Bok Choy Bohemia | A Vegetarian Blog

First off, I don’t remember what’s in the soup.  I dumped everything “Asian flavored” I had into the pot and let it simmer for half an hour.  Then there was soup.  I made some simple veggie wontons with shredded carrot, napa and mushrooms sauteed with a bit of five spice powder.  Overall it was pretty good, although I STILL don’t know why I went with hot soup on a hot day, it was too much.

Forbidden Rice is something I’ve been wanting to try for awhile, and when I saw that it was on sale for about 2 bucks a bag this week, I knew now was the time.  it turns a dark purple when cooked, and has a deep, nutty flavor.  I set this up with some sauteed onions and salt and pepper, nothing fancy, since I wanted to focus on the flavor of the rice.

Would I buy the rice at full price?  Probably not.  It isn’t bad, I simple don’t think it’s worth five dollars for a two serving bag, 2 was much more appropriate.  It is pretty cool to think I’m eating a grain once reserved for royalty, if that doesn’t give you the warm and fuzzies, I’m not sure what will…

Selah.

Sometimes all you want is a cold salad, and what masquerades as a simple salad but sounds so much cooler?  A succotash, of course.  This recipe is perfect for summer, although I must warn you that if you plan on leaving some of this for leftovers, you should omit the olives, because the brine overcomes the succotash when it chills.

I had my first helping on toast, and the second alone because I simple couldn’t get enough. I still enjoy saying it too…succ-o-TASH! Selah.

This was an idea I had because frankly, it was too humid to boil a huge pot of water for lasagna noodles the other day, but I was still feeling “casserole”.  I’d picked up some gorgeous summer squash at the first farmer’s market of the year, and the idea to mandolin those into thin strips and use them as “noodles” just seemed natural.  This whole thing worked out really well, and wasn’t at all hard to make, so I was pleased.  I WAS a bit disappointing that it didn’t want to stay together for a photograph, but I did the best I could with the structure…once chilled, it held its shape a lot better.

If you’re looking for a light but fulfilling dish that doesn’t need pasta, eggs and cheese to be delicious, this is your recipe.  I was rather proud of it myself, and I can’t wait to see what else this year’s farmer’s market will bring that could lead to new renditions on the same idea.

Selah.

This potato salad recipe was adapted from “Mom’s Kitchen Sink Potato Salad”  in the 2009 Penzy’s spices catalog.  The picture made my mouth water, so I had to make it, albeit minus the chicken stock, hard-boiled egg, and bacon.  I also messed with the amounts a bit, so bare with me, I’ll post the entire recipe as I made it.  This also gave me a great excuse to use tons of Bac-Uns, and that’s always a good thing.

This is seriously good.  I’m pretty sure it’s all about the different textures, it’s got lots of crunch, but some nice soft and saucy bites to.  The pepper adds a nice kick as well.  My favorite thing though is probably the inclusion of the two types of olives, I really like that briney flavor that they add.

Even better, it actually feels like summer today after WEEKS of rain.  Granted there was a thunderstorm around 1 this afternoon, but it passed quickly and the sun actually came out afterwards.  Yay!

Selah.

I made Persian Pilaf in honor of those in Iran who were outspoken about their beliefs and jailed for it…so they can’t enjoy such dishes.  This was probably the most time consuming rice dish I’ve ever made start to finish, and that even included risottos.  Unlike a risotto, a lot of the time with this dish is “inactive” so that helps a bit.  It’s also quite a presentation….although I was terrified there would be a disaster when it came time to overturn it onto the serving platter.  I got lucky though…

Recipe from Madhur Jaffrey’s World Vegetarian

This is actually a five layer rice dish.  You start with the potatoes, then a layer of rice, followed by a layer of the green bean-tomato mixture, more rice, more veggies, then more rice.  Ok, I lied, it’s six layers.  Sounds real intense, but the layering isn’t that hard, and the part where you leave it alone for half an hour isn’t bad at all, so I’ll reccomend the dish.  The cruncy rice and potatoes on the bottom/top are definitely the best part.

I also picked out a recipe for lemon-cashew chicken from Brand Name Chinese and replaced the meat with tofu.

The sauce on this was great…I was really into the lemony flavor with the white pepper.  The trick is crisping up the tofu on all sides before adding the rest of the veggies to the wok, and you’ll be golden.

Selah.rice, green beans, to

I used the Brand Name Chinese Cookbook again last night, with mixed results.  The green bean and shitake recipe which I followed to a T was pretty good, if not entirely mind-blowing.  Since I’ve been doing chinese food lately I’ve also been using a lot of cornstarch, which I’m not too keen on, but that’ll slow down a bit as I move to different flavors, since I never stick with a particular part of the world long.

While the green beans were good, I wasn’t so sure about the orange “chicken” (I used seitan).  1/4 cup of mollases seemed like too much, but I decided to follow directions for once and stick with it.  I was right, 1/4 cup of mollases IS too much, and that’s exactly what the seitan ended up tasting like, instead of orange even though there was plenty of that as well.  If you want a good seitan recipe, I’d suggest the (much simpler) one I used here.  It’s also not deep-fried, which’ll help if you’re calorie counting…

Selah.

This was originally a recipe from my brand name chinese cookbook, that I messed with a bit to veganize it.  Using wonton wrappers for things always seems like a great idea until I realize (again) just how fat my fingers are, although I did better this time then normal.  I’ll admit they also got significantly better looking the more I did.

I tweaked the simple seitan recipe from from V’con a bit to give it an Asian flair.  By that I mean that I replaced the olive oil with peanut, and sprinkled in some powdered ginger, five spice powder and white pepper.  It’s subtle, but it works.

The apricot preserves in this are really key, since they give the potstickers a nice tang even without dipping into the sauce.  A nice mango relish could be a unique change as well for more of an Indian flavor.

Selah.

Whenever a recipe features something like “mock duck”, you know I’ve been to the Asian Market, and that’s exactly where I was yesterday, leading to this dish.  I know stir-frys are pretty standard, but this one was among the more delicious, so I decided to post it anyway.

Loot acquired at the Asian Market yesterday and used in this included green tea soba noodles, Vegan Oyster Sauce, Mirin (I finished the old bottle the other day), and the canned “Mock Duck Meat”.  Cooked up with the mock duck was a couple stalks of celery, a few button mushrooms, and a bushel of asparagus.  The sauce was a combo of the Vegetarian Oyster Sauce, Mirin, Galangal, Tandoori Masala, and Shallot Pepper.  The entire affair was topped with Gomasio.

This was lunch, but I didn’t bother photographing the steamed eggplant with Korean Hot Sauce that we had for dinner, since I’ve done it before.  It’s one of those Madhur recipes I continue to enjoy and would reccomend.

Selah.

I never thought I’d say this, but there is such a thing as “too much mango”.  I’ll go head and admit it, the Mango-Ginger tofu from VwaV was too much mango for me.   I could only handle a small helping of this stuff because it was just so overpoweringly sweet and mango-ey.  There was no sugar or anything added, it was all from the mango.  There’s just not a whole lot I can say about this beyond holy mango! but it was pretty, so take a look:

I did an additional twenty minutes in the oven once the mango and pepper had been added, and I stand by that decision, because everything was cooked to perfection, and not overdone.  Still too much mango.  I can’t seem to get past the mango…I mean, really.  Great idea, but it’s just not my thing.

I don’t usually picture a simple green salad, but the dressing on this was pretty different.  I got the Sesame-Ginger-Miso recipe from The Passionate Vegetarian, and used it to top a quick salad of greens, pea shoots, and mushrooms.  I’m not normally into raw mushrooms, but I dressed this in advance, and the dressing actually did a great job of marinating those shrooms so they didn’t taste raw in the least.

I must admit that  I also rather like the colors of the salad, wich was added reason to take a picture and post it.  What can I say?  Sometimes I’m a bit vain.

Selah.

This was sooooo good.  Like I ‘just can’t stop thinking about it and imagining the next time’ good.  Not thoughts I have often about tempeh, but oh MAN did this recipe do it for me.  I wish I could say I’d come up with this, but the stroke of genius goes elsewhere this time.  I stole it, and I highly recommend you do too, from 101 cookbooks here.

I mean just LOOK at the tempeh!

I must warn you that while the recipe says the glaze will form in ten minutes, mine took more like 25.  Either the author’s cooktop is much more powerful than mine, or I’m just a bit slow.  It was well worth the wait though, because this DID glaze up eventually, and the coating on the tempeh was delicious.  I served atop some ramen noodles (gasp) which were boiled in some vegetable stock with powdered saffron and tandoor masala.  The noodles were mixed up with some bad company onions and mushrooms that I sauteed with S+P and which I thought mixed quite succesfully with the orange tempeh.

This is another big winner…and one more for the happy tempeh file, YAY!

Selah.