American Thanksgiving Brunch 2014...

The Breakfast Table

As I said before my husband had to work on Thanksgiving, and so we celebrated with a huge holiday meal Wednesday night instead. Thursday however I decided to get up early and make an epic Brunch for him so he’d be nice and full for work. Since we’d just had a huge meal the night before I didn’t want to go overboard, so I picked four dishes to satiate us Thursday mid-morning.

Chicken-Fried Seitan Steak

White Sausage Gravy

Our main was the Chicken Fried Seitan Steak and White Sausage Gravy from Celine Steen and Joni Marie Newman’s book “Hearty Vegan Meals for Monster Appetites.” Despite owning this book for a number of years now I have never made this recipe, and the reason being - on my very first ever trip to Chicago, back when my husband and I were dating, we went out for Breakfast. I had never eaten, nor in fact heard of ‘Chicken-Fried Steak’ and so I ordered it. I took about 2 bites and wanted to throw up, I thought it was the most disgusting thing I had ever eaten in my life. Literally everything about it was bad right down to the gravy it was smothered in. I hated it, and didn’t understand how people could love it so much. After I went vegan I avoided vegan versions of this popular breakfast food, and then one day earlier this year out of curiosity I ordered it at The Chicago Diner and fell in love. Vegan Chicken-Fried Steak is the bomb! So, since I liked the vegan version so much, I decided to try my hand at making it at home. As par usual Celine and Joni do not disappoint with this recipe. It does however require some advanced prep. The seitan steaks only take 30 minutes to boil but if you’re in a time crunch make them a day ahead. Frying them up is easy as pie and they’re coated in a flour, corn cereal mixture that is so good! The gravy is simple, vegetable broth, butter, flour, and chunks of seitan ss you would expect, but the surprise is that this gravy has vegan sour cream in it! What? I know, it sounded crazy to me too, but trust me when I say this gravy actually turned out really well, it was buttery, and velvety and smothered the steaks in perfection.

Grandma Jo's Tater Tot Surprise 

To accompany our Chicken-Fried Steak I decided to make Grandma Jo’s Tater Tot Surprise, also out of “Hearty Vegan Meals for Monster Appetites.” Basically this is a tater tot breakfast casserole, and I was really taking a chance on this one. It sounded like something I’d never eat - vegan or otherwise - but boy was I wrong. This was the first of our leftovers to disappear, it was THAT good. In addition to tots, this casserole also has vegan sour cream, vegan butter, vegan cheddar cheese, green onions, and vegan cream of mushroom soup. Though there is a recipe for mushroom soup provided in the book I just used the leftover mushroom soup I had from making the Broccoli Casserole the night before. After you combine all of that, you top it with crushed cornflakes and bake, and I know it sounds weird, but trust, trust, trust me on this one. If you own Hearty Vegan Meals and haven’t made this yet, get thee to the kitchen ASAP!

Sweet Potato Biscuits 

Biscuit Gravy

Next up I made the Sweet Potato Biscuits with Gravy from Jenny Engel & Heather Goldberg’s book “Sprok-Fed” I’ve actually had my eye on these for a while but never get the chance to actually make them. I’m glad I made time for it this time around because these were delicious. They did not have an overwhelming sweet potato flavor but they did have a lovely orange color and they were so super moist. Very delicious biscuits, and they came together super quick. The gravy was equally delicious and also really fast and easy to make. It’s your typical vegan milk-based biscuit gravy that has sausage. I used Tofurky Italian Sausages in it because that’s all I had and I think the combination worked pretty well. These were so good I know I’ll be making them again.

Cinnamon Orange Rolls 

To top it off I made the Cinnamon Orange Rolls from Julie Hasson’s book “Vegan Diner” this is another recipe I’ve had my eye on for a while but cinnamon buns are just not something I make regularly. It’s not that I find them difficult to make - in fact these were so easy! - it’s just that I hate waiting for dough to rise, so usually anything that requires yeast as an ingredient makes me stay away, or drag my feet. I know it doesn’t make any sense because it doesn’t require any extra work, just waiting time, but for some reason it’s just one of those things I rarely feel inspired to do. I should definitely make cinnamon buns more often though because these were superb. The orange flavor was subtle, yet strong enough to let you know it’s there. I love that the dough had orange zest in it, and then the glaze has orange juice. The filling is just your basic brown sugar and cinnamon mixture. These were definitely a hit and they went fast! Actually, we don’t have a single one left!

My Over-flowing Plate. I had a Cinnamon Roll too but there
wasn't room on this plate, so I had it on a small plate that I forgot
to Photograph

So that was our lovely Thanksgiving Day Brunch, and it was so good that we were talking about making Thanksgiving Brunch a regular thing. We did it last year and it was awesome, we did it this year and it was awesome again, you gotta love new traditions.

Retro-Strawberry Pie without Whip

Lastly I also made the Retro-Strawberry Pie from Dynise Balcavage’s book “Pies and Tarts with Heart” Originally I made this to take to my husband’s aunts house Thursday afternoon, but in the end I changed my mind and decided to leave it at home for just my husband and I. We had some Thursday and Friday and it was so good. Super easy too. The filling is just strawberries, salt, cornstarch, water, sugar and agar. You cook that up and pour it into a vanilla cookie crust, although I skipped the cookie crust. I had purchased a pack of 2 pre-made pie crusts since the Chocolate Pumpkin Cheesecake Pie recipe just said to use a store-bought crust. Originally I was going to disregard this and make my own as usual, but in the end I had so much work to do that I decided to take a short cut. I’m sure home-made crusts on both pies would have been better but sometimes you gotta cut corners. So I used a regular crust, and I think it actually tasted good in a regular crust. The flaky buttery crust was a nice compliment to the sweet filling. The recipe states to top the pie with vegan whip cream, and there are recipes for making your own at home - which I normally do, but once again I was lazy, and besides that I just had to try the new So Delicious Coco-Whip. Which is basically the most amazing thing ever. Vegan cool whip guys! Since it just appeared in my local grocery I thought that this was the perfect time to give it a try, and it did not disappoint but I’ll save a full review for another post. In any case, the pie was fantastic, I’ve always much preferred fruit pies to any other kind.

Retro-Strawberry Pie with Whip and Garnish 

So that’s it for holiday madness until the end of December, until then I’ll probably be eating pretty clean, green juice, green smoothies, limited sweets, salads, etc... Once again I hope you all had a lovely holiday.

American Thanksgiving 2014...

The Dinner Table

I hope everyone had a nice American Thanksgiving. Since my husband had to work Thursday, we had our Thanksgiving Dinner Wednesday night. It was peaceful and quiet - more so then other years - which is impressive considering I cooked a lot, par usual. The food was excellent, and I think we both agreed that overall this was one of the best celebratory meals I’ve made.

Green Beans with Beurre Blanc

There were lots of mouth-watering side dishes, like Green Beans with Beurre Blanc from Mark Reinfeld’s “The 30 Minute Vegan’s Taste of Europe.” These were simply steamed green beans drenched in a vegan white wine and butter sauce, from the chapter on French cuisine. If I had a complaint about the dish it would be that I would have liked more garlic, but otherwise these were very tasty.

Caramelized Brussels Sprouts with Pecans

I also made the Caramelized Brussels Sprouts with Pecans from Bianca Phillips book “Cookin’ Crunk.” This is a really simple recipe that involved first steaming the Brussels, and then pan-frying them. The ingredients list is short, but the flavor is out of this world. Once again my husband ate these Brussels Sprouts up like they were going out of style so you know they have to be good! I love the sweetness from the hint of sugar she throws into the recipe, and the slight kick from the red pepper flakes. Seriously, these were the first things to go, and I wish I had more. I’ll definitely be making them again, and again.

Whisky Mashed Sweet Potatoes

Then no Thanksgiving celebration can be complete without a mashed tater, and so I picked the Whisky Mashed Sweet Potatoes from the book “500 Vegan Recipes” by Joni Marie Newman and Celine Steen. These were absolutely fantastic mashed sweets! Really, neither my husband nor I could get over how delicious they were. Unlike other mashed sweet tater recipes I’ve made these had vegan sour cream, and vegan butter in them, in addition to brown sugar, maple syrup and of course whisky. The whisky flavor was nice, and subtle, not the least overpowering. The butter and sour cream made them so soft and creamy. I did cut the sugar content down a bit though, but otherwise this was a perfect dish.

Broccoli Casserole

Then I did something crazy, I made a Broccoli Casserole! It might sound crazy - since I know how popular this dish is in the United States, or at least in the Midwest - but I had never had nor heard of Broccoli Casserole before moving to Chicago. This however has always been one of my husband’s favorite holiday dishes, and his mother makes a great broccoli casserole each year for the holidays. Obviously when we went vegan we couldn’t have it anymore, which definitely made my husband a little sad, and for some reason it never occurred to me to make a vegan version. Lucky for me Bianca’s book “Cookin’ Crunk” contains a Broccoli Casserole recipe, and it looked quite simple enough and so I thought, ‘why not?’ I felt inspired, and I knew my husband would really appreciate it. Her casserole - unlike the traditional one - is made using fresh broccoli and frying it till soft with onions in oil. Then you add it to a bowl of cooked rice, add in some home-made vegan cream of mushroom soup - which I also made using her recipe. Then you add in the final component which is a homemade cheese sauce - also from her book. Then you bake it. It doesn’t taste exactly like the Campbell’s and Cheeze-Whiz version but it tastes pretty darn close. My only complaint is that due to the fact that the cheese cause contains Nutritional Yeast the casserole does have a slight nooch taste. I think I’d make this again without the cheese sauce or maybe using a milder tasting vegan cheese sub. Either way I’ll definitely make it again because it was a big hit.

Walnut Apple Stuffing

Of course no Thanksgiving Feast is complete without stuffing and because I couldn’t decide which stuffing I wanted to make I simply made two! Crazy I know. The first stuffing I chose to make was of a more traditional nature. It was the Walnut Apple Stuffing from Nava Atlas’s book “Vegan Holiday Kitchen” this was a super delicious, super moist stuffing. The apples were sweet, and tart, and I loved the idea of adding in apple juice rather then vegetable broth. The walnuts were not overpowering and even my husband enjoyed the stuffing despite the nuts.

Potato Sauerkraut Apple Stuffing

Our second stuffing was the Potato Sauerkraut Apple Stuffing from the same book. This Slavic style stuffing may sound strange to you, but trust me when I say it was delicious. A perfect mixture of potatoes, sauerkraut, apples, breadcrumbs, and Eastern European spices. Somehow it works, and my husband who si not normally a kraut fan, loved this one too.

Stone-Ground Mustard, Horseradish & Cornichons

Seitan Pot-Au-Feu

For our Pièce de résistance I made the Seitan Pot-Au-Feu from Robin Robertson’s book “Fresh From The Vegan Slow Cooker” This is a slow-cooked French-style stew that is probably traditionally made with beef, but in our case seitan is used. The stew also contains parsnips, carrots, potatoes, huge chunks of savoy cabbage, vegetable broth, red wine, and a bouquet garni of delicious spices. The seitan you form into little patties and place right on top of the vegetables where they steam to perfection while everything else is cooking away. The smell of this thing cooking is tremendous and mouth-watering and the flavor of the finished dish is wonderful. The seitan is magnificent, truly, I think slow-cooker seitan is probably some of the best seitan I’ve ever eaten, so succulent! And the vegetable choices made for a very nice compliment. You serve the Pot-Au-Feu somewhat communal style with bowls of Stone-Ground Mustard, Horseradish, and Cornichons, as well as bowls of the cooking liquid, which serves as a sort of Au Jus for dipping. I have to say that at first this struck me as a bit of an odd idea, but the seitan was particularly delectable when dipped in a bit of mustard and horseradish, so were the veggies.

Chocolate Pumpkin Cheesecake Pie

Now, for dessert. We barley had room after all that and so we waited a good couple of hours before digging into this Chocolate Pumpkin Cheesecake Pie from Nava Atlas’s book “Vegan Holiday Kitchen” I have actually been wanting to make this pie for a long time but never seem to get around to it. Overall I thought it was pretty good, but it’s not my favorite pumpkin pie, nor is it my favorite pumpkin cheesecake. I think it was under sweet, and under spiced but I do really love the idea of it. I would definitely make it again but perhaps with my own spice mixture rather then the ‘pumpkin pie spice’ she recommends. Since pumpkin is hit or miss with my husband - and since this pie contains walnuts - he inevitably was not a fan. Bummer for me, I hate when I make a dessert he isn’t thrilled about.

Vanilla Spice Cupcakes with Pumpkin Buttercream 

But, to make up for the pie I did make a batch of the Vanilla Spice Cupcakes with Pumpkin Buttercream from Bianca’s “Cookin’ Crunk” and these were delicious. Super easy to make, these came out super moist and flavorful. There is pumpkin puree in the frosting but the overall effect is somewhat understated and my husband wasn’t bothered with it. Somehow he shoved two of these delicious cakes into his mouth before we finally passed out in front of the television, and that as they say is that.

My ridiculously full plate!

I hope you all had an enjoyable holiday, I’ll be back tomorrow with a post about our epic Thanksgiving Brunch!

Celebrating Thanksgiving 2013...

The Holiday Table

I hope everyone had a wonderful and lovely Thanksgiving yesterday. Thanksgiving has always been my absolute favorite holiday, I look so forward to it each and every year. I love the big elaborate dinner, and the time spent with family and friends. This year it was a little different though, my husband and I chose to celebrate Thanksgiving quietly, just the two of us, because my family has suffered a poor turn of events this past week. Last Monday my Oma was hospitalized, and Sunday the 13th - the day before Thanksgiving - she passed away. It was an unexpected string of events that brought us to this point, and we’re all taking it rather hard. We’re all in a state of surreal sadness and shock I think. My Oma was a great lover of holidays - any excuse for an occasion or a party, something to dress up for and a reason to eat heartily. So because I had all the fixings for the Thanksgiving dinner I had planned to make I went ahead and made the dinner for just the two of us. I couldn’t handle company, but I know my Oma would not want us to give up all of our plans - especially if they included food! - just on her account. So my husband and I had a peaceful muted Thanksgiving. We ate, and drank beer - her favorite drink despite us not particularly liking it. - and we reminisced about good times and told fun stories. It felt appropriate. I only wish I didn’t live 2000 miles away from my family, because I would have liked to spend the day with my mother.

The Roast after being removed from the slow cooker and the foil
Not perfect, but not to shabby for a first try.

So, what did we all eat? You’re wondering. Well, we ate far more then we should have, and I cooked far more then was necessary for 2 people, but C’est la vie, and now I don’t have to cook the rest of the week. Now, the first thing any proper Thanksgiving Celebration needs is a good centerpiece, some main dish that the table can revolve around. Last year for American Thanksgiving I made a home-made Tofurkey. For Canadian Thanksgiving last year the centerpiece was a Butternut Squash Lasagna. This year I decided to go the home-made roast route again. I wanted something that felt traditional and so I went with the Stuffed and Rolled Seitan Roast from Carla Kelly’s book “Quick and Easy Vegan Slow Cooking” I have never made a seitan roast in the crock-pot before and I really liked the idea of it because that freed up my oven for other baking needs. Initially I thought making a seitan roast - particularly a stuffed one - was going to be hard. As it turns out, despite the initial work you have to put into it, it’s rather easy. I did have some trouble rolling my roast as it wanted to keep busting apart. Though I think this happened for 1 of 2 reasons. Either I had too much stuffing, or I rolled the dough out too thin in the first place. An easy fix for next time. The good thing is even if your roast threatens to bust and some stuffing pokes out, as long as you wrap the dough really tight in the foil and kind of mold it back together it really does fix itself in the steaming process. In my finished roast you could see a few pieces of apple or apricot poking through the surface of the roast but my roast had a huge crack down the center of it originally and by the time it was done steaming that crack had sealed itself completely.

The Roast after it had been put back into the slow-cooker and
basted for an additional 45 minutes.

Isn't it a beauty?

So not too hard, but how about the flavor? I think it was outstanding. Really, one of the best seitan roasts I’ve ever eaten. I think the slow-cooker method for seitan roast is my new favorite! The texture was also impeccable, it got really firm, but still remained moist and chewy. Loved it, and the flavor was spot on, it wasn’t too gluteny - thanks I’m sure to the addition of tofu in the dough.  I only made one change to this recipe, instead of using vegetable stock I used store-bought mushroom stock. I did this because I had a carton on hand that I haven’t used for anything and I wanted to use it. Though I also thought it would provide a nice depth of flavor for the roast. Mushrooms are earthy, and remind me of meat. They have that subtle slightly ‘off-putting’ flavor that is really hard to describe, and I think using the mushroom stock both in the roast itself and as the basting liquid really worked wonderfully. I highly, highly recommend trying this recipe out sometime!

Maple Pecan Sweet Potatoes

Now, once the roast was all settled on we needed some vegetable side dishes. All the traditional players came to mind originally and I had a strong debate about whether to go with regular mashed potatoes or mashed sweet potatoes. Since I couldn’t decide I let my husband pick and he chose sweet potatoes. So I made the Maple Pecan Sweet Potatoes from Nava Atlas’s book “Vegan Holiday Kitchen” I think that these potatoes are actually suppose to be roasted and glazed as chunks not a mash, but my brain was a little preoccupied and so I over-roasted them and they became a sort of mash. I didn’t actually use a masher but when I started scooping them from the casserole dish into a serving bowl they just sort of mashed themselves and well, that was perfectly alright with me. Maple and sweet potatoes go together perfectly, and I loved the crunchy addition of pecans. However I forgot to add the pecans while the potatoes were roasting, but I had plenty of leftover caramelized pecans from the salad I’d made and so I just topped my sweets with them and I think it was a brilliant idea.

Agave Mustard Glazed Brussels Sprouts 

Aren't they beautiful! and so delicious!

We also had Agave and Mustard Glazed Brussels Sprouts from “Vegan Holiday Kitchen”. Sprouts for me were never a traditional part of Thanksgiving. I mean sure they appeared on the table from time to time but I never ate them. It wasn’t until I went vegan that I started making them a part of my Thanksgiving dinner. Each year I try a new preparation method and I think this is one of my favorites. I mean, all the sprout recipes I make are good but these were just perfection. I love agave-mustard concoctions anyway, and I really liked that this recipe used yellow mustard instead of Dijon. Nice to switch it up from time to time.

Orange-Ginger Glazed Carrots 

We also had carrots because Thanksgiving isn’t Thanksgiving without a side of carrots. I made the Orange-Ginger Glazed Carrots from “Vegan for the Holidays” by Zel Allen and they were pretty good. I think I still prefer the traditional Earth Balance, salt, pepper, and parsley mixture but I liked the subtle sweetness of this dish, the thickness of the glaze and the kick from the ginger.

Mixed Baby Greens with Pears and Glazed Pecans

Of course you can’t have a well balanced meal without a salad and so I made the Mixed Baby Greens with Pears and Glazed Pecans Salad from “Vegan Holiday Kitchen” This was a really great salad. It’s super simple, greens, pears, pecans, lemon, olive oil, and carrots, but I added some leftover minced parsley, and some sliced red onion along with cracked black pepper and it was really a to-die-for salad. The perfect healthy dish to make you feel good about all the other not so healthy holiday treats.

Yorkshire Pudding

You also can’t have a holiday without some kind of bread and on my dad’s side of the family that means Yorkshire Pudding. I made these last Canadian Thanksgiving as well and they were such a hit I decided to make them again. Not a single holiday dinner has ever passed at my Grandma’s house without a Yorkshire pudding, and that was one thing I missed after going vegan. So when I discovered Mark Reinfeld’s recipe in “The 30 Minute Vegan’s Taste of Europe” I knew I would have to make it again and again. They come out a bit more dense then my grandma’s because he uses spelt flour instead of white, but they’re still delicious.

Chipotle Scallion Double Cornbread

And even though we already had bread covered I decided to go crazy and include one of the ‘three sisters’ by making a cornbread. Although don’t think for a second that this is just any old cornbread, it’s the Chipotle Scallion Double Cornbread recipe from Julie Hasson’s book “Vegan Diner.” Have y’all made this? If you haven’t you NEED to make this because oh my goddess it’s probably one of the best cornbread recipes I’ve ever made. I did make one crucial substitution though. Instead of simply using chipotle powder I used 2 small whole chipotles that I seeded and minced. I highly recommend this, it was so good. I also used 2 cups of corn rather then 1 and a half cups. The finished bread came out really moist which is how I likes my cornbread.

Cranberry Chutney 

There was also the obligatory Cranberry Sauce - which I nearly forgot which is why you don’t see it in the photo of the spread on the table. - Typically I make a more traditional cranberry sauce, or cranberry relish as some call it, but this year I wanted to branch out. I used Nava Atlas’s recipe for Cranberry Chutney in “Vegan Holiday Kitchen” which I quite liked. I used the suggested pineapple Juice, and enjoyed the use of dried apricots as well as fresh apple. Red Pepper Flakes are also used - just a pinch - to give the chutney some heat and I think the only thing I’d do differently next time is add a bit more sweetener. Again this might have been simply because my cranberries were overly tart, who knows.

Gravy

Lastly you can’t have a dinner with a roast and Yorkshire pudding without having gravy. This was a super simple gravy that I made by using the basting liquid from the roast, adding in flour, seasonings, and almond milk to taste, as suggested in the recipe footnote by Carla Kelly.

My overstuffed Plate. I couldn't eat both slices of roast so my
husband had to help out. I did sneak a few extra sprouts though

And now we come to dessert. Thanksgiving just isn’t Thanksgiving without pumpkin pie. It is my absolute must-have at any Thanksgiving celebration, and it is literally my favorite thing about the holiday. So this year I chose to make Robin Robertson’s Pecan Pumpkin Pie from “Party Vegan” I had not tried this recipe yet. I really loved the sweet crunchy pecans and the crust was wonderful but overall I’d have to say - much to my regret - that this was not my favorite pumpkin pie ever. It was good, but Colleen Patrick-Goudreau and Isa Chandra Moskowitz are still tied in my heart for best pumpkin pie!

Pecan Pumpkin Pie

Since my husband doesn’t like pumpkin pie I have to make more then one dessert. Which is naturally A-Okay with me, because I’ll take any excuse to bake, and I don’t mind going overboard. As luck would have it just over a week ago I bought Hannah Kaminsky’s book “Easy as Vegan Pie” and so I was eager to give it a spin. Pie incase I haven’t mentioned this before is my upmost favorite dessert ever. Some people are cake people, some people are cupcake people, some people are brownie people but I will honestly take a slice of pie over any other dessert out there any day of the week. I’m a pie girl, there is nothing better! Since her book is filled with so many amazing looking pies I had a really hard time choosing which one to make, and in the end I went with two - for an overall total of three pies!

Trio of Pie
Top - Apple Burgundy Betty.
Bottom Left - Pecan Pumpkin Pie. Right - Cran-Cherry Impossible Pie

I made the Cran-Cherry Impossible Pie which is a mixture of cranberries, cherries, and almonds. I liked this because there wasn’t a traditional pie-crust involved. You know I hate working with dough and the cool thing about this pie is that you make a batter, poor it on top of the fruit and during the baking process the berries float to the top and you get an all around crust. Pretty cleaver. I liked this pie, though personally I thought it could use a bit more sugar, maybe my cranberries were just extra tart? My husband wasn’t a fan of the almond taste so next time I would make this sans almonds and using vanilla extract instead.

Cran-Cherry Impossible Pie 

Finally - because it’s hard to have Thanksgiving without apple pie I decided to make the Apple Burgundy Betty Pie. Which is a brown betty mixed with a pie and kicked up to new heights with the addition of burgundy wine. I think out of all three desserts this was my favorite. The breadcrumb topping was a little strange at first but the overall flavor is just so good, especially when you top the pie with Vanilla Almond Milk Ice Cream, and Vegan Soy Whip. Yum!

Apple Burgundy Betty Pie 

So there you have it folks. Though we were very sad, there is nothing better for grief then food, and in my opinion cooking. Cooking and baking always takes my mind off my troubles and in the end I think we had a Thanksgiving celebration that was fitting for our mood, and I think it was one that my Oma would have really enjoyed.

The Apple Burgundy Betty

The Pecan Pumpkin Pie topped with Soy Whip
Vanilla Almond Milk Ice Cream topping the Apple pie behind.