Friday, March 26, 2010

Boston

I fell in love with Boston because of the beautiful brownstones, the parks, the walking, ok, it was really the ducks. (This is Make Way for Ducklings.)



I didn't have to do too many meal planning activities myself while there. My lovely coworkers very considerately included restaurants that had at least one veggie option. The most frequent breakfast option (which I did find myself) was a tofu scramble. The Otherside Cafe was awesome and I'm sad I never went there for beer since they had a great list.

Here was breakfast one morning at the Otherside Cafe. A southwest tofu scramble:


We ate a seafood restaurant one night. This is what my coworker ate:


And surprisingly this is what I ate at the same restaurant. A Thai-style tofu dish with rice and veggies.


Another tofu scramble, this time with broccoli, mushrooms, and Havarti cheese at the Trident Cafe. (Loved having an indie bookstore that also had delicious food!)



This was a dinner from a more Asian-style place. Rice, tofu, veggies, and sauce.



A breakfast of oatmeal and fresh fruit plus potatoes at my hotel. Sadly I again had to learn the lesson that fruit out of season is not worth eating.



And one night I ate an Indian restaurant: rice, cauliflower and chickpeas, and lots of roti (whole wheat naan).



Happy to be back in California, even with this beautiful city to visit!

Thursday, March 18, 2010

The Inbetween

This is the week inbetween travels. I was in Chicago last week and I leave for Boston tomorrow. So while I was home I tried to cook as much as possible to have that home-cooked feeling last as long as possible.

On Wednesday last week, I made sourdough buttermilk biscuits. I love sourdough and since we had missed several pancake opportunities lately the sourdough had not been getting as much attention as it might like. With the biscuits I made a mushroom gravy and roasted cauliflower, asparagus and tofu. Note to self: Don't try making a new recipe like the mushroom gravy on a school night. It took forever to thicken, regardless of the "5 minutes" the cookbook claimed it would take. Veganomicon fail. (It did however taste great.)



On Thursday we used the rest of the cheese sauce (Veganomicon success!) to make another round of mac and cheese with a side of sauted broccoli, greens, and tofu.



On Friday Dandelion the Bitter Green made a butternut squash and sage soup, served with buckwheat.



Saturday night was leftovers because Dandelion the Bitter Green had a show at Grace Cathedral(!) which started early.

Sunday was taco night. I made rice, pinto beans, and a stir-fry of veggies tossed in the leftover mushroom gravy, served in the most awesome sprouted corn tortillas. (No, I did not make them. Still working on that recipe.)



Monday was a risotto of rice, tofu, carrots, and broccoli. This was flavored with white miso, an easy and ghetto way to thicken and "cheese-ify" dishes.



On Tuesday I made a two bean roulade with carrots and greens, served on rice. A roulade is a thick stew or a chunky sauce. Using two cans of beans (pinto and navy) it was a fast and quite tasty dish. We have a lot of sage so this dish was also flavored with sage and oregano.



Wednesday night I had to use as much beautiful fresh farmers market produce as I could. I steamed some asparagus and carrots and then tossed them with olive oil and lemon. Then I made a dish of braising greens (kale, chard, collards) with crispy tofu all served over pasta.





Tonight we had pizza-- the best pre-planned frozen thing I've made so far. A few weeks ago I made pizza dough. One batch is enough for two pizzas so I froze half the dough and tonight we had a delicious caramelized red onion and braised greens with roasted cauliflower, walnuts, and a tiny bit of manchego cheese.

Thursday, March 11, 2010

Is Chicago. Is Not Chicago

As you might guess I was in Chicago last weekend for work. I survived the land of steak houses without even eating a veggie burger! Admittedly I was only there for 3 days.



I like to travel with lots of food in case I can't find anything decent to eat, which was the case at the beginning of this trip. I made three hummus and tofu sandwiches which got me through the flight and into the hotel. I also brought a trail mix (I didn't make it but did mix it myself. I simply bought an unsalted nut mix from the farmer's market and added a handful or more of a raisin medley I love.) I also had Lara bars, a tangerine, and some dried fruit. This all came in handy when I arrived with a splitting headache and discovered that my coworker I had planned to eat dinner with was actually in a different hotel.



Day 1: Wandering around aimlessly and ending up eating at a Mexican fast food joint. I got veggie tacos with corn tortillas as they seemed the least offensive. I also went to a grocery store and bought chips, hummus, and fig newtons. Snack accumulation: success.



Day 2 breakfast and lunch: The hotel served breakfast and while I think I was the only person who ate the oatmeal I went for it. They had fresh blueberries but after the first day I didn't bother. Note to self: If blueberries are not in season don't eat them. I also ate potatoes and a small scoop of scrambled eggs. For lunch I had more of a break so went for a long walk. I found a food court in a mall that I'd been to before and got a make-your-own salad. I included chickpeas, cranberries, and as much broccoli as I thought could fit.

Day 2 dinner: I went to the best restaurant I've been to in Chicago, at least for vegans or vegetarians: Green Zebra, a high end gourmet place serving tapas style veg food. I ordered a baby leaf salad with long thin slivers of raw vegetables like carrots and jicama. Then I had roasted shiitake mushrooms rolled up like sushi with crispy thinly sliced potatoes as the outside wrapper. Then my final dish was udon noodles in a spicy sweet and sour sauce. I also had to try the dark chocolate hazelnut brittle.









Day 3 Breakfast and Lunch: Breakfast was the same, though I got up later and felt like it wasn't as good. That's what I get for waiting til the end of the free food time period. Lunch that day was served in the exhibit hall so I ate a roasted veggie wrap with a spinach tortilla and feta cheese, plus a bag of potato chips and an apple.

Day 3 Dinner: I hit up the highly recommended Chicago Diner for another vegan meal. Sadly I chose the most boring thing on their menu. (I think I was craving brown rice.) It was brown rice with steamed veggies, fried tofu, and spicy black beans. When they asked if I wanted a sauce, I should have said yes.



Day 4 Breakfast: Same, same, same. Lunch? Not really. Or at least not until I made it to the airport at 3 in the afternoon. I celebrated by having a pizza and a beer. The pizza was only ok but it did come with broccoli on it which was what really mattered.

Thursday, March 4, 2010

Pro

I was not thinking "pro" as in "professional". I was also not thinking "pro" as in "probiotic". (I'm actually tired of having living things in my food and that's saying a lot coming from the girl who drinks homemade kombucha and eats soy yogurt as a snack.) I was thinking "pro" as in "pro-active". This week I pro-actively prepared sauces and basic ingredients for a dinner that I would make the next night. The result: Mac and cheese! Pizza!

Monday I made broiled tofu, cheese sauce, roasted veggies, and polenta squares. The cheese sauce was used the next day for...



Mac and cheese! Pasta with crumbled tempeh, cheese sauce, and a side of greens. I can not reveal the secret ingredients in the cheese sauce except that it involved nutritional yeast, lemon juice, and mustard. The recipe is from Veganomicon.



And the next night was leftover mac and cheese! With a slightly different dish of side veggies.



Then we ate Thai food take out while I did laundry. BUT I proactively made pizza dough that we used tonight to make a pizza with caramelized onions and garlic, roasted broccoli, and navy beans.



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Recipe: Caramelized Onions

1 large onion, cut into thin slivers
2-3 cloves of garlic
olive oil
soy sauce
stock (or water)
Dash of sugar (optional)

Heat up a large cast iron pan with a little bit of olive oil. Add the onions and saute until brown. Add the garlic halfway to two-thirds of the way through. Add soy sauce and stock and a sprinkling of sugar if you want. Or you can use what we did which is sugared stock (because we had sugared tea for the kombucha and I thought it was stock and added more stock to it. It's great for collards or something like this.) Stir occasionally to keep the onions from sticking to the bottom of the pan. The heat should be high enough that they cook but low enough that they don't burn. The goal is melty juicy onion bits with lots of sauce. If you need to add more water or stock you can, just make sure you don't drown them in liquid. It needs only enough to cover the bottom of the pan. If you add more just turn up the heat or cook them longer.