Saucy Vegan Spring Rolls

My stomach is rebelling. I don't think my body is into the whole gorge-on-as-much-dairy-as-your-grubby-fingers-can-get plan as much as my eyes are. It's a sort of civil war, but this one has an easy solution that can be fixed up if you have a little time. And your running shoes, there's a lot of that pot-chasing that I mentioned these require none of.

A few words about these buggers:

You will need rice wrappers, which I found in the Asian section of Fred Meyer. Have I confessed to you my love for Freddies? I don't think so, and I definitely don't have enough time for that now.

Go WILD, toss in whatever veggies you want, just remember to plan accordingly and know that harder veggies like potatoes will take longer than the cabbage to cook.

They taste GOOD. Like, I inhaled mine. And then the boy's. And then I had to get my tucas up and make more because hungry boyfriends < full boyfriends.


Vegan Spring Rolls
Makes 8-10 rolls

1 cup broccoli florets (mine came straight from the freezer)
2 tablespoons garlic
1/2 package diced tofu
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
2 cups thinly sliced cabbage
1/2 cup garbanzo beans
1/2 cup dry white wine
1 1/2 cups cooked rice
10 sticks asparagus
2 tablespoons soy sauce
2 tablespoons Hoisin sauce
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1 teaspoon lime juice
1/4 cup creamy peanut butter
1 package of rice wrappers
cilantro if you wish (I wished)

Here we go:

1. I like my tofu on the crispy side, so I begin by heating the tofu, garlic and broccoli up over medium heat with the vegetable oil; saute for about 5 minutes until the tofu is a little brown and before the garlic burns.


2. Add the sliced cabbage, garbanzo beans and white wine; bring to a boil for a minute, then turn the heat back down to a simmer and cover; stir about every 5 minutes.


3. In the meantime, place your asparagus spears in a steamer basket (I had to tear mine in half to fit) and place over a pot that is half full of water; bring the pot to a boil and steam the asparagus.


5. While your asparagus and cabbage are going (this is when you begin to sweat a little and realize you should up your jogging mileage. At least, that was my situation), mix together the soy sauce, Hoisin sauce, ground ginger, brown sugar and lime juice until combined.

6. When your cabbage mix is all nice and soft, turn off the burner; plop the peanut butter on and pour in the Hoisin sauce mixture; stir the whole pan up so it's all lovingly incorporated.

7. Turn your faucet on to a small drizzle of cold water, and run one rice wrapper underneath the water flow, turning it around so the water hits the entire wrapper evenly. You'll want the wrapper to be soft and pliable, but not disintegrating in your hands - mine took about 15 seconds.


8. Lay the wrapper on a flat surface and fill with rice, an asparagus spear, the saucy cabbage mixture and cilantro; roll the wrapper around its insides, making sure to tuck the ends in as you go.

9. I double-wrapped the majority of these because I'm a terrible wrapper roller and guts were falling out everywhere. Do what needs to be done!

Vegan Spicy Pear Bread

HAPPY NATIONAL NUTELLA DAY!

The recipe I'm posting right now has absolutely zero Nutella in it!

(Dumb. Bad planning.)

BUT, it is completely possible to spread some chocolately-hazelnutty schmear on this bread, especially when it's still warm from the oven.

Those pear chunks? Bountiful. And beautiful. Both on the eyes and on the taste buds.

Make this bread one morning, and good things will happen. Your windshield will scrape itself, your bills will be paid by your neighbor, and your hair won't have any static electricity.

(If any of that stuff does not occur, don't blame the bread. Blame the playa.)


Vegan Spicy Pear Bread
 Makes one 9x5 loaf


*Wild: If you decide to go vegan with me on this, I used the baking powder/oil/water substitute, which is 2 tablespoons water, 1 tablespoon oil and 2 teaspoons baking powder. If not, use an egg!


1 Egg substitute
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1/4 cup applesauce
1/2 cup sugar
1 1/4 (about 1 large) peeled and chopped pear
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 3/4 cup gluten-free flour blend (I used Pamela's, of course)
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1 teaspoon cinnamon

1. Preheat oven to 350 and grease baking dish.

2. In a large bowl, whisk together the egg substitute, vegetable oil, applesauce and sugar.

3. Fold in the pear and vanilla.

4. In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour and spice.

5. Gradually add in the dry flour mixture to the wet mixture; fold all together just barely to incorporate all the ingredients.

6. Using a spatula, scoop the mixture into your baking dish and slide into the oven.

7. This takes about 55 minutes to cook, but I noticed it was starting to brown at 40 minutes so I covered it with tinfoil the last 15.

8. (optional) (not optional) Schmear some of the Nutella on a slice and go MMMMMMM.

9. Repeat step 8.

and some chips for kicks

If there's one vegetable that never had enough appeal for me to try, it was kale. It reminded me of seaweed's naggy stepmother, and who wants to deal with that?

But then I discovered I actually liked seaweed, which, according to philosophy 102, therefore meant that I should like kale. But then I looked up both seaweed and kale, and WHAT?! They're not even related. Off the hook. Chain. Whatever.

Then I told myself to take my thumb out of mouth and just freaking try kale. So I did, and maybe I had some help.

A Full Circle Farmer plucked that kale for me, gently put it my bi-weekly order, and sent it off my way. "Kale swing my waaay, surrre look gooood to meee." I'm so thankful I can suppress my food frights until someone else force feeds them to me. It's as if they know I'm not a food waster, and would rather kiss Jack Nicholson square on the lips (gag) before I throw away veggies.

After making these, I'm excited to try them raw in salad form. Kale is slightly sweet with a rougher texture that I could imagine would nicely accompany other types of greens.

So I made those. The green things, named Kale Chips. And I have zero regrets, namely because:

1. They are light and crisp and you feel like your eating salty air, but they are packed full of nutrients and not air so you don't have to worry about how much Gas-X you have left.

 2. THEY ARE REALLY GOOD!

3. They taste great dipped in that Caesar dressing or by themselves.

Kale Chips
(double the recipe if you want some leftovers, because one bunch was gone between 2 people in our house.)

-1 large bunch of kale
-3 tablespoons olive oil
-as much salt as you would like


1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees; line a baking sheet with tinfoil if you're neat like that.

2. Wash and blot your kale dry; tear off the leaves from the hard stalk in the middle; discard the stalks and tear the leaves into bite-sized pieces, placing them in a large bowl.

3. Pour the olive oil over the kale leaves in the bowl, and massage the oil in with your hands; make sure you coat all the leaves so they'll crisp up.

4. Dash on the salt.

5. Scatter the leaves onto the baking sheet in a single sheet; if they're are piled on they will steam and get soft and that's not what we're going for.

6. These guys takes about 10 minutes to cook, but keep on eye on them. I flipped mine over at 5 minutes, which may not be necessary.

HARD CORE

FACT: My intake of mozzarella cheese and creamy coffee the past 2 days should be illegal.




FACT: Justifying glutenous cheese feedings by reminding yourself it had been a month since you've tasted the stuff, is actually OK. For 2 days.



FACT: I can feel my abs getting softer.



FACT: After this arrives, I will be in a melty, my-muscles-are-mush, puddle on the floor. I'm both thanking and blaming Rachel for my sudden motivation to obtain such a meltdown.



FACT: I need to go eat a carrot stick. Which will be rounded out with an orange M&M.

FACT: Sometimes a girl just needs a margarita the size of her head, and all clarity will be restored.

Vegan Caesar Salad with Roasted Golden Beets

"Ooo we ooo, killer tofuuu!" 

(Get it? Get it. Dig way back to 1991.)

The dinner plate family is back! Let me tell you, this girl is stoked to share this with you. There is something incredibly satisfying about creating something in the kitchen that zings off the taste buds. One of those dishes that makes you want to keep eating far beyond when you probably should, for stomach's sake. Whether you used a recipe stemming from your own ingenuity, or someone else's brilliant thoughts, it really makes no difference - the food is bomb.

This caesar (the word and I have fought since day 1. Ceasar? seezer? Capitalize? All hail the romaine) salad dressing comes largely from The Post Punk Kitchen, a network ran by a spunky vegan. Her cookbook has been a staple in my kitchen not only during Vegan-O-Con, but year round. Her recipes are cohesive and don't require expensive and out-there ingredients. 

Another hot point for the dressing: it came out on the thicker side (think bleu cheese) which I wasn't expecting, but then I doubled it as a veggie dip and then tripled it for another surprise I'll be posting. Needless to say, the lazy girl in me is thrilled with all this efficiency!

*The two ingredients I bypassed were the capers and caper juice, out of my displeasure of running out to the store at the ungodly hour of 7:30pm.

Vegan Caesar Salad with Roasted Golden Beets

Makes 2 entree salads and about 4 side salads

Caesar Dressing

1/3 cup slivered or sliced almonds
3-4 cloves garlic, peeled and crushed
3/4 cup silken tofu
1/4 cup olive oil
3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
1 heaping tablespoon capers

4tablespoons caper brine

1 teaspoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon mustard powder (I used spicy brown, to try and make up for the lack of caper-kick)
Salt

1. Blend garlic, tofu and oil in food processor until creamy.

2. Add the remaining ingredients and pulse until all is blended.

3. Put in the container you want to serve the dressing in; add almonds and shake/whisk it all together.

4. Refrigerate at least 30 minutes before serving.

Roasted Beets

This is a toughy, so pay close attention:

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

2. Peel beets.

3. Wraps beets in tinfoil.

4. Place beets in oven for about 30 minutes, or until tender - they will be hawwwt coming out of the oven, so be careful unwrapping the tinfoil and make sure to let them cool a few before you try and slice em.

5. Slice the beets up, and either place them upon your salad greens or next to, then ladle on that dressing.

February Goals

VEGAN-O-CON for 2011 is officially over in 4.5 hours, and I already have my boy at the store picking up cheese. Don't know what's going to happen with that, but one thing is guaranteed - tasty time!

Now, I really like to feel the heat (I'm not talking the sunshine here, but that would be cool, too). I'm a competitive person, and enjoy pushing myself to accomplish even the most simple challenges. Which is why I have continued to set some healthy goals for myself for next month. Nothing too extreme, just four 7 day changes that I would like to see incorporated in my life. Maybe they'll be lasting, some should be lasting, but they are all things that I know will benefit my health in one way or another.


1st week of February (2/1 - 2/7)

What? Significantly reduce added sugar - in coffee, on oatmeal, while baking, anyhow with everything.

Uh, you mean..: No sugar granules of any kind (natural, raw or Stevia). No candy. Get  more accustomed to dark, savory coffee. Use natural sweeteners in baking, such as fruit.

(Honestly, this is going to s-u-c-k. No sugar in baking might as well translate to not wearing clothes in public. Possible, but not an awesome idea. Repeat, it's only a week.)

2nd week of February (2/8 - 2/14)

What? Run 30 miles in the week

Please, elaborate: The past few weeks I've been working on my fitness more than usual to prepare for the 1/2 marathon. I've averaged about 23 miles a week, but would like to see myself get up to 30.

My plan is to run 4 miles Monday-Friday on my lunch break, and log 5 miles on Saturday and Sunday.

This may difficult, given that I despise few hour long experiences more than jogging on a treadmill in a nasty cloud of stench that your nose never "gets used to." Which is why I aim to run 4 miles on my lunch break outside, which is rather difficult to do in the rain. Soooo, I might have to buck up my nose or buck up and run in the rain.

3rd week of February (2/15 - 2/21)

What? No excessive fats. We all need some fat, but there are some areas to cut back and still feel satisfied.

Pardon moi? No oil/butter in baking (applesauce will be a great replacement...hopefully), no extra cheese, no fried food. (It's only a week...repeat again.)

4th week of February (2/22-2/28)

What? No soda. I think we all got this.

I'm curious - what are your goals?

Versatile Vegan Loaf

I used to consider it weird and borderline glutenous that I would contemplate dinner 5 seconds after finishing off the last bite of breakfast. "There are so many other important life things that need attending to until 6:00pm, and all you can think about it more food?"

Cafe Gratitude, San Francisco. Not tonight's dinner.

Then I quickly learned there's nothing like completing 3 Sodokus, riding a luxury yacht for 2 hours and picking my pimples out my favorite picture of James Dean that will make you really appreciate a well-planned dinner. After all that, a girl is exhausted and wants some good eats. And besides, it's no secret that food is pretty essential to the act of living for all things living. Might as well make it delicious. Bam, justified.

@ home. Tonight's dinner.

We had this for dinner tonight, something I only started thinking about, oh, last night. But it was later last night, you know like 9 pm. I need an adequate amount of time to prepare a 4-slot meal.

Right now, I'm only going to share this guy:

This kid's the good kid. We're talking straight A's. It's not thick and bold and brassy - it tends to be more simple, classy and a little naiive. This loaf won't meet you at the 18th hole for some burrs and wings; it will meet you at your aunt's garden party. It's easy to love, hard to dislike, and looks about 15 thousand times better in realty than in the picture above.

Stay tuned the next few days to get the scoop on the rest of the dish. We have one kid down, but you have yet to learn about the rest of the family.

Vegan Loaf with Quinoa, Tofu and Veggies
makes one 9x5 loaf


*Wild! -  This truly is a flexible recipe. Stick with the tofu/oats structure and then add in whatever veggies you desire. If you’re not on the vegan train, I think cheese would be an excellent addition as well. Mix it in with all the other ingredients before you pack it in the loaf pan, so it gets all gooey and cozy with the other friends in there.

½ package of extra-firm tofu

2 tablespoons lemon juice

¼ cup olive oil

1 clove garlic

½ cup quick-cooking oats (if you have Celiac disease, make sure they are gluten-free. I use Bob’s Red Mill, which is one of the few brands that is gluten-free.)

1 cup cooked quinoa (keenwah!) 
½ cup spaghetti sauce
Salt and pepper to taste
½ cup broccoli florets
small handful of dried cranberries

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease up your loaf pan.

1. First, if you don’t have 3 large Tupperwares of leftover quinoa in your fridge, come over and swipe some from me. Or you could take the really bumpy road and prepare yours yourself.

2. Put the tofu, lemon juice, olive oil and oats in a processor or blender and pulse until it resembles a ricotta-like texture; you might need to scrape down the sides a few times with a spatula.

You're tofu/oat mixture should look pasty, like this:

3. Using a spatula, scrape out the tofu/oat mixture and place in a large mixing bowl; add in quinoa and stir it all together so the quinoa is all covered.

4. Add in the spaghetti sauce and your desired amount of salt and pepper; stir it all again.

5. Finally, throw in the broccoli and cranberries (and any other wild veggies you choose) and mix one last time.

6. Scrape the mix in to the loaf pan and pop into the oven. Cooking time is about 40-50 minutes, until the top is lightly browned and crispy. Cool this guy for about 15 minutes if you want loaf-ish slice; dive right in if you want a more crumbly, casserole-esque experience.