bothered by the potential off-spring that won't ever be in a species (amongst many) that are being fished into extinction?

Vegan gyros; the results

After a trip up to the roof to watch the sunset, I went downstairs to put away the cooled seitan.


It swelled up quite a bit and had a very spongey texture. (I think next time I'll knead the dough for a lot longer and see if I can get a chewier, stingier texture, although this was very moist and flavorful.) I placed one mass into the fridge, in the simmering liquid for later use. Another mass I placed in a container with liquid and froze. The third mass I sliced and fried up for gyros. It took a little shot of non-stick spray to keep the seitan from burning to the pan.


The final result with onion, tomato, and sauce in a pita? Not bad. I feel like the "meat" needed to be a little firmer, and could have used even more rosemary/marjoram and perhaps a few other spices. I like lavender and coriander seeds in lamb dishes, so I think future incarnations will involve those. (Perhaps I'll make a Moraccan dish with the rest of the seitan and get a chance to utilize those spices.) I feel the sauce tasted right though, so overall, it was a success. A few textural differences aside, it's really the tzakziki that makes it taste like a gyro. The spices I'll continue to tweak until they're just right, but I give this dish a B-. It's good, but with definite room for improvement.