I made this dish for my family’s Christmas get together in Chicago last week (though it was just vegetarian for them and not vegan, as I couldn’t find Daiya on short notice Christmas eve). It almost didn’t happen; do you have any idea how hard it is to find lasagna noodles at 4pm on Christmas Eve? We had to go to 2 stores, and I got the very last package on the shelf at store #2 (thank you, Target!) It was well worth the search. This lasagna got thumbs-up reviews from even the meat eaters, and I enjoyed it so much that I made it again at home for New Years.

This recipe makes a 9×13″ dish of lasagna – good for 8 serious servings (which in my case means, a freezer full of lasagna!) For the record, it does freeze and reheat very well. If you plan to go that route, let it cool down a bit then portion it out into freezer-safe containers and freeze. You can also make this a day ahead of time and refrigerate it prior to baking, then toss it in the oven when it’s time to make dinner. Just add 5-10 minutes if you’re starting with cold lasagna.

Without further ado, my favorite lasagna recipe of all times:

BacOs are vegan.

Yeah, BacOs, like, bacon bits – there’s no bacon in them.

(Note: vegan does not equal healthy. They’re made with genetically modified soy and a bunch of chemical crap… but they sure do remind me of my youth, and that tends to lead to some good tasting eats).

I picked up another alien (aka romanesco) cauliflower at the farmers market and was trying to figure out what to do with it. The onset of chilly fall weather has me clamoring for comfort food, so I decided to turn my Christmas Tree Veggie into cheezy bacon cauliflower.

I boiled the romanesco cauliflower for 5 minutes or so, then drained it and combined it with some Daiya cheddar, soymilk, and BacOs.

It was a glorious way to eat my veggies!

Veggie Burger and Cheezy Bacon Romanesco

Paired with a poor-man’s veggie burger (I was out of buns!)

So good.

Discovered via Stephanie, the Little Vegan Baker.

I’m Vegan: Gary Francione from Eric Prescott on Vimeo.

Veggie Sushi

My family’s Easter gathering is tomorrow, and as a vegan (and even as a vegetarian), if I don’t want to starve, I have to bring at least one dish I can eat. It’s all good; I don’t expect anybody to bend over backwards to make sure there’s something for me to eat. This holiday, I decided to try something new: veggie sushi.

I’ve never had sushi before. In fact, I spent the first 36 years of my life misinformed, thinking that “sushi” meant “fish.” (It doesn’t; sushi is actually the rice). What gets wrapped in that rice? Anything you want! Including veggies.

So I got myself a $4 bamboo sushi rolling mat, and set to work.

First, I prepped (way too many) veggies.

Sushi veggies

I had red peppers, sundried tomatoes, avocado slices, green onions, carrots, and cucumber slices. I also had some shiitake mushrooms and steamed asparagus on the side, and a small batch of buffalo tempeh and a small batch of ranch tempeh spread (inspired by PPK’s Spicy Tempeh Rolls).

I got to rolling. It wasn’t as hard as I thought it would be – though the rice is super sticky (keep your hands wet!), and it seems I was over-stuffing my sushi rolls a bit. Still, it all seemed to work out. I need more practice getting the rice to the ends of the nori sheets, though.

This roll was a simple avocado, carrot, and green onion roll.

Rolling up sushi

My 10-pack of nori sheets only had 9 sheets in it! Gypped! That’s OK… since I was over-stuffing the rolls, I only had enough rice for 9 rolls anyway.

9 Uncut Veggie Sushi Rolls

(Please pardon the “well seasoned” cookie sheet. I need new ones). I left some of the ingredients sticking out of the ends, because in the very first episode of the Post Punk Kitchen, Isa did that, and the end pieces looked cool with stuff sticking out. I’m not sure mine will look quite as cool, but can’t blame a girl for trying.

Next, I discovered just how not-sharp my formerly-awesome-sharp-knife is. Not so good for cutting sushi. I cut up one roll and taste tested it (pretty good!), but I’ll cut the rest up tomorrow.

The result: my very first veggie sushi:

The result: veggie sushi, first try

Not so bad, eh?!
I made a couple buffalo tempeh & cucumber rolls, a couple ranch (actually, Sanctuary Dressing) tempeh and avocado rolls, and a variety of mish-mosh veggie rolls.

I feel like something in there probably needed some salt, but maybe that’s where the soy sauce for dipping comes in.

I’m definitely stoked about sushi now! Can’t wait till July for my Vegas trip, where I will be checking out some Vegas sushi.

What’s your favorite sushi filling?

But every time I dug into a cup of yogurt, I thought about the cows.

I went on a day trip to a dairy farm a couple years ago, before I went veg. It was interesting and fun. I saw the birth of a cow, and all of the cow barns, and the milking process. It all looked pretty OK. And that experience is what I’ve used over the past year to paint ignorance over what I know is really happening.

Because when I take my blinders off, I have to ask: what happens to the baby boy calves after they’re born? Why are the cows pregnant all the time? How do they get pregnant? And so on. I know the answers. They aren’t pretty. They’re exactly why I went vegetarian a year ago.

So, why have I made it OK to eat dairy? Because it tastes good?

Essentially, I’ve been choosing to ignore the reality of the matter for my own sensual pleasures.

Not anymore.

This past year spent eating vegetarian has been eye-opening and truly remarkable for me. I really do feel like I am living my own personal truths. It lifts a weight off of my heart that I could not have imagined. I can honor my compassion for animals wholly and without feeling like a hypocrite – that is, except for the cows.

So, to my friends, the cows – I will no longer ignore your anguish. I will not participate in the horrors placed upon you by this country’s factory farming practices. I come in peace.

Yesterday, 1 year after I went vegetarian, I decided to free my mind from the guilt of hurting the cows. March 21, 2011: I am vegan once more.

Being spring break and all, I’ve been goofing around in the kitchen again. I recently added Isa’s “Appetite for Reduction” cookbook to my arsenal, and have been cooking my way through it this week. (Check it out – if only to see the cover of the book. Total take on the old Guns n’ Roses album of a similar title. How cool is that?!)

Tonight, I made Baked Falafel from Appetite for Reduction. I also made Sanctuary Dressing, a cow-friendly ranch-style affair. The result:

Oh. My. Gawd.

Wonderful! Wonderful! Wonderful!

I’m new to the world of falafel. This past December, I was in Las Vegas for a poker tournament with my poker blogger friends. (Wow – never thought my foodie world and poker world would cross!) We were at the Aria poker room, hours and hours into the tournament. I’m not sure I had really expected to last so long in the game, and I was starving famished. On a break between levels, I ran next door to the little food bar to see what I could grab within 10 minutes (as the clock was counting down). The only vegetarian thing on the menu was falafel.

“WTF is falafel?” I asked.

“It’s good – you’ll like it!” CA April told me.

(For the record – falafel is a fried ball or patty of spiced chickpeas, usually served with a tahini-based sauce, often in a pita).

I tried it (served exactly as described above), and it was ridiculous-good. YUM. Apparently, I like Egyptian food. Who knew?

I’ve been yearning for falafel ever since! I even bought a boxed falafel mix, but when I paid closer attention to the ingredient list… yuck. So I was pretty excited to see a baked falafel recipe in Isa’s new cookbook.

This falafel was awesome – and way healthier than the fried variety. Spicy and substantial and yummy. And super easy to make. The recipe claims to make 12 falafel, but it seems my idea of a golf-ball size must be off, because I only got 9 falafel out of mine (3 servings instead of 4). That’s OK – there’s only one of me, anyway. Here’s the nutrition breakdown (based on 3 servings in the entire recipe):

Not bad, eh?

I ate mine over a bed of organic spring greens, about 1/4 of a cucumber, and a handful of sundried tomatoes – smothered in Isa’s Sanctuary ranch-like dressing (which, I am happy to report, is the first homemade dressing I’ve ever made that I actually really liked! And, only 40 calories per 1/4 cup… because really, who uses only 2 tablespoons of dressing?). That’s what I like about Isa. She’s a realist.

While I’m bragging about Isa’s food-smarts, I might as well add that I finally got around to trying her Chickpea Cutlet recipe from Veganomicon. It too was a smashing success, served over some whole wheat penne with her Mom’s Marinara recipe from Appetite for Reduction. The marinara was so simple and so delicious that I can’t figure out why anybody eats the junk from the jars! OK, jarred sauces are convenient – but it took practically no time at all to make this marinara, and it was infinitely more delicious. Real food ftw, again.

My tummy is happy this week!

After some time, I started reading about other non-dairy milks… almond milk, coconut milk, hemp milk. But none have quite as much protein as soy milk, so I relegated them to the category that I tend to avoid – that in which I drink my calories.

A few weeks ago, though, I stumbled upon almond milk once again, and noticed something. The unsweetened variety has only 40 calories per serving (versus approximately 100 in the soy milk I’d been enjoying). Hmm. After considering my weekly nutrient range, I’m nowhere near protein-deficient. All of a sudden, almond milk looked more like a beacon of light – a way to continue to enjoy milk, without extra calories.

I use milk for 2 things: breakfast cereal, and smoothies. Since I also use protein powder with my smoothies, my concerns are solved.

Almond milk, it is! (And, it’s delicious!!)

Dessert recipes!!

Even better, my test of the vegan chocolate pudding is included in the reviews! (I’m the one that was inhaling the cocoa).

Check it out: Just In Time For The Holidays: A Dessert Cookbook Review Extravaganza!

Yummy

And while we’re at it – my fave food blogger Emily posted a vegan White Chocolate Chip Peanut Butter Cookie recipe. *dies*

I made friends with butternut squash this past winter, early into my “try new foods” experiment. This week, I made friends with a dear relative of the butternut squash – the spaghetti squash. And what a perfect name! This squash makes spaghetti! For real!

It makes a great substitute for traditional pasta noodles, and I plan to try it in every noodle dish I’ve ever had! Last night, though, I did a double-dip into the new foods arena: I roasted a spaghetti squash, and topped it with a sauteed mushroom sauce. Pretty brave, methinks. I’ve been terrified of mushrooms pretty much my entire life. Ironically, I think that they taste good – but I still have to avoid thinking about what I’m eating in order to tolerate them.

I got this recipe from Emily at The Front Burner – Spaghetti Squash and Vegan Mushroom Cream Sauce

Now, I’m certain this recipe would work just as well as a traditional non-vegan cream sauce. (In fact, I had to make mine an almost-vegan cream sauce, because the local grocery store didn’t have non-dairy creamer and I didn’t feel like making the 30 minute trek out to Whole Foods, so I had to get the dairy kind – but I did use soy milk as my sauce base).

Here’s what my dinner looked like (you can find many more photos of the process at the original link):

It was delish!

I think what “made” the dish was the garlic and olive oil rub that I did on the spaghetti squash before roasting it. I’ve heard that butter and cinnamon works well too, for a more dessert-style side dish (thanks, Athir!) There really isn’t much to it other than, cut the squash in half, scoop out the guts, rub with seasonings, and roast for an hour or so at 375F. When it’s nearly done, prep your sauce, and voila.

The spaghetti squash is a little crunchier than pasta, but not much. It’s also a little bit sweet (so I can see where it would make a great dessert side). It tasted great with garlic!

I plan to try a marinara/cream sauce mix this evening with the leftovers

I’m getting back to it, though, with the return of the usual fall and winter suspects. I can’t wait to get back into my butternut squash loving mode! While I’m sad to no longer find yummy blueberries and cherries and other amazing fruits at my local farmers’ markets, I’m equally happy to get back into the winter bounties.

As a sort of pot-luck dinner last week, I pulled together some of my recent Whole Foods organic produce finds – namely, a zucchini, a yellow squash, an orange pepper, and a leek.

I chopped them all up…

… sauteed them in a bit of extra virgin olive oil, along with some Italian seasonings and a bit of Garlic Gold nuggets, then added a jar of organic marinara and simmered for a bit.

Add that to some whole wheat pasta and, dinner!

I proceeded to clear out the leftovers, eating this meal every day for most of last week!

It made me wonder: why don’t we always put veggies in our spaghetti? It was delicious, and it definitely bulked up the meal without adding crazy calories (while totally adding a nutritional punch!) I think even non-veggie eaters could enjoy this, because it’s so much like… spaghetti!

And, it was super easy, to boot

I’m certainly no chef, but I have had a blast so far this year learning how to cook. I would have never tried anything like this before 2010. I think a lot of different veggies could work in this dish – just roast or saute or steam whatever you’ve got on hand, and toss it in with your spaghetti sauce! I’m thinking broccoli would be good… or maybe even a spinach spaghetti sauce. Nom!

Look out, world – I may need to create a category for my spaghetti sauce experiments. I love spaghetti in the winter. It’s such a warm, gooey comfort food. One thing I’d like to try this winter is making “noodles” from squash. I just read a post on one of my fave food blogs – The Front Burner – on just this sort of thing!

So, while summer has made its way out, and old man winter will be creeping in, I plan to enjoy the bounties of winter. How about you?