Anyhow, here’s my favorite hummus recipe and my favorite way to eat it.

Helen’s Hummus

• 1 can garbanzo beans, drained and rinsed
• 2 tablespoons tahini
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 2-3 tablespoons lemon juice
• 1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt

1. Combine all ingredients in a blender and blend. Add lemon juice as needed to get mixture to right consistency.

Helen’s Hummus Sandwich

• good bread (like French bread)
• hummus
• grilled red bell peppers (fresh or jarred)
• marinated artichoke hearts
• spinach
• veganaise (optional)
• vegan mozzarella (optional)

1. Spread/layer all ingredients on bread. Press in a panini press if you like.

I cannot get over the smell of this stuff. I can’t put my finger on what exactly it is that I find so repulsive, but something about its odor activates my gag reflex. The sticky, slimy texture upon removing it from the packaging is also offputting.

The taste is passable, though strikes me as very artificial; if sort of reminds me of yogurt that may or may not be past its expiration date. In its solid state, Vegan Rella has a mild flavor and creamy mouthfeel that is well-suited to crackers or rice cakes. Melted, it turns into a runny opaque fluid that I really can only compare to forms of bodily discharge that have no place on a food blog.

Overall: C

I had brunch at Portage Bay Cafe in the U-District over the weekend with some girls in my program. I was impressed with the number of delicious looking vegan (and non-vegan) options on the menu, though disappointed by the service, wait time, and unreasonably large portions; many people feel that big plates of food are a good thing when dining out, but I would rather pay less, eat a sensible yet filling meal, and move on. Instead, I balanced three servings’ worth of food on my lap through the entire 3-hour the post-brunch movie (Avatar). While I was grateful for the food, I ended up paying $9 plus a $5 tip (ah, the perils of eating in a group) for a dish I knew I could duplicate for a fraction of that at home.

The dish? The cafe’s coconut rice: long-grain white rice stewed in coconut milk, served with shredded coconut, dried cranberries, nuts and banana. While I greatly enjoyed it, I am determined to replicate the experience in my rice cooker for less money and less calories. Here’s my first stab:

Coconut Rice
makes 4 servings

• 1 cup long-grain brown rice, washed
• 1 can light coconut milk plus enough water to make 2 1/2 cups
• 1 tablespoon agave nectar

1. Combine all ingredients in rice cooker; cook.

Serve with chopped pecans, dried cranberries, and shredded coconut (optional)

Cinnamon rolls are traditions for many families at Christmas. They weren’t for mine, but we wouldn’t have minded if they were- we’re suckers for anything sweet.

My folks went to Hawaii and David’s folks went to Disneyland for the holidays this year, so it was just the two of us on Christmas morning. Breakfast was my responsibility, and I decided upon cinnamon buns because… I like them. And David likes them. We have such different tastes in food that it can be hard to come to a compromise and still eat the same thing. So, I searched far and wide for a good recipe. Many required several hours of rise time, meaning that the result was probably better, but I can’t wait that long to eat in the morning.

This version from Tasty Vegan provides an (un)healthy dose of cinnamon and brown sugar in a pinch because it relies on baking powder instead of just yeast. This also makes them more akin to sweet, spiced Southern biscuits instead of Cinnabon clones, but they are still very tasty. David commented on how flaky they were.

I put mine a little far apart; I’ll put them closer together next time.

Quick Vegan Cinnamon Rolls
Adapted from Tasty Vegan

• 3/4 cup soy milk
• 2 tsp yeast
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 1 tbs baking powder
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 4 Tbs vegan margarine
• 1 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1/3 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 cup vegan cream cheese
• 1/2 cup powdered sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla extract

1. Preheat oven to 425F; grease baking sheet.
2. Heat milk in saucepan over medium heat (or microwave until warm but not hot); sprinkle with yeast. Set aside.
3. Combine flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt in a bowl. Rub margarine into flour mixture with fingers until mixture resembles coarse meal. Stir in milk until soft dough forms.
4. Transfer dough to a well-floured surface and dust with flour; flatten in to a rectangle.
5. Combine brown sugar and cinnamon in small bowl; Sprinkle over dough, and press in lightly. Gently roll dough lengthwise into log. Cut log into 16 3/4-inch-thick slices. Place slices on baking sheet, reshaping as necessary. Bake 15-18 minutes, or until rolls begin to brown.
6. Beat together cream cheese, powdered sugar, and vanilla. Spoon glaze over warm cinnamon rolls

“Snickerdoodle cookies?” He asked.

“No, lemon wafers,” I replied.

“Oh.” He said, sounding a little disappointed. “I was hoping for snickerdoodles.”

Snickerdoodles are his favorite cookie, and since it is nearly Christmas (prime cookie-making time), I didn’t see the harm in whipping up a batch. These are just a straight veganization of the recipe found in the Better Homes and Gardens Cookbook. They are bits of crispy-on-the-outside, chewy-on-the-inside, cinnamon-sugary deliciousness.

Vegan Snickerdoodles
makes 16 medium-sized cookies

• 1 stick (1/2 cup) non-hydrogenated margarine
• 1 cup sugar
• 1/4 tsp baking soda
• 1/4 tsp cream of tartar
• egg replacer for 1 egg (eg, 1 tbs Bob’s Red Mill mixed with 3 tbs water)
• 1/2 tsp vanilla
• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 tbs sugar
• 1 tsp cinnamon

1. In a medium bowl, beat margarine for 30 seconds. Add the 1 cup sugar, baking soda and cream of tartar; beat until combined. Beat in egg replacer and vanilla. Beat in flour. Cover and chill for 1 hour.
2. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Combine the 2 tbs sugar and the cinnamon. Shape dough into small balls and roll in cinnamon-sugar mixture. Place 2 inches apart on ungreased cookie sheets and bake 10-11 minutes or until edges are golden. Cool cookies on a wire rack.

Now, I come from a long line of whiskey lovers. The one photo of my great, great grandfather Joe in existence is him posed with a bottle of whiskey. My dad loves whiskey, but never drank it around us when we were growing up; my brother and I learned how to drink thousands of miles apart, yet both drifted towards whiskey. Nothing brings the three of us together like a Manhattan (while my mom, a vodka woman, sips her Martini). Therefore, it seemed only fitting to make a whiskey pie.

Yeah, right: Chivas in a pie? You can’t even taste the whiskey after the pie has cooked, so don’t waste the good stuff. The Chivas is a gift for David’s dad, who also really, really likes whiskey.  The pie was baked with Western Canadian, the second cheapest brand at the liquor store, which I have on hand for my own personal drinking.

In addition to whiskey in the filling, the crust is made with barley flour, as whiskey too is either made from barley or rye. This is a happy accident: I found a small bag of barley flour on sale at the grocery store and knew it had to go into my pie. David wasn’t a huge fan of the barley (too whole grain-y, not flaky enough) but I thought it gave the pie a rustic feel that Great Great Grandfather Joe, a farmin’ man, would have approved of.

I love beer. I love baking.  I love baking with a beer in one hand and a spoon in the other. I also love baking with beer as an ingredient. I came across Beer and Good Food, a cookbook published in 1958 in a used bookstore, and was intrigued by the selected of vintage beer-containing recipes within. And the front and back covers:

Ok, technically I may be violating copyright by posting that image, but then again, I might not be- copyright law between 1923 and 1963 is tricky.  Anyhow, the book has some delightful-looking recipes, but the one that sold me on it was for Berlin Beer Cake, mainly because it doesn’t have eggs: I’m a sucker for recipes that are vegan or easily veganized without weird replacements. I’m also a sucker for cakes with nuts. Especially hazelnuts.

The recipe called for 1 cup of molasses. That’s a lot of molasses. Instead, I used 1/4 cup molasses plus 9 Tbs brown sugar and 3 tbs water- you replace molasses with sugar in a 3:1 ratio. I found a recipe on Foodista for pretty much the exact same recipe, only with an additional cup of sugar added. I don’t think that is necessary, though it would make the cake a more decadent dessert.

Berlin Beer Cake

• 1 cup molasses
• ½ cup non-hydrogenated soy margarine
• 12 oz beer
• 1 cup raisins
• 2 ⅔ cups sifted flour
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• ¼ teaspoon baking soda
• ½ teaspoon cinnamon
• ½ teaspoon nutmeg
• ½ teaspoon ginger

1. 1 cup coarsely chopped filberts or pecans
2. Combine molasses, butter and beer in a saucepan and heat until the butter melts. Stir in raisins and let the mixture cool 15 minutes.
3. Sift together dry ingredients. Stir in the nuts.
4. When the beer mixture is cool, pour it over dry ingredients and stir until smooth.
5. Pour batter into greased and floured tube pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour.

Top with powdered sugar, a simple glaze or icing, or drizzle with agave.

I wrote a post on baking with beer and included this cake.

Pumpkin pies always call for a lot of eggs. There are recipes for pumpkin pies made with tofu, but David would never eat tofu for dessert (and he always asks what’s in my cooking), and there is no way I could eat a whole pie myself without gaining 10 pounds, which is kind of the opposite of what I’m trying to do right now. After seeing a recipe for a frozen pumpkin pie, I decided that’s what I would make. With a few twists, of course. [wink!]

Thanksgiving is about food and football. My favorite football-watching snack is pretzels. To be honest, I don’t care much for football, but I’m nuts about pretzels. Goodbye graham cracker crust, hello pretzel crust. I’m also nuts about, well, nuts, so I subbed out half of the ice cream that the original called for with butter pecan. Vegan ice cream, meaning that there’s probably more soy in this pie than had I baked a tofu pumpkin pie. Shhh… don’t tell David.

Crust* (inspired by this crust):

• 1 1/2 cups finely-crushed pretzels
• 1 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup non-hydrogenated soy margarine or butter, melted

Filling (inspired by this filling):

• 1 cup pumpkin
• 1 pint pecan ice cream (or soy ice cream), softened
• 1 pint vanilla ice cream (or soy ice cream), softened
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1/4 tsp cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp nutmeg

1. Combine ingredients for crust and press into a pie plate. Refrigerate for 1 hour.
2. Combine filling ingredients in a medium bowl; spread into pie crust and freeze at least 3 hours.

*You will have much more crust left over than fits into the plate. At first I thought I had read the recipe wrong, and that it called for 1 1/2 cups of pretzels, crushed. So, after making the first crust, I ground 1 1/2 cups of pretzels into fine crumbs, added 1/2 cup melted margarine and 1 cup brown sugar (because I ran out of granulated sugar). This left a soupy buttery mess that reminded me of cookie batter. So, I made cookies with it. That recipe is a work in progress.

Autumn Beer Bread (adapted from my cousin Jeni)

• 3 cups flour
• 3 tablespoons brown sugar
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
• 1 cup chopped pecans
• 1/2 cup golden raisins
• 12 oz. pumpkin beer

1. Mix all of the ingredients together; pour dough into loaf pan sprayed with cooking spray.
2. Put loaf in a COLD oven and set temperature to 375 degrees.  Bake for 60 minutes.