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The Kitchen Recessionista

So, here we are, in a recession. Let's eat!

Greek Chik’n Tacos With Couscous.

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First of all, let us all take a moment to wish the United States men’s national soccer team well.  Their loss today was heartbreaking, but what a World Cup this was!  And for the second time in as many World Cups, they made it to the knockout round – not a small feat.  I’m proud of them.  (And now, in honor of my beloved former neighbors, I will root for Germany.)
Now, let’s get on with tonight’s meal!  With a heavy heart, I lumbered into the kitchen after the game to put together a dish I’ve been wanting to try for a while – Christy Jordan’s Greek chik’n tacos from over at SouthernPlate.com.  Well, truth be told, she uses real chicken, but of course in our household we found that seitan would do the trick just beautifully in its stead.  So I marinated it per Christy’s instructions, then browned the seitan for about 10 minutes in a nonstick pan.  As it cooked, I prepared a pot of couscous, which I felt would be a great addition to the Mediterranean theme!
We had tortillas left over from Sunday night’s fajita-fest, so we put them to work again tonight.  We also had half a container of No. 1 Sons spicy sauerkraut from the same meal, and found it went just beautifully atop the tacos!  Other toppings included black olives, feta cheese, and a chopped tomato topped with fresh parsley from the garden.
This was such a light-tasting yet filling meal!  We both loved the marinade; the seitan soaked it up perfectly.  And we loved having tacos that didn’t taste like the usual tacos!  The couscous was a welcome sidekick, as well, especially after being topped with a little nutritional yeast (which, admittedly, I will put atop anything at all).
Our only lamentation is that we don’t have any leftovers for tomorrow’s lunch!  But as usual, that’s the sign of a dinner well-loved.

:)

New Recipe: Vegan Creamed “Tuna” Over English Muffins.

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Creamed tuna is a longtime family favorite – my mother used to make it as a go-to dish, particularly in the summertime or when we were camping.  Since we’ve been vegetarian (for the last 15 years or so), I’ve missed it tremendously!  We haven’t had many occasions to have a creamed tuna substitute in the last decade or so – not since Tuno went off the market, anyway, which has been at least 10 years now.  So after several successful outings with Sophie’s Kitchen’s Vegan Toona, I knew it was time to give it the test of a lifetime.  How would it hold in creamed “tuna”?
The full recipe is below, but the shortened version is: I prepared a basic flour-and-almond-milk cream sauce, then added the toona to the pot – we used the Black-Pepper Toona tonight – and stirred everything around to mix it thoroughly.  I spooned the creamed tuna over English muffins, served some steamed mixed vegetables alongside, and dinner was ready!  From end to end, it took about 15 minutes of preparation time; not too shabby for a night when we were short on time and energy.  (Tonight was a shelter night for me, and LeeLee had to bring some work home to finish up.)
The finished product reminded me so much of my mother’s creamed tuna, it was amazing.  Instantly, I was transported back to my family’s dinner table (the actual table is now at our home!), where I ate serving after serving, unable to get enough.  That was the case tonight, as well; we cleaned the saucepan out!  We’re not proud.  Just hungry after a long day of work.
In short, this meal was a definitive success.  We’ll certainly make it again and again!
VEGAN CREAMED TUNA OVER ENGLISH MUFFINS
Serves two-four
What you’ll need:
4 English muffins
¼ cup vegan butter
¼ cup flour
2 cups almond milk
1 can vegan tuna
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. pepper
First, toast your English muffins.  I like to handle all four at once by opening them up and putting them on a baking sheet, baking them at about 400 degrees for 10 minutes.  Once they’re in the oven, it’s time to make the creamed tuna!
Next, make a roux by melting the butter in a saucepan and then whisking the flour in to make a paste.  Once those two ingredients are combined, add the milk and whisk continuously until the mixture becomes a cream sauce (this always takes me 5-7 minutes). 
After you’ve got your sauce in order, it’s time to add the tuna!  So spoon in your vegan “tuna” and be sure it separates nicely, rather than forming big clumps within the cream sauce.  Next, add salt and pepper, stir to combine, heat everything through, and let stand until the muffins are toasted.
To serve, simply place two muffins on a plate and spoon a heaping helping of creamed “tuna” atop each open-face slice.  Serve alongside a vegetable or salad to round out the meal, and enjoy!

:)

Sunday Cookout: Vegetarian Chik’n Fajitas With Rice.

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Ooooh, I think I have concocted a new Sunday-cookout favorite.
As I put together this week’s menu plan, my thoughts, as usual, drifted to what I could possibly grill out for our weekly barbecue.  Now, I love all the usual suspects – riffs on burgers, or veggie dogs, or tofu, or Portobello mushrooms.  But I wanted to do something different this week.  Something unexpected.
Something involving my never-been-used new vegetable-grilling pan, given to me by LeeLee a little while back.  Something like … fajitas!
So this afternoon I got to work.  I sliced my last Vidalia onion into thin half-moons, gave a red bell pepper the same treatment, and washed off a container of sliced white button mushrooms, putting them all into a large zip-top bag.  To the veggie mixture I added several tablespoons of olive oil and plenty of chipotle powder, garlic powder, and ground cumin.  Then I sealed the bag up and massaged the marinade into the vegetables, putting them back into the fridge to soak up the goodness for a while before I fired up the grill and turned the rice cooker on.
When it came time to cook, it couldn’t have been easier.  I placed the grill pan on the grill grate, poured in the veggies, and then placed four Gardein chik’n filets on the grate as well.  Every few minutes, I flipped everything around, and after about 15 minutes, the veggies were cooked through and the chik’n was nicely seared.  After I took the chik’n off, I added a foil packet full of flour tortillas just to heat them up a bit, and then dinner was ready!
Let me just say: These fajitas were fantastic.  The onions, peppers, and mushrooms had a great smoky taste – the spice blend really melded well with the grilling technique – and we loved the addition of chik’n, something we’re never able to get at restaurants!  We topped our fajitas with the works – vegan sour cream, Daiya pepperjack shreds, lettuce, sliced black olives, diced tomato, and the piece de resistance, a spicy sauerkraut from No. 1 Sons, which we absolutely adored.  Paired with the rice, the fajitas made an extremely filling meal – with plenty left over for lunch tomorrow!
With that, we’ve deemed the grilled fajitas a success.  And it’s safe to say they’ll be part of the usual suspects in very short order!

:)

Vegan Crab Cakes With Veggies and Mashed Potatoes and Broccoli.

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This dinner was a meal of two firsts and an old faithful (though not that Old Faithful!).  We’ve been on a bit of a veggie-seafood kick lately, having recently discovered the bounty of Sophie’s Kitchen (no kickbacks, I swear – I’m just enamored of the products!), and now that the CSA has kicked back up again in earnest, I’m getting a wonderful array of vegetables to use each week alongside.
First up tonight was the mashed potatoes and broccoli.  I found this recipe over at Real Simple, and tonight was its maiden voyage.  First, I chopped two large heads of CSA broccoli in the food processor, then added it to a steamer basket along with a bag of small potatoes, which I halved to speed up their steaming process.  Then it was just a matter of steaming them (I found that the cooking time took about 20 minutes – longer than the 10-12 Real Simple called for), and them mashing everything together with the potato masher, adding the mix-ins as I went.  Next time I might even add some veggie bacon for taste!
As the broccoli and potatoes steamed, I baked four vegan crab cakes in the oven at 375 for about 15 minutes, flipping them over halfway through.  When I had about five minutes left of cooking time, I heated up a bag of frozen mixed vegetables – they go with any meal!  I placed them in a serving bowl and garnished them with a little chipotle powder, my new go-to seasoning. 
Once everything was cooked fully, it was time for serving – and taste-testing!  We were eager to give all of our new recipes a try, and thankfully we weren’t disappointed!  The crab cakes were sufficiently “fishy” without being fishy, and they went great with my little fake-cocktail-sauce of mayo and spicy ketchup.  The mashed potatoes and broccoli were fantastic – I mashed everything roughly, leaving some chunks of vegetables here and there, and we both loved the texture and the flavor, which was creamy even though we didn’t use any milk.  And of course the mixed vegetables filled out the plate (and our stomachs) beautifully.
We’ll definitely give this meal – both in whole and in part – another try!  It’s a keeper, for sure.

:)

Breakfast for Dinner.

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This is another one of those meals that LeeLee and I just adore, but that for some reason I haven’t added to the menu plan in ages!  Maybe it’s because we have a home-cooked brunch at least once a weekend, or maybe it’s because I’m always eager to try out a new dish instead.  But regardless, it’s been much too long in between times for our beloved breakfast for dinner!
Tonight’s breakfast – I mean, dinner – I mean, breakfast – was a longtime favorite: scrambled eggs with drop biscuits and sausage links.  And it took no time at all.  I tend to rely on my friends at Bisquick for the biscuit mix, so all I had to do was add water and drop the biscuits onto a cookie sheet to bake them for 15 minutes or so.  I scrambled four eggs in the last five minutes of the biscuits’ cooking time, and heated the veggie sausage up before serving.

By the way — we don’t buy too many eggs these days, for both health and ethical reasons.  So when I do, I try to make a good, conscious choice.  We tried out Vital Farms’ eggs tonight and liked them quite a lot!  Of course they’re pricier than your standard grocery-store egg, but per all my research, they’re a more humane option.  And isn’t that what being frugal is all about — allowing yourself options to make better choices for your family?  Anyway, I’m not a soapboxy person (at least I don’t think so!), and I feel like everyone has to make the choices that are right for them and their families, but I did want to point that out. :)

Though it took little time – and, if we’re being honest, little effort as well! – you’d have thought I’d been working at this meal all day with the reception it got at the dinner (breakfast?) table.  We had a couple of biscuits left by meal’s end, but all of the eggs and sausage were cleared, not even a molecule left.  And I’ve already got my eye on those biscuits for tomorrow’s post-exercise breakfast.  LeeLee, look out!

:)

New Recipe: Vegetarian “Shrimp” Scampi Over Linguine.

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Vegetarian shrimp scampi, where have you been all my life?
As a Gulf Coast girl, I used to eat shrimp scampi all the time.  I loved the blend of tart lemon and sweet wine and my beloved shrimp, which was my favorite food before I went vegetarian (and the single meat product I ever missed afterward).  Now that there are several vegetarian “shrimp” products on the market, I can enjoy that scampi once more!  Or twice more.  Or thrice.  Or … well, dozens of times in the coming months, I’m sure!
Now, I’ve got to be honest: I’ve never made shrimp, or “shrimp,” scampi ever before in my life.  Someone else – a friend, a relative, a restaurant – has always done the cooking.  But I knew what I liked, and I knew what I wanted, and I also knew it was possible to enjoy thanks to a package of Sophie’s Kitchen breaded vegan shrimp in my freezer!  So I got right to work.
The full recipe is below, but the shortened version is: I heated some linguine, then got to work sautéing the onion (a Vidalia onion I picked up at a farmer’s market on our way home from the beach yesterday – do you know how difficult it is to find Vidalia onions this far north?  I nearly wept with joy when I saw a crate of them!) and minced garlic.  Once they were translucent, I added the juice of a lemon, a half-cup (or so) of white wine, some green peas, and some butter, then topped it with some salt and pepper and let the liquids reduce.  Once they reduced, I threw the shrimp in the pan – I baked them first, because they were breaded and I didn’t want all the breading to fall off in the pan during the cooking time! – and heated everything together once more.  After that, we were ready to eat!
The end result was fantastic, if I do say so myself. The scampi sauce was tart and sweet with a hint of peppery goodness, and the peas and vegetarian shrimp went together perfectly.  The shrimp was great, as well – it tasted, well, shrimpy, which I very much appreciated given all my hard work!  The dish made me remember those shrimp scampis of old, and then made me so happy that I could re-create such a dish with a vegetarian flair all these years later.  I’ll definitely make it again!
And now, the recipe …
VEGETARIAN “SHRIMP” SCAMPI OVER LINGUINE
Serves 2-4 (depending on how hungry you are)
What you’ll need:
1 box linguine
2 tbsp. olive oil
½ onion, diced
2 garlic cloves, minced
½-¾ white wine
1 lemon, sliced in half
1 cup frozen green peas
2 tbsp. butter
Salt and pepper to taste
1 package vegetarian shrimp (we used Sophie’s Kitchen brand)
¼ cup fresh parsley, chopped
First, heat a pot of water to boil.  Once it’s rolling nicely, add the linguine and let it cook.
Around the time you add the linguine to the pot, place the vegetarian shrimp on a baking sheet and bake them in the oven at 425.  You’ll add these to the pan at the last minute, but you want them to be fully cooked first; we use breaded shrimp and don’t want them to lose their breading in the pan!  (If you’re not using breaded shrimp, you can probably get away with adding them straight to the pan when the time comes, without the pre-baking.)
Next, add your olive oil to the pan and heat the burner to Medium.  Once the oil has warmed up, put the onion and garlic in and allow them to cook until they’re translucent, about 5-7 minutes.  If a few bits of garlic brown, no problem – just keep on cooking. :)
Once the onion has cooked (because the garlic doesn’t take nearly as long), add the wine and the juice of a sliced lemon and mix everything around nicely.  Place the butter in the pan along with your salt and pepper to taste.  Then add the peas and allow the liquid to reduce until it’s nearly gone.  If your linguine is finished before the liquid has reduced properly, give it a little gas and flip the burner up to Medium-High.  (Just keep an eye on it!)
Finally, it’s time to drain the pasta and add the shrimp to the pan – no, not all at once.  Drain the pasta and let it sit, and then add the baked shrimp to your pan, stirring everything around to coat thoroughly.  Be careful of the breading!  You’ll surely lose a little of it, but try to be gentle when you toss everything regardless.
Just before serving, add the parsley and stir everything around once more.  Pile your plate high with linguine, add a hearty helping of scampi, and enjoy!

:)

Sunday Cookout: Veggie Dogs With “Bacon”-Wrapped Asparagus and Baked Beans.

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Happy weekend, friends!  We’ve been at the beach since Friday (hence the silence on these blog pages), and rolled back into town just in time to throw food on the grill for tonight’s U.S.-Portugal soccer game.  The fun in the sun was fantastic, but we were both ready for some home-cooked food.  Enter: tonight’s Sunday Cookout!
As you no doubt know by now, veggie dogs are a perennial favorite around Chez Recessionista.  So is asparagus.  So are baked beans!  But I wanted to do something a little different, to jazz up the dish and surprise and delight my fellow diner (that’s LeeLee).  With that in mind, I looked in the freezer and my eyes settled on the new package of vegetarian bacon, just waiting to be used as an inspiration piece.
Aha!
I’ve wrapped Brussels sprouts before and cooked them on the smoker, but I’d never done the same thing with asparagus (and the grill).  No matter!  Tonight, I washed our asparagus (delivered in last week’s Great Country Farms box), cut off the woody ends, and wrapped each stalk in a slice of veggie bacon.  Instead of wrapping them in one even cylinder, as I did with the sprouts, I wrapped the bacon up the stalk, trying to cover as much of the asparagus as possible.  Then I covered them with foil and kept them chilled until their time on the grill began!
Next, I lit up the grill and let it get nice and hot.  Then I placed a pan of baked beans onto the grate and warmed it for 20 minutes or so before placing the aforementioned bacon-wrapped asparagus next to the pan.  After another five minutes, I added the veggie dogs – and after this point there was no space left on the grill!
After about 10 more minutes (and several rotations of our veggie dogs), I took everything up and added two buns to replace them, toasting them on each side for a couple of minutes apiece.  After that, it was time to pile our plates high, crack open a beer, and watch the World Cup while we had dinner atop our trusty TV trays (which are brought out for just such occasions)!
The World Cup may not have gone America’s way tonight (though it could have been worse!), but the dinner was a hit here at home.  We both loved the bacon-wrapped asparagus, and of course as usual devoured the veggie dogs and baked beans.  Both of the latter components are now waiting in the fridge to be used as leftovers tomorrow; I can’t say the same for the asparagus, which was picked clean tonight!  We’ll definitely make that again.

:)

Vegetarian “Steak” and Potatoes With Mixed Veggies.

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This meal is one of LeeLee’s favorites, a good old hearty “steak” and potatoes affair that soothes the soul and satisfies the stomach.  But don’t worry, I didn’t suffer any – truth be told, it’s one of my favorite dinners too!  And the final result – pots, pans, and serving dishes stripped clean of any molecule of tonight’s meal – proved it beyond a shadow of a doubt.
First, I set a large pot on the stove to boil, and once the water was going full speed ahead, I dropped a bag of small colorful potatoes in to cook.  Usually, I slice them into quarters, but these were small enough to cook all by themselves in about 25 minutes!  Once I had the potatoes in their proper place, I ventured out to our garden and cut some parsley and chives, washing them and chopping them up for serving atop the potatoes.  Hold that thought – I’ll be back to those in a few minutes.
When we had about 15 minutes left in the cooking process, I coated a frying pan with cooking spray, set the flame to Medium, and arranged a package of Gardein beefless tips in a single layer, flipping them around every 5 minutes or so to cook them evenly.  They sizzled beautifully, spicing up the kitchen with a mouthwatering aroma!
Finally, it was time to tackle the mixed vegetables – the easiest part of the meal, by far!  I pulled a package of steam-in-the-bag veggies out of the freezer, microwaved them for 5 minutes, and voila!  Tossed with some chipotle powder and a pat of butter, it was ready to be devoured in short order. :)
When the potatoes were fully cooked, I drained the water from the pan and placed them in a serving bowl.  That’s when I added a pat of butter to the top and sprinkled the parsley and chives over the spuds, stirring everything to coat the potatoes evenly.  The herbs added a splash of color to the bowl – and the flavor can’t be beat!
I gave away the ending to this story in the first paragraph of today’s post – we always love this meal, and tonight’s rendition is no different.  We’d cleaned the serving bowls so well, they hardly had to be washed (note to guests: I mean this facetiously, please come back over and eat, knowing our dishes are perfectly sterile!).  And though there are no leftovers, that’s OK.  Tonight’s dinner was worth it.

:)

Vegetarian “Chicken” Gumbo With Rice.

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This recipe is a tried-and-true, and it never lets us down.  And on nights when it’s almost too hot to think (my dear Floridian family, forgive me – this is our first heat wave of the season and my blood hasn’t thickened yet!) and LeeLee and I both came limping in later than usual, it is so embarrassingly easy to cobble together that it makes last-minute cooking a joy!  It’s light enough to stomach on summer evenings, yet filling enough to not have us sneaking back into the fridge half an hour later.  A win-win!
This gumbo is a longtime favorite – my mother has made it for the better part of at least three decades, maybe more.  And it’s incredibly versatile – we’ve used vegetarian chik’n, seitan, “steak” strips, and no protein at all, and the final result is always tasty!  Served atop a bed of rice, it’s a perfectly portioned meal.
As usual, we’ve got plenty left for lunches – at least two or three more servings!  And the flavors always mingle beautifully after a day in the fridge.  We can’t wait to dig in tomorrow!

:)

New Recipe: Vegetarian Chorizo Quesadillas.

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USA!  USA!
Tonight was a World Cup night in our home, complete with TV trays set up in the living room for dinner.  What could be better for such festivities than something handheld and festive?  Chorizo quesadillas – a recipe I concocted for just such an occasion – fit the bill beautifully!  Paired with a side of yellow rice, it made a perfect meal that was easy to cook, easy to eat, and celebratory, too.
LeeLee and I both loved the spice of the chorizo – we used Field Roast’s version tonight.  I sautéed it with a yellow onion, which brought a hint of sweetness to the dish, and added a diced jalapeno for a little extra kick.  Then I infused the pan with all my favorite spices – cumin, garlic powder, and even a hint of ground chipotle powder – and topped it all off with a hearty helping of diced cherry tomatoes for a little cooling-off period.  This blend resulted in a wonderfully flavorful dinner that had something for everybody!
And to top it off, the USA beat Ghana!  If that isn’t a sweet dessert, I don’t know what is.
CHORIZO QUESADILLAS
serves three
What you’ll need:
1 onion, diced
2 links of chorizo (we used Field Roast tonight and saved the other two links for later!)
1 jalapeno pepper, chopped finely
1 tsp. ground cumin
1 tsp. garlic powder
½ tsp. ground chipotle powder
3/4 pint cherry tomatoes, halved
1 package of six medium-size flour tortillas
1 cup cheddar cheese (we used Daiya)
Preheat your oven to 450 degrees.
Spray a medium-sized pan with cooking spray and heat it up to medium.  Sauté the diced onion until it becomes translucent, then add the chorizo, separating it into grounds with your hands if necessary.  Next, add the jalapeno and spices, and let everything heat up together for about 10 minutes.
Once the ingredients are warm and cooked through, add the cherry tomatoes, stirring to blend everything together.  Let the tomatoes warm up for about five minutes, and then it’s time to put your quesadillas together!
Lay three tortillas out on a baking sheet (or two baking sheets, if you have small sheets like mine!) and spoon 1/3 of the mixture on each one.  Divide the cheddar among each tortilla and add it atop the chorizo mixture.  Next, place the remaining tortillas atop your soon-to-be quesadilla, then spray the tops lightly with cooking spray.
Put the quesadillas in the oven for 10-15 minutes (begin checking after 10), or until the cheese is melted and the top tortilla is slightly golden brown.  Once they’re cooked, remove them from the oven and let them cool slightly before cutting them into quarters (I like to use a pizza cutter!).  Serve with sour cream, salsa, avocado wedges, a side of rice – whatever floats your boat!
Enjoy!

:)