Secret ingredients

Last night I busted out the secret ingredients option for dinner. I was making a fairly standard stir-fry (with seitan which is exciting for us) but generally the normal list of veggies and rice. I was really feeling like I needed to do something else to make it exciting. So I went for a secret ingredient, which is not really secret when you taste or look at the dish. I added chopped roasted almonds. It totally took it to the next level of interest in texture and flavor. And so simple: I roasted them in a little cast iron pan while I was making the rest of the stir-fry. By the time it was done so were they. I roughly chopped them up and tossed with everything else. I seriously need to remember to do this more often so that I don't get so bored with meals. This was a simple easy thing and it made all the difference.



Monday after camping we ate pasta at a restaurant which wasn't as good as it could have been. And Tuesday night we had my favorite meal of corn tortillas with rice, pinto beans, and stir-fried veggies.



Tonight was broccoli-miso soup with garlicky kale and whole wheat walnut bread.

Camp

A special edition: the camping trip!

We went camping this weekend and traveled to a land outside our weather pattern. We also did pretty well with our food during the trip. We hiked in (ok, only about 3.5 miles) to the backcountry of Henry Coe State Park. But we carried all our food and ate well, even considering that I forgot to bring certain unalienable items, like roasted almonds for our breakfast cereal.

We did eat before we left town so let me catch up. Thursday night was my favorite instant dinner: "refried" pinto beans with miso over rice, with salad mix, shredded carrot, and avocado. Served with chips. I could seriously eat like this almost every night and not have any problems. I think growing up eating Taco Bell did me no favors.





Friday night was a barley lentil soup with rutabaga and carrot. Served with a side of purple broccoli rabe. Saturday night was, lo and behold, the same soup only this time with a side of regular green broccoli and some lovely Acme rye bread.



Sunday night was camping night. We've determined (after much trial and error) that pasta does not work so well when camping. It takes a lot of water and there's the whole straining issue. So for recent trips, including this one, we took polenta. It cooks quickly and doesn't require a lot of water. Probably an even better choice would be quinoa. It cooks super fast, takes almost no water, and is a complete protein. For this dinner we had polenta with some broccoli and garlic thrown in and a little bit of miso for flavor. We also added some packaged baked tofu (which we could only do because it was just one night) and ate it with sauerkraut.



Breakfast was a little less fun because I'd forgotten the almonds. We made our usual breakfast cereal but next time we'll probably add some maple syrup granules to the mix for flavor. This time we ate it with sauerkraut (because- well, why not?) For lunches we had mini whole wheat pitas with a (pre-mixed) almond butter/ jelly combo. We've decided pitas are better than regular bread due to the squish factor. We should have brought some baby carrots and some more fruit (we had a small thing of blackberries) as those things would have helped us get more vegetables as well as water (since I was afraid we would run out).



So, in conclusion, everyone should try vegan backcountry camping. More fun than hand-blended margaritas.

Baby bok, baby bok, baby bok choy

It's a bok choy kind of week. It's shown up in almost everything, including our regular breakfast greens (usually they are collards). Monday was baby bok choy, stir-fried with carrots and snap peas. Served with roasted sweet potatoes and broccoli (tossed with an amazing soy sauce/ lemon/ sesame dressing) and brown rice with lentils.





Tuesday night a spicy curried cauliflower and potato soup with the leftover rice and lentils. Served with broiled asparagus and garlic.



Wednesday: Baby bok choy! Stir-fried with carrots, snap peas, and tempeh and served over rice.

Hot, Hotter, Hottest

Now that I'm back from my travels I thought I'd want to cook more. But it's been a surprisingly hot week so I tried to avoid actual heat sources. Instead I made a salad. Or ate take-out or leftovers.



Tuesday night we were sort of starved for greens. We made red cabbage and green chard tossed with toasted sesame seeds. Served with roasted root veggies (rutabagas, carrots, sweet potatoes, and red onions) and rice and lentils.





Wednesday night is usually pasta night but I was working late so while I didn't have time to go to yoga I did have time to make dinner. I made tempeh with cabbage, chard and carrots. Broiled asparagus with garlic, served with soba noodles.



Thursday we went to see the Dead and mostly ate leftovers and PB&Js. Oh, and garlic fries. Yum!

Friday it was too hot to cook or really to eat. We snacked on hummus but never made dinner.

Saturday we made a salad since it was still too hot. Lovely salad greens from the farmer's market plus avocado, snap peas, grated carrots, smoked tofu, and roasted sunflower seeds.

Home cooking

I didn't think we'd end up cooking while in MN but we did quite well. We made one dinner and a lovely brunch while surviving restaurants that had no vegetarian options whatsoever.

Friday night we made baked tofu from the Millennium cookbook, blackened asparagus made in the broiler, a German red cabbage and apple dish, and a kale and carrots stir-fry served with brown basmati rice.



Saturday night we ate at a local Italian restaurant that had a delicious dish of roasted brussel sprouts with local honey. Some people in our party thought it was too sweet but I thought it was worth considering. Sunday was at a fancy fish/meat restaurant. I managed to get one that at least came with vegetables. I'm not sure what people would do if they ate at places like that all the time.

Sunday for brunch we recreated our classic vegan pancakes with tofu scramble, tempeh bacon and fresh strawberries and raspberries.



After that it was mini-bags of salty peanuts and a late night burrito in the city of fog.

Preparation

I thought I'd do a quick update before we leave for MN and probably a lot of takeout food. Monday I made my first official recipe from Veganomicon. Sesame bok choy with crispy shallots. It was quite good. Served with roasted potatoes and broccoli and our traditional rice and lentils. Oh, and an exciting wakame and sunflower seeds salad. It's been a while since we made one of those and it was so worth it.



Tuesday was a leftover soup. That's not soup that's leftover but a soup made out of leftovers. It was mostly carrots, a little rutabaga, and the final remains of the rice and lentils, the roasted potatoes, and the delicious wakame and sunflower seed salad. As far as a soup-made-out-of-leftovers goes it was good. I didn't like the consistency of the carrots because these were a weird farmer's marker heirloom variety but Dandelion the Bitter Green didn't see anything wrong with it. And it was fine the next day with a bit of salad greens and some mochi (the kind you bake in the oven).



I also made granola last night. It's the best granola recipe ever, not too sweet and you can put whatever you like it. When Dandelion the Bitter Green goes on tour he takes it with and it's quite popular with the band mates. (Not as popular as the vegan rice krispie treats, but that's for another post.) I'll include the recipe below since it's based on one from a 70s macro cookbook but it's so revised now by me that I would consider this my version. And tonight is pizza before we get on the plane. I think we'll be happy to have the granola with us (and probably the rest of the pizza too.)



Best Granola in the World
3 cups oats
1 cup almonds
1 cup walnuts (broken into small pieces)
1/4 cup whole wheat pastry flour
1/4 cup sunflower seeds
1/4 cup coconut
1/4 cup (or more) cashews
1/2 cup brown rice syrup
1/3 cup oil
dash of vanilla
pinch of salt

Mix all the ingredients together until everything is coated. Spread out on a cookie sheet and bake at 300 or 325. (Note: I tried a higher temperature this time because I was using the oven for something else at the same time and the granola burned. Don't do that.) You'll have to stir it every ten minutes or so for about an hour, until it stops being so sticky and starts feeling like granola. Once it's cool you can add raisins and such if you like that kind of thing.

Asparagus choy

It's been a while, mostly because I've been eating take out. In between that though I have been making some amazing meals, particularly with asparagus. I've also noticed that I become obsessed with certain vegetables for a while and then after making many dishes with said vegetable I again forget that it ever existed. I'm feeling that way (in the manic part of it) about asparagus right now. I used to feel that way about brussel sprouts.


Last Tuesday we made a quinoa with chickpeas for a fast salad. Then a stir-fry of baby bok choy and carrots.



Wednesday was broccoli with tofu and these crazy yellow carrots I got at the farmer's market. Served over soba noodles.

Thursday was leftover soup and Friday was Thai take out.



Saturday I went nuts with the asparagus. I wanted to do some kind of asparagus and mushroom dish but at the same time I wanted to broil the asparagus like I had last week. So I ended up making a mushroom and kale dish separately. I broiled the asparagus with garlic as before. Then I also made some red potato and sweet potato baked chips. Served over rice and lentils.


Sunday: one meal to rule them all.