I'm Baaaaaaccckkk! Plum Crisp, Comin' At Ya!

I know, can you believe it!!!!!??? I am coming back from the hole you all (hi Mom!) thought I crawled into and am blogging again!!!! (At least for a post...) So many new things (marital status, job, kitchen, dishwasher, iphone app...) in my life, but I am missing cooking and a creative outlet, now that I am not wedding planning and find myself a little too busy with my job I thought I'd blog again!

Today I am sharing some individual plum crisps I made. Plums looked good at the farmer's market this morning, and I have some ADORABLE tiny individual purple Le Creuset dutch ovens (thanks to my in-laws) and I had a hard morning (teacher test!) so obviously I thought it was individual desert night-- not that I don't like sharing, but sometimes you need your own dutch oven full of crisp.

I don't really have a specific recipe for these puppies, although I do have a pretty foolproof crisp/crumble method, which I don't know if I have shared with you before. Basically, I chop up about 2-3 cups of whatever fruit I want to use (apples, pear, plums, peaches, etc.) and add a little sweetener (usually agave, maple syrup or honey), some cinnamon, vanilla extract if you like and a tablespoon-ish of flour and throw this in the bottom of my baking dish (or dishes!). I then mix together equal parts flour, oats, nuts, and oil (canola or coconut is good, melted earth balance will do too) and add a dash of salt. I usually do a half cup of each, but you can totally adjust this depending on the size of crisp/crumble you want to make. Gently mix the topping ingredients together with a fork until the mixture looks "sandy" or "crumbly." Pour the topping on the fruit and throw the whole thing in a 375 degree oven for however long it takes for the top to brown and the fruit to get "bubbly."

I know, usually when you bake the formula should be exact but this method really does create yummy crisps and crumbles every time, and you can totally experiment with fruits, spices, nuts, etc. Even if the results aren't exactly how you wanted them to be, you really can't go wrong with hot fruit, crunchy bits of nuts and oats and a little melting vanilla soy or coconut ice cream on top.

So there you go everyone (or just Mom!), just in time for fall! Hopefully I'll get my act together and get on this thing more often...

My homemade vanilla extract-- vanilla beans + vodka + 1 month to sit = PERFECT! Thanks Ina Garten!

Blueberry Corn Muffins

I haven't blogged in forever! Well, now that I am on summer vacation hopefully I"ll get it together more. We shall see... Anyhoo, I am up to my elbows in blueberries (and romaine lettuce) this week thanks to our CSA. I froze many of them on a cookie sheet for a few hours, then stored them in a ziploc bag to use over the next few weeks. The remaining berries made their way into these blueberry corn muffins.

The recipe is from Vegan With a Vengeance, and someone posted it on the web here. I have made these in the past, and knew it would be worth the effort to turn on the oven in this unbelievably gross heat to bake them this morning. Even if you don't try this recipe, I strongly urge you to experiment with the combination of blueberries and cornmeal, it's a delicious one. I made these extra large, so I ended up with 9 instead of 12. To me it's worth it, small muffins that don't rise past the tops of the muffin tin just aren't worth the trouble of baking, people. I will be shocked if any of these are left for breakfast on Monday...

Banana Nut Bread

It's recipes like these that prove that the old baking rule that you need eggs to make a moist bread or cake is crap! This bread is soooooooo good, and healthier than many other versions out there that are loaded with butter, eggs and sugar. I swear, you won't even know they are missing!
This recipe is originally from How It All Vegan! but I have modified it so much the past few times I've made it that it's pretty much a new recipe now... EVERYONE loves banana bread, so you really have no excuse not to make this the next time you look over to your fruit bowl and spy some sad, brown bananas :-)
Banana Nut Bread

• 2 1/2 - 3 ripe bananas, mashed
• 1 tbs. apple cider vinegar
• 1/2 cup canola or vegetable oil
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/2-3/4 cup chopped pecans (depending on how nutty you want it!)
• 1 cup whole wheat pastry flour + 1/2 cup whole wheat pastry flour
• 1/4 cup ground flax seeds
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 1/2 tsp. baking powder
• 1/2 tsp. baking soda
• Cinnamon sugar

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. In a small bowl, mash the bananas with a fork until very mushy, then add the vinegar, oil, sugar and stir together. In a separate bowl, stir together the flour, flax seeds, salt, baking powder and baking soda. Add the banana mixture to the flour mixture and mix together gently until "just mixed." Fold in pecans. Spoon into lightly greased loaf pan and sprinkle the top with cinnamon sugar. Bake for 40-50 minutes until a knife comes out clean.


p.s. A handful of chocolate chips instead of or in addition to the pecans would turn this baby into the perfect desert to bring to a picnic- it wouldn't suck heated up with a scoop of vanilla soy ice cream on top either!

Vegan Dinner for Carnavores (aka Mom and Dad)

I am at home once again visiting my Mom, Dad, and Sam. Last night they agreed to cook something from my Candle Cafe cook book... and eat it! We decided on cornmeal-crusted tempeh, a dish where the tempeh was marinated in a mixture of soy sauce, maple syrup, ginger and garlic and baked for one hour, then coated in cornmeal and pan fried. The results were pretty tasty, and hearty (my Dad even had seconds and thirds!). We also made some collard greens and smashed and fried potatoes topped with a lemon parsley vinaigrette. The following photo makes it all look a little sad, because the plate is so big, but trust me, this is a meal that will satisfy skeptical meat eaters!


For desert, I made strawberry short cakes, following this recipe, which I chose because it only made 3 or 4 biscuits at a time (it can be dangerous to have leftovers!). Instead of vegan whipped cream, I heated up the biscuits and topped with some rice ice cream. I highly recommend this recipe, not only is it pretty fast and easy, but the biscuits were some of the best I'd ever had- a success!

A Gooey German Chocolate Cake

For a very special birthday!

This was the first German chocolate cake I had ever made, and I kinda didn't realize I couldn't frost the sides.. I think people usually use chocolate butter cream or something for that.... Whoops!

Anyhoo, it was delicious, I made one mini cake and four cupcakes. The recipe was from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World, a book which has never let me down. The basic chocolate and vanilla cake recipes from this book are amazing, and thrill and amazing non-vegan people every time!

Lime Cupcakes

For Tom's birthday!!!

If you're turning 80, let me know, my baked goods seem to be in demand for that particular birthday!

C is for Cookie...

...and that's a good enough reason for me to bake up two dozen every weekend.

Seriously, I seem to go through a vegan baking phase every winter. Two years ago it was vegan cupcakes. Last winter it was pies. This winter it's cookies. It's not a healthy habit, but life is short, and I do have help taking care of them from a certain cookie vacuum I live with!

These two cookie recipes are, sort of, healthy. The first one is agave sweetened peanut butter cookies from Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar. So, they not sweetened with sugar, which is nice. However, the three generous handfuls of chocolate chunks I added to them had plenty of sugar, I'm sure. What are you gonna do? But these were gooood people. Like, shut. up. good.


My next attempt at "healthy" cookie making was the oatmeal, walnut and dried plum cookies from Alicia Silverstone's new book, The Kind Diet. I changed them quite a bit by using raisins and pumpkin seeds instead of plums and walnuts, and had to use 1/4 cup regular sugar instead of the maple sugar called for, but that's OK. They still were low(ish) on the sweeteners (they also called for maple syrup) and used only 3/4 cup flour. These flattened when they baked, which was disappointing, but they were chewy and actually pretty good! I would make them again for sure.


On that note, I highly recommend The Kind Diet. Although I have had the utmost respect for Alicia Silverstone for years for speaking out against cruelty towards animals and advocating a vegan/vegetarian diet, I was skeptical this book would be good (sorry Alicia!). I was wrong. It's awesome, and a great book for anyone wanting to try veganism, vegans who need a diet make over, and people who just want to know how to eat a little healthier. Although it's a "diet" book, Alicia makes a point to say if you are paying attention to what you eat and striving to eat lots of veggies and grains, that's the most important thing. She also stresses not beating yourself up if you eat crap every once in a while (I didn't just eat an Oreo brownie from Vegan Treats!), and to make sure you don't deprive yourself. Her view on exercise is very similar to mine as well, there is no point in forcing yourself to sweat on a treadmill at the gym if you hate it- you're much better off doing something you love, like yoga, or going for a long walk. She even says she likes to still go to beginner yoga classes just so she doesn't feel pressured and can move at her own pace- that's awesome!!!! OK, done gushing.

Trouble!

I had been looking for a vegan brownie recipe that was reminiscent of how I remembered non-vegan brownies tasting for a long time now... however, most that I had found called for silken tofu, not really my thing when baking. I had made these brownies from The Vegan Scoop before, to put in ice cream, but had yet to make them to enjoy straight up by themselves. Saturday night I made them, using the author's suggestion to add some peanut butter, and cut them into hearts (a little experiment for some upcoming Valentine's baking).

I packed them in some tupperware and headed to dinner in Jersey City, where I think they were a hit, especially heated up with a scoop of coconut vanilla ice cream on top. The problem now is there are still some left over, and I'm in trouble, cuz I CAN NOT STOP EATING THEM!!!!

Greenpoint Food Market- A Success!

In case you've been sleeping off a mulled wine hangover (not that I have!) or have been in an oblivious haze the past two days, let me catch you up. It snowed on the East Coast. A lot. Or at least most people think it's a lot- being from Colorado I would only call it a medium/small-ish storm. Anyways, this ridiculous storm caused my flight home, which would have been this morning, to be canceled.

Needless to say I am pretty bummed, I want to get home and do Christmas stuff, like a gingerbread house throwdown, asap! But, the hard blow of the reality that I won't be home until Monday night was softened yesterday by the fact I sold out of everything but 7 chocolate rugelach cookies yesterday at the Greenpoint Food Market!!!!!!!!!!!

I had a lot of fun, partly because everyone was in a Christmasy cookie mood, and partly because I once again shared a table with my buddy Aja, aka Sandwich Friend, who is awesome and makes seriously yummy sandwiches.

The set up- not the greatest picture, but you get the idea.


Chocolate chocolate-chip gingerbread cookies- these were a last minute addition but were the most popular- inspired by Martha Stewart, but veganized and spiced up with crystallized ginger on top. These sold out, and I have to admit I was kind of disappointed, I had hoped to at least save one to eat later! The lighting is crappy- you can't see how chocolaty these really are....
The chocolate and raspberry rugelach!!! It sparked many conversations- people told me how their grandmothers used to make it, or how they became addicted to it living in South Williamsburg. The raspberry was the first thing to sell out- much to Phil's disappointment.


Aja's sandwiches- she always has a vegan option that is off the hook. Yesterday it was a "Saucy Tempehtress," tempeh baked in bbq sauce with pickles, pickled red onions, swiss chard and some Vegenasie... I think the quality of my life would drastically improve if she could pack my lunch every day....

So yeah! It was a lot of work, but a lot of of fun, and satisfying to see people eat my cookies, and sometimes even come back for seconds, or a whole bag. This was The Lindzertort Bakery's second official time out, and I am learning so much... Even though I made a ton of cookies to sell, I think this is only the beginning of my holiday baking- stay tuned!

Vegan Mofo: Candle Cafe Pumpkin Pudding

Cookbook: The Candle Cafe Cookbook: More Than 150 Enlightened Recipes from New York's Renowned Vegan Restaurant
Author(s): Bart Potenza & Barbara Scott-Goodman

Result: I got this book for my birthday from my buddies at work, and there are so many fantastic recipes I had no idea where to start. The last night my Mom was here and we were cooking dinner, I decided to throw this together because I had most of the ingredients on hand, and if you have been reading this blog you know I can't resist anything involving pumpkins.


I replaced cornstarch for the arrowroot or powder or kuzu powder the recipe called for, so I am not sure if the taste was affected or not. All in all it was a fine desert, especially when topped with a little vanilla-coconut ice cream. It could have been a tad sweeter, so with a little more maple syrup added and maybe some straight up vanilla soy ice cream (minus the coconut which didn't pair so well) dusted with cinnamon I could see this being a lovely vegan holiday desert.

Vegan MoFo Day 10: Lower Fat Banana Bread with Chocolate Chips and Crystallized Ginger

Cookbook: Veganomicon
Author(s): Isa Chandra Moskowitz & Terry Hope Romero

Result: I have been reading this book, and have really been enjoying it. It's a charming book of recipes and the stories of how they came about, written by the Molly Wizenberg, the person behind this lovely blog. Anyways, in the book, she describes in vivid and delicious detail a recipe for crystallized ginger and chocolate chip banana bread. I read this chapter on Monday, and have been obsessing about making this bread ever since. I had bananas, I had chocolate chips, I had crystallized ginger, it was only a matter of time.

So, tonight was the night. I couldn't really justify coming home and baking a loaf of old school banana bread loaded with sugar and fat, so I decided to give this recipe from Veganomicon a try. The resulting bread was not as moist as I had hoped for, but it did reveal that chocolate, banana and crystallized ginger are a surprisingly fabulous combination. I will be trying them together again, but probably in a different banana cake/bread recipe.

Vegan MoFo Day 3: Leek and Bean Cassoulet with Biscuits; Apple Wrapper Pie

Leek and Bean Cassoulet with Biscuits
Cookbook: Veganomicon
Author(s): Isa Chandra Moskowitz & Terry Hope Romero

Result: I had made this recipe about a year and a half ago when I was at home with help from my mom. I remembered it being delicious and very comforting. It was pretty good again this time, although it lacked a little bit in flavor, so I added some more salt. It was still a little bland, but over all a filling fall meal with a good dose of protein (I added the suggested seitan).



Apple Wrapper Pie
Cookbook: Betty Crocker's Cookbook
Author: Um.... Betty Crocker?

Result: I love having people over for dinner because it always gives me an excuse to make a pie. I turn to my handy-dandy Betty Crocker cookbook whenever I need a really basic recipe, and it always comes through for pies. I wasn't in the mood to make a double crust pie today, but had a request for pie made from some apples scored at the Farmer's Market this morning.

The "Wrapper" pie is an easy and perfect solution when you want pie but don't want to put in a whole lot of effort, and don't want the fat that comes with two pie crusts. I sub Earth Balance soy butter for the shortening the recipe calls for, but the result is still a flaky and delicious crust, and I highly doubt most people can tell the difference... We enjoyed this puppy with some vanilla coconut ice cream.

Vegan MoFo Day 2: Pumpkin Spice Muffins

Cookbook: Babycakes
Author: Erin McKenna

Result: It probably does not pay to be a cheapskate. I opted to leave out the xanthan gum in this recipe because it was $10 at Whole Foods, and I was not in the mood to pay that much. I used some ground flax seeds mixed with water to replace it (as a binder), and that worked OK, but the batter was kinda runny and lumpy. Not sure if that was because of the xanthan/flax switch up, or the recipe itself.


I chose this recipe because I was craving some pumpkin muffins, as it is now October, and I find very few things more adorable or perfect than pumpkins. I looked through a few of my cookbooks, but every recipe I found called for a lot of sugar. This one only called for 2/3 cup of agave nectar, and 1/2 cup of coconut oil. The muffins were a little less sweet than your traditional pumpkin muffin, and I would probably throw some raisins or chocolate chips in next time. But, all in all they turned out moist and pumpkin-y, and made 16 muffins! Pumpkin muffins for breakfast for all, all week!

Back to School Granola

Because something has to get me out of bed at 6 a.m. tomorrow.... HOLY cow. Inspired by my lovely friend, Prysm.


* Granola*

• 4 1/2 cups organic rolled oats
• 1 cup raw pecans
• 1/2 cup raw walnuts
• 1/2 cup flax meal
• 1 1/2 tsp. salt
• 1/2 cup unrefined sesame oil
• 1/2 cup pure maple syrup
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 2-3 dashes of cinnamon
• 1 generous cup chopped dates
• 1/2 cup golden raisins

Preheat oven until 350 degrees. In a large mixing bowl, combine oats, pecans, walnuts, salt and flax meal. In a smaller bowl, whisk together sesame oil, maple syrup, cinnamon, vanilla extract and cinnamon until well combined. Pour wet ingredients into dry, and mix with a rubber spatula until all of the oat/nut mixture is completely coated, this will take awhile but it will happen, I promise.

Once everything is well combined, pour onto a lightly greased cookie sheet, spreading the granola into an even layer, about an inch thick. Bake in the oven, checking granola every 6-8 minutes and moving it around on the cookie sheet with a spatula. After about 25 mins or so the oats should be golden brown, which means its time to take the granola out of the oven.

After the granola has cooled a bit, mix it together with the dates and raisins. Store in an airtight container.

Many granola recipes have you toast the oats before mixing them with the other ingredients and baking everything together. I found that it was fine without pre-toasting, and it makes the whole process quicker.

Vegan Zwetschgenkuchen- Take 2

"Butter" Cream Roses- not nearly as easy as you would think...

I made a few smaller "practice" cakes to work on my icing technique- I am trying to teach myself how to make butter cream roses (of course mine are vegan...). They are soooo hard! I am determined to master the rose by the time I go back to school in a few weeks, we shall see if that happens. Here's hoping these photos serve as "before" pictures soon... I now understand why people charge hundreds of dollars for cakes!

Birthday Cake!

Here are some pics of the cake I made for my Grandpa Ted's 80th bday! I used the skills I learned in my cake decorating class last month. It didn't turn out exactly as I had hoped (there was a pastry bag mishap), but it was fun to make!

The cake was a basic yellow cake with mocha butter cream frosting, as per Grandpa Ted's request. I wish I could say we had leftovers today, but we don't, it was quickly devoured! One more victory on my quest to convince the world vegan deserts are every bit as yummy as "regular" ones!

I also made a backup pineapple upside down cake, because I was afraid the bday cake wouldn't feed everyone. Luckily there was enough for everyone, so there wasn't a need for the mushy pineapple cake. Next time I think I will make individual pineapple upside down cakes, they would probably bake more evenly...

Tell your friends! I need to start selling these puppies for money. Just kidding! Kind of...

Vegan Party Cupcakes- Ready for their Close-Up!

48 mini chocolate/chocolate and vanilla-lemon cupcakes, ready for our shin-dig tonight. I tried to be fancy with my new pastry bag skills, but the surface of these little guys was too tiny to do much... I hope I made enough!