Raw Dinner

As much as I love cooking, sometimes I like not cooking just as much.

This salad was inspired by SusanV, who, probably a year ago, posted about eating corn on the cob by rubbing it with lime and sprinkling with salt.

Spicy Corn Salad:
2 ears of corn
1/4 lime, juiced
1 teaspoon fresh dill
1/8 teaspoon (or to taste) chili flakes
Couples of shakes of salt to taste

Cut the kernels off the cob, mix with the spices and serve cold with a side of lime and dill.

I was going with raw lasagna, inspired by Nutshell, but I was missing a few ingredients so this is:

Tomatoes and Garlic Cream:
1 heirloom tomato cut into thirds
3 sprigs oregano
3 Tablespoons olive oil
1 clove of garlic
1/2 cup soaked cashews
1/4 cup water or oil
Chives to garnish
Salt and pepper to taste

Mix the cream sauce first by pureeing the soaked cashews and 1/2 the clove of garlic, add enough water or olive oil to make it a smooth, creamy consistency.
Make an oregano pesto with the oregano, olive oil, garlic and salt and pepper

Layer: 1/3 tomato, 1/2 of the cream sauce, 1/3 tomato, oregano pesto, 1/3 tomato, remaining cream sauce. Garnish with chives and cracked pepper.

Simple Meals

This one wasn't as great as I wanted, but it was good enough to fill me up.
Green Bean Sandwich:
Steamed green beans tossed with a bit of garlic aioli. Placed on bread with a thick slice of tomato.


What to do with a bunch of broken chips?
Baked Tofu:
Tofu crusted with ground tortilla chips, flour and a bit of spices, then baked for 20 minutes.
Served with a side of salad.

Grains

Since I haven't been to the farmers market in a few weeks the house has been lacking many vegetables. Below are some simple meals with mainly grains.

Garlic Israeli Cous Cous:
1 cup Israeli couscous
1 cup vegetable broth
4 cloves garlic
1/2 bunch garlic scapes

Cook couscous in broth until tender.
Saute 4 cloves of garlic for 1 minute before adding the small chopped garlic scapes.
Sprinkle with your favorite salt and serve warm.


Shells and Fresh Herbs:
Since visiting a great new Italian joint in my neighborhood I have been craving pasta - something I've stayed away from for years.
It also helps that my little herb garden is growing into a medium sized herb garden.
Here I used a similar mixture as I did with the popcorn, but with the special inclusion of garlic, and lots of it. Shells are easily my favorite pasta.


Roasted Corn and Rice:
1 cup rice, I used a mix of brown and black
2 cups water or vegetable broth
1 cup corn
1/2 cup frozen spinach
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 tomato

Cook rice as normal.
Saute corn on high until it looks like it's burning a bit, just give it a good char. Add garlic and spinach and stir until the spinach is hot.
Mix the cooked rice and corn mixture. Add more powdered vegetable broth, pepper and salt to taste.
Serve warm with a side of tomatoes and sprinkling of salt and chopped parsley. This mixture held together really well and were almost like burgers so it went perfectly with the tomatoes.


Raspberry Lime Fruit Salad Dressing:
Juice of 2 limes
1/8 tsp guar gum
2 Tablespoons seedless raspberry jam/jelly
1/8 round of fresh ginger root, or to taste
1 teaspoon toasted poppy seeds

Juice the lime, add the minced ginger, guar gum (it acts as a thickener, if you don't have it, don't sweat it) and raspberry jam. Blend together until well combined. Add toasted poppy seeds and toss with the fruit.
I used grapes, cantelope, cherries and apples. This dressing was wonderfully tart, and spicy and a little bit smoky with the seeds. Enjoy this salad on your deck with good friends on a warm day.


My life no longer lacks a food processor. My kitchen feels complete. For the salad. I was able to use my food processor to juice the limes, mince the ginger and blend everything together. It was so quick and simple. I can't wait until I can whip up my favorite carrot salad in just a few minutes.

Summer Salads!

It's been getting hot again - my favorite weather, so I've been making some salads to cool us down.

Chili Lime Salad:
Marinated tofu with lime, garlic and chilis; broiled, then chilled.
Mixed with some cold glass noodles, chopped carrots, ginger and garlic.
Garlic Bean Salad:
Briefly saute a lot of garlic with oil and a sprig of fresh chopped basil; mix with cooked beans and set aside.
Steam garlic scapes.
Mix with some shredded carrots and serve cold.
I sprinkled mine with black sea salt and pepper.

Sesame Noodle Salad:
Julieanne a large handful green beans and 1 carrot.
Saute 2 cloves of garlic, 1/4 inch of ginger in some peanut or sesame oil. When the garlic is just about clear, add 3 tablespoons of soy sauce.
Mix sauce, glass noodles and veggies. Add more oil if it needs it.
Serve cold.
Chocolate Mint Cookies and Cream Cupcakes!
Disaster struck as I was creaming the earth balance and remaining powdered sugar for the frosting and reached for the other box of powdered sugar and it wasn't there!
To make up for it I had to chop (I can't wait until I get my food processor) lots of cookies to make a nice earth balance and cookie crumb frosting.

Tofu, Salad and Pie

My posts have been lacking because either my photos have not been turning out or my recipes have not been. Below are a few of the things that have turned out.
Tandoori Tofu:
My mother bought me a jar of tandoori marinade awhile ago and it's been such a treat to use with tofu. Here I marinated the tofu for two days before broiling. I also made a red bean and onion side to go with the tofu and rice.


Roasted Corn Salad:
Inspired by a Whole Foods salad I saw. This is great for picnics, which I hope to attend more of this summer.
1 bag of frozen corn
1 large handful of baby carrots, chopped
1 cup loose spinach, chopped
1 tsp. fresh chopped herbs of your choice. I used tarragon and a bit of rosemary
2 bulbs of garlic, roasted
1/4 sweet onion, chopped
Spices

Panfry the corn until browned. Turn heat to low and throw in carrots herbs and garlic. Add more oil if necessary. For a more smoky flavor, add 1/4 tsp or less of liquid smoke.
Once cooled added the chopped spinach and onion. This is a good dish to add red pepper if you're into them.
Julie's Chocolate Pie with Webly's Raspberry Topping:
At Vegfest a few weeks ago I attended some cooking sessions and was inspired by Julie's Chocolate Espresso truffle Pie. I love versatile recipes!
1 1/2 box of silken tofu
10 oz. melted chocolate
1 cup powdered sugar
1/4 cup espresso
2 tsp. vanilla
1 9" crust

Put everything but the crust in the blender, blend until smooth, poor into pie crust and let set over night in the fridge.

Alright, I like this because it's easy as pie too!
My version is similar but with raspberry. I used soy milk in place of espresso. Before the pie set I carefully folded in some bone-free (seedless) raspberry jam. I then mixed silken tofu, raspberry jam and powdered sugar to make a thin raspberry topping.


I am currently working on a coconut cream pie, which is odd because I am not sure I ever had the non-vegan version. I'm also still working on the perfect cheesy sauce.
Outside of my cooking experiments I am planning the wedding, trying to fix up the house and keeping up to date on Jess and my other website: Stumptown Vegans.

More Simple Meals

Meals without recipes. That's how I normally cook - just throw stuff together that tastes good on it's own and hope it tastes good together with spices.

Buckwheat Noodle Soup:
With veggie broth base, leeks, onions, garlic, miso, chickpeas, buckwheat noodles and diced tomatoes.
Diced tomatoes are one of my new favorite things to add to soups. Drain the juice from a can and throw it in. I use to put the juice in there before but it always made it too tomato-y so just putting the fruit in there helps the other flavors sand out on their own.


Saturday Market Dinner:
Roasted fiddleheads, steamed asparagus, garden salad with purple cabbage.
Fiddleheads - I knew bringing these home was going to raise some eyebrows. I was cruious as well. They look a little too much like bugs to me. I saw them once on one of my blogs I read, so I picked them up. They are very expensive. One small handful for $1.50. I really wasn't excited about the taste. They weren't bad, what roasted with garlic can be bad?! but they just weren't $1.50/handful good. Interesting look though.



Cheesy Cauliflower and Greens with Almond Pate:
We eat a lot of vegetables, can you tell? Steamed cauliflower with that special cheesy sauce I have been trying to perfect. When I perfect it I'll share the recipe.
Steamed greens with a fun almond pate. I soaked almonds for awhile, added sun dried tomatoes, paprika, chili powder, lemon juice, miso, salt and garlic powder. Mixing this into the greens reminded me of a savory cottage cheese. It was very good.

Simple Dinners

So we're getting settled into our new house. After a few weeks of crackers and peanut butter, or eating, I am back to cooking! Yeah!
Here are a few simple meals I've made.

Roasted potatoes with lots of garlic, sauteed chard with some liquid smoke and caramelized onions with a fresh salad with a dill ranch dressing:

More roasted potatoes with cumin and a cheesy sauce (i'm trying to perfect a recipe for my partner) and a side salad with Italian dressing:

I've been trying to buy more things are the farmers market. Here's this weeks loot. For $18 I got kale, elephant garlic, rhubarb, asparagus, lettuce, cauliflower, leek, shallots, cabbage and fiddlehead ferns:

Proper Plate

I've been busy so my cooking has been minimal. When I do cook it's about eating fast and I don't have time for photos. I am planning a wedding, working on a secret project with someone you may know, fixing a house to sell and buying my first house (well we bought it today but we don't get the keys until this weekend.)

I've been craving healthy, quick meals and came up with this weird variety of foods, called the Proper Plate because it tastes like something that would come out of this great vegan restaurant in Portland called Proper Eats. It's food that makes you feel good after eating there.


Proper Plate:
Mixed baby salad greens
1 handful carrots, steamed
1 large handful cauliflower, steamed
Lemon garlic hummus (oops, I added too much lemon while making it!)
1 Roma tomato sliced and deseeded
Sprinkling of Paprika
Sesame seeds

Laydown the salad, put the cooled steamed veggies on top and around the salad (in case you feel like dipping into the hummus.) Slather in hummus, a dip and a dressing in one. Place the tomatoes. Sprinkle with paprika, salt, pepper and sesame seeds. Add some nooch if you feel like going that way.

This was a great, filling, healthy meal with a lot of flavor.

Common Dinner Salad

Simple salad but oh so good!


Butter leaf lettuce, spinach, shredded carrots, basil, tomatoes, red onions and cubed moz. Scheese with balsamic vinegar dressing.

I am a big fan of the salad spinner. The lettuce we had was about 2 weeks old and wilting. I just chopped it up and put it in the salad spinner with cold water and within 10 minutes it came back to life and was crunchy. You could do this with any bowl, but what makes the salad spinner so great is that it gets out all that extra water in the leaf folds.

Fall is in the Air!

Every year I look forward to the Apple Tasting at the Portland Nursery. This year I ropped Jess into going with me. It was a wonderful way to kick off fall. Every year I've been it's been held on beautiful, sunny days where the sun is warm and the shade is cold. Unfortuntally, Portland doesn't have many of these type of fall days that I grew up with, but yesterday was one of them.

The follow is how we celebrated.

Pumpkin Pie
1 box of silken tofu
3/4 cup sugar
1 can pumpkin
1 tsp. vanilla
pumpkin pie spices to taste

Blend in blender until smooth. Pour into premade crust and bake for about 1 hour at 400F.


Simple Maple Salad
Salad greens and other veggies of choice (I used shredded carrots, thiny sliced onions, lettuces)
1/2 pear chopped
1 Tbl. maple syrup
1 Tbl. balsamc vinegar
pepper

Mix and serve.
Toasted nuts and other fruits are also a nice touch to this dressing.


Roasted Veggies
Any random veggies you need to get rid of. Looks like I used potatoes, leeks, onions, carrots, winter squash. All mixed with olive oil, garlic and some rosemary.
The special touch to this simple dish was adding roasted kale on top. I just baked 4 leaves until crispy. Once the veggies were done I sprinkled the dry leaves on top. It added a nice depth to this dish and put some leafy greens into a roasted dish.



Apple Strudel
Totally inspired by the apple tasting.
Many sheets of phylo.
2-4 apples
powdered sugar
olive oil.

Lay a couple of phylo sheets down, spraying olive oil between each sheet. Layer on sliced apples, sprinkle with powdered sugar. Repeat a few times. Fold/roll phylo once the apples are done to make a latice across the top.
Bake about 20-30 min at 350F.
Once out of the oven coat in vanilla frosting.

A simple dessert that only looks fancy.


Lentil Soup
I wanted a brothy soup and found a quick way to use up those left over roasted veggies.

Boil left over roasted veggies for 30-60 minutes.
Strain veggies and add 1/2 to 1 cup of lentils, depending on how much liquid you added to your veggies.
Add salt and pepper to taste. let look until the lentils are tender.
Garnish with shredded carrots and chopped chives.


I've updated the cupcakes I've worked on. Check out this post for new pictures.

Sweet and Savory Green Dinner

Simple Salad and Green Beans Dressed Up
With very lose recipes.

Salad with Figs and "Honey" Mustard Dressing:
Simple salad of: torn butter lettuce, thinly sliced carrots and onions; tossed together.
Chopped figs and slivered almonds added.
Then drizzled with an agave, mustard mixture right before serving.

Maple-Mustard Green Beans:
This was based off of Isa's maple, mustard potatoes and string beans.
Steam the green beans and just before they are done, transfer to a frying pan.
Mix the sauce and pour over the green beans in the frying pan. Cook until the sauce has been cooked and well coated on the green beans.
Serve warm.

Sauce:
2 Tablespoons yellow mustard
2 Tablespoons soy sauce
4 Tablespoons maple syrup
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1/2 teaspoon onion powder

Maple Chard Salad

Salad:
2 cups chopped chard
2 Tbl. shredded carrots
2 Tbl. toasted slivered almonds
1/2 Cup fresh blueberries

Dressing:
3 Tbl. Maple Syrup
1 tsp. Balsamic Vinegar
1/8 tsp. guar gum (thickener)
pinch cayanne
1/8 tsp. paprika


This is pretty simple, but it's so fantastic with the sweet of the berries and maple syrup and the bitter of the chard. The toastiness of the almonds brings this really nice round flavor to it all.

Pasta Salad

This pasta salad hit the spot and was worth the boiling of water on the hot day.


- 2 1/2 cups dry pasta
- One eared corn on the cob
- 1/3 medium yellow onion, chopped
- 10 baby carrots
- 12 oz. jar of marinated artichoke hearts, chopped (reserve the juice)
- 1 clove of garlic, minced
- 1 sprig fresh tarragon, chopped
- 1 sprig basil, chopped
- 1/4 cup sliced almonds, minced (optional)
- 1/4 cup dried tomatoes, chopped
- 1 Tbl. dark vinegar
- salt and pepper to taste

While the pasta is boil, chop the herbs and vegetables of your choice.
When the pasta is almost done, rinse with cold water.
Add the juice of marinated artichokes and all the other vegetables and spices to the cold pasta and mix together.
Chill and serve cold.