Recipe Round-Up: Quick and Easy Low-Cal Vegan Comfort Food

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I've posted about how much I love Appetite For Reduction, so I was excited to get Quick and Easy Low-Cal Vegan Comfort Food by Alicia Simpson, figuring that it would be full of quick, fresh, low cal interpretations of favourite comforty foods. Not so much. In fact with many of the recipes I've made it seems to be fairly high-cal (I haven't made it yet, but the alfredo recipe has half a cup of oil in the sauce!), but with teeny tiny serving sizes. This doesn't really work when you have a decent appetite! Also I don't really find this all that quick and easy, several recipes require ingredients that need to be pre-made. Oh well. I have still made some nice stuff from here.

Chickpea Cacciatore with Sesame Broccolini: The cacciatore was fantatic, with a sauce full of all sorts of herbs. I used peas instead of capsicum, and there was also carrot and onion. I also added a few tablespoons of red wine that I had kicking around. This made about 4 servings, rather than 6. I used four small bunches of broccolini for the side dish, which are served with a sauce of sesame oil, balsamic, orange juice and Braggs, which gave 4 servings, rather than 6. Served over brown rice.
Rating: Cacciatore :D, Broccolini :)



Cincinnati Chili and Five-Minute Garlic Spinach: This chili has TVP and kidney beans in it, as well as liquid smoke, cocoa powder and lots of seasonings. Traditionally served over spaghetti, this versions lacks the cheesy sauce that I have made in other recipes. I missed the cheesy sauce. I only used 8oz of spaghetti rather than one pound, so got 5 servings rather than 10, but if I had made it with the full amount of pasta there would have been a tiny amount of the chili itself for each servings. The spinach comes together very quickly.
Rating: Chili :), Spinach :)



White Bean Cassoulet: This was nice, but lacked the flavour that I love in a cassoulet, Leeks, carrots, celery and white beans are the main parts of this. I got four servings out of this, rather than 6.
Rating: :)



Indian-Spiced Chickpeas: This comes together very quickly, and is a bit bland in that tasty kind of wayI served this over basmati rice and baby spinach.
Rating: :)



Kung Pao Tofu: I have come to very much enjoy kung pao tofu recipes, the sauce is just lovely, especially with the rice and broccoli to serve with it. I forgot to press the tofu, but it was still fine. I also pan-fried the tofu in a little peanut oil rather than bake roasting it in the oven for speediness. I got three and a half servings out of this, rather than 5.
Rating: :)



Chick'n Curry: This recipe calls for a defrosted package of MorningStar Farms Meal Starters Chick'n Strips, which we don't have here. Instead I used some Fry's Chicken Style Strips. I cooked the strips according to packet directions first, then followed the seasoning and baking directions, otherwise they end up with a strange texture. The was OK, though a bit bland.
Rating: :|



Strawberry Cheesecake Ice Cream: This simple ice cream has only five ingredients (including some Tofutti cream cheese), and has a lovely flavour. It is especially great with strawberry cupcakes, and makes a great sundae.
Rating: :)



Pepita Smoothie: I was intrigued to try this raw pumpkin seed based smoothie. It said it makes two servings, but a half recipe made a very small serving! There is richness from the pepita, but the liquid is water, which left it with a faint watery aftertaste. I was expecting it to be green, but the mango and strawberry gave it a lovely pinkish hue.
Rating: :)



Cute Kitty Photo of the Post



Sahara toes.