hot for food

I eat fake meat… so! Look I’m really not one for imitation vegetarian/vegan food. I also think its deceiving and mega disappointing when a food item is called something it really isn’t. Even worse when vegan/vegetarian meat substitutes or imitations taste like paper, cardboard, rubber or some other man made material that doesn’t resemble food. I don’t eat meat and sometimes, as much as I DO NOT want to eat meat, well I kinda want to eat meat. Make sense?! But I won’t and luckily Gardein has come out with a line of perfect replacements for those moments of weakness. The products are all non-GMO and organic.  They taste amazing. And they are starting to pop up at grocery stores everywhere. Just recently we received the expanded line of products in Canada that had previously only been available south of the border. Honestly, Gardein makes it easy to become vegetarian without compromising taste, satisfaction, and health. I mean, just like meat, I wouldn’t live on this stuff. It’s still a processed food, but nothing is slit in the throat or submersed in feces to get it to your plate. Just saying. Check out these deceiving vegan meals I made using Gardein, and another incredible product, Daiya.

Beef & Veg Stir Fry
Ingredients: Gardein Homestyle Beefless Tips, various veggies, stir-fried in sesame oil, ginger, garlic, hot sauce and tahini, on a bed of soba noodles.

Meat & Cheese Pizza
Ingredients: Gardein BBQ Pulled Shreds, Daiya Mozzarella Style Shreds, gluten free pizza dough, tomato puree, yellow bell pepper, green onion

Chicken Finger Dinner
Ingredients: Gardein Chipotle Lime Crispy Fingers, homemade maple mustard dip, broccoli, smashed sweet potatoes with nutmeg and basil.

Tell me your mouth is watering?! Even my carnivorous man friend I occasionally feed was all over that Beef & Veg Stir Fry and he can hardly tell the difference between Daiya and real cheese. So go ahead and fake it, even for just 1 day a week. Besides these products have far far far less saturated fat then the real thing. Meat and cheese might just be the death of you… but not me.

I bet you had NO idea you could make a vegan quiche. It’s not just my imagination. I know, I know, a quiche is a savory baked egg tart. BUT I figured out a way to mimic the taste and texture without the use of dairy or eggs! I sort of remixed a couple of recipes I’ve seen, and improv’d a little. So as per usual I didn’t follow a recipe and what I’ve listed below might not be EXACT, but its all about mixing and then tasting. Maybe you want it tangier, saltier, spicier etc. So PLEASE do with this what you want and create your own personal vegan quiche!

Vegan Mushroom Leek Quiche

Dough:
1 cup pastry flour OR all-purpose flour
3-4 tbsp Earth Balance
2-3 tbsp cold water
pinch of sea salt

This is a very simple tart/pie crust. I eyeballed the whole thing and only had 1 cup of flour in my cupboard. This made 5 tarts in a muffin pan. So if you’re making a dozen you should double this recipe. Using a pastry blender or your fingers cut the cold Earth Balance into the flour so it becomes crumbly but don’t over mixed. Then add the water a bit a time and mix with your hands or the pastry blender until you’ve got a ball of dough. The texture is pliable but not really wet or dry. Roll out on a floured surface and cut rough circles out approx. 3-4 inches wide. Just using your hands form and press the round of dough into lightly oiled muffin pan cups. Make a couple of stabs with a fork into the bottom of the crusts. I DIDN’T bake my crust in advance, but I should have. Bake these at 350 F for approx. 10-15 minutes until they are very lightly browned. Allow to cool before pouring in the filling.

Filling:
1/4 cup chopped onion
1/2 leek
1 cup mushrooms
8 oz silken tofu
2 tbsp dijon mustard
1/3 cup nutritional yeast flakes
1 tbsp tamari or shoyu
1/2 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp paprika
1/4 tsp fresh thyme
1 tsp tumeric
1 1/2 tsp cornstarch
fresh ground pepper

Put all the ingredients, except the leek, mushroom, and onion in a blender or food processor and mix until well blended. Again some of these ingredients can be eliminated or replaced with other herbs and spices depending on your tastes. I made this all by eye balling and tasting as I went along until I got the right taste I wanted. However, the cornstarch should not be altered, only increased if you make more of this recipe.

Chop the onion, mushroom and leek into fairly small pieces. Saute everything until cooked through. Add the vegetables to the quiche mixture and fill each tart crust just before the top edge. Bake at 350 F for 15-20 minutes or until the filling is browned on top and bubbling.

I am still in awe of the versatility that tofu has. I encourage you not to shy away from incorporating it into your diet even if you’re not vegan or vegetarian. Yes, some people are allergic to soy. But the reason that happens is because people are eating a lot of packaged food and therefore eating a lot of processed genetically modified soy. You had no idea did you! Whole organic soy (Wildwood is a great brand) is good for you and the possibilities and uses for it are limitless.

On a daily basis I am faced with all kinds of comments about how “radical” my diet/lifestyle choice seems. It really isn’t, at least I don’t see it that way. So look… if Oprah can influence 378 or so members of her staff to go completely vegan for a week (including herself), I’m pretty sure you can too. I’m just happy momma O has devoted an entire episode to talking about veganism. To me, this is monumental. If Oprah is talking about veganism to ALL of America it therefore can’t be that “crazy”.  Here’s a chunk of the show that aired Feb 1, 2011.

So it’s been just about a month of my new updated version of my diet. I haven’t had any white bread! But I do know some other refined sugar has snuck in, in small small amounts. I had some vegan chocolate chips that I was NOT about to throw out! (I’ll post those baked goods another day) No alcohol and no coffee. Not NO caffeine, I’ve had maybe 3 black types of tea. But that’s a HUGE step. I feel better. But I’m still working on it. I still haven’t kicked the movie popcorn!!

I made a Barley Risotto recently that was really good. I actually prefer it to using Arborio Rice which is a white starch. Barley is a whole grain and good for the immune system. I just cooked it slowly, the same way as a risotto, and added hot water and stock in small amounts stirring constantly until absorbed and the barley looked creamy. I added sauteed mushrooms and peas to the mix as well, AND lots of black pepper. Delicioso!

A whole lot of non-food related stuff has been going on lately and I haven’t been able to blog for a while. Mainly, I started a full time job. Which is wonderful, but it means I’ve had to cut back on my leisurely cooking time. I’m all go-go-go now. At least until I adjust to this new lifestyle and figure out a balance. The whole reason I started this blog was mainly out of boredom. I was a freelancer for a couple of years. I did things on my own terms, when I wanted. And I somehow found a joyous outlet in cooking, taking photos of what I cooked and then blabbing about it to you, in my vast amounts of spare time. There was a time when I was making something inventive 3 times a day! However, everything I’ve eaten in the past 3-ish weeks has mainly been done in haste. However, this post is to show you how one vegan can still be healthy in hurry.

Luckily purchasing a Vitamix blender with my new found income has made it awesomely easy to get my fruit and veg intake in a jiffy. I’ve heard this machine is life changing, and now I know. It’s really quite incredible that it can whiz up a whole apple, 2 carrots, a 1/2 cup of berries, spinach, fresh ginger, and a shot of pure pom juice in the time it takes to sneeze. Or how about a sweet re-hydrating protein smoothie with raw almonds, rice milk, dates, banana, and coconut water.

I can also whiz up raw pesto cream in the Vitamix and store it in the fridge for the week to use as  a veggie dip, or as a tangy base for a pita pizza. I am slightly addicted to this at the moment. As a vegan I’ve missed pizza, but this is a million times better than anything I ate in my past life with cheese. The pesto is super easy: 1 cup raw sunflower seeds and almonds combined, 1/2 cup olive or sunflower oil, 2 cloves garlic, juice of one lemon, lots of basil, sea salt. I add water to make more and make it smoother, but you can also get a really dark green, chunkier pesto dip without water and run it through a food processor.

My comforting go-to is always brown rice pasta.  This is a Spicy Kung Pao Tofu dish I whipped up by just stir frying veggies and tofu and tossing with the noodles in a sauce of natural peanut butter, chilli garlic sauce, hoisin sauce, lime juice, brown rice vinegar, sunflower oil, and freshly grated ginger.

And I always have a pile of brown rice made up in the fridge so I can make stir fry and pair it with other things. If you bake up these acorn squash – I lightly coated in melted Earth Balance and a bit of maple syrup at 400 F – in advance you can stuff them with all kinds of things. In this case, it’s a simple and quick rice dish I did in a cast iron pan and just added cranberries, corn, walnuts, red pepper, and kale. I added some tahini for creaminess and a bit of cinnamon and nutmeg which gave it the perfect flavor to go with the squash.  I made this up on the spot and it’s a keeper! Also the seeds of the acorn squash were SO delish lightly seasoned and baked. I was going to put them in with the rice mixture, which would have been tasty, but I ate them all before everything was complete!

So if you want to keep eating right in more hectic times, it just takes a little bit of pre-planning and time to make sauces, grains etc.  in advance. If there’s good stuff in front of you when you open the fridge, you’ll be less compelled to resort to packaged foods. And seriously, looking at these pictures don’t you want to put in that extra effort

I made my first vegan burger this weekend. I’ve been in a bit of a rut lately…eating the SAME things over and over again and not really wanting to cook. But cooking for friends is always the best way to get your imagination going again. I made dinner for my friend Dee last night. She’s g-free and I’m vegan, so I have to get savvy if I’m going to cook for the two of us! I’m not saying veggie burgers are the most inventive things to make, but they are versatile and you can essentially put whatever you want in them. These are lentil walnut patties. They turned out amazing… probably because I didn’t follow a recipe! You’ll notice the burger is actually used as the “bun” allowing for a plethora of filling ideas. I stole this GENIUS idea from 101cookbooks.com. Man, I so wish I thought of this myself. I mean I could of. Isn’t it great!

I’ll tell you what’s in these burgers, but I do not know the amounts. Geez, how would I ever make a recipe book? I need an archivist or a scientist or something to keep track of me while I cook.

Ingredients for the burger patty/bun:
Green lentils, toasted walnuts, carrots, green onion, nutritional yeast, cilantro, parsley, cumin, paprika.

I cooked the lentils in veggie broth, boiled and drained the carrots, toasted the walnuts, and whizzed everything together in a food processor. I ended up with the exact consistency I needed. Not too soft and mushy and not too dry and hard. I made the patties into a thick enough size, thinking I would pan fry them and then slice them in half to use them as the bun. But after a trial run of that, I decided it was better to slice the patty in half first then pan fry either side. You could also just make thinner patties first. You can make the patties in advance and refrigerate them until you’re ready to cook and assemble them. So the possibilities of what to put inside these babies are endless! I did homemade cashew pesto cream, caramelized onion, a tomato slice, avocado, and baby spinach.

After devouring 2 mini burgers each and a pile of yam fries, Dee treated me to a piano serenade of Take Five by Dave Brubeck. Best ever! And we ate ourselves into chocolate chip peanut butter cookie comas.

My chef friend Denise Blinn has been wanting me to try her Krispy Kale Tofu recipe for months. She’s not a vegan, but includes this dish and other options as part of her Meals on Heels lunch delivery service. I was supposed to eat a batch that she made herself, but instead she sent me the recipe… and I tried it right away! Of course, I always have these ingredients in my kitchen at any given time so it’s the perfect thing to whip up and make large batches of for easy leftovers. Surprisingly, the kale stays crisp after day one. My only addition to the original recipe is chopped apples.

Krispy Kale Tofu

Ingredients
1 cup short-grain brown rice or basmati
1/3 cup olive oil
1 tsp sesame oil
2 tbsp soy sauce
1 lb kale chopped (ribs removed)
1 gala apple, chopped into cubes
1/2 cup unsweetened coconut flakes
1/2 lb extra-firm tofu, cut into 1/4″ cubes
sea salt

Preheat oven to 350° and place shelves in upper and lower thirds of oven. Prepare Brown Rice. Whisk together olive oil, sesame oil and soy sauce.  Reserve 1/3 of the dressing, then combine remaining with kale, coconut and tofu.  Toss well, then spread in a single layer on 2 sheet pans. Bake until crispy, about 25 minutes, stirring occasionally to cook evenly on all sides. Remove from oven and toss mixture with remaining dressing and the cooked rice.  Season with salt and serve warm.

This recipe is a winner. I almost ate all of it in one day, which is possible sans rice! If you live in Toronto’s downtown core and either don’t bring your lunch to work, fail to eat a nutritious lunch, or just want a nice change check out Meals on Heels… it’s a steal of a deal!

I swear, I could eat sweet potato and avocado exclusively, for the rest of my life! Well, perhaps that’s a stretch. But I have been eating this winning combo for breakfast, lunch, and dinner for the past few weeks. I thought I would show off the photos from my last few dates with these amazing ingredients. In most cases, the sweet potatoes have been microwaved until almost cooked through, then chopped and pan fried in a drizzle of olive oil, S&P, cayenne, paprika, cumin, and nutmeg. The possibilities for tasty additions is endless!

Here’s a simple side of potatoes for breakfast – pan fried sweet potato with onions, fresh avocado, salsa, and cilantro

This was a yummy warm lunch salad – pan fried sweet potato, with fresh avocado, green onion, red pepper, and sweet raisins all tossed in a good dose of lime juice. Next time I would add sliced or chopped almonds too!

This is a quick dinner staple. And if you want to be real quick, microwave your sweet potato or yam. Baking just takes SO long! Then slice it open and mash the insides, then top with freshly made guacamole. I always carrot ribbons for extra crunch!

Crispy sweet potato fries make a great dinner starter or mid-day snack. But instead of dipping them in a vegan spicy mayo, I’ve now resorted to my guacamole salsa for dipping.

If you have not incorporated these two ingredients, sweet potatoes and avocado, into your life yet you are truly missing out! Hopefully this gives you some ideas to start eating these vegetables together. If you have your own ideas and recipes for the marriage of sweet potato and avocado, let me know! Oh, and if anyone knows the difference between and sweet potato and a yam, please inform me?!

I’ve professed my love for quinoa before… it’s my fave! This time around I tried black quinoa. I have made the white and red quinoa before and there’s a huge difference in texture between them. I prefer the white, actually. It has a softer, fluffier feel and I find it absorbs the cooking liquid much better and faster. But I thought black quinoa would just look better in this recipe from Vegetarian Times for Gingery Quinoa Salad with Apples, Peas, and Coconut… and it does! But I would make it again with white for purposes of more pleasurable eating. The red and black quinoa’s are much chewier and make my jaw hurt after a few bites!

This is a great recipe and it happened to be one of those rare moments where I don’t modify anything! There’s a nice creaminess to it being cooked in 100% carrot juice and I like the hint of coconut flavor combined with the sweet peas and apples. If you love quinoa, give it a whirl!

Ever since I’ve turned vegan you know I’ve been trying to experiment with versions of mac & cheese. I tried one recipe from VeganYumYum and another from FatFree Vegan Kitchen. One was tofu based and the other blended from raw cashews. They were pretty good… at the time. But now I’ve perfected the recipe and I feel this tastes much better. It’s milder in flavor and quicker to make… which is the whole point of mac & cheese, isn’t it? I feel as though this is a perfect vegan mimic of my fave mac & cheese (made from real cheese) that I USED to eat at The Drake. If you’re not vegan, you must try their dish! If you are vegan, you must try my Easy Pea-sy Mac & Cheeze.

Ingredients:
1 package Rotini noodles
1 cup frozen peas
2 tbsp tahini
1 tbsp each of lemon juice, olive oil, white miso, nutritional yeast, tamari
finely chopped cilantro
1 clove of garlic, minced
black pepper

In a dish mix together the ingredients for the sauce including tahini, lemon juice, olive oil, white miso, nutritional yeast, tamari, cilantro and garlic. Rinse peas under water to defrost. Once pasta is cooked and drained, add in your peas and half the sauce. Mix to coat noodles. You can add more sauce as you like, but you’ll probably find you have extra.

I prefer the texture of rotini noodles (and of course I used brown rice pasta) because macaroni tends to feel worm-ish and slimy. The measurements I outlined make more than enough for 4 servings of pasta. If you want to make more you can just double the recipe. I had left over sauce and I find it also makes a great dip for crackers or veggies!

I am surprised how many people still don’t know about quinoa! When I mention it aloud, people go… huh? Well, you need to know about it. It is an ancient whole grain, and is considered to be a complete protein. Technically, though it is a seed. But it replaces grains in recipes and cooks the same way. It is AMAZING! It’s cheap, versatile, and completely healthy for you. AND most importantly, it doesn’t hurt my gut! It is my favorite food. I vow to try more interesting recipes using this super ingredient. I even want to try baking with it.

I found this recipe linked from a Facebook post of fellow blogger Sweet On Veg. I cooked up a whole box of quinoa for this Quinoa Taco Salad and ate it all myself over the course of a few days.

Credit goes to Karina, the Gluten-Free Goddess. She is incredible. Lots of foodies know about this amazing site and I check back often, because she has a lot of gluten-free AND vegan recipes, including a lot of baked goods. Now I’m not 100% G-free, but I am experimenting with it. I think we could all stand to lighten up on the refined sugars, flours, and yeast. Check out Gluten-Free Goddess for some ideas and give this salad a try!