CSA Share Week 2

I actually just picked up CSA Share Week 4... so I'm a few weeks behind, as usual. I had busy things, and sick things, and medical procedure things, and vegan potluck BBQ things, so BUSY!


Week 2's share contained Easter Egg Radishes, Nappa Cabbage, Lettuce, Spinach, and Garlic Scapes.

Garlic Scapes met up with Broccoli this week in a Broccoli Pesto stirred into whole wheat elbow macaroni, served along side carrots sauteed in Earth Balance and Dill and Gardein Crispy Tenders.



I sauteed the cabbage and spinach with red bell pepper, carrots, more garlic scapes, and what was supposed to be thin sliced 5 spice seitan, but my food processor mostly turned into ground seitan.

The lettuce and radishes went into a salad with a homemade vinaigrette and topped with a modified version of Chickpea Hijiki Salad from VwaV (no carrots; diced celery, dill). The boy looked at me like I was insane when I put this on his plate.... then ate two massive plates full of salad.

Now, with any luck, I'll get week 3 posted before week 5!

Vegan MoFo Day 30: Comfort Food

I made it! I made it I made it I made it! 30 days of blogging! Sort of on a holiday theme the entire time. A few diversions anyway, but hey, I posted every day and that's what counts. I decided to end November with a typical easy cleaning-out-the-fridge comfort dinner we enjoy at Casa Megatarian. It can best be described as Pasta Primavera, as it is veggies and noodles, though we just go with the simple "vegetable pasta." It's quick, it's easy, it's delicious, and it will take whatever you've got around the house to toss in! I'll write up what I tossed in tonight, but it's just a suggestion. The important part is to have at least as many veggies as you've got pasta!


Vegetable Pasta
12 oz wholegrain pasta
1 large broccoli crown
1/4 head of cauliflower
1 15oz can fire roasted diced tomatoes
2 cups frozen peas
2 cups frozen spinach
3 cloves garlic
2 tbsp olive oil
Handful of fresh flat leaf parsley, chopped
salt and pepper to taste

1. Prepare the pasta according to package directions.

2. Meanwhile... cut the veggies into bite sized pieces and dice the garlic. Heat the oil in a large skillet (I use a wok) and sautee the garlic until it is fragrant but don't let it brown. Add the veggies and sautee the whole lot until they've reached desired tenderness. Add bits of water here and there if the pan is getting too dry.

3. Drain the pasta, toss with the veggies, fresh parsley, and season to taste with salt and pepper. Serve with your Parmesan cheese substitute of choice!

And now, since I may not blog again for Blog knows how long, I leave you with a cruddy picture of my Christmas tree, and Laser Cats.

Vegan MoFo Day 28: Green Bean Casserole

Green Bean Casserole is one of those quintessential Thanksgiving foods that I had never eaten in my life until last year's Pre-Thanksgiving Vegan Thanksgiving Potluck. In my family, you didn't cover vegetables in "sauces" or ever use cream of anything soup for anything. The exception to this, somehow, was creamed spinach... but I'm just going to chalk that up to an anomaly. Sure we ate green beans, sauteed, with butter or green beans with slivered almonds, but never, never, with a cream sauce and fried onions in a can. Which leads to the second reason I'd never eaten this -- the onion thing. I think it's well known by now that I don't *do* onions. It's not that I dislike them, but they have a burning searing hatred for my guts... literally, so I don't eat them. Third -- Green Bean Casserole always seems to be made with canned green beans. I don't do canned vegetables either, with the exception of corn, and tomatoes, and legume type beans (i.e. chickpeas, kidney beans). I don't like squishy veggies. After two years of potlucks eating green beans with yummy mushroom sauce I decided I'd give it a go myself this year. After perusing lots of omni recipes, I decided I'd just wing it, and here's what I came up with, in all its delicious glory!



Green Bean Casserole
1 1/2 lbs FRESH green beans, ends snapped off, cut into 1" pieces
1/4 cup diced shallots
10 oz crimini (baby bella) mushrooms, sliced
1 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp all purpose flour
2 cups Creamy Portabello Mushroom Soup
1/2 cup non-dairy cream cheese (I used Follow Your Heart brand because I can't find Tofutti Nonhydrogenated here anymore!)
Salt & Pepper to taste
1 can French Fried Onions

1. In a large skillet, heat the olive oil over medium high heat and add the shallots and mushrooms. Sautee until the mushrooms are all shrunk down and the shallots are soft and translucent.

2. Add the green beans to the skillet and continue to sautee until they are just fork tender. Keep in mind they will also be baked and you don't want soggy beans! Add a little of the mushroom soup if the pan needs some moisture.

3. Add the 2 tbsp of flour and sautee for a minute to get rid of the raw flour taste.

4. Add the soup and cream cheese and salt and pepper to taste. Bring to a boil and stir often to dissolve all the cream cheese. Allow it to thicken slightly (just needs a few minutes) and remove from heat.

5. Pour your green bean gravy mixture into your baking pan of choice. Top with French Fried Onions, and bake for 30 minutes at 350 degrees.

So now you may be wondering "But what about the onions?!? You don't eat ONIONS!!" This is true. I portioned out a small amount for myself in a single serve baking dish and topped it with Panko. Problem solved :)

Veggie-full Pasta Salad

This pasta salad has been a while in the making. I picked up the really cute tri-color ABC pasta at Trader Joe's last time I was visiting my parents and it's been lying in wait in the pantry for a pasta salad occasion. The occasion came about when we were invited to an omni BBQ and Bonfire! For occasions such as these, I try to make a side that could work as a light meal, but doesn't seem like I'm bringing an entree. This salad has a lot of nice bright veggies in an olive oil and tahini dressing, as I'm not a fan of mayo salads. If you wanted to make it even hardier, you could add in a can of drained and rinsed beans of your choice.

I'm realizing more and more what crappy macro shots my camera takes. My old camera did a much better job. This new one can't deal with light, no matter if it's natural, artificial, or flash and everything just comes out looking not nearly as good as it does in person.

Veggie-Full Pasta Salad
8 oz pasta, cooked and rinsed in cool water
1/2 cup frozen peas, thawed
1 ear of fresh corn, kernels cut off the cob (or 1/2 cup canned or frozen/thawed)
1 carrot, peeled and finely diced
1/2 bell pepper, finely diced
1 cup cherry tomatoes, quartered
2 tbsp parsley, chopped
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
1/4 cup tahini
Juice of 1 lemon
Salt and pepper to taste

1. In a large bowl, mix together the pasta and all the cut up veggies and parsley.

2. In a small bowl, whisk together the oil, tahini, lemon juice, and salt and pepper. Depending on the size of your lemon you may want to start with half, taste, and then add more for extra zing.

3. Fold the dressing into the pasta and veggie mixture. Chill until you're ready to serve.

Summer Vegetable Risotto & Garden Loot

Check out the recent loot from my garden!!

A gentry squash (yellow), an eight ball zucchini, Cascade Beans (thanks KimberlyNE!), and some mysterious purple beans... sadly these all go green when you cook them.



Two more gentry squash looking rather like they're birds enjoying a conversation.


Not featured, snap peas! While the humid, rainy weather and otherwise cool temperatures are not doing my tomatoes well (I've got late blight. :( ), the squash plants and beans and peas are doing very well!! Now starts the process of trying to creatively use tons of beans, peas, and squash from the garden! I still had a quart of homemade vegetable broth left in the freezer from my last huge batch this winter, so I decided to use it to make a nice summer vegetable risotto. I used a yellow squash, beans, snap peas, and a half of a yellow bell pepper I had in the fridge. I also sauteed up a handful of shiitake and oyster mushrooms and added it to my portion. At the very end I stirred in a generous handful of fresh basil chiffonade (leaves rolled up like a cigar and cut into thin strips), sprinkled it with faux Parmesan sprinkles from the Ultimate Uncheese Cookbook (I make mine with half pine nuts and half sesame seeds. SO GOOD!) and it was divine!!

This recipe is really more of a technique. You can use any veggies you have in the house and as many of them as you've got. You can use less arborio rice if you want less risotto as long as you keep the 4:1 liquid to rice ratio.



Summer Vegetable Risotto
1.5 cups Arborio Rice
6 cups vegetable stock, simmering on the stove
1 tbsp olive oil + more for sauteeing vegetables
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 summer squash, diced
3/4 cups each green beans and snap peas, cut into small pieces
1/2 bell pepper, diced
1/2 cup fresh basil leaves, cut into thin strips
salt and pepper to taste

1. In a sautee pan, heat a little oil and sautee the veggies (minus garlic) until they are tender-crisp, about 5 minutes

2. In a large pot (3 quarts at least), heat the tbsp of oil and sautee the garlic for a minute until it starts to sizzle, then add the rice and stir it around so it get coated in oil. Once coated, add a few ladles full of the hot broth. Stir.

3. When the liquid is mostly absorbed into the rice, add a couple more ladles full of broth. Stir. Stir it every few minutes at least, and keep adding more liquid until all the liquid is absorbed and the rice is tender. It will get very creamy! This process should take around 20 minutes.

4. Fold the veggies and basil into the rice. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Serve, sprinkled with your Parma sprinkles.

Soba Noodles with Seitan and Veggies

WE MOVED!! I'm cooking in my new kitchen now and I hope that means I'll be food blogging a lot more. This meal is a combination of many things that the boy and I enjoy. Strips of seitan, julienned veggies, and soba noodles in a creamy tahini-miso sauce.

I made the seitan yesterday - cutlets this time, baked in some broth in the oven at 350 for 50 minutes. And so, I mostly made this up as I went along, though the sauce is based on esme's sauce.


Soba Noodles with Seitan and Veggies

1 - 8 oz package of Soba Noodles
2 tbsp canola oil
2 cloves of garlic
1 red bell pepper
1/2 bunch kale
1/2 zucchini (I used half because I had it left over)
1/2 lbs snow peas
1 cup carrots
2 cups seitan

Sauce 2 cups veggie broth
2 tbsp soy sauce
2 tbsp rice wine vinegar
2 tbsp nutritional yeast
2 tbsp miso (paste, not the instant powder)
2 tbsp tahini
1 tbsp cornstarch dissolved in a little cold water

1. Prepare the veggies and seitan by cutting them all into thin strips of about the same size. Chop the garlic, or grate or press it.

2. Prepare the soba noodles according to package directions.

3. In a large skillet or wok, heat 1 tbsp of oil over medium-high heat. Add the seitan and cook until lightly brown, then remove it from the pan and set aside.

4. Add the second tbsp of oil to the pan, still over medium-high heat, and add the red peppers. Sautee for about 3 minutes, then add the kale a handful at a time until it's all wilted down. Add a few tbsp of water if the pan is getting dry. Add the garlic, zucchini, peas, and carrots and stir fry for 3-5 minutes until the veggies are bright and tender-crisp.

5. While the noodles are draining, add all the sauce ingredients to the noodle pan and heat, stirring until smooth. Add the noodles, and stir to coat, then add the veggies and seitan. If the sauce is thick enough for you now, you can stop now. If not, add the cornstarch dissolved in water and cook for another minute or two until the sauce thickens up.

Manhattan Vegetable Chowder

This recipe comes from 1000 Vegetarian Recipes by Carol Gelles, a weird cookbook that, while claiming to be vegetarian, also calls for fish stock in some soups. I'm not entirely sure where she learned about vegetarianism, since it's obvious to most vegetarians that fish are animals, and vegetarians don't eat animals, ergo, vegetarians don't eat fish, but it seems she missed that day in veg training school. It's easy enough to say "Oh well vegetarians just would use vegetable broth" but people who are not veg, and get the book out of the library, say, to choose something nice to make for there vegetarian dinner guest might not know any better and suddenly you're eating fish. Gross. Enough with that rant, this soup is damn good. It is shown with whole wheat rosemary foccacia bread sticks sprinkled with coarse sea salt.




Manhattan Vegetable Chowder

1 tbsp olive oil
2 cups shredded cabbage
4 cups vegetable broth
2 cups water
6 oz tomato paste
1 cup sliced celery
1 cup diced zucchini
1 cup diced carrots
1/2 cup frozen lima beans
1/2 cup green beans, cut into 1 inch pieces
1/2 tsp dry thyme
salt and pepper to taste

1. In a large soup pot, heat the oil over medium heat and cook the cabbage until it's softened, about 4 minutes.

2. Add everything else, stir well to dissolve the tomato paste, and bring to a boil. Turn the heat down to maintain a simmer and simmer uncovered for about 30 minutes.

Vegetable Vindaloo! Back to the Slow Cooker!

This is slow cooker, take 2. After slow cooker round 1, Fresh from the Vegetarian Slow Cooker author Robin Robertson left a comment that she has an updated pot roast recipe on her blog, with a link so -- check that out if you're interested. And really, buy her books because her recipes rock. I think I've got at least 5 of them...

The boy really enjoys Indian food, and I can't stand curry powder, so when I find recipes that are Indian, but not curry, they're a good compromise. Being a Vindaloo however, this recipe contained spicy things, and also onions. Being me, and if you've read my blog long enough you'll see what's coming next here, I left them both out because my belly doesn't like them. My mom called and said whatever it was my Dad made for dinner, and I said that I made a really yummy Vegetable Vindaloo and she was surprised I made something spicy, and I said it wasn't, I left the spicy stuff out, and then she said it wasn't Vindaloo and I said "Whatever it was delicious." If you're a spicy things person, just throw some spicy things, and an onion, in the crock pot too. It is definitely well seasoned though and not bland at all!

This is the part where I say 'Come on camera PLEEEASE'

Vegetable Vindaloo
2 tbsp olive oil
3 cloves of garlic, smashed and peeled
1 tbsp ginger, peeled and diced tiny
1 tsp light brown sugar
1 tsp ground coriander
1/2 tsp ground cumin
1/2 tsp dry mustard
1/2 tsp turmeric
1 tbsp apple cider vinegar
2 carrots, peeled and cut into coins
1 green bell pepper, diced
2 cups cauliflower florets, cut into small bite sized pieces
2 zucchini, cut into coins
15.5 oz can kidney beans, drained and rinsed
6 oz tomato paste stirred into 1 1/2 cups hot water
salt and pepper to taste
1/2 cup frozen green peas

1. Heat 1 tbsp the oil in a small skillet and sautee the carrots for about 5 minutes until they start getting tender.

2. Meanwhile, put the remaining tbsp of oil, vinegar, garlic, ginger, and spices in a food processor or blender and process/blend until smooth. (I ended up adding 1/4 cup of water to get it to process smooth, and just subtracted it from the hot water that you mix with the tomato paste)

3. Place the carrots in the crock pot turned on to low, along with the rest of the vegetables (except hte peas), and beans, and spice mixture, and stir for about a minute. Add the tomato/water mixture, stir again, cover, and cook on low for 6 hrs.

4. Add the peas about 10 minutes before you serve.

Seitan Pot Roast with Veggies

The boy's Mom gave me her old 3 1/2 quart slow cooker that she didn't need any more. She said if I liked it, I could always get a more modern slow cooker. It seemed like a good idea. I have a few long days between work and classes and it's often a rush to get dinner on the table. I didn't quite realize how out of date the slow cooker was, however, until the boy, very thoughtfully, bought me Fresh From The Vegetarian Slow Cooker by Robin Robertson. I was all excited to try the recipes -- then realized I'm out of the house too long. Most are done in 4-6 hrs -- which isn't even a full work day! It seems Ms. Robertson has a modern slow cooker with a "timer" and "Keep Warm" functions -- whereas mine is "HI|OFF|LOW."

Still, the cookbook is full of good sounding comfort food recipes, and so I thought I'd try it anyway. One recipe that looked especially intriguing was "Not Your Mama's Pot Roast," and I knew I'd be home all day to monitor the monster, so I though I'd give it a try today. But -- more difficulties. You need a 6 quart slow cooker, and seitan quick mix... or use her seitan recipe which involves the whole wheat flour and a lot of washing. No thanks. That recipe made 2 lbs of seitan, so I thought I'd just make 1lbs using vital wheat gluten, and cut the recipe in half to make in my smaller slow cooker. I also threw in some more veggies, since it just called for carrots, potatoes, and onions. It came out REALLY yummy in the end, the seitan was really moist and tender -- and was ready in about 6 1/2 hrs instead of the prescribed 8.


Seitan Pot Roast with Veggies

For the seitan:
Dry:
1 cup vital wheat gluten
3 tbsp nutritional yeast
1 tsp onion powder
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp fresh or 1/2 tsp dry thyme

Wet:
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp tomato paste
1 tbsp tahini
1/4 cup soy sauce
Up to 1/2 cup unbeef or vegetable broth

1. Mix together the dry ingredients.

2. Mix the oil, tomato paste, tahini, and soy sauce together. Add to the dry ingredients. Slowly add in the broth or water, stirring constantly (or in my case, with the stand mixer mixing constantly) until the seitan comes together into a moist, but not wet, ball.

3. Knead the dough for about 5 minutes, then form into a smooth ball.

For the Pot Roast and Veggies Part:
6 pearl onions, peeled
1/4 lbs baby carrots
1/2 lbs red potatoes, diced
10 brussels sprouts
1 parsnip, peeled and cut into coins
8 crimini mushrooms
2 cloves of garlic, peeled and crushed
1 1/4 cups vegetable or unbeef broth
1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
1 tbsp tamari
2 tsp fresh or 1 tsp dried thyme
Olive oil

1. In a large skillet, heat 1 tbsp olive oil and quickly brown the veggies, except the garlic.

2. Lightly coat/mist the bottom of the slow cooker with vegetable oil to prevent the seitan from sticking.

3. Place seitan ball in the bottom of the slow cooker. Top with veggies. Pour broth, vinegar, tamari, garlic, and thyme over the top of the veggies and seitan.

4. Cover and cook -- the cookbook says low for 8 hrs. I cooked it on low for 5 1/2 hrs, and then high for 1 hr.

5. Remove the seitan and veggies from the broth. Turn the slow cooker to high. Whisk 1 tbsp cornstarch in a little bit of cold water, then whisk it into the remaining broth. Stir until thickened.


I served this with some roasted Delicata squash. I sliced the squash in half, cleaned out the seeds and guts, put about 1 tbsp of Earth Balance and a drizzle of maple syrup inside, and dusted it with cinnamon. Then I roasted it in the oven at 450 for about 30 minutes until it was fork tender. The sweet squash with the savory pot roast and veggies went great!

Pesto Pasta with Baked Pesto Tofu

I bought a huge bunch of basil recently for a recipe and I had a bunch left over, so I thought I'd make some pesto with the rest of it. I mentioned it to the boy and he said there was some chicken pesto monstrosity that he enjoyed from a deli, and wanted to know if I could do pesto seitan or tofu or something. I decided on tofu since I thought it would adapt better to pesto that seitan. I think of seitan as more of an alfredo protein. All the pesto recipes I found called for tons of oil and more basil than I had, so I kind of winged it with what I had around the house. It came out REALLY yummy and the whole dish was delicious, though it doesn't photograph so well!



Pesto Pasta with Baked Pesto Tofu, Roasted Cauliflower, and Zucchini

The Pesto
2 cups basil, packed
3 tbsp olive oil
3 cloves garlic, crushed
1/4 cup vegetable broth
3 tbsp pine nuts, toasted
Juice of 1/2 lemon
2 tbsp nutritional yeast
salt/pepper to taste

1. In a small saucepan, heat the oil on low with the crushed garlic. Turn the garlic occasionally until it's light brown and fragrant. *

2. Put the basil, garlic infused olive oil, as much garlic as you want from it, broth, pine nuts, lemon juice, and nutritional yeast in a blender and blend until smooth. Taste, adjust seasoning, blend, taste again, until desired flavor is reached. Refrigerate or freeze until you're ready to use it.

The Tofu Part
1 lbs tofu, drained, pressed, cubed
3-4 tbsp pesto

1. Toss the tofu with the pesto and refrigerate, covered, overnight to marinate.

2. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Bake the tofu on a non-stick spray sprayed baking sheet for 30 minutes, turning several times, until it begins to tan.

The Veggie Part
1/2 head cauliflower cut into bite sized pieces
1 zucchini, cut into half moons.
1 tsp olive oil

1. Lightly spray the cauliflower pieces with olive oil and place on a baking sheet.

2. Bake in a 425 degree oven until soft and beginning to brown, about 20 minutes. Turn halfway through.

3. Heat the olive oil in a small skillet and sautee zucchini until just tender. About 3 minutes.

The Pasta Part
8 oz fettucini or the pasta of your choice

1. Prepare pasta according to package directions.

The Assembly

1. Toss cooked pasta with another 3-4 tbsp of pesto... or more or less depending on your taste. Fold in the tofu and veggies. Nom.



* I cook the garlic because raw garlic doesn't agree with me. If you like raw garlic, or are indifferent or lazy, you can skip this step.

Another lunch - Bulgur and Grilled Veggies

I haven't been updating, but I swear I've been cooking/eating! I had trouble photographing this as our dinner tonight, but it worked out quite well in a lunch box! This is another meal from the "things I threw together" department. I thought it was quite yummy, but the boy was less than thrilled with the dried fruit in the bulgur. He's not a big fan of sweet-in-savory. I think it offset the salty/savory veggies well, and it was a snap to put together!

The veggies there isn't really a recipe for. I marinated the tofu in some hoisin sauce thinned with some soy sauce and just a splash of sesame oil. The veggies got a spraying of olive oil, and salt, pepper and garlic powder, and the rest of the tofu marinade. I grilled them on a cast iron grill pan set under the broiler until the veggies were tender and browned. I grilled up some crookneck squash and zucchini, Japanese eggplant, crimini mushrooms, red bell peppers, and some snap peas from the garden (because I have them coming out my ears!). So that went into my lunch box with some of the fruited bulgur, some melon, strawberries and local blueberries (so delicious and fat!), and two Trail Mix cookies that I baked over the weekend. (I'll have to post a recipe for that sometime too!)

Fruited Bulgur
1 1/3 cups apple juice
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup bulgur wheat
6 dried apricots, diced
2 heaping tbsp chopped dates
1/2 cup unsalted roasted cashews, chopped
1 cup frozen peas, thawed
1 carrot, grated


1. In a medium pot, heat the apple juice and salt to boiling. Turn off the heat and add the bulgur. Stir, let sit, covered, for 20-30 minutes or until all the liquid is absorbed. Fluff with fork.

2. Add everything else and toss well to distribute.

Vegetable Phyllo Roll

I really enjoy phyllo dough. Once you get used to working with these paper thin sheets of dough, it isn't that scary. I find an olive oil mister is very useful to spray the sheets as I layer them, but a pastry brush and some oil in a bowl will accomplish the same thing.

This recipe works out well around our house because I put in different veggies for the boy and me, he gets the onions, I get the mushrooms. This time I also threw in a small Japanese eggplant, because I had one. The veggies here are flexible, just try to cut them all in the same julienne. A light marinara sauce pairs well for dipping, and they're even good left over, though the dough will lose it's flakiness. When I make these, I like making a few small rolls to put in my lunchboxes for the week. This is another mystery recipe. I wrote it down from somewhere and I don't know where. Yields 4 rolls.



Vegetable Phyllo Rolls
1 cup thinly sliced onions
1 cup julienned carrots (about 2 carrots)
1 cup thinly sliced red and/or yellow bell pepper (about 1 medium)
1 cup julienned yellow squash and/or zucchini (one small)
2 cups sliced mushrooms
1/4 tsp dried tarragon
1 tbsp chopped fresh basil or 1 tsp dry
salt and pepper to taste
1 box phyllo dough
1 cup bread crumbs
2 tbsp sesame seeds, crushed or run in the food processor a bit + extra whole ones for sprinkling
2 cloves of garlic, pressed
Olive oil as needed for moistening phyllo

1. Sautee the onions over medium heat until soft. Add the carrots, cover and cook 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Stir in the peppers and squash, cover and cook another minute. Add the mushrooms, tarragon, and basil, and cook until the mushrooms cook down. Drain any excess liquid off the veggies, and season with salt and pepper to taste.

2. Combine the bread crumbs, garlic, and 2 tbsp of crushed or otherwise broken up sesame seeds

3. Assemble the rolls by laying out 3 sheets of phyllo dough, lightly mist or brush with oil, sprinkle with bread crumbs, and repeat 3 times so you have a total of 12 sheets of phyllo layered.

4. Spread vegetables evenly on the phyllo within 1 inch of all 4 sides. Fold the long edges in, roll up, and lay seam side down on baking sheet (silpat is great here). Brush or mist with more oil, and sprinkle with whole sesame seeds. Bake at 350 degrees for 30-40 minutes until golden brown.

Thai Steamed Green Garden with Coconut-Peanut Sauce

Jeez, what is it with me and peanut sauces this week?? This is another recipe from Vegan Express by Nava Atlas. It sounded interesting, and used some baked tofu, and it was easy enough to leave the scallions out to make it onion free. In the end, I was actually about halfway disappointed by the baked tofu. It really didn't have much flavor, and for almost $4 for 8 oz, I would have liked it to taste like something all the way through! (The outside had some sauce on it) The texture was really nice and firm and creamy though. Still, I don't plan on spending $8 on special tofu any time in the future. I think next time I'd just use my favorite locally made tofu and marinate it overnight in the coconut-peanut sauce. Along side this, I used the rest of the light coconut milk and cooked some brown rice in it (2 parts coconut milk to 1 part brown rice - bring to a boil, reduce heat to low, cover and barely simmer 45 minutes. Turn off the heat and don't touch it for 10 minutes, then eat it). It complimented the veggies and tofu really well!


Thai Steamed Green Garden with Coconut-Peanut Sauce
4 cups broccoli florets
8 oz green beans, cut in half
2 stalks of lemon grass, cut in half and slit with a knife
1 medium zucchini, cut in half and sliced
1 red bell pepper, cut into strips
2 8 oz packages of White Wave Thai-Flavored Baked Tofu, cut into slices

1. In a large skillet or wok, combine the broccoli and green beans and add just enough water to coat the bottom of the pan. Put the lemon grass on top, cover, and steam until the veggies are bright green, about 5-7 minutes.

2. Add the rest of the veggies and tofu and toss together. Cover and steam again for about 2-3 minutes until all the veggies are tender-crisp.

3. Fold the veggies and tofu with enough coconut-peanut sauce to coat (recipe to follow). Serve the rest on the side.

Coconut-Peanut Sauce
8 oz Thai Peanut Satay Sauce (available at grocery store)
1/2 cup light coconut milk
Juice of 1 lime
2 tsp maple syrup

1. Mix all ingredients together.

2. Yea that's it.

3. The original recipe also called for 1/2 tsp red or green Thai chili paste, but I'm not a spicy food eater, so I left it out. Add it in if you like.