Taquitos

Yay! Taquitos! I veganized this recipe by using Tofutti cream cheese, Daiya pepper jack shreds, and freshly made tortillas with hatch chiles in them (bought them from HEB Central Market). I got 12 taquitos from the recipe, not 16, since I used ~2 Tbs of filling per tortilla. I used a very flavorful chipotle salsa, which I think really helped this dish. I served it with some more salsa, smashed avocado (they're only a dollar here!), and the refried beans from Appetite for Reduction. Those beans are my go-to refried bean recipe and they use tomato sauce instead of oil! These were a fun meal and I enjoyed them even on the 3rd day.

New Vegan Snacks

I've been spending my weekends checking out grocery stores. Not the most exciting thing ever, but I've really enjoyed it. There are 3 different Whole Foods within a decent drive, a Trader Joe's is on the way, and several regular grocery stores. I've found a few new snacks worth mentioning. I'm still on the hunt for Beanfield chips, because the HEB Central Market that is listed on the Beanfield website did not have them in stock when I've visited the store. That store has knife-sharpening and a surprisingly good selection of vegan goodies and a LARGE bulk section. If I lived closer, it might be a viable alternative to Whole Foods for certain items.

Beanitos - the chipotle bbq variety is amazing

Crispy Cat mint coconut bar - weird combo, but tasty

Samosa Casserole

I've had this casserole recipe on my Pinterest for a very long time, so I finally decided to make it. I had intended to make this over the weekend, since it's a bit involved. However, I took my knives in for sharpening this weekend, so I couldn't prep all the vegetables. Since I finished work early today and my advisor didn't come in, I decided to make this casserole finally. The cauliflower was starting to look a little sad in my fridge. Overall, I liked the flavors of the casserole, but I think I'd double the dough recipe in the future. I rolled the dough out really thin and still couldn't get it to fully cover my large casserole dish. I used all purpose flour, since I didn't have any wheat flours on hand. I also put all the potatoes on the bottom to soak up any juices left from cooking the other vegetables in the vegetable broth.

Vegan Potluck

My pen pal recently started a vegan group in her town. I decided to look if such a group existed in Houston. This is the 4th largest city in the US, so I knew there was chance of finding a group. I got lucky! There is a monthly potluck hosted by a local vegan group. I attended the potluck and was quite impressed with the turnout of ~30 people. I brought the vanilla cupcakes from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World topped with a Nutella-like frosting. Instead of using Nutella in this recipe, I used Justin's chocolate hazelnut butter. You can see the cupcake on the left side, I marked one with a toothpick to grab it when the buffet opened. They were quite good and got nice reviews from other guests. I filled my plate with a tiny bit of everything on the buffet, even going back for seconds on the baked pasta, tofu scramble with black beans & tortillas, and flax crackers & hummus before picking up a mini slice of apple pie. :)

Hawaiian Sloppy Joes

I received a recommendation from a friend to try the Hawaiian sloppy joes on Chef Chloe's website. She was the first vegan to win Cupcake Wars on Food Network and a couple other vegans have competed since her appearance on the show. I thought she was great on the episode and was very pleased that her win allowed her to appear in many mainstream publications and on tv shows. What an excellent way to promote veganism! Anyways, back to the sandwiches - the sweetness from the pineapple is great, but I couldn't really taste the mushrooms. I made the lentils one day in advance, so these were simple to put together when I got home from work. I served these with baked fries and peas. Yum!

Tofu Cheesesteaks and Avocado Fries

I waited all week last week for the weekend, because I wanted to make this slow-baked tofu cheesesteak sandwich! The recipe says there are shortcuts, but I didn't want to short-change a potentially awesome sandwich. When I made the sandwiches yesterday, I tried them with smashed avocado instead of the avocado aioli. I was not interested in buying a $6 jar of vegan mayo when I *hated* regular mayo. I can't imagine what I'd use the rest of the jar for, so I just used smashed avocado. I thought the flavor of the avocado got drowned out by the Daiya havarti cheese that I used. Tonight, I decided to use the rest of my avocado for baked avocado fries. These seem really popular on Pinterest, so I wanted to veganize them. I used Ener-G instead of egg, Earth Balance margarine for the butter, and Whole Foods brand panko bread crumbs. I would recommend increasing the seasoning quite a bit, because the seasoning was hard to taste. I saw on several other recipes that avocado would need to be seasoned aggressively if baked. I agree and I wish I had used some cayenne pepper to give the fries a kick. Overall, the sandwich was awesome and fries have serious potential. :)

Sweet & Savory Tofu

I am known to enjoy the combination of sweet and savory on occasion. I pinned this sweet chili tofu recipe on my Pinterest board a while ago, but decided to make it now that I have an abundance of tofu. The Costco in this area has a 3-pack of tofu for only $5! I am a happy girl. :)

For the sweet chili tofu, I pressed it for a while using my Tofu Xpress. I marinated the tofu in the sauce recipe during the day while I was at work. When I cooked the tofu in the skillet, I made another batch of the sauce to add to the tofu. So much flavor. I skipped the coconut quinoa recipe, but used the kale recipe with spinach instead. I know this photo is rather blah, but I literally was about to eat the first bite before I realized I should snap a quick photo.