Vegan Football Sunday: Potato Skins, "Wings," and Guacamole

The Eagles were televised yet again, so I thought it would be fun to have a few friends over to watch the game.  I decided to do a number of vegan friendly and football friendly finger foods for the occasion: "wings," loaded potato skins and guacamole.

The wing recipe is from the October 2011 Vegetarian Times.   I used Upton's Naturals original seitan, Cholula hot sauce, Whole Foods maple syrup, Original Vegenaise and the smoked paprika we had handy in the spice cabinet.  The wings needed to marinate for two hours before being breaded and cooked, so I did that step first and then popped them in the fridge.

Next, I started the prep for the potato skins.  My husband had picked up a five pound bag of medium potatoes for me earlier in the week, so I baked those in the oven for 45 minutes at 425, and sent them on a wire rack to cool.

While the potatoes were cooking, I made tempeh bacon crumbles.  The October 2012 Vegetarian Times had a recipe for Warm German Potato Salad that included directions for the "bacon" crumbles, so I decided to try those for my skins.  The recipe's not online yet, but it includes tempeh, low-sodium soy sauce (I used Bragg's Liquid Aminos), blackstrap molasses, ketchup or tomato paste, and liquid smoke.  I ended up using both ketchup and tomato paste to get the crumbles to a more "bacony" color, and also cooked them in the pan a bit longer than the recipe called for to get them to crisp up more.  There is a TON of "bacon" left over, so I'll likely sneak it into recipes throughout the week.

To finish the potato skins, I used this CHOW recipe as a guideline, but veganized the ingredients. Instead of butter, I used Earth Balance, and I stuffed the potatoes with the vegan bacon crumbles and daiya cheddar cheese, then topped them with freshly chopped chives.  The potato skins were definitely the hit of the party - my non-vegan friends couldn't believe they were vegan, and especially that I didn't use real cheese.  When I explained what daiya was, my friend Greg joked that I have "gone to the dark side."

To make the guac, I used four ripe avocados,three roma tomatoes (diced), two serrano peppers (seeds removed, minced), half a red onion (minced), four cloves of garlic (minced), the juice from one fresh lime, fresh cilantro (chopped), sea salt and freshly ground black pepper,  I set out the guac with some Garden of Eatin' Multigrain Blue Corn Chips for my friends to eat while I finished the skins and wings.  I also had a tray with carrots, celery and hummus.

After the potato skins were out, I finished up the wings, using whole wheat panko for the breading.  The breading really didn't stick as well as I would have liked, but they had a nice golden exterior.

 

For dessert, thanks to my friend Carol, we had Football Shaped Oreos.  Did you know Oreos are vegan?  (My friend Valerie describes them as "accidentally vegan.")  That's yet another example of an everyday food that non-vegans eat that's vegan friendly.  I'd put them in the same category of pasta with marinara sauce, PB & J, rice and beans and the guac I made today.

Are you a vegan football fan?  How do you veganize your favorite football snacks?

Vegetarian Deli at Home - Mushroom Lunch Meat and Almond Cheese

As I've noted before, as a good Northeastern Jewish girl, I've spent a lot of time eating deli food.  Clearly, as a vegetarian, I'm not eating corned beef, BLTs or tuna melts any more.  But, I did have a curiosity about vegetarian lunch meats and if they would be a passable substitute in a deli style sandwich.  To that end, I decided to make myself a vegetarian melt.

Some of the more popular vegan and vegetarian items, like Tofurky Deli Slices or Light Life's Smart Deli brand are off limits to me because of the soy.  But, Field Roast Grain Meat Company makes vegan deli slices that are soy free.  Varieties include lentil sage, wild mushroom and smoked tomato.  The only version I saw available at Whole Foods was the wild mushroom variety, so I grabbed that.

I had been eating regular cheese on occasion, but it's been upsetting my stomach more and more, so I'm cutting back.  Daiya has been a terrific option for me (in fact, I'll be using it in tonight's vegan cooking experiment - stay tuned), but I was curious to try a "nut cheese."  The raw food and vegan communities have embraced this type of "cheese," which has a similar texture to dairy, but healthier fats and no animal products.

At Whole Foods, I was able to pick up a shredded almond cheddar style cheese by Lisanatti Foods.  Upon closer inspection, I saw that the cheese contains casein, which is milk protein.  So, this cheese is not appropriate for those who are strictly vegan, those with milk allergies or those avoiding casein for dietary reasons.  So, you may, ask - why bother?  Well, like I mentioned earlier, I've been having stomach trouble with dairy-based cheese, but I was curious as to whether I can even tolerate casein.  Also, if you do a side by side comparison of one serving (1oz or 28 grams) of almond style cheese versus regular full-fat cheddar cheese, it looks something like this:

	Almond Cheddar Cheese	Traditional Cheddar Cheese
Calories	63	110
Fat	3g	5g
Saturated Fat	0g	5g
Cholesterol	0g	25mg
Sodium	190mg	180mg
Protein	7g	7g
Calcium	25% DV	20mg

So, there are some nutritional advantages here, especially if you're looking to avoid saturated fat and cholesterol.

With all that background, back to my deli melt experiment.  Our local market has excellent fresh pumpernickel bread, so we picked up a loaf of that.  I fired up our toaster oven and put in two slices of the  pumpernickel, topping them each with a wild mushroom deli slice and a generous sprinkle of almond cheese.  I let it go in the toaster oven at 400 until the almond cheese melted to my satisfaction.  Like daiya and other soy cheeses, it didn't get as gooey as traditional cheese, but it did achieve a decent meltiness.

I topped my open faced sandwich with spinach leaves and sliced grape tomatoes.  The taste evaluation?  Fell solidly in the "decent" level.  I wasn't swooning over it, but it wasn't awful either.  The texture was good, and the cheese especially had a good mouthfeel to it.  The biggest bonus?  No allergic reaction whatsoever, which, after a week where I've been particularly soy sensitive, was a welcome relief.

I think the deli slices will be a good addition to my convenience product staples - sometimes, I may not have time to make a proper lunch, so it will be nice to have these handy if I want to make a quick sandwich. 

Cooking for the Masses, Or How Many Lasagna Cupcakes Might Fit in My Oven

Tomorrow (or, at this point, later today) is my sister-in-law's baby shower, and I am on deck to provide the vegetarian options. 

About a month or so ago, I saw an episode of Aarti Party that was baby shower themed.  One of the items Aarti prepared was "Lasagna Cupcakes," which are essentially little individual lasagnas made with wonton wrappers, rather than noodles.  I thought a vegetarian version of this dish would be a cute idea for the baby shower.


Mind you, the original recipe serves 12, and there will be 30 adults and 7 kids.  So, I quadrupled the recipe, which meant eight trays of lasagna cupcakes.  To get to the eight trays of my version of the cupcakes I needed 112 ounces of canned crushed tomatoes with garlic and italian seasoning, 3 pounds of mozzarella cheese, 3 pounds of grated parmesan, 3 pounds of part skim ricotta, two large onions, four enormous zucchini and 192 wonton wrappers.

All the ingredients that I was able to fit on the counter.

I made the sauce in a five quart sauce pan.  Since I knew I had a full night of chopping ahead of me, I decided to use the food processor to chop the onion.  I basically pureed it, but it was still chunky enough to add texture to the sauce.

The original recipe called for chicken sausage.  Normally, when I  vegetarianize a pasta dish, I sub mushrooms or eggplant, since they have a nice, meaty texture.  However, my sister-in-law is very allergic to both mushrooms and eggplant and you really don't want to poison the guest of honor.  So, I decided to go with zucchini, which I thought would be chunky enough to make the sauce interesting.  While the Indian elements of the recipe sound good, I decided to omit the mango chutney and the cinnamon and cloves and go with more of an Italian vibe.

Most of the 48 lasagna cupcakes, pre-baking.

The sauce making and ricotta filling went well enough.  However, when I got to the assembly part, I started to lose my mind a little bit.  After all, I was putting down a wonton wrapper, layering sauce and then layering cheese 192 times. 

So, at this point, I did what anyone in my position would do at 10:37 in the evening.  I called my mother.

"I am about to have a wonton wrapper related psychotic break.  Please entertain me," said I.

"How many of these things are you making again?"  said Mom

"48.  But there are FOUR LAYERS.  Plus an individual basil leaf inside each!" said I.

Mom graciously stayed on speakerphone with me through the lasagna building process, which did make the whole shebang go much faster.  I ran out of parmesan (I don't think I bought a full three pounds after all), but we have leftover sauce and filling that will go into a pasta in the next few days.

All 48 lasagna cupcakes!

Anyhoot, I am glad I decided to do 48 and not 60, because the eight trays literally took up our entire oven and all of my counter space. I put them in for the entire 20 minutes and then moved the bottom trays up to the top rack so they could brown properly.

I finished all of this around 11:45 and which point I started the second dish, a vegetarian version of Ina Garten's Orzo Pasta Salad from Barefoot Contessa at Home.  I've made this one tons of times, and it's great for parties.  Ina's recipe calls for shrimp, but it tastes just fine without it. 

I triiple-plused this recipe, which allegedly serves 8-10.  I used three one pound boxes of orzo, three cups of dill, three cups of parsley, three whole bunches of green onions, one extra large red onion, 14 lemons, two cups of olive oil, two two-foot long hothouse cucumbers, and two pounds of feta cheese.  It ended up being so much pasta salad that I had to split it into two bowls while I was making it.

Yes, this is a ridiculous amount of food for 37 people, some of whom are too young to have all of their teeth.  It's even more ridiculous when you keep in mind that I have the makings for a large fruit tray and a large veggie tray also in my fridge.  Oh, and I'm also not the only person bringing food.

Lots and lots of lemony orzo pasta salad goodness.

However, I am genetically predisposed to making too much food.  This dates back to my great-grandmother, if not earlier.  Nanny Sadie was legendary for making two roasts for Sunday dinner to serve eight people.  Thus, down my mother's family line, all of the women were pre-conditoned to assume that whenever we are preparing a meal, the entire Eagles roster, plus the practice squad, the cheerleaders, the coaches, the medical staff, the beer guys and several season ticket holders would show up unexpectedly, and none of them would have eaten since breakfast.

Have I mentioned I typically make five pounds of mashed potatoes at Thanksgiving?  We do at least eat all the leftovers.

Anyhow, five hours later, everything is in the fridge and ready to go for tomorrow.  The only things I need to do are load all the food and serveware into the car, reheat the lasagnas, put together the fruit & veggie trays, garnish the lasagnas, take pictures of all the food, eat and watch my sister-in-law open presents.  :)

Food Network Star Recipe, Veganized

I love the Food Network, and I'm especially fond of Food Network Star, where culinary hopefuls battle it out for a chance at their own series.  This season's winner was Jeff Mauro.  His concept, Sandwich King, makes "every sandwich a meal and every meal a sandwich."   All of his recipes look amazing, but, like most of the food featured on food competitions, tend to be meat-centric.  The one I saw on his show this afternoon was no exception - Greek Tacos with ground lamb.  But, since I love Greek food and it featured lots of produce, I decided to attempt to make it over into a vegan meal.

It was a fairly easy swap.  I made the cucumber, tomato and onion relish as directed, except I forgot that we didn't have red wine vinegar in the house.  Instead, I used apple cider vinegar.  Removing the seeds from the cucumber definitely helped from keeping it to watery - using a spoon was the most efficient way to do that.

For the "lamb," I sauteed some striped eggplant.   After removing the eggplant from the pan, I added some seitan.  I then made the sauce as directed - minced red onion, freshly minced garlic, tomato paste, oregano, salt and pepper and red wine.  Since I was making a vegan version of the recipe, I didn't make the yogurt sauce.  And, instead of making it a sandwich, I made up a pot of farro to use as a base. 

It may have been heresy to Mauro's concept, but it worked.  I liked the contrast between the warm, wine-y, meaty seitan/eggplant mixture and the cool relish.   The farro added a nice chewy texture as well.  The recipe was also a hit with our dinner guests, my cousin and my cousin's 14 month old daughter, who is quite the gourmand for a toddler! 

My favorite part of this recipe was my inaugural use of tomato paste in a tube.  I was always hesitant to make anything with tomato paste, because I feel like I never end up using the whole little can.  The tube allowed me to just squirt out what I needed to add enough flavor and color to the sauce.  I know it's been around in this form for awhile - why it took me so long to take advantage of it, I have no idea.

Yet Another Concoction

It was time to use up what was in the fridge yet again, so dinner was a concoction.  Tonight's experiment involved roasted brussel sprouts (30 minutes at 425 - make sure to coat them with olive oil and season with salt and pepper).  In a saute pan, I worked some shallots, sliced mushrooms and garlic in olive oil.  After that was done, I stirred in leftover wild rice, the brussel sprouts and some parmesan cheese.

Sunday Blog 2 of 2: Celery Root & Mushroom Lasagna

I've been somewhat obsessed with celery root since the fiance and I took a trip to Montreal a few summers ago.  We had a celery root salad that I can still taste if I think hard enough about it.  I've been dying to play with it in the kitchen ever since, but I just now got around to it.

Celery root - it looks ugly, but is mighty tasty!

 I mused around for several recipes that sounded intriguing, and landed on this Celery Root & Mushroom Lasagna from Food & Wine magazine.  I've had it printed out for a month, and was determined to make it this weekend.

For those of you not familiar with Celery Root, our friends at Wikpedia share that:

Celeriac (Apium graveolens rapaceum) is also known as celery root, turnip-rooted celery^[1] or knob celery. It is a kind of celery, grown as a root vegetable for its large and bulbous hypocotyl rather than for its stem and leaves. The swollen hypocotyl is typically used when it is about 10–12 cm in diameter; about the size of a large potato. Unlike other root vegetables, which store a large amount of starch, celery root is only about 5-6% starch by weight.  Celeriac may be used raw or cooked. It has a tough, furrowed, outer surface which is usually sliced off before use because it is too rough to peel. Celeriac has a celery flavour, and is often used as a flavouring in soups and stews; it can also be used on its own, usually mashed, or used in casseroles, gratins and baked dishes. It can be roasted like a potato, giving it a crispy edge.

After procuring the necessary ingredients, I fully intended to make this three hour (yes, you read that correctly - three hour) recipe right when I got home from the grocery store.  But, after a much needed long nap and getting Blog #1's pie in the oven, I got a bit of a late start - around 8:00 p.m.

I love the fact that this recipe is so veggie heavy.  Pounds of mushrooms, leeks, celery root and shallots!  And, it was easy to make veg - I eliminated the prosciutto and used a vegetable broth (Pacific Natural Foods) in lieu of the chicken broth.   Also, a tip: rather than buying individual packages of herbs, you can just get a Poultry Blend, which will have just enough of the sage, rosemary and thyme (yes, I now have "Scarborough Fair" in my head).

Clockwise from bottom right: cremini mushrooms, leeks, celery root and soaked porcini mushrooms.

Now granted, despite all the produce.  healthy is not exactly how I'd describe it . . . we're talking pounds of cheese, lots of heavy cream.  But, have you ever tried to peel and chop a celery root?  It's like hacking through lumber.  I was literally sweating.   The chopping alone took about 20 minutes, so, if you find chopping tedious, this is not the recipe for you.

The aforementioned ragu.

However, if you're willing to put up with all the hacking, this recipe is tremendously rewarding.  The smell of the vegetable ragu was intoxicating - shallots and mushrooms and leeks and celery root in olive oil and butter, along with a bundle of fresh herbs . . . it was all I could do not to just eat it all while it was cooking.  It would make a terrific pasta sauce. 

After the ragu and cream sauce were done, and the lasgana noodles were boiled, the assembly began.  

The recipe called for fresh basil and fresh mozzarella, in addition to the ragu and cream sauce.

And here it is, after an hour in the oven.  It's 11:07 p.m. and I'm eating my first piece and wow, was it worth the wait!