Another yummy tofu dish

Tonight I made a tofu recipe I found on VegWeb for Lemon Tofu. I didn't have the capers the recipe calls for, but oh well. The nutritional yeast/lemon combo must have been upped the tangy factor. I can only say the flavor was very interesting and very good. With it, I had the last of my sauteed pea pods and a baked potato. I'm going to make another Portobello Pot Pie either tonight or tomorrow. I made the dough when I got home, and it's chilling in my fridge.

My boyfriend ate the last of my bulgur pilaf (sob), so I'm going to have to make more of that or another bulgur pilaf. He also liked the Lemon Gem cupcakes. I found a lemon-poppyseed cookie recipe that might be good for the rest of the lemon icing. Or I guess I can try to make the lemon cupcakes again. I absolutely have to do more baking, but the local indy grocery was practically out of bulk turbinado sugar. I'm going to have to go back tomorrow to see if they've restocked. I also found a supplier for black cocoa powder. I found a recipe that calls for it, and while it would probably work with ordinary cocoa powder, it can't hurt to have a richer, darker cocoa flavor.

Now, if you really like chocolate, you absolutely must try Clif Nectar Bar Dark Chocolate and Walnut flavor. It's pretty much dates, walnuts, and chocolate. I did not see any added sugar. It's rich and fudgy and it's a good thing I was sitting down when I was eating it; that's how good it was. I absolutely have to get more of their bars because they're a fabulous, tasty snack when I'm working. If you buy nutrition or food bars, make sure they have as many whole ingredients as possible and mininal artificial or junky ingredients. Bars such as Clif and Larabar are pretty much only fruit, nuts, and sometimes spices. Larabar is all raw; Clif Nectar are mostly raw, but some have roasted nuts. They don't replace a meal, but they do work as a snack or when you're in a place that doesn't get "vegan."

I have a confession

I absolutely love kitchen and home supply stores like Linens N' Things and Bed Bath & Beyond. I avoid most department stores like the plague since so many sell fur in the form of coats, fur-trimmed clothing, and trinkets. I also toss conventional wisdom on its head in that I would love to receive kitchen gadgets as a gift. Well, I'd like a larger kitchen, but I make do with what I've got. There are days I feel really domestic (which is really a weird form of PMS kicking in and that feeling should end in a week or so) and I want to be a vegan Rachael Ray and feed people delicious cruelty-free food. On TV. I don't want to be Martha because I'm just not into the odd crafts for decorating. I mean, I make my own jewelry, but that's about it.

Anyway, in the Sunday paper, there was a coupon for a BB&B that just opened up in the Chinatown neighborhood, which is rapidly becoming a tourist trap of chain restaurants and stores mixed in with crummy little restaurants. After I got off the bus and was walking toward the store, the stench of bad Chinese food hung in the air. I had a bit of fun in the store, got a new 1-quart pot (for cooking sauces and melting chocolate), a bamboo cutting board for rolling out dough and maybe cutting veggies, and a few squirt bottles for when I make condiments. I figure it will also be good for icing cupcakes and cookies. I was all but itching to get another 9-inch cake pan and a springform pan, but that will have to wait. I store my baking pans in the oven when I'm not using it and put it on the bed when I am, but I still have room for more stuff. Hee hee.

Some people say get the stuff at thrift stores, but I would rather buy stuff that has never touched meat or dairy and never will. Granted, some of the stuff I had before has, but that's a sunk cost, and I'm not tossing my big knife because it was once used to cut flesh. I waited until my old cutting board shattered before getting a new one (a small plastic one). I use one or two old pans. But if I need something I don't have, I'd rather get something that will only touch plant products. I'm weird that way.

My mouth's all tingly

It was an absolutely beautiful day today. It was a tad chilly, but there was no sign that a week ago, everything was softly coated with snow. The air was what is called "bracing" or "crisp" and it was wonderful being outside. I needed to get a few things from the grocery store, and since the local market only sells them in bulk, I ended up walking to the Whole Foods and added some more herbs and spices to my drawer, some yams to add to my dinner for tonight, and a few odds and ends.

The first thing I made were Lemon Gem Cupcakes from Vegan With a Vengeance. They didn't turn out so pretty, but they sure tasted good. I think I need to get new baking soda; that would have helped make the cupcakes fluffier. I have some leftover lemon icing, and I think I'll try to find a shortbread recipe and frost the cookies with the lemon icing.

For dinner, I made Jerk Seitan from VwaV (but the seitan recipe was from La Dolce Vegan!), Balsamic Yams adapted from The Garden of Vegan and a salad adapted from an issue of VegNews. I often buy precut, prewashed lettuce because even though it's expensive, it makes it easy to make a salad. The nice thing about the little plastic containers is I can keep the salad right in them. When I tested the jerk sauce, it wasn't terribly spicy, but as I ate it, I noticed the spiciness. Whoa! It made me glad I heated up the last of my leftover brown rice. I'm going to have to find a nice rice recipe to cut the seitan. I feel weird having rice and yams, but somehow it works.

I am debating mentioning a really ugly story I read in this morning in The Washington Post about how the FDA is trying to stop the meat industry from treating its product with carbon monoxide. It's a little scary because it hides what could be rotten meat from unwitting consumers. It's even scarier than a "Dateline" episode I saw a few years ago about grocery stores redating meat to keep in on the shelf longer.

And people think vegans are weird.

T-t-t-t-t-tofu.

So I adapted a recipe from La Dolce Vegan! for what Sarah Kramer calls Shook N' Cook Tofu. I really should stop doing grocery shopping on a whim, but there were a few things I needed. Now I really need to get paprika, as it is showing up in a number of recipes.

Anyway, I had some leftover barbecue sauce (from a recipe in The Garden of Vegan, which I use when I make veggie ribs). So I made the coating mix, dipped the tofu squares in the sauce, then shook them in a container with the coating mix and fried them up. In adapting the recipe, I used some cayenne, and I must have used a bit much in some parts, but it was mighty tasty. With it were my standbys of the bulgur pilaf and lemon rosemary carrots from Tuesday. I don't think I've had a potato all week--shocker! I am a huge fan of potatoes.

And somehow I have resisted spouting off on Dick Cheney's hunting accident, but I will say this: only a coward partakes in canned hunts. Okay, maybe I'm making an assumption here, but he was on a ranch, which is owned by a supporter. Apparently they stocked quail on the ranch for good ol' boys to kill. And I have to wonder what kind of sicko stocks quail for "men" to shoot for what they call "sport"? I can't feel too sorry for the guy who got shot; he was killing birds whose only defense was the ability to fly. If you must shoot a living being, use a camera.

I'm cooking again

This weekend, I made some goodies, some for my boyfriend for Valentine's Day--Cashew Nut Butter Chocolate treats--and some for myself, which in the cookbook was called "Cow Pies." The Nut Butter treats kinda fell apart, so I don't have a picture of those. The "cow pies" are basically melted chocolate chips with dried fruit and chopped nuts. I used dried cherries and chopped almonds.

Yesterday, I went all out for dinner and cooked the Tomato Walnut-Crusted Seitan, the Fruited Bulgur Pilaf, and Lemon Rosemary Carrots. My boyfriend absolutely loved everything, especially the seitan. He stopped at Sticky Fingers, a vegan bakery, and got even more treats. For Valentine's Day, they had these mini-cakes called tartlets that were layered with raspberry and covered in chocolate ganache. He also got peanut butter smackers, which are peanut butter balls drizzled with a bit of chocolate. I haven't eaten mine yet.

Tonight, I made a mushroom casserole from Vegan Cooking for One and the yam-quinoa patties from Conveniently Vegan. I had it with some leftover seitan. The mushroom bake definitely needs a little side, but otherwise was good. I added a little more seasoning to the yam patties and used red quinoa instead of the plain. They were very good, and it will be hard not eating them all before the weekend so I can serve some to my sweetie, who is a big fan of them. I do have an extra yam, but I have other plans for that. Well, I have plenty of leftovers...

I've been remiss, I know.

An utterly beautiful, warmer-than-normal January became a frigid February. I can't think of anything else that would sap my desire to cook creatively. Well, I can, but I'm not going to moan about my job situation here.

But I did saute some tofu, adapting a recipe in Howard Lyman's new book "No More Bull!" which deals with all the diseases caused by animal confinement and has a whole bunch of recipes. I also made a standby stirfry with tempeh, a few mushrooms, canned water chestnuts and bamboo shoots, celery and some pea pods, and tossed some almonds at the very end of cooking. I used a bottled sauce, but clearly not enough, so I've had to drizzle some Bragg's Aminos over it. The great thing about stir-fries and rice is they make a great lunch the next day.

I also have planned a big dinner for Valentine's Day. I'm going to make the tomato walnut-crusted seitan, steam some baby carrots, throw together a simple salad, and drag out some leftover bulgur pilaf. I also need to make some treats for my boyfriend because he's always asking for treats when he comes over.

So we're supposed to get snow tomorrow, about 3 to 6 inches. We got some snow in December, but it was really a dusting. It was almost three years ago that the DC area got utterly hammered with about a foot-and-a-half of snow. I sent pics to my family, and my sister made a snarky remark about wearing shorts the previous weekend. My dad said it's why he lives in Florida. I pointed out that in DC we only have 2 or 3 months with 90 degree weather, as opposed to 6. And at least in DC, we don't have Jeb Bush. Hee hee.

But I bet that by a week from now, the snow will all be melted. It's kind of sad because everything looks pretty with a dusting of snow, but it's a pain to walk in.