From The Urban Vegan: Spaghetti Carbonara

Vegan Spaghetti Carbonara

Isn't this a nifty idea? Take a brand new cookbook, decide on a recipe, make it, and post the results! Who knew blogging could be so simple? How MoFo!

This dish is from the brand new, captivating Urban Vegan cookbook. I received it last week to review*, and couldn't put it down this past weekend. I was pouring over the pages, trying to decide on what to make first. I haven't been this enthusiastic over a non-PPK cookbook in a long ass time.

Dude, I'm saying this and there aren't even photos! It just covers so much ground - there are so many vegan dinner parties waiting to be born from this book!

With tempeh bacon still invading my thoughts from the Fakin' Fest, I turned to the Spaghetti Carbonara first. It was indulgent, saucy, smokey, noochy (hello, nutritional yeast!) and buttery (hello, Earth Balance!).

What was I thinking making this for myself? This was definitely a special guests meal, but I was treating myself.... The dry white wine was a sweet touch - I adore how much wine is in this book - for cooking & accompaniment!

I served the dish with fresh parsley, as advised, and a side of roasted rapini with crushed red pepper and coarse sea salt.

Whoa, my goodness.

Next up? Her unique rapini panini!

*like I wouldn't have bought it anyway!! It's well documented that I think Dynise is fabulous. Sorry, the interview is down on the old Herbivore Magazine site, but you get the point.

Hazelnut, meet Eggplant.

Baked Hazelnut Breaded Eggplant.

It only looks like a Boca Cutlet.

The other night I gave myself the classic challenge - make dinner using what you actually have at home. There were ideas that came to mind quickly: a stir fry with rice, sauteing vegetables over pasta and even making pizza dough, but I wanted to side step a bed of grains.

The arrangement:

I turned to the local eggplant*, and introduced it do the last of some homemade breadcrumbs in my freezer and a container of ground hazelnuts from too long ago. After the small talk was out of the way, dinner came together quickly.

The eggplant was sliced (skipped salting, don't tell my Italian great Aunt Helen), dipped in flour, a cornstarch + water slurry, and then both sides were pressed into a mixture of the breadcrumbs, ground hazelnuts, sea salt, black pepper, oregano and a bit of crushed red pepper.

I baked the slices on parchment paper at 375, 20 minutes one side, then 15 after flipping. I topped them with some tofu ricotta with added white miso, and a dollop of roasted garlic and almond pesto.

On the side is chopped fresh sweet green bell pepper tossed with balsamic vinegar and homemade shiitake marinara sauce.

Dinner #2 featured the eggplant slices just as vegan-traditional. Baked once again for 15-20 minutes in the oven at 400F, flipping once, topped with marinara, tofu ricotta and nutritional yeast, and baked an additional 5 minutes.

I served this with a side of steamed collards with sea salt.

*True Story: My younger sister Jenny was 'friends' with an eggplant from our garden when we were little. There's a picture of them dressed up in matching costumes, I swear. Or just really want to believe it. She was 6 or 7 or 12 or so at the time.

It's name was..."friend". I tell this story sweetly, but really, it was a scary time and eggplant was eaten.

Chicken Seitan Parmigiana with Roasted Broccoli

The week before I made this meal, I had been busy after work and missed dining at home. Not just cooking, but the practice of changing out of my officey clothes, feeding my two cats and winding down in the kitchen. Weekend hit and it was time to lose myself in my kitchen for a couple hours, while entertaining side projects like cleaning and petting cats while things simmered and roasted.  

I recall channeling my Italian parents and after successfully making boiled seitan (which is actually simmered) for the first time in years and thinking about the mozzerella teese in the fridge, I set out to make Chicken Seitan Parmigiana.  In the same afternoon, of course.

Mangia!

The boiled seitan was made with vegetarian chicken style bouillon cubes and based on the recipe from Veganomicon.  I used fresh thyme, rosemary, dried bay leaf, extra pepper, garlic and nutritional yeast.  After it was done simmering I put aside some in the broth, froze a tray of broth ice cubes and cut off a section for the parmagiana cutlets.  

Here they are, freshly...pan-fried in extra virgin olive oil:

I can't say that I'm a fan of kneading bread dough, but I don't really mind seitan.  It's more forgiving, for sure.  Savoury productivity.

After simmering:

The breading station:

The fundamentals of vegan Italian breading go as follows - dip in flour, dip in a water or soymilk cornstarch slurry, dip in pulverized breadcrumb mixture.  

My third mixture was of homemade breadcrumbs, various herbs, black pepper, sea salt and nutritional yeast.  Doing this takes me back to making real animal cutlets and dipping them in egg and flour as a little one....and I say that fondly.

Ready to pan-fry:

Pan-friend, and served with homemade red marinara over multigrain and flax penne, roasted broccoli with olive oil, garlic and sea salt and mozzerella teese, ready for melting.  Using teese really made the meal memorable was was the best faux cheeze I've tried for the job.

Melted, sliced and shortly, devoured.

Truly no need for dessert following this.

I Love Joanna Caeser Salad with Tempeh Croutons

Joanna's Caeser Salad with Tempeh Croutons

You don't see a lot of salads on this site, but I do eat them.  You know how it is - they've been a way of life since I was ten and ordering salads at chains with a side of ranch dressing and thinking croutons were great stuff while my sister ordered chicken strips.  

Come late spring and summer, when I shop exclusively for produce at the farmers markets, I find myself making a lot of simple and boring ones at home.  Sorry, it's true.  These days I order salads by default when dining with my office at restaurants with limited options, and while I typically choose to take Portland restaurants up on dishes that don't bore me, I'll give a shout out to the Caeser salad with Tempeh Bacon at Hungry Tiger Too as a salad I dig.

Therefore, when the incredible Joanna Vaught of Yellow Rose Recipes shared her new recipe for Caeser Salad with Tempeh Croutons, I thought, "Hell yes", "I love Joanna" and "I need to buy tempeh"!  It's going to be in her upcoming cookbook sequel, so stay tuned to her website for more on that.  Joanna posts about her cooking projects, life and comical and informative lists of tips featuring smart grocery shopping and seitan troubleshooting.  Her seitanic post includes a recipe for chicken seitan cutlets and if you've ever doubted your seitan making abilities or have yet to make it - read it!  There are only so many food blogs I can handle, and this is one I make sure to follow*.

Tempeh Croutons!!

Leftover Tempeh Croutons on Teese'd Pizza

with cherry tomatoes, kale raab, maittake mushrooms, garlic, kalamata olives and homemade marinara.

Last night I went to Paradox Cafe for a dinner meeting and ordered a hot salad with tofu.  Okay, #2 with tofu, which is really a stir fry with tossed with seasoned potatoes.  Wholesome.

*Disclaimer:  Fine, I'll out myself as being actual friends with Joanna Vaught, on and off the internet. Not to boast too much, but earlier today we exchanged emails about last night's episode of LOST that included multiple exclamation points, questions marks and my repeated love and respect for Mr. Linus and her squealing over the previews for next week.  She rules, and so does the Caeser!  A non-boring salad I'd make again, for sure.

teese'd pizza with fake sausage.

Pizza night.

Right before I left on a business trip to sunny, warm Phoenix (please note that these are climate related adjectives that do not describe a fun time for me) I made pizza.  Teese'd pizza, to be exact.  I hadn't bought teese in months and couldn't freaking resist picking up one of the new small logs of mozzarella for sale at Food Fight!  They were cute, I'd recently made marinara and had a batch of steamed Italian sausages at home.  It was meant to be.  I'll talk more about my Phoenix eats soon, which were sadly slim because I didn't have a ton of free time or a car but I worked one actually delicious meal in.

Speaking of Chicago Soy Dairy products, I'm expecting a bag of their new Dandies Vegan Marshmallows soon!  Anyone have them yet?  They seem to be the next big thing.

Let's continue on to the vegan pizza porn overloading....

Organic New Seasons pizza dough, Italian sausage, cremini mushrooms, broccoli, chard, red wine marinara, teese, dried oregano and sesame seeds.

From my Food Fight! stop.

Portland area folks - check out teese'd slices at It's a Beautiful Pizza.  

Available by the slice and pie.  Sometimes their sauce is herb-tastic and sometimes it's bland, what are you gonna do?  They wear tie dye shirts, for pete's sake.  I'll be eating great vegan thin crust slices in NYC next month on my annual pilgrimage to the home state.

Behind the scenes of the sausage.  

I based the sausage recipe on Isa's Spicy Pinto Sausages from the PPK, which are in turn based on Julie Hasson's.  I utilized fresh thyme and frozen pesto, among other things.

I like mixing the wed ingredients in my magic bullet blender.

After I'm done steaming, I literally toss the sausages into the steamed sausage drawer in my fridge.  It's their home.  Until I eat them.

More sausage, chard and creminis.

A Peek at Portobello Vegan Trattoria

Open less than a month, Portobello Vegan Trattoria is becoming quite the immediate hit among Portland vegans.  I joined friends for my first meal there last night, and will be dining with another group for a family style dinner this weekend.  

After last night's luscious dinner, I'm ridiculously stoked to return so quickly, try more and support this new vegan establishment in such annoying economic times.  

Let me say that I grew up eating Italian food more than any other, and fresh vegan pasta at a restaurant in town, let alone in walking distance to my apartment, is in itself a thrill.  

Here's a peek at what my table ordered:

Small plate of Portabello Ravioli with Walnut Arulgula Pesto.

Side of Roasted Brussel Sprouts

Beet Appetizer

Pickled plate appetizer

Small plate of Gluten-free Spaghetti squash with one giant meatball

Ham and Scheese wrapped Seitan

Side of Roasted Pumpkin with Rosemary

Side of Garlic Broccolini

Lasagna

Believe it, we didn't order any desserts!  Don't panic - Tiramisu will be enjoyed this weekend.

Look for an official review in the next month on StumptownVegans.com when they've been open a bit longer.  

For now, enjoy the Italian food porn and check them out if you're in the Portland area.  

They're open Wednesday-Saturday 5:30-10:30pm and are located at 2001 SE 11th Ave, in the same location as the excellent Cellar Door Coffee Roasters, who are open during the day.

NOVEMBER FARMER'S MARKET SCORE!

Saturday morning I hit up the Portland Downtown Farmer's Market for the first time in a while with my friend Michelle. I was restocking my empty kitchen and she was preparing for her vegan Thanksgiving Potluck, to which I brought my last post's pecan pie.  

I ridiculously cherish going to farmer's markets as it is, but I knew it was the end of November and had squash and potatoes in mind.  It has been a mild fall, and to our delight and wonder, we were able to a wider variety of produce than we expected - including bell peppers and eggplant. We spotted some cherry tomatoes but we're not crazy. 

My haul:

For under $14, I picked up:

- McIntosh apples: 50 cents a poud for my favorites!!!!!!!!!!!!!

- my first delicata squash of the season

- white eggplant

- golden beets, AKA the best beets besides the band

- 3 chanterelle mushrooms - couldn't resist

- 2 large bell peppers - 2 for $1

- kale $1.75

- fancy brine and oil cured olives - $3 for a small box

- broccoli $1.25/lb - sadly, I thought I checked thoroughly but I did have a long battle with my arch nemesis, broccoli bugs, when I got home.  warm water, white vinegar, repeat, repeat, repeat, cry, scream, repeat, check, check, check.

Michelle and I both got excited by these purple brussel sprouts.  We're both big studies of local vegetables and had never seen these before and were drawn in.  We looked at each other with astonishment and glee!

She almost bought a stalk, but then we learned that they turned green while cooking and we had cash to burn elsewhere...

Last stop - The All Mushrooms stand.  I couldn't resist buying those 3 chanterelles.

Lions Mane Mushrooms.  Purr.

Fried Chicken Mushrooms.

Onto some cookings.

Roasted broccoli and the last of my Vegan Brunch test kitchen chorizo.

Red Wine and Chanterelle Marinara

Baked Tofu Scramble with olives, bell pepper, garlic, spices and white mushrooms

After the farmer's market, Michelle and I stopped by Hot Lips for vegan foccacia slices.  

The slices had delicata squash, which was adorable and delicious.  I also had a bubbly Hot Lips apple soda.  

And thanks to Bianca of Vegan Crunk for the Butterfly award note!

Hello, long weekend.

glorious produce

gloria! gloria! gloriiiia! 

glorious! proooooduce! proooooduuce!

I went all out at the Portland Farmer's Market this past Saturday.  I spent almost $20 on fresh produce, jubilantly buying yellow tomatoes, peppers and fresh basil in what is now late October. It was my first time in months going by myself, and was relaxing and adventurous. Pushing through out of towners and families with dogs and strollers to get to my favorite stands, and compare who's selling eggplant for how much a lb..

My haul included, with estimates:

 sweet, hot and bell peppers

eggplant $2/lb

a sweet onion! $1/lb

yellow and red tomatoes $1.95/lb

bag of garlic $3

basil $2

Asian cucumbers 2 for $1

broccoli

kale $2

Now here's the pasta dish I created using fresh vegetables and whatever the hell I had around - 

Hodgepodgepasta

With chipotle sundried tomato sausages, broccoli, garlic, fresh basil, eggplant, hot peppers, kale, olive oil, tamari and nooch.  Probably more..

with flax & multigrain spagetti from Trader Joe's.

It's fairly terrifying to think about, and certifiably hodgepodgey, but it was actually tasty.

Back to my market adventure, where I show you photos of things that caught my eye and some I wish I'd bought...

Chanterelles

Yellows!

Purples and Oranges!

Whites!

Where I bought my broccoli and more hot peppers.

Leaving the market for the day.  

I fought the urge to run back for more tomatoes, and immediately ran and caught the streetcar to another part of town after I took this photo, camera in hand.

Don't you just love that this market goes until December????