Wednesday, July 22, 2009

Raw Week, RawR!

I'm almost done my raw week.  It's been easy in a lot of ways (the food is just as delicious as any "normal" food), and in other ways a bit of a challenge (detox symptoms, having to throw out lots of food that spoiled unexpectedly fast, the whole nut soaking thing, the whole raw food extremism thing)...

It's actually going to be bittersweet easing back into regular food, I think.  I don't feel any huge inclination towards it at the moment, even though I know that someone as flighty and spacey as me really does flourish better on the standard vegan fare.  But that said... I should get onto the food of this week, more or less a meal by meal replay of all the lego-bright dishes I got to have the time of my life constructing.

Okay, so this is technically a pre-raw warm-up (haha, warm up, is that a pun?).  I made a carrot/tomato/miso soup to see how I'd feel about it all, thick with pumpkin seeds and bowl-licking good, and so....

I jumped in headfirst.  Would you look at that?  It looks like a deep-sea fish it's so pretty.  A lot of green, but worth it.  The sprouted chickpea hummous in those wraps kept me going for snack times for the first few days, and the minty cucumber dressing from Vegan World Fusion doubled as a salad topper and a soup, before spoiling way too fast as these enzymic dishes are wont to do.  Alas, alas!

Avocado was also a life-saver, as I never felt warmer or more satisfied than after a meal that incorporated it.  I mashed this one up with rice vinegar, soy sauce and ginger, and made showy crunchy (astoundingly good) sushi rolls.  And a fruit salad with loquat and date syrup beside it.

Breakfast of day 2: the incarnation of my oatmeal habit!
Raw oats ground up in a spice grinder, with a heavy pinch of ground flaxseed, half a mashed banana, berries and lots of salt and cinnamon, left to soak overnight.  I'm keeping this one!  I'd been getting tired of regular oatmeal and this is perfect for summer and very laid back.  You have to choose fairly soft fruit for best results, but again - peaches, berries, tropical things - all available right now!  It's very nutty and satisfying to have for breakfast.

Lunch day 2: Zucchini bites with spicy hummous, a salad of shredded carrot, red pepper, soaked walnuts and red wine vinegar (yum!!), and broccoli tossed with cucumber dressing.

Dinner that night was my first green smoothie.  I will admit I thought it the concept very strange at first, at least before I took my first sip.  Is it totally an unabashedly weird that I love the taste of green things in my smoothie now?  It adds a neat texture and a resonant kind of garden note that makes it more of a meal to me.  Especially wonderful with banana and pomegranate juice, I might add.

I'm skipping breakfast reports because they're all variations on the raw oat groat thing, but...
Lunch day 3: A curried miso carrot dressing on spinach with avocado chunks and dried pineapple pieces - ZOMG.  Genius.  And some cucumber dressing in a bowl trying to be soup as I attempt to slurp it all up before it goes bad.  

Dinner 3: My attempt at flatbread without a dehydrator resulted in (of course) a lot of prematurely fuzzy food, but there was a small grace period where it was semi-firm enough to eat as bread and I made little sandwiches with homemade sumac tahini cheese, and some green beans tossed with organic stone-ground mustard and lemon.

Dinner day 4: pizza!
(lunch seems to be missing from the record)
The pizza is topped with sage-y sundried tomato marinara, green pepper, onions, pineapple, almond cheese, and artichoke hearts.

Lunch day 5: Possibly in the top 5 sandwiches I've ever eaten, is this Haiku Wrap from Juliano's contribution to The Complete Book of Raw Food.  It has avocado mashed with garlic, ginger and lemon topped with wakame, mustard, pickle, burdock, bell pepper, onion, corn and shoyu - and it's a magical, magical combination.  (carrot slaw with sprouted peanuts keeping the sammiches upright on either side).

Dinner 5: Another one of those raw standbys I never understood (like the green smoothie), was the zucchini pasta thing, but you know what?  It's pasta-like, and not salad-like as I thought it would be!  Really good, actually, enough to repeat it later.  And the things that look like eggs are crunchy turnip slices topped with nut cheese.

Lunch 6: Cabbage burrito-wraps with cumin and chili sunflower pate inside (along with corn and tomatoes and green onions and things).  With a side of Pringle lookalikes (but really it's delicious turnip) and nut cheese again for my new favourite take on nachos.  Soaking the slices in cold water gives them the perfect chip shape and makes them sweeter, too!

And that's not to say there were no sweets!  I made some tahini-geranium cookies, that I could upload but they look pretty much like little brown discs.  The brownies are gorgeous, though!  I ground up some sprouted and dried buckwheat into flour and combined it with dates, ground almonds, walnuts, carob powder, salt and vanilla and proceeded to nom NOM NOM them up because they were so amazing!!  I highly recommend the buckwheat flour thing, I have a container of the sprouts in my freezer right now and it gives things a more cake-like texture than the usual wodgy raw dessert texture.

And here's a plate full of desserts I took to a raw potluck last night.  Clockwise from the top left are salty sunflower seed cookies, then those buckwheat brownies with a banana-fudge frosting, then coconut-cashew-agave crusted pear tarts with gojis on top, and finally like orange & clove oatmeal raisin cookies!  So much fun, and so easy to just make a few servings of anything, and experiment all over the place!  I definitely got into the habit of whizzing up just a single cookie for after lunch sometimes when I needed something for my sweet tooth.

Potluck food itself was possibly the BEST vegan thing any non-vegan has ever made for when I came to dinner.  It was a sundried tomato-cashew romesco sauce over marinated eggplant and it was mindblowingly good.  I think it was from a book by the same people who did Raw Food/Real World, if you wanted to try it, and you might want to add extra orange juice like my friend did and eat every indulgence-soaked aubergine triangle with additional gusto for having done so.  :)

Day 7....
....   it's day 7?  It's the end of the week?
Do you realize I didn't realize that until about halfway through writing this post and counting up the dates?  Oh my goodness, I suppose that means I'm done and I should ground myself now.  Part of me wants to keep going, and in fact... *goes off to buy bananas for a few minutes*

* a few minutes later *

Well... on the way down the stairs to the market, oh what do I smell but buttery wafts of rice and faint hints of curry? and whoa-p, there goes MY 100% raw convinction!  That, and charred hot dogs on the street as I walked... and I'd like to feel like myself again, I think. :D

A few things I noticed, though, to sum up the week...

* it doesn't necessarily have to be expensive at all to eat raw.  I stuck mostly to almonds and sunflower seeds for nut protein, which can be relatively cheap.  And I didn't indulge in the condiments like nama shoyu and special apple cider vinegar or anything.  If anything it might have been cheaper due to me not buying coffee all the time.  OH YEAH I QUIT COFFEE FOR A WEEK.  !  Craziness.

* nut soaking liquid is super mucilagous and gross, and I'll probably soak most things now if I think of it beforehand.

* white wine was okay to drink, as was whiskey (although I'm pretty used to whiskey).  Red wine on the other hand, made me terribly achey for a whole day after drinking it, and then the ache turned into a kinda "detox ache" that I've still got in my calves when I bend over too far.  

* a couple drying racks set in front of a sunny window was my dehydrator, and it worked pretty well for cookies and buckwheat sprouts.  Terrible for bread though, and I wouldn't even try crackers.  Oh yeah, and sun tea!  Tasty stuff!  And not even that long to make, maybe a few hours in the sun for amber-steeped liquid.

* I caved once, for a bunch of artichokes I got for free, but wouldn't you?  All succulent and dipped in lime & olive oil???  I'd never tried artichokes before and it was my chance right there, so I don't feel bad.  And they are, by the way, not nearly as hard to make and eat as advertised and mysteriously sweet and I ate the stems too, YUM.

* Guess that's it!  And I'm so making pizza, man, like, soon.

Monday, July 20, 2009

Brunching, making chutney, crispy cookies, and fudge-hearts!

I've been raw for 5 days now!!  I'll save writing about that for the next post, but in the meantime here's a whole bunch of photos from the past few weeks I never got around to posting but are kinda making me hungry right now...

Allright, we've got up there... chili cashew dosas (my favourite recipe so far from Vegan Brunch), with a notably amazing chutney I made from the back of Indian Cookery, ie: this book ------>

Which is basically my favourite indian cookbook ever, even for the chutney chapter alone, which covers pretty much anything you'd want to stew and preserve in a super authentic, full of interesting tidbits kind of way.  Like, that peach chutney I ate with the dosas had paprika, poppy seeds, cloves, green chiles and cashews, oh my!  Totally easy to make, too.

Another perk of making chutney is that you get to re-use little jars and give them away after they've sat for a month on the shelf looking very pretty.  On the right is the peach, and in the middle is a pineapple chutney with about a ton of ginger and garlic in it, yay!

Okay, what else - this was astoundingly good.  It looks kind of grey, I'll admit, but so so so good.  Velvety corn creamy chinese wedding soup, or something like that, with bits of savoury tofu floating in it and fresh peas.  It's Bryanna's recipe, and incidentally my introduction to creamed corn (I'm a fan, it turns out).

Oh, and Singapore green beans from Tropical Vegan Kitchen in the background.  Once that stuff marinates it's addictive!

East Coast Coffeecake for an omni BBQ!  Plus adorable sign. :)
I loved how I could even make this in my dad's kitchen - it's the sign of a perfectly adaptable baked good.  (flour, sugar, oil, check!)

My favourite PB cookies ever, are the Crispy PB Cookies from Extraveganza with the cereal flakes inside.  They crackle like pop rocks and have that perfect dense chew, and are so easy to make.  I usually quarter the recipe and make them into the size of quarters, and have them as little pick me ups throughout the day.

Polenta Rancheros from V.Brunch, with noticeable flecks of toasted coriander that perfume the whole thing, it's really nice, especially when made with fresh tomatoes cause that's all I had.  Surprisingly light for a bean dish!

White bean, mango and rosemary tacos!!!  My surprising invention that worked, plus some leftover Tempeh Wingz made with tofu, cold and chewy out of the fridge.  (That red sauce is illegally finger-licking.... wow.)

Fresh organic vegetable pasta spirals with a sauce made from tomatoes, raisin-sage sausages, capers, zucchini & basil, NOM.
Banana Rabanada!!!  Not only is this delicious but no refined sugar, either, so it's perfectly viable to eat for lunch!  Isa was spot on about the syrup & cinnamon-mopping, too.

(Heart-shaped) Fudge-pops from How It All Vegan, since I found my ancient copy in my mom's garage a few months ago and figured I'd give it a whirl again.  These were sooooo good, and almost exactly like fudgesicles, which is no mean feat!

Sausage and eggplant quiche from V.Brunch with a homemade crust I put too much EB in but was still okay.   And I think that's about it for cooked stuff!  Phew, sorry for the cursory writing about it all, too.  Somehow I think the pictures speak loud enough that it's okay I don't remember the details, plus this raw food thing is making me spacey... zomg.  It's great, but I'll be glad to bring it down to maybe 60% raw after the next few days.  Can't wait to show you what that's been like, though! 

Tuesday, July 7, 2009

Blueberry bliss, pea pancakes, and mousse.

(ps. sorry about the font in some parts of this post.  not sure why it went so wonky)

So if my blog tags are any indication at all (and amusingly, they often are), I'm more than a little mad for blueberries.  Dunno why exactly... it could be the bursting qualities... or the way they're so purple and freeze perfectly and are also called starberries?  And when you stick them in things people go "oooooooh" without fail, it's kind of funny!

When I saw this recipe for pea pancakes with blueberry basil dressing I knew knew KNEW I had to try it, it sounded the thing little fresh-showered elves would eat over tea and the latest forest news.  Lo and behold, it even looks like that sort of food, too!  Call me bowled over with technicolour, batman.  I wanna cook chromatically so much now!

Here's the veganization of it all.  The pea pancakes are almost perfect (I'd consider leaving out the cornstarch to keep the flavour brighter perhaps?).  The blueberry dressing is also pretty good, but I could do better probably and another kind of vinegar would probably work nicer, I just haven't figured out which one.  Still really good though!  (If you wanted lemon I'd never stop you, I just wanted to see if I could use something besides citrus.  Balsamic would probably be nice, too, come to think of it).  

Blueberry Basil Sauce

2/3 cup blueberries

1/4 cup water + 1 tbsp

1/2 tsp sugar

1/4 tsp salt

1/2 tsp cornstarch

1 tsp vegetable oil

1 tbsp unseasoned rice vinegar

1 tbsp fresh minced basil

cracked black pepper

- In a small bowl, whisk together 1 tbsp of water with the cornstarch, set aside.
- In a small saucepan over medium heat, bring the blueberries, 1/4 cup of water, sugar and salt to a low boil until the berries start to pop and bleed their juice.  Remove from heat and stir in the cornstarch mixture, oil, vinegar, basil, and pepper.  Taste for salt and cover to keep warm.

Green Pea Pancakes (serves 2-3 as a snack or side)

4 oz. snap peas, strings removed

1/2 cup green peas

1/2 cup milk or cream

1 tsp melted buttery spread

1/2 tsp cornstarch

1/4 cup flour

1/4 tsp sugar

1/4 tsp salt

1/2 tsp baking powder

- Bring a pot of lightly salted water to boil.  Blanche the snap peas for 30 seconds, then rinse in cold water.  Do the same with the green peas, until they're tender (2-3 minutes maybe).

- In a blender, combine the cooled peas with the milk, butter, and cornstarch, and blend until pretty smooth.  Move to a mixing bowl.

- Sift in the dry ingredients and gently fold until totally incorporated (shouldn't take much effort)

- Melt a bit of buttery spread in a nonstick and fry thin little 2" pancakes until golden brown on both sides.  Serve warm with a bit of blueberry sauce and some basil leaves on top.

Right.  And.

It was Pomme's birthday time this weekend, and that meant I was required to out-do myself again, inspired by love to fling culinary handrail-holding out the window and concoct some sort of artistic masterpiece that'll never have a recipe written down (but I'll always remember how to do).  In this case - a 2-layer Morrocan Mint cake with generous inches of Blueberry Mousse and a Pomegranate Glaze, topped with sugared pine nuts and mint leaves.  !!!!  For the record, I did a billion new things in the kitchen for this (well okay, I played with agar), and it turned out like some patisserie's jazzed star, in shades of aubergine, gold and lavender, and I *wish* I had a slice shot, but it was enjoyed by candlelight in the company of lots of vegan restaurant coworkers, so I'll just have to make another layer cake soon to make up for that! :p

Officially, the entire thing doesn't have a recipe, but I'll post the adaption I made to the matcha cupcakes from Vegan Cupcakes because it made a damned fine joconde and the vegan world can always use another attempt at that, I think.  Pretty simple, actually... (it was the simple part)

Vegan Morrocan Mint Joconde

1/2 cup soygurt

2/3 cup strongly brewed green tea with 10-12 fresh mint leaves in it (strained, of course)

1/4 tsp vanilla

1/3 cup canola oil

1/2 tsp almond extract

3/4 cup flour

1/2 cup ground almonds

1 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp baking soda

3 tsp matcha soymilk powder

1/4 tsp salt

3/4 cup sugar

- Preheat oven to 350 and line an 8" cake tin with nonstick spray and parchment paper.

- In a large mixing bowl combine the soygurt, tea, extracts, and oil

- Sift together the dry ingredients, then slowly add it to the wet bowl in installments, gently folding with a whisk until it's smooth.

- Pour into cake pan and bake for 35-42 minutes (my oven is really slow, so take these times as approximations).  A toothpick should come out clean, and the top should be glossy and flat.

- Let it cool almost completely before turning it onto a parchment lined cooling rack.  Once cool, cut it carefully into 2 layers, and soak each layer (as you construct your moussey cake) with Mint Syrup.

Mint Syrup

2/3 cups strong Morrocan mint tea (made the same as before)

1/3 cup sugar

some extra mint leaves if you want

- Bring everything to a boil in a tiny saucepan over medium heat and let it bubble until it's reduced slightly and thicked.  Cool completely before spooning over your cake layers.

(it all tastes of exotic and meltaway sweet sand and herbs..... very very very - needless to say - delicious)

Wednesday, July 1, 2009

chromatic sausages for Canada!

red white and umami all over

Happy July 1rst, that is to say - Canada Day!  It's the nation's birthday and I'm celebrating in Quebec, which means a certain amount of gusto is required to make any noise at all, what with everyone tired from St Jean Baptiste Day just about a week before.  It's not quite the party that it is in Ontario, but by golly if I can't make my lunch about as patriotic as a waving flag, at least in colour scheme anyway (and association to good old BBQ food... yes I SO do love the taste of char).

For lady Canuck's 142nd, I dived into the sausage section of Vegan Brunch and couldn't even approach deciding one recipe over another, so I made 2 batches at once - the Italian Feast and the Cherry Sage, done up into smaller links so they were hot dog sized.  And after discovering that the grocery store had no (NO) hot dog buns (and even if they did, they would probably be terrible because they usually are), I just had to make a little batch of my own.  Which I TOTALLY recommend, it makes a huge world of difference.  So much so that I'm gonna post the recipeeeee, taken from this blog, taken from King Arthur flour......

Hot Dog Buns
(chewy, wheaty, soft, dense in a good way, stands up to condiments - ie; perfect)
(makes 8)

1 tbsp sugar
2 1/2 tsp active dry yeast
1/4 cup warm water
1 cup warm milk
2 tsp vegetable oil
2 tsp salt
3 - 3 1/2 cups flour (I used 50% whole wheat, still came out fluffy and soft)


- In a large bowl, combine water and sugar and let it sit for 5 minutes so the yeast gets foamy.
- Mix in the milk, oil, and salt, then add 3 cups of the flour and knead until it comes together into a dough ball.
- Turn onto a floured surface and knead for 6-8 minutes, until it becomes a bit like plasticine.  The dough isn't as soft as in some recipes, and it shouldn't be sticky (add up to 1/2 cup more flour as needed).  Move to an oiled bowl, cover and let it rise in a warm spot for 1 1/2 hours, or until doubled in size.

I'm just building anticipation for chewy perfect grilled bun-bite here :)

- Once it's risen, turn onto a lightly floured surface and cut into 8 equal pieces.  To shape a bun, make a piece into a rectangle, then starting at the end closest to you, roll it up tightly like you would roll a cigarette, folding in the ends on each side as you go.  Pinch the seam when you finish, then place it seam side down on a parchment-lined baking sheet.  Repeat with the rest, then cover with a piece of plastic wrap sprayed with nonstick spray and let them rise for 30 minutes. 
- Preheat the oven to 400F
- Bake for 20 minutes, then move to a rack to cool


Unrelated to photo above, but that's what scrolling is for ------------ the beautiful red and white salad next to it all was from the Tropical Vegan Kitchen and ab-solutely scrumptious.  I'm going to post the recipe, too, because I just saw a great video concerning appropriation and culture (and breakbeats) and I figured heck why not, share the love, share the coconut dressing ---

Thai-Style Romaine Salad with Creamy Coconut Tamari Dressing
(serves 4)

10 oz. of romaine leaves
1 cup cherry tomatoes, halved
1/2 cup red onion, thinly sliced and soaked in cold water for 10 minutes, drained well
1/2 cucumber, peeled, seeded and thinly sliced
2 tbsp basil, rolled up and thinly sliced

Coconut Tamari Dressing:

6 tbsp coconut milk (full fat works best here)
2 tbsp fresh lime juice
2 tbsp tamari
2 large cloves of garlic, minced fine
2 tsp palm sugar, or brown sugar
1 1/2 tsp red thai chile, seeded and minced superfine


- Whisk, let it sit for at least 10 minutes.
- Toss 1/2 the dressing with the salad components, arrange prettily onto plates, then drizzle with the remaining dressing.  

So patriotic!  (if a little Thai ;)