i love sandwiches

Or sammiches, as I prefer to call them.  Before we enter into that discussion, however, you must first see our farmers market haul from the first offical market of the season.

green peppers, pattypan squash, spring onions, white cucumbers, red potatoes, green beans (blue lake?), beets, summer squash, and a ginormous cabbage

All for around $20.  Not bad.  There were fewer stalls than usual and no greens (so frustrating!), but...  what can you do?  Michael and I still had a fun time going around and talking to the growers.  We also brought my buddy Becca with us, and it was her first time ever, officially popping her Huntington Farmers Market cherry.  Hooray!  Michael also managed to get interviewed for the evening news (his closing line was 'Eat your veggies!'), but we don't have cable or local channels, so we didn't get to see it.  That boy just attracts cameras wherever he goes.  Sheesh.  No, I'm not jealous it wasn't me they interviewed.  Really.  I swear.  Ok, maybe a little bit.  

Anyway, on to the the real meat (so to speak) of this post.  (soy protein?  wheat meat?...we need a new saying here.)  I was scanning through pictures that haven't yet made it onto the blogeroonie, and I noticed that I have an inordinate amount of pictures of sammiches.  I guess, in a regular post, they sort of get overlooked in a 'oh, they're not really a meal that's creative or fun and no one cares about my sammich obsession' kind of way.  I mean, I think that, until I look and see a bunch of neglected sammich pictures building up and begging to be shown.  Poor sammiches.  It's your turn.

monster dinner sammie

I guess I could have color-corrected that one a bit more.  Oh well.  Anyway, this is something Michael and I do from time to time, and I'm sure I've talked about it before.  At least once.  But there are evenings when we look at eachother and ask, 'What do you want for dinner?' and one of us (ok, usually him) suggests, innocently, 'Giant sammich?'.  I say innocently because, this is one mothereffer to make.  Really.  It always, always involves a trip to the grocery store, which is why I generally veto the giant sammich, even though I love it.  You see, I never buy chickn strips anymore, so there's that.  And, yeah, it has to have them.  And it's rare that we also have: roasted red peppers, artichokes, black olives, avocado, basil, tomatoes, lettuce, squash, zucchini (those last two are optional, but phenomenal), some type of Italian dressing, and a huge loaf of ciabatta bread all at once.  But seriously...once all those things go on there together...  you're in heaven.  You see, you assemble the sammich and then wrap the whole thing tightly in plastic wrap and set a heavy book on top and leave it for like a half hour so that all the flavors combine and get extra awesome.  And then you eat it.  Like, all of it.  We never have leftover giant sammich.  So anyway, that's one sammich obsession.

rad lunch sammich

Next up is the lunch sammich.  Lunch sammiches are, generally, lighter.  The bread isn't quite as serious.  There's probably some fake lunch meat on there.  What makes this one particularly awesome is the lunch meat that Michael's mom got from Indiana that's like cranberry and tofurkey or something...I can't remember, but it's Thanksgiving themed.  Oh, and this was right after I learned that I love raw squash and zucchini (they are sauteed on the giant sammich, by the way), so this one has thin slices of both of those.  Ok, honestly?  The real reason I eat sammiches most of the time is to have a vehicle for mustard.  I had some fancypants mustard that I put on this one.  And you probably know about my mustard obsession.  Sometimes, I put 2 different types of mustard on one sammich.  Just to see what will happen.  Also, for those of you who love avocado, but don't know how to eat it on a sammich without it slipping out all over the place, do this:  mush it up on the top piece of bread.  Use a fork.  That way, it's more like a spread.  

the emergency sammich

Chances are, you have the makings of a sammich in your fridge in case of emergency.  If not, the components of a sammich are not that expensive.  This particular sammich came about the other night when our city had a water main break and there was no water for like 5 hours.  I know you don't REALLY need water to make a decent meal, but...  well...  you sort of do.  But you know what you don't need water to make?  That's right.  A sammich.  We happened to have some leftover lunch meatses and fake cheese (from the seitan parmesan night) and bread and lettuce and avocado, so when I learned the water was out, I just walked to the corner market, purchased 2 tomatoes, 2 gallons of drinking water, and a case of beer, and I was set for the night!  These we fried old school style in the cast iron skillet (just the cheeze and meats inside, then added the toppings after the bread was nice and black).  Once we ran out of lunch meat, I made a cheeze and tomato sammich and Michael had a PB&J (another classic, of course).  We did have this with a huge salad, in order to get some nutrition out of the meal.  I also, for the record, like how this sammich looks like a face with blueberry eye-stalks.  

the smooshed sammich

I really like paninis.  I like paninis so much that I will put just about any type of sammich in the Foreman grill and squash the hell out of it.  There is just something about a seriously compact sammich that was once huge and hard to put in your mouth.  Especially if the bread is big, like this bread was.  Plus, they're crispy and pretty and warm and lovely.  I remember this sammich in particular because we made them for a late afternoon lunch in between episodes of Jekyll (awesome show for the first few episodes, then it gets stupid and sucks).  Sammiches are good to eat while you watch tv or movies because you don't have to look at them to make sure you're getting all the good bits in your mouth at once.  That's the beauty of the sammich.  All the good bits are there, all the time.  I mean, if you make it right.  

In conclusion, you do not need to work at Subway to be a sandwich artist.  It's better to be a sammich artist in your own home with better ingredients and you don't have to wear gloves and your kitchen probably doesn't smell like pizza subs as soon as you walk in.  

The end.

totally rad and surprisingly easy dinner

And sort of healthy.  

seitan parmesan

Ok, super easy components:

1. Basic seitan recipe from Vegan with a Vengeance with the following modifications: Instead of 1/2 cup soy sauce, use 1/2 cup of water; add a tsp of onion powder and a crapload of poultry seasoning and one golden seasoning packet; steam 40 minutes (made into cutlets and wrapped in foil) instead of simmer.

2. Bread those using breadcrumbs and rosemary mixed together (some old bread + rosemary whirred around in the food processor).  For the wet part, we did soymilk with about a Tbsp of ground flax mixed in.

3. Spray a baking sheet, put them on, bake at 350F for about 25 minutes.  Then your seitan is all done.

4. Make teeny skinny strips of zucchini and summer squash and boil them for like 2 minutes, then drain.  That's your pasta. 

5. Pile up veggie-noodles, add your favorite pasta sauce, top with seitan and some fake cheese.  We made the buffalo mosterella cheese from the Ultimate Uncheese Cookbook (which was also totally easy and delicious and cheap).

Also, we reconstituted some dried morel mushrooms and cooked them up in some Earth Balance.  They were rad on the side.  Anyway, it's a healthier alternative what with baking the seitan and using veggies as the noodles.  Not too heavy for your tired and hot summer belly.  And fun to make!  And easy!  You are doing yourself a serious disservice if you don't try this.  I mean it.

eat good food all year long

Time for more summertime awesomeness easy peasy lazy hot and sweaty meals!  First up is a radioactive picture of some lovely zucchini provencal that I made with my friend Becca.  We also baked some tofu with bbq sauce and she sauteed red cabbage in raspberry vinegar with apples (amazing).

lovely layers

This was kind of like a lasagna without noodles.  And it ruled.  You can find the initial recipe here, but we used 3 zucchini, 3 tomatoes, and added tons of minced garlic to each layer.  Even better that way.  Anyway, it's something to do with the mountains of zucchini that I'm sure you'll have this summer.  It's always good to have a nice zucchini recipe.

who needs color when you can have tots and corn and breaded things?

Ha.  Seriously though, these were the tofu fish sticks from Vegan Dad's blog, and they were fabulous.  A bit messy to prepare, but worth it.  Nice and crunchy with a soft interior.  I had no idea you could get things this crunchy by just baking them.  We made the tartar sauce as well, but I hated it because I am, as you might remember, currently hating vegan mayo.  Blegh.  Anywho, we channelled our inner children and had them with tots and corn on the cob.  That's how we roll.

we eat healthy crap too, ok?

This kick-ass salad was assembled by me.  I made this salad specifically to go with this wonderful lime thyme dressing from VegWeb.  You know, I always used to think my mom was nuts for putting strawberries in salads.  Not so, friends.  Paired with a nicely salty salad dressings, strawberries in salads are the bomb.  Anyway, after I made the dressing, I marinated some tempeh in about 1/4 of it, and then pan fried it to get it nice and browned.  Genius, let me tell you.

how could anything this green be bad?

Everyone:  make this dressing.  I didn't think it tasted overly thyme-y, but maybe I didn't add enough.  At any rate, I only added 2 Tbsp of the sugar, which was way too much for me, so I reccommend only adding 1 Tbsp and working up from there.  I also added way more salt and lime and a little red wine vinegar to make it more tart.  We ate the leftovers of this dressing for days on salads.  Fabulous.

smoked tofu is awesome.

Ok, I'd never had smoked tofu.  We were in Indiana this past weekend to see Michael's family, and I saw this in a health food store and just had to get it.  Amazing.  It's...creamy.  Like cheese.  It tastes more like cheese than any vegan cheese I've ever had.  Weird, but very cool.  It's rich though...I probably didn't need to eat all that, but what the hell.  Served up cold (straight out of the package) with some roasted asparagus and curried couscous (recipe from the idiot cookbook).  I cut my tofu up into little bits and mixed it with the couscous and it ruled.  I so wish we could get this stuff around here...but it's like 5 bucks a package, so it's definitely a luxury item for us.

i made muffins!

Another VegWeb recipe.  I kind of forgot that I had a bajillion recipes saved on there and revisited them this past week a bunch, obviously.  These gems are orange poppyseed muffins.  And they were glorious.  Though not really orange-y.  I even added the zest of a big orange along with the orange juice (fresh squeezed).  Next time, I will add twice that much zest.  Also, here's a perk: the only fat they have in them is from the flax seeds.  They're not even gross or dense because of it.  Fluffy.  Moist.  Almost cupcake-like.  Oh, another bonus: they are super cute on top!  I don't know how that happened, but I definitely am a fan. 

israeli couscous is not for everyone

By 'everyone', I definitely do not include myself.  Because I loved it.  Michael, not so much.  But that's ok.  I ate the crap out of this.  For it, I roasted 2 tomatoes that I diced beforehand with some sliced green olives, then added that to the prepared couscous.  We found this for $1.50 a bag at Big Lots, which makes me happy.  It was a nice lunch, anyway.  For me.

everything in the kitchen pasta, plus portobellos

This weekend at Michael's parents' house, we cooked dinner the first night.  Basically, anything I found in the kitchen, I put in the pasta.  That includes asparagus, green olives, spinach, onions, scallions, roasted red peppers, and artichokes.  It was very vegetable-y and yummy.  Michael grilled the mushrooms, and even though I claim to hate portobellos, these were delicious.  I was also kind of drunk though, so I might blame that.

summertime classic

Because of my embargo on vegan mayo, I have to be creative when it comes to pasta salad now.  As some of you might remember, I am enthusiastically obsessed with the flavor combination of mint and dill.  This pasta salad was the perfect vehicle for it.  Those two herbs, plus peas, scallions, and red cabbage, then a generous dousing of olive oil and red wine vinegar.  It was heavenly.

the best dips are the accidental ones

Right?  Well, maybe.  Anyway, I was starving and wanted hummus, but didn't have any chickpeas.  Or lemons.  Thus, curried white bean dip was born.  I made it in about 2 minutes and it was absolutely addictive.  I even have a recipe.

Curried Bean Dip

1 15 oz can butter beans, drained (or other white bean.  or any bean, really.)

2 large cloves of garlic

1/4-1/2 15 oz can coconut milk

1 Tbsp chili garlic sauce

1 Tbsp red curry powder

2 tsp onion powder

2 tsp cumin

2 tsp dried dill

1 tsp coriander

1/4 tsp salt

Throw the beans and garlic in a food processor and process until smooth(ish).  Add spices (except salt) and 1/4 can of coconut milk, and continue to process, adding more coconut milk until it gets to the consistency you like.  Add the salt, to taste.  It's spicy, so if you're a wimp, leave out the chili garlic sauce or use yellow curry powder.  Wuss.

recently, we've been stealing herbs

Yeah, we found this apartment building down the block that has rosemary, mint, oregano, and lemon verbena growing in the yard.  No one's ever around.  What?  Anyway, it's fun to add fresh, free herbs to food.  For example, here we added mint and dried dill to those beans.  And roasted the potatoes with rosemary.

the basil is ours

Yeah, too bad there's nowhere with free basil, huh?  Oh well, we have some growing in our kitchen (and two other plants maturing on the porch).  Basil and tomatoes are a classic summertime combination, but add some avocado to that mix and...  Oh my.  It's pretty, too.

Hope you're all still enjoying your summer!  Except for those of you who are now having winter.  Disregard.  Remember, even though it's a million degrees out and you're hot and sweaty and tired, that's no excuse to not eat decent food.  Though, admittedly, I do use that excuse from time to time.  Nobody's perfect.

contest winner!

I'm out of town, so a short winner post is in order for my contest ending yesterday. Anna wins! Anna, please contact me so (my email is linked in my profile) with your address so that I can contact the people from Food, Inc., and get you your books! Congratulations!

my first vegan potluck!

And only 4 out of the whole group were actual vegans!  Cool friends I have, eh?  It wasn't even my idea.  Here's documentation of everyone's adventures in vegan cooking.  Don't mind my yellowed photos.  I tried to color correct, but they were unbelievably yellow, even after I adjusted my white balance.  No clue why.

bean salad by susie

Susie couldn't even stay to eat anything, and she still brought something!  Lovely bean salad with lots of crunchy red onions and mango, if I recall correctly.

black bean potstickers with pineapple salsa

Made by the fabulous Ruth and Ben.  Ruth has experience in vegetarian cooking, and it shows.  She totally rocks out some awesome food now and then.  These were no exception!  Spicy and salty and with just the right amount of sweet.  I could have scarfed these all night.

mini sausages and sundried tomato-basil pesto sauce

Michael and I made this stuff.  As usual, I adapted Vegan Dad's sausage recipe (this time only adding 1 tsp of fennel seeds, and adding a tsp of dried basil).  Did you know you can get 32 mini sausages out of that?  Now you do.  The pesto sauce was rehydrated sundried tomatoes, fresh basil, garlic, lemon juice, red wine vinegar, olive oil, and salt.  They paired nicely, I thought.  Everyone seemed to like 'em.  You can't go wrong with sausages.

felafel by shannon

Who doesn't like felafel?  I love it, that's for sure.

couscous, also by shannon

Nice and salty, with a kick of curry.  I cannot get enough couscous in my life, which is good, because there were two kinds!

couscous by allison, bruschetta by lauren

Allison's couscous had a more Mexican edge, and was equally wonderful.  Lauren's bruschetta was bangin', fresh, and tasty!

sweet/regular mashed potatoes, red beans n rice

By Kristy!  Those potatoes were so good.  And the beans and rice.  I was so spoiled, you guys!

roasted asparagus, red beans and rice again

I think Kristy might have made this asparagus as well.  It was tender and delicious.

banana bread!

Also by Kristy.  This was seriously the best banana bread I have ever eaten in my life.  I'm sad because I only had room in my tummy for a little bite of it, and forgot to steal a piece to eat later.  Another vegan couple (they exist here!) came later and brought a super creamy and fabulous mac n cheeze, but I didn't get a picture of it.  Take my word that it was beautiful and yummy though.

Aren't my friends the best?  There was very little complaining about the lack of meat ;)

Don't forget you still have until midnight (EST) on Thursday to enter my contest to win some rad books!

Food, Inc. Book Giveaway Contest!

As vegans (or people who are close to vegans or are just interested in veganism), I imagine that most of you are interested in food, where your food comes from, and the impact of the food industry on health and the environment. Because food has now become an 'industry'. Well, for those of you that are interested in all of these matters, there is a new movie opening Friday, June 12 in select cities (and expanding throughout June and July) that will most likely tickle your pickle: Food, Inc.

'go see this movie!  moo!'

Not only will you, most likely more informed and lovely people who read my blog, find this movie intriguing, but I hope that it opens the eyes of others to the travesty that has become what most people in our nation have come to think of as 'food'.  

In light of all this awesomeness, the movie's PR lady, Janeal, asked if my readers would like a chance to win the companion book for Food, Inc. and Fast Food Nation, by Eric Schlosser.  I responded with a resounding 'heck yes!' or something of that nature.  I know that you all like to be informed and smart, and these books will get you one step closer to ultimate awesomeness.  Therefore, if you'd like to enter this contest, you must do one of 3 things:

1. Twitter - 

2. Post on Facebook - 

or

3. Blog - 

--- about Food, Inc. with a link to their webpage, so as to get the word out to those who may not yet know about it.  Then come back here with the link to what you posted, and leave it in the comments section.  Normally, I wouldn't require anything so strenuous (ha) of you, but I really, really want people to know about this movie.  So go spread the word!

If your blogger profile does not link to your email, make sure also that you leave your email address in the comment.  If you do not have a valid email address that I can access, I'll have to disqualify you.  (Sorry!  But last time I had a contest, the winner never left their email and I ended up having to choose someone new, anyway.)  Contest ends next Thursday, June 18th, and I will use a random number generator to pick one winner.  Get going and report back, go go go!   

simple dimples and famers market and other things

I really do mean to post more often...  but things have been a bit crazy around here.  Michael found a new job (yay!) and I put in my two weeks notice at mine (also yay!).  Still, it's been stressful, and though I think about blogging every day, I only seem to have the time on weekend mornings.  So...  you're getting the best I can do for right now, friends.  Explanations aside, lets discuss some more interesting things.

We went to the farmers market this morning for the first time this year!

the basics

And there was only one seller and we bought mostly everything they had!  Well, one basket of everything, anyway.  And it wasn't as cheap as usual...  but the real deal farmers market starts officially June 27, so you bet your bottom dollar we'll be there for that.  I was a little disappointed that there were no greens...  But I can make do.  I'm always a fan of little red new potatoes.  And those tomatoes don't look completely ripe, but I'll make it work.  I'm most excited about the beans and zucchini though...  Mmm.  Spent $9.25.  We've been discount shopping like crazy lately because of our tentative job situations, and cheap produce is perfect right now.  

Have you been wondering about our garden?  Well, it's been a tad stunted because the light on the porch has been dwindling since the trees outside got more leafy, but...  progress!  Look!

teeny tiny pea pod

Our babies are growing!  So far, this is the only sign of actual items producing veggies, but it means there is hope.  And hope is damned fine for me, thanks.

What with it getting warmer (though it's been raining here all week, go figure), I've been craving raw veggies like nobody's business.  Thankfully, I remembered this, and have been making my own rendition.

i may never cook kale again.

I didn't even watch the video again before making the salad, I just remembered seeing it once and decided to wing it.  Basically, you just wash and tear your kale into bite sized pieces and massage olive oil and salt and lemon juice into it until it looks nice and wilty.  Then add in an avocado and mush it around so it coats the leaves (I do whole bunches of kale at once, so that's one whole lemon's worth of juice and an entire avocado...I do skimp on the olive oil though).  Then just add cracked pepper and whatever other veggies you like.  I put radishes and strips of summer squash in this version...and I've learned that I also love raw squash.  And zucchini.  

I liked it so much that I ate the leftovers for breakfast the next day.  Then went home and used the other bunch of kale I had to make another raw kale salad.  I am a woman obsessed. 

ok, not fully raw, but we do what we can here.

To this one I added thinly sliced zucchini (you really must try raw zucchini if you haven't...it's amazing.  So much better than cucumbers.) and scallions and radishes and also a few splashes of red wine vinegar.  Michael made some seitan and we topped our salads with it, and it was freaking amazing.  I ate the leftovers for lunch, then went out that evening and got more kale and lemons and avocados, and plan to make more salad today.  It's been like 3 days.  I miss it.  Yeah, it's got a lot of fat in it, but it's healthy fat, so suck it up and go make this.  Because it's awesome.

More on budget meals that are also quick and/or relatively easy:  Thai tempeh with veggies and rice noodles.

this was amazing.  i impress myself sometimes.

We've had a lot of tempeh floating about since Michael's mom brought us 3 packages of it, and we had 2 already in the fridge.  And we're out of tofu, and seitan sometimes takes longer than my poor hungry (aka grouchy) belly can handle.  Anyway, I got all this coconut milk at Aldi for like 90 cents a can, and a bunch of zucchini and frozen broccoli...  We had all the other stuff on hand: scallions, frozen peas, carrots, tempeh, rice noodles, ginger, limes, soy sauce, etc.  I steamed the tempeh and while that was going on, made a marinade of coconut milk, ginger, lime zest and juice, a little cumin and coriander, soy sauce, and red pepper flakes.  Drain tempeh, marinate for about a half hour, scoop out with slotted spoon and pan fry...  While that was going on, I sauteed the veggies and cooked the rice noodles.  Add tempeh to veggies, add marinade on top of that to act as the sauce, heat through, and bam!  Dinner's ready.  That might seem like a lot of steps, but if you're good at multi-tasking, it's not so bad.  

Ok, so I just noticed that the next 4 pictures are really strange looking...because there was a lot of yellow in the meals and I took them in sort of bad lighting, so pardon.  I always forget about the white balance button on my camera because I'm hungry when I'm photographing the food.  And I color corrected the best I could without making them look like food from Mars.  I will try harder, haha...

Anyway, here's some more tempeh and discount meal stuff:

maple dijon tempeh is the best thing on this planet...and it wasn't my idea.

So, at the market down the block they have discount veggies sometimes, which I love, obviously.  This time I got a pack of leeks, some sweet potatoes, and some roma tomatoes.  They all went into this carb-filled meal.  The tempeh was simmered in some broth, and then Michael pan fried it and made this amazing sauce out of maple syrup, dijon mustard, hot sauce, and water.  It was so creamy and fabulous and decadent...I can't even think about it.  It makes my mouth water.  We also roasted the sweet potatoes with some red potatoes we already had and a bunch of whole garlic cloves (amazing!), and I made a risotto with the leeks and tomatoes.  This was all relatively easy, except for my stirring for half an hour.  It was kind of a chilly evening, so the oven being on wasn't a big deal.  Anyway, it was all delicious!

Next is a weird bean and millet salad we concocted one night when it was really hot and we were being lazy.

creamy beany

It's just two cans of beans, some millet, avocado, celery, and Nayonaise.  I actually kind of had an aversion to this because I've somehow become like, incredibly over sensitive to the taste of soy mayonaise and I officially hate it.  I mean, I never really liked it, but I could tolerate it in salads and sauces.  Now, it's on my black list, which sucks because I used it a lot in those things.  Maybe I need a new brand.  But I digress...  This salad was good though, in theory.  I added a bunch of nutritional yeast and lemon juice to my portion, which made it way better.

Oh, this one's old, but was really yummy:

vwav alfreda

I got some orriechette, which is my absolute favorite pasta shape and wanted to use it in some kind of creamy sauce with broccoli.  Never having tried the alfreda from Vegan with a Vengeance, I decided to give it a go.  And...wow.  This sauce is seriously the best creamy sauce ever.  It calls for a lot of nutritional yeast, but somehow doesn't taste noochy.  We added some sausage style tempeh (basically the tempeh sausage crumbles from the same book, but I didn't look at the recipe and just winged it).  Fabulous.  I don't often call things fabulous, unless they really truly are.  And this is.  Ok, so I called the maple dijon tempeh fabulous as well, but it was.

With quick and easy meals, sometimes it's not worth taking a picture.  Like the beans and rice we had last night.  Or the pesto we put on pasta a week or so ago.  But sometimes the leftovers from those meals become something totally photo-worthy.

if i could only get a decent photo when the time comes!

The leftover pesto went onto a pizza crust...  toppings were onions, garlic, cherry tomatoes, summer squash, zucchini, black olives and vegan parmesan (all of which we just had one hand!).  I don't often like a pizza without a tomato sauce, but this one was perfect.  And easy.  And quick.

Lastly for today, I leave with with deliciousness and a good photo.

spinach artichoke dip!

Yes, that does deserve an exclamation point.  I used to luuuurve spinach artichoke dip.  I made a vegan version once before and it was horrible.  It called for all this soy sour cream and cream cheese...and it tasted just like those.  Of which I am not a fan, by themselves.  This recipe came from the idiot cookbook.  And it was...I'm running out of synonyms for delicious again.  But it was all of those synonyms put together into one giant flavor explosion of happiness.  We liked it, in other words.  Plus, it was easy peasy and didn't call for any specialty ingredients except for nutritional yeast, which is only specialty for some people (like me, who have to drive a bit to get it).  Michael and I devoured this with crostinis (discount bread, hell yes) and the Greek salad that I blogged about last time.  I'm loving this idiot cookbook, by the way.  At first, the recipes seemed too simple to bother making, but it turns out that simple is good when you're in a hurry (duh) or it's hot out (duh) or the flavor combinations just plain old work (double duh).  

So simplify your life.  And enjoy your weekend!