Edible Vegdible

recipe: crockpot spaghetti squash with tomato and onions

2009-10-14T11:32:00.000-07:00

Lately I am on a fall cooking kick. The weather is cooling down, we had rain this week, it's gray and miserable out and I love it! Really. And when you've been out and about in cold miserable weather, there's nothing as good as coming home to the smell of a delicious hot meal ready and waiting for you to chow down on, right? What's that? You live alone and nobody is at home cooking up a storm and waiting anxiously for your return? Awww. Sad. But not a problem! If you don't happen to have a live-in check, you can get this experience quite easily by purchasing a crockpot. They're relatively inexpensive (and can frequently be found at thrift stores or garage sales--just check that the cord is not worn out before buying) and are a huge timesaver in the kitchen. In general I do not own a lot of gadgets (no bread machine, no stand mixer, no blender (a food processor works just as well), etc.), but the crockpot is one gadget I really love and would hate to do without. You can make soups, chili, large batches of beans to freeze and use later, etc. Sold on the idea yet? No? Well, you can also make this delicious dish:

Spaghetti squash! Quite possibly my favorite squash ever (although butternut is quickly working its way into my good graces). When cooked, the flesh of the squash separates into thin, spaghetti like strands, thus the name. I think most people roast spaghetti squash, but my mother always cooked it on the stovetop. Because I am lazy, I adapted it to work in the crockpot.

If you want to make your own, you'll need to start off by assembling the appropriate component parts:

Here we have:

2 medium spaghetti squash (about 5 lbs each)
1 28 oz. can diced tomatoes
2 medium onions (dice these)
4 cloves garlic (crushed)
1 c water or vegetable stock
1 tbsp olive oil

You'll also need about a teaspoon each of basil, marjoram, thyme, and oregano (adjust to taste, I tend to just toss stuff in).

Start by prepping your squash. You will need to remove the skin. This step can be a real pain in the neck, but sticking the squash in the microwave for about 5 minutes beforehand really speeds things up and makes the skin easier to get off. I generally find the squash skin is easiest to get off using a serrated bread knife, like so:

Once the squash is de-skinned, scoop out the seeds and slice into about 3/4" thick rings. Place in a crockpot and add the canned tomatoes:

Turn the heat onto low and cover it up. Now to give the onions and garlic a little saute before throwing them into the mix. I know, I know, the whole point of a crockpot is that you don't have to mess around with cooking things on the stove. But trust me, in the case of onions, a few minutes time is so worth it. If you really want to keep it simple, add the onions and garlic raw, but don't come crying to me when your squash tastes like raw onions. I won't want to hear it.

So anyway. Heat a tablespoon of olive oil in a frying pan over medium heat. When the oil is hot, throw in the onions and garlic, stirring around to distribute the oil. Saute for 5-8 minutes, until the onions are soft and a little translucent:

Mmmmmm. The other reason I don't mind taking time to saute the onions is that I love the way they smell when they're cooking.

Finally, toss the onions, garlic, and herbs into the crockpot. Stir everything around and pour a cup of water or stock over the top. Leave on low for ~8 hours (time may vary depending on your pot), then enjoy! This recipe will make 6-8 portions, depending on whether you are eating as a side or a full on meal. If you are planning to eat it as a meal, tossing in some chickpeas or white beans will up the protein content and make it a bit more filling.

Kanelbullens Dag, North American style

2009-10-08T08:33:00.000-07:00

This past weekend we had a sudden transition into what passes for fall out here--a breeze picked up, temperatures went down, the air was positively crisp. No leaves changing color, but I'll take what I can get. In short, the weather was perfect for a little fall baking:

This here is the beginning of a seriously delicious batch of cinnamon rolls. Not just any cinnamon rolls though. Pumpkin cinnamon rolls. With cranberries and walnuts. Sounds delicious, no? They look delicious also:

And they are even MORE delicious if you take it a step further and top them off with a maple glaze:

Yum. Recipe, you ask? Well....I don't exactly have one yet. I used this recipe on the King Arthur Flour blog as a loose inspiration, but I made some definite changes. Mainly, I turned the recipe vegan, but I also played around with the spices and the dry:wet ingredients ratio. My one complaint about cinnamon rolls (in general) is that they can be VERY dry, which I do not care for at all. So I had to do some tweaking to make sure these rolls came out moist. I did make some notes on my modifications, but I'm going to need to make these at least once more before I've got things down and have a real recipe to share. Which means that this fall, I'm going to be having a lot more breakfasts like this:

Can't complain.

snacktime!

2009-10-04T12:41:00.000-07:00

While I am mostly a three squares a day kind of girl, I frequently find that I need a bit of a snack in the afternoons to hold me over between lunch and dinner. Recently, I've also been increasing my running mileage a bit and I've discovered that while heading out the door for a three mile run first thing in the morning with nothing in my stomach is no problem, heading out on a five or six mile run without a little snack beforehand does not work out so well.

Of course, there are lots of easy snacks out there: fruit, the ever popular hummus and vegetables combo, a handful of nuts, and so on. But there are also lots of fun snacks you can make with not too much effort at home. Recently, I started experimenting with making my own fruit and nut bars, based loosely on the commercial Larabars. I am actually not a huge Larabar eater because those things are kind of pricey, but if you do like them, you'll probably have noticed the super short ingredients list. Each bar is basically some combination of fruit and nuts--pretty much nothing synthetic or chemically or what have you. Sounds great, right?

There are several recipes for homemade "Larabars" floating around on the internet (like this, or this). I checked a few out and then got to experimenting. For this first try, I was lazy and didn't feel like going out for special ingredients, so I used nuts and flavorings that happened to be in my cabinet to devise a chocolate hazelnut flavor combination.

I used:

3/4 c. dates (measure AFTER pitting)
1/3 c. raw hazelnuts
1/4 c. raw cacao nibs
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
1/2 tsp. hazelnut extract

To make:

1.Place dates in a food processor and blend into a paste. Transfer paste from processor into a bowl.

2. Place nuts and cacao nibs into processor, and pulse until finely chopped. Add nut/cacao mixture and extracts to bowl with date paste. It will look something like this:

3. Mash everything together. Use your (clean!) fingers. When everything is thoroughly mixed, shape the dough. You can go for bars, or pinch pieces off to roll into balls (I went with this method), or really, whatever you want. Store in the refrigerator to maintain maximum freshness.

This recipe makes about a dozen truffle balls or around 4 good sized bars.

So, how did they turn out? Delicious! So delicious that I disposed of them all before I remembered to take a picture of the finished product. Oops. However, I'll definitely be making these again, and experimenting with some flavor variations. I think a nice addition to these would be a spoonful of baking cocoa, to really intensify the chocolate flavor. Yum.

Full breakfast, vegan style

2009-10-02T10:55:00.000-07:00

I am not one of those vegetarians who gave up eating meat because I just didn't care for the taste. Prior to my conversion to herbivory, I was absolutely a fan of the stuff. When I decided to make the switch, some types of meat were definitely easier to forgo than others. Chicken, for example, was not really missed all that much. One of the things I did miss were all those delicious fried pork products: bacon, sausage links, sausage patties, etc. Some of the meat facsimiles out there are decent, but I don't really like to eat commercially processed fake meats that often. So my life became pork-product free and, I admit, sometimes at family breakfasts I would stare wistfully at the plate of sausages.

Well, no more! One of the most exciting (to me, anyway) sections of Vegan Brunch is, you guessed it, sausage! It is a little time consuming to make (40 minutes of steaming, anyone?), but the results are so worth it. Nobody who eats actual meat will mistake these for genuine pork sausages, but they are still very tasty and the texture is quite meaty in nature.

There are a couple of sausage recipes in the book, the ones I tried were the chorizo flavor. A few of the ingredients proved difficult to find--namely, smoked paprika and dry rubbed sage. I used regular paprika and regular sage, then tossed in about a half a teaspoon of liquid smoke.

The majority of the sausages were consumed at a brunch party, but I did manage to have a few leftovers, which I did homage to by preparing a full breakfast:

Toast, scrambled tofu, sausage, and some sauteed tomatoes. Mmmmmmm.

Dehydration, take one: apples

2009-09-30T07:42:00.000-07:00

The oven in my apartment runs on gas (excellent!) and it somewhat on the elderly and substandard side (not so excellent). One of the consequences of this combination is that the oven is always a little warm from the pilot light being on. Recently, I had the idea of putting this energy to use and using my oven as a dehydrator.

Note that if your oven is NOT already an miracle of inefficiency like mine, turning it into a dehydrator may add on substantially your monthly energy bill. Try it out to see how you like dehydrating, and if you think it's going to be something you'll do a lot, look into getting a dedicated food dehydrator.

Now, onto the experimentation. I decided to start things simple and use some fruit I already had on hand:

Here we have one Granny Smith apple, cored and sliced. I placed a piece of muslin fabric on an oven rack, and placed the slices on the cloth. I chose to use fabric rather than a tray to maximize the air circulating around the pieces of fruit. I placed the whole thing into the oven, shut the door, and left it.

These are the apples at 12 hours after starting dehydration. Major reduction in volume, but they still seemed like they might not be totally done.

At 24 hours, however, these are definitely finished.

Verdict: These dries apples tasted delicious, and were dead easy to make. In future, I think I might leave them in slightly thicker pieces. I'll also probably go ahead and remove the skins. I wanted to leave them on since that's where most of the fiber and nutrients hang out, but they turn rather crunchy (in a not so great way) in the oven.

My plans for my new oven dehydrator? First, if my gardening ever takes off, I'd like to be able to preserve seasonal vegetables for use later. Second, when fruit and vegetables are cheap and in season, I can stock up, dry them, and then enjoy later in the year. I'm also having visions of concocting soup mixes for use in backpacking, late nights at the office, etc. Right now, the possibilities are endless!

more waffling: apple cinnamon!

2009-09-28T11:59:00.001-07:00

My adventures in Vegan Brunch continue with some delicious apple cinnamon waffles:

I made a batch of these and froze most of them to have on hand for quick breakfasts during the week (they reheat really well!).

Apple cinnamon is one of the suggested variants on the plain raised waffles recipe. I added about a teaspoon of cinnamon and 1/2 c. chopped dried apples to the batter (the cookbook suggests fresh apples, but dried were convenient at the time, so I went with that). The result was waffles with a little bit of tart sweetness--they taste delicious totally plain, or with a generous dollop of apple butter, as shown above.

In the last post I wrote about this waffle recipe I mentioned that I thought the recipe called for a lot of sugar. This time around I cut sugar down to 1 tablespoon and I think it definitely improved things. The waffles themselves had a more "neutral" flavor and I also didn't have any problems with the outsides browning too fast or sticking to the waffle iron, both of which had happened with the first batch. The browning/sticking issues may, of course, depend somewhat on your waffle iron, but if you're finding it's a problem, try reducing the sugar. As an added bonus, you can then allow yourself to load on more syrup later!

Sweet tooth saturday: fauxstess cupcakes

2009-09-26T20:43:00.000-07:00

Way back when I first cracked open Vegan with a Vengeance, the recipe for Fauxstess cupcakes (aka imitation Hostess cupcakes) caught my eye. At the time I was in a super nomadic phase of my life and didn't own an electric mixer, which is something of a must for this recipe. Eventually I did settle down a bit and get a mixer. And then this weekend I finally got around to making Fauxstess cupcakes:

Not bad, eh? There were some problems with the consistency of the white icing, but overall they are a convincing visual facsimile, no? As far as taste goes, these do actually bear a surprising resemblance to the cupcakes you find in gas stations across America. The batter gets a pretty thorough beating compared to the typical cupcake, which seems to produce a slightly denser crumb. The filling is full of artery clogging junk, much like the real thing, but the topping is definitely superior, as it's a nice chocolate ganache and not some sort of chocolate flavored concoction of icing sugar, water, and coloring.

Final verdict? This recipe is a little involved, but the novelty factor can't be beat (not to mention that the cupcakes are pretty darned tasty).

Recipe: fragrant chickpea curry

2009-09-25T12:42:00.000-07:00

This curry is one of my never fail dishes that I like to break out if I have folks coming over for a casual dinner, or if I just have a busy week coming up and need a big pot of something delicious to eat through the week. The dish originally came from my mother's friend Pamela, and called for "one rotisserie chicken". My mother veganized it by using chickpeas instead, then passed the recipe on to me. I have since played around with it a little more. The ingredients are pretty simple, but the finished product is delicious! Serve over rice with a salad or steamed vegetables on the side.

Fragrant chickpea curry (serves 6)

Ingredients

2 tablespoons curry powder

2 tablespoons grated fresh ginger

½ teaspoon cinnamon

¼ teaspoon ground cloves

¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper

2 tablespoons canola oil

1 large onion, halved and thinly sliced

4 garlic cloves

4 c. chickpeas

1 14-oz can light, unsweetened coconut milk

1 14 oz can diced tomatoes

1 c. vegetable stock

Method

1. Mix spices in a small bowl and set aside

2. Heat oil in small stock pot over medium-high heat

3. Add onion and saute until golden, 5 to 6 minutes

4. Add garlic and saute about 30 seconds

5. Add spices and saute until fragrant

6. Add chickpeas and stir until coated with spices

7. Add coconut milk, tomatoes, and stock

8. Bring to simmer, and cook until flavors blend and stew is thick, about 20 minutes.

Serve over rice and enjoy!

My dinners have been revolutionized

2009-09-21T12:30:00.000-07:00

The other week I finally got around to buying a bamboo vegetable steamer. My real motivation for purchasing one was that I wanted to make vegan sausage (more on that in a later post), but I have been using it for its intended purpose a lot also.

It is so easy to just chop up a bunch of vegetables, toss them in the steamer, and top with seasoning. If I'm in a hurry or just don't want a lot for dinner, I'll just eat vegetables, but you can also cook up some rice or quinoa, and perhaps saute a little tofu to go on top. The steamer is super easy to clean up after, and of course you don't have to use oil like you would for, say, a stir-fry. Recently I scored a huge bag of green beans for 99 cents at the food co-op, and I ate them all in one sitting:

Topping in this instance is a Trader Joe's concoction, Hawaiian Soyaki sauce. Yum!

My one big tip with steaming would be to NOT OVERCOOK your vegetables. Seriously folks. They taste better and retain more nutrients with minimal cooking. I turn off the heat a little bit before things are cooked (for a steamer basket full of green beans, as shown above, that's about four minutes from turning on the burner), then let the steamer sit covered for a moment while I retrieve a dish to put the cooked vegetables in. Remember, if they're underdone, you can always turn the heat back on, but there is no un-cooking overcooked food!

Swwet tooth Saturday

2009-09-19T09:22:00.000-07:00

I've been intrigued by the idea of gluten free baking for a while, but since I don't personally have a gluten intolerance, I've not had serious motivation to actually try it out. However, I recently did some baking with someone who did, so we whipped up a batch of these guys:

Gluten- free chocolate cupcakes with peanut butter frosting. The recipe is from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World.

Verdict? These cupcakes are delicious! They were a bit denser than most cupcakes made with wheat flour, but also nice and moist, so the dense crumb was definitely not a problem. Aesthetically, they did seem to sink in the middle--you can absolutely hide the sinkholes with a little frosting, and it certainly doesn't seem to be reflective of bad texture.

If you have a gluten-intolerant baked goods lover in your life, definitely give these guys a whirl! You do have to buy several different kinds of flour, but then you'll be all set to experiment with different varieties of gluten-free deliciousness.

waffling: non-political variety

2009-09-16T09:18:00.000-07:00

I don't know about you, but I love waffles. When I was little, waffles were a pretty big deal in our house. We usually did a big breakfast on Saturday mornings, and while most weeks that meant pancakes, periodically my parents would break out an enormous mixing bowl and the waffle iron. We did not use mixes. No way! My father was the proud owner of a genuine Belgian waffle recipe, given to him by a Real Live Belgian. Waffles with this recipe required some advance planning, because the primary raising agent was yeast and it needed a while to work. But the results were worth it--using yeast instead of baking powder/soda gives a totally different texture and flavor.

Unfortunately this amazing recipe was....you guessed it, not vegan. I snagged a copy from my dad and thought about veganizing it but never quite got around to figuring out how to get the effect of whipped egg whites without actually whipping any egg whites.

Then I picked up Vegan Brunch, and what was there a recipe for?

Raised waffles! Made with yeast! Naturally I had to try it. I whipped up some batter, let it sit for the recommended hour, and then cranked up the waffle iron. I also made some strawberry rosewater sauce to go along with the waffles:

They make an attractive pairing, no?

Overall, I was pretty happy with the results of this recipe. The results were crisp, delicious waffles that were a perfect vehicle for maple syrup or fruit sauce. My only issue with this recipe is that there is a lot of sugar. There are a couple of reasons I wasn't too psyched about that. First, the waffles had a definite sweet flavor, which I admit I'm not used to. I generally think of waffles as a relatively neutral sweet/savory taste that is then sweetened with toppings. The other issue with the sugar is that it makes the outsides of the waffles brown VERY quickly, and they also had a tendency to stick to my (nonstick) waffle iron. Next time I make these I will probably cut the sugar down to 1 or 2 tablespoons instead of the 1/4 c. the recipe calls for.

Recipe: Italian style quinoa stuffed peppers

2009-09-13T10:40:00.000-07:00

Stuffed peppers are such a fun dinner to make--for some reason people are always more impressed by a grain/vegetable pilaf stuffed into a pepper and baked than they would be by the same pilaf served up as a side in a standard dish. There are endless possibilities for pepper stuffing, and my latest favorite is this one:

The filling is a mixture of quinoa, zucchini, celery, canned tomatoes, onion, and garlic, mixed with some Italian herbs and a healthy dose of white wine. The filling is then stuffed into peppers and baked for a bit to finish things off. Served with a nice salad, one of these peppers is absolutely a meal in itself. I like using quinoa instead of more standard fillings like rice because it has a high protein content, as well as calcium and iron. Plus it's delicious! Be sure to rinse the quinoa to remove bitterness before cooking.

To make four stuffed peppers of your own, you will need:

4 large green peppers, seeds removed

For the stuffing
1 tbsp olive oil
3-4 cloves garlic, crushed
1 small onion, diced
1 tsp oregano
1 tsp thyme
1/2 tsp basil
1 bay leaf
1 zucchini, diced
1 c. quinoa, rinsed
1 14oz. can tomatoes
1/2 c. white wine
1 c. water or vegetable stock

1. In a medium sized saucepan on medium heat (note: you will be cooking the quinoa in this pan as well, so a fry pan will probably NOT cut it), heat the oil. Add onions, saute for 4-5 minutes, until softened. Add garlic and saute for 1-2 minutes more.

2. Add oregano, thyme, basil, bay leaf, and zucchini. Saute for 3-4 minutes.

3. Add quinoa. Stir for 1 minute, all ingredients should be evenly mixed. Add tomatoes, wine, and water or vegetable stock. Cover pot and bring to a boil. Turn heat down and cover mixture, allowing to cook until liquid has been absorbed (~25-30 minutes). When the liquid is almost all absorbed, start the oven preheating to 350F.

4. Spoon filling into peppers, making sure to fill each one completely. Place peppers on a greased baking sheet and pop them in the oven for 30 minutes, or until outsides of peppers are beginning to brown.

5. Remove peppers from oven and allow to cool for a few minutes. Serve whole or sliced in half to show off the stuffing:

Jackson Pollock Gingerbread

2009-09-10T15:25:00.000-07:00

I don't know that I've mentioned it on here before, but I do love a good dessert from time to time. I know people are down on sugar these days and I am definitely a proponent of limiting consumption. However, I also think it's okay to have a little something sweet after dinner a few times a week. Moderation is the key, folks! Also, it's my belief that if you are making most of your food (desert or otherwise) from scratch, you can cut a LOT of hidden sugars from the rest of your day. Have you looked at the labels on some packaged foods these days? Even things that are typically classed as savory frequently have sweeteners added. Get rid of all that stuff and you can most likely eat some dessert with no worries (depending on your personal health conditions and just what you are making to eat during the rest of the day, of course). And the next time you are in a dessert mood, allow me to recommend that you whip up a batch of this lovely stuff:

I've termed this number the Jackson Pollock Gingerbread, for the rather abstract decoration scheme that tops it off. The recipe is adapted from one originally posted over at Angry Chicken. There's a sort of secret ingredient: coffee! I know it sounds weird but it really adds a nice deep flavor to the finished product. I've veganized it, made some additions, and top with a lemon icing, crystallized ginger, chopped nuts, and molasses splatters instead of the suggested whipped cream. It is seriously delicious!

To make your own 9x13 pan of gingerbread, you will need:

For the cake
1 c. whole wheat flour
1 1/2 c. all purpose flour
2 tbsp. tapioca flour
1 1/2 tsp. baking soda
1 tbsp ground ginger
2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp ground cloves
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 c. canola oil
1 c. molasses
1 tbsp. vinegar
1 c. coffee (the darker, the better)
1/3 c. crystallized ginger, chopped
1/3 c. pecans or walnuts, chopped

For the icing
Note: this icing recipe makes enough to cover the top of the gingerbread. If you want to flip it out of the pan and ice the sides as well, you will need to double it.
1/4 c. margarine or shortening
1 c. powdered sugar
Juice of 1 lemon
2 tbsp. soy milk (or other nondairy milk)

For the topping
1/4 c. crystallized ginger, chopped
1/4 c. pecans or walnuts, chopped
a few tablespoons molasses (you can use as much or as little as you like, but remember that straight molasses has quite a strong taste, so try not to go overboard on the topping)

1. Start oven preheating to 350F and grease a 9x13 baking dish.

2. In a large mixing bowl, combine flours, baking soda, ginger, cinnamon, cloves, and salt.

3. In a separate bowl, combine sugar, oil, molasses, and vinegar.

4. Mix wet and dry ingredients. The batter will be quite stiff at this point--don't worry! The next step will fix that right up.

5. Add coffee to batter.

6. Fold in chopped ginger and nuts.

7. Pour batter into pan and bake for 30 minutes, or until a knife inserted in the center of the cake comes out fairly clean.

8. Allow gingerbread to cool for at least 20 minutes before icing.

9. To prepare the icing, mix together margarine, icing sugar, lemon juice, and soy milk. Spread evenly on top of the gingerbread. Sprinkle nuts and ginger on top of icing. Finally, make the molasses streaking by taking small spoonfuls or knifefuls of molasses and flicking them across the gingerbread (warning, it can get a little messy!). The molasses will flick better if they are warmed briefly in the microwave (no more than 10 seconds) beforehand.

Slice and enjoy with a glass of soymilk or a scoop of vegan ice cream!

Let the brunch odyssey begin!

2009-09-10T08:32:00.000-07:00

Last weekend I finally got around to picking up a copy of Isa Chandra Moskowitz's latest offering to the cookbook world, Vegan Brunch. As is the case with her previous works, it did not disappoint. I think I'm going to have a lot more fancy breakfasts in my future. The cooking kicked off with this lovely scrambled tempeh:

The tempeh is sauteed with a few vegetables and a nice big dose of kale. I love tempeh, but somehow I don't seem to eat it that often. My primary protein source most days is just straight beans, and then if I start getting into soy products tofu is kind of my default. I suppose it's that it's more widely available (not that tempeh is all that hard to find--I got this stuff at Trader Joe's). So I was pretty excited to have an excuse to work more tempeh into my repertoire, in the interests of culinary variety.

This dish pretty much typifies why I like Moskowitz's cookbooks so much. They're just full of good food that is fun to make and eat. My experience with vegan cookbooks is that they often fall into two categories: way too simple and repetitive (twenty recipes for lentil loaf!), or incredibly complex recipes that require days of advance planning, special trips to ten different grocery stores, and then five or six hours of preparation to top it all off (vegan haute cuisine). These recipes strike a nice balance in between--the food is fresh and different, but the ingredient lists tend to be fairly straightforward and the preparation is not rocket science either. If you don't have a Moskowitz book on your cooking shelf, you should!

Cupboard scrounging: black bean empanadas

2009-09-01T15:23:00.000-07:00

Despite my love of cooking and general obsession with food, I sometimes get busy with other stuff and when dinner time rolls around I find I've forgotten to go grocery shopping since what seems like the Carter administration. Since I'm a) lazy, and b) cheap, the end result is usually a dinner thrown together from various non-perishables floating around my kitchen cupboards. Last night was one of those evenings and the end result was these:

Black bean empanadas! These were quick to prepare, filling, and even tasted pretty good! I also had leftovers so lunch today was all taken care off as well. This recipe makes enough dough and filling for eight empanadas. I made it up mostly out of my head so no guarantees on authenticity.

Empanada dough
2c. flour
2 tbsp canola oil
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 tbsp. vinegar
2/3 c. cold water

Black bean filling
2 c. cooked black beans
1 c. diced tomatoes (I used three roma tomatoes)
1 small onion, diced
3-4 cloves garlic, crushed
1 jalapeno pepper, seeds removed, finely chopped
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp coriander
1 tbsp oil
salt to taste

1. Prepare the dough. In a mixing bowl, sift together flour, baking powder, and salt. Add the oil to the flour and mix--the flour will become somewhat crumblike. Add vinegar and 1/3 c. water and knead together. Slowly add the remaining water until the mixture becomes a soft (but not sticky!) dough. Roll dough into a ball and leave to sit while you prepare the filling

2. Filling: In a frying pan on a medium heat stove, heat the oil. Add garlic, onion, and jalapeno, and cook for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add cumin, coriander, and tomato and cook for another 10 minutes. Add the black beans and cook for another 5-10 minutes, until everything is nicely heated. Turn off the stove and get going on rolling dough.

3. Divide the dough into eight pieces. On a lightly floured board, roll each piece into a roughly 6" circle.

4. Place approximately 1/2 c. black bean filling on each dough circle, like so:

5. Fold half the dough over the fillings and crimp around the edges with a fork. Repeat until all the empanadas are filled. Place on a baking sheet and get ready to stick those guys in the oven:

6. Bake at 350F for ~25 minutes, until empanadas are lightly browned. Remove from oven, allow to cool for a few moments (unless you are into burning the roof of your mouth off, in which case, okay, cool, whatever floats your boat), then enjoy!

These empanadas were great with a little guacamole, and I bet salsa would pair nicely too:

Recipe: Hummus duo and baba ghanoush with pita crisps

2009-08-31T23:14:00.000-07:00

I went to a potluck this weekend, and needed to bring something that could be served cold, since I had a load of errands to run beforehand. Of course, I also wanted it to be somewhat impressive. I decided to go with a selection of dips and pita crisps for dipping:

Yum, no? I made baba ghanoush, roasted red pepper hummus, and a classic plain hummus. It sounds like a lot of work to make three dips, but a lot of the prep work for these is combined, so if you're going to commit to one, the trio can be done for not a lot of additional effort. For example, you can roast the eggplant, red pepper, and garlic at the same time, and also have the pita toasts going on your second oven rack. And then you have a great selection of dips to take to parties, break out as snacks, spoon on top of salads, etc. The possibilities are endless!

To make your own, you will need:

1 head garlic
1 large eggplant (1.5-2lbs)
2 red peppers, halved, with seeds removed
2 c. chickpeas
1/4 c. +2 tbsp lemon juice (1/4 c. for hummus, 2 tbsp for baba ghanoush)
1/4 c. tahini (2 tbsp for hummus, 2 tbsp for baba ghanoush)
1 tbsp cumin (2 tsp for the hummuses, 1 tsp for baba ghanoush)
1/4 c. cayenne (optional)
2 tbsp olive oil (1 for hummus, 1 for baba ghanoush), plus ~2tbsp for roasting vegetables
salt to taste
a few sprigs parsley for garnish

NOTE: Both hummus and baba ghanoush can be adjusted a lot to suit your tastes. These are the general proportions that create a hummus that I like, but you may find you prefer something a little different. Treat the recipes more as suggestions than anything set in stone, and feel free to adjust quantities or make additions as you see fit.

If you want to make pita chips, you will also need some pita bread. I used 1 package of 8 pitas for the potluck, but you definitely get enough dip to use up a couple of packages. Slice pitas into eights to make chips

1. Slice eggplant in half and salt. Leave eggplant to sweat for 30 minutes.

2. Brush eggplant and red peppers with olive oil and arrange on a baking sheet. Place garlic on baking sheet as well. Bake in a 450F oven until eggplant is soft and peppers are slightly blackened, ~20 min. If you are making pita chips, you can also arrange them on a baking sheet and toast while you have the oven going.

3. While the vegetables are roasting, you can get started on the plain hummus: in a food processor, combine the chickpeas, 1 tbsp olive oil, 2 tbsp tahini, 2 tsp cumin, and 1/4 c. lemon juice. Blend until smooth, thinning with water as needed (you can also thin with lemon juice or olive oil--be sure to taste test frequently to see how things are shaping up!)

4. Remove vegetables from oven. Leave the eggplant and peppers for a moment. Pull all the cloves off of the garlic and squeeze the garlic out of its skins. Add half of the garlic to the hummus and blend thoroughly. Remove a little more than half of the hummus from the food processor, and your classic garlic hummus is done! The hummus left in the food processor will form the basis of the red pepper hummus.

5. Peel the skins off of the red peppers. Slice a thin piece or two off of the peppers to use as garnish. Coarsely chop the remaining pepper and toss in the food processor with hummus. Blend until smooth. Scrape the hummus out and clean off the food processor for the final dip, baba ghanoush.

6. Baba ghanoush time! Remember that eggplant you roasted? Scrape out the flesh and place it in the food processor (chuck the skins into your compost). Add the rest of the garlic, 2 tbsp lemon juice, 2 tbsp tahini, 1 tsp cumin, 1/4 tsp cayenne and 1 tbsp olive oil. Blend until smooth. Scrape out the baba ghanoush.

7. Arrange your dips in nice bowls and garnish with parsely and red pepper slivers. Serve with pita chips:

Enjoy!

Millions of peaches...

2009-08-28T08:45:00.000-07:00

Okay, maybe not quite millions, but today's dish+recipe packs a serious peach punch. Peaches were a mere 50 cents a pound at the grocery store this week, a bargain even here in the land of abundant affordable produce. This pricing scheme has two key implications. First, I have been eating a half dozen peaches or so every day. Second, it's time to make a peach pie:

I like to keep my peach pie fairly simple, with minimal additions. I did make the crust for this one from scratch, but I hear it's possible to get perfectly acceptable (and even vegan) puff pastry in the freezer case of your grocery store these days. Personally, I am determined to eventually make a good vegan rough puff (this one was merely okay, so I'm not posting the recipe) so I am resisting the siren call of Pillsbury for now.

Once you have figured out the pastry end of things to your satisfaction, it's time to make the filling. One thing I personally hate about fruit pies is that you sometimes wind up with a huge gap inside the pie between crust and filling. This gap is due to the pastry baking enough for its shape to set before the fruit has really started to cook down and shrink in volume. The solution to this problem is to pre-cook the fruit for 15-20 minutes on the stovetop.

For a super peachy filling, you will need:

~4lbs ripe peaches, washed, pitted, and sliced (NOTE: Try to get peaches that are not underripe, as they aren't as sweet).
juice of 1 lime
1 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
1 tbsp. sugar
1 tbsp. cornstarch or arrowroot powder

1. In a large saucepan, mix together peaches and lime juice and let sit for a few minutes.

2. Add nutmeg, cinnamon, and cornstarch to peaches and stir together until well mixed

3. Place saucepan on stove over medium heat. Cover saucepan and cook peaches for 15-20 minutes, stirring every few minutes. If the peach juice begins to boil, reduce heat. Eventually your peaches should look something like these guys:

4. Turn heat off on stove and add the sugar to peach mixture. Roll out the bottom half of your pie crust and place in pie dish. Spoon the peach filling into crust. Roll out top crust and place over top of filling. If you have leftover pastry dough, use some to decorate your pie. I usually go with four leaves (as pictured above), but there's no reason why you couldn't do something different.

5. Place pie in a 450F oven and bake for 30-40 minutes, until pie is nicely browned.

6. Slice and serve:

Recipe: Black bean soup with kale and tomatoes

2009-08-26T12:42:00.000-07:00

Although it is technically the peak of summer here, we've been getting a lot of cool, cloudy weather, courtesy of the local marine layer. Which means that fall foods like hot soup are totally appropriate for the menu rotation, especially paired with a simple salad and some delicious cornbread like the stuff featured yesterday:

Black bean soup is one of my favorites, but I find it can be kind of heavy if it's just beans. This version mixes things up by adding in tomatoes and kale. It's delicious, filling, and with the fiber, iron, calcium, and protein, also made of nutritional win.

Black bean soup with kale and tomatoes

Ingredients
5 cups cooked black beans
28 oz can diced tomatoes
1 15oz can vegetable broth OR 1 carrot and 1 stick of celery, diced, plus a pinch each of oregano and thyme
3-5 c. water (depending on whether or not you are using stock)
1 bunch kale (approx. 1/2 lb), finely chopped
1 medium onion, diced
4-5 cloves crushed garlic (you can dial down the garlic if you like, I tend to load it onto everything)
1 tbsp olive oil
1 1/2 tsp. cumin
1 1/2 tsp. coriander
1/2 tsp. cayenne pepper (adjust as desired depending on your heat preference)
salt and pepper to taste.

1. Assemble all your prepared ingredients:

2. In a large saucepan or soup pot on medium heat, heat the olive oil. When a piece of garlic dropped in sizzles, you're good to go.

3. Add the garlic to the oil and saute for 1 minute. Add the onions and continue to saute, stirring occasionally, for 2-3 minutes. If you are not using stock, add the diced carrot and celery. Continue to saute until onions are nicely softened up and slightly clear (not carmelizing, although some carmelization will not ruin things, so don't sweat it too much). Add the cumin and coriander.

4. Add kale into the mix and cover pot for 1 minute, kale should be lightly steamed. Remove lid and stir for a few more minutes, until kale is fairly wilted.

5. Add cayenne, vegetable stock (if using, alternatively add 2 c. additional water), tomatoes, 2 c. water, and black beans. Stir together and cover pot. Bring mixture to a boil, then turn heat down and leave soup to simmer for 30 minutes. Check occasionally and add additional water if needed. Salt and pepper to taste. I find it's best to go light on the salt and pepper in the soup pot and then let people go with their own preference after it's been served into bowls. Which leads nicely to step 6....

6. Turn off burner and ladle soup into bowls. Serve with salad and cornbread.

If you don't have cornbread handy, a few tortilla chips crumbled on top are also a nice touch. Or just skip the refined carbs completely if you must, the soup will be delicious on its own.

Cornbread!

2009-08-25T18:14:00.000-07:00

Last night for dinner I cooked up a big pot of soup (more on that in a later post), and I was in the mood for a little something to go along with it. Conveniently, I also had some cornmeal in the freezer, so I decided to go for cornbread:

Cornbread is one of those typical Southern foods that I love even though I rarely ate it growing up (also on this list: okra, collard, grits). My mother finds the texture too coarse, so she didn't serve it often. So I don't have a tried and true family recipe to share with you, sorry! Instead, I used this delicious vegan cornbread recipe. The only modifications I made were to use 1/4 c. of oil instead of 1/3, and to add about 3/4 c. of corn salsa. The result was a delicious, moist, cornbread with a little bit of kick from the salsa:

One of the best things about this recipe is that it does not have too much sweetener, just a few spoonfuls of maple syrup. A lot of cornbread recipes I have seen call for a ton of sugar, anywhere from 1/2 to a whole cup, which I think is really more like a recipe for corn cake! I think next time I make this recipe I may even cut the maple syrup down to a single tablespoon because even this cornbread was just a little bit sweeter than what I am used to.

Finally, a note about storing your cornbread. Like most quickbreads, it is best eaten straight out of the oven or within a day or two of baking. If you are a single person like moi, you may not care for the rate of cornbread consumption that requires. Fortunately, cornbread (and most quickbreads) freezes well! I wound up putting about two-thirds of this batch into the freezer for later consumption, while the rest is currently chilling out in a Mason jar in the fridge:

Yes, if you're out of tupperware, a mason jar will absolutely do!

Mediterraneand salad

2009-08-24T09:02:00.000-07:00

Yup, another salad. What can I say? It's summer and they're delicious!

This salad mix is my basic lunch fallback when I don't want to have to think too much about ingredients or flavor combinations. Right now I'm probably eating it a couple of times a week:

I like to think of the flavor theme as vaguely Mediterranean, but really it's just good.

You'll need (for a 1-person meal sized salad):

6 leaves red leaf lettuce, washed and chopped
1 roma tomato, sliced
1/2 green bell pepper, sliced
1/2 red bell pepper, sliced
1/2 cucumber, peeled. Slice the cucumber into thin pieces and quarter them to get the look here.
2 tbsp hummus
handful chopped scallions

To assemble: You can toss everything together or go for a fancier assembly (pictured above). I place the lettuce on a plate and spread it evenly across the surface (not mounded in the center). Then arrange the vegetables. Here, the peppers form the base of the vegetable topping, arranged to lie like bicycle wheel spokes. The tomato goes next, forming a ring around the middle of the plate. Finally, place the cucumbers in a mound inside the tomatoes, and leave a small depression for the hummus. I had quite a bit of cucumber so I also put some around the outside of the tomatoes. Finally, spoon the hummus onto the cucumbers and top with scallions.

Say grace, dig in, and enjoy!

Sweet Tooth Saturday

2009-08-22T09:56:00.000-07:00

I don't know about you, but I really love making (and eating) desserts. Sure, the stuff that comes before is great too, but a really good dessert? Hands down one of the best things ever.

I got into making cupcakes a while back when the amazing Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World came out. Since then I've started playing around with my own flavor combinations and making up recipes. Some are better than others (ask me about the licorice cupcakes I made last Halloween sometime...), but these latest ones are definite winners:

Lemon cupcakes with blackberry filling and a lemon buttercream frosting. Yum! Like a lot of my cooking and baking, this recipe was inspired by odds and ends in the kitchen that needed using up quickly. I had a few lemons that were heading towards overripe, and also some leftover blackberry flummery (basically a blackberry sauce concoction...I thickened it up on the stove a bit for use here, I've written the recipe to just use blackberry jam since I eventually wound up with that general consistency).

This recipe makes about a dozen cupcakes, although I think I could have stretched it to 13 or 14 if I had been using regular rather than "jumbo" liners. You will need:

Dry ingredients
1 1/4 c. flour
2 tbsp arrowroot powder
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
pinch of salt

Wet ingredients
1 c. milk
3/4 c. sugar
1/4 c. lemon juice
1/3 c. canola oil
1 tbsp vanilla extract
zest of 1 lemon

Filling
3/4 c. blackberry jam or preserves. Blueberry would probably also work well.

Frosting
1/2 c. margarine or shortening
juice of 1 lemon
1/4 c. soymilk
2 c. confectioners sugar

1. Preheat oven to 350F and prepare a muffin tin with 12 cupcake liners.

2. In a mixing bowl, combine all of the wet ingredients (including sugar).

3. In a separate bowl, sift together dry ingredients.

4. Add dry ingredients into wet and stir together. It's important not to stir the batter for too long--no more than a few minutes. Don't worry if there are still a few lumps in the batter

5. Spoon batter into cupcake liners. I like to use a 1/4 c. measure and a silicone spatula to get the batter into the liners.

6. Bake at 350F for 20-25 minutes, until cupcakes are slightly browned. Remove from oven and transfer to a cooling rack. Allow cupcakes to cool completely before filling or frosting.

7. When cupcakes are cooled, poke a hole in the top of each one with a knife or your (clean) index finger. Load all but a few spoonfuls of the blackberry jam into an icing bag with a fairly wide tip attached. For each cupcake, place the tip into the hole you've poked and squeeze gently. After the cupcakes are filled, spread the remaining jam in a thin layer across the top of the cupcakes:

8. Prepare the frosting. With a hand mixer, cream the margarine, lemon juice, and soy milk and frosting together. Slowly sift in confectioner's sugar.

9. Frost the cupcakes! You can either spread with a knife or use an icing bag and tip to get fancy. Since these cupcakes are already spread with a jam layer, the icing bag route will give a tidier finish, but either will result in delicious cupcakes.

sinquesadillas

2009-08-20T21:49:00.000-07:00

Last weekend I had a potluck to go to, so I wanted to make something delicious and easy to eat. I cracked open my cookbooks and settled on the Grilled Yuca Tortillas recipe from Veganomicon, which is basically a recipe for quesadillas minus the cheese. However, when I went to pick up ingredients, I ran into a slight hitch: my food co-op did not sell yuca. The grocery store down the street did not have yuca (although they did tell me they have it sometimes, but it's a "seasonal" item). The grocery store by the library did not have yuca, and Trader Joes was also a yuca free zone.

I decided four stores was enough searching for one lousy root vegetable and started contemplating substitutes. After some conversation with the manager at my food co-op, I decided to go with a mix of russet baking potatoes and Garnet sweet potatoes. The Garnet potatoes are lighter in color than the usual sweet potatoes you find in the grocery store and are not as sweet. I picked up about 3/4 lb. of the Garnet potatoes, 2 large russet potatoes, and also one very large regular sweet potato (I made two flavors of this recipe, details below).

For the first filling, I used 1 1/2 russet potatoes and all the Garnet potatoes. I boiled all the potatoes and left the skins on since a) I like the taste of potato skins b) they add some nice flecks to the mashed potato and c) hello, that's where all the nutrients are! This version was made according to the main directions in Veganomicon, and I added in 2 roasted red peppers and approximately 1/2 c. of corn salsa that I had from Trader Joe's. This made enough filling for 7 large white flour tortillas.

The second batch of quesadillas used the regular sweet potato and remaining 1/2 russet potato. I also added in approximately 1 c. of cooked black beans, a few teaspoons of cumin and a pinch of salt. This made enough filling for 6 large tortillas. After all the filling was in the tortillas, I had a massive and beautiful stack of no queso quesadillas waiting to be cooked:

Looks delicious, no?

Next, the recipe calls for browning the quesadillas on the stovetop. However, I only own a single frying pan and I didn't have all night to brown quesadillas. Instead, I turned my oven up to 350F, oiled a couple of baking sheets, and placed 3 tortillas at a time on each sheet. I then lightly oiled the tops of the quesadillas and popped them in the oven for 10-15 minutes while I primped for the party. When the tortillas were lightly browned on top, I took them out and cut each quesadilla in half. Everything was then nicely arranged on a platter along with a bowl of tropical salsa (mango, avocado, tomato, lime juice, cilantro, not pictured...sorry! I was running late!).

For comparison purposes, I did also cook a few quesadillas on the stove. Honestly, I thought the ones in the oven were a little better--they had more crunch and did not seem as greasy as the stovetop version. However, if I were only making 1 or 2 quesadillas, I would probably still go with the stovetop method rather than going to the trouble of turning on the oven.

Ironically, on my way to the party, I had to stop in at a fifth grocery store, and what do you think I saw staring me in the face from the produce section? Yes, yuca. Unbelievable.

summer salsa salad

2009-08-19T10:48:00.000-07:00

While I really enjoy breaking out all the pots and pans and cooking a big fancy meal, I'm also a huge fan of simple foods. Salads are one of my go-to lunches: easy, filling (provided you have the right components), fresh, and colorful. Here in California there is beautiful produce available almost year round, but the summers are especially wonderful. I pick up a assortment of vegetables at the farmer's market and grocery store, then turn them into lunch throughout the week,

I mixed up this delicious summer salsa themed salad the other day and it did not disappoint:

In it, we have:

~2 c. romaine lettuce
1 heirloom tomato, diced
1/2 green bell pepper, diced
1/2 cucumber, peeled and sliced
2 tbsp Trader Joe's corn salsa
1/2 c. cooked black beans
handful chopped scallions
a few sprigs of cilantro

While we're on the topic of salad, I'm also going to mention one of my weird food things: I don't do salad dressing. Not for any particular health reason, but because I never liked it as a kid. And then I found out that most dressing wasn't that good for you anyway, so I never bothered to seriously acquire the habit. I do make occasional exceptions for a nice oil and balsamic vinegar, but in general I prefer my salad naked.

A lot of people are really surprised to hear about my no-dressing preferences, insisting that salad by itself tastes bland or even gross. My answer to that is that these people are clearly eating the wrong kind of salad. If you chop up a head of iceberg lettuce and call it a day, then yes, it is bland, and yes, dressing will probably improve it. The key to a good salad that is not dependent on slatherings of ranch is to have lots of interesting ingredients. I have a couple of salad guidelines that I like to try and follow:

1. NO ICEBERG LETTUCE. Sorry, this one is super important, so I had to go with the all caps. My top pick for greens would be spinach, as it has the best vitamin and mineral content. In case you weren't aware, spinach is a great source of iron for vegetarians and vegans. Unfortunately, it is not as great a source of calcium as some folks would have you believe, despite what the nutrition label may say. If you can't spring for spinach, at least get some more interesting varieties of lettuce: romaine, bibb, red, etc.

2. Have lots of non-greens components. I like to try to have at least three non-greens vegetables in my salads. Some good options include: tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, sprouts, carrots (especially attractive if you take the time to grate them), artichoke hearts, beets. Also, if you have any cooked vegetables leftover from dinner the night before, chop them up and toss on your salad as well.

3. Make your salad a meal. Vegetables are good for you, but they don't make a very filling meal by themselves. I like to make my salads a full meal by adding some sort of bean and/or grain into the mix. Cook a large batch of beans in your crockpot on the weekend and then toss a handful onto your salads throughout the week. My favorites are black beans and chickpeas, but red and white beans can also taste good. For grains, I like to add a little couscous, whole wheat pasta, or quinoa (which I know is not technically a grain but in my kitchen it gets treated like one).

4. Dress up your salad with non-dressing. While I hate traditional dressing, I do like to add things like a generous dollop of hummus or a few chopped nuts to my salad. They add a lot of flavor and much more nutrition than anything you'll find in a bottle at the grocery store.

It's really very simple to make a delicious, healthy, and interesting salad. Now put down that dressing bottle and head of iceberg and get to work on yours!

farmer's market stir fry

2009-08-15T23:11:00.000-07:00

Stir fry is one of my favorite dinners to make. It's quick, hard to mess up, and versatile. I've been trying to pick up new vegetables at the farmer's market for culinary experimentation, and there is one stand that is always selling unusual bunches of leaves for $1. Recently I picked up a bunch of okra leaves, which I was informed made an excellent addition to stir-fry. I promptly went home to test this advice:

In addition to the okra leaves, I threw in a zucchini, an eggplant (which I always salt and sweat ahead of time, as I do not buy this business about eggplants that are now bred to be less bitter), and some baked tofu. For seasoning, I crushed a few cloves of garlic, then added red pepper flakes, a generous splash of mirin (a Japanese cooking wine--it has a thick consistency and is on the sweeter side), and a dash of sesame oil. Sounds yum, no? Here, have a close up to drool over:

So how did the okra leaves turn out? The flavor is quite mild, similar to actual okra. The guy who sold me the leaves said they would also behave like okra and produce the same thick juices (or "slime" for the okra haters out there) that okra does when cooked. Honestly, I did not notice that there was much of a thickening effect, certainly nothing like what I would have expected from a comparable volume of okra. Still, they were cheap, added bulk, and the taste was good, so I'll probably be adding them into the stir fry rotation again.

Let's have a dinner party!

2009-08-15T22:49:00.000-07:00

I figure if I'm going to do a food blog, I should kick it off with something good, no? Fortuitously, I hosted a dinner party this week. The menu was vaguely Italian and decidedly delicious in its theme. Unfortunately by the time everything was ready to eat I was too busy socializing to snap any finished photos but I did get a few of the prep:

On the left is a triple recipe of marinara sauce, from Veganomicon. I made it pretty much according to the instructions, and added in an onion (carmelized) and a bulb of roasted garlic. This was a nice basic tomato sauce, perfect for the lasagne I used it in.

On the right is a batch of no-knead bread dough about to go into the oven. I loosely follow the recipe that appeared in the New York Times a few years ago. I do find that their liquid/flour ratio is quite high, so for this batch I did roughly 2 c. water and 6 c. flour (1.5 of which were whole wheat). I also use a fair bit more salt than the recipe calls for (a generous tablespoon...be still my rising blood pressure). This batch also benefited from a couple tablespoons of olive oil and a generous amount of dried rosemary.

Next up, appetizers:

Pesto stuffed mushrooms waiting to go into the oven for a quick run under the broiler. This recipe is from one of my go-to cookbooks, Donna Klein's Mediterranean Vegan Kitchen. While these are delicious fresh out of the oven, they also are great the next day diced and tossed with some pasta, if you are lucky enough to have leftovers.

There were also some green beans (not pictured), but the piece de resistance was definitely:

Lasagne! Yes, it is possible to make amazing, decadent, and creamy vegan lasagne. This version is made using a recipe from Veganomicon. Since I hadn't made it before, I followed the recipe pretty much as written (including the optional pine nut cream), with a few mods:

-50% more sauce than called for

-One online review complained that the recipe had too much lemon, so I omitted the lemon zest from the almesan (fake parmesan). I also added a few tablespoons nutritional yeast to the almesan. Who doesn't need a little extra B12 in their diet?

-I also found some complaints online that the recipe was "watery". I used uncooked noodles and skipped the suggestion to add a cup of water. The noodles came out nicely al dente and the lasagne was not watery at all. My only possible complaint would be that it was maybe too much noodle content. If I make the lasagne again I will probably add some more vegetables and omit a noodle layer (this lasagne had 4 layers)

-I don't know about where you live, but tofu here is generally sold in 14 oz. packages. Both the ricotta and the pine nut cream call for 1lb of tofu (16 oz). I just went with 14 oz but kept all the other ingredient volumes the same. The results were great and definitely not too tofu.

The lasagne also refrigerates well. Here's a bit of the leftovers right before I ate them for lunch the next day:

This recipe is a bit decadent for everyday, but I will definitely be making it again. Now that I've done one round according to instructions, I'm planning to experiment...visions of white/pesto lasagne with lots of basil and grilled vegetables are floating through my head.