Simple, Yet Fancy Feeling Cabbage Rolls

I often do make fancy foods, big gourmet dishes that seem elaborate to those I serve them to. On the other hand, I mostly make food like this, Simple and Delicious foods I grew up with, IE Cabbage Rolls.

My Father, being the cook of the house (my mother could only really make 2 things- beef stew and thai food) would cook foods that he liked primarily, because he was the cook. (Inalienable logic there) Due to this, we would often eat things that he'd grown up with, and one of those things were cabbage rolls. These cabbage rolls are different, as his had just rice, peas, and hamburger in them, and mine do not have hamburger, and have more vegetables, but the idea is the same, and they tasted pretty good!

Sorta Fancy Cabbage Rolls 
Ingredients:

About 10-12 large cabbage leaves, the tough parts of the spines removed.
3 Cups Brown Rice
1 Jar vegan pasta sauce (I used Garlic Mushroom)
1 cup Peas
1 yellow pepper, diced into small chunks
2 artichoke hearts, cut into small pieces
1 small onion, diced.
1 tbsp olive oil
Salt and Pepper

Directions:
Preheat the oven to 375.
Bring a pot of water to boil. Plunge the cabbage, a few leaves at a time, and boil for a few minutes, until cooked.  Set aside to cool.
Heat the oil in the frying pan. Add in the onion, and cook until transluscent. Add in the pepper and cook for a few minutes. Add to a bowl with the artichoke hearts, and toss with some salt and pepper.
Add in the Peas, and 1/3 of the jar of pasta sauce. Mix with the Rice.
Lay out the leaves, and add a few spoonfuls of the rice mixture. Roll up into rolls, and lay into a casserole dish with a lid. Use a dish that about half of the rolls can fit onto one layer. When you have one layer down, cover with half of the remaining sauce. Repeat for the rest of the cabbage leaves. (If there's any mixture left over, just eat it, it's pretty good, haha)
Cover the second layer with the rest of the sauce.
Cover the casserole dish, and bake for 30-45 minutes, until sauce is bubbly and everything is getting nice and cooked.

Then Eat.

Scalloped Potato Casserole

Growing up I loved scalloped potatoes. Everytime my dad would make them, I would be in heaven! I actually had no concept of what was in them until recently, when I tried to make them, and had to ask around, thinking It was cheese, and things. But no, there is no cheese. And they're really easy to make... and I turned them into a casserole!

Scalloped Potato Casserole
Ingredients:
Sauce:
2 tbsp vegan margarine
1 tbsp cornstarch
1 tbsp rice flour
2 tbsp cold water
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper
1/2 tsp rosemary
1 1/4 cup non-dairy milk

Vegetables:
3 Largish potatoes, sliced thin
1 smallish onion, chopped
1/2 a yellow pepper, chopped
1 cup mushrooms, sliced
1 cup frozen peas

Directions:
Preheat the oven to 375.
In a pot, bring your margarine, milk, and spices to a boil.
In a small bowl, mix together the cornstarch, rice flour, and cold water. Slowly add to the mixture, whisking until thickened and smooth.
Line the bottom of a casserole dish (Mine wasn't very large, probably has about a 6 cup capacity) with a layer of sliced potatoes. Top with all the mushrooms, and 1/3 of the onions. Pour 1/4 of the sauce on top of it.
Add another layer of potatoes, and the yellow pepper, and 1/3 of the onions. Pour another 1/4 of the sauce.
Add a third layer of potatoes, the peas, and the rest of the onions, and then top with a final layer of potatoes. Pour the rest of the sauce on top of the casserole. Cover.
Bake for 30-45 minutes, until sauce is boiling and the potatoes are cooked through.
I added an optional crust, where you mix together some rice flour, salt, pepper, and margarine, and crumble on top, and then broil for about 5 minutes, until the crust is crispy. This is completely optional.

Creamy Cashew Pasta

I used to love fettucini alfredo. Love it. I think my prom date even made some for me before the prom, because I used to eat it like it was going out of style.

Since finding out that most of my health problems were caused by what I was eating, I could no longer indulge in the sweetness that is Fettucini Alfredo. This, however, does not mean that I can't have a similar, delicious foodstuff! BEHOLD!

Cashew Cream and White Wine Pasta
Ingredients:
1 Serving of pasta of your choice, cooked (I used rice vermicelli) 
5 stalks of asparagus, chopped into pieces, very ends discarded
a handful of sliced mushrooms
1 tsp olive oil

Sauce
1/2 cup raw cashews, soaked overnight
1/2 tbsp minced garlic
1 tbsp tamari
1 tsp lemon juice
2 tsp onion powder
1/3 cup nutritional yeast
1/2 cup white wine
Salt, Pepper, Basil
1/2-2 tsp cornstarch, depending on how thick you want it.
Water

Directions:
In a blender, blend together all of the sauce ingredients, adding a bit of water at a time, until it is smooth, thick, and creamy (the texture of heavy cream). Taste, and feel free to adjust the various ingredients to your liking.
Heat the olive oil in a saute pan or wok, and add the mushrooms, sauteing for a few minutes until browned. Add in the asperagus, and cook for about a minute, until they start to get bright and green.
Very quickly add in the sauce, mixing together with the veggies. Stir constantly (or it will stick to the pan and burn) until the sauce is bubbly and thickened.
Toss the sauce with the pasta, and serve, enjoying the tastesplosion of happiness!

Massaman Curry

Mini Natalia shopping at a market in Thailand

When I was very little, we spent a year living in other places around the world. The place we stayed the longest at (long enough for me to attend school, and then refuse to go back to school in a temper tantrum) was Songkla, Thailand. We lived in a little house attached to other little houses, and hung out with the neighborhood children, and met people who were very different from us.

I think that this time I spent in Asia really shaped my tastebuds, as I grew up not really enjoying traditional "american" style food like meatloaf, and hamburgers (mac and cheese being my big exception) and instead loving the Thai food my mother would make, like fried wontons (called golden bags in her little cookbook) and curries.

The curry type that my mother loved to make more than all the others was called Massaman Curry. I don't make it very often, because in order to get Massaman Curry paste I have to go to Chinatown, and search through the little shops, which, while fun, can be time consuming, and in the winter it's so cold I like to stay inside rather than going to Chinatown. However, last weekend Matthew and I decided to go to lunch and get some bubble tea, and we stopped into a grocery store to pick up some bok choy. I saw little cans of Massaman curry paste, and decided "Yes... I'm getting this."

And I made a curry. A delicious, nostalgic curry.

Tofu Massaman Curry
Ingredients
Sauce:
2 Tbsp Massaman Curry Paste
1 Cup coconut milk
1 Cup vegetable stock

Ingredients:
1/2 Block tofu, cubed
1 can straw mushrooms, drained and chopped
1 cup chopped peppers
1/2 diced sweet potato
1 medium sized onion, diced
1 tbsp peanut oil (or another mild oil)
Vermicelli noodles or rice to serve

Directions
Mix together all of the sauce ingredients until smooth. What I then did was add the cubed tofu, and let it sit in the fridge overnight, but this is optional, I just like the flavor to soak into the tofu.
Heat a wok on med-high, and add the oil and onion. Saute until the onions are softened, and add in the mushrooms, peppers, and sweet potato. Saute for about 5 minutes, until the vegetables begin to soften.
Pour in the sauce and tofu, and check consistency of liquid. If it's thick, add in a bit of water or stock, until it's sort of thick, but also soupy. Bring to a boil, and then reduce to low, and allow to simmer.
Continue simmering until the sauce reduces and thickens.I simmered mine for about half an hour, but it might take longer, or shorter. Keep an eye on it, stirring every few minutes.
Serve over noodles or rice, and enjoy the magic.

Why I love my Crock Pot

I had this old clunky crock pot, which I'd bought for 15$ my first year of university. It worked well for the past 6 years, however time had diminished it. It was white, which was one of my first crock-pot buying mistakes, and thus had developed a yellow tinge, and was stained despite my best attempts to keep it clean. The heating elements were a bit shot, it was either not hot enough to heat the contents through, or scalding and wayyyyy too hot.

It was time for a new crock pot. Thus, Matthew and I decided to invest in one, a small two person one, that I could fill with only a few items. We've had it two months, and it's been AWESOME. (Also it's bright green, which makes me cheerful!)

So I decided to make one of Matthew's favorite dishes the other night, a simple Curry. A cheap Curry. A delicious Curry. This curry is not only delicious, filling, and healthy, it's also extremely cheap to make. The whole pot cost us less than 5$, as it uses some of the cheapest vegetables you can buy.

Simple Crock Pot Curry
Ingredients
1/4 cup coconut milk (or creamed coconut meat mixed with water, which is what I used. It comes in a box, and you can use as little or much as you like, and it lasts longer in the fridge, which is nice!)
1 tbsp Cornstarch
Vegetable Broth
3 Tbsp Curry Powder
2 tbsp Ketchup

1 Cup chopped cabbage
1/2 medium onion, diced
1 cup chopped Carrots
2 medium sized potatoes, diced
1 smallish can of corn
1/2 cup frozen peas

Directions
In a small bowl, whisk together the coconut milk, ketchup, cornstarch, and curry powder until it is all combined. Set aside.
Turn your crockpot to low if it's the morning and you're gonna let it cook all day, or high if it's the afternoon and you want it in a few hours.
Toss in all the vegs except for the corn and peas. Toss in the coconut milk mixture, and pour in broth until the liquid comes almost to the top of the vegetables (but does not quite submerge them)
Give it a stir to mix everything together, and then leave it alone, mixing it every so often.
About 5-10 minutes before you're ready to eat it, stir in the frozen peas and can of corn, and let them heat through.
I served mine over some brown rice, which works very well, or you can just eat it alone!

Deceptively Fancy! 

Nom  Nom Nom

It was a delight to eat as well :)

The Easiest Soup you'll ever Eat

So I've been ridiculously lazy lately. Call it the stress of planning a wedding where everything is falling apart, or perhaps the course I'm taking, or researching my thesis, or even perhaps the cold frigid winter  is getting to me, but I've not wanted to do a damned thing lately. (Excuse the language)

This sadly has included cooking to any great degree. I've been lounging around eating cereal out of the box in my sweatpants, and it's frankly been really depressing as a whole.

So I decided to make something delicious and simple that could perhaps cheer me up slightly. I needed something that was the simplest thing I could think of, and I made my tomato cream soup.

Super Easy Tomato Cream Soup

Ingredients:

1 large can diced tomatoes

1 cup soy/almond/rice milk (whichever you prefer)

Basil, Salt, and Pepper (To taste)

Directions:

Chuck all the ingredients into a blender. Blend until smooth. 

Transfer to a soup pot, and bring to a boil. 

Serve over Rice (if you want!)

If it's a bit too thin for you, and you like your soup thicker, feel free to add a bit of cornstarch (a tbsp or so) to the blender while you're blending it, and it will cook up thicker. 

My last puffed Pastry Recipe for a While

I promise, this is the last one!

Man, it's been a bit of a stressful few weeks! You might not know this, but I'm a teaching assistant at the university in the Theology department, and all the papers for the class I deal with were due, so it was epic paper marking time! I did read a lot of really great papers, and some... less successful efforts shall we say!

But I finished marking on Sunday, inputted all the marks on Monday, which means I'm done for the semester! Matthew and I leave on Friday to go visit family, however I shall try to keep with a semi regular updating schedule over the holidays :)

Onto the food!

I had a bit of puffed pastry left from the first use of it, so I decided to make a pie. Unfortunately, my pie pan was dirty, and being lazy I didn't feel like cleaning it... So I used a casserole dish. This was in error, I should have DEFINITELY gone pie pan, as it was a bit too deep to pull out pieces of it neatly, so the pictures aren't as pretty as I like. However, It did taste AMAZING, So I'm just going to let it go for now.

Vegetable Puffed Pastry Tart
Ingredients: (all of these are what I used for my dish, however they will alter slightly for different sized baking dishes!)
1 medium onion, sliced
2 medium potatoes, sliced
Enough puffed pastry to cover your dish
2 cups diced tomatoes
2 cups sliced mushrooms
1 1/2 Cups Daiya Cheese

Directions
Preheat your oven to 350.
Roll out the dough, and cover your baking dish with it. Bake for about 10 minutes while you slice up all your veggies.
Remove the partially cooked dough from the oven, and begin layering all of the innards onto it. I did Potato, Tomato, onion, mushroom daiya in 2 layers, but do whatever feels right.
Bake for 45 minutes.
Remove, eat, enjoy!

Nom!

Fancy Mac and Cheese

Ever need something fancy to prove to non-vegans that your food isn't tasteless mush? When I first 'came-out' as vegan as it was often difficult to explain to people that I wasn't eating just lentils and brown rice, or other brown tasteless mushes just to keep me sustained. Apparently vegans used to eat that back in the day. Poor people!

Luckily, in the current age there's all sorts of things Vegans eat! Taking out meat really hasn't slowed any of us down, has it? However, every once in a while you still need that little helping hand, a dish that really makes the stubborn go "Oooh, yum!"

And I have this dish!

Fancy Mac and Cheese (Serves 3-4)
Ingredients:
1 cup dry macaroni noodles
1/2 zucchini, sliced thin
2 smallish tomatoes, sliced thin
3 Spring onions, the white bits chopped up and put aside, and then the stalks chopped up and put separately.
a few sprigs of basil, chopped (and more for garnishing if desired)
1 tbsp of olive oil
1/3 cup non-dairy milk
1 1/2 cups Daiya Mozzarella

Freshly ground Salt and Pepper

Directions:
Preheat the oven to 350.
Bring a pot of salted water to a boil. Cook up the macaroni. Drain and place in a casserole dish. Set aside.
Next, in a frying pan or wok, heat the olive oil on medium high. Add in the zucchini and white bits of the spring onions. Saute for a few minutes.
Once the zucchini are mostly cooked, add in the tomatoes, basil, and onion tops. Saute for about 1 minute.
Toss with the macaroni.
Feel free to use the same pan for the following steps- heat up the milk until it just boils. Add in the cheese, and stir until melted. Season with salt and pepper.
Pour the cheese over the noodles, and stir slightly to get the cheese mixed to everywhere.
Bake for 30 minutes, until the top is bubbly and slightly crispy.
Serve with some basil as a garnish if you're being super fancy! Then wait for expression of happiness on your skeptical omnivore friend's face!

Beginning Vegan- Cream Sauce Spaghetti

One of the most common (and annoying) things you will get asked when you become a vegan is the following sentence (or variation thereof):

"But... if you don't eat meat, where do you get your protein?"

It will get old REAL fast, trust me. However, the best way to deal with it is have a recipe on hand that has an overload of yummy plant based proteins to have a visual and nommable response to the question. 

This is such a dish. 

As a note, this does have 2 ingredients which may not be common to a new vegan, but should definitely be bought/ordered: Nutritional Yeast and Tempeh. I buy both of mine at the health food store, and I know that nutritional yeast can be ordered online. (Nutritional yeast looks like yellow flakes, and has a lot of Vitamin B12 in it, which is good for you!) 

Tempeh is fermented soy beans pressed into a patty, and is found in the frozen section. Don't fret if you can't find it, you can use Tofu as well, which is much easier to find! (Though Tempeh is so tasty!)

In addition, this recipe has a lot of ingredients, but is very very simple to make! Be not daunted!

Cream Sauce Spaghetti with "bacon" chunks

Serves 2

Ingredients:

1/4 cup tempeh (or tofu) chopped into little chunks. (if you aren't GF, you can use storebought vegan bacon, and not have to make the marinade with the following ingredients!)

1 tbsp olive oil

1 tsp liquid smoke

1 tbsp maple syrup

1 tsp Tamari or Soy Sauce

2 servings of spaghetti noodles (I tend to use either corn or brown rice noodles)

1 box silken tofu

1/2 tbsp corn starch

Soy Milk (a few tbsps)

Nutritional Yeast (to taste)

Freshly Ground Salt and Pepper

3 cloves garlic, minced

1 tbsp olive oil

2 cups mushrooms, sliced

1 cup frozen peas

All the different parts cooking at once!

Directions:

In a small bowl, mix together the tempeh, 1 tbsp olive oil, liquid smoke, maple syrup, and Tamari. 

Add the tempeh/Tofu, and toss to coat. Set aside for a few minutes. 

Place a pot of salted water on the stove, and bring to a boil. Add in your spaghetti to cook while you prepare the sauce. 

In a blender, blend the tofu and cornstarch, adding in a bit of soy milk to get a nice creamy smooth texture. 

Add in nutritional yeast,  tasting every tbsp until it has a flavor you like. 

Season with salt and pepper. 

In a small frying pan, dump the tempeh mixture (even the marinade!) and turn the heat to medium. Fry, stirring every few minutes, until they're nice and crispy and brown. (Do this while making the sauce, which is the next instruction down!)  (same goes if you use Tofu. If you're using storebought vegan bacon, nuke a few strips, and then cut into chunks!) 

In a wok or high-sided frying pan, sautee the olive oil, garlic, and mushrooms, until garlic is fragrant, and mushrooms have turned brown and it looks quite yummy. 

Dump in the tofu blended mixture, and the cup of peas. Bring to a bubble, and simmer until the pasta is cooked. 

Drain the pasta, and add it to the sauce mixture, stirring to combine. 

Divide between 2 bowls/plates, and top with some more freshly ground salt and pepper, as well as the tempeh. 

Then eat and enjoy the proteiny goodness!

It's much easier to make than it sounds! Trust me!

My sad attempts at a video... and a delicious tequila based recipe!

I made a very bad video! I'm hoping my future videos will be much nicer... 

However! For those at home following along, here's the recipe in non-moving form:

Silly Drunk Soybeans

Ingredients:

1 medium onion, sliced into slivers

1/2 cup craisins soaking in 1/2 cup vegetable broth

1 box so soya chicken strips (or tofu, or seitan if you aren't GF)

2 granny smith apples, peeled, cored, and cut into chunks

3 cloves garlic, minced

1 plantain, peeled and sliced (if you can't find a plantain, use a potato!)

1 cup slivered almonds

1 generous cup mushrooms, sliced

3-4 tbsp oil of your choice

1 cup carrots, chopped

1 cup vegetable broth

1 cup tequila (does not need to be good quality, haha)

Rice and Cilantro to garnish, if desired

Directions

Heat the oil in a pan on high. Add in the mushrooms, garlic, and onions, and cook for 3-4 minutes, until onions are nice and transluscent. 

Soak the soy strips in the broth, and set aside. 

In the pan, add the carrots, apples, almonds, and plantains. Mix well, and cook for 3-4 minutes. 

Turn the heat down to medium. Add in the craisins with their broth, the soy strips with their broth, and the tequila. Stir to mix everything together, cover, and cook 10 minutes, stirring occasionally to prevent burning. 

Uncover, and turn heat to low. Cook for another 10 minutes or so, until liquid is pretty well absorbed. 

Serve with rice, and garnish with cilantro if desired!

Happy Saturday! Eat some Falafel Like things

Oh my what a week!

I have a bit of a long-winded story coming up, but this image you see is the recipe at the end of it, so read through, or feel free to scroll down to the recipe if you want!

I've been on a bit of a very slow updating for the past two weeks, and I TOTALLY apologize! I will be updating with much more frequency next week, however I was dealing with some ridiculous things this week, the most painful being my outstanding tuition debt.

A bit of a background to this ridiculousness: Last September I was trying to fill out a Quebec student loan form. I used to just fill out SL forms from New Brunswick (where I was born) but Matthew and I are considered married by the government, and he is a Quebec resident, so I am now a QC resident. I had never filled out a QC Student Loan form in my life, and screwed it up royally. They didn't TELL me I had screwed it up, they just told me I was rejected. So I thought to myself "I might be able to pay this!"

Le shock, I wasn't. It was a failure on all levels.

So come the summer, I think to myself, "This is okay, I won't take courses this summer, and I'll only have to find like 4000$" My mom had agreed to give me 3000$, so I only needed 1000, which is TOTALLY dooable, and I had already paid (through my job) like 700$, so I was in the clear. (So I thought)

Did you know that at Concordia University, if you're a graduate student, you pay summer tuition EVEN if you don't take any classes?

I didn't, and my tuition shot up to 7000$. Meanwhile, a tree falls on my mother's house, and the 3000$ she had slated for me now went to fixing her house. I am in the lurch!

So I drag myself down to the Student Loan office, where I cry my eyes out to a really nice lady named Sarah. She listens to my story, and says "You applied for a Quebec Student Loan? I can fix this!"

She proceeds to pull up forms, print out new forms, highlight exactly what I need to fill out and what documents I need to bring, and tells me that she's going to get me my loan for the last year, so my tuition will be paid, and she'll also help me fill out the loan for NEXT year, so this doesn't happen again.

She deserves a raise!

However, after that long tale that you most likely didn't care about too much, I give you Fake Falafels!

Fake (But Yummy) Falafels
Ingredients:
1 Can Chickpeas, drained
1 tbsp Cilantro Paste (or like 4 tbsp chopped fresh cilantro)
1 tsp Cumin
1 tsp baking soda
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp minced garlic
2-4 tbsp buckwheat flour (for texture- you can use any type of flour you want, by the by)
salt & pepper, a few shakes of each

olive oil
cornmeal

Directions
Preheat your oven to 375
In a food processor, Add the chickpeas, 1 tbsp olive oil, garlic, cilantro, salt, pepper and cumin. Process until smoothish.
Add in the baking soda. Process until well mixed.
While the machine is running, slowly add in a tablespoon at a time of the flour. Once it's thick, and starting to not stick to the side of the processor, it's enough flour.
Cover a cookie sheet in parchment paper and set to the side.
Put some olive oil in one bowl, and some cornmeal in another bowl.
Make ping-pong ball sized balls out of the mixture, and flatten them slightly. Coat in the oil, and then cornmeal, and then place them on the cookie sheet. Do this for all of the mixture.
Bake for 25 minutes, flipping halfway through.
Enjoy with garlic sauce and hummus!

I even made my own garlic sauce, and it's very simple. I shall share it with you!

Super Easy Garlic Sauce
Ingredients
1 bulb of garlic
Olive oil
1/2 cup Vegannaise

Directions
Preheat oven to 400.
Peel off the outer layers of the garlic, and very carefully with a paring knife cut off the tops of each individual clove, exposing the insides.
Place the bulb on a sheet of tinfoil, and drizzle with olive oil.
Wrap up the foil, and place in the oven for about 45-60 minutes. (The garlic will be very squishy!)
Once the garlic has cooled, squeeze it into a blender with the vegannaise, and blend until smooth.

That's it!

Cheezy Stuffed Peppers

Happy August!

No preamble today! Just a delicious yummy Recipe!

Cheezy Stuffed Peppers

(Makes a bunch of filling!)

Ingredients:

Peppers, for stuffing, tops cut off and seeds removed.

4-5 medium carrots, chopped

1/2 cup frozen peas

1/2 largish yellow (or green, whatever!) zucchini, chopped

4 pattipan squashes, chopped into pieces (i love these little things!)

1 medium onion, chopped

1 cup chopped mushroom

1 1/2 cup rice cooked in veggie broth instead of water (still hot!)

2 tbsp vegan margarine, divided

1 cup Daiya mozzarella, with a bit more for topping

Oregano, Salt and Pepper (to taste!)

Directions:

Heat your oven to 350.

In a bowl, mix the rice, 1 tbsp margarine, daiya, and spices. Set aside. 

Heat a sautee pan, and melt the remaining margarine, adding in the onions and mushrooms. Saute for 2 minutes. 

Add in the rest of the vegetables, and saute for about 5-8 minutes, until all are softened. 

Dump the vegetables into the rice mixture, and toss to combine. 

Jam as much as possible into your peppers! If you have peppers that won't stand up straight, cut them in half lengthwise, and lie them on their sides instead of standing them up, it'll still taste great!

Top the peppers with a bit more Daiya, and then place their jaunty little caps back on (if you want to!)

Chuck in the oven and bake for about 30 minutes, until the cheese is all melty, and the peppers have softened up!

Then, eat you crazy vegans, EAT!

As a note, these are also popular with non-vegs!

Lentil Shephard's Pie!

The Humble Potato! It can make so many things!

And one of those things is delicious Lentil Shephard's Pie!

When I was growing up, I used to LOVE when my dad made shephard's pie, though his was very simple: Ground beef, frozen peas, potatoes. I loved scraping the potatoes off and eating them separate, never one for the mushy peas and ground beef (even as a child I wasn't a bit meat eater.)

He'd roast them under the broiler so the potatoes would get super crunchy on top, a method I still employ today! I used 3 different types of potatoes- red skinned, white skinned, and purple potatoes (which is why the center of the shephard's pie is a different color!)

Enjoy!

Lentil Shephard's Pie
Serves 4
Ingredients:
Gravy:
1/3 bouillon cube
1/2 cup water (You can just use 1/2 cup broth instead of the bouillon and water!)
1/2 tbsp cornstarch mixed into 2 tbsp water
1 tsp Tamari or Soy Sauce
1 tsp Red Miso Paste
a generous sprinkling of dried basil

Potato Layer:
6 small potatoes, cooked and mashed up (no need to peel! The peelings are good for you!)
2 tbsp vegan margarine
3-5 tbsp almond milk (depending on how dry the potatoes are)

Other Layers:
1 cup cooked brown lentils, mashed slightly
1 cup diced tomato
1 cup carrots chopped
1 smallish onion, diced

Directions:
Preheat the oven to 350

In a sauce pan, heat up the water and bouillon cube until cube is dissolved. Bring to boil
Add in the miso paste and tamari, and whisk around to dissolve.
Slowly add in the cornstarch, turning the heat down to medium, whisking until sauce thickens.
Sprinkle with dried basil, stir to combine, and take off heat.
In a frying pan, fry up the onions and carrots until mostly cooked.
In a  bowl, mix the potatoes, margarine, and almond milk until mixed up and sort of creamy (but still lumpy!)
Spread the mashed lentils on the bottom of a smallish casserole dish. Top with the gravy, then the tomatoes, then the carrot/onion mixture, and finally spread the mashed potatoes over the top.
Spread a bit more vegan margarine on the top, and place in the oven.
Bake for 15 minutes at 350 on the medium rack.
Move to the top rack, and broil for 5-10 minutes, until the top is crunchy and browning.

And then Enjoy, because it's delicious. The bottom falls apart a bit, so aesthetics wise it's not the prettiest, but it sure is delicious!

Variations: You can use soy beef for the bottom layer (but it's not gluten free!) or re-hydrated TVP made with veggie beef flavored stock! Any vegetables can be used as well (some ideas: corn, peas, parsnips, and yams would all be nice!)

'Risotto' stuffed peppers

I got a gift of a day off of work!

As a babysitter, I often get the day off when the kids are sick, or their mom gets off work early. So I enjoyed a little afternoon off today, and thus decided to make something slightly fancier than usual for dinner!

So I made 'Risotto' Stuffed Peppers. The Risotto is in parenthesis because while it's the same flavors as the risotto I am sort of known for making amongst my friendlies, I didn't cook it in the time consuming regular method, but faked it.

Anyhoo, here you go!

Risotto Stuffed Peppers


Ingredients:

1 Cup cooked jasmine rice
1/2 cup mushrooms, sliced
1/2 small onion, chopped
1 medium carrot, chopped
1/3 cup sundried tomatoes packed in oil, chopped
1/4 cup of the oil from the jar of Sundried Tomatoes
2 Bell Peppers, deseeded and cut in half.
basil, oregano, salt and pepper to taste

Directions
Preheat the oven to 350.
Take the rice and dump it in a bowl. Combine with most of the oil, (leave about 1 tbsp) sundried tomatoes,  and the spices.
In a frying pan, sautee the carrots, onions, and mushrooms in the remainder of the oil.
When the onions are transluscent and mushrooms cooked down, dump the cooked vegs into the rice.
Stir to combine.
Place the bell peppers side by side in a casserole dish  and spoon the rice mixture into them. Don't be afraid to overstuff! They'll be fine!
Bake for 15-20 minutes, until steamy and the peppers are softened.
Serve and Enjoy!

Evening Delight- Zucchini Pizza

When I'm on vacation, while everyone else eats communally, I tend to branch out and do my own thing, making a special meal for myself.

To give my family credit, they often do try to make something for me special, however often this turns out poorly, due to a lack of understanding about my dietary needs.

Veggie soup is great, but with barley in it I'm out of luck. Onions sauteed in butter? Sadly no. Rice cooked with a splash of chicken stock? Le sigh.

So it's easier in the long run to create my own stuff. However, I get the opportunity to make my own stuff like this personal pizza!