Oh my god it's a talking muffin!

Lemon pound cake with glaze!

2012-01-12T12:55:00.000-08:00

It's been a really long time since my last post! There are lots of things that have been going on in the kitchen since my Halloween candy post, but I've been keeping them all to myself. Well, how about a recipe for lemon pound cake with some very lemony glaze? I have to tell you, it's not exactly quick to make. It requires some slightly annoying prep (pan-flouring, flour-sifting, lemon-zesting), and takes a lot of time in the oven. But even though that stuff might seem a little fussy, the difficulty-to-impressiveness ratio still comes out in your favor. It's zippy from all the citrus, and the glaze gives the outside of the cake a crunchy coat. Kind of like those really sour English lemon drops in cake form. I'm starting to think every cake should have a glaze. Here's the (very step-by-step) recipe, because I want you and the people you love to eat this cake.

(PS I think that paragraph can be summed up as, "cake cake cake cake cakety-cake cake cake! And glaze.")

Ingredients:
2 lemons
3 cups sifted all-purpose flour
2 1/2 tsp. baking powder
3/4 tsp. salt
2 sticks margarine
2 cups sugar
1/2 cup soy yogurt
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1 cup non-dairy milk
2/3 cup more sugar (for the glaze)

1. Dry Ingredients
First, you'll need 3 cups of sifted all-purpose flour. If you've never done that before, it's easy, and there's a first time for everything. Here's all you do: Sift about 4 cups of all purpose flour into a large, dry mixing bowl. Now measure 3 cups of that sifted flour into a different mixing bowl. Sift in 2 1/2 tsp. baking powder and 3/4 tsp. salt. (The leftover flour that you sifted can get added right back into your flour canister.)

At this point, you'll also want to grate the peel of two lemons. Make sure you wash your lemons first! I use the finest side of a four-sided grater, and to grate onto a flexible cutting board, since grating into a bowl can be kind of wobbly. You want to get as much of the yellow outside zest as possible, but try to not get too much of the bitter white pith that's just under the skin.

2. Baking Pan
Grease (I use cooking spray) an 11-cup tube/bundt pan. If you don't have one of those, or if you like your pound cake loaf-y, grease 2 8" loaf pans. Dust the oiled pans with vegan breadcrumbs (NOT the seasoned kind!!! Blech. And check the ingredients for milk products.) If the only vegan bread crumbs you can get your hands on are panko, you'll want to crush/grind them up first. You can do that with a blender, food processor, mortar & pestle, or ziploc bag & rolling pin. Tap any excess crumbs into the trash, you only want a very fine coating.

Preheat your oven to 350 F.

3. The Fun Part: Cake Batter
Use an electric mixer or fork to cream 2 sticks (that's 1 cup/ 1/2 lb.) vegan margarine. If you use something salty like Earth Balance, you should omit the salt from the dry ingredients.
Once the margarine is soft, add in 2 cups of sugar, and beat until well incorporated. Use a rubber spatula to scrape down the sides of the bowl so that everything gets mixed evenly. It should look pale yellow, fluffy, and smooth. Beat in the 1/2 cup soy yogurt, vanilla, and lemon zest.

Now turn your beater down to low, and add in about half of the flour mixture. Once that's almost all mixed in, add 1/2 of the milk and stir until incorporated. Now add the other half of the flour, and finish with the rest of the milk. Mix just until everything's smoothly incorporated, because overmixing will make your cake tough.

Pour the batter into your prepared cake pan(s) and bake for about an hour and ten minutes for a bundt, or 40 minutes for a loaf. Check your cake by poking it with a toothpick. If the toothpick comes out clean, its ready to come out of the oven! If not, give it another five minutes and test again.

Remove your cake from the oven and let it sit for five minutes in the cake pan while you prepare the glaze:
Juice the lemons and strain out the seeds. How much juice do you have? You only need 1/3-1/2 cup of the juice for this glaze, so put the rest in your seltzer or in some salad dressing or something. Add 2/3 cup of sugar and stir until the sugar is mostly dissolved. (It doesn't have to be perfect.)

Now invert your cake onto a wire cooling rack and brush or spoon glaze all over the warm cake. It will be messy, so put some foil under the cooling rack to catch the drips.

Let that sit for a few hours until cool, and serve to your friends and family, who will adore you forever. My sisters describe it as "nom nom nom," if that gives you an idea

Goodies!

2011-10-28T17:57:00.000-07:00

Today I was supposed to clean the kitchen, so instead I made a mess in the kitchen. Sound familiar? I made some stuff and dipped it into chocolate. It was fun and Halloween-y.
Here is what I made:

Peanut butter candies

Chocolate Peanut Butter Candies
(Or you could use the same basic recipe to make peanut putter cups.)

1/2 cup peanut butter
1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
1 pinch salt
12 oz. vegan chocolate chips or chopped chocolate

Combine 1/2 cup peanut butter (the no-stir variety) with a pinch of salt. Sift in 1/2 cup of the powdered sugar and stir until well combined. Add more (sifted!) powdered sugar as needed until you have a stiff dough-like consistency. Roll the peanut butter into teaspoon-sized balls and place on a piece of parchment on top of a cutting board or cookie sheet (something flat.) Put the peanut butter balls in the freezer to firm up for about 30 minutes.

Meanwhile, melt the chocolate in a double boiler. If you don't have a double boiler, make one by placing the chocolate in a metal mixing bowl on top of a pan of simmering (not boiling!) water. The mixing bowl should be wider than the pan, so that steam doesn't get into the melted chocolate.

Use a fork or a toothpick to dip the peanut butter balls into the melted chocolate. Try not to worry about making them look professional! Drippy chocolates with fingerprints on them will still impress your friends.

If you want them to harden really quickly, put them back into the fridge or freezer until the chocolate has set. You might want to store them in the fridge, too, depending on the temperature of your house.

Peppermint Patties

Peppermint patties

1/4 cup agave syrup
2 cups powdered sugar
1 drop pink or green food coloring (optional, of course)
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1 1/2 Tbsp. peppermint extract
1 pinch salt

Combine the agave, salt, food coloring, and extracts in a small bowl and mix well. Sift in 1 cup of the powdered sugar, and stir to combine. Sift in enough additional powdered sugar to make a firm dough.

Dust your hands and a work surface with more powdered sugar. Form heaping teaspoons of peppermint mixture into balls and smoosh them to form patty shapes. Place them on a parchment-lined baking sheet and freeze for about 30 minutes.

Prepare your chocolate for dipping, as in the above recipe.
I had a really hard time dipping these, since the patties were sort of soft. Instead, I spread a spoonful of melted chocolate on top of each peppermint patty, and put them back in the fridge. When the chocolate was set, I gently peeled the parchment of the bottoms, flipped the candies over, and coated the other side with chocolate.

And don't eat these for your entire dinner! Unless you want people to start asking you questions like, "Where do vegans get their protein?"

Meat-less pies revisited, and a pita recipe

2011-10-26T10:30:00.000-07:00

Do you remember those Lebanese meatless pies I made back in March? Well I finally got around to making a batch with the pita crust, and it was very yum yum. I left out the soy sour cream from the filling, and didn't miss it at all. I also added a little more paprika and cinnamon, and a little extra mint since it's still really thriving in my garden.
One advantage of making a pita crust is that if you have leftover dough, you can make pita bread! They get nice and puffy in the oven. I was too hungry to take pictures, sorry!

Pita dough
Combine 1 packet of yeast with 2 1/2 cups warm water. Let stand 5 minutes.
Combine 1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour with 2 tsp. salt. Add to the yeast mixture and whisk until smooth.
Knead in 3 1/2-5 cups white flour, until a soft but not sticky consistency is reached. Knead until stretchy. Put the dough in an oiled bowl and cover with plastic wrap. Let it rise in a warm place about an hour, or until doubled in size. Punch down and let rise again. (That step isn't really necessary, but the extra time gives the pita more flavor.)

If you have a pizza stone, this is a great time to use it. Place the stone near the bottom of your COLD oven and preheat to 450 F.
If you don't have a pizza stone, you can preheat a cookie sheet and bake the breads on that.

To Make Pies:
Divide your dough into 12-16 equal pieces. Roll them out to 1/4 inch thickness and spoon some of the "lamb" mixture into the center. (Don't worry if they're not perfectly round, just do your best.) Bring up 3 sides of the circle and pinch together in the middle. Pinch the seams closed to form a triangular pie. Brush the tops with olive oil. Bake them 2 or 3 at a time on the preheated baking stone or cookie sheet for about 9 minutes. The tops should be barely golden and the dough should still be soft.

To Make Pitas:
Roll out the dough into 1/4 inch thick rounds (or ovals or amoebic shapes or whatever) and let rest 5 minutes. Bake on a preheated baking stone or sheet until puffy, about 5 minutes.

Serve the pies and pita with some green salad, and maybe some hummus and baba ganouj, for a gigantic and tasty Middle-Eastern feast.

Vegan Challah Round 2

2011-09-22T21:11:00.000-07:00

Poppy seeds, or sesame? I can't choose!

I made another batch of challah today. The recipe is courtesy of challah-genius Sara Rivka at www.CreativeJewishMom.com. Check out her blog!

She also has posted a really neat guide for how to braid round challah for Rosh Hashanah. I made one loaf with sesame seeds, and one with poppy. Instead of an egg wash, made a little bit of flax seed goo (that's the technical term for it, anyway.) I poured 3 Tbsp of boiling water over 1 Tbsp of flax seed meal, whisked it for 3 minutes, strained out the bits of flax seed, and brushed it over the top of the loaves. Using soy milk is a little easier and works fine, but this way comes out shinier.

Ready to go into the oven

There was a little cross-pollination that happened with the two loaves on the same pan, but I think that probably won't hurt anything.

Here they are about to go in the oven.

Let cool before cutting

Let them cool on a wire rack. And don't overbake! Because then you'll have to make a whole lot of French toast.

Vegan Rosh Hashanah

2011-09-20T14:31:00.000-07:00

Here is attempt #1 at vegan challah.
Here is the dough that I used:

3 c flour
1/4 c sugar
1 packet dry active yeast
1 tsp salt
1/4 tsp tumeric

Whisk all that together in a medium bowl and set aside.

In a small bowl, whisk 2 Tbsp flax seed meal with 1/4 cup warm water. Beat this mixture for about a minute. It should be sort of gooey. Add 1/4 cup soy milk and another 1/4 cup warm water. Stir in the dry ingredients with a wooden spoon.

Turn the dough out onto a clean, floured cutting board and knead until the dough is stretchy and elastic.
Put the dough in an oiled bowl, cover it with plastic wrap, and let it rise until doubled in size. Punch it down, and let it rise another hour.

Now it's time to shape the dough. This is the fun part!

Turn the dough onto a cutting board. I didn't need to dust it, but you can use flour if you need to.

Cut the dough into two pieces, one about twice the size of the other.

Divide each of these pieces into thirds. Roll each piece into a rope. You want all the ropes to be equal in length.

First, make a big braid from the three bigger ropes. Next, make a smaller braid from the remaining dough.

Using the rush the top of the big braid with some soy milk. Tuck the ends of the braids underneath so that it will look pretty, and stack the little braid on top of the big braid. Now brush the whole thing with soy milk.

Cover the loaf with plastic wrap, and put it in a warm place to rise for 40 minutes. Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 375 F. Bake for about 40 minutes. To test for doneness, tap the bottom of the loaf. If it sounds hollow, it's ready to come out of the oven.

I think I'll try adding more oil and more water next time, and baking it in a slightly cooler oven. In the meanwhile, this is yummy with apricot jam.

Peanut butter & sesame seed cookies

2011-09-20T13:24:00.000-07:00

This is just to say

I have eaten the cookies

I baked for my weblog

and I didn't even take any pictures.

Forgive me, but they were delicious

with a hot cup of coffee.

I did a bad thing. I made a batch of cookies, and then I ate them all without taking any photos for you.

Fortunately, it is an exaggeration to say that I ate them all. I had help. But still, no photos. I'm sorry. Forgive me. These are very similar to regular old peanut butter cookies, but with a slightly more assertive flavor. They are a little chewy and a little crumbly and a little crunchy all in one, and they're not too sweet.

Here is the recipe:

1/4 c peanut natural smooth peanut butter, unsalted*

1/4 cup sesame tahini

1/2 cup non-hydrogenated margarine*

1/2 cup white sugar

1/4 cup light brown sugar*

1 1/4 c flour

1 Tbsp cornstarch

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt*

1 Tbsp each of black and white sesame seeds*

1. Preheat the oven to 350 F. Grease two cookie sheets. Using an electric mixer or fork, cream together the margarine, peanut butter, tahini, salt, and sugar in a medium-large bowl. Beat until the mixture is fluffy. Taste a tiny bit and adjust the salt, if necessary.

2. Add the cornstarch and the flour. Mix with your hands until the dough comes together. If it's really really dry, add a tablespoon of soy milk, but only do this if the dough is too crumbly to work with.

3. In a shallow bowl or a plate, mix the two colors of sesame seeds together.

4. Scoop up a 2-tablespoon sized piece of dough, and roll it into a ball. Flatten it a little between your palms, and dip one side into the sesame seed mixture. Place seedy-side-up on the cookie sheet and repeat with the remaining dough. If you want to, you can use a fork to make a criss-cross pattern on top of each cookie, as you would for classic peanut butter cookies. Bake the for about 12 minutes, until they are golden-brown around the edges.

*So many stars, right? Well, here's what you should know. You can absolutely use salted peanut butter, but if you do, and especially if you're using salty Earth Balance, then leave out the additional salt.

As for the margarine, you are of course welcome to use regular old hydrogenated margarine. Cookies aren't really good for you anyway. But read the ingredients to make sure they haven't snuck any whey or other dairy ingredients in there, or else the cookies won't be vegan and you'll have worked so hard only to make cookies that you won't want to eat, and that would be the pits.

If you don't have light brown sugar, you can just use white sugar. If you don't have white sugar, you can use Sucanat. The sesame seeds are primarily for decoration, and while they are lovely, they can be omitted without really ruining anything. You will still have yummy cookies! If you don't have sesame seeds, you can dip the cookies in coarse sugar instead.

In short, you are your own person and you can cook however you gosh darn please.

A search bar!?!

2011-09-09T10:15:00.000-07:00

I've added a search bar to the blog--Fancy!

The only thing is, it doesn't always work. For instance, I searched for the word "kasha" and nothing came up, even though I have a kasha recipe posted on this blog. Not perfect! I'll see if can figure out what the problem is but in the meanwhile, try searching for cookies, cause that works just fine.

Summer corn soup

2011-08-31T09:40:00.000-07:00

5 ears of corn, shucked with the silk removed

3 scallions, washed and trimmed

1 serrano (or jalapeno) pepper

2 Tbsp Earth Balance

1 qt water

Salt and Black pepper, to taste

1. Roast the pepper by holding it with tongs over an open flame until the skin is wrinkly with black spots. Or, you can cook it in a dry skillet over high heat. Shake the pan frequently so it doesn't stick. Once it is nice and toasty, remove it from the heat and set it aside to cool. Once it is cool enough to handle, cut it in half the long way and remove the stem and seeds. Mince one half of the pepper. (Adjust the amount of pepper to your taste, but remember that the corn is very light in flavor, and it could be overwhelmed by too much chili.)

2. Use a sharp knife to remove the kernels of corn from their cobs. Then, use the back of the knife to scrape the juice into a bowl.

3. Chop the scallions and set aside.

4. In a heavy-bottomed pot, melt the earth balance. Add the corn and corn juice, along with the scallions and chili. Cook over medium heat for 2 minutes. Add the water, salt and black pepper. Bring the broth to a simmer, and then cook for an additional 5 minutes over medium heat.

5. Puree the soup in a blender in batches, filling the blender only halfway for each batch. You don't have to go crazy trying to make this 100% smooth; a few kernels of corn are nice.

6. Impress your friends!

Lazy Pants Macaroni

2011-08-11T18:19:00.000-07:00

This is pretty good.

Boil 2 c. water with a sprinkle of salt and one (minced) clove of garlic and a shake of chili powder.
Add 1 c. shell pasta (or whatever shape you feel like, gosh.)
Reduce heat to medium.
When almost all the water is gone, add 2 Tbsp. tasty flakes (aka nutritional yeast), a couple grinds of pepper, and a smidgy pinch (in the ballpark of 1/8 tsp) or dijon mustard. Cook until the water is absorbed.
Eat it. You might want to use a fork, but no judgments either way.

Bubbe's Kasha Varnishkes

2011-07-18T13:10:00.000-07:00

When I was a kid, my mom would always try to persuade me to eat kasha varnishkes, and I would tell her that I hated it because it tasted "like dirt." This is probably because I hated anything that was whole-grain until I was about ten, and kasha is made of buckwheat groats, which are very whole-grainy-seeming to a little kid.
Now, you may ask, what even is kasha varnishkes?
Well kasha varnishkes is a traditional Eastern European Jewish dish made of buckwheat groats with bowtie pasta, and it often has onions and mushrooms as well. I myself have more or less refused to eat kasha varnishkes since about forever.

Well, one of my grandmother's favorite activities is to bring food to me (we live in the same neighborhood.) In the last few years, this has been a bit of a problem for her since she's somewhat overwhelmed by the idea veganism and vegan cooking. Lately, the main thing that she seems comfortable making without any meat or eggs or dairy is soup.
Soup! In July!
So I told her, Bubbe, it's the summer. You have to stop bringing me soup to eat because I'll just put it in the freezer til the fall, anyway.

So do you know what she brought me instead?

Well if you guessed kasha varnishkes, you guessed right.
And I tried it.
And it was delicious! I mean, really really delicious! I ate the whole container full of it.
I think the reason I didn't like it when I was little was because it has a very earthy flavor--maybe because of the minerals in it? Kasha is a good source of iron and phosphorus, and if my Bubbe cooked it, it's also a good source of onions. It's traditionally made with an egg, but this is Bubbe's veganized version.
Incidentally, she says this is "a pain in the ass" to make. I say, totally worth it.
You can eat it hot or room temperature. Oy! So good.

Chop one large onion, and cook it in a saucepan over low heat in some olive oil. Add 1 cup kasha and cook until the kasha is toasty. Add 2 cups water and 1/2 tsp salt (Bubbe never adds salt, but I do.) Cover the pot, and simmer for about 12-15 minutes over medium-low heat. You want to cook it until the water is absorbed and the kasha is fluffy.
Meanwhile, cook 1 lb bowtie pasta (farfalle) in boiling water until it's tender, around 10 minutes. Drain and set aside.
Meanwhile, brown 8 oz. sliced button mushrooms in a little bit of olive oil.
Once the kasha is finished, fluff it with a fork and add the mushrooms and bowties.

Three simple steps to make your summer better

2011-07-15T19:03:00.000-07:00

1. Slice a ripe banana

2. Fry it in Earth Balance margarine over medium heat for around five minutes

3. Put it in a crepe, or on top of some ice cream, or on your pancakes, or on your waffles, or french toast (get the idea?)

You're welcome.

Hamantaschen

2011-03-26T08:04:00.000-07:00

My hat it has three corners, three corners has my hat...
Sorry to post this a week AFTER Purim, but I had to rework the recipe a bit. Slash, I got lazy.

You'll need:
2 c. flour + 1 tsp. baking powder + 1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 c. refined coconut oil
1/4 c. apple sauce
2 Tbsp. orange juice
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1/8 tsp. lemon extract

In a medium mixing bowl, use an electric mixer to beat the coconut oil until soft. Cream in the sugar for 1-2 minutes. Add the apple sauce, vanilla, and lemon extract and beat until combined. Add half the flour and mix until just combined. Then mix in the orange juice, and add the remaining flour. The mixture will be a little crumbly, so smush it together into a ball. Refrigerate the dough for about 30 minutes.

To roll out the dough, cut into 4 pieces. Lightly flour your work surface and rolling pin, and roll out one of the pieces to 1/4 in thick. Use a cookie cutter or the rim of a glass to cut as many large circles of dough as you can out of the piece of dough. You can re-roll it and re-cut it a few times to make as many cookies as possible.

Put the circles of dough on a silicone baking mat or piece of parchment on a baking sheet. Spoon about 2 tsp. apricot preserves (or other fillings) into the center, and fold the edges into a triangle shape. Pinch the edges closed tightly around the filling. Repeat this process to shape the remaining cookies. You can also fill them with the traditional poppyseed filling, (which comes in a can, lucky for me!)

Bake at 350 F for about 12 minutes, until the edges are light brown. Let cool on the baking sheet for at least 5 minutes before transferring to a wire cooling rack.

Lebanese Meat-less Pies

2011-03-17T15:23:00.000-07:00

Ok, here's my vegan version of something delicious that I used to eat a long time ago: lebanese meat pies. They're tasty, but they're traditionally made of lamb, which isn't really my style. So here's my lamb-friendly version, 'cause of this t-shirt.

You'll need:
1 1/2 cups dry TVP granules
1 1/2 cups boiling water
1 tsp. vegan Worcestershire sauce*
2 tsp. reduced-sodium soy sauce*
1 medium yellow onion, diced
1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
1 tsp. ground allspice
1/4 tsp. sweet paprika*
1/8 tsp. ground cloves*
2 Tbsp. olive oil
3 Tbsp. tomato paste
juice of 1 lemon
1/2 cup chopped fresh parsley
1 Tbsp. chopped fresh mint leaves
3/4 cup finely chopped walnuts (traditionally you're supposed to use pine nuts, but I'm not that rich right now)
1 Tbsp. soy sour cream
salt and pepper (how much? you ask. Figure it out yourself! I believe in you!)

1 package filo pastry and some oil, for brushing

*these ingredients are not traditional, but they help the TVP not taste bland

So that was a lot of ingredients! Well, if you're still feeling ambitious you can wrap these lil' guys in home-made pita dough, but I'm gonna take the shortcut and wrap them up in pre-made phyllo. Cause that's how I roll.

Ok so here we go. Let's make the filling:
1. Heat up the oil in a large skillet. Add the onion and spices and saute, stirring occasionally.
2. Mix the Worcestershire, soy sauce, tomato paste, and boiling water. Pour this over the TVP. Let this sit for five minutes, and then add it to the skillet. Adjust the heat to medium, and let it sit. You want the TVP to brown a little bit, so don't stir too much! Cook for 15 minutes, and then remove from heat.
3. Pour the TVP mixture, walnuts, lemon juice, herbs, and soy sour cream into a mixing bowl and stir. Add salt and pepper to taste. Now you have to find something to do while you wait for that to cool down to room temperature. (Like for instance, check if anyone posted on your facebook wall? Brush your hair? Walk the dog?)

4. This is the tricky/ fancy part. If you don't want to deal with it, you could also serve the filling inside of store bought pita, especially if you warm up the pita first. Otherwise, follow these instructions for how to fill the pastry. (I could describe it for you but it would not help you one bit. Just watch the video.) Bake them in a 350F oven for about 15 minutes, until they are golden.

They are a bit involved to make, and they will disappear quickly so you might be annoyed. Sorry? Um, enjoy.

Key Lime Pie

2011-02-20T18:42:00.001-08:00

This will make your friends want you to come over for dinner all the time.

First, make the crust:
1 1/2 cups graham cracker crumbs
1/4 cup plus 1 Tbsp. (that's 5 Tbsp.) vegan margarine
3 Tbsp. sugar

Preheat the oven to 350 F.
Combine the sugar and cracker crumbs in a medium bowl. Pour the melted margarine over the crumbs and stir to combine. Press into a 9-inch pie plate.
Bake the crust for 5-7 minutes.

Now make the filling:
1/2 cup key lime juice (I used one from a bottle, the brand is Nellie & Joe's.)
2 tbsp coconut cream (as in, the cream scraped from the top of a can of coconut milk. I had some left over from making thai green curry. If you don't feel like opening a can of coconut milk, you can just leave this out.)
3/4 cup sugar
2 Tbsp. almond milk
2 tsp. tapioca starch
1/4 tsp. vanilla extract
1/4 tsp. salt
1 package mori-nu firm silken tofu
1/4 cup soy cream cheese

In a blender or food processor, combine the key lime juice, sugar, salt, almond milk, vanilla and tapioca starch. Blend until smooth. Crumble in the tofu and blend until smooth, scraping down the sides. Add the soy cream cheese and blend some more. Taste it and see if it's good. If it's no good, give up now, 'cause it should already be delicious.
Pour the filling into the pre-baked crumb crust. Bake for 1 hour. It should still be slightly jiggly in the center. Don't worry; it will set as the pie cools.
The hard part: Let it cool before you slice it. Seriously, let it cool before you slice it!

Smoky Lentil Soup With Spinach

2011-01-28T19:43:00.000-08:00

There's nothing very exciting about lentil soup. Still, this is some goooood soup! Especially now, when there's a foot of snow on the ground here in Brooklyn. I decided to season the soup with smoked paprika and lemon zest, and I used some split red lentils for the sake of a) speed and b) prettiness. I got the idea to season lentil soup with smoked paprika from Mark Bittman's How To Cook Everything, whose The Minimalist column in the NY Times will be sorely missed, at least by me. (And please, please note that this dish is actually part of a healthy meal, and not a house made of cookies and candy! Don't accuse me of just wanting you to eat junk.)

You'll need:

1 lb. split red lentils
1 lemon
1 medium onion
1 large carrot (or two small)
2 stalk of celery--I know, I know, I really had a thing going with just one of everything! I guess you could use one if you wanted?)
2 bay leaves
1 Tbsp smoked paprika
1/4 cup oil (I used canola. Use whatever oil you like!)
A handful of frozen spinach, thawed--I used about 3 ounces, which were left over from another dinner this week. Or, if you want to use fresh, that would be awesome, obviously.)

Heat the oil in a large pot with the bay leaf. Dice the carrots, onion, and celery and add them too. Saute these veggies together until the onion looks translucent and the carrot is starting to think about maybe getting tender some day. While this is going on, pour your lentils into shallow pan and sort through them. This way, if the package had any lentils or bugs or clumps of dirt or other kinds of legumes mixed in, you can avoid putting them in your soup. Once you are satisfied that your lentils are in fact lentils, dump them into a colander and give them a quick rinse. Then they go right into the pot with the veggies. Add enough water to cover everything, plus an inch. (Not a very precise measurement! I swear, it's really okay; you can add as you go.) Add the smoked paprika and stir it in.
Bring the lentils to a boil, and then you can turn down the heat and let everything simmer on medium to low heat for about 40 minutes. The exact timing varies every time you cook dried beans. Just give them a stir every now and then. Add water periodically, so that the lentils always have some water covering them.
While all that's going on, you need to drain your spinach. Once it has thawed, grab hold of it and squeeze all the water that you can out of it (hold it over a bowl or the sink.) Yes, you lose some vitamins this way, but you avoid turning your soup green. If you really really can't stand throwing out the baby with the bathwater (wait, I mean....) then it's really your call, cause it's your soup. That's all I'm gonna say about that.
Plop the spinach down on a cutting board and chop it up. You don't want long stringy pieces of spinach falling out of your spoon and making you look like a fool when you eat.
Now wash your lemon and, using a microplane or box grater, grate as much zest as you can from the skin of the lemon. (Keep in mind that with zest, you always want only the yellow part on the outermost layer of skin, not the white stuff underneath.) Put all your zest to the side--now comes the juicing part. Cut the lemon in half and squeeze as much juice as you can from each half into a bowl or cup. You can strain it to remove any seeds, or else you can fish them out with your fingers (or chopsticks if you're really, really good at chopsticks.)
Once your lentils are soft, season to taste with salt and pepper. If you want, you can puree the soup in a blender (or with an immersion blender if you have one!) After pureeing, add in the spinach you've chopped.
Immediately before serving, stir in the lemon juice and zest. It's pretty hearty, so it can be a meal on its own, especially with some whole-grain bread. Yum!

Gingerbread houses and other stuff, too

2011-01-05T14:51:00.000-08:00

Happy new year! Maybe in 2011 I will make some things that are actually healthy, but I spent December making sweets, sweets and more sweets.

But first things first, Whaz in da bag???

This is my sister's dog, Remy.

Ok, so gingerbread houses are nice. For the dough, I used Mark Bittman's recipe for gingersnaps, which are delicious, but I added some finely ground black pepper and a pinch of cayenne to make it extra-spicy. For icing, I melted some corn syrup with confectioners' sugar until it made a thick paste, and used a spoon to drip the "glue" wherever i needed it. The results were very messy, but I like to think that adds charm.I had some dough left over, which I shaped into balls and rolled in sugar for some sparkly gingerbread cookies. I guess if I wanted to be really ambitious, I could have made gingerbread people like I did last year, but they still tasted good!

Another thing that had been bothering me was a complete lack of non-marshmallow rice crispy treats in my life, as I was having a bit of a jonesing for them. I found a recipe on VegWeb.com that was really fantastically easy, and which turned out great. I doubled the vanilla, and I didn't regret it. Let them cool for a couple of hours before you cut into them to get neat little squares. If you felt like mixing in some chocolate chips or something in there, that would be ok, too, but I like them plain. And if corn syrup freaks you out, use brown rice syrup instead. Yummeh!

Here, kitty kitty

2010-12-07T18:29:00.001-08:00

Meow meow meow
meow meow
meow!

Does it seem like I'm the worst blogger ever? And butternut squash ravioli.

2010-11-11T08:59:00.000-08:00

I know I haven't posted any tasty things in months. MONTHS!
But yesterday I made butternut sqash ravioli and I want to tell you all about it.

Did it take about three hours? Yes, it did. Was it totally worth it? Yes, it was.

Did I do that totally lame thing I do and not take any pictures, even though everyone knows that's the whole point of a food blog? Ummm..... maybe. But I'll tell you how to make ravioli! That should count for something, right?

You'll need:
One butternut squash
One box firm silken tofu (such as Mori-Nu)
One medium onion
Dried sage
Garlic powder
1/2 lemon
2 tsp white miso paste
1/4 cup nutritional yeast
2 cups flour--I used 1 cup each of semilina and whole grain spelt. I don't necessarily recommend using the spelt, since it's rather low-gluten and therefore a little hard to handle in the dough. That said, I did it and it turned out fine.
Olive oil
Salt and pepper

First, make the squash: Use a big sharp kitchen knife to cut the very top and bottom off the squash. Use a vegetable peeler or paring knife to peel off the skin, and scoop the seeds out of the middle. Cut the squash into 1-inch cubes, coat with a little oil, and bake at 400 degrees until they're very tender. (This will take about 20 minutes.)

For the dough: Combine 1/4 of the tofu, 1 tsp. of sage, 1 tsp. salt, 2 Tbsp. olive oil, and 3 Tbsp. water in a blender. Puree until smooth. Sift the flour into a large mixing bowl or onto a large clean surface, like a cutting board. Make a well in the center of the flour, and pour the tofu mixture into the middle. Using your fingers or a fork, incorporate the dry stuff into the wet stuff. If it's really too dry, you can add a little more water, one tablespoon at a time. You need to really knead this dough a lot before it will come together, so don't get discouraged! Once the dough finally comes together, knead it for about five minutes so that it can get nice and stretchy. Wrap it up tightly in plastic wrap and let it rest at room temperature for an hour.

While the dough is resting, combine the miso, juice of half a lemon, and a drizzle of olive oil. Mix until it's all incorporated. Add the rest of the package of tofu, and mash it all together. It doesn't need to be perfectly smooth, but you want the tofu to absorb all the flavors. Add salt and pepper and garlic powder to taste.

Next, cut the onion in half, and slice thinly. Heat 2 Tbsp. olive oil in a saucepan over medium heat, and add the onion to it. Add 1 tbsp of dried sage. Stir occasionally until the onion is nice and brown and caramelized. (This part makes the whole house smell yummy.)

Add the squash to the onion and smush with the back of a fork and comine the squash and onions into a nice little filling for your ravioli.

Now, tear off a small hunk of dough--more or less 1/3 cup. Place it on top of a piece of wax paper and pat it out into a flat round disc. Use a rolling pin to roll it out (very gently) until it is about 1/4 inch thick. Now, do exactly the same thing to another piece of dough so that you have two pasta sheets of about the same size. Lay one sheet on a flat surface and scoop teaspoonfuls of the tofu mixture about 3 inches apart. Scoop the squash in the same way right on top of the tofu. Use your finger or a pastry brush to brush some water around all the little mounds of filling. Lay the second sheet of dough on top of this and gently press the dough down around the scoops of filling so that it will stick. Use a knife or cookie cutter to cut out the raviolis, and place them on a plate dusted with cornmeal or flour. Continue to do this until all your dough is gone--you can re-roll the scraps of dough until you run out.

Now just boil them in salted water until they float! Now you are an accomplished ravioli chef. (Just like Chef Boyardee?)

Pesto is yummy

2010-08-02T12:31:00.000-07:00

Pesto is one of those foods that I could eat every day.
For a long time I would just follow a traditional pesto recipe and omit the cheese, but something seemed to be missing. Then one day I had the idea to try adding some miso. It turns out I'm not the first person to have thought of this (not by a long shot, it's all over the internet) but it's a good trick! I find that it gives the whole thing a little bit of a salty kick, sort of how parmesan cheese would. And the only real work involved is cleaning the blender at the end!

Ingredients:
1 bunch of basil (about two cups)
1 clove of garlic--(Seriously, you don't need a lot! It tastes stronger when it's raw!)
juice of 1 lemon
1/4 cup walnuts or pine nuts
1 Tbsp. miso paste (you'll need more or less depending on what kind of miso you used, since some are mild and some are pretty sharp. I used white miso, which is pretty mild.)
olive oil

1.Wash the basil and remove the stems. Put the basil leaves in the blender, along with the walnuts, lemon juice, and miso. Smush the garlic with the side of your knife, give it a very rough chop, and add that too. Give everything a whirl until all the ingredients are pretty evenly mixed.
2. Now you can start adding olive oil through the hole in the lid of the blender! (Oh, is that what that thing is for???) Drizzle the oil in a little at a time until the mixture is relatively smooth enough for you--this is kind of a matter of taste so you'll have to judge for yourself.
3. This is the most important step: taste it! Add more miso if you want, and season with black pepper. (The miso is salty, so you probably won't need to add extra salt to this.)
4. Spread it on your sandwiches, toss your pasta and veggies in it, cry when it runs out...

Fennel, I'd love to get to know you better

2010-07-12T08:25:00.000-07:00

There's something about fennel that seems to just scream, "fancy!" It's fragrant and dainty and my parents never fed it to me, which I guess just adds to the mystique. But what should I do with it now that I've brought it home from the store?

Here's what: put it in everything! Especially pasta salad.
I know, I know, everyone is so sick of pasta salad (or is it just me?) Well, no more!

Pasta salad with fennel (Or maybe I should call it, fennel salad with pasta.)

Cook and drain one pound of whole wheat rotini. Toss with just enough olive oil to coat while its still hot--this will prevent sticking.
Chop 1/2 cup of fresh basil leaves (Got more? Good, add them too!) Add this to the pasta.
Cut 2-3 large ripe tomatoes and add to the pasta.
Finely chop a quarter of a vidalia onion and add this to the pasta, too.
In a small bowl, gently smush 1 can of white beans with the back of a fork. Add salt and pepper to taste, and a nice healthy squeeze of lemon juice. Add 1/4 cup of nutritional yeast if you have some lying around.
Wash and thinly slice 1/3 of a bulb of fennel, and add to the salad. If it has the little leaves on it still, you can roughly chop those and add them, too.
(If you feel like it, you could roast the fennel before putting it in here, but it was way too hot to turn on the oven when I made this!)
Add the beans to the pasta and toss everything around.
It's best if you let it sit overnight so the flavors really have a chance to meld. Take it out of the fridge about 40 minutes before serving so that it can come to room temperature.
EAT IT! You can serve it over salad greens or next to just about anything.

Hooray for vegan cupcakes on the Food Network

2010-06-27T17:02:00.000-07:00

Chloe Coscarelli, an LA-based vegan chef, won cupcake wars--yay! I'm really glad to see that the (very mainstream) Food Network is finally catching on.
Here is an interview with Chloe on VegNews.
I'd also like to point out that the runner-up said some kinda snotty things about Chloe's vegan baking (or rather, about vegan baking in general) and came across looking like a bit of a narrow-minded sore loser, and I hope she learned her lesson!
And I can't wait to try Chloe's winning recipe for chocolate strawberry shortcake cupcakes.

Summer Makes Me Lazy

2010-06-23T07:13:00.000-07:00

Summer makes Stella lazy, too.

All I want to eat is sandwiches and salad and--as I believe I've mentioned before--vegan ice cream. And you all know how to make your own sandwiches and salads, so I'm not going to bore you with silly recipes. But pictures are ok, right?

This one is fresh corn, tomatoes, green pepper, parsley, olive oil, hot sauce and red wine vinegar, with salt and pepper. Nom!

Avocado melts are YUMMY. Cut up some avocado and arrange it on some wholeo-grain bread and add a slice of vegan cheese (I've been buying Tofutti slices, but I've heard Daiya is the best ever, so I guess I'll have to try that too.)
Stick it under the broiler until the cheese melts, and then eat it while complaining that it goes straight to your thighs.

Then, take a nap.

We all scream for (soy) scream

2010-06-06T14:55:00.000-07:00

It is HOT here in Brooklyn, and humid as well! So I've been eating ice cream a lot. Sometimes in lieu of actual meals.

Hot Fudge Sundaes are the best!
Sure, it's animal friendly, but keep it away from your dog.

To make hot fudge: Finely chop 3 oz. bittersweet chocolate. Put it in a saucepan with 1 c. soy milk, 2 tbsp. light corn syrup and 1 tbsp. agave nectar (you can use all corn syrup but I like the caramelly sweetness of the agave, I think it adds depth.) Add 2 tpsp. vegan margarine. Stir over medium heat until the chocolate is all melted. Bring to a boil, stirring often. Once it comes to a boil, cook for five minutes, stirring often. After five minutes it should be thick and viscous. Pour it into a sturdy glass jar, and add 2 tsp. vanilla extract and (optional) 1/8 tsp. almond extract, along with two pinches of kosher salt.

To make a sundae (as if you don't know perfectly well how to make a sundae), scoop some vegan ice cream into your favorite bowl. I'd like to try making my own s'cream, but that's a post for another day. (Laziness, ahoy.)
Top with your choice of sliced bananas, shredded coconut, nuts, sprinkles, fruit, hot fudge, vegan marshmallow creme, and anything else you want! Top with a cherry if you like to be fancy/nostalgic. Some combinations I like are:
Chocolate ice cream topped with toasted coconut and slivered almonds
Tofutti Wildberry Supreme with fresh berries. As soon as I can get my hands on some vegan marshmallow creme, I'll be adding that, too! Mmmmmm.

Cheater "Chicken" Salad

2010-06-04T10:18:00.000-07:00

I can't really take credit for this recipe, since I started with Trader Joe's mock chicken stir-fry strips. I just made the dressing. But it's hot outside, and this was quick and easy! So this is like The vegan version of "Semi-Homemade with Sandra Lee." Except that I wont' tell you how to make a cocktail and tablescape (what even is a tablescape?)
I can't find my camera so I didn't take pictures (I'm sorry!!! I'm the worst at that!)
Naturally, I didn't actually measure anything (because when do I ever do that?) but here's what I did:
First, I chopped half of the package of strips into little chunks, and added some finely diced celery, and chopped scallion and parsley.
In a measuring cup, I mixed the juice of half a lime with two heaping tablespoons vegan mayo. I added about a quarter teaspoon of grated ginger, and a tablespoon of finely chopped jarred lemongrass. It was still a little bland, so I added tiny splash of rice vinegar and a few drops of sriracha chili sauce, which I've been adding to everything lately.
Then I stirred the dressing into the salad and refrigerated it for a couple of hours.

Rename nutritional yeast!

2010-05-19T19:57:00.000-07:00

Ok, I like nutritional yeast. It gives me vitamins and it makes vegan mac and cheese possible.
BUT
it needs a better name. Something that sounds like food.
What should we call it?

And I just took a two hour final exam in biology tonight so that's all for now, I'm gonna go to sleep. See you in the morning!

A tiny post on this fine spring day

2010-05-14T09:11:00.001-07:00

Today was my last day of classes as an undergrad! Hooray, obviously, but also I know that I'll probably just be nostalgic about college for years to come. (Blah blah blah, right? On to the recipes.)

I just had a lovely quick lunch of pasta with zucchini and garlic and some basil and nutritional yeast, and it was so good I just had to write about it, even though I devoured it much to fast to take a picture. That's ok, you know what pasta looks like! Here's how I made it, in case you want to give it a try, but I didn't measure anything so be warned.

Pasta with Zucchini and Garlic

First, cook up a serving of pasta-I used some broad noodles that I found in the cupboard.
In a skillet, heat enough extra virgin olive oil to coat the bottom of the pan. Add one clove of sliced garlic, and 1/4 to 1/2 of a zucchini, slivered up into matchsticks. Stir over medium heat until the zucchini is tender. Add a little bit (maybe one ounce) of drained and crumbled extra-firm tofu. Add salt and black pepper to taste, and a generous sprinkle of nutritional yeast. Add the pasta and stir-fry for a minute until everything is combined. Add some chopped fresh basil and parsley. EAT!
(I bet you could add some cherry tomatoes to that with delicious results, too.)

Here is a picture of the basil I just planted in the front yard of my house. I'm not sure if it will make it (it's not looking too healthy, unfortunately) but if it does, hopefully the students that live here next year will enjoy it!

And now it's time to go study for finals.

Blueberry Banana Muffins

2010-05-04T19:22:00.000-07:00

Do you ever put a banana in your bag for later, and then forget about it until much later? And it's all mushy and weird?
And you kind of don't want it anymore?Well, today I found yesterday's banana and decided to make some muffins.

A note about this recipe: you might think it's a really bad idea to put vinegar in your muffins, but you are wrong! It helps to leaven them (with the baking soda) and it makes them tender and lovely.

dry ingredients:
1 c. all purpose flour
1 c. whole wheat flour
1/4 c. cornmeal
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. salt
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 tsp. nutmeg1/8 tsp. cloves
1/8 tsp. cardamom

wet ingredients:
1 large mushy ripe banana
1/3 c. canola oil
1/2 c. soy milk + 1 tsp. apple cider vinegar
1/4 c. maple syrup
1 small container plain or vanilla soy yogurt (6 oz., or 1/2 c. plus 2 Tbsp.)
1/4 c. water or additional soy milk
1/2 c. frozen or fresh blueberries
Glaze: 1/4 c. granulated sugar dissolved in 1/3 c. warm soy milk

1. Preheat oven to 350 F. Grease a muffin pan, and line with paper liners if you like. (They're optional here: these muffins are sturdy enough that you can bake them right in the pan if you want to.)
2. In a medium bowl, combine all the dry ingredients.
3. In a large bowl, mash the banana with a fork.
4.In a small bowl, pour the cider vinegar into the soy milk and stir. Set aside for five minutes until the milk has curdled. This will look really really weird and gross, but it will be fine, trust me. After five minutes, add this all the remaining wet ingredients to the banana
and mix thoroughly.
5. Stir the dry ingredients into the wet until just combined. Do not overmix, or the muffins will be tough. It's ok to have a few small lumps, I promise!
It still won't look delicious, but have some patience!

6. Stir in the blueberries. If they are frozen, don't thaw them first, or it will turn your batter purple. Better to just let them thaw in the oven!
7. Spoon the batter into the prepared muffin pan and bake for 18 minutes, or until a knife inserted into the center of a muffin comes out clean.

8. Spoon glaze over the muffins while they're still warm in the muffin pan. Once they've cooled down a bit, you can leave them on a cooling rack or plate to cool the rest of the way.
Enjoy for breakfast, lunch and dinner. (Just kidding, really you should only enjoy them for breakfast and lunch.)

The DIY yogurt experiment

2010-04-21T17:39:00.000-07:00

Everyone likes yogurt, even us vegans. Especially when it's made of coconut milk (yum yum yum yum yum!)

But I get sick of paying a lot of money for it all the time, and besides, they stopped selling coconut yogurt in this town--probably because everyone else was sick of paying a lot of money, too.
So I decided to try to make my own. I have NO IDEA if it's going to come out well. But I hope it does cause how cool would that be?

I'm making it in a crock pot. (Who knew we had a crock pot? Not me.)

Ingredients:
2 cans coconut milk plus 1/2 can of water
about 1/2 cup already-made yogurt (I used Silk soy yogurt)
lots of time and patience

Time for an adventure? Here we go:
1. Pour the cans of coconut milk into the crock pot. You may be surprised at how much fat there is floating at the top of the can. Like, you'll have a hard time pouring it until you break it up and mix it around a little--that much fat. (Who ever said being vegan was healthy? Ha ha.)

2. Stir the coconut milk around a little to break up the clumps of fat. At this point I added a little bit of water, because it seemed really thick. I added about half a can.

3. Heat the coconut milk on low. Theoretically it's supposed to come to about 180 F to sterilize it, but guess what? It came out of a can so I'm gonna bet it doesn't have too many microbes in it, that's the point of canning. (But if it doesn't work out I'm gonna be embarrassed at my impatience!)

4. Once it reaches 110 F, it's time to turn off the crock pot, unplug it, and add your starter. My starter is plain old soy yogurt--I'm using Silk brand. It's important that you use a kind of yogurt that has live active cultures. You could certainly use a packaged yogurt starter, but I'm very low-tech. Also, if you have pre-packaged yogurt starter you probably don't need me telling you how to make yogurt, right? Cause I'm making this up as I go along.

5. Sorry, I got sidetracked. Where were we? Whisk in the yogurt (I used a spoon, my whisk is broken!) and then put the cover back on the crock pot. Wrap the whole thing in clean towels or something to keep it insulated and warm. I didn't have too many clean towels, so I wrapped it in a flannel sheet. Toasty toasty.

6. Check up on it after 8 hours or so. Hopefully, it will taste like yogurt, and not just like a big pot of coconut milk!

7. I checked my yogurt after 10 hours (the next morning) and it did indeed taste like yogurt--hooray! But it also didn't have a very satisfying texture; it had barely thickened at all. I even tried thickening some of it with agar and corn starch, but I wasn't pleased with the result. I've heard that it gets easier the more batches of yogurt you make. Next time I'm going to try culturing it in a sterilized glass mason jar instead of in the crock pot, and see if that works any better. For now I'm putting it in lots of tasty smoothies! And if I eventually perfect the yogurt recipe, I will definitely post it.

happy birthday to Leta!

2010-04-18T14:32:00.001-07:00

It was my roommate Leta's birthday a couple of days ago, and I baked up some cute lil cuppycakes (recipe from the book Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World, which is not an exaggeration they are quite actually taking over the world.)
Anyway, here's an admittedly not-that-spectacular photo of one.
Remember, I'm not a photographer! I just like to bake!

Crumbly Apple-Pear Pie

2010-04-14T20:29:00.000-07:00

I know, I know, April isn't exactly apple pie season. Well, I didn't have anything else to make into a pie, and the apples were looking sort of sad and old, and this seemed like the best way to make them into something delicious.
This is everything you like about apple crisp, combined with everything you like about apple pie.

You will need:
1 9" deep dish pie crust

3 medium sized apples
2 pears
About 3 Tbsp sugar, depending on how sweet your fruit is
1 tsp cinnamon
1/8 tsp ground ginger
a splash lemon juice, but I was out of lemon juice so I used scotch whiskey
a sprinkle of flour

Crumbly topping:
3 Tbsp oil
1 tsp water
3/4 cup brown sugar*
1 tsp vanilla extract
flour

1. Preheat oven to 350 F.
2. Wash, peel, core, and thinly slice your apples and pears.
3. In a large bowl, combine the fruit with the sugar, cinnamon, ginger, lemon juice/whiskey, and a small sprinkle of flour. Stir that up until the fruit is coated.
4. Make the topping: combine oil. water, brown sugar and vanilla. Add in flour 1/4 cup or so at a time and mix it in with your hands until it forms a crumbly mixture that resembles cookie dough.
5. Dump the fruit into the pie crust, and sprinkle the crumb topping over it. Bake for about 30 minutes, or until the fruit is soft--you can tell by poking a sharp knife into it. The knife should go in pretty easily.
6. Don't let your roommates eat it all on the first day, because left-over apple pie is the world's best breakfast.

P. S. I know I know the photo is not too pretty. My excuse: it was too yummy to photograph; all I could do was just gobble it up.

Citrus-stachio muffins

2010-04-08T11:53:00.000-07:00

I love citrus, and I love pistachios, and I love citrus with pistachios. And this is supposed to be a blog about muffins, right? So lets make some muffins!

1/2 cup apple sauce
1/3 cup sugar
2 Tbsp. oil
zest of 1 lemon and 1 orange (wash those lil' guys before zesting, please!)
juice of 1 lemon and 1 orange, plus enough soy- or other milk to add up to 1 1/3 cups
1/2 cup VERY finely chopped pistachios
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 tsp. salt
2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
optional: coarsely chopped pistachios and coarse sugar for decoration

1.Preheat the oven to 350 F. Line a muffin pan with paper liners and spray with oil to prevent any stickage.

2. In a medium bowl, combine orange juice, lemon juice, and milk. The milk will probably start to curdle; don't freak out, you didn't do anything wrong! Once it has thickened a little, whisk in the sugar, apple sauce, and oil.

3. In a large bowl, sift or whisk flours, salt, baking powder, and baking soda. Whisk in the grated zest and the finely chopped pistachios.

4. Add the wet ingredients into the dry and stir just until combined. (I like to do this with a rubber spatula.) A few lumps in the batter are ok, so don't over-mix!

5. Scoop the batter into the lined muffin tins, and sprinkle the tops with coarsely chopped pistachios and coarse sugar. Bake for about 20 minutes, or until a toothpick stuck in the center comes out clean. If you can't wait to devour them, I understand but they're tastier after they've cooled down to room temperature.

Macaroons

2010-03-29T11:29:00.000-07:00

These are a classic for Passover! In my family we always have those ones from a can but, come on! Everybody knows, cookies are supposed to come from the oven!

These are incredibly easy to throw together, and you can make them a couple of days in advance, just store them in a tupperware once they're cool.

Yield 2 dozen cookies

1 (7 oz.) bag sweetened shredded coconut
2/3 cups slivered almonds
1/2 cup matzoh meal for cake--this type is much finer than regular matzoh meal
1/3 cup apple sauce
1/3 cup agave nectar
1 Tbsp oil
1/4 cup soymilk (or substitute coconut milk for extra coconut flavor! But I didn't have any so I used soy.)
Optional: chocolate, to melt & drizzle across the tops

1. Preheat the oven to 350 F. Put the almonds in a blender or food processor and pulse until they're ground. When they're done, they should look sort of like sand.
2. Put the coconut, ground almonds, and matzoh meal in a bowl and use your hands to combine them and break up any big clumps of coconut.
3. Mix the apple sauce, oil, and agave, and pour this into the coconut mixture.
4. If it's doesn't hold together easily, add a little of the soy milk until it's wet enough to hold together.
5. Use a tablespoon to pick up balls of dough and roll them LOOSELY in your hands, just to help it keep its shape, but you don't want to squeeze it too hard. Place the cookies on a lightly greased baking sheet. You can put them pretty close together, because they won't spread.
6. Bake for about 10 minutes, until the coconut looks nice and golden. Be careful with them when they're still warm; they'll fall apart easily. I think the safest way to get them onto a cooling rack is with a thin metal spatula.

For that Mounds Bar effect, you can drizzle the tops with melted chocolate once they're cool.
Enjoy!

Note: if you can't find the special cake matzoh meal, you can put some regular matzoh meal through the blender until they're the consistency of flour.

Chickpeas!

2010-03-28T14:40:00.000-07:00

I have a new-ish obsession with dried chickpeas. Mark Bittman told me in his cookbook How to Cook Everything Vegetarian that they're about a hundred times tastier than the ones from a can, and it turns out he wasn't lying. So here's how I cooked them today:

1 bag of dried chickpeas (aka garbanzo beans), picked through for pebbles and rinsed
water
salt and pepper to taste
one small onion, chopped
lots and lots of cloves of garlic (like 8-ish would be about right), smooshed with the side of a knife

To soak or not to soak?
I don't usually bother with soaking beans before cooking them, but chickpeas take forever otherwise so do yourself a favor and soak them the night before. Or else you can quick-soak them by covering them with water, bringing to a boil, turning off the heat, and then letting them sit, covered, for one hour. Whichever method you use, drain the soaking water and cover with some new water to cook them.

Cooking
Put the beans in a pot and add enough water to cover. Throw in the smooshed garlic, the chopped onion, and the pepper and bring to a boil. Cook it, stirring occasionally, for about two hours or so, until they're soft. This takes a long time, even with the pre-soaking, so you'll probably want to call someone on the phone, or read a book, or cook some side disihes, or wash some laundry, or wash some dishes, or write a paper, or study for a test, or paint your nails, or do SOMETHING to amuse yourself while they're cooking. Ok? Don't say I didn't warn you.
Once they start to get soft, that's a good time to add some salt. Taste them and ask yourself, what delicious spices would go well here? This can vary a lot depending on your mood. If you are feeling under the weather, this would make an awesome broth+chickpeas for some chickpea-noodle-soup. Just add some carrots, some noodles, and if you want it to taste like my grandma cooked it, some fresh dill. And then you can tuck yourself into bed and sit around feeling sorry for yourself until your cold goes away.
Or, a less sick-in-bed variation:
Just now when I made this, I added some cooking sherry, and another onion, which I first chopped and sauteed with about 2 tsp garam masala, 1 tsp mustard seeds, 1 tsp cumin, and 3 cloves of finely-chopped garlic. (I like garlic, can you tell?) Then I added the sauteed stuff to the beans, deglazed the pan with some more sherry, poured that in too, and stirred. And guess what? It's yummmmmy.
I'm going to eat this for dinner next to some roasted brussels sprouts and some rice, and it's gonna be so tasty that my family and I eat it all up!
And watch out for a post about coffee cake, comign soon!

Coffee coffee coffee cake

2010-03-28T13:24:00.000-07:00

(AKA Spring break coffee cake)

The dough is adapted from Kris Holechek's Braided Holiday Bread from the amazing book 100 Best Vegan Baking Recipes. (Buy her book! It's freakin' awesome! And since I don't like to go around telling you recipes that are the intellectual property of somebody else, I shall not print that recipe here. That would be mean!)
If you don't have her lovely book, you could also use a regular enriched-white-bread type recipe, or your mom's favorite cookbook's yeasty coffee cake recipe, and here's how to veganize it: Substitute 1 tbsp flax meal + 2 tbsp warm water for each egg, and use margarine + soy/almond/rice milk instead of milk + butter. (I love substitutions! Hoorah.)

The filling is yum yum yum, and here's how you make it:
1/2 cup brown sugar
3 tbsp oil
3 tbsp brewed coffee
3/4 cup pitted prunes (I know right? But I was out of raisins and we had these and I tasted one and it didn't kill me and it was actually pretty tasty, and trying new things is good!)
1/4 cup chopped almonds
1/2 tsp almond extract
1/4 tsp ground cloves
a little flour for dusting

Coat the prunes with a little flour to make them easier to chop. That was my mom's idea, and boy is she smart! Chop up the prunes. Combine all the ingredients and let them sit while the dough is rising so that all the flavors can really meld and the prunes (BTW, you could also use currants or raisins or even dates) get nice and juicy.

Once your dough is finished rising, roll it out on a floured surface into a rectangle about 14x20 inches or something like that.

Spread the filling on the dough, leaving plenty of room around the edges without filling. Then roll the whole thing up lengthwise (like a jelly roll or a magic carpet) and seal it together with water and lots of patient pinching. Gently pull the edges around into a ring shape--if this is difficult, let the whole thing rest for a minute and try again. Pinch the edges together, using water again to seal it. If it's really thin on one end and fat on the other, you can gently scootch it around until the shape is more even.
Flip it into a 10" round baking pan (a springform pan is probably easiest) with the sealed side down. Let it rise for about 20-25 minutes, covered, in the baking pan.
When it's ready to go in the oven, cut some nice little slits in the top of the ring, and bake it at 375 for 15 minutes, and then about an hour more, until the it sounds hollow when you tap it.

You can ice it with a mixture of powdered sugar and soy/almond/rice/etc. milk, if you want. (I want! I want!)

Let it cool and serve it with coffee, duh.

Feeling good and springy

2010-03-23T14:03:00.000-07:00

Springlike? Anyway, I'm pretty much over this cold that's been bothering me all week, so that's good good news. And of course that means I'm cooking again, which is also happy.
On second thought, cooking might not be the right word for it because --alas!--it's midterm week here in Oberlin, and I am busy busy busy. But I did have time today to make some white bean dip, which I will now share will all of you (All of y'all.)
It's not even pretty, so there is no picture. It basically looks like hummus.

White bean dip
1 can white beans (navy, cannelini, or great northern are all good)
1 tbsp lemon juice
1/2 tsp chili powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp fresh black pepper
2 tbsp nutritional yeast
1/4 tsp garlic powder
1/4 of a small onion, chopped
1 tsp Zaatar spice*, if you are lucky enough to have them in your cupboard

Put everything in the blender and process until smooth. Eat with crackers and sliced veggies such as carrots, cucumbers, and bell pepper. You can also smear this onto a sandwich, if you feel like it.

*Zaatar spice is a blend of sesame seeds, sumac, thyme and oregano, and is used in some Middle Eastern dishes. It's tasty, but don't feel too bad if you can't find it--you can still make yummy dip! I promise.

2010-03-21T11:40:00.000-07:00

I haven't been cooking much cause I've been sick, but here's something that's been bothering me. When I search for vegan recipes on Google, it substitutes vegetarian as a search term. If I search for "vegan lasagna recipe," that does not mean that I want the second result to say "Cheesy vegetable lasagna."
(Duh!)

a really hospitable robot

2010-03-17T10:01:00.001-07:00

This robot brings people snacks! Read it, you'll like it!

http://dinersjournal.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/23/the-discreet-charm-of-robots/?scp=2&sq=food%20robot&st=cse

And have a nice day!

Let's talk about macaroni and cheese

2010-03-12T09:54:00.000-08:00

Ok, how to make vegan macaroni and cheese is probably one of the top controversies of veganism. And I'm not even talking about when omnivores are like "how can you even call that mac and cheese?" cause that's a whole nother can of spam. But no two vegans seem to like the same fake-o cheese on their macaronis!
Well, I guess that's fine--your recipe might be different from mine, but this should be a good guideline.

This recipe will make enough for just one super hungry person, but if there's more than one of you, fear not; you can scale it up with good results.
If it's dinner time and this is all you feel like eating, mix in some thawed and heated green peas.

Here we go:
Leftover pasta is great for this! Otherwise, throw 1 cup of macaroni (I like spirals or tiny penne) into a pot of boiling water (to salt or not to salt? I'll leave that up to you!)
And cook it until it's al dente, which ought to be about 9 minutes but keep checking cause soggy pasta is bad news.

Meanwhile make the sauce:
2 or 3 tbsp. nutritional yeast
2 shakes garlic powder
2 shakes reduced sodium seasoned salt (I like that stuff! Don't judge me.)
about a tsp. margarine--this is completely optional if you make the sauce in the microwave
1 pinch tumeric if you want it really yellow
black pepper
1/2 tsp. dijon mustard
awesome but optional: tahini and a splash of lemon juice
a couple spoonfuls of soy sour cream if you've got any lying around--yum
a splash of soymilk (0r almond milk or rice milk or hemp milk yata yata yata)
but if you're out of soymilk (which I sometimes am, argh) you can even substitute with water, I do it that way all the time.

Microwave instructions: Do you know anyone who says microwaved food is bad for you? What's up with that?
Put all the sauce ingredients in a bowl and stir until smooth. Microwave at about 60% just until hot--in my microwave that takes about 40 seconds, but keep checking it. If it's too thick, you can thin it out with a little more milk/water/sour cream.
Add the (drained) pasta to the bowl and stir. Yum!

If you don't have a microwave, melt the margarine in a small saucepan over medium heat. Add nutritional yeast and spices and stir to combine. Add mustard, sour cream and milk and stir, cooking until thoroughly heated. You can add more milk if you need it. Add the drained pasta and stir until coated.

EAT IT! You can even eat it right out of the pot. I won't tell.

The next question of course is what do you call your vegan mac and cheese? Mac and cheez? Mac un-cheese? My boyfriend calls it mac and trees--but he eats real cheese so maybe that has something to do with it. Anyway, I'm gonna leave that up to you.

One more thing--pour cheezy sauce over your tortilla chips for some nice nacho cheese, (which is what you call cheese that doesn't belong to you.)

Ok, lets talk muffins

2010-03-10T10:54:00.001-08:00

Today was a hard day (is) because I couldn't find the spray bottle of oil, so my muffins are sticking to their liners a bit. At the same time, it was glorious, because they baked up sooo tall! Seriously, all my life I've dreamed about baking a batch of muffins with glorious tops as tall as these.
The recipe was from Kris Holechek's The 100 Best Vegan Baking Recipes, which is a fantastic book and if you're like me you'll read right through it like a romance novel cover to cover scanning for the scandalous (i.e. lime coconut bars and pumpkin-cinnamon swirl cheesecake.)
Online, she can be found here.

While we're on the subject of me telling you what blogs I like, the most important thing is that you go read my friend Julia's blog right now don't even finish reading this sentence!

Have a nice day!