Some Food and Stuff

So we had the east coast flu plague here - in fact, Chad is suffering its effects right now which is why I'm ready to throw the toddler OUT THE WINDOW...but I promise I won't. Seriously.

Vietnamese Seitan Sandwiches with 5-Spice Dipping Sauce
These are my new favorite sandwich. They are so tasty! All the different flavors together - it's seriously like a party in your mouth. The basics are baguette with veganaise (and don't skimp!) then some fried seitan, some cilantro sprigs, some red onion and some peeled cucumber, sliced thin and long (not circles, strips). Then the dipping sauce is some broth, garlic, red chili flakes, ginger and 5-spice powder. It is just so awesome, kind of like having vegan au jus. I love just about anything you can dip, though. Thank you, Veganomicon!!! I never would have come up with this one on my own.

Isa Pizza Turned Vcon-inspired Lasagna

Ok, so the picture really doesn't do it justice, but this was awesome! I was too busy shoveling it into my mouth to take a picture of an individual slice. So I was going to make Isa Pizza - I had TJ's dough to use up. So I made the sauce, pesto and tofu ricotta from Vegan with a Vengeance. I get ready to roll out the dough and I realize it ain't happenin'. I left it on the stove to come to room temp, but it was too hot and the bottom half sort of half-cooked in the bag. Blech! What to do!?! So much work, for nothing! Then I realized I had pretty much what I needed for a lasagna, so I got out my no-cook noodles (god, I love those things) and set up my assembly line. I used a little pesto in the second "cheese" layer, but I have a lot leftover for rice salad or pasta or pizza another night. Then I baked it a while, then added the V-con pine nut cream sauce for the last 15 minutes - the white cracked stuff in the picture above. YUM! That stuff is the bomb. So creamy and delicious. A very satisfying lasagna, I would definitely make it again. I have to remind myself (often) that lasagna isn't really a big deal to make, especially when using those magic noodles. It always feels like it will take 5 hours, but it really takes like an hour and 15 minutes, including cooking time.

Carrie's Magic Powerhouse Pancakes

So I wanted pancakes this morning, but I've struck out the last couple times I've made them. My fellow blogger Carrie at Adventures in Vegetarianism posted a recipe the other day that sounded good, so I popped over there and found it. They were AWESOME! I will definitely make these again, probably doubling or tripling the batch so that I can have ready batter in the fridge for successive days (ever tried that? It's a great trick. The "dough" has time to really relax so the pancakes are awesome and fluffy and magic). We had these with maple syrup and apple slices. Yay for pancakes!

In other news, Chad was able to master the Whatchamyballs recipe and made a batch that we devoured in like 1.2 days.

Oh and just a note - we went to Trader Joe's Today and I got some of those Vegetable Gyoza that I keep reading about over at theppk.com - and they are SOOOOO GOOOOD! That's all.

ELC, Day 6 Menu

Food Consumed Thursday, September 6

Breakfast:
Homemade granola (60% local by volume :D)
Yogurt
local blueberries
Strawberry kefir

Lunch:
Canadian bust. Terrible pizza. See previous post for a breakdown.

Dinner:
Swiss Chard Lasagna

Using no-bake noodles, homemade local marinara, local chard, and TJ's Quattro Formaggio cheese blend. And semi-local cottage cheese (150 miles). Not bad! A good way to use up chard. I got the idea from Animal, Vegetable, Miracle.

ELC 9/07, Day 5

We're figuring this stuff out, I swear.

Breakfast:
Homemade granola (about 60% local by volume; local oats, butter and sunflower seeds; unlocal: coconut, wheat germ, pumpkin seeds, sesame seeds, cinnamon, canola oil and maple syrup)
Yogurt (nonlocal; can't find any local! help?)
Eden soymilk (local company)
Strawberry kefir (unlocal. Anyone have a local source?)

Lunch:
Hubby was sent to work with a peanut butter and jelly sandwich on local bread, an heirloom tomato salad with local mozzarella cheese (non local EVOO, balsamic and salt), and a local Molly apple.

I munched on leftover tofu "egg" salad sandwiches (local tofu, celery, onion; nonlocal soy mayo, mustard, relish, turmeric, s&p) on fresh rye bread from one of our local bakeries, Strawberry Moon (they use organic flour, too, yay!; the ambrosial tomato salad from vintage cooking (so good!) with local cherry & pear tomatoes and oregano from the backyard (nonlocal EVOO, honey and s&p). Oh, and alert the media! I, Chessa, former hater of all things related to raw celery, at several skinny stalks of fresh CSA celery! Dipped in nonlocal peanut butter. But seriously, I don't think I've intentionally eaten raw celery since I was in 3rd grade. Always hated the stuff. I feel a little silly now, because mostly it just tastes like crunchy nothing. But it was my one holdout, immature "I hate you just because" vegetable, and I'm feeling pretty awesome about overcoming that issue. Could it have something to do with it being local, and not grown for the supermarket showcase? It makes me wonder.

Dinner
For dinner, I was planning eggplant parmigiana, because we received two white eggplants in our CSA share. My recipe called for me to peel them and bake the slices for 15 minutes. I realized as soon as they were sliced and on the baking sheet that this was probably going to be far too little eggplant to make it. Hmmm. So I thought, maybe lasagna! I got out my no-cook lasagna noodles, the homemade sauce and the TJs cheese. But what about ricotta? We didn't have any, so I thought maybe seasoned tofu, but that would be a lot of work (what with needing to food processor and then having wash it). Then I realized that on a whim earlier this week I purchased some local-ish cottage cheese (funny story: I bought it because the brand was "Michigan." When I got home I checked the location on the packaging out of curiosity and found that in this case Michigan was in Ohio. Lame.) I checked in with the internet and found that yes, cottage cheese can sub for ricotta with no known issues. So in it went. About an hour later, I dug into our tiny 8x8 eggplant lasagna, and all I can say is, it was worth it. So good! The sauce was amazing, the eggplant tender and smoky, and the cottage cheese did just fine, thank you.

Oh and we also had some cherry/pear tomatoes that I intended to make into salad, but when the time came around to do it, I was too hungry so we just ate them plain. Still delicious. :)

And there may have been an ice cream run later in the evening, to a locally owned joint just a few miles up the road.