Beet-pink Tropical cookies. With Rice Crisp cereal. Otherwise known as the PPK Vegan Chopped dessert challenge.

Isa Chandra Moskowitz is a brilliant lady. Which she already knows. Anyways, she and a few others set up this Vegan!Chopped series and this round is the dessert. (I didn't participate in the entree round-I wasn't sure what to do and I was also away most of the weekend)

But dessert? Dessert is totally my thing. I mean.. I made up brownies but screwed up and it somehow became a delicious cake. Still not sure how I managed that. But I can do dessert. At least on the baked good side. Ask me about pudding or parfaits or I dunno, something else like that, you're going to get a blank look. I can do cake. I can do cookies, I can do brownies.

Especially cookies.

So! On to the ingredients! The four needed ingredients are:

Beets
Crisped Rice cereal
Fresh mango
and unsweetened flaked coconut.

I made, well, I don't have a name for them, but I suppose you could come up with one. Let it not be Beet-Coconut-Mango-Rice Cookies. That'd be booring.

But really kind of what I did. I got a 'banana mango' according to the little sticker on it from Market basket and it was actually ripe. Which I was really glad about because I didn't really have time tomorrow to do this. I peeled it with my potato peeler cut all the ripe bits up and tossed them in the blender. I blenderized for a minute or two until was basically mango puree. Smooth, delicious sweet mango puree. I mean. Uh.. I totally didn't sneak tastes of it. Not at all!  

I had two rather old tiny soft beets in the fridge. I think they were ok. I'll let you know if I get sick or something. Anyways, I used the finest grater I had and grated them up until I had about two tablespoons full of shredded beet, tossed them in a bowl, added about a quarter cup of melted earth balance, a quarter cup of applesauce and a quarter cup of unsweetened almond milk, stirred it all up until it looked like this:

I added brown sugar, cane sugar and a little over a cup of crispy rice cereal, stirred it up (If I were doing it differently, I might add the crispy rice cereal at the end instead) and then added the dry ingredients-king arthur white flour (approximately 2.5 cups), baking powder (probably could have added another half teaspoon) and salt, as well as about 2 tablespoons of crunched up coconut flakes (unsweetened of course). When the mix was the right ish consistency for cookies, I rolled/dropped them onto my cookie sheet. They looked like this: 

While they baked, I made the frosting with about 2 tablespoons melted earth balance, a whole lot of confectioner's sugar and another quarter cup of the mango puree. Nom. I made it rather thick and then let it sit while the cookies finished baking and cooling. Then I moved over to the table so that I could frost the cookies with the mango frosting and dust them with the unsweetened coconut. 

I frosted and then pressed the frosted cookie into the coconut and out they came. Beautiful. Here's some food porn shots of them:

I have had two so far and I find that they are quite delicious. I think they're a little on the tough side, though I'm not quite positive about how to fix that. I might leave a little of the flour out and a little less crispy rice (as well as add it at the end rather than the middle). I was a little worried before they baked that they'd be *too* sweet, but the cookie itself was sweet, but not overly so and the frosting and coconut really complimented the flavors. I don't the beet flavor really shone through and it'd be neat to more prominently favor that flavor, though, again, I'm not quite sure how. The crispy rice definitely made the cookie a little bit more interesting (good interesting, as in multiple) texture wise, although I think it would've gone better if I'd added them at the end so they didn't sog up and break down as much. The things we learn on the first time 'round. Anyways! I hope you enjoyed my photo tour of my attempt at combining these ingredients!

Beans + Blondies=delicious

Oh. Hello! I have all these things I've wanted to talk about here, but.. well.. I've been lazy. And forgotten. But! That's all changed. At least, for today. Because today (and yesterday, really) is different! I have had inspiration. There has been inspiration in the form of Navy Beans: 

See those pretty little beans? They're delicious in lots of things. (And by lots of things, I mean Isa & Terry's Leek & Bean Cassoulet from Veganomicon. *ahem*) And they're good for you. And shit. 

We all know (assumption! Maybe we don't?) that black beans go into brownies and make them healthy. So, what about white beans? Can they go in Blondies? A google search informed they could & did. I may or may not have spent some time at work investigating the various recipes posted. I ended up making my own version. Using bits and pieces of those recipes and some of my own ideas. 

I am so glad I did and could. Just look at them: 

They were delicious, although I need to work on the texture a bit. Maybe someday I will post the recipe.  In the meantime, I just want to make you jealous.

The Holidays! Just like everyone else!

I'm going to go ahead and call my first Vegan christmas a complete success. I mean, how could I not? With  Fat Free Vegan's Sweet Potato Casserole, Vegan Dad's Pumpkin Pull Apart Rolls, Acorn Squash with Sage-Apple Rice from Vegan Girl's Guide to Life, and Isa Chandra Moskowitz & Terry Hope Romero's Maple Pecan pie, how could I go wrong?

The correct answer is: Only if I burn everything. Or miss crucial ingredients.

I didn't. So it didn't go wrong.

Also? It snowed today. Sortof. I tried to get a picture of the flakes:

See the snowflakes? See them? 

That didn't really work (and this is the best attempt). But that's ok, because I veganized this recipe for breakfast. (Tradition to have cinnamon rolls for breakfast on christmas in my family)

Cinnamon Sugar Pumpkin Bread with Butter Rum Glaze

I look a little insane while my mother teaches me how to make pie crust (again-I really can't pick it up and I don't know why)

Making Pie Crust

Bought in a yoga store in RI

 When the 2nd iteration of the Teal Cat project came out, I had to get one for my sister. It was her christmas gift, plus a donation to an animal rescue nonprofit in the area.

Teal Cat #231

 This is the third time I've made the pull apart pumpkin rolls and the third time they've come out fantastically.

Vegan Dad's Pull Apart Pumpkin Rolls

 I made pecan pie for Thanksgiving and was drooling over it for Christmas too!

Maple Pecan Pie

Burnout on writing, but not on cooking

Sorry guys. The end of october gets RIDICULOUSLY busy for me. (Birthday and all)

So, I was supposed to go to a vegan potluck (organized via ThePPK) but something happened and it ended up not happening (but it will! At some point! Somewhere!). I'd spent a while thinking of what I wanted to make for this potluck-one person who was going to attend has a nightshade allergy so I was trying to brainstorm things to make that were friendly towards this person. I had Celery Root in my refrigerator from the farmer's market and I google searched to see if celery root went with Sweet Potato. Supposedly it did.

I remembered the Quesadillas I made previously (which I have yet to blog about. Whoops!) Yuca quesadillas from Veganomicon. They were incredibly good. So. Good.  So, I figured, if I could do a mash of that and put it in a tortilla and call it a quesadilla, why couldn't I mash Sweet Potato and Celery Root together with some spices and onion and garlic and call it a Quesadilla?

Well? Why Not?

I did:

Sweet Potato Celeriac Quesadilla with kale

I did half on a cast iron skillet on the stove and the other half in a George Foreman (can you tell which one this came from? You're very smart, so I bet you can).

I had to add a bunch of spices to the mash, but after frying, these babies tasted delicious-indian spiced but wholly my own creation.

Breakfast!

I've been... slacking recently. Posting pictures of food with no back story. As such, I have a wee little one for you today.

I've been dating a boy for a month. Back when we first met (from the internet, of all places), he would go on about how we ought to go to brunch sometime. It was not to be for our first date (turns out thankfully), but several weeks later. Overall, it sounded like a good plan to me, though I was slightly concerned with the places that he suggested. On one of their websites' however, the one restaurant claimed to be able to cater to any dietary preference/style. I figured that meant vegan-friendly. Or at least, there was probably something I could eat. I had high hopes that they might be able to make vegan pancakes. I knew I should have called ahead of time, but work was busy, so I didn't.

We get there and there is a [short] line and the boy was already waiting there. There's a man gladhanding (if I use the term correctly) and I asked him about vegan options. he said anything and if the server gave me a hard time, come to him.

So I ask if I could get vegan pancakes. Turns out, not really. SO! I had a bagel toasted with jam:

Bagel with strawberry preserves

And a giant plate of fruit with granola (I didn't actually really like the granola..I never really have, so I'm not sure what I was thinking-but the fruit was fantastic!):

Fruit Plate with Granola

As it turns out, something in this breakfast didn't agree with me as I started having...severe....digestion issues that lasted into the next morning. I think it was probably the amount of fruit I ate (almost the whole plate) plus the fact that I didn't let my body just flush it out. I had to eat more food later... But it tasted so good while I was there! :)

Soup and the accompanying awful picture

Ever since I moved in the beginning of September (and really before, in conversations my then-meat eater roommate and I had about food/sharing food), my roommate has been talking about this chili that he loves. He makes it with a base of peppers instead of tomatoes and sweetens it with honey (not this time!). I was vaguely intrigued but cautious. Chili is not my favorite in the first place, so it didn't seem like something I'd necessarily want to try..

It's quite good at first go, with some daiya on it plus some vegan sour cream. I learned in eating the leftovers, however, that it should be warmed up again and have more vegan cheez & sour cream in it, plus maybe some bread or something. Potatoes might go nicely in it..

One of my favorites

I'm a (veggie) burger kind of gal. I love making burgers out of beans/legumes/veggies. Stuffing my nutritional needs into one little patty? Best thing. Plus I can put ketchup on it. I like ketchup on my burgers, no matter what they're made of. So. Good.

Anyways. I made these a little while back with sauteed kale and tomatoes (I have got to find a better recipe for kale... Like peanut sauce or something!). From Color Me Vegan, the Cashew Red Lentil burgers. (Curried) They are to die for. (Well.... maybe not. But they're really good! I promise!)

And a little shout out to Occupy Boston! Love them. So well organized.