It's the End of the Blog as We Know It

Vegan Family,

Looking back over the past year in blogging made me come to a conclusion: this blog is effectively over and has been for at least a year.  Only 30 posts in 2012 (half the number from 2011), and none of particularly great.  I have been especially negligent responding to the comments.  I think it is time for this Vegan Dad to retire.

Like most retired dads I will most likely kick around the house grumbling about politics, the economy, and the kids who keep walking on my lawn.  I may even, on occasion, do something useful.  I will maintain the Facebook page which has put me in contact with so many amazing people, and which has been my outlet for non-food posting.

While I am sad to see the blog go, my non-blogging life is pretty busy.  Four kids, three book projects, a wife in grad school, and community obligations don't leave much time or energy to be creative in the kitchen.

It has been an amazing journey and I want to thank you all for making it possible.  A blog really isn't anything without the people who read it, comment on it, use it, and share it.  Since September 2007 I posted 834 entries that resulted in 5,669,334 pageviews and 10,929 comments.  4628 people subscribe to the blog, and 11,593 people like the Facebook page.  Not bad for a dad from North Bay.

While this blog is over, my commitment to veganism is not.  I am glad that this blog has been an inspiration to vegans new and old, and I hope it will continue to serve as a resource in the future (I will leave it online so you can comb through the archives).  Blogging forced me to expand my horizons and try new methods, flavours, and ingredients.  May our culinary curiosity never be sated.

So, that's it for me kids.  Take care of yourselves, and do no harm.

Vegan Dad

Sheep-Lover's Pie

My guess is that if you love sheep you don't to grind up their bodies and eat them.  This recipe isn't supposed to precisely mimic shepherd's pie, but it certainly is reminiscent of it.  I like the fennel, even though I don't think it is a traditional ingredient for such pies, and the Dijon mustard and horseradish in the potatoes really complete the dish.  This recipe makes a lot, so either halve it, or invite a bunch of friends over.  I could also see adding some cranberries and roasted chestnuts and making this a holiday meal.

INGREDIENTS
Mashed Potatoes
- 3.5 lbs potatoes
- 2 cloves garlic
- margarine to taste (I like 1/4 cup)
- soy milk to taste (I use about 1/2 - 3/4 cup)
- 2 tbsp large grain Dijon mustard
- 1 tsp horseradish
- salt, to taste

Tofu
- 1 pkg firm or extra firm tofu, small dice
- 2 tbsp oil
- 4 tsp ground fennel
- 1 tsp each coriander, ground mustard, sage, parsley, tarragon, smoked paprika
- 1/2 tsp cumin
- 1/2 tsp mild chili powder
- 1/4 tsp cinnamon
- pinch of nutmeg
- 1 tbsp soy sauce
- 2 tbsp HP sauce (or A1)
- 1/3 cup red wine

Veggie Mix
- 2 tbsp oil
- 2 large onions, diced
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- 3 cups diced carrots
- 2 leeks, halved lengthwise and sliced
- 2 cups finely sliced kale
- 2/3 cups white wine

METHOD
Mashed Potatoes
1. Peel potatoes and garlic, then cut into chunks.  Boil until tender in salted water.  Drain, then mash until very smooth.  Add as much margarine and soy milk as you wish to make an easily spreadable mashed potato.  Stir in mustard and horseradish, then season to taste.  Set aside.

Tofu
1. Heat oil in a large frying pan over med-hi heat.  Add tofu and fry until golden on all side.  Add spices, and stir well to coat.
2. Add soy sauce, HP, and read wine and stir well.  When wine has reduced, remove from heat and set aside.

Veggie Mix
1. Heat oil in a large frying pan over medium heat.  Saute onions for 7-10 min, or until lightly golden and tender.  Add garlic and dry 1 min.
2. Add carrots, leeks, and kale and fry for 5 mins.
3. When kale and leeks have cooked down, add wine and let reduce.  Remove from heat.

TO ASSEMBLE:
Preheat oven to 400 degrees
1. Distribute tofu evenly on the bottom of a large, oven-proof, dish (somewhere in the 10.5 x 13.5" range).
2. Top with the veggie mixture.
3. Gently spread mashed potatoes on top.
4. Bake for about 35-40 mins, or until potatoes are golden.

Serve with tomato chutney, or this tomato-onion relish.

Gluten-Free Yeast Donuts

Today I made donuts for my senior research seminar in American history.  Nothing takes the edge off having to present your research like some deep fried dough.  One of my students cannot have gluten so I ventured yet again into the world of yeasted but gluten-free dough.  After hunting around the interwebs, I settled on this recipe.  I liked that the main ingredients were weighed (more accurate), and the chemistry of the recipe made sense to me (baking soda and apple cider vinegar are standards in vegan baking).  It also seemed pretty easy to veganize.

So, here is what I did:
1. All-purpose flour: the recipe calls for Better Batter brand, which I do not have access to here.  Looking over the ingredient list I saw it it made of: Rice flour, brown rice flour, tapioca starch, potato starch, and potato four.  So, I made a mix of 1 cup rice flour, 3/4 cup brown rice flour, 1/2 cup tapioca flour, 2 tbsp potato starch, and 2 tbsp potato flour.  You can make up your own mix since it is the xanthan gum that binds everything together.
2. I used 2 tsbp vegan cream cheese for the egg, blending it into the milk mixture.  You could also use whizzed silken tofu.  Another time I might try ground chia seeds blended with some water.
3. I replaced the egg white with Ener-G "egg whites" as per the instructions on the box.  You might be able to omit this altogether, but I thought it might help the donuts rise a bit more.
4. I used vegetable shortening instead of unsalted butter.
5. I mixed the dough by hand and glazed them with this glaze.

The amazing thing about these donuts is that they actually do rise.  Not as high as a glutinous donut, but not too bad.  Also on the plus side is that they do not absorb much oil at all when deep fried.  They resemble an old-fashioned donut (i.e those cake-like ones) and aren't too dense.

Gluten-Free Country Batard

In the wake of the Vegan Sandwiches Save the Day! giveaway, I thought I'd post a few bread recipes to get you on your way to some great lunches.  As you know from all my previous baking posts, I am very familiar with gluten-filled baking.  And, while I have always been intrigued with gluten-free baking and what methods can produce tasty loaves, I have never explored it in any detail.  I was really looking forward to Peter Reinhart's new gluten-free cookbook and had it on pre-order for quite a while.  I figured if anyone could crack to code of wheat-free baking it would be him.  I love all of his previous books and find his recipes very easily veganizeable (usually eggs serve to enrich the dough and little else, and thus are easy to replace).  Not so this time.  All the recipes rely heavily on eggs and egg whites to give the bread structure and rise.  So, while it is easy to replace an egg or two in some enriched dough, it's not so easy to replicate the role 8 eggs whites are supposed to play in a wheat-free loaf.  Le sigh.

So, I was excited to discover Jennifer Katzinger's Gluten-Free and Vegan Bread.  I ordered it right away.  Katzinger's basic baking theory is gluten-free bread does not need to rise like its glutinous counterpart.  Instead, these loaves rely on oven-rise to give them some spring and a lighter crumb.  I decided to make a loaf for an NDP dinner party for which I was providing a variety of baked goods.  This country batard seemed like it would be a crowd pleaser.  Here is the recipe, taken from the preview on Amazon.

Now, if you are a baker you might be wondering how you can bake a loaf for almost 2 hours at 425+ degrees and not have it turn into a burnt brick.  Well, the answer is you can't.  The first thing that struck me as I read through the recipes were the incredibly long baking times (as long as four hours!).  I was dubious, but plunged ahead.  After an hour things were smelling burnt so I removed the almost black loaf from the oven.  So, while I like how these loaves come together (some may question the amounts of tapioca and/or arrowroot), I am perplexed with how way off the baking times are.  Thankfully, she does say that a loaf that reaches 205 to 210 degrees is baked.  So, armed with my thermometer, I tinkered around and found the following baking times produced a pretty impressive loaf:

1. 15 mins at 400.
2. 15 mins at 350.  Rotate loaf in the oven then
3. 15 mins at 350.

An hour less baking time?  Can that be right? Making the recipe a third time I accidentally added 1.5 cups of water.  It meant that I had to shape the loaf with extra flour, but the oven rise was better.  That is the loaf you see pictured above.  I also made the following changes:

1. Ground the chia seeds.
2. Used warm water for the yeast--I could not get it to activate in room temp water.
3. Added the oil after the yeast had activated.

I also made the Soft Millet Sandwich Bread and the Quinoa Sandwich Bread.  Again, the baking times are a bit mysterious.  The two loaves are essentially the same ingredients and the same wet to dry ratio.  And yet, the Millet Bread is supposed to bake for 1 hour 45 mins, and the Quinoa Bread for 2 hours and 30 mins at 350.  I found that an hour sufficed. 

So in the end I am not sure what to make of this book.  The basic ideas seem good, but the recipes are unreliable. But, if you have some baking sense, the end product can be tasty and not too dense.  

Vegan Sandwiches Save the Day Giveaway Winner!

Thanks to everyone for entering the Vegan Sandwiches Save the Day! giveaway.  I really enjoyed reading all of the comments.  Some of you are new vegans, some have been at this for a while, some busy and in need of a quick meal, some with kids, some with vegan partners, or with non-vegan partners who need convincing, some are young, some more . . . mature.  It really is amazing to see the great diversity of the vegan community.  You are all hippie weirdos, of course, but each in your own way.

270 people entered the giveaway.  The random number generator spit out the number 61, so the winner is Kelsey Marcus who wrote, "Looks like a great book! I would love to learn about making "topless" sandwiches! ;)."  Congratulations, Kelsey!  Please email me at vegandadDOTblogspotATgmailDOTcom and I will get the book headed your way.

Vegan Sandwiches Save the Day Giveaway!

Hey kids!  It's a giveaway!

That's right!  You can win your very own copy of Celine Steen and Tamasin Noyes' fabulous new cook book Vegan Sandwiches Save the Day!  I was first got acquainted with this project when Tami contacted me seeking permission to use the "steam, then bake" method of my veggie lunch meat.   I said yes, of course, since sharing recipes and methods is what the vegan blog community is all about (after all, the veggie lunch meat itself was a version of Julie Hasson's sausages).  So, there I am on p. 183 with a "huge thanks" from the authors (the nod to Julie Hasson is on the previous page).  I reviewed Tami's previous cookbook back in 2010, and I emailed back and forth with Celine back when I first started my blog.  So, every though we have never met in person, I feel like I am sharing in the great success of some good friends.

The first thing that strikes you about this book is the art.  Celine took all the photos and they are perfection.  Combined with Debbie Berne's book and cover design, the book is a visual feast.

As you can see from the table of contents, Celine and Tami have redefined what "sandwich" means.  Turns out, you can eat sandwiches for every meal of the day!  You could start with Berry-Stuffed French Toast Pockets for breakfast, eat a Ratatouille Sandwich for lunch, move on to Chickpea Shawarma for dinner, and end the day with Oreo Wafflewiches.  Yes, please!

The book also has the basics covered, from bread (I would have liked to see more recipes, but I know baking scares many people off), to several veggie meats.  Scattered throughout the book are various dressings, spreads, pates, and toppings.  There really is something for everyone here.

CONTEST DETAILS:
Residents of Canada and the U.S. only, please.
To enter, leave a comment about the book in the comment section below by 6:00 pm EST November 12.  One entry per person.  Each entry will be assigned a number, and the winner chosen by a random number generator.  Good luck!

Caramel/Candied Popcorn

 I've decided that this is what I am handing out to the neighbourhood kids this year.  I suppose I will have to offer an alternative to kids I don't know, but for the many wee'uns I do know this is what they're getting.  I have posted a caramel corn recipe before but this one is a bit easier, I think, even though it bakes for longer.  It is also a little more adaptable with the candied version.  This is a Paula Deen recipe that has been (easily) veganized and cut in half.  I certainly don't own a roasting pan that can hold 8 quarts of popcorn.  I guess everything really is bigger in America.

INGREDIENTS
- 2/3 cup popping corn
- 1/2 cup margarine
- 1 cup packed brown sugar (use white sugar for the candied version)
- large pinch of salt
- 1/4 cup light corn syrup
- food colouring (for candied version)
- food flavouring (optional for candied version)
- 1/2 tsp baking soda

METHOD
1. Pop the popping corn whatever way you like (hot air popper, stove top).  Your yield should be 8 cups of popcorn.  Transfer to a large roasting pan to cool, making sure you remove unpopped kernels.
2. Preheat oven to 200F .
3. Place margarine, sugar, salt, and corn syrup in a medium saucepan over medium heat.  Bring to bubbling and boil for 5 mins.  If you want to use a candy thermometer, you are aiming for 125F, but just letting it do its thing for 5 mins works as well.
4. If making candied version, add food colouring and flavours and mix well.  Add baking soda and mix well.  Drizzle over popcorn and stir to coat.
5. Bake for 1 hour, gently stirring every 15 mins.
6. Spread on waxed paper or baking parchment to cool.  Break into smaller pieces if needed.

The idea of the candied version is to make coloured and flavoured popcorn according to the event.  I made orange popcorn with some Wilton icing gel.  Red colouring and cinnamon flavour for Valentine's Day.  You get the idea.