Veggie Lasagna

Its cold, we are having new house drama (hopefully to be remedied tomorrow AM) and all I want is comfort food. Which means warm, rich goodness in whatever form my pantry/fridge yields for the day. Homemade chunky applesauce, "skillet supper" of chickpeas, beans and veggies, mixed bean soup, roasted squash...and lasagna.


I wasn't going to post about this since its really quite basic with no "real" recipe, but the picture turned out kinda cool and the whole thing was super tasty. Basically, I layered, in this order: tomato sauce, pre-cooked brown rice pasta, tofu "ricotta" made with firm tofu, nutritional yeast, a little lemon juice, garlic and fresh (frozen) basil, with some cooked greens (in this case turnip) mixed in, sauteed veggies (carrots, mushrooms, onions and garlic) w/ seasonings, then another layer of sauce, etc. Topped with more sauce and a whole bunch of nooch then stuck in the oven at 350 for about 45 minutes, then under the broiler for another 5-10 to brown up the top. Let it set for about 15 minutes before cutting....it still kinda fell apart but tasted fine regardless. The picture's from the next day after it was in the fridge overnight and had really set well.

I really should stop self-medicating with food, but comfort food is so...comforting.

come on, everybody's doing it...

yep, here's that freakin' vegan survey that so many people are doing. I'm nothing if not a follower... oh, and there's some craziness going on with the text formatting here...blogger seems to like italics, no matter what I do...

1. Favorite non-dairy milk?
vanilla unsweetened almond milk...yum.

2. What are the top 3 dishes/recipes you are planning to cook?
Crunchy Chocolate Truffle Pie, some sort of GF vegan scones, pumpkin rice pudding

3. Topping of choice for popcorn?
penzys' northwoods seasoning....or nooch/maple syrup (kinda like kettle corn ish?)

4. Most disastrous recipe/meal failure?
Katie's birthday last year...first attempt at veganizing a cake...kinda fell apart...had to mold it back into shape...or into some sort of shape.... It may not have looked pretty but it sure tasted good., very, um, dense. I'll have to find the pictures and post them some time, it was quite amusing

5. Favorite pickled item?
carrots and garlic...or maybe watermelon?

6. How do you organize your recipes?
in a folder on my desktop and in my favorites folder and in a little index card holder and in a folder and in a bunched up pile in the kitchen...aka, i don't organize my recipes...

7. Compost, trash, or garbage disposal?
trash/disposal currently but we've stated a compost pile at the new house. Oh yes, and there's the insta-compost machines, the rabbits and pigs, who eat green scraps, carrot butts, etc.

8. If you were stranded on an island and could only bring 3 foods...what would they be (don't worry about how you'll cook them)?
apples, lentils, dark chocolate cake

9. Fondest food memory from your childhood?
my mom's shepard's pie. or making snickerdoodles at my grandmother's house with my cousins and using FAR too much food coloring to make them "pretty"

10. Favorite vegan ice cream?
temptations or purely decadent chocolate peanutbutter. Someone needs to make a wheat-free chocolate peanutbutter pretzel vegan ice cream...i still pine for my ben and jerry's chubby hubby!

11. Most loved kitchen appliance?
immersion blender or mandoline

12. Spice/herb you would die without?
Garlic

13. Cookbook you have owned for the longest time?
Compassionate Cook

14. Favorite flavor of jam/jelly?
elderberry or grape or blueberry/apricot

15. Favorite vegan recipe to serve to an omni friend?
anything with vegan chocolate mousse...but now susan's "impossible pumpkin pie" may be the new go-to recipe, since EVERYONE loved it

16. Seitan, tofu, or tempeh?
tempeh just to eat straight (or at least minimally modified) but tofu is so versitile, I use it a lot more often.

17. Favorite meal to cook (or time of day to cook)?
dinner or brunch

18. What is sitting on top of your refrigerator?
an empty cooler, a jar of quinoa, a jar of black mustard seeds, a whole lot of cans of beer and a bunch of newspapers

19. Name 3 items in your freezer without looking.
tomato paste, ground flax seed, the last 3 crispy chocolate peanut butter cupcakes...

20. What's on your grocery list?
nooch, apples, "veggies for thanksgiving", frozen fruit, tofu, tempeh, soy yogurt.

21. Favorite grocery store?
wegmans...followed closely by trader joes and then by harvest co-op in cambridge, MA

22. Name a recipe you'd love to veganize, but haven't yet.
angel food cake...haha

23. Food blog you read the most (besides Isa's because I know you check it everyday). Or maybe the top 3?
have cake, will travel, where's the revolution?, fat free vegan

24. Favorite vegan candy/chocolate?
green and black's mint bar...or anything chocolate over 65%

25. Most extravagant food item purchased lately?
various holiday soy beverages...and excessive amounts of sugar cookie tea

26. What was your favorite food BEFORE becoming veg*n?
bbq chicken...and before going vegan, grilled cheese

27. Veganaise or Nayonaise?: um, whichever one tastes like miracle whip. I usually make my own mayo-like stuff, though

28. What is one recipe or ingredient or cooking technique that you've become familiar with in the last year that you can't imagine you ever lived without?
steam-frying

29. What is your favorite veg*n cookbook?

not to be a stereotype, but VWAV...though I haven't bought a new cookbook in a long time and haven't seen a lot of the new ones that sound so very awesome.

30. Make up another question (and answer it!)

bunny-tasticness (and pickled carrots)

Warning: the food-related content of the following blog is simply an excuse to post cute bunny pictures. Proceed at your own risk....

The other day I made this recipe, with some changes because about 2 months ago, we ordered pickled carrots at a restaurant and they were out, triggering a seemingly unquenchable craving. Good recipe (especially with my additions/substitutions) and I think the craving is tamed. However, Phina (aka, "big angry bunny") did not approve of my wasteful use of carrots...


Oh, yeah, the food....



Spicy Pickled Carrots

• 2 lbs large carrots, peeled and sliced into 1/4 inch thick pieces
• 6 cloves garlic peeled and diced
• 1 large red onion, quartered and sliced 1/4 inch thick
  
• 1 1/2 cups apple cider vinegar
  
• 1 1/2 cups water
• 10 bay leaves, whole
• 10peppercorns
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 3 whole jalapeños, sliced widthwise
  

Spray a large saucepan with cooking spray and sauté the garlic and onions. Add in carrots and saute for 2-3 minutes. Carefully add in vinegar, peppercorns, salt, and and bay leaves. Bring to a simmer for 5 minutes and then add water and jalapeños and bring to a simmer again for another 10 minutes.

Let it cool completely and then transfer the carrots and cooking liquid into a covered container and refrigerate overnight. Store the carrots in the liquid and use a slotted spoon to serve them. You may leave the bay leaves in the liquid to add to the flavor, but do not eat them!

Nutritional Info: Servings Per Recipe: 10, Amount Per Serving: Calories: 44.5, Total Fat: 0.2 g, Cholesterol: 0.0 mg, Sodium: 286.1 mg, Total Carbs: 11.3 g, Dietary Fiber: 3.1 g, Protein: 1.0 g

Feeding the Troops

Firstly, I have to apologize in advance...I really meant to get back into the habit of regularly posting on here, but we finally closed on our new house (!!!!) and are in the slow process of moving. Thank goodness the house is only about a mile from our apartment, so we can do most of the move by car, but regardless, things are a crazy mess and that limits the blogging opportunities. That in combination with the fact that I somehow managed to melt the camera battery charger (long story...) and haven't replaced it yet will limit my posts for awhile. but anyway...

Saturday, a massive contingent of family from both sides descended upon Syracuse to help us move furniture over to the house. My policy is that when people help you out, you have to feed them....plus I wanted to try out the new appliances. So, after a long day of hauling heavy furniture and boxes down 3 flights of stairs and then up at least 2, sometimes 3, flights of stairs, inhaling massive quantities of rabbit hair and dust that had collected behind said furniture, dealing with Katie's wonderfully helpful but majorly OCD father, and actually having to go out and buy a pound of hamburger to appease the carnivores (my uncle and cousin installed our stove, microwave and dishwasher, plus figured out how to turn on our hot water heater and bought us one of those crazy turns-into-5-million-different-things ladder...if they wanted meat, we were willing to get them some meat), we at down to eat. The menu included:

Veggie Chili (with meat on the side, uck)
All-Corn Cornbread, fat-free-ified with applesauce/nutritional yeast
Susan's Impossible Vegan (and gluten-free) Pumpkin Pie made from real, not canned, pumpkin
and an awesome fruit salad made by my grandmother.

We had tons of leftover chili, cornbread and pie, mostly since we made it for 10-12 people and only 7 ended up staying for dinner, but that ok, cuz it all found a good home when we had friends over to help us paint today...the pie was amazing, especially for crust-haters like me, and the cornbread is officially my favorite cornbread recipe of all time. Plus the massive quantity of food managed to sustain us as we stayed up until 2 am hauling boxes around to clear out the rooms to be painted and setting up fishtanks to prevent fish-death. Can I just say that I LOVE daylight savings?!

Some day I will get pictures up of food/house, but until then, back to moving...