Cauliflower it's what's for dinner

Cauliflower recipes are everywhere. It seems you can do more with it than you can with chicken; which is great because I'm not a huge fan of chicken. For most of my life I had the notion that cauliflower should be eaten raw and broccoli cooked. For the past couple years however, I've used it as a replacement for dairy in sauces, grilled like a steak, as a "burger" and this past week; spicy cauliflower soup.

This soup is definitely a keeper. Let's start with the fact that an entire medium head of cauliflower has about 150 calories, it's low in fat, has no cholesterol and it's relatively inexpensive, – can you say healthy!  Of course you can.

Spices

1 Tbsp. olive or coconut oil

2 medium yellow onions, diced

1 bay leaf

1 1/4 tsp. ground cumin

1 tsp. kosher salt

1 tsp. ground turmeric

1/2 tsp. ground coriander

1/8 tsp. ground cardamom

Dash of ground black pepper

Sprinkling of crushed red pepper flakes

4 garlic cloves, minced

Sustenance

4 1/2 cups vegetable broth

1 large head of cauliflower, roughly chopped to the same size

Finish

1 cup canned coconut milk

1 Tbsp. apple cider vinegar

In a large soup pot, heat the oil over medium temperature. Add all the spice ingredients, except for the garlic. Sauté, stirring occasionally until the onions become translucent, about 10 minutes. Then, add the garlic and sauté another few minutes. 

Add the sustenance ingredients and bring to a boil over high heat. Reduce to a simmer and cook for about 15 minutes, until the cauliflower is fork tender. 

Remove from heat and transfer carefully to a blender. Blend on high (allowing steam to vent) for a few minutes, until silky and smooth. 

Return to the soup pot and stir in the coconut milk and vinegar. Bring back to heat over low, ensuring it doesn't boil. Serve with crusty French bread and a green salad.

Enjoy!

Relaxing with Chili

After spending the better part of last week in Dallas at a work event, I was happy to come home, sleep in my own bed, pet Camille and hang out with Dan. I really enjoyed the company meeting it was the first time I had the opportunity to meet all of my coworkers and I have to say - I work with a lot of very nice and very talented people.

The trip down had a bit of excitement tho, just after we took off the flight attendant asked if there were any medical personnel on board. After the 3rd call and no response we noticed that the plane seemed to be charting a new course. As it turned out, the sutures of a passenger who had recently had surgery had opened up and he needed medical attention so, off to Omaha we went.

I've never been on a flight with a medical emergency but I thought we would land, he would be taken off the aircraft and we would be on our merry way - not exactly the way things turned out. An ambulance pulled up next to the aircraft, the passenger was removed, put in the ambulance, sewed up, returned to the aircraft and after filing new flight plans and refueling we were back in the air!

We had some great sessions and fun events at our company meeting. We visited a nice brewery, had an awesome dinner at a farm to table restaurant and I attended my first ever rodeo - bucking broncos here we come. For those of you who know me and my love of "fair junk food" - yes I did break down and have a corn dog - I'm good for about 5 years now - but it was good and it had lots of mustard so delicious!

So after a week of indulgences I was hungry for chili - spicy chili. A couple weeks ago I stocked up on beans and I still had some frozen tomato sauce from the garden which I used up in this dish; it was worth it. The chili was spicy and filled with peppers, onions, tomatoes, 3 kinds of beans and  southwestern corn - it really hit the spot. I served it with with homemade sweet cornbread.

Vegetarian Chili
Olive oil
1 large red onion - finely diced
2 peppers (I used a combination of red/yellow and green) - chopped
4 cloves garlic - minced
cayenne pepper to taste
crushed red pepper to taste
cumin to taste
1 can southwest corn
2 cans diced tomatoes with green chills
4 cups tomato sauce
1 can black beans - rinsed and drained
1 can dark red kidney beans
1 can white beans
1/3 package Quorn crumbles

Directions
In a pot, heat olive oil, add onion and cook until translucent. Add peppers, garlic, cayenne pepper, crushed red pepper and cumin, cook until peppers are soft.

To the pot add diced tomatoes, beans, corn and tomato sauce, cover pot, reduce heat and simmer for about 30 minutes. Taste, adjust seasoning, add quorn crumbles and simmer for 15- 20 minutes. Garnish with avocado slices, cilantro, and chopped green onions, serve with cornbread.

Valentines Day is this weekend - remember to give your sweetie a hug and let them know how much you care. If you have any favorite Valentine Day dishes, send them my way; especially if they are sweet I'm looking for ideas.

A Vegetarian for Every Year

I started this year with a revised vision - I'm continuing my vegetarian diet but in situations, generally associated with restaurants, in absence of a healthy vegetarian option I'll order fish - which makes sense inasmuch as my goal is continued healthy eating.

If you're a regular, you've most likely noticed the new look, my original plan was to create a whole new blog but after giving it a lot of thought, I didn't want the people who were currently following me to have to reset bookmarks, hunt around for the blog or wonder where I was  - I decided a redesign of the site with the same link made more sense - so welcome/welcome back!

For those of you who recall how I started this vegetarian journey it was one of my 15 for 15. For those of you who don't know what that means - each year I try to do 16 (15 in 2015, 14 in 2014 …) things that improve either my life or someone else's. Some things are bigger (going to half price books quarterly and stocking up on elementary age appropriate reading for the local Little Free Library stops in the neighborhood) to simple (helping the neighbor shovel the driveway, carry in groceries or drop off a loaf of banana bread). We can change lives for the better in many ways, my experience is giving of yourself is the most rewarding.

I've added a new twist this year. I've decided to add a word that will guide my actions and behavior, this year I've decided that JOY is something I want to focus on. Not simply to increase the joy in my own life but to look for opportunities to add joy to other lives; I think it will be a challenge, one I'm willing to accept.

I've been pondering vegan lasagna for a long time - I've always loved the beautiful layers but I don't make it because I'm not a fan of all that pasta. I was browsing Pinterest a while ago and came across a vegan, dairy and gluten free lasagna so I gave it a try. It's a bit putsy (what lasagna isn't) but it was well worth the effort.

The next time I make it I'll change a couple things; first salt and drain the zucchini if you don't you'll have more liquid than you like in the bottom of the pan. Second I would add nutritional yeast to the cashew/walnut cream - it gives it a cheesy flavor. We served it with some crusty bread and a spinach salad with blueberries and raspberries and a balsamic dressing.

Vegan butternut squash lasagna

Ingredients
1 small butternut squash
1 medium zucchini
8 ounces - baby portabella mushrooms
⅔ red pepper
⅔ yellow or orange pepper
1 batch of cashew/walnut cream
1 batch tomato sauce

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

Using a mandolin slice zucchini and butternut squash in slices lengthwise approximately ⅛ inch thick. Trim peel from butternut squash set aside. Wash and slice mushrooms - set aside. Wash and very thinly slice peppers.

Cashew and Walnut Cream
1 ⅔  cups raw cashews soaked for at least 2 hours and drained
1 ⅓  cup walnuts soaked for at least 2 hours and drained
1 T fresh lemon juice
4 cloves garlic peeled - add more to taste
1 ⅔ to 2 cups of water (depends on your thickness preference)

Combine nuts, lemon juice and garlic and 1 cup of water in a high speed blender and blend until creamy. Add additional water ⅛ cup at a time until you have desired consistency.

Tomato sauce
Roma tomatoes
Onions
Garlic
Basil
Salt
Pepper
Black olives

Sauté onions and olive oil in a stock pot until onions are translucent. combine tomatoes, garlic, basil and salt and pepper to taste in a high speed blender and puree. Add tomato mixture to stock pot and boil until think - adding seasonings as desired.

Assembling the Lasagna
In an 8 x 8 or 9 x 9 pan add ½ to ¾ cup tomato sauce and spread it on the bottom. Add a layer of butternut squash slices filling in open and small spaces. Add a layer of cashew cream to cover butternut squash.

Add a layer of zucchini and top with a layer of portabella mushrooms. Cover with tomato sauce. Add another layer of butternut squash and top with cashew cream then top with peppers.

Final layer
Add a layer of tomato sauce, top with zucchini, the rest of the portobella mushrooms and the final layer of cheese.

Bake in oven for 50 - 60 minutes - until the butternut squash is cooked but still firm. Remove from oven and let rest for 15 - 20 minutes.

Serve with spinach salad and seed or garlic bread

The End of Year One

As 2015 draws to a close I've been pondering this vegetarian journey I've been on and I have to say it's been a good thing for me - I feel better having eliminated meat products from my diet, I've lost a few pounds and I feel like I have more energy. With the exception of Dan's coconut and almond crusted tilapia (which I'll be having on New Year's Day) and the famous garlic and onion turkey burgers I haven't missed eating meat so for the most part I'll continue the vegetarian lifestyle (and blogging too). 

What I've learned along the way:

• People who don't understand your food choices can be annoyed by them and they may try to thwart your efforts, convince you that you're wrong or behave rudely. I think this is the thing that surprised me the most although it probably shouldn't. I've spent a good part of my existence not eating products derived from a cow and have encountered a broad range of responses, from deciding I was too picky, to being accused of wanting attention, to being told "A little won't hurt me"  - thanks but no thanks - please understand that it's an allergy issue not a vanity issue. 

• I don't understand why my food choices are a concern to others? I've not asked anyone to conform to my lifestyle, I'm willing to bring my own food (and often do) to events, I've not asked anyone to purchase special food for me or change their way of cooking - yet it still seems to be a point of contention; go figure.

• Many restaurants that tout themselves as "vegetarian friendly" think that means cheese (as a replacement for meat) and ice berg lettuce and sometimes even those who support you - just want you to order that salad so they can get dinner and move on. In the same way carnivores want something tasty - I want something tasty that happens to be vegetarian, not something that you've simply removed the meat from - altering a dish and truly having vegetarian options are not the same thing.

• With the exception of a very few brands, most "fake meat" products taste like fake meat and should be avoided at all costs.

• Healthy cooking takes time, plan accordingly.

• Read labels if you can't pronounce or have no clue what ingredients are in something you shouldn't eat it - put it back on the shelf

• Experimentation is fun! Try one new food each week, if you don't like it don't eat it again it's not the end of the world. When Dan and I first met he told me he didn't like brussels sprouts or squash, turns out he'd only been exposed to pureed squash and boiled brussels sprouts - no wonder he didn't like them. Say hello to the oven and roasting - he's now a huge fan of both and regularly asks me to make them.

• Tempeh over tofu - while I like and will eat both, I prefer the texture and nuttiness of tempeh.

• Take a vegetarian cooking class or two (or four). I've learned so many new recipes by taking community ed and un-cooking classes at the local raw food restaurant, many are now my go to favorites.

• Vegetarians and Vegans need protein be sure to include beans and other sources of protein on a daily basis - protein is important but it doesn't have to come from an animal.

Thanks to those of you who have supported me, followed & shared my blog, shared recipes with me and tried my veggie creations - it's been a great journey and I hope you'll continue to follow my blog.

Wishing everyone a Happy and Safe New Year - see you in 2016!

A Different Perspective - Dan's View of AVFOY

Ann's movement to a vegetarian diet for a year has made me a healthier eater. However, unlike Ann, I am not a strict vegetarian. I still enjoy fish and brats (I do love brats). So I guess I am a technically a Pescaterian-Bratatarian?

My primary concern about pure vegetarian diets is that they sometimes lack good protein. Although I love mock duck and tofu, Ann is not a huge fan.  She will eat tofu if I prepare it in a specific way, other than that we have to be creative.

One of my findings is that black beans are a great source of protein. We've also explored high-protein grains like Freekeh [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freekeh] and quinoa and played around with alternative vegetarian/vegan products with mixed success.

When it gets cold in November and December we like to make soups. Ann makes a fabulous Forest Mushroom soup. So I modified her Mushroom soup recipe based on things we had available. Something you should know about me is that I love onions and I hardly ever follow a recipe. I often lookup various recipes and look for patterns (yes, design patterns I'm an architect geek by trade), but I like every dish to be different.

We had a large amount of dried mushrooms in our pantry and I wanted to use them up. We get them at a local Oriental grocery store, and as Ann has mentioned, they are much less expensive then at the traditional grocery stores. I put them in the crock pot in the morning thinking they would be soft by suppertime. I was wrong! They were still hard as a rock and rubbery; especially the stems. I tried to cut the large parts up and put them back into the crock pot. Yet even the small parts were tough after another hour. So I finally had to put the mushrooms in our Ninja blender and grind them all up into very small parts.

I then added two large onions (sautéd in olive oil until golden) and a cup of Freekeh.  I put the Freekeh and ground mushroom on the stove and let them boil for about 1/2 hour.  Then I added two cans of black beans (high protein) and put everything back into the crock pot for another hour.  I added a bit of salt and pepper and some cumin and that was about it.  I like to serve the soup with a good artisan bread (from Costco) and a bit of cheese (Brie is my favorite).

Ann's one comment was that she thought the soup lacked color, which I totally agree with.  She suggested adding carrots, which most of my other soups do have. Next time I would grid the mushrooms stems up in the Ninja blender before soaking. Rubbery mushrooms really are not a good texture.

Thanks for supporting Ann's blog - and thanks to Ann for letting me guest post this week. 

- Dan

With Gratitude

Yikes I looked at the date of my last blog post and all I can say is I've been busy. I decided to take the NaNoWriMo challenge this year and I'm excited to say I finished around 6 am this morning. I woke up at about 4 am and knew exactly how my novel needed to end and I couldn't go back to sleep because my mind kept running through the end of my story so I decided to get up and finish! This is the 4^th time I've finished a novel – one day I'd like to go back and edit one and end up with a "real book" that I could send to a publisher.

I've also been editing a novel for one of my friends who is a "real writer" – you know the kind who gets royalty checks on a regular basis for writing books. She's a romance author and her books have a paranormal twist which I really like. Her characters are interesting and her style is elegant I'm looking forward to seeing the final version.

And then there was Thanksgiving – we had a whirlwind weekend. On Thanksgiving Day we had dinner with Dan's family (I was in charge of  appetizers) and then we headed to Fargo, to have a Friday Thanksgiving with my family. It had been a few years since we all were able to get together – there was lots of food, fun and laughter. I got to spend time with 2 of my nephews and 4 of my great nieces and nephews - something I throughly enjoyed.

Amid all of that driving and eating and laughing I did do some cooking. For those of you who have been following for a while you know we were "those kind of people" – we had a bumper crop of acorn squash so I offered to bring a baked squash dish to my family celebration.

I started by roasting 1 ½ acorn squash and about 1 ½ lbs of butternut squash with just a brush of olive oil and a few grinds of sea salt. While the squash was roasting, I diced a large onion and sautéed it in 1 T of olive oil until it was soft. To the onion I added 2 grated apples, cinnamon, 1 clove of garlic minced, coriander and cumin, covered the mixture and cooked it until the onions were slightly caramelized. I removed the pan from the heat and let the onion mixture cool.

When the squash was cool I put it into a blender added the onion mixture and then blended until it was pureed. I poured the pureed squash and onion mixture into a baking dish added 2 T of agave and sprinkled cinnamon on top.

When I got to my family celebration I heated it in a 350-degree oven until hot. We had so many good dishes that I came home with a lot of leftovers but we're eating it and I'm pondering either vegan lasagna or vegan mac n cheese with the squash as the sauce for dinner on Tuesday night.

For me the holiday season is a time of reflection – I'm grateful for the many things in my life; good health, a loving family, amazing friends, a job I enjoy and the freedom to make choices about how I live my life and what I believe in. I know I'm lucky and I try not to take these things for granted because I know it could all change in an instant. 

Ciao

Eight Hours to Dinner

For those of you who read last weeks post where I was raving about our Minnesota November; today it was 61, sunny and again beautiful – I'm happy and speechless – I know right!

With that being said, our weather has been a bit odd, we had one day of super rain, a couple cold an brisk days (which are great for walking) and warm days – all in all it seems like the weather is undecided – which is so Minnesota. On the bright side we put up the Christmas lights out front in short sleeves yesterday, which is better than parkas, mittens and snow so we're all good.

On Friday morning  (one of the chilly and crisp days) I decided a hearty soup was needed and I remembered that a bag of red lentils sat in our pantry waiting to be put to good use and I knew exactly how I would use them.

It was 7am – since I had all day to cook I decided to toss a few things in the crockpot and let them simmer. I diced an onion, added 2 cups of lentils, 2 cans of fire roasted tomatoes, 3 carrots roughly chopped, 3 cloves of garlic – minced, 32 + ounces of vegetable broth, 1 tsp. basil, 1 tsp. salt, ½ tsp. fresh ground black pepper and 3 large shakes of Penzeys Northwood's fire spice.  Cook on high (I have an older crockpot) for 8 hours –Done – I love simple!

We've been enjoying it for most of the weekend – Friday with whole grain bread, Saturday with spanakopita and tonight with whole grain bread.

On another note I tried a new banana bread recipe given to me by a co-worker – I loved that it had 100% whole wheat (no white flour), agave (the recipe called for honey but I'm not a fan) – I loved how moist it was and the agave gave it a slight sweetness but not too much sweetness – I liked it.

As Thanksgiving looms I'm reminded of all that I have -  a loving family, good friends and good health – I am truly grateful. 

Have a great day!