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The Kitchen Recessionista

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

Taco Salad With Vegan Fish.

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taco-salad-with-fish

Hello, friends!

My apologies for the brevity this week! Between work and home events, it’s been a busy one, carrying right on through today, which happens to be my birthday! After a few days of eating out for various and sundry reasons, I was itching to get back into the kitchen tonight, so I whipped up a version of my best vegan taco salad and managed to add in some Gardein “fish” for a spot of protein! And it worked out just perfectly, if I do say so.

I’ll be back on the proper blogging wagon next week (and tomorrow, of course, for Friday Favorite), but I did want to just pop in and say hello and tell you how much I miss you. Drop me a note in the comments and let me know what YOU’VE been up to this week!

:)

Vegan Taco Salad Supreme.

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It’s no secret that Mexican fare is a mainstay here at Chez Recessionista, in much the same way as we adore Cajun food. But sometimes, the usual tacos, burritos, and quesadillas get a bit worn-out, a bit heavy. That’s when we turn to taco salads to fill the void in the most delicious way possible!

Now, I suppose in full disclosure I should mention that we enjoyed a Pie Day at work today, where my colleagues and I brought in nearly a dozen pie offerings and sampled just as many. So I was hardly virtuous in my dietary plan as the hours ticked by this afternoon! And by the time I got home, I knew I had to have some greenery in order to at least try to offset the sweets.

I’m calling tonight’s taco salad creation the Taco Salad Supreme because it has a little bit of everything, and it has a lot of flair. First, I heated up two taco-shell bowls in the oven at 350 for about 10 minutes, and as they warmed, I coated a pan with cooking spray and sautéed some Gardein beefless tips to add some steaky flavor to the salad! As they cooked, I also warmed a can of black beans in a small saucepan, seasoning the beans with some adobo spice for a little extra kick. Once the taco bowls were ready and the vegan steak was heated through, it was time to plate everything up!

First, I placed a taco bowl atop two plates (one for LeeLee and one for me, of course). Then in each bowl I layered a hearty dose of black beans (sauce and all), then plenty of lettuce, then the beefless tips, then black olives, cherry tomatoes, Follow Your Heart vegan provolone slices (I use them in my lunch wraps, and it was the only cheese I have in the house at the moment!), and Snapea Crisps. We topped our salads with a homemade creamy lemon dill dressing – with dill from our garden, because why not? – and then poured ourselves a glass of wine to go along with the main event. Cheers! Time to eat.

These taco salads are so much fun to eat – the edible bowl adds an air of festivity to dinner! And by the end of dinner, we had nothing left but two leftover tortilla bowls and a handful of black olives. No matter – I’ll be back to my wraps for lunch tomorrow, and the bowls will keep in the freezer for quite some time! I feel sure we’ll put them to good use in short order.

:)

Vegan Taco Salad.

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Now, I know this is supposed to be a Crock-Pot Monday, but I had a bit of a technical difficulty with regard to some dried black-eyed peas, so this week’s slow-cooker creation will have to debut tomorrow instead. In its place, I present you with one of our favorite meals: Vegan taco salad!

Taco salad makes the rounds fairly frequently around here, and it’s a cinch to put together – perfect for nights like this, when I’m off to tai chi class in short order. I heated up two taco bowls in the oven and then warmed up a can of beans and a package of ground “beef” (in two separate pans, of course!) on the stovetop. I added some adobo seasoning to the beef to give it a little extra pop and kept a close watch on the beans, which are prone to burning on the bottom if you’re not careful.

When the taco shells were ready, so were the beans and beef, and I rolled up my sleeves to start the assembly line. In the bottom of each shell I placed a hearty helping of beans, then a layer of beef, then several handfuls apiece of lettuce, then several cherry tomatoes, and finally topped everything off with a dollop of vegan sour cream and a handful of Daiya pepperjack shreds. Served with a little salsa on the side (and, as is customary for me, a nice helping of nutritional yeast on top of everything!), it was a feast!

We popped out our TV trays – as has become Monday’s tradition – and ate our fill while catching up on the news and an episode of “The Golden Girls.” (It’s a guilty pleasure. Don’t judge!) And now I’m certainly fueled-up for tonight’s tai chi! And LeeLee is fueled-up for a night with the cat. Not a bad way to spend some energy!

:)

Lazybones Cooking for All Occasions!

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It’s true. For the last two days, I’ve been a bit of a lazybones in the kitchen! Last night, LeeLee was away at a meeting (where he ate dinner) and so I decided to treat myself to a feast from my friends at District Taco, which has a branch within walking distance from my house. (Too close for comfort, I say!) That’s the taco you see above – a vegan black-bean and rice concoction that comes in a set of three. Glorious!

I include this here even though it’s not my own cooking to keep it real, you know? As much as I love to roll up my sleeves and get into the kitchen, sometimes life gets in the way and we decide to treat ourselves. These little sidetracks to get carryout or delivery during the workweek illustrate the living portion of the living below our means credo that we try to abide by most of the time. Because we take our lunch to work, brew our own coffee, make dinner nearly every night, and so forth, we can afford – literally! – to deviate from the menu plan once in awhile. And last night was definitely one of those nights. I sure embraced it, that’s for certain!

Tonight’s story is slightly different. I volunteered at our local animal shelter before attending a meeting at said shelter, and then said meeting ran over, and then my planned dinner drifted further and further out of my grasp. But no matter. A Kashi frozen pizza and a bag of Southwest salad mix soon set things right:

kashi-pizza

And while it was not the homemade meal I was planning on, it certainly hit the spot! Neither LeeLee nor I were at all dismayed to feast on pizza and salad (to say nothing of the Moscato we served alongside), and the meal I was planning on making tonight will keep until next week. No harm done!

Now, speaking of the animal shelter, my good friend Cheesecake is waiting for a home:

cheesecake

So if you’ve been looking for a sweetie-pie, be sure to march right down and visit her straightaway!

:)

Taco Salad With Vegetarian Steak.

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You know, this week we just haven’t had enough greenery in our lives. Forget the soup. Forget the pancakes (just for a minute). Forget that it’s like 0 degrees outside.

No, what we needed tonight was a salad. A hearty, heaping salad with lettuce coming over the side of the plate, with olives and cherry tomatoes rolling onto the table and a warm base of vegan steak nestled deep within a tortilla bowl with a layer of refried beans serving as the base. Yes, a taco salad is exactly what we needed, in fact.

And a taco salad is exactly what we had! I heated up two tortilla bowls in the oven, and as I did, I sautéed a package of Gardein “beef” tips in my new omelet pan, topping them with some chipotle powder for seasoning. As they cooked, I heated up a can of refried beans in my beloved Corningware crockery. After just a few minutes, everything was cooked to perfection, and it was time to assemble the dish!

I placed each tortilla bowl on a plate and then topped each one with several heaping spoonfuls of refried beans. Next, I divided the beef tips evenly between the bowls – no leftovers on these, no way! – and then topped the protein with lettuce, black olives, and cherry tomatoes. Then we dressed our salads with the dressing of our choice – balsamic for LeeLee, Thousand Island for me – and I added a dash of nutritional yeast for good measure. (LeeLee abstained from that part.) Then all that was left was to dig in!

For being so cold outside, this salad was a blast of summer if I’ve ever tasted one. The flavors were so fresh, the composition a mixture of cool and warm temperatures, and we each mowed down the entire salad, bowl and all. I take comfort, however, in knowing we’ve got enough fixins left for another (steak-less) salad tomorrow for lunch! Let’s extend this summertime feeling just as long as we can, OK?

:)

Super Bowl Sunday: Vegan “Beef” Pizza With Orzo Salad (and a Special Dessert!).

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It’s that time again, friends! Time for the second biggest football game of the year (the biggest? Why, the college football title game, of course!), the good old Super Bowl. Some years, we attend friends’ gatherings; some years, we host our own. But this year, LeeLee and I are content to have an exclusive private party for two (well, three, when you count the Wonder-Cat). It’s not a bad way to celebrate, all told!

And what goes better with the Super Bowl than pizza? Not a single thing. And so it came to pass that yesterday I prepared my trusty dough and let it rest in the fridge overnight until we needed it today. As the game was nearing its kickoff, I spread the dough out on one of my pizza pans, heated it for 10 minutes or so at 450, and then topped it with pizza sauce, Daiya mozzarella shreds, mushroom slices, and diced veggie burgers. Then I baked the pizza again for about 15 minutes until the cheese had melted and the crust was browning nicely. I pulled the pizza out of the oven to rest for a moment (which makes cutting it much easier), and then turned my attention to the orzo salad, which I pulled from The Pioneer Woman’s blog.

True confessions: I actually made this salad yesterday for a dinner party we attended last night, but it made so much that we had plenty to take back home after the fact! So it’s been resting in the fridge all day, which allowed the flavors to mingle even more. And it’s a wonderful substitution for the normal tossed salad I like to make! It certainly added an air of festivity to the evening.

Speaking of festive foodstuffs, I decided to take some liberties and make a dessert for tonight’s meal as well – a rarity in our household, because I do love sweets and I’ll eat every last morsel if it’s in my house. But I enjoyed these vegan Rice Krispie treats so much when my friend Jill hosted her Super Bowl party last year that I just had to make them for myself this time around! They were a cinch to make, and they look (and taste) just like the original recipe. Love!

vegan-rice-krispie-treats

And with that, our dinner was complete! Paired with a lovely appetizer of chips and salsa, as well as a frosty beverage from our friends over at Port City Brewing, it’s been a perfectly wonderful evening, no matter how the final score ends up!

:)

Vegetarian Taco Salad.

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Due in part to the drizzly weather and in part to the sheer post-Christmas exhaustion I felt this afternoon, tonight’s usual Sunday cookout became instead a vegetarian taco salad for one indoors. (Oh, that was the other reason a cookout wasn’t tenable this evening: LeeLee attended a dinner with some friends, so I would have fired up the smoker just for one person. I could think of better ways to spend my time this afternoon, such as going to search for the snowy owl!)

So with all this in mind, I fixed a simple yet filling taco salad upon arriving home from communing with Snowy, using roughly the same recipe I’ve outlined on these pages in the past. The only difference: I eschewed the ground “beef” I usually cook, since to be perfectly honest sautéing the crumbles was just simply too much work for one person!

Instead, I heated up a can of refried beans and then placed them at the bottom of a taco bowl. Next I heaped on several handfuls of romaine lettuce, then some pretty cherry tomatoes LeeLee picked up last night, then some black olives, then cheddar cheese, then nutritional yeast (because why not?), then vegetarian bacon bits, and then, finally, some salad dressing. Easily done!

I don’t mind telling you I mowed down the entire bowl full, including the tortilla bowl itself, and had a second smaller helping of just lettuce, olives, and cheese. And I’ve got plenty more for tomorrow and Tuesday – it’s the gift that keeps on giving, from one meal to the next!

:)

Leftovers’ New Life: Chili-Tater Salad.

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As I mentioned last week, my family visited LeeLee and me (and, most importantly, the Wonder-Cat) over the weekend. We had a great time catching up, watching Alexandria’s annual Scottish Walk on Saturday, crossing our fingers for another Florida State football win, and sharing many meals together. Some of them were at-home affairs – the black-bean soup I discussed last week, as well as a rendition of my baked penne recipe, just to name a couple of selections – but we also visited several of our favorite haunts around town for a change of scenery. From pizza to brunch to chili, we certainly made the rounds!

That last genre – chili – is where I’m focusing my time for the benefit of this blog post. It’s our family’s tradition that on the last night my parents are in town, we visit Hard Times Cafe, one of our very favorite chili cookeries right here in Old Town. There’s something for everyone: A meaty chili for my dad, vegetarian chili for LeeLee and me, and a chicken sandwich for my mom, who always dares to be different. :) So per tradition, that’s where we found ourselves last night, seated in one of their tight-knit booths, Johnny Cash and Elvis tunes playing in the background.

We never leave Hard Times hungry; the portions are huge! And often we leave with a little something to take home (my mother calls it a “kitty bag” on account of the Wonder-Cat). Such was the case last night, when I managed to bring home about half of my Chili Taters – chili, tater tots, and all the fixins, blended together into a tasty bowl full.

I didn’t have quite enough leftover to stand alone as a meal, but added to some vegetables? A perfectly filling dinner indeed!

So I heated the chili taters up and arranged a plate full of lettuce in the meantime. Then I spooned the chili atop the greens and topped it with cherry tomatoes, sliced olives, and nutritional yeast. Finally, I added some Thousand Island dressing to the lettuce leaves, grabbed a fork and napkin, and got down to business! (Where is LeeLee, you ask? Eating at an evening meeting tonight. The perfect time to enjoy leftovers for one!)

The outcome was glorious. Hard Times actually serves a chili salad in their restaurants, so this wasn’t too far off the mark from their existing menu item. (I don’t think they serve nutritional yeast atop theirs, however. Hee.) The chili – and tater tots – held up well overnight and were a perfect topping to the salad, blending just perfectly with the butter lettuce, tomatoes, and olives. And the dressing gave the meal a little extra burst of flavor just to keep things interesting.

These leftovers definitely got a new life today – I can’t wait to get back to Hard Times to bring home some more!

:)

Potato and Corn Salad With Vegan Shrimp.

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So, as I’ve mentioned now quite often, we have a bunch of potatoes skulking about the house.  Fortunately, other members of my CSA, Great Country Farms, have been generous with their recipe suggestions, and I took one of them to heart tonight!
Along with our potatoes, we’ve also had plenty of fresh corn as of late thanks to our weekly veggie boxes, so this Food Network recipe was no trouble at all to put together.  Since I’m training for a triathlon and this week is a ramp-up week, I’m hungry all the time, so I decided to add a little protein to the mix by way of some Sophie’s Kichen vegan shrimp.  As a Gulf Coast native, I figure shrimp (or, these days, its vegan counterpart) goes with anything!
And so I got started preparing the veggies – though I deviated from the recipe a little and boiled both the corn and the potatoes in the same pot at the same time instead of sautéing the corn separately.  As they cooked, I heated up a pan full of vegan shrimp, which were warm and toasty by the time the potatoes were soft and the kernels of corn were ready to be cut off the cob!
In a large bowl I shaved the ears of corn clean and then added the drained diced potatoes to the mix.  Then I put the shrimp on top and sliced a scallion, and finally tossed everything in the dressing.  Instead of using buttermilk, I used almond milk, and for the first time I tried out Just Mayo, which I liked quite a lot!  I also used white balsamic vinegar for the vinegar, because we had it lying around so why not. :)
The result?  Majesty!  We loved this salad so very much, and the shrimp did indeed make a wonderful addition to the mix.  It was fresh yet filling; healthy yet hearty.  And the dressing was just great!  I was worried that the almond milk would render it too watery, but it maintained a very nice consistency within the salad and coated the ingredients just beautifully.
We were both so pleased with this salad – I’ll definitely make this recipe again!  And heaven knows we’ll have plenty of potatoes to practice on in the next little while.  (Speaking of, if you have suggestions for what we should do with our dozens of pounds of potatoes, please speak up in the comments!  I’d love to hear from you.)

:)

Old Faithful Taco Salad.

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Why didn’t I think of this before?
As it happened, last night we had a little bit of our black beans and rice – aka Old Faithful – left over after dinner.  Tonight, I dined alone – LeeLee had a meeting that went through dinner – and I was looking for something easy, yet filling; tasty, yet healthy.  As I drove home, it hit me!  Why don’t I put the leftover Old Faithful on a tostada bowl, add some fixins, and make it a salad?
Genius!
When I arrived home, I got straight to work.  First I heated up the black beans and rice and cooked a tostada shell at 350 for several minutes.  Next, I layered a heaping helping of lettuce in the bottom of the shell, then added the leftover beans and rice, then a handful of cherry tomatoes (from a larger collection I have for this weekend’s FSU football party – nobody will miss them!), then some Daiya cheddar cheese, a spoonful of sour cream, and some Tabasco.  I topped the whole thing with salad dressing, and dinner was ready five minutes after prep had begun!
I really can’t believe I haven’t tried this particular taco salad combination before!  Maybe I’d pigeonholed poor ol’ Old Faithful and couldn’t see it in a new light?  In any case, I’ve seen the error of my ways now, and I won’t make that mistake again.  This would also be an excellent workday lunch; I may make a batch of beans and rice for just such an occasion!

:)