Bunny Cake.

For the icing:
2 packages Tofutti cream cheesey goodness.
1 teaspoon vanilla extract.
2 teaspoons orange zest.
5-6 tablespoons Agave sweetener.

Mix all the ingredients together. I heated the tofutti in the microwave for 35 seconds to help it melt.
Then stir in ¼ cup melted chocolate, to taste.

Tofu as an Egg Replacer

I got this book, Tofu 1-2-3 by Maribeth Abrams, out of the library to try tofu in baking as an egg replacer. I made brownies, corn muffins and oatmeal cookies. They all came out great in texture and taste. The brownies were made with a sinful & expensive amount of maple syrup (1 cup), cocoa and melted chocolate chips, with 1/3 cup soft silken tofu. They were moist and delicious. They did need a lot more cooking time than stated in the book
The corn muffins were excellent! The recipe was a basic one for most corn muffins using apple juice for the liquid and maple syrup for sweetener and 1/4 cup tofu. The batter was quite thin. When they were baking I could smell the apple juice, but I really couldn't taste it in the finished product. They also took extra time cooking.
The oatmeal cookies were tasty, but chewy in texture. Of course, we ate them all!
The book had lots of other recipes to try. The author gave nutritional information for each recipe and clear instructions for preparation.

Tasty Pancake Tips

Adding a little corn meal to organic whole wheat pastry flour makes a more complexly flavored pancake - and - adding finely shredded coconut to the batter is one more step towards a superior pancake. Then of course, having Aquila, Branden, and Marcy's hand picked black/blue/berry/peach jams as toppings is pretty darn scrumptious! (This meal savored and approved by Marcy and Stephen on a Silent Sunday with only humming allowed to express appreciation. Hummmmmming Hum Hum Ming !)

Thai Brownie Cookies

The problem with Thai food is a distinct lack of brownie cookies. Thus:

1/2 can coconut milk
1 t red Thai chili paste
8-10 oz dark chocolate (I used 72%)
1 cup raw sugar
1 medium-large banana, smooshed
1/4 cup peanut butter
1/2 t real vanilla
1/2 t salt
1 t baking powder
1 3/4 cups flour

Heat the first three ingredients gently until chocolate melts. Remove from heat, then add everything else in order. Bake at 325F for 12-13 minutes. Let sit on cookie sheet for a few minutes before serving.

Appreciate the separate waves of flavour. Think "cookies" when next you're asked to bring a dessert to a Thai dinner. Try coconut milk next time you run out of margarine for baking.

Orange Cake with Okanagan Preserve Glaze

I wanted to make this for Christmas Eve, but was out voted in favor of Chocolate. Everyone missed out, because this turned out great. It was a moment of inspiration to add the peach preserves.

Orange cake

350 degree oven 30 minutes 9" round or square pan greased or lined with parchment paper

1 1/2 cups flour
3/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/3 cup vegetable oil
1 cup orange juice - I used not from concentrate in a carton
1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar
1 Tablespoon orange rind
Stir together dry ingredients in a mixing bowl. Add wet ingredients, stir just enough to combine. Pour into pan and bake. Warm preserves and spoon over cake.

Apple Upside-Down Cake

This tasty little cake won 2nd place in the 2nd Annual Apple Bake Off at the UVic Geography Department. Yeah.

Caramel-apple topping (bottoming?):
1/2 c brown sugar
2 T margarine, melted
3 c baking apples, very thinly sliced (1-2 large)
1/2 c pecans or walnuts, chopped

Cake:
1 1/2 c unbleached white flour
3/4 c cane sugar
2 1/2 t baking powder
1 t cinnamon
1/2 t salt
1 c soy milk
1/4 c oil
1 T apple cider vinegar
1 t vanilla

Preheat over to 350F.
Oil the sides of a 9" cake pan. Line the bottom of the pan with parchment paper.
Mix dry cake ingredients in a medium mixing bowl, set aside.
Mix wet cake ingredients, set aside and let sit for a couple of minutes.
Combine hot melted margarine and brown sugar. Spread this caramel mixture over the bottom of the cake pan.
Arrange apples in a pretty pattern on top of caramel. Top with nuts.
Combine wet and dry cake ingredients, stirring just to mix.
Pour cake batter over apples, use a spatula to gently spread the batter evenly over the apples.
Bake for 30 minutes, or until the cake tests done in the middle.
Let cool on a wire rack for at least 10 minutes before removing from the cake pan.

Notes on a "healthier" version:
This morning I made a somewhat healthier version of this cake for breakfast. I replaced 1 c of the white flour with whole wheat flour and reduced the sugar in the cake batter to 1/2 c. I also added an extra cup of apple slices and tried substituting water for margarine in the caramel sauce. It turned out tasty and still quite sweet, however, the caramel sauce stayed thin and ended up making the cake a little soggy in the middle.

Potato Gnocchi

These are exceedingly simple little pasta-like dumplings. The only hard part is deciding how you want to shape them. Serve them with any sauce you would normally have with pasta: pesto, marinara, oil and balsamic vinegar, etc. We had them with an exciting dandelion-greens sauce that Jennie made.

2 lbs russet potatoes, peeled
Salt and pepper to taste
1 1/2 to 1 3/4 c unbleached white flour

Bake, boil or steam the potatoes until they are all soft. Make sure they cook evenly (we had problems with some less-cooked chunks sticking around).
While they are still hot, mash potatoes with salt and pepper.
Gradually add flour, stirring until you have sticky blob (sounds tasty, eh?).
Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface.
Knead dough for about 3 minutes, adding more flour if the dough is too sticky to handle.
Pat dough into a rectangle, cut into long strips about an inch wide.
Roll strips into thick ropes (like you're playing with clay), cut into 1/2 inch thick cylinders.
Now the really fun part: decide how you want to shape the gnocchi. We followed a cookbook's directions and pressed the dough between a thumb and fork. They turned out a little funny looking, but that didn't stop them from tasting good!
Drop gnocchi into a pot of boiling salted water in batches small enough that the pot won't be too crowded.
Gnocchi are done when they float to the top.
Drain cooked gnocchi in a colander. If you're making a big batch, you may want to pour a little oil over the waiting gnocchi to keep them from sticking.

This recipe served three of us, but should be good for at least four if Branden isn't there.

Blueberry Crumble

A lovely summery crumble. The addition of pecans in the topping makes it even more special.

Filling:
4 c blueberries
2 T lemon juice
2 T flour
2 T cane sugar
1/2 t vanilla

Topping:
1/4 C margarine, melted
1/3 C brown sugar
3/4 C flour
3/4 C quick-cooking oats
1/3 C pecans, finely chopped
1/4 t salt
1/8 t each allspice and cinnamon

Preheat oven to 350F.
Toss blueberries with remaining filling ingredients until coated.
Place blueberry mixture in a pie pan.
Combine margarine and sugar. Add remaining topping ingredients and mix until an even, but still coarse, texture is reached.
Spread topping evenly over blueberries.
Bake for 40 minutes, or until lightly browned on top.

Mushroom-Bean Burgers

These turned out as delectable delicate patties. They don't hold together as well as some patties, but they make a delicious meal nonetheless, soft and almost creamy inside, crispy outside. I ate them all as main courses, with goddess dressing for gravy and some yummy veggie sides, but I'm sure they'd make great sandwiches too. I might try a curried version of these in the future.

5 c cooked black eyed peas
1 med white onion, finely diced
2 c portabella mushrooms, finely diced (3 small mushrooms)
1/2 c celery, finely diced (2 small stalks)
1 c parsley, finely diced
1 med carrot, grated
2 T flour
1/4 c oats
1/4 c sunflower seeds
2-3 T nutritional yeast
Salt, pepper, cayenne, paprika, and braggs, to taste
Mild olive oil

While the beans are cooking, fry onions over medium heat in a little oil until onions begin to soften.
Add mushrooms, cook until mushrooms begins to soften and release their juices.
Add the celery, cook until celery is almost done.
Add parsley and carrots, cook until parsley is wilted and vegetables are all soft.

In a large mixing bowl, mash black eyed peas. Add flour, oats, and seasonings. Adjust seasonings to taste and add extra flour and/or oats if the mixture is too moist.
Gently stir in sunflower seeds and cooked vegetables.

Shape into patties.
Place on a well oiled baking sheet and bake at 450F or fry in an oiled skillet until crispy and brown.

Mango Gazpacho per Cafe Pasquals of Santa Fe

A simple delicious cold soup for summer - blend the fruit from 2 ripe mangos and a peeled cucumber or two, thin with water as needed and reblend, pour into a big bowl, chop finely and add in a cucumber, 1/2 a red onion, a few sprigs of cilantro and a firmer, less ripe mango in cubes ... serve on a hot summer's afternoon or evening. Refreshing!

Las Tres Hermanas Maravillosas – Three Sisters Marvelous Tamales

What a joy to discover how enjoyable it is to make fresh tender tamales. Following the tropical Oaxacan style, they were steamed in banana leaves which seems to create a very moist and succulent tamal. We made three types, and there was definitely a first place winner - surprisingly the one I had the greatest doubts about as it was an instinctive combination of ingredients, not from a given recipe. One of the most enjoyable parts took place before my guests arrived - that was the mixing of the masa. The soft, fine grain of the corn masa must be mixed gently by hand and the texture was so soft and tender and fluffy, like the sand on the beach at Tulum. Adding the water and slowly squeezing the masa to pull the moisture into the ground corn is such a sensual experience, and then later adding the vegetable shortening - both steps were alchemical in nature as the dry corn became a soft and succulent golden pillow of grain. It seemed an ancient Mayan ritual, a woman’s hands bringing life forth from deep down in the earth through love of the corn and in honor of the Earth Goddess. A magical transformation.





The very best of the fillings was a steamed ancho chile blended with red onion, garlic, and a little tofu for a creamy body, and then mixed in a bowl with finely chopped zucchini. As we layered the corn masa on the banana leaf, we added the ancho chilie filling, and then topped it with thinly sliced dried tomato and a slice of jack cheese. With a final dollop of masa on top, we carefully folded the banana leaves up (top and bottom first, then sides) and tied the moist bundles closed with thin strips of banana leaves. I had harvested the banana leaves earlier in the day, cut them to size, microwaved them for 2 and a half minutes, and then stored them in a plastic bag to keep them moist. This flavor combination was the best tamale I have ever tasted, made one quietly hum a little while slowly savoring it.



The second best tamale was the sweet one – shredded coconut was added to the remaining masa, and then fresh local sweet white pineapple chunks (with out the acid of the yellow pineapple, it tastes more like a pear) and raisins were gently pressed into the masa. The third tamale was a canned Anaheim chile with jack cheese and dried tomato, a familiar flavor, but just not as remarkable as those with the fresh and complex ingredients.


Corn Masa
makes 10 - barely

2 cups of masa ( I found Red Mill’s in the natural food
section in a one pound versus five pound bag)
1-1/2 cups of water
1 teaspoon of baking powder
½ teaspoon of salt
All blended together, squeezing slowly, by hand.
(And listening to Santana’s Abraxis certainly didn’t hurt, with a little dancing to Black Magic Woman while squeezing the masa)
In a separate bowl, whip with a fork
2/3 cup of Earth Balance organic vegetable shortening
(probably ½ cup would be enough / less rich)

Fillings

One dried ancho chile with top and seeds removed,
steamed in water, then chile and water are poured into blender with ¼ red onion and a few cloves of garlic. A small piece of firm tofu is added, probably less than 1/4 of a pound / block, for body. In bowl, add finely diced half of a zucchini to the ancho sauce. Assemble with thinly sliced dried tomato (creates great chewy texture and flavor) and a slice of Jack cheese is optional. This made enough filling for a second follow-up batch.

Pineapple was sliced and cubed, raisins and finely shredded coconut added as well. Anaheim chiles were rinsed and patted dry, added with Jack cheese and dried tomato.

Cooking

Layered in the steamer basket in a large pot, we had to steam them for an hour to get a good result. Recipes all said 45 min but they weren’t ready until 60 min. If you serve them immediately, you will see a transformation take place. The first one is a soft pillow of grain that crumbles a little and needs a fork to be eaten. The second one gains a little body and is firmer as it cools. The third one is the cooled into the firmer tamale shape one is more familiar with and can be eaten by hand. All three stages were excellent, but even the third one was still just minutes from the stove, much fresher than any other possible way to enjoy them. Maravilloso!

Rhubarb Crumble

Before this crumble, I had never cooked with rhubarb, although I have ordered many a slice of strawberry-rhubarb pie. Rhubarb is in season on the island right now, so I ordered a couple of pounds and experimented.

Filling:
5 c rhubarb, diced
1 c cane sugar
1 c water
2 T cornstarch
2 T orange juice
1 t vanilla

Crust:
3/4 c flour
3/4 c oats
1/2 c brown sugar
1/4 c margarine, melted
1/4 t salt
1 t cinnamon
pinch of cloves

Preheat oven to 350F.
Arrange rhubarb in a 9" pie plate.
Combine cane sugar and cornstarch in a sauce pan, whisk in water and orange juice. Heat, stirring frequently, until mixture reaches a boil.
Remove from heat and add vanilla.
Pour sauce over rhubarb.

For the crust:
Mix margarine and brown sugar together, combine with remaining crust ingredients. The crust mixture should end up with an even, coarse texture (don't let any of those sneaky little sugar lumps stick around).
Spread crust evenly over rhubarb.

Bake for 50 minutes, or until rhubarb is soft.

Homemade Enchiladas

Intense and delicious!
You will need:

1 dozen corn tortillas
5-6 dried Pasilla Chilies also called Anchos
(often in packaged Mexican food section)
6+cloves of good garlic
A yellow onion
Small can of tomato paste
Spinach leaves, no stems, produce bag full
Mushrooms, at least half a pound
Cream Cheese (Tofutti)
Almonds or pecans
Small bunch of cilantro
Olive oil
Canola oil
Salt
(optional, grated Jack soy-cheese)
Wear an apron!

Begin by slicing open the ancho chilies and removing the seeds and stems (seeds seem to scrape off best with a thumbnail despite trying various tools). Don’t touch your eyes or lips with hands with chilies on them. Put the anchos in a sauce pan with water to cover them, add salt, and simmer on low heat for 20-30 minutes. While they simmer, chop 3 big cloves of garlic and ¼ of an onion and put them in a blender.

Wash and de-stem spinach, dice 3 more garlic cloves and rest of onion. In olive oil in a sauté or sauce pan, sauté the onion and garlic until nearly golden and add spinach and mushrooms and cook until wilted and tender. Set aside spinach. (Grate cheese if using Jack). Set up a saute pan with shallow canola oil to get ready to lightly dip the tortillas in hot oil to soften them.

When anchos are done, add the chilies and water to the blender and blend with garlic and onion. Hold lid on tight when you blend, not too high a setting. To taste, add tablespoons of tomato paste and re-blend to reach desired hot/cool spiciness. I found I ended up using the whole can, but kept adding/blending it 3 tablespoons at a time. Another time I will try roasted tomatoes per original recipe, not the paste. I also added a tablespoon of olive oil to cut the spiciness, but that wasn’t in the original recipe.

Set up a counter adjacent to stove top with the pan of spinach, a bowl larger than the tortillas filled with the sauce from the blender (don’t wash blender out, leave some sauce in down around the blades), any grated cheese, the corn tortillas, and an empty dinner plate. All this needs to be beside the sauté pan with the canola oil. And you need the pan you are going to assemble and serve them in – glass or ceramic pie/casserole type.

Heat up the canola oil and with the type of tongs you may use in making pasta, begin lowering one tortilla at a time into the oil and quickly flipping it over and then lift out, let oil drip off, and drop into the bowl with the sauce. As you do that with one hand, with the other, drop the next tortilla into the hot oil. You will get a production going where you then remove the tortillas from absorbing the sauce on both sides to the empty dinner plate in time to drop another tortilla from the oil into the sauce and another tortilla into the oil.

Once all tortillas have been in the hot oil and dipped in the sauce, and are on the dinner plate, turn off sauté pan with oil and clear space to assemble the enchiladas. Set one sauce covered tortilla in the serving pan and with the same tongs or finger, add the spinach/mushroom filling, cheese if desired, and there will be sauce remaining that can go on top of the spinach before you roll if you desire. Roll them up, and keep on filling them.

I ran out of spinach as didn’t do a full bag’s worth, so I improvised something equally delicious. In the blender that still has the sauce in the bottom, add 4 oz of cream cheese and nuts (almonds or pecans), a small bunch of cilantro, and a little soymilk for moisture and blend. Then use this delicious cream filling instead of the spinach, on another group of tortillas.

They do not need to bake, but you can add any remaining sauce over them and warm them in the oven before serving so they are all the same temperature. I served it with a green salad and watermelon and it was a quintessential Mexican meal!

PS – doesn’t hurt to play some Spanish language music and dance a bit while making these – viva Mexico!

German Chocolate Cake, a saga

Branden requested German Chocolate Cake for his birthday. All I knew about German Chocolate Cake was that it was a) chocolate, and b) covered in some sort of coconut-pecan frosting. So I had to do some research. In searching for a recipe, I uncovered a conspiracy as profound as the sweet potato scandal... German Chocolate Cake is not the least bit German. It is in fact Texan, and is named German after "German's Chocolate", which is made by Baker's (which is all awful pseudo-chocolate, by the way). Furthermore, German's Chocolate is not German; it was called German after this guy named German, but even he wasn't German, he was British.

German Chocolate Cake should have "German's" chocolate and should be made with buttermilk, being Texan. The frosting should indeed involve pecans and coconut, but may also involve caramel, and may share the cake with chocolate frosting.

I couldn't bring myself to use Baker's chocolate, but I did figure out how to make soy buttermilk. I made two frostings, one a lightly caramelized pecan-coconut and one a simple chocolate buttercream-type frosting. Also, I served some of my banana bliss ice cream with the cake.

The birthday-party-goers, all in Viking attire (even if that consisted only of an authentic viking name tag), exclaimed loudly about the cake and then immediately started to fall asleep on our living room floor. So be careful, don't eat german chocolate cake and drive.

Now onto the recipe...

For the cake, I used Morgana's Chocolate Cake recipe. However, I used soy "buttermilk" instead of water. To make the buttermilk, I mixed 2 c of soy milk with the vinegar (I used white vinegar) called for in the original recipe, and let it sit for about ten minutes before adding it to the other ingredients.

Coconut-Pecan Frosting
1/2 c margarine
3/4 c brown sugar
1/2 c soy milk
1 t vanilla
1 1/2 c shredded coconut
1 c pecans, chopped

Melt margarine, add sugar. Cook, stirring constantly, until the mixture is thick, sticky, and lightly caramelized. Add remaining ingredients, bring to a boil, and cook, stirring frequently, for twelve minutes. Cool for a minute or two, until it is a spreadable consistency, before frosting the cake.

Chocolate Frosting
1/2 c margarine, softened
2 c sugar
1/3 c cocoa powder
2-4 T soy milk
1 T vanilla
pinch salt

Cream all the ingredients together, using only as much soy milk as is needed to make it spreadable. You may want to chill the cake in a refrigerator after frosting to make sure the frosting is totally set before serving.

Pepper Seitan

This is my version of Chinese Pepper Steak. I usually end up browning seitan when I use it, so it's a nice change to eat this recipe, in which the seitan ends up soft and succulent. Serve with brown rice and a side of steamed or stir-fried vegetables.

1 lb seitan, cut into long thin strips
1 large green bell pepper, cut into long thin strips
1 large yellow onion, cut into thin half-moons
1/2 c sliced water chestnuts

Marinade:
1 T reduced sodium soy sauce
1 t sugar
1/2 t salt
1/4 t black pepper
1 T cornstarch
2 T rice vinegar
1 t fresh ginger, grated
2 cloves garlic, minced or grated
1 T sesame oil

Sauce:
Original marinade from seitan, plus enough water to make a total of 3/4 c of liquid
1 T cornstarch
1 T reduced sodium soy sauce

Marinate seitan (in the marinade) for about fifteen minutes; this is the perfect time to chop the veggies. Whisk sauce ingredients to combine.

Stir-fry onions for about five minutes, or until they are just starting to become translucent. Add peppers and water chestnuts, stir-fry for another five minutes, or until they are as cooked as you want them.

Put veggies aside; in the same (now empty) pan, stir-fry seitan for five minutes. Add sauce and reserved veggies, cook until the sauce is thick and everything is warm, probably another (you guessed it) five minutes.

Wild animals at a birthday party

I finally found 6 hole muffin tins to fit in my mini oven
and whipped these up for a little man's birthday celebration 5/4/07...

Chocolate cupcakes with vegan or vegetarian options

1-1/2 C organic whole wheat flour
1 C organic brown sugar
2 teasp baking powder -
1/3 C organic rapunzel cocoa powder
1/2 C organic canola oil
Cap full of pure vanilla
1 C water (or soy/milk)

I tried 6 of each - vegan style would be best with a little more oil for added moisture but both were great. Topping is cream cheese or tofutti cheese with a little sugar, vanilla, and fresh orange peel zest, topped with an organic strawberry. lefts overs were great (sans frosting) with yogurt and fruit for breakfasts. Yum!

Celebrating fresh fruit!

And the tree it came from ...

Dense and Easy Chocolate Torte

1 c butter substitute (try Earth Balance)
1.5 c good chocolate chips (try Guittard)
3 T powdered egg replacer
1 c soy milk
.5 c sugar
1 t vanilla
1 c almond flour (or walnut flour)
.5 c whole wheat flour

Melt butter-substitute and chocolate chips in a mixing bowl. In a smaller bowl, whisk egg replacer with milk. Add sugar and vanilla, then combine with melted stuff. Fold in flours. Bake in an ungreased 9" round pan or springform for 55 minutes at 325F. Let sit for a half hour, then refrigerate. When cooled, frost with vegan ganache:

1 c good chocolate chips
2 T butter substitute
.75 c soy milk

Melt butter and chocolate, add milk, stir until smooth, cool until it slows down a little, then drizzle over torte. Refrigerate frosted torte for at least an hour before serving. It's great with milk or coffee.

A few small but tasty discoveries

First - waffles taste wonderful and are softer if you add cascadian farms organic frozen blueberries that have been heated and cooled. (or fresh I am sure if you are so lucky) Nice to have the little blueberries embedded right in the whole wheat waffle (theirs are tiny, like the size of capers). Also, a new gravy discovery: I had frozen a box of the organic butternut soup and discovered the pulp had sunk to the bottom when it thawed. I mixed the pulp with raw cashews, a little water, and blended it up, and then added a little tamari sauce and blended a bit longer. Exceptional! going to put it on steamed red potatoes and carrots (if I don't nibble it all first ;-) . Try it! (made while watching a very good documentary on woodstock - what an event - mind blowing in many ways, espec. strong outspoken anti-war theme that has great meaning today.)

Easter Bun

An organic vanilla Easter Bunny cake with meyer lemon zest, coconut pudding filling ( that also made a great tail), and frosting with big shreds of coconut. The purple flowers are off the hong kong orchid tree and its the first time I have ever picked them and was delighted they are such an interesting flower up close. Hoping the sun will come out (its a little rain cloudy) for a walk among butterflies down at the shoreline ... the yellow sulphurs show up down there en masse this time of year for some reason ...

BTW - Since the bunny cake recipe / construction has been kept something of a family secret, I wondered why ... and think I may possibly have figured it out. In order to shape his shoulders and get his head to be the right porportion, it requires some carving down ... which leaves left overs! So maybe the master of the bunny cake has been secretly enjoying these samples all of these years and not telling anyone? Hmmmm ?? Possibly .... ;-)

And since we are not all together for Easter, here is what each daughter was sent to enjoy today ... note the serendipity of the individual color themes! Each of the cotton 'eggs' packed inside is what I used to get for Easter and something you each have mentioned missing not getting anymore. When I told this to my mom, she laughed and said I used to 'complain' about getting them for Easter! and now you all want them ... funny how things change yet somehow stay the same, over the generations. Hope you noted that we are new/renewed members of NRCD and Greenpeace, and enjoy the music ... and chocolate (which I think is vegan, as are the jellies). And take your vitamins!
Happy Spring 2007!