Baked Mac and Cheeze

The recipe below is from 1,000 Vegan Recipes by Robin Robertson.

---x-posted over at Cooking from 1000 Vegan Recipes---

I've had a favorite vegan macaroni and 'cheese' recipe for years (New Farm Cookbook recipe) and have been quite dedicated to it. I see new recipes for macaroni and 'cheese' all the time and have not been able to bring myself to try another. I sometimes even buy ingredients to try another recipe and wind up making the old standby. Well I finally did it. I made a different recipe.

I tried the Baked Mac and Cheeze and you know, I loved it. I still like my old recipe too, but I cannot decide which one I like more. This recipe is less creamy (and probably a lot healthier) but it tastes great. It has a little onion in it which gives it a nice flavor and also has a healthy dose of cayenne for a big kick. I think I might use just a tad less cayenne next time, but otherwise, I would not change a thing. This recipe will probably now be the go-to macaroni and 'cheese' recipe for a while. It was time for a change.

I used whole wheat breadcrumbs for the topping.



Served it with broccoli.

Seitan Noodle Casserole

The recipe below is from 1,000 Vegan Recipes by Robin Robertson.

---x-posted over at Cooking from 1000 Vegan Recipes---

I recently bought some seitan from a local natural foods store. I didn't realize till I got home that it was shaved seitan (cut very thinly). I had no idea what to do with that, so I stuck it in the freezer. I was looking through the book looking for something to make and saw the Seitan Noodle Casserole {p 316}. It looked perfect for the seitan in the freezer. I made this last night for dinner and thought it was just ok. I expected it to be creamier than it was (more like a tetrazzini). It tasted fine, but I'm not sure I'd make it again.

Tahini Dressing

I'm guest posting over at Cooking from 1000 Vegan Recipes this week, so you'll see that all my posts will be cross posted over there. The recipe below is from 1,000 Vegan Recipes by Robin Robertson.

---x-posted over at Cooking from 1000 Vegan Recipes---

I love tahini in just about anything. I especially love tahini in salad dressing so I had to try out the Creamy Tahini Dressing {page 102} and I definitely was not disappointed. The tahini really shines in this dressing and makes me look forward to our nightly dinner salad. I did think that it was missing an element of sweetness so I might add a dash of agave nectar to it next time.



The only change I made to this recipe was to mix the dressing in the Vita-Mix instead of mixing by hand. The salad is green leaf lettuce, dried cranberries, and gomasio.

Vegan 'Carbonara'

I'm still cooking out of 1000 Vegan Recipes by Robin Robertson. I'm really liking this book. This is Carbonara Style Pasta. I don't have much to say about this other than YUM.



I used my own vegan parmesan made from the uncheese cookbook recipe, spaghettini, fakin' bacon, and added peas as suggested in the notes. Go make this because it is amazing!

Chocolate Chip Banana Bread (or muffins!)

Yesterday I made some excellent muffins. The recipe is from 1000 Vegan Recipes by Robin Robertson. It is actually a recipe for Chocolate Chip Banana Bread, but I made it into muffins. I've had one too many quick bread recipes turn out mushy in the middle and I wasn't in the mood for failure. Turning the bread into muffins makes it a safer bet that it will be cooked through and quite honestly makes portioning easier too - and I don't have to slice the bread! These turned out really really good and were quick to put together.

Here are some pics:

Tempeh Satay and Peanut Sauce

Last night we made Tempeh Satay and Peanut Sauce out of Robin Robertson's new cookbook, 1000 Vegan Recipes. We served it over some leftover white rice with garlicky dinosaur kale and roasted butternut squash. All in all, this was a pretty good meal.

The Tempeh Satay was just ok for me. Two things might factor into my less-than-wow review: 1) I couldn't get the tempeh I like, Lightlife soy or Lightlife 3 grain because Whole Foods was out of them. I had to settle for Westsoy brand soy tempeh (which I don't like very much). 2) I had recently made seitan chimichurri skewers from the Candle Cafe cookbook and those were amazing. I couldn't help but compare the two things as they are both skewery things that get marinated, cooked on the grill and served with a sauce. I know they are the same, but the Candle Cafe recipe knocked my socks off.

Don't get me wrong, it was pretty good and if you have the cookbook, it is worth trying.

Modifications: I modified the sauce a bit because I tasted it after blending and it tasted like coconut milk with garlic. So I doubled the chile sauce (used Siracha) and doubled the tamari and added another large blop of peanut butter. Then I added some water as it cooked because it was getting pretty thick. We skipped the skewers and just threw the tempeh right on the grill.