Vegan Cranberry Loaf

 

This VEGAN CRANBERRY LOAF with orange and walnuts reminds me of my Aunty, who would serve one every year when we visited. It was quick to mix up and an hour to bake. I made two in medium-sized oiled loaf pans. Preheat oven to 350F degrees.

 

Ingredients

 

Dry

3 ½ cups — whole wheat pastry flour (or 2 cups pastry and 1½ cups white flour)

½ cup — granulated organic sugar

1 Tblsp. + ½ tsp baking powder

½ tsp — salt

½ tsp — cinnamon

1 cup — chopped walnuts

 

Wet

1 cup — leftover cranberry-raisin relish, and chopped orange rind (I used my vodka-infused rind, so it was wetter — otherwise, you can just chop up an orange, removing the seeds, of course) about half and half

½ cup — sunflower oil

2 cups — water

Method

Mix together the dry, and mix together the wet. Mix both together and pour into two oiled loaf pans, baking vegan cranberry loaf for one hour.

If you can’t eat it all at once, it would freeze well for later guests.

Barbecue Tofu

It’s easy to make BARBECUE TOFU. Just mix up the following sauce in a measuring cup, pour it over quarter-inch-thick slabs of tofu, bake it in a preheated 425 degree oven for half an hour on one side, flip, and a quarter hour on the other. Serve with rice, greens, and corn.

Ingredients

4 blocks sliced tofu, or one of those bulk-size tofus

 

Sauce

½ cup — tomato sauce

½ cup — water

¼ cup — olive oil

¼ cup — apple cider vinegar

1/8 cup — organic sugar

2 Tblsp. — tamari

1 Tblsp. — molasses

1 Tblsp. — onion powder

½ Tblsp. — garlic powder

¼ tsp — allspice

Sprinkle of red pepper and black pepper if you want it

Mince Moons

Whether as Mince Pie or Mince Moons, vegans can enjoy this traditional treat with no fear of anything scary lurking in the mix. It is easy to prepare and, if it lasts, can sit out for several days with no problem. My daughter named the little pies Moons because they are crescent shaped. A lattice crust is pretty to weave on the Mince Pie.

Filling for One Deep Dish Pie

 

Ingredients

1 ½ cups — raisins (I used to chop them, but have decided it's not necessary.)

4 — apples, pared, cored, chopped

1 — organic orange, juiced, and then rind chopped finely

½ cup — cider

 

Method

Cover these ingredients and simmer until the apples are very soft. Then stir in:

More Ingredients

¾ cup — Sucanat (brown sugar)

½ tsp each — cinnamon and clove powder or allspice

3 Tblsp. — finely crushed pretzels or crackers, or arrowroot powder (this last is to help it bind, but I like the way the crackers fool the eye and make you wonder, “What is that??”

This mixture can be made ahead. I often make it and the pumpkin filling on the Sunday before Thanksgiving, and then it is easy to fill pie shells and bake them the night before.

Method for Moons

For the MINCE MOONS: roll out crust (look elsewhere on this blog for my crust recipe), and use a five-inch round thing (I happened to have a crumpet tin, but a plastic container would work) to cut out as many rounds as you can. Bunch the remaining dough with some more dough and do it again. I had about eleven of the rounds altogether. 

 

Spoon a bit of the filling (heaping tablespoon) on one side, fold the circle in half, and press it together. You can bend them into crescent shapes. Bake at 425F degrees for thirty minutes.

 

 

Method for MINCE PIE

Roll out one crust, lay it in a pie plate, and fill it with the filling. You can pour four tablespoons of brandy over it at this point if you want, but it isn't necessary. 

 

With the second crust, cut it in half inch wide long strips. Lay down one across the width of the pie. Lay another across it perpendicularly. Then weave more strips in, lifting the alternating strips so you get a latticework. It really isn't hard, and I will leave it to you to figure out. 

 

Crimp the edges together to neaten it up. You can bake this the same as the mince moons, at 425F degrees for half an hour or until just beginning to brown slightly. Or you can bake either of them in a preheated 450F degree oven for ten minutes, then reduce the heat to 350 degrees and bake for twenty minutes. Your choice.

 

I feel like I only made the one pie filling but still had enough for the moons and a flatter mince pie. If you double the recipe, you could freeze half of it for a later holiday pie.

Cacao Nib Cookies

I wanted to make chocolate chip cookies, but I only had some organic cacao nibs on hand. Would they work? It turns out they did. Cacao nibs are not at all sweet, but have a strong chocolate flavor. Someone wondered what the little nuts were in these cookies. I thought they meant the rolled oats, but they showed me the little brown nib. I pulled out my foil package of Frontier Cacao nibs to show him what they were.

These roasted bits of the whole cacao bean are full of flavonoids and antioxidants, which, not to bore you, are just generally good for you. They help in the release of serotonin and endorphins in your body, which will improve your mood, and they are a good source of A, B, C, E, beta-carotene, magnesium, zinc, iron, and calcium. They also taste good, along with the other ingredients in these CACAO NIB COOKIES.

Dry Ingredients

2 cups — whole wheat pastry flour

1 cup — rolled oats

½ cup — Sucanat

½ cup — cacao nibs

2 tsp — baking powder

½ tsp — salt

½ tsp — cinnamon

 

Wet Ingredients

¾ cup — sunflower oil

¼ cup — maple syrup

2 Tblsp. — water

Method

Preheat oven to 350F degrees. Stir together the dry ingredients. Add in the wet ingredients. Adjust the wetness until everything is moistened, but it is still a thick moldable mass. Form into eighteen balls and bake on two cookie sheets for fifteen minutes. You could also try pressing them down, instead, but I liked the little round balls. They would cook faster if they were flatter, keep in mind.

Cacao nib cookies are a good alternative to chocolate chip cookies if you don't have chocolate chips or are looking for a healthier alternative.

Vegan Pumpkin Pie and Walnut Cream

 

VEGAN PUMPKIN PIE is appropriate for Halloween, and is certainly necessary later on in November for Thanksgiving. I've made this vegan version for years, and nobody complains it isn't as good as other pumpkin pies. I'd like to think it is better. 

 

A lot of vegan pumpkin pies utilize tofu, but this one doesn't. If you have a soy allergy, you could substitute a rice or nut milk for the soy milk. You could use a can of pumpkin, but I like to cook up some squash or pumpkin for a fresher taste.

It is called vegan pumpkin pie, but for many years I've made this pie with buttercup squash, a squat, green-skinned, orange-fleshed squash with a rich flavor. However, one of my sons thinks he doesn't like squash, but he will eat vegan pumpkin pie (a much friendlier name), and another son insists pumpkin pie should be made with pumpkin.

So this year we bought an organic pie pumpkin, which is smaller and sweeter than the big ones. Today I washed it and cut it horizontally through the middle, discarded the seeds (somewhat guiltily because they can be roasted and eaten, but I don't like them much), and then placed the two halves cut side down on a cookie sheet to bake for an hour at 350F degrees. 

 

When I took it out of the oven it had been sitting for an hour in there without the heat on, and the skin peeled away easily. What was left were two perfect orange halves that looked like they had been molded in a special pan. I thought they looked like they should be served that way with something interesting filling the center, but I will leave that for someone else to do.

Pear Pie the Organic Way and How to Make Vegan Pie Crusts

A generous local organic farmer was kind enough to give me a bag of pears this past week, which I promptly turned into two PEAR PIES. I believe they were Yellow Bartlett pears, and they were very easy to cut in half, remove the centers, and cut into thick slices. 

 

I looked in Joy of Cooking for some ideas of how to flavor pear pies. My memory from a child was that pear pie involved some kind of creamy stuff around it, but I think that's just how my mother made it, and I don't remember it fondly. Yet, pears struck me as being a little more bland than, say, an apple, so I knew it would need to be perked up in some manner.

There was a recipe for baked pears that gave me some guidelines. I ended up adding a little cinnamon, lemon, sugar, chopped walnuts (the part I probably wouldn't have thought of on my own), and a few dribbles of the remains of the lemon-infused vodka. That seemed to do the trick, as the little chewy bits of walnuts were a nice foil to the mushy pears, and the lemon and cinnamon did their perking jobs.

Two Organic Pear Pies

 

Ingredients

 

Filling

½ peck of organic pears (about 16)

½ cup organic sugar

1 organic lemon, juiced

½ tsp cinnamon

1 Tblsp. lemon infused vodka, or maybe some white wine

1 cup organic walnuts, chopped

Crust

2 cups organic whole wheat pastry flour

2 cups organic white flour (with the germ added back in — you can buy it that way)

½ tsp salt

1 cup organic sunflower oil (or enough to turn the flours into crumbly mixture)

Up to ½ cup of water (or enough to be able to form dough into a soft pliable ball)

Coral Mushrooms

 

I finally identified some edible mushrooms out in the woods behind my house yesterday afternoon. They seemed to be Coral Mushrooms. Since they weren't bitter (yes, I tasted a tiny bit), did not bruise brown, and weren't gelatinous at their base, they passed the test. Some were white and some were tan. All grew along a woodsy path attached to rotting branches. I left some behind in hopes they will continue producing.

Always check an expert source before ingesting any wild mushrooms. A few weeks ago I had found loads of what I hoped were small puffballs, but, alas, they were poisonous. My first hint was when they were dark purple when I broke them open. My second was when a friend's mushroom expert friend confirmed their identity. I had also researched them online. In other words, this is not something to take lightly.

A sure sign these coral mushrooms were fine: All of us who ate them last night suffered no ill effects. We made sure that not all of us ate them — so somebody could explain what had happened to the rest of us had the worst happened.

The good news is they were very tasty, indeed, just sauteed in some olive oil with a sprinkle of tamari. First I did have to pick off all the pine needles and leaves stuck to them. Even though I know you aren't supposed to, I submerged them in water to help me clean them. Then I lay them out to dry before sauteing them.

This has been a great wet year for mushrooms and toadstools, if not for people, so be sure to take a walk in the woods to check out the wide variety. There are some very surprising shapes and colors. Most not edible, but all of them interesting to look at.

Vegan Pancakes

Making a vegan pancake is just as easy as making any other kind of pancake. The good thing about vegan pancake batter is you can throw all kinds of healthful ingredients in, if you want, and nobody will be the wiser. The basic batter can be changed and adapted to what you have on hand. Blueberries or bananas are always a welcome addition, or ground seeds or nuts. I used up the yogurt that separated (because I didn't follow my own recipe ...), and every pancake was gobbled up. We like to eat our vegan pancakes with applesauce, organic Smart Balance, and syrup.

Zucchini Lasagna

 

I wanted to make a lasagna last night, but didn't have any wide lasagna noodles — but I had a lot of zucchini to use up. Hmmm. I'd made a large pot of tomato sauce, and I decided to layer up what I had on hand. I had seven people to feed, so I wanted a large amount of whatever I came up with.

Quick Blueberry Smoothie

Nothing could be easier in the summer than a QUICK BLUEBERRY SMOOTHIE. When it's hot out, you want to just eat (or drink!) and go. We picked some organic blueberries yesterday and I poured most of them into freezer Ziploc bags and placed them in the freezer. I don't wash them first, so they don't stick together. I figure any germs will be frozen by the time I use them. It's worked for me, over the years ...

Ingredients
1 cup — frozen blueberries
1 — peeled ripe banana
3 cups — soy milk
2 scoops — vanilla Total Soy Protein Powder

Method
Blend the blueberry smoothie ingredients all together. Add more liquid if the blender is having trouble moving the contents. Vary the ingredients according to what you have around. I always buy ripe bananas when I see them, peel them, and place them in the freezer for future smoothies. Other berries, like raspberries or strawberries, are also delicious in smoothies.

You can sneak a few other nutritious ingredients into your blueberry smoothie when nobody is looking. I like to add flax oil, liquid lecithin, sunflower seeds, raisins — whatever you're trying to get into your family without them complaining too much.

Roasted Ratatouille

 

There was a recipe for ROASTED RATATOUILLE in a section of my newspaper, and I had everything but the eggplants and onions growing in my garden. I like when that happens. I went to my local organic farmstand to buy the eggplants and picked up some onions, garlic, and sweet corn while I was at it. The recipe said to use thyme to season it, but I ignored them and used basil instead. I also didn't have enough cherry tomatoes, so I cut up some of my larger tomatoes.

 

Ingredients

2 eggplants, cubed

2 onions, diced

1 yellow bell pepper, cut into pieces

2 zucchini, cubed

12 garlic cloves, peeled and halved

Large handful of fresh basil

¼ cup — olive oil

Salt and black pepper to taste

2 cups — cherry tomatoes or cubed tomatoes

Creamy Crunchy Vegan Layer Dessert

If you don't feel like pie and you don't feel like cake, maybe you'd like some

CREAMY CRUNCHY VEGAN LAYER DESSERT? It's got raspberries, chocolate, vanilla, and that crunchy layer, so there's a lot to love.

Ingredients

Crunchy Layer

4 cups — puffed cereal

1 cup — whole wheat pastry flour

1 cup — sunflower oil

½ cup — agave syrup

1 tsp. — vanilla

(or use a graham cracker crust)

Chocolate Layer

2 bars — dark chocolate

Pudding Layer

3 cups — soy milk

½ cup — organic sugar

1/3 cup — organic cornstarch (arrowroot powder makes a less pleasing pudding)

¼ tsp. — salt

1 Tblsp. — vanilla

Raspberry Layer

1 package — frozen raspberries or 2 cups fresh

¼ cup — sugar

1/8 cup — cornstarch or arrowroot powder

Eating from Our Garden

I haven't been posting much lately because we are just eating variations on the same things, it being summer and our having been eating from our garden. I thought it might be useful to see some of the daily pickings. 

There are the burgeoning garden greens, some for steaming, some for the salad. There are now summer squashes coming in and several kinds of string beans. We like these sauteed in olive oil and a sprinkle of salt, cooking until they are wilting and beginning to brown, and then adding some garlic at the end. 

We all love pasta with vegan pesto (see my recipe in the archives), so I usually make enough for lunch the next day. Tonight I quickly pickled some kidney beans I'd canned and served those too. I also made yet another batch of my creamy miso dressing (see recipe under condiments). Anyhow, I just thought I'd better post something so everyone knows we're all still eating even when I'm not writing about it.

Vegan Strawberry Rhubarb Shortcake

 

 

VEGAN STRAWBERRY SHORTCAKE is easy to make. Up where I live it is now or never. My fourteen-year-old twins are picking berries for a nearby organic farm, and they tell me the season is almost over.

I've already mentioned how to make tofu whipped cream — look at my archived recipes for that under chocolate pudding. I am finding I like the whipped cream with a can of light coconut milk blended in with it too. It makes it taste less like soy. You can either thicken it with more oil (or use regular coconut milk), or you can try to thicken it with a teaspoon of guar gum. I suggest mixing guar gum into the dry sugar before blending it with the wet ingredients, to keep it from clumping. Oh, what the heck — I'll give you the recipe again.

I'm adding ingredient lists to all my recipes

If you haven't noticed yet, I am going back and adding ingredient lists to my recipes. Are there any you would like me to get to sooner rather than later?

Mojito Frozen Dessert--Vegan Style

It was a hot and humid day when I came upon a yummy-looking recipe for Mojito Frozen Dessert, which I decided to veganize. I changed the crushed pretzel crust into a granola crust, and I used Tofutti cream cheese and Morinu tofu to make a whipped topping. Everything else was pretty much the same. Just be sure to have at least three limes and a small bunch of fresh mint on hand. This is a simple dessert to make when you are hot and some guests are coming later that night. Make it several hours before you serve it, as it has to freeze up first. 

 

Ingredients

 

Crust
1 — spring-form pan
1 cup — granola
1/8 cup — sunflower oil
1 Tablespoon — maple or other syrup

OR

1 — cake pan and some plastic wrap
1 cup — crushed graham crackers or pretzels
2 Tablespoons — Smart Balance or oil
1 Tablespoon — syrup

Filling

1 — 8-ounce container Tofutti cream cheese
1 — 12-ounce aseptic Morinu tofu
3/4 cup — organic sugar
large handful — fresh mint leaves
2 — organic limes
1/4 cup — sunflower oil
1 teaspoon — vanilla
water as needed to move mixture in the blender

My Productive Day

After a few hot and humid days, today was cool and seemed to prod me into productivity. I had started the sourdough last night, so in the morning I made four loaves and two large pizzas, topped with my homemade tomato sauce, to which I had added crumbled homemade soysage and cooked dandelion greens, green onions, oregano, nutritional yeast, olive oil, salt, and pepper.

I made three liters of soy milk and turned the first batch into nine cups of soy yogurt.

I used some of the soy pulp in the roast gluten.

I made some granola.

I also pressure canned the kidney beans I'd soaked overnight, adding in some carrots and white sweet potato to some of the jars when I started to run out of beans. Maybe that will be the beginning of a soup some night months from now.

Later I made a frozen creamy lime and mint dessert, but I will save that for another post.

Creamy Vegan White Sauce for Pasta

After my son told me his friends didn't like beans or chickpeas, I was wondering what to make for dinner last night. I figured a bunch of boys would eat pasta, and I wanted them to have some protein and  vegetables too. I decided to disguise the protein by making a CREAMY VEGAN SAUCE for the pasta.

Ingredients

Greens
2 cups — chopped cooked greens
1 can — straw mushrooms
Small bunch — green onions, or 1 small chopped onion
5 — chopped garlic cloves
1/2 Tablespoon — tamari, or to taste


Creamy White Sauce
1 package — Morinu tofu
1/2 cup — nutritional yeast
1/4 cup — unbleached white flour
2 Tablespoons — light miso
1 Tablespoon — dark mustard
1 Tablespoon — vegan Worcestershire sauce
1 — chopped garlic clove
3 cups — water

Pasta
Large pot — boiling water
1-2 packages — pasta (I used linguini)

Method
I got a large pot of water heating up for the linguini. I needed enough to cook two packages.

I then started with the vegetables, which for us these days means dandelion greens. My oldest son seems to enjoy going out and picking them every couple of days, and then we cook them, pour off the bitter water, and then cook them a little more — about twenty minutes in all. This takes away some of the nutrition, but most of the bitterness is gone. I had some already cooked, so that was a good start.

Vodka Infused Tea Cakes -- Lemon or Orange

These VODKA-INFUSED TEA CAKES can also be made with fresh organic lemons and oranges, but a couple of months ago I washed and sliced into thin rounds several of each, layering them separately in tall jars with organic sugar sprinkled between the layers and covering them with vodka. 

 

In a few days, the vodka had become a very fresh-tasting liqueur, and the sunny-looking jars made me happy every time I opened the cupboard, their yellow and orange brightness a fine contrast to the drab end of winter. I used up the liqueur, was left with all the sugared fruit, and I knew what I wanted to make with them.

Equipment Needed
2 oiled — loaf pans
1 large — sheet pan
Chopping or grating device
Juicing device
Bowls
Whisk
Measuring devices

 

Ingredients

 
Dry
3 1/2 cups — organic whole wheat pastry flour
1/2 cup — organic sugar
1 Tablespoon plus 1/2 teaspoon — non-aluminum baking powder
1/2 teaspoon — salt

Wet
1 cup — organic lemon or orange rind, with lemon or orange juice added in (have 3 of each on hand if they are small)
1/2 cup — organic sunflower oil
2 cups — water

Glaze
1/2 cup — organic sugar
1/2 cup — fresh organic lemon juice or orange juice, or 1/2 cup lemon liqueur plus 1/2 — squeezed lemon or 1/2 cup orange liqueur plus 1 Tablespoon fresh lemon juice

Liqueurs, if desired — make a few weeks ahead of time when you see a good price on organic fruit
1 or 2 tall quart glass jars
3 thinly sliced — organic oranges or lemons
1 cup — organic sugar
2  quarts — vodka

Wood Ear Mushrooms and Collards Served on Whole Wheat Linguine with Free-Form Tofu on the Side

 

Eating organically can cost more, though I like to think the health benefits pay for themselves in the long run. However, there are places to find cheaper products if you look around. In our area, there are several businesses that sell overstocks, hurts, and out-of-date products. 

 

One of them is Ocean State Job Lot. I don't go there often, but the last time I did I stocked up on organic noodles, semolina and whole wheat in various shapes for $1.25 a pound, considerably less than the buying clubs I belong to even when they are on sale. I also found a variety of fancy dried mushrooms for $2.00 a package. These can be soaked and produce a large quantity for the money. All of these were perfectly fine and weren't even out of date.

Last night I thought I would try to use the strange looking WOODEAR MUSHROOMS. They were a dark gray curly jumble and appeared to be cut in long strips, as if they were a type of pasta themselves. Unsure of their taste and texture, I threw caution to the wind and soaked them in water to cover, heating it somewhat and then walking away for about half an hour.

 

Ingredients

 
Pasta 
1 package — organic whole wheat linguine
Large pot — boiling water
Sprinkle — salt

Woodears with Greens
1/2 package — woodear mushrooms (1 package makes a LOT)
Warm water to cover (reserve for later)
5 large — collard green leaves
3 chopped — green onions
5 large chopped — garlic cloves
1/4 cup — arrowroot powder or organic cornstarch
1 Tablespoon — olive oil
1 teaspoon each — vegan Worcestershire sauce, toasted sesame oil, hot sauce, and balsamic vinegar
1/2 teaspoon each — tamari and sweetener

Tofu
1 package — extra firm tofu, squeezed, if needed
1 Tablespoon — olive oil
1 teaspoon each — turmeric, nutritional yeast, tamari, and paprika

Stinging Nettles, Rice, Steamed Carrots and Yam, Sauteed Onions, and Chestnuts over Soysage

STINGING NETTLES used to scare me, but now I look forward to running into a patch of them, though not literally. Of course, it's essential to wear long pants and gloves to avoid their formic-acid-filled prickers. I pick their tops off when the plants are about eight inches to a foot high, bring in a big bowl of them and fill it with water. I use a ladle to push them down and then pour off the water, saving any insects that might come off. Save them for what? Just to save! Put them outside again, of course.

Homemade Soy Yogurt

I decided a couple of months ago to try to make SOY YOGURT with the soy milk from my soy milk maker. I liked a certain brand of vanilla soy yogurt, but it is currently off the market, and it was expensive when it was available. Now I can make nine cups of it using only half a cup of commercial soy yogurt. At last I think I have, after four versions, perfected my recipe.

The only odd ingredient is guar gum, which I have mentioned before in the miso dressing recipe. It is a vegetable gum that thickens and creates a smooth mouth feel. A little goes a long way.

Equipment 
1 — soy milk maker
1 — blender
1 — insulated cooler
1 — towel for the bottom of the cooler
1 — warm jacket or blanket to cover cooler
3 — quart jars filled with hot water to heat the cooler
4 — clean pint jars with lids or plastic wrap to cover yogurt
1 — sauce pan
1 — whisk

Ingredients
1/2 cup — dry soybeans soaked in 1 liter of water and made into hot soy milk in a soy milk maker
2 cups — cold soy milk
1/2 cup — organic cornstarch
1/2 cup — organic sugar
1/2-1 teaspoon — guar gum
1 teaspoon — vanilla
1/2 cup — commercial soy yogurt with live culture, or a couple of vegetarian capsules opened up or a dry vegan live culture. 

Happy Mother's Day Breakfast in Bed

The three boys still at home brought up a small bowl of homemade soy yogurt to buy them some time until their final preparations were delivered to me. The orange juice didn't make it into the photo, as it was thought of too late.

Roma hot beverage with soy milk and maple syrup, homemade sourdough toast with scrambled tofu, blueberry pancakes with maple syrup and apple sauce, and some kind of vegan sausages.

I hope our neighbor doesn't miss her flowers ... but thank you, boys, for another tasty meal! That's it for breakfasts in bed this year.

Try Roasting the Beets

The family thinks they don't like beets, but when I roasted some chopped-up golden beets tonight, along with carrots, onion and turnips, olive oil, seasoned salt, and balsamic vinegar at 350F degrees for about forty-five minutes, stirring them now and then, they liked them fine. I roasted the vegetables on the lower rack while my sourdough bread was cooking on the upper rack.

I served the roasted vegetables with roasted potatoes, leftover homemade baked beans, and steamed collard greens. Sometimes the simpler dinners taste the best.

It's Lovely Bread Pudding Again

When you've got some stale bread or bread ends stashed in the freezer for the future, a good use of it is to make BREAD PUDDING. We had some last night for dessert, but it is also a yummy snack on a cold day.

Ingredients
4-6 cups — stale bread, broken into pieces
1 quart — soy milk
1/2 cup — raisins
1/2 cup — sunflower oil
1/3 cup — Sucanat
1 1/2 teaspoons — cinnamon
1 teaspoon — vanilla
Drizzles of — oil and maple syrup or sugar

Banana Bread

 

 

The next time you see overly ripe organic bananas on sale, buy a bunch or two and make some BANANA BREAD. You can also peel some and freeze them for use in making smoothies. They are sweeter and more easily digestible when the skins are beginning to turn brown and show no more green. Brown spots on the skin are a good thing. If any bad spots are on the banana itself, just scoop them off.

Wet Ingredients
2 — ripe bananas, mashed
1 cup — water
3/4 cup — Sucanat
1/2 cup — sunflower oil
1 teaspoon — vanilla
Sprinkle — salt

Dry Ingredients

2 cups — whole wheat pastry flour
3/4 Tablespoon — non-aluminum baking powder (like Rumford)

 

Method

To make banana bread, preheat the oven to 350F degrees and oil a medium-sized loaf pan, though this could also be made in a cake pan if that's all you have. Just cook it for a shorter amount of time.

Birthday Breakfast in Bed

My fourteen-year-old twins made this breakfast and took a picture of it before serving it to me in bed this morning. Pancakes (leftover batter from yesterday featured some of the first trial of homemade soy yogurt, whole wheat pastry and unbleached flour, baking powder, sugar, salt, vanilla, cinnamon, and some water) with applesauce and agave syrup. Scrambled tofu with homemade sourdough toast with Organic Smart Balance spread and Eileen's Fuchsia Pickled Onions. Orange pieces, orange juice. Good job, boys!

Condiments — Yummy Piquant Miso Dressing and Eileen's Fuchsia Pickled Onions

Plain rice and beans is all very well, and anyone would be happy to have a bowl of them if they were starving, but if you add a few CONDIMENTS to your meal, you might enjoy it a little more.

My boys loved an organic creamy miso dressing that had been available at our grocery store, but then it was discontinued. I tried once before to duplicate it, and it wasn't quite right, but this time they liked it. I also was referencing my memories of another discontinued nutritional yeast dressing which I am missing, so I changed a few of the ingredients to try to mimic that, as well.

The only odd ingredient is guar gum, a vegetable-source product that I get from one of my buying clubs. The good thing about guar gum is that it thickens something like a dressing so that you can add more water and less oil, making it lower in fat. I also used liquid lecithin, which is an emulsifier that helps to distribute the fats in the blended product. I had some flax oil in my refrigerator so I used some of that, too, for its omega 3 fatty acid content.

Tomato Okara Gluten Roast with Quinoa, Kale, and Sweet Potato Fries

I had to leave before the dinner was served last night, but the TOMATO OKARA GLUTEN ROAST with Quinoa, Kale, and Sweet Potato Baked Fries was still good when I got home. The photo was taken by one of my three sons, who told me last night that it looked like something-unmentionable-on-a-vegan-blog. My partner said he liked the texture better than the usual roast gluten. My other sons rated it a seven out of ten. Their two friends ate it and didn't complain. 

 

I was happy to get rid of the okara (soy pulp) left over from making two batches of soy milk. After a while, one gets tired of soysage, and I am not yet ready to add it to my compost pile, but my freezer is filling up with it, and a friend who has been taking it (free protein source!) is also getting sick of soysage. I am always looking for new ways to use it up.

Ingredients

4 cups — gluten powder

1 1/2 cups — okara (soy pulp) or substitute tofu or beans

15-ounce can — tomato sauce

1/8 cup — tamari

1 tsp — onion and garlic powder

1/2 tsp — red pepper

1/2 tsp — turmeric

1/2 tsp — cumin

Enough water to turn it into a glossy ball with no dry parts

Method

Pretty much follow the roast seitan recipe found elsewhere on this blog. To four cups of gluten powder add the dry seasonings — I used garlic and onion powder, red pepper, turmeric, and cumin — and to one-and-a-half cups of soy pulp (or blended beans or tofu, I suppose, if you haven't any pulp) add a fifteen-ounce can of tomato sauce, an eighth cup of tamari, and enough water to mix the gluten into a a ball with no dry parts. 

 

Knead it all together and add water as needed. Flatten it into a large glass baking dish that's been oiled, and pour on two more cups or so of water, to which another eighth cup of tamari has been added, or to cover. Bake at 350F degrees for one-and-a-half hours.

Sauergluten with Red Cabbage

Sometimes I want a stronger, more flavorful meal than the children like, or will even try, and this SAUERGLUTEN WITH RED CABBAGE scared them into eating ramen noodle soup with their friends last night. Initially stung, I soothed my wounds with the pleasing thought “All the more for me!”

My inspiration was a recipe in Brother Ron Pickarski's Friendly Foods cookbook. I had every intention of following it to the letter, until it came to the part where I was supposed to let it marinate for twenty-four hours. I wanted it for dinner, so that wasn't going to work for me. Also, I had already planned ahead by roasting my seasoned gluten the day before, so that was about as forward thinking as I wanted to be.

Miso Mushroom Gravy

 

MISO MUSHROOM GRAVY is good on brown rice. Miso was thought to protect against radiation sickness in Japan after the atomic bombings. Some people have found it helps them after radiation treatments. It is also a delicious salty condiment with the added benefit of friendly bacteria, and it should be added at the end of cooking when the gravy is warm, not hot, to keep the friendlies alive.

Ingredients

1/2 pound — mushrooms, sliced

1 — onion, chopped, optional

Olive oil to fry in

1/2 cup — whole wheat flour

1 tsp — garlic powder

1 tsp nutritional yeast

Sprinkle — dried basil

2 1/2 cups — hot water

1/4 cup — miso 

1/2 — squeezed lemon

 

Method

Heat a kettle of water.

Slice half a pound of your favorite mushroom. I used white. In a frying pan, saute the mushroom slices in two tablespoons of olive oil until they are limp and slightly reduced in size.

Mix half a cup of whole wheat flour with a teaspoon garlic powder, a teaspoon of nutritional yeast, and a sprinkle of basil. Stir in with the mushrooms. It will be crumbly. Keep it moving as you brown the flour for a minute or two.

Very gradually add hot water to the pan. Altogether it will be two-and-a-half cups of water. The slower you go and the hotter the water, the less likely the gravy will be lumpy. Let it cook down to a gravy consistency. This may take fifteen minutes or so to thicken. You can use a spatula to stir it every now and then to keep it from sticking. The mushrooms might get stuck in a whisk.

Remove a little gravy to mix with a quarter cup of red miso, or whatever miso you prefer. I also added half a squeezed lemon. Add this paste back to the gravy when it has cooled slightly, so as not to kill off the friendly bacteria in the miso or dim the brightness of the lemon.

How to Serve

This would also be good made with onions along with the mushrooms. I served it with the brown rice I made in my rice cooker, some steamed kale, some more of the outer crunch tofu — though it was more chewy this time than crunchy: I baked it at 425F degrees, and I had marinated it in water to cover, two tablespoons tamari, and half a teaspoon of garlic powder — and a salad made with red lettuce, scallions, avocado, grapefruit, shredded carrots, and dried cranberries.

The boys all vied to have their plate of food be the most photo-worthy. I wonder whose I will pick?