Kimberly Steele's Blog, page 21

Daily Vegan Lunch for July 6, 2013: Roasted Walnut Pesto and Grilled Vegetable Sandwich

This is the type of sandwich that you see in restaurants around my area as their sole vegetarian option — often they want to put asiago cheese or parmesan pesto on it (gross) rendering it non-vegan. This uses a delicious dairy free walnut-basil pesto. These sandwiches travel particularly well.

SANDWICH INGREDIENTS:

For each sandwich:

2 slices of wheat bread

1 slice of roasted red bell pepper (I use organic roasted red bell peppers from a jar)

3 slices of baked sliced zucchini

About 1/2 cup worth of roasted eggplant slices

2 tablespoons walnut pesto (recipe below)

PESTO INGREDIENTS:

1.5 to 2 cups fresh basil, washed and plucked off the stems

2 cloves fresh garlic

1 cup walnuts

1/4 cup olive oil

1 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon lemon juice

DIRECTIONS:

Roast the eggplant and zucchini by slicing them in 3/4 inch slices and laying them on an oiled cookie sheet in the oven at 350 for 20 minutes, flipping once at 10 minutes, though I usually forget to flip them! If you are using fresh red bell pepper, you can roast that too, just take out the seeds and white pith first. No additional oil is needed on top of the vegetables to make them roast.

Make the pesto by combining all pesto ingredients in a blender. Don’t puree the pesto completely, just puree until it is just smooth, about a minute to a minute and a half. You might have to scrape down the sides as this recipe is for a very thick pesto spread.

Make the sandwich by laying out a small layer of each vegetable and spreading one of the bread slices with 2 tablespoons of pesto.

Daily Vegan Lunch for 5 July, 2013: Taco Salad

INGREDIENTS FOR ONE LARGE SALAD TO SERVE 4:

Cashew-Garlic Dressing (recipe below)

6 – 8 cups dark lettuce

2 cups corn chips, crumbled or Fritos

1 avocado, peeled, pitted, and cubed

2 cups grape tomatoes

1/2 cup chopped onion

1 cup corn, thawed and drained if it was frozen

1/2 cup black olives (optional)

1/4 cup chopped sweet bell pepper (optional)

CASHEW-GARLIC DRESSING INGREDIENTS

1/2 cup cashews, soaked overnight

1/3 cup water (you can use reserved cashew water or just start fresh)

1 teaspoon lemon juice

1 tablespoon chopped onion

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon or more taco seasoning (any mix of cumin, chili powder, and garlic powder)

1 tablespoon nutritional yeast

1 clove garlic

Make salad by combining all salad ingredients except for avocado and chips, which you will save until just before serving.

Make dressing by combining all dressing ingredients in a blender and pureeing until very, very smooth. Depending on your blender, this can take up to five minutes.

Add avocado and chips to salad and serve with dressing.

Daily Vegan Lunch for 4 July, 2013: Clean Dirty Rice

INGREDIENTS:

2 cups cooked long grain rice (I used basmati)

2 teaspoons oil

1.5 cup onion

2 cups eggplant, unskinned, chopped into 3/4 inch bite size pieces

1 cup walnuts

2 tablespoons chopped jalapeno peppers (I used the kind from a jar or can) OR 2 tablespoons green bell pepper

1/4 cup roasted red peppers, minced

1 tablespoon sundried tomatoes, minced OR tomato sauce

2 tablespoons fresh garlic, minced

1/2 teaspoon thyme

1 cup vegetable broth (I used 2 teaspoons Better Than Bouillon mixed with 1 cup water)

2 tablespoons soy sauce

Black pepper, to taste

DIRECTIONS:

Heat a large pan on medium-high, add 2 teaspoons oil. Add walnuts and toast them until browned and fragrant, about two minutes, stirring them to make sure they don’t burn. Add eggplant, onion, and jalapeños to the eggplant. Sauté for about 7 to 10 minutes until onion looks translucent and eggplant starts browning. Stir periodically. Make a well in the center and deposit the garlic in it, allow it to cook there. Dump the sundried tomatoes, red peppers, and thyme on top of cooking garlic and allow to sauté for about a minute.

Turn heat to Low.

Add rice to pan, stirring in gently to break up any rice clumps.

Lastly, mix vegetable broth and soy sauce and pour into the rice/eggplant mix. Cook for about 2 – 3 minutes more until liquid absorbs.

Finish with a sprinkle of black pepper.

Daily Vegan Lunch for 3 July, 2013: Creamy Corn and Zucchini Chowder

See how it is thicker the second day?

INGREDIENTS:

1 Tablespoon oil

1.5 cups onion, chopped

1 cup frozen or fresh corn kernels

1 zucchini, peeled and chopped small

3 plus 1 cups water

1 veggie broth cube or 3 teaspoons Better Than Bouillon

1/4 cup flour (any kind)

3 Tablespoons vegan cream cheese (I used Tofutti)

1 teaspoon dill

1/4 teaspoon sage

1/2 teaspoon celery salt or Old Bay Seasoning

DIRECTIONS:

Fry onion in oil in the bottom of a medium sized pot until translucent on medium heat. Add corn, thawed if it was frozen, and zucchini. Stir for about one minute and add dill and sage. Cook about 30 seconds more.

Turn heat to high, add 3 cups water and veggie broth cube, drowning the vegetables and herbs. Take the one cup of water not added to the soup and mix it with 1/4 cup flour. Meanwhile, cook soup until is almost boiling but not quite. Turn the heat back to medium and add the water with flour in it. Stir continuously. Mixture will thicken after about three to five minutes. Add salt if needed and Old Bay Seasoning/celery salt. Take about 2 cups of soup out of the pot and put it in a blender or a food processor. Blend it for 1 -2 minutes until completely pureed. Add the puree back to the soup and stir. Like many soups, it is better on day two.

Daily Vegan Lunch for July 2, 2013: Curry Potato Salad

INGREDIENTS:

4 – 6 medium sized potatoes, I used Yukon gold

About 6 cups water

1 tablespoon oil

1 teaspoon salt

2 tablespoons vegan mayonnaise

1 tablespoon dill or sweet pickle relish, I used dill

1/4 cup roasted red pepper, chopped small

1/4 cup chopped white onion

1/2 teaspoon cumin

1/4 teaspoon turmeric

1/2 teaspoon garam masala

Salt to taste

DIRECTIONS:

Peel potatoes and chop them into 1 inch bite size pieces. Put the potatoes in a pot and fill the pot with water until the potatoes are just covered. Add 1 teaspoon of salt and 1 tablespoon of oil to the potatoes and water. Bring the pot to a boil on high heat and then turn down to medium-high. Boil about 7 minutes or until potatoes are tender but not mushy. Drain the potatoes and set them aside for about 20 minutes. Spread them on a cooking sheet or a cutting board and put them in the refrigerator or even the freezer if you need the process to go faster.

Once potatoes are cool, combine them in a large bowl with mayonnaise, onion, pickle relish, cumin, turmeric, and garam masala. Salt to taste and chill once more.

Daily Vegan Lunch for July 1, 2013: Veggie Sausage With Grilled Onions

I grilled about 3/4 white onions in 1 teaspoon of oil for about 5 minutes on medium heat right in the same pan as this Tofurky Italian Sausage.

Daily Vegan Lunch for 30 June, 2013: Super Protein Chocolate Smoothie

INGREDIENTS:

1.5 cup frozen bananas

2 cups curly kale

1.5 cups frozen strawberries

1/2 an avocado, pitted and peeled

1 Tablespoon cocoa powder (I used organic, fair trade cocoa powder. Expensive but worth it)

1 teaspoon cinnamon

2 chili peppers (optional)

2 cups soy milk

DIRECTIONS:

Combine all ingredients in a blender. My Vitamix was able to get this done in less than 2 minutes. A less powerful blender would be more like four to five minutes with a little rest period in the middle so it doesn’t overheat.

Daily Vegan Lunch for 29 June, 2013: Spanakopita (Spinach Phyllo Pie)

INGREDIENTS:

10 cups fresh spinach or 2 packages frozen spinach, thawed with water squeezed out, about 4 cups total

2 cups chopped onion

2 tablespoons olive oil

2 cups chopped fresh dill OR 1.5 tablespoons dried dill

3 teaspoons salt

1.5 cups firm tofu, crumbled

1/4 cup nutritional yeast

3 teaspoons cornstarch or arrowroot powder

1/2 package of phyllo dough, thawed (about 20 sheets)

Additional olive oil for phyllo sheets

DIRECTIONS:

Wilt fresh spinach in a large pan with a tablespoon of water on medium heat for about 3 minutes. Once spinach deflates and gets smaller, scoop it into a bowl and set it aside to cool. In the same large pan where you just cooked spinach, fry onion in 1 tablespoon of the olive oil until slightly transparent. Add dill and tofu plus the other tablespoon of olive oil. Keep cooking until dill deflates (if you were using fresh) and/or tofu is heated through, about 2 minutes. Drain the cooked spinach by pressing it in the bottom of a colander over the sink. Alternately, if you used frozen spinach, thaw it in the microwave by cooking it on high power for three minutes. Drain it in a colander by pushing the water out of the spinach. Add the spinach to the fry pan with onions and tofu. Add dried dill at this point if you didn’t have fresh. Add nutritional yeast, cornstarch/arrowroot, and salt. Stir well until the slight amount of water released by the spinach in cooking binds with the arrowroot/cornstarch and thickens, about three minutes.

Set the spinach mixture aside on an unused stove burner and allow it to cool for at least 20 minutes.

Lightly oil a large casserole pan like the one pictured above. Unpackage the thawed phyllo dough. Carefully lay out the phyllo dough on a large cutting board or clean countertop. Extract a single sheet of phyllo and lay it down. Spread the lightest possible layer of olive oil on the sheet (an olive oil sprayer would have been fabulous but I did not have one) and lay the next sheet down until you have 10 – 13 sheets. Spread spinach mixture flat on the phyllo dough bed you have created. Follow up with 10 – 13 more sheets prepared in the same manner. Bake the resulting spinach pie at 350 degrees for 30 minutes.

Spinach pie is even better the second day!

Daily Vegan Lunch for 28 June, 2013: Best Ever Vegan Nachos

If you love nachos but don’t love that the average small plate of them has 19 grams of fat and 400 calories, this recipe is for you. Oats and roasted red pepper replace cow’s milk fat so there are way less calories and no suffering for any mommy or baby cows. The sauce doesn’t clump in nasty, greasy little brownish balls like the nacho cheese sauce I remember as a child, instead it remains smooth and yummy even if you refrigerate it.

INGREDIENTS:

About 1.5 cups corn chips per serving

Jalapeno peppers from a can or jar

Chopped tomatoes

Vegan sour cream (I used a tablespoon of Tofutti vegan cream cheese thinned with a tablespoon of water)

Chopped onions

Black olives (I did not have them)

OAT CHEESE INGREDIENTS:

1/2 cup oatmeal

1 cup water

1/4 cup chopped onion

1 teaspoon dijon mustard

1/4 cup nutritional yeast

1/4 cup roasted red pepper (I use organic roasted red pepper from a jar from the Italian section of the grocery store)

1/2 a lemon’s juice

1 teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons taco seasoning OR 1 teaspoon cumin, 1/2 teaspoon chili powder, and 1/2 teaspoon garlic

Tabasco or Sriacha, to taste

2 teaspoons arrowroot powder or cornstarch

DIRECTIONS:

Cook 1/2 cup oatmeal and 1 cup water for 3 minutes in the microwave, stirring at 1 minute and 30 seconds. Combine thin oatmeal with all other sauce ingredients in a blender or food processor. Blend until very smooth, up to 5 minutes. Transfer mixture to a small pan on the stovetop. Cook at medium heat, stirring constantly until it thickens. Cheese sauce is now ready for nachos.

Daily Vegan Lunch for 27 June, 2013: Jackfruit Stir-fry

INGREDIENTS:

2 cups shredded jackfruit, raw or cooked in boiling salted water for 7 minutes and drained

1 cup shiitake mushrooms, sliced (I used dried shiitake mushrooms rehydrated in water)

1 carrot, julienned

1 zucchini, sliced on the diagonal

2 cups bok choy, chopped

CHINESE WHITE SAUCE INGREDIENTS:

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon vegan Worchestershire or soy sauce

1/2 tablespoon sugar

1/2 tablespoon cornstarch

6 tablespoons water

1 teaspoon white wine

1/4 teaspoon sesame oil

DIRECTIONS:

Chop all vegetables and set them aside in bowls or on a cutting board like I do somewhere near the cooking area.  Prepare the white sauce by stirring all ingredients together in a small bowl.   Heat a large pan or wok until oil shimmers (very hot) and add vegetables, tossing them around until the bok choy wilts slightly, about one minute.  Turn the heat down to low and add the sauce.  Stir fry is done once the sauce thickens, about 30 seconds to one minute.