Fair Weather Vegan

And You Thought Cafe Gratitude Couldn't Get More Annoying

Many San Franciscans already avoid the original because they believe in having their food cooked, and are really nonplussed at being forced to order things with silly names only by the silly names.  In case you don't know anyone who's been there, Cafe Gratitude serves dishes with names like "I Am Enlightened" or "I Am Compassionate," and if you don't order them in exactly this way, if you say 'I'll have the bean dip" or whatever, they won't serve you.  This sort of thing would have lasted about a week in Manhattan.*  Now the ownership has opened a companion vegan, organic Mexican place at 2211 Mission.  It is called, get ready, Gracias Madre.  It is going to be a stretch to get me into a place with a name like that because at some point I'll have to say it.  I can't go around calling it 'the Cafe Gratitude Mexican place' forever.  Which is a true shame because the menu looks awesome.  I will no doubt have to swallow my aversion in order to also swallow some cashew cheese and butternut squash quesadillas. 

*Although they do tolerate Shopsins.  Manhattan likes its eccentrics only in rude genius form. 

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.

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. 

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. 

Pumpkin Ice Cream, Etc

I have been attempting to read Barbara Kingsolver's Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, an exercise in frustration that I will report on another day, but it has made me more aware of seasonal food changes.  Not that I do anything about them, per se, but there was pumpkin ice cream on the shelf and I picked it right up. 

Because I generally eat non-dairy ice creams Double Rainbow Perfectly Pumpkin was the first of the San Francisco company's flavors I've tried.  It's super-premium, which means a minimum of air whipped in, and also hekshered OU, and gluten free.  Oh, and did I mention it's really good?  Extremely impressive (although at this moment I'm considering what BiRite would do with pumpkin ice cream and nothing could compare to that), natural tasting, fairly subtle pumpkin flavoring and a light, creamy texture.  Following it with Mudslinger's Chocococo does not reflect well on that brand.  If you click on the link, you'll see a charming flash opening in which a contemptuous little girl insists "I hate wussy ice cream."  And in truth, Mudslingers has tried too damn hard to pretend it's not making a dairy-free product.  They're supposed to taste different, as Coconut Bliss has brilliantly demonstrated, but Maggie Mudd's has tried to make regular ice cream out of coconut and what emerges is a heavy, gooey article that doesn't have the refreshing quality of either milk or coconut milk (they create something called coconut cream as a base by gumming it up).  The chocolate flavor is deep and intense, but the experience of eating it is just not that fabulous.  They do make a variety with whiskey and fudge, however, so I'm not giving up hope for them yet. 

What do you eat with ice cream?  Why cookies of course (and a big glass of ice water because the Mudslingers is going to make you hella thirsty)!  But not these cookies, specifically the wheat-free, dairy-free versions.  I don't know that I've ever had a bad Newman's Own product, but these come close.  I blame the wheat-free aspect.  They're not even gluten-free with all that, so why waste the time?  Anyhow, they've still got the quality Newman chocolate, but they're also dry and have a seriously bitter aftertaste.  At least they're hekshered (OU dairy, presumably because of the equipment being used to make dairy products).  But there are a lot of alternatives to try before you end up here. 

You Can't Eat It: Lush Squeaky Green Shampoo

Is there a more fanatical demographic than Lush fans?  We can find our way to a shop simply by closing our eyes and waiting for the distinctive Lush product smell to waft over us.  They always keep their doors open for just this purpose.  One of the many amazing things about the storied British cosmetics company is their commitment to environmental causes.  Far from being greenwashers, they are constantly on the watch for ways to make their handmade products and packaging more earth-friendly.  From soap to bath bombs, many of their products don't use packaging at all.  One of their brightest ideas was the solid shampoo formula, which obviates the need for plastic bottles.  The shampoo comes in fun little discs and you can save it in a tin.

My first experience with a Lush solid shampoo was not a success.  I tried Soak and Float and not only did it smell of charcoal (which Lush cheerfully admits), it also made my head itch, which was the exact opposite of its stated intent. I also found the usage somewhat difficult, and never quite got the hang of swiping the bar on wet hair and then lathering up.  So it took a few more years for me to try again, and this time I chose Squeaky Green, with rosemary and peppermint.  My scalp does seem to like it much better, and one day after washing my hair is soft and has a lot of body.  I don't know where the reviewers are coming from who say it dries out hair, because that hasn't been my experience.  Unfortunately, the day of washing it's usually flat since not only am I trying to deal with a new, longer style but it's hard to gauge how much goes on and it's quite difficult to rinse out.  You always need fewer swipes than you'd think and more rinsing time than you'd normally take. 

I recommend Lush shampoo bars for a fun, green alternative but they do need some getting used to and it takes time to find the one that's best for your hair type. 

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. 

More Tasty Non-Dairy Ice Cream

The real surprise is that I have a Post-Punk Kitchen recipe I've been testing and will be ready to write about tomorrow, but in the meantime, have some coconut-milk ice cream.

Larry and Luna's Coconut Bliss is now hekshered parve with the heart-K.  It's also still vegan, gluten-free, and sweetened with agave nectar.  I found the chocolate hazelnut fudge flavor to be less aggressively coconut-y than prior flavors I've tried, with an extra crunch from the nuts and a strong chocolate flavor complemented by the more subtle hazelnut, which creates a drier sensation on the palate similar to some of their other products.  I suspect this is their homage to nocciola, the traditional gelato.  

Turtle Mountain's Purely Decadent coconut milk mint chip, by contrast, is very icy like a sorbet.  It shares all of the positive production attributes listed above  The mint flavor is quite refreshing and tastes natural.  I am a bit taken aback by the ingredient list, which includes beet sugar to make the (Dutch) chocolate used for the chips, chicory, and carob (the root of all evil), and yet when I was eating it I thought it was delicious, so perhaps I shouldn't have revealed this to you before you tried it. 

It's interesting to me how these non-dairy products, and also something like Soy/Rice/Hemp Dream, use words in their names to emphasize the idyll you will presumably enjoy if you eat them.  It's almost like they're trying to convince skeptics that the stuff will taste good ;) 

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.