Tuesday, December 30, 2008

Poached Pear Salad

Poached Pear Salad with Honey Sherry Vinagrette
This salad is simple, beautiful, and delicious--perfect for entertaining! We served this as the second course of our 5-course holiday dinner, and it was a huge success. We even veganized it by substituting Blue-Style Sheese for bleu cheese. The presentation is pretty, and the dressing is light and refreshing!

My friend's mom got the recipe from some caterers, so it makes for a pretty large salad :) Obviously, you can scale up or down according to your needs. In addition to veganizing the recipe, we did a few other substitutions and modifications as well, which I've listed in my notes below.

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Poached Pear Salad
24oz California field greens
96pc sun dried cherries
96pc toasted walnuts
6 whole poached pears 1/2 fanned
12oz crumbled amish blue cheese
12pc edible flowers
honey sherry vinaigrette (see below)

Honey Sherry Vinaigrette
1/4 cup sherry vinegar (have also used champagne citrus and white balsamic raspberry vinegars)
1/2 cup olive oil
2 Tbsp honey
2 Tbsp pomegranate molasses
salt and pepper to taste


Notes
Instead of counting out 96 cherries, we just used a 5 oz bag. It didn't seem like a lot, so we probably could have used more. We also didn't count out the walnuts; we probably used 8oz or so, which was perfect.

Rather than poaching the pears, we just sliced them into fans, and served 1/4 of a pear per person. It turned out pretty good--I thought the fresh pears made it very refreshing and light!


As I mentioned before, we substituted the Amish bleu cheese with vegan Bleu Sheese (we used a 4oz box). We served the sheese separately so people could choose how much to add to their own salad; however, we did toss the salad with the vinaigrette (also pictured below) just before serving.


We used 2 boxes of edible flowers, which is about double what the recipe calls for. I thought it looked perfect that way!


We couldn't find sherry vinegar, so we used a citrus champagne vinegar instead. It turned out really delicious.

My friend's mom had pomegranate molasses in stock, so we didn't have to buy it. Apparently it's hard to find, though. She said the best bet would have been to go to a Middle Eastern grocery store.

The vinaigrette can be prepared beforehand. We made ours the night before.
Toss the cherries, flowers, and walnuts (and cheese, if desired) together before tossing with the greens & dressing.


Serve, and enjoy!

Saturday, December 27, 2008

Vegan Sweet Potato Pie

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Vegan Sweet Potato Pie w/Vegan Whipped Cream & Berries w/Chocolate Tofu Mousse

And now, for the vegan version of the Chopping Block Vegetarian Thanksgiving Sweet Potato Pie! It's basically the same recipe, but I didn't want to clutter the original version with too many notes. So here it is, reprinted for all my vegan friends!

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Vegan Sweet Potato Pie
For the filling:
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1 pound roasted sweet potatoes, mashed (We used canned)
12 oz coconut milk
egg replacer for 2 large eggs (We used EnerG)
1/4 teaspoon fresh grated nutmeg
1 teaspoon cinnamon
3 tablespoons crystallized ginger, minced
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 recipe pie dough, using vegan subs for butter & shortening

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.
Roll out your pie dough so it fits into a 9 inch pie dish. Crimp the edges under and set aside.

Mix all ingredients together for the filling and pour into the prepared pan.
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Place pie in preheated oven and bake for 15 minutes, and reduce heat to 350 degrees.
Continue to bake for another 40 to 50 minutes, or when a knife is inserted it will come out clean. (Our knife never came out clean. Our filling was boiling, and a skin formed on top, but the knife still came out wet. The filling didn't set for about an hour after we took it out of the oven, but it did eventually set.)
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Remove from oven and let rest at room temperature for at least 1 hour. You can serve at room temperature or cold, with or without vegan whipped cream.
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Notes:
In general:
- Crystallized ginger is easily found at Whole Foods or any specialty store
- Roast the sweet potatoes before starting. Approximately 2 potatoes per pound. Canned works fine too.
- Can also use pumpkin instead of sweet potato. It wasn't as good as the sweet potato, but it could have been better if we added pumpkin pie spices to it.
- Use a ricer to mash the sweet potatoes
- Food scales are a must in any kitchen!

For the filling:
- Add the egg replacer as late as possible because it tends to set fairly quickly.
- Don't stir the potatoes too much or they'll get gluey.
- Based on the above, the best order would probably be to mix everything but the potatoes & egg first. Then, when you're ready to pour the filling, add the egg relacer until blended, then finally the sweet potato. Fill the pie immediately.

For the crust:
- Use lots of flour on work surface & rolling pin to prevent sticking.
- Let dough temper 10 minutes before rolling so it's not too cold.
- Use the rolling pin to place the dough into the pie plate.
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- Leave edges on when you add the filling, then use kitchen shears to cut the excess.
- Tuck the edges under before crimping.
- Cover the edges with foil at the beginning to protect it from burning.

- Pie is done when skin form on top and filling boils. Our filling did not set until it cooled down, about an hour after we took it out of the oven.

Sweet Potato Pie

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Here is the recipe for the Sweet Potato Pie I learned to make at my Vegetarian Thanksgiving class at the Chopping Block! We made a vegan version of it at our Holiday Dinner Party, but I'll post about that separately since we deviated quite a bit from the original version. Both versions were very good, but I think I'll stick with the vegan version in the future (somehow it feels less sinful, even though I know it's probably the same calorie-wise).

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Sweet Potato Pie
For the filling:
1 pound roasted sweet potatoes, mashed
one 12 oz can evaporated milk
2 large eggs
1/4 teaspoon fresh grated nutmeg
1 teaspoon cinnamon
3 tablespoons crystallized ginger, minced
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 recipe pie dough

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.
Roll out your pie dough so it fits into a 9 inch pie dish. Crimp the edges under and set aside.
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Mix all ingredients together for the filling and pour into the prepared pan.
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Place pie in preheated oven and bake for 15 minutes, and reduce heat to 350 degrees.
Continue to bake for another 40 to 50 minutes, or when a knife is inserted it will come out clean.

Remove from oven and let rest at room temperature for at least 1 hour. You can serve at room temperature or cold, with or without whipped cream.
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Notes from class:
- Crystallized ginger is easily found at Whole Foods or any specialty store
- Roast the sweet potatoes before starting. Approximately 2 potatoes per pound
- Can also use pumpkin instead of sweet potato
- Use a ricer to mash the sweet potatoes
- Food scales are a must in any kitchen!

- Cream the eggs & the sugar first.
- Don't stir the potatoes too much or they'll get gluey

For the crust
- Use lots of flour on work surface & rolling pin to prevent sticking.
- Let dough temper 10 minutes before rolling so it's not too cold.
- Use the rolling pin to place the dough into the pie plate.
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- Leave edges on when you add the filling, then use kitchen shears to cut the excess.
- Tuck the edges under before crimping.
- Cover the edges with foil at the beginning to protect it from burning.

- Instead of egg wash, can use heavy cream to give it color.
- Pie is done when filling is no longer jiggly.

Pie or Tart Dough

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This is an all-purpose dough we learned to make at the Vegetarian Thanksgiving class I took at the Chopping Block. This same recipe was used to make a Mushroom & Tempeh Tart as well as a Sweet Potato Pie. It's pretty versatile, as it can be used in both sweet and savory dishes!

Pie or Tart Dough
Makes: One double crust pie or two tarts.

2 cups all-purpose flour
1-2 tablespoons sugar (optional)
Pinch fine sea salt
1 1/2 stick unsalted butter, chilled
1/4 cup shortening, chilled
1/3 cup cold water

Put flour, sugar, and salt in the bowl of a food processor fitted with a metal blade. Cut butter and shortening into small pieces and add to processor.

Pulse mixture until crumbly and butter is in small pieces throughout the flour. Working quickly, start processor and add ice cold water until the mixture just forms a ball.

Turn out dough onto a work surface and from into a ball. Cut the ball in half and flatten each piece into a disc. Wrap each disc in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 24 hours.

Notes from class
- Pulse in food process just until dough comes together (approximately 8 pulses).
- Only add just enough water to form ball.
- For pie crust, was went larger chunks of butter; dollops of butter & shortening cause the flakiness in the crust.
- The dough must be chilled for a minimum of 2 hours. Can be frozen and kept for 4 months.

Tuesday, December 23, 2008

A Sad, Sad Day in Gingerbread Land

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Our vegan friend Lake challenged my cooking buddy & me to come up with the Ultimate Gingerbread House. So in addition to qualifying for our Iron Chef-style cooking blog's Holiday HoHo Challenge, this entry also satisfies Lake's Ultimate Gingerbread Challenge. However, we one-upped him and made the Ultimate Gingerbread Diorama instead. I'm pretty sure it's not low calorie, but hey, it's vegan, and we didn't eat most of it. And it was a hit at our dinner party this past weekend!

We followed this recipe pretty much to the letter. The gingerbread recipe was really good! It worked really well for everything we did. It was structurally sound, but easy to cut, and tasted really good.

We used these cookie cutters to make our men:

And because we were too lazy to build a house, we used a loaf pan to make an nondescript building:

The icing, on the other hand, didn't work out as well as the gingerbread. It was a bit melty-looking which made everything look pretty sad. In the end, our it made our whole gingerbread diorama even funnier, but it was really hard to control what we wanted it to look like. For example, our snowman wasn't supposed to be melted, but that's just how he ended up :(

I'd still call our project a success. Since our diorama was supposed to be humorous, it wasn't all that bad that the icing was melty. Lake ended up making his own (more traditional) gingerbread house for the party with a better frosting recipe, so if anyone's interested, I could try to snag that from him and post it (unless it's a super-top secret concoction. Or he doesn't remember what he did).


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VEGAN GINGERBREAD
The gingerbread recipe comes from the Vegan Lunchbox blog.
- 1/3 cup non-hydrogenated margarine, at room temperature
- 1 cup packed brown sugar
- 1 cup sweet unsulphured molasses
- ¾ cup water
- 6 cups all-purpose flour
- 2 tsp. baking soda
- ¾ tsp. kosher salt
- 1 tsp. cinnamon
- 1 tsp. ground ginger
- ½ tsp. cloves
- ½ tsp. allspice


METHOD:
1. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle hook attachment, or in a large mixing bowl with a hand mixer, cream together the margarine, brown sugar, molasses, and ½ cup of water.
2. In another bowl, sift together the flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, ginger, cloves, and allspice. Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients, adding just enough of the water to incorporate all the flour and form a dough that holds together well.

3. Turn the dough out of the bowl and form into four equal balls. Wrap each ball well with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least one hour.

4. Preheat the oven to 350º. Line some baking sheets with parchment and spray with nonstick spray. Set aside.
5. Working with one ball at a time, roll the dough out on a lightly floured surface with a lightly floured rolling pin. Roll the dough about ¼-inch thick and cut into desired shapes.

6. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes, until the surface is firm. Transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

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VEGAN ROYAL ICING
The icing comes from http://www.goodbaker.com/.
- 1 lb. confectioners' sugar
- 1/4 cup powdered soy milk
- 6 tbsp soy milk
- 6 tbsp light corn syrup

METHOD:
In a mixing bowl, mix the sugar and soy milk powder, then add most, but not all, of the soy milk. Add corn syrup just until combined. Add remaining soy milk if the icing consistency is not smooth enough, but be careful not to add so much that it will be too runny or fail to harden.

Monday, December 22, 2008

Our Vegan Holiday Dinner



One of the best ways to share holiday cheer with friends is by hosting the most fabulous dinner party ever! Since my friend and I have been cooking up a storm the past few weeks and finding tons of great recipes, we decided to do just that :) We made the meal completely vegan so that everyone could enjoy everything we made (we had 2 vegans, 4 vegetarians, and 5 omnis in the group). It turned out better than expected, and everyone was thoroughly impressed!

Here's the menu for our five-course dinner. I've already posted many of the recipes for the dishes that were featured. Vegan substitutions were made when necessary. I've also noted any other changes. For the ones that I haven't blogged about yet, stay tuned; I'll post those recipes soon!

Aperitif
Glögg
Holiday Cheer in a Mug!
We used a modified version of the recipe we did for the Holiday Challenge. From the original recipe, we doubled the wine and brandy; halved the almonds and raisins; and quartered the orange peel. The recipe turned out perfect, and it was a hit!



Salad
Poached Pear Salad
A tried-and-true salad that's simple and elegant.
My friend's mom has been using this recipe for years to entertain guests. It's light, fruity, and refreshing--a great way to start off the meal!



Soup
Velvety Squash Soup
Rich, smooth, and warm.
We served a modified version of the soup we had done for the Cooking Light Challenge. Instead of using fresh squashes, we used canned puree. Unfortunately they didn't have canned acorn squash, so we used pumpkin instead. It turned our fairly well, though we did tweak the spices slightly since the pumpkin is so much more flavorful than acorn squash.



Main Course
Marshall Field's Chik'n Pot Pie
A Chicago Classic.
We used the same veganized version of the recipe that we did for the Holiday Challenge. We just omitted the first part where we had to boil the chik'n to make stock. Instead, we just used some of the liquid that came with the seitan and some veggie stock.


Mustard & Maple Glazed Brussels Sprouts
Popular, even among Brussels sprouts-haters!
I followed the directions as written, and it took forever to reduce the sauce. The sprouts ended up a bit overcooked, but it was still very good. Next time, I'd skip the step that says to cover and cook for 10 minutes. I'll just allow it to cook uncovered until the sauce is reduced.


Acorn Squash with Apple, Sage, and Quinoa Stuffing
My new go-to dish for potlucks and guests.
For this one, we added some apple sage seitan sausages to the stuffing to increase the protein content. It went really well with the recipe! I may make this a permanent addition to the recipe from now on :)


Roasted Vegetables
Simple yet delicious.
Asparagus, green beans, broccoli, cauliflower, carrots, parsnips, and kohlrabi drizzled in olive oil and tossed with garlic, salt, and pepper.



Dessert
Sweet Potato Pie & Pumpkin Pie
The sweet potato pie is a veganized version of the pie we learned to make at the Vegetarian Thanksgiving Class we took at the Chopping Block. It turned out just as good as the original version! For the pumpkin pie, we used the same recipe was the sweet potato pie, substituting pumpkin for sweet potato. It was very good, but we may add different spices next time to go better with the pumpkin.


Chocolate Tofu Mousse with fresh fruit
Rich Ghirardhelli's dark chocolate blended with silken tofu to create a decadent dip for our fruit platter. Also good eaten alone with a spoon ;)


Gingerbread Landscapes
The results of Lake's Ultimate Gingerbread House Challenge!

Tuesday, December 16, 2008

The Field's Pot Pie, A Chicago Holiday Classic

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A great holiday tradition for many generations of Chicagoans is to go see the holiday display at Marshall Field's. One of the most famous Field's food items (besides Frango Mints) is Mrs. Herring's Chicken Pot Pie, served in the Walnut Room on the 7th floor. It's still being served there, even though Field's is now Macy's. . . but as a tribute to the Chicago Holiday tradition, we made a vegan version of the Marshall Field's Chicken Pot Pie.

For the recipe, we substituted chicken-style seitan for the chicken, Smart Balance w/flax for the butter, soy milk for the milk, and a concoction of oil, salt, and sugar for the egg wash. I've noted what we did in italics below.

It turned out AMAZING, just as good as I remember it. The only thing we thought needed tweaking was the egg wash, to make the crust shinier. But the taste was dead on! We're definitely going to be featuring it as the main course at our holiday dinner party next weekend.

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Mrs. Herring's Chicken Pot Pie
Ingredients

Chicken and stock ingredients
1 (3 1/2 pound) frying chicken 2 1-lb packages of chicken-style seitan
1 carrot
1 celery stalk
1 small onion, halved
2 teaspoons salt

Pie crust ingredients
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup (1 stick) chilled unsalted butter Smart Balance w/Flax, diced into 1/2-inch cubes (best to chill cubes in the freezer for at least 15 minutes before using)
1/4 cup vegetable shortening, chilled
3 to 4 Tbsp ice water

Filling ingredients
6 Tbsp unsalted butter Smart Balance w/Flax
1 large onion, diced (about 1 1/4 cups)
3 carrots, thinly sliced on the diagonal
3 celery stalks, thinly sliced on the diagonal
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 1/2 cups soy milk
1 teaspoon chopped fresh thyme leaves
1/4 cup dry sherry
3/4 cup green peas, frozen or fresh
2 Tbsp minced fresh parsley
2 teaspoons salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Egg wash
1 egg whisked with 1 Tbsp water
oil w/salt & sugar


Special equipment needed
6 10-ounce ramekins
(We used 8 7-oz ramekins because that's all we had. We had a lot of the filling left over because we didn't have enough ramekins.)

Method

Cook the seitan chicken and make the chicken stock.
Combine the seitan chicken, carrot, celery, onion and salt into a large stock pot. Add cold water until just covered and bring to a boil over high heat. Reduce the heat to a simmer and cook for 45 minutes. Remove the seitan chicken from the pot and let cool for 15 minutes. While the seitan chicken is cooling, continue to boil the remaining water and vegetables in the pot. When the chicken has cooled enough to touch, strip away as much of the meat as you can. Place the meat on a dish, set aside. Return the chicken bones to the stockpot and [Since we were working with seitan, we didn't have bones to work with.] continue to boil, on high heat, until the stock has reduced to a quart or quart and a half. Set aside 2 1/2 cups of the stock for this recipe. The remaining stock you can refrigerate and store for another purpose.
[In the future, we're going to omit this step and just use the "stock" that the seitan comes with instead. Or use/make veggie stock.]


Prepare the pie crust dough.
Combine the flour and salt in a food processor. Add the chilled butter cubes and pulse 5 times to combine. And the shortening and pulse a few more times, until the dough resembles a coarse cornmeal, with some pea-sized pieces of butter. Slowly stream in ice water, a tablespoon at a time, pulsing after each addition, until the dough sticks together when you press some between your fingers. Empty the food processor, placing the dough on a clean surface. Use your hands to mold into a ball, then flatten the ball into a disk. Sprinkle with a little flour, wrap with plastic wrap, and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes, or up to 2 days, before rolling.

Prepare the filling.
Preheat oven to 400°F. In a large skillet, melt butter on medium heat. Add the onions, carrots, and celery, and cook until the onions are translucent, about 10 minutes.

Add the flour and cook, stirring, one minute more. Whisk in 2 1/2 cups of the chicken stock. Whisk in the milk. Decrease the heat to low and simmer for 10 minutes, stirring often. Add the chicken meat, thyme, sherry, peas, parsley, salt and pepper and stir well. Taste and adjust seasoning if necessary. Divide the warm filling among six 10-ounce ramekins.


Prepare the crust.
Roll out dough on a lightly floured surface to a little less than a quarter-inch thick. Cut into 6 rounds, slightly larger than the circumference of the ramekins. Lay a dough round on each pot pie filling. Fold the excess dough under itself and use the tines of a fork to press the dough against the edge of the ramekins. Cut a 1-inch vent into each individual pie. Use a pastry brush to apply an egg wash to each pie.


Line a baking sheet with foil, place the pies on the baking sheet. Bake at 400°F for 25 minutes, or until the pastry is golden and the filling is bubbling. Let cool for at least 5 minutes before serving.


Serves 6.