New Lifelong Vegan Blog Starting Up

Pragmatic Vegan

Discussing everything you need to be healthy, fit and well as a vegan for life

Check out my son's new vegan blog and ask him some questions. He likes researching the answers and has been making quite a study of the vegan diet. His first post is about some supplements to add to an all-vegan diet for those who are hoping to make a long-term commitment.

Vegan Quick Tomato Soup

Ever feel nostalgic for childhood comfort foods? Maybe a little tomato soup like your mom used to make from a can? Except maybe there's junk in the soup can you'd rather avoid. How about a quick vegan tomato soup you can make to mimic it? Serve with oyster crackers for the full deal.

Ingredients
1 small can organic tomato paste
1/4 teaspoons of garlic powder, onion powder, and oregano
1 teaspoon tamari (or vegan soup stock concentrate)
Sprinkle of black or red pepper
Squirt of agave syrup (sweetener)
1 cup unsweetened soy or other plant milk
1 cup water
1 Tablespoon olive oil (optional)

Method
In a pot, empty a can of organic tomato paste. Add garlic powder, onion powder, oregano, tamari, pepper, and agave. Stir in soy milk, then water. Heat, pour in bowl, add oyster crackers. Enjoy!

Vegan Chestnut Coconut Cream

Before I forget what I did, here is a yummy vegan cream made with chestnuts and coconut milk. Usually I make whipped cream with Morinu tofu. Yesterday we had picked six quarts of organic strawberries at my friend's long, straw-mulched patches bordered with rhubarb, so all I needed to do was make the shortcake and cream.

Tonight I made a shortcake, and then went to get the box of aseptic silken tofu. What? No tofu? How to make cream? I spied a 5.3-ounce packet of ready-to-use organic roasted peeled chestnuts. Hmmm. I wondered how they would blend up with a 15-ounce can of coconut milk. Very nicely, I am happy to report. Think of this as a nut cream and the tan color won't make you wish for a bright-white whipped cream.

Vegan Pineapple Upside Down Cakelets

It occurred to me that the organic canned pineapple rings would fit into the bottoms of a shallow, wider muffin tin I own, so I decided to make VEGAN PINEAPPLE UPSIDE DOWN CAKELETS. There were only eight holes in the tin, so I got a small bread tin ready for any extra. It turns out there were ten slices in the can, which fit into the two tins just right.

This recipe is usually made in a rectangular glass dish, but it can easily be made in any baking dish. It would probably even work in narrow-bottomed muffin tins, with the pineapple rings curved. One son asked why I didn’t make them more often, so I think they liked them.

Vegan Burritos

There’s not always time for an elaborate vegan meal. There are some fallback easy-to-cook nutritious vegan foods to fill the belly. Burritos are one of them. I had to work all day (from home), so I started soaking some white beans early in the day. They hadn’t gotten bigger after a few hours, so I heated them and let them soak some more. Then I poured off the water and added fresh water. I put them on the back of the stove to simmer for a few hours. 

 

Another way to do this, if you couldn’t check on them during the day to stir them and add more water because you work outside the home would be to use a slow cooker — to have your beans hot and ready when you return, after soaking them overnight. Use your instapot or pressure cooker if you have one. Or, of course, open and heat a can of beans!

Ingredients

1 package whole wheat tortillas

1 can white or pinto beans, seasoned

2 cups cooked kale and onions, stir-fried

3 tblsp. gomasio

Chopped tomatoes, cucumbers, avocado — 2 small ones of each

Creamy miso dressing to taste

Rice — optional

Method

I stir-fried some kale and onions. I dry-roasted some sesame seeds and salt to make gomasio. I chopped up some tomatoes, cucumbers, and avocado. I heated whole wheat tortillas in the toaster oven until they were soft. None of this took very long. I added seasoning to the white beans (see previous post recipe for white bean soup). 

 

I assembled my burrito, adding a dollop of Creamy Miso Dressing (see previous post recipe) on top of the beans, kale and onions, tomato and avocado. I sprinkled it with gomasio. I took a picture. I called the boys to come and make their own. They heated up some rice and added that to their burritos, as they wanted an even more hearty meal. We all ate and were happy. Healthy vegan meals can be made without a lot of effort.

Samosa Style Pasties/Pastries

One of my daughters said she couldn’t make pie, so I wrote down the recipe again and mentioned she could make it sweet or savory — which led to my wanting to eat a SAMOSA. The crust was easy to make. I made a double recipe and rolled out two big crusts. Then, because I don’t attend to the fancy details of life, I cut them into random blocky shapes. I got about five per crust — ten in all.

Now, for the filling. But, oh! There were no potatoes in the house. What to do? I began by sautéing a large onion in olive oil. I sprinkled on some tamari. That’s always a good start. I opened a can of green peas and dumped them in. But I still needed something more substantial. Luckily I had made some of the okara patties the night before — the ones seasoned with Indian spices and basil instead of cilantro. They also had carrots, onions, and peppers in them and a bit of tomato sauce with big chunks of oyster mushrooms in it. So: plenty of fodder for a samosa. I threw it all in the pan.

I had to contain myself to keep from spooning too much of the filling onto the pastry shapes. I found it easiest to rest the flattened dough shape on my palm, with the center cupped down. That gave me a better idea of how much filling to glop in the middle. Then I folded the sides up to the center and pinched it closed. I placed all the samosas on one baking sheet and baked them in a preheated oven at 425 degrees Fahrenheit for 30 minutes.

Tofu Quiche

TOFU QUICHE is pretty easy to make. I think I have a better recipe than this, but I was in a hurry last night, so I just sautéed some onions, blended up the tofu and seasonings, pressed a crust into a quiche pan (a pie plate will do), and baked it for 40 minutes at 375 degrees Fahrenheit. Serve with some greens or a salad.

Ingredients

1 bottom crust

1 onion — chopped and sautéed in olive oil

1 package — tofu

1/3 cup — nutritional yeast

2 Tblsp. — arrowroot powder or cornstarch

1 red pepper — minced

1 Tblsp. — tamari

1 Tblsp. — vegan Worcestershire sauce

1 Tblsp. — balsamic vinegar

1 Tblsp. — brandy or 1/3 cup white wine

Method

Make one crust and press it into a quiche pan or pie plate. I added a little nutritional yeast and gomasio (toasted sesame seeds and salt) to my dry ingredients. I also added too much oil, so I’m not giving out THAT recipe.

Saute the chopped onion until just beginning to brown. Spread on the crust.

Blend the other ingredients as best you can. You will have to be stirring from above, carefully. I, as usual, managed to chip off the end of my bamboo spoon. I guess it added some roughage to the meal. If you add a tad of water, it might make this easier, but I wanted to keep it thick and spreadable.

Spread the smooth tofu mix on the onions. Bake at 375F for forty minutes.