Fruit of Adventure

Yummy Vegan Pancakes

When author and owner of Vegan.com, Erik Marcus, asked if I would be interested in taking on a photo shoot project for a groundbreaking new recipe from a well-known vegan cookbook author I was, naturally, ecstatic. I replied with an enthusiastic “YES!” without even knowing what the recipe was! So when he eventually sent the recipe including all ingredients and instructions, my boots began to shake and suddenly I became rather intimidated. The challenge was a palm-oil-free butter created by the genius chef Bryanna Clark Grogan and it appeared ever-so-complicated with all sorts of special ingredients. Liquid soy lecithin? Non-deodorized fair trade organic cocoa butter? All items not in my every day pantry and ones that I don’t have experience working with so the potential to mess it up was great. Plus I was running short on time and knew that I didn’t have days to play with it if I bombed on the first try.

During an afternoon trip to Union Square and Sur La Table I successfully acquired all of the dishes and items I needed for a butter photo shoot and I’m happy to share the results of that shoot as this is one of the photos I sent and was used to feature this amazing new butter recipe:

As for the pancakes, this particular version has been in my recipe box for over ten years and is written on a pancake-batter stained notecard that I officially labeled as “Yummy Vegan Pancakes.” When I first went vegan I tried all sorts of different recipes tweaking them to my liking and landed on this particular one as a favorite that I consistently use. I hope you like it!

Yummy Vegan Pancakes

This yields roughly a dozen pancakes.

Ingredients

• 1 cup white flour
• 1 cup whole wheat or whole wheat pastry flour
• 4 tablespoons baking powder
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 cups vanilla soy milk, almond milk, or any other non-dairy milk
• 4 tablespoons vegetable or canola oil
• 6 tablespoons applesauce
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• additional oil for greasing the pan

Dry Ingredients: Combine dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt) in a medium bowl and mix well.

Wet Ingredients: Add the soy milk, oil, applesauce, and vanilla to another medium bowl and whisk until well incorporated.

Combine: Add the wet ingredient mixture to the dry ingredients and stir until the batter is moistened. A few remaining lumps is A-okay—do NOT over mix the batter.

Cook: Heat a lightly oiled frying pan or griddle over medium-high heat and pour 1/4 cup of batter. Cook until the bottom is browned, flip, and repeat on the other side. Serve with delicious maple syrup, vegan butter, and berries.

Pinto Bean Hummus (ish) Dip

I spent the last week at my mum’s house in the ‘burbs of a tiny town called Baraga. To give you an idea of what I mean by tiny, the L’Anse/Baraga metropolitan area roughly consists of 4,000 people. I graduated with a class of 46 students. While it’s not quite a one-room schoolhouse story, this is a decidedly small population of people. Not only that, the closest “big” city is Green Bay, which is a four hour drive away and if you want something more cosmopolitan you’ll need to drive six hours to Minneapolis or seven hours to Chicago. Furthermore, my mum lives outside of the tiny town of Baraga where her house sits on four acres of land and where she owns another 40 acres across the street.

It’s a six mile drive to the nearest grocery store so when you’re out of a particular food like I was that day, you’re SOL, in a way. It was hummus that I was looking to make as I had been craving it all day, but there was a problem—I was lacking a lemon. Yes, it was a single lemon that stood between me and a freshly whipped up batch of hummus. So I decided to improvise and create a creamy bean spread with a different bean and a few different ingredients. And happy was I when this spread turned out so awesomely, despite the minimal ingredients I had on hand.

As I sat relaxing in the beautiful bay window in my mum’s dining room eating my Pinto Bean Dip, I was able to observe an industrious little squirrel who enjoyed hoarding and gorging on sunflower seeds from the bird feeders. He repeatedly ran back and forth from his stash under the deck to the tree where the feeders hung. After all of his hard thiefery work, he was so pleased with himself that he just had to do a little jig.

While he was congratulating himself on the deck, the blackbirds safely returned to the tree to snack on any seeds that may have fallen to the ground. Every few seconds another bird would land for a snack until the ground looked like this.

But that didn’t last long as Mr. Squirrel became a little envious and launched himself towards the birds, which in turn provided us with this beautiful site of colorful feathered wings.

It wasn’t just blackbirds that we saw. That morning we were graced with the presence of an immense variety of birds. Who would think that you can see goldfinches and purple finches, blue jays, red-wing blackbirds, mourning doves, chickadees, sparrows, and rusty blackbirds all in a 10 foot radius in Michigan? There were moments where all of the birds were in the tree together, but most of the time the colorful finches, sparrows and chickadees would feed together, leave, and then a variety of blackbirds would show up and all feed together like school children attending their separate specified lunch breaks.

Pinto Bean Hummus (ish) Dip

Ingredients:

• 1 can pinto beans, drained and rinsed
• 2 tablespoons tahini
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1 (to 2) teaspoon balsamic vinegar
• 1/4 teaspoon of each paprika and cumin
• salt and pepper, to taste

Puree: Throw all ingredients in a food processor and blend until smooth and creamy. Serve with fresh chopped veggies.

Note: While I thoroughly enjoyed this spread, Alex was not terribly fond of it, which is why I *had* to eat the entire dish myself…in one sitting. 🙂 All I’m getting at is that perhaps it’s not for everyone. I think that the vinegar what might have been what turned Alex off to it so if you’re not a huge fan of balsamic vinegar perhaps you want to start with a smaller amount and increase if you like it.

White Bean Hummus with Basil Pesto

Does the world really need another hummus recipe? Yes. Yes, in fact, it does. Because while no bean can ever replace the beloved chickpea, sometimes you just need something different. A change of pace. That’s where the smooth and creamy white bean comes into play and works so well as a chickpea replacement in this dish.

It amazes me how many people consistently buy pre-made hummus from the store when it’s so ridiculously easy (and cheap) to make at home. The above photo shows all of the items you need to make this dish and once you’ve acquired and prepared them simply throw them in your food processor and whirl away until you get the creamy texture you see in the photo below.

A traditional way to eat hummus is with pita chips and you can buy them from the store or you can make your own. Just like hummus, these too are downright effortless to make and doing it yourself allows you to choose how much oil and salt you want to add.

Simply cut the pita bread in half and then in half again and once more until you are left with little triangles. Brush each one with olive oil and sprinkle with salt.

Then place them in a preheated 400 degree oven on a parchment lined baking sheet for about 8 minutes or until they’ve reached the crispiness you desire. Then serve them with this delicious white bean hummus.

White Bean Hummus with Basil Pesto

Ingredients

• 2 cans (or 4 cups cooked) white beans strained (I used a combination of cannellini and butter beans this particular time, but feel free to use whatever kind you like since there are so many varieties out there)
• 2 tablespoons tahini
• juice of 1 lemon
• 1 clove garlic
• water, as needed
• salt, to taste

Puree: Place all ingredients in your food processor and process until completely smooth. You will need to stop the machine every so often to scrape down the sides of the bowl and add water as needed until you’ve achieved the right consistency.

Basil Pesto: Ingredients and instructions are listed here if you want to add this topping to your hummus. Even though it’s not necessary as the white bean hummus is delicious in it’s own right, the pesto adds an even greater kick if you’re feeling ambitious and excited to add that wonderful basil flavor.

Serving: Place the hummus in a dish, top it with the basil pesto, and serve alongside toasted pita triangles and/or chopped fresh veggies.

Vegan Chocolate Marshmallow Surprise Cookies

Marshmallows and chocolate. In the shape of eggs. To my 5 year old mind, that’s what Easter was all about. For some reason, late March and early April is the only time of year you could find those chocolate covered marshmallows that came in styrofoam egg cartons. Of course there were peeps, but I never cared much for peeps. Actually, I’ve never been much of a plain marshmallow person ever; however, when you marry marshmallows and chocolate together that’s a whole nother story as it creates an irresistible combination to my palate.

Oh! And surprises! I can’t forget about surprises! Easter was all about surprises—from the surprise of where your Easter basket could be hidden to the mystery of what could possibly be hiding in your plastic Easter eggs.

So these cookies are a throw back to those Easter memories—a bit of chocolate enveloping a hidden marshmallow surprise.

Making these cookies is fairly easy. It just requires a couple additional steps with adding the marshmallow and the frosting. You first need to sift the dry ingredients in a medium bowl. This step is especially important if your cocoa powder is as clumptastic as mine was.

Next you need to cream the Earth Balance and sugar in your stand mixer for several minutes until they are well incorporated.

After it’s thoroughly creamed, put the Ener-G Egg replacer in a small bowl with the 2 tablespoons of warm water and then blend them together using hand beaters until it’s thick and foamy. When working with the equivalent of two or more eggs it’s quite easy to beat it to the point that you can create stiff peaks with it, but when using only one egg I find it difficult to get it to that stage. The foamy consistency of the middle photo below is about as thick as I can get a single serving. Add the “egg” and soy milk to the butter mixture and mix them for another couple minutes.

Next add the dry mixture in 1/2 cup batches until it is thoroughly incorporated and you have a batter that resembles the below photo.

With a cookie scoop drop the cookies on a parchment lined cookie sheet spaced about an inch and a half a part.

Pop them in your preheated oven for about 8 minutes. The photo on the left is what they looked like before I put them in the oven and the one on the right is what they looked like after 8 minutes.

While they’re baking cut your marshmallows in half. Note that you can totally omit this step if you want a higher marshmallow to cookie ratio. The very first time I made these a couple years ago, I didn’t halve them and they turned out just as awesomely.

Immediately after they’ve baked for 8 minutes and you pull them out of the oven, place a marshmallow half in the center of each cookie. Place them back in the oven and cook for another 2 minutes until the marshmallow is semi-melted. The photo on the left is pre-baking of the marshmallow and the photo on the right is what it looks like after 2 minutes in the oven.

Place them all on a cooling rack and let them cool completely.

While the cookies are cooling you can make the frosting by melting the Earth Balance and cocoa powder in a small saucepan over medium heat.

Place the 3 cups of confectioners sugar in a medium bowl and add the melted chocolate. Wisk them together until completely smooth with no lumps.

Then drop a tablespoon or two on each cookie and spread. Let the frosting harden on the cookies before putting them in a sealed container for storage.

Vegan Chocolate Marshmallow Surprise Cookies

Ingredients

• 1 3/4 cup all-purpose white flour
• 3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup Earth Balance, softened to room temperature
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 1 1/2 teaspoons Ener-G Egg Replacer
• 2 tablespoons warm water
• 1/2 cup original soy milk (full fat and not unsweetened)
• Dandies vegan marshmallows (you should be able to find these at most natural food stores)

Dairy-Free Nut-Free Basil Pesto is the Best-o

I remember my first taste of pesto. It was a warm summer night on an island off the coast of Maine after I had just completed the 8th grade. My mom and I were on an epic, two week road trip along the East coast with my maternal grandmother.

There are a few memorable moments seared in my brain from that trip. Like when my grandmother told my mother that I was ungrateful after leaving my used towels strewn about the bathroom floor in our hotel room (oops! still feel bad about that!). Or when I had my first (and only!) lucid dream while napping in our rental house on Cape Cod as my mom attended a conference presented by Will Schutz (my cat’s name happened to be Schutz!)

Most of all, I remember trying pesto for the first time. We were having dinner at an old friend’s of my mom’s summer house and it first hit my olfactory senses as they were cooking dinner in the kitchen. I will never forget the feeling that strong basil aroma left in me and, to this day, whenever I smell that piquant herb it brings me back to that very moment in my life. Our hosts had prepared a lovely dish of pesto pasta and I remember the taste being just as remarkable, though surprisingly not as strong as the scent.

After that amazing night with pesto it wasn’t until years later when I was in college that I finally encountered it again. And ever since I’ve not let this heavenly dish go.

What’s remarkable is that I’ve found you don’t need to add much to pesto to create an amazing condiment. In fact, I think that the less you add, the stronger the basil flavor. Some foods play well with each other and can actually enhance the strength of each other’s flavor, but neither cheese nor nuts do that for basil.  I discovered this when I went vegan and started to omit the cheese. Also, at that time I was making my pesto with almonds because Alex is allergic to pine nuts. Soon after I tried it sans nuts entirely and found that I liked it even better. So here you have the only other players in addition to basil in this amazing pesto—lemon juice, olive oil, salt, pepper, garlic.

So few ingredients makes for a very fast meal. Throw them all in your food processor and blend away. I like using my mini processor for pesto since all of those fluffy basil leaves are reduced to this as soon as you turn on the motor.

Yes, all of that basil only produced this much pesto. It makes buying a few basil plants a worthy addition to your home garden.

A very easy way to enjoy pesto (besides pasta) is by toasting baguette slices in the oven…

and then smearing the besto pesto on them…

and then topping them with slices of fresh tomato.

Dairy-Free Nut-Free Basil Pesto

Ingredients

• 4 cups fresh basil or one bunch, rinsed and trimmed
• juice of half a lemon
• 1 clove garlic, peeled
• 1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
• water (if necessary to thin it out if you don’t want to use more oil)
• salt and pepper to taste

Lemony Asparagus Artichoke Pilaf

As soon as asparagus shows up in the markets we all know that spring has definitively arrived. That moment emerged a number of weeks ago in San Francisco and I have been itching to make something with it ever since. I knew I wanted to do a pilaf with rice and lemon juice, and then the red pepper caught my eye at the store so I added that to my cart. I already had scallions in my fridge from another recent meal and knew they would make a great addition. So I thought I was all ready to make the dish when it struck me that I needed to add artichoke hearts. So back to the store I went.

Did you know that asparagus has magical powers. Oh, yes, it does! It can actually change the aroma of your urine—what other food do you know can do that? Moreover, not everyone has the ability to smell this transformation. Apparently, some people lack the gene to smell “asparagus pee,” while the rest of us (me included) can. For a long time I thought I was one of those people who lacked this gene; however, I later realized that was just because I never used to eat asparagus.

What’s interesting is that while only some people can detect asparagus-pee, I’m pretty sure I have yet to meet one of those people who can’t. Granted, my sample size is fairly small because I don’t talk about asparagus-pee with everyone I meet, but I’d say I know at least 20 people who have confirmed they have it and not a single person who doesn’t. So now I wonder what the ratio of asparagus-pee detectors to non-detectors there are in the world? How about you? Care to divulge whether you’re a detector or a non-detector? Or are you too shy or, as a European would say, prude?

Lemony Asparagus Artichoke Pilaf

Ingredients

• 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• 1 medium yellow onion, diced small
• 2 cloves of garlic, minced
• 14 (or so) asparagus spears, trimmed and cut into 1-inch pieces. Also, if your spears are very large and you have the time to peel them with a potato peeler, go for it. It makes them so tender!
• 1 can artichoke hearts, chopped small
• 1 red bell pepper, diced
• 3 scallions, thinly sliced
• 1 1/2 cups white rice
• 2 1/2 cups water
• 2 tablespoons lemon juice
• salt and pepper
• basil chiffonade (optional)
• 1 1/2 cups edamame (optional, see note)

The Most Amazing One-Ingredient Ice Cream!

OMG! I’m obsessed! Obsessed with my newest discovery of one-ingredient banana ice cream. Yes, it’s just bananas and it’s as creamily smooth as soft serve ice cream.

I readily admit that I’m an ice cream addict. I’m pretty sure that it runs in my family as my brother and sister are severely afflicted as well so I think it’s safe to blame genetics on this misfortune.

The other night during one of my “CHRISTINA NEEDS ICE CREAM RIGHT NOW!” moments, I downed an entire pint of this stuff.

It was just what the doctor ordered! The only problem is that it was 10pm at night and consuming large amounts of sugar late at night keeps me up. So as I lay in bed well after midnight with my heart racing and not a wink of shut-eye in sight, my late night ice cream binge wasn’t looking like such a hot decision after all. Sadly, I know this about myself—how sugar affects me. And I clearly knew how late it was, yet could not stop eating the sweet creamy bliss. *sigh*

However, I’m thinking that this holy-mother-of-god-amazing invention of only-banana ice cream just might be my savior to late night cravings since fruit sugar (fructose) does not affect blood sugar levels the way that refined sugar (glucose) does!

Also, I must clarify. When I say ice “cream” I am, of course, referring to those of the non-dairy variety, which I dare say are better than the kind made from a lactating bovine. And with the overwhelming number of different companies producing such a wide variety of flavors it’s hard not to find at least a couple that you will love. You have choices from coconut to soy, almond, cashew, and rice based ice creams—so, yeah, lots to choose from. That Nada Moo kind I had the other night was awesome and I want to try other flavors of it, but my favorite kind that’s available nationally is Ginger Cookie Caramel Coconut Bliss. Sooooo good! Almond Dream is also another great brand and I actually love the straight up vanilla one. And if you’re in the Bay Area you cannot miss trying Scream Ice Cream—it takes the cake (heh) as best ice cream in the world and makes me salivate just thinking about it.

Somehow I missed the internet craze about this banana ice cream when it initially hit as it seems to have been all the rage a number of months ago. Apparently there is even a special banana ice cream making machine on the market. I don’t mean to knock it, but if you have a food processor this tool is completely superfluous and just another unnecessary kitchen gadget. You’re just blending bananas!

Ok. Ok. Enough chit chat. Onward with how to make this mother of all inventions!

You first want to slice some ripe bananas and stick them in the freezer until frozen (I like to wait a day to make sure they’re solid.) Then you throw them in your food processor.

And start to process…you’ll see it turn to chunks and then start to get a bit smoother.

After blending a few minutes more it’ll start to get even creamier. I like to periodically turn on the machine and scrape down the side and spread out any chunks so that it gets evenly pureed.

I really love it at the stage in the above photo on the right, but you can continue blending until it’s even creamier like the one below.

I’ve noticed that if you don’t add any additional fruit to your ice cream, when you refreeze it maintains that soft creamy consistency. However, if you add strawberries, for example, the refrozen version becomes harder and tastes more like sorbet.

I also enjoyed topping it with chocolate sauce, strawberries, and toasted coconut.

Oy…clearly, I’m very inexperienced at photographing frozen foods because, in retrospect I realize that I should have frozen the plate and then let this trio sit in the freezer for a few minutes before photographing it—meltytown!

One-Ingredient Banana Ice Cream

Ingredients

• at least 2 frozen bananas (or banana slices)
• (optional) splash of vanilla

Arame Purple Cabbage Slaw with Tahini Goddess Dressing

Spring has apparently sprung (or was bypassed in favor of summer?) for my dear friends and family in Michigan where they’ve been enjoying record high temperatures. Even though it’s still possible that they’re in for a good Mother’s Day snowstorm (it wouldn’t be the first time!), for now they can savor the warm weather and perhaps enjoy the colorful fresh veggies spring has to offer like this favorite slaw of mine.

In general, I’m actually not a huge fan of seaweed. The strong fishy flavor is usually what turns me off to it. I do enjoy sushi rolls occasionally, but even the nori on rolls can be a tad too strong sometimes (I know, I’m weird, right?!). I’ll still eat them, but there’s something about that flavor that can be so offensive to me. And that’s what I love about arame because it lacks that distinct fishy flavor and is one of the most mild sea veggies there is.

Above you’ll see the lovely arame in it’s dried form and this is what you’ll be looking for when you purchase it at the store. For this recipe, you’ll want to pull it out of the bag and cover it with warm water to soak for at least 15 minutes.

While your arame is soaking, chop the veggies and make the Tahini Goddess dressing. Before moving on, I have to stop right here and mention that this dressing is possibly my all-time favorite. In college I used to purchase Annie’s Goddess dressing at my local co-op before learning how to easily make my own homemade version of it. The homemade version is just as good, if not better (and doesn’t use any extra oil!), if I dare say so myself. 🙂

Once you’ve chopped your veggies and placed them into a large mixing bowl you’ll have this beautiful rainbow of colors.

After the arame has soaked for at least 15 minutes it will look like this. You then want to strain it with a sieve and squeeze out (with your hands) as much excess water as you can before adding it to the rest of the salad.

Toss all of the veggies including the arame together and then add the tahini sauce and toss again until everything is well coated and the dressing is evenly distributed. Easy peasy, hey? At this point you’re done and ready to enjoy!

Arame Purple Cabbage Slaw with Tahini Goddess Dressing

Ingredients

• 1 small head purple cabbage, chopped into small strips
• 1 large carrot, shredded
• 1 red bell pepper, cut into thin slices and halved
• 2 scallions, white and green parts thinly sliced
• 2 cups dried arame

Tahini Goddess Dressing

• 1 clove garlic
• 2 tablespoons tahini (roasted or not roasted—either works just fine)
• 1 tablespoon soy sauce (tamari, shoyu, or Bragg liquid aminos—whatever you prefer)
• 1/4 cup fresh squeezed lemon juice
• 1/4 cup water
• salt and pepper to taste

Soak Arame: Place the arame in a medium bowl and cover with very warm water. Let it soak for a minimum of 15 minutes. It always takes me a bit longer to prep the rest of the veggies and tahini sauce so I just let the arame soak until I’ve completed all of that.

Chop Veggies: While the arame is soaking, chop all of your veggies and place them in a large bowl.

Make Dressing: Place all of the dressing ingredients in a mini food processor or blender and blend until completely smooth.

Assemble: Toss the veggies and arame together in the bowl and then drizzle the dressing and toss again until all veggies are evenly coated with the dressing.