Veggies with Spicy Chile-Garlic Sauce

We don't often venture outside of Mexican food, when we do, it is generally some sort of Asian food. This is one of those "some sort of Asian food" posts. It's nothing against other cuisines, but beyond Mexican and Asian, we do Middle Eastern occasionally, and even more rarely, Italian food. I am one of those freaks of nature that has never really been too big of an Italian food fan. What can I say? Mexican has always been my favorite kind of food. I'm lucky I met Brett because he concurs on this as well.

This was really easy to make - it was our way of taking advantage of the remaining abundance from summer. September is one of the best times of year because it is harvest time! It's also the time when the staples of summer (tomatoes, cucumbers, etc.) are still hanging on, but on their way out, and the staples of fall (potatoes, cabbage, broccoli, etc.) are coming in full-force. It is the time of year to experience the best of both worlds.

Anywho, on to what you all really want - the food!

Just a reminder of the produce legend:
no asterisk = grocery store
* = farmer's market
** = CSA
*** = Container or Community Garden



























The second picture is my dish with extra sriracha, 'cause I'm a freak like that.

I do have to say that I have a strong affinity for the bottle with the rooster on it. I love me some sriracha, it is one of the best things there is!

Veggies with Spicy Chile-Garlic Sauce

2 cups brown Basmati rice, cooked

Chile-Garlic Sauce:
1/4 cup water
4 tbsp shoyu (or other soy sauce)
1 tbsp red wine vinegar
1 tsp mirin
2 tbsp organic sugar
1-2 tbsp sriracha sauce (or 2 Thai chiles, seeded and minced)
a couple of pinches of salt
a couple of pinches of black pepper

Whisk ingredients together in a small bowl and set aside.

Veggie Schtuff (all local!):
1 Japanese eggplant, cut into chunks *
1 zucchini, cut into chunks **
1 yellow summer squash, cut into chunks **
2 cups shiitake mushrooms, minced *
1/2 yellow onion, minced *
2 cups mung bean sprouts *
3 cloves of garlic, minced *

Heat a few tablespoons of safflower oil in a large skillet. Add the eggplant, zucchini, summer squash, shiitakes, and onion and cook for 8-10 minutes, stirring often.

Add the bean sprouts, garlic, and sauce to the pan.

Simmer for about 5-8 minutes.

Serve over brown Basmati rice.

Yummy, yummy, yummy.

Tonight, we are doing a "breakfast for dinner" kind of thing. I made a vegan take on Huevos Rancheros awhile back, so tonight I am going to try making the "real thing", sans cheese of course. I rarely eat eggs, and will only eat them from one local purveyor who has a very small operation going, seems to treat the chickens quite well, and isn't doing anything on an environmentally degrading scale. We had some lying around and Brett had the Huevos Rancheros at a local restaurant called Cafe Berlin last weekend so he wanted me to try it out at home. We'll see how it goes.

'Til next time.

Basmati Rice with Adzuki Beans, Shiitake Mushrooms, and Veggies

This was a very humble, yet tasty meal. You might notice that there are fewer local veggies in this dish than normal, and this is because we were trying to use up some of the veggies in our freezer to make room for all the sauce I plan on making in the coming weeks (this only ended up using the edamame in our freezer, but we did make a little more room). I don't know if I've mentioned before, but we really like basmati rice, we use it more over the winter for stir-fries 'cause frozen veggies are easier to come by than fresh ones (unless you don't mind food that travels thousands of miles, which we try to avoid). Has anyone ever noticed that basmati smells a little like popcorn when it cooks?

I'm a little behind in my food posting as, well, I've been blabbering about other things, but I am going to hunker down and get caught up this week.

We made enough of this yummy meal that I could make a lunch out of it at work. I added some sriracha hot sauce to my dish 'cause that's how I roll.

Just a reminder of the produce legend:
* = farmer's market
** = CSA
*** = Container or Community Garden















Basmati Rice with Adzuki Beans, Shiitake Mushrooms, and Veggies
1 cup adzuki beans, cooked
2 cups brown Basmati rice, cooked
2 large carrots, peeled, and sliced
1/2 cup edamame, cooked
1/2 red or yellow bell pepper, seeded and minced **
2 cups shiitake mushrooms, finely minced *
1/4 yellow onion, minced **
2 tbsp sesame oil
1" ginger, minced
3 cloves of garlic, minced *
2-3 tbsp shoyu
1 tbsp seasoned brown rice vinegar
2 tbsp organic sugar

Heat the sesame oil in a skillet over medium-low heat. Add the carrots, edamame, bell pepper, mushrooms and onion. Cook until the veggies begin to brown.

Meanwhile, heat a few tablespoons of water in a small sauce pan. Add the garlic and onion and cook for about 5-8 minutes. Add the shoyu, brown rice vinegar, and sugar. Stir well.

Add the rice and adzuki beans to the skillet with the veggies to heat. Pour the sauce over the mixture and enjoy!

'Til next time.

Happy Friday!

So I am really looking forward to this weekend, as I will be using Veganomicon for the first time! I am really excited about it. Stay tuned to see how my first dance with V-Con goes!

Last night’s dinner was a yummy General Tao’s Tofu stir-fry. Something kind of funny about this though. I guess Veggie and I are on the same wavelength, because she made it this week as well too. We even adapted our recipes from the same one on VegWeb. What an interesting world, I guess some of us veg*n’s think alike, eh? Anyways, you might pop over and check hers out as her photography is generally much better than my own, not to mention, I don't have a picture of the stir-fry because of user error.

You see, I often take multiple pictures when I photograph my recipes to make sure that I get a good picture. Well, I was going through them on my computer, found the one I wanted. At least thought I selected the one I had chosen, and then deleted the rest. Well, I went to upload the photo, and it was one of the grainy, bad pictures, and I lost the rest as I had already deleted them. Argh.

But anyways, I went a slightly different direction with this, opting for a spicier, savory sauce, so my recipe for the sauce is quite a bit different from the template I started out with on VegWeb.

Here she be (in the words of Wilbur)!

General Tao’s Sauce
onion chopped (I diced up about a quarter of an onion)
diced red chilies to taste (dry if possible, substitute crushed red pepper if can't find chilies)
cayenne pepper to taste
1-2 tbsp ginger, minced
1-2 tbsp garlic, minced
2/3 cup vegetable broth
2-3 tbsp shoyu (add a bit at a time, and then add more if needed)
3-6 tbsp sugar (more or less depending on your desired level of sweetness)
1-2 tbsp rice vinegar
1 tbsp sesame oil
1-2 tbsp corn starch
splash of hot chili oil for good measure

Sautee onions, garlic, and ginger. Mix all ingredients together. Add cornstarch to thicken shortly before serving.

General Tao’s Tofu Stir-Fry
Tofu:
1/2 block tofu cut into small cubes that has been marinated in a bit of General Tao's sauce for at least 30 minutes
corn starch
pinch sugar
egg replacer for one egg
peanut or sesame oil

Stir-Fry:
General Tao's Sauce
onion, chopped
broccoli, cooked
cauliflower, cooked
edamame, cooked
Hot, cooked brown Basmati Rice

Mix together egg replacer (mixed with water according to package directions) and coat tofu in it.

In a small bowl, combine corn starch and sugar. Cover tofu in dry mixture. Heat some peanut or sesame oil in skillet and fry tofu until golden brown.

Top hot cooked rice with cooked veggies, tofu and desired amount of sauce.

You know, stir-fries are very good, but I’m a bit stir-fried out. I probably won’t devote an entire week to a particular type of food again, but I got a lot of good recipes to add to my collection.

I want to thank those who gave me suggestions on good vegan cookbooks, it was very helpful. I have placed an order for Eat, Drink, and Be Vegan on Amazon, and will probably look into getting Vegan with a Vengeance in a couple of weeks once I have tried a few things from V-Con and ED&BV.

Well, I am a bit tired after a long week of dealing with data (sounds so fun I know), and lugging a nice, big load of grub home from the store, so I’m off to make a quick dinner and to listen to Democracy Now!

Happy Friday!

Teriyaki Tofu

Last night I decided to move away from sweet Asian sauces a bit to make something more savory, as both Brett and I felt like we had eaten a lot of sweet foods this week. So I went for a Teriyaki Tofu Stir-Fry, and it turned out spot on. I was impressed with how much my homemade version actually tasted like teriyaki sauce, since, as I said in a previous post, sometimes I make things sweeter, spicier, and tangier, than they are made “authentically”. But this sauce seemed pretty authentic.

I also loaded this stir-fry up with veggies because I felt like we haven’t had as high of a veggie intake lately as we should. This is one thing I love about stir-fries; they are a perfect way to get a nice, healthy dose of veggies.

Teriyaki Sauce
1/3 cup mirin (Chinese Rice Wine)
1/3 cup water
1/4 cup shoyu
1-2 tbsp minced ginger
1-2 cloves garlic, minced
2-3 tbsp brown rice vinegar
1 tsp sesame oil
3 tbsp brown sugar
1-2 corn starch dissolved in water (depending on desired thickness)
red pepper flakes

Heat all ingredients except for corn start and water mixture on stove. Stir frequently while waiting for sauce to boil. Once boiling, add corn starch and water mixture, stirring frequently until desired thickness.

Teriyaki Stir-Fry
tofu, cut into small pieces
Teriyaki Sauce
onions
bell pepper
snow peas
broccoli, cooked
edamame
Hot cooked, brown Basmati Rice
peanut oil

Heat peanut oil in skillet and fry tofu until it begins to brown. Add onions and bell pepper. Cook until onion and peppers begin to get soft and tofu is done to your liking.

Throw all the veggies over some brown Basmati rice, top with the sauce and enjoy!

I probably won’t have a post tomorrow as I feel like being lazy tonight which means…..Amy’s Pizza. I really do like Amy’s products; there is a vegan bean burrito Amy’s makes that I love taking to work for lunch when there are no leftovers to take.

I wanted to end this post asking for a bit of wisdom from the seasoned vegan cooking community out there. As I have mentioned before, I am just starting my vegan cookbook collection. So far I have Veganomicon. I want to get one more regular cookbook and one dedicated to desserts to start. I am thinking about Eat, Drink, and Be Vegan or Vegan with a Vengeance for my regular cookbook choice (anybody have suggestions for which I should get?), but am stumped for ideas for where to start in the way of vegan dessert cookbooks.

Any advice will be most appreciated!

‘Til Friday!

More Muffins and Crispy Sweet and Sour Seitan. But First........

Breakfast wasn’t too exciting yesterday morning, I just cut up some fresh fruit (diced apples, diced pear, sliced bananas, sliced kiwi fruit, and orange segments), I splashed the cut fruit with some fresh squeezed lime juice. I use the lime juice for a bit of flavor, but more importantly, it keeps the fruit from oxidizing. I sprinkled on a little sugar and had this yummy fruit with a bowl of vegan granola and soy milk. You know one of the many things I love about fruit? It looks (and tastes) pretty all on its own, you don't have to do anything to it at all, its like one of those women who can roll out of bed, do nothing, and still look amazing - the words of a true fruitaholic.

Moving on. I was excited from my success with muffins on Saturday, I decided to make another batch of a different flavor yesterday. I think I am starting to get this whole muffin making thing down, because these turned out good as well. I ended up making one batch of batter and doing it two ways. Part of the batter was turned into Apple Cinnamon Muffins; the other portion was turned into Apple Cinnamon Raisin Muffins. Nothing really special or different about the two except raisins, but both were very good. The muffins turned out sweet, but not overly so, and were nice and moist. They go very well with coffee for a nice light breakfast (this also happened to be my breakfast this morning).

I usually like to use applesauce in place of oil wherever I can, but yesterday ran out of applesauce and ended up doing half applesauce half oil instead. You could always replace the additional oil in this recipe with applesauce.

Apple Cinnamon (Raisin) Muffins
1/4 cup Earth Balance (melted)
1/4 cup unsweetened applesauce
1/4 cup canola oil
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup sugar
2 cups whole wheat pastry flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
cinnamon (to taste)
just a dash of nutmeg
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup soymilk
2 peeled diced apples
Raisins (as many as you like)

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

In a mixing bowl, combine all dry ingredients. Add the moist ingredients and then slowly fold in the apples and raisins.

Fill muffin cups (or greased muffin tin) about 2/3 of the way full and bake for 20-25 minutes or until golden brown.

For dinner last night, I made a modified version of VeganYumYum’s Crispy Sweet and Sour Seitan and it was so, so, so good. The next time you get an urge for something sweet, sour, crispy, and a bit spicy, give this a try. It satisfied even the “super particular when it comes to vegan food” omni, also known as Brett.

I followed her recipe for preparing the seitan exactly, but deviated on everything else. I made some modifications to the sauce and added some veggies and served it all over brown Basmati rice.

Sweet and Sour Sauce
2/3 cup veggie broth
6 tbsp brown rice vinegar
6+ tbsp sugar (Brett likes things pretty sweet, so I put more than this in there, but for everyone else [who is not a hummingbird] start with this and add more if you need more sweetness)
2-4 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp ketchup (next time I am going to try tomato paste)
1/4 tsp ground ginger
1 clove garlic, minced
dash cayenne or crushed red pepper flakes
pinch salt
corn starch mixed with water to thicken

Combine all ingredients except for corn starch and water mixture and heat, stirring frequently.

Turn up heat to where sauce is boiling and add corn starch and water mixture to sauce. Stir frequently until at desired consistency. Remove from heat immediately.

Crispy Sweet and Sour Seitan with Veggies over Basmati Rice
VeganYumYum’s Crispy Seitan recipe
Sweet and Sour Sauce
Chopped onions (I cooked them with the seitan)
Broccoli, cooked
Cauliflower, cooked
Hot, cooked brown Basmati rice

Prepare rice according to package directions.

Prepare sweet and sour sauce.

Start cooking broccoli and cauliflower.

Make the crispy seitan and add the onions while cooking.

Serve crispy seitan, veggies, and sauce over brown Basmati rice.

I really liked the way the seitan was done for this recipe. It gave it the flavor of a fried mushroom. I am going to be thinking about other things I can do with this crispy seitan as the flavor and texture are wonderful. It took Brett a little while to grow to like tofu in anything except a scramble, preferably a scramble stuffed into a tortilla, but he has warmed up the seitan very quickly. I can probably thank this recipe for that.

Well, that’s all for now!