What can I eat if I go veggie??!!

A lot of people ask me what I eat when they learn that I'm a vegan. I guess it's hard for someone who centers every meal on meat to think outside the box. Their experience of vegetables are only as a side dish or as penitence in the form of THE SALAD for a dietary transgression. But I have such a wide open range of options as a veg only eater, that it always strikes me as a funny question....especially since I happen to be lucky enough to live in Northern California where there are lots of local organic farms, and produce is just gorgeous and abundant. I get them farm fresh at the farmers market, where they are often picked the same morning or day before. What a huge difference fresh picked makes!

So I recently put together this list of recipe-inspirations-sources for a friend who just went veg and realized she can't keep eating bread for dinner. I hope it helps inspire and fire up your inner Iron Chef.
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Martha Rose Shulman of the New York Times has a pretty good cooking column. I usually need to make some simple adjustments to make the recipes vegan, as she loves cheese, milk, and eggs. A couple of things I change in her recipes, I don't cook w/canola oil, I don't buy canned beans (so easy & better to make yourself), and I always buy seasonal, organic & local (when possible, obviously they don't grow wheat or bananas in California so nothing I can do about that).

http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/health/series/recipes_for_health/index.html?ref=nutrition


some books that i use for inspiration:

The Art of Taste (the author is the chef at the White Lotus Yoga Center, where James & I did a retreat)
http://www.amazon.com/Art-Taste-Gourmet-Vegetarian-Cooking/dp/0964330202/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1270256672&sr=1-1

Voluptuous Vegan: more sophisticated (read: complex) recipes but awesome results; dinner party fare
http://www.amazon.com/Voluptuous-Vegan-Sinfully-Delicious-Dairy-Free/dp/0609804898/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1270256344&sr=8-1

Chopra Center Cookbook--mostly not indian food
http://www.amazon.com/Chopra-Center-Cookbook-Nutritional-Nourishing/dp/0471454044/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1270256416&sr=1-1

The Peaceful Palate
http://www.amazon.com/Peaceful-Palate-Fine-Vegetarian-Cuisine/dp/1570670315/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1270256813&sr=1-1

Raw Food/Real World
http://www.amazon.com/Raw-Food-Real-World-Recipes/dp/0060793554/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1270257333&sr=1-2

The Vegan Table
http://www.amazon.com/Vegan-Table-Unforgettable-Entertaining-Occasion/dp/1592333745/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1270256777&sr=1-1

The Esalen Cookbook
http://www.amazon.com/Esalen-Cookbook-Charlie-Cascio/dp/1586858521/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1270256293&sr=8-1

The Millenium Cookbook (highly recommend going to this restaurant in SF)
http://www.amazon.com/Millennium-Cookbook-Extraordinary-Vegetarian-Cuisine/dp/0898158990/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1270257223&sr=8-1

i also get ideas from the Mad Cowboy newsletter/Yahoo Group (send email to Mad_Cowboy-owner@yahoogroups.com), Vegetarian Times, Yoga Journal has a recipe section, Eating Well, and just from browsing the stalls at the farmers market and seeing the wonderful, organic, beautiful seasonal and local produce...restaurants are also a source of ideas.

Rosa's Homemade Sweet Black Bean Paste Steamed Buns--aaaahhhh!

From my cousin-in-law Rosa...

There are different types of dough, mixing with cold (room temp) water, warm water or hot water. After doing some late night research on the web, turned out it involves a lot of food science.   Flour can absorb more hot water than cold water, and hot water dough is softer and more pliable (because heat destroyed the gluten somewhat) than cold water dough. 
Usually, I just added random amount of flour to my bowl, then gradually mixed in water till I felt the consistency is right.  My experienced coworkers said it usually takes them only minutes to mix the dough, it took me an hour once!!  
anyway, cold water dough is good for items you need to boil (like dumplings or noodles) or deep fry.
Hot water dough is good for pan-frying (potstickers, green onion pancakes) or steaming (eg. dumplings).

Of course, for the dough for buns, I added active dry yeast.  I usually use 1 teaspoon of yeast. Again, I added random amount of flour (probably 3-4 cups??), added room temp water and the rehydrated active dry yeast (warm water + sugar), and a pinch of salt. I usually let it rise for 2 hours, then started rolling them out. After each bun is formed, I let it rise for another 30-40 min or so.

These sites give better portions. I usually check out a few links (cos everyone uses different amounts), and sort  of digest the info and come up with my own.  But I never strictly follow a recipe. I think feeling with my hands is the best way to tell whether I need more flour or more water.... hope this helps.
http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Chinese-Steamed-Buns/Detail.aspx
http://www.globalgourmet.com/destinations/china/steambread.html


Rosa's advice for what kind of flour to use:

For the buns with fillings, my coworkers (from Northern china, home of these dim sums) told me to use all-purpose flour only. She said whole wheat flour may not be "sticky" enough for you to work with, probably not enough gluten.  If you just want to make the plain steamed buns (no fillings), I have tried whole wheat flour as well.  They were fine, but not as fluffy as the all-purpose flour.  My first batch of veggie/meat buns turned out to be very flat, because I didn't use enough dough for each bun, plus, I think my dough was a bit too wet.  Second batch was better.   Oh, by the way, my coworker said for some reason, gold medal AP flour didn't work too well for her for making buns.  She said they looked fine while they were being steamed, but once she opened the lid, they collapsed.  So she recommended using Safeway brand. Worked well for me!  I saved my Pillsbury and Gold Medal AP flour for making dough with no yeast.
For the green onion pancakes and noodles, just AP flour.


I found this recipe for homemade sweet red bean paste:

http://www.applepiepatispate.com/japanese/sweet-azuki-red-bean-paste/

I will try making my own sweet red bean buns this weekend. I will try a batch with unbleached white flour (sinfully stripped of all nutritional value whatsoever) and a batch with whole wheat pastry flour (healthy enough to appease the nutrition-nazi in me). I'll report back on how it turns out.

Eggs & Turkey Hash

Great for breakfast, lunch, dinner or snacks...

Scramble a couple of eggs per person in a small bowl. Add some sliced scallions, dash of sea salt. Set aside.

In a medium sized skillet, brown some ground turkey (I use organically &locally raised, ground turkey thigh meat; about 1/4 pound per person depending on appetite) with some extra virgin olive oil or sunflower oil. Salt to taste. 

Add egg mixture to skillet and stir until cooked through.

Serve on freshly made whole grain toast, english muffin, or warmed tortilla. Salsa and fresh avocado are nice condiments. My teenager likes ketchup on it. Yeah, I know, eww.

Crunchy top Mac n Cheese by James

Comfort food by James. Our teens love baked mac n cheese with crunchy bread crumb topping with a side of buttery corn on the cob and seasoned rice spiked with all beef hot dogs.

Maybe we can get James to divulge his secret recipes...

Xmas Eve Desserts

Guest Spot: Cabbage & Apple Salad with Warm Mustard Vinaigrette

This one just in from my childhood friend Kristen. She and her partner Steve just finished the 2800+ mile trek on the Pacific Crest Trail. They are now recuperating in Crested Butte for the winter.
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this is one of my favorite winter recipes - which is easy to make completely vegan, especially tasty with an earthy homemade loaf of bread. it serves 6, but we eat it as an entire meal and get 3 full meals out of it, just toss in some already cooked tofu, or chicken or a piece of leftover grilled tuna or salmon for the non vegans in your household. i've never even used pine nuts, just walnuts and toasted pecans. i also alter the cabbage and radicchio, based on what is available, one being red, the other green. also good as leftovers for lunch and i toss in leftover pasta then.

1/2 sm head green cabbage, cored
1/2 sm head radicchio, cored
1 large apple, cored
juice of 1/2 lemon

Vinaigrette
1/4 c olive oil
2 Tb minced shallots
5 Tb Champagne vinegar
1/2 c chicken or vegetable broth - homemade is awesome
1 tsp brown sugar
2 T dijon or stone ground mustard
1/4 tsp salt, or to taste
1/4 tsp pepper, or to taste
3 Tb toasted pine nuts or hazelnuts

Thinly slice the cabbage and radicchio. Set aside. Julienne the unpeeled apple and rinse in a solution of half lemon juice half water to minimize discoloration.

Heat 2 tsp of the oil in a large skillet over med hi heat. Add shallots and saute until soft. Add vinegar, broth and brown sugar. Simmer to reduce slightly, then whisk in the mustard. Remove skillet from heat and whisk in rest of oil. Season with salt and pepper.

Add cabbage, radicchio, and apple to the skillet and toss well to coat. Garnish with nuts and serve warm.

Spiced Gift: Persimmon Chocolate Bread

Before I went off to college, I commandeered my mom's recipe box. One of the treasures I found in there, was a fool-proof recipe for banana bread. I started experimenting with the base recipe, replacing white flour with whole wheat pastry flour, swapping out eggs for Egg Replacer, and adding things like chocolate chips or different spices or nuts---sometimes only one, sometimes all of them together at once. Then I started experimenting with swapping out bananas for pumpkin (YUM). That was a huge success  and so I looked for other alternatives---apple sauce, kabocha or red kuri squash, and hachiya persimmon have been favorites of friends, family, and even picky teenagers.
I get asked to share the recipe a lot so I thought I'd post here...

Ingredients:

2 Egg Replacer eggs (the resuls with Egg Replacer are better than with chicken eggs): 3 t Egg Replacer mixed thoroughly with 4 T hot water
1/2 c organic safflower or sunflower oil
the pulp from 3 completely ripe hachiya persimmons
1-1/2 c organic whole wheat pastry flour
2/3 c organic unrefined sugar
1 t baking soda
1/2 t sea salt, kosher salt, or Himalayan salt (just not iodized table salt, yuck!)


1-1/2 t ground cinnamon, or to taste
1 t ground cloves, or to taste (optional)
organic dark chocolate or semisweet chocolate chips (about 1/2 c or to taste, not optional at our house)

Heat oven 350F. Mix all the wet stuff. Add all the dry stuff except chocolate chips. Mix thoroughly. Fold in chocolate chips with silicone spatula. Scrape into greased 8x8 baking dish or loaf pan.

Bake (8x8 takes about 30 min, test with toothpick; loaf pan takes about 45 min, test w/toothpick). Cool on a rack (this is usually the point at which kids & visitors pounce).

Keeps about a week. If I have any leftovers, I like to cover it & put in fridge after the 2nd or 3rd day (depending on room temperature).

I double or triple this recipe and bake 3 loaves at a time for holiday gifts. Wrap in unbleached wax paper, wrap in recycled alum foil. Tie with ribbon.