Tag Archives: Gardein

Vegan MoFo 2017 Day 8: Salad!

Posted by Banana Curl Vegan Girl in Salad of the Week, Unicorn, Vegan MoFo 2017 and tagged with , , , , , , , , , , ,

Hey, Fluffy here.

Though I am all for eating desserts myself, today I’m sharing a Fluffy approved salad. Actually, any salad can be Fluffy approved, with a bit of creativity.

Today Laura took a unicorn cookie cutter, two pieces of Follow Your Heart vegan cheese (the smoked Gouda is our fave), placed them side by side, and made a unicorn silhouette out of cheese!

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The salad is pretty simple. It contains all my favorite vegetables (lettuce, carrots, cherry tomatoes, cucumbers, and onions). For the final touches, we put some leftover crispy chickpeas and Gardein chickun tenders, topped with the unicorn shaped cheese!

The dressing (not pictured) was a sweet maple mustard made with maple syrup, Just Mayo, and yellow mustard. Laura has always believed in the magic of a creamy sweet mustardy dressing.

Whew, I’m glad this week is over. All this writing has gotten me tired and a bit overwhelmed. I’m sure Laura will still be stressed with all the cooking and baking she’s about to do for the coming weeks, but hopefully, her belly will be happy with it. I know mine will be!

Stay tuned for next week’s theme, behind the scenes! We will be sharing some hot unicorn tips, must-haves, tricks, tools, kitchen magic, etc.

Vegan Air Fried Chickun and Waffles

Posted by Banana Curl Vegan Girl in Air Fryer, Comfort foods, Cooking, Dinner, Dinners, eggless, Fried food, Meatless Meats, Nutritional Yeast, Other Vegan Food Blogs, Recipes, Sunday Brunch, Vegan Junk Food, veganism, Veganized Recipes and tagged with , , , , , , , , , , ,

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Hey, so I wanted to make a fried chickun and waffles recipe using my air fryer. I based the recipe off of this and this, but made several big tweaks to them. For the chickun, I used Gardein chick’n scallopini, and I didn’t have the Follow Your Heart vegan egg so I used Ener-g and added more ingredients to make it taste better, among some other changes, such as using beer and changing the spices to suit my tastes better. For the waffles, I used less (not gluten free) flour, almond milk yogurt, avocado oil, and changed the method a bit.

It was SO AMAZINGLY GOOD! OMG.

I’m hoping to be back on my blog a lot more now that I’m in a good place with my humane education master’s degree program, so keep a look out for new posts! I know I often say I’ll be posting more frequently and then never end up doing so, but this time I think I mean it!

Here’s the recipe:

Ingredients:

For the chickun:

  • 1 package of Gardein Chick’n Scallopini, slightly defrosted, just enough to be able to cut in half, not enough to be mushy.

Dry mix

  • 1 1/2 cup flour
  • 1/3 cup cornstarch
  • 1/4 tsp pepper
  • 1 tbsp garlic powder
  • 1 tbsp garlic powder
  • 1 tbsp onion powder
  • 2 tsp salt
  • 1 tbsp paprika
  • 1 tsp cayenne pepper

Wet Mix

  • 1 cup plain unsweetened almond milk
  • 1 tbsp Ener-g Egg Replacer + 4 tbsp water
  • 1/4 tsp Kala Namak (Indian Black Salt)
  • 1 tbsp nutritional yeast
  • 1/4 tsp turmeric
  • 1 tbsp hot sauce
  • 2 tbsp vegan beer

For the waffles:

  • 1 1/4 cup unsweetened vanilla almond milk with 1 tsp apple cider vinegar added
  • 1/2 cup rolled oats
  • 1 1/2 cup flour
  • 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
  • 1 tbsp sugar
  • 1/4 tsp salt
  • 1 tbsp flax meal
  • 1/4 cup avocado oil
  • 1 small container Kite Hill almond vanilla yogurt
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract

Toppings:

  • Maple syrup and vegan butter, as desired

Directions:

  1. Start by making the chickun first. In one bowl, mix together the dry ingredients.
  2. Mix together the egg replacer, water, black salt, nutritional yeast, and turmeric.
  3. In another bowl, add the egg replacer mixture into the rest of the ingredients for the wet mix.
  4. Slice each piece of scallopini in half vertically.
  5. Coat the scallopini pieces in the dry mix first, until each piece is coated. Place on a plate or tray.
  6. Add 3 tbsp of the liquid mix into the dry mix. Coat the floury scallopini pieces in the liquid, then place them into the wetted dry mix until covered. Put them back on the tray or plate and place in the fridge while you start preparing the waffles.
  7. Preheat your waffle iron.
  8. Add the apple cider vinegar to the almond milk, stir, and let sit for 5 minutes.
  9. Meanwhile, in a large bowl, stir together all the dry ingredients.
  10. When the almond milk and vinegar is done, pour the mixture into the dry mix, along with the oil, yogurt, and vanilla. Stir well. The mixture will look clumpy, that’s totally okay.
  11. Place the coated chick’n scallopini into the air fryer basket in a single layer. Heat at 400 degrees 4, for a total of 10 minutes. Check on them and shake the basket after five minutes of cooking. You may need to cook in batches if your air fryer is small like mine is.
  12. While the chickun is cooking, place a good amount (depending on your waffle iron) of batter after spraying the iron with coconut oil. Cook according to the instructions for your waffle iron.
  13. Keep waffles in a pouch of aluminum foil until ready to serve.
  14. Serve with the chickun atop the waffles with maple syrup and vegan butter if you like.

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Bon Appetit, don’t eat your feet!

 

 

Christmas Re-cap

Posted by Banana Curl Vegan Girl in Appetizer, Baked Goods, Christmas, Holiday Food, Ice Cream, Menus and tagged with , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Oi. So the school semester finished Sunday the 21st and I was a bit of a mess. After that, I barely stopped. It was a whir of wrapping presents, menu planning, grocery shopping (multiple times, ugh), spending time with family, cooking, etc. Since then I haven’t really stopped either, until today…Thank Goodness.

Remember my menu? I stuck to it pretty closely with a few adjustments.

My mom actually made the salad and the eggplant Christmas Eve which was great. She actually helped so much with the cooking which was a big relief because even as I write this now, I still feel like I am recovering from being so stressed during school.

First, we had the greek salad:

Isa Does It Greek Diner Salad

Isa Does It Greek Diner Salad

Then we had the main course, which for me was a piece of Spanakopita pot pie and the eggplant parm.

Spinach Pot Pie

Spinach Pot Pie

Spinach Pot Pie-Inside

Spinach Pot Pie-Inside

Eggplant Parmesan

Eggplant Parmesan

The dessert I was making for Christmas Day got screwed up because my mom was trying to teach me a trick with the roll cake but forgot how to do it the correct way and it fell apart 😦 So we decided to save the mud pie for Christmas day, and instead would have the vegan peppermint stick ice cream I had made…The frosting for the cake was already made, so we ended up making some of the crumbled up cake, ice cream, frosting, crushed peppermint candies, and chocolate syrup into sundaes. Everyone was obsessed with the peppermint stick ice cream, and I really don’t blame them! It was so good. It’s been requested that I make it again.

Vegan xmas Ice Cream Sundae

Vegan xmas Ice Cream Sundae

Then on Christmas morning we had my famous pretzel bread pudding for breakfast:

Pretzel Bread Pudding

Pretzel Bread Pudding

For an appetizer I made the Hummus Pomodoro with Warm Pizza Crust from Chloe’s Vegan Italian Kitchen which was so good. Everyone really loved it, and my grandmother was telling me I selected some really good tomatoes, haha.

Festive hummus, pizza bread slices not pictured

Festive hummus, pizza crust slices not pictured

For dinner, here was my plate:

Clockwise from top left: Caramelized onion mashed potatoes, Gardein Holiday Roast, creamed spinach, and glazed carrots

Clockwise from top left:
Caramelized onion mashed potatoes, Gardein Holiday Roast, creamed spinach, and glazed carrots

And for dessert? Well, my grandmother decided to leave before we had it, so while I was waiting for my mom to take her home, I ended up whipping up a surprise. I had so much frosting leftover from the botched cake that I decided to make whoopie pies:

Whoops, I made Whoopie Pies

Whoops, I made Whoopie Pies

And we ate them along with the mud pie! (two gross but delicious sounding “pies,” haha)

Mud Pie!

Mud Pie!

This was also the first year I barely got any cooking related gifts.  Believe it or not, I’m okay with that. This is because:

A) I have way too many cookbooks and am now trying to make my own cookbook zine so I’m mostly eating my own creations.

B) I have pretty much everything I need in the way of utensils, though I did get a new measuring cup set and a cool little frosting thingy for decorating cakes and stuff in my stocking.

C) I am trying to also eat a bit healthier, so candy and junk food isn’t wise. Although, I did get a package of peppermint Bark Thins and Supercandy (they are vegan and basically gum drops with tons of B vitamins in them) in my stocking.

D) Apparently my love of working out has almost overtaken my love of cooking, at least, gift wise. I got some cool workout gear this year!

I do hope to use the two Whole Foods gift cards I got for presents for some food-related goodies/healthy foods! Yay.

Happy holidays everyone! I will probably not be posting until after the New Year, so I hope you all have a happy one!

My Xmas Menu

Posted by Banana Curl Vegan Girl in Appetizer, Breakfast, Christmas, Desserts, Holiday Food, Menus, Original Recipes, Vegan cookbooks and tagged with , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Happy holidays everyone!

Just a quick post to share my menu I have planned out for Christmas. I hope to post a bit more later on in the week.

Christmas eve dinner:

  • Greek Diner Salad from Isa Does It
  • Spinach pot pie (own recipe)
  • Eggplant Parmesan from Chloe’s Vegan Italian Kitchen
  • Dessert: Mississippi Mud Pie (own recipe)

Christmas day breakfast:

My pretzel bread pudding casserole

Christmas day appetizer:

Hummus Pomodoro with Warm Pizza Crust from Chloe’s Vegan Italian Kitchen

Christmas day meal:

  • Gardein Holiday Roast
  • Caramelized Onion Mashed Potatoes from Vegan Table
  • Creamed Spinach from Chloe’s Vegan Italian Kitchen
  • Glazed carrots (my mom’s recipe)
  • Dessert: Peppermint stick ice cream (my own recipe) and chocolate peppermint roll cake (my own recipe as well)

I’m so excited for all this! haha. Yum.

Have a delicious holiday season! 🙂

I’m back with a new recipe! Vegan Quinoa Jambalaya

Posted by Banana Curl Vegan Girl in Original Recipes and tagged with , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Hello there,

There are lots of new things happening in my life lately. I have lots of new ideas for this blog. I am planning on changing the content I post a bit, to be more informative about food and nutrition, post more of my recipes, and also talk about other vegan, health, and wellness related topics.

Unfortunately my last semester at my community college where I will graduate with my associate’s degree and planning for the next step of working towards my bachelor’s degree has had me quite busy lately. I hope to be able to find more time to write here though soon. By Summer there should definitely be more time.

Today I made a recipe though, and am sitting down to type it up and share it in this post.

Before I was vegan, my mom used to make Jambalaya with a seasoning mix and rice, chicken, shrimp, and sausage. I liked it even though it came from a box. I had been thinking about it lately, and how to veganize it.

I wanted to make it with quinoa because I am not the biggest fan of having rice all the time. Plus quinoa has more protein in it, which I like.

This recipe used store-bought meat substitutes for the vegan chicken and sausages, but you could find recipes to make your own if you desire. For the vegan shrimp, I had a plain batch of leftover shrimp seitan  that I froze and defrosted from when I made the vegan shrimp bao recipe. It is not gluten free because of the shrimp seitan, but there may or may not be other vegan shrimp alternatives that are gluten free that you can find in stores if that is important to you.

I do not know for sure if this is very authentic jambalaya, but since it is inspired by it, that is what I am calling it. It is really yummy though, that is for sure!

Image Recipe for Vegan Quinoa Jambalaya

Makes about 10 1 cup servings

Ingredients:

  • 1 cup Vegan shrimp (either store bought or made from scratch via this recipe)
  • 2 Tofurky Italian Sausages, sliced into rounds
  • 3 pieces Gardein Chick’n Scallopini chopped into chunks
  • 3 tbsp olive oil, plus a bit more to cook the veggies
  • 4 cups cooked quinoa
  • 2 small-medium yellow onions, chopped
  • 1/2 large green bell pepper, chopped
  • 1 medium red bell pepper, chopped
  • 2 tomatoes, roughly chopped
  • 8 oz canned tomato sauce (I used a no-salt added brand)
  • a splash to 1/4 cup of vegetable broth (I used Trader Joe’s Low Sodium broth)
  • 1 1/2 tsp paprika
  • 1/2 tsp onion powder
  • 1/2 tsp garlic powder
  • 1/2 tsp salt (or more if you like salt)
  • 1/2 tsp dried oregano
  • 1/2 tsp dried basil
  • 1/4 tsp dried thyme
  • 1/4 tsp black pepper
  • 1/4 tsp white pepper
  • 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper

Directions:

  1. Before you really start to cook, combine the spices in a bowl or little ziplock bag and set aside. Also cook the quinoa in advance, if you wish. It takes about 10-15 minutes to cook, so either way is fine.
  2. Cook each vegan “meat” in a frying pan on medium heat with 1 tbsp of oil separately, one at a time, until slightly brown or golden. You can use the same pan for each of them, but I think it works best to cook one at a time, and then set it aside on a plate while you cook the next one.
  3. After the “meats” are cooked, heat a little more olive oil into the pan. Add the onions and peppers, and cook until the onions are translucent.
  4. Add the tomatoes and cook for a bit longer, stirring a bit.
  5. Add a splash (or more) of vegetable broth, the spice mix, and tomato sauce. Make sure the spices and ingredients are thoroughly mixed.
  6. Reduce the heat to low, then fold in the quinoa and the vegan shrimp, sausage, and chick’n. Stir to incorporate everything together.
  7. Allow to heat thoroughly. Adjust seasonings as desired.
  8. Eat! Enjoy!

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Foodie (Photo) Friday is back! (sorry it was absent for a bit…I was still cooking though!)

Posted by Banana Curl Vegan Girl in Betty Goes Vegan Cookbook, Breakfast, Chloe's Kitchen/Chloe Coscarelli, Foodie Friday, Other Vegan Food Blogs and tagged with , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Hey there!

I am still recovering from the weekend where I was very busy…I cannot believe it’s been a week already since the start of the Ladies Rock Camp. It went really well, especially the food, from my standpoint.  Well of course everything went well, but I was focused most on making sure the food was great, and I think it was.

Anyhow! I think I am going to play catch up a bit.

This week I made some Hawaiian Toast (Page 44) for breakfast and Texas Beefless Skewers with Chipotle Peach Glaze (Page 140) from Betty Goes Vegan, pizza english muffins and easy monkey bread (from the Vegan Stoner Cookbook, haha) with a friend, a really good salad several times, and a jackfruit/northern beans “tuna” melt. I don’t have pictures of the monkey bread and pizza English Muffins, sadly…

In weeks prior where I did not get to post, I also made:

  • a Cheezburger Pie from Betty Goes Vegan
  • Cupcakes for my birthday (on October 29) from Chloe’s Kitchen–the spice ones

and other stuff too, but that I apparently did not take pictures of or remember. Ooops.

Here are the details and evidence:

Northern bean/Jackfruit un’tuna melt…
photo (73)recipe here 

Bye bye, chickpea untuna sandwiches! This combination beats chickpea faux tuna sandwiches by a landslide! So good and a close flavor from what I remember! I didn’t add any salt and it was recommended to me to not use a whole lemon. I did not use the frying step as listed because it seemed fairly redundant. I just broiled some bread with spinach, tomatoes, and daiya cheddar on it and then put the still hot sandwich mixture inside. The un’tuna salad tastes good when cold the next day, too. Also, I don’t know how this makes just two sandwiches! It makes about 4 for me. If I piled the amount it’d take to halve the recipe on the bread, it wouldn’t hold it all. But this is probably one of my favorite recipes using jackfruit I’ve tried so far.

I rate this recipe:

4bananas1

Hawaiian French Toast from Betty Goes Vegan Cookbook

photo (72)

This cookbook has so many amazing sounding recipes, especially for breakfasts. This one immediately caught my eye when I read it. It has both a tropical and cheesy flavor to it, and works out really well when you follow the directions as instructed. I would not change anything about it! It’s so yummy. My non-vegan brother gobbled it up, and I don’t even think he likes French Toast type things much, but no complaints…This definitely deserves a 5 good banana rating!

5bananas

Texas Beefless Skewers with Chipotle Peach Glaze from Betty Goes Vegan

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I used Gardein Beefless tips as directed for this recipe. It looks almost too real, which is slightly scary for me. They were oh so tasty, though! I made some cilantro lime rice with corn in it (a frozen prepared bag, haha) to go along with it and it was delicious! When I shared this picture on facebook, it seemed to get more “likes” than usual…I do not know if maybe it is because it looks so convincing as a fake meat, or what, but yeah…It was also pretty quick and easy to make. I am finding that most of the recipes I have tried so far in this cookbook are, which is great and a huge plus for me. The only thing I would recommend with this particular recipe that wasn’t mentioned in the book is to have a baking pan on the rack underneath in case the juices drip out…it was needed and I thankfully thought of it before it was too late…

4bananas1

Cheezburger Pie from Betty Goes Vegan

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 Well, this was amazing. I used Whole Foods Brand burgers and did not defrost them and they worked fine. The Bisquick and the ener-g egg replacer make this almost quiche-like…which I was very impressed with. I have not been too keen on ener-g egg replacer powder until I used this cookbook and particularly this recipe. I ate it with ketchup, dill relish, and yellow mustard. It was comforting. Amazingly, when I calculated the nutrition facts  it was fairly decent  (at least calorie wise, I was thinking this would be really intense). Visually it is appealing too as you can see, haha!

5bananas

Finally, I amnot going to review them because I’m mostly tired now, but I will leave you with some pictures of the cupcakes for my birthday on October 29 which I neglected to blog about. They were from Chloe’s Kitchen.

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