True Love, Thy Name is Chocolate Pie

This year, my Valentine is not a woman, but rather, Alton Brown's Mooless Chocolate Pie. I am honestly okay with this.

I had my doubts about the pie, but I also had some soft silken tofu in my cupboard, and I never use soft tofu, and the recipe looked so easy. And, in fact, it was. The most recent pies I've made have all turned out too goopy, and it looked like the same was going to happen here, but it chilled into a surprisingly firm texture, and also surprisingly smooth. When I blended everything together, I could see little teeny bits of tofu, but they miraculously absorbed into the pie in the end. Next time, I think I'll just do a homemade Oreo crust, because the storebought ones are always so dry, but it's still superb and I love the combination of Kaluha and chocolate.

So, the basic idea is this. You want to melt twelve ounces of chocolate chips. He says "high quality," and of course high quality probably would be better, but to keep it in budget I went with Hershey's semisweet. Add 1/3 cup of Kaluha, and careful to keep stirring so you don't burn anything. I recommend low heat. Once you have a nice smooth substance, you can take it off the heat and dump it in your bowl. Alton says to use a blender or food processor, but I found that a bowl and electric mixer worked fine for my purposes. Granted, my mixer is really, really powerful. Anyway, add a box of soft silken tofu. I drained it a little, but not completely. Also dump in a tablespoon of honey and a teaspoon of vanilla. I eyeballed it. Put your blender on liquify or your mixer on high speed until you have a really smooth consistency. I did it about three minutes on the highest mixer speed. Pour into a chocolate cookie crust and chill at least two hours. It should be almost a cheesecake consistency, and oh so delicious.

Scrambled... Not-Eggs

My good friend Kat has been telling me for the longest time that I have to try this recipe for tofu scramble, and as tofu was on sale at the grocery store last weekend, I decided I had to bite the bullet and attempt it. I will admit that the spice blend is pretty fantastic. It has an Indian curry sort of flavour, but it isn't at all spicy. Next time I might try fresh thyme instead of dried, because the little bits get stuck in my teeth and I don't have a mortar and pestle to properly crush it, but I still consider the blend a success. As you can see, I just dumped everything onto a paper plate and swirled with my fingers, which worked nicely.

Like any pan-fried recipe, you want to be sure to have everything ready well in advance of the part involving heat. With that in mind, I went ahead and drained my tofu, squeezing a good bit of the water out, peeled my garlic cloves, got my spice blend all ready to go, washed my mushrooms and piled them on another plate, and peeled my onion (always last because I tend to cry). After I chopped up the onion (I used a medium sweet yellow onion from Peru because they were on sale as well) and threw it in the pan with my oil, I realised I really needed to use my largest pan. So there was a quick transfer and just a bit more oil before the mushrooms went in. I wish I could better capture the beautiful colour of the mushrooms - unfortunately, the one bad thing about this kitchen is that the stove is really badly lit for photographs.

One note about the recipe is that I cooked everything over medium heat because the onions started frying much too quickly at first. Also, my tofu was already pretty moist, so I only added a small splash of water towards the end. I didn't have trouble with anything sticking because I used a non-stick pan, but I did poke the tofu every now and again to make sure it was holding up in moisture. Towards the end, it started to brown, which is lovely. I've always found that tofu is much better when it has that grilled taste. You really don't need to break it up too much at first, because it will crumble more in the pan when you move it around. Also, I couldn't find nutritional yeast, so I used Parmesan cheese and killed the vegan aspect. That said, you could easily use neither and it would be just fine.

---

On a little self-promotional note, the Featured Publishers at Foodbuzz are having a little friendly competition this month. What does this mean? Well, if you're a regular reader, thank you, and I encourage you to keep coming back. I'll be posting several times a week whenever possible, and providing you with as many new photos and recipes as I can get my hands on. Also, I'd be very appreciative if you could spread the word about my blog to your friends. It may be small, but it's still growing! Finally, I hope that the AVF challenges will be a way to attract more readers, so I encourage anyone who is interested to participate! I'd love to have you. Also, if you did find your way here from Foodbuzz, it's great to have you dropping by, and I hope you'll come back soon.

Just Like Grandma Used to Make

This recipe is something of a tribute to my late grandmother, along with being a fairly obvious case of Empty Pantry Syndrome. My grandmama was my Daddy's mother, and her food was always the sort of simply, down home country cooking you associate with grandmothers. I don't remember her cookies, but she did make a fantastic squash casserole, and also a broccoli casserole that I vaguely remember involved Campbell's cream of mushroom, broccoli, and some sort of a crumb topping (and perhaps Cheddar cheese). She and my Grandaddy lived in Charlotte, so I didn't know her quite as well as my Grandpa who lived in Raleigh (and whose name will certainly come up when I blog after my birthday tea party). We did try to visit once or twice a year, though, and I still donate to Salvation Army on her behalf whenever I see the little red kettles.
What I came up with was a bit different, because I was constrained by ingredients. I didn't have any Campbell's on hand, so it was a choice between Wolfgang Puck or Amy's. I went with the Amy's, which was tasty, though surprisingly salty. I also had to go with Parmesan cheese, as it was the only variety I had available last week. For the crumb topping, I actually did consult the internet for an idea, which was probably a mistake. The recipe I looked at suggested melting two thirds of a cup of butter and mixing with a cup seasoned breadcrumbs. I used the same amount of butter and a mixture of dried herbs, crushed Ritz crackers, and wheat germs. It was very wet and mealy, and though it did make for a tasty, buttery topping, it could have been a wee bit healthier.
So the recipe isn't really a recipe, but I'll give it to you anyway. Pour a can of soup in a baking dish. I used a 9-inch square casserole dish, and due to the size probably should've gone with two cans of soup. This made a very thin layer. Cook a bag of frozen broccoli and throw in with the soup. Sprinkle with Parmesan cheese. Top with the above described crumb topping and spread out evenly as possible. Bake at 350 for 20 minutes or so, or until the topping is golden brown and the soup is hot. For something so impromptu, I thought it was pretty good. Cheesy and buttery, but with broccoli so you don't feel like you're killing yourself. Next time I would use a less salty cream of mushroom, though.

Speaking of soup, don't forget! AVF #2 entries are due February 22nd! Also, if anyone knows anything about Is My Blog Burning, can you leave me a comment? This is the second time I've tried submitting and gotten an error, and then e-mailed my submission and gotten no response. If anyone would be willing to submit the event for me, or knows of another food blog event listing I could use, please let me know! Thanks!

AVF #2: A Vegetarian Feast-in-a-Pot

I'm happy to announce the second round of A Vegetarian Feast! This round's theme is "Vegetarian Feast-in-a-Pot." To warm folks up this winter, we're blogging about our favourite meatless soups, stews, chilis, hotpots, and anything else I haven't thought of that goes in a pot, on the stove. If you aren't sure if a dish qualifies, just ask. It probably does.

Rules are simple: post on your blog, don't include any meat, fish, or poultry, and e-mail your post to me at judithavory@gmail.com OR reply to this post with a link. Deadline for this round is Friday, February 22nd, and I will be posting the round-up Sunday the 24th. Please tell your friends, or post about this event on your blog, so that we can get people excited about cooking meatless! And as always, just e-mail me or leave a comment if you have questions.

Vegan Baking Makes Everything Better

This is the second time I've been amazed by how much better a vegan recipe is than the dairy one. Granted, this is a completely different recipe than the last time I made oatmeal cookies, but still I'm amazed by how much more I like this version. They're still chewy (I guess you can't really have a crisp oatmeal cookie) but these are moist and delicious and just sticky enough to hold together, rather than crumbling or tasting dry after a few days.

The basic recipe came, I think, from the vegan_cooking community on LiveJournal, though I'm not entirely sure. I found it in my recipe file and went with it because I didn't have any eggs but really wanted to use the oven, as the wind chill was -24 Farenheit last weekend when I baked them, and I really needed to warm up my apartment. I deviated a little from the recipe because I didn't have whole wheat flour, and I used cinnamon applesauce instead of plain (which I actually think was an improvement). The recipe suggested adding chocolate chips, butterscotch chips, or nuts, but I wanted to use some more of my chocolate covered toffee pieces.

So the basic idea is this. Mix together 1/2 a cup brown sugar, 1/4 cup white sugar, 1/2 cup applesauce, and 1 t vanilla. You'll get a dark, grainy liquid. Then in another bowl, mix 3/4 cup flour, 1/2 t baking soda, 1/2 t cinnamon, 1/4 t baking powder, and 1/4 t salt. Stir the dry into the wet, a little at a time. You may need some arm strength toward the end. I like to dump a little of the flour mixture into the centre, then incorporate from the centre out, scraping the sides of my bowl before I add some more. Stir in 1-1/2 cups quick-cooking oats and 3/4 cups toffee chips (or chip/nut of your choice). Drop spoonfuls on a greased cookie sheet (note: these are really too soft to try to use foil) and bake 8-10 minutes at 375, or until the bottoms are a nice medium coppery brown. Cool on a rack.

Easy Peasy Pasta

With the start of the spring semester, my research assistant position, Quire rehearsals, and other miscellany in my life, it's been important for me to come up with some good, nutritious lunches that are easy to pack and reheat in the law building. For the first half of the week, I went with what is probably the best meal you can eat as a vegetarian (beans, brown rice, and steamed mixed vegetables), but after a few days of that I was craving something slightly more exciting. The great thing about this pasta recipe is that it's cheap, easy, and very easy to alter. Admittedly, fresh veggies would have been better than canned and frozen, but nevertheless it was tasty and probably cost less than a dollar per serving.

So here's the basic idea. First, I put some water on to boil and cooked half a box of mostaccoli pasta until just tender. While that was happening, I cooked a package of frozen broccoli in the microwave according to instructions. You could also do it on the stove, honestly I think it takes the same amount of time either way. When the broccoli was done, I threw it in my pasta drainer, along with a can of mushrooms. Fresh really would have been better, again, but beggars can't be choosers. Then I tossed my cooked pasta in and gave it a nice shake to make sure everything was well drained before returning it to the pot over low heat.

Next, in went the last of a bag of shredded cheddar, a healthy handful of grated Parmesan, and maybe about a third a cup of sour cream. Everything got stirred around until well mixed and the cheese was melted, and there you have it. The ideal version of this recipe, incidentally, comes from my mother. You want to use plenty of Cheddar instead of a cheese mixture, and she uses spaghetti usually for the pasta. The veggies are some sauteed onions and fresh mushrooms, and it's absolutely magnifique. One of my favourites growing up as a kid. You could also substitute spinach and garlic, fresh tomatoes, or a mixture of different coloured bell peppers. Whatever floats your boat, really!

Happy Martin Luther King, Jr. Day to readers in the States, and Happy Human Rights Week to everyone! If you have anything to spare, Amnesty International can always use your help.

It's Party Time!

Blog party, that is.

I've missed the last couple of blog parties, much to my dismay, as I just love Dispensing Happiness and her fabulous foodie events. But this time, I couldn't not participate. The theme is vegetarian, which was meant to be a selfish endeavour so that our lovely hostess could sample all the tasty treats, but in fact it's generous as well, for I too am definitely looking forward to some new recipes!

One of the challenges to being a vegetarian, and especially to using vegetarian recipes, is that cookbook authors tend to call for rather fancy ingredients. All the authors have their little bundle of favourites - some like tahini, for others it's miso paste or pine nuts, or maybe saffron - but for a vegetarian on a budget, this can be quite disheartening. My mission, therefore, was to come up with a drink and an appetizer that anyone could make on a fair-to-middling budget, and enjoy as well!

Grilled Tortilla Wedges with Fancy Mustard

Lettuce, tomato and cheese. Tomato, cheese and lettuce. How many times have you heard these three sandwich ingredients recited? They're the staple of any vegetarian sandwich diet, and no matter how much you try to experiment and come up with fancy lunch ideas, you come back to that particular trifecta. Well, I for one was determined to do something interesting with lettuce, cheese, and tomato, something that would be appropriate for a party and taste good to boot. So, I did a little rummaging around my cupboards and came up with this recipe.

I had some flour tortillas left over from several nights of burritos, but I didn't really want to make a wrap. I hate how the ingredients in a wrap tend to shift around and fall out of the bottom, and how it always seems so insubstantial. So, I thought I'd try something a little more like a quesedilla, and use some of the shredded Cheddar cheese I've been trying to consume in the process. I also wanted to try one of the fancy food items I picked up before the holiday from Prairie Table, so I selected this Stonewall Kitchen Bourbon Molasses Mustard. It's sweet, but much tangier than a honey mustard, and very grainy.

The process itself is pretty simple. I cut one eight-inch flour tortilla into four wedges, and then made a couple of sandwiches with my cheddar cheese. Then I plopped them on my nifty stovetop griddle. You can purchase these for about ten bucks at Bed, Bath, and Beyond, and the cool thing is that one side is flat and the other has grill marks, so you can grill veggies and bread but also make pancakes on the reverse side. The only thing I *don't* like is that it's a pain to clean. Anyway, I cooked my wedges for a few minutes each side over medium heat, no oil or anything, flipping when some grill marks appeared and the cheese was starting to melt. Make sure you tuck any stray cheese back inside when you flip it. If you don't have a griddle, you can use a plain skillet, you just won't have grill marks.

Once the cheese was completely melted, I sliced up a small tomato so that I got two thick slices out of it, and popped those on the griddle. Then I spread a healthy portion of mustard on top of each tortilla wedge, and stuck a couple butter lettuce leaves on top. Once the tomatoes were cooked on both sides, I plopped them on top of the lettuce, and sprinkled with a little salt, pepper, and dried oregano. Of course, you can adjust the seasoning as needed, or use spinach instead of lettuce, or a different cheese, or another favourite mustard. This is a great recipe for experimenting!

Peanut Butter Banana Smoothie

This drink doesn't go with my appetizer at all, but I hope you will all forgive me. I've been wanting to make a smoothie for breakfast for quite a while, and I also don't really want to spend the money on alcohol right now, so this is my "mocktail" contribution. It's a little like a thick milkshake, but if you add more milk and less of the other ingredients, maybe some crushed ice, you'd have more of a drink. Anyway, to start, you want to freeze a banana. I learned the hard way that freezing the whole bunch in their skins is kind of a dumb idea. But if you do this, you can salvage the banana - just let it thaw a few minutes, then score the skin with a knife and cut the banana in half. From here, you can stand it up on one end and peel like a potato.

I didn't take measurements with this, because I was basically experimenting, but this is the jist. I cut my banana into four pieces and popped it in the Cuisinart, pulsing until I had some coarse frozen banana crumbs. Then I added two pretty big spoonfuls of peanut butter (next time, I'd stick with one regular sized, as this is what made it very thick), a spoonful of wheat germ, and some milk. I pulsed until it was starting to incorporate and then blended until smooth. I had to keep adding milk until I reached the desired consistency - again, less peanut butter would have helped that. Still, it was nice and smooth and tasted great. You could add honey if you like, but I didn't need it. Also, the peanut butter was reduced fat and the milk was skim, so it's not bad for you at all!

Thanks again to Dispensing Happiness for hosting! I can't wait to see what veggie creations everyone came up with!