One of our family’s favorite menu items is make-your-own-sushi. In fact, judging by the reactions from our friends, sushi night seems to be a favorite for everyone. Over the years it’s gotten a little fancier, but it doesn’t have to be. When we first began doing vegan sushi nights, I would make the cut rolls… And the ingredients varied but usually included some baked tofu, cucumber, and avocado. Sometimes we’d have romaine lettuce, shredded carrots, or veggie “ham.” In other words, it really varied.

As our girls got older, and developed their incisors, sushi night got easier because I stopped making cut rolls. After all, making a lot of hand rolls is a lot faster. Then came the switch to “make your own.” I would prep the ingredients, and everyone would make their own roll. This was wonderful because it resulted in two things… 1) our girls’ food prep skills increased and 2) it gave me more time to focus on the ingredients and prepare a variety of fillings.

Recently, that extra time has also been used to explore the world of nigiri sushi. I know, this pushes me back into the crazy world of frenetically creating labor intensive meals, but the results are worth it, and it keeps me fresh with new ideas. In truth, the actual prep work increases a little, but not as much as. You’d think. Making nigiri isn’t as time consuming as making hand rolls or cut rolls, and the topping for the nigiri can often be the same ingredients you use for the hand rolls… Maybe cut in a slightly different way, but it can still be the same stuff.

Before I go into the different things I did for our last sushi night, I want to talk about su for a little bit. Sushi su is the vinegar mixture that you use to season the rice and give it that distinctive flavor that adds a bit of subtle depth of flavor and aroma. There are a lot of sushi su recipes out there. I’m sure that most, if not all, sushi chefs have their own twist to the recipe. Sushi su is essential. The fillings in rolls are important too, but the flavor and texture of the rice can make or break sushi. For me, the big thing is balance of flavor. Here’s my recipe.

Note: I use all organic ingredients. Non-organic work fine as well. It’s all about what you prefer.

4 cups of sushi rice. I use some medium grain brown rice, but short grain works too. White is fine, but I like the protein of brown.
1/2 cup rice vinegar (do NOT use seasoned rice vinegar… That’s a totally different ingredient with salt and sugar already added)
3-4 tablespoons agave nectar
1 and 1/2 tablespoons kosher sea salt
1/4 cup or more of toasted sesame seeds

Cooking Instructions:
This recipe uses four cups of rice. Adjust accordingly if you need less or more.

Rinse rice well until the water is more clear. Add water as per markings on the rice cooker. Let the rice sit in the water for about 30 minutes. If you don’t have a rice cooker, then get one. Yes, you can cook rice in a pot. It’s not that hard, but the days of measuring with a finger, watching for the water to boil, covering the pot, lowering the heat, and simmering till done are over. It’s so 20th century! Rice is much more consistent when it’s cooked in the rice cooker. Very little chance of burned bottoms with mushy middles and crunchy tops.

Start the rice cooker and wait. When it’s done, don’t open the rice cooker. Let it sit steaming and off for then minutes. Note: while the rice is cooking, you have time to prep all other ingredients you’re filling the rolls with or toast sesame seeds or read a few chapters in a book.
For the sushi su, you will mix all the ingredients together until there are no crystals of salt. Note: if you have no agave, sugar will do, but you might actually have to increase the sugar… Agave can be sweeter.

It’s time to season your rice. Put the rice in a large, shallow bowl. The traditional wood sushi containers are great, but ceramic works fine too. The key is shallow and wide. If the sides are high, but the bowl has a smaller diameter, then the rice won’t breathe enough and it’s far more likely to get mushy.

Put the rice in the bowl and pour a little (like two tablespoons) of the su over the rice. You want to pour it on the rice paddle so that it splashes more evenly over the rice. When you get more experience, try bouncing or shaking the paddle vertically while pouring the su on it… The su will splash and spray a lot more, but that’s what you want.

Mixing technique varies, but you want to be a thorough and gentle at the same time. It’s like folding in an ingredient to a delicate batter… But be thorough!

When the su is fully absorbed, add more sushi su and repeat folding. When you’ve used a little over half of the amount of sushi su, begin tasting the rice to check for enough seasoning. This is a personal preference thing.

When you’ve added all the sushi su you want to, sprinkle the toasted sesame seeds onto the rice and fold in throughly.

The rice is ready for sushi now!

Note: a lot of people, me included, get someone to fan the rice as you are adding the sushi su. This does two things… It cools the rice a little bit and it makes it shiny.

Variations: if you like a fresh citrus flavor, substitute some (not all) of the rice vinegar with fresh lemon juice. If you like the sesame flavor to be more pronounced, add a 1/4 teaspoon of toasted sesame oil. Black sesame seeds are a fun, colorful treat as well.

This is a long long long time coming, but I’ve been meaning to post an image for my red cabbage salad recipe that I posted previously. So here it is… finally! Enjoy!

Red Cabbage Salad

From fries to green beans to kissing to revolutions to the Eiffel Tower, we have a lot to thank the French for (*see note at bottom). If there was a scoreboard for a country’s contributions, then chalk up another point for French toast. In my opinion, French toast theory is pretty simple; it’s controlled bread pudding. Well, that’s my take, at least. For my family, perfect French toast is a little crisp on the outside and nice and soft on the inside. Sometimes, we even allow it to be soft to the point of being custardy. Although the crunch on the outside can be created by corn flakes or something else toothsome, I go with the old school method of just pan frying it till it’s good and done (golden brown with flecks of darker brown… Black would be over done).

French toast has long been a favorite of our family. When we went vegan (almost four years ago), we erroneously believed that our happy French toast eating days would be over. After all, one of the main ingredients of traditional French toast is usually eggs… And when it figures so prominently, it’s hard to substitute. Of course, we were wrong!

This recipe is based on Isa Chandra Moskowitz’s great “Fronch” Toast recipe from Vegan with a Vengeance. Like I said, it’s a great recipe, but I changed a few things to please my family… And I like experimenting anyway. Don’t we all modify recipes a little (or a lot)? I have no pre-conceived notions that you’ll follow this recipe to the “t” so change it all you want… As long as the secret ingredient isn’t bacon fat or something, I’m good with pretty much any modification. This recipe makes about 15-20 slices of French toast… Depending on type, size, and thickness of bread. If you want to do less, just cut the quantities in half.

Ingredients:
1 loaf of good quality bread. Italian or French bread are both great. I usually get a multigrain or whole wheat sourdough bread from a little bakery at the farmer’s market. Baguettes work… larger slices are good… Basically any type of bread is good as long as it isn’t the some kind of thin sliced white bread food product.
1 cup soy or other non-dairy creamer (I’ve used Silk and Mimicreme, and they’re both excellent… That said, if you don’t have any non-dairy creamer, just use soy milk or any other non-dairy milk)
1 cup rice milk or other non-dairy milk
1/2 cup garbanzo bean flour (AKA chickpea flour)
2 Tbsp agave nectar (maple syrup or any other natural liquid sweetener)
4 Tbsp arrowroot starch (cornstarch works fine too)
Pinch of sea salt
1/4 tsp cinnamon
Pinch of freshly grated nutmeg

Directions:
Slice the bread into 1/2 inch to 1 inch rounds. If I slice it myself, then I’ll often slice it at a bias, so it’s not just straight on… It makes the dish more fancy. This type of cut is often called a “french cut” which is ironic, right? French cut French bread… Hee hee. Okay, I guess it’s not so funny… Anyway, stale bread works really well because it absorbs the batter without totally falling apart. Fresh bread works well too.

I won’t lie to you. Lots of recipes that use arrowroot (or cornstarch) recommend dissolving the arrowroot with the liquid ingredients first. Clumpy arrowroot isn’t good. Clumpy garbanzo flour is fine if there are just some small clumps (I know, it’s a double standard). Here’s the thing, if you put all the ingredients in a big bowl and use a wire whisk on it, the arrowroot dissolves just fine.
However, if you’re really into making sure that the arrowroot is fully dissolved, then first add it to the creamer and milk and mix till it’s dissolved… Then add the rest of the ingredients. If you’re pressed for time or trust in your mad whisking skills, then throw everything together and whisk like crazy. It’s not like you save a ton of time, but putting all the ingredients together, instead of adding arrowroot first, is one less thing to worry about.

Put the mixture into a shallow, wide bowl. I use a jelly roll pan because it gives me a chance to maximize the amount of slices of bread I’m preparing. Soak the slices about one minute per side. It’s important to only soak as many slices as you can actually cook. I have a dream range with a griddle, so I can cook about eight full slices of bread. Before we got the range, I could do about four to six in my two cast iron skillets.

I pre-heat my pan at about medium/medium-high heat. When I’m ready, I pour about a teaspoon of oil in and move it around with a paper towel so that it’s evenly spread and isn’t a puddle. One of my other secrets: I use an oil mister that I got from Pampered Chef (Sur La Table and Williams Sonoma also have them), and I give the cooking surface a nice even spray. You don’t want too much oil. Just enough to help the French toast keep from sticking. Even after spraying, I’ll use a paper towel to quickly spread and absorb any excess.

Put the already soaked French toast in the pan to cook. After about two minutes, flip over and cook about another minute or two more. It should look like French toast… In other words, golden brown with some nice flecks of dark brown. Really, you can cook it more, and it will be fine. My family likes a little more crunch, so I cook just a little longer. It still tastes good.

Serve with non-dairy butter, pure maple syrup, cashew cream, banana slices, a luscious berry compote, freshly grated nutmeg, a dusting of powdered sugar… You get the point.

Variations:
See final bullet point in Directions…

Just kidding. Sometimes I take a tablespoon or two of peanut butter and whip that into the batter for a rich peanut-buttery taste.

Do you like tropical flavors? Substituting coconut milk or coconut cream for the non-dairy creamer adds a very rich flavor that is reminiscent of a Hawaiian brunch.

**Author’s note: okay, so it’s time to come clean…
French fries aren’t really French. Several sources cite pommes frites as the early fry and Belgium as the country of origin. There are many guesses as to the origin of the name ” French fries.” some say it’s because French was the spoken language of the Belgian army during World War (and the fries were popular among the American and British soldiers)… Others think it could be the cut of the fries (French cut) or the way they are cooked.

There are French green beans (AKA haricot verts which is actually French for ‘green beans’), but it’s more common to refer to the green beans as French cut.

French kissing… Well, that’s another story. So kissing with an open mouth and tongue (French kiss) is not specific to the French. In fact, the origin of the term goes back to the 1920s. Some sites suggest that it was coined because the French were thought of as morally liberal in a physical way. The stereotype of the French at that time (and even now) is that they are a passionate people. That said, the origin of French kissing may actually have nothing to do with the French at all.

The French revolution really did happen. For ten years, from 1789 to 1799, France was politically in upheaval as people rebelled agains the monarchy and aristocrats. In fact, the monarchy fell within the first three years as the French people fought for their rights.

The Eiffel tower is real too. Designed in 1889 by Gustave Eiffel for the World’s Fair, it is still the tallest structure in all of France. Located in Paris on the Champ de Mars, it’s entirely made up of metal. It is the single most visited landmark that people are willing to pay for.

French toast is not necessarily French in origin. It’s eaten in England and known as “eggy bread.” in Brazil it’s “rabanada.” And in Spain, where many believe modern French toast originated in the 15th century, it’s known as “torrijas.” Most of the popular recipes include dipping the bread in an egg mixture, but hopefully this recipe will help change that.

Crunchy, sour, and fresh. Those are the first three adjectives that come to mind when I think about this salad. It happens to be a family favorite… Especially with Sweet Potato (my wife not the ingredient)… And you’ve probably heard the saying, “a happy Sweet Potato is a happy family,” or something like that. A lot of people say that they like green cabbage better than red cabbage, but I’m pretty sure they haven’t tried this recipe. Red cabbage is a little stronger in flavor than green, so it needs a stronger dressing. Unlike coleslaw, one of the more common ways people consume green cabbage, this recipe gets its slight creaminess from emulsifying the oil and vinegar for the dressing.

Before I get to the recipe, I wanted to share the fact that I really enjoy veganizing old, favorite recipes… I’ll spend hours trying to adapt recipes for my vegan family… Tinkering with flavors till I get some semblance of what I remembered while modernizing it. I guess that fact actually doesn’t really apply to this recipe. As you can imagine, there aren’t a whole lot of red cabbage salads in China, but there are a lot of pickled salads and there’s even a pickled cabbage salad (green cabbage), so me having fond memories of this red cabbage salad isn’t a huge stretch. Now, in terms of veganizing this recipe… there’s no need to veganize this salad recipe (unless your family’s secret ingredient was lard), but I did adapt this recipe to make it a little healthier (another favorite thing I do with recipes). Many of the recipes I’ve seen for this salad use twice as much oil (or more), and that’s just not necessary. Emulsifying also helps cut that amount down because it increases the volume of the dressing.

One final comment. Red cabbage isn’t really red. It’s a lot more purple than red, but as Sweet Potato pointed out, it’s closer to red than green cabbage is. I have to agree with that.

Red Cabbage Salad
Ingredients:
• 1/4 cup canola oil
• 2/3 cup red wine vinegar
• 1-2 tablespoons agave nectar
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon seasoned salt (or a flavored spice mix… I use a shish kabob seasoning that Seitan and the Conscious Eater gave us)
• 1/8 to 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
• About 1/8 of a fresh onion or 1/4 teaspoon onion powder
• 1 medium clove garlic grated
• 1 head red cabbage, cored and shredded

Directions:
• If using fresh onion (my preference), place all ingredients except for the cabbage into a blender or food processor and blend until smooth. This helps create a creamier, emulsified dressing. The dressing will be kind of orange/pinkish, but dont worry… The cabbage makes it redder. If you don’t have fresh onion, or prefer onion powder, you can mix the canola oil, red wine vinegar, sugar, salt, seasoned salt, pepper, and onion powder in a bowl. Mix it well.
• Place the shredded cabbage in a large ceramic or glass bowl.
• Pour dressing over cabbage, and toss to coat.
• Cover, and refrigerate 8 hours, or overnight, stirring occasionally. Drain before serving.

Variations:
• Like things a little more garlicky? Add more cloves of minced garlic to the dressing before blending. It’ll give the salad a more pronounced garlicky kick.
• Speaking of kick… Adding a 1/8 to 1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper will give it a spicy kick. You can also use your favorite chili pepper sauce instead.
• Finally, this isn’t a variation… It’s a tip. If you have a leak-proof container (like the newer Oxo brand containers), then you can save tossing time by putting the shredded cabbage with the prepared dressing in the container, closing the lid, and shaking for all your worth. It’s pretty good exercise too. A Ziploc type bag would work as well, but it also increases your carbon footprint.

(Author’s note: Okay, so I didn’t get back to writing once per month yet, but I’m working on it. I also wanted to thank my Fullerton friends. I’m glad you like the recipes… it’s motivating me to write more! Finally, a photo to follow soon… I promise!)

So VeganMoFo ends, and I decided to take a small break. Maybe a day or two… maybe a week at most. Well, that was the intent. I was so excited that I’d been a better (more regular) VeganMoFo blogger (mostly due the partnership I had with Seitan of Conscious Cooking), and I vowed to continue with the recipes, reviews, thoughts, and more (someday we’ll start the podcast)… and then life happened. This included issues with one of my other blogs, so I kind of put my Wok on the Wildside blog to the side. What a huge mistake that was, huh? This is the blog I enjoy the most, and I neglected it. The irony here is that Seitan, our families, and I have been continuing our weekly vegan supper club, and we were both musing this past week that neither of us have written much.

But all that is going to change… I swear. I can’t promise daily or weekly entries, but I do promise to write every now and then. This isn’t a promise to any reader in particular, it’s not a commitment I’ve made with Seitan or my family, but it is a promise to me. I want to write more because I enjoy it. I love being vegan, I love sharing food, I love cataloguing my recipes, and I want to showcase that on my blog!

And wouldn’t you know it? Seitan jumped in first and is motivating me again. At a recent vegan supper club, I served a crispy sesame kale that she enjoyed, and she wrote about it on her blog. Now I really have to get moving on my writing!

So in the spirit of starting fresh, here are some pics and stuff from Thanksgiving (Yikes! Thanksgiving? Yep)… and the secret ingredient is love, of course… well, actually, today’s ingredient I’m writing about is tofu skin, but I create the food with love:

So Thanksgiving is a tradition for our family. It’s a day that my mom can take a break and I do the cooking for her, dad, my family, and any of my brothers who might be visiting. This year, due to some personal matters, my parents elected not to come by… what a bummer! So instead of moping around, something that I could have done, we arranged for Seitan and The Conscious Eater to come by and start a new Thanksgiving tradition with us. It was nice to do an all-vegan feast and avoid Thanksoween, as Dan Piraro calls it.

Like any good Thanksgiving feast, it was an all-day event filled with eating, cooking, eating, talking, eating, laughing, eating, and more eating. Although Seitan and I cooked most of the day, it was never rushed or frantic. We took breaks and even got a chance to take a walk around the neighborhood. We were actually trying to get boba from our favorite drink place in Temple City (Boba Express), but of course, it was closed. However, the walk was wonderful. Baby Corn and Dumpling enjoyed the weather and company. Having Seitan and The Conscious Eater there also meant that there were two more pairs of eyes to watch our girls, so Sweet Potato and I got a chance to walk together hand-in-hand… a rare event!

The real magic to the day (other than the wonderful company), was the food, of course.

The menu included:

Need I say that there was way too much food? If we were hobbits, we would have been in food heaven… of course, if we were really hobbits, then we would have had two or three suppers in the evening. I’d have to say that everything was wonderful… I know, I’m pretty biased, but it was! I was most pleasantly surprised by the persimmon pie. That was seriously good! Think pumpkin pie, but with a soft persimmon mousse like consistency. The spices weren’t overpowering, and the crust was amazing with flavor and hearty goodness. I was surprised by it because I’m more of a crunchy persimmon kind of guy… not the soft squishy ones. That said, it was so good. Just the right amount of cinnamon and nutmeg. Seitan did a great job on it, and it featured her wonderful cashew cream.

One of the reasons I decided to make my own seitan turkey was because there are too many products out there that cook up really dry. The Field Roast is pretty good, but I have to admit, I’m not a fan of the Tofurkey turkey or the Now and Zen one. I think they’re dry and a little salty. With my own thing, I get to control the moistness of the seitan I make. I can shape it into little drum sticks or larger breasts if I want to. Most of all, I can wrap it with tofu skin to help retain the moisture and give it a crisp exterior.

So here’s the secret to working with tofu skin (also sometimes referred to as yuba skin or wrap). Okay, it’s not really a secret, but these are tips and tricks I do when I use tofu skin… One quick note, although you can find fresh tofu skin or yuba in many asian supermarkets (or even make it yourself), I prefer to buy the frozen variety because it’s consistent and convenient. So, here are my tips and tricks…

Tofu skin is very easy to use and can wrap a lot of different things. We love the crispy crunch of the tofu skins that have been basted and baked, so we use it to create little eggroll-like things with stuffing. We’ve also created something I call Chinese Samosas with them. When we do things like that, we actually pan fry them with just a small amount of oil in a cast iron skillet. Very yummy!

So we had a potluck at work for Halloween. One of my “Go To” potluck dishes is a quinoa and beet salad. This is chock-ful of protein, fiber, vitamins, and tasty goodness (not actual ingredient). In other words, this is a perfect potluck dish because it’s cold, delicious, and it ensures that I’ll have at least one thing I can eat at the potluck. Sorry… no photo today… but you do get two recipes for one blog entry.

Quinoa (“keen-wah”) and Beet Salad

Ingredients:

• 1 cup quinoa, uncooked
• ½ lb. Baked tofu or veggie sausage, cubed
• 1 lb. cherry or pear tomatoes, halved
• ½ lb. steamed peeled beets, diced (Trader Joe’s has some great ready-to-eat beets if you don’t want to steam your own)
• 1 bunch swiss chard (any color) or kale (leaves only) chopped or torn into smaller pieces.
• ½ – ¾ C. Balsamic vinaigrette

Directions:

• Rinse and cook quinoa according to directions. For more flavorful quinoa, add salt, liquid aminos, or cook in vegetable broth… however, the salad won’t need it because it takes on the flavor of the vinaigrette. At end of cooking, fluff quinoa with a fork to prevent overcooking. It’s important to allow the quinoa to cool before compiling the salad. A great way to do this is to spread it out on a jelly roll pan so that it cools quickly
• Rinse and drain the chard (or whatever greens you’ve chosen). Tear or slice in smaller strips. I usually cut out the stem first and then cut the leaves in strips. If you use chard, you can cut the stem into little ½ inch segments, and they’ll add crunch and flavor. If you’re using kale, then discard the stem.
• Steam or lightly fry chard (or whatever greens you’ve chosen) till wilted, but not overcooked. Allow to cool before compiling salad. Note: adding a pinch of salt while sauteing will cut down the bitterness a little bit.
• Toss kale with small amount of vinaigrette.
• In a large mixing bowl, put all ingredients together and mix together. Add vinaigrette to taste.

Variations:

This is an easily transformed salad. Like it a little sweeter? Add some dried cranberries. Do you like herbs? Fresh basil is a great addition. Interested in having more quinoa, then double the quinoa but keep the veggies the same. Corn adds color and flavor.

Easy Balsamic Vinaigrette

Ingredients:

• ½ cup balsamic vinegar
• 2 Tbsp lemon or lime juice
• 2 Tbsp Dijon Mustard (or other whole grain mustard)
• 2 Tbsp (or more) agave nectar (maple syrup works well too)
• 1 tsp salt
• 2 cloves garlic grated or finely minced
• 2-4 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil

Directions:

Combine all ingredients except oil in a blender. Blend till well mixed. Add oil slowly while blending to properly emulsify the vinaigrette. Alternatively, you can combine everything into a dressing shaker/jar thing and shake it really well. The goal is to create a dressing that doesn’t have a layer of oil.

Variations:

Flavor it according to how you like it! Some people like a sweeter balsamic vinaigrette, so they should add more agave nectar. If you like a little more bite, add more garlic or fresh cracked pepper.

Macaroni and Teese

I want to start by saying that I really like nutritional yeast. I think it’s a great flavor for my homemade gluten, sauces, and when I want a slightly cheesy flavor to things. However, I have to admit that I don’t love nutritional yeast as the sole cheesy flavor when making a comfort food like mac and cheese. Am I the only one who feels that way? Judging by the leftovers my daughters leave when I’ve created yeast-based mac and cheese, I don’t think I’m the only one who feels this way.

Enter the new era of vegan cheeses. Previously I talked about Teese in the Vegan Nachos. Well, the soft cheddar flavor makes a great base for gratins, mac and cheese, cheesy soups, and many other great dishes (haven’t tried it with fondue, but I’m sure that would be pretty good). Whenever I make a macaroni and cheesy type dish, I like to top it with some breadcrumbs. This adds more whole grains to the diet with a nice crisp crunch… and we could all use some more fiber in our diets, right?

Ingredients:

• 1 package elbow macaroni (whole wheat, rice, or plain semolina… and you can use any smallish pasta like shells)
• 1 block of soft cheddar-style Teese (10 oz. size)
• ½ cup unsweetened rice milk (you can also use soy, almond, hemp, or whatever non-dairy milk you enjoy)
• 1 tbsp non-dairy buttery spread (Earth Balance is great)
• 2 tbsp nutritional yeast
• 1 tsp salt (or more)
• fresh breadcrumbs from a single slice of whole wheat bread
• olive oil

Directions:

Preheat your oven to 375 degrees. Cook the macaroni according to directions. I prefer to keep mine just a tad more al dente than I like to eat it because this dish gets finished in the oven. So take a look at the package and cook it a minute less or so.

Break up the Teese into smaller chunks. You want to make sure it’s not huge so that it melts a little more easily. When the macaroni is finished cooking, drain lightly (that means that you don’t want to drain it till it’s bone dry. It can have some of the cooking water on it and still be moist.

Put macaroni and Teese into the pot you were just using and put on medium-low heat. You don’t want to scorch the Teese. Stir constantly while melting Teese. When the majority of Teese has melted, add butter, rice milk, and nutritional yeast. Mix thoroughly and continue cooking for about one minute. Add salt to taste, but 1 tsp is usually good. Mix thoroughly and taste more.

Put the mixture into a ceramic or glass casserole dish. Sprinkle the breadcrumbs over the macaroni mix and spray with a little olive oil. If you don’t have a sprayer, then use your thumb to cover the opening of the olive oil, leave just a tiny opening, and shake over the casserole dish. Move rapidly. You don’t want a lot of oil on one part… just a light spritz and spread of olive oil so that the bread crumbs get nice and brown. Bake in the oven till the top is golden brown and crunchy. Watch out! You don’t want it to be burnt… just crunchy.

Remove from oven. Let cool and set for about 3 minutes. Scoop and serve!

Variations:

Add any manner of herbs or spices to the topping for a slightly different taste. You can also add chopped Tofurkey or veggie ham to the macaroni and Teese mix for more protein. For a little tangy surprise, add some pear or grape tomatoes to the macaroni and Teese mix before baking. For more veggies, add some slightly blanched green beans or asparagus (chopped not whole).

Slow Simmered Pinto Beans

Comfort foods are things that I love to eat when I’m not feeling great (mentally and/or physically). My list of comfort foods seems to grow every year, but this list includes vegan versions of baked potatoes with toppings, rice porridge, oatmeal, lasagna, pad see ewe, bun bo hue, thai curry, samosas, mango with sticky rice, minestrone soup, split pea soup, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, grilled cheese sandwiches, hot chocolate, and sweet potato fries… okay, I’m sure there are way more foods I consider comfort foods, but those are the ones off the top of my head. Well a nice bowl of slow simmered beans is right up there. This is a dish that’s easily modified to match a variety of cuisines. Depending on the beans you use and the flavorings you add, it can be southwest style, mediterranean, or even asian-inspired.

Ingredients:

• 2 cups dried beans (whatever you want… I used pinto beans in this recipe, but I’ve also used black beans, kidney beans, chickpeas, kidney beans, black-eyed peas… I’m sure you get the idea, any beans will do)
• 8 cups of water
• ½ onion, peeled and chopped
• 2 cloves garlic smashed
• 1 bay leaf or 1 strip kombu
• ¼ teaspoon salt
• ½ teaspoon liquid aminos
• juice from ¼ lemon
• ½ tablespoon of agave nectar or other sweetener

Directions:

I’m a traditionalist when it comes to this recipe. I like to soak my beans overnight to prep them. For some reason, it makes the beans come out more tender, and they seem easier to digest. Maybe that part’s my imagination. Anyway, I rinse the beans then put enough water in the pot with the beans so that the water line is 2 inches above the beans.

The next morning, I pour out the water that was used to soak the beans (carefully reserving it to water the garden with). In your crock pot or slow cooker, put the beans with the 8 cups of water, the onion, the garlic, and the bay leaf or kombu. Do NOT add the salt and other flavors. There will be plenty of time for additional seasonings once the beans are tender. Don’t ask me why, but when you add salt, the beans don’t get as tender. Something about cooking it with salty water makes the beans hard. This isn’t like the digestible thing. This is a fact.

I set it to high until the water is simmering. Then I set it to low and leave it alone for about five hours… or until it’s tender. You can keep it on high if you want to, but I think the beans get more tender when it’s a lower heat.

Alternatively, if you’re pressed for time, you can use a heavy pot and bring it to a boil, reduce the heat to low and simmer for about 60-90 minutes. Test the beans. When they’re tender, it’s ready!

Regardless of which method you use, when the beans are tender, go ahead and remove the bay leaf or kombu, and add the salt, liquid aminos, lemon juice, and agave nectar. Let it simmer for an additional 15 minutes or so to bring all the flavors together. Serve hot with brown rice.

Variations:

These beans are great as is, but you can also dress them up with other flavorings. Try some chili powder and cayenne for heat. Add molasses for a deep sweetness. Add the beans to 10 cups of broth and assorted vegetables for a tasty bean soup. Tomato paste gives the beans a nice tanginess.

Easy Peasy Spanish-y Rice

Have you noticed a pattern to my cooking yet? When I have time, I tend to do more fancy, time-consuming stuff. But I rarely have time, so I do a lot of quick and easy recipes. This one is the quick and easy variety. The thing is when you do Spanish-style rice, a lot of recipes call for frying the rice a little first (toasting it in a pan) and then bringing it to a boil and then lowering the heat to simmer while covered… blah blah blah. Throw it all into a rice cooker and be done with it. The rice grains won’t be as separate as when you cook it in a pan, but the dish also won’t be as oily, and the rice cooker makes it dead simple… no checking to see if the rice is done yet or worrying about burning the bottom layer or forgetting you have it on, etc. etc. etc. It’s easy peasy.

Also, this recipe is totally modifiable. I usually use frozen corn and edamame. I didn’t have any this time, so I think I used green beans. No vegetable broth? Add water and a little more salt or liquid aminos. You get the idea. Lots of options.

Ingredients:

• 2 cups rice (I use brown basmati or jasmine rice, but white works fine… so does brown short or medium grain rice. Just don’t use sticky rice)
• ½ cup ground tomatoes or diced tomatoes in juice (if you don’t have either, then use 1 tablespoon of tomato paste and increase the broth by almost ½ cup)
• ½ tsp salt
• 1 tsp liquid aminos
• 1-2 cloves garlic (minced)
• ¼ onion chopped
• ½ cup total of frozen vegetables (I usually use edamame, corn, and carrots)
• 1 tsp agave nectar
• about 2 to 2 ½ cups vegetable broth

Directions:

Rinse rice and drain. Make sure you pour the drained liquid into another container so that you can water some plants with it (this also works great with water you’ve used to wash vegetables).

Put rice in a rice cooker. Add vegetable broth to just under the correct marker. So pretend that you’re making slightly dryer rice. Typically, I use about 1 ½ cups liquid (water or vegetable broth) for each cup of brown rice. So in this recipe, reduce the liquid by about ¼ cup for each cup of rice. Don’t worry, the liquid from the tomatoes and vegetables will make up for it.

Add in all the other ingredients and mix well.

Press start on the rice cooker (if I had a nickel for every time one of us forgot to press start… well, I wouldn’t be rich, but I might have 4 or 5 dollars).

Variations:

A variety of frozen mixed veggies work well. Some of the mixes are a good choice (like Trader Joe’s Soycutash). You can also use fresh shredded carrots if you have more time. If you like things spicy, they use a little hot sauce or chili powder.

Howdy Vegan MoFo’ers! Been a few days since I wrote. Actually, that’s not true. I’ve spent the last few weeks writing a grant at work which we just turned in. Now back to what’s way more fulfilling (unless we win this grant)…

Summer is such a great season. Sure, I could do without the extreme heat, frequent humidity, and plethora of bugs that want to suck my blood (are there vegan mosquitoes?), but the fruit in summer is amazing. From pluots to peach to watermelon to mangoes to a variety of berries… summer is never lacking in bold, fresh flavors of fruit. I like my fair share of fruit salads as well as eating whole fruit, but sometimes the lazy chewer in me gets the best of my cooking choices, so I like to whip up things like dessert soups. They’re cool, refreshing, and full of flavor.

Peach-Strawberry Dessert Soup with Tapioca Sauce

Peach-Strawberry Dessert Soup with Vanilla Tapioca Sauce

Ingredients:

• 3 cups rice milk (soy or almond milk), divided
• ⅓ cup small tapioca pearls
• 1 ½ tsp cornstarch (or 1 tsp. arrowroot)
• 3 tablespoons agave nectar or other sweetener
• ½ tsp vanilla extract
• 1 pound strawberries, washed and stemmed
• 1 pound peaches (peeled)
• agave nectar to taste
• juice from ½ a lemon
• 1 pint raspberries, blueberries, blackberries, or other fruit in season, rinsed and drained

Directions:

For the tapioca sauce… place 2 1/2 cups of rice milk and the tapioca into a saucepan. Heavier is better so that it can simmer without scorching. Bring to a gentle boil, stirring occasionally to avoid scorching the liquids, and then turn down the heat to a simmer. Stir well every few minutes, scraping the bottom and sides. This is one of those recipes that you can’t just leave and come back to. If tapioca just cooks unattended, it can congeal together, and that’s really not the goal. Simmer for about 20 minutes or until the tapioca pearls are just turning translucent.

Make a slurry of the arrowroot and 1 tablespoon of rice milk. Set that mixture aside. Add the remaining rice milk to the pan along with the agave and vanilla extract. Increase heat so that the mixture gets up to a gentle boil again. Continue cooking for five minutes. Don’t forget to stir! Mix in the arrowroot slurry and cook until the liquid thickens.

Remove from heat and chill in refrigerator for about 2 hours or so. You can also use a cold water bath to chill it faster. The mixture will be thicker than water, but not as thick as a pudding.

While the sauce is cooling, prepare the fruit for the dessert soup. Cut the peaches into bite-size pieces. Cut the strawberries in quarters. For each fruit, you’ll want to follow this process… put the fruit in a food processor along with the about 1 teaspoon of agave nectar and pulse until coarsely pureed. Taste it. If it’s too tart, add another teaspoon of agave nectar. Stir in the juice from ¼ lemon to add depth of flavor and keep the color from turning. So start with the peaches. When the peaches are done, process the strawberries.

I like my fruit purees to have a little texture, so I usually don’t puree it very long. If you want an ultra-think soup, then puree longer. You can also add some apple juice to liquefy it more.

To assemble… using a pretty glass container, add about ¼ cup of the thicker fruit puree to the bottom of the glass. Follow that up with ¼ cup of the other fruit puree (for me, it was peach first then strawberry). Add about two tablespoons (or more) of the vanilla tapioca sauce and top off with a few raspberries, blueberries, or whatever fruit you’ve chosen. Serve immediately, or chill for up to ½ an hour if serving later.

If you’re the thin fruit soup type person (don’t worry, some of my best friends are thin fruit soup type people), then use a small shallow bowl and pour the fruit purees into two halves. If you’re careful, you can even do a yin yang design with them. Top with the vanilla tapioca sauce and fresh fruit. The consistency of apple sauce, or slightly thicker, is good for layering. Anything thinner is best for a shallow bowl.

Variations:

Try different fruits. In summer, there are plenty of fruits in season (like melons and other stone fruits). Mango is great too! Also, if you make the vanilla tapioca sauce thicker (like a pudding), then you can turn this into a parfait.