2 Quick Book Reviews

I'd like to thank Book Publishing Company again for sending me some of these books.

The first book here is The 4 Ingredient Vegan by Maribeth Abrams and Anne Dinshah.

Actually, I wasn't planning on reviewing this book, but they sent it anyway. At first I skimmed through it, just browsing the recipes. And most have maybe 5 or 6 ingredients. The only downfall here, for me, is that a lot of the recipes use prepackaged foods, like packaged pierogies, frozen pizza, hummus, spaghetti sauce, and soups. I wish there had been some easy recipes for these instead. Even the hummus can be a 4 ingredient recipe!! I've been so busy, I really only got around to making one of the recipes, but I will definitely make some more of them when I have the time.

Harvest Mash:

Before

After

This was really delicious and so easy to make! Lots of healthy vegetables, seasoned with broth....and I had lots of leftover broth left to use for something else. Of course I spiced it up a little with my Creole Seasoning :)

The author does list all sorts of foods you should stock your kitchen with, but alas, it includes premade soups, vegan meats, vegan sour cream/cream cheese, and canned foods. I suppose if you're in a real hurry, perhaps you should have some of these on hand, but I try to minimize them. I do have vegan cream cheese and sometimes sour cream in the fridge, but I use them very sparingly. Just because it's vegan, doesn't mean it's healthy!

So if you're the kind of person that's always in a hurry and keeps lots of canned tomatoes, beans, etc, stocked in your pantry, you'll get a lot of use out of this book.

Sproutman's Kitchen Garden by Steve Meyerowitz

I'd been looking at this book for a while, so I was excited to get it. Yes, it's a bit old, in that it was published in 1999. But....I really wanted a sprouting book. This one has a lot of various recipes for things, from breads, to pies and snacks. I wish it had a little more info on the actual sprouting process. It does dedicate a small section in the back to sprouting beans, seeds, and grains, but I wish it had explained it a little more in detail.

I tried (and failed) to make the Sprout Bread. I'd always wanted to make sprouted grain bread. Well, this one didn't seem to work for me. It was more like a thick cracker. Although it had a nice sourish flavor. I think perhaps it was my food processor.....I need a bigger, more robust one. This recipe also only called for sprouted wheat. No yeast, no nothing else. So my next try will be the kind with yeast. If you really want pictures of my failure.....here it is:

The nice sprouted wheat (did I sprout them too long perhaps??):

On the pans, before baking:

After baking:

The bottom fell out:

FAIL.

Next recipe, with success: Party Sprouts

The sprouted lentils:

The baked:

These were really delicious! Although they didn't totally dry out in the oven....they did keep well in a container for quite a while. I'll make these again. Great snack!

And lastly, the Hotcha Zucchini

I baked these instead of using the dehydrator, as I don't have one. But they were pretty good too, albeit a bit salty for my taste. S liked them! And he hates zucchini!

The book has recipes using all sorts of sprouts and soon, I will learn to sprout more than lentils and alfalfa. If you're a sprout fan, you should check out this book!

Have you ever made 100% sprouted grain bread? With or without yeast? In the oven, or bread machine?

If you still want to help me out with trip suggestions, you can here.

If you're in the New Orleans area, don't forget to check out the NOLA VeggieFest 2011!!! I'll be there!

Eat smart,
T.

Vegetable Barley Stew

We were recently on a trip, which I'll be blogging about in a few days, and I had the most amazing barley stew ever! Ok, it was in an Irish pub and it was called a mulligatawny, but still.....it was awesome! And I knew I had to try and reproduce it. So I did, with a few more vegetables :) So for those of you who are still in winter temperatures, this will really warm you up!

Vegetable Barley Stew:

1 1/2 cups hulled barley (aka hulless barley, NOT pearl)
4 cups vegetable broth


1 TB minced garlic
1 yellow onion, chopped
4-5 carrots, sliced
4 stalks celery, chopped
1 TB dried jalapenos
1/2 head cauliflower, broken into bite-sized pieces
1/2 zucchini, cubed
1/3 cabbage head, sliced into small pieces (not shredded, that's too small)
8 cups vegetable broth

To cook the barley, put the barley and broth into a pot and bring to a boil. Cover and simmer for 1 1/4 hours or so, until cooked, but still chewy. 


While the barley is cooking, add the garlic, onion, carrots, and celery to a large stockpot, along with 1/4 cup water. Heat on medium until onions are soft.  Add the broth, jalapenos, and cauliflower. Turn up the heat and bring to a boil, covered. Then turn it down to medium-low and add the zucchini. Let slowly boil (covered) for 5-10 minutes until the vegetables are mostly cooked, but not mushy. Add the cabbage and cook for another 3 minutes. Salt to taste. Spoon into a bowl and top with a large spoonful of barley.


*Note-you can use pearled barley, but it will take less time to cook (follow directions on the package).


Enjoy! I still have leftovers and will be eating them for dinner tonight, even though it's 80 degrees outside.


Eat smart,
T.

Who wants pizza?

Over the past few months, there have been a few nights when I was just too tired to cook. So, S bought a couple of Amy's pizzas to keep in the freezer. I'd never had them before, as we don't often buy this type of thing. Here are my thoughts:

The first one we tried was the Amy's Roasted Vegetable Pizza-

I've gotta say, this was really delicious! I loved the flavor of the caramelized onions. Who needs vegan cheese? This was great without it. It was good and filling....we each ate half.

The second one we tried was Amy's Rice Crust Spinach Pizza:

Hmmmm, this one didn't quite do it for me. The crust was really "buttery" and flaky, not what I like in a pizza. This one was more like a rich quiche. So if you're in the mood for that, go for it! But if you really want pizza, I don't recommend it. The cheese didn't really melt. I put it under the broiler for a few minutes after it baked, just to try and melt the cheese. It helped some, but mostly just browned it. It didn't look like the picture on the  box! But it was pretty good....just not very pizza-like.

If you really want great pizza, you should try my own recipe :)

Have any of you tried Amy's vegan pizzas? Or any other frozen vegan pizza?

Eat smart,
T.

Book Review: Asian Fusion

Thanks again to Book Publishing Company for sending me a review copy of "Asian Fusion: A Culinary Odyssey of Vegan Recipes". If you want to win some awesome books during their Live Delicious, Eat Vegan campaign, click here!

The Book: "Asian Fusion: A Culinary Odyssey of Vegan Recipes" by Chat Mingkwan.

What a great idea for a book! I love Asian food, and often, it can be veganized easily. This book covers various parts of Asia, from Burma to Vietnam:

Burma
China
India
Indonesia
Japan
Korea
Laos
Malaysia
Philippines
Singapore
Sri Lanka
Thailand
Vietnam

The first part of the book explains all the "special ingredients" used, like bean sauce/paste, herbs like galangal and fenugreek, Asian vegetables, and rices. Once again, you really need to have access to an Asian supermarket if you're going to follow these recipes exactly. I did, however, leave some out, as I just didn't have them.

The first recipe I made was the Tomato Salad, which was delicious! Very refreshing on a hot summer day (ok, it's already hot down here where I live) and I actually had all of the ingredients. Here is the recipe, with permission from Book Publishing Company:

Tomato Salad
Chung Sik Faan ke Sa Leut (from China)

3 large, rip tomatoes
3 tablespoons thinly sliced green onion, both green and white parts
2 tablespoons rice vinegar
1 tablespoon minced garlic
1 tablespoon light soy sauce
1 teaspoon sugar, more or less to taste
1 teaspoon sesame oil
1/2 teaspoon salt, or more to taste
1/2 teaspoon ground pepper

Slice the tomatoes thinly and arrange them on a serving platter. Refrigerate to chill.

To make the dressing, combine the remaining ingredients in a bowl and stir to mix well. To serve, sprinkle the dressing evenly over the tomatoes.

The next recipe I made was also from China: Fried Rice with Vegetable Fu Yang. I always have cooked brown rice around, so this was a great way to use it.I left out vegetables I didn't have and added others I did have. And it seemed to call for this "vegetarian stir fry sauce" but I just couldn't get myself to buy the stuff at the grocery store. There were just too many ingredients and it just didn't look healthy.  So I added in some extra soy sauce. It was very good though and I'd make it again. Pretty simple dish to make.

And the last recipe I made was the Sweet and Sour Plate from Singapore. I happened to have some leftover pineapple so this worked out great. I cut down on the sugar and added too much Sambal Oelek! It was quite spicy, so I had to serve it over brown rice. S didn't like all the pineapple (but he really doesn't like this kind of "sweet and sour" dish). So maybe next time I'll puree the pineapple first, so you don't get all the extra sweetness in each bite. Again, I added the vegetables I had and omitted the ones I didn't have.

I'm excited to try some of the other recipes in this book. I do see that it does call for a lot of sugar and that "vegetarian stir fry sauce". I'll probably end up omitting the latter and really cutting down on the sugar part. I will have to see what I can get at my Asian supermarket. Not sure they have kaffir lime leaves, fresh curry leaves, abalone and oyster mushrooms, or fresh lemongrass.......

Overall, it's a great book if you want to cook up some good Asian food, vegan style. There are tons of different types of recipes to choose from. On the other hand, I'm pretty sure 90% of the recipes call for sugar. But, you can probably leave it out or replace it with something else. So go on over to Book Publishing Company and order yourself a copy! And don't forget to enter to win some cool free books too :)

......On another note, I still need your help on my upcoming trip. I need as many suggestions (foodwise) as you can give me, either on the places I'm going, or stuff to bring with me, so please check out my trip post and help a girl out!

Eat smart,
T.