Pancakes

I love pancakes with fruit for breakfast, but I've never made them from scratch, I always use the mix from box. :/ Yesterday I decided to make them myself -- sooo much healthier because you can use whole wheat flour, no chemical preservatives, no corn syrup, and no milk/whey/eggs that the pancake mix boxes have.

Toss:
- 1 1/2 C Soymilk
- 1 Tbsp Sugar
- 2 Tbsp Oil
- 1 C All-purpose flour
- 1/3 C Wheat flour
- 1 tsp Baking Powder
- 1 Tbsp Flax seeds
- 1/4 tsp Salt
- 1 tsp Lemon Extract (or vanilla)
- about 1/8 C water to thin batter out (add as needed)

All in a blender.

Pour into hot nonstick pan.

And voilà:



They were a tad bit too flat (I like them a little bit more fluffy), but still good. Oh, and if you can't tell by now, I like strawberries. The white stuff is powdered sugar.

I made them based off of this recipe from veganyumyum, of course.

I ate at One World Vegetarian Cusine* ...

in West Covina last Friday and had their vegan cheesecake for dessert. OMG, it was delicious, so the next day I was craving more of it, but that place is just too damn far* so I decided to make my own.

*It's a casual place and they have a lot of different types of food. I had a "quail" with vegetables and rice (very good), "egg" rolls (pretty good), bf had teriyaki "beef" (okay [fake beef doesn't really go over well with me, it's all about the fake chicken]), and then the cheescake for dessert (awsome!!). The restaurant is decorated nicely and still has great prices, so it's DEFINITELY worth the trip. I can't wait to go back and try some other plates.

Anyway, I sorta followed this recipe from FatFree Vegan Kitchen. Except I used soy milk instead of eggnog and I omitted the brandy/rum because I didn't have any. Also, Trader Joe's didn't have any silken tofu!!! :/ So I used regular tofu.



Everyone that has tried the cheesecake says it's good, but I don't think it compares to One World's creamy...and slightly gelatinous version. That description might sound gross, but I swear it was good. It was light and fresh yet still cheesecake like, I don't know how they did it. I think you can taste the tofuness in mine a little too much, that might be because of the type of tofu I used though.

MMMM, Fried "Chicken" Seitan

I'll be making this again.



I mostly followed this recipe from veganyumyum (i heart that blog).

Awesome Orange Chicken Style Tofu

So easy to make, and you don't even have to have all the ingredients listed. You can pretty much replace any of the vegetables with some other vegetable you have on hand, like bell peppers or asparagus.



Ingredients:
Olive oil
1 block extra firm tofu, drained and chopped
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 smallish eggplant, chopped
Mushrooms, chopped
2 green onions, minced (just use regular onion if you don't have them)
1/2 C shredded cabbage
Carrots, chopped in long little pieces
Salt
Pepper

Sauce:
3 TBSP orange juice
2 TBSP lemon juice
2 TBSP vinegar
4 TBSP light soy sauce
1/2 C brown sugar (reduced a little bit if you don't like it too sweet, i just don't pack the sugar very firmly when measuring)
1/2 tsp red pepper flakes
3 TBSP Cornstarch mixed with 2 TBSP water

I also like to add ~1 tsp of this Asian chile thing that I got from a Chinese market but I have no idea what it's called because the label is all in Chinese. It has chili flakes and peanuts and it's in oil. Really yummy.



Directions:
1, If you have a nonstick pan that actually works toss the tofu in the pan on medium heat and cook until the water disappears. this is way easier than having to press the tofu and drain all the water out. As soon as the water is gone add some olive oil and then add the eggplant and garlic. If you have a crappy nonstick pan just add the oil first and try to get as much water out of the tofu as possible and hope it doesn't splatter and burn you.
2. Add salt and pepper to taste.
3. Once eggplant is almost done add the rest of the ingredients.
4. While that cooks, take a smaller pan and add the sauce ingredients (except the cornstarch mixture) to pan and bring to a boil. Once boiling, reduce heat to medium and add the cornstarch mixture while stirring. Once it gets as thick as you want it, take it off the heat.
5. Add sauce to the tofu and serve with rice. I think the sweetness goes well with a side of plain edamame.

Tofu Ceviche!

Yum! This recipe is super easy and it tastes good...it tastes like what I think I remember the real thing tasting like. :) I found the recipe for this online, but I changed a few things to make it yummier. :)



Ingredients:
One package extra firm tofu, chopped and marinated in my crazy homemade Worcestershire sauce.
Tomatoes, cut into little cubes
Cilantro, chopped
Red onion
Salt
A ton of lemon juice (I use meyer lemons from my backyard)
[You could also toss some chopped up green chile if you're into that.]
[I've also made it with chopped up radishes.]

My crazy homemade Worcestershire sauce Ingredients*
1/2 C apple cider vinegar (any kind of vinegar will do though)
1/4 C water
1 C orange juice
4 TBSP soy sauce
2 TBSP brown sugar
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/4 tsp mustard
1/2 tsp onion powder
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp pepper

*The original tofu ceviche recipe said to marinate all the tofu with 2 tablespoons of vegan Worcestershire sauce.... How are you supposed to marinate all that tofu with 2 tablespoons??? you need at least a cup of sauce to cover it completely and that's a lot of Worcestershire sauce ...which of course I don't have, so I googled a recipe for the Worcestershire sauce and made some modifications to it ...because I didn't have the proper ingredients for it of course! I finally bought the proper ingredients for the sauce and I decided my version was much better, so maybe this doesn't taste like WS, but it tastes good on the tofu, so there.

Here's what you do:
1. Take a package of extra firm tofu and squeeze as much water as you can out of it then slice into small cubes. I like to wrap the tofu in a couple of paper towels and then wrap it with a cloth towel and pile plates on top of that.
2. While tofu is being pressed, mix all of the stuff for the crazy homemade Worcestershire sauce together in a small pan and stir thoroughly. One it starts to boil you reduce the heat and simmer for a minute and then take it off the heat.
3. Toss the sauce on top of the tofu and let it marinate in the fridge for half an hour or so.
4. Afterwards, spread the tofu out onto a baking sheet covered in a nonstick mat type thing or parchment paper. Don't get a lot of sauce on there because it will just burn. Put in 350 degree oven for half an hour, mixing halfway through the cooking.
5. Meanwhile slice up all your veggies and squeeze a lot of lemon juice.
6. When tofu is done toss it in your bowl of veggies and lemon juice and salt and put it in the fridge for a few hours.
7. Eat with some tostadas.

Sausage and bean mix type thing...

My lunch:

The sausages are a bastardization of the Everyday Dish's Spicy Italian Vegetarian Sausages recipe and Cupcake Punk's Super Easy Steamed Sausages recipe and my crazy substitutions.

Strawberry Pie...

So my dad brings home 3 boxes of strawberries. Not the little basket ones, the larger plastic containers. OK, I love strawberries, BUT NO ONE IN MY HOUSE HELPS ME EAT STRAWBERRIES AND THEN THEY JUST GO BAD SO I FEEL BAD. :( I usually wash most of them and then freeze them for smoothies. This time I decided I wanted to make a strawberry pie.

I made a pie crust and baked it in the oven. My crust was hideous. I suck at pie crusts. :( Probably because I insist on trying to work a little bit of whole wheat flour into the crust in an attempt to make it healthy or something. Anyway, my pie crust dough was too dry and cracked while I was rolling it out, so I got cranky and wadded it up into a ball and then slammed it against the countertop... and then started calmly over again. The damn thing shrank in the oven though. :/

While the crust baked, I sliced a bunch of strawberries and kept the outside slices for decorating the top of the pie. I tossed the inside slices in a pan with about half a cup of sugar and a little bit of vanilla and cooked them for a bit. Then I tossed that into the pie crust (minus the juice), and attempted to make it look pretty with the fresh bit of strawberries. Drizzled some of the juice on top to make the fresh strawberries look glaze-y.

And voilà. Don't look too closely at the crust. :(

I MADE RIBZ!

And they were yummy! For some reason I was never a big rib eater when I was a non-veg, but that being said, these things were absolutely amazing and I want to make more soon! I even made my mom try them and she says they do taste like barbecued ribs.

The recipe is from Everyday Dish. I like watching their cooking videos because afterwards I want to go on a cooking spree.

Here's what you need for "Susan's Barbecued Seitan Ribz":

1 cup vital wheat gluten
2 teaspoons smoked Spanish paprika
2 tablespoons nutritional yeast
2 teaspoons onion powder
1 teaspoon garlic powder
3/4 cup water
2 tablespoons peanut butter, tahini or other nut butter
1 teaspoon Liquid Smoke
1 tablespoon soy sauce
about 1 cup barbecue sauce

Pretty simple. Go to the site, watch the video/read the recipe and then go coook!


That's a picture of the ribz on day two (yummy leftovers). There's rice, beans and then the ribs of course. Those are the ugly ribs, the cute ones were eaten first. :) Some yummy asparagus are one the plate as well, gotta have something green. The red sauce is a tomato sauce that my dad makes for barbacoa. I think I may try modifying this recipe by omitting the barbecue sauce and then tossing in some barbacoa seasonings next time. Mmmm, seitan rules.

And another picture just because:

mmmm, I made Banana Bread!

I used the PPK's Banana Bread recipe and made a few minor [changes]:
-I skipped the apple cider vinegar because all I had was red wine vinegar and that didn't seem very banana-bread-like.
-I sprinkled raw sunflower seeds and flax seeds on top of the loaf before baking and it made the top part supper yummy.
-The suggested baking time of 60 to 70 minutes was a little bit too long (for my oven at least); I cooked it for ~57 minutes and it was a tad bit overdone on the bottom.

Ingredients
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cups white sugar
1/2 cup margarine, at room temp
3 very ripe bananas, mashed well
2 cups flour [I used whole wheat]
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 cup vanilla soy milk, mixed with 1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar [I totally skipped the vinegar but added a bit more soy milk]
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon allspice [I used pumpkin spice instead, 'cause I obviously don't have a well stocked spice rack]
1/2 teaspoon salt
[raw sunflower seeds]
[flax seeds]

Directions
Preheat oven to 350 F. Spray a 8x4 bread pan with non stick cooking spray, or lightly coat with margarine.

Sift together flour, baking soda, salt and spices.

Cream together the margarine and sugars. Add bananas, soy milk and vanilla.

Add the wet ingredients to the dry. Mix well. Pour batter into pan. [Sprinkle with sunflower seeds and flax seeds]. Bake for an hour to an hour 10 minutes. [55 minutes for my oven].

Overall I give it a 4.5 out of 5 and will definitely make it again next time I have a bunch of rotting bananas. :)

MMM! Apple-Orange-Cranberry Salad


So Delish:

Green leaf lettuce
Peeled and chopped orange
Chopped granny smith apple (coat with lemon juice before adding to salad)
Chopped dried turkish apricots
Dried Cranberries
Raw sunflower seeds

If you're one of those people that insist on hiding the yummy natural flavors of your salads, use a basalmic vinaigrette.