Vegan MoFo Day 21: Chili Recipe

I keep meaning to post my husband's vegan chili recipe--promised days and days ago!

Vegan Chili
2 large onions, chunked, boiled until translucent
5-6 large portobello mushrooms
5-6 large red peppers
1 lb (dry) kidney beans, precooked (yields)
1 lb (dry) barley
2 large cans crushed tomatoes
Approx. 1/2 cup chili powder (we use unsalted)

Cook all the above on low heat until the barley is soft.

Vegan MoFo Day 15: Chili = What's for Dinner

My husband's vegan chili recipe.  I'll post it later, when I'm not so hungry!

Vegan MoFo Day 10: Compulsive Recipe Tagging!

I subscribe to a large array of vegan blogs via Google Reader, and whenever I see a recipe that looks good and whose ingredients and prep instructions are sufficiently non-intimidating, I tag the entry for later use.  At this point, I must have at least a recipe-book's worth of recipes tagged.  The crazy thing is I can count on one hand, with fingers to spare, the recipes I've actually followed through on.  I clearly am more enamored with the idea of making all these great dishes than with putting the time and energy into actually making them.  However, I keep telling myself I WILL, at some point, get my kitchen groove on.

But meanwhile, I confess, I peruse the blogs and get a vicarious thrill from the vegan food pr0n.  I am especially partial to the cupcakes, brownies, and the raw desserts.  In that respect, it's probably for the best that my follow-through is so poor.  If I made and ate every beautiful vegan dessert that catches my eye and earns my "recipe" tag, I'd surely gain at least ten pounds! 

Anyone else out there in vegan blogland who is more of a food spectator?

2010 already?

Wow, I can't believe I haven't posted anything since November of 2008. I was planning on posting something for my one-year veganniversary, but it came and went without my really having much to say about it. Here I am at two years since I started my process. Though I initially imagined it would be more of a process than it actually turned out to be. It now just feels normal to me to be vegan.

Since that last post in November, I've done my first half marathon and two more 15K's. This is going to be my year to do my first full marathon. W00t!

That holiday party I was worried about? It didn't happen. No one said anything about it, but I am guessing it was economy-related--everyone is cutting back on things like that. December 2008 AND December 2009 went by without that tradition. One less thing to worry about.

So, let's see--vegan goals for 2010. Try more recipes. Write here semi-regularly. Be a good example. :)

Skinny Vegan

In early May, I found my weight had crept to the high end of the "healthy" range (I'm 5'7" and I was weighing in at 159.4 LBS). I cranked my running into high gear and cut back on eating veggies cooked in oil--loading up on steamed veggies/salad instead. Then, in June, I picked up Eat to Live and started doing a modified version of that (I don't abide by his "no snacks" rule--sorry, I'm active and I need to stay fueled!) So, between early May and late September, I went down to 133, where I've been ever since. The funny thing--to me anyway--is I've reached a tipping point of some sort, where people have gone from saying "You look great" to "You're getting too skinny!" Funny to me because I'm not even close to being underweight. I'd have to drop below 118 for that.

I'm now reading The Thrive Diet, which is awesome because it's written by a vegan triathlete, Brendan Brazier, and he actually gets the whole "needing fuel" thing and is all about meals + snacks. He's got some promising-looking recipes at the end, too, many of which are raw (though not all, and I don't see myself becoming a 100% raw vegan).

In related news, here is where I am with my running progress. In October, I did Race for the Cure, and my time was 26:47. Last year's was 30:28. Average per-mile time went from 9:49 to 8:38. Then, earlier this month, I did my first 15K (longest race I ever did, including high school, when I ran cross country and track). My first mile I did in about 8:42 and I got slower as I went, but I was still happy with my overall time. 1:28:11--9:29/mile average (so still faster than last year's 5K pace!).

My yoga practice has also been developing so that I can do things I couldn't do before and overall I'm stronger than I've been, maybe ever. It's so silly that people have a stereotype of weak vegans--I just keep getting stronger and faster and I've never felt better. 41 years old and I feel younger than I did when I was 21.

Hezbollah Tofu!

This site came to my attention thanks to a post at the "veganpeople" LiveJournal community.

The famed Anthony Bourdain has a hate-on for vegetarians and vegans. I've never seen his show Without Reservations, but he's shown up as a judge on Top Chef, which I do watch. This quote of hate comes from his book Kitchen Confidential:

Vegetarians, and their Hezbollah-like splinter faction, the vegans, are a persistent irritant to any chef worth a damn. To me, life without veal stock, pork fat, sausage, organ meat, demi-glace, or even stinky cheese is a life not worth living. Vegetarians are the enemy of everything good and decent in the human spirit, and an affront to all I stand for, the pure enjoyment of food.

The "Hezbollah Tofu" blog quotes this nastiness in its first entry and offers the following message to Bourdain:

So we aren't just going to "enjoy" food, we're going to enjoy vastly improved, veganized versions of your masturbatory, blood-oozing recipes. And then we're going to compile them, sell them in zine form, and donate the proceeds to vegan outreach organizations and farm sanctuaries--in your name. Anthony, I have to say, I'm really looking forward to the great work we're going to do together for veganism.

This is an open call to vegan cooks of all stripes: professional chefs and bakers, cookbook authors, food bloggers, amateur cooks, and--perhaps most importantly--ordinary, everyday people who just want to live their lives and eat their dinners without unnecessary heckling from the heroin-addled peanut gallery.

I have to say I adore this idea. I've come across Bourdain's quote o' nastiness before and found it equal parts baffling and irritating. I can hardly wait to see what people come up with.

Isa and Terry's Books Will Take Over the World!

My mom came up yesterday to celebrate my son's birthday. He's five! Because of his egg allergy, I got a vegan chocolate-cake recipe from the Post-Punk Kitchen site. Would you believe this was my son's first-ever taste of cake? In any event, he enjoyed its chocolaty goodness. Dinner was a vegan pizza of Dkat's invention, which Boykat happens to love.

My mom is a lacto-veg, so she was also happy to have a chance to eat cake without worrying about egg. I showed her Vegan With a Vengeance, and almost immediately she decided she'll have to buy a copy of her own. When I raved about the ease and goodness of the seitan recipe, she looked it over and immediately made a trip out to the coop to buy vital wheat gluten and nutritional yeast so she can make some of her own. She also perused Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World. The Moskowitz/Hope domination is imminent!

In related news, I forgot to report here that I had success a couple of weeks ago with the chickpea cutlets from Veganomicon, which (almost tearfully) I had to return to the library after a scant two weeks, because it was requested. See, these books are taking over the world!

Seitan Success

The seitan was a success. Shockingly easy to make (I love when that happens). We haven't made anything with it yet, though I had some in salad today. Dkat likes the taste and texture, so thumbs up.

I also made squash-oatmeal cookies. They're really supposed to be pumpkin-oatmeal cookies, but we only had two cans of pumpkin (which I've used) and the rest are squash. I left out the raisins because we didn't have any and left out the nuts because I forgot to put them in. I was going to use almond slivers instead of walnuts, only because I'm not a big "walnut" fan. The cookies are good in spite of everything, so they are going fast.

Miscellaneous

Dkat made an awesome vegan pizza this past week, completely of his own invention. It was soooo good! He made a pizza sauce with veggies, spices, and tofu. Last night, he used his sauce recipe as a pasta sauce and we brought it to a vegetarian potluck. We are talking about hosting some potlucks of our own sometime.

Yesterday, my office closed to attend a funeral (husband of a co-worker passed away early Wednesday). I've only just started telling people that I'm off dairy and egg. A bunch of us from work were sitting together at the reception held after the burial, and someone asked me what I'd had from the buffet. I had put together a sandwich of lettuce, tomato, cukes, and a bit of baked ziti that, thankfully, was just pasta and red sauce. I mentioned that I was off dairy and egg, so no cheese. Naturally, someone asked where I was getting my calcium. This is kind of funny to me, considering that there are populations all over the world wherein people do no consume dairy, and we're really the only species that not only consumes the milk of another species, but does so throughout our lifespan. But anyway, I told her fortified soy milk, vitamins, and green leafy vegetables.

Another co-worker told me that she'd never be able to give up cheese. I told her that I used to feel the same way, but I am finding I don't miss it. This same co-worker asked me if I skip over baked goods if I know they have egg or dairy in them. I told her not only that, but I will skip over baked goods unless I know for a fact they they don't have egg or dairy in them. She sort of shook her head as if she were talking to a major head case. Then, to top things off? About 20 minutes later, she came to our table with a tray of cookies, offering them to each person there. And she offered them to me. Hello, what were we just talking about? ::boggle::

Though I can't harsh on her too much, I guess. Even Dkat, though he knows I'm veganning and he's supportive, will sometimes forget--like when he was in the hospital, he told me he'd had egg for breakfast and asked if I was jealous. This comes from our egg ban in our home, due to our son's egg allergy. Me: "No, I'm not eating egg anymore, remember?" "Oh, yeah." Same thing last night. He asked me if I'd had one of the [non-vegan] cookies. Nope. Still veganning. "Oh, yeah."

In related news, I have a pot of seitan cooling on the stove. I'm kind of excited since it's pretty easy to make. Will report on the results.

Odd and Ends

Dkat had to spend a couple of nights in the hospital this week. When asked if he had any dietary preferences, he said that he eats mostly vegetarian at home, was interested in becoming vegan someday, but didn't expect to be able to eat vegan while in the hospital. The nurse told him, "Oh, we can do vegan!" They gave fruit and nothing else! After that, he didn't try for vegan or vegetarian again.

Yesterday, I made another dish from Vegan with a Vengeance, the Breakfast Veggie Chorizo. It's meant to be used as a filling for breakfast burritos, and features Textured Vegetable Protein. It turned out really good and Dkat loved it.

We had a family walk to our neighborhood food coop today and picked up a bunch of great vegan staples, like nutritional yeast, flax meal, sunflower seeds, agave syrup, wheat gluten flour (to make our own seitan--see p. 157 of Vegan with a Vengeance), and others I've already forgotten. My confidence in my cooking skills has definitely been boosted.

Awesome Pumpkin Loaf

Since we have cans of pumpkin, I wanted to bake something pumpkinny. I was originally thinking pie, but then I found the recipe for "The Best Pumpkin Muffins" in Vegan with a Vengeance. Besides looking yummy, it's a simple recipe with non-exotic ingredients.

One hitch was that the muffin tray I imagined we have is probably a muffin tray that my mom has, and we don't have any of those little paper/foil muffin cups. So I resorted to making two little muffin loaves instead, using our loaf pans. Also, we don't have molasses, so I substituted 2T tahini for the 2T molasses.

The result? So much awesome! Mm. They are so, so gone and my husband LOVED them. :)

Veganning with a Vengeance

I've gone on a binge of ordering vegan cookbooks from the library. True, I've only actually done one recipe so far, but I have a stack of potential.

Dkat borrowed from me Isa Chandra Moskowitz's Vegan with a Vengeance and was so impressed he decided to buy it. In his words, it's got realistic, doable, tested recipes. He likes the fact that the recipes do not rely on all kinds of processed meat replacements and fake cheeses, but on fresh, whole foods. He's jonesing to try the falafel recipe and I'm very curious about the homemade seitan. I had no idea it could be made so simply (or at least it appears so from the recipe). I've also got her new book, Veganomicon, on order from library.

As a testament to the growing interest in vegan cooking, I found I was unable to renew Vive Le Vegan because someone else had requested it. Part of me thinks, "Harumph" but another thinks, "Go, vegan cooking!"

In other veganning news, I had a dream that I accidentally ate some butter cookies.

The idea of recipes

I realize that I like the idea of recipes much more than I actually like following them. I have a pile of vegan cookbooks that I checked out from the library, and I was planning to try some new recipes over the weekend, but I didn't. I ended up mostly alternating between peanut butter sandwiches and microwaved frozen veggies with lentils, rice, and recaito sauce.

One reason that I like the idea of recipes more than the actual recipes is I just want to have everything I need. I don't want to have to shop for a recipe! Please note, I think our pantry is reasonably well stocked--wide array of spices, grains, etc. But I don't have tamari sauce or a zillion different types of miso. Just the soy kind from our Asian grocery. I forget what else we don't have that I see showing up in recipes. I confess--I'm prone to laziness, especially on weekends, which is when I actually have time to cook. Also, I don't like having to use our food processor, mainly because it's a pain to clean it up properly. We don't have a dishwasher. If you don't get all the little areas cleaned up, you get mold. Mold is bad!

To my credit, I did try a new recipe during my holiday time off between Christmas and New Year's. I tried the lentil pie from Vive Le Vegan (with some modifications; miso and soy sauce instead of vegan Worcestershire and tamari, for instance; also pan-fried all the ingredients before putting them into the food processor, and lentils pre-cooked in the slow cooker). My husband liked the results enough that he asked me to write out the recipe (with my modifications) on a recipe card for further use. This is a high honor, because he's got very exacting standards when it comes to food.

I've been meaning to check out Food For Thought, Albany's new vegan café, and might do so today during lunch. I brought a peanut-butter sandwich in case the weather fails to cooperate.