This might be called Breakfast Tofu but it is good for any meal of the day. A cumin-infused spice rub makes these quite flavourful and baking allowed the flavours to permeate the tofu. Serve, as is, as a slab of tofu with a side of vegetables, or use it as a filling for your next sandwich. I preferred the latter, but honestly, you could have caught me snacking from the pile in the fridge as well. Read the rest of this entry »
It took me three years but I finally bought millet again.
While I have shared a few recipes with it, I loved it most of all popped and found in granola. This time, I was intrigued by Meghan Telpner’s millet crust. Soak and cook millet, then press it into a pie plate. And voila, instant gluten-free, whole food, texture-a-plenty pie crust. Read the rest of this entry »
Tofu scramble does not taste like scrambled eggs. Have you ever thought that?
I imagine it might be an early reaction to a tofu scramble, with the second thought reminding yourself how wonderful it tastes, irregardless. Even my favourite dillicious tofu scramble does not remind me off eggs, unless you like lumpy firm eggs? When I first cooked scrambled soft tofu, I was one step closer to scrambled egg creation. However, while the soft tofu is creamy, silky and fluffy, the problem is that it took much longer to cook. Read the rest of this entry »
Part of the allure for travelling to Madagascar and South Africa, other than the interesting animals (LEMURS! elephants! giraffes! rhinoceroses!) was the plant-life as well. I don’t like to scope out flowers (much) but I was excited to visit a tea plantation. Sadly, we were not in the right areas to visit vanilla plantations (Madagascar is the world’s top producer of vanilla) or cocoa plantations but we serendipitously stumbled upon fields and fields of macadamia trees in South Africa. Turns out South Africa is the second largest producer of macadamia nuts, after Australia where it is indigenous.
So in addition to the chocolate, vanilla pods and tea, Rob allowed me to bring home some macadamia nuts too. A nice change from cashews, they bring a brilliant white to its sauces and possibly more creamy with all its fat. This is great news for those without a high-speed blender: silky sauces are just macadamias away.
While the blogosphere feasts on the beginning of the fall produce (apples, pumpkin and my favourite: brussels sprouts), enjoy this berry-filled salad spruced with mint and topped with a creamy whipped macadamia cream. The vanilla is a pronounced flavour which countered the sweet berries well. Feel free to use it on top of your morning oats (see below), or as part of a parfait, or perhaps, more in keeping with fall, on top of a vegan pumpkin pie or fall-spiced hot beverage (pumpkin latte, pumpkin chai tea or hot chocolate, anyone?).
Are you ready for fall yet?
Hello again!
Sorry for the all the unanswered comments over the last month…. but thank you for hanging in there!
Usually I have this “do not mention you are going on vacation” mentality so that people come to rob my place. Although, for this special time, we had no home to rob. (Our stuff is still in a shipping cube somewhere, so please do not steal it). As we moved back to Canada, we had a very long detour. Rob and I set out for a month-long vacation in Madagascar and South Africa. We have both done extensive travelling (Rob more so than I) but we both agreed that travelling through Madagascar was the hardest we have ever travelled.
As I regroup for a daunting August (in which I start independent practice, write some exams, celebrate the arrivals of niblings (one is an expected niece, the other TBD) and somehow fit in training for Cycle Oregon. Oh, and unpack all our stuff, because it will meet us a week late), I will likely keep a slower pace for my posts.
Until then, I am thankful that Kathy has shared with me this fabulous photo and recipe from her upcoming cookbook OATrageous Oatmeals. I also reviewed Kathy’s Great Vegan Bean Book, which I really like, so I am thrilled to share her creativity with oats.
Do not be fooled, this book is way more than oatmeal. Yes, she has oatmeal recipes designed for each part of the year, including cooling summer overnight oats (Blueberry Earl Grey Overnight Refrigerator Oats ) and warming bakes for the winter like Pumpkin Oat Breakfast Cake. She also has a chapter for snacks like Peanut Butter Banana Granola Bars and later a dessert section with treats like Mini Raspberry Cakes and Chai-Spiced Oatmeal Tart with Warm Coconut-Vanilla Sauce.
However, I am most excited about experimenting with her savoury options. She has an entire chapter for soups (Scottish-Inspired Mushroom Lentil Stew, Fragrant Yellow Split Pea and Rolled Oat Dal) and another for savory options like Cauliflower Oat Pizza Crust, Indian Oats Upma, Oat Dosa, Not-from-a-Box Mac and Oat Chez and Oats-bury Steaks. And even beyond the kitchen, she has recipes for Soothing Lavender Oat Bath Soak and Oatmeal Cookie Scrub.
How do you like to use oats?
To celebrate her new cookbook, Kathy is offering a pre-order giveaway from OXO along with a copy of her cookbook. Click here to enter (open until August 4). After you pre-order the book, submit your receipt to Kathy for special recipes, coupons and your chance to win a different OXO prize.
Recipes from OATrageous Oatmeals spotted elsewhere:
Blackberry Mojito Overnight Refrigerator Oats
Coconut Oat Vanilla Nut Creamer
Steel Cut Oat Sausage Crumbles
I am sharing this with Healthy Vegan Fridays, Bookmarked Recipes, Virtual Vegan Linky Potluck and Laura’s Strange but Good.
I almost thought about making my blog vacation all about chickpea flour. I have been experimenting with it a lot more and this was a fun venture into sweet pancakes.
I was drawn to Gena’s recipe because they were protein pancakes without protein powder. While I am no stranger to savoury chickpea flour pancakes (aka besan chilla), I liked how these were more traditional. Here, chickpea flour is combined with cashew flour and soy milk for a heartier base.
They did not fluff up like regular pancakes, but were good for a lazy weekend breakfast. I topped them with a quickie raspberry chia jam for a summer twist. Forget boiling the fruit as in my blueberry vanilla chia jam. I simply defrosted some frozen raspberries in the microwave, added some chia seeds and waited a few minutes. The jam was a nice sweet contrast when rolled inside the pancakes.
I am sharing this with Dead Easy Desserts.
Thank you so much for your positive response to my cookbook. You can see Johanna’s review of it here.
I have been debating whether to go on a complete blog hiatus during the summer or work on some pre-written posts. I am leaning towards a blog vacation simply because my absence will be too long for me to mask or simply dwindle down to a post once a week.
When deciding what to share this week (while I was on vacation last week), I had to see what was lurking in my archives. (Note: I should have added one more tip for food bloggers: have draft posts and lots of them). As such, I have been hunting through my archives of not-yet-published posts. You know – the half-written posts, the posts without any photos uploaded and the worst – the ones without a recipe. As soon as I discovered these photos, I knew I wanted to share them.
The glowing strawberries are oh-so-ripe and the drizzle of balsamic layered nicely around the oats. I would love a bowl of this right now.
Truthfully, I don’t remember making this but my photo time stamp tells me it was 2011. Obviously around strawberry season. Perfect timing because Ontario strawberries are just starting to appear, as we found out this weekend.
This dish was from a time when I used to toast my steel cut oats as I waited for the water to boil. Now I don’t bother.
It was before I started adding protein powder to my oats. My current concoction is a murky green stew but I am not sure if that is any better than my previous (chocolate) brown variety with berries. I used to share a lot of my morning eats but with my morning monotony there is not as much day-to-day novelty. I already shared a Balsamic Lemon-Blueberry Steel Cut Oats which was likely my inspiration 3 years ago.
Be it resolved to change my morning oats this week? Absolutely!
How about you? Do you have a similar breakfast every day?
Any preferences for my blog sabbatical? I am toying with the idea of a few summary posts (like the best vegan restaurants in Houston and Toronto).
PS. I am sharing this with Four Seasons Food for Red, Shop Local, and Simple and In Season.
They let it slip.
My claim to fame.
At my hospital, they get new trainees every year. Obviously, it can be hard to keep track of us all. One of my co-workers may be known for her love of dance, the other that became a new mama, or another that took off suddenly to get married.
I suppose I have a few quirks. Beyond being Canadian, I could be remembered as the bicycle commuter, or perhaps the vegan… But no. Even more memorable are my unique breakfasts. Or breakfast #2 as I call it, since I eat it at work, more than a few hours after I have woken up, eaten after breakfast #1, cycled to work and gone to the gym.
Breakfast #2 is my green goop and I have eating the same thing for the past year: cooked oatmeal, hemp protein powder with some flax and chia seeds. Everything is ready to go in the morning. Once I get to work, I add some hot water, stir it up and love it.
For the uninitiated, the green swamp goop is certainly not appealing. The hemp protein powder is the colouring agent. My breakfast is an acquired taste but all things green need not taste bad. And as I learned here (and my green kale pancakes), even a small amount of green ingredients can blend to a brilliant hue.
Even though I am lamenting leaving my juicer in storage, I have been drinking my way through the smoothies and açaí bowls in The Juice Generation.
While I cannot lay claim to be a Canadian açaí expert, at least I know how to pronounce it. It has become a new foodie fad. Although, I will not praise any non-scientifically proven claims of this “superfood” other than its anti-oxidant laden berry-licious taste.
Originating from Brazil and popularized in Hawaii, California and eventually New York City, The Juice Generation has been one restaurant to popularize the breakfast açaí bowl. Topped with a hemp seed granola, an açaí bowl has a lot more substance than the rest of their juicy menu. They have 5 flavours on their menu and 5 recipes in their cookbook. Four overlap, but there is a bonus hemp açaí bowl in their cookbook not on their menu.
I found a combination of the green açaí bowl and the hemp açaí bowl to be the perfect combination. When I made my first açaí bowl, I was surprised at how green it turned out. Certainly not a vibrant red from the frozen açaí and not even a murky burgundy, it was positively green. The handful of spinach worked its magic and even masked my subsequent addition of hemp protein powder. The protein powder is now part of my regular addition to the açaí bowl which helped thicken the shake, an important factor since I was eating it like a soup.
The second revelation from my experiments with açaí was that it is naturally not that sweet. Some frozen packets add sugar to compensate, so buyer beware. In this case, I opted to use frozen bananas to buffer the spinach, hemp and açaí. Topped it with Rob’s granola of the week and sprinkled with some additional hemp seeds, I think this is awfully pretty. Green goop and all.
In addition to the recipes for their açaí bowls, there are also over 100 different combinations for fresh juice and smoothies in their latest cookbook. Thankfully, the publisher is letting me give a cookbook to one reader living in the United States or Canada. To be entered, please leave a comment here, telling me what you think of green breakfasts (smoothies, puddings, bowls, etc) Do you eat them, too? I will randomly select a winner on May 2, 2014. Good luck!
PS. There is still time to enter the giveaways for The Blender Girl and The Vegan Cookbook, too.
I am sharing this with this month’s Extra Veg.
Note: I was given a copy of the cookbook from the publisher. I was under no obligation to share a review. The opinions expressed are entirely my own.
Breakfast Chocolate Mocha Pudding Cake.
Because all things with rolled oats are actually meant for breakfast. Add coffee to it, some chocolate for good measures, then there is no question: this is all good breakfast things. A perfect way to start your day.
Because that coffee at night, may keep you awake. Or maybe it was the chocolate.
This was how I rationalized eating this for breakfast.
Eaten fresh, this is basically a self-saucing cake. A chunky dense cake doused in a mocha-chocolate sauce. It was really good, although a bit gummy from the oat flour.
I apologize for the unappealing photographs, but the leftovers were what I had to work with… The leftovers firmed up a lot after the overnight rest, sopping up the sauce, leaving this with a texture more comparable to leftover oatmeal. I hope you still get the idea that this is saucy, though.
Just so you know, I debated remaking this to get a better photo, but decided to share it anyways. My motto is to keep things stress-free and I wanted to share this sooner rather than later.
Chocolate pudding cake has always been associated with the Good Friday Cooking Disaster of 2009, wherein I made a meatless feast with a black bean and pumpkin soup, penne alla vodka and finished it off with a brownie pudding cake. Of course, all were new recipes that I was dying to try out. If I recall correctly, everyone was mostly satisfied with my first two dishes (I remember the penne alla vodka turning out well but I had to simmer off a lot of liquid) but all heck broke loose when I shared dessert. My family did not like it and they told me very bluntly. (Too sweet! I can cook better than you!) That last part is true.
However, I think everyone would love this pudding cake, for dessert or breakfast. Or both. Rob highly approved. For both.
In addition of its association with the upcoming Easter holiday, I also wanted to share this because I received some lovely ingredients to try courtesy of Carrington Farms, ground flax seeds and coconut oil, both of which I used here. Because this is a pudding cake filled with all good things. Check out stores near you celebrating Carrington Farm’s All Good April campaign by passing deals to you, too. In Houston, you can find that at HEB and Fiesta Mart. They also have additional coupons on their website.
Disclosure: I wrote this review as part of the #CarringtonAllGoodApril campaign with Carrington Farms, through FitFluential LLC. I received the products described at no cost in order to complete the review. However, opinions are honest and my own.
PS. This is my submission to We Should Cocoa, Love Cake, and Let’s Cook Sweet Treats for Easter. Read the rest of this entry »
Rob and I have been on a quest. A mission to find corn tortillas. Corn tortillas so light and pliable, you easily could think they were flour tortillas.
I don’t know if it is just me, but I always think of hard, crunchy El Paso taco shells when I hear corn tortillas. Nothing could be further from reality. We were treated to the fresh tortillas while in Mexico City and figured it was just a matter of research. They were bound to be found in Houston.
Because once you’ve tried them, you can’t go back.
I was not alone in my quest. The lovely folks on the Houston Chowhound boards already helped others satisfy their fresh corn tortilla needs. Our adventures to Mi Tienda proved to be a quick trip back to Mexico. They are a grocery store for all your Mexican needs, including corn tortillas. They are freshly made in-house and perfectly tender when consumed that same day. Since it is a bit far from home, we bought 80 tortillas. All for a whopping $2.
While we froze the majority of the tortillas, we have been enjoying tacos all times of the day. Breakfast, lunch and dinner. No complaints from Rob. He LOVES tacos!
For our breakfast tacos, we were inspired by Dawn’s recipe to make “cheezy” scrambled eggs with chickpea flour and nutritional yeast. WeRob routinely makes Indian chickpea flour pancakes and tofu scramble, so this kind of married the two. It was a fun mess, too. We served it with spinach and topped it with a creamy, cheezy mustard sauce.
Corn tortillas – what do you think?
This is my submission to this month’s Bookmarked Recipes and this month’s Shop Local.
The recent cold, wet and rainy weather put a temporary hiatus on our weekend cycling. Thus, with a bit of extra time on our hands last weekend, Rob and I crafted a delicious weekend brunch.
Rob was becoming a bit overwhelmed by our weekly banana surplus. I agree 4 bunches for a $1 is great, but probably not the best idea 2 weeks in a row. After packing our freezer with frozen bananas, we then caramelized the leftovers ones into this spin on a bananas foster baked oatmeal.
There are two ways to make this. When Rob and I team up together, we can easily divvy up the tasks: him caramelizing the bananas, while I mix together the rest of the oatmeal, which are then combined before baking. However, I have also made this solo, where I found it easier to simply caramelize my bananas, deglaze them with the milk and then directly mix the rest of the ingredients in the skillet, which is then subsequently baked. Less dirty dishes is always a perk.
While we have added the rum, we couldn’t really taste it, so it is definitely optional. Or, conversely add more if you want to taste it. Or perhaps drizzle it at the end.
In any case, you have a delicious breakfast. I prefer it warm, fresh from the oven. The sweet, caramelized bananas melt tenderly amongst the creamy baked oats. I have used both walnuts and pecans, with good results. If you have any leftovers, this is good chilled, too. Of course, that only works if you have leftovers. 😉
Baked oatmeal made previously:
Baked Apple Banana Oatmeal
Baked Pumpkin Cranberry Oatmeal Breakfast Pudding
Baked Blueberry Oatmeal Breakfast Pudding
Apricot Oatmeal Breakfast Clafoutis
Rhubarb Baked Oatmeal
Peanut Butter Cookie Baked Oatmeal
This is my submission to this month’s Bookmarked Recipes.
PS. The winner for the Raw & Simple giveaway is Emma.
Which food makes you giggle? An automatic response because you just don’t want to eat it.
While I have cooked and baked with prunes before, I subconsciously think of my bowels when I see prunes. I know it isn’t just me, because the folks in California have been rebranded prunes as “dried plums“. So many less connotations, while using different words.
Dried dates, apricots and cranberries get a lot of love, but prunes are rarely heralded. It wasn’t until I picked them up on a whim that I remembered how nice they taste. They aren’t as cloyingly sweet as dates or raisins, and have a much more complex flavour: deep and robust.
If you’ve been reading my blog for a while, you know I love to explore new breakfasts, although I rarely share them these days. I spotted this recipe for stewed prunes with citrus and cinnamon and figured it would be a great topping for my morning oatmeal.
I was drawn to this recipe for stewed prunes because there is no added sugar and the sweetness comes entirely from the prunes and orange. In fact, the sweetness is tempered by including the orange peel in the pot as everything simmers. A dash of cinnamon permeates the succulent compote and melds seamlessly. I halved the original recipe since I didn’t have a pound of prunes. I used half a Navel orange, cut into thin slivers, which delivered a wonderful flavour. Don’t be off-put by including the entire orange, peel and all. It works. Really well.
(I’ve done something similar before, years ago when I made Nigella’s Clementine Cake in which you boil 5 whole clementines (peel and all) for two hours until meltingly soft, add half a dozen eggs, sugar, ground almonds with a dash of baking powder before you throw it into the oven. The cake is oh so moist, not super sweet, but wonderful. Gluten-free baking at its finest, although obviously not vegan.)
Just as Molly suggests, the silky prunes develop a complex flavour throughout its hour-long simmer. Overnight, in the fridge, the flavours meld further. It was a delicious topping for my morning oatmeal and could easily top some yogurt or ice cream, if you are into that, for a delicious dessert. Warm and cold, I loved it both ways.
Other prune recipes that have caught my eye:
Tagine of Yam, Carrot and Prune from Moroccan Food and Cooking
Butter Bean, Prune and Tomato Tagine from Sanitarium
Georgian Red Beans in Sour Prune Sauce in Olive Trees and Honey
Spinach and Prunes with Beans in The New Book of Middle Eastern Food
Prunes Stuffed with Walnuts in Orange Juice in The New Book of Middle Eastern Food
Quinoa Tagine with Chickpeas, Olives and Prunes (Quinoa and Chickpea Marbella) at Diet Dessert n Dogs
Chickpea and Sweet Potato Stew in A Year in a Vegetarian Kitchen (recipe here)
Masala Chai Poached Prunes at In Praise of Sardines
Orange-Scented Hazelnut Prune Truffles at Anja’s Food for Thought
What are your favourite ways to enjoy prunes dried plums?
This is my submission to this month’s Tea Time Treats with dried fruit and this month’s Credit Crunch Munch.
PS. The winners of Plant Powered 15 are Johanna and Kari.
Oh my gosh… what happened? I posted on a Monday! WHAT?!
Long hours at work must be making me sloppy. *sad face*
Bonus for you, I suppose, since I decided to still write up a quickie Tuesday post!
Now that Rob is back, it means that we have our Houston weekend routine back in place. On one day of the weekend, it goes something like this:
1. Sleepy fresh oatmeal breakfast before heading out for a 50-km bike ride (The cronut ride is still my ride of choice. Mostly because the route is very simple. We came for the cronut, but kept returning for the bathrooms… although Rob gives their donuts two thumbs up)
2. Come home to a delicious smoothie, then hop in the shower to remove all that grime
3. After we are both clean, we do a load of laundry, hang out a bit and then let the laundry hang dry.
4. Now, it is usually time for lunch. Rob and I usually make a scramble of sorts, with arepas or chilla.
This time, Rob decided to merge our two favourite tofu scramble recipes… Especially since we learned that dill + curry = awesome! But how about, dill + curry + tomato + Brussels sprouts! With some noochy and kala namak goodness sprinkled overtop? Very awesome! Booyah! I honestly look forward to my freshly made weekend meals with Rob. When they taste this good, who wouldn’t be thrilled? 🙂
Do you have a favourite morning routine?
If you can’t tell, I am a planner. You don’t magically become successful. You plan for success.
During one of my trips last year, I discovered a lovely portable breakfast idea: Ruth’s Chia Goodness. Basically it is an instant breakfast featuring chia seeds, nuts and seeds with flavours. Just add water, wait 10 minutes, and voila! Healthy breakfast is served!
Ruth has a few flavours, but I wanted to recreate the Chocolate version for this roadtrip.
The ingredient list: Chia (salvia hispanica L.), buckwheat, hulled hemp seeds, organic cacao, raw organic cacao nibs, dates, almonds, evaporated cane juice, Celtic sea salt.
Familiar with my other breakfast puddings with oats and almond milk (chocolate cherry overnight oats and gingerbread pumpkin overnight oats), I knew I had to get rid of the fresh ingredients and milk. Oats need a long overnight soak, so to make this an instant breakfast, hemp seeds and almonds seemed like a great idea. Buckwheat couldn’t possibly be used raw, though, in its uncooked form. I turned to dehydrated buckwheat, instead. With its crunch, they added the perfect textural foil to the gummy chia seeds. The cocoa nibs and Amazing Grass added the malty chocolate goodness that left me with my morning chocolate fix. Ruth has added sugar in hers, but I felt like this was perfect without it. Sometimes I add fruits to it as well. Apples, mangoes, kiwi.. I don’t know any fruit that don’t pair well with chocolate. 😉
Do you have any great travel-friendly breakfast recipes?
This is my submission to this week’s Healthy Vegan Friday.
I am a sucker for beans.
While I have a pantry filled with heirloom specialty beans from Rancho Gordo and Kalustyan’s, I still keep finding new-to-me beans. During a cycling trip last year, a few friends and I cycled up to Woodbridge, and wound up at an Italian grocer for lunch. I perused the aisles for my lunch. Even though it was Italian, I had a brown rice veggie avocado sushi roll and an apple but I also discovered a new bean: Tondini beans (also known as burrini beans or pea beans). A small white bean in a glass jar. Perfect for a traveller: no need for a can opener and the cap could be screwed back on if on the go. I brought it back home and a few months later, I decided to bust them out for a salad.
However, when I opened the jar, they were sitting in a funny gooey jelly. A lot of the beans had split open, likely releasing their starch and gelling the liquid. I didn’t think the road that THAT bumpy on our ride. I typically cook my own beans so I don’t normally run into this problem… so how to use mushy beans?
Scramble! A breakfast scramble… although more of a brunch or breakfast-for-dinner sort of meal. Perfect anytime, if you ask me. Definitely one of my favourite meals lately. The Tondini beans were nice and small, similar to flageolet beans, but more fragile, lending well to a scramble. The beans are simmered with onions and garlic, along with tomatoes and spinach as familiar breakfast omelette toppings. Similar to my chickpea and tofu-tahini scramble, but lighter and more cheezy from the nutritional yeast. Black salt added the eggy flavour.
Beans for breakfast, I could get used to this. 🙂
Have you ever had a problem with mushy beans?
the taste space 