Quick Dinner!

Tonight's dinner was ridiculously quick!

I started by slicing a block of Lightlife garden veggie tempeh in half lengthwise so it wasn't too thick and then each slice in half.  Then I mixed up a marinade of:

2 Tbsp. olive oil

Juice of 1 lemon

Zest of 1 lemon

1/2 tsp. garlic powder

1 tsp. thyme

black pepper

sprinkle of salt

...and rubbed it all over the tempeh.  

Then I started cooking up some quinoa.  It only takes about 15 minutes and it's a whole grain with ridiculous amounts of protein and calcium!  When the quinoa was done I stirred in:

Juice of 1 lemon

Zest of 1 lemon

3/4 cup chopped Italian parsley

2 green onions

salt and pepper to taste

Then I heated up a cast iron skillet and added a little oil.  I tossed in the tempeh and let it sear nicely before flipping to the other side.  It didn't take long.

I threw in a salad at the last minute with some green leaf lettuce, craisins, and walnuts.  I mixed up a little dressing, too.  I have no idea on the quanitites, but the ingredients were:

Veganaise

Dijon mustard

flax oil

lemon juice

salt

pepper

This could totally be on the Rachel Ray show.  Except that it doesn't have sausage or cheese in it.

Election Night Comfort Food

It's a tense night tonight.  We're big Obama fans in this house, so we're huddled around CNN right now.  Even the boys are cheering every time a "blue" projection comes in.

I wanted some comfort food tonight- and a lot of vegetables.  So here's what I made:

I put some homegrown carrot chunks in a baking dish with some maple syrup, Earth Balance, ground coriander, celery seed, and salt and pepper.  I baked these with a lid on until they were tender and fragrant.  One boy scarfed these up without any "Oh, I don't like carrots that much" complaint.  The other boy needed some extra onion and sage gravy before consenting to eat them.  

I'm a big fan of super quick tempeh sausage crumbles made in the cast iron skillet.  With fennel, thyme, smoked paprika, cumin, and Bragg's, this is some seriously flavorful tempeh.  I just topped the hot sausage with shredded lacinato kale from the garden and it had enough residual heat to wilt the kale just perfectly.  Yum!

The mashed potatoes turned out really well.  I boiled about 5 lbs. of red potatoes and then whipped them with a cup of plain soy yogurt, some almond milk, chopped green onions, salt, and pepper.  I love the combo of yogurt and green onions, especially in mashed potatoes!  

We'll be breaking out the gluten-free almond blondies later tonight- perhaps in celebration!

Two Sandwiches

I got home at 8:30 pm tonight and was famished. I had picked up some pea shoots at the co-op, but wasn't sure what to make with them. I had to harvest the day's strawberries before dark, so it was around 9pm when I started thinking about what I was going to make for a very late dinner.

Like any tired, hungry foodie, I googled "pea shoots" to figure out what I should make. And imagine my delight when I found a recipe that not only used my pea shoots and freshly picked strawberries, but also called only for ingredients that were locally produced and already in my fridge!


So my first sandwich was the Strawberry and Pea Shoot Sandwich.I did add a little Tofutti cream cheeze with the jalapeño jelly, because that's just such a rockin' good combination.

Second sandwich (because I needed some protein) was a tempeh salad sandwich. While I didn't have any locally made tempeh, all of the herbs, onion, lettuce, and bread is from MN or my backyard.

I'd like to say that I saved one of those sandwiches for my lunch tomorrow or shared that plate with a friend, but I didn't. I ate the whole darn thing and it was amazing.

Sicky Yuck Yuck

The past few days have included a lovely assortment of cold and sinus symptoms, cramps/PMS, and pink eye. Lovely.

And I had to get pink eye the week I had 3 separate talks planned for parents/children. The group on Monday night agreed to risk it, but the ECFE groups wisely rescheduled. Smart move since by the time I woke up this morning my eye was swollen shut and I looked REALLY scary.

Luckily, I don't have a ton of other work planned this week and have plenty of sick time. But really, I have a tough time staying home. I either need to be
A: Busy with a "to do" list in hand, cooking dinner, and doing laundry while fielding questions from work OR
B: Sprawled out on the couch with a rootbeer and popcorn and hours of Netfix

There is no in between.

So when I'm sick I vacillate between sleeping/relaxing and attempting to accomplish any number of tasks- and really, I suck at both of these when I'm sick.

Except maybe tonight's dinner.

These are Mary Frances' Light and Fluffy Gluten Free Biscuits with some tempeh sausage, kale, and white bean gravy. I didn't write down measurements or ingredients for any of this, but it was darn good. I did, much to Mike's delight, accidentally add too much salt to the gravy. It was way too much for me and I love salt. But I think I can just thin out the leftover gravy to remedy the situation.

Now I'm off to do another turmeric and fennel eye compress. Hopefully, I'll wake up tomorrow miraculously cured.

The Perfect Sunday

Today was a delightful day. I woke up at around 9am and cooked some soup for breakfast (Christmas lima beans, carrots, and celery). Sundays are my day to clean up the house a bit, so I cleaned the bathroom and swept the floors and cleaned the baseboards. Then I snuggled with the animals on the couch and worked sudoku puzzles. It was so warm (maybe 50?) and the sun was streaming in the windows.
Then I whipped up some wheat-free chocolate chip cookies for desserts this week. At around noon a friend came over and we did yoga for a couple hours. Then I did a little grocery shopping and got started cooking. I took my time and decided to cook exactly what I wanted, even if they didn't really go together.
This is Tinkyada pasta with Tofu-Walnut Balls. I remember seeing a recipe for these balls that called for baking them first and then covering them in an apricot glaze and baking them again...but I can't find the recipe for the life of me. But these were really good, too.

Tofu-Walnut Balls
In the food processor, combine:
1 1/2 cups oats
1 package of firm tofu
4 Tbsp tamari
1 cup walnuts
1/2 onion
2 cloves garlic
1 Tbsp lemon juice
1/2 tsp cumin
1 tsp sage

Then scoop up balls/blobs of the mixture and place on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Bake at 400F for about 20 minutes, flip and bake another 10 minutes.

I served these with a nice sweet & smoky tomato sauce- kind of a hybrid between a usual tomato sauce and barbecue sauce.

Sweet & Smoky Tomato Sauce
2 Tbsp olive oil
1/2 onion
1/2 tsp salt
1 16 oz. can diced tomatoes
6 drops liquid smoke
2 Tbsp. apricot preserves
a splash of tamari

Saute the onions in the olive oil until the onions begin to brown, then add remaining ingredients and simmer about 20 minutes.



I also really wanted sushi. This sushi has steamed tempeh marinated in tamari, carrots, chives, red pepper strips, and wasabi veganaise. Yum!

While everything was finishing cooking, I had time to work out on the elliptical machine. Then Mike and I ate dinner out on the deck (we had to wear jackets, but at least it was kind of warm). After dinner we played boggle- Mike won, but it was really close.

Then I took a long bath while working sudoku puzzles. And then Dirt was on TV. And throughout the day I got about 3 loads of laundry done.

Can a day get any better?

Monday and Tuesday meals

I blatantly stole this meal idea from Mary Frances at Gluten Free Cooking School and Susan at Fat Free Vegan. Susan originally posted the recipe and Mary Frances paired it with coleslaw.

These beautiful stuffed corn bread/tortilla rounds could be filled with anything- the possibilities are endless! These were super quick because I filled them with Amy's Organic Refried Beans and Vegan Gourmet Monterey Jack (Both on sale this month at the co-op! Yes!). The surprise hit of the meal was the coleslaw- which was just shredded cabbage and carrots with a dressing of veganaise, soy yogurt, vinegar, celery seed, and salt. I think this is basically the same as my mom's recipe, except using vegan mayo and some soy yogurt.

I planned ahead for this next meal. Tuesdays are always so busy, so I pre-marinated my tempeh in lemon juice, olive oil, dill, garlic, and kelp powder to make "Sea Sticks" which are my version of fish sticks. I even got my potatoes rubbed with kosher salt and olive oil and wrapped them in foil the night before.

But then Tuesday night wasn't nearly as hectic as normal. The kids had a cold so we didn't go to basketball. Their teacher only gave one worksheet for homework, so that was over quickly.

All I had to do was dip the tempeh in a mixture of crushed brown rice crispy cereal, nutritional yeast, and salt and bake at 350 for about 30 minutes with the potatoes. Then I steamed some broccoli and stirred together a Cheeze sauce with nutritional yeast, salt, lemon juice, cornstarch, garlic powder, and almond milk.
So dinner was a breeze and we had plenty of time to enjoy Battleship and couch-snuggling with the whole family. Awwww....

Hot Sauce Glazed Tempeh and Italian Shepard's Pie

One of my favorite things in the world is South River Miso Company's Garlic Red Pepper Miso. I was so sad when I couldn't find it on their website a while ago, so when I saw it at the Wedge yesterday I knew I had to get some. It was just in time, too, because I emptied my previous jar this morning when I had toast with Earth Balance and miso. I let Hannah clean out the jar because she's really good at "rinsing" the recyclables. But look how angry she looked when she thought I might take the jar away!

She might love miso as much as she loves peanut butter, broccoli, jalapeños, apples, and cabbage.

For dinner tonight I had to use up the leftover pizza toppings from the other night. I've had these little baby green bell peppers in the fridge for a couple of weeks (because I had to clear out the garden before they were fully grown). So I mixed the onions, artichoke hearts, black olives, and pizza sauce with brown rice and stuffed the little babies. Then I topped them off with leftover cashew ricotta and baked them until the peppers were tender and the ricotta was lightly crispy. This picture really doesn't do them justice.
Because I had way more filling than green peppers, I also made individual ramekins of the pizza/rice stuffing with ricotta piped on top and baked. They reminded me of little shepard's pies, but Italian-style.
The tempeh on the side is the Vcon Hot Sauce Glazed Tempeh. Wow! Those were really awesome! I didn't have any wine, so I used Jack Daniels instead. We don't drink, but I find that Jack comes in handy for some sauces and desserts. And I must say that the marinade was good enough to drink by the spoonful! (But I tried to restrain myself).