Fair Weather Vegan

Vegetarian Biscochitos

In the past few weeks I have had the good fortune to eat several meals at the home of my friends Pain Perdu and The Rocket Scientist.  They are wonderful cooks and they also select great cheeses, even if they can't always remember which cheeses they are.  TRS is a New Mexico native, and one of the meals was a special New Mexican Shabbat lunch, which included her adapted recipe for kosher or vegan biscochitos, or little biscuit-shaped cookies.  What follows is the recipe with her comments. 

Kosher Biscochitos
Adapted from allrecipes.com Biscochitos 1

6 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
3 teaspoons baking powder
2 cups shortening (use veggie shortening, or even butter, or half and half)
1 1/2 cups white sugar
4 teaspoons anise seed (original recipe had 2)
2 eggs
1/4 cup brandy (can use slivovitz!)
1/4 cup white sugar
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Directions
    1.    Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C)
    2.    Sift flour with baking powder and salt. Cream shortening with sugar and anise seeds until fluffy. Beat in eggs one at a time. Mix in flour and brandy until well blended.
    3.    Turn dough out on a floured board and pat or roll to 1/4 or 1/2 inch thickness. Cut into shapes (the fleur-de-lys is traditional). Dust with a mixture of 1/4 cup sugar and 1 tsp cinnamon.
    4.    Bake for 10 to 12 minutes in the preheated oven, or until golden brown.

Notes:
I cut to ~3/8 or 1/2 inch thick, and cook time was ~23 min with vegetable shortening.
Dough did not hold together that well -- I had to roll it out in chunks, wetting my hands to get it to a rollable consistency. Another version of this recipe on allrecipes uses 1/2 cup wine, so that might work better.

Glazed Holiday Bundt Cake

This was my family's go-to holiday cake even before we found the foolproof recipe.  It comes, of all places, from a Hershey's cookbook and makes a moist, flavorful base for a deep chocolate glaze.  If you want to be true to the authentic Mama Louie spirit, carry a carton of whipping cream and a mixer to wherever you take the cake, so that fresh whipped cream may be served.  

Cake

• 2 cups sugar
• 1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cup cocoa
• 1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
• 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 2 eggs
• 1 cup buttermilk or sour milk
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 cup hot coffee

1. Pre-heat oven to 350
2. Grease and flour bundt pan
3. Stir together dry ingredients in large bowl
4. Add wet ingredients
5. Beat on medium speed for about two minutes (makes a very thin batter)
6. Pour into bundt pan
7. Bake 30-35 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. 
8. Cool 10 minutes, then move to rack.
9. Cool completely.  Pour glaze (recipe follows) over top.

Glaze

• In small saucepan bring 1/4 cup sugar and 1/4 cup water to a rolling boil.  Stir until sugar is dissolved, then remove from heat.  Immediately add 1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips.  Whisk until chips are melted and mixture is smooth.  Cool until slightly thickened.  Makes about 2/3 cup glaze. 

Seitan Portobello Stroganoff Is A Hit

Another quality recipe from Post Punk Kitchen.  I successfully opened a bottle of wine for the first time in my life in order to make it, and this is one to serve to your most recalcitrant meat-loving friends.  I will, however, quibble with the ingredient proportions.  There's way too much seitan.  I used Westsoy brand, because hell if I'm going to make my own. I included slightly less of it and fewer mushrooms than called for in the recipe, and the dish was extremely seitan-intensive.  The mock meat should be the accent, as is recommended today with real meat.  The mushrooms should be the stars.  Modifications follow, including the correct spelling of a certain ingredient.   The instructions are a mix of the original's and mine. 

Ingredients

• At least one pound egg noodles.  This makes a ton of sauce.  Original recipe calls for fettucine.  Who eats stroganoff with anything but egg noodles?  It's wrong, I tell you.
• 1.5-2 cups seitan, cut into bite-sized pieces
• 2 tablespoons +1 teaspoon olive oil
• 1 cup shallots, thinly sliced
• 1 large onion, roughly diced (for those who don't like big pieces of onion)
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 cups cremini mushrooms, thinly sliced
• 2 portobello caps, thinly sliced
• 1 cup red wine.  Original recipe says Burgundy; I used Cabernet Sauvignon.  My sommelier suggests Pinot Noir.  
• 2 cups cold water
• 2 tablespoons thickener (corn starch, arrowroot, potato starch)
• 2 tablespoons fresh thyme, chopped 
• 1 tablespoon hungarian paprika
• 1/4 cup nutritional yeast flakes (optional. It's all very well in its place, but I remain unconvinced its place is in a stroganoff.  Added mostly for texture, I believe.)
• 2 teaspoons dijon mustard (extremely optional)
• 1/2 cup original flavored soy milk or other milk substitute, or milk
• 2 cups peas

Directions
1. Dissolve the thickener in the 2 cups of water, set aside.
2. Heat olive oil in skillet over med-high heat in a large pan, which you're going to need to hold all the mushrooms. Add the shallots and onions, saute for 5 minutes. Add garlic, mushrooms and thyme. Saute for 15 minutes.
3. Meanwhile, heat a cast iron skillet or other pan (I just used a frying pan) with 1 teaspoon olive oil.  Add the seitan and saute over medium heat about 25 minutes, until it is dark brown and crispy on the outside. For store-bought seitan, somewhere between 10 and 15 minutes should be about right.
4. Add wine and paprika to sauce. Turn heat up high to reduce the liquid, about 10 minutes. Don't be like me and add the full cup of wine if you don't have the requisite quota of mushrooms.  Temper accordingly, or you will get an intoxicating sauce ;) 
5. Lower heat to med-high, add water and thickener, stir well and let sauce thicken for about 5 minutes. You can add nutritional yeast here if desired. Add milk and mustard and bring heat down to low. If using soymilk apparently you need to be very careful not to let it boil because it can make the sauce bitter. I substituted slightly less rice milk because it's thinner and it was fine.  Add seitan and peas, cook for 10 more minutes.
6. Divide noodles into bowls and mix with the stroganoff. It is best to mix immediately so that the pasta doesn't stick. I added low fat sour cream, mostly to cut the taste of of the extra wine, but I agree that it's not really necessary.  This is a rich, hearty, extremely filling meal. 

Twist on Tradition- Cheese Latkes

If for some reason you are tired of the fried potato variety, check out this amazingly delicious alternative from a friend's family recipe.  It definitely won our latke cook-off.  Serve with a dusting of powdered sugar. 

Grandmom's Cheese Latkes

 2 cups cottage cheese

4 eggs-seperated

1 cup flour

4 tsp sugar

1/2 tsp salt

1 cup sour cream

 

Beat egg whites until stiff and put aside

Beat egg yolks, salt and sugar together

Stir in cottage cheese and flour to egg yolk mixture

Add sour cream

Fold in egg whites

Fry in peanut oil  (we used canola yesterday).

These latkas are difficult to flip, so best to use a large metal spatula if possible.

Gnocchi Recipe, Tweaked

So I tried it again, using half-and-half plus some feta cheese and remembering to drain the spinach more thoroughly, and the whole experience was better.  Crumbled cheese like chevre was not recommended in the original recipe because it doesn't melt very well, but in the end small pieces of cheese that blend with the flavors more, in my mind, are preferable to a cheese that is creamy but doesn't taste very good (looking at you, Trader Joe's goat brie).  Still, this number didn't blow me away even with the changes.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I had originally planned on taking the chickpea flour masala brussel sprouts to my festive gathering, but instead am going with Isa's vegan take on the Midwestern green-bean casserole.  I had quite the amusing interchange with an Australian friend last week, in which she advocated moving Thanksgiving to the spring because then we could eat spring foods, strawberries instead of cranberries, etc.  The two Americans vigorously protested that we like the traditional foods and it wouldn't be the same.  Adding an extra poignancy, most of the foods served on Thanksgiving are native to North America.  I hope wherever you are, you are celebrating with good food, family, and friends, and have something in your heart to be thankful for. 

Gnocchi With Pumpkin, Spinach, and Goat Cheese

Mistakes were made.  I'm willing to admit that 90% of them were mine.  Still I think this recipe, from Broke Ass Gourmet, has some problems.  At base, it looks amazing and didn't taste that good.  It was supposed to be "creamy and decadent," but I think then it would require half milk and half cream in the sauce.  Goat cheese brie is somewhat overwhelming here, and I wonder why, if we're melting the cheese anyway, chevre is so vigorously excluded. The pumpkin flavor was quite muted, so perhaps at least a cup instead of 3/4 cup.  I don't understand what the onions are doing there a'tall because I can't imagine they work, but maybe to soften the cheese's sharpness and probably I should add them next time.  Do remember to drain the spinach, so as not to water the sauce down, and blanch for exactly the amount of time noted so as not to create bitter spinach.  Indeed my biggest complaint was bitterness, which is why I presume this less than satisfying meal was mostly my responsibility.  It seems like such a good idea that I encourage you to fiddle around with it, fix my errors, and make it live up to its promise. 

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.