We were invited to a potluck to celebrate the new book “My Beef with Meat” by Rip Esselstyn, and were glad to have a chance to get together with other plant-eaters and enjoy a healthy dinner in the park. We knew we wouldn’t be able to heat anything up, and quiche is pretty good at room temperature, so we decided to make the Asparagus quiche from Everyday Happy Herbivore. As with all HH recipes, it’s pretty much impossible to screw this up, so even though I’d never done this one before, I was certain it would be good. I did have a moment of concern when I looked at the big pile of asparagus and green onion versus the relatively small bowlful of tofu batter. But, I trusted the recipe and went for it. Once it was all mixed together, I relaxed and decided the proportions were actually perfect. 

Since we didn’t have any way to heat up food at the park, I timed it so the quiche came out of the oven right before we left and it was still warm when we arrived. There were so many yummy things to eat – slaw, tofu-nut balls, banana bread, cookies, lentils, no-egg salad, pita, soup, chili, well, you get the idea. The quiche was a hit with everyone and we had a great time meeting new people, catching up with friends, and enjoying the evening in the park. 

I think I may have mentioned this, but THE FIRST CSA BOX IS HERE! As excited as I was to go pick it up, I was a little overwhelmed at the contents and not entirely sure what to do with all of them. I’d never had turnips before, and I have no idea how I’ve lived 40 years, most of them in the South (even though I still consider myself to be from Long Island) and never eaten a turnip, but there you have it. I think I associated them with radishes and beets, neither of which I care for. I have no idea what to do with the radishes we got this week and will get for the next few weeks in our box. I was very excited to try the new variety of kale – Portuguese – which looked like collards. I decided to make an old-style veggie plate to start out with. I planned to do it on Thursday night, but the weather was so nice and Seth was finally home, so I decided we needed to go over to the not-so-impressive-but-fun-to-eat-at-Mexican place across the road from us. Anyway – since the kale looked like collards, I cooked them the same way I normally cook collards for Seth. Or, really, more like a cross between the way I make them and the way his mom makes them. She adds turnips and potatoes to them. Light bulb! This is how I can use the turnips I had no clue how to use! I also had a few small blue potatoes that really needed to get used up, so double win. I don’t really use a recipe anymore, but there’s one in The Vegan Soul Food Guide to the Galaxy that’s a great place to start if you’re new to cooking collards. Just let it simmer for at least an hour, preferably two or more, if you plan to feed them to a Southerner. Collards must be cooked until they’re really, really tender to be acceptable to a true Southerner. Anyway since you asked – this is the basic gist of how I did the kale: one chopped yellow onion chopped, several cloves of chopped garlic, large bunch of kale cut into strips and then roughly chopped, several turnips (I mostly left these whole), turnip greens (roughly chopped) a handful of small blue potatoes (whole), vegetable broth and a chopped tomato. I sauteed the onion and garlic until they were soft, then added everything except the tomato and brought it to a boil. I let it boil for a few minutes and then reduced the heat to medium-low, covered it and left it alone for about half an hour. I added the tomato and let it simmer another half hour or so. I dunno, ‘til it was “done”. While the kale cooked, I simmered some black eyed peas (I soaked and cooked them on Wednesday) in veggie broth with chopped onion and garlic and some Spike seasoning. I also threw a couple of ears of corn in the grill pan because while it’s not quite “corn season” it’s close enough.

One of our beautiful friends gifted us with a whole bunch of fresh chard from the garden where she works, as well as several sprigs of fresh oregano. I’ve recently falling deeply in love with chard, so this made me very, very happy. I was flipping through the most recent Happy Herbivore book, Happy Herbivore Abroad when I found the recipe for Mediterranean Chard. As with all HH recipes, if you have chard on hand, you’ve probably got everything you need on hand to make this. The only thing I was missing was a lemon, but I had lemon juice, so no big deal. This one really jumped out at me because it uses a LOT of garlic and a lot of kalamata olives, two things I’m pretty sure I cannot get enough of. So. Chard, garlic & olives? I’m in love. I was still on my own for dinner, so I didn’t want to make a big mess that I’d have to clean up later. I had cooked some chickpeas a day or so ahead of time to add to this, so I just tossed them in the pan & let them heat up with everything else. I may have put too many in, but hey, it stretched the meal so that I had a healthy sized lunch the next day. SCORE! I will definitely make this one again. Seth isn’t as into chard as I am, but he doesn’t object to it like he does mushrooms or eggplant, so I can still sneak it in.

Oh, and we got our first CSA box today!!! So excited! Look at the bounty of kale (it looks like collards, but it’s kale), bok choy, turnips, radishes, strawberries, two heads of lettuce (the reddish stuff) and bay leaves! More on what we do with all this goodness to come…

With Seth out of town for work, I decided to make myself something I rarely eat when he’s home – mushrooms. He hates them. I love them. We are a house divided. Our other conflict vegetables are eggplant (I love, he hates) and collards (he loves, I hate).  So, while I make collards for him and a separate veggie for myself when I do, the others I only cook when it’s just me. I made the Garlicky Mushrooms and Kale recipe from Appetite for Reduction once before. It’s a pretty basic recipe, using just a few ingredients – mainly just mushrooms, garlic and kale. It’s actually a side dish, but since it was just me for dinner, I didn’t make anything else.  I probably would prefer it as a side better – I mean, I like the recipe, it’s good, it’s just not my favorite thing I’ve ever made. I also prefer kale raw, so there’s that. But, probably alongside some baked tofu or something, this would be a solid bet. 

We were both running in a million different directions for a few days and only sat down to eat together once, and that was leftovers for me and WF hot bar for Seth. Hardly worth mentioning. I went to visit my family on Friday and Seth left for a work trip. Sunday was the first night I’d actually cooked for a little while. I decided I wanted some seitan tacos, even though I was cooking for one. I kind of had the Peruvian Skewers from Viva Vegan in mind and I looked at that recipe for inspiration, but I really wanted some chipotle. So I based my marinade on that, but left out a few things and added a few things. Basically, it was a little olive oil, a little oregano, some cumin, red wine vinegar and a bit of adobo sauce from an open can of chipotles in adobo I had on hand. I used some beef-style seitan from Cookin' Crunk that I had in the freezer, cut it into little bites and let it soak in the marinade for about half an hour or so. I pan-seared the seitan in a cast iron skillet with a little oil and the remaining marinade. When it was almost done, I pushed it off to the side and added some fresh spinach to wilt. The spinach and seitan got wrapped in warm flour tortillas with some grated Daiya Havarti, diced tomato and a little Tofutti sour cream. A simple, but yummy dinner I will definitely make again.

So, one of the things we love about our camping trip every year is the potluck on Saturday night. It’s a large group of people who go on the trip each year and Saturday is the night we all eat together. There are some vegetarians, some vegans and a lot of omnis, but for some reason, the stuff we bring always goes pretty fast. Hmm… guess omnis like vegan food after all. Anyway, since we had to basically evacuate the camping area Saturday morning, we had a ton of food and nowhere to grill it.

Thankfully, we had some friends who were willing to not only let us bring the food over to grill and share, but also let us set up our wet tent in their yard to dry. Yay! A few more people came over (also refugees from the trip), everyone brought something and we had a mini version of the potluck. Seth “casually” asked me (suggested) if I was going to make a sauce for dipping the tofu in, which meant he wanted some tzatziki. I found a great recipe here, which was a huge hit. 

Seth manned the grill and everything was cooked perfectly. The tofu and veggies were marinated in the Veganomicon Italian marinade recipe and were gobbled up enthusiastically. We had made the marinade ahead of time for our camping trip and added the oil to it right before we put the tofu in. We even brought some of our homemade butter for the corn and everyone thought it was great. Beautiful night with beautiful friends. Gratitude.

So the last week was kind of a crazy one for us. We spent the first part of the week prepping for a camping trip and didn’t make anything for dinner other than veggie burgers or sandwiches. We may have had one or two snafus with Seth’s new camera and on nights we did actually cook, we didn’t have any photos to share. Anyway, we headed into the woods on Thursday, with plans of making a grilled pizza. I had the crust from Whole Foods, the veggies, the Daiya cheese and realized we forgot the sauce. We also had another camper stop by while we were still setting up our site, so we just grilled some Field Roast Frankfurters instead. No pics were taken. Friday night we did actually cook and take pics, but they were pretty bad. The food was good – we beer battered tofu, asparagus, broccoli and onion rings and deep fried them along with potato wedges in a pot of oil on the camp stove and dipped them in ranch dressing (Cookin’ Crunk) and BBQ sauce. Not healthy, but we only do it once a year. Grease gets everywhere when deep-frying so if you do it outside, it’s less messy. Sadly, we got rained out on Saturday (we were supposed to be there until Monday) and had to bail and head home. We were so tired by the time we got back after packing up in a hurry and in the rain that we just grabbed some take out and called it a day. But, Cinqo de Mayo was now upon us, and we had already made the marinade and seitan for the Peruvian Skewers from Viva Vegan. We bring this kind of stuff camping with us and cook it on our little Weber grill. Since it was STILL raining and we have nowhere to grill at our apartment building, we used the grill pan. Seth made the steamed red seitan recipe (also in VV) on Wednesday night and it was perfect. Yay for Seth’s first batch of seitan! He also made the marinade on Wednesday and we just left out the oil until the last minute so it wouldn’t congeal in the cooler (now fridge). I just cut up the seitan, pepper and onion, boiled the potatoes and skewered everything up. Since the pan can only hold a few skewers at a time, we do it in batches and keep them warm in the toaster oven. We had a ton of corn on hand since we’d brought it with us camping to share with our friends and had to leave before we had time, so we grilled that in the pan and called it dinner. It was super good, even if we weren’t in the woods. 

This month’s ATL Vegan Drinks meet up was at Fuego Mundo in Sandy Springs. The restaurant is very vegan friendly and made a few extra treats for us as well. This is the second time we’ve been there and the food was delicious both times. Seth started off with the cream of tomato soup. We also, on the advice of everyone at the table, got an order of the yucca “cheese” bread (which we ate too fast to take photos), which was amazing. The other tapas options were yucca fries and dip, bab ganoush, and a Latin veggie soup.

For the entrees the options were veggie fried rice with plantains, grilled tofu steak with chimichurri, quinoa veggie salad or a wood fired Mediterranean veggie burger on a wheat pita. Seth got the veggie burger and a side of fries. All of the sides are vegan at Fuego Mundo and range from beans and rice, to yucca fries to salad. We’ve loved every one we’ve tried. 

I had the tofu steak, which is what I had the last time we went. It’s so yummy and simply made. The chimichurri isn’t cilantro-heavy, which some are, so the seasoning is just light and tasty and smoky. I had a salad for my side and it was huge. And yummy. There were several drink specials to choose from, including a mimosa, white or red sangria or virgin mojitos. We just had beer, but the sangria looked pretty good too. 

We skipped dessert, but I heard the plantain s’mores looked pretty tempting. There was also a praline-crunch ice cream, a passion fruit sorbet and a virgin mojito sorbet to choose from. The s’mores and sorbets seemed to be the most popular. Looks pretty good, no? Thanks to Feugo Mundo for hosting us again!

We used up the rest of the homemade pasta (I dried it when I made it) and Seth made a fresh batch of his new favorite thing: Zombie Sauce. It’s a fresh tomato sauce recipe from the Vegan Zombie. It takes a little time to make, but it’s really good. We normally put it in the Vitamix to puree it a bit, but you could use an immersion blender or skip that altogether if you prefer a chunkier sauce. The recipe is pretty basic and you can modify it any way you like by adding veggies or vegan meats to it. He also made an amazing salad and his 8^th deadly sin garlic bread. After a day walking around at the Inman Park Festival and this yummy dinner, we were tired, well fed and happy. And sleepy.

I’m really getting summer-time veggie plate fever and for us that means lots of beans or tofu, something green and corn. We love corn. A lot. I didn’t want tofu two nights in a row, so I went with a Cajun chickpea recipe I came up with several months ago. It’s pretty simple to make and it spicy and yummy. I cooked the chickpeas ahead of time, but you could also just use a can, drained and rinsed. It’s basically just the beans, a small onion, several cloves of garlic, about half a cup of veggie broth and Cajun seasoning. I like to mush up some of the chickpeas to thicken it up a bit. I stopped by Whole Foods and got a couple of ears of corn and some kale salad (I was in a hurry and didn’t really have time to make anything else). Simple, healthy & delicious.

Nothing special here. Just some veggies over rice with some tofu. I actually forgot to marinate tofu so we ended up getting one of those premade packages from Trader Joe’s. They’re pretty good and if you don’t have the time or inclination to marinate your own tofu, they’re a good option. They’re pretty expensive, though. I made a quick stir-fry sauce to go on the veggies since we usually use the leftover tofu marinade for that. It was pretty basic – tamari, garlic, chili-garlic paste, ginger. The veggies were also pretty basic: broccoli, bell peppers, zucchini, shallots. We served it over short-grain brown rice with a side of Ling Ling brand frozen spring rolls.

After a busy weekend, we decided we just wanted a good, old-fashioned veggie plate. I generally make baked beans from scratch now rather than buying them canned and they’re so much better. The canned ones are just too sweet. We love the Happy Herbivore recipe in her first book and it’s been my go-to whenever we make them. I’ve tried one or two others, but this is my favorite. It calls for a can of navy beans, un-drained. Well, I didn’t have any canned, but I had a ton of dry. I soaked and cooked them earlier in the day, so it was basically the same thing as opening a can. I know it’s not quite corn season, but I’m trying to force it anyway. I found some at WF that looked promising, so I grabbed a couple of ears. It was good – not height of summer in the South good, but good enough to hold me over.  We sautéed some kale in veggie broth with lots of garlic, a little miso and a bit of tahini. It was good. We also sautéed some yellow and zucchini squash with lots of onions and garlic. (What? We like garlic.) Simple, easy, yummy. 

I’ve recently fallen a little bit in love with chard. It’s not on the level of my love for kale, but it’s running a close second. Color Me Vegan has a few really good chard recipes and this is one of them. If you really hate chard, you can swap out a different leafy green, like spinach. I use a little less lemon than the recipe calls for because we found it a little overpowering the first time. It’s a pretty basic dish – chickpeas, chard, and so on, but it’s oh so tasty. And easy. I’m a big fan of easy recipes. I’ve also been on a bit of a squash kick lately and really love this recipe. It’s sort of like a squash casserole, only much lighter. It also incorporates cherry tomatoes (I use grape tomatoes) and has a topping of toasted pine nuts and nutritional yeast that gives it a cheesy flavor. Seth got me these little Le Creuset baking dishes (they have a specific name, which escapes me at the moment) and I’ve been trying to find ways to use them ever since. I make a half batch of the squash recipe and it fit perfectly into the 4 little dishes. 

Another winning recipe from Appetite for Reduction. This one will have you drooling and wondering when you turned into such an amazing chef. Not kidding. It’s that good. No need to marinate the tofu all day or anything, either. I love that the list of ingredients is pretty short and it comes together really fast. I like to spice it up a little and add dash of hot chili garlic paste to the sauce. It’s super good. I also tend to use more shallots than it calls for, but I just like them a whole bunch. I can never find Thai basil to use and my one attempt at growing it from seed in my apartment window failed miserably. All my windows face north, so I have nowhere near enough light. Anyway, in the absence of Thai basil, you can use regular old basil or even a different variety of purple basil; I used both this time. We like to have spring rolls with this and I’m a big fan of Ling Ling Brand - you can find them in the freezer of stores like Whole Foods or natural grocers like Sevananda. 

Some days, a simple dinner of beans and greens is all you need. We love Appetite for Reduction and I use it more than any other book in the kitchen. Seth, being a proper Southern boy, loves black-eyed peas. I’ve learned to love them since I started cooking them for him, and other than chickpeas, we probably cook those more often than any other bean. This is a staple recipe in our arsenal and comes up in the rotation pretty regularly. It’s really simple to make and just tastes so darn good. Beans, kale, onion and garlic. What’s not to love? We like to use Hotlanta Hot Sauce in it. Super good. Even though there’s a bunch of kale (or whatever greens you like) in the peas, we like to have a side of broccoli, or asparagus, or a salad with it. Tonight, asparagus won. 

Pasta Drying

So my mom sent me a neat new toy for my birthday – a pasta attachment for my KitchenAid mixer. I love my mixer and this gadget just makes it that much better. All of the pasta recipes that come with it contain eggs (eew!) so I used one from The Artful Vegan cookbook. I don’t use that book very often because the recipes are ridiculously invloved, but there are a few standout recipes in it that aren’t that complicated. I know, I know it’s one of the Millennium Restaurant books, so it’s bound to be difficult, but still…

Anyway, I use their pasta recipe when I make ravioli so I already knew it was easy, quick, and reliable. After a few false starts that involved not having the attachment on right and having it turn upside down and fall off, I was up and running and pasta was coming out. Since this was a one person operation, I had to stop the mixer a bunch of times to remove the cut pasta from the bowl and lay it out to dry so it didn’t get all tangled up and turn into a blob. I decided that for my very first time making this stuff, that I should definitely pick a shape that would be hard to work with. Not really – I had no idea it would be wonky when I started. I’m not sure if it was the dough or my technique – probably the latter – but my corkscrews didn’t all, well, corkscrew. Oh well. It doesn’t have to be pretty to taste good. As you can see, it made a lot so we let it dry and packed up the rest to use later. I made a quick batch of pesto, and we lightly sautéed fresh veggies – the usual suspects of spinach, broccoli, asparagus, bell pepper and grape tomatoes. Once the pasta was cooked – it cooks really fast, we mixed everything together so the veggies and pasta were coated in the lovely pesto. Seth took one bite and said it was the bset pasta he’d ever had. Score. We have a winning toy. This would be really good with leftover (or fresh) grilled veggies. We’ve done that plenty of times and it’s super yuumo. Seth also made his amazing garlic bread to round it all off. We are incapable of having pasta without garlic bread. 

It was my birthday (40! Eep!), so I got to pick where we went for dinner. Normally we like to go to someplace kinda fancy-pants like Café Sunflower, but I really just wanted sushi. Ru San’s has a really broad selection of vegan sushi and we love every bit of it. They took one of our favorite items off the menu, which was really disappointing, but hey, things change right? It was a really large spring roll filled with carrots and asparagus and came with a spicy dipping sauce that was to die for. The one spring roll was large enough to be an appetizer for two. 

Anyway, we started off with Miso soup, it was a rainy and chilly day and that helped shake off the chill. We love their soup and get it even when it’s hot outside. Next up, we had a plate of tempura veggies – potato, zucchini and mixed vegetables. We What? The calories from fried stuff don’t count on your birthday. Which is good, considering the rest of what we ordered. I’m a sucker for good tempura – light and fluffy and crispy, and yes, fried. Plus there’s yummy stuff to dip it in. 

When it came to ordering our rolls, we went a little overboard. We always, every single time get the fried garlic maki (Yes. Fried. Garlic. Thank you Ru San!) which is every bit as good as it sounds. Our other every single time, without fail item is the mixed vegetable tempura maki. Yes, I know, we also had mixed veg tempura as an appetizer, but well, we love it and can’t stop.  The roll is huge and difficult to eat, but it’s delicious and amazing so we persevere. We decided to get the asparagus roll too. It’s served chilled and is really just what it sounds like – nothing but asparagus. A light roll to break up the fried goodness of the rest of it. And lastly, we got the inari tofu roll. We actually ordered two pieces of inari tofu, the pockets stuffed with rice, but the waitress must have thought we wanted it as a roll – I didn’t even know that was an option. It was really tasty too. I love inari tofu. Fir the first time ever, we had to ask for a to go box. Not surprising how much food we ordered under the influence of saki…

Even though we were stuffed, you can’t have a birthday without cake. Since neither of us likes sweets very much, Seth got us a couple of cupcakes from Dulce Vegan, one of the two vegan bakeries in Atlanta. After I blew out the candles, we split one and save the other one for the next day. As delicious as they were, we were way too full from dinner to eat any more.  

This is what happens when I have no one to cook for. I just eat random stuff I find in the fridge. I had half a bell pepper, half a zucchini, part of an eggplant and some green beans. I roasted everything but the beans, which I steamed. Then I cooked the Gardein “wings” and tenders. I had some buttermilk ranch (Cookin’ Crunk) in the fridge, so I dipped them in that. It was a small miracle I cooked at all…

Seth left for Vegas for a work conference, and since he hates mushrooms and I love them, I decided to treat myself to some fungi.  I seasoned it with a little olive oil, balsamic vinegar, garlic, oregano and thyme and then popped it in the toaster oven for a bit until it was tender. While my ‘shroom cooked, I made some pasta and sateed some veggies (broccoli, spinach, bell pepper, onions) and then mixed them all together with some of the leftover cashew cream sauce (The Vegan Table) from the other night. Easy, tasty dinner. 

We love Indian food. A lot. I have an Indian cookbook that I absolutely love called The Indian Vegan Kitchen. The recipes are easy to follow, once you get over the somewhat long list of spices, but hey, that’s Indian cooking. We have several favorite recipes from IVK and this is one of them. It’s basically like a vegetable korma, with coconut milk and it’s amazing. One thing about her recipes is that they tend to be a bit hot, so I usually cut back on the amount of cayenne I put in. The recipe as written is just veggies, but this time I added some tofu, since I didn’t make any dal to go with it. (I was being lazy.) I just quickly pan fried some tofu in curry powder, cumin and whatnot. On it’s own, the tofu was pretty bland, but mixed into the stew/korma it was pretty good. We can’t have an Indian dinner without nan – we just can’t. One of the first recipes I tried from Vegan Eats World was the nan (we make the garlic variation) and I now always have some on hand. It makes a lot in one batch, so I when I make it, I freeze the leftovers. They reheat really well and then I just smear them with a little homemade butter and, when I have it on hand, sprinkle with fresh parsley. We also love Sukhi’s brand samosas, but they’re crazy expensive (you can find them in the freezer section of Whole Foods and some smaller health food stores) so we try to only buy them when they’re on sale – and then stock up.

I kind of have a thing for these beans. And the rice. The combo (both recipes are in Viva Vegan) is one of our make it again and again and again meals. You want to do it on a weekend or a day you have plenty of time to let the beans cook because they need about 3 hours. They’re worth every minute. The first time I made them, I was a bit thrown by the sofrito recipe that goes in them. It’s basically a lot of bell peppers and a lot of onions cooked in a lot of oil until they reduce significantly. (I use about half the amount of oil the recipe calls for, and it’s totally fine.) But once I figured out how it’s supposed to go, it’s been smooth sailing. The beans recipe makes a big batch, so we normally have a couple of lunches from it and put the rest in the freezer and use them later for tacos or enchiladas or nachos – you get the idea. The rice is really easy to make and will impress your friends and neighbors. It tastes like you worked really hard seasoning it and making it turn yellow, but really it comes together super fast. We like to serve this meal as sort of deconstructed nachos  - which chips (who needs forks?) and topped with lettuce and salsa. Sometimes, two kinds of salsa. I like a little Tofutti sour cream with mine, too.

Seth went to Chattanooga to see his mom for Easter. They had their Easter dinner on Saturday night since Seth needed to get back to Atlanta pretty early on Sunday. I made some of the “This is Sparta!” spinach pies fromVegan Eats World at Christmastime and everyone liked them so much, I made a batch for Easter. Seth said they were his and his mom’s favorite part of the meal, but I think he just says stuff like that to be nice. In fairness, they are pretty darn good, although a fair amount of work. I had a mishap with not thawing the filo dough correctly, so Seth had to run to the store and get me a new package on Friday, which meant I had to thaw that one and make the pies in the morning instead of Friday night. Oh well. Filo is a harsh mistress. Anyway, if you’ve got a little time on your hands and want to impress your friends and family, make these little guys. They reheat really well too, so they’re a nice addition to a holiday meal. Seth roasted some potatoes and asparagus and whipped up a salad for them. Our favorite vegan roast to have for holiday dinners is the Field Roast brand, and I made a quick batch of Happy Herbivore brown gravy for them too.  

I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned this, but we recently got a new toy. I really wanted to give a try on cashew cream sauce, since it’s one of the reasons I wanted one so badly. A while back, we made a batch of the cashew mac & cheese from The Vegan Table. It was really good, but the sauce is much more like an alfredo-style than what you may think of as a cheese sauce. It makes a lot, so the last time we made it, I used the leftovers on broccoli and whatnot. Which gave me the idea to just use it as a cream sauce over pasta with a ton of veggies. I reduced the amount of oil in the original recipe, because it’s a lot and I don’t think it harms the final sauce at all. I settled on some of those little pasta shells; better for holding the sauce. The veggies we used were pretty much the odds & ends in the fridge – broccoli, spinach, bell pepper, that sort of thing. Seth made a kick-ass salad and garlic bread that I’m pretty sure is the 8^th Deadly Sin. Here’s how he does it: take a small baguette & slice it in half lengthwise; take a head of garlic & mince most of it (really, most of it); pour way too much olive oil into a pan and add the garlic; season with a mix of dried Italian herbs & let the garlic get slightly brown; spoon the garlic & oil over the bread & bake at 425 until toasty; eat way too much and enjoy the decadence. 

Wait what? Vegan Drinks was at a BBQ joint? Yeah, that’s what I said too. But, like many restaurants nowadays, they’re broadening their usual menu to include folks like us. Actually, Burnt Fork has a few different options on their regular menu and created a special menu just for our group. We started off with spring rolls, which we forgot to take a photo of. Oh well. Seth decided on the “Chicken Fried” Tofu with gravy, which I think turned out to be the best thing on the menu. It was served with Kale with candied pecans that was ridiculously good, and he also had a side of fries.

I got the nachos. They were piled high with black beans, cheese sauce and BBQ tofu. They were good, but not as good as the fried tofu. Also, it was a lot more food than I could possibly eat. There was also a tofu enchilada on the menu that came with refried beans – it looked pretty good too. 

I grew up in the Northeast but I quickly developed a love for Southern grub when I moved here to the South, except grits and collards – those are just nasty. But other than that, how could you not love the cuisine of a place where Mac & Cheese is considered a vegetable? (Seriously, go to any proper Southern restaurant and it’s listed there right next to the green beans.) Anyway, these days it’s vegan mac & cheese for us, and we don’t consider it a vegetable, but still. So, loving Southern food and being vegan, we naturally love Cookin’ Crunk. We first tried the beef stew back in February and loved it. The first time I made the beef-style seitan, it came out a bit spongy, which was totally my fault. I decided to give it another go, in spite of having a package of Upton’s Naturals seitan I scored in a Vegan Cuts deal. This time, my seitan came out much better, but I really should have made smaller pieces, because they were a little more than bite sized. The stew is pretty standard, potatoes, carrots, seitan, onions, but it also adds a lot of kale, which just makes me happy. I put extra in there. We love this stew recipe, it’s hearty and comforting and perfect for a chilly night. Being proper southerners, I made a batch of biscuits (Vegan Diner has my go-to recipe) so we could soak up the stew and enjoy their fluffy goodness. 

So I made this soup a few weeks ago and we loved it. It’s super easy (heh) and if you like asparagus, it’s right up your soup alley. Having recently become the proud mama of a bouncing baby Vitamix, I naturally wanted to try making soup in it. The recipe is written to be made in a Vitamix, but if you don’t have one it’s ok. We made it the first time without one. Being really new to this wonder of a machine, I was really afraid of burning up the motor. I don’t know why, it’s just a fear I have. I think I should have run it for longer to heat the soup more. The flavor was still good, but it wasn’t as hot as we’d have liked, which is why I didn’t rate it as high as the last time we made it. Also, I didn't have a lemon, which you really do want for this. The recipe says 4 servings, but we like a big bowl of soup, so we get more like 2 ½. Whatever. I also like to have a sandwich with my soup, so we naturally grabbed the Daiya havarti with garlic and jalapenos, sliced a tomato and made some grilled cheese. It was yummy.

Monday, March 18

Spanish Rice & Beans

Rating: 4.25

We eat a lot of rice and beans around here, which could get really boring and repetitive. Fortunately, we also have way too many vegan cookbooks, so we have an endless supply of recipes for different ways to make them. This one (from 1000 Vegan Recipes) is really tasty and has a nice special guest flavor – kalamata olives. It’s pretty easy to make, and most of the time it takes is just simmering so the rice can cook. You could use a can of beans, or just cook some dry beans ahead of time, which is what we do. We buy things like beans, rice, flour and sugar in bulk from the local co-op; it’s a lot cheaper than canned or packaged, and they’re organic too. If you want to be really frugal, you can store them in empty pickle jars. Who says being vegan is expensive? Plus, you can use all the money you’re saving for buying organic produce, which sadly is generally pretty pricey. Anyway, the beans and rice makes a lot, so we have the leftovers for lunches at work. We also like to have some veggies with it, so we made a salad, but sometimes we have steamed broccoli or grilled asparagus with it. 

Saturday, March 16

Pizza, sort of…

Rating: I have no idea

This was a colossal pizza fail that tasted really good, but as you can see, well…

We actually generally make really good pizzas. This time, however, the sauce was our undoing. Seth made a fresh batch of Zombie sauce, and it was a bit juicier than it needed to be. The dough was happily rolled out and on the wooden peel ready for sauce, toppings and transfer to the stone warming in the oven. Unfortunately, some of the juice from the sauce ran over the edges and onto the peel, under the dough. Since the peel was sprinkled with cornmeal, the combination of that with the juice made, um, glue. Seth likes more sauce than I do, so his side was more stuck than mine. We decided to try to fold the dough over and make calzones instead since the pizza was not coming off the peel intact anyway. As you can see, my half folded over sort of neatly. Seth’s, however, ended up looking like a ball of dough that rolled down a hill and picked up toppings along the way – broccoli, spinach, garlic, tomatoes, onions & Daiya mozzarella. They were ugly, but delicious. 

Thursday, March 14

Asian-Buffalo Grilled Tofu, Slaw and Roasted Veggies

Rating: 4.25

OK, so we’re in love with the Vitamix and since it’s new, are trying to find reasons to use it as often as possible. I found a recipe in the cookbook that comes with it for an Asian-Buffalo sauce, which was suggested for tofu (along with other gross things we won’t discuss). Now, we normally prefer to marinate tofu and I knew that just doing a basic oil/tamari/maple syrup glaze and grilling, then topping with sauce would not be how we like our tofu. So. I marinated it in the sauce. I really liked it. I don’t think Seth was as big of a fan as I was. The sauce/marinade is basically and Asian ginger sauce with hot sauce added. I baked it for a bit, then finished it in the grill pan. We had some slaw with it because this is the South. I based my free-hand version on the basic slaw recipe in 1000 Vegan Recipes. There was no recipe for the veggies either – just asparagus, bell pepper, broccoli and zucchini tossed with a little oil, and some light seasoning.

Wednesday, March 13

Pinto Beans over Yellow Rice with Garlic

Rating: 4.5

Keeping with our current beans and rice and veggies theme, Seth requested pinto beans. I’ll be honest. I have no idea what to do with those little bastards. Back when he was in college, Seth worked at a place called Tortillas, which made massive, inexpensive burritos. (Some of the guys from Tortillas opened up El Myr and you should go there if you live in Atlanta because the food is awesome and it’s very vegan friendly. But there's no non-smoking section, so if that bothers you, get your food to go.) Anyway, he had a pretty good recollection of how they made the beans and went with that. I don’t know what the proportions were of what he put in, and I don’t think he measured. Just put “lots” of cumin, garlic salt and chili powder in while the beans are cooking and you’ll be fine. We served them over yellow rice with garlic (Viva Vegan) and some of Seth’s fresh made salsa/pico di gallo. 

Sunday, March 10

Pasta with Zombie Sauce, Garlic Bread and Salad

Rating: 4.75

So, something really, really, really exciting happened. Seth got me a Vitamix for my birthday… AND LET ME HAVE IT A MONTH EARLY! Since we had a new toy, we decided that the only logical thing to do was to make Zombie sauce. Seth found the sauce recipe a few weeks ago and we really love it. It’s not hard, but it does take a little while to make. It’s worth it though.  It’s just so good. Plus, we got to give the Vitamix her maiden voyage. Seth also made a salad and garlic bread, which were predictably amazing.

Wednesday, March 6

White Rice and Black Beans with Salvadoran Slaw

Rating: 4.5

I may have mentioned that I love Vegan Eats World, right? Well, Seth wanted a basic beans and rice recipe and this one seemed to be the way to go. It’s really pretty simple to make, and as with all of the recipes in VEW, it’s delicious. It’s a definite keeper, put in regular rotation recipe. I wanted to make a simple side dish to go with the rice and beans, but I didn’t want a salad. I settled on the Salvadoran Slaw recipe in Viva Vegan. It’s easy, quick and amazingly good. Seriously. People will have no idea that it took so little work to make it. (Especially if you cheat the way I’ve been doing lately and buy pre-shredded slaw mix… I only do it because I have a hard time using up a whole head of cabbage before it goes bad.)

Sunday, March 3

Blackened Tofu, Creamed Corn and Roasted Broccoli

Rating: 4

It had been a pretty long while since we’d had blackened tofu and I really wanted some. We normally use the recipe from Appetite for Reduction, and while it’s delicious, the coating can be a little bit dry. I found another recipe I wanted to try, so we went with that one. It was really good and just as easy as the AFR recipe. It uses a bit more oil, so it’s not at low fat though. Also, I smoked the tofu first, which I have to say, is my new favorite thing to do with tofu. (My mom got us a stovetop smoker for Christmas and we love it.) I also cut it into 8 slices instead of 4. Corn isn’t in season yet, so I grabbed a bag of frozen and made a batch of creamed corn (this was the AFR recipe). I don’t know what was up with the almond milk I used but the corn came out really sweet. So sweet in fact that I checked the container about 10 times to be sure it was, in fact, unsweetened milk. It was. I checked the cornstarch to be sure it wasn’t powdered sugar. It wasn’t. I’ve never had that happen before, it was so weird. Normally, that recipe turns out perfectly, so I totally blame the milk. I also made a side of roasted broccoli from one of my new favorite books, Vegan Eats World. It’s rather easy to make, and I pretty much just followed the recipe as a guide and used my own seasoning and a lot of garlic. Because, garlic. 

Seth ordered a cake for his mom’s birthday from Dulce and we stopped on our way to Chattanooga to pick it up. And have breakfast. Because, really, you can’t go to a vegan bakery in the morning and not get breakfast. The sandwiches at Dulce are huge and delicious. Seth got an English muffin with vegan egg and bacon, Daiya cheddar and sliced tomato. 

I usually get the English muffin too, but this time I got the biscuit instead. I also had the egg, bacon and Daiya. I also had a huge cup of delicious Earl Grey tea. Everything was fresh, piping hot and yummy. Once we were happily fed, we got the cake and a pack of the cute little vegan candles that they sell there. 

Since we were in Chattanooga at lunchtime we went to Sluggo’s. OK – we planned to get there at lunchtime so we could go to Sluggo’s. We go every time we’re in Chatty. Happily, some friends of ours who live up there were able to meet us for lunch so it was nice to see them too. We love the food there and I actually spent a fair amount of time looking at the menu throughout the week and deciding what I was going to get, which changed as soon as I saw the specials for the day. My plan was the Cheeky Wing Wrap, which is spicy seitan in a wrap with spinach, salsa, carrots and creamy dill. I’m already a huge fan of their creamy dill and get it pretty much every time for my salad. But, as I mentioned, the specials board changed my mind. I decided on the tofu grinder instead. It was their breaded tofu (they also use that on the BBQ sub) on grilled marble rye, with cheezy sauce, lettuce, tomato, and onion. And it was as good as it sounds. I got the platter with comes with a salad and side, and as usual, I got double salad with creamy dill dressing. And a pickle.

Seth got the lentil patty melt platter, which also comes on grilled marble rye. For his side he went with the collards. The sides include mashed potatoes and gravy, pinto beans, pasta salad, chili, soup and so on. The last time we were there they had a pesto mac & cheese special that was amazing – Seth had it and I took a little taste. It was ridiculous how good it was. The salad dressing he got was the tahini goddess dressing. I had that last time and it’s really good too. We were stuffed after that big breakfast and then the huge lunch. 

Beautiful Cake from Dulce

We took Seth’s mom to the Canyon Grill for dinner. And forgot to take pictures. Oh well. Canyon Grill isn’t really what you’d think of when you think vegan food, but they actually do a pretty good job. You won’t find a vegan entrée on the menu, but they have several sides that are suitable and actually really good. The staff can always tell you what has butter, animal stock or a creamy sauce and help you find the vegan stuff. We got the grilled vegetables, crispy fried potatoes, sweet and sour slaw and salads. The grilled red cabbage is also really good (order it without sauce) and the waitress said the crispy yellow squash and fried green tomatoes are also vegan. When we got back home, we gave Seth’s mom her beautiful cake – which she loved. Oh, and it slowed (lightly and only a dusting accumulated) almost the whole time we were on the mountain, which was awesome.

This month’s ATL Vegan Drinks meet-up was at Across the Street Mexican Restaurant. We go to ATS pretty regularly because the food is great and they have a good selection of vegetarian tacos (grilled veggies, tempeh, TVP, fried tofu, etc.) that they will happily make vegan for you. In addition to the usual menu, they also created a special menu just for us. We started off with the salsa trio which came with guac, mango salsa and pico di gallo (they also served their regular yummy salsa). 

There was a new taco on offer for us that I really hope becomes a regular menu item because it was amazing – silver oyster mushroom taco. It was loaded with oyster mushrooms that were dusted in corn meal and lightly fried, fresh raw spinach and spicy cashew cream and it was ridiculously good. ATS, please please please add this to the regular menu. Pretty please. Neither of us ordered the pozole, but there was one on offer that was huge and looked really tasty too. It was vegetable broth, stewed hominy, shredded napa cabbage, sliced radishes, cilantro, jalapenos and avocado cream.

We also ordered two of the other special menu items:
The Chilaquiles – which was mole, with sautéed with tortilla crisps and was served hot with red onion, cilantro and avocado. It was super yummy. You could also add tofu, tempeh or TVP to it.  The other one we got (which we forgot to take a photo of) was El Diablo Verde  - it was ancho chile and orange marinated tofu sautéed with rice noodles and black beans in a spicy cilantro basil verde with cucumber salsa and coconut crema. It was super spicy and really tasty. 

For dessert (which we were too full to eat, but one of our friends had) was a chimichanga made with sautéed and seasoned apples in a giant tortilla that was flah fried. It was huge. We had a little taste. It was amazing. Great job Across the Street! We had a great time and an awesome meal!

Seth made dinner and did a great job – honestly, he’s a much better cook than I am, especially without a recipe. We had some tofu leftover from making the breakfast sandwiches over the weekend, so I cut those into squares as well as I could and made a quick marinade for them  - tamari, white wine (I was out of mirin), garlic, ginger, a little hot chili sauce, a little sweet chili sauce – and put them in the fridge on Tuesday night after I dry-fried them for a bit. He used the leftover marinade as a stir fry sauce which was really tasty. The veggies were the usual suspect – broccoli, bell pepper, carrots, green onion, shallots & garlic. We served it on basmati rice with a side of Ling Ling Brand spring rolls.