A Buffet of Recent Eats

I've had a bunch of pictures hanging around for a while, so instead of reviewing each recipe I thought I would just post the pretty pictures.  Enjoy!

Jerk Asparagus and Chickpea Piccata

Appetite for Reduction

Chicken Salad Sammy

The Best Veggie Burgers

Curried Red Bean Pilaf with Walnuts and Raisins

Vegan on the Cheap

Strawberry Rhubarb Crumb Pie 

theppk.com

Cajun Beanballs and Spaghetti

Appetite for Reduction

Thai-Style Pineapple Rice Salad

Vegan on the Cheap

Fronch Toast with mango coconut salsa

Vegan with a Vengeance

It's summer..

 

and that calls for a nap!

Farmers' Market #3

Date: Saturday, June 4

Location: Downtown Springfield, IL

Total Purchase: $15.75

Cucumber $1

2 Zucchini $2

2 Summer Squash $2

Asparagus $4

Micro Greens $2.50

Jalapeno Plant $1 

"Ugly" Tomatoes $2.25

Green Onions $1

American Vegan Kitchen.. revisited!

We've been doing a pretty good job keeping our cookbooks active since the challenge ended.  We've probably made something out of American Vegan Kitchen at least once a week.  One of our favorites is still the Coconut Bacon Bits, but here are some other goodies:

Seitan Po' Boys

These were the perfect flavorful and messy sandwich!  Aside from making the seitan (which I did the day before) they were also pretty quick to make.  We served them on French bread, as suggested, with pickles, mustard and a little extra mayo.

Brew City Stew

We used the extra seitan to make this stew.  The seitan really picked up the flavor of the beer, which I didn't expect.  It was really hearty and gave us enough to dinner and leftovers for lunch.

Brewpub Tater-Tot Pie

This might not be the prettiest dish, but it was definitely one of my favorites from this book.  We used a can of kidney beans in place of the TVP and omitted the mushrooms, otherwise we followed the recipe.  Again, the flavor of the beer really came through in this, so pick a beer that you like!  This is a relatively quick meal to keep in mind for the fall or winter.

Unhealthy splurge

I'm not saying I eat healthy all the time, but I try to stay away from greasy, fried foods.  If I have chips, I make sure I'm at least eating them with some fresh salsa.  I bake almost exclusively with whole wheat pastry flour.  But.  These cheese curds have nothing healthy about them; they were a total splurge (which we ate with a big, green salad loaded with veggies, if that's any consolation) and totally worth it.  I used the batter for beer-battered tofu from "Vegan Brunch" and cubed up half a brick of Follow Your Heart nacho cheese (that was Chad's pick; I would have gone for almond cheddar).  Although the result was melty, greasy and delicious, it will probably be a while before I make these again!

Keep the burgers coming!

I thought another post about burgers would be fitting for Memorial Day.  We've still been loving "The Best Veggie Burgers on the Planet" and it seems like every recipe we try is better than the last.

Pintos and Rice Burger

This burger is so easy!  Joni even says something like, just mash all the ingredients together.  It takes no time (unless you forget to make some rice ahead of time, in which it will take you almost an hour.  Ugh.) and is so delicious.  We cooked these on our George Foreman grill, which we probably haven't used in two or three years.  They had a nice crispy, crunchy crust and were dense, but chewy on the inside-- just perfect.  We topped them with a healthy scoop of guacamole, some green onions and a few cilantro leaves.  I think these would hold up well on the grill and can't wait to make these again and share their deliciousness.

Potato Samosa Burger

I've never made a real samosa before, but we bought a big bag of potatoes from Trader Joe's, so I thought I would give this a try.  They turned out super tasty, almost like a fancy mashed potato-ish burger.  There were lots of seasonings, but next time I might even double them.  We ate this with a smear of vegan mayo.

Super Quinoa Burger
Chad did most of the work for this burger.  The ingredients are pretty simple, quinoa (2 cups!), beans, peas, cashews, tahini and a couple spices.  They are super flavorful and have very little oil, so they're a healthy choice, too.  We made these on the Foreman grill and they turned out great.  Joni also suggests that this can be used as a side if you don't form the "batter" into burgers, which is definitely something I'm going to keep in mind this summer!

Bacon Cheeseburger
We saved these to grill outside today-- with the temps over 90 and humidity through the roof, I didn't want to turn on the stove or oven and it was a good excuse to leave the air conditioning for a bit.  Plus, I worked up a sweat just kneading this dough for five minutes!  I made a few adjustments to the recipe, subbing a mix of barley and cracked wheat for the TVP and cutting the oil in half.  They have a ton of flavor going on, from the bacon (we used coconut bacon bits from AVK), peanut butter, liquid smoke, nooch and more.  After I formed the patties (which were about 1/2 c each), I stuck them in the freezer for just about 15 minutes to firm while we preheated the grill.  They held up well and since I oiled them, even got great grill marks!  They turned out perfect-- a little crunch from the grill, super flavorful and a little chewy in the center.  Next time, I might even make a double batch, just to have some extras on hand in the freezer.

Farmers' Market #2

Date:  Saturday, May 28

Location:  Springfield, IL

Total Purchase:  $12.75

Organic Lettuce 2 bags at $3.00/bag

Radishes $1.25

Green Tomatoes 2 medium at $1.25

Asparagus just over a pound at $3.00/pound

Dog treats $1.00

I don't think I've ever bought radishes, but these were so pretty I couldn't say no!  Schatzi was apparently intrigued also!

Gardening.. To Go!

Since we are back and forth all summer, we never get to plant a real garden.  This year, I decided that I wanted to at least try some herbs, so in early April I bought top soil, organic seeds and colorful pots and planted our favorites.  We have cilantro, basil, parsley (this is the little gray pot, which I obviously didn't grow from a seed), sweet red pepper seedlings and tomatoes (which have already been sent to my mom's for transplant).  So far, the basil has yielded enough for two small batches of pesto and seasoning for other dishes.  We've also used the parsley and cilantro for a few things.  It's so nice to just pick and cook, instead of running to the store and hoping for something fresh.  Next year, I think I'll branch out.. hopefully to some bigger pots and more veggies.  For this year, I'm content with my mini-garden to go!

What are your favorite fresh herbs to plant?  What have you had the most luck growing?  Least luck?  Good luck to all the other gardeners out there!

Summer is in sight!

The end of the school year is quickly approaching.  My desk is scattered with papers and final exams.  In less then one week, I will be enjoying another beautiful summer break!

This is my fourth year teaching in my current position, so in high school terms, it's kind of like I'm a senior.  Actually, it means that the Freshman I taught my first year are all grown up and graduating!  I've had only one student who has been in German all four years and one student who I've taught three of the four years, so I had to take the opportunity for a picture with them before they went out into the big, real world!  (One of them even built me the awesome podium a few years ago in his shop class!)

Farmers' Market #1

Date: Saturday, May 21

Location:  Medford, WI

Total Purchase: $13.00

Maple Syrup $10.00

Rhubarb $3.00

Cousins' Weekend 2011

My mom has five sisters (and one sister-in-law who you would think, if not for her height, was one of the sisters) who are all really close.  Those five sisters and one brother have more than a dozen children, over half of which are girls, who are also really close.  For years, the sisters have planned yearly "Sisters' Weekend," where they all meet up somewhere fun and have a weekend filled with sister stuff.  For the last few years, the cousins have followed suite and have planned "Cousins' Weekend."  Cousins' Weekend is usually something cheap, such as camping, as the six regular participants have been in some stage of schooling, unemployment, or otherwise short on cash.

This year, we finally went close to all-out-- we rented a beach house in North Carolina, where my cousin Alyssa just finished an internship.  Spring in the Midwest has been rather undesirable, so we were all looking forward to a bit of sunshine and warm weather.  I got up early two mornings and ran along the beach (one morning barefoot, which was awesome!)...  We watched the sun rise over the ocean...  We spent a whole day being lazy on the beach...  We decorated foam visors with puffy paint and seashells...  We crammed into the backseat of Alyssa's car and explored the city.  It was by far the best cousins' weekend to date and will be hard to top next year!  Here are a two of my favorite pictures from the weekend...

Bring on the Burgers!

My latest addition to my cookbook collection is "The Best Veggie Burgers on the Planet: 101 Globally Inspired Vegan Creations Packed with Fresh Flavors and Exciting New Tastes" by Joni Marie Newman that came out on May 1.  I pre-ordered it through Amazon was excited to find it at my door when I came home from school the last week in April.  This looked like it would be the perfect book for summer grilling.  Well, first of all, the book itself it gorgeous.  It's heavy for a paperback, with thick,colorful pages and pictures for about every third recipe.  To boot, the recipes are great too!

So far, we have tried three burgers:

grilled, topped and ready to eat!

Our first burger adventure was the Chipotle Sweet Potato Burger.  Chad and I love all things chipotle, so this was an easy choice.  The burger had a great texture from a combination of baked sweet potato, tofu and cashews.  We grilled these outside, which could have gone better.  Next time I will take Joni's advice and freeze the burgers before grilling them.  We had a lot of burger stuck to the grill, but they were delicious, regardless.  We topped them with avocado and tomatoes and skipped the buns.  I also made a side of black bean and rice salad with some homemade chipotle mayo.

baked to (almost) perfection

The next burger was the Jamaican Jerk Burger.  We had some leftover seitan from making Seitan Brew Stew (from American Vegan Kitchen) earlier in the week, so this burger was really easy to throw together.  I don't know if I added too much liquid or not enough dry or what I did, but this burger never really held together.  We baked it, so it wasn't a big deal, but it turned out to be a crumbly, yet tasty, burger.  We'll definitely have to experiment a bit more with this one if we want to grill it.  I enjoyed the flavor from the pineapple and hot peppers. 

Tonight we made Garlicky Ranch Potato Burgers.  I am pretty much in love with these burgers.  They were SO easy to make and were FULL of flavor, despite an ingredient list shorter than 10 ingredients.  This is definitely a recipe to keep in mind, because usually have everything on hand.  They were like bulked up, super tasty hash browns in burger form.

Adventures in AFR

A few weeks ago, I finally bought Appetite for Reduction and have been loving it!  We have made two or three things each week and already have a few favorites-- including Baked Falafel.  So... here are some recent pictures and thoughts on some delicious meals!

The first thing we made was Baked Falafel, which we have made probably half a dozen times now.  Last night, Chad was even successful making them solo.  The first time we made them, we just ate them plain for a snack.  Since then, we usually make a big salad with cucumber, tomato, red onion (for me) and tahini dressing.  The recipe is so easy, just throw the chickpeas and some other ingredients in the food processor, blend until smooth, mix in a few other seasonings, form and bake.  They can be ready in right around 30 minutes, so it's a surprisingly easy weeknight meal.

The second thing we tried was another salad-- Pad Thai Salad with Peanut-Lime Dragon Dressing.  We doubled the veggies and added some pan-fried tofu triangles to make it a meal.  Since I've been in love with anything Thai and peanutty lately, I thought this salad was amazing... lots of fresh veggies and flavor.  I also liked making the dressing from scratch.  There are a bunch of recipes for dressing in this cookbook that I'm planning to make.  I like that you can adjust the seasoning, oils and such and know exactly what you're eating.  Plus, you can always taste freshness!

The remaining recipes in random order:

Herb-Roasted Cauliflower and Bread Crumbs

This was a simple side, but was SO flavorful.  The bread crumbs and herbs make the cauliflower taste rich and buttery.

Mac & Trees with Easy Breezy Cheezy Sauce

Another vegan mac and cheeze recipe to add to my arsenal!  This had a good flavor, not too rich.  The big stalks of broccoli (or trees) bulked it up and added more flavor.  I think I used a whole box of whole wheat pasta and still had enough sauce to go around.

Lasagna with Roasted Cauliflower Ricotta & Spinach

This recipe used a combo of cauliflower and tofu to make a ricotta-like filling and black olives on top in place of cheese.  It was really filling and made enough for dinner and lunch for me and Chad.  I can see this becoming a fall and winter favorite.

Curried Chickpeas & Greens

Another really quick and delicious meal.  This was the first time that I used mustard seeds, garam masala and I also finally bought fresh ginger.  I LOVED this recipe.  It was so flavorful from all of the seasonings (I think there is something like 10 different spices), tomatoes and kale.  I'm already looking forward to making this again!  (This picture is from my phone.  Somehow my camera battery was dead for over a week!)

Arabian Lentil & Rice Soup
I don't know how I missed taking a picture of this one.  Chad will probably say it's because he made it, which he did, but that's not why there is no picture.  This was made with creamy red lentils and jasmine rice, with its own share of veggies.  It was also a good way to use up some of our homemade veggie broth (it's taking over the freezer!).  I think we had enough of this for a few left-over lunches, so that was a little bonus.

I think that's it... so far.  I'm loving this book and there is so much that I still need to try!  I love that, like Isa's other books, there is such a variety of recipes.  There are safe favorites (like Mac & Trees  and Classic Black Bean & Veggie Chili) mixed in with other recipes that I wouldn't normally seek out (like Curried Chickpeas & Greens and Curry Laksa). I'll let you know what else I try soon...

Happy Birthday, to ME!

Two weeks since my last post!  Now that poms, basketball and the Cookbook Challenge are over, I've been surprisingly busy doing nothing.  Actually, I've been cooking from Appetite for Reduction a lot, so I'll have to do a post on that soon.  BUT... last Thursday was my birthday, so I thought I'd share a picture...

Kayla & The Giant Penny

I did it!  I have my very own, hard-earned giant penny medal!  The Lincoln Presidential Half Marathon was yesterday.  It was a perfect race day-- 50s, slight breeze, partly cloudy.  I ran with one of my co-workers, Gretchen and it felt like a surprisingly quick route.  There were a few hills that I thought were going to kick my butt, but I recovered pretty quickly.  Best of all, I finished with a personal best time of 2:16.43, which is almost 15 minutes faster than my previous best!  On to the next...