Vegan MoFo day #13 Post #10: Kitchen tour time and recipe for yellow rice

Hey,

Today’s Vegan MoFo post prompt is: It’s kitchen tour time!

Technically “my” kitchen is actually my mom’s kitchen. I am very lucky to live with my parents right now because they have a really awesome kitchen. I’ll miss it when I move out.

The pictures I will post at the end will show that the kitchen a bit messy, and that’s because I took them right after I made an elaborate dinner. My mom is always complaining about the messes I make. I really can be a bit of a hurricane when I cook.

Tonight’s dinner was from the cookbook Great Gluten-Free Vegan Eats From Around the World by Allyson Kramer. It was the Peanut Mole soy curls, although I’m not sure why it’s called that, since there are no peanuts in it. In addition to that, I decided to make a yellow rice recipe, which wasn’t in the book, but somehow came out looking almost exactly like the rice that was pictured in the recipe.

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The mole may not be exactly attractive, but let me tell you, anything that has a whole bar of melted chocolate in it is worth making!

Here is the recipe for the rice I made:

Yellow Rice Makes about 4 cups cooked

Ingredients:

  • 2 cups basmati rice
  • 4 cups veggie broth
  • 1/2 tsp ground turmeric
  • 1 dried bay leaf
  • 1 tbsp olive oil
  • 1 tbsp dried minced onion
  • 1 1/2 tsp dried basil
  • 1/2 tsp salt, or more to taste
  • 14.5 oz can diced tomatoes
  • 1 cup defrosted frozen peas

Directions:

  1. I recommend using a rice cooker for this as it’s easier and I love rice cookers! Place all the ingredients except the peas and tomatoes into the pot of the rice cooker and stir before turning on.
  2. If using a rice cooker, set to cook and leave it alone until it switches to warming. If you prefer not to use a rice cooker, cook on the stove as you would any other rice (you probably know better how to do that than me at this point, since I’ve grown reliant on rice cookers.)
  3. Once cooked, transfer into a large bowl and fold in the tomatoes and peas.
  4. Serve as a delicious side.

And now, what you’ve been waiting for: the kitchen tour!

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This is the area where the stove, oven, fruit basket, utensils, and blender reside. You can also see my rice cooker and the mole I just made when this was taken.

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This is the corner where my new juicer resides that I am loving and endlessly intrigued by.

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This is the sink area. You can also see on the left hand side (sorta, it isn’t clear) some pencils, pens, and paper that we keep there along with my parents’ actual landline phone. It is a mess of dirty dishes in this picture AHHHH! I cleaned them up right after eating.

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This is where a lot of the cups and glasses are stored above and where I often prepare food but am not really supposed to because my mom likes it as clean as possible. My hot water heater is currently on the top of the counter top. My cat Neko often jumps up onto this counter to get his food (since we prepare it on there), which we’ve tried to discourage him from because it’s gross, but we haven’t been consistent enough with correcting the behavior so he’s still doing it. In the background you can see the eating area where my brother is eating the Mole dish as well (he’s not a vegan but likes the food I make and eats it happily).

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The pantry area, spice rack, microwave, toaster oven, Mrs. Pots Cookie jar, etc. You can also see the cupcakes left over from the bbq I told you about that I made for Saturday, my Vega One shake, some random ingredients such as gluten free vegan breadcrumbs and buckwheat flour, and other cluttery stuff. Check out my mom’s alphabetized spice rack…we have a bit of an overgrowth of spices, as the overflow is housed in the cabinet above.

That’s all for tonight, it was fun showing you the kitchen!

Vegan MoFo Day 6: Post #6 Thai Peanut Massaman Curry with Coconut Rice

Today’s theme for Vegan MoFo is to recreate a restaurant meal.

There is a Thai restaurant in my town called Tong-D that is really vegan friendly. However, at one point I was assuming my favorite dish I used to get, Peanut Massaman Curry with tofu was fully vegan based on the description on the menu. Well, one day my mom went a step further than I did, and tried to confirm that it was vegan with the waiter. They wouldn’t say what is in it that does not make it vegan, but I knew from that point on it wasn’t. So, I’ve eaten there other times and ordered different stuff, but I’ve missed this particular dish.

A few months ago I went to Market Basket and found a package of Massaman Curry paste that’s both vegan and gluten free. The implications for this ingredient was obvious. I was going to recreate this dish. And since I could, instead of tofu, I decided to use Beyond Meat Chicken Free Strips.

Additionally, the restaurant in particular has the most amazing coconut rice they serve as a side. It’s the ultimate comfort food for me. I have been wanting to recreate it for so long, but all of the recipes I’ve tried online do not come out as good. So, I decided to try and experiment with how I think it should be done to re-create the taste, and it actually came out pretty much exactly spot-on.

Peanut Massaman Curry

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Ingredients:

  • 1 cup coconut milk
  • 1 package Kanokwan Massaman Curry Paste
  • 1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
  • 1 9 oz package Beyond Meat Chicken Free Strips
  • 1 onion, sliced into strips
  • about 2 cups chopped red potatoes
  • 1/3 cup peanuts, plus more for topping

Directions:

  1. Steam potatoes in a covered microwave proof bowl or casserole dish with a small amount of water (you don’t want to cover the potatoes with the water). Microwave for about 5 minutes or until a fork can easily be inserted into a piece. You don’t want it anywhere near the softness you’d need for mashed potatoes
  2. Pour the coconut milk into a heavy bottomed saucepan and put the curry paste into it. Stir on the stove on medium heat constantly until the paste melts and oil appears on the top.
  3. Mix in the peanut butter until it melts.
  4. Add the chicken free strips and cover, stirring occasionally until they defrost.
  5. Add the onions and microwaved potatoes.
  6. Turn to low heat and stir every so often until the onions are soft.
  7. Fold in the peanuts.
  8. Serve with coconut rice (recipe below) and top with peanuts.

Thai Coconut Rice

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Ingredients:

  • 1 cup jasmine rice
  • 1 1/2 cups coconut milk
  • 1/2 cup water
  • 2 tablespoons sugar

Directions:

  1. Mix the sugar into the coconut milk and water.
  2. Place the rice and coconut milk, sugar, and water mixture into a saucepan or rice cooker bowl.
  3. You basically cook this as you would normal rice (if you don’t know how to cook rice on the stove, I highly suggest you invest in a rice cooker. They are usually $20 or less and make perfectly cooked rice every time. They also make cooking a heck of a lot easier because you can focus on other things–like making curry– while your rice is cooking.) You may need to stir it a bit more at the end before letting it sit for a bit. It turns out my rice cooker was broken when I went to use it, and so I had steamed the mixture for a bit before I had to transfer it to a pan to cook on the stove. It still came out awesome.

Enjoy! The first full week of MoFo is done, and was pretty successful! Yay!