MoFo Day 8: Peanut butter salad

Today’s cookbook: You Won’t Believe It’s Vegan! by Lacey Sher and Gail Doherty. I checked this book out from the library years ago and made the very first recipe (Apple Crumb Muffins), and they were phenomenal. Looking back, I’m surprised I made them because the recipe calls for 1½ cups of maple syrup. I’m all for whole foods and natural sweeteners, but that’s an expensive batch of muffins! Last year, I noticed the book was really cheap on Amazon and I had a gift card, so I bought it based on my memory of those muffins and a few other recipes I had added to my binder.

This was my first time cooking anything out of it since then. A lot of the recipes sounded good to me – clean, distinct flavors and reasonably healthy – but the ingredient lists always seemed too long. Now that I give the book a closer look, I think it’s mostly layout. The ingredient box is only an inch wide, so most items take up at least two lines, and they’re double-spaced. On one page, a vegetable bullion cube takes up five lines. I guess it’s a good little parable about not judging on first impressions.

Tonight’s choice was Gado Gado (the recipe is visible on Google Books), which the book says is an Indonesian classic. I’d say it’s salad with baked tofu and peanut sauce. The ingredient column spans the full length of the page, but I had all the non-produce items except tamarind paste and brown rice vinegar already. I’ll use any excuse for a trip to the Indian grocery store, and tamarind paste is something I’ll use again. I broke my MoFo rule by substituting regular rice vinegar for the brown rice vinegar. Because ohmigosh vegan cooking requires so many kinds of vinegar! I have an entire shelf of vinegar and I just couldn’t bring myself to add another that’s so similar.

Before:

The first step was to bake to the tofu. The recipe refers to a marinade, but it’s really just a coating of olive oil, tamari and liquid smoke you brush on before putting it in the oven. My tofu instincts told me to actually marinate it, but I followed the recipe. I was regretting that choice when I pulled this monstrosity out of the oven:

I don’t think this picture fully conveys what a greasy mess this was. Don’t get me wrong, I like greasy things; I’ve polished off more baskets of fries than I’d like to admit. But baked tofu swimming in pools of olive oil just doesn’t appeal to me. I wiped each one off and drained them on paper towels. I was disappointed that the marinade didn’t impart much of its smoky, salty deliciousness, but when mixed with everything else, I didn’t notice.

The dressing, which is basically peanut sauce, went more smoothly (pun intended). My immersion blender handled the full cup like a champ. While plating, I decided there was too much dressing for the salads, so I ate the leftovers with a spoon. And yes, that’s still an empty beer bottle propping up the window.

After chopping the salad ingredients (and using my salad spinner! 3 gadgets in one recipe!) and dividing the rest, I have lunch for the week.

Overall, this is a solid recipe. There’s no nutrition information in the book, but that’s probably for the best. I will go on blissfully eating peanut butter-coated lettuce and calling it “salad.”

MoFo Day 6: Cookies for Breakfast

As I said before, Appetite for Reduction is my absolute favorite cookbook. My second favorite is Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar. The chocolate coconut bars, cream cheese brownies and peanut butter blondies are all in my top 5 desserts. I’ve made half the recipes in the book, and it’s probably not surprising that none of those have been from the “Wholesome Cookies” section. The recipes sound good, but when I want cookies, I want granulated sugar and melted chocolate, not brown rice syrup and carob. A challenge of using a different cookbook every day is working through my collection of dessert books without gaining 50 pounds. With a weekend camping trip approaching, I thought the Banana Oatmeal Breakfast Cookies would be a good choice. The recipe is posted here.

These cookies were easy to throw together and used a lot of the random jars in my pantry from my last healthy eating spree. They’re sweetened with brown rice syrup and agave and use banana and flax seed as a binder. They come together like typical oatmeal cookies, with walnuts and dried cranberries mixed in last.

I followed the recipe’s instructions to spray a measuring cup with cooking spray and they were a breeze to portion out. I got lazy with the “scant” 1/4 cup and only got 18 cookies instead of the 24 the recipe called for, but since I was eating them all anyway, it didn’t matter.

These turned out great. I like a lot of stuff in my cookies, so I’ll probably add more cranberries and nuts next time, but they had a great flavor and texture. They traveled well and were perfect for a weekend of camping. I’m sure I ate more than necessary, but they kept me as full and energized as a bowl of oatmeal would have. And they were much easier and more fun to eat!

MoFo Day 5: Gardein overload

You know how people say art is personal? Well one of my favorite works of art is The Conscious Cook. The photography and layout is beautiful. I just want to look at it all the time, and when I’m reading it, I feel like a beautiful, accomplished chef (even though I’m likely wearing dirty sweat pants and eating cereal). I have such high aspirations with this book that I felt lazy for choosing to make wraps with the California Gardein "Chicken" Salad. But I needed food to take camping this weekend and time and energy were at a premium. The recipe is posted here.

I halved the recipe to make four servings, but it still needed a pound of Gardein (which is a brand of meat substitutes). Meijer didn’t have the plain kind the recipe called for, so I bought two 10 ounce bags of teriyaki flavor and saved the sauce packs. The recipe also called for champagne grapes. After three stores, I gave up and used green grapes cut in half. I made the mistake of waiting to buy wraps at my last stop (Whole Foods). They only had three kinds and two of them had honey, so I was left with the gluten-free option. They tasted fine, but flaked a lot and had pretty much disintegrated after three days in a cooler.

Aside from the grape-hunt, the recipe was really easy to put together. I mixed Earth Balance vegan mayo (I normally use Veganaise, but the new EB kind was on sale so I figured I'd try it) with lime juice and agave, then mixed in chopped chicken, walnuts, grapes and celery. I tasted it and… yuck! I'd always assumed Gardein needed to be cooked to get the right texture and was surprised the recipe didn’t call for that, but I trusted it since I suspect they paid to be featured in the book. That trust was misplaced. I normally like Gardein, but the uncooked stuff was really mushy. The salad ratio had way too much chicken (even if it had been the right texture), so I added all the grapes and celery I had - twice as many grapes and four times as much celery as the recipe called for. At this point it was decent and ready for wraps.

With a ton more celery and grapes this was good, and with cooked Gardein, it would have been pretty solid. I’m surprised because the other recipes I’ve made from this book have been great. The wraps served their purpose of keeping me fed while camping, but I probably won't make them again. The only time I use meat analogs is when I'm craving the foods I grew up eating. In 19 years of being an omnivore, I never tried chicken salad, so I don't have any nostalgic interest in eating it now.

The one upside to my grape-hunt? The closest Whole Foods is in the same strip mall as the closest TCBY, so I got to try their new soy chocolate frozen yogurt. It tasted exactly like Silk chocolate soy milk (which I neither like nor dislike). I'm fortunate to have two places closer to me that serve vegan frozen yogurt (Easy Like Sundae in Ferndale and Sweet Earth in Royal Oak and Birmingham) AND have Oreo's, but it's nice to have a mainstream nation-wide option.

MoFo Day 4: Appetite for Deliciousness

From the moment I first held it in my arms at a work Secret Santa exchange, I have loved Appetite For Reduction. I know, a DIET vegan cookbook?? That was my first reaction too. But I’ve made a quarter of the recipes in the book and they’ve all ranged from very good to outstanding. AFR is my most beloved and most used cookbook. I cannot say enough good things about it. It’s not just for vegans – I would recommend it to any omnivore looking for meal ideas with less fat and zero cholesterol. Nothing in here tastes like health food, the dishes will fill you up, and there are very few “weird” ingredients.

So after explaining how hearty the dishes are, I chose the most hippie recipe in the book: Vietnamese Rice Noodle Salad with Grilled Tofu. My diet has been so bad lately that I’m actually craving vegetables, so this was an easy choice.

The salad is basically a spring roll and dipping sauce in a bowl. I was a little confused when the recipe called for string beans – are they green beans? Am I supposed to cook them? When I got to the grocery store, I noticed prepackaged beans that were much thinner than the bulk ones. And guess what – they’re delicious raw! Like snap peas, but not as sweet. I have a lot leftover, so I’ll be snacking on them instead of grapes (or potato chips) at work.

I used a mandolin to slice the cucumber and onion, and for the first time ever, did not cut the tip of my finger off! I love how fast and easy that thing makes slicing, but the time savings have always been negated by first aid. But surprise, using the finger guard actually prevents finger injuries! Who knew? 

This was pretty easy to throw together, but be warned – it uses a lot of dishes. First you mix the dressing (dish 1) and marinate the tofu in some of it (dish 2). The recipe didn’t call for it, but I pressed my tofu. Then you cook the rice noodles (dish 3), rinse them in a colander (dish 4), and mix the salad ingredients with the noodles and dressing (dish 5). I used a HUGE bowl for this (the normal sized ones were in the dishwasher), and it still spilled over the edges while mixing. Next you make a gremolata of mint, lime zest and peanuts (I used dish 1 again). Last step is to cook the tofu (dish 6). I don’t have a grill pan so I used my trusty IKEA cast iron skillet. I love seared tofu:

The recipe says it makes 6 servings at 260 calories each. I made it into four servings, thinking 400 calories is a pretty decent lunch.

In case you’re wondering, the bottom left container is the one the salad mix came in. It has a resealable lid, so why get another container dirty? Just like everything I’ve made from AFR, this did not disappoint. It made a great lunch, and even got compliments while in the office refrigerator. The recipe is posted here.

Bonus: Not cooking related, but I was in Birmingham and couldn't pass up (vegan) frozen yogurt at Sweet Earth. It's hard to tell in the picture, but it's chocolate and vanilla swirl, Oreos and Hershey's syrup. It's always hard NOT to fill up the entire 32 ounce cup.

MoFo Day 3: Breakfast Soup

I bought a Crock Pot with high aspirations, but my dreams of coming home from work to a hot meal were destroyed when I realized I’d be too paranoid to function with a heat-producing appliance on when I wasn’t home. I know people leave them unattended all the time, but after a house fire in college, I’m probably more fire-averse than average. Even if hot meals won’t be waiting for me, I was still excited to get Kathy Hester’s The Vegan Slow Cooker for Christmas last year. A ton of recipes sound good, and with vague memories of the delicious cheesy hashbrowns at every childhood potluck, I chose the Weekend Tofu and Hash Brown Breakfast Casserole. 

Before:

Like most recipes in the book, this came together really easily. You just pour in frozen hashbrowns, some (vegan) cheese, then a blended mixture of silken tofu, soy creamer and spices. 

It needs to cook for two hours, and breakfast is the only reason I get out of bed on the weekends, so making it in the morning wasn’t realistic. Instead I cooked it Monday night, put the crock in the refrigerator, and reheated some for breakfast Tuesday. Behold:

This is a horrible picture, partly because I was in a hurry to get to work, but also because the dish is not photogenic AT ALL. It’s a half-congealed, half-watery white blob. But let me tell you, it is the most delicious half-congealed, half-watery white blob I have ever tasted! It’s like cheesy hashbrown soup. I was skeptical the ½ cup of cheese the recipe called for would even be noticeable (because more cheese = more better), but it was a perfect amount. The tofu was creamy and flavorful enough that the cheese accented it, rather than masked it. I will definitely be making this again. I’ll try using Mori-Nu tofu instead of the water-packed kind to make it a little less runny, and I might add some black salt to get a little more egg flavor, but it’s still delicious as is. You can view the recipe on the Amazon preview (link above - breakfast is the last chapter).

MoFo Day 2: Labor Day Fiesta

I know Labor Day is typically celebrated with BBQ, but I think salsa and margaritas make a much more fitting final meal of the summer season. I used Vegetarian Times Fast and Easy today for the first time since I bought it a year ago. When it first arrived I flagged a bunch of recipes, but haven’t bothered to open it since. To make up for lost time, I picked four recipes: Watermelon Margaritas, Tomato-Avocado Salsamole, Clementine Salsa, and Black Bean Soup with Roasted Red Pepper (links are to the Veg Times website). Fortunately my sister was on hand to help me consume it all.

Salsas and margaritas:

I love my Vitamix and I know it can make me delicious, nutritious juices and shakes and soups in mere seconds. It even came with a recipe book full of these things. Want to know the one recipe I use? Frozen margaritas. And I’ve made them enough times that I don’t even NEED the recipe. But they’re healthy, right? Anyway, I saw the recipe for Watermelon Margaritas and had to try them. It was just frozen watermelon, tequila, Triple Sec (I used Cointreau), a little sugar, lime juice, and ice. Tomato-Avocado Salsamole is exactly what it sounds like – salsa mixed with guacamole. I couldn’t find clementines for the Clementine Salsa so I used a navel orange.

With a minimal amount of blending and chopping, I had this table of deliciousness:

The margaritas were good, but next time I’ll add twice as much watermelon and a touch more sugar. The orange salsa was also really good. The last step of the recpie was to let it sit overnight. Oops, guess that’s why you’re supposed to read the whole thing first. I’m going to trust that it would have been great tomorrow, especially if I’d used clementines. Now the salsamole – OMG AMAZING. I’ve never had anything with avocado that I didn’t like, but this was outstanding. If I had been alone, I would have licked the bowl.

On to the soup:

Like the Vitamix, I know I also underutilize my pressure cooker. It’s hard to come by recipes that use it AND sound good, so I had to try this one. You sauté some onion, then add unsoaked (!) beans, water and spices and cook for 25 minutes. Cooking time with pressure cookers is misleading because it doesn’t include the time to reach full pressure (>5 minutes) or the time to release the pressure (>15 minutes). But 40 minutes from the time I open a bag of beans to when I can eat them is still pretty awesome.

While the soup is cooking, you roast the red pepper. I read the recipe wrong and put them skin side down on the baking sheet. (Note that I had finished two margaritas and moved on to beer at this point. Hey, it’s a holiday!) After the 15 minute cooking time, I realized my mistake. I flipped them over and put them closer to the broiler and OMG the coolest thing happened! Almost immediately the skin puffed up—like a giant blister from one side to the other. This obviously made it super easy to get the skin off once they were cool. I was worried they’d be dry, but they were still juicy. So there, I just invented a new method of roasting red peppers!

Half the peppers are chopped and added to the soup and the other half were made into a puree. As you can see below, the “puree” didn’t add much aesthetic value. When I finally got around to cleaning up two hours later, the puree had thickened a little, so it might actually swirl in the soup. Personally, I’d skip it next time.

The soup was pretty good. Not the best black bean soup I’ve ever had, but cheap and easy. The book does have a lot of good weeknight meals, though, so I’ll have to come back to it next month.

Bonus: assistant editor

MoFo Day 1: Blueberry Bliss

I can't think of a better way to start MoFo than by combining two of my favorite foods - blueberries and cheesecake. Vegan Pie in the Sky was a gift last year and I haven't used it much, mostly out of fear that I will eat an entire pie by myself. I go to my parents' house for dinner most Sundays and thought bringing a dessert would help me use the book and still fit in my pants. An afternoon at Hazen's Farm last month yielded a freezer full of handpicked blueberries (7.5 pounds!), so the Blueberry Bliss Cheesecake was a pretty easy choice.  

I only needed to buy vanilla cookies and tofu, both of which I was pleasantly surprised to find at the new Detroit Meijer. Well, I also had to buy a springform pan because I lost my old one while moving, but it was too small anyway. Even with the pan, I still only spent $10 making this. 

Before:

I made a graham cracker-type crust using vanilla flavored animal crackers. The package, minus the two handfuls I ate, made exactly the right amount of crumbs. While that was in the oven, I hauled out my treasured Vitamix. The filling is made of cashews, blueberries, banana and silken tofu. After years of making fillings in my mini food processor, I still can't get over how fast and easy the Vitamix makes everything.

(Yes, that's a beer bottle propping up the window. I'm classy.) After pouring the filling over the crust, the cheesecake baked for 60 minutes. I pulled it out of the oven and it was perfect: slightly cracked and just browned on the edges. While it was baking, I cooked the topping of blueberries, sugar, cornstarch and lemon juice. Then I had to wait 2 1/2 hours for it to cool. And wait for dinner. And wait until everyone was ready for dessert. Finally the moment arrived. Please excuse the photo quality, at this point I was too excited to fuss with lighting.

I've eaten a lot of vegan cheesecakes over the years. Some are just like regular dairy cheesecakes and others taste like a block of sweetened tofu. This one tasted great, but was more like a blueberry custard pie than a cheesecake. I also couldn't get over the hints of banana, but no one else said anything, so maybe that's just me. Don't get me wrong, four people ate half of it and I'll happily devour the leftovers this week (or possibly finish it tomorrow). I think my expectations were just a little too high.

UPDATE: I ate the leftover cheesecake the next day and it was 100 times better. It had that cheesecake tanginess and the texture had improved a lot. My high expectations were definitely met! Also, you can find the recipe here.