sweet and simple success

So, despite last night's relative failure (not really, but it didn't live up to my hopeless perfectionism, so...) I strapped on my holiday-appropriate red-n-white striped apron again.  I guess it's kind of like getting right back in the saddle after being thrown?

Well, maybe not as painful, although you may find it painful to observe my "clashing" stripes.  By pure lucky coincidence, I happened to be wearing horizontally-striped socks and I thought it was a funny combination with the vertical stripes of the apron.  If you disagree, remember what your mother taught you about what to do if you don't have anything nice to say.

I have plenty of nice things to say tonight - we'll start with the cookies.

My first "nice" statement is to point out how lucky my colleagues are that I am a woman of my word (and that by telling them I was baking I created built-in accountability).  Mister and I each had one small cookie to test their quality and were completely impressed.

In addition to being attractive on the outside, these cookies are "charming and delightful" and a pleasure to be around.  I do not expect them to last very long tomorrow - they are just the right amount of sweet, aided, in part, by the cinnamon sugar in which I rolled them before plunking them down on the baking sheets.  However, the generous amount of Earth Balance that began the batter contributed to an incredibly buttery taste and texture - you could liken these to a combination of those Dutch butter cookies so much like shortbread, and honest to goodness sugar cookies.

They are, in a way, sugar cookies - The recipe, filched gracefully from realsimple.com is for Brown Sugar Drop Cookies but my increasingly OCD self couldn't deal with the ugly little deposits of dough on the sheets, so I rolled them into buttery little balls and then dunked them into cinnamon sugar before pressing the down a little onto the sheet.

Time to pack them up! Before Mister and I eat them all...

happy smells like toasted coconut and lime

Earlier today, before I started preparing dinner, I had a strange, out-of-the-blue hankering for cookies.  It was so unlike me that when I told Mister I wanted a cookie, he was truly surprised and had to repeat me: "You want a cookie?"  We then had a conversation about the pros and cons of going out to buy cookies versus me making cookies (all kinds of unnecessary, weird crap in the ingredients vs. big messy kitchen right before dinner).  When I started pulling together dinner ingredients, I noticed I did not have the coconut milk I thought I had until I had a memory flashback to the empty shelf at Superfresh.  So....since I had to stop by Essene for that crucial ingredient (otherwise the Coconut Rice would just be.....Rice, which is not terribly interesting), I picked up some organic, special, not-gonna-kill-ya cookies and felt that was a reasonable middle ground.

The problem starts here, though: before I went over to Essene, I made the marinade for tonight's Jerk Seitan from Vegan With A Vengeance so it could start its hour of marinating time while I went to the store. As I combined the dozen ingredients in a spouted measuring cup that I would use to pour the marinade evenly over the seitan (which was carefully placed in real Gladware this time around... it only takes once for me to learn my lesson), the amazing scent of the two fresh limes I juiced attached to my skin and smelled better than my Mediterranean Fig perfume.  Once everything was all mixed together, the most amazing scent filled my kitchen, thereby shoving out any real desire to eat cookies.  Or anything that was not Jerk Seitan on Coconut Rice for that matter.

The coconut rice has two layers to it, which I hope I've captured with this image - the first "layer" involves cooking Basmati or Jasmine rice in a water + coconut milk + cinnamon mixture which is divine all by itself.  The second layer, however, really cements this rice as more than just a side dish or meal base.  What you see unceremoniously dumped sprinkled gracefully on top is a 1/2 cup of toasted coconut flakes.  Do you know that almost nothing smells better than coconut toasting on your stovetop?

Well... ask me again in October/December and I may have a different answer, usually involving chocolate and my oven or ginger+molasses and my oven, but you know what I mean.  The best part is how the scent lingers in the air even now, even after a thorough searing of the peppers and seitan with leftover marinade.

That looks delicious.  However, I promise you, the picture does not do it justice.  For one thing, you will never understand how amazingly flavorful and tasty this dish is until you go out, buy VwaV and make it (just be sure you won't be sharing with more than one other person or you're going to have to double the recipe).  For another thing, although the marinated seitan and perfectly pan-seared green peppers are unbelievably tasty all by themselves, the level of flavor satisfaction you will reach when you eat these jerked bits over the sweet, fragrant Coconut Rice cannot be described.  I'm not even going to try.

Instead, I'm going to focus my energy on willing you to visit your nearest independent bookstore (or go online, if you must) and get yourself a copy of Vegan with a Vengeance, because if you don't, you will never find true happiness.

I don't want that for you.  I want you to be happy.  Go buy the book.

there's lettuce in my pasta

Like I mentioned in my menu, I've always skipped over recipes calling for escarole, primarily because I can never find it at Whole Foods.  To my great delight, I came home with some yesterday, so tonight I made Penne with Cannellini Beans and Escarole from Vegan Italiano.

Isn't it lovely?  So... green!  I have a confession to make: I've never had escarole until tonight.  In addition to having an extraordinary amount of trouble locating it in center city, it was most certainly never a part of meals growing up outside the city.  Mister was very surprised when I shared my escarole epiphany with him since he grew up in a hippie family with a Greek dad and part-Sicilian mom; dark leafy greens and various other things that never crossed my lips until adulthood were a regular part of the days there was money for food in his childhood.

My take?  It's kind of weird, isn't it?  I think I imagined escarole to be a dark leafy green, kind of like Tuscan kale but with the texture of spinach or chard - a silky green that would linger briefly on my tongue before following the penne down my throat.  I couldn't have been too much more wrong - it was more like I had added lettuce to my pasta.  It was a little crunchy, a little bitter, and plenty chewy - more like the look of lettuce with the toughness of kale.  I should have realized I was wrong when I was chopping it.  It was actually tough to chop!  Ordinarily, my fancy new knives slice through greens like butter, but not this time - I actually had to put some elbow grease in.

The combination of escarole, tomatoes, garlic, and cannellini beans was classically Italian and completely delightful.  I served dinner with a generous bowlful of mixed Mediterranean olives in a vinegary brine, accompanied by a glass of Apothic Red for my sipping pleasure.  It could only have been a more perfectly rustic and Country Italian meal if we were eating outside as the sun set behind a far-off horizon with a basket full of crusty, warm bread to sop up the sauce.

And just when you thought I couldn't paint a more delightful picture of [food-provoked] happiness, you must have forgotten (or not known) that I baked last night after my post!

I called them macaroons, but Hannah calls them Coconut Drop Cookies.  They just magically appeared in my inbox one day, courtesy of the VegNews e-newsletter I get monthly.  Okay, the cookies themselves did not magically appear, but the simpler-than-pie recipe sure did and it took very little time to pull all of the ingredients together and make my kitchen smell amazing.

The best thing about these cookies (besides everything) is that the recipe makes 10.  That is a totally manageable number of cookies.  I really don't like cookie recipes that yield a tremendous number of cookies (unless it's the holiday season - any holiday season - and I'm baking for a crowd) because they make too big a mess and then I have too many cookies anyway.  Ten cookies?  Well, we'll get through almost half the first night and they'll be gone by tomorrow night.

They have the most amazing flavor.  Like I said, they are super simple to make, so please do yourself a favor and click that link.  Make these cookies and enjoy them with a tall glass of nondairy milk.  I rarely drink soymilk because it does have kind of a weird aftertaste when you're drinking it solo (I use unsweetened original - no flavor and no added sugars), but these cookies are so rich and flavorful, I dare you to try to eat them alone.  Actually, I don't - why mess it up?  Just enjoy with a cup of coffee or your favorite nondairy beverage - there are two delightfully contradictory flavors that come together in a way that enhances each: the tropical sweetness of toasted coconut and the spark of salt from an unusually large measure added to the recipe.

Dear Lord...I think it's time for dessert.

snowpocalypse: the beginning of the end

How's that for an epic title?

We got a whole ton of snow here in Philadelphia - I think the final numbers were around 15-16 inches.  Today began the great dig-out, so I moved through today to the soundtrack of shovels scraping the pavement.  That's right, folks, I got another snow day after all.  I wish I'd known ahead of time, like I did in high school, so I could just sleep in, but I think I got a lot more done than I would have if I'd gone back to bed.  I really did think I was going to work this morning, despite my desire for another snow day; however, there's not much you can do when all the buses have stopped operating and every train that would take you to your destination is being canceled.  Since the sidewalks were a hideous mess and cabs were sliding into the curbs, walking to the train station to wait for a train that would never come kind of lost its appeal.

So, thanks to Snowpocalypse 2011, I have begun the process of moving, which I will probably document here as a pitiful excuse for my interesting meal stories diminishing.  Believe me, my pots, pans, and everyday dishes will be the last things packed (besides the cat), but I fully anticipate:
a) some take-out dinners in the last part of this process and
b) packing taking priority over posting.  I'm only here now because my new bottle of Beaujolais, picked up when I was harvesting boxes from the wine store, was singing its siren song and I needed a short break from wrapping every(fancy)thing a person could possibly drink from in newspaper.

I spent most of the daylight hours hunting down boxes since I can't get them home from my office.  Between Essene, the wine store, and a few other places, I've managed to procure 14 boxes.  So far tonight, I've filled two, but it's only 10:30, so I have time!  I also traded some books for $33 of store credit at a used bookstore beside the thrift store that will soon inherit some wine glasses, bowls, and decor I've outgrown.  This packing-n-purging thing is going really well.

By the way, if anyone was wondering the outcome of last night's quandry, I was strongly encouraged to consider baking cookies by Mister... I really didn't need that much coaxing.

Plain Jane chocolate chip cookies, but boy were they good right out of the oven.  I got so into making these [wonderful] bizarre fusion cookies that I forgot how magnificent it is to bite into a gooey, melty chocolate chip cookie.  Don't be alarmed!  I've remembered.

As my own form of repentance or a spectacular display of irony, tonight I made Pasta Con Broccoli from Appetite for Reduction.  Those cookies are the reason cookbooks like this must exist.

It was delightful, just like last time, although the broccoli got a little mushier than I wanted it to be and I really feel like 1/4 cup of sliced garlic should have a more obvious contribution to the meal.  Perhaps I've been spoiled by the bite of raw garlic in my recent recipe testing, but I could barely tell there was garlic at all!

Anyway, the broccoli got mushy because I let it steam too long while I was trying to clear the table for dinner.  Putting 14 boxes at the table seemed like a good idea when I was bringing them all home...

I think the hardest part of, well, anything, is starting.  Just like I always have trouble deciding which recipe to make first when I have a fresh menu, I had more than a small amount of trouble trying to figure out where to start packing.  Obviously, I would start with things I use infrequently and as the next 16 days progress, I'll move closer to the things I use regularly.  Two weeks from now we will absolutely be eating from takeout containers.

Finally, I decided the most logical place to start was by packing the things I never ever use.  Also, there is something in the restaurant downstairs that vibrates sometimes and causes these beautiful teacups to make very annoying clattering noises.

This is one of those family heirloom stories - I have very few of them, so I cherish those I have.  Aside from the rightmost teacup, these teacups (and the ones in the first picture) have been passed from my mother's mother to her, and from her to me.  As a result of my love of these pretty things, my dear friend and my mother-in-law are helping me to build my collection.  The rightmost teacup in this picture was a Christmas gift from my friend back when I lived in my ghetto apartment.  She gave me another one this year and my husband's mother has given me teacups the last two years for Christmas; for my bridal shower, she gave me a whole tea-set, including the teapot, creamer, and sugar bowl.

This "shot glass" is 108 years old.  You may or may not be able to see in the picture that it is cut crystal, with red tint and two thin gold bands bordering the white stripe in the middle.  I have four and I cherish them - they are what is left of six original glasses with a small crystal pitcher that I inherited from my father's father when they were almost exactly 100 years old.  The reason I know their precise age is because they were apparently a "parting gift" at the 1903 Republican National Convention.  My grandfather was born in 1913, so although I inherited them from him, he must have inherited them from his father.

I love old things.  My design ethic is completely bizarre and I'm looking forward to seeing how it plays out in the new home (where I'll actually have space to decorate and design).  I admire the sterility and order of modern design; as I believe I've mentioned once or twice, I am completely in love with IKEA and have no issue designing my home to look like their catalogs (I've already begun plotting my kitchen improvements for the new place).  On the other hand, I adore old things and the aesthetic of antiques.  I have very Victorian leanings, but dear heavens does that create clutter!  I love my grandmother-mother's teacups and my grandfather's souvenir shot glasses (I'm pretty sure they're actually stemless cordials) because they link me to a far off past and join me to my family in a quiet, subtle way.

Speaking of subtle, I think the last sip of my wine is the quiet prompt to get back to packing.  I think we'll do platters and plates next.  See you tomorrow!

curry, burritos, and cookies, oh my!

Happy Friday!  I cannot believe it is already the end of the third week of January.  Next weekend is the last weekend of January, which blows my mind for two reasons: first, I can't believe I blinked this month away already.  Second, something for which I have been preparing since May is finally culminating...or at least, beginning to culminate: my dear student has her first college music audition.  Tomorrow is our last lesson before the audition, our last chance to iron out any last kinks.

Between that and a few other things that are irrelevant to a food blog, I've been a little distracted lately...pondering the meaning of life (why did I marry a philosopher?), what I am doing with mine (why am I so introspective?), and ultimately, how to be happy.  I do want to share some fun food stories, so here's a random selection from the last couple of days.

Last night, since the Spinach Drought finally ended, I finally made Chickpea and Spinach Curry from Vegan With a Vengeance.

I was going to write last night, but I got distracted by the pure incompetence of someone from whom I've been waiting to hear news for at least a week.  I was too pissed off to focus on the relatively calm post I had in my brain - I thought a fun title would be Calming Colors: Chickpea Beige.

I love the color combination of this flavorful curry: bright red tomatoes, emerald green spinach, and golden-beige chickpeas.  Although I appreciate the bold colors of crimson and hunter, it is the subtle, creamy taupe of the garbanzos that pull everything together and make this dish a thing of beauty.  This is no testament to my still-developing photography skills, but if I saw the picture above in a cookbook, I would want to make that dish purely because it is attractive (and appears to be made of food I like).

Even though the Great Spinach Famine of 2011 is coming to an end, we're not back in business quite yet, so I was only able to get half of what I needed.  As a result of forgetting that while mixing the curry spices, the result was a little more intense than it usually is, but it was still very tasty, even if it took Mister three breads to get through his servings.

Tonight, I made Barbecued Black Bean and Tofu Burritos, also from Vegan on the Cheap, which I've made once before.  Although I went back and read that post, in which I commented on wanting to marinate the tofu, here's what I did instead:

I sliced it as thin as I could without tearing it, then laid it on some towels to drain a bit.  After spraying and heating my skillet, I arranged the slices and let them cook a few minutes while I seasoned the "up side" with sea salt and chili powder, then sprayed them with olive oil.  Once the tofu was popping enough to nearly flip itself over, I turned each piece and seasoned the half-cooked sides.  One more flip and I turned off the burner while the tofu finished cooking on the cooling-down skillet.

I will always do it that way - it came out so well.  Also, as the black beans were simmering in my home-made barbecue sauce, it seemed like there was too much liquid, so I looked in the fridge and found what I was looking for: leftover cooked rice.  I tossed that in, stirred it up and let it heat through, then lined each tortilla with 3-4 tofu slices and dumped a healthy bit of beans-n-rice on the tofu and rolled it all up.

Sooo tasty...  Speaking of tasty things, do you know what time of year it is?

That's right, kids - it's Girl Scout Cookie time.  One of my most recently hired and trained employees brought some in to sell for her daughter, but she just straight up gave me these: Shout Outs are brand new to the line up.  Round wafer cookies, embossed with one inspiring word (3 of the 4 I've already eaten said "Lead" and I wonder if I should be taking that as a message), and aside from an undefined "Sugar" in the ingredients, these sweet treats appear to be vegan - no milk, eggs, or other recognizable animal bits to be found in the nutritional label.  Also, I'm a pretty big fan of serving sizes like this: 4 cookies = 130 calories.

renaming recipes

I like a well-named recipe.  When I'm flipping through my cookbooks, it is the name of the recipe that catches my eye, luring me to the ingredients list and finally to the preparation methods.  The first step, though, is always the recipe - if it has a boring name or lists an ingredient (as a main) that Mister and/or I won't eat, it doesn't get a second glance.

Because of the importance I place on the title of a recipe, it is often difficult for me to come up with my own recipe names: I want them to jump out and say "pick me!"  Every once in a while, though, I come across someone else's recipe that I really feel compelled to give a new name.

Tonight's dinner was appropriately named Corn Chowder.  I think I have at least half a dozen recipes for a chunky, hearty corn and potato-based "chowder," and they're all named similarly.  I'm not in the habit of marking up my cookbooks (I really need to get over that), so sometimes it's difficult to remember which one is which and how I felt about each of them.  More importantly, considering his aversion to soup dinners, I want to remember how Mister felt about each of them.

Tonight's Corn Chowder came to us from Vegan With A Vengeance and I couldn't tell you the last time I made this.  That is a certifiable pity because this chowder is freaking amazing.  Hearty and thick and full of various flavors, it is by far the winner of the multiple other Corn Chowders for which I have recipes.  If I'm ever babbling about corn chowder in the future, would someone please leave me a comment reminding me that this one is the amazing one?

I would like to rename this Corn Chowder: Nothing Left Chowder.  I put it on the table, Mister and I sped through our first bowls as quickly as the heat would allow, still taking the time to savor and appreciate the flavor profile created by combining mainly corn and potatoes with a diced red pepper and a few diced carrots.  I think the thing that really sets this one apart from the others, I think, is that it simmers for nearly an hour with a big, fat Turkish Bay Leaf.  Regardless, Mister had gone back for seconds before I finished my first bowl and then we rose simultaneously to refill (my second helping, his third).  Yes, that's right - Mister had three servings of soup dinner.  Win!

Because it's Sunday and I had plenty of time to start dinner early, I had plenty of time for baking projects after dinner.  Despite Angst's reticence to help, we had us a little bake-a-thon.

here he is, crammed onto Mister's expensive messenger bag,
being grumpy because he knows he has to move when Mister comes in for dinner.

Our first baking project was Banana Coconut Cookies - I was directed to this recipe via a VegNews e-newsletter.  I had been saving two nearly rotten bananas for this and when I removed them from the banana hanger on the fridge to make way for the new bananas I picked up this afternoon, I realized that they were not going to wait another day to be turned into something.  

Not a bad thing to turn into, wouldn't you say?  They are soft and chewy with a little bit of structure provided by the oats.  I made them a little big, so they didn't make the 18 the recipe said they would, but if that means I get to eat share bigger cookies, then that's good enough for me.

Currently, baking project number two is in the oven, smelling up my home something [delightfully] fierce.  While I wait for the Seed Cake I'm testing for the new Urban Vegan cookbook to gestate, let me share the new menu:

1. Chickpea and Spinach Curry from VwaV - I still haven't made this because there still isn't spinach.  Does anyone know something I don't know?  Regarding the Spinach Famine, that is.

2. Chickpea Piccata served on Caulipots, both from Appetite for Reduction.  You thought I was kidding, didn't you?  I had asked Mister, when I first got the cookbook and wanted to make this, if he liked capers.  He didn't remember because he couldn't remember what capers were.  When we were at Horizons, I separated one from my appetizer to show him.  He promptly remembered that he does like them, so this was pretty much fated to be on the menu.

3. Quinoa Bulghur, White Bean, and Kale Stew also from Appetite for Reduction.  Mister doesn't like quinoa, so I'll be substituting bulghur because it cooks nearly as quickly and Mister is ambivalent to it.

4. Salsa Rice and Red Beans from Vegan on the Cheap.

5. Barbecued Black Bean and Tofu Burritos, also from Vegan on the Cheap.  I made this before, but I want to try something different with the tofu.  Besides, it was pretty good the first time around.

6. Farfalle with White Beans and Cabbage, also from Vegan on the Cheap.  I'm really into cabbage right now...if you didn't notice.

Fresh out of the oven, here is Seed Cake from the forthcoming UV2.  As you can imagine, it got its name from the tiny little caraway seeds speckled throughout the inside.  It's a light spice cake and mine has quite a crunch to it.  I could very well have messed up, or maybe I just need to rethink my idea of cake.  This was possibly a little more like a coffee cake, especially with its optional dusting of powdered sugar, which makes a bit of sense since Dynise recommends eating yours with tea.

I think it needs just a little tweaking, but I am fully confident that by the time this new cookbook hits the shelves, this will be one of the recipes people are stumbling over each other to make for a Sunday brunch, elbowing each other in the spice aisles, trying to get the last bottle of caraway seeds.

baking in the witching hour

Some time over the summer, a friend helped me name my imaginary public access cooking show (which will result in unimaginable fame and wealth, eventually).  Because he couldn't believe how frequently I bake at night (probably 95% of the time), he suggested "Late Night Baking with Natalie K" but I think I prefer the title to this post.

Although I suppose there could be some debate over the exact time of the witching hour, my scones were safely baking as the clock struck midnight, foisting my baking adventures officially into tomorrow. 

Banana Chocolate Chip Scones

Let's build up to the scone/overinflated cookie story, though, shall we?

After a deeply satisfying night of sleep (the first of many, I hope), I wandered, sleepy-eyed and wanting coffee, into my kitchen.  Once I had gathered my wits and looked out the window, I was profoundly disappointed to see not a flake of snow floating gently down from the sky.  There was a light dusting on the street, but not at all what I was expecting.

Never fear, rapt readers - it did not take long for snow to join me in welcoming the day.  Before I poured my second cozy cup, little glittery flakes had begun their descent from the low, grey cloud cover to cold, black pavement.  This continued throughout the day and I watched giddily as the snow began to accumulate on sidewalks, cars, and my husband upon his return from Steve's Steaks, veggie cheesesteak in a brown bag, canister of lemonade mix under his arm.

It seemed fitting that the only item left on my menu (and by default, the only thing I had the ingredients to cook, which is why Mister went out for lunch) was Warm Chickpea Ragout with Swiss Chard, Carrots, and Harissa from Vegetarian Times: Fast and Easy.

The advantage to having such an extensive (and growing) cookbook collection is that I repeat dishes so infrequently that I'm [almost] always as pleasantly surprised as I was the first time I made something.  This was no exception.  The heat of the harissa is just right - it intensifies the flavors of the dish without traumatizing my tastebuds too severely (unless I accidentally inhale an unmixed dot of the stuff...then I choke and my eyes tear and Mister laughs at me... no matter how sick he is). 

I served it over what was left of the Coconut Rice I made with the Jerk Seitan oh-so-long ago.  Between the subtle sweetness of the rice and that which is coaxed out of the tomatoes as they were fire-roasted, the whole dish has a surprising but perfect undercurrent of dulce.  It balances the heat of the harissa and the creaminess of the chickpeas in a way that made me contemplate every single bite I took.  This, surely, is the road to mindful eating.

After dinner, the snow was still going strong, despite my newly kindled internal fire.  Every time I hear a plow or shovel outside, I want to chase away the one who wields it, screaming something insane like, "Leave my snow alone!"

Instead, I occupied myself by making these incredible scones.  VegNews directed me to the recipe and I thought it seemed very much like single-serving banana bread, so I jumped on it.  I was a little worried when I started plunking down the batter - I can't call it dough - it spread a little much for my comfort level.  In the end, they came out looking like huge banana-chocolate-chip cookies.  The texture is somewhere between a nice, soft, right-out-of-the-oven cookie and the top portion of a muffin.  Divine. 

I really shouldn't have another....should I?

too much is never enough

I have eaten waaaayyy too many cookies in the past 24 hours.  They are just so good - I swear, these are absolutely the best oatmeal cookies I have ever made or eaten (although Kylie at Cups & Chairs makes an awfully good oatmeal cookie, too).  I'm pretty sure it's the brown sugar - I don't think I've ever used that as the sole sugar, sole sweetener in a cookie before. 

By the way - I have come to the conclusion (in my vast understanding of brown sugar and how to keep it) that Gladware is the best possible vessel for brown sugar.  I can't remember how long ago I exposed my brown sugar to oxygen, but it's been tucked away in its little Gladware vacuum, kept from sunlight in a dark corner of my cupboard, and when I opened it to scoop out the 2/3 cup for this recipe, it was as soft as it was the first day it tasted air.

Anyway, by sheer force of will (and general lack of other options) I made it through today.  It actually passed quite quickly, to my bemused horror - I keep running out of time!  I already have less than an hour until I start pretending to get ready for bed and I haven't...

• cleaned up dinner
• changed the sheets on the bed (time for the warmer ones - we won't see 40 degrees again until Friday)
• changed the bathroom towels
• put up my Christmas tree (although Mister did point out when I forgot to do it last night that the fewer nights the tree is up, the fewer nights Angst has to try to destroy it, so this one might wait until the weekend when I can also start gift shopping and wrapping...at which point I'll need something to place my pretty gifts beneath!)

So, without further ado, tonight's dinner was Moroccan Chickpeas with Couscous from Vegan on the Cheap.

It's so pretty and colorful!  Apparently, no one (including me) can write a recipe involving chickpeas, tomatoes, and raisins (cranberries) without plunking the word "Moroccan" in front of it.  Someday, I would like to go to Morocco and see if everything involves chickpeas, tomatoes, and raisins.  Actually, for bizarre, wanderlust reasons I'll probably never know, I've actually wanted to visit Morocco since I was a child.  There's something about the festiveness of the colors, the passion of the firey reds and burnt oranges that just seems regal and outlandishly extravagant to me.  In fact, while dinner was simmering, I was so taken by how opulent the colors of my simmer were, I had to snap a picture:

The broth/sauce was a rusty color that augmented the brilliant beige (find someone else who can say that and mean it) of the chickpeas, while little, barely noticeable green flecks of chives and pepper litter the pot.  I was about to dump some frozen peas in there for a little nutrition and I was irrationally worried it would mar the beauty of my chickpeas.

As you can see, I need not have worried.

limited time offer

So, I knew it wouldn't last forever.  Perhaps, if I ever get tired of the blog being called "Angst Loves Spinach" I'll change the name to Taming of the Brown Rice.  Not quite as catchy, I'll grant you, but I feel like I spend an inordinate amount of time discussing my inability to cook brown rice.

I finally tasted victory the other day, but I knew it would be short-lived and tonight's dinner reinforced that belief strongly.

I made Rice Island Casserole from Vegan on the Cheap.  When I started cooking, I asked Mister if anything on the menu jumped out at him.  He refrained from giving any guidance other than "you might want to make something that takes a while, since you're starting early."  Pretty good guidance, actually, considering how darn long it took to cook.

Fortunately, while it was simmering away...for about two hours...it smelled amazing.  That just made the waiting more difficult!  There was such a great combination of herbs and spices that just simmered away smelling very much like the pan of mulling spices left on a back burner in my mother-in-law's kitchen on Christmas Eve.  I thought, as it simmered and simmered, that once it was finally finished, if it tasted anything like it smelled, it couldn't help but be a phenomenal success.

I was absolutely right.  It was so good and it brought out a serious hankering for Isa's Jerk Seitan on Coconut Rice...

Bonus!  I made cookies for a colleague (and because cookies are awesome):

The recipe is that of Oatmeal Raisin Cookies from VCIYCJ, but I used cranberries instead of raisins and I plumped them in some hot water while we were [finally] eating dinner.  My kitchen smells so good right now.

super foodie post

Please pardon what is probably about to be a somewhat random post - there will be at least one connecting thread: everything will have to do with fabulous vegan food!

Most of the time when I post my menu, I do so at the conclusion of the post.  However, it seems like the best place to start this one, considering my Ode to Cookbook Browsing and my Look What I Can Do posts this week.  So, I did finally sit down with a glass of Beaujolais and Vegan on the Cheap last night and figured out what we're eating this week:

1. Caldo Verde with Vegan Gourmet grilled cheeses.  This looks like a hella hearty soup - potatoes and kale work together so nicely, texturally, taste-wise, and nutritionally.  I love the combination of the smooth, squishy potatoes with the chewy, stern kale.

2. Savory Sausage and Peppers which was dinner tonight, so you'll read more in just a moment, but I'll give you this one little hint:  it was so freakin' good.

3. Tropic of Tempeh Tofu - It really makes me sad that Mister crumples into a heap of hurt whenever he eats tempeh, because I really like it and never get to eat it.  Nevertheless, this recipe looked way too good to bypass just because Mister can't eat the main ingredient...so I changed the main ingredient.

4. Better Bean Burgers with oven fries and these super-slick "burger thins."  I can't wait to make this and photograph it because these things are awesome - they're like the Macbook Air of bread products.

5. Tuscan White Bean Pizza because Mister loves pizza and I love Mister.  And I love pizza.  And all things Tuscan.  Plus, it takes a pretty picture.

So, tonight's dinner was Savory Sausage and Peppers and it was delightful.  How can you go wrong with a skillet supper involving diced Tofurky, bell peppers, and sliced potatoes (among other things)?  Also, there is something magical that happens when you add thyme to potatoes.  It seems like most people associate rosemary with potatoes, but I think they missed the boat - Thyme is where it's at.

It looks just as good as it tasted.  Between the intensity of the Italian Tofurky and the herb and salt-rich sauce, I was able to limit myself to just one-and-a-half servings, preserving a decent bit of leftovers for later this week.  This dish smelled phenomenal while it was simmering, even drawing Mister away from his computer and into the kitchen (all 7 steps) to see what smelled so tasty.  I wasn't at all surprised that it tasted as good as it did, but its inherent attractiveness shocked the heck out of me.  I mean, look at it - it's gorgeous!

Breakfast was also stupendous - a girl has to get fueled up for a fun day of grocery shopping and baking for work potlucks, right?  As promised, it comes with another recipe.

Banana Pecan Oatmeal
serves 1 (but easily multiplied)

1 banana
1 cup of nondairy milk (I used Almond Milk)
1/2 cup oats
1/4 cup pecan pieces
1 Tbsp agave nectar (although I find the banana, when very ripe, is sweet enough)
cinnamon sugar for sprinkling

Bring nondairy milk to a light boil.  Shake in oats, stirring, then reduce heat to low.  Simmer 3-5 minutes, stirring often.  Meanwhile, break the banana into pieces and place it in a microwave-safe bowl.  Nuke on high for 45-60 seconds, then mash to near-liquid consistency with your spoon.  Pour oatmeal into the same bowl, along with half the pecan pieces and stir to combine with banana.  Taste and add agave nectar if necessary.  Sprinkle with cinnamon sugar (if using) and remaining pecans.

Tomorrow will bring three blessings (we have to counteract that whole Bad Things Come In Threes thing somehow, right?):

1. For me: When I leave work tomorrow night, I will be halfway through my work week :)
2. For everyone at work: we're having a Thanksgiving potluck and surely, tasty food will abound.

Applesauce Softies from VCIYCJ, more in a minute

3. For YOU:  finally, after all your patience, The Great Chocolate Round-Up.  Yes, I promise.

So, Essene was having a sale last week and I took the opportunity to stock up on BOGO Santa Cruz Organic Applesauce.  There are a ton of amazing holiday recipes which recruit applesauce as a fat replacer, binding agent, or just plain fabulous flavor to incorporate into autumn eats.  One of the reasons I don't have a pantry is...well...because there's no room for one.  Honestly, I would give up my dishwasher to have space for a pantry.  The other reason I don't have a pantry is because even though I have the purest of intentions, when there is a sale that causes me to get things I wouldn't ordinarily buy or have no specific use for right now, I bring them home, thinking I'll store them somewhere until I need them, but then they stare at me until I do something with them.  Such was the case with my applesauce, so when I remembered this afternoon that I have a potluck at work tomorrow, I decided to try my hand at the Applesauce Softies that have been softly whispering to me since I got the book (within days of its release to bookstores).

The first step of the recipe involves reducing the applesauce by simmering it until it becomes more dense and concentrated.  The recipe says this should take about 25 minutes, but it took me about 45 minutes to reduce the sauce from 1 1/3 cups to 2/3 cup.  I had hoped that the simmering applesauce would fill my home with the tasty scent of autumn and apples, but it really didn't smell much as it evaporated the juices into the air of my apartment.  The cookies, on the other hand, smelled amazing!  Mister and I did a small sampling, to make sure I wouldn't accidentally poison my work-mates.  The taste is subtle but they are pillow-soft and rather light for cookies.  The best thing to compare them to would be muffin tops - the kind you want to eat, not the kind that make you avert your eyes out of courtesy and self-preservation.

One last tangent, then I'll let you go dream of chocolate in anticipation of tomorrow's round-up: I stopped into Essene today for my last test chocolate, a pizza crust, and hand lotion (can you develop a more disparate shopping list?) and came away with a bonus prize.

That is an organic Winesap apple.  Until today, I was unaware of their existence.  I still haven't eaten mine - I will probably save it to savor for breakfast on Wednesday morning, but I fear that I will become addicted to these the way I have recently become addicted to Honeycrisps.  I fear this because they are not inexpensive, but heavens!  Look at how red that apple is!  The deep crimson apple, along with my newly ebony hair and perpetually ivory skin made me feel something like Snow White...so I took a cheesy picture: enjoy!

something sour this way comes

By way of introduction, I would like to strongly encourage you to read Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury, if you have not had the opportunity to do so yet in your life.

Dinner last night was completely unremarkable - I merely reheated the 48 oz of Pasta e Fagioli leftover, moistened with what was left of the Bertolli marinara.  I did buy an almost-fresh loaf of sunflower bread from Essene, initially with the intention of turning it into multi-grain garlic bread, but it was so squishy and soft with perfect bits of crunch from the seeds mixed generously into the body of the bread, so I just sliced it and served it plain.

Tonight, I made Barbecued Black Bean and Tofu Burritos from Vegan on the Cheap.  It cooks up very quickly, so if you make it yourself, be prepared for it to be ready in about 10 minutes from the time you begin cooking.  The barbecue sauce is very flavorful, so it is well-balanced by the relative blandness of the tofu.  I think the tofu will be better next time if I slice it slightly larger and marinate it in something for 5-10 minutes.  I served the beans and tofu in red chile tortillas from Whole Foods, which added a fun twist.

What was really fun, though, was last night's dessert!

Lemony Vanilla Cashew Cookies
yield about 2 dozen cookies

2 cups of flour, lightly spooned and leveled
1 Tbsp cornstarch
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt

1/2 cup vegetable shortening, room temperature
1/2 cup raw agave nectar
1/4 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
3 Tbsp coconut milk
2 tsp vanilla extract

1 cup raw cashew pieces

Preheat the oven to 350.  Combine flour, cornstarch, baking powder, and salt in a medium bowl.
With an electric mixer, cream together shortening and agave until thoroughly combined, about 1-2 minutes.  Add lemon juice, coconut milk, and vanilla and mix to combine.  Slight curdling will occur - don't worry.
Add the dry ingredients in two batches, mixing well and scraping down the sides in between.  Fold in cashew pieces with a spatula.  Scoop batter by the tablespoon and place on baking sheets.  Pat down lightly with your hand - the cookies will not spread much at all in the oven.
Bake in 350 oven 18-22 minutes, until lightly golden and beginning to darken at the edges.  Cool for a minute or two on the sheets then move to a rack to cool completely.

These cookies grew in my brain when I was trying to figure out a way to capture the taste of my loved-and-lost Clif Nectar bars.  Because the vanilla is subtle yet noticeable, the sensory emphasis remains on the taste of the lemon.  It doesn't strike you all at once, but rather accumulates as you make your way through this tender and chewy cookie.  Although I loved the [four] I had right out of the oven, I believe they were even better after sitting overnight. 

As always, please let me know how it goes if you make these yourself!

brookies? cownies?

What would you call a cookie-brownie hybrid?

I have recently taken to bribing thanking people I work with by bringing them baked goods.  Thank you for mentoring a new hire.  Thank you for assisting me with training.  Thank you for helping me get promoted.  Thank you for making the website work....and please keep doing so.  There are a few people who get to share in the baked goodies simply because I like them and they like my "food."

Bribing, er, thanking people with baked goods is not completely selfless - it allows me to make tasty treats but not have to bear the horrible burden of eating them all.  Despite what may present itself as an overwhelming desire to do just that, I hate clothes shopping too much to allow for the inevitable weight gain behavior like that brings.  I make a batch of cookies or brownies or a small cake, I have a cookie (or five) or a brownie (or two) and take the rest to work - I guess it's kind of like a group of ladies sharing a dessert at a restaurant, but ever so slightly less expensive.

I stood in my kitchen tonight with two recipes in hand - one, my banana blondies recipe, and the other the Banana Everything Cookies recipe from VCIYCJ.  I couldn't decide which to make and the two bananas threatening to dive off of the banana "tree" atop the fridge were not helping.  I tried to get Mister to decide, but his sage advice was "make the fun one."  Thanks, darling.

I did what any half-insane, sleep-deprived person would do when they want to bake something at 11 PM on a work night - I created my own hybrid recipe.  Lucky you!

Coconut Oatmeal Brownies
makes 9 (or more, depending on your preferred brownie size)
 
dry ingredients
2 cups quick-cooking oats
1 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup cocoa powder
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp sea salt
1 cup sweetened, shredded coconut

wet ingredients
2 large ripe bananas
1/3 cup canola oil
2/3 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Lightly oil an 8x8" baking pan and set aside.

In a medium mixing bowl, whisk together all of the dry ingredients. 
Combine wet ingredients in a food processor or blender and puree until smooth and a little foamy - about one minute.
Pour wet mixture into dry mixture and stir until completely moistened and sticking together.  Scoop batter into the prepared pan.  With an offset spatula, press down so the batter is evenly distributed and pushed into the corners and to the sides.
Bake 25-30 minutes, until a tested inserted into the center comes out clean.  Allow to cool in the pan or turn out onto a cooling rack after 10 minutes.  When cool, cut into 9 (or more) squares to serve.

wintertime, and the livin' is easy

Having "wasted" my day off enjoying myself yesterday, I made the only thing for dinner that I had the ingredients left to make: Kedgeree from The Accidental Vegan. I have made kedgeree (kitcheree) before - it's fairly common in vegetarian cookbooks with any kind of international flair. From what I can tell, it is the result of Great Britain's colonization of India. Ordinarily, it is a kind of pilaf, a mixture of lentils and rice (complete protein!) with some herbs and spices mixed in so it's not completely bland. Not exactly main course material...until this kedgeree.

Look at it, all chock full of vegetables! I would dare say that the kale and carrots outnumber the rice and lentils! Having recently noticed how awful brown rice smells, I must admit, I wasn't all that excited about its prominent presence in this dish, but the subtle spices and hearty sauteed kale, balanced by the sweetness of the carrots really gave this kedgeree a pleasant mild flavor. I substituted kalamata olives for the mushrooms in the recipe because Mister hates mushrooms (I'm not a fan myself) and we both love olives. It took some time to prep, but I'll definitely do it again.

After dinner, we needed more cookies, so I whipped up a batch of Banana-Maple Oatmeal Cookies from Susan V at FatFree Vegan Kitchen. They were delightful and very easy to make...even easier to eat! Mister and I ate over half of them last night - it's amazing how much easier it is to overindulge when something is labeled as low-fat.


Oh! It's time for a flashback - watch the screen:

The year is *mumbleahem* and my dear friend, Courtney, and I are around 21-22 years old. In a moment of what can only be described as a complete lack of good taste, we decide to rent "Spice World" and have a girls' night in. Our snacks of choice? Mini York Peppermint Patties. Why? Because they're low in fat. Go ahead and completely ignore that they're made of sugar and therefore contain a decent number of calories, times however many we each ate. We sure did.
You can also ignore our beverage of choice - Snugglers - instant hot cocoa (surely low-cal) with a generous "shot" of peppermint schnapps.

~*~ end flashback movie ~*~

Since I didn't feel like chasing myself around the streets of Philadelphia, had the wind picked me up and carried me away, I shirked my Domestic Goddess duties yesterday and did not go food shopping. We needed to finish up our big box of spring mix baby greens before they get all wilty and gross anyway, so tonight's dinner was a simple soup and salad:

I'm taking taking a page from Mama Pea's book and photographing every salad I eat - I understand why she does it - they're all beautiful!

I reheated the Potato Corn Chowder from the other night and made a pretty little salad of spring mix, sprouts, carrots, cranberries, broccoli, and olives. Quick-cooking dinners are perfect for Friday nights, even if I didn't actually spend my usual half hour looking for parking when I got home from The Week From Hell at work. It feels good to arrive at the weekend, especially since I took Sunday off.

If you are in need of celebratory libations on this fine weekend, let me add that Smirnoff's Grand Cosmopolitan is very easy to drink. Cheers!

my brain: use it or lose it

It is Still snowing in Philadelphia. This is now officially the snowiest winter on record - all we needed from this snowfall (which started around 7 pm yesterday and is STILL going strong at 10 minutes to midnight today) was 9.5 inches, but current estimates put total accumulation at 14 inches in Philadelphia, more in outlying suburbs. That's 14 inches on top of the 28.5 we got over the weekend. I haven't seen a plow yet and while that is fortunate for my poor little snow-covered car and what remains of its paint, it doesn't exactly fill me with optimism about the condition of the streets I am supposed to drive on tomorrow to go to work. Even when the streets were plowed on Saturday night/Sunday morning, it was still a slippery mess.

Since there was already an inch of super-fast accumulation when I got home from work last night, it seemed appropriate that the last dinner on my menu was a soup dinner. I made the mistake of changing into warmer, comfier clothes and then sitting down before strapping on my apron and could barely muster the energy to make Turkish Spinach and Lentil Soup. Fortunately, I knew the majority of effort I needed to expend was on peeling garlic cloves, so I managed to convince myself to put about 5 minutes of work into what ended up being a very tasty and satisfying dinner.


One of the reasons I wasn't too enthused about it was because I had forgotten just how tasty this soup is! I think I owe a lot of the flavor to the new bouillon cubes I picked up at Whole Foods last week. I used to use Rapunzel bouillon cubes all the time - they are far more cost-effective and compact than boxed quarts of premade broth - but after I had two boxes of gross, rancid-looking, melty cubes, I ditched them in favor of the Swanson broth I've been using for at least six months. I picked up the vegan bouillon cubes with sea salt and they have the most amazing savory taste!

Now, I'll admit - I really did not think the snow was going to come down as heavily as it did. Granted, the National Weather Service had issued a Blizzard Warning and more or less implied that you would be risking life and limb to leave your home today, but I guess I just didn't believe them. I spent all day today looking out the windows and laughing because the snow was still coming down and it really did look like a blizzard. This seriously interfered with my plans to go food shopping, though, so I comforted myself with the knowledge that the crazy Chinese people who have a restaurant that is literally a 10 second walk from our front door were open today. However, by the time "dinner time" came around, neither Mister or I wanted to leave the comfort of our warm, snowless home.

I had been thinking the other day about my culinary adventures. I'm addicted to recipes, and even when I do something on my own, I approach it in the same manner I was taught to compose music: I write it out first, then "play" it. However, having spent the past several years learning how to cook, and at least the past year really paying attention to how ingredients work together to create certain tastes and/or textures, I had a revelation. Theoretically, I should be able to just grab some random ingredients and put them together in a way that results in something tasty (or at least edible). In culinary schools, this is known as the Basket Test. Students are given a "basket" of seemingly unconnected ingredients and must find a way to create something edible (and amazing) from them. Mister inadvertently presented me with that challenge tonight and I am thrilled with the results!

My "basket" was made up of a few half-empty bags of frozen vegetables, a couple of cans in the cupboard nearing their expiration date, and a few half-empty bags of various grains. I always take comfort in my extremely well-stocked herbs-n-spices collection, though, and I figure I could probably make a gourmet meal out of Angst's Meow Mix with their help, if I had to. Lucky for you, I was so excited with how tasty my invention was that I wrote it down and will share my first recipe of 2010 with you!
Naked Burritos
2 cups broth
1 cup Basmati rice
1 Tbsp canola oil
3 cloves garlic, pressed
1 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp chili powder
1/4 tsp sea salt, or to taste
1 cup chopped carrot
1 cup frozen corn
2 cups frozen whole leaf spinach
14 oz vegetarian refried beans

Cook rice in broth on very low heat (covered) for 20-25 minutes, until all broth has been absorbed.
Meanwhile, heat oil on medium heat in a large saute pan. Saute garlic and carrots, covered, for about 5 minutes, stirring often. Lower heat to medium-low, stir in cumin, chili powder, and salt. Add corn and spinach, cover and cook 7-10 minutes, until heated through, stirring occasionally.
Meanwhile, in a smaller skillet, warm the refried beans with 1-2 Tbsp water. Stir and heat until steaming and smooth, adding another Tbsp of water if necessary.
To serve, lay a bed of rice at the bottom of a wide, shallow bowl. Spoon on 1/4 of the refried beans and top with the vegetable mixture.

You could use brown rice if you wanted, but you would need to increase your cooking time to about 45 minutes. Since I ran out of brown rice and since Mister was threatening to have more junkfood as an appetizer, I went with quicker-cooking white Basmati.

Of course, an all-day snowfest is a great excuse to make cookies, even if no one found and unearthed your car for you... so I whipped up a batch of Chocolate Agave Trailmixers from VCIYCJ. They are so good and SO rich. I like soymilk with cereal and as an ingredient in something, but I've never been able to just drink it plain. If you can, or if you drink another kind of milk, nondairy or straight from the cow's udder, you'll want a tall glass to go along with these chunky treasures. One of the add-ins are sweet-tart dried cherries and it never fails to astonish me how well the tartness of the fruit brings out the sweetness of the chocolate.

Enjoy! I know Mister and I did!