You know it is a great soup when I make it two weeks in a row. It is not often that I repeat recipes in such rapid succession, but I only ate 2 servings and had planned to share it with our baby. I thought it was ok for him until I realized I used broth powder with salt in it.
Round two was solidified. Without any vegetable broth. The necessary salt was added after we removed baby P’s portion. Read the rest of this entry »
It has been a while since I flipped through Terry’s Salad Samurai. I know salads are not just for the summer, but I smiled pleasantly as I looked through the chapters aimed at the colder months. I bookmarked the Beet Balls and Fries Salad after reading Nicole’s raving review, and felt now, during the winter, was a perfect time to whip up a salad featuring root vegetables. Read the rest of this entry »
I hope you don’t mind me sharing recipes from my newest favourite kitchen gadget. Rob bought me an Instapot and we’ve been slowly exploring it – both with the slow cooker and pressure cooker functions (I will be waiting a while to try the yogurt function unless someone can point me in the right direction for something easy). Read the rest of this entry »
It is much more obvious in these photos that I like to overstuff my wraps.
With so many different parts, I wouldn’t want each bite to miss out. Read the rest of this entry »
Aren’t vegetables just the cutest?
The purple and white fingerling potatoes, red and orange bell peppers and fresh corn were all from a recent haul from the farmer’s market. I hope you aren’t enthralled by winter squash just yet because I am happily munching through the summer bounty. Read the rest of this entry »
I hope you’ve been enjoying the recipes from Vegan al Fresco. I don’t normally share so many recipes from the same cookbook (at least at once, because we all know I love to share Tess‘ fabulous recipes).
I was immediately drawn into this recipe. Adding a chopped pickle to a potato salad seemed ingenious. Adding the pickle juice to the dressing was doubly intriguing.
A perfect make-ahead salad for my next picnic. Read the rest of this entry »
Remember that time I had a mustard tasting party? Only 18 months ago, or so… I don’t think I have bought a new mustard since and we are down to the bare minimum, guys. Depending on what I find first (mustard or mustard seeds), I may try my hand at homemade mustard. I want to try Miyoko’s recipe for Ale and Brown Sugar Mustard but don’t want it to taste like beer. If you make it (or can recommend other homemade mustard recipes), please let me know. I will await your assessment in 4 weeks. 😉
In the meantime, onwards with the potato salads. A perfect side for your summer meals.
Another winner of potato salads, this is for serious mustard fans. Rob preferred the Creamy Lemon-Dill Roasted Potato Salad but I really can’t pick a favourite, especially considering the Smoked Paprika Roasted Potato Salad. This salad is definitely heavy on the mustard, so pick a good one. The vibrant yellow is courtesy of a dash of turmeric and the dressing is more complex with the addition of Old Bay. A fun twist for yet another non-mayo potato salad. Enjoy!
PS. I am sharing this with Bookmarked Recipes.
This may very well turn out to be the summer of potatoes and mushrooms. While not everyone likes the mayo-heavy potato salads, everyone seems to like the non-mayo salads from this summer so far.
Rob said this was his favourite potato salad yet.
His Polish roots may be particularly partial to fresh dill.
The dressing is a creamy, but not heavy, lemon-tahini sauce with a touch of mustard which I tossed with salt-and-pepper roasted potatoes and fresh dill. The recipe makes a lot of dressing, which was great throughout the week to dress up some of the leftover grilled vegetables. The dressing was also great when I added in some extra chickpeas.
What is your favourite recipe for potato salad?
I am sharing this with Bookmarked Recipes and Tea Time Treats.
As Rob and I hone our BBQ hosting skills, we have divvied up the work. Rob tends to the BBQ and I work on the sides. I have never liked the stress of cooking while guests are over so I have gravitated to the make-ahead salads. And guys, this potato salad is wicked awesome. Seriously.
I took some small potatoes and roasted them with paprika (the regular stuff works – I was all out of the smoked variety) along with dried tarragon, onion and garlic granules. When they came out of the oven, Rob and I had to peel ourselves from the pan. We could have eaten the whole batch together before our guests had arrived.
In the back of my mind, I was worried about ruining the most perfect roasted potatoes by adding more dressing, but I continued with the potato salad recipe which called for a white balsamic dressing with a touch of fresh dill and marjoram. Only a touch because my plants were just seedlings. I tasted again. A bit hesitant. Fabulous. No need to worry, I stashed it in the fridge to marinade even longer. We all loved it.
This gem of a recipe comes from Joni and Celine’s latest cookbook, Complete Guide to Even More Vegan Food Substitutions. I don’t have the first of the series, Complete Guide to Vegan Food Substitutions, but this is a fabulous resource for people who want to create their own spins on vegan foods. Joni and Celine explain (with examples) how to replace meat and dairy from other recipes with the latest advances in vegan cuisine with an emphasis on whole foods based ingredients (barring aquafaba).
At the heart of the book are recipes for kitchen staples. Milk substitutes and vegan butter (different than Miyoko’s homemade vegan butter). There are countless recipes for different kinds of cheese (American Cheese, Cheese Balls, Chia Seed Cream Cheese) and even how to replace eggs in different scenarios
They explain how to replace eggs while in baking versus in a dish such as shakshouka, where the eggs are prime and centre, as well as in baking. Meat substitutes, including chicken broth powder, are included.
However, in addition to the staples, there are applications of the recipes. There are examples of how to veganized a recipe, comprehensive lists with substitutions but also recipes that have taken the guess work out of it for you. Personally, I prefer recipes that do not try to mimic dairy/meat recipes which is why I gravitated to this potato salad. Mayo-free, it is perfect just the way it is, without any substitutes at all.
Thankfully, the publisher allowed me to giveaway the cookbook to a reader living in the US or Canada. To be entered in the random draw for the book, please leave a comment below telling me what you find the hardest to make vegan. The winner will be selected at random on July 20, 2015. Good luck!
Recipes from Complete Guide to Even More Vegan Food Substitutions spotted elsewhere:
Sweet Potato and Avocado Sushi
Vegan Bánh Mi Scramble
I am sharing this with Cooking with Herbs and No Croutons Required.
This post is almost 5 years in the making. Before there were tamale and mustard tasting parties, pierogi parties have been a long tradition. One reason I became interested in cooking and blogging was to learn and share our family recipes. Hand’s down, my most popular post is How to Make Authentic German Apfelstrudel and I photographed this almost 5 years ago, wanting share our family’s favourite Ukrainian food: perogies.
This is how my family makes perogies. They are not vegan although my Dad said he might try Isa’s vegan recipe next time. I did not know I could be competitive about perogies until I was invited to a perogie party when I first met Rob. As his family is Polish, he was obviously making them differently (most notably his family uses cheese and uses butter and a special pierogi flour). I am partial to our methods and simple recipe and encourage you to follow along.
First you boil your potatoes:
Fry your bacon. Remove and drain.
Fry your onions.
Mash the potatoes with the bacon and onions. The filling can be then set aside until needed.
The dough is a simple combination of flour, eggs, a dash of oil and water. My Dad is adamant that we must roll out each pierogi dough individually, because that was how Baba did it. Rob’s technique is to roll out the entire dough and use a metal can (as a cookie cutter) for identical shapes.
In any case, we rolled them out until very thin.
And it is ok if they are not perfectly symmetrical
Put a bit of the potato mixture inside the dough
Then add some more and centre it.
Stretch the dough so it you can pull it overtop the pierogi.
Pinch the tops so it stays shut.
Work your way on one half
Until it is sealed on one side, then seal the second half.
Then go over it again to make sure it is completely sealed (exploded perogies are no good)
As you make them, place them on a towel and cover with another damp towel so they do not dry out.
When you get going, you will make a lot. This is what we had made during the second day.
Fresh perogies are best boiled and served simply with sour cream.
You can freeze them after boiling them.
If you prefer videos, this one is pretty good although slightly different than our technique.
If nothing else, I hope you like the photos of my Dad’s fingers making the perogies. I like the lighting and detail and feel it captures a lot of character.
Are there any family recipes you truly cherish?
I have another great cookbook to share with you.
Quick, healthy, vegan meals. What’s not to like?
Like The Oh She Glows Cookbook, I have been madly cooking out of Robin Robertson’s latest cookbook: More Quick-Fix Vegan.
She promises simple, delicious meals in under 30 minutes. Provided you have cooked brown rice (which takes 45 minutes to cook), she’s right! Delicious vegan cuisine need not be elaborate nor time consuming.
Take this exotic-sounding vegetable bowl: Manchurian chickpea bowl.
Manchurian cuisine is a subtype of Chinese cooking that heralds from the North-East region of China. While I am not sure how authentic it is, Gobi Manchurian may be a well-known dish. A spicy tomato sauce infused with ginger and garlic typically smother deep-fried cauliflower. In this inspired dish, cauliflower (roasted, not fried, in my case) is joined by potatoes, peas and chickpeas. I was worried the chickpeas would seem out-of-place, but they were actually very good. It seems more Indo-Chinese (or Hakka-inspired) rather than Manchurian. In any case, I can whole heartedly recommend it. Delicious. Even without choice leftovers (hello leftover roasted cauliflower), this could be pulled together within a half-hour.
I have been slowly cooking my way through the cookbook and again, had the same difficult: which recipe to share. My full reviews can be seen here, but I also highly recommend the uncanningly simple “Roasted brussels sprouts and chickpeas” which reminds me of my Easy Cheezy Chickpeas and Kale. The cookbook includes many one-dish meals including soups/stews. bowls, stir-fries, pasta, sandwiches, pantry-friendly, oven-cooked meals and even quickie desserts. I appreciate that most meals are based on whole foods and not vegan substitutes (mostly. dessert section exempted). Robin does supply recipes for some of the convenience foods including a cashew-based vegan cream cheese and tofu-based vegan mayonnaise. Having these staples pre-made expedite getting dinner to the table. Of note, Robin calls for ketchup a few times (like in this recipe), although I substituted my own convenience food: mild Turkish red pepper paste. Booyah!
Recipes from More Quick Fix Vegan shared elsewhere:
Chipotle-Sweet Potato Bisque
Chickpeas Nicoise
Kale and Black-Eyed Peas With Smoky Grits
Three-Bean Pantry Chili
Sweet Potato Barbecue Bowls
Veracruz Tacos
Banh Mi Inspired Noodles
Banh Mi Bowls
Avocado Mousse with Raspberries
Date-Pecan Bars
Mango Fried Rice Pudding
Peanut Butter and Banana Ice Cream
Blueberry Chocolate Trail Mix Bark
Thankfully, the publisher allowed me to share the recipe and giveaway the cookbook to a reader living anywhere in the world (YAYAYA!). To be entered in the random draw for the cookbook, please leave a comment below telling me about your quickest and/or easiest vegan meal. The winner will be selected at random on May 16, 2014. Good luck!
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.
PS. I am sharing this with My Legume Love Affair, hosted by Sowmya.
PPS. Do you like my purple slippers in the last photo? They were so colourful I had to keep them in. Can you tell I just blindly lift my camera to take shots from overhead? Sometimes I am way off-target. 😉
Onwards with the 30 vegetable challenge. Instead of using an abundance of vegetables in a single dish, I am focusing on possibly the most popular vegetable. A vegetable that I rarely eat at that: the humble white potato.
White potato has its critics. A high glycemic starchy vegetable that is typically consumed deep-fried or slathered in oil. I actually don’t like the taste of white potatoes, either, preferring its colourful cousin, the sweet potato. In any case, not all white potatoes are created equal and it was most apparent while we travelled in Colombia and enjoyed their local favourite: papas criollas. A small, creamy potato, perfect to eat after a simple boil, although it was also common spotted after a toss in an oiled skillet. Other small potatoes can be reasonable substitutes. I spotted these at our favourite (Mexican-flavoured) farmer’s market and brought them home to make a vegan twist on devilled eggs.
No eggs, no problem. The creamy potatoes are a fun twist for the cooked egg white base and a creamy mustard-hummus filling with a touch of black salt is very reminiscent of the real deal. Sprinkled with a touch of smoke paprika and you have an easy, pretty appetizer. If you have some mad piping skills, you could make this even more fancy.
This recipe is from the latest in the Happy Herbivore cookbook series, Happy Herbivore Light & Lean. For some reason, I have never really warmed up to Lindsay’s earlier cookbooks but this one was different. First of all the photos are gorgeous. Secondly, the recipes appeal to me more.
Her recipes, even if from previous cookbooks, have been lightened up and spruced up with bolder flavours. She has a bigger emphasis on vegetables and less reliance on ketchup and mayonnaise. More complete meals, instead of sides. All her recipes are oil-free and low-fat which I don’t necessarily advocate but did not mind trying out temporarily. Her recipes prove you do not need oil to make food flavourful but I like a bit more fat for satiety. Even if for no other reason, yes, you need some fat to absorb fat-soluble vitamins A, D, E and K.
The third part of the book includes an introduction to basic strength exercises. She includes good photographs and descriptions of each move with modifications for beginners and those who want a challenge. I like that she included another aspect of healthy lifestyles, beyond nutritious food.
First and foremost, I enjoy sharing delicious food and this cookbook delivers. These deviled eggs are only one recipe but I also recommend the garden vegetable chili, cheater pad thai noodle bowl, breakfast tacos and scrambled tofu.
Thankfully, the publisher allowed me to share the recipe (with one of the gorgeous food photos by Jackie Sobon from Vegan Yack Attack, too) AND giveaway the cookbook to a reader living in the United States or Canada. To be entered in the random draw for the cookbook, please leave a comment below telling me what you think about no-oil meals. The winner will be selected at random on April 7, 2014. Good luck!
Recipes from Happy Herbivore Light & Lean elsewhere:
Thai Crunch Salad
Caribbean Bowl
Meatloaf Bites
Chocolate Chip Cookies
Pumpkin Pancakes
Blueberry Yogurt Muffins
Breakfast Tacos
Lentil Joes (with a video)
Spinach Love Wrap
Soba Peanut Noodles
Deviled “Eggs”
Microwave Peach Cobbler
PS. This is my submission to this month’s Anyone Can Cook Fabulous Vegetarian Food.
If my weakness is beans and greens, Rob’s weakness is beer.
I may hoard and admire my (completely edible) bean collection. Likewise, Rob drinks through his beer collection. I will admit that I know very little about beer, other than I have yet to meet a beer I like. Rob has given up on getting me to sample his beers. I am pretty confident that whatever makes a beer a beer (hops?) is what I don’t like, which cannot be masked by hints of chocolate or lime or whatnot.
When we travelled to Quebec last summer, we made sure we stopped off at a beer store to stock up on beers that are not easily available in Toronto. We found a beer haven closeby, Veux-Tu Une Biere?, that had over 250 different microbrewed beers. Rob picked out beers that tasted like chocolate and raspberry, chocolate and espresso, espresso solo, coriander and orange, lime, pumpkin, juniper berries and orange peel, rye, scotch (yes, scotch beer), cognac (yes, cognac beer) and who knows what else. Without having to worry about customs, we returned with enough beer to last until our move to Houston.
Rob let me pick him one to try. He has non-mainstream tastes. His favourite beer last year was a Double Chocolate Cranberry Stout. Let’s just say my father and brother didn’t appreciate it as much as him. So while at the beer store, I tried to get Rob to buy spruce beer. Turns out you can find that one in Toronto and one of our friends thought it tasted like a forest. A no go. I ended up picking one with a demon on the front. I have classy tastes. (It also said it won a beer award). Turns out my choice was a winner (except I can’t remember what it was). Too bad Rob only bought one. He bought two of the other beers. However, not all beers were as fabulous. Which is lucky for me, because normally Rob says his beers are too good for me to use in the kitchen. They say you shouldn’t cook with a wine you won’t drink, but this is what you do with beer you don’t like. Any beer will do because you cannot taste it.
I cook with wine but don’t cook with beer because I am afraid of that “beer” taste lingering. I bookmarked this highly-praised recipe for beer-soaked fries but it wasn’t until Ellen tried it and reassured me: a) the fries were fantastic “Not sure what the beer does for the outside of the fries, but there is some marvelous alchemy going on…”, and b) you could not taste the beer, did we venture to try our hands at beer-soaked fries. Rob picked out one of his not-so-fabulous beers (a lime pale lager) and whipped up these fabulous fries.
I am not joking. These were resto-quality, crispy (baked) fries. We used a mix of white and sweet potato but I was partial to the sweet potato fries. All you do is marinade the fries for 15 minutes in the beer, then toss with garlic, oil, salt and pepper, and wait a painful 30-45 minutes as they bake. Next time, I may throw other spices on it like I have done before.
Apparently you can reheat the leftovers. I will admit, there was nothing left over. Demolished. All of it. Now to find more yucky beers.
Do you cook or bake with beer? Or just drink it?
Savoury beer uses, here and elsewhere:
Beer-Baked White Beans at The Bitten Word
Beer-Stewed Pinto Beans (Frijoles Borrachos) by Nava Atlas
Beer Hummus at Sprint 2 the Table
Smoky Chipotle Vegetarian (Beer) Chili with Parmesan-Black Pepper Beer Bread at Joanne Eats Well With Others
Belgium Beer-Bathed Seitan Stew from Vegan Eats World or Vegan Planet
Seitan Goulash with Kraut over Parsleyed Noodles from American Vegan Kitchen
Tempeh Sauerkraut Brew Stew from Vegan Appetite
Vegan Chocolate Guinness Cake from Keep It Simple Foods
This is my submission and to this month’s Simple and in Season, this month’s No Food Waste Challenge for alcohol and to this month’s Bookmarked Recipes.
I have been reading other VeganMoFoers posts this month and I am thoroughly impressed. Lots of people have themes, or an outline for specific days of the week… 31 days of unique spices. A month devoted to orange food! Or 1 food, done 5 ways x5 (cashews and kale so far!). Recipes with ingredients following the alphabet. Me, I just want to be able to post every day.
Then I thought.. 1 week in, a bit late on the theme-front, why not showcase my love of beans. So I will share with you bean dishes for the rest of the month. Get ready for your daily dose of bean! 🙂
Lately, I have been on a white bean kick. Baby lima beans, giant lima beans, flageolet beans, bring them on! Ashley thought it was amusing that my bean collection had so many of the same white beans in different containers.
Look closely, and while they are all white beans, they are definitely not the same!
While I also don’t mix different batches of beans, since they may cook at different lengths of time, all my white beans are different. In fact, I don’t have any more lima beans left and only a handful of dried flageolet beans. What I have left are Great Northern beans, white kidney beans, navy beans, Macedonian tetrovac beans and Turkish dermason beans. I am so curious as to how the latter two taste but still fall into the simplicity of the familiar!
I feel so naked now that I am out of lima beans. I used the last of the baby lima beans in this delicious quinoa corn chowder from Viva Vegan. The small, plump yet creamy baby lima beans melded well into this perfect end of summer stew-like corn chowder. Light, yet creamy with a dash of soy milk, a bit of zip from chili flakes, sweetness from the fresh corn and hearty with both the quinoa and lima beans.
It wasn’t even 6 months ago that I likely would have shunned lima beans based on my childhood disdain, but I am so glad that I made the leap to try something new. If you haven’t yet tried cooking up your own lima beans, definitely give it a go. You may never look back!
I hope my white kidney beans don’t get shunned too long… they are just so unsexy compared to its other white bean counterparts. I wonder if the dermason beans will be just as good as the lima beans? 😉
Thankfully, because if not, my pantry-substitute, Better Bulk, has baby lima beans, so the next time I have a hankering, they are right around the corner. 🙂
This is being submitted to this week’s Weekend Herb Blogging, hosted by Cinzia from Cindystar.
The fourth curry this week… I am almost getting curried out!
I have never seen Rob so excited about trying a new recipe. I was browsing through my newest favourite cookbook, For The Love of Food, and I spotted a recipe that seemingly used up a lot of the odds and ends in our fridge.
Massaman curry, have you heard of this, Rob? Would I like it?
Turns out it was his favourite curry while travelling in Thailand.
However, as we made the curry together, Rob quickly realized this wasn’t the same Massaman curry he had eaten overseas. The sauce had coconut milk, lemongrass, cardamom, cinnamon and ginger, but no peanuts. No fish sauce nor tamarind.
After slaving and salivating in the kitchen for a while, Rob felt let down when he taste-tested it the first time. The vegetables were good, but the depth of flavour was lacking. He ended up adding all of the spice mixture, as the recipe only called for a couple tablespoons of the mixture. After which, when I tasted it the second time, I told him I wouldn’t be able to eat it for dinner- it was now too spicy! Those peppercorns were likely the culprit but thankfully, it didn’t have that ominous “curry” flavour.
Since I had adored Cotter’s previous recipes, we still trucked on with making the cucumber and coriander salsa. Rob finally sat down to eat it, served with the salsa and rice, with a drizzle of freshly squeezed lime juice. The more he ate it, and accepted it as a non-Massaman curry, he grew to enjoy it.
I then decided to give it a go with the salsa and lime.
While Cotter may have misled us by calling this a Massaman curry, he also said this curry was best with the cooling salsa, and there he wasn’t lying. It definitely made the dish go from something I refused to eat, to something that was genuinely spectacular. Another Janet-sanctioned curry, this time hailing from Thailand.
I am definitely realizing that more complex dishes, where each component is outstanding on its own, can be brought to high levels when combined. The only problem is that it makes for a kitchen filled with lots of dirty dishes. Gah!
An authentic Massaman curry is still on our to-do list, though. But whatever its name, this curry is the bomb, just don’t forget the salsa!
This is my submission to this month’s Veggie/Fruit a Month, featuring cauliflower, to this month’s My Legume Love Affair, hosted by Cathy, to this month’s My Kitchen, My World destination Thailand and to Ricki’s Wellness Weekends.
the taste space 