DDOW Thai Coconut Farmer's Market Soup

Part two of this week's Delivered Dish...



From the website:

Thai Coconut Farmers Market Soup (V, Paleo, GF, soy-free, no added sugar) Like a vegetable chowder but with Thai flavors and coconut milk. Simmering it with corn cobs add extra sweetness. Expect some chopped collards or kale.

The soup was great. Nice coconut flavor. It had potatoes, corn, greens (collards?), carrots, and tomatoes. I added some spice because I love spicy food, but other than that I ate the soup as-is. Great as always.

Next week for DDOW: ratatouille and polenta!

DDOW Raw Zucchini Noodles w. Tomato Sauce - Vegan Mofo 2013

Another week, another Delivered Dish!


You can check out other DDOW posts by clicking the tag below or here.


For today's dish, I am going to highlight the raw zucchini noodle dish. From the website:

Zucchini Linguine with Raw Tomato Sauce (V, Paleo, GF, soy-free, no added sugar) Carb-free pasta! Fresh sage and oregano flavor the simple sauce. Super low-cal.

I must say, other than this time last summer, I don't know if I ever really had zucchini noodles before. And that last time didn't count too much as I had the noodles with spaghetti. This dish was light, refreshing, and flavorful. Even though the yellos is what you can really see, which I assume is yellow squash, the green zucchini is definitely in the dish throughout. It came packaged with plum tomatoes throughout, as well as some basil and other herbs. This may inspire me to make zucchini noodles on my own!

Lemon-Dill Dressing: on Pan-Fried Tofu and a CSA Salad [Vegan Mofo]

Happy Vegan MoFo Day 4!

So many great ideas on the giant 2012 blogroll of MoFo-ers! It's fantastic to read through what others are doing this fun-filled month.

So I made this dish a while back, when I was up to my ears in dill and did not know what to do with it all! After a Google search of something along the lines of "what do I do with all this dill!?" I came across a few interesting recipes and stumbled upon this Lemon-Dill Tofu from Oh She Glows.

I had everything except the tahini, but it still turned out great and was a fantastic addition to some pan-fried tofu triangles.



My sides for this meal include some homemade simple cabbage and carrot coleslaw with a light vinegar/oil dressing and some steamed broccoli with sesame seeds. The coleslaw and dill were from the CSA. The broccoli was frozen.

I loved the dill dressing! I used it on a salad made from greens, carrots and tomatoes from the csa and topped with some flax seeds. Delicious!

Caprese Salad with Daiya [Vegan Mofo - Bonus!]

That's right, a bonus second post for Vegan Month of Food Day One!
A beautiful caprese salad, made with slices ofjalapeno garlic havarti Daiya wedge.
Yeah, Daiya made a "hard" cheese. The wedges come in cheddar, jack, and the above-mentioned jalapeno garlic havarti flavors. The havarti tastes what I remember pepper jack cow cheese tasting like -- and that was one of my faves to eat on crackers or plain. So it was delightful to make the caprese salad with Daiya.

The tomatoes and basil are from the aforementioned CSA. I also drizzled a tiny bit of olive oil over the salad as well as fresh sea salt and fresh ground black pepper. I loved it, Mr. Coconut did not care for it. ("Too cheesy" was the complaint. Pfft.)

What is a CSA? Well, it stands for Community Supported Agriculture, and it involves getting a weekly supply of produce from a local farm. I did a lot of research and chose a farm that had a drop-off site near me. It's been fantastic getting fresh, organic produce every week since June 8th. (The season of my farm goes through most of, maybe all of, October.) I'll be talking more about CSAs and specific details of my experience with it. (Spoiler alert: I'd like to do it again next year.)

One more photo:

Okra & Legumes with Berbere Spice Mix

I'm back! As all times when I have long absences from the old food blog, I hope to post more often. I signed up for a CSA recently so I look forward to summer when I will get tons of fresh veggies and lots of inspiration for cooking!

So about that food pictured above...Berbere is an Ethiopian spice mixture that is made of things like fenugreek, chili peppers, clove, paprika, coriander, cardamom, etc. Some folks make the blend themselves. I'm lucky enough to have African markets near where I live, so I just picked up a small container of the spice mix the other day.

I am a huge fan of
Ethiopian food, so I was excited to use the flavors in other dishes.

I decided to make some lentils (or split peas? I can't remember which these were) and cook them in a bunch of berbere. I started with onion, garlic, ginger, oil, salt, and added berbere and dry legumes. Added water and a small can of seasoned tomatoes, brought everything to a boil and then simmered until the legumes were at a tenderness I liked. I added some frozen okra and cooked until it was done.

While this was cooking, I made some quinoa: 2 parts veggie broth to one part quinoa. Bring everything to a boil, reduce to simmer, cover and cook for 15-20 mins.

Okra, Tomato & Potato Curry [Vegan Mofo]

Vegan Mofo, Day 4!

So this is what I whipped up for dinner tonight, with delicious results!

A stew/curry of tomatoes, potatoes, okra, quinoa, curry powder, onions, garlic, spicy Rotel for more tomato-y goodness.

I didn't measure anything, really. This was an experiment to work on something in the future. I think that this is a great example of why I don't blog all my food. I feel bad if I don't write down a full recipe and measure everything, etc. By the time I even start thinking about that, I give up on considering blogging and just eat some food! So this is a great push to keep posting about food, recipe or not.

Hola Arepa: Food Trucks [Vegan Mofo]

More food truck coverage for Vegan Mofo!

Pictured above is an arepa, like a little patty of corn dough cooked on a griddle and split open and filled with various foods. This particular arepa is from Hola Arepa, a food truck in Minneapolis. This one is filled with black beans, tomato, pickled cabbage. I also got the side of chips as well as salsa and guacamole.

DELICIOUS. It was super tasty! I have been craving another one ever since. Hopefully I can get another before it gets too cold and they close for the season.

Open-Face Sandwich: Cashew Cheese, Tomatoes, and Basil

I've been experimenting with nut cheese lately. I wasn't able to get raw cashews, which I know may affect the taste and texture. I've been experimenting with roasted unsalted cashews, soaked and blended. The first time around, I added sundried tomatoes, salt, lemon juice, water and garlic. My errors? Too much garlic, a little too much salt, kind of bleh. This time? 1 clove of garlic, a touch of sea salt, a little water, some nutritional yeast, and a touch of liquid smoke. Not bad. I am not in love with the texture - it's like hummus but weird, but not bad. Hard to explain.

Mr. Coconut has not tasted any of it yet, it's far too much into it's infancy to be worth giving to others yet. I like it, it's not bad. But I've had amazing raw nut cheese before, and this is not it yet.

With all that negativity, I liked this sandwich. It was delicious. I also tried the "cheese" with some pasta. Again, I need to get the texture to a better consistency. Maybe in the Magic Bullet as opposed to my tiny food processor would get it there.

Easy Echilada Bake

This was an extremely simple, lazy enchilada bake. I am excited to try this again with even more ambition and ingredients.

Here is a cross-section shot:



Now on to how I made this dish.

First, I layered 6 frozen corn tortillas on the bottom of a 9x13 inch pan. Then, I dumped one smallish can of black beans and seasoned with cumin and chili powder. Then I spread out one can of refried black beans on top of the black beans. I placed another layer of 6 corn tortillas on top of that. I put *another* layer of black beans, these seasoned with lime juice. I dumped out a cup and a half or so of dry TVP, a small can of spicy diced tomatoes, and a small can of red spicy enchilada sauce. Then I put the last layer of 6 more corn tortillas, topped with another small can of spicy red enchilada sauce.

I placed this whole pan into a 365 degree F oven, baked for 30-40 minutes or until I thought it was heated and cooked all the way through and a bit crispy on top.

I sliced it up like I would a lasagna, served on plates with taco sauce and hot sauce.

I thought this was great, as did all who had a serving. Really beany, but we're all fans of beans.

For next time: I would definitely add corn, but I did not have any available this time. Maybe fresh slices of tomatoes would be interesting, or tomatillos. Awesome salsa would be a great bonus as well. It would not be necessary, but as an extra, I might think about adding shredded "cheeze" of some sort or making my own nacho sauce.
Zucchini and other veggies would be a nice addition as well.

Eggplant Sandwich with Tomato and Cheez on Wheat Toast

The title says it all. I've been rather infatuated with these frozen eggplant cutlets from Dominex. They are vegan, pre-breaded, frozen eggplant cutlets. Great to add to pizza, pasta, make your own sandwiches, or baked with onions and garlic.

So, for this concoction, I toasted up some bread, pan-fried the eggplant cutlets with olive oil, then assembled a sandwich adding sliced tomatoes and a piece of Tofutti cheese. Pretty delicious.

Erbert's and Gerbert's Veggie Sandwich

Not a terribly exciting photo, but a tasty sandwich nonetheless. This is from Erbert's & Gerbert's, a sub sandwich place that delivers. This sandwich is called "The Jacob Bluefinger" and I veganize it by asking for no cheese, no mayo and instead get extra avocado and some dijon mustard. The sandwich includes lettuce, tomato, and sprouts. I also usually get a huge deli pickle.

Veggie Wrap and trail mix - Bellagio Casino, Las Vegas, NV

I recently traveled to Las Vegas, NV, and enjoyed quite a few delicious meals. It takes a little more searching to find truly satisfying vegan food (something other than just french fries) but it exists.

Pictured above: a veggie wrap with no cheese filled with alfalfa sprouts, tomato, cucumber, lettuce, served with a little garnish salad of cabbage, sprouts and veggies as well as a pickle. It also came with a plate of french fries. This was off of the room service menu at the Bellagio.

Pictured below: tasty trail mix from the Bellagio gift shop, Tutto. Why take a picture of it? It was impressive for trail mix: pepitas, roasted soy nuts, roasted flax seeds, raisins, goji berries, sliced almonds.



We also ate at a fast food type of place in the Bellagio called "Snacks," where they had vegetarian lentil soup and fries. They also had a veggie sandwich but we didn't get it or inquire if it had cheese or other non-vegan items.

Fasika

This is one of my all time favorite comfort foods: the veggie sampler from Faiska, a local Ethiopian restaurant here in St. Paul. It's just really tasty and nutritious: lots of lentils, cabbage, veggies, greens, split peas, all cooked in different spices and served on top of Injera, a spongey pancake-like bread made from teff flour. The best part about Ethiopian food is that you eat with your hands, using the injera to scoop up the food.

I highly recommend clicking on the above photo to fo to the Flickr photo because I labeled everything. I'll try to describe it as best as possible.

In Center: Misir Key Wot (red lentils cooked in Berbere sauce) and from L to R: Atkilt (cabbage, potatoes and carrots); Gomen (cooked greens); horseradish? puree at the top; some unknown potatoe-y thing; kik alicha wot (split peas cooked in curry and other spices); beets; and a salad with oil/spices as dressing and peppers and tomatoes.

Hearty Vegetable Soup with Toasted English Muffin

Homemade soup with lots of fresh vegetables, served with a toasted sprouted grain English muffin.

Ingredients:

2-3 garlic cloves, minced
Mirepoix (onion, chopped carrots, chopped celery)
3T olive oil (optional)
frozen veggies
1-2 Potatoes, diced/chopeed

seasonings: poultry seasoning, SALT, pepper, celery salt, oregano

1 28oz can of whole peeled tomatoes, along with 2 of those cans filled with water added to pot


1. Sautee the onion, garlic, carrot, potatoes, and celery and the dry seasonings.
2. Add frozen veg and oil.
3. Add tomatoes with juice, stir, add water.
4. Boil, then bring to simmer.
5. Cook until poatoes are tender.

DONE!

Chiang Mai Thai: Laab Salad with Mock Duck

This is probably my favorite dish in the Twin Cities. It's from a restaurant called Chiang Mai Thai, and stands as one of the very few, if only, Thai restaurants I trust 100% to understand that vegan means no fish sauce or oyster sauce.

This "salad" is made here with mock duck, roasted rice powder, bell pepepers, lime juice, cilantro, scallions, onions, and some other spices/seasonings. It's served with 1/4 of a head of iceburg lettuce, 2-4 large slices of cucumbers, and 2-4 tomato wedges. Recently, they started serving it with fresh mint as well, which makes it even better. It's also served with a side of sticky rice. The idea is to make your own little lettuce cups. I also usuually get a spice level of 2 or 3 out of 4 because I like it spicy. I'm sure I'll have more pictures of this in the actual restaurant, maybe with an appetizer, too.

So freaking TASTY. They have some other dishes at Chiang which are decent, but it is really hard for me to ever order anything other than the Laab. Let's take another look:

Tomatoes, Mushrooms, and Onions

This was a really simple but satisfying dish. I sliced a bunch of mushrooms, I think I used baby bellas here. I cut wedges of onions and tomatoes, and threw it all in a pan until done to my liking. I also added a generous shake of my favorite seasoning which just found it's way back on my counter:

B&T: "Bacon" and Tomato Sammy

Simple sandwich: Smart Bacon with sliced tomatoes and vegenaise on toast. I did not have any lettuce or greenery to put on the sandwich.

secret to Smart Bacon: CRISPY. Otherwise, it tastes like crap. And it's not like bacon at all, just adds that salty smoky flavor that bacon can add to stuff like this.

50th Post: Peppered Tofurky slices with Guacamole, Crispy Smart Bacon and Tomatoes on Toast

I had this for lunch today. I've been dreaming of an excellent tofurky-guac sandwich for a while, but the guac gets eaten pretty fast around here.

The Title says it all: I toasted two pieces of bread and pan-fried three pieces of Smart Bacon with a little bit of non-stick spray oil. The secret is to use a cover on the pan and continue to flip the pieces. I wait until they are REALLY crispy, the Smart Bacon is not worth it otherwise.

I spread a couple Tablespoons on one piece of bread, layered Peppered Tofurky slices on another, put tomato slices on the tofurky, put bacon on top of tomatoes, and then sealed the deal with the guac piece on top. The guac was spicy and REALLY brought out the peppery tofurky. Great sandwich.

Another picture:

Butternut Squash Ravioli Pan-Fried in Garlic Butter Sauce with side of Broccoli

This was awesome. I'd been wanting to do something special with the package of butternut squash ravioli from Rising Moon Organics. So, I decided on a garlic butter sauce with a ton of olive oil, vegan butter (I use Earth Balance), lightly toasted pine nuts, and diced tomatoes. I used plain old boiled frozen broccoli for a side which I flavored with lemon pepper and garlic salt/seasoning.

Notes: I didn't quite get the crispy pan-fried texture I wanted, and it didn't brown, so next time I think I would sauté the ravioli a little more in a lot less oil. That was the other problem: way too much oil. Well, not WAY too much, but I could cut it in half since I wasn't really making a sauce and I'm more after the flavors. I would also possibly cut the pine nuts in half. My bigger problem is I need a non stick pan that's twice the size of the one I have so I can concoct these larger all in one pan meals.

What You Need: (Serves 2)
1pkg Butternut Squash Ravioli
16g garlic (rough chop)
157g diced tomatoes (I used Roma)
.125c Olive Oil (1/8c: but I might have used as much as 1/4c)
.25c Butter (Could be different with actual animal fat butter)
36g onion (small dice)
40g pine nuts (lightly toasted)
429g broccoli (A lot, I know. I love broccoli.)

To Taste:
red pepper flakes
salt & pepper
also at the very end: basil flakes or fresh basil

1. Put pine nuts on a sheet pan, lightly oiled (I used generic nonstick spray) and set in oven. I used a toaster oven and burned them a little, so I'll have to get back to you on exact times and whatever. They definitely get a nutty-popcorny smell when they are done. KEEP AN EYE ON THEM. It only takes a little bit.

2. Ravioli: you know what to do. Boil water, GENTLE boil, not rough hard rolling boil. Gently add ravioli, boil until pillowy and extract with a slotted spoon.

3. In a pan over med. heat, heat up olive oil and butter together. Put garlic in this mixture, but don't brown it. The purpose is to get the garlic flavor permeating this oil. Add onion and stir until transluscent.

4. Add Ravioli. Sauté until they get golden brown. I was unable to do this, so maybe a different approach would have to take place. I kept flipping them around in the pan until they got a tiny bit crispy but thye never browned for me. Salt and Pepper and Red pepper flakes are good to add now.

5. Add pine nuts and tomatoes until they are cooked in the mixture.

6. Turn off pan, add fresh basil or dry flakes.

DONE. Whee! I am definitely making this again and tweaking hte recipe, so watch for another version of this. The flavors were spot on. Calorie-laden and fat-tastic, but so worth it.

Sub Sandwich with Four Bean Salad and JoJo Potatoes

I didn't make any of this meal: a Veggie Delight from Subway with no cheese and ALL the veggies; 4 Bean Salad (garbanzo, green bean, white green bean, baby lima bean) from the deli counter; and JoJo Potatoes from the deli counter.