Well That's Different!

This morning I made hot barley cereal.  I can't imagine this is common but I love the chewy texture of barley and figured it would made a good breakfast so I cooked it in water until it was almost cooked then added almond milk.  I let it cool then added brown sugar and craisins.  I will definitely be doing this again but next time I might just add maple syrup instead of sugar and I'll probably just cook the barley in the rice cooker.  I also like to do oatmeal with almond milk, brown sugar, craisins and chia seeds.  I love eating hot cereals that I've just made but making them ahead of time and putting them in Tupperware so they are ready to go when I run out the door in the morning is also hugely convenient.

For lunch I made a pesto and onion tart.  I made pizza dough by combining 2 cups white flour, 1 cup wheat flour, 2 tsp salt, 2 Tbsp yeast, 3 Tbsp olive oil, and 1cup+1 Tbsp warm water.  I kneed the dough until it becomes sticky and stretchy then coat the bowl with olive oil and put in a mildly warm place covered with a kitchen towel for an hour or 2 until it doubles in size.  While I was waiting on the dough I made vegan pesto by pulsing 1/3 cup walnuts and 2 cups fresh basil in my mini food processor until it was chopped up.  I then added a tsp each of salt, garlic powder, and onion powder and pulsed again until smooth.  Then I slowly poured in 1/2 cup of olive oil while the food processor was on.  At the end I added a bit more salt but just do it to your own tastes.  I let the pesto sit while I attended to the dough.  I always break it in half because that's quite a bit of dough to handle and then slowly I let gravity help me to stretch it.  The technique was a bit hard for me to get at first but basically you just want it to stretch out while trying not to compress out all the wonderful air that makes the dough fluffy.  Its kind of like how if you hold silly putty up it will stretch out, same thing here.  Just hold it up until it stretches a bit and then rotate your hands to keep letting it stretch out.  It doesn't need to be too thin but keep in mind that it will fluff up. I get holes sometimes and I just push them back together.  Once it is stretched place it in an oiled 9x13 inch glass dish. Do the same with the other half and let them rise for another 30 minutes.  Glass rather than a cookie sheet gives it an amazing, delicate crunch to the crust and it cooks more evenly.  While its it rising I browned some thinly sliced onions.  One the dough had risen I brushed it liberally with the pesto and spread the browned onions on top and put it in the oven at 500 degrees for 12 minutes. I let it cool before I cut it so it doesn't fall apart.  It always blows my mind how much flavor such pure food can have. And the best part is there's plenty to take to my excruciatingly long ass day at clinicals tomorrow. 

Highlight Reel

Wow! I can't believe it has been over a month since my last post.  School is a powerful drug. It's like it eats time. Anyway, here are some of my favorite foods I've made over the last month.

Hummus sandwich, an easy go to when I know I'm going to have a busy day.  It packs up nicely and doesn't need to be refrigerated so its good to-go.  I use any type of whole grain bread, smother one side with hummus and layer veggies on the other side.  In this instance I used cucumber, red bell pepper, and lettuce.  Other veggies I like to use are other colored bell peppers(yellow are great) tomatoes, mushrooms, and spinach. I have also substituted avocado for hummus. Depending on the firmness I either mash or slice it.

Hard tacos. I sauteed sliced onion and red bell pepper in olive oil and crushed red pepper, no need to add salt, there is plenty of flavor. Pan fried chipotle field roast sausages, mashed avocado, trader joes refried black beans with jalapeno. Load all the toppings into store bought hard shells and you're done.

Vegan street tacos. I fried corn tortillas in a little bit of olive oil and then placed it in a folded position while it cooled. Then I pan fried a chipotle field roast sausage  and roughly chopped it up with the spatula so it looked like taco meat and topped the tacos with pickled red onions. 

I often use recipes for guides and combine elements to make my own version.  This was my first time pickling my own red onions and I chose the easy refrigerated version mostly because I'm lazy.  They ended up turning out so good that they were gone in less than a week.  Next time I am making 3 jars full. Oh and the best part is once the onions are gone I used the brine to make salad dressing. 

Pickled Red Onions
1/2 cup red wine vinegar
3Tbsp sugar
6 allspice balls
6 cloves
1 Dried bay leaf
2 Tbsp yellow mustard seeds
1tsp each salt and pepper
-Fill a jar with thinly sliced red onions
-Combine all the ingredients in a nonreactive pan and boil for 5 minutes and let cool
-Pour mixture over the red onions in the jar and refrigerate for 4 days before eating.

They tasted the best at about a week.
I also used the red onions to do vegan hot dogs using pan fried smoked apple sage field roast sausages and hoagie buns.  The little mustard seeds are so full of flavor and they pop when you eat them. YUM!

My famous soba salad can be made a variety of ways but the core ingredients are Soba(Duh!), avocado, green onions, cucumber, and lettuce.  Above and beyond that you can put in whatever you like really.  I like matchstick carrots, blanched asparagus, red bell pepper, etc.  So basically you boil the soba according to the directions, cut up your veggies and combine them.  Then I top the salad with sliced almond, sesame seeds, and furikake ( a seaweed seasoning you can find in the asian section). I always put the dressing in a separate bowl so that each person can decide how much they want to put on.
Soba salad Dressing
2Tbsp sesame oil
1Tbsp light olive oil
1Tbsp soy sauce
1Tbsp sriracha(more if you like it spicy)
a cap of rice vinegar and a pinch of sugar
-Whisk ingredients and adjust to taste, I rarely measure I just add stuff until it tastes right.

Ah yes and I did a beet, blueberry, kale and almond milk smoothie.  Now I must emphasize that you use boiled beets, NOT pickled beets from a can.  I used half a beet and it gave it a beautiful color and added natural sweetness.

Lastly, although I didn't take any pictures, I hosted an incredible vegan sushi night. Everyone brought toppings and we ended up with a wonderful variety of sushi. The topping included lightly roasted asparagus, zucchini, carrots,mashed sweet potato, cucumber, fried tofu, sauteed portabellas, and avocado.  Al we did was make sushi rice according to any online recipe and spread it on nori then add 2-3 toppings and roll.  My two favorites were avocado/cucumber/fried tofu/carrot and sweet potato/asparagus/zucchini. We also did desert sushi.  For this we used rice paper wrappers that you can buy at any asian store, sticky rice made in the rice cooker, azuki beans(red beans boiled in water for an hour then mashed with sugar, found the recipe online, got the beans from asian store), fried banana, sliced cantaloupe, and kiwi.  My favorite was with azuki beans and fried banana.  Oh and the best part was that I made sweet coconut milk by simmering coconut milk for 15 min stirring frequently then added 2 Tbsp sugar and dipped the desert sushi in it. Delightful.

And then life happened

Well I am glad to report that although I have been too busy to sit down and blog I have not been too busy to eat vegan.  With final exams approaching it has been a balance of eating out and reheating leftovers.  Breakfasts have been a bag of oat squares and walnuts or shakes made with bananas, strawberries or blueberries, protein powder, kale, and almond milk both of which are easy to take on the go.  While eating out I have enjoyed veggie pho, thai food, and vegan burgers.  I had round 2 of bangers and mash but had it with peas and gravy this time.  I made the gravy out of "Better Than Bouillon" (BTB) veggie broth and flour by mixing a tablespoon of bouillon with 4 Tbsp. of water and heating it in a saucepan until bubbling.  Then I slowly whisked in 2 Tbsp. of flour which made it very thick.  I slowly added more warm water until it was the consistency I wanted.  I reheated some of the leftover mash and pan fried some field roast sausages and added some peas and smothered the whole thing with gravy. It was even better than the first time.

Last night I marinated sliced extra firm tofu in kalbi sauce (bought at any Asian store) for about 6 hours and then pan fried it and served it with brown rice and iceberg lettuce with vegan ranch.  Yep, Vegan Ranch!  I made some butter milk by putting 1 Tbsp of apple cider vinegar in a 1/2 cup and filling it with soy creamer but I think almond or soy milk would work also.  Let it sit for 10 minutes and then mixed it in a bowl with 2 heaping spoons of vegannaise, a cap of apple cider vinegar, 2 tsp. of fresh minced dill, 1 tsp. each of dried parsley, onion powder, garlic powder, mustard and salt and pepper to taste.  It was a little sweet because I used soy creamer but it was like the sweet ranch at teriyaki restaurants.

Today for breakfast I had malt o meal with sweetened vanilla almond milk.  Sometimes I add in craisins and chia seeds. 

For lunch my niece and I made a salad.  We cooked Israeli couscous  following the directions on the box but using BTB vegetable broth instead of water.  We blanched and chopped some asparagus and headed up some frozen peas and threw it all together in a bowl.  The couscous was so flavorful we didn't need dressing. My niece, a finicky eater, even asked for seconds. I had seconds too.

Fuck yea that's vegan!

Does that oven look different than usual? That's because last night I was invited to cook a vegan meal at a friends place.  I decided to go with one of my tried and true favorites, Japanese curry.  A lot of people are familiar with Thai curry and Indian curry but aren't even aware that Japanese curry exists and has its own unique taste.  I usually use the "Golden Curry" box curry that you can buy at most grocery stores but I'm working on making my own recipe because the box curry has MSG in it.  Last night for time and ease purposes I used the mild Golden curry.  I started by draining, pressing, slicing and frying the tofu then setting it aside while I browned the onion carrots and mushrooms in a bit of oil.  I added 1 cup water and then broke the curry cubes into the pan and stirred to dissolve.  Once dissolved I added another 2 cups of water and let that goodness simmer on medium heat for about 15 minutes stirring occasionally.  I sliced up the fried tofu, added it to the pan and let it simmer 5 more minutes. 

The curry was served with rice and sriracha to two of my meat loving friends who had never heard of Japanese curry before and are mildly skeptical about "the whole vegan thing."  It was also my husbands first home cooked meal after being away on a job for over a month.  I don't remember the exact comments because I had a glass of wine while cooking and when you're vegan it doesn't take a lot of wine to get the job done but it was something along the lines of ..."This is vegan?!"  To which I replied "Fuck yea that's vegan!"  The thing I like about Japanese curry is that unlike Thai curry there is no shrimp paste or fish sauce, it is truly vegan and truly delicious.

On Monday I decided to do another one of my favorite vegan meals, roasted veggies. There are a ton of vegetables that one can use to roast but I used cauliflower and onion.  I started by mixing a dry packet of Lipton's onion soup with about 3 Tbsp. of olive oil. I tossed the cauliflower florets and onion pieces in the bowl trying to cover each piece with the mix and let it sit while the oven preheated to 400 degrees.  I used a glass pyrex dish because it sticks less and spread the veggies out so they are in a single layer.  I put them in the oven for 15 min, use a spatula to turn and rotate a bit, then put 'em in for another 15.  Each oven is different but basically they're done when you can pierce the veggies with a fork. While the veggies were roasting I pan fried the Italian eggplant flavor of my field roast sausages and served the whole deal with brown rice. 

The Italian eggplant flavor sausage was good but I liked the smoked apple sage better and the roasted veggies were the star for sure but unfortunately the Lipton's packets are made with MSG so I'm trying to find an MSG-free version of that as well. As we all know MSG is Ew!

Breakfast this morning was an almond butter and fig jam sandwich and for lunch I'm going to have a hummus sandwich with sliced cucumber and mixed greens.

Vegan on the run

One thing I have noticed about successfully eating vegan is that there is a bit of planning involved.  I need to have things packed in glassware in the fridge so I can see what I have available and get to it easily.  For lunch yesterday I had a delightful wrap consisting of a whole wheat tortilla, Trader Joes cuban black beans, sprouted lentils and heaps of homemade guacamole that took 2 minutes to make. It also took about 2 minutes to eat...Delicious!

Having all the ingredients for great meals makes it easy to take food to go as well.  If I'm really going to commit to a veganish lifestyle there are many times I need to take food with me.  Last night I had a babysitting job so I threw a salad together to go.  It took 5 minutes to put some mixed greens, garbanzo beans, beets, sprouts, and green peas with a little container of balsamic dressing in a container and rush out the door.  I also threw a can of Amy's organic lentil soup in my purse just in case the salad wasn't enough, but the salad was enough if you were wondering.  The best part about taking vegan meals with me to school or clinical or work is that they can sit out for hours and because they don't have any animal products in them they wont spoil.

This morning I munched on Quaker oat squares mixed with walnuts while I did homework.  The fat in the walnuts enhances the sweetness of the cereal which is delightful.  I often have a bag of oat squares and walnuts in my backpack to get me through long days at clinical or school.

Because its Sunday I spent a bit more time on lunch than I usually allow myself.  I decided to do a vegan version of the British favorite Bangers and Mash.  I made roasted garlic by cutting the top off a bulb of garlic, drizzling it with olive oil and wrapping it in foil then putting it in the oven for 30 minutes at 400 degrees. While the garlic was cooking I steamed some cauliflower and purple cabbage and pan fried field roast sausage which I purchased at Costco.  Hell yes people, Costco has field roast!  I was surprised and delighted to see the lone vegan option perched on a shelf with its nose high in the air among the aisles of bulk meat but anything that makes eating vegan cheap and easy is entirely welcome.  When I got to the line which, as always, was a freaken mess the guy in front of me insisted that I go first.  Maybe it was the fact that I only had 2 items or maybe it was the 12-pack of field roast sausage staring him down making him rethink the majority of items in his cart.  Either way it comes in a variety pack. Today I used the smoked apple sage.

While everything was cooking I could not believe the amazing smells that were filling the house.  The roasted garlic with the field roast sausage was in-cre-di-ble.  I remember mentioning to my aunt-in-law the other day over tea that one of the most noticeable changes that happens when eating vegan is that my sense of smell and taste are like a damn bloodhound. By not over-saturating my palate with salt and fat I can smell and taste my food like never before.  I wonder if all vegans have this experience.

Once the garlic was done I squeezed each clove on to the steamed veggies and added olive oil. I used a hand blender to mash it all together but a food processor would probably work, just let everything cool a bit first.  After mashing I added salt and pepper and the mash had this light and fluffy texture that I knew wouldn't weigh me down.  Now I'll be perfectly honest, the star of the dish was the field roast sausage but the mash was the perfect accompaniment.  The purple cabbage added some color to the mash which was fun to look at too. The finished product.

The best part is I have lots of mash left over to use for a vegan meal on the run.

Vegan options

Yesterday was my last day of clinical.  I started my day with instant oatmeal spiked with craisins and chia seeds.  Before running out the door at noon I made a quick salad composed of mixed greens, sprouted lentils, garbanzo beans, and avocado smothered in honey dijon dressing.  Again, I realize honey is not vegan but I value the antibiotic properties honey offers.  Also, it tastes great.  I've noticed that having all the ingredients for a great salad neatly packaged in Tupperware in the fridge makes it so easy and fast to eat healthy. 

After enjoying my last hours of clinical a few of my classmates and I decided to go for a drink and some bar food. Great, three days in and I'm already off the wagon I thought.  Nope! We went to a place called the Honeyhole on capital Hill known for their slutty meat sandwiches.  To my surprise and delight they had a veggie BLT with the option of veganaise to make the sandwich vegan.  That's right people vegan mayonnaise exists and its freaken awesome.  I was not happy about the fact that my vegan BLT was mildly more expensive than the real bacon option but that extra 50 cents now will save me lots of money not spent on diabetes medications in the future.  The best part is that the sandwich was delicious.  I only ate half of my sandwich because when your food is not full of saturated animal fats you don't feel the urge to keep cramming food into your mouth when you know you are full just to reward the pleasure centers in your brain. 

Eating vegan is quite a different experience.  There have been so many times when I was eating meat and knew I was full but would finish my meal thinking "well I don't want to waste it," which was an excuse for "this is so good I have to keep eating it until its gone."  That almost never happens to me when I am eating vegan.  There is communication between my brain and my stomach.  My stomach says "we're all good here, stop putting food in my mouth" and my brain cooperates.  Rather than my brain on meat/drugs pulling a power trip, " F U stomach this is happening, deal with it!"  Which we all know feels good at the time but about 20 minutes later we all wished we had just stopped when we knew we were full.  Moderation people! Its a lot easier when you eat food that doesn't cause your eyes to glaze over and put you in a trance-like state until you come to with an empty plate in front of you thinking "how did this happen?!"

Anyway, I love Seattle because most restaurants offer a veganish option.  Tonight I'm going to a friend's birthday at Naked City Brewery where they serve a beet burger so good it'll make you cry. Damn being veganish tastes good!

Don't Hate!

I realize that a lot of vegan people hate the term "veganish," posing that veganish is just another term for omnivore so I'd like to take a moment to clarify what I mean by the term veganish.  Traditionally people chose a vegan lifestyle based on their beliefs about animal cruelty.  More recently the population is becoming aware of their health as an increasing number of people are being diagnosed with diseases such as diabetes and heart disease at younger ages than ever before.  There is a push to limit intake of saturated fat(fat generally found in animal products) and increase intake of fresh foods and whole grains.  A vegan diet meets these requirements.  However, when approaching veganism from a health stand point the tiny details like having a bit of honey(not vegan) in my green tea are not an area of concern for me, hence veganish.  I definitely don't smother ranch all over my salads and call it vegan but I do have vitamin B12 in my protein powder etc.  I think everyone has the right to decide what they put in their mouth *Wink* so if having one vegan meal a week meets your health goal then that's great.  There is no rule that says tomorrow you have to start eating 100% vegan.

Before hopping on the veganish bus I used to make fun of a vegetarian friend of mine.  I truly felt that if god did not want us to eat meat then why does it taste so good.  Even the thought of being vegetarian or vegan made me cringe.  I would just think of all the things I could not eat.  That all changed when I got that high blood sugar reading and decided that I would rather do what it takes to prevent myself from getting diabetes than deal with the hassle of poking my finger every day and having side effects of medications because I have "literally" seen what its like to have diabetes and to that I say no thank you.

I now look at being veganish as what I CAN eat rather than what I can't eat.  It's not about depriving yourself of the joy of food but changing the way you see food altogether.  I will admit, there are times when I am feeding my body for nourishment and there are times when I am eating for pleasure but I generally achieve a balance between the two. Hence today's menu:

Breakfast Smoothie- handful frozen baby kale, 1/2 banana, 3 frozen strawberries, scoop of protein powder, and vanilla almond milk unsweetened(the banana makes it sweet and covers the taste of the kale).

Lunch and Dinner will be the salad bar at Virginia Mason where I do my clinicals.