This and That

Here is a hodgepodge of what's been going on in the kitchen (or somebody else's kitchen - meaning a store) for the past month or so. It is pic heavy, so please accept my apologies in advance (yeah right, who doesn't love food porn?).

Leahey vegan mac & cheeze. I did not want to try this, but Andy is into packaged up fake cheeze stuff, so it happened. I'm glad that it did, because it was really good. I wish I didn't have to look at the pic, because I want more!

PCC chocolate cheezecake. This was pretty good. It didn't have exactly the texture of cheesecake, but not bad. I'm not that into super dense chocolate things like this. Probably because if I'm going for a chocolate overload, I would rather have a small piece of organic fair trade snobby high end stuff that is at least 70% cacao.

PCC chocolate chip cookies in a bag. I have never seen these before. They reminded me of a packaged cookie, but in a good way. It was between a crunchy cookie and a soft cookie.

Milano Cookies. I went out of the house and came back to some milano cookies baked by Andy. He had seen this recipe and it had been eating away at him. The cookies could have been a little thinner (his critique, not mine). I think the middle stuff was spot on.

Vegetarian Times' "best" vegan lasagna ever. NOT. Have you ever made a recipe that called for lots of fattening stuff and the result wasn't really worth it? This would be it. I prefer a veggie lasagna that has no fake meat, a tofu ricotta that doesn't require tofutti, and lots of veggies. It was ok, but nothing special. They say it serves 8, but their nutritional info is for a much smaller piece. If you fix their math, it's around 1,000 calories for 1/8 of the lasagna - which is a normal sized serving. ugh.

Here are the pics from St. Patty's Day.

Irish Soda Bread. From the Joy of Vegan Baking. It was ok, but was sort of dense. At least it didn't taste like a pile of baking soda like some others I have tried. It didn't call for caraway seeds and raisins, but I added them in.
Colcannon, Carrots & Parsnips, and Corned Seitan. The veggie sides were really good. I used the leftovers to make quesadillas the next day.

The corned seitan was not good. I had cut way back on the salt, but it was still way too salty. Good news is that the seitan texture was just how I like it, so I'll be trying some of her other seitan recipes.

Apple Duff. Basically you take an apple, core it (I also cut it in 1/2), fill it with cinnamon, brown sugar, and raisins (in this case raisins, dried cranberries, dried blueberries). Then you wrap it up in puff pastry and bake. It was good, but the puff pastry wasn't that flavorful. Perhaps some sort of wash on the outside was needed.

Super Green Tofu Quiche. I didn't make this for St. Patty's day, but really should have. This is your basic tofu quiche w/ onions, broccoli and spinach. The main herb was tarragon. It was really good. This past weekend, I made the same thing with the addition of kale.

PS. Guava, this is my typical brunch food

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Here's Tubs caught mid yawn.

Persian Cooking Class & Pi Day

I took the Flavors of Persia class at PCC (so did yasmin in an earlier class). It was taught by Omid Roustaei. If you are in the area and haven't taken a class taught by Omid, you should make an effort to do so. He is an awesome instructor. He also teaches The Main Course series, each of which are around 15 hours of learning the basics of cooking deconstructed. I want to take that class, but haven't had a chance to fit it into my schedule.

Back to Persian cooking. The class was really fun and filled with stories about Omid's experiences growing up and why each dish was important and when they would eat it. A food processor is definitely useful because there is a lot of fine chopping that needs to be done.

The food was like nothing I've had before, and I hope I have a chance to explore more Persian food in the future (because it is delicious).

Khoresh-e-Fesenjoon (left)(Pomegranate-Walnut Stew with Chicken Style Seitan)
Polo (Steamed Basmati Rice with Saffron)
Koresh-e-Ghormeh Sabzi (Persian Fresh Herb Stew)

Amazing! The pomegranate stew was very tangy. The walnuts are ground very fine so that you don't know they are there. The herb stew earned it's name because it had a ton of fresh herbs in it. A good contrast to the pomegranate stew.
Havij Polo (Saffron Carrot Rice Pilaf with Roasted Tofu). The rice had orange marmalade in it so it had an interesting sweet flavor. As you can see, the tofu was roasted to perfection with a lot of spices.

Baghlavah (Persian Baklava). Persian baklava is different because it has a simple sugar syrup with rose water instead of honey (yay, no honey), cardamom instead of cinnamon, and almonds (or pistachios) instead of walnuts. In class he used coconut oil instead of butter.

The next week, I made 3 of the dishes at home because I knew Andy would love them.

Pomegranate stew with Polo. This tasted just like the stew Omid made in class. I should have ground up the walnuts more. It was surprisingly easy to make. This is not a dish that you can have a huge portion of because it is so sweet and sour and rich all at the same time, but it will definitely be a favorite that I will look forward to.

The classes that I have taken lately have made me reconsider hating saffron. When used correctly, it adds to a dish. Though I still don't like it super strong. Omid grinds his saffron so that it's flavor spreads through the dish better.

Baklava. I made a 1/2 batch. I greased up every sheet and I spread the nut filling between 4 layers rather than 2. It was very crispy when it came out of the oven and it stayed that way. It looks pale in the pic, but it wasn't in real life. Note to self: Do not make baklava if it's not going to be eaten by more than 2 people. Otherwise sugar overload will ensue.

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Sorry for the super huge post, but I'm trying to catch up from my slacking without posting every day. 3/14/2009 was Pi Day, so Pizza Pi had their annual Pi weekend. Nerdy deliousness. I'm sure you're all getting sick of seeing pics of pizza, but I promise you I didn't order the same ol' same ol'.

Cheezy Breadsticks. We get these once in a while instead of the plain ones. There was also a caesar's salad, but I didn't take a pic.

I think this was called St. Patrick's Revenge. The sauce was some form of artichoke topped with green peppers, spinach and other green veggies/herbs that made for a pizza that I hope they keep on their menu. In honor of Pi Day, they also made stuffed crust pizza upon request.

Cheezeburger sandwich. This was good, but I like it in pizza version bestest. The sandwich wasn't open faced, I did it do you could see the inside.

Dessert Pizza. mmmmmm..... yogurt and fruit. I should have ordered it on a stuffed crust.

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I saw this cat from a distance and wondered how tubs had gotten outside. Then I figured it out and took a very bad pic of the neighbor cat before he took off. He is HUGE!
Here is a slightly better pic of him heading back home. If you click on it to get a better view, you can see that it looks like one eye opens up more than the other.