Sometimes recipes just call to me, like the Hot Tamale Pie from Bianca’s amazing Southern cookbook Cookin’ Crunk.  Check out her Vegan Crunk blog for lots of awesome recipes.

Spicy and savory, this hot dish is perfectly warming on a cold winter’s day.  Side of salsa with fresh cashew sour cream and a little green tobasco.  Yum!

Here it is right out of the oven.  It’ll be perfect for the next office pot luck!

Easy meaty pasta sauce made with bulgur wheat.  This whole grain power house is not just for hippies anymore.  Satisfying meal ready in 20 minutes.  Bulgur was suggested as a meaty substitute by a friend when I was making chili last summer, so I bought some and figured it was time I finally used it.

I recently discovered a great way to make to go cups out of mason jars.  Cuppow!  The lid screws on with the regular mason jar rings.  These lids are also fantastic for  delivering a sprinkle of sesame seeds.  I mixed the tan and black ones together.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays everyone!

Vegan Boursin that is.

Miyoko Schinner’s Artisan Vegan Cheese is an interesting new challenge for making vegan cheeses at home.  Most of the basic types are derrived from a cashew cheese which includes rejuvelac.  Rejuvelac is produced by soaking sprouted grains in water for a few days.  The result is a sourish liquid that can be used as a cheese starter.

My husband accidentally took a sip from a mason jar in the fridge thinking it was lemonade and was not pleased.  However, I like a good fermented drink, so it’s weird, but in a good way like Kombucha.  Apparently it’s good for you on it’s own.  Probiotics and stuff.

I’m not going to repost the recipe, but if you want to test it out, the rejuvelac, cashew cheese, and boursin are included in the book preview on Amazon.

It’s pretty true to form.  Nice consistency and good flavor balance.  Enjoy with some crusty French bread and your favorite wine.  Perfect for a Les Miserables party.  Tastes like France.

If there isn’t pent up sibling rivalry over Thanksgiving then what’s the point?  My fancy chef brother Travis – of Spoons Bistro* in Victor Idaho nestled in the Grand Tetons near Jackson Hole Wyoming – is not a fan of quinoa.  His argument is basically: Why bother with quinoa; I’d rather make risotto.  Point taken, but despite having a nice bag of organic quinoa sitting unopened and lost in my pantry for probably about a year, I felt the need to defend this little grain, because I actually like it.

I tried quinoa long before it was popularized by the gluten-freeists.  It’s ridiculously easy to cook, just add water at a 2:1 water to quinoa ratio, boil, then cover and simmer 10 minutes.

I just got back from vacation in the aforementioned Jackson Hole area and I haven’t gone shopping yet, so I decided to tap into the five day meal box I have on have hand for emergencies thanks to Vegan Unplugged.   There’s a lovely recipe for a Quick Quinoa Pilaf that was the base for the dish.  I had a few Thanksgivingy looking acorn squashes that were also begging to be stuffed with something.  I recently had a similar type stuffed squash shepherds pie kind of dish at a meet-up at Sweetgrass Grille in Tarrytown for Meatless Monday with blogger friends JL and Jodie.

Kind of a side dish**, but excellent as a meal in itself.  Quinoa stuffed squash fit the post thanksgiving craving and reminded me that I do like quinoa for more than just argument’s sake.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Quinoa stuffed acorn squash

1 acorn squash, sliced in half, seeds removed and roasted about 45 minutes at 350 degrees.

1 cup quinoa
2 cups water
2 tsp bullion
1 tsp onion powder
1 can carrots; drained – or obviously cooked carrots
1 can peas; drained – see above obvious note
1/4 cup shelled sunflower seeds
1 TBS dried parsley
salt and pepper to taste

Toast quinoa in dry hot saucepan for a minute or two.  Add 2 cups water, bullion, and onion powder.  Boil, then cover and simmer for 10 minutes.  Add carrots, peas, sunflower seeds, and parsley.

Scoop out most of the flesh from the cooked and cooled squash halves, leaving the skin shells intact, give it a rough chop, and add to the quinoa.  Season the quinoa mixture to taste with salt and pepper.***

Add quinoa mixture back to the squash halves and warm in the oven at 350 degrees for 10 minutes or until ready to serve.
 
Enjoy!

If you know who Sandy is and you don’t have a copy of Jon Robertson’s Vegan Unplugged and a 5 day pantry stash, well, then you’d better make some plans to evacuate on over to my house.

Keep the book with your pantry stash.  This is one instance where I recommend a real book over an e-book.  Not so helpful if your battery has run dry…

But to keep you entertained while you’re still charged, check out Jon’s novel Permelia Lyttle’s Guide to the End of the World.  I won’t dish any spoilers, just read it already.

And don’t forget, animals need a plan, too!  Gary the cat’s emergency pet preparations.

Right now despite it not even being stormy yet, I’m in the “using up fresh stuff I have” phase.  However, I’m prepared to be off the grid and will probably cook some emergency grub even if we don’t lose power.  I had a lot of fun cooking unplugged during Irene last year where I didn’t even lose cable.  Here’s a sample.  Hit the links for the original blog posts…

White Beans and Greens Soup

Pasta with Creamy Pumpkin Walnut Sauce

Layered Tortilla Skillet

 Last Resort Lasagna

Stay safe everyone!

There’s just no way around it.  I’m a lazy MoFo.  Here’s tonight’s random vegetables over rice in a totally improvised sauce.  Looks like a big ole’ brown mess in the middle, but there’s onion, green pepper, garlic, eggplant, mushroom, roasted turnip, and roasted sweet potato.  It’s topped with natto, avocado, and black sesame seeds.  

Pretty photo it’s not.  But delicious it is.  – Yoda

Natto is one of the weirder Japanese ingredients.  It’s fermented soy beans in a soy mustard sauce.  Sometimes the sauce has seashells and stuff in it, so if it does, just discard and substitute with soy sauce.

Rice with random vegetables

1 cup short grain rice
1 cup water

1 sweet onion minced
1 green pepper minced
2 cloves garlic minced
1 small eggplant cubed
1 portabella mushroom cubed
2 turnips cubed roasted
1 sweet potato cubed roasted

1/4 cup dry white wine or saki
1 TBS thai curry paste (red or green)
Soy sauce
1/4 cup tahini

Cook rice in rice cooker (because rice cookers are awesome)

Saute onion, pepper, garlic until browned.  Add eggplant, mushroom, turnip, and sweet potato, (mine were already roasted, so if raw just add water and extra time until they are cooked) add wine, curry paste, soy sauce, and tahini and heat through.

Serve over rice.  Add natto, avocado, and black sesame seeds.