Fair Weather Vegan

Vegemite Heresy

Australians are incensed that the spread's American parent company is changing its name and recipe.  I've only had it once, and it tasted like salty soy, but it's a nation icon and shouldn't be messed with. 

The Post Punk Kitchen's Edamame Pesto

Isa Chandra Moskowitz, one half of the famed vegan cooking team, is at work on a low-fat cookbook.  There's no need to explain how I might feel about that endeavor as a whole ("good lord, the stuff is already vegan, what the hell do you want?" pretty much covers it).  But i was totally intrigued by the thought of edamame pesto, so I dove right into the recipe with more alacrity than I usually show (i.e., any).  It's set out as a two-step meal that also includes a mushroom-based sauce.  I chose to make the pesto by itself, and also made other changes to the recipe since I'm not enamored of cilantro, and also halved some ingredients to create a 'single-serving' option.  I do encourage you to try the original, since it's impossible to go wrong with creminis.  I made my version twice, and was quite happy with it both times.

• 8 oz. shelled frozen edamame, thawed
• 2 cloves garlic
• 5-6 fresh basil leaves
• 1/2 cup vegetable broth
• 1 or 2 tsps olive oil 

Roughly chop the garlic and throw it with the basil into the food processor.  Pulse a few times. Add the other ingredients and blend until smooth-ish.  I use that word because mine always turned out grainier than traditional pesto.  This may be because I have a sad little three-cup food processor and didn't give it enough time, but it might have something to do with the ingredients themselves, so don't be surprised if the pesto has a bit of a crunchy texture.  It adds interest to the dish, which (obviously) lacks the fat of pesto but brings its own lighter appeal.  Makes enough for two large bowls of pasta (I used fettuccine).  Non-vegans, do not put parmesan cheese on this no matter how tempted you are, because it doesn't blend its flavor well.  Moskowitz also recommends it in any place pesto may be used, such as sandwiches. 

What Is So Hard About Making Packaged Humus?

Why are so many brands so awful?  Homemade humus, or humus made in small batches, is simple and usually turns out very smooth, mild, and chickpea oriented.  I still sometimes think about getting back to the Pasadena farmers' market (it's market day, here on FWV!) and finding out if the humus-sellers who changed my opinion of the spread are still there.  But when it's mass-produced brands either use too much tahini or too much lemon juice or both, and it ends up tasting sharp and unpleasant.  I had high hopes for the Trader Joe's house version with roasted red peppers, but it fell prey to these defects as well.  Bah. 

Organicville Vegan Ranch Dressing

There is a famous story told in the annals of food science about the moment when ranch dressing first left Oklahoma.  Before then it was a regional delicacy, unknown to most Americans.  When they were trying to make a version to sell nationally, they couldn't get it to taste right because some of the original ingredients weren't shelf-stable.  They fretted about this for long hours, until one employee suddenly realized that it didn't matter: since no one who was going to buy it had ever tasted the dressing before, no one would know the difference.  Whether you think this is a tragic moment or an example of capitalist brilliance, or a little of both, it changed food sales forever. 

Nowadays, the nation puts this new version of ranch on just about everything, giving a nice fat, creamy kick to salads and pizza, but especially spicy things like buffalo wings. If you are a vegan but want ranch, there is even a version for you.  Instead of buttermilk it uses soy milk; it's sweetened with agave nectar instead of sugar, and the tang comes from apple cider vinegar, mustard and onion powder.  Needless to say with a name like that, it's also organic.  The company makes a range of organic salad dressings, sauces, and ketchup. 

So how does this ranch dressing stack up against the non-vegan kind?  Basically if you're eating it on a wing-thing, say the Morningstar farms version, it will do its job of pleasantly cutting the spice fine, even if something with dairy would work slightly better (food science again).  Quibbles include the fact that It's too thin, and it's obviously missing the creamy element since soy milk just doesn't have the fat content.  If you taste it on its own it doesn't always stay consistent between the sweet and slightly sour elements.  One could argue this just makes it taste real, unlike the bland flavor uniformity of lots of other kinds of ranch.  Bottled ranch is not exactly a culinary masterpiece to begin with.  I would choose this dressing over the low-fat dairy version with no qualms. 

Snack News For Veggies And Jews

Little Debbie is putting out a creme-filled cupcake, designed to compete with the curlicued Hostess version.  Now, we know that it will stand in quality relation the way a Swiss Cake Roll does to a Ho-Ho, ie, slightly drier and less decadent. But I believe, pending a check, that Little Debbie doesn't use trace amounts of beef fat in its creme filling.  So it's 'suitable for vegetarians' as the British would say. 

Pop-Tart Related Injury

A few weeks ago I bought a box of Amy's toaster pastries.  The first time I made one, I ignored the package directions to put it through the toaster twice, and got frozen filling for my trouble.  Determined to prove I can learn from my mistakes, this past Sunday I not only toasted it twice, I toasted it twice on the 'four' setting.  The result was a nice little edge of burned black along one side.  But that was just the beginning of my travail.  As I arrived back in my chair, the thing cracked into pieces in my hands and dropped on the rug.  Super-heated filling seared my thumb, but I had to brave it to get the pastry off the floor or go without breakfast, since I was leaving for RH services.  The result was a few chunks of extremely bad Pop Tart knock-off and burned fingers.  I remember now that there used to be warnings on Pop Tarts about the filing being really hot, but who knew those were anything but the product of suit-shy lawyers?  This type of product is also on the list of markets that Amy's should have shrunk from expanding into.  The same dough recipe may work equally well for pizzas and pot pies, but a toaster pastry is in most ways a dessert, for which a thick, solid, bready dough is not something people want.  This is why Toaster Strudel, which uses an ersatz puff pastry shell, can rightly claim to be the best-tasting brand.  Sticking with the dessert theme, 'tart' is a description of the type of pastry, not the filling.  Strawberries are supposed to be naturally sweet.  If they're not, add sugar.  If you can't add sugar because you're an organic food company, don't make toaster pastries. 

Sonoma's Okay, I Guess

"I was swimming in the pool looking up at the redwoods," reports my father when he calls to tell me how his birthday trip is going.  My mother had sent him on a golf weekend earlier in the summer (after thirty years in the midwest my dad finally turned into that guy), but the birthday ends in a zero so he's stringing it out a bit.  He'd wanted to go on a wine tasting tour ever since I moved to Northern California, but Mom and I always said we'd prefer watching wallpaper peel.  So I offered to give him one for his birthday, and Mom reluctantly agreed to go along since he'd already had one major event without her and at least it didn't involve golf. 

I suggested Frog's Leap Winery, on the sound principle that I knew nothing about wine so an organic, sustainable place couldn't be too bad.  They found the Applewood Inn in the Russian River valley to stay in.  Thus, while I waited tensely in the blazing sun to be in the front row at the free Third Eye Blind concert in San Jose, only to find that the thousands of people who arrived hours later spent the whole show crushing me into the barricade so that my ribcage broke out in hives, my parents were sipping white wine and hearing about environmentally friendly vine production, and eating what both of them kept describing as the "best" of whatever it is they'd had, ever ("the best lamb chop" "the best pancake").  Not that I begrudge them, since they claim to like my company enough to take me along most places, including a good portion of their thirtieth anniversary trip.  But Stephen Jenkins?  Kind of a preening jerk.  Go to a show at which you can sit down. 

Here are some photos taken by my father at the two locations.

The kitchen and cellars at Frog's Leap:

 
 

 

The gardens and the aforementioned pool at Applewood Inn:

 

 

Jams, Jellies, And Preserves

What is the difference, exactly?  As far as know it's encapsulated by 'jelly is cheaper than preserves, which are cheaper than jam,' which must mean that there's an inferiority scale too.  More or less fruit in the finished product?

Mac and Cheese: Lower Fat Option

My mother would like to point out that she's been altering that recipe for years, using only one egg and 1 and 1/2 cups milk, which can be skim.  She also insists that the lasagna pan doesn't actually work, despite our using it for years before we found we were doing it wrong.  Anyhow, she made the mac for dinner last night and it was fabulous. 

Mama Louie's Mac and Cheese

This recipe originally came from, of all places, a Betty Crocker cookbook.  It's both easy and delicious, and a nice change from bechamel-based mac and cheese recipes.

8 oz. pasta (we use penne)

1 1/4 cup cubed mild or medium cheddar cheese
2 tbsp butter

1 tsp salt

2 eggs

3 cups milk

dash paprika

1. Cook pasta until al dente 2. In large bowl, combine butter, cheese, salt and pasta 3. Turn into 1 1/2 quart greased dish (a lasagna pan also works) 4. Beat eggs, add milk, then pour over pasta. 5. Sprinkle with paprika 6. Bake at 350 for 40-45 minutes or until cheese is bubbly and edges are crip.