Lentil Sheperd's Pie with Caulipots - MoFo Post 5!

The gray and rainy weather stuck around another day so yet again, I found myself craving comfort food. Thinking back to the Sheperd's Pie I was going to go get the night before, I decided to make some at home. I knew I wouldn't have the patience to cook everything, put it all together in a baking dish and then wait for it to cook some more so I turned to the Upside-Down Lentil Sheperd's Pie and Caulipots from Appetite for Reduction.

This was the quickest and tastiest Sheperd's Pie (vegan or pregan) I've ever made. Being the rule breaker I am, I couldn't follow the ingredients perfectly. I omitted the zucchini, subbed oregano for tarragon, increased the worcestershire sauce(I like a saucy shep pie) and added frozen corn when I was adding the peas. Oh yeah, I didn't have du Puy lentils either so I used green. No bigs. A scoop of Caulipots (also #9 on the PPK 100 list!) topped with a scoop of the lentil mix and a side of steamed broccoli was the perfect meal for a crappy day like today.

Cookbook Challenge. Week 1. AFR-40 Clove Chickpea and Broccoli

If there was ever an easy, healthy and delicious meal made up specifically for me, this would be it. This was really one of the easiest recipes I have ever made from a cookbook. With only a few ingredients, 1 cutting board, 1 baking dish and a ton of garlic, you really can't go wrong. This is without a doubt going to become a staple in my cooking!

While the recipe says "40 clove" it really doesn't have that many. It only has 10! It's really so simple that it doesn't call for a huge long post about it. Throw some broccoli, chickpeas and smashed garlic into a baking dish sprinkled with some olive oil, salt, pepper, oregano and lemon zest. Bake for 30 minutes, add some veggie broth and bake 15 more minutes. I cooked up some brown rice to serve it with and I had the perfect lazy night meal!That's it! Dinner is done! 

The slight crunchiness the slightly browned bits of broccoli with the tenderness of the chickpeas and garlic with the veggie broth spooned over a bowl of brown rice really hits the spot on a cold snowy New England night. I highly recommend you make this dish. Soon.

I'm sad to see the week end for Appetite for Reduction but at the same time I am very excited to see the week for Veganomicon start. I love that cookbook so much and have made quite a few recipes from it since I bought it over the summer but am definitely looking forward to trying out some new ones so stay tuned next week for more vegan goodness!

Cookbook Challenge. Week 1. AFR-Creamy Mushroom Fettuccine

I really can't go wrong with anything in this cookbook! 3rd winner in a row! The thing I have liked most about the recipes I have made so far from AFR is that it only takes one serving to fill me up, more often than not I find myself going back for seconds, not the case here. On the menu for tonight was Creamy Mushroom Fettuccine. I was a little hesitant to make this recipe because I either love recipes with mushrooms or I hate them, but since I am obsessed with anything that has balsamic vinegar I decided to give it a go. And I am so glad I did! I made this recipe exactly as it was written except that I added one crown of chopped broccoli that I had leftover from making Mac and Trees last night, and I used white cooking wine since I had no dry white wine. I also made garlic bread on the side to sop up the extra mushroom goodness.

I sauteed the garlic and threw in the mushrooms, broccoli and some thyme and cooked them for about 5 minutes and then I added the cooking wine and let that cook down. Next up was some Creamy Portobello Mushroom Soup mixed with some cornstarch. After that thickened up I added some balsamic vinegar and after that was the cooked fettuccine.Topped with some chopped green onion, it was perfection.

Let's talk about my garlic bread now.... If they had garlic bread contests I'm pretty confident I would win. No joke, it's fucking awesome. I think everyone needs to experience this garlic bread so I will share my recipe with you...

Fuckin Awesome Garlic Bread

1 loaf of Italian Bread cut lengthwise down the middle(I only use one half, if you want to use both, double everything below)

4 tbspn olive oil

3 cloves garlic minced

1 tbspn dried rosemary crushed

1 tspn crushed red pepper

1 tspn salt

1 tspn black pepper

nooch

Preheat oven or toaster oven to 350

In a small cast iron skillet heat the olive oil on low and add all ingredients, except nooch. Let heat for a few minutes to release all of the flavors into the oil. 

Using a pastry brush, brush oil onto the bread and scoop all leftover garlic and seasoning from pan onto the bread and spread out. Sprinkle nooch on top of the bread. 

Bake for about 10 minutes or until bread is getting golden brown and toasty but the inside still has some freshness and chewiness. 

Slice, sop up any sauce on your plate and fall in love.

So really, if I haven't convinced you to go buy this cookbook yet, I don't know what else to do. Except post more delicious recipes? Ok fine........... But only one or two more and then I'm moving on to Veganomicon for Week 2 of The Cookbook Challenge so you're on your own!

Cookbook Challenge. Week 1. AFR-Buffalo Tempeh and Mac & Trees with Easy Breezy Cheezy Sauce

We are only a day into the Cookbook Challenge and I have already seen so many great meals cooked by other PPKers. There is not a menu in the Table of Contents that I am not interested in cooking. I may or may not have already said this, but if you don't own this book, buy it!

On the menu for tonight was Buffalo Tempeh and Mac and Trees with Easy Breezy Cheezy Sauce. The second meal I made from Appetite for Reduction was another winner. I made a few minor modifications out of necessity but it wasn't anything that would make a difference in the way the recipe turned out.

The Buffalo Tempeh was made according to the recipe with the exception that I used fresh garlic and onion instead of the granules because I didn't have them. I cooked them down in a little EB before adding cayenne sauce, veg broth and oregano. I would have never thought to add oregano to hot sauce before, especially because I think hot sauce is good on its own but the flavor it brought was great. I usually don't steam tempeh before I cook it but I really do feel it helped it to absorb the marinade and made the texture better.

I have read the Mac and Trees recipe a few times while flipping through the book and again while making my shopping list, I'm not gonna lie, it took me until I actually bought the broccoli to get the "Trees" part. I should have gotten it sooner because growing up my dad always pretended like broccoli was a little tree with little tiny birdies living in it. Now, thinking back, I'm surprised I even ate broccoli that I though contained little baby birdies. Anyways, the Mac and Trees was simple to make, I subbed rotini for macaroni because for some reason the pasta aisle at Whole Foods tonight was barren, maybe due to the impending snow storm we are supposed to get in the Northeast tomorrow night/Wednesday. I think rotini holds sauce better anyways so I wasn't completely devastated.

The Cheezy Sauce was a nooch based sauce which was awesome, but to be honest, I can't really ever tell a difference in any of the nooch based sauces I've made in my vegan life. They all have different ingredients but they always taste very much the same. Again, not complaining, I love a nooch sauce as much as any vegan. After the tempeh was done cooking and the nooch sauce was all mixed in with the pasta I drizzled some of the leftover buffalo sauce over my plate of pasta . As an omni I never actually had buffalo mac, but if I did, I would have to say the vegan version is better. Not only is it better for you, it just tastes awesome.

This was a really hearty meal that left me feeling full after a small bowl and knowing that it was relatively good for me made it taste even better. Just like the lettuce wraps and fried rice I made last night, this is absolutely going to become a staple in my recipe repertoire.

PPK Cookbook Challenge. Week 1. AFR - Lettuce Wraps and Unfried Rice

I posted the other day about the Cookbook Challenge we are doing over at The PPK, and I am using it as an opportunity to not only use some of the cookbooks I have and have never used, but also as a chance to get some more blogging in.The Challenge technically starts tomorrow but I started today just because it's always easier to cook on Sundays for some reason. Up this week is Appetite for Reduction.

I got Appetite for Reduction for Christmas and haven't cooked anything from it until today. I made the Lettuce Wraps with Hoison-Mustard Tofu and the Unfried Fried Rice. Both were super easy to throw together and tasted awesome. When I make lettuce wraps I usually make a copycat version of P.F. Changs tofu lettuce wraps complete with the crispy fried cellophane noodles. While the AFR recipe didn't call for crispy fried noodles, it was definitely an awesome dish, and much healthier! Normally, I can't leave well enough alone and always change something about a recipe, but this one was almost perfect as is. The only change I made was an addition, to the hoison-mustard sauce, I added an extra teaspoon of mustard, but instead of adding the same yellow mustard, the extra teaspoon was Dave's Insanity Mustard. The sauce was really delicious as is, but I like things hotter. The hot mustard really took it to another level, both flavor-wise and heat-wise.

I can't remember the last time I made any sort of fried rice at home, I think it was when I was an omni, but I have had it on a few occasions as a veg while drunk and having Chinese food as the only option for late night eats. I make a lot of rice, but I usually just make plain jasmine rice and top it with whatever random stir fry Im cooking up. The Unfried Fried Rice recipe is such an awesome base to build your favorite fried rice, but without as much oil and other junk.I made the rice an hour or so in advance so it could cool and not get mushy when getting reheated. The recipe called for Brown or Jasmine rice, which I unfortunately didn't have, but white instant rice subbed just fine. I used reduced sodium soy sauce and added petite peas and fresh bean sprouts just before cooking adding the rice to make it healthier and more flavorful. I love the way the little peas pop in your mouth combined with the slight crunch the sprouts have when added in. I really can't imagine eating any sort of fried rice without them.

After a long afternoon this was the perfect meal to make. Fast. Easy. Healthy. Delicious. I am really looking forward to making more recipes from this cookbook!