Mission: Vegan

I guess technically my contest this month has closed.  I only had a few submissions, which were all great, but there were two that really stood out.  So, the winners are:

Trina

&

Ginger

Trina came up with a logo idea that I really, really like (now I just need someone to make it for me– if you want the job, send me an email please!!) and Ginger came up with a name that I really, really like.  The only problem with the name is that the domain is not available, so I need to think about a variation or something.  When I officially register the domain and have the site up and running, I’ll announce it then.

Congrats to my winners and thank you all for your great ideas!

Last night, I suddenly realized that it was dinner time and I needed to whip something up quick.  The fridge was running on empty and I still had half of the 6-pound zucchini to use.  Pretty much the only dinner item in the fridge was some tofu, which made me think of VeganDad’s Memphis BBQ Tofu.  And if I was going to go to the trouble of grilling the tofu, why not grill the zucchini too?!  Oh, and speaking of VeganDad, he’s hosting a “guess the gadget” giveaway which runs until July 6.  You could win a copy of his cookbook.

Back to the food…  The tofu was freakin’ awesome!  Like seriously, seriously good.  Even a non-tofu lover would like this stuff.  I used super firm tofu, put on the dry rub, then grilled it on my indoor grill.  After it was grilled on both sides, I coated it very generously with BBQ sauce (Bull’s Eye brand… sorry, but I love it and am too lazy to make my own  from scratch), then put it in a baking dish in a 300 degree oven while I grilled the zucchini.  I had the leftovers on top of a salad for dinner tonight and it was unbelievably good!

The zucchini was a different story… the thing was just too big to be worth eating as a zucchini should be eaten.  The seeds were huge– like the size of pumpkin seeds– and the flesh was super fibrous and tough.  These big guys are best for baking, but I still ate it to set a good example.

Start to finish, this meal probably only took 15 minutes to throw together.  If I had had a larger grill, it would have taken half that.  And did I mention that the tofu was awesome?!! 

It’s been too hot to cook, so I don’t have any food to share.  I do have a very interesting essay from my one of my favorite blogs to share.  Here’s a short excerpt.  Happy reading:

“The people who are ultimately responsible are not those who own and operate the slaughterhouses; those who consume meat and animal products, who create the demand, bear the ultimate moral responsibility.”

I’ll drink to that!

U.S. beef recall expanded, 18 illnesses suspected

CHICAGO (Reuters) – A Colorado meat company is expanding a recall of beef due to possible contamination by E.coli O157:H7 bacteria after an investigation found 18 illnesses may be linked to the meat, the U.S. Agriculture Department said on Sunday.

Greeley, Colorado-based JBS-Swift Beef Co is voluntarily expanding its June 24 recall to include about 380,000 lbs of assorted beef products, USDA said. The original recall was for 41,280 lbs.

The affected beef was produced on April 21 and was distributed nationally and internationally.

E.coli O157:H7 is a potentially deadly bacteria that can cause bloody diarrhea, dehydration, and, in severe cases, kidney failure. The very young, seniors, and persons with weak immune systems are at the most risk.

Consumers with questions can call 1-800-685-6328.

JBS Swift is a unit of Brazilian meat company JBS S.A..

How does beef become contaminated with E. Coli?  More than likely, the meat comes into contact with poop post-slaughter.  Now doesn’t that sound delicious?!  What a complete waste of a cows life.  Seriously, this stuff just makes me mad.

Only a few days left to get your entries in! I know you’re super creative and can come up with a great business name for me. Who wouldn’t want to win 2 dozen cupcakes (or cake mix and fondant decor if you aren’t local)?!

I made LOTS of fondant yesterday (seriously, I used about 6 pounds of sugar!) and experimented  a bit:

I’ve always used agar agar flakes to make it, but I was somewhat annoyed with how long it took for them to fully dissolve.  This one step often took more than 15 minutes and for something that I don’t necessarily enjoy doing, this was entirely too long.  Making fondant, to me, is somewhat of a pain– first you have to sift all that powdered sugar and then you have to wait for the flakes to dissolve.  Don’t get me wrong– homemade fondant is so far superior to storebought that it’s worth the effort.  But yesterday, I needed to make a batch of white and a few batches of chocolate.  That’s potentially 45 minutes or more of just waiting for the agar flakes too dissolve!

Enter agar powder.  I’ve tried this before and I think I used too much powder for the amount of water in the recipe.  When using powdered agar, generally the ration is 1 tsp of powder to 1 TB of flakes.  And in a recipe, you can generally substitute 1:1 agar flakes for gelatin.  So I used powder and it did indeed cut down on “dissolve time.”

If you use my fondant recipe, follow as directed, except use about 1 1/2 tsp of agar powder for the agar flakes.  You may need to add a little bit more water if it becomes too pasty.  The brand of powder I used (pictured left) even has vanilla flavoring in it, so you can get that vanilla taste into your fondant without using vanilla extract, which will give your fondant an off-white color.

Side Note:  I found this brand of agar at the Asian market.  Be careful when you buy it because it also comes in red and green (as in it has red and green coloring added to it) and all three packages are identical.  Read the ingredients list before throwing it into your cart.

The difference between using powder over flakes:

1. Once dissolved, the water will become gelatinous, but you are left with more liquid than if you use flakes.  This means that you will need much more sugar to get the right consistency.  Plan on using more like 9 cups per recipe (which will produce more fondant per batch).
2. The consistency of the finished product is near perfect once all of the sugar gets kneaded in.  The problem I find when using flakes is that the fondant reaches a perfect consistency after it has been allowed to sit for several days.  On the day it’s made, I find it to be a little too soft to use right away.
3. You won’t have to worry about having bits of undissolved flakes floating around your fondant.

The verdict for me is that powder is better than flakes here.  It dissolves faster and produces a better finished product.  My next fondant experiment will be to see if I can use my stand mixer with the dough hook attachment to knead in the sugar, rather than by doing it by hand.  The process of kneading in the sugar is very similar to kneading bread dough so it stands to reason that it should work.  Stay tuned!

As you know, I have LOTS of zucchini around here.  I’ve been using it up by making lots of zucchini bread and giving it away or freezing it for later.  Last night, I really wanted to make these chocolate zucchini muffins again, but I wanted it in loaf form because it doesn’t take up so much freezer space, and I was also in the mood for a little experimantation.  So, I took the chocolate zucchini muffin recipe and smooshed it with the zucchini bread recipe from The Joy of Vegan Baking and came up with this Chocolate Zucchini Bread hybrid.  And it is soooo delicious!

Chocolate Zucchini Bread

(makes 2 loaves)

Wet

2 ripe bananas, mashed well

1/2 cup canola oil

1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce

1 TB white distilled vinegar

2 cups sugar

2 cups grated zucchini

2 tsp vanilla extract

Dry

3 cups flour (I used 1.5 cups whole wheat pastry and 1.5 cups all-purpose)

2 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp baking powder

1 tsp salt

1/2 cup vegan chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 325 degrees.  Prepare 2 loaf pans by spraying them with non-stick spray and set aside.

In a large bowl, combine all of the wet ingredients and mix well.  In a separate bowl, either sift together the dry ingredients (minus the chocolate chips) or use a whisk to break up any clumps.  Mix everything together well.  Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients and stir until just combined.  Divide evenly between the 2 loaf pans and bake for 60-70 minutes or until a tester comes out clean.

I’ve made a variation of these chickpea burgers before, but thought I’d change it up a little this time.  The idea was inspired by a recipe in Super Natual Cooking, which calls for 4 eggs!  I still can’t get over that…

Anyway, my solution for this is pretty simple- use dried, soaked chickpeas in place of cooked and add a little flour.  In any bean burger recipe, I really don’t care for the texture when cooked beans are used.  It’s usually mushy and weird.  These turned out really tasty and even Emma ate some of it!  I don’t know if it was willingly, but she ate it.

Lemon Basil Burgers

1 cup dried chickpeas, soaked 8-12 hours

1/2 tsp salt

Juice and zest from 1 large lemon

1/2 cup chopped red onion

1/3 cup chopped fresh basil

4 TB flour

Soak chickpeas.  Drain and rinse.  Place in a food processor with the salt and process until smooth.  Remove from food processor and put in a mixing bowl with the rest of the ingredients.  Mix well and refrigerate for 30 minutes.  Form into patties and pan fry in a little bit of oil for 5-8 minutes per side, or until golden brown.  I suppose you could also bake these, but I have not tried that method.  Makes 5-6 patties.

I don’t normally post stuff like this because… well, it’s not even food related, but this story is a good illustration of Karma:

Shot dog bites gunman

BERLIN (Reuters) - A dog in Germany shot by a drunken man with a gun took swift revenge by biting off the end of the man’s nose, authorities said on Monday.  Police said the armed man was snooping at night in the yard of a house in Stadtlauringen in northern Bavaria when he shot the Bernese mountain dog from point-blank range.  Before collapsing, the dog leapt at the 39-year-old man and bit off the end of his nose, a local police spokesman said.  Bleeding profusely, the man called police and was taken for treatment in a nearby hospital. His motives for being in the yard were unclear, police said.  Doctors removed a bullet from the dog’s shoulder and discharged it from a clinic after an operation lasting several hours.

The dog only got shot in the shoulder and is going to be fine, but now this man has no nose.  Serves him right!

This weekend was pretty fun…  we headed to Sacramento for a family reunion (my mom’s side) and I was in charge of dessert!  Not knowing how many people would actually show up, I made a batch of strawberry cupcakes with strawberry buttercream, chocolate cupcakes with cookies & cream buttercream, and (from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World) tiramisu cupcakes.  As you may expect, there were way more cupcakes than necessary, but it allowed people to have seconds and take some home!

The tiramisu cupcakes are a vanilla cake (I used my own recipe, not the one in the book because– in my opinion– the cake recipes in the book all turn out really weird) topped with cream cheese frosting.  Before putting on the frosting, you scoop out a little well in the center of the cake and generously fill it with Kahlua and coffee.  Delicious!  I think this is my new favorite.  It would also make a really delicious layered cake.

Everyone enjoyed all three, but I think the kids (well, teenagers) really liked the chocolate with cookies & cream.  I’ve made it before, but this time I used my food processor to get the cookie chunks much smaller.  I liked that better.

Last, but not least, we have my mom’s favorite, the strawberry.  I’m really anxious to try the strawberry recipe with peaches.  Doesn’t that sound heavenly and so summery?  Peach cupcakes!  Yum!!

My dad has a garden and this year he’s planted more than just tomatoes. His tomatoes are awesome, btw. Check out these zucchini that he said “got away from him.”

The photo doesn’t really do them justice.  The larger one is about 18″ long and 15″ around. It weighs 6 pounds. That’s not much smaller than Emma when she was born. The smaller one is 15″ long, 11.5″ around and 4 pounds. I predict lots of zucchini bread and some chocolate zucchini muffins in our future.

Now for the best part. There is this billboard near our house that I see all the time. Since I’m the one driving and I almost never have my camera handy, I can never get a picture of it. Well, as we were crossing the Bay Bridge yesterday (Matt was driving), I saw the exact same one and was able to get a pic.

In case you can’t read it, it says “Be Veg!  Go Green!  Save the Planet!”  The ad is sponsored by the people that run this website.  While the website is a little strange, it does have some very interesting information on it:

• According to the UNreport “Livestock’s Long Shadow,” livestock production is the greatest contributor to global warming.
• Animal waste and feed cropland dump more pollutants into our waterways than all other human activities combined.
• Meat-based diets require 10-20 times as much land as plant-based diets – nearly half of the world’s grains & soybeans are fed to animals.

I can think of NO good reasons to eat meat, when you take into account how horribly the animals are treated, how it contributes to climate change, and it’s effects on your health.  Seriously, I’m the weirdo at a restaurant who has to pick apart a menu item to make it suitable for me, when in reality, you are the weirdo for suppoting this.  Anyway, I was really surprised that someone would pay for such an ad (happy about it, but still surprised).  I do hope there are ads elsewhere other than the Bay Area where vegetarianism is really pretty common.