My Favorite Recipe: Viva Vegan's Peruvian Seitan Skewers

Viva Vegan's Peruvian Seitan Skewers are the bomb, seriously! Especially served up with some fresh homemade guacamole. I tend to leave out potatoes when I make these now because I always have bell peppers and onions on hand but potatoes I rarely buy at the moment. I've made them probably about 5 times now and these skewers never get old... You must buy this cookbook it is worth its weight in gold!

VegWeb's Creamy Sundried Tomato Dip and Some Leftovers

 I had an extra tub of Tofutti Vegan Cream Cheese and a bit of sundried tomatoes in oil that needed to be used up so I decided to make VegWeb's Creamy Sundried Tomato Dip. I am pretty broke and didn't have the chives or even green onions on hand so I subbed 3 tablespoons minced yellow onion and also added 2 extra cloves of garlic. I used about a half a cup of sundried tomatoes (Mine came julienned and I wasn't sure how much to use so I just finished the bottle). The dip came out fantastic and tasted heavenly dipped with wheat thins!

Leftovers for last nights dinner were awesome courtesy of Viva Vegan. I had leftover Drunken Beans with Seitan Chorizo and Latin Baked Tofu, heaven on Earth my friends.

Teaching Newbies How To Cook Tofu And Make Other Vegan Goodies

I often here people saying, "Oh vegan sounds so hard. I don't know how to cook. What can I eat that isn't meat?" and it goes on and on and on... I always offer up a friendly, "Well come over to my house anytime and I will show you how to cook a few things." This past weekend a coworker came over to do just that. She has really made an awesome effort to eat mostly vegan but always eats such boring stuff and ends up complaining about it (plain spinach, lazy salads, etc). This weekend I showed her how to make Chickpea Salad Sandwich Spread, Viva Vegan's Red Seitan (A recipe not for a beginner but since I was making some anyways I wanted her to watch), and some cornstarch coated, fried, teriyaki tofu with creole seasoned steamed veggies on the side.

The teriyaki tofu was drained, pressed, and cubed and shaken around in a bag with about 1/4 cup of cornstarch. I then fried the tofu until golden and added some thick teriyaki sauce and green onions. Turned out perfect as usual! To go with the tofu, I cut up some of the random veggies she brought over: broccoli, celery, and cabbage. I put a little water in the pan and added the broccoli and celery first, then covered the pan with a lid. Within a few minutes the broccoli looked tender and I added the cabbage and a little more water and mixed everything around with a generous amount of creole seasoning until the cabbage was cooked. Perfect!

Viva Vegan's Latin Baked Tofu and Drunken Beans with Seitan Chorizo

Wow! Viva Vegan almost never fails in the recipe department! Tonight I made Latin Baked Tofu and the marinade was killer... Red wine, red wine vinegar, olive oil (I omitted this), tomato paste, soy sauce, garlic, cumin and oregano.

The Drunken Beans with Seitan Chorizo was awesome as well! Home-cooked pinto beans with onions, roasted serranos, some of her amazing Chorizo Seitan Sausages, oregano, chili powder, cumin, diced tomatoes, Mexican beer (I used a can of Bud), and tequila... Garnished with onions, cilantro, lime juice, and pickled jalapenos.... OMG yum... But it did take 3 hours to make so I was really hungry by the time I got my little vegan hands on the goods!

VegWeb's Cauliflower Poppers & More Grilled Teriyaki Tofu

When I have a big head of cauliflower to use up, I typically rely on two recipes, either VegWeb's Cauliflower Poppers or VegWeb's Oven Roasted Cauliflower with Rosemary and Garlic. Both always turn out amazing though I always add extra of the ingredients they list though cause I like things super saucy and flavorful. My Cauliflower Poppers came out amazing as usual!

I have also been making my Grilled Teriyaki Tofu bu the boatload! I love to eat it plain or in salads as it tastes best cold. I made two tofu bricks worth last night and it's already a third gone!

Viva Vegan's Chorizo Seitan Sausages and some Latin Inspired Quinoa (Take 2)

 Viva Vegan's Chorizo Seitan Sausages are way yum, loaded with many spices and a wonderful addition to some Latin Inspired Quinoa I made tonight. 3 Sausage recipe makes 6 sausages (I got 7) and I used 3 in this recipe.

Ingredients (Mostly Approximations):

- 3 Viva Vegan Chorizo Seitan Sausages, you could sub a few Field Roast Chipotle Vegan Sausages, cut into bite sized chunks
- 1 teaspoon olive oil and veggie broth as needed (You can use more oil, I'm trying to get away from using it)
- 1/4 a large white onion, diced
- 6 cloves garlic, minced
- 6 mini sweet bell peppers, cut into thin rings
- 1/2 cup black beans
- 1/2 cup corn
- 1/4 cup green onions, thinly sliced
- 1/4 cup black olives, sliced
- 1/2 to 1 cup diced tomatoes (I used canned so probably only used 1/2 cup)
- Cilantro to taste (I only had a few tablespoons left)
- 1.5 cups leftover quinoa
- 1 teaspoon each chili powder, oregano, and cumin
- Mexican hot sauce to taste

Directions:

- Fry your sausages in a little oil until they begin to brown.
- Add onions, garlic, and bell peppers and a little veggie broth and cook until onions are translucent, adding more veggie broth if needed to prevent sticking.
- Add ALL the remaining ingredients and mix around until everything is heated through.
- Serve with avocado slices or a dollop of vegan sour cream.

Stuffed Peppers (Again... Yes I know!)

Yes my friends, I made stuffed peppers again! This time I used my own recipe since I had some leftovers that needed to be used up. The leftovers were a "Mexican" mushroom stirfry concoction that I made last weekend which consisted of thinly sliced crimini mushrooms, onions, corn, olives, black beans, and a tomato. I added this mixture to some leftover quinoa and used that to stuff the peppers. I boil the peppers first for 5 minutes, then drain, stuff, and bake them at 350F for 20 minutes. Then I topped them with minced cilantro. I thought they were a little bland but good with some salsa and vegan sour cream on top. I think they would have been better if I added some salsa or tomato sauce to the stuffing mixture.

Sorry I haven't been posting as much I just have so many leftovers that I still need to eat... Ethiopian Seitan, Jerk Seitan, 'Cheezy' Potatoes, Tofu Scramble, and now 3 leftover Stuffed Peppers are added to the list!

Rainbow Salad

I love salad people! I eat it almost everyday drenched in Vegan Ranch. I always make a bunch at a time (Think 3 heads of romaine) and put it in a gallon sized ziploc so I can have a quick and amazing salad with only 1 days worth of chopping!

Here's my salad for this week: Romaine, Red Bell Pepper, Green Onions, Black Olives, Purple Cabbage, Carrots, Corn, Edamame, Black Beans (I add these day of so they don't get gross), and Grilled Teriyaki Tofu... Delish! I also really like peas in my salad but was sadly out.

VWAV's Scrambled Tofu and VegWeb's 'Cheezy' Roasted Potatoes

This weekend I tried VWAV's recipe for Scrambled Tofu and thought it was pretty good, but I've had better. I think tofu scrambles are in the same category as garbanzo bean salad sandwiches though to us vegans in that everyone has their own personal way of making it. I thought the scramble was a little too heavy on the nutritional yeast and needed some bell peppers in it for sure but I followed the recipe exactly as written. I served mine up with some salsa and sliced avocado... Yum!

I also made VegWeb's 'Cheezy' Roasted Potatoes. I used multicolor fingerling potatoes and they seriously melted in your mouth! I didn't notice these being at all 'cheezy' tasting but they were still both beautiful and delicious, give 'em a try!

VWAV's Jerk Seitan and More Stuffed Peppers!

VWAV's seitan recipes are more of an acquired taste for people not used to eating seitan. My bro loved all the seitan recipes from Viva Vegan but VWAV, not so much, so I have lots of leftovers in the fridge right now. Oh well, more for me! Jerk Seitan is flavored with onions, ginger, lime, soy sauce (I used Braggs), olive oil (I left it out), maple syrup, thyme, allspice, cinnamon, cayenne, and nutmeg... It tasted pretty darn amazing! I didn't marinate the seitan because I forgot to read the directions before I started, dang it. I also didn't follow her cooking directions as I browned the seitan first, then added half the sauce along with the bell peppers and onions (I don't like mine overly cooked), then dumped the rest of the sauce in about 5 minutes later.

I also made VWAV's Black Bean, Mushroom, and Quinoa- Stuffed Peppers again so I could give it to a friend as a bday gift (I got to save 4 for myself, score!) and they were amazing as usual. I will definitely be making this recipe again and again!

Viva Vegan's Tofu Chicharrones and Mojo Oven-Roasted Seitan

Viva Vegan's Tofu Chicharrones was alright, nothing amazing as far as the flavor goes. The marinade was pretty basic and consisted of soy sauce, liquid smoke, garlic, red wine vinegar, and agave syrup. I cheated and made this on the Forman so that I didn't have to fry it up in a bunch of oil. Any tofu I cook on the Forman I let cool and firm up a bit before chowing down, it just tastes better that way.

I made Mojo Oven-Roasted Seitan again since I found some oranges growing on some trees near my house along a bike trail. I really like the citrus-y marinade used in this dish, yum!

Lots of leftovers left to eat, hopefully I will get around to cooking more soon :)

VWAV's Homemade Seitan + Ethiopian Seitan and Peppers

 VWAV is a pretty amazing cookbook though Viva Vegan still has my heart. One thing I enjoy is trying different recipes for making seitan, for us seitan makers out there, we know each batch of seitan has a life of its own and is a bit different even with the same recipe! So this time around I figured I would use VWAV's recipe for Homemade Seitan and I thought it turned out pretty standard as far as seitan goes... Nothing insanely amazing like the seitan recipes out of Viva Vegan.

So I made the seitan to use in VWAV's Ethiopian Seitan and Peppers recipe. The recipe looked like it wanted me to use the entire batch of Homemade Seitan but that seemed like way too much seitan (And definitely more than 4 cups) so used half the Homemade Seitan recipe and it came out perfect. I really liked this dish! The seitan is flavored with serranos (I left the seeds in), ginger, garlic, cumin, cardamom (Didn't have), turmeric, cloves, cinnamon, and red wine. The seitan turned out really "meaty" and moist, quite heavenly.

Creole Roasted Carrots

I love carrots, especially roasted and if you didn't know already, my favorite seasoning in the whole wide world is Tony Chachere's Creole Seasoning!

Directions:

- Preheat oven to 375F
- Get as many handfuls of baby carrots that you feel like eating and put them into a glass baking dish
- Spray the carrots with a bunch of cooking spray and season the carrots generously with creole and shake everything around a bit
- Roast in the oven for 30 minutes, turning the carrots halfway.

Taco Style Seitan and Creamy Refried Beans

Tonight I wanted a quick and easy dinner and had a big batch of Refried Beans sitting in the fridge. I needed something "Mexican-y" to go along with the beans so Taco Style Seitan was the plan.

Taco Style Seitan:

- 4 cups seitan cut into small chunks, (I used 2 loaves of Red Seitan from Viva Vegan)
- 2 small or 1 large bell pepper, cut into small chunks
- 1/2 medium yellow onion, cut into small chunks
- 6 crimini mushrooms, sliced
- 1 tablespoon taco seasoning
- 2 tablespoons water
- 1/4 cup cilantro, minced
- A drizzle of olive oil for frying

Directions:
- Fry up the seitan chunks in oil over medium high heat until they blacken a bit.
- Add the bell peppers and onions and fry for a few more minutes until they soften to your liking (I prefer mine not to be overly cooked).
- Add the criminis, taco seasoning, and water. Cook until the criminis begin to soften.
- Add the cilantro and stir everything around to get it coated evenly.

Creamy Refried Beans:

- 1 pound dried pinto beans, soaked overnight, then rinsed
- 4 bay leaves
- 1 to 1.5 teaspoons sea salt
- 1/2 teaspoon pepper
- A few jalapenos, chopped (optional)

- 1 onion, chopped

Directions:

- Place all ingredients into a big pot and cover with about 1.5 inches of water.
- Bring everything to a boil, then cover and everything simmer for 2 hours.
- Drain your beans in a metal colander and pick out the bay leaves.
- Place your cooked bean and onion mixture into a food processor and let it do its magic for a minute or two.
- Taste and see if additional salt is needed and don't ruin your beans by over-salting them!

See you don't need oil or lard to make creamy refried beans, just use a food processor!

A trip to L.A. to see The Getty and eat at California Vegan

Me and my brother wanted to do something different this weekend and take a trip to L.A. We decided that we wanted to check out The Getty and get a bite to eat at California Vegan.

The Getty was awesome and we only went through one of the many buildings (We will be going back to see more since it's free). There was tons of Renaissance-Age and European artwork (I liked this picture with the cute puppy) and famous photography. We also checked out 2 of the gardens which were amazing but my camera died so no pictures.

There are TONS of vegan restaurants in L.A. so it was a tough choice. I felt like Asian food and California Vegan is a Thai restaurant. Below is my brother siting in the cutesy little restaurant.

I had the Spicy Eggplant with Tofu and asked for it extra spicy and it was not spicy at all so I had to load on the chili paste. The dish had a lot of veggies though, which I love but mostly bell peppers and the tofu wasn't cooked the way I like it, it was just kinda thrown in the dish and left mushy.

 

My brother had the California Chow Mein with Tofu that was again mushy. Overall we both thought the restaurant was just okay, I probably won't bother going back again.