More Fall Favorites...

...Just because fall is awesome like that.

How about a super-colorful and uber-tasty main dish salad? Yes, it's the Autumn Root Salad with Warm Maple-Fig Dressing from Veganomicon. I think anything with a Warm Maple-Fig Dressing would taste good, no? It's steamed sweet potato and red potato, sliced baked beets, baby romaine, and...that dressing. Ahhh, that dressing. It's dried figs, garlic, shallots, white wine, maple syrup, salt, Dijon mustard, and white balsamic vinegar. It's simmered on the stoptop and them whipped into submission. It's ambrosial.

I usually top it off with some chopped pecans, but I was out of pecans, so I subbed some chopped hazelnuts. Some plain ol' steamed cauliflower was served on the side.

I also love to bake up some Cranberry Orange Nut Muffins every Thanksgiving. I've used the recipe from Vegan Brunch the last two years and made little mini muffins. This recipe is the bomb-diggity because these muffins pack a flavor punch. Fresh cranberries, fresh orange juice, orange zest, and pecans  all explode in your mouth and say KA-POW! Yeah, they are seriously awesome.

I made 30 mini muffins, and I think I was responsible for eating at least 18 of them. Hey, to the baker belong the spoils, I always say!

Roasted Beet and Cashew Goat Cheez Salad (and Bread and Pancakes)

I don't know what's gotten into me, but I have been on a baking tear this last week or so. I think I've done more baking in the last 7 days than I've done in the last 7 years. No kidding! I've always found baking to be somewhat frustrating in its precision - just the right amount of wet, just the right amount of dry, chemical reactions, humidity, blah blah blah. I've already lost interest just talking about it. But I've been feeling inspired to bake more things to stick in my freezer - waffles, quick breads, cookies, and today - pancakes!

Today's specimen: Pumpkin Pancakes from Vegan Brunch. I've only made these once before, but I still remember it like it was yesterday: warm, fragrant, autumnal flapjacks, topped with a delicious ginger-cranberry sauce. Mmmm.

But no such sauce today. Today's work was just about making pancakes for the freezer. I decided to make a double batch, since it really wasn't much more work to do so. I'm glad I did. If I have to get so many dishes dirty, it may as well be worth it!

Here's the first batch, getting all cozy and warm on the griddler:

They came out delightfully thin and soft.

Once they cooled, I stacked them all up. I just thought it would be fun to make a gigantic stack and pretend I was going to eat it like a giant.

But then I came to my senses and stuck them in a freezer bag. I'll be so glad to pull these out of the freezer whenever I need a quick breakfast or snack for my son! Or me.

Since I opened a gigantic can of canned pumpkin, I still had a whole lot of it left. Fortunately, I knew just what to do with it. It's called Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bread.

But you know what's better than one big loaf of Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bread?

Yeaaaah. Three mini loaves of Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bread. Holla!

I've been making this bread for a couple of years. It's awesome. I've doctored the recipe up a million different ways, and it always comes out great. Today, I made a healthier version, substituting white whole wheat flour, agave syrup, maple syrup, applesauce, and flax "eggs"for the white flour, white sugar, margarine, and egg substitute, respectively. I also used 1/2 cup of chocolate chips and 1/2 cup of chopped pecans instead of 1 full cup of chocolate chips. Normally I do the full cup of chocolate chips, and it is decadently delicious. I decided to show a little restraint today. These babies, too, are going in the freezer. This bread freezes unbelievably well and makes a perfect packable snack for road trips. Or for just eating by yourself, standing in front of your kitchen sink while your son is napping. Ahem.

But even with all this baking, I figured I still needed to make something, you know, respectable and vegetable-y for dinner. I mean, there was pumpkin in the pancakes and the quick bread, but let's be serious.

I had some softball-sized beets hanging out in my crisper drawer, so I thought it would be a perfect night to have a Roast Beet, Goat Cheez, and Spinach Salad from Choosing Raw.

This is easily one of our favorite main-dish salads, if not one of our favorite meals, entirely. My hubby ALWAYS tells me what a nice surprise it is to have this for dinner! There are a few steps involved, but it's really not too bad to put together. The cashew goat cheez is amazing. I don't actually make Gena's version of goat cheez, but I do something similar. I soak some cashews and then food process them along with some miso, lemon juice, salt, water, basil, pepper, agave, and white balsamic vinegar. It's tangy and succulent and super-delish!

Other than that, it's just roasting some beets and whisking together a simple lemon-dijon vinaigrette. Aren't those beets gorgeous? Served over a bed of baby romaine and baby spinach, it's a great summer (or winter) salad. Some raw chopped walnuts add some crunch and earthy flavor.

I'm always looking for ideas for more vegan main-dish salads. What are your favorites?

Baking Bonanza

Yesterday morning, my son and I were puttering around the house, trying to think of something fun to do. Well, at least I was puttering around - my son was contentedly plopped on the living room floor, hoovering some Kashi cereal and watching Curious George. What to do, what to do. Then, I had a flash of inspiration...

"Hey, J...do you want to cook with Mommy....again?"

Hey, I didn't say it was a flash of genius, or creativity, or ingenuity. I mean, it's not like we didn't just cook together a few days ago. But we'd had a lot of fun, and I was feeling ready for our second cooking session. My son happily agreed and dragged a chair over to the kitchen counter.

I was feeling very ambitious. I decided we would tackle not one, not two, but three different recipes. I wanted to make some waffles to freeze for easy breakfasts; some quick bread for easy snacks; and some more healthy cookies, because, well, who doesn't love cookies?!

I knew the waffles would take forever to make, so I decided to start with them. I opened Vegan Brunch to our favorite recipe, Gingerbread Waffles. Spiced with ginger, cinnamon, and cloves, these molasses-sweetened treats are a big hit in my household. Here, get close and take a whiff...

Mmm....gingerbready!

While the waffles were cooking, we started on our next recipe, Ginger-Molasses Bread with Blueberries from 1,000 Vegan Recipes. I guess I was in a gingery-molasses-y kind-of-mood yesterday, I don't know. Anyway, my son was thoroughly perplexed when we made vegan "buttermilk" by mixing soy milk and cider vinegar together. He couldn't understand why his beloved beverage started to look so...curdled. Fortunately, he didn't dwell on this too long. Once I gave him a wooden spoon and a measuring cup loaded with blueberries, he was one happy camper.

But let's face it...while he was happy to be helping make the bread, what he really wanted to do was make the cookies. So, after we got the batter made and put the bread in the oven, it was cookie time.

When it comes to cookies, I don't mess around. I don't bake all that often, but when I do, I want the cookies to be good. I mean, gooooooood. There's no one I trust more for cookie awesomeness than the cookie queen herself, Dreena Burton. Seriously, the woman knows her cookies. Her recipes are very specific in terms of how long to cook, how long to keep them on the cookie sheet after they come out of the oven, and how big to make them. If you follow her directions, you're sure to come out with delicious cookies every time. As a bonus, her cookies are usually loaded with healthy ingredients, like whole-grain flours, natural sweeteners, and superfoods like chia and hemp. In short, they're yummy cookies I feel good about giving my son!

We got to work on making the Super-Charge Me! Cookies from Eat, Drink & Be Vegan. These cookies contain oats, whole-grain flour, coconut, raisins, carob chips, maple syrup, and almond butter. Yum!

Soon after, we had the cookies in the oven, the bread in the toaster oven, and waffles coming off the waffle iron. It smelled heavenly in the kitchen!

Witness our bounty: first, the gingerbread waffles, cooling on the rack:

A close-up of a Super-Charge Me! Cookie:

And more of his little friends:

Finally, the Ginger-Molasses Bread with Blueberries was ready:

By this time, J and I were hungry from all our cooking. He wanted to try some of the bread, so I cut us each a piece and slathered them with some Earth Balance.

That's his Buzz Lightyear plate, BTW. Not mine.

I took a bite, and ZOMG...you know what this reminded me of? Brown bread. That wonderful, mysterious bread-in-a-can that adorned many a meal in my childhood. I can't even think of hot dogs and baked beans without thinking of big slabs of brown bread, fried in butter and then smeared with cream cheese. Mmmmm. This bread had that same delicious dark sweetness and crispy texture, minus the rings that came from being molded into a can. I am totally digging the molasses-and-cornmeal combination. There needs to be more of this in my life. Molasses and cornmeal smoothie, perhaps?

No baking today, though. My hubby and I are running the Rock and Roll Half Marathon in Providence tomorrow, and we spent today getting our gear at the Expo and visiting my parents, who will be watching our son while we run. Wish us luck!

Greek Pizza and Other Weekend Eats

I love the 4th of July, especially when the holiday falls on a Monday. It always means a weekend full of fireworks, food, and fun. We had a great time at our family cookout on Friday night (although, with a 2-year-old, we had to leave before the fireworks began). Yesterday, we began our day with a nice family run (that is, my hubby and I ran and pushed our son in the jogging stroller!) and then drove to LL Bean in the late afternoon/evening just to get out and go somewhere. Since I wasn't sure if there'd be any vegan-friendly restaurants in the area, I packed sandwiches and snacks for us to take with us.

Of course, with the three of us, that means three completely different sandwiches :) I had almond butter, banana, cinnamon, and raisin; hubby had cashew butter, almond butter, cinnamon, raisins, and jam; and my son had sunflower seed butter, cinnamon and jam. At least we all ate the same kind of bread.

I also packed some drinks and some bags of Trader Joe's Lite Kettle Korn. We'd never tried it before, but all three of us loved it!

After church today, I made some Basic Scrambled Tofu and Cornbread Waffles from Vegan Brunch. I added spinach, kalamata olives, red onion, broccoli, and ketchup to my scramble. Along with a cup (or four) of carrot juice, it was a tasty, filling lunch.

For dinner tonight, we wanted to have pizza so I looked in the fridge and pantry to see what I could find. I'd bought some baby spinach earlier in the day, so I thought a Greek pizza might be nice. While my hubby made the dough, I sliced some red onion and tomato and chopped up some spinach and kalamata olives. I layered the dough with some pizza sauce, basil pesto, tomato, spinach, red onion, kalamata olives, and some Daiya vegan mozzarella cheese and baked it on our pizza stone.

I was really happy with how easy this pizza was to make - and tasty, too! My son devoured it, which made his Mommy happy since it was loaded with fresh veggies.

Here's my pizza recipe:

Easy Greek Pizza
Serves 2 hungry adults and 1 hungry toddler

First, place a pizza stone in your oven and preheat to 450 degrees. Then, start making the dough:

Dough:
1 cup white whole wheat flour
1/2 cup whole wheat pastry flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1/4 teaspoon dried basil
1/4 teaspoon dried oregano
2 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 cup water

In a large bowl, mix the flours, baking powder, sea salt, basil, and oregano. Make a well in the center, then add the olive oil and water. Incorporate the liquids and the dry ingredients until combined, then knead dough on a floured surface for 5-7 minutes. Stretch dough into a round shape (keep in mind, since this is a "quick" dough and not a yeasted dough, it doesn't stretch like a normal dough would. Just use your hands and shape it into a circle). Place on a greased metal pizza pan, then place pan on pizza stone. Bake for 5 minutes, then remove from oven and top with pizza ingredients.

Toppings:
1 large vine-ripened tomato, sliced thinly and blotted well with paper towels
1/4-1/3 cup kalamata olives, chopped
2 large handfuls baby spinach, chopped
1/4 of a medium red onion, thinly sliced, then chopped
1 cup Daiya vegan mozzarella
basil pesto, to taste
pizza sauce, to taste

Top pizza as follows: pizza sauce, basil pesto, sliced tomatoes, spinach, red onion, kalamata olives, Daiya mozzarella.

Bake an additional 10 minutes. Slice and serve!

The only thing that would make this perfect is to have some leftover CCK Deep-Dish Cookie Pie for dessert - but alas, it's all gone :( I'm sure I'll be making more very soon...like tomorrow, maybe?

Puttanesca Scramble and Two-Step Southwestern Stew

This weekend was supposed to be sunny and pleasant. This weekend ended up being chilly, gray, and drizzly :( Boo! However, we didn't let it stop us from getting outside. In fact, both my hubby and I thought it would be a perfect time to go kayaking on the pond near our house!

My son is stubborn and independent...just like his Mommy and Daddy! He insisted on handling the paddle by himself quite often during our hour-and-a-half outing. It gave my hubby the opportunity to wave and pose for pictures while my son handled the rowing duties. Sometimes it's hard to believe my son is only 27 months old! We're so happy that he loves being outside and active.

All that unexpected kayaking made me super hungry! I was already starting to think about lunch options before we even got off our kayaks. I knew we didn't have any leftovers from last night, so no luck there. I was craving some tofu or tempeh - something, well, meaty! - after all of that paddling around. By the time we got back to our house, I was a starving, raving lunatic so I grabbed a container of tofu and my copy of Vegan Brunch and looked for the quickest, easiest tofu scramble recipe I could find. I struck gold with the Puttanesca Scramble, which could be made in approximately 15 minutes with mostly pantry ingredients. It has tomatoes, capers, and olives, and it was deliciously salty and succulent. I didn't have quite enough fresh tomatoes, so I subbed in some jarred roasted red peppers. My hubby and I finished off the entire batch in one sitting, along with a side of steamed spinach. It was fabulous and couldn't have been easier to make!

Thankfully, I had already prepared the brown rice and Green Onion-Miso Vinaigrette for last night's dinner, so throwing together the Sushi Roll Edamame Salad from Appetite for Reduction took almost no time at all. And it was really, really great - spinach, shredded carrot, shredded cucumber, sesame seeds, avocado, edamame, and brown rice, drizzled with a tasty dressing. Unfortunately, for the life of me, I cannot locate the pictures I took (??) I'm positive I took pictures. I think they went to lost-photo-land, though :( Sad me. The salad was gorgeous!

I do have pictures of tonight's dinner, though - Two-Step Southwestern Stew from Vegetarian Times, and Grandma's Cornbread Made Vegan from VegWeb. I had already made the cornbread a few weeks ago and stuck it in the freezer, so all I had to do was pull it out and let it thaw out for a few minutes. This cornbread tastes great fresh or frozen, so I often will make extra and freeze it.

This stew takes 15 minutes to make - it's simply some fresh zucchini and onion, along with canned diced tomatoes, hominy, and kidney beans. It's great for those nights when you want something quick and nutritious! My son gobbled up his stew and lots of cornbread, so I'll be making this again :)

Breakfast for Dinner

I suppose the title of this post is a bit of a misnomer. If you've learned anything about me, you know that my breakfasts consist solely of smoothies, fresh juice, and the occasional bowl of oatmeal. That's it. I mean,  I have a smoothie for breakfast every single day - the fresh juices are added on Mondays, and the bowls of oatmeal are added after my smoothie on days when I need a little more sustenance. However, once in a blue moon, I get a craving for some "real" breakfast food - pancakes, waffles, french toast, etc. Even so, I still won't eat this for breakfast - I find it way too heavy in my tummy in the mornings. Rather, I'll make a big breakfast meal and eat it at dinner time, when I'm much more in the mood for something hearty and substantial.

Last night, I whipped up two recipes from Vegan Brunch, Isa Chandra Moskowitz's fourth cookbook and, admittedly, the one I've probably neglected the most. I cook frequently from her Appetite for Reduction and Veganomicon cookbooks; her Moroccan Vegetable Tagine from Vegan with a Vengeance is one of my favorite recipes ever; and her cookies and cupcakes from Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar and Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World never fail to impress my omnivorous friends and family. But Vegan Brunch has definitely not gotten the love it deserves from me, mostly because I don't "cook" breakfast all that often. But I had been thinking about waffles all weekend, and I decided that waffles would be on the menu Sunday night. Hubby enthusiastically supported this decision :)

Since we were getting rather hungry, I asked my hubby if he'd be willing to make the Old-Fashioned Chelsea Waffles while I made the Basic Scrambled Tofu with spinach, red onion, and broccoli. Both dishes required rather close attention, so I was happy to have the extra set of hands (and eyes) on the food.

The tofu scramble was absolutely amazing - easily the best one I've ever had. It was so easy to make and the nooch really added a great flavor to the dish:

I wished I'd taken some pictures of the waffles cooking, or at least a close-up of a freshly made waffle, but you'll have to settle for a picture of my hubby's plate (before he added Earth Balance and maple-flavored agave nectar to his waffles):

Here's my plate**, complete with EB/agave on my waffles, ketchup on my scramble, and some baked garlic fries:

**Plate #1, that is. I went back for more waffles and way more scramble!!

The verdict? HOLY YUM! The waffles had some cornmeal in the batter, which gave them a crispy texture which totally rocked. The tofu scramble was sooooo good, especially when I added the ketchup (BTW I never ate ketchup with my eggs when I was an omni!) The baked fries were an easy way to add some "homefries" without having to do any work. Hubby, toddler, and I all devoured our food. I don't know why I don't make breakfast-for-dinner more often, but I am going to rectify that situation!