Recipe Round-Up: Big Vegan

Finishing out some more recipes I have made from Big Vegan, by Robin Asbell. You can see the rest of my posts from this book here.

Tibetan Beef Fried Noodles: The recipe calls for sliced seitan to be used as the beef here, but instead I reconstituted some TVP slices with some beef-style stock and then cut them into strips. They were really tasty, and to be honest I prefer them to seitan. The noodles here are angel hair pasta, so nice and thin, and as well as the beef they are mixed with carrot, celery, tomato, and spinach (I added some extra spinach). They have a nice spiced flavour, a mix of garam masala and curry powder (I used less and a mild version). Very nice.
Rating: :)



Corn and Cauliflower Stir-Fried Noodles with Peanuts: This used the other half of my packet of angel hair pasta (though a half packet is 250g, more than the 170g called for, but I scaled up). I also scaled up the cauliflower, using a half head rather than one cup. This is meant to have a cheery yellow color scheme, with corn and yellow squash, but I used zucchini for the squash and make it more colourful. I also added 200g of Soyco Japanese Marinated Tofu. As I had increased some of the ingredients, I also increased the sauce ingredients by using AU tablespoons rather than US tablespoons (20mL vs 15mL). I served the crushed peanuts as a garnish, rather than mixing it through, and also popped some fresh coriander on top.
Rating: :)



Japanese Okinomiyaki Veggie Pancake: This uses silken tofu to replace the usual eggs in making okinomiyaki, and the pancake mix has cabbage, carrot, onion, and shiitake mushrooms mixed through. I only had a 9 inch tin, rather than 10 inch, to bake it in, so I baked a bit longer as it was thicker. It was nice, but fairly soft. The recipe has you make both a tomato sauce and a wasabi mayo for garnish. For the wasabi mayo, I used some vegan kewpie powder mixed with some wasabi powder, rather than vegenaise mixed with wasabi paste.
Rating: :)



Squash, Tofu, and Red Onion Roast with Sweet Soy Glaze: I had some technical issues with this, as following the roasting instructions for the titular ingredients didn't really do much, I ended up uncovering them, turning up the heat, and cooking longer and they roasted up nicely. The glaze didn't really dry out the way it said it would (you add it at the end of baking), but it thickened and coated everything nicely. This is a lovely dinner, and is nice with some rice and a green side. I roasted some brussels sprouts.
Rating: :)



Roasted Tofu and Veggie Curry in Garlicky Coconut Gravy: Again, I had to increase the baking time and temperature, and uncover, to get these to roast nicely. The vegetables here are cauliflower, carrots, parsnips, and turnips. However as they are baked with the sauce ingredients, the sauce ended up mostly absorbed. At the end, it has you sprinkle in some brown sugar and toss, which made it oddly sweet, I would skip this or use less. Overall this was kind of odd and bland, yet also a little moreish, which I suspect was the result of roasted veggies being delicious no matter what.
Rating: :|



Tofu and Rice Brown Rice and Veggies: The nice thing about this is instead of putting everything together in a pot on the stove, I could just throw it all into my rice cooker and then not even think about it until it was time for dinner. I love rice cookers. It's cooked in a coconutty sauce (light coconut milk for me, of course), and has a nice flavour from the seaweed. The recipe called for crumbled dulse, I don't have any I could crumble but I did have some dried dulse flakes that I used. But I cut the amount down from 1 cup to 1 20AU tablespoon, or it would have completely overtaken the dish because the flakes are quite concentrated.
Rating: :)



Millet, Ginger, and Edamame One Pot with Orange: This comes together prety quickly and easily, with a mix of carrots, scallions, and edamame as well with orange juice and zest and a garnish of nori. It tasted good, but was just a bit dry. Needed some more sort of sauce for it.
Rating: :)



Cute Kitty Photo of the Post



Yesterday (August 8th) was International Cat Day. But Dim Sim would like to remind everyone that EVERY DAY is indeed international cat day.