Nirvana Enchilada Casserole

Even though Amy was away last night, I still cooked from Isa Does It.  Last night, I made Nirvana Enchilada Casserole .  And yes, I DID watch the video before I actually made this dish.

Fast forward to the results I got:  My blender did not break down the roasted cumin and coriander seeds as well as I would have liked.  And I ran low on tortillas.  Other than that, it came out fabulous.  The cashew cheese is amazing when it is baked on top of the casserole.  In fact, I think I prefer cashew cheese without the nutritional yeast in it.  When it's baked on top of something, it becomes really cheesey.  My mom complained about the seeds, but Chris really liked it.  I also changed up what went into the filling.  I did not use mushrooms, because Amy doesn't like them.  I used up some roasted vegetable I'd kept on hand, hoping to do something with them.  The filling was really delicious.

Mom and Amy do it!

We are having a fabulous ISA CHANDRA MONTH OF FOOD!!!

Saturday, I made the Roasted Red Pepper Mac and Cheese.  Tonight, we made Creamy Potato and Leek Soup AND Roasted Vegetable Romesco Sandwiches.  Man, this stuff tastes so good that it HAS to be fattening just thinking about it.  (Actually not so much, though cashews and almonds make appearances, and I used almond milk in the soup instead of water)  Amy loved the sandwiches, and amazingly enough, there is enough sauce that all we need are veggies and rolls to have this again tomorrow night.  I even have enough soup to take to work, if need be.  For breakfast, I made Chickpea Scramble and roasted potatoes which were delicious.

Amy makes salad

What do you get when you combine a bag of salad with peas, cannelloni beans and Italian dressing?   Amy's latest salad creations.  She also roasted some Brussels sprouts and tossed a few of those in there.   Looking forward to more Amy creativity in the kitchen!

(This post was saved in my drafts box, and I hadn't posted it until now.  This salad was very good, and I hope to have Amy make some more salad soon.)

Rotini in sauce with faux sausage

Amy made a delicious meal this evening.  Spaghetti sauce combined with "Don't Be Piggy" faux sausage from Wegmans, along with roasted Brussels sprouts and roasted zucchini slices.  Delicious!  And I made fast bake bread in the bread machine.  Excellent dinner.  And very simple.  All done and cleaned up.

Belated Birthday post

I almost forgot to post something about my birthday.  It was a wonderful day.  Amy gave me a little book, a copy of The Tale of Peter Rabbit, which is a favorite of mine.  Marcus gave me a Le Creuset baking dish - very very nice.  I will definitely use this!
Amy made a feast of Spaghetti For Peanuts (veganized, from Diet For A Small Planet) and roasted Brussels sprouts.  She also made a veganized Red Velvet cake.  YUM!  We had some really good eating today.

Later, Marcus took me out to dinner and we went to Tito's Diner.  I had their hummus and a veggie burger and sweet potato fries.  YUM.

All in all, it was a very fun birthday!

Black Bean Burgers

We made the Black Bean Burgers recipe from Veganomicon, the Roasted Brussels Sprouts from Vegan With A Vengeance and mashed potatoes with a secret ingredient - grated onions.  All in all, a delicious meal!  Thanks to Amy for your help and your idea for the onions in the mashed potatoes.

update - those black bean burgers are GOOD

Sweet potato and black bean stew with quinoa

I made up this recipe, because I didn't have all the ingredients for any of the recipes I looked up that involved sweet potatoes and black beans. 

First, I cooked a boatload of quinoa in my rice cooker.  Turned out pretty good, though I guess I needed to rinse the quinoa a little better.

Second, I diced and roasted two large sweet potatoes.  This was almost too much, except for the brazen sweet potato lover (me). 

In my soup/stew pot, I sautéed a diced onion and added a can of black beans (drained) and a can of diced tomatoes (with juice).  I seasoned it with a TBSP of chili powder and a tsp of cumin, as well as a dash of garlic powder.  TASTY!

I combined all these things and VOILA!  Pretty good for an improvised recipe.

The kids liked it better once they added some Sweet Baby Ray's BBQ sauce.

Roasted Sweet Potato and Black Bean Chili

Roasted Sweet Potato and Black Bean Chili

Food wishes Chef John goes vegetarian (vegan, actually, if you leave out the sour cream, or use vegan sour cream).  My husband Marcus found this recipe on teh interwebs. This is what I'm making today.  I have transcribed the recipe from the video and am posting it below.  This is definitely a good cause, and especially as a vegan, I feel that we DO have enough food to feed the world - it's terrible that children starve, when if people adopted a vegan diet, we could feed everyone.  Just my opinion.  At any rate, sign the petition.  Kids need to be fed.  And we can start, by feeding our own children good nutritious food.

Here's the website to sign the petition:  Sweet Potatoes on the menu at One.org

And now, the transcribed recipe:

Roasted Sweet Potato and Black Bean Chili

Ingredients:

2 lbs orange-fleshed sweet potatoes

1/2 tsp ground chipotle pepper, or to taste

1/2 tsp salt

2 tbsp olive oil, divided

1 onion, diced

4 cloves garlic, minced

1 red bell pepper, diced

1 jalapeno, sliced

1 tbsp cumin

2 or 3 tbsp Ancho chili powder, or other chili powders, or to taste

1/4 tsp dried oregano

1 can (28-oz) diced or crushed tomatoes

1 cup water, more as needed
1 tbsp corn meal

1 tsp salt, or to taste

1 tsp sugar

1 tsp unsweetened cocoa

2 cans (15-oz) black beans, drained, rinsed

cayenne to taste

vegan sour cream and cilantro to garnish, if desired

Peel and cube  3 sweet potatoes.  Place cubed sweet potatoes in a bowl and add salt and chipotle chili pepper and olive oil, stir to coat.  Place on baking sheet and roast for 20-25 minutes at 400ºF. 

Meanwhile,  sauté onion, red pepper and jalapeño , chili powder , cumin and oregano until onions are translucent.  Add crushed tomatoes and bring to a simmer, adding salt, sugar, water and corn meal.  While simmering, add cocoa and simmer for thirty minutes.  Stir in black beans and sweet potatoes, and keep warm until ready to eat.

Update:  This is positively delicious!  YUM YUM

Three for all

For dinner tonight we're having chickpea salad sandwiches on pita bread.  The chickpea salad is pretty simple:  1 can of chickpeas is mashed in a bowl.  Add diced onion (a whole onion for us onion lovers) about a teaspoon full of dried dill weed and Nayonnaise vegan mayonnaise along with salt and pepper to taste (I used quite a bit of pepper; love me some black pepper).  Amy has been craving chickpea salad sandwiches for ages, so she should like tonight's dinner.

Canned beans and roasted broccoli complete the meal.  And it's just that simple.  Vegan food isn't always about making complicated, difficult recipes.  Sometimes, it's just some salad and some veggies, and that's it.

I do think I will make some vegan brownies this evening.  Craving them.

Update: I made those vegan brownies - yum, yum, yum!  The kids love 'em too.  Sometimes, chocolate simply hits the spot!

Update #2:  Now that I'm thinking of it, heating up the chickpeas before mashing them makes them softer, easier to work with. 

Muffins for church

Tomorrow is the third Sunday of the month.  We have fellowship after the service, and Brian wanted us to bake something for this.  So, we are baking the Banana-Wheat Germ Muffins from Veganomicon.  This is an entirely new recipe for me, so I am eager to see how they turn out.  They are baking as I write this.  I don't want to eat any of them tonight, but I am thinking we should try them just to see if they are good.  Maybe I will have Brian try one.

The rest of today's meals were good - pancakes from Vegan With A Vengeance for breakfast.  Lunch was General Tso's Tofu at Hunan Garden.  Then for dinner I made beans and rice (Amy cooked the rice a few days ago), and Roasted Brussels Sprouts for dinner.

This morning, after I dropped off the kids at the school (it was Tag Day where they go out and get donations for the music program), I had to take my mom to the medical lab to get blood work done.  For some reason, I was really jittery.  I finally had to leave her there, and go back to her house & get Chris to go pick her up.  It was kind of scary, and I'm not sure exactly what caused it.  One other negative thing - I haven't gotten to do any more water aerobics this week.  Next week I will do better.  Amy and I are both looking forward to Monday night. 

Thanksgiving

We had a lovely Thanksgiving.  The spread wasn't as big as I originally planned.  I made gluten-free pumpkin bread, which was very crumbly.  We also had gado-gado, rice noodles, Brussels sprouts (the only thing that didn't turn out all that well; they needed to be roasted a bit longer and at a higher temperature), broccoli, a shepherd's pie, and Alison brought a ham roast for the omnivores (truthfully, it did NOT look tempting; she didn't like it very much).   

Learning point for gluten-free cooking:  When baking using gluten-free flour, you need more moisture in the mixture.  Now one suggestion is upping the oil, but that is way too much fat.  As it is, the recipe for the pumpkin bread called for an entire CUP of vegetable oil.  Perhaps sub applesauce or something like that?


Later in the day, Alison's Aunt Susan Spillane came to visit; I had not seen her in a number of years, and it was wonderful to catch up and take some pictures with the family.  My kids are growing up.

Attitude of Gratitude

After my rather apocalyptic dream last night, I'm glad to awaken to life the way it is.  I dreamed we were attacked, and that there was impending death and destruction.  I'm truly grateful that this was only a dream.  Despite the fact that we will do a fair share of cooking tonight and tomorrow, it is still good to sit down at table and give thanks for all we have. I guess I'm just a bit nervous about my first vegan Thanksgiving.  We're having a brunch in the middle of the day, rather than an extensive evening meal, since my daughter and her husband are committed to going to his aunt's house for dinner. 

Now, the menu:  First of all, gado-gado.  Amy insisted upon this.  It's virtually her favorite thing we make at home.  So that means LOTS of roasted vegetables of all kinds.  And pasta.  Maybe even some rice, but I doubt it.  AND pumpkin muffins.  AND pumpkin bread.  I might make some spaghetti for peanuts as well, since now I know I can veganize it.  And since one of our family members has celiac disease, everything will ALSO be gluten free.  Yes, and a vegan shepherd's pie.  AND herb biscuits (using the recipe in Vegan Brunch) with Navy Bean Gravy (I believe that is in Vegan Brunch also).  We also found a recipe for Southwestern Corn Pudding in VB, so I will try that.  We've made pretty much everything before, except for the last three items, so it is just a matter of doing all the work.  We will be busy.

UPDATE:  I am also hoping to make the cinnamon rolls from VB, but I don't know if I will have the time.  I will have to make them at home, so if I DO make them, I will have to wake up REALLY early in the AM.

Crash Hot Potatoes redux

http://veganyumyum.com/2009/01/crash-hot-potatoes/  I've made these once before, but tonight I'm trying them on with paprika and thyme.  Sides include vegan baked beans and roasted broccoli.  I suppose it helps that I made eight potatoes AND I am ravenously hungry.