fun with homemade seitan

So, in my continuing quest to be frugal and use what I have resourcefully, I made seitan on Sunday and since I had everything I needed for this recipe, it didn't cost me a penny, much less the 459 of them I would have spent at Whole Foods.

Okay, that's kind of a lie.  Not the price - that's true - but the motivation for making seitan.

Going back a week.... Now that we're hosting Thanksgiving, my precious Mister gets to have his long-awaited Tofurky Roast.  We started that "tradition" last year and continued it this year.  The night before Thanksgiving, however, we celebrate with his father and that whole side of the family.  Throughout some conversations, I heard Mister answer someone inquiring about the taste of Tofurky this way: "Well, it's better than the worst turkey you've ever had, but not as good as good turkey."

Silly me, I took this, added it to the fact that Mister only had one slice the following night at our Thanksgiving, and came to the seemingly rational conclusion that Mister didn't like Tofurky so much as he felt like Thanksgiving required it and he just kind of muddled through it for that reason.  So, the day after Thanksgiving, as I was giving thanks for not having to work on Black Friday (see? unemployment is fun!), I decided to eat the leftover Tofurky, gravy, and potatoes.  Do you see where this is going?

So, later that night, Mister went rummaging through the fridge for way longer than usual.  Finally, I asked him what he was looking for.  He said "The leftover Tofurky," and I felt that little twinge of guilt and then said "Oh.  I ate it."  Crestfallen, poor Mister looked for something else to eat, even though he'd apparently "been looking forward to it alllllll day."

Bad wife.  Someday I'll learn.

Anyway, Mister has mentioned in the past that the homemade seitan [loaf] I make is seasoned in such a way that it tastes like lamb, the other thing my sweet Greek misses about eating animals.  To make up for being selfish and thick-headed, I spent Sunday making seitan, which I then sliced and served as filet with Broccoli Chickpea Casserole from Vegan with a Vengeance.

Last night, I wanted to use up what was left of the seitan, so I created a delightful little mediterranean ragout, based roughly on a new recipe in Vegetarian Times by Nava Atlas.

I should say the resulting dinner was "loosely inspired" by the recipe in this month's VT.  In the end I think the only similarity was the 2 Tbsp olive oil and 3 shallots (which were not small).

I don't really have a name for it... I guess you could call it

Broccoli and Seitan Stew (as in, the kind of stew you serve over rice or mashed potatoes)
4-6 servings

2 Tbsp olive oil
4-6 cloves garlic, pressed or minced
3 large shallots, sliced
1/2 to 3/4 cup vegetable broth
1/2 tsp sea salt
1/4 tsp black pepper
4 cups broccoli florets
15 oz petite diced tomatoes, undrained
about 2 cups cubed seitan

Heat the oil in a large saute pan (4-qts) over medium-low heat.  When oil begins to shimmer, add shallots and garlic and stir well to coat.  Reduce heat to low; Cover and stir occasionally for about 7-10 minutes.  About halfway through, you may find the garlic is sticking and/or browning more than you'd like.  If so, add a splash of broth to deglaze the pan and add some liquid.  By the time you add the broccoli, the shallots should be browning slightly and very soft.

Add broccoli, sprinkle salt and pepper over the broccoli, then pour in half of the remaining broth and cover.  Turn up heat slightly and allow the broccoli to steam for about 5 minutes undisturbed, then lift the lid and stir to combine broccoli and shallots.  Stir in tomatoes, then add the cubed seitan and the remaining broth.  Stir well and cook for about 10 more minutes, uncovered, until everything is tender and smells amazing.

Serve over an aromatic rice (I used Jasmine) or mashed potatoes if you're lucky (and your spouse didn't eat them all...).

been a long time comin'

Hello Friends!  It's been a while, eh?

By way of a very short explanation for my sporadic posts, a few of which had absolutely nothing to do with food, and my months-long absence from any kind of posts, I will just say that life has changed a good bit this year, and sometime in the late winter, early spring, I decided that I didn't have anything interesting to say about food anymore.  I was repeating recipes and/or not cooking due to an awkward schedule and I just couldn't think of anything worth saying about stuff I'd made dozens of times before.

Sorry about that, but let's get back to it, shall we?

A couple of weeks ago, I lost my job.  It's cool, don't worry - I feel much better, actually.  It was incredibly more stressful than it needed to be and although I felt good about the things I was able to accomplish in my relatively short time there, my professional development was being strangled.  So, aside from that "money thing," I've decided to consider my newly acquired LotsaTime a blessing.

Back to that whole "money thing" for a minute, though.

If you look back over older posts in this blog, you'll see a few times when our financial situation changed and we had to readjust our budget/financial paradigm.  I'm a naturally frugal person anyway and gain great satisfaction from seeing the little "You saved $___.__ today!" that prints out at the bottom of my SuperFresh receipt after I painstakingly examined the 3 different brands of Navy Beans to find the one that would save a bit of money.  Maybe not the best example, but when I can pay $3.59 for 28 oz of organic fire-roasted diced tomatoes or $0.88 for 28 oz of "regular" diced tomatoes, I find that a bit of a victory.

So what has inspired me to start writing again?  Well, in a sense, I found a new thesis statement (do you remember having to learn those in elementary school English class??): How to Still Eat Well (taste-wise, as well as nutritionally) with Diminishing Funds.

When I lost my job, I had already put together a menu for the following week, since it included Thanksgiving, which I had the privilege of hosting again this year (click here for last year).  It made my insides shrivel up when it came time to run our purchases down the conveyor belt of each store and watch the cashier tally up our debt, knowing it would be higher than usual and at possibly the worst time.  Nevertheless, we had a delightful Thanksgiving and it took us many days (nearly a week, actually) to clear enough leftovers from the fridge for me to start cooking things that created more leftovers.

When it came time to shop for this week's food, I did something I haven't done in years.  Literally.  As in, since before I started this blog and began charting out weekly menus (which I continued all through my absence, even though I didn't share them with anyone but Mister).  I went to the grocery stores and just bought staples and a few fresh veggies I knew would play well together.  Then what?  Then I took all the knowledge I've been storing away over the last three years of Cookbook Studying and just made it up!  I know, right?

One night, I made a thick, hearty minestrone using some canned tomatoes, fresh zucchini and carrots, and orzo lovingly donated to us by my dear FIL (which is a whole other story for another time, but let's just say Mister comes from good stock).

Oh?  You want a recipe?  Well... it's the least I can do after leaving you high and dry for so many months.

Hearty Winter Minestrone (I know it's not winter yet, but it should be!)
yields about 4 quarts (I'll let your bowls decide how many servings that is)

1 Tbsp olive oil
6-7 cloves of garlic, minced or pressed (depending on clove size and personal preference)
4 stalks of celery, thinly sliced
2 large carrots, sliced into pieces of uniform size
2 small zucchini, diced*
1/2 tsp McCormick Mediterranean Sea Salt Blend
1 quart vegetable broth (or measure 4 cups water and add 2 bouillon cubes when it starts to boil)
28 oz crushed tomatoes
15 oz petite diced tomatoes
15 oz can of white beans (cannellini would be good, but I used Great Northern)
scant tsp sea salt
1/4-1/2 tsp black pepper
1 tsp dried basil
1 cup dried orzo
* The easiest way I've found to do this is to "top and tail" the zucchini, then slice each one 4x lengthwise, then cut those slices 3x lengthwise and then just cut across in half-inch slices.

This is definitely the kind of meal where you can be chopping ingredients as you go along, so you should, because it'll shave off a little time.  Don't get me wrong - this is absolutely a delightfully slow-cooked soup, but there's no need to be standing around watching the pot for 5 minutes until it's time to add the next thing, right?

Heat the oil in a 4- to 6-qt pot on medium-low.  When the oil starts to shimmer a little, add the celery and garlic.  Stir well to combine and thoroughly coat with the oil, then cover and reduce the heat to low.  While they're cooking, cut up your carrots.  When they're all cut up, add them to the pot.  If you have super-fast, ninja-like knife skills, feel free to dice the zucchini and add that at the same time you add the carrot - the idea is to give the celery about 5-7 minutes of quality time in the sauna, stirring occasionally to make sure nothing burns.  Whenever you add the zucchini, sprinkle the Mediterranean Sea Salt blend over the whole mess, stir, and cover again.  Let that melange mix and mingle for another 5-7 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Stir in the diced tomatoes, then sprinkle with sea salt, pepper, and basil, then pour in the quart of broth and stir everything together.  Turn the heat up as high as it will go and wait for your soup to boil.  It'll probably do this faster if you cover the pot again, but don't wander off and check your facebook - you want to be ready the very moment the broth starts to boil, so hang out in the kitchen and glance between the latest issue of Vogue and the pot on your stove.

When the soup has reached a healthy boil, slowly pour in the cup of uncooked orzo while stirring the pot. Continue stirring while the broth boils for another minute or two, then lower the heat to medium/medium-low.  The soup should be at a vibrant simmer, but not boiling.  Be sure to stir frequently now that you've add the orzo - the first time or two that you stir, you'll likely find yourself pushing stubborn bits of pasta off the bottom of your pot, but once you've gotten to the 8 or 9-minute mark, you can relax the stirring and just let your soup simmer another 10 minutes or so.

Taste for seasoning; if necessary, add more salt and/or pepper, and serve immediately.

boys like girl-treats, too!

It would be something of an understatement to say my cupcakes were a success.  I'm not a big braggart (ordinarily), but I have irrefutable evidence that my cupcakes were a hit - 3 previously cupcake-filled containers came home with me empty.  Then there were the nearly vulgar sounds some colleagues made while eating them.  Personally, I'm a fan of the eyes-widening, mouthful-of-cupcake-smiling reactions, of which I got many.  I've kept you in suspense long enough - wanna see 'em?

of course you do

Let's travel back in our magical phone booths to... 24 hours ago (Mister's been watching Dr Who)...

Although I honestly bought the wine specifically to make the icing, I knew I was only going to use a couple of ounces and it would be such a shame to waste that whole big bottle...  Nothing says "I'm ready to bake!" like a glass of wine balancing on top of two small cookbooks.... nothing, maybe, but a brand new apron (seriously, I don't think I can have too many - I'm becoming an apron addict).

I wish I could have gotten more of the apron in the picture, but my arm isn't long enough to do a full body self portrait, but that cute little pattern just repeats along the body and down to the cute little gathered hem bits.  Okay, so clearly I have to take a picture of the whole apron by itself because that last part made No sense.

This, right here, is probably my favorite part of the whole recipe (except the Eating It part).  This is the part of the recipe that made me fall in love with the oddly-named Funeral Cake.  This part of the recipe actually smells better than the part where the cupcakes are baking.  I know - you don't believe me - but go ahead and melt Earth Balance in a saucepan with oil, water, and cocoa and tell me you couldn't die happy.

Go ahead.  I'll wait.

Anyway, once I was done salivating from the scent of the cocoa boiling on the stove and had cleaned up enough to feel comfortable touching it, I poured the chocolatey mixture over my dry ingredients (which includes so darn much sugar I actually ran out and had to sub in some brown sugar to make up the difference - way to plan ahead and check your ingredients, Natalie - apparently flour wasn't the only thing keeping me from baking) and mixed it all together until it resembled oily fudge.  I filled the cupcake liners to the top and just look at them pretending to be pure chocolate candy cups!

Once they'd finished baking (about 25 minutes was perfect), I managed to let them cool to Nearly Room Temperature (the closest I'm likely to get any time soon) before trying to ice them.

I put about a cup of confectioners sugar in a bowl, then carefully sprinkled in 2 Tbsp red wine.  I stirred it up good with my little whisk, until the sugar had all melted into the wine and the icing had a puce kind of hue going on.  Never a big fan of pink-purple, I added another teaspoon red wine for color, but then the icing was way too thin.  In the future I will likely do the same amounts but either

a) use 1.5 cups sugar OR

b) put everything (cupcakes and icing) in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.

Despite the huge mess I made, I ended up dipping the top of each cupcake into the icing, swirling it around a little and then setting it down on the tray they live on in the refrigerator.  I put them all in the fridge overnight and it definitely helped the glaze set but not before it dripped all down the sides, making quite a mess when people pulled off the wrappers today.

The woman who inspired me to make these was extremely grateful and astonished I could combine two great things like chocolate and red wine, but she took her cupcake home to eat for dessert tonight, so I have to wait until tomorrow for her reaction, but everyone else gave me instant gratification.  The gents loved the cupcakes and used many descriptive words to tell me how much.  Another colleague has now specifically requested the Strawberry Creme cupcakes that were part of yesterday's brainstorm.  Fortunately, the incredible reactions I got on this batch are definitely provocative enough to get me back in the kitchen in time to bring those cupcakes in next week...

nothing ventured, nothing gained

So, I've been thinking of baking on and off for a couple of months.  Obviously, the best time to do so is during the first May heat wave in years.  Let's back-track, though.

A few times recently the Baking Bug bit me, only for me to open my cupboard and discover (repeatedly, since I don't learn the first time) that I have less than one cup of flour.  Not too many things you can make with that little flour.  A few times recently, Mister's been up to his old tricks, wandering into the kitchen, wanting "something," only to be thwarted by the fact that neither of us has replenished the flour, so again - no baking.

This past weekend I was around cakes almost every waking hour.  I watched batter being made in large quantities and enough frosting (they call it "icing" in the South) to fill a plastic storage bin other people would use for their winter clothing or to corral cleaning supplies.  I was surrounded by the heavenly scent of cakes baking - chocolate, almond pound, vanilla - and watched as they were prepped for icing and then decorated efficiently and skillfully.  I was even lucky enough to have some batter slung at me while I was eating my breakfast, as a sister-in-law reacted in time to save a full cakepan from overturning but too quickly to put down the spatula first.

Needless to say, after a weekend like that, all I wanted to do last night, my first night home, was bake cupcakes and even decorate them.  It's rare that I bother with icing my cupcakes, as I explained over the weekend, because you have to be patient enough to let them cool and I just want to eat them while they're still warm.  Nevertheless, when I started daydreaming about what I would make and how I would decorate, I was rudely awoken to the continued Lack Of Flour in my cupboard.

~*~*~*~*~

Over the weekend, we moved the retail and service portion of our flagship store (which is currently our corporate headquarters) into a new location, just two doors down.  Despite the move being so close we didn't even need movers' assistance, and despite a bunch of hardworking individuals pulling a 14-hour day while I was sitting in Georgia sniffing cake batter, things are still a little crazy as everyone gets settled.  A little (okay, a decent bit) of that chaos is leaking back into the "old" building, where me and other administrative folks are still in residence.  By the end of today, one of my colleagues was clearly in need of some TLC and good, old-fashioned, female-tilted relaxation.  

I hatched a plan on my walk home: moist dark chocolate cupcakes, topped with something decadent.  Maybe I would get a decorator tip and food coloring and make a red rose topping (a wee bit ambitious for someone who has never actually decorated a cupcake outside of smearing an improvised "cream cheese" icing on top and carefully placing chocolate chips to look randomly sprinkled on).  No.... I try to stay away from artificial ingredients, so why would I use food dye?  Ah!  Strawberries!  Yes, I would puree fresh strawberries and then make a pink "buttercream" to frost the tops of these decadent chocolate cupcakes.  Hmmm.... suddenly, the light flavor of a strawberry creme topping seemed better suited to vanilla cupcakes, which I had no interest in making.  Then I remembered a comical conversation about Tequila-tinged cupcakes and rethought the strawberry theme - I'll stop at the liquor store, pick up some Pinnacle Whipped and macerate some berries in it, then plop them on top of a chocolate frosting!  But then there's the issue of transportation... thinkthinkthink... I've got it! 

~*~*~*~*~

As I sit here, telling ridiculous stories and dragging this post out as long as possible to make up for all the words I haven't been sharing, I am breathing in the thick, delicious aroma of newly baked chocolate cupcakes.  I used Dynise's recipe for Funeral Cake in her new book Celebrate Vegan.  I actually tested this recipe for the book, so I knew its intense flavor was exactly what my colleague (and I!) need to make it to Friday.  It is taking every ounce of my imaginary self-control to stay away from the cooling cuppers (though I think the large amount of batter I scraped from the sides of my mixing bowl and ate while they baked helped...)

I know, I can feel your sarcasm seeping through the computer as you think "Wow, Natalie, you made chocolate cupcakes?  Good freakin' job."  No, no, friends - it gets far better.

When I stopped to get flour on my way home (and strawberries, just in case I changed my mind), I also picked up a bottle of sweet red wine.  Again, nothing much new here, so let's skip right to the Big Innovative Moment this has all been leading up to:

If I actually let the cupcakes cool without eating them, I'm going to whip up a glaze using that wine.  The cupcakes alone are enough to give you a foodgasm, (have I mentioned you need to get the book??) but if the icing comes out even half as well in real life as it does in my brain, the complementary flavors will kick these sweets up a notch and a half.  Current plan is to do a cup of confectioners' sugar with 2 Tbsp of the wine, then more or less paint the glaze on or possible dip the nicely domed tops of the cupcakes to allow a little Hershey Kiss-shaped action on top.

No pictures tonight, sweetpeas, nor confirmed recipes - I promise I will return tomorrow with pictures, recipes, and reactions, but for now it's time to get to sleep so I can get up early and ice my cupcakes!

the greatest of these is love

Pardon me.  Have you seen the movie "Crash"?  Very much the way it starts by flashing around to seemingly unrelated stories, I am going to start with two apparently independent vignettes.  Just like the movie, it will all come together in the end.

*~*~*~*~*

A little while back, Christians worldwide celebrated their holiest holiday, the one that gives irrevocable substance to their beliefs - Easter and the holy days preceding it.  Long story short, the man bold enough to call himself the son of God breaks bread with his friends and then tells them that the next time he will eat with them will be "on the flip side."  After a night of ardent prayer in a garden in Jerusalem, one of his "friends" leads those who would arrest him to Jesus, beginning the end, so to speak.  The next 24 hours will find this supposed Messiah tried, beaten, and hung on a cross, crucified until dead.  The miracle, though, upon which Christians base their faith and find their salvation, is that after resting in a tomb from a Friday afternoon until a Sunday morning, Jesus rose, bringing veracity to all his claims and reconciling a broken relationship between humanity and a pure deity.

I have no idea who named all the holy days, but as Easter approached this year, my cousin's wife inquired if anyone knew what the word Maundy meant (as in Maundy Thursday, the night that Christians remember The Last Supper and take part in a sacrament begun on that night 2000ish years ago).  I'll admit, I referred to the expertise of the internet to help me answer her, but upon finding this article, I remembered things I learned in seminary.  "Maundy" is taken from "Mandate."  Let me explain further:

After humbling himself and washing his friends' feet in a symbolic act of what he was about to accomplish on a far larger and bloodier scale, and after instituting the sacrament of Communion by offering his friends his body/bread and blood/wine and asking them to remember him when they dined together, Jesus gave them one last mandate.  "A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.  By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another." (Gospel of John, 13:34-35 ESV)

*~*~*~*~*

Do you know who Beth Hart is?

I've mentioned her before, but lately she's been taking up a lot of space in my brain and in my heart.  I believe I have come to decide that she is truly the greatest performer of my time for what she does.  There are two reasons for this:

1. She seems to have perfect pitch - she never misses a note!
2. She is so completely honest and raw... she pours every part of her heart into her music.  I saw an interview with her when she said that she wrote when she was sad and toured when she was not, more or less.

Having lost myself in hours of YouTube videos over the last several weeks, I've seen her live performances from all over the world, in all kinds of venues from stadiums to dive bars, and multiple versions of her more popular songs.  She is a consummate performer - she enjoys every moment of what she does (even in a bittersweet, maudlin kind of way) and recognizes at every opportunity how lucky she is that she gets to sing her heart for a living.  She is so real.

She is a storyteller and I love that.  Through her songs and the tales she uses to introduce them, I learn more about her and her life and her inspirations.  She has written the most sincere love song I've ever heard and the most painful plea for love, too.

Beth did not have the fame she deserved in the USA, so she does most of her touring overseas, throughout Europe.  She very clearly feeds off of the energy of her crowd, so she interacts with them frequently throughout the concert.  She loves it when her crowd sings along, they obviously love when she talks to them, and there is always this intense intimacy between her and those in attendance at her shows.  I hope to be so lucky one day.  

As I've been vicariously participating (via YouTube), I noticed a trend in her closing song.  It is not normally the same song, though they are almost always incredibly personal and sometimes heart-wrenchingly painful songs.  One can almost imagine Beth's fans leaving the concert in a contemplative way not unlike the worshippers at a Maundy Thursday service.    

After concluding her Wroclaw (Poland) concert with the song that made her [at least somewhat] famous, she sincerely thanks her fans for being "so nice to me."

Maybe I was in a particularly melancholy mood while watching this one night, but I thought to myself, "what kind of pain makes a person thank total strangers for being nice to her?"  It was enough to push tears into my eyes, thinking of all I knew she had been through from reading up on her and watching interviews with her.  Divorced parents, possible abuse, a heroin user by age 15, when she was 22ish her old sister, who she holds in high regard, died from AIDS, which she caught from a dirty needle.  It took Beth years to care enough about herself to clean up (and the love of a good man).  Her self-esteem is still just awful and my heart aches for her.

In her adult years, she reconciled the broken relationship she had with her father, who left when she was still young.  When she wrote one of her more recent albums, 37 Days, she asked him what his favorite song was.  He told her he didn't know why, but it was this one:

She told him she knew why - Because he is an addict, just like her.  Clean or not, it is a continuing struggle, laid bare in this song.  "God knows I can't change me; I've tried and tried... it's been a long time at the bottom.  Spent a lot of time way down there.  It's been a long time at the bottom - I don't know how I made it here."

*~*~*~*~*

So how do the two parts of this post "crash"?  Really, it's quite simple.

You don't know what another person is going through or has lived through.  You don't know their joys or the pain they carry unspoken.

Be kind.  Love one another.

this is your brain on bacon

Bacon.  It's kind of like The New Superfood except that it'll kill you, not make you stronger.  In addition to its high fat and cholesterol content, there is a carcinogen in bacon that is activated through the cooking process.

Nevertheless, Bacon.  People love it.  All kinds of people - big people, little people, fat people, thin people, couch potatoes, athletes....and vegetarians?  Yup, sometimes vegetarians love it, too.  It's been referred to as the "gateway meat," the one temptation that proves too much even for a committed vegetarian to resist.  I've heard stories of friend's friends who are steadfast vegetarians... until they get really drunk and then they want to eat bacon.  I guess it's not made of pig when you're drunk.

But listen, I'm not here to criticize.

If you ask most vegans/vegetarians what one thing they miss, taking animals and the environment and everything else out of the equation, it's normally bacon.

Once upon a time, in a land kind of far away (not really), I had a weekend tradition.  My friends and I would go out to a club/bar on Friday night and drink and dance until it closed, then we would return to the home of the friend who lived almost right behind the bar/club, eat nachos and then either disperse or fall asleep.  The following morning, we would curl up on the couch and drink coffee and watch ridiculous things on the TV until we were hungry enough to send her boyfriend to the nearby Burger King for food (yes, I thought that's what it was way back then).  I always got a #5 value meal with Dr. Pepper.  The #5 was a Double Bacon Cheeseburger with fries and I loooooved it.

Time passed and the "weekend treat" turned into my Go-To "to go" meal.  I would even get the "gourmet" version at a local Philly pub.  I truly don't know how I lived long enough to become a vegetarian, but I'm glad I did (and so are my heart, arteries, and waistline).

Believe it or not, this is all building up to my lunch today.  Please keep breathing - I didn't eat a double bacon cheeseburger...

I had a Ziggy Burger from HipCityVeg!  Please excuse the rotten picture - the place was packed, so I took my biodegradable, recycled-and-recyclable bag of lunch across the street to Rittenhouse Square and I care way too much about whether strangers will think I'm weird for photographing a burger, so I just took a crappy picture with my ancient dumbphone.

Anyway, I actually had planned to get the Philly Steak, but when I asked about getting it without the mushrooms and onions, I was told that they were "cooked into" the seitan, so that ended that little dream.  The bubbly, cute girl behind the iPad "register" suggested the Ziggy Burger.  She had me at "smoked tempeh," so I decided to give it a try.

Once I'd seated myself on a bench in the park, I pulled my burger out and was immediately amused by the wrapping:

It looks even neater up close.

The first bite of my burger was an almost otherworldly experience - I never thought I would taste a bacon cheeseburger again, but that is exactly what the Ziggy Burger tastes like.  It was so good.  I don't even want to describe it, I just want you to go to HipCityVeg and try one yourself.  Or anything else from this amazing menu...

photo credit

I want to try everything that doesn't involve Portobello mushrooms.  This is a goal that will likely be spread out over several paychecks, since the fast food set-up does not over-ride Rittenhouse Square pricing.  What's worse is how I only vaguely cringe at this point when my burger came out to $9.10 (including tax).  Actually, no, what's THE worst is that $9.10 only covered the burger.  If I had gotten fries (or kale!) and a drink, I'd have paid $15-20.  For lunch.

That being said, it was a great burger (though I kind of suspect the patty itself might have been a Boca vegan burger...) and when I entered the joint I was offered a free shot of their "Groothie," a green smoothie made of apples, bananas, kale, and pineapple and it was amazing.  I would totally pay $3.50 for it... on occasion.  I was fortunate to get there at a "lull" in the excitement.  Yeah, every seat was taken and some people were lined up along a wall waiting for their food, but I walked right in and up to the register to order - no waiting.  I must have (for once) had perfect timing, because by the time I moved to the wall to await my white satchel of burger with HipCityVeg stamped oh-so-indie-ly upon it in black ink, there was a queue of people straight out the door!

If you miss bacon, do yourself a favor and go to HipCityVeg.
If you love bacon and still eat it even though it will kill you, do your body a favor and go to HipCityVeg.
If you just love to eat good food (tasty and nutritious!), go to HipCityVeg!


Maybe I'll see you there after I get my next paycheck ;)  I'll be the one with sweet potato fries, sauteed kale, and a groothie begging the lady with the iPad to take my money.

black magic, brown rice

I know, I know - how many posts can I really devote to brown rice?

At least one more.

I am just so pleased with myself at the moment.  Tonight I made the Seitanic Jambalaya from Veganomicon in just under an hour!  The book gives it an hour and a half, and previous attempts
have seen me begging the rice to be plump and done after two and a half hours of simmering uselessly on the stovetop.  Tonight, though, I nearly made this into an express meal!

Well, okay, let's not get out of control here.  Besides, it's not like I did anything terribly innovative - I just used the same trick I've employed for other brown-rice-stovetop-simmering recipes - I cooked the rice separately and then added it to the pot.  Ah, yes.  The pot.

Another contributor to my success may have been the use of my beautiful 4-quart saute pan.  Everything fit!

Speaking of perfect fits (and awkward segues...), I am so excited about a new development exactly halfway between the two center city locations of my company.

HipCityVeg is the new venture by Nicole Marquis, who was formerly the General Manager at my dear, departed, and sorely missed Horizons.  I knew I was in love when I read a review that featured a casual mission statement from the proprietress: "I wanted to put Horizons on a sandwich."  Um... you had me at Hello!

Great reviews abound and apparently there have been lines out the door since the place opened on Monday.  I am hoping to stop by there for lunch tomorrow since I will be traveling from one store to the other and, like I said, it's mid-way.  My mouth absolutely watered checking out the menu...

I'm putting my camera in my purse now and with a little luck (and probably a lot of patience), I'll finally have some food photos for you tomorrow (and of course, as detailed a review as I can muster!)  Until then, chickpeas, take care!