It's Meatless Monday

How about some Chickpea Noodle Soup?

Tofu Breakfast Sandwiches

Back in the day I used to love egg and cheese breakfast sandwiches. There are times when I crave that breakfast-y yum and I've found the perfect solution. Tofu sandwiches. Super easy, quick and delicious. Although these make for a great breakfast food, feel free to enjoy at any time of the day.

Tofu Breakfast Sandwiches

• 4, 1/4" slices of extra firm tofu 
• garlic powder
• tumeric
• crushed red pepper
• salt
• pepper
• 2 slices sprouted whole grain bread

Heat a large skillet over high heat and spray lightly with cooking spray. Season one side of your tofu slices with the spices, I am usually very generous with the tumeric and then go light on the others. No measuring needed here, just go ahead and sprinkle it on, eyeballing as you go based on your own taste preferences. Once pan is hot (shouldn't take long) place each tofu slice seasoned side down on the pan. Turn down the heat to medium/medium high. Now season the second side of your tofu. You'll want to cook each side of tofu until it's a nice golden color, but be careful not to burn it. Toast your bread slices and when the tofu is done, arrange it on your bread to make a perfect sandwich. 

Now, keep in mind this is for a basic sandwich. My favorite way to have this is with a generous helping of cheddar Daiya all melty in between the slices of tofu. I also enjoy adding some vegan bacon strips from time to time. 

Here's a handy list of other possibly topping and spices:

Toppings

-vegan bacon

-tempeh

-tomato slices

-cheddar Daiya 

-sauteed onions

-salsa

Seasonings

-parsley

-oregano

-chili powder

-cumin

-smoked salt

-Old Bay

-smoked paprika

Other possible sandwich vehicles

-whole wheat wrap

-corn tortilla

-bagel

-english muffin

-biscuits

Song! Vegan Myths Debunked

Pancakes and Paradise

Banana Cupcakes w/ Almond Buttercream

I'm sure you're wondering why I would make the same cupcake twice. Well, frankly, I couldn't decide which combination I wanted in the first place. Banana cake or almond butter cake? I just knew that I wanted banana and almond butter in cupcake form. So I went ahead and made 2 batches of cupcakes with opposite cake/frosting combinations. In the end I couldn't decide which ones I actually liked better! So I'll let you all be the judge.


Banana Cupcakes
Makes 12 cupcakes

• 1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 2 bananas
• 1/4 cup oil
• 3/4 cup almond milk
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/4 cup brown sugar or sucanat

Preheat oven to 375º F. Line/grease cupcake pan/muffin tin.
Combine flour baking powder & soda and salt in a large mixing bowl. In a separate bowl, cream bananas. Add oil, almond milk, vanilla and sugar. Pour the wet mixture into the dry mixture, combine well. Pour into cupcake pan and bake for about 16 minutes.

Almond Butter Frosting

• 1/2 cup Earth Balance margarine
• 1/4 cup almond butter
• 1/4-1/2 cup powdered sugar

With a hand mixer or stand mixer cream together Earth Balance and almond butter. Slowly add sugar a little at a time. You might not need the full 1/2 cup, so keep an eye on it.

Almond Butter Cupcakes w/ Banana Buttercream

Since my favorite place to grab some noms, Sticky Fingers, has just won Cupcake Wars I thought this would be a good time to put up my cupcake recipe series.

I made banana bread one day and was enjoying it slathered with almond butter. I love the two flavors together, a kind of rich, sweet, creamy, nuttiness. I began to think that I would really fancy a cupcake with the same flavors. So I started playing...

Almond Butter Cupcakes
Makes 12 cupcakes

• 3/4 cup almond milk
• 1 tablespoon ground flax seeds
• 1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 cup almond butter
• 1/4 cup brown sugar or sucanat
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/4 cup oil

Preheat oven to 375º F. Grease cupcake pan, or line with liners.
In a glass measuring cup vigorously whisk together the almond milk and flax. Set aside.
In a large mixing bowl combine flour, baking powder & soda and salt. In a separate bowl mix almond butter, brown sugar vanilla and oil until well combined. Pour the milk mixture and sugar mixture into flour and gently combine. Pour batter into cupcake pan, filling each 3/4 of the way full. Bake for 10-13 minutes, until a toothpick (or in my case, a skewer) inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool completely before topping with banana buttercream.

*Make sure these cupcakes cool off completely before you handle them. Otherwise, they will crumble and fall apart. These babies are delicate!

Banana Buttercream

• 1/2 cup Earth Balance margarine
• 1 banana
• 1 cup powdered sugar

Using a hand mixer or stand mid mixer, cream Earth Balance and banana. Slowly add sugar until desired consistency is reached.

Meal Planning Continues (subtitled, Problems in the Kitchen)

In the event you are keeping up with my meal planning via Happy Herbivore, here is the latest...

(These recipes are all from the website, so feel free to join in this week!)

Monday- Polenta Pizza
Tuesday- Chickpea Tacos
Wednesday- Oyster Mushroom Scampi
Thursday- Yam Falafels
Friday- Crispy Chickenless Nuggets w/ Baked Onion Rings

Yam Falafel w/ Cilantro Yogurt Sauce

Now a quick little disclaimer. As I was getting started tonight I decided to veer away for the original plan. As I was looking at the recipe for the polenta pizza, I noticed the polenta part is supposed to be refrigerated for an hour before cooking. I decided this would take too long and we'd be eating too late. Plus I just got back from a Bikram Yoga class and I was starving. So I settled on making yam falafels instead (based on ingredients I had and didn't have at the moment, read: we forgot the dried chickpeas in this week's shopping, kind of a problem).

I was feeling good about this decision at first, and was really excited to try this recipe. As I went along I came across my first problem. My sweet potatoes were huge. Really, like 10 pounds each, and bulbous. They didn't even fit in the steamer/pot. Which bring me to the second problem, I was cooking 2 sweet potatoes instead of the 1 the recipe calls for. Why did I do this? I have no idea. Reading too quickly through the recipe, I suppose. 

So at this point, I'm trying to steam a couple of mammoth sweet potatoes, which is taking an hour instead of the usual, oh, 5 minutes it should take. I got so annoyed that the damn potatoes weren't cooking fast enough, so I just yanked them out of the pot and started trying to break them up to mash. Obviously this was impossible, because the insides were not cooked all the way. So here I am hacking away like a crazy person at the outsides of mutant sweet potatoes, making a mess everywhere and burning my hands in the process. Finally I got enough potato to mash and continued on. The falafel balls were made and ready for the oven. (Here comes problem # 3.) This is the first time in this entire process that I notice that these need to bake for 40 minutes. Ugh. I've been cooking for 2 hours and at this point I'm not even hungry anymore. But, into the oven they go.

My poor massacred sweet potatoes, it's like a vegetable murder scene.

In the end, they were delicious, so it was worth it. But let this be a lesson to all of you. Read a recipe before you embark on an unknown journey in the kitchen. And my lesson, stick to your gut feeling. We could have been eating polenta pizza about 2 1/2 hours ago.

After tonight I think I've realized not only should you meal plan around you are feeling like eating, or around what ingredients you may already have, but also around how much time you have.

Goodnight.