Showing posts with label MrsTattooedgeek. Show all posts
Showing posts with label MrsTattooedgeek. Show all posts

Thursday, October 8, 2009

Vegan Mofo day8 Vegan Shrimp Fra Diavolo

17 years ago, before we both became completely vegetarian, my husband was a shrimp and fish fan.  Me, not so much. When we stumbled upon vegan shrimp ~ boy was he excited to make Shrimp Fra Diavolo.  His Fra Diavolo sauce is always excellent. The vegan shrimp is a bit fickle, drop it in the Fra Diavolo sauce and it was really good.  But saute it Scampi style in garlic, 2 tbs of earth balance, lemon juice, white wine and fresh parsley and the vegan shrimp became very rubbery. In our opinion Vegan Shrimp, Fra Diavolo = good, Scampi = not so good.

Monday, October 5, 2009

VeganMofo Italian Wedding Soup & Vanilla Cookies with Chocolate Sprinkles


Italian Wedding Soup
Italian Wedding Soup is a delicious hearty soup that "marries up" pasta, meat and greens.  I make my Vegan Wedding Soup with vegetable broth, chopped endive or spinach, chopped carrots, onions and garlic, 2 cups of vegan white wine, olive oil, 1/2 cup of lemon juice, sea salt & pepper, chopped parsley, small ring shaped pasta and vegan meatballs.  If I don't have any vegetable broth on hand I'll use Rapunzel Vegan Bouillon and for the meatballs I'll use Nate's Italian style.  Nate's are precooked and usually frozen so after all of the vegetables and the ring shaped pasta are fully cooked I'll drop the vegan meatballs into the broth and let them reheat right in the pot of soup. Bring the pot to a boil again for 5-6mins then serve.  I'll make vegan parmesan by putting Bob's Red Mill Almond Flour, sesame seeds, garlic powder, dried oregano and lemon juice in the food processor and process into a course meal.  Put a bowl of the Vegan Parmesan on the table, it is a great companion for your Wedding Soup.  Don't forget garlic bread!
For Bob's Red Mill flours and meals: http://www.bobsredmill.com/
 
Vegan Vanilla Butter Cookies with Chocolate Sprinkles
Chocolate "Let's Do Sprinklez" are perfect decoration for Vegan Vanilla Butter cookies.  Chocolate "Let's Do Sprinklez" are a little pricey.  One box has two very small pouches of sprinkles but they taste great.  Traditional chocolate sprinkles tend to be both tasteless and loaded with dyes and chemicals, besides every other brand I found contained Confectioner's glaze which is not vegan.  Chocolate "Let's Do Sprinklez" is Confectioner's glaze free, all natural and made with real Chocolate.


Sunday, October 4, 2009

VeganMofo day 4 ~ Easy Chik'N Salad Pitas, Corn Bread my Vegan kids.



Super Easy Chik'N Salad Pitas

2 packages of Morning Star Farm Chik'N strips thawed and Diced
1 Red Pepper Diced
1 Green Pepper Diced
 1/2 Sweet Onion Diced
1/2 Red Onion Diced
1 Bunch of fresh Italian Parsley chopped
Handful of Cherry tomatoes cut in halves
2 cups of  Follow Your Heat Vegenaise
Sea Salt & Pepper to taste (I like Jane's Krazy Mixedup salt)
2tsp Braggs Apple Cider Vinegar
Garlic Powder to taste
1tbs prepared mustard
2 or 3 marinated roasted red peppers chopped

Mix Vegenaise, apple cider vinegar, garlic powder, prepared mustard, chopped roasted red peppers in a bowl and set aside.  Mix the Veggies and ChikN in a large bowl.  Pour Vegenaise mixture over Veggies and ChickN and stir.  Make sure everything is really covered with the Vegenaise mixture.  Add sea salt and pepper to taste and let chill or serve in Pita's immediately.  Cover left overs and refrigerate.  This salad tastes better and better every day!  All of the dressing ingredients can be increased or decreased to you preference ~ just remember that the Morning Star Farm Chik'N strips are preseasoned and pretty peppery.

Em and her cornbreads
My youngest daughter, unlike me, would rather eat cornbread than candy, cookies or cake, even chocolate cake ~ weird.  She'll actually nag to make cornbread. She/we (but mostly she) veganized a recipe using vanilla soy yogurt and vanilla soy milk.  It makes a really sweet pleasant corn muffin or corn bread. 

Years ago my oldest two and I were walking to the playground and we came across a dead pigeon laying in the middle of the sidewalk.  My son (then 3) looked down at the dead bird and said "Put that bird in a baggie so we can bring it home for Nanny (his grandmother)"  I asked him why would we do that?  He replied  "Cause she eats dead birds." "Not pigeons!" I said. My daughter (than 2) looked up at me and with a completely puzzled look on her face asked "What's the difference?"  My son added "A dead bird is a dead bird right?"  How do you argue with a 3 year old when he's right?

One afternoon when my oldest daughter was in preschool I received a phone call from her teacher complaining that my daughter had disrupted the class that day. I asked what had she done.  The teacher told me that she had made a big pot of Chicken Alphabet soup for the students.  When she came to give my daughter some my daughter said "no thank you" The teacher asked "why not?"  my daughter replied "I don't  eat dead meat soup."  The rest of the children heard what my daughter said and then they didn't want to eat "dead meat soup." either.  That's my girl, revolution starter in preschool.



Saturday, October 3, 2009

Vegan Mofo Day 3 East meets West!


Stir Fried Seitan in Garlic Chili Sauce


Vegan Sushi

House of Vegetarian
Whenever we find ourselves in Manhattan we aim to eat at House of Vegetarian 68 Mott Street, NY.  It's not the trendiest place to eat in NYC but it's our favorite.  The food is straight up Chinese food ~ nothing  too fancy, it's all vegetarian and I'm pretty sure all vegan.  We don't live in NYC and taking 5 kids and 2 adults out to eat is not something we can afford to do more than a few times a year.  And forget about ordering good vegan Chinese food up here in the Hudson Valley. So we make our own. 
This is a pretty good Garlic Sauce recipe:
2 tbs rice vinegar
3tbs pure maple syrup
2 tbs dark soy sauce
2tbs Chinese rice wine
3 to 4 whole dried chili peppers
3 tbs sesame oil
1/4 cup water
3 to 4 cloves of garlic thinly sliced
2 tbs cornstarch
Saute garlic in sesame oil for a min or so.  Dissolve corn starch in water. Stir all of the other ingredients (except cornstarch and water) into the sauteed garlic and bring to boil for about 3 mins.   After 3 mins stir in cornstarch and water combo.  Bring to boil again while stirring.  Sauce will thicken.  Pour over your stir fry.  This sauce works really well with tofu, seitan, tempeh and almost any veggies you would use in a stir fry.

Whenever my man (Mr. Tattooedgeek) isn't working for the man he's working for the woman ~ me! He's my resident Sushi Chef , Screen Printer and Artist. Aside from the typical veggie sushi rolls he makes toasted tempeh w/hot sauce rolls, teriyaki seitan rolls and others.
We've added several new totes to the shop this week.  This Hanya tote is just one of them.   



Caught Willow, one of our Siamese, being lazy earlier today ~ she was too cute to pass up!


Monday, September 28, 2009

Check Out September's Little Black Box.



Tattooedgeek Inc. Soy Candles will be included in Septembers Little Black Box. Dozens of various 1oz tins were sent out. We are so happy to be included along side so many talented crafters! Pick up a Little Black Box for yourself. http://thelittleblackboxes.com