West Virginia Strawberry Festival

Last weekend I went home to see my mom and celebrate the amazingness that are strawberries.  We mainly avoided the festival itself, though the craft fair and quilt show were pretty darned awesome.  I got some West Virginia made foodstuffs like hot mustard relish and hot pepper sauce and tomato basil garlic pasta and garlic fettucine.  Hell to the yeah.  Anywho, the real and true main event was the strawberry feast that we created once we got home from town.  

Mom and I spent most of the afternoon picking, prepping and cooking.  The first thing we churned out was this wonderful strawberry avocado salsa:

wouldn't you like a bite?

This was basically salsa with the tomatoes replaced by strawberries.  It was so easy!  Strawberries, avocado, red onion, garlic, cilantro, and lime juice and zest.  The avocado added a nice creaminess to the whole deal and it was a lovely combination of tart and sweet.  There's nothing like a fun variation on salsa.  Plus, it's tricky because the strawberries look just like tomatoes.  Go make it and trick someone.  They'll love you for it.

Meanwhile, a pizza crust needed to be made up for this pizza my mom found a recipe for...  strawberry goat cheese pizza.  Obviously, goat cheese is not an option for me, so I made the cashew goat cheese from this past issue of Vegetarian Times.  Normally, I'm not a huge fan of that magazine, but I picked it up specifically for the vegan cheese section.  The cheese itself turned out pretty tasty.  I'd say it was really awesome, if not for the fact that it was a greasy mess.  It's dangerous to have in your fridge, guys.  It's yummy (though not really spectacular), but for a one ounce serving...  well, you probably don't even want to know how fatty it is.  However, it's a nice treat and yummy and just fine in moderation.  Anyway!  Rant and review aside, look how freaking awesome my pizza crust turned out.

just call me papa jessica

I found this crust recipe in Mom's Moosewood New Classics cookbook.  It was really simple and had a nice flavor and good texture.  Now, time for toppings!

strawberry strawberry strawberry

The pizza was topped with dollops of the cashew cheese, sliced strawberries, spinach from Mom's garden, and pistachios.  It was a good pizza, in theory, but Mom and I both thought something was missing.  The original recipe called for arugula instead of spinach, which would probably add a much needed peppery aspect.  Then, I rinsed the pistachios because the cheese I made was so salty, but that made them a little soggy instead of crunchy.  Still, I enjoyed it, and when I had a slice for lunch the next day, I added more of the cashew cheese and it was truly delicious.  Sometimes you just can't skimp on the awesomeness factor, even if it isn't that good for you.

prettiest pizza contest winner

We ate the pizza with some fresh picked asparagus from the yard, which we tragically overcooked until it was a complete mushy mess, but still the best tasting asparagus I've had all season.  Oh, and daquiris.  Strawberry, of course.  And a salad all made from stuff from their garden.  

spring garden bounty

Mom's radishes, green onions, and lettuce are all ready and roaring so far.  Which is more than I can say for our own garden!  If only there was direct sunlight on the porch.  Sigh.  Anyway, I enjoyed our lovely little salad of home grown veggies and greens.

For dessert, Mom whipped up these lovely little poppyseed shortcakes.

scones in disguise

They really were very scone-like.  Not that I'm complaining.  I love scones.  Aren't they pretty though?  Naturally, we piled them high with loads of sliced strawberries so I got to have strawberry shortcake after all (since I couldn't get any downtown this year at any of the sales).

...i didn't eat the ice cream.

Have you guys ever had Rice Dream Organic ice cream?  It sucks.  But the shortcakes were lovely with the strawberries and the perfect end to our meal and day!

In the morning, we took a break from strawberries and made blueberry pancakes.

a quiet respite

Blueberry cornmeal pancakes from Veganomicon, to be exact.  Because honestly, I think we were both strawberried out.

Making Tofu! and ruebens.

I'm tired of putting 'Vegan Mofo Day whatever' up there.  It's not my style.  Anyway, can you believe I've blogged for over 11 days straight?  This is a total anomaly.  But I've been enjoying it, so yay!  Before I tell you about our tofu making adventures, you must bear witness to my very first ever rueben experience.  I have to tell you, the idea of ruebens has never appealed to me.  I don't like sauerkraut, I don't like thousand island dressing, I thought I didn't like rye bread, and I obviously wasn't a fan or corned beef.  But I've seen lots of vegan bloggers talking before about how amazing the vegan rueben is...so I had to try it.  This one comes from the recipe from VWaV.  And what a lovely recipe it is.  This is a mishmash of pics because the finished product pictures last night were no good, but we had them again for lunch today and got some better shots.  Here's the assembly from last night though:

grilled marinated tempeh, pickled cabbage, pickles, avocado, and homemade thousand island all on rye

They were just incredible.  I never in a million years though I would enjoy any of those things together on a sandwich, but something about the combo is just...right.

michael's 'working man's lunch'

Today I added some spinach and a slice of Tofutti mozzarella to mine.

the spinach was awesome, but the cheeze...meh.  that stuff is only good on pizza, apparently

Anyway, in the midst of us eating lunch, we were also making TOFU.  Yes, that's right.  Our very own, homemade tofu.  It was so easy!  After you put the soybeans in the soymilk machine, it does all that work for you.  Here it is in a pot after it was all done brewing (brewing?).

foamy like a latte

But then we realized you're supposed to spoon the foam off, so I did.  At this point, just add the packet of coagulent (came with the machine), stir it in, cover, and let sit for about 12 minutes.  Then you spoon/pour it into the little press (also came with the machine), like so:

just like curds and whey...but SO MUCH BETTER!  up yours, little miss muffet!

Fold the cheesecloth over it, put on the lid, and pressssssss press press.  But be careful about leaving stuff on top of it to press because we had a bit of an incident involving falling spaghetti sauce cans and water being everywhere.

press out as much water as ya can.

Then after a little bit, it looks like this:

i can't believe that this is tofu.  and that we made it.  in our own home.  cool!

And it's delicious!  We added nothing to this batch, just to see what it was like, you know, and it's nutty and yummy and has the consistency of ricotta cheese (which is a little weird, but whatever).  Apparently to get really firm tofu, you're supposed to add 2 packets of coagulent.  Still, this is totally awesome and even the soymilk tasted good without any salt or sugar.  Coming from someone who HATES the taste of plain (and really any) kind of soymilk, this is big.  Plus, Michael ordered 13 pounds of beans for like $18.  13 pounds makes 58 cakes of this size.  That comes out to 32 cents per tofu cake!  And I've been paying $2 for one at the store.  Not that $2 is exorbitant or anything, but hopefully this will save us a load of money.  As long as we don't get lazy about it.  You can also make rice milk with this thing, just by rinsing rice 3 times and then pressing the button.  Voila!  Rice milk!  

So, all in all, this soymilk maker is fabulous, and the tofu we made is awesome, and ruebens are good.  Also, is there nothing better in this world than nutritional yeast (plus some garlic powder and some pepper) on popcorn?

the answer is, no.  there is not anything better than this.

If you're wondering why so much of this is underlined...I have no idea.  There isn't even an underline button on my toolbar.  Blogger sucks.