Well, this has
been a really fun week in the Elfin Kitchen...found some lovely new cookie
recipes to try and both of them turned out quite nicely. We made a ‘family
sized batch of The Gentle Chef’s Shredded Chikun and at least two batches of
his Bacun (see the blog post of 5.10.15 titled Gone With the Elf for a blow by
blow account of how to make the Bacun). There were NO epic fails this week, for
which The Elf was truly grateful. We’ll recap the stuffs we made with some
pictures after our EXPERT RECIPE OF THE WEEK is shared.
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This week we’d
selected the Thai Black Pepper and Garlic Tofu from Susan Voisin’s awesome site FatFree
Vega
We totally
enjoyed this dish and high recommend it if you are a fan of Thai food. As
usual, we made it spicy. As we practice our kinky cookery, we are trying to become
more organized with preparation activities. So, we’re off and cookin’!
Here are the
ingredients for the recipe with the exception of the tofu. It had been squished
by an iron skillet to get the excess water out, cubed and placed in a plastic
bag with the easy to fix marinade. You’ll see a picture of the tofu shortly
And here’s the
tofu that had been pressed and cubed. We let ours marinate a pretty good while
since we are lovers of intense flavors—for example, when Susan’s recipe calls
for a range of Sriracha sauce, we go the maximum and then wind up adding even
more! There are two pictures here, one of the tofu ready for the oven and a
close-up of a couple of the cubes to give you an idea of how the peppery
marinade looked.
As the tofu
was baking, we began cooking the veggies. We opted for broccoli florets rather
than the kale along with the onions, mushrooms, bell pepper and asparagus. We sautéed
the onions and added the remaining vegetables in our little wok pan.
And the final
dish looked like this. We served it over brown rice but our picture of the
plated dish was awful…all blurry and cloudy (so we guess that was our epic fail
of the week). You can get an idea of just how delicious this was just by the
wok view!
The recipe
selection for this coming week (OMG--IT’S JUNE ALREADY!!) was really a
no-brainer for us! When Susan posted it as a featured recipe, we were ON IT! It’s
the Seitan Saltado Peruvian Stir Fry with Potatoes. Just the sight of the word
Peruvian in the recipe was enough to titillate our taste buds.
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The cookies we
tried this week were so much fun! You know, we love to bake sweet stuffs (we
are indeed all about FIFTY SHADES OF TASTES AND FLAVORS) and share them with
folks. Well, we had run the table, in our mind, on variations of oatmeal
cookies to take to the fine folks at the Animal Rescue Fund of MS (ARF/MS) and
wanted to offer them something a bit different. So, here are the two recipes we
found. First we made Vegan Lemon Sugar Cookies. One of the comments at the end
of the recipe speaks to the amount of oil that is in the original recipe...3/4
cup of canola oil. The reviewer suggested that ½ cup of oil (we used coconut
oil instead of canola) and ¼ cup of unsweetened applesauce would work well and
reduce the amount of oil. We did that and it worked beautifully. In fact, next
time, we may go ½ and ½ oil and applesauce to reduce it even further. In any
event, these were quite lovely and luscious IF you are into lemony stuffs!
And while we
thoroughly enjoyed the Lemon cookies, we were totally captivated by this next
recipe! When we saw them during a search for something new and different, we
knew we had to try them. They are called Grandma’s Cornflake Cookies. As we
were making them, we kept thinking…uh-oh, this isn’t going to work. The dough
was really soft and we felt like it just wouldn’t hold together and would most
likely spread out all over the pan. What a delicious surprise!! We could hardly
wait for the first batch to cool off enough to try one! Holy Yumminess!! Try
them—you’ll like them!
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A couple of
other offerings from the week. One night, we had just a plain ole Southern
dinner of sautéed cabbage, black-eyed peas and vegan cornsticks. We just LOVED
it and especially the cornsticks. We thought we’d made enough to share with
some friends but lo and behold, we ate them all over the next day or so. No
recipes or links, just good old chopped up cabbage sautéed in a bit of peanut
oil (or you could use grape seed) with some liquid smoke flavoring. We also
infused our oil with some of the Bacun ends that were cubed. The black-eyed
peas were also seasoned with some chopped onion, liquid smoke and Bacun ends.
The cornbread recipe is just a veganized version of regular buttermilk
cornbread (using cashew milk and lemon juice for the buttermilk). If you look
closely at the picture, you can see the flax meal from the flax egg substitute.
And finally,
we decided to try our hand at making our own vegan version of Nutella. We had
the hazelnuts and all the other ingredients, so we thought ‘what the hell, let’s
go for it’. The Minimalist Baker had a recipe posted for their version of
Nutella but we opted for a different recipe. It turned out well but we may try
the Minimalist Baker version next. We also used the Cuisinart processor instead
of the VitaMix to process the spread to the point where we felt comfortable
putting it in the VitaMix (I’m still phobic about that machine). The VitaMix
did blend it some smoother but we are not sure it was worth all the transfer
effort. So it’s not perfectly smooth from the food processor…it was damn good
to eat. Big Solid likes a ‘newtella’ and banana sandwich.
And FINALLY, we
have DISCOVERED smoked sea salt! It’s one of the ingredients in the Bacun
recipe that really really adds a great flavor to the end result. Now, we use it
on just about everything. In fact, we just bought a salt grinder specifically
for it. One of the brands we saw at Fresh Market was WAY EXPENSIVE and we
passed on it; however, this one was more reasonable. It’s in crystals so the
grinder is important to get the most bang for your buck. In fact, we just
ground a bit on a fresh cucumber/tomato sandwich for lunch. The Elf’s taste
buds were thrilled.
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And you know WHAT!! This little blog is now a YEAR OLD!! We began it last May. WOW for The Elf! And so we
begin our second year with the month of June...this is the month when farmer’s
markets in the south begin to overflow with fresh vegetables and fruit. So get
out there, enjoy Nature's bounty and do something really good for your body, mind
and spirit. Ain’t NUTHIN’ in the world better than a fresh summer tomato. So,
til next week, breathe deep, eat plants, laugh a lot and love life.
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