Mango Lassi Ice Cream with Beet Halwa and Crisp Rice-Coconut Laddu

I love, love, love beet halwa -- so I was already thinking of making some from the beets we got from our CSA this week, but when I saw that the latest PPK Chopped/Vegan was a dessert challenge demanding beets as one of the four ingredients . . . I took it as a sign.  

The mystery ingredients were mango, red beets, dried unsweetened coconut, and crisp rice cereal.    I'm a sucker for a scoop of ice cream on top of warm beet halwa, so I made a mango lassi ice cream for the top and a crispy rice and coconut laddu for the bottom.  Here it is:

Not the prettiest picture -- the ice cream was starting to melt from the heat even before I scooped it onto the still-warm halwa -- but I'm just happy to have any picture with my broken camera.

The bottom layer is a coconut and crisp rice laddu.  I know that laddu with puffed rice are delicious, so I subbed crisp rice cereal for the challenge.  The laddu were made from crisp rice cereal and shredded coconut (two of the mystery ingredients), plus ginger, cardamom, cloves, coconut milk, vanilla, and agave nectar.  First you make a syrup over low heat with the milk, agave nectar, and spices  -- then remove from the heat and mix in the dried coconut and rice cereal.  Normally you would then roll the laddu into balls, but I flattened them out into a disc-shape so that they would be a better base for the rest of the sundae.

The middle layer is the beet halwa, made basically the same way as my recipe posted here -- except that I used coconut milk instead of s'milk, left out the cashews, added ginger, and used ground cardamom.  I also toasted a little of the shredded coconut to add to the beet halwa while it was simmering.

The melting top layer is the mango lassi ice cream.  I've been making crazy amounts of ice cream lately, but here's what's in the mango lassi ice cream: mango*, soy creamer, coconut milk, vanilla soy yogurt, tapioca starch, and sugar.  Some of the mango is pureed and mixed in with the rest of the ice cream base, and some is chopped up and mixed into the ice cream for nice little chunks.

In the end, the result was a crispy-crunchy layer, a warm-gooey layer, and a cold-melty-fruity layer.  In addition to the four mystery ingredients, I used the following ingredients: coconut milk, agave nectar, vanilla extract, canola oil, soy creamer, vanilla soy yogurt, tapioca starch, sugar, ground ginger, ground cloves, and ground cardamom.

After taking a few pictures with my broken camera (and hoping that my ice cream sundae would even be in one of them), I suddenly remembered that I was going to get to eat this thing -- how exciting!  Even though I'd been tasting all the parts separately, the combination was somehow different from any of the individual parts -- and in a totally good way.  I managed to secretly eat almost half of it before my daughter caught me and ate the rest.  Ah well.  At least she liked it!

* The challenge called for fresh mango, but I used frozen and thawed mango.  I am embarrassed to tell you how long this mango has been in our freezer, but I'm pretty sure this is the third apartment it's lived in.  Yikes!  Somehow, miraculously, it is not freezer-burned and still tastes just fine.  It's a Chopped/Vegan miracle!

Green Bean French Fries (Roasted Green Beans)

We got the world's biggest bag of green beans from our CSA this past week -- and I had a plan for them! But when I got home from school, P rejected that plan, causing me to scramble at the last minute to come up with something else for dinner. What I finally settled on was roasting up the green beans, tossed with olive oil, salt, and pepper -- plus a little onion powder and garlic powder. It is super-easy to roast green beans; just throw them in the oven at 400° for about 12 minutes, periodically checking on them and shaking the pan around so they don't get crispy just on one side.

We were calling them green bean french fries, because that's basically what it tasted like! P said he would much rather have green bean french fries than the breaded zucchini sticks that are at diners everywhere, though that particular menu change doesn't seem all that likely. I had a hard time getting a good picture of the beans, because this kept happening:

So . . . I guess that's a good thing?

I think these pictures speak for themselves -- the green bean french fries were a hit!

Summer Squash Cakes

Last summer, I made some zucchini cakes -- a vegan version of crab cakes, the way I remember them from my childhood when we would head to the shore every summer. I've been a vegetarian for sixteen years now, but still -- in the summer, I think about crab cakes.

When we got our first summer squash of the season from our CSA this week, I instantly knew that it was time for some vegan crab cakes. Technically, these are squash cakes and not zucchini cakes -- since they are made with a green summer squash that isn't zucchini -- but it is basically the same thing.

These cakes might not taste exactly like crab cakes, but they definitely serve the role -- flaky, moist, buttery, and extra-delicious. The kelp gives it that sea flavor -- with almost a fishiness to it -- while the Old Bay calls on a classic crab cake seasoning.

The only time-consuming part of this recipe is grating the squash, but I took care of that as soon as I woke up this morning -- so at dinner time, it was a simple matter of throwing everything together in a bowl and then pan-frying. This recipe easily scales up or down, depending on how much squash you have -- but my one small green squash yielded the cup and a half of grated squash called for in the recipe. This amount of squash produced four big squash cakes -- plus one small one for Zelda.

Zucchini or Summer Squash Cakes

• 1 1/2 c grated squash or zucchini, patted dry
• 4 tbsp olive oil
• 1 c plain bread crumbs
• 1/2 tsp Old Bay seasoning
• 1 tsp kelp granules (I use this, but really any kind of powdered/granulated seaweed works)
• 2 tbsp flour
• oil for pan frying

Mix together the squash, olive oil, bread crumbs, Old Bay, and kelp in a bowl. Form into patties, then dredge in the flour on both sides. Drizzle some oil into a pan and let it heat up over a medium-high flame. Once the oil is hot, pan fry about three to five minutes per side, until it turns a lovely golden brown.

Kale Pesto

The other day, as I stared at a huge bunch of kale from our CSA, a thought occurred to me. I love basil pesto; I've heard of spinach pesto; why not kale pesto? We had two small sprigs of basil this week, so they were recruited -- along with said huge bunch of kale -- into pesto!

There wasn't anything fancy about the recipe itself -- it was a very standard pesto recipe, but with kale stepping in for the bulk of the greenery. It's extremely easy to make pesto; just put everything in the food processor and process the food until it has a nice smooth texture. This pesto was made of pine nuts, rice-parmesan, olive oil, garlic, kale -- with the stems removed and coarsely chopped, basil leaves, and a little salt and pepper.

It took just as long to wash and chop the kale, assemble the other ingredients, and prepare the pesto in the food processor as it took for my pot of water to boil and the pasta to cook. Quick and easy! And, to make it even easier next time, this recipe made three times as much pesto as I needed for tonight's dinner -- so I froze two individual servings of pesto for the next couple of times!

As easy as tonight's dinner was, I didn't have the energy even for this much work last night after I got back from doing work at school. I present you with a bonus photo of last night's dinner -- roasted CSA broccoli and farmers' market potatoes plus salt, onion powder, garlic powder, and cayenne pepper.

I love roasting -- you just throw your vegetables in the oven and forget about them, then -- BAM! -- dinner's ready! Despite my intense love for both roasting and broccoli, I'd actually never had roasted broccoli before -- but this will certainly not be the last time. Roasting the broccoli gave it a fantastically nutty flavor; I may have just found my new favorite way to prepare my favorite vegetable.

Indian Potato-n-Kale Stuffed Peppers

We got some tasty-looking green bell peppers at the farmers' market last week, but I wasn't sure what to do with them -- maybe stuffed peppers? -- and then inspiration struck. With some red-skin potatoes (also from the farmers' market) and a bunch of kale (from our CSA), I would make an Indian-flavored, spicy mashed potato and sauteed kale mixture to stuff the peppers with.

P chopped up the kale nice and small so that there would not be big chunks mixed in with the smoother texture of the potato, while I chopped and boiled the potatoes until they were soft enough to mash and got the peppers ready -- cutting off the tops and scooping out the seeds inside. I sauteed the kale in a bit of olive oil and some Indian spices, including the hot curry paste I use for just about everything. Once the kale was cooked and the potatoes were mashed, I mixed it all up together -- it already tasted delicious, but I managed to get (most of) the mixture into the peppers anyway.

Once stuffed, I stuck the peppers in the oven at 375 for about 20 minutes, until the peppers were nice and soft -- but not too soft! The texture of the peppers was perfectly balanced between tenderness and crispness, and the top of the stuffing peeking out the top got delightfully crunchy from being uncovered in the oven. Fabulous!

We have one pepper left, and you can bet that we are going to be fighting over it for lunch tomorrow!

Grilled Kale

Last weekend, we barbecued with my dad -- and he had the idea to grill some kale along with our corn and veggie burgers. I have to admit, I was a little skeptical at first -- but he talked me into it. And I'm so glad he did! The kale turned out amazing.

It had that delicious smokiness from the grill, and was crisp on the edges while the rest of it was still nice and soft. We made sure not to cook it too long, so the kale wasn't bitter -- and it turned out with a perfectly rich, smoky flavor.

The preparation was simple -- we tossed everything in some olive oil, salt and pepper, and a little bit of cayenne pepper. First, we grilled some CSA carrots and spring onions with the chopped up pieces of kale stem; once those started to get nice and soft, I threw in the leafy part of the kale. I made sure to keep stirring up the veggies so that the kale didn't get charred on one side, but the whole cooking process only took about ten minutes.

You can see our farmers' market corn and black bean burgers in the background, but the grilled kale was definitely the star of this meal! Grilled kale is definitely a must for our future barbecues!

Asian Chik'n Salad with Scallion Pancake

Earlier this week, I made these delicious salads as part of my dad's birthday-father's day celebration. Having a nice big salad for dinner is pretty much his favorite thing, so I made these -- with some fabulous salad greens from the CSA, tangerine vinaigrette, and veggie chicken (Trader Joe's chicken-less strips -- my dad's favorite), garnished with sesame seeds. The chik'n was cooked up with some plum sauce, red pepper flakes, ginger, garlic, and a little peanut oil.

As you can see from the picture, we also had some scallion pancakes with our salad -- made from the last of the spring onions from our CSA and whole wheat pastry flour. Overall, a tasty, satisfying, light summer meal -- and, most importantly, my dad loved it!

Curried Chick Peas & Kale on Potato Pancakes

One of our classic family favorites is curried chick peas and some kind of green vegetable -- with some potatoes thrown in if I have them. I've posted about it before, because we really do have it all the time! Last night, however, I made a slight variation on the classic garbanzo'n'green extravaganza.

The chick peas and chard were prepared as usual, but -- instead of having potatoes as part of the curried mixture -- it was served on top of potato pancakes. It was delicious -- and a fun twist on one of our standard dishes!

Despite the fact that the chick peas were quite spicy, Zelda ate a million of them -- and refused to eat any of the potato pancake. In the background, you can see a glass of homemade limeade that we had with the meal. Zelda was watching Yo Gabba Gabba -- and Plex taught us how to make lemonade (squeeze lemons, add water, add honey, stir). We didn't have any lemons, but we did have a couple of limes -- so we made our limeade with agave nectar. Yum!

Thai Enchiladas with Kale, Black Beans, and Sweet Potato

At long last, our CSA has started up again! This week, we got kale, spinach, lettuce, arugala, mustard greens, spring onions, sage, lemon balm, and radishes.

We had our official first CSA meal of the season last night at my dad's house, after picking up the vegetables. Last night I made a sweet and spicy stirfry with all of the mustard greens and some veggie chicken that my dad had (Trader Joe's chicken-less strips); the sauce was made from plum sauce, peanut oil, red pepper flakes, garlic, and some spices. We ate the stirfry over brown rice, garnished with some sesame seeds.

Alas, I don't have a picture of last night's meal (though I should have one whenever my dad e-mails it to me) -- so let's talk about tonight's meal, the second official meal of the season!

Tonight, we had thai enchiladas filled with kale, black beans, and sweet potato -- and they were awesome. The filling was creamy and delicious, and the various flavors blended really well to make an amazing meal. I considered keeping the secret of this complicated-sounding recipe classified -- but the best part of this super-tasty meal was how easy it was to throw together. This comes with a confession that I didn't make my enchilada sauce or most of this recipe from scratch; no, there was a very crucial assist from my friend carton of soup.

In our pantry, we had a box of Pacific Foods Thai Sweet Potato Soup. I strained out the liquid to be the base of the sauce and left the chunky sweet potato bits for filling. I added a can of drained black beans to the mostly sweet potato mixture, then added kale that had been chopped and sauteed.

The liquid from the soup is pretty thick to start, but needs a little bit of thickening to be really good as an enchilada sauce. I think coconut flour is a good thickener to use, since there is already coconut in the soup -- but really, any thickener will do. Whisk in a little bit of your thickener of choice until it is smooth, then heat gently until the sauce thickens up enough to pour over the enchiladas.

We only had small, taco-sized corn tortillas -- so these were really mini enchiladas. One container of soup and half of our part of the kale yielded nine small enchiladas. You'll want to drizzle a little bit of oil and sauce on the bottom of the baking pan so that the tortillas don't stick or get hard on the bottom. Roll up the tortillas with the filling and lay them in the baking pan; when they are all assembled and comfortably snuggled together into the pan, pour the sauce evenly over all of the enchiladas. Bake at 350 for 30 minutes, covered in tin foil so your tortillas don't dry out.

When there was about five minutes left, I decided on a whim to sprinkle a bit of soy cheddar over the tops of the enchiladas to give them some cheeziness -- but that is definitely optional. The darker sauce on top of the cheese is a little bit of extra sauce drizzled over the top. You can see a bit of kale and black beans peeking out shyly at the end of the tortillas. Overall, not the most photogenic creation, but definitely super yummy -- and easy!

Squash Nuggets

We went to a potluck last night and I've been feeling in the autumn spirit as I think about what to make for Thanksgiving next week, so I wanted to bring some very seasonal, autumn-y dishes. I decided to make pumpkin spice cupcakes with cinnamon creamcheese frosting, and these little guys -- squash nuggets.

I was thinking about the super-delicious zucchini cakes I made this summer and wanted to make something in that family, where the vegetable is transformed into the centerpiece of the meal instead of a side. The nuggets have a nice chewy texture from the vital wheat gluten, more like a meat analog than like a pure vegetable. We ate ours dipped in mustard, but they were also good plain.

Really any spice blend would work with these little guys! Next time, I will probably try cinnamon, curry powder, coriander, and ginger. Another blend that would work great with the squash is rosemary, thyme, basil, oregano, and garlic. This recipe is definitely open to lots of different flavorings, so you can get creative with the spices!

Squash Nuggets

makes two dozen nuggets or six cutlets

• 1 1/2 c roasted squash, mashed (you can also use canned pumpkin)
• 1 c vital wheat gluten
• 1/2 c bread crumbs
• 1/2 tsp thyme
• 1/2 tsp sage
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp garlic powder
• 1/4 tsp marjoram

Combine ingredients in a bowl and knead until strings start to appear. Form the dough into small balls about 1 inch in diameter, then flatten them out into nugget shape and place nuggets on a lightly oiled baking sheet. Brush the tops of the nuggets with olive oil, and bake at 350 for 20 minutes -- flipping the nuggets halfway through.

I roasted three small winter squashes left from our CSA -- one delicata, one acorn, and one butternut -- but really any kind of winter squash (including pumpkin!) would work. To roast the squashes, I cut them in half and placed them on a lightly greased baking sheet, then threw them in the oven at 400° for about 45 minutes. If you don't want to roast them yourself, canned pumpkin or squash puree would definitely work in place of the roasted squash. My three squashes yielded a cup and a half of mashed squash, but if you end up with more or less squash after roasting, this recipe could be scaled up or down accordingly.

Roasting the squash takes the longest amount of time; the rest of the recipe comes together very quickly and easily. Since you don't actually have to be there watching the squash while it roasts (in fact, I left P with the roasting squash while Zelda & I went to the store to pick up some ingredients for the cupcakes!), it is not a very time-consuming recipe. Definitely easy enough -- and tasty enough! -- to be worth making again!

Update: These nuggets have become a family favorite!  You can either make a whole bunch of nuggets or make them into larger cutlets.  I normally make some big cutlets for the grown-ups and nuggets for Zelda.

Zucchini Bread Contest

Our CSA holds an annual zucchini bread (well, summer squash baked good) contest -- but I've always been afraid to enter. People always have preconceived notions about vegan baked goods, and I didn't really feel like dealing with it. But! This year, I put on my big girl pants and entered. I submitted two things -- chocolate summer squash bread and lemon zucchini muffins. Unfortunately, I forgot to take pictures. (Sorry!) Well, the results are in . . . and those lemon zucchini muffins were apparently a hit!

Here's what I won! A container of fresh raspberries and blackberries, and a tote bag with the name of our CSA on it. The berries were super delicious. Hooray for lemon zucchini muffins!

Falafel and Cucumber-Tomato Salad

Last night, I made a cucumber-tomato salad and some falafel for dinner. We had a bunch of cucumbers and more tomatoes than you could shake a stick at -- so what better way to use some of those veggies up? And who doesn't love falafel?


For the cucumber-tomato salad, I used a bunch of CSA veggies: three small cucumbers (probably about two average sized cucumbers), one and a half giant tomatoes, and two small onions. The onions were chopped up and lightly cooked with some garlic before mixing with the other chopped veggies, for the same reasons as the last time I made a cucumber salad.

Since there was more of a middle eastern vibe to this meal, I wanted a hint of mint in the salad -- but I had no fresh mint. Instead, I made a small cup of mint tea and used that as the liquid when I cooked up the onions and garlic, letting it completely cook in. The veggies were tossed with a bit of lemon juice, a bit of lime juice, and a bit of olive oil -- then they just sat together in the refrigerator, letting their flavors mingle until it was ready to be served!

Falafel is another one of those quick and easy meals. I baked them this time, since we were bringing dinner over to the home of our friends who are moving out -- and their entire apartment is in boxes. Much easier to throw a tray in the oven than make a mess with the stove! Ahead of time, I mixed two cans of chick peas with few splashes of lemon juice and a variety of spices -- some cayenne pepper, onion powder, garlic powder, turmeric, and salt; this mixture was mashed all together with a fork, then I added a bit of chickpea flour to help bind the falafel balls together.

I made fourteen moderately-sized falafel balls in total, brushing them with a bit of olive oil on both sides before putting them in the oven. I had never baked falafel before, so I cooked them for the first 10 minutes on 350 before realizing the oven needed to be much hotter if I wanted the falafel to get crispy; the last 25 minutes were cooked at 400. Halfway through the baking time, I flipped the falafel over and made sure they still had a bit of oil brushed over them to keep from drying out.

They were delicious! The whole meal is easy to make -- and you can make it all ahead, heating up the falafel when you're ready to eat. The warm falafel coupled with the cold salad is a really great contrast, and the spices of the falafel are balanced nicely by the crisp coolness of the vegetables in the salad. Definitely a great meal for a summer night!

Vegan Omelette with Jalapenos, Potatoes, & Pepper Jack 'Cheese'

I am closing in on the perfect vegan omelette. I swear. I'm not quite there yet, but it is slow and steady progress from the last attempt at a vegan omelette. Last time, the outcome was a little too fluffy; this time, not quite fluffy enough. The taste is there -- the kala namak and chickpea flour combination are definitely where it's at! --, but the texture needs to be just right.

It's getting close though; so close I can almost taste it! I am definitely going to make another attempt this week, so hopefully I'll have an actual factual recipe to post soon instead of being a tease with only pictures.


Pretty though, isn't it? It's stuffed with home fried potatoes, a red jalepeno, a green jalepeno, and pepper jack style almond cheese. The home fries were cooked with garlic powder, onion powder, cayenne pepper, and a little sea salt; the cayenne pepper gave them a nice little kick! The red jalepeno was nice and sweet, with just a hint of spice to it; the green jalepeno lacked that sweetness but was a bit hotter than the red, giving a different layer of heat to the overall flavor. Finally, the almond cheese bound all of the filling together and gave the oozy cheesiness that I look for in an omelette. Totally delicious.


(Full disclosure: I probably wouldn't have posted another recipeless post about the vegan omelette, but I am compensating for the fact that I forgot to take a picture of a meal I wanted to post earlier this week! The missing meal was a lime basil pesto -- yummy pesto goodness with a hint of citrus! -- over rotini. If we get more basil at the CSA this week, I will try again! Pinky swear!)

Mexican Cucumber Salad

A couple of days ago, I made a big batch of black beans to use in various recipes; once the beans are cooked instead of dry, they need to get eaten -- so I was looking for a way to use the beans with some of the vegetables from this week's share. We had a nice cucumber, so I decided to make a cucumber salad with a Mexican-style twist.


Neither P nor I are fans of the bite that raw onions have, so I cooked the onions a bit with the beans to mellow their flavor a little. Other than that, this meal was basically of the chop'n'toss variety; chop up the ingredients and throw them all together in a bowl. Extremely easy, though it does take a little bit of time, since I wanted to let all the flavors mingle together in the refrigerator for awhile before serving.

It was the perfect meal for a hot night: cool and fresh, with a delightful tang from the lime juice. P ate his with a few warmed corn tortillas, but I ate mine just as is. It would surely be delicious with the addition of a diced avocado -- or a few dashes of hot sauce, if you're into that!

Mexican Cucumber Salad

• 2 cups black beans
• 1 onion, diced
• 1 cucumber, diced
• 2-3 small tomatoes, diced
• 1-2 hot peppers, minced
• 4 tbsp lime juice (or the juice of two limes)
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 2 tbsp fresh cilantro
  
• 2 tsp cumin
• 2 tsp chili powder
• 1 tsp garlic powder
• salt and pepper, to taste

Optionally, you can first cook up the onions with a bit of water to mellow their flavor; I cooked them with the beans, because the beans needed to cook a tad longer -- and then let the whole thing cool in the refrigerator while I chopped the rest of the vegetables.

In either case, combine lime juice through salt and pepper in a bowl and mix well; add the vegetables and beans to the mixture and stir to evenly distribute the liquid. Refrigerate about half an hour, to allow the juices to mingle. More juice should form as the salad sits, so be sure to mix the entire salad again before serving.

Curried Chick Peas, Chard, & Potatoes

One of our family favorites -- you know, the standard meals that we have a million times a year, the one you whip up quickly when you have no time to cook -- is curried chick peas and green peas. Sometimes I throw potatoes in there too, or chik'n pieces . . . however the mood strikes that particular night. Well, we didn't have any peas in our CSA this week, but we did have a bunch of delicious-looking chard -- and some potatoes from the farmers' market. The chard looked super fresh and awesome, and was just begging to be devoured -- so I decided to mix up the ol'favorite with some chard.


The potatoes get diced and cooked first, in a little olive oil and a good-sized amount of curry paste. While P and I use a fairly hot curry paste, you can use whatever level of spice fits your personal taste. After sauteeing a little bit so the outsides of the potatoes are heading down the road into crispy territory (and are well-covered in curry paste), I put the lid on the pan to steam the potatoes for a bit so they can get nice and soft. While the potatoes are cooking, I wash and chop the chard, then open a can of chick peas. The chick peas -- and any stem bits of chard -- get added to the potatoes first, stirred up so they get their own nice thin coating of curry paste. Finally, the leafy chard gets added last, since it doesn't need to cook very long before serving. The whole meal comes together quickly, and is one of my favorites!

Kalesanga

Tonight I made a giant tray of kale lasagna -- which I affectionally refer to as kalesagna. Since I made it with rice noodles, the whole thing was also gluten-free . . . though we ruined the effect by having slices of farmers' market whole wheat bread on the side.

I made my first kalesagna right after Aunt Karen died, to bring up with us when we went to be with the family; it felt Karen-y to me when I made it -- so it seemed particularly appropriate to make a kalesagna as part of my season of Karen.

The lasagna is made up of layers of tomato sauce, sauteed kale, and tofu ricotta; I had a bag of Daiya mozzarella cheese still hanging out in our fridge from before, so I used that for the top of the kalesagna.

The tofu ricotta I always make is based on the ppk's recipe, though I have made it so often now that I never look at the recipe or measure anything; in fact, when I just now looked up the recipe, I was a bit surprised to see it called for salt. My variant is a bit different from that recipe, but it is essentially the same thing. I've seen lots of vegan ricotta recipes out there, but this one is definitely the best. Even if I don't exactly follow it anymore, it's still definitely the best starting point for making your own ricotta. Plus the recipe is super simple, and throws together quickly -- always a bonus.

July in a Nutshell

Life has gotten busy, hence I haven't posted anything in almost three weeks; I've still been following the plan, it's just that the time for documentation has gotten scarce.  My summer class started, plus we had some car-related adventures leaving us stranded in Massachusetts for a few days.  Fun!

While I didn't document everything over the past three weeks by any stretch of the imagination, I do have a few highlights here to share -- from those few times when I actually remembered to bust out a camera!

Pinto Bean Burgers

I made these pinto bean burgers for the fourth of July, and we grilled them up at our friends' house.  Sarah, the lady of the house, also made some killer potato salad -- also pictured on the plate!  Sarah & Will had slices of soy cheese at their house, as well as some tomato and lettuce from the farmers' market.  The burgers themselves were an improvement on the black bean burger I'd made previously; much sturdier for grilling while being a bit lazier of a recipe.

• 2 15 oz. cans of refried pinto beans
• 1/3 c. whole wheat flour
• 2/3 c. vital wheat gluten
• 1/3 c. cornmeal
• 1/3 c. salsa
• 2 tsp cumin
• 2 tsp cayenne pepper (optional, to taste)
• 1 tsp garlic powder
• 1 tsp salt

Combine all ingredients in a bowl until well mixed; if the mixture is too liquidy, add more flour or cornmeal as needed.  Divide into eight balls on a plate and refrigerate for at least an hour.

After cooling, flatten the balls into patties and grill at least five minutes per side until well-cooked.  Extra burgers can be placed between wax paper, wrapped together, and frozen until needed.

Vegetable and Gardein Kebabs

Again, at Sarah and Will's house, we made our first ever kebabs.  Although we all like kebabs, none of us had ever made them ourselves.  The peppers and tomatoes were from the farmers' market and the onions were from our CSA; the fake meat is gardein.

Sarah had bought wooden skewers to make s'mores, but she had plenty of extra skewers for the kebabs!  This picture is pre-grilling, though the kebabs looked a bit different after cooking.  Everything was supertasty, but the most notable thing for me was how deliciously sweet the onions were.  I was ambivalent about grilled onions prior to our kebab experience, but now I am a devoted fan of the grilled onion.  Mmm.

Swiss Chard Quiche

The swiss chard quiche was so good in principle, and such a disaster in practice.  The crust puffed up in all the wrong places, the chard was not soft enough . . . basically, this was a lesson in what not to do for quiche!  I used the crust recipe from Vegan Brunch and the tofu filling recipe from the Ultimate Uncheese Cookbook.  The idea of the quiche was a good one though, and I'm not giving up on it!  I will defeat the quiche by the end of this summer, mark my words.

We have stopped getting greens from the CSA though, so I'll have to figure out another vegetable that is good to quicheify.  More on the quiche saga as it unfolds!

The last two photos are not actually foods I prepared -- though they are foods I enjoyed!

Blueberry Pie

This is my friend Sarah's famous blueberry pie.  It is as good as it looks . . . and maybe even better.  She makes it every fourth of July, with fresh blueberries from the farmers' market.  Did I mention that it is super good?  I'm not normally a huge fan of blueberry pie, but I absolutely make an exception for this deliciousness.  In fact, even the picture is making me crave it.  I don't remember her exact recipe, but I know it involves blueberries and lemon juice and no sugar.  And some kind of magic.  Yum.

Moroccan Sweet Potato Stew

Our friend Jimmy made this and brought it over to our house in early July.  His mother cut the recipe out of a magazine for him -- and we both thought it sounded fabulous.  Being the wonderful guy that he is, Jimmy whipped up a batch and brought it over to share with me and P.  It was super delightful, and we ate it over plain couscous.  Here's the recipe!

• 2 tsp olive oil
• 1 medium yellow onion, chopped
• 3 cloves garlic, crushed with press
• 1 1/2 tsp curry powder
• 1 1/2 tsp ground cumin
• 1/4 tsp ground allspice
• 1 14.5 oz can diced tomatoes
• 1 3/4 c. vegetable broth
• 1 c chick peas
• 1 large (about 16 oz) sweet potato, peeled and cut into 3/4-inch chunks
• 2 small (about 6 oz each) zucchini, cut into 3/4-inch chunks
• 1 c whole-grain couscous
• 1/4 c loosely packed fresh mint leaves, chopped

In a nonstick 12-inch skillet, heat oil over medium heat.  Add onion and cook 8 to 10 minutes or until tender and lightly browned, stirring occasionally.  Stir in garlic, curry powder, cumin, and allspice; cook 30 seconds.

Add tomatoes, broth, chick peas, and sweet potato; cover and heat to boiling over medium-high heat.  Reduce heat to medium; cover and cook 10 minutes.  Stir in zucchini and cook, covered, 10 minutes or until vegetables are tender.

Meanwhile, prepare couscous according to package directions.  Stir mint into stew.  Serve stew over couscous.

Rice Noodles with Tofu and Broccoli in Peanut Sauce

I had entirely forgotten about the two small heads of broccoli that we got this week from the CSA, until P reminded me on the way home from class. Broccoli is my very favorite vegetable, so I was super excited about all the dinner prospects before me. I decided that I wanted something relatively quick and easy, since I was tired from teaching for four hours. But I also wanted something tasty that would use up our sweet, sweet broccoli.

Ultimately, I decided to make the first meal I ever made for P, back when we first started dating. It's also one of my favorite meals, though I don't make it all that often for some reason. On top of all that, rice noodles cook super quick -- so it would all assemble pretty quickly.

After pressing the tofu, it was cubed and fried in peanut oil until the sides were a nice crispy golden brown. The broccoli got thrown in with the tofu once it had browned, then everything was tossed with the cooked rice noodles and the peanut sauce. Quick, easy, tasty!

Zucchini Cakes

Earlier this week, I saw a recipe online for "crab" cakes made from zucchini rather than . . . y'know, crab. The recipe was vegetarian, but not vegan -- and I was lacking a couple of the key ingredients (like Old Bay seasoning). So I winged it a bit.

The results were delicious. Looking at the picture now, I am making myself hungry again. I can see why the recipe called them crab cakes, even though the taste isn't the same; the texture is very crab cake-like. I had already shredded the zucchini and summer squash the same night I made the Chocolate Summer Squash Bread, so there was hardly any prep work involved; the cakes made a fast and tasty meal before I went off to teach class.

After class, we picked up some Old Bay seasoning at the store; I'm going to definitely make these again once we get another batch of squash (which will undoubtedly be this week). I will try them with the Old Bay and then post a definitive recipe here. For now, the picture is all I have to offer.

(Update: finished recipe for vegan crab cakes now available!)

Chocolate Summer Squash Bread

With the exception of the pancakes we had last weekend, I haven't made any breakfasty foods so far. And I really like breakfast, so that needed to change. Last night, I made two loaves of chocolate summer squash bread -- one to leave with my dad and brother and one to bring home for me and P.

The idea for the bread came from here, but I made a fair number of changes to it. I would have made slightly different changes in my own kitchen, but I was at my dad's house so I had to work with what he had. My modifications left out the eggs, oil, and sugar -- and added a tsp of baking powder and a mashed up banana. I also used a 10 oz bag of grain-sweetened chocolate chips in place of all of the chocolate in the recipe. I was at first planning to use the same quantity of chocolate as the original called for, but that left only a few chips in the bag . . . so I tossed the rest in. I originally bought the grain-sweetened chocolate for a recipe I planned to make for Karen's memorial, from a macrobiotic dessert cookbook called Love, Eric. I ended up making my own recipe of ice cream instead, which meant I had this chocolate around to use up! I also added an extra cup of flour at the end, because the batter looked much too liquidy -- I'm not sure if I would do that again in the future, but the squash I used was very juicy.

We had slices of the chocolate bread for breakfast this morning -- actually, a few pieces disappeared even before this picture was taken! The bread was dense and fudgey; maybe without the extra flour it would've been a bit lighter. The density wasn't a bad thing though! The bread was sweet but not too sweet -- perfect for breakfast -- and definitely very chocolatey.

I will absolutely plan to make this bread again with more of the summer squash we get; the modifications will be a bit different at home though, since I won't have bananas but will have access to other potential egg substitutes.