Pho Noodle Soup with Tofu

Ack! This week completely escaped me for food blogging!

Hopefully this week I will be more consistent.

This week also marks VegFest Minneapolis 2013! It is coming up already! I will be volunteering at the festival, so come check it out!!!! Lots of fun and food!

OK. So the photo above is a quick soup I threw together. Again, I got major help from the Pacific Vegetarian Pho Soup Base that I added to thinly sliced garlic and onions. I threw in vermicelli rice noodles, then removed from heat and stirred in some "power greens" which was a mix of spinach, baby kale and baby red chard (mainly spinach).

For the tofu: I grilled them on the George Foreman Grill for a bit, then slathered on some quick cilantro-ginger-hot pepper sauce, cut into mini triangles and set on top of the soup.

What can I say? The temperature is dropping here and soup is comforting and fairly easy to make.

Kimchi Soup with Tofu, Shiitake Mushrooms, and Veggies

Confession: I have never had kimchi.

Until now!

It is really common for kimchi to have fish sauce in it, so...not vegan. However, vegan/vegetarian kimchi does exist! I picked up some from Trader Joe's and have been hanging onto it for some time, not sure of what to do with it. Well, tonight it became part of a soup.



I started with some thinly sliced onion and sauteed it in coconut oil until translucent. I added mini sweet bell peppers sliced into strips and thinly sliced garlic - 1-2 cloves. Then some frozen shiitake mushrooms, an entire container of firm silken tofu (the little ones in the aseptic containers). I cubed half the tofu block and just tore the other half into chunks. Then I poured in a bunch of broth - I used Pacific Vegetaria Pho Starter soup base, along with some water and soy sauce. I brought everything to a boil, then turned off the heat and added a handful of baby kale and some cilantro.

This was a pretty easy, tasty soup. I had a ton left over for more than one lunch. I would maybe use a different base if I made this again and I added a lot of spice later on because it was not spicy enough for me.

Crescent Samosas with Chimichurri - Vegan Mofo 2013

What am I going to make for dinner? - this thought ran through my head all the way home. Constantly flipping through ingredients I know I have on hand and weighing out whether I needed to pick up anything on the way home.

From pasta to taco night to taco pizza, nothing seemed to feel right. My mind's eye went back into the fridge and clicks off ingredients: vegan sausage (Gimme Lean), peas...crescents. Scanning the pantry and counter, I rested upon potatoes and was sold.

Once I got home, I started washing some potatoes (little reds and yellows) and sliced them into as evenly shaped and sized pieces as possible. I tossed them in a small bowl with olive oil and crushed whole garlic cloves that I tore apart with my hands. Onto a foil-lined tray for the toaster oven. Before I placed it in to bake - I also covered the tray with foil, poking 3-4 slits for ventilation.

As the potatoes started steaming, I opened one tube of crescent dough, and laid them out on a plate to become more malleable.

I did a small dice on one quarter of a large onion and started to slowly sweat the onions in a pan. At least 15-20 minutes were spent just sweating these onions out on really low heat with a little coconut oil. Once I was satisfied with the onions, I removed them from the pan and got the Gimme Lean out. Sliced off a couple chunks, and seasoned with curry powder & paprika before sauteing in the onion pan, splitting up the sausage until they were smaller chunks and added the onions back along with the peas I had already cooked the day before.

Once the potatoes were soft, I threw them into a bowl and mashed, with a little butter (not much!), then added the sausage-onion-pea mix in with some of the potatoes. I carefully placed a big Tablespoon of the mix onto a crescent triangle, then closed the dough around it and carefully placed it onto the toaster oven tray and baked a little longer than recommended, flipping the crescents over. This made about 8 samosas total.

The sauce was similar to the chimichurri sauce I did earlier this month.

Great and fairly easy, though somewhat labor-intensive. This would be even better if there was a mixture already made and then just use the leftovers the next day inside these crescents. Next time I would probably mess around with the dough a little more.

A look on the inside:

Zesty Bean Dip - Vegan Mofo 2013

I've made bean dip before, and this will not be the last time I make bean dip. Hang in there, we are a little over halfway through Vegan Mofo, and I have a busy week.

I made this dip a little different than I've made other dips in the past. I blended up some onion, 3 big garlic cloves, 1-2 Thai Chili peppers, cumin, dried coriander, and water. Then simmered that mix in a pot, added half a veggie bouillon cube, and then added one can vegetarian refried beans. This was really soup-like, and I simmered it down for a while. It thickened even more as it cooled in the fridge. As usual, the flavors become more intense as time goes on, so this would be really great made the day before. I can rarely have it last that long in the house.

CSA Green Pasta Bowl [Vegan Mofo]

Day 13 of Vegan Month of Food!

CSA Green! We are nearing the end of 7 days of green theme. This dish was delicious: penne pasta tossed/sauteed with asparagus, fresh oregano, olive oil, spinach, garlic scapes, onion and garlic. I am pretty sure the vegetables, garlic, onion, and oregano were all from the CSA, though the spinach could have been purchased at the grocery store.

Curry Chickpea Stuffed Squash [Vegan Mofo]

Welcome to Day 5 of Vegan Month of Food!!!!

I made this two nights ago. I've always wanted to do a stuffed squash type of dish and now I have! The two types of squash I used: acorn and delicata. I must say that after this experience I am a huge fan of delicata squash. Light, very sweet, cooks up fast and gets nice and caramelized while roasting due to the high sugar content. I sliced both of the squash in half, scooped out the seeds, and lightly rubbed olive oil all over them. Then I placed insides facing-down on a pan (does that makes sense?)and roasted for 25-45 minutes around 350 degrees F. I flipped the delicata squash every 10-15 minutes, it was done way faster than the acorn squash.

The stuffing/filling: I sauteed some thinly sliced onions and added chickpeas & curry powder. Next was some cabbage, beet greens, then wild rice and brown rice and veggie broth. I added garlic near the end along with some fresh parsley. Then I scooped into the cooked squash halves.

While all of this was cooking, I also was roasting up some beets, both regular beets and beautiful Chiogga Beets. Sliced up and served on the side of the stuffed squash.

The squash, parsley, beets, beet greens, cabbage and onion were all from the CSA.

Papa John's Kicked-Up Veggie Pizza [Vegan Mofo]

Day Two continues with Vegan MoFo! I'm on a roll now and hope to keep it up. Day two, post two.

Dinner tonight - a one topping (pineapple) Papa John's pizza that I got for free (or nearly free). I sliced up a bunch of my CSA vegetables that I had as well as some other items to create a massive vegetable pizza. Green peppers,
Hungarian wax peppers, onion were from the CSA. Mushrooms and green olives in the pantry. (Note: only part of this pizza has olives and mushrooms since they are not Mr. Coconut's favorite toppings. More for me.)

Behold the sea of vegetables:

Zucchini Noodles with Spaghetti [Vegan Mofo]

Happy Vegan Month of Food!

It's the first day of Vegan Mofo VI, and my second year participating. (But it's my first year signed up on the official blog roll!)

Even though at the end of October last year I was pumped and wanted to come up with a theme, I do not really have a plan for this year. I will be focusing a LOT on all the photos I've been taking of dishes using ingredients from my CSA from Featherstone Farm. That means a lot of fresh produce will be featured, like the dish pictured above (and below).

I sliced up a few zucchini with my mandoline v-slicer so they were shredded into long thin noodles. I tossed the zucchini noodles in a little olive oil, salt and pepper, and added to a pan of cooked spaghetti noodles that was mixed with sauteed onion and garlic. I tossed the whole thing until well-mixed. This is a great way to "hide" vegetables - the pasta noodles and zucchini noodles blend together really well, texture-wise. If you add red sauce, you can't taste them at all. I enjoy the taste of vegetables, so it's a non-issue for me.

Here's one more picture:

Chana Masala with Kale

So this is another test to see how blogging goes straight from my smartphone. Tonight, I have a cold. So my cure is to cook warm, comforting slightly spicy foods.
I have been thinking about making chana masala for a while and tonight I had everything I needed.
The recipe was cobbled from a few different googled "easy chana masala" recipes I found. Basically, I sauteed onion in olive oil until it got soft, added cumin seeds, cumin powder, curry powder, cinnamon. Added minced jalapeno & garlic and one 15oz can of chickpeas.
I added 2-4 diced tomatoes, stirred everything up and added about 1/2 cup of water or so and let everything simmer until it reached the consistency I liked and at the very end I added 1.5-2.5 cups of kale. I served with quinoa. i

Pasta-O's with TVP "meat" sauce

As per usual, a straightforward recipe.  I boiled some veggie broth with fennel for some added flavor to soak/hydrate the TVP in.  I was going for a sausage flavor.  I then sauteed up onion and garlic, added the TVP and some tomato paste and water.  Made up this recipe since I did not have canned or fresh tomatoes and did not have canned sauce.  The pasta is <a target="blank_" href="http://www.barillaus.com/content/prodottobarilla/ditalini">Barilla Ditalini</a>  which are fat, short little tubes of pasta.  Delicious!

Mock Duck in Yellow Coconut Curry

Yum yum yum.  Just another easy-peasy curry.  One 15 oz can of coconut milk.  Some curry powder, veg broth = sauce done.

Mock duck fried up in a pan with soy sauce, garlic, hoisin, ginger, onion.  Broccoli and pineapple added, served over brown rice.

It only seems complicated because there are a few different parts to it, but really it's one of those simple "cook while watching TV" type of dishes that just satisfies and can leave leftovers for lunch tomorrow!  (Or breakfast.)

Curry Tofu Spinach in Tortila

This is my first take on Amy's Indian Spinach Tofu Wrap -- which I am obsessed with. However, at $2+ I can't afford to eat it everyday, particularly when thinking about how cheap the ingredients are. This was made pretty simply -- drained tofu (firm or extra firm) sauteed with onion and garlic and curry powder. Add in spinach until doneto my liking, placed in an Ezekial 4:9 Sprouted Tortilla and enjoyed - many times! It was perfect with sriracha and a coriander chutney I like to get. I can hardly wait to try my hand at more of a saag approach to this once I am getting more spinach on a weekly basis.

Gardein Beefless Burger Open-Faced Sandwich

I know, another product from Gardein? Yes! I really like Gardein products. These burgers were great! I did have these in a "traditional" hamburger way as well as this open-faced sandwich way.

For this dish, I sauteed a bunch of onion and mushrooms together, and made a sort of gravy sauce. I toasted some bread, pan-fried the burger, and put it all together with some peas on the side.

Curried Split Pea Soup with Dumplings

I essentially made the curried split pea soup from
VWAV. (I make that soup regularly because it's so easy and cheap.) I added in frozen carrot slices and some whole wheat dumplings.

I had no idea how to make dumplings. I was making drop biscuits and had a lot of dough left over so I made tiny little balls and plopped them into the soup to cook. They turned out dumpling-like and tasted fine.

Another shot:

Coconut Curry with Wild Rice and Okra

This was AWESOME. I made some wild rice first. Then I started some onion sauteing in oil, added garbanzos, the wild rice, and coconut milk. LOTS of vegetable broth, curry paste and frozen carrots and okra. It was a thick stew more than anything else. I loved it, so did Mr. Coconut. It was one of those days where we did not have much food left in the house and what was left did not seem to mix. This is yet another example of how coconut milk and curry paste or powder is the great equalizer and makes anything delicious together.

Another shot:

Gardein Beefless Tips with Spaghetti

So the picture is AWFUL, I know. It was not a great day for my crappy camera. I assure you, though, that this was DELICIOUS. I think it was the first time I've had Gardein's Beefless Tips. I sauteed for a bit with onions and garlic and then added frozen broccoli and Newman's Own Garden Peppers Sauce. The beefless tips became very juicy and took in a lot of the flavor of the sauce. These beefless tips would make AWESOME veggie kabobs and I really want to make those on the grill next summer.

I really like Gardein's products. Almost every one that I have tried is really delicious. I splurged on several of their products recently so I will have a few product reviews coming up.

Puff Pastry Samosas [Vegan Mofo]

Vegan Month of Food has only one more day left!

I experimented a bit with puff pastry today. I made a samosa mix: potatoes diced very small, cooked with small diced carrots and onions and frozen peas. I cooked the mixture with curry powder, veggie broth, garlic, and salt. I finished it with a little flour to help thicken the broth and some cilantro and parsley.

Then I spooned the mix onto thawed squares of frozen puff pastry, wrapping to the best of my ability. I baked at 400 degrees F until golden brown. The above photo was the most successful triangle shape I made.

In the end, there was too much pastry to filling, but I'm not sure how to fix this other than using phyllo dough instead off puff pastry. I would like to try more of a mashed potato approach to the mixture: make curry mashed potatoes and then mix in cooked onion, peas and carrots.

Here's a photo of the other various shapes that came out of this batch (with some cookies cooling on the edge of the photo, that's another post, though):

Curried Seitan Strips [Vegan Mofo]

Vegan Month of Food continues, and I need to pick up the pace!

This was from last week, another experiment with vital wheat gluten to see if I could make edible treats easily. Most recipes for seitan take an hour or more, but I like these quick and easy ways of frying them or baking them. I used the same techniques as my last seitan experiment 2 posts ago, but changed up the ingredients. I made a miso-soy sauce to add into the vital wheat gluten, a bunch of curry powder, some hoisin sauce, some soy sauce. Next time I think I will go for more miso because I couldn't really taste it, but these were still delicious.

I wound up baking these off as larger strips, like chicken fingers almost, and then cooling them and slicing into strips. I put them into a dish that I served with bean thread noodles, okra, & broccoli with a sauce of hoisin, soy, miso. It was really good. These reminded me of the steak/chik'n strips I buy once in a while, but WAY cheaper and kind of fun to make.

Here's a shot of the strips before going into the larger noodle dish:

Bajillion Bean Stew: A Lesson Learned [Vegan Mofo]

Vegan Month of Food continues!!!

So pictured above is "Bajillion Bean Stew", as I named it. Looks good, right? Sounds good: black beans, pinto beans, butter beans, split peas, lentils, white beans, black eyed peas, etc. I added mixed vegetables, potatoes, and okra.

Well, it was awful.

Problem #1: Old Beans.
I've had them for a long time, I don't even know how long. That made for gross tasting stuff. All the problems below are pretty much moot because of this one, but I'll lay them out anyway.

Problem #2: Too many beans in one mix.

Too many mixed dry beans made for ridiculous cooking results. The butter beans were just right, which meant the lentils, split peas, and other small beans were nearly decimated.

Problem #3: Wrong seasonings.

I have been out of veggie stock/bouillon cubes for a while, and that would have given the stew some depth.

Problem #4: Okra, overcooked.

I put the okra in too soon and this resulted in weird consistency throughout the stew.

So, a pretty big disaster despite high hopes. This is what Vegan Month of Food is about, though: posting everything - the experiments gone wrong included. I was really disappointed because it was a TON of food that was wasted, but it was inedible. That's saying something, because I will eat just about anything, even bland *blech* stuff, to not waste it. Ah well, it took a decent picture and it is chalked up to food lesson learned.

Broccoli Fried Rice [Vegan Mofo]

Vegan Month of Food continues...

This is what I made on Sunday. I used up the rest of the brown rice we had, and sauteed it with onion, garlic, and mixed veggies. I also added broccoli to give it something more. It was tasty. I mixed in hoisin sauce, soy sauce, and sriracha.