speedy vegan?

I was originally going to title the post "Speed Vegan" but I didn't want it to be confused with the cookbook by the same name.  Although I sure would enjoy the SEO hits that may result from such a clever title, I don't want to be the cause of all the disappointment people would feel upon discovering this was not an associated blog.

However, I do want to share with you one of my cookbook gems: Vegetarian Times Fast and Easy.  This is a pretty good book - a lot of recipes are surprisingly tasty.  That truly was not intended to be the backhanded compliment it looks like.  What I mean is that some of the recipes combine bizarre (and sometimes difficult-to-find) ingredients but it always comes out well.  Other recipes you can look at and just know they'll be great.  I enjoy the first kind - I love being surprised by dinner.  This is actually pretty funny, considering what a picky eater I was as a child and how I hated to "try new things."

A few nights ago, I made one of the latter - an old, faithful standby, Tuscan Vegetable Ragout.

It's an incredible melange of crunchy, creamy, squishy, and squeaky.  Squeaky?  Well, yes - haven't you ever noticed how sometimes artichoke hearts make a squeaky sound?  You'll notice now.

Anyway, there are general ingredients - white beans, tomatoes, zucchini, artichoke hearts - which make up the standard Italian cuisine base, wouldn't you say?  Then there are embellishments, just like a good opera. [If I could take a brief detour: through my adolescence, I was trained as a classical vocalist.  One of my favorite things about Italian music was the Aria - the purpose of an aria is to showcase the ethereal voice and undeniable talent of, normally, a soprano.  As luck would have it, that was the part I sang.  The structure of an aria is similar to a canon in instrumental music - you start with a simple theme, but then to "show off" you sing through the exact same tune a second time but with wild - yet tasteful and perfectly articulated - ornamentation.  I am not saying that I fulfilled all the lovely descriptions I just gave of the Diva, but I did adore singing the second round of an aria.]

In Tuscan Vegetable Ragout, the ornaments take the form of cubed smoked tofu, sliced kalamata olives, and occasionally small pasta.  I skipped the pasta this time around because I felt like the menu was already quite noodle-heavy, so I served it on brown basmati instead.

The flavors of the various parts combine into a mouthful that is at once sweet (from the artichokes and tofu) and a bit savory (from the tomato-drenched beans and zucchini) with the satisfying crunch of zucchini combined with the smoothness of creamy cannellini beans.  There is nothing outstanding about this dish other than how perfectly its parts come together to make a whole.

Tonight's dinner, on the other hand, was quite outstanding, flavor-wise.  Tonight I made Singapore-Style Noodles with All That Other Stuff.  I nearly forgot how stirfries worked, which is amusing to me as they were all I did know how to do before I learned to cook.

I have gotten so used to chop-as-you-cook recipes that when I know I'm making a time-saver, I tend to automatically go to that.  You cannot pull of a successful stirfry this way.  No, fortunately, I remembered just in time that you really do need to prep all of the ingredients before you heat the oil.

This required 4 prep bowls, 2 knives, 2 measuring spoons, 2 measuring cups, and 1 whisk to accomplish, but I did pull it off and the result was terrific.  Love at first bite for Mister.

Me?  Well, it bit me.  Does it look tasty?  It totally is.  Does it look spicy?  It definitely is.  Furthermore, it's that sneaky spicy that doesn't hit you at first and then all of a sudden you're like "holy cow, my mouth is on fire!"  This should have been obvious as I was whisking nearly a tablespoon of curry powder and a teaspoon of harissa into the sauce, but it wasn't really.  I'm still stupidly brave about both of those ingredients and continue to forget how much harissa especially likes to kick me in the throat halfway through my meal.

It was absolutely worth it, though - I could only handle one bowl.  Mister had plenty of time to plow enthusiastically through two bowls while making mean jokes about dinner eating me.  He also had a good laugh as I tried to cool my burning tongue and lips by unwrapping the last Li'l Dreamer and pressing it to my tongue, which was sticking out through my lips.

Hey, ya know what?  I may have looked like a doofus, but it worked.  And it was delicious.

did you miss that?

Pardon me - does anyone know where I might find the forest?  All I can see are all these trees...

Last night I got an amusing message from a friend I used to work with.  Having [presumably] read my posts about Skinny Bitch, he decided to pick up a copy and see what it was all about.  I think it would be fair to say it changed his life, since the purpose of him contacting me was to get help on starting his journey away from eating animals.  I wrote him back a short novel and he responded quickly to thank me for being the first person to be happy for him making such a change.  Part of the transformation he is affecting helped him to quit smoking cigarettes and people are universally happy about that, but he is meeting with the same resistance I've encountered for the past eight years.  He expressed appropriate horror that people are missing the "bigger picture" because eating animals is so socially acceptable that no one wants to know what goes on behind the scenes.

Another friend, rich in compassion, has been posting impassioned pleas for awareness and action on behalf of dogs being bred solely to die for human consumption in Korea.  Sound familiar?

No one wants to think like that though, but really - in our country, we have set aside these animals to eat and these animals to keep as companions.  In other countries, they do the same, but that doesn't mean we all choose the same animals.  In a culture where a cow is held up as sacred, they would have the same livid response to our consumption of cows - one of horror and disgust that anyone would think it's okay to eat this animal.  Whether it's cows or canines shouldn't be the issue as much as the factory farming that exploits and destroys them both.

On that happy note... I've discovered yet another weapon in the war on dairy!

For reasons I don't know, the Dream team does not have any information available on the website for their almond milk-based frozen desserts.  Fortunately, I have a relatively sharp camera and an even sharper tongue.  This creamy, sweet, all-around delightful ice cream analog found a welcoming seat on that same tongue.  With only 140 calories a serving and devoid of dairy, this sweet treat is welcome there anytime.  If you blindfolded my husband (BIG ice cream fan, who has dragged me on multiple mid-winter midnight ice cream runs) and fed him a spoonful of Haagen-Dazs, one of Ben & Jerry's, and one of Almond Dream, I promise you, he would pick the wrong one to be the non-dairy dessert - it is so close that it even has that bizarre aftertaste that usually accompanies "real" ice cream.

With 140 calories per 1/2 cup serving, it is competing with Tempt for a favorite low-cal treat to keep around - Sometimes Treats are even better when the Sometimes can be closer together!  There are 7g of good fats (poly- and mono-unsaturated) and 0 Saturated or Trans fats.  There is also no cholesterol, which seems to be a growing problem among my age-peers and I think that is tragic.  The ingredient list is also short and sweet.  I used to be super-obsessed with labels, refusing to buy things with too many calories or too much fat.  If you've been paying attention, you know that kind of behavior can lead to all kinds of trouble, consorting with the devils of artificial sweetening and chemically engineered fat substitutes.  Since reading Skinny Bitch (will I ever get tired of promoting that book?  I don't know.), I recently realized that I don't look at the nutritional facts until I've read the ingredients, and sometimes, I just don't even bother if I'm happy with the ingredients.  My waistline has not yet punished me.

In case you're wondering, last night's dinner was Black-Bottom Pineapple Tofu with Coconut Cashew Rice from Vegetarian Times: Fast and Easy.

In case you're wondering, it was wonderful.  Now if you'll excuse me, I have some forest to find.  Do you think it's behind those trees there?