New Lasagna Variations

Had some lasagna noodles to cook and made some interesting vegan variations, and have one more recipe to try later this week once my vegan tofutti ricotta comes. Recipe #1: I veganized Rachel Ray's all-American lasagna.

I was a little lazy and used the no-boil lasagna sheets. For the tomato sauce: in a large pot heat from olive oil and then add in crumbled vegan beef crumbles. Cook until browned, and then add 1 can of 28 oz crushed tomatoes, 1/2 cup ketchup, and 1.5 cups water. Mix together and simmer until thickened, about 10 minutes. I also boiled one frozen bag each of peas and broccoli while I was working on the tomato sauce. For the cheese sauce: melt 4TBsp maragarine in a large saucepan, then mix in one bushel of chopped scallions. After the scallions are wilted mix in 1/4 cup flour quickly, and then start pouring in 2 cup soy milk slowly, whisking it in. Once the sauce seems like it wants to thicken pour in one bag of Daiya mozzarella cheese and stir, taking off heat as the fake cheese melts in. To arrange the pasta: grease a casserole dish. First pour some of the tomato sauce, then a layer of noodles, then a layer of tomato sauce again, then cheese sauce. Next do noodles, then tomato sauce, then the veggies, then the cheese sauce, then more noodles. Lastly I topped the noodles with some daiya mozzarella. I baked this at 400 degrees for about 45 minutes. This was a really creamy and delicious, hefty meal. Recipe #2: I normally am not a fan of squash, but am glad I tried this lasagna dish, though it took a lot of work.

I ended up using whole wheat noodles; cook these as per the instructions while working on the other ingredients since there is no baking involved, just assembly at the end. The layers? 1. wilted spinach- easy enough. 2. Acorn squash, roasted at 400 for one hour with some olive oil, salt, and balsamic vinegar on top (this is the most time consuming part). Once roasted this was cut in to cubes without the shell. 3. Sauteed mushrooms: I used a mixture of white mushrooms and shitake. I first heated them up in a little olive oil until browning, and then added 1/4 cup red wine vinegar and a dash of liquid smoke. 4. The sauce- this was the toughest part. First I pureed about 2 cup fresh basil, 1/4 cup basil, 2 TBsp garlic, and 1/4 cup oilve oil. This was a little chunkier than I wanted, so I then added 1 cup soy yogurt. Lastly I made some tofu ricotta- this involved crumbling a block of tofu and mixing it with 2 TBsp tahini, 2 TBsp garlic, 3 TBsp yeast, 1 TBsp lemon juice, 1/2 tsp nutmeg, and 2 TBsp dried parsley. Of course this would not all fit in the blender with the stuff I had already pureed, so I mixed about 3/4 of it in, and ended up with a creamy cheese like sauce. For the lasagna assembly, first line the plate with the sauce, then spread the noodle on top using about 1/3 of it; on top of the noodle, place another layer of sauce and some chunks of squash, then fold it on itself in a 1/3 again; next apply more sauce and some mushrooms, and lastly on top apply the sauce and top with the wilted spinach. It took quite a while to assemble but smells and tastes wonderful, just like fall.

Eggplant pizza

It's funny how sometimes I buy a particular veggie or product, only to remember I never really liked it and not sure why I would try to now. Butternut squash, bananas, and eggplant are the two things that fit that category most. Sometimes I see it in the store on sale and I feel inclined to buy it, only to remember I am a fan of many recipes i have made in the past with those products. Well, I bought some eggplant last week, and then as I searched for new recipes nothing looked good. Vegan versions of eggplant parm looked gross as I thought of the texture of the eggplant, which makes me nauseous. I quickly realized I was an idiot to buy it, but then I found an eggplant pizza recipe that looked reasonable. It involved grilled eggplant, and since I didn't have a grill I ended up chopping my eggplant in to tiny cubes instead, and frying it in a little olive oil first.

Then for the pizza I first put a layer of pizza sauce on the dough, then topped it with chopped up eggplant, tomatoes, spinach, and black olives. The original recipe I had called for provolone on top, and since i had these new slices of daiya vegan provolone in the fridge, I sliced the slices into thin strips and topped the pizza with it. This was then baked at 450 for 10 minutes. Mark and I loved the result. I had too many toppings to fit on one pizza, and so today I made a veggie wrap with the remaining toppings and a little italian dressing, which was also good. I think the fact that I made the eggplants tiny little cubes allowed for me to appreciate the flavor without the texture, so maybe I can like eggplant afterall.

PHENOMENAL quesadilla casserole

This one was superb, not gonna lie, one of my favorite new dishes. I had some boca fake beef crumbles that I heated up in a little olive oil first. Then in a large bowl I mixed together one can black beans, one can diced tomatoes, and one can of kidney beans (all rinsed and drained). Once the fake beef was cooked I stirred that in. And Trader Joe's had this pre-roasted frozen corn kernels that I had thawed out of the fridge earlier in the day, well I mixed that in to the bowl with the bean mixture along with 2 TBsp cilantro. In a large bowl I then whisked together 1 jar enchilada sauce with 1 jar salsa together. Then in a circular casserole dish (a glass pie dish works best) I sprayed some PAM, and placed a flour tortilla. I then topped the tortilla with the bean mixture, then the sauce, then a layer of Daiya cheese. This was repeated with another tortilla on top, and topped lastly with a final tortilla. I ended up using Daiya cheddar and mozarella on the bottom, and then peperjack and mozarella on the second layer, and lastly pepperjack and mozarella on the top of the last tortilla. This was then baked at 350 for 30 minutes. It was SO FREAKING GOOD. I served it with 1/2 an avocado. Delicious left overs too.

green curry thai dish

This was a super quick, 10 minute meal to make, and was quite tasty. Basically I made some rice and while that was cooking I steamed some broccoli and spinach. Lastly I fried a block of tofu in peanut oil cut in to 1-inch chunks. This was all mixed together with Trader Joe's Green Curry sauce, and served over rice.

melt in your mouth vegan peanut tofu dish

This dish took quite a while to prepare but was well worth the effort. The dish is served on top of rice, so start cooking that while you prepare the rest. I had the TJ's high protein tofu that I cut in to 1 inch thick triangles first, and tossed in a mixture of 2 TBsp garlic, 1 tsp pepper, 2 tsp cumin, and 1/4 cup peanut oil, all in a tupperware container. This was then placed in the fridge while I continued cooking. In a saucepan I mixed up 1 TBsp peanut oil with 1 TBsp ginger powder, 1 tsp onion powder, and 1 tsp red pepper flakes. Then I added 1/3 cup smooth peanut butter to the sauce pan along with 1 TBsp lime juice, 1 can coconut milk, and 2 TBsp soy sauce. This was heated at low for about 15 minutes, with lots of stirring. While this was simmering I cooked up two bags of prepackaged broccoli, carrots, and cauliflower in a wok with a small amount of canola oil. Once these were cooked I put them aside in a large bowl and then took out the tofu and fried that up with all the sauce it was soaking in in the wok. Once browned, the tofu was removed and mixed in with the veggies. Once all this is done you serve the tofu and veggies over rice with some peanut sauce. You can also sprinkle some ground peanuts on top if you have them.

More "clean the cabinet" pasta dishes

This pasta dish involved me cooking up some rotini I had sitting in the cabinet. And in a wok I just heated up some sliced asparagus, spinach, broccolini, and halved grape tomatoes in some veggie oil. Once those were all cooked placed them as well as some pine nuts in a big bowl and made up the sauce for the pasta: The sauce was 1/2 cup balsamic vinegar whisked together with 1 TBsp brown sugar and 1 TBsp olive oil. It made for a nice light summer dish as well.

Hawaiian Pizza Vegan Style

This pizza surprisingly took a little bit of time to make, but was rewarding as Mark said it was one of the favorite pizzas I have ever made of his. For the toppings, first you should make the vegan bechamel sauce: Heat 1/4 cup margarine, 1 TBsp onion powder, and 2 TBsp garlic in a large pot. After a couple minutes add 1/4 cup corn starch and quickly stir to form a paste, then add 2 cups soymilk and 1 TBsp lemon juice. Lastly mix in 1 Tbsp yeast, and a pinch of salt, pepper, and nutmeg each. As the sauce is taken away from the heat it will start to thicken quite a bit. I then spread the sauce over the pizza crust we were using, put the remaining ingredients of pineapple chunks, diced green bell peppers, and sliced vegan ham on top of this sauce, and topped that with vegan mozzarella. I baked it at 400 for 15-20 minutes.

BBQ Mac and Cheese dish

I know, I know, I have said it a thousand times, but I do truly believe that everything is better with BBQ sauce. So this dish involved just that, as well as leftovers again while we tried to use up all the food in our fridge before moving cross country.

First I cooked up some macaroni noodles as well as fried up some vegan trader joes chicken strips in a tiny bit of oil. I added a little cayenne pepper and garlic powder to the fake chicken while frying it. Lastly I boiled some peas that were hanging out in the freezer while this was all occurring. Once the pasta was cooked I placed it in to a casserole dish and mixed in the fake chicken and peas. Lastly I made the cheese sauce. In a sauce pan I boiled 4 TBsp margarine and once melted whisked in 4 TBsp flour, 2 cups soymilk, an 1/2 cup soy cream. Once this was all mixed together I added one package of daiya mozzarella cheese and 12 package daiya cheddar cheese. I continued to mix that in for about 30-60 seconds, as it melted really quick in the boiling mixture. This was immediately poured on top of the casserole and mixed in with the remaining ingredients. Finally I sprinkled a bunch of bread crumbs as well as some vegan parmesan cheese on top, and placed the dish in the oven for 20 minutes at 400 degrees. The finishing touch of course was the barbecue sauce, and this was the most amazing comfort food I have made in a while.

Vegan Sausage Pizza

This was a leftover pizza that turned out just right.

I had some pre-made mini pizza crusts as well as frozen broccoli, italian flavored seitan, and mushrooms. I cooked them all up in a tiny bit of olive oil first, then topped on top of a pizza with marinara and a new vegan mozzarella cheese substitute I found at the store, Follow Your Heart Brand. Mark and I both loved this dish.

new vegan quesadillas

While in San Diego for my conference I did do a day of sight seeing in Old Town, and randomly came across a little recipe book for quesadillas. It was not a vegan cook book, but the pictures were beautiful and I instantly knew I could make a lot of the recipes veganized so I bought the book. This quesadilla was my first experiment and was pretty simple. I sliced up several tomatoes and placed the tomatoes on a paper towel, sprinkled with salt, and let sit for 15 minutes first, then soaked up the excess liquid from them before cooking with them. To make the quesadilla I first took a tortilla and sprinkled it with mozzarella (Daiya) as well as sliced Daiya jack cheese. Then I topped this with the tomato slices as well as whole basil leaves, and then one more sprinkling of daiya mozzarella on top before frying up in a skillet with a titch of oil. Super delicious.

Sundried tomato pesto pasta

Sorry it has been way too long peeps! But I spent the last month moving cross country after taking a hell of an exam to hopefully become DACVECC board certified (news to come on that when I get the test results). Of course with moving and being at conferences I did not have a lot of time to cook, but have several recipes I meant to post and now will do some back logging. Let's start with this refreshing summer pasta.

Basically I made up a package of farfelle and while that was cooking I made some pesto. For the pesto combine in a food processor: 2 TBsp Garlic, 1 package fresh basil leaves (remove the stems), 8 TBsp water, 6 TBsp walnuts, 1/4 cup olive oil, 1/2 a jar of oil packed sun dried tomatos, 1tsp red pepper flakes, and 1 TBsp yeast. Then once the pasta was cooked I mixed it with the pesto as well as the remaining jar of sun dried tomatoes. (And since I had osme fresh tomatoes in the house I needed to cook with I also chopped them up and mixed them in as well). Very refreshing for a first meal that I could have in Cali on the porch as the sunset.