Taking on the V-Con Pt. 12

As many of you know three lovely ladies and myself decided to challenge our selves by cooking our way through the Veganomicon, our own Vegan version of Julie and Julia, if you will. It was great fun, but unfortunately didn't last as long as I had hoped. I haven't even looked at the Veganomicon since our last recipe, almost a year ago. Lately I haven't had the expendable income to purchase groceries needed to fulfil new recipes and have been making standards and creating new things from what I have in the house. I have had an enormous amount of lentils in the house due to my love of lentil soup but as the temperature increases my love of soup diminishes (only a little, really) thus I found myself staring at a pound of red lentils and not a single clue on how to consume then. I then remembered the fabulous Snobby Joe's recipe we did last year with red lentils and decided to see if there were anymore creative and delicious recipes with lentils as a main ingredient.

I had only to turn to page 177 and find my favorite meal of all time Lentil Fetoosh, or as called in the Veganomicon "Lentils and rice with caramelized onions and spiced pita crisps" whew, that is a mouthful...of awesomeness! There is a restaurant Timmy and I frequent called Pita Jungle and we tend to order only one thing, the lentil fetoosh salad. Firstly because fetoosh is so much fun to say and secondly because it is the best fucking salad I have put into my mouth. The recipe in the Veganomicon is not spot on but it was close enough for me!


Ingredients:
3 large yellow onions (I used 1 1/2, because three seems like way too much)
3/4 cup olive oil (i drizzled mine on, maybe used 1/3 cup)
1 cup long-grain basmati rice
1 cup red lentils
1 cinnamon stick
1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
1 1/2 teaspoon cumin

Pre heat oven to 400 degrees

and start slicing your onions into thin rings.

Spread onions our on a deep baking dish and coat with olive oil. Roast in pan and stir often, I checked mine every five minutes. While the onions are roasting bring 4 cups of water to a boil, add rice cinnamon stick, all spice and cumin. Lower heat, cover and simmer for 15 minutes, then add lentils. Gently stir in lentils to incorporate and bring to a boil. Once boiling lower the temperature and cook for about 45 minutes.

Gently fluff the lentils and rice when finished then fold in caramelized onions. You can eat the lentils and rice as so, or do what we did, put it over a bed of lettuce and have yourself a plate of lentil fetoosh. We made a lemon dressing similar to the one at Pita Jungle and drizzled that on top of our salad.


along with the salad we enjoyed a marinated bean salad as well. Yummy!

Taking On The V-Con Pt. 9

Number nine, number nine....

The next four recipes (that includes today's recipe) was picked by yours truly. I wanted to pick recipes that had a South Western flair and that also reflected the many great things that come along with summer, like strawberries, bbqs, and stuff that was muy caliente! like the desert in which I live. The forcast reads, hot, hot and with a chance of scorching!! The last two weeks saw cooler weather with a few thunderstorms but the forecasters have predicted this week to heat up, with highs up to 117 degrees. With that being said, what is better than Mexican food and an ice cold cerveza to help beat the summertime blues? Today's recipe is...wait for it...wait for it...

Grilled Yuca Tortillas!


After picking this recipe I became a little scared, having never tried Yuca (or cassava) before, but then I realized, wait, I HAD tried cassava before and numerous times in the form of Daiya cheese. Daiya is made from the cassava root and tapioca, which is closely related to cassava. I will say that I do not normally top everything with fake cheese, there are times when I will eat a pizza with Daiya and it is just heavenly. The grilled yuca tortillas were incredibly easy to make, and just as easy to devour. The recipe called for fresh yuca which I could not find but I did, however, find frozen yuca at Lee Lee an Asian grocer in Mesa. Lee Lee has all kinds of amazing frozen vegan food, and if you live in the valley, I suggest you check it out!


yuca up close

On with the recipe:

Ingredients:
1 lb. yuca
3 T. olive oil
6 cloves garlic
1 small yellow bell pepper (I used red grilled pepper)
1 jalapeno
2 tsp. lime juice
1/2 tsp. salt
pinch of pepper

then I added a sauteed red onion and black beans to the mix for good times and fun to be had by all.

As I stated earlier this recipe is very easy to make. You pretty much just boil the yuca, and mash it up like a cooked potato.


Saute garlic, bell pepper and jalapeno in olive oil,


add to smushed yuca


shove into a folded tortilla and fry up on the stove top.


I baked my tortilla to cut back on fat, but I definitely did not cut back on flavor.


Yum!! I would make this recipe again and again and again!

Taking on the V-Con Pt. 2

Ah, the trials and tribulations of cooking. Today I had a quite simple recipe to follow and yet I managed to goof it up. The recipe, Snobby Joes from the Veganomicon.



The reason as to the less than satisfactory outcome? Lentils. The recipe calls for lentils and I assume that means regular lentils, but I used red lentils because I already had some in my pantry. Red lentils cook up faster than regular lentils and even though I cut the cook time almost in half I still had a mushy texture I was not too thrilled with. The Snobby Joes were a tad on the bland side, which I noticed Courtney mentioned in her blog, but she was more creative than I and spiced things up a bit. I however, have been in a funk and my creative side was sulking somewhere in the recesses of my brain. I followed the recipe step by step, ate my dinner then sighed. Blah. Blah day, blah dinner, blah blah blah. I am not going to give up on this recipe, I will buy the correct lentils and try try try again damnit! Until that day comes this is the result of my take on the Veganomicon's Snobby Joes.


ingredients, minus the maple syrup and mustard


soaking in its juices


it was a bit spicy from the chipotle pepper, and a bit smokey too

Don't forget to check out Courtney and Katie's blogs to see their results also!

Yummy Quinoa and Spicy Tofu Salad

Normally I am not a fan of salads. To me they equal lack of creativity and they are what a vegan or vegetarian eats when there are no other options available. My grandma has always invited me over for dinner with the promise of there being salad for Tim and I to eat and though I appreciate her offer salad is just so darn unappealing. This is why I was taken by complete surprise when my little baby belly started craving the green stuff on a daily basis. I did not think I would ever wake up in the middle of the night desperately seeking arugula or biking around town with the thought of spinach following closely behind.

The other day as I worked the produce section in my grocery store I realized I was drooling. I kept eyeing the carrots and hugging the broccoli and whispering sweet nothings in the direction of the celery and cucumbers. This was enough! I was starting to go loony from lack of salads! That day I went home and pulled all the veggies out of the fridge and got straight to work, but wait, what about the pantry? There must be goodies in there too, no? This is when I found the quinoa hiding behind the wild rice and a light went on or a bell chimed or the proclamation of Eureka was shouted. Which one happened, I am not sure because I was already preparing the quinoa on my stove top before I fully understood the golden delicious salad I was going to be shoveling into my tum tum later.

With the addition of quinoa to my veggies I was ready to start building my dream dinner. Spinach, Romaine, heirloom tomatoes, carrots, pine nuts, dried cranberries, quinoa and something else, I needed something else. This is when my genius self (OK moderately smart self) grabbed a red onion, a few cloves of garlic and got to chopping. I sliced up some extra firm tofu and added it to the onions and garlic in my frying pan then for fun tossed on Sriracha and Bragg's Liquid Aminos and the end result was fantastic! A spicy delicious salad with the sweet/tart dried cranberries made my heart skip a beat. I am going to make this again, I am going to make it tonight, and eat left overs for lunch, it is that good!

Roasted Sweet and Red Potatoes

Sometimes while at work I will walk the aisles of my fine grocery store and make lists. Lists of things to purchase that week, lists of new cupcake flavors, lists of my favorite mythological creatures and often lists of foods I do not eat enough of or at all. Just this last Sunday I eyed some fantastic organic sweet potatoes and tried to remember all of the things I have made with sweet potatoes and I came up with one dish, sweet potato pie. Now, this is my favorite pie in all of the land so I was not completely disappointed with my lack of s.p. culinary prowess. I was, however, upset that since I do love this root vegetable with an intense fiery passion that I do not eat it more often and more as an entree instead of dessert.

The sweet little potatoes are packed with beta carotene, vitamin A, fiber, B6, vitamin C, are beneficial for those with diabetes and are raved about by one of my fave Vegan chefs Bryant Terry (Vegan Soul Kitchen); that it really boggles my teeny brain as to why I have not been eating these by the bucketful.

I decided on roasting these babies with red potatoes because I really did not know what else to do with them, next week I am thinking pizza with them. As for Monday, they were a side dish to Bryant Terry's delicious black-eyed pea fritters and an arugula and spinach salad with oranges and blackberries. Sounds yummy, huh? Everything was so tasty I ate it twice (saved some for lunch the next day)! I make my co-workers jealous with my leftovers. :)

Roasted Sweet and Red Potatoes

3 red potatoes
5 medium sweet potatoes
1 red onion
5 cloves garlic
2 T. olive oil
1 teaspoon coarse sea salt
pepper to taste

Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees

Peal and cube sweet potatoes, cube red potatoes leaving skins on (that is where the fiber is!) chop onion and mince garlic. Combine all in pan and coat with olive oil and sprinkle on sea salt and pepper. Bake for 35-45 minutes.


Ready for oven!

Black-eyed Pea Fritters

Arugula and Spinach salad with Blackberries and Oranges

All together now...