Recipe Round-Up: Vegan Junk Food (e-book)

Hello friends! I missed last week of blogging because I have been sick with an awful cold. I ended up taking a few days off work, and while I am a better than I was I still definitely have a ways to go to recovery. Being sick is no fun! But what is fun is food. And even if I spend a few days not cooking because I had no energy and little appetite (hello peanut butter toast, my old friend), I still have a million back logged photos to keep on blogging forever.

I really love cooking from physical cookbooks. I like something to flip through, choose, and write notes into. One of the reasons I am so bad at making the whole list of delicious recipes from blogs I want to try is because my brain defaults to the joys of looking through a book. Occasionally though, cookbooks come up on Kindle that are just too cheap to say no to! Vegan Junk Food by Lane Gold was one of these super duper specials. But it suffered from being trapped in my Kindle, forgotten in favour of the actual books. However, recently I made a concerted effort to go through it and start cooking from it, and it has a lot of really fun stuff in it! Since I bought this, a new Expanded Edition has also been released. This is the first time I have posted anything from this book!

Pumpkin Pie Pancakes with Cinnamon Syrup: I had some leftover tinned pumpkin kicking around in my freezer, and this seemed like and excellent way to use it up! I made a half recipe of batter, and using the 1/3 cup scoops they recommended I got 3.5 pancakes. I ate these all for a filling breakfast. The batter was pretty thick, so the pancakes didn't form pretty rounds. There is almost no sugar in the batter mix, so the pancakes themselves are barely sweet at all. This means the cinnamon syrup goes perfectly with them, bringing a wonderful sweetness. I only made 1/4 recipe of the syrup, and as you can see I thought the sugar had all dissolved but then when I poured it on it hadn't really. But it was still lovely. I served these with some fresh raspberries as well.
Rating: :)



Portobello Cheesesteak: I made a half recipe of this for two sandwiches, and they were very nice. Instead of using capsicum, I used some celery for crunch. The mushrooms are sauteed in a mix including Worcestershire sauce, so they had a lovely savoury flavour. I used some leftover Vietnamese baguette rolls, and scooped out a bit of the bread from the tops to fill with cheese (I used FYH mozzarella). I grilled/broiled the sandwiches with their tops and bottoms separated rather than all assembled, to make sure the cheese definitely got nice and melty.
Rating: :)



Pad Thai Wrap: I made the full recipe of noodles, but only made two wraps out of them. This meant I had lots of delicious leftovers to eat as regular pad thai! The pad thai is pretty simple, with baked tofu, green onions, and peanuts. I left out the chili. But it is also topped with some delicious Spicy Peanut Sauce. Of course when I made it, I left out the spicy parts! The sauce has PB, lime juice, seasoned vinegar, brown sugar, and coriander, and has a lovely sweet and tangy flavour. I just made a half recipe of the sauce to serve with the wraps. I served these with some steamed broccoli on the side, topped with more peanut sauce.
Rating: Wraps :), Sauce :)



South-of-the-Border Potato Tacos: Cheesy potato stuffed pan-fried tacos with avocado sauce? Sign me up. I made a half recipe, and stuffed it into two regular-sized wheat tortillas. The potatoes are boiled, then pan-fried to get nice and golden. I also added some mushrooms stems, spinach and celery to the filling, and left out the jalapeno. Both nutritional yeast and melted mozzarella (I used FYH) make it wonderfully cheesy. The filling is folded into the tortillas, and then they are pan-fried. I dry fried mine. To be honest, I'd say these were more like quesadillas rather than tacos. But still yummy. The crowning glory though is the Avocado Sauce, which is amazing! It is also easy to scale down if you are just making enough for a single dinner. I left out the chili in it and used onion powder rather than chopped onion. Served with some steamed broccoli.
Rating: Tacos :), Avocado Sauce :D



Noodles with Tofu and Cashew Stir-Fry: I halved this recipe yo use up some leftover tofu (300g) and linguine (100g), though I still used the full amount of snow peas and added a bit of diced carrot. I left out the chili, of course. The tofu is coated in cornflour and pan fried to be crispy. I find the easiest way to do this is the put the cubed tofu in a large mixing bowl with a lid, sprinkle the cornflour on top, put the lid on, and shake. I found this recipe to be a bit too sweet. The sauce is a combination of hoisin, light soy, brown sugar, and seasoned rice vinegar. I think I would use regular rice vinegar, regular soy sauce, and leave out the brown sugar if I made it again.
Rating: :|



Spinach Artichoke Dip: This recipe does not mess around, full of cream cheese, sour cream, and mayo it is incredibly rich! Of course it has spinach and artichoke in it, as well as some nutritional yeast and seasonings. Then it is topped with mozzarella. I popped it under the grill for a few minutes after baking to really get the cheese melted and bubbly. Serve with corn chips and veggie sticks, this will be snapped up fast.
Rating: :)



Cute Kitty Photo of the Post



While some days she ignores me in favour of sleeping in her chair cave, there have been several days when I have been sick and on the sofa that she has taken advantage of it and spent some quality time on my lap.