March 2009 Archives

For Christmas Katie got me my first entirely-vegan cookbook:  Vegan with a Vengeance by Isa Chandra Moskowitz.  It has a large section on brunch, which thrills me.  Breakfast and brunch can be one of the most delicious and exciting meals, but going out to eat as a vegan can be disappointing.  As Moskowitz says and I have often found to be true, most restaurants (Old Town Cafe being one of my favorite exceptions) offer only oatmeal as a vegan option. 

On Monday, my gentleman friend Chris and I made Moskowitz's recipe for lemon corn waffles with blueberry sauce.  They are luscious.  The waffles are creamy and taste subtley of lemon; the corn meal gives them a pleasant texture; the blueberry sauce tastes delightfully of vanilla.  For the savory counterpart to the meal, we tried marinated tempeh strips called Fakin' Bacon.  Chris is a meat-eater, and said the "bacon" wasn't fooling anyone, but it was tasty and worth the money he spent on it.  I wouldn't want the tempeh to be too meaty anyway, and I enjoyed the smoky flavor.



Lemon Corn Waffles

Ingredients
1 1/4 c. plus 3 tbsp flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 c. cornmeal
1/4 corn oil (vegetable and canola work too)
2 c. soy milk
1/4 c. soy yogurt
Zest and juice of 2 lemons
1/4 sugar (or Sucanat)

1.  Preheat waffle iron.
2.  Mix the dry ingredients (minus sugar) in one bowl, and whisk wet ingredients (plus sugar) in another bowl.  Make a well in the dry ingredients and pour the wet ingredients in.  Mix until just combined.  I've heard overmixing makes waffles and pancakes less fluffy.
3.  Cook waffles.  If you're not familiar with waffle irons:  I check how close the waffles are to done by watching the steam.  The more steam that comes out of the waffles iron, the less done they are.  The less steam, the more done they are.  I don't know if this is try for all irons and waffles.



Blueberry Sauce

Ingredients
1 1/2 tbsp arrowroot powder
1 lb frozen blueberries, partially thawed
1/2 c. maple syrup
1 tsp vanilla

1.  In a small saucepan, mix the arrowroot with the blueberries until the arrowroot is mostly dissolved.

Dissolving arrowroot in blueberries
2.  Cook over medium heat until blueberries are warm.  Add syrup and vanilla.  Cook until sauce thickens.

Pour sauce over waffles and dig in!

I found these adorably precious little duckling cookie cutters the other day, and I had to test them out immediately. So cute!

 

Ingredients:

1 c margarine, softened

1 c sugar

4 c flour

2 egg replacers

2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp vanilla

¼ c cream cheese (vegan)

1 lemon

 

Directions

1. Combine dry ingredients and set aside.
2. Cream margarine an sugar. Beat in egg replacers. Gradually mix in the dry ingredients. Mix in the cream cheese. Add the zest and juice of one lemon.
3. Cover dough and chill for a few hours.
4. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Greese some cookie sheets.
5. Roll dough on a lightly floured surface until it's about 1/4 inch thick. Cut into shapes!
6. Bake for 12 minutes until bottoms begin to turn brown. Remove from oven. Cool
7. Make a glaze! Add a little milk to a bunch of confectioner's sugar. Add food coloring and a few drops of vanilla. Stir. It should be a bit liquidy. Dip the cookies into the glaze and let the glaze harden.
8. Enjoy!

-Katie

 

Note to no one in particular: these are not vegan. They are rather delicious, however. I concocted these little lovelies quite some time ago for my sister's birthday.

 

Pastry Ingredients

2 c flour

4 oz butter, softened

2 tsp confectioner's sugar

zest of one lemon

1 egg yolk

 

Filling Ingredients

4 oz cream cheese, softened

1/2 c confectioner's sugar

2 egg yolks

juice of one lemon

1/2 c sweetened condensed milk

 

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Greese pastry tins or muffin tins.
2. Sift flour into a bowl, cut in butter. Add sugar, zest, egg yolk, and a few tablespoons of cool water. Kneed gently on a floured surface until the dough is smooth. Cover and chill for 10 minutes or so.
3. While the dough chills, beat egg yolks. Add cream cheese and sugar, beat until smooth. The mixture should be a bit thick. Add lemon juice and condensed milk. Beat well. Set aside.
4. Roll out the dough. Trim the dough into rounds and press into tins (I used a muffin tin, and I didn't bother to measure the rounds. They turned out a bit funny looking, but it was quite easy and mess-free.) Prick the bottoms with a fork and bake for 10 minutes.
5. Remove the crusts from the oven and pour the filling into them until nearly full. Bake them for another 5 minutes or until the filling has set. Garnish with zest or poppy seeds.

-Katie