Give a girl a sugar pumpkin...

...and she'll be eating pumpkin all week. One little pumpkin goes a long way!

For dinner the other night I made Curried Pumpkin Cream Sauce. It came out super rich and creamy, like an autumnal vegan alfredo.

Ingredients:
-flesh from 1/2 of a roasted sugar pumpkin (about 2 cups)
-1 cup unsweetened MimicCreme (you could substitute any non-dairy milk, but you'll lose the richness)
-1 tbsp curry powder
-1/2 tsp ground coriander
-1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
-1/2 tsp salt
-dash black pepper
-1 lb. fettuccine (I used whole wheat)
-4 vegan sausage patties (I used Whole Food's brand)

1. Slice the pumpkin in half, scoop out seeds and stringy stuff and put on a lightly greased baking sheet, cut side down. Bake at 400 degrees for about 45 minutes, until very soft.
2. Scoop out flesh from one half and place in a medium saucepan(save the other half for another time).
3. Add all other ingredients and blend with an immersion blender. Add more creme if you want it thinner.
4. Simmer the sauce at medium-low for about ten minutes, till heated through.
4. While the sauce is cooking, boil pasta and heat sausages in a pan.
5. Mix sauce with pasta. Crumble sausage with a fork and mix in.It kind of looks like barf, I know. But I swear it tasted awesome. And MimicCreme is my new favorite thing - so so rich with such simple ingredients!

With the leftover pumpkin I tested an iced pumpkin bread recipe for an upcoming Happy Herbivore cookbook. If I didn't know better I'd swear this had a cup of oil in it. Way too good to still be so healthy!Slice being devoured. Hee.

I still have about 1/2 a cup of pumpkin left!

Recipe Reviews and Black Bean Dip

I've been too lazy/hungry to photograph my food lately, but I have to talk about this awesome recipe from Fat Free Vegan Kitchen for curried red lentil soup with dandelion greens.

I had some dandelion greens in the fridge and no idea what to do with them, and I got a pressure cooker a couple weeks ago, so this recipe called out to me even though it's a zillion degrees here. I've never had lentils like this before - it was almost like a split pea soup, cause the lentils explode and the whole thing is deliciously creamy. Really simple to make too, I'll definitely be making this again. I had some friends over and it was a big hit, they both went back for seconds.

Less of a hit was the curried tempeh mango salad from VWaV. I liked it, but no one else did. Omnivorous Boyfriend thought it was too sweet (and he's right, it is very sweet) and my brother-in-law said it was "sorta ok." My sister wouldn't even try it. I'm not saying it's my favorite dish ever, but I did enjoy it, and it was nice picnic food. We all went to see R.E.M. last night, and we had beautiful weather for hanging out on the lawn. I also made a quick black bean dip, which everyone liked (yay!):

Ingredients:
1 can black beans
2 tbsp water
1 clove garlic
juice from one lemon
1 tbsp tamari
1/2 tsp cumin
big pinch cayenne

Combine all ingredients in a food processor. Puree until smooth.

We dipped carrots and spicy blue corn chips in this. Then we had watermelon and cherries for dessert. It was a great show and a great night.

Strawberry-Rhubarb Cobbler

Made this one up, and it came out great! Very exciting. Inspired by the strawberry-rhubarb-peach pie in VWaV, and the arrival of spring produce at the farmer's market.
Ingredients:
Filling
2 cups strawberries, finely chopped
3 stalks rhubarb, finely chopped
1/4 cup walnuts
1/4 cup sugar
1/4 tsp ground cardamom
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tbsp arrowroot
1/4 tsp vanilla

Topping
1/2 cup whole wheat pastry flour
1/2 cup rolled oats
1 + 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground allspice
2 tbsp turbinado sugar
1/4 cup very cold earth balance, sliced thin
1 tsp vanilla extract

1. Preheat oven to 425
2. Put the fruit and walnuts in a medium bowl and toss with the sugar and spices
3. Stir in the arrowroot, then stir in the vanilla
4. In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder and spices
5. Stir in the sugar and oats
6. Cut in the earth balance with two knives or a pastry blender, until crumbly
7. Gently stir in the vanilla
8. Pour fruit mixture into greased glass baking dish and sprinkle on topping
   
9. Bake for 30 minutes, until fruit is bubbling and topping is browned

I intended to make this in a 9" square dish, but when I went to get it from the cabinet I remembered it's still at my office with whatever is left of the brownies from last week. Clearly I am baking too much lately. I made it in a loaf pan instead, which worked just fine, but the ratio of fruit to topping would be even better in a shallower dish. We ate this hot with Soy Dream french vanilla, which may be my new favorite soy cream. It has a creamier texture than Purely Decadent and is less sugary than Temptation.
I've never cooked with rhubarb before, I thought it would require much more effort than it actually does. I love the tart-ness it gives the cobbler. Amazing how it looks so much like celery, and yet tastes so different...

Pancakes

I've tried a bunch of different pancake recipes, and this one is my favorite so far. The carbonated water, as advertised, makes them nice and light and fluffy. I've tried the banana walnut pancakes from Vegan With a Vengeance and the easy pancakes on VegWeb, and wasn't very impressed with either. They were both fine, but seemed to be missing something compared with non-vegan pancakes. These were the best yet. Next time I'll try a version that adds something as an egg replacer instead of just omitting the egg, as all three of these recipes do.

I used 1 cup of all purpose flour and 1/3 cup of whole wheat flour. I would have done half and half with whole wheat pastry, but this was what was around. Served with fresh blackberries (again, cause that's what we had - great deal at costco) and maple syrup. If I'd thought about it I would have added a little cinnamon and some pecans.

Risotto and Roasted Carrots

Friday night I made risotto from another ppk.com recipe. I made this once before for my grandfather, following the basic recipe and adding a whole bunch of cremini mushrooms. It was rich and yummy and everyone loved it. This time I skipped the mushrooms and followed Anna's suggestion to add a can of pureed pumpkin and a 1/3 cup toasted pine nuts. It's a toss up as to which is better, but they're both amazing. Pretty quick and easy to make too. With oil and mushrooms it has a very savory and rich flavor; the pumpkin makes it much creamier and almost adds a cheesy taste.

To go with it I roasted a bunch of carrots with olive oil and an insane amount of minced ginger. Not the most balanced meal, as it's lacking a significant source of protein, but quite tasty and filling. It makes a *ton* of food, too - my boyfriend generally eats about 3 servings of any given dish at a time, we had some leftovers tonight and there's still a big portion left, which by my math makes it more than 8 servings.

Brownies (mmmmmm, chocolate)

This recipe (like so many things I make) comes from Isa Chandra Moskowitz, found on the ppk website.

Absolutely fantastic. As the recipe says, they're somewhere between cake-y and fudgy, definitely more cake-like than the brownies of my youth (which came from a box). They're like really really really rich chocolate cake squares. I think they'd be even better with a little chocolate icing on top.


While not as simple as your basic brownie, I had no trouble making these, and since I've already admitted to butchering baked tofu (repeatedly) that's saying something. I used light firm tofu instead of the extra firm called for, cause I had 3 boxes of it sitting around. I also added the rest of the bag of chocolate chips into the batter at the end. Holy mega chocolate bliss, batman! I brought these to work, and no one guessed they were vegan.

I used Trader Joe's chocolate chips. They're not specifically marketed as vegan, but they are, and WOW. I like these even better than Tropical Source and Ghiradelli, both of which cost way more. They are seriously rich and chocolate-y.

Curried Tofu and Mashed Potatoes

I love Veganomicon. I really do. But I don't love the curried tofu recipe.

I should start out by admitting my bizarre failing with baked tofu. I don't know why, but I seem to screw it up every time. It should be very simple, but I either forget to slice the tofu before marinating it or put the pieces in a bowl they won't fit into or forget to flip it or on and on and on. It always ends up seeming like a lot more work than it should be. One day I'll get the hang of it.

I've tried this recipe twice, since the first time I messed it up in multiple ways. Most egregiously I used 1/4 tbsp of curry powder instead of a 1/4 cup, and I used some dried cumin instead of cumin seeds. It wasn't bad but mostly tasted like soy sauce.

I actually liked it better this way than the second time, when I got the spices right. I love curry powder, but 1/4 cup of dried spice on tofu...just not working for me. It tasted kind of gritty and flat. Oh well.


I wanted to make mashed potatoes with it, and I always try and make these healthier by using as little fat as possible. Usually I mash 'em with just a little soy milk, but this time I used the leftover marinade from the tofu. It was actually pretty tasty, if I do say so myself. Since I won't be trying the tofu recipe again I think I'll try mashed potatoes with a little olive oil, vegetable broth, curry powder and cumin next time I make an Indian dish.