New Food

I had it in my head that I wanted to focus once a week on something that I've never made before. Then since I crapped out on the whole first week of Mofo I pretty much gave up on trying to do themes. BUT that didn't stop me from wanting to try cooking with something I've never cooked before: eggplant.

The reason I wanted to give it a try is because it's in season here in Ontario right now. Our growing season isn't especially long but we do grow lots of good things. My local farmer's stand has been my go-to for veggies this whole summer, as since from the first bite of wax bean I took all the veggies have been exceptionally delicious. And lo and behold, there were eggplant this week. I decided to take the dive.

It was very fortuitous timing that not only did the eggplant appear, but a friend lent me a cookbook that I spied at her house last weekend and one of the recipes that caught my eye was for a coconut curry with potatoes, chickpeas and, you guessed it, eggplant. Kismet!

It's an eggplant! I could Google to see why it's called that, but honestly, who has the time these days?

So, that's what they look like inside. Okay, just kidding, that wasn't a big mystery or anything. It's still kind of pretty though, right?

The recipe was from Mouthwatering Vegan, which I'd never heard of before. Leafing through there are definitely a lot of super promising things, but there is also a really heavy reliance on 'cheeze' - be it Daiya or home-made - and I am not keen on that. The curry section is all kinds of awesome though and Eggplant, Chickpea, Potato & Coconut Curry is the first of many that sound amazing. (note: the recipes also tend to be very oil heavy, but I think you can probably cut down on that as preferred. I did with no ill effects). And I'm lucky that not only are eggplants in season at our market, but luckily enough, so are potatoes, garlic, and onions.

This was in a field a few days ago!!!

The method of cooking the onion / garlic / ginger was different than any I've ever done, which to this point, has been straight chopping / mincing and then sauteeing. So not a lot of other methods to compare to. But anyway. Instructions were to chop them roughly and then toss them into the food processor until they were completely broken down. And you know what, I kind of loved that.

Only 4 or 5 cloves to the whole head! So different than the Chinese garlic.

I liked that it blended right into the sauce this way. I liked how consistent it made the flavour of the curry, too. Am I too lazy to do it every time? More than likely. But when I have extra time? Heck yeah!

The spice mix was perfect, if a little less spicy than what I'm used to in a curry. I also forgot to add the sugar called for so I added some agave at the end and then let it sit for a few minutes. I cut down the oil and skipped the cilantro.

The end result was delicious. And now I can't say I've never cooked eggplant, so double win.

However, I still can't figure out how people make curry photograph 'pretty' and not like... this.

Back! Meal planning.

Well I crapped out at the end of MoFo which was kind of inevitable. Anyway, I had a baby on November 12th so I think I'm justified for the last couple of weeks' absence.

Now that it's been 2 weeks, I'd like to get back into the swing of things. Thankfully, Aphra is super laid back and this shouldn't be a problem. Most of these are from the PPK. I just wanted things that are quick and easy to throw together, and tasty of course.

Chickpea Rice Soup
Taco Tuesday - Lentil Tacos
"Beef" stew and green salad
Broccoli curry stir fry
Sweet chili tofu with kale and coconut quinoa

Pumpkin Mac N Cheeze

I wanted something to do with the half can of pumpkin left over from making the baked pumpkin oatmeal. Fortunately, I had pinned a (non vegan) pumpkin mac n cheese. This need to finish the pumpkin has also coincided with some awful teething from Dash, who can't eat anything less soft than macaroni. Perfect marriage of circumstances.

I worked mainly by feel here; mostly I was influenced by OhSheGlow's mac n cheeze, which I didn't realize till after I had already made this. It was the most recent mac n cheeze I've made though, so that makes sense.

Pumpkin Mac N Cheeze

1 box penne, cooked (or whatever pasta you like)

1/2 c cashews, soaked for as long as you've got. Mine were soaked for 4 hours.
2 cloves garlic (I will probably add more next time, but we like a lot of garlic)
1/2 can pumpkin - I would guess around 1 1/3 c.
here's where it gets sketchy because I stopped measuring
dijon mustard (a couple of tsp)
3 half handfuls nutritional yeast
some olive oil (probably 2 tbsp)
some almond milk (1/4 - 1/2 c)
some salt (1 or 2 tsp?)
some veg broth (around 1/4 or 1/2 c as well)
juice of half a lemon

Topping

2 tbsp Earth Balance
2 tbsp horseradish
1 c panko crumbs

Preheat to 350.

Throw everything but the penne into a food processor and process until totally smooth, scraping down the sides every once in a while. Pour over the cooked penne, mix well, and dump into a large baking pan that has been sprayed with cooking oil or otherwise destickified.

Melt the earth balance, stir in the horseradish, then drizzle over the bread crumbs. Spread evenly over the macaroni and then toss it in the oven for about 30 minutes.

Dash's plate. He ate this and then another helping. Yum!

Enjoy!

ps this was 100% approved of by our (admittedly not at all picky) toddler. "How's your food Dash?" "Mmm! Delicious, mommy!"

Carrot Soup

Part of my plans for this MoFo include making some freezer foods for when I have Lip and won't want to do / be able to do anything other than sit around in my underwear because, let's face it, the first few weeks of newborn having are kind of less than glamorous.

I had a Carnival squash sitting around not doing much of anything. I get really excited when it's squash season and buy them with no plans at all for them.

Then I decided I wanted carrot soup. Squash goes with carrots, right? So I threw that squash in the oven in the afternoon (cut in half & scooped, inch of water in the pan, 400 degrees, 45 minutes or so). Then the entire adventure of my day was braving the grocery store on student discount day, which is the worst, because many of them have never learned the amazing life skill of grocery shopping and have zero shopping etiquette, plus there's a million of them.

So I didn't follow any particular recipe; I'm sure that there's all kinds of various recipes floating around in my head because I've made lots of carrot and / or squash soups in my life.

Soup

1 carnival squash
1 tbsp olive oil
1 onion, chopped
3 cloves of garlic, chopped
2 inches fresh ginger, peeled and chopped or however you like to prep ginger
2 tsp masala
2 tsp hot curry paste
1.5  - 2 lb carrots, chopped
4 c veg broth
1 can coconut milk (I used lite)

Cook your squash however you like to cook squash. I suppose that if you want to peel it raw and chop it into chunks and toss it in the soup and cook it a bit longer you could do that too. Put your soup pot over medium heat and put in the oil. Saute the onions with a sprinkling of salt until softened and translucent; toss in the garlic and ginger, cooking until fragrant. Add the two curries and cook for a minute or two. Add the squash, carrots and broth and bring to a boil. Reduce to a simmer and cook for 30 minutes or until carrot is tender, stirring occasionally. When everything is cooked, turn off the heat and add the coconut milk.

If you want to pull out your blender, you can blend and nom; just make sure to let the steam escape. I used my immersible hand blender because it's awesome and convenient.

The only problem with this soup is that we ate the majority of it for dinner instead of freezing any, so I'm going to have to make some again soon to toss in the freezer.

Meal Planning on a Wednesday

Yup. Halfway crapping out. Whatever. Don't judge me. I've had a sick kid to deal with. A sick kid who ate nothing but home made mini donuts for two days. At least his taste buds weren't broken; that's pretty much the only thing that wasn't.

Garlic roasted chickpeas with lemon dill dressing, quinoa & spinach - yeah it was on last week's list, but fortunately nothing in it is perishable because we didn't get to it. So it's here again. (I forgot to buy the spinach last week, so you know it wasn't meant to be anyway.)

Zucchini boats, grilled portobellos, Italian rice & beans

Broccoli cheddar soup, garlic bread, caesar salad

(We had tacos Monday and Jerk Tofu, mashed ginger coconut sweet potatoes, and roasted cauliflower Tuesday, BTW)

Meal Planning Monday - Week 6

Back on the wagon!

Delicious looking Garlic Roasted Chickpeas, quinoa, garlic sauteed spinach
Roasted Red Pepper and Goat Cheese Penne, caesar salad
Jerk tofu, ginger mashed sweet potatoes, bbq'd zucchini, beet salad
Lentil sloppy joes, mashed potatoes, carrots, green salad
Black bean chipotle soup, bruschetta, kale salad

Meal Planning

It's not Monday and I've missed a week, but anyhow...

Vegnews Macaroni and Cheese (best mac n cheese EVER) and green salad
Marinated grilled mushrooms, greek salad (with vegetarian ricotta salata), lemon bbq'd potatos, tzatziki, pitas
Beet and basil salad, broccoli, mashed sweet potato, jerk tofu
Something thai. I bought some red curry paste and some ginger and some kaffir lime leaves. With jasmine rice.

Extra treat: I want to make vegan current friands. Not sure how that's going to work.

Meal Planning Monday: Week 3

We totally crapped out on the meal planning thing over the weekend, unfortunately. I feel sufficiently guilty about it to say that I am confident we will not crap out this week.

This week will feature

Jerk tofu, mashed cauliflower, grilled zucchini with cherry tomatoes & cheese

TLT sandwiches and fava bean soup

AfR Mango BBQ Baked Beans, steamed broccoli, rice

PPK Cabbage and Rice Soup, green salad

Grilled portobellos, lemon roast potato packet, green beans, greek salad

Saturday is the wedding for which I am doing 150 vegan cupcakes, so this week's meal plan doesn't feature anything super exciting; I wanted to stick with things that are easy and fast.

Oops & Macaroni & Cheese

Monday was supposed to be AfR's Mango BBQ Baked Beans. Then my spanish onion was rotten so I had to use a red onion. Then my mango was rotten so I had to panic. Fortunately, doing all the grocery shopping in one day meant a fully stocked fridge and I was able to throw together the AfR 2nd Ave Korma instead.

Whew. Crisis averted.

Tuesday brings with it glad tidings of Mac N Cheese. Note to self: do not use any blends with mozzarella. You will end up with cheese dough instead of cheese sauce.

Be that as it may, it's still a yummy classic home cookin' rib stickin' comfort food.

If you haven't checked out The Pioneer Woman yet, you should. Full of yummy food that is constantly getting pinned and repinned. It's from her that I got my mac n cheese recipe. I aded the crumb topping because I like crumb toppings, but you can do whatever you want.

I did end up making two casseroles worth, which was far too much, even when we took it for lunch and such.

I also added in a head of chopped, lightly steamed broccoli; Dash saw through that ploy almost immediately, of course.

Please excuse the non veganess. I try not to cook with cheese often, but I am wanting a lot of dairy this pregnancy; growing another person will do funny things to you.

Meal Planning Monday: Week 2

Well that whole thing went swimmingly for me last week, so I think we'll do this again!

I can't really get posts out in a timely fashion but I did get Ian to take pictures of many of the foodstuffs that emerged from the kitchen last week; not that I want to do a daily post about them but I like to share delicious food always. However, objective 'eat out less' was achieved, as was, for the most part, objective 'eat all the food that gets purchased.'The notable exceptions were that I never ended up feeling like eating kale salad, but thankfully kale holds over pretty well; and the macaroni and cheese recipe made WAY TOO MUCH. I might cut it in half next time. We still have about half a casserole left of it, but it's late enough now that I'm going to have to chuck it.

This week's meals

Stuffed portobellos, mashed potatoes, mushroom gravy, steamed carrots
Ricotta gnocchi & caesar salad
Lemon roast potatoes on the BBQ, grilled zucchini, leftover 'slaw
Roasted mushroom & white bean soup, green salad, garlic bread
White bean & kalamata salad, roasted cauliflower, green beans
Penne with roasted asparagus & balsamic glaze, kale salad

Early Summer Food & Drink plus some other stuff.

Food & Drink is one of my favorite magazines. It's not particularly (or sometimes, not at all!) veg friendly - they seem to think that a vegetable stir fry is vegetarian despite containing oyster sauce - but it does have beautiful photography, fun entertaining ideas, and great flavour combinations that I yearn to replicate in a veg friendly fashion.

Ian suggests that perhaps Oysters are 'the vegetables of the sea.'

This current issue has a recipe for 'Bang Bang Chicken Noodle Salad,' the peanut sauce for which sounds divine and for which I suddenly found myself having a craving. I more or less kept the sauce as is, just switching agave for sugar and leaving out the coriander (Ian is not a fan); I also used Thai rice stick noodles instead of vermicelli, forgot to use the mint, and chopped up some napa cabbage in lieu of bok choy.

The recipe is not yet online, but here's my slightly modified version of it; keep your eye on the Food & Drink website for the original, if you happen to be a chicken or coriander eater. I didn't think to take any pics because we were starving, but it's really not that pretty unless you want to style it instead of just mixing all of it together in a bowl, and I wasn't about to do that.

Peanut Sauce
1 c natural peanut butter (sorry Kraft. You're for toast only.)
1/4 c rice wine vinegar
2 cloves of garlic crushed
2 tsp agave
1 1/2 tsp red pepper flakes
2 tbsp finely grated ginger
1/3 c tamari
1/2 c water

Mix all of those together with a fork or whisk in a bowl or measuring cup. It'll be quite thick.

Salad
250g rice stick noodles
1/2 english cucumber, julienned
2 large handfuls of shredded carrot
10 or leaves of napa cabbage, rolled up and then sliced thinly
2 green onions, sliced pretty thinly

Cook the rice noodles according to package directions. Rinse them in cold water and put in a bowl. Throw everything else on top and then add the dressing and use tongs to mix and get all the noodles and vegetables coated in sauce. Serve. If you want to beef it up, some grilled Asian style marinated tofu would be delish, or I bet even some chickpeas might work in it.

I mention 'other stuff' in the title. Fiddleheads are in season! If you find them in your local grocery store, make sure to pick them up. They're a great spring veggie (really a baby fern frond) and go well pretty much wherever you would use broccoli or asparagus. Tonight we had grilled BBQ tofu (was supposed to be jerk, but we couldn't find the jerk sauce), coconut milk & ginger mashed sweet potatoes, and steamed fiddleheads for dinner.

I made crock pot chili last night. I wanted it for lunch today so I popped everything in the crock pot at 11pm and set it to high for 8 hours. I woke up at 5:30 am and absolutely could not get back to sleep because damn, girl, that chili smelled so good. Not a photogenic food, nor did I have time as I shoveled some into a container to take to work this morning anyway, but here's the recipe. Slow Cooker Chili (note: I used a half cup of navy beans instead of chickpeas because I think chickpeas in chili is weird. I also added some cayenne for a bit more heat.)

Delicious Lentils.

It's really easy to fall into a trap where as a vegetarian you end up eating soy products an awful lot. December was definitely one of those months and whether or not the whole cancer thing is true, it's always better to have a more diverse group of foods in your diet rather than letting things get stagnant and eating the same thing day in, day out. Back to the bean!

Or legume. We had Isa Chandra's Upside Down Lentil Shepherd's Pie for dinner tonight and it was scrumdiddlyumptious. Served over dijon mashed potatoes and with a glass of merlot, you can't go wrong! I ended up using about half red lentils and half green because I was too lazy to find du Puy lentils the other day - I would have had to go downtown *gasp* and I just didn't feel like it. Also, do try to find the Worcestershire sauce - it definitely adds a little sumthin sumthin. I've made it without, as well, so I'm not just saying stuff.

Oh, yeah, and I added corn instead of peas because it's what I had.

Not Cupcakes

The last couple of times I've made cupcakes I've been all "Yeah! Gotta make cupcakes!" and then made them and not actually wanted to eat any, so they've been donated to the worthy cause of the stomachs of the people with whom I work. I decided it was time to talk about something else then, too.

I love multi coloured quinoa. It's the perfect side to this orange tofu and braised baby bok choy.

For the bok choy, heat a little olive oil (mediumish heat) in a wide shallow pan, add some well cleaned bok choy and a couple of cloves of garlic, crushed. Give it a stir, add a splash of water, and cover and let steam until crispy and bright green, just a few minutes.

Pictureless Recipe: Panko Coated Chickpea Cutlets and Maple Mustard Sauce

I didn't get any pictures of this meal, but I assure you it was delicious and you want to eat it now.

Meal: panko coated chickpea cutlets with maple mustard sauce, mashed potatoes, green beans and tomato and fennel au gratin.

I've made the chickpea cutlets before but never to great effect. I decided that I would try one last time but instead of frying or baking them immediately, to steam them like one does with vegan sausages and then later coat them in bread crumbs and fry them.

Result? Success! They were definitely a little softer than they probably should have been but I found them much preferable to the other two trials I've made, so I'm pretty happy. The only problem is that I'm a slow prep chef and that combined with adding the steaming onto the cooking made the whole meal take almost 2 hours to make.

The recipes I used for the coating and sauce for the cutlets is from Food & Drink magazine.

Maple Mustard Sauce

1 tbsp olive oil
1 small sweet onion, diced
3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 tbsp flour
1 c veg stock
2 tbsp dijon mustard
2 tbsp maple syrup
1 tbsp soy sauce
salt & pepper

Saute the onion in the olive oil over medium heat until translucent (5 - 7 minutes). Add the garlic and saute another minute. Add the flour and continue to cook another minute, till there is no more white visible.
Whisk in the stock, mustard, syrup, and soy. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat and whisk constantly for another 5 minutes or until thickened. Season to taste with salt and pepper; keep warm till ready to serve.

Panko Coated Chickpea Cutlets

1/2 recipe Doublebatch Chickpea Cutlets

Coating
 1 tbsp maple syrup
3 tbsp dijon mustard
1 tbsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp salt

1 c panko bread crumbs

Mix the syrup through salt together in a wide, shallow bowl and place the bread crumbs in a similar bowl. Coat each cutlet in the syrup mixtures and then coat in breadcrumbs. Pan fry over medium heat in olive oil until brown and crispy, 5 - 8 minutes / side.

Serve with the maple mustard sauce. Yum!