The Triumvirate Pantry Burger

Once again, I just have to say how much I love MoFo.  It's about as much as I love veggie burgers, all ilks.  I almost did an all-veggie-burger theme this year, just to let you know how much I love the veggie burger.  This one is mine, my own, my love, my precious:

For this burger, I found particular inspiration in these two posts:

Taylor's review of a new burger joint in my old hood has this beautiful veggie burger:

LORDY. I'm going to have to give this one a try at some point the next time I go over the bridge.

And, Vegan Family Dinner's Vegan Big Mac, ahumina humina humnina!

Seriously, doesn't this look amazing??

Anyhoo, for tonight's burger I stuck to my pantry theme. I used my fridge pantry, and found the Triumvirate of the Veggie Burger To Be:

Organic extra-firm tofu (being pressed in my TofuXPress!) organic polenta, and swiss chard soaking!

I have been wanting to get rid of that polenta FOREVER, and never got around to it. I prefer making polenta from scratch, but thought I'd use some premade polenta at some point, so I bought on whim it a while ago.  It had been in there so long it was actually a little past the due date, but whatever, it's just corn!  And, I haven't made tofu in a long time for whatever reason, so that was near it's due date as well.  

I thought I could get away with a sort of quicker recipe, but my stupid, foodie brain got to thinking, and before long, it was a double saute AND food processor burger.  Oh well. 

First, protect your polenta from rogues:

Once you have secured the polenta, start your first saute. Soak/wash your greens (I had Swiss chard, my favorite favorite leafy green, but you can use anything you've got, kale, collards whatev).  Press your Fu.  While your fu is pressing and your greens are soaking, you can saute your polenta.

Slice your polenta pretty thin and then fry it up in some olive oil until it is crispy, like 10 minutes or so.  Then, add about 1/2 cup of dried cranberries, and cook a few more minutes.  In the last minute, add a chopped clove of garlic.  Total saute time for the polenta is about 15 minutes on medium heat.

It don't have to be pretty. It's going into the burgers, so you just want thin, crispy pieces of polenta.

The swiss chard saute is a standard, just chop the chard into shreds, and saute it in olive oil for a few minutes until it is soft.  I added two cloves of garlic for the last two minutes.  And about a teaspoon of salt:

Let them cool.

Now, in your food processor, process the tofu with the greens, add a teaspoon or so of soy sauce or Bragg's, and a bit of dijon mustard.  Or, you can just add whatever other flavorings you feel like putting in (miso, tahini, whatever).  You guys know what you are doing.  Whatever you feel like putting in is fair game, intuit your burger!  Then process a bit more to incorporate.  Dump the processed tofu mixture into a big bowl and stir in the polenta saute:

I knew I had seasoned breadcrumbs in my freezer that I made last month, so I added about 1/2 cup of them to dry things up a bit.  Also, there was quite a bit of sage in them, and I wanted a little of that flavor.

See? Chipping away at the freezer, too...

Mix em up well and form into burgers.   

An amazing transformation! 

I baked them.  I just sprayed olive oil on my lined baking sheet and baked them at 400 for 20 minutes, then I sprayed the tops again and flipped them and baked for another 10 minutes. I like my veggie burgers a little crispy.

And thirty minutes hence, the Triumvirate Pantry Burger (haha, the T.P. burger) is born. And he was deeeelicious!

Enjoy!

As Austrian as Apfel Pie

Apfel Knodel!

The best part of MoFo is the blog feed.  Almost 700 blogs, all in one feed makes it fun to just scroll down at random times and see what there is to see.  A few days ago, I saw this:

And I couldn't believe my eyes! An Austrian blogger, Phoenix, blogging about Germknodel! (This is her picture). A childhood favorite of my husband, who had them on a ski trip to Austria when he was a boy, and has been talking about them ever since.  I had to try to make them.

Problem: I did not have the delicious prune jam, aka: the FILLING for the knodels.

So, I decided to go to the farm and get some fresh, local apples and make an apple pie type filling for the Germknodels.  When I came home, I made the dough.

I made the dough using Phoenix's recipe (which she so kindly clarified for me in the comments, if you need to know how to make the dough exactly, it is there. The only thing I would say is I think you do have to knead the dough and not just stir it before letting it rise!).  It is a very easy dough, actually.

As with all things, I used white whole wheat flour.  I can't recommend it enough.  It is a little sweeter and nuttier than regular all-purpose flour.  I cannot tolerate ap flour, it hurts my stomach, whereas the white whole wheat does not. Amazing. I use it for everything.

Here are pictures:

 The "dampfl" that Phoenix explains in the comments section.  I hope it is right!

The dough before it rises. You can see I had tried to "stir" it first, then I kneaded it. Still don't think I kneaded it enough before I let it rise.  Not sure!  It came out fine, though, so no worries I guess.

Anyway, while your dough is rising, make the filling!

Dawn's Apfel Knodel Filling:

4 large apples, peeled and chopped fairly small (I used two Honeycrisp and two Winesap, both local and low spray)
Juice from 1/2 an organic lemon
2/3 cup of organic sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp salt
2 tablespoons arrowroot powder

Put everything except the arrowroot in a medium saucepan.  Heat it over medium heat, stirring gently.  Keep stirring gently so that the sugar doesn't burn.

Obviously not the whole apples :-) That was just for fun. The one on the left is the Honeycrisp, on the right is the Winesap.

OK, here is how it looks before the juices start to go.  Keep cooking it and stirring!  

After a few minutes, the apples will start to give up their delicious juices.  Once you have a good amount of juice in the pan with the apples, say after about ten or  fifteen minutes, take a coffee cup or a measuring cup and push it into the apples to collect some of the juice (about 1/4 cup of juice if you can get it, less is OK too).  Gradually whisk the arrowroot into the hot apple juice until it is all dissolved (I have a teeny tiny whisk that I use for purposes such as these).  It will be very thick in the cup, almost like a paste.  Now, pour the arrowroot mixture back into the apple mixture.  Keep stirring.  The rest of the apple liquid will congeal almost immediately.  Let it cook a bit longer, until the apples are soft.  Mine took about 25 minutes total. Two tablespoons may seem like a lot of arrowroot, but I wanted the consistency to be very gel like and not runny at all since it was going to go into dumplings to be steamed.  It worked.

OMG this filling is SOOOOOOO good. You can use this for anything, like as a topping for waffles or pancakes or as a filling for fancy pumpkin breads or whatever you like.

Now, you have to make your dumplings.  Good luck!  It's a little tricky.  Honestly, I couldn't do it the way Phoenix said to, I don't think my dough was right for that.  So, I used a Chinese dumpling filling technique that I learned on my cooking shows (thanks to Ming's mom!) and it worked well.

Here's the final product:

Now, I didn't have ground poppy seeds, so I decorated with black sesame seeds (there's that Asian influence again!).  More filling on the side, since I can never get very much inside dumplings without them coming apart.

It came out pretty well overall.

I'm sure I have bungled Austrian cuisine and mangled the German language enough for one day, so I'll get to planning my next post, whatever the heck that is going to be :-)

Have a great day (or night, depending on where you are in the world!)

Random Round-up: My New MoFo Friends!

My back isn't doing well, so can't sit long.  That means recipe post-poned (haha) until tomorrow at least.

I love finding new blogs to read during MoFo, so I'm gonna do a quick round-up of some of my favorites from the past few days.  The established bloggers get all the attention, and though they are great, there are so many talented bloggers out there not getting any press.  The MoFo feed is a constant supply of vegan blogs, and there are really some gems in there.  I wanted to take a little time to share my finds.  If these are popular, I didn't know about them, so they are new to me!

Phoenix of the blog Phoenix Dreaming is an Austrian blogger, and is doing some great traditional Austrian food for MoFo that got my attention. Check it out.

Vegan Family Dinner did a vegan Big Mac post, OMG, I am still thinking about those.  I have yet to purchase Vegan With A Vengeance, so, I don't have the veggie burger recipe, but I WILL get that book soon (of course I have some of Isa's others, just not that one).

Oh Lady Cakes, I dig your blog name and your blog.

Anchors and Feathers, well-designed, well written, and good looking recipes.

My new friend, B.A.D. is cool, too. I dig her website.

There are others, but I have to get up now or I'm gonna be sorry!

Love you guys!
Dawn

P.S. The recipe post I am going to try to get up for tomorrow or Friday is this:

See you guys tomorrow.

Flight, We are a Go for Launch: The Soup

Roger that, Houston. I had success today.  It depended, as success has want to do, upon many random variables coming together in a stream of white light and tamarind:

The story:

At what used to be his naptime until very recently (insert a deep sigh of mourning here) I took my son’s advice from yesterday morning and made the hot chocolate that I blogged about on my birthday.    

Since my petite budgerigar did not nap, I couldn’t cook dinner until my husband came home from work because, well, he wasn’t asleep (my son, not my husband).  I needed a direct source of melted chocolate, almond milk and, this time, whiskey in my system to keep me going until I could be a “go, flight.” Next time, more whiskey.

When hubby got home, I headed down into the basement pantry (now that you guys know I have stuff stored all over the place, I figure you'll need directions to which pantry I'm talking about) and then into the fridge for inspiration.  I came upstairs with good stuff:

Closer upper.

The cock and the nuts!

I wanted a complex, spicy, coconutty soup with roasted chickpeas, pablano and red peppers, and bean thread noodles. Not quite a curry, but curry influenced.  

THE RECIPE:

First, the Coconut Roasted Chickpeas with Peppers:

1 tablespoon coconut oil (you can use olive, or any other oil you’d like, but I needed to dent this jar of coconut oil in my pantry if you feel me)

2 cups cooked, organic chickpeas

1 tsp coarse Kosher salt (sea salt is also good, I just hate regular "table" salt)

½ sweet red pepper, chopped

½ fresh pablano pepper, chopped

1 garlic clove, chopped

Heat the coconut oil in a large, stainless stockpot on medium heat until melted and hot (about 2 minutes).  Add chickpeas, salt, and chopped peppers.  Saute about 10 minutes or until chickpeas are blistered and golden and peppers are soft.  Add garlic and sauté one minute more (time it if you need to, do not burn the garlic!) stirring constantly.  Remove chickpea sauté from pot and put aside.

These are the chickpeas, with basil from my garden which is going in at the end (it's a little haggard at this point, but still going outside) and the garlic. In the background is the hot chocolate that needs more whiskey.

Now, make The Soup:

8 cups water

2 smashed garlic cloves (don't chop them, just smash them a bit to release their flavor. We are going to take them out later on so soup doesn't get too garlicky).

1 tablespoon of soy sauce (organic tamari is better if you have it)

2 Rapunzel bouillon cubes (vegan and fabulous, I used the ones with sea salt) 

3 tsp red curry paste (fridge pantry)

2 tablespoons of agave syrup (light organic agave if you've got it) 

1 tablespoon Sriracha or "rooster" sauce (or cock sauce!)

1 tablespoon tamarind concentrate (weird, I know, it was in my pantry, though)

1 can light, organic coconut milk

Garnish: fresh basil (chopped), roasted cashews (chopped), chopped scallions (if you have them, they would be great here) 

In that same large stockpot, bring 8 cups of water, garlic cloves and soy sauce to a simmer.  Once simmering, add bouillon cubes, curry paste, agave syrup, sriracha, and tamarind and simmer some more until bouillon is dissolved.  Taste for salt, sweetness and spiciness (this is spicy!).  Add coconut milk, and continue to simmer gently for a few minutes.  While soup is simmering, cut the bean thread noodles in half lengthwise so they aren't totally unmanageable to eat (otherwise they are WAY too long):

Action shot of my husband cutting the noodles for me. They are a bit of a pain to cut dry, but worth it.  Oh, and there is the tamarind concentrate I found behind some other stuff in my pantry. 

I was scared to use it before!

Put the chickpea saute back into the soup to heat it through.  Add bean thread noodles.  If you want this to mostly be a soup with noodles, add half of the package of bean thread noodles.  If you want it to be more like noodles with sauce, add the whole package.  

The noodles only take about 2 or 3 minutes to soften in the simmering soup.

Garnish with fresh, chopped basil and roasted cashews.  Scallions also would be great here, but I didn't have any.  

We all really enjoyed this soup. It had a little too much heat for my son, but he kept trying to eat it anyway!  With the heat and the garlic, it is a great weapon to fight off that cold you caught online.

Note: fish out the garlic cloves before you put the soup away (if there is any left!) if you leave them in, I think it would get way too garlicky.

Enjoy!

Lentil Soup, Not!

Can you catch a cold online? I feel like I read a lot of MoFo posts where the blogger was sick, and I’m feeling a little off, myself.  I am definitely fighting something, but intend to rest enough and drink enough (no, not whiskey) to fend it off successfully.  I also have a lot of issues with my back and with sitting for any significant period of time, so MoFoing can be a slow going, piecemeal process.  Anyway, when I asked my son what he would like me to make today, this was the answer:

By which he meant that he just wanted to eat some raw choco chips right from the bag. And, can you blame him? That is a bag of chocolate chips that he pilfered from my baking drawer. 

The pilfering made me look into that drawer...not only do I have a problem in my basement pantry and in my freezer, but in all my drawers and shelves as well.  Oh, and in the fridge. Damn.

Here is my “baking” drawer (I have another baking shelf, too, btw):

Luckily while looking through my baking drawer, I found some new checks! There they are, lurking in the back of the drawer under some shredded coconut: 

I was just about to order new checks, too, so this works out well.

Question: does anyone have particular systems for keeping their pantry well stocked but not over full?  I find that balance is hard to strike, I either have too much or not enough (usually too much, but in the winter, I tend to grocery shop less, and then I make a lot of pantry-based meals, and my pantry actually gets pretty low).

It’s funny because when I started this blog, the first series I did was called “Stock Your Pantry.” J I guess I have a thing with the pantry. 

Is anyone else doing a pantry theme or a planning or grocery shopping theme? Let me know.  Let’s share our dirty pantry stories.

Gotta take some vitamins or something now.

Love to all my fellow ‘Foers,

Dawn

Pumpkin Biscotti

Party in the Pantry, Recipe #1: Pumpkin Biscotti

It's not usually hard for me to use up canned pumpkin, I LOVE it and I use it pretty often.  But, what to do with the rest of a can, about 2/3 of a cup of canned pumpkin, leftover after making Isa's pumpkin cupcakes?  I also had use for some raw, organic walnuts in my freezer, as well as an amount of flour bordering on oversupply (I have three, five pound bags) and two bags of Trader Joe's Organic Brown Sugar.

Then it struck me: Pumpkin Biscotti! Here they are:

I arrived at my recipe thanks to the wisdom of  my Italian Nonna, Bryanna Clark Grogan, whose recipe for almond biscotti served as my guide in this undertaking.  Grazie, nonna!

Pumpkin Biscotti   
Makes about 20 cookies

2/3 c. white organic sugar (organic sugars are vegan)

1/3 c. organic brown sugar (I use Trader Joe’s)

2/3 c. organic canned pumpkin

1 tsp vanilla

¼ tsp almond extract

2 tablespoons organic sunflower oil (or canola, peanut, any other non-olive oil that you like)

2 c. whole wheat white flour (I use King Arthur’s, but it’s not organic)

2 tsp baking powder

¼ tsp salt

½ tsp cinnamon (I lost my Vietnamese cinnamon from Penzey’s during the hurricane!)

1/3 c. organic, raw walnuts (Trader Joe’s again for me)

1/3 c. chocolate chips (Wegmans or any other non-dairy brand)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Grease a shiny cookie sheet or jelly roll sheet, or cover a dark one with greased aluminum foil.  You can also use a Silpat on your baking sheet as I did.  I just about fit everything on one 9 x13 sheet, but I could have used the room of two sheets, really.  It's up to you if you want to do one or two sheets!  

In a large bowl, stir the wet ingredients (sugar through sunflower oil) together until well combined.  Place a sifter over the bowl, and add the dry ingredients (flour through cinnamon) and sift them into the bowl.  Stir together with a wooden spoon until a dough forms.  You can use your hands to knead in the walnuts and chocolate chips.  Or, separate the dough into two bowls and make one small batch of pumpkin chocolate chip and one of pumpkin walnut biscotti as I did.  Flour your hands (the dough is a little sticky) and form the dough into a log with squared-off ends, about three inches wide by about six inches long or so.  Here is my pumpkin chocolate chip dough log:

Bake your logs in the oven at 350 degrees for about 30 minutes, until they are firm-ish to the touch and look dry on top.  The baking time really depends on your oven, your baking sheets, etc.  Here are my baked biscotti logs:

See, they barely fit on the one baking sheet! Anyway, they aren't quite done here (I was using a lower temp oven and it wasn't cutting it, probably because of the pumpkin, which is why I recommend you use a 350 degree oven for the whole time), you can see they are still a little wet in the cracks, so I had put them back in the oven for a few minutes. 

Carefully transfer them (I use two large spatulas to pick the log up) to a cooling rack and let them cool for about 15 minutes.  

 You can see they look cooked enough here.

Then carefully transfer them to a cutting board (not the one you use for onion and garlic!) and slice them carefully across the width into biscotti!  Put cookies cut side down (they will be laying on their "sides") onto your baking sheet and bake 10 to 15 minutes until lightly browned on the bottom.  Take them out and flip them onto the other side and bake about 10 more minutes.  Let cookies cool on your rack and enjoy! They keep well packed in an airtight container for a few days, or wrap tightly in foil and freeze them if you made too many :-) 

We already ate half of them! Enjoy! 

Is there a Party in Your Pantry?

With Hurricane Irene's approach at the end of August, I had to get everything off of my basement floor and actually ON the pantry shelves. I had bags and bags of delicious, vegan pantry goodies all over the place.  Once I got them onto the shelves, I realized that I have a bit of a problem: a pantry problem.

Since we were very lucky and somehow managed to keep our power on and our large, old trees from falling on our house, I had no occasion to dwindle my pantry supplies in honor of Irene.  Also, there is another ongoing problem I have, further compounded by Irene:

My freezer is stuffed to capacity.  My pantry is stuffed to capacity.  I can't go to Trader Joe's because I have no room to put anything away. What to do? Enter...

Got me a theme for Vegan MoFo!  If you aren't familiar with MoFo, it is really fun. Here's what happens: vegan bloggers sign up and try to blog every weekday about anything related to vegan food, for the entire month of October (last year MoFo was in November).  Some bloggers have themes, some don't, but TONS of great recipes, information and fun stuff is shared during the MoFo.  I followed along last year and posted my recipes and pics to Facebook, but I didn't have a blog yet.  By following Vegan MoFo, I found a lot of the blogs I follow now, which is cool, and I was inspired to get my own blog up in December of last year, right after MoFo ended! It's a good time 'fo all.

So, I vow to (attempt to) get my pantries down to a more manageable size by making awesome vegan eats and maybe making sculptures.  Anyhoo, I will be blogging my pantry adventures during MoFo.

Looking forward to partying in the pantry with you guys.

<3 Dawn