Vegan MoFo: Agave Beer Pizza Crust

On Tuesday, I wrote about our and pizza, beer and wings night, but I didn't show the pizza.  Here it is! We often make our own pizza, and about half the time, we use this crust. I love the soft, bready-like texture, the quick, easy recipe, and the slightly sweet, yeasty flavor. We love making our own pizza, because it's economical, fun and each get make it just the way we like it.

For this pizza, I doused the crust in sauce, then I chopped up a few handfuls of spinach very thinly, topped that with some chopped Morningstar Farms/Gardein chick'n strips, finely sliced frozen artichoke hearts, thinly sliced kalamata olives and tons of Monterrey Jack flavored Follow Your Heart.

Before I covered it in FYH.

          Agave Wheat Pizza Crust
        Christina Terriquez

 In my hometown, there’s a local pizza chain that’s famous for their crusts. The standard crusts are wheat, semi-thick, bready and lightly sweetened with honey. Each pizza even comes with a small side of honey so that you can dip your crust and eat it for dessert. We didn’t go to that pizza chain often, but the crusts left a huge impression on me. This recipe is my answer to that crust. It’s soft, bready, and very flavorful. 

 1 1/2 cups organic whole wheat flour    

1 1/2 cups organic unbleached flour    

         1/4 teaspoon unrefined sea salt   

3 teaspoons baking powder     

1 tablespoon organic extra virgin olive oil,     

1 tablespoon organic agave nectar     

11 ounces your favorite beer, pale ale, hefewizen or light  lagers work well  

Directions   

Preheat oven to 350° F.      

Sift dry ingredients together into a large bowl.  

In a small bowl, whisk together oil and agave nectar, then add beer and gently mix. Fold wet ingredients into dry ingredients and gently mix to incorporate. Batter will be slightly wet and sticky. Knead until dough comes together, adding more flour as needed.  

Cover two baking sheets with unbleached parchment. Divide dough in two, and lightly flour. Using flour as needed, roll dough out into a round approximately 10–12 inches in diameter.  

Bake crusts for 10–15 minutes, or until crust is golden brown and done in the center. Top as desired and bake.  

Variations 

Try dividing dough into thirds or fourths for personal pizzas.  

Use 2 cups whole wheat flour and 1 cup unbleached white for a heartier wheat flavor.              

Brush crust with olive oil prior to baking.  

Notes 

The beer will flavor your crust quite a bit, so use a beer you enjoy drinking. Light to medium beers with heavy wheat or honey flavors work especially well here.  

         This crust is very bready, the texture is like a quick bread, not stretchy like regular pizza dough.

Finished product, covered in FYH.

What's your favorite pizza? Do you ever make your own crust?

Vegan MoFo Wordless Wednesday: Chocolate Raspberry Silk Pie

Vegan MoFo: Sushi Bowl

I love sushi. There are endless combinations, flavors and textures to try, but sometimes, I just can't wait to for the rice to cool to make rolls, or the rice is leftover and not sticky, or I'm just feeling too lazy. In these cases, a sushi bowl is perfect. It's great for day the day after you make sushi, too, since you'll already have all of the ingredients prepared. 

Just place a bed of cooked rice (it can be hot, room temperature, or even cold, if that's your thing) in the bottom of large bowl, and top it with bite sized pieces of your favorite sushi additions. 

Some things I like:

steamed or blanched carrots, green beans, or asparagus

pan friend, baked, or marinated tofu or tempeh

fresh cucumber, green onion, and avocado

roasted red pepper

sauteed portobello or shiitake mushrooms

Don't forget to add strips of nori, toasted sesame seeds, and season with soy sauce to take this from "rice salad" to "sushi bowl".

Jeremy thinks it's gross, but I also sometimes add mustard to my sushi bowls (he insisted I not take a picture). If you aren't using vinegared rice and want more flavor, you could add wasabi, toasted sesame oil, a miso sauce, or whatever you like in your sushi.

Vegan MoFo Wordless Wednesday: Vegan Kentucky Bourbon Pie

Vegan MoFo Iron Chef Challenge Week 2: Quinoa!

This week's Vegan MoFo Iron Chef Challenge item was another ingredient that I am very familiar with, quinoa. I love quinoa, and I use it a lot, especially in the summertime, when its quick cooking time is particularly nice.



My mind immediately went to some of my typical quinoa dishes, like gluten-free cake or cupcakes, a timbale of quinoa and fall vegetables, a quinoa salad, or a pie with a gluten free quinoa crust. I actually had a really hard time trying to figure out what to do for this week's challenge, because I wanted to make something that I hadn't made before that was, well, challenging, but I've used it so often, and for many different types of things, I was kind of stuck into my routine way of thinking.

I ended up making a lot of quinoa in case things didn't work out......it's a really good thing I did. I thought about trying scones, but I wasn't in the mood for scones. I thought about trying to make a custard with quinoa, but that didn't strike my fancy, either. Finally, it hit me, pancakes! Pancakes are perfect for Sunday morning brunch. And I thought I could do it pretty successfully.

First, I scoured my quinoa really well and rinsed it until the water ran clear. Then I dry toasted it in a plain cast iron skillet. Then I boiled it. This made some perfect quinoa. the kind of perfect quinoa that would great as is or in a really simple grain salad. but I had bigger plans for it.

Once it was cooked, I chilled it overnight. This morning, I blended the cooked quinoa with some soymilk, a touch of sweetener, and some baking powder. The batter tasted great, with no bitter bite, but I could still see some whole grains. Oh well, I figured, it might give the pancakes some body and texture.

The first pancake looked perfect and beautiful, with a perfect, golden brown skin on one side, and it flipped nicely, too. I should have known better. I couldn't get the second side off the skillet. And for the next 4 attempts, I couldn't even get the first side off. I tried letting my skillet cool, I tried oiling it between each side, I tried cleaning the spatula between each flip (really a necessity, because they were sticking like crazy) but nothing was working. The bits that I could pry off tasted good, like a buttery skillet cake, with a soft, barely-cooked center, and a crisp, outside.

So I decided this batter would just not work. I thought at first that it was just too much sweetener. I added a little white spelt flour. This helped. The pancakes where sticking like mad, but if I could turn them, they came out okay. I ended up with a bunch of little crushed looking wads of dough.

The third batch is on the left. See how fluffy and cute they are? The ones on the right are the second batch. Super buttery and eggy, but very flat and sticky. Also, batch #2 isn't pretty.

The third batch was the charm. I realized that the batter needed a binder. I added some flax seeds, a little more water, more white spelt flour, and a little bit of lemon zest. As soon as the first pancake hit the skillet, I could tell that this batch would be good. I immediately saw the telltale bubbles coming to the surface. Then, I tried to flip it....no resistance! It worked! As soon as it was flipped, it puffed up even more. It was already about twice as fat as my first two batches, but now it was about four times as tall. I cooked the rest of the batter, and tasted them. They were good!

The third batch did deflate a bit after it cooled, but they look like perfect little pancakes. Add syrup, and you can clearly see why the word "cake" is a part of their name. The second side got super bubbly while the first side cooked, and when you pour on the syrup, the tiny little holes make each pancake a sponge for syrup, which they completely soak up.

Quinoa pancakes, drenched in raspberry syrup.

The flavor is amazing when the pancakes are hot; the quinoa lends a buttery flavor, and an eggy texture, which I've never had in any pastry since I've been vegan. The taste does change a bit when they cool, though. I've been eating as I type this, and the pancakes are starting to taste like more robust cooked grains, like rye or something. I would definitely try this again if I made too much quinoa and had leftovers, but I probably wouldn't make quinoa just to make pancakes.

For the rest of my brunch, I made garlic sautéed spinach, sausage-style tempeh, and rosemary sweet potato hash. It was heavenly.

Product Review: Laver Fish

JD and I both LOVE Laver Fish! Laver fish is the really cartoon-y looking fish analog that you sometimes see at Asian markets. It is also sometimes called beancurd fish, though it's not actually tofu. It's flavored and pressed yuba--basically thin, chewy sheets of soymilk--that's wrapped in nori. It's always sold frozen, and it has a chopstick down the center as an artificial bone. Not all versions are vegan, some contain egg white, and there are different varieties. We prefer the style that is just yuba, nori and soy sauce, but there are some that contain more flavorings, even some with mushroom added.


I love the flaky, light texture of laver fish, and JD says it's pretty close( in texture) to actual fish. I also love that it's minimally refined, since it's just yuba and nori pressed together. I've even found a recipe for making your own laver fish online that I'd like to try during this MoFo, if I can make it to one of the Asian markets.

JD wants me to mention how much the taste varies by brand, he doesn't enjoy the particular style/brand in these photos because it's too sweet, and he says you can't taste the nori--he's not even the biggest fan of nori, though he does appreciate the "sea flavor" it lends to dishes like this laver fish or sushi.


While it's minimally processed, we typically only eat it once a month or less, but it's is a relatively inexpensive convenience food (about $3), and it's considered 3.5 servings. Our favorite quick meal with laver fish is the one in the photos; pan-fried laver fish, boiled potatoes, and steamed, blanched or sautéed vegetables. JD likes to dress his potatoes with EB, while I prefer to make a dipping sauce out of Vegenaise, prepared horseradish, lemon juice, a pinch of sea salt, and lots of freshly cracked black pepper. I use this sauce on both the potatoes and the laver fish. This meal usually takes around 15 minutes to prepare, so we can make it in a snap, even when we're super-famished.


You can also prepare laver fish in other ways, and one of our favorite complex preparations is to make laver fish tacos, by thawing the laver fish, cutting it into thin strips, then lightly breading and frying it. When we make this, we usually serve it in corn tortillas with fresh homemade salsa--mango chipotle works especially well!

Mini Poke Cakes

Day 5 of Vegan MoFo 2010! There are so many great blogs I never would have found on my own, and so many enthusiastic and creative vegans, I love this month. Ijust wish I had more time!

Do you remember poke cakes? My mother loved them with I was little. All you needed was a boxed cake mix and a box of gelatin, and you could a cake that looked like it had technicolor stalagmites. It really was kind of cool.

Yesterday, after decorating my mini Devo cakes, and realizing my concept was not working out, I thought of another way to use the raspberry syrup I had made with the lemon cupcakes. Mini vegan poke cakes!

This is a pretty simple concept, you just need a syrup or strained jam, a squeezable container like an agave nectar bottle, a chopstick, and unfrosted cupcakes and icing.

Start by using the chopstick to poke holes into your cupcake. I would recommend starting with a test cupcake, just to see how far in you should go, how much syrup or jam you can use, and how many holes you need. Basically, if you push too deep, you'll ruin it by having syrup run right out, and if you put too many holes, everything will run out in a big syrupy mess when someone bites into it.

Next, fill your squeezable bottle with the syrup or jam of your choice. Insert the tip into the cupcake, and gently squeeze some syrup into each hole. If you spill, use a clean dish towel or a paper towel to wipe away excess, because icing will slid off if the top is too slick.


Once you're done filling all of the poke, frost away!


Admire and enjoy your mini vegan poke cakes!


I know there's not much icing on these cupcakes, I like a high cake to frosting ratio.

Vegan Icing

And without a hand mixer! I have a lot of kitchen gadgets, ice cream makers, pressure cookers, grapefruit extractors, citrus reamers, zesters, pasta machines, you name it, I probably have it, with one notable exception. Hand mixers.

I've never really a seen the benefit when compared to the amount of use I would get out of them. Hand mixers just whip things really fast. I can whip things. A hand mixer would be sort nice for nostalgia, because it's what my mom had, but other than that, I don't think I'd use it much. Especially since I can already make good vegan buttercreme icing.

I don't use cane sugar much, preferring less refined sweeteners like agave nectar, rice syrup, and maple syrup for the most part. One case where liquid sweeteners just don't cut it, though? Icing. If you want peaks of pipe-able icing, you really have to use powdered sugar. I've tried tons of different things, but none really work.

I've tried tofu. Silken and firm. It's gross. Don't even bother, it taste like tofu, and retains the properties of tofu. I've made mousses and ganaches, and sometimes you can pipe them, but they either melt quickly, dry and crack, or slip and slide.

My biggest tip for incredibly smooth and creamy icing is start by mixing the fat and liquid.

Obviously, the ingredients will vary based on what flavor you want, but I made a basic Lemon Creme Icing today with the following recipe.

Lemon Cupcake with Lemon Creme

Lemon Creme Icing
by Christina Terriquez

Ingredients
1/4 cup solid oil (palm oil, coconut oil, EB, or vegetable shortening)
1 large pinch sea salt
1/4 cup unsweetened non-dairy milk, room temperature
lemon extract or edible lemon oil
juice of 1 lemon
1/2 teaspoon of organic lemon zest, minced
3--5 cups powdered sugar
turmeric, if desired for color

Directions
In a large bowl, stir oil or shortening and sea salt to smooth out any lumps. Add non-dairy milk and mix well. Mixture should be slightly emulsified at this point. Add 6 drops of lemon oil or 1 teaspoon of lemon extract, lemon juice and lemon zest and stir to combine.

Add 1 cup of powdered sugar and stir well. Mixture should be very thin, but lump free. Repeat two more times. Taste, and if needed, add more lemon oil or extract. Add turmeric if desired at this point. You should need no more than 1/2 teaspoon, since adding any more may greatly alter the flavor.

Once color and flavor are as desired, add more powdered sugar until desired consistency is achieved.

Notes
Adding less sugar will give you a glaze or a spreadable icing. Add more sugar for a pipe-able icing.

I used coconut oil for this batch of lemon icing, since the weather is cool and the icing wasn't in danger of melting, but I would not use this during summer or in a hot climate.

You can use the same technique for other flavors, for example for peanut butter frosting, use 1/4 cup peanut butter, 1 tablespoon solid oil, and omit all lemon ingredients and turmeric.

Are we not cupcakes? We are DEVO.

I had to share this last picture, of a Lemon Cupcake with Lemon Creme Icing and Raspberry Glaze, because even though it is horrible--or maybe because it is awful--I love it. It doesn't even look like something edible, it looks like Devo. Or a fake plastic cupcake. Or something kind of pornographic. There's no flash here, and I took 10 pictures, all of which had that same weird glow. But let me tell you, the raspberry glaze added a perfect contrast to all that lemony goodness.

Last night, JD and I went to see Janelle Monae and Of Montreal (one of my favorite bands), and I kept thinking about what kind of food I could make in his honor. I think this raspberry glazed cupcake with it's crazy bright inner glow and flamboyant hot red color would be fitting.

Restaurant Review: Conan's Pizza

Day one of Vegan MoFo! I was going to save this review until a little later in the month, but I couldn't wait, especially after Gerald was so kind as to offer up a donation of delicious, delicious pizza for VRA's Halloween party. I figured I owed it to vegans all over Austin to tell of the wonders that are only a phone call away.

It all started when Gerald from Conan's posted a note over at Vegans Rock Austin! that starting October 26, Conan's Pizza would begin offering Daiya on their pizzas, and that both the wheat and white deep dish crusts were vegan.

Wait, a local chain that is in my neighborhood AND delivers to my house is offering Daiya AND they have vegan deep dish crusts? This is amazing! I knew this deserved further investigation.

We drove by and sure enough, their sign proudly proclaimed that they had vegan options. I got a small Don't Choke Art! which includes artichoke hearts, spinach, garlic, and tomatoes. Conan's put a perfect amount of Daiya and toppings, and I have to say, I think the pizza was even better after it had cooled. I've always been a big fan of cold, leftover pizza, and for me, room temperature Daiya pizza is the way to go. I'm not a huge fan of cold Daiya pizza, since, as Daiya doesn't really firm it when it's chilled, it seems kind of soggy.



My favorite noncheese of choice for pizzas is still FYH Monterrey Jack, but Daiya is definitely gaining ground. And I'm really glad that so many restaurants are offering it. It seems to be opening a lot of doors for vegans and other dairy-free people. As I said on my twitter stream, I feel this is truly the start of a vegan revolution.... If you're not a fan of fake cheese, I think this pizza would be great without any cheese or Daiya.

I've never had deep dish pizza other than Pizza Hut's Pan pizza, which was my family's pizza of choice when I was growing up and this was so good! It was really comforting, because it kind of reminded me of the pan pizza, but at the same time, it was also completely different. The crust was soft and bready just under the toppings but perfectly crisp, with that fried dough texture all along the edges and bottom of the pizza.

Look at how thick this baby was!

Conan's has four veggie "specialty" pizza options and ten vegetable/seasoning options. They also offer barbecue sauce and pesto, but as of this writing, only the tomato sauce is vegan, however, it sounds as if they might be looking into making a vegan pesto.

They do charge a little more for the Daiya, but they offer a 10% discount if you have a Go Local card, and you can print out $2 off coupons. I got the small, which I believe is about 8 inches. My small deep dish was about $11, which is not bad all, since it was fresh, super thick, and mega delicious, plus, it will feed me at least once more. It was perfect and could feed about 2-3 people if you had a salad or vegetables on the side. Of course, you could also be like JD and eat the whole thing in one sitting....

The south location is also really cute, with a Colorado table, a rock'n' roll table, and plants with names like Alabama and Batman. It gets extra points for being right next to my favorite library on the south side and right across from the park, although it's also right across the street from a high school and college, so it's likely to be packed at lunch time on weekdays.

At the VRA Halloween party, I got to try a slice of another pizza, which I think was either the Veggie or the Veggie Supreme (I didn't see any tomato or pineapple slices, but I did catch a few pieces of jalepeno, so maybe it was something else entirely). As my first pizza confirmed, Conan's makes a great pizza, and Austin Vegans are lucky to be able order deep dish pizzas.

Zesty Lemon Asparagus

Vegan MoFo is almost upon us and I'm going to give it another go, so I thought I'd post to get back into the swing of things.

A lot of times, I make dishes but don't post about them because they don't really seem like recipes. This is pretty simple, and is almost more of a series of small techniques. Which I guess is what recipes are, hence, here's a recipe!

I love asparagus, it tastes kind of like a delicate, more tender version of broccoli stalks to me. Recently, Newflower has been having it on sale, and I've been eating a ton of it. I love it sautéed, blanched, after it's been dipped in tempura and wrapped in rice and nori, as sushi, and a hundred other ways, but my favorite way to prepare it is like this:

Looks pretty good, right? It tastes even better!

Zesty Lemon Asparagus
by Christina Terriquez

Ingredients
1 organic lemon
2 tablespoons whole almonds or hazelnuts
1 tablespoon olive oil
1-2 cups asparagus
sea salt to taste

Directions
Prep your asparagus by breaking the ends. Take the tip in one hand and bottom end in the other, and gently bend, until asparagus stalk breaks. Discard the hard, white end. I like to cut my asparagus into 3 inch pieces for this dish, but you can leave it whole, or cut it into 2 inch pieces if you wish.

Zest the organic lemon, then juice it. Set both the juice and zest aside for now.

Carefully slice the almonds or hazelnuts into thin slivers.

Heat a medium sized cast iron skillet over medium high heat. Add olive oil and slivered nuts to pan and lightly toast. Once nuts have browned just a bit, add the asparagus and a pinch of salt to the pan and sauté until tender-crisp, about 2 minutes. Turn off heat and add a big pinch of zest and taste. Add lemon juice, lemon zest and sea salt to your taste.

Notes
You can buy almonds already slivered instead of slicing them yourself, but they usually cost more.

I think the hazelnuts taste a little bit better, but I don't always have them on hand.

I usually use 1--1 1/2 cups of asparagus, and the juice and zest of 1/2 a medium sized lemon, but depending on the rest of your meal, and your tastes, you can adjust it accordingly.

I hope that got you in the mood for some stellar vegan posts from tons of new and old vegans. There are already over 430 people signed up for Vegan MoFo 2010, from at least 15 countries.

Vegan MoFo: Vegan Pork Belly Review and BLT of AWESOMENESS.

BLT of AWESOMENESS (that it is vegan should be understood by all, since it is AWESOME)

First, I have to say, I was a little bit surprised by all of the positive responses I received after my meat analog post. I thought it would either be completely unnoticed since there were no pictures, or totally polarizing. I'm really glad so many people read it.

Over the weekend, I played with the first of the many analogs I picked up at MT Market, the vegan "smoky pork belly". I have to say, first of all, that while I used to love bacon, and I've often heard of it as "the gateway back to meat", I don't really miss it, and I don't like most of the bacon analogs I've tried. Most bacon analogs have a really intense liquid smoke flavor, or if the flavor is okay, the texture is too much like a cracker. I am NOT a fan of liquid smoke. When I want a flavor as smoky, salty and complex as bacon, I usually add alder wood smoked sea salt and a dash of olive oil or toasted sesame oil. If I want something that's similar to bacon in both flavor and texture, I like to use either pan-fried dulse, tempeh that's been simmered in a marinade of shoyu, alder wood smoked sea salt, water and occasionally garlic, smoked paprika, or black pepper, or, for the most fatty bacon texture, fresh shiitake mushrooms pan-fried in olive oil until slightly browned and seasoned with alder wood smoked sea salt and a dash of shoyu. As you can tell, in my house, we're big fans of alder wood smoked sea salt--JD uses it whenever he can, and always pleads for me to put it in the greens-blanching- water.



In the package, the vegan pork belly looked like a thick piece of black pepper cured, unsliced bacon. I toyed around with a few ideas, like using it as the pork in a batch of green chile, but in the end, I decided to try a bit of it simply pan-fried with some of the beautiful Asian greens I had, so that we could really taste the flavor, and get a feel for the texture. I cut about 1/4 cup of the vegan pork belly into 1/4" dice and as I diced I was a little impressed with the way the "meat" and "fat" had different textures, and I wondered if they would taste different, too. If I had been using actual bacon or pork belly, I would not have needed any salt or oil, but since the white part of the vegan pork belly wasn't really solid fat, I figured I'd need a bit of oil. I heated about a teaspoon of safflower oil in a cast iron pan, then added the diced vegan pork belly. I used safflower oil because I wanted a flavor-neutral oil, so that we could taste all the flavor nuances of the pork belly. After the pork belly started to brown, I added the thick, sliced stalks of the Chinese broccoli, but didn't add any salt, because I thought the vegan pork belly would have plenty of salt. At this point, I decided that a little garlic and some chili flakes would add a really nice flavor, so I added a pinch of crushed red chili flakes, and about 1/2 teaspoon of garlic powder (normally, I'd use fresh crushed garlic, but since my pan was already hot, and there was some liquid in the pan, I knew the garlic powder wouldn't burn). After about two minutes, I added the gorgeous, super-tiny heads of mystery greens, which I just washed and cut in half. I sautéed these for about one more minute, then added the leafy tops of the Chinese broccoli and sautéed for about two more minutes. Since the dish had a definite Asian bend, I thought some toasted sesame seeds would be a nice garnish.

Slightly blurry, here's my serving of greens.

Overall, the dish was really pretty, and the flavor was good, although it would have been hard to screw up those lovely greens. The vegan pork belly was kind of neat and fun, but in this dish, it didn't really offer anything new. JD like it enough, but didn't rush back for seconds, and as I told JD, it didn't really add anything that tempeh or even smoked or fried tofu couldn't. The large pieces of black pepper added a really good flavor, and the smoke flavor was mild enough to be enjoyable without tasting overpoweringly artificial, but it was almost too mild, in fact, I found myself wishing I had added a bit of smoked salt while cooking. The "meat" and "fat" part of the pork belly did have slightly different tastes and textures, which was novel, but after this dish, I wasn't impressed enough with this aspect to imagine going out of my way to buy it again.

At least, I couldn't imagine going out of my to buy it again until I had The BLT of AWESOMENESS. As I was putting away the remaining unused vegan pork belly, I thought I should really try slicing it and using it like bacon. I decided that a BLT would be the way to go, partially because I had most of the ingredients on hand. I often make Dulse, Lettuce and Tomato sandwiches with a slice of avocado, and I love these because they're quick, easy and delicious. I figured the vegan pork belly could be an interesting addition, but I no idea...

I started by heating a small amount of safflower oil in my cast iron pan, then adding the sliced vegan pork belly, and a little bit of smoked sea salt to improve the smokiness. While that was browning, I cut my ciabatta into a sandwich-size square, and sliced it in half. I spread FYH vegan mayonnaise on the top half, then topped that with two layers of thinly-sliced tomato--you could use one layer of thick-cut tomato for less mess, but come on, sloppy is more delicious! At about this point, the first side of vegan pork belly slices had browned, so I flipped then, and placed slices from half a small avocado on the bottom half of the ciabatta, sprinkled it with sea salt, and put a nice bed of baby red and green romaine leaves over the avocado. By now, the vegan pork belly was nicely browned, so I placed it over the lettuce, put the top half of ciabatta on, and sliced it.

Look, it's almost reaching out and inviting you to take a bite.

It was gorgeous. Thinly sliced layer upon layer, mayonnaise coating tomatoes and causing them to gently slide down the baby lettuce, while the vegan bacon glistens and the avocado all but hides under the lettuce. I almost didn't want to eat it. Almost. It was definitely one of the top five sandwiches I've ever had in my life. I think it'd probably even be the second best, only behind a tempeh reuben made with fresh, homemade sourdough rye.

A perfect sandwich.

While I was building my sandwich, JD noticed I was in the kitchen, and came to see what I was making. He decided he also wanted a sandwich with the vegan pork belly (even though he had lunch meat and smoked salmon in the fridge), so he sliced up and fried the remainder. Since he does not like avocado, lettuce, raw tomato, or mayo in any form (JD picky?? Nah!), he just had a vegan pork belly sandwich, so apparently it was more than tasty enough to satisfy even a omnivore, even when meat options are available. Because of its stellar participation in The BLT of AWESOMENESS, I have to say I would definitely buy vegan "smoky pork belly" again, but probably only for use in sandwiches.

Almond Ricotta-Stuffed Shells and Vegan MoFo

You may have felt an inexplicable buzz of excitement, heard the unmistakable sound of food bloggers taking pictures, uploading and typing, or maybe you've just noticed vegan and vegetarian bloggers coming out in droves lately, and wondered why. Well, it's because today is the first day of Vegan MoFo, the magical time of the year when we all band together and update our blogs at least once every weekday for a whole month.

Last year my computer crashed a mere four posts in, but, given that my computer has already crashed once this year, that I'll be out of town and away from computer for about 2/5 of the month (more on that later), and that I have a back up plan, I'm ready for Vegan MoFo 2008. For an ever-expanding list of Vegan MoFo Bloggers, check out Isa's Blog. Hopefully, this will introduce new bloggers to a different audience, widen and reinforce the vegan support network, inspire people, and show how gorgeous, tasty and fun vegan food can be!

I also have an update about a new blog that I've joined, Lone Star Plate, which is a group blog comprised of vegans from all over Texas! I'm aiming to post a combination of new content and cross-posted content from Vegan Vanguard.

Now, onto the food!

Almond Ricotta-Stuffed Shells with Blanched Broccoli and Seitan Sausage

Summer in Austin can be unbearably hot, and on most days, the last thing you want to do is spend an hour in front of a hot stove, which is what made this one of our favorite easy summer meals. If you blanch your greens in the water before you cook the pasta, then you'll only end up using one pan, too, which makes clean up super easy! I came up with this simple dish when JD's mother was in town and I wanted something that was semi-familiar, like pasta and marinara, but also simple, elegant and tofu-free. I know that a lot of people use and love tofu ricotta, and while I think it's great in lasagna, I don't think it's quite right in dishes where it's the main ingredient, and I like to show people who haven't had much exposure to vegans that we really do eat more than just tofu and salad.

This recipe does require a long soak, which you can either start in the morning before you go to work, or in the evening, for the next day. If you start this a day ahead and you don't want the almonds to ferment, place the soaking almonds in the fridge. To make a fermented almond cheese, after soaking the almonds for 8 hours, drain the water and allow them to ferment for a more complex flavor and additional healing benefits.

Soaking nuts makes their protein and fat more digestible and accessible.

Almond Ricotta Stuffed Shells up close

Almond Ricotta Stuffed Pasta Shells
by Christina Terriquez

1 cup raw almonds
1--2 cloves fresh garlic
ume vinegar
sea salt
2 tablespoons fresh Italian parsley, minced

8-12 jumbo pasta shells, boiled until al dente and drained
2 cups of your favorite marinara, red sauce, or Mama Mia sauce

Directions
Either blanch and skin the almonds, or soak the almond until the skin inflates and skin the almonds. Soak skinned almonds for 8 hours.

Blend soaked almonds and garlic, in a blender or food processor, slowly adding water as needed to achieve a homogeneous, but slightly textured ricotta consistency. Season to taste with ume and sea salt, then add parsley.

Heat marinara.

Gently spoon almond ricotta into each shell. Pour a little marinara on each plate, then arrange shells over marinara, and finish with more marinara. Garnish with parsley, if desired. Serve with blanched or sautéed greens.

Variations
-Use fermented almond cheese, but dilute with a little water and season with garlic, ume and sea salt.

-Use basil and oregano in place of or in addition to Italian Parsley.

-Add freshly ground black pepper.

-Use with almond ricotta with manicotti instead of jumbo shells.

Almond Ricotta-Stuffed Manicotti with Red Kale

Summer Pico de Gallo, Salsa, and Tacos

Seitan Asada Tacos with "grilled" onions, cilnatro, limes, salsa and a side of papas

Salsa is one of those great foods that can do triple duty as a garnish, an appetizer or a condiment. It's also widely available, inexpensive, easy to make and, pretty much always vegan. In fact, the only other food I can think of that fits that bill is hummus. And while both are simple to prepare from scratch, they are generally store bought. Well, since it's the height of tomato and pepper season, and some many beautiful varieties of both are available right now, I thought I'd post a few recipes.

Pico de Gallo
by Christina Terriquez

1/4 cup white or yellow onion
1 clove garlic
sea salt
1 lime, optional
2--4 red ripe tomatoes, skin off, if desired
1--2 jalapenos

Directions
Chop the onion and place in glass bowl. Mince garlic and add to onion. Add two pinches of salt and the juice from half of the lime, if using lime. By salting and adding citrus juice to the onion and garlic, you are starting the pickling process, which will take some of the edge off of them.

Chop the tomatoes and drain the seeds and juice. Add tomato pieces to the onions.

Wearing gloves, mince the jalapeno, then add it to the onion. If you like really mild food, remove the seeds and all the white pith from the pepper before mincing it. Mix well and let sit for at least 10 minutes. Season to taste with lime juice and salt.

Variations
-Add some chopped cilantro.

-Add some cubed avocado.

Pico de Gallo has many things going for it, it's pretty quick, assuming you have a good knife, it's easy, only requires one bowl, doesn't call for any cooking, keeps for a few days, a little goes a long way, and it can add a lot of texture and flavor. I like pico as a condiment, or for adding it to other things like soup or guacamole. However, when I want salsa to eat with chips, I make the following version.

Simple Summer Salsa
by Christina Terriquez

1--2 cloves garlic, crushed or minced
1/2 medium onion, minced
sea salt
2 serrano or jalapeno peppers, washed and dried
4 ripe tomatoes
chopped cilantro, to taste
fresh lime juice, optional

Directions
Place minced garlic and onion in a medium size bowl, sprinkle with two pinches of sea salt and toss. Set aside.

In a 3 quart saucepan, place approximately 4 cups of water on to boil. While waiting for that, proceed to the next step.

Roast peppers over flame until skin is black and blistered, being careful not to puncture skin as juices will leak. Set blackened peppers aside or in brown paper bag to cool. Repeat until all peppers are roasted.

Using plastic gloves, under cool running water, peel the skin away from the peppers, de-stem and de-seed. Mince pepper flesh, and place in the bowl with the onions.

Make an x-shaped score in the bottom of each tomato. Blanch each tomato for about 30 seconds, then let cool. When cool enough to handle, peel the skin from each tomato, starting at the scored x. Cut each tomato into quarters and discard the juice and seeds. Mince tomatoes and add to bowl.

Mix all ingredients and season with salt, cilantro and lime juice.

Variations
-Use a food processor instead of mincing ingredients. This will make a slushier, juicier salsa. If you have a molcajete, you could also crush the chopped ingredients in that.

-Add some fresh diced peaches, mango, pineapple or other seasonal fruit to the salsa.

-For a spicier sals increase thae amount or type of chilies you use.

-To cut the acidity of the onion and garlic, instead of mincing and salting the garlic and onions, cut the onion into 1/2 inch thick wedges, and peel the garlic but leave it whole. Sauté the onion wedges and whole garlic cloves until the onion becomes tender and slightly translucent. Mince or process until finely minced in food processor.

This is my favorite style of salsa because it's fresh, has great texture and flavor, and is still really simple, but the elements that cause most people trouble have been neutralized a bit. The skins from nightshades that are hard to digest have been removed, and the peppers have been cooked just enough to add a wonderful flavor and smell while reducing the risk of heartburn. The onions and garlic which can have an unpleasant edge, have been either salted or sautéed to cut that edge, while maintaining some pungency.

For people who are avoiding nightshades all together, but still want a little heat, quick-pickled pepper onions are perfect.

Quick-Pickled Pepper Onions
by Christina Terriquez

1 whole white, yellow, or red onion
umeboshi vinegar
1/2 teaspoon whole black peppercorns

Directions
Slice onion into thin half moons and place in a glass bowl. Sprinkle about 1 tablespoon of ume vinegar over the onions, then gently massage the vinegar into onions. Set aside.

Using a rolling pin or coarse pepper mill, crush the peppercorns, and sprinkle half over the onions. Let sit for at least 30 minutes.

Taste onions. Season with more pepper if desired.

Variations
-Use a mixture of lime juice and umeboshi vinegar for a more tangy flavor.

-Omit the black pepper.

These onions are not only tasty and easy to make, they're also a beautiful bright pink.

Quick Ume Pickled Onion (black pepper omitted)

Recently, we've been eating a lot of salsa and tacos. The breakfast taco is ubiquitous in Austin, and it usually contains two ingredients, one of those often being beans. Common pairings include bean and cheese, bean and egg, and chorizo and egg. As a vegan, bean and potato tacos are often the only safe bet (if the beans are free of lard and meat), although many establishments carry some kind of vegetarian friendly item, like tofu scramble, sautéed vegetables, or soy chorizo. They're always served on a flour or corn tortilla(not in a taco shell) and are usually under 2 bucks each. Salsa is available, but vegetables are never served unless specifically requested.

Bean and potato tacos with avocado, green leaf lettuce and salsa

I love bean and potato tacos, but I really like them with salsa, lettuce, and avocado, so when we happened to have all of those ingredients, I knew we had to make some. I also decided that some carna asada-style tacos would be really good with the salsa, so I made some seitan, and homemade tortillas, which I'll post about next.