Red Beans and Rice

Traditional red beans and rice usually has a ham hock cooked within for a bit......and then of course, some sort of sausage. This recipe has neither.......I still managed a bit of the smoky flavor by using liquid smoke, but really, there's no substitute for the flavor the ham hock imparts. In my opinion, it's a tad spicy, but my husband doesn't think so. And again - the resident carnivore pronounced this dish "pretty good", so I take that as a raging endorsement.

This makes a pretty big batch......enough for 10 to 12 people easily. My husband and I will be eating this for dinner for the next week.

Here goes:

1 lb of pinto beans (or use whatever red-ish beans you prefer)
2 teaspoons liquid smoke
1 teaspoon worcestershire sauce
1 teaspoon salt
A few shakes of red pepper flakes
1 teaspoon thyme (I used dried)
1 teaspoon black pepper
1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper
2 Tablespoons of chopped chipotles in adobo sauce (this adds smoky flavor - try not to skip using it)
1 to 2 Tablespoons of fresh sage - minced (I use 2 Tablespoons)
1 green bell pepper (I blackened mine)
1 cup of finely chopped onion
2 cloves of garlic, minced

I use my large crock pot and let the recipe cook for 4 to 5 hours, or until the beans are very soft.
You could cut down on the time by using canned beans instead of dried, but I think the long, slow simmer helps the flavors meld together.

Here are the steps in the order I did them. You could prep some of it ahead if need be:

1). Pick through the beans to remove and small pebbles that may have made their way in the bag. Wash them thoroughly and dump in the crock pot. Add water until the water is about an inch above the beans.
2). Add to the crock pot: the liquid smoke, worcestershire sauce, salt, red pepper flakes, thyme, black pepper, cayenne, chipotles, and sage. Turn it on high.
3). Rub some olive oil on the bell pepper, and blacken it in a pan. Just lay it on it's side, whole and with the stem intact. Check it every few minutes; when it's black on that side, turn it to another side.
4). While the bell pepper was cooking, I chopped my onion and garlic. Leave them seperate - don't combine the onion and garlic.
5). In other pan, heat up a bit of olive oil and saute the onions for a couple of minutes. Add the garlic, stir it around another minute or so. Dump the onion and garlic in the crock pot.
6). By now, the bell pepper should be ready. Let it cool, then chop it into very small pieces. Add it to the crock pot.
7). All you need to do is stir it every so often, and make sure the water level stays above the beans. You will need to add more water throughout the cooking process. I also added more salt and pepper after about 3 hours.
8). I leave my crock pot on high for about 3 hours, then turn it to low for another couple of hours. Cooking time will vary depending on your pot. Test the softness of the beans by taste.
9). When you think the beans are soft enough, mash up about half of them - or more than half, depending on the consistency you want your red beans and rice to have. I just mash them right in the crock pot.
10). Spoon over rice and enjoy!

Creamy Spinach-Mushroom Taquitos

Awhile back Laura posted her awesome spinach enchilada recipe. I made them, (loved them btw) but there are only two of us so I had a container of the filling leftover and I froze it. It freezes very well, and today I pulled it out and made some awesome taquitos with it.

These taquitos are vegan, but anyone who doesn't hate spinach will love them.

They would be awesome at any party or as a main dish, and if you have vegetarian friends you want to feed occasionally these are pretty much a guaranteed hit. The traditional accompaniment for taquitos is sour cream and guacamole. These don't really need sour cream as one of the fillings is a tofutti based cream cheese type thing. Guacamole would be awesome but honestly, just a simple hot sauce would do just fine. They are very flavorful and don't need much help.

The recipe calls for only 1 to 1+1/2 cups of enchilada filling. You can freeze any that is leftover, or make enchiladas the next night. Or if your making a lot of these for a party you can use the whole recipe.

Ingredients:

1-11/2 cups Lauras spinach enchilada filling

1 small tub of tofutti cream cheese (vegan) room temperature

1 t. chili powder

1/2 t. garlic salt

4T of chopped green chili

1/2 t. dehydrated onions

1 t dried parsley

1 doz corn tortillas

1/2 cup vegetable oil

Mix all ingredients except tortillas , oil, and enchilada filling.

soften the corn tortillas in the microwave by stacking them on a plate and smearing a little olive oil on each one. Cook in the microwave for about 1 minute just to soften.

take a tortilla, put a spoonful of tofutti mixture in the middle and kind of smear it over half of the tortillas, and then a very large spoonful of spinach mixture down the middle of the tofutti.

Roll up beginning on the tofutti side. Place seam down into large frying pan with heated oil. Let brown and turn and brown the other side. Drain on paper towels. Repeat till you have done as many as you want. You can generally cook 3 at a time.

Serve immediately or place into pan to stay warm in the oven. These are great with traditional beans and rice as a meal, or with guacamole as party fare.

Pizza! Pizza! Pizza!

Well I've been making my own pizza crust for quite awhile now, and wanted to post it because it's so easy. But the problem was that I don't use a recipe, when I bake it reminds me of the Donald Duck cartoon where he goes into the kitchen to bake Daisy a cake and there's this huge cloud of flour and chaos and out of it all a fabulous, if somewhat lopsided cake emerges.
Pizza is really great because you are not bound by any rules, use whatever you have. Your favorite spaghetti sauce works great, you can get creative with cheeses, and toppings are only limited by your imagination. I personally like more veggies than cheese, I use about a cup of cheese on an entire pizza, but don't forget the grated parmesan too, it makes all the difference. A teaspoon of dried basil sprinkled on top is awesome.

When I bake bready type things I don't measure, so I've done it a few times trying to get the exact amounts. Difficult, but I think I've finally got it.

Home made pizza crust:

1+1/2 cups warm water
1 TBS honey (I really just give a big squirt from the bottle)
1 tsp. salt
1 package quick rise yeast
1/4 cup olive oil
3-4 Cups unbleached white flour.

In a large bowl mix the water, honey and yeast. Stir and then let sit till yeast is fully dissolved and beginning to bubble a little.

add the salt and olive oil, mix and then start adding the flour. Add two cups and mix well, then add 1/2 cup at a time till the dough is stiff enough to start kneading. Turn it out onto a well floured surface and begin kneading adding flour to the top and bottom whenever it starts getting sticky. knead in this manner until you have a smooth ball of dough that springs back when you touch it. At that point it is ready to rise.
in a clean large bowl put a tablespoon or so of olive oil. Take your ball of dough and oil it well all over in the bowl and then cover with a clean dishtowel and leave in a warm place to rise. It will take at least an hour, maybe more depending on the warmth of the room. When the dough is double in bulk poke it with two fingers to release the air and you should have a soft elastic dough.
Divide dough in half, this recipe makes enough for two cookie sheet size pizzas. Or you can make a loaf of bread with the second half.
Put the dough you are working with on a floured surface and knead just a little to toughen it up. When it is smooth and soft again begin rolling it out to fit the pan you are using. Perfection is not necessary, the charm of this pizza is that its home made. When you think it's about right sprinkle your sheet with a little cornmeal to keep it from sticking and place the dough on it.
If you like a thick puffy crust, let it sit and rise. When double add your sauce, cheeses and toppings and bake on center shelf of oven at 375 for 15-17 minutes.
If you like a thin crust add your sauce, cheeses and toppings and put it right into your preheated oven on the center shelf for 15-17 minutes.
Crust should be golden brown on the sides, the cheese should be bubbly.

Jim's Naanich

Next up we have a quick and easy sandwich recipe from Jim. He adapted this recipe from a vegetarian sandwich found in the book "By Any Greens Necessary". He sent the recipe from the book also; I'll post that later. I am posting this one first because it seems easier to make, and more likely that folks would have most -if not all- of the ingredients on hand.

Here goes:

You will need:
1/2 piece of naan bread
Avacado (as much as you like - mash it up, or slice it)
Roma tomato - again, as much as you like
Kale - a few small pieces
Bragg's amino acids (tastes like soy sauce)
Bragg's nutritional yeast
Cucumbers and garlic - optional
Tempeh (called for in the original recipe from "By Any Greens Necessary". Optional)

I cut a piece of naan bread in half. Then cut one half into quarters. Then warm the naan bread. I get the Indian naan bread from Sprouts. Spread avacado on the naan quarters. Add thin slices of roma tomato. Add small pieces of kale. A few sprinkles of Bragg's amino acids and Bragg's nutritional yeast. I found both of these at the vitamin shoppe. The naan bread warmed up with avacado is sooo good. Sometimes I add thin sliced cucumbers and finely chopped garlic. You could add thin slices of basically anything you like. I'm thinking about adding thin sliced or shaved carrots on a future naanich. I am definitely going to be adding the tempeh since I love bacon but am trying to cut way down on animal fat replacing them with raw vegetable fats. I saw some tempeh in the refrigerated section at Sprouts today.
I love this naanich as a snack or a quick lunch since it goes together quickly, is yummy and nutritious.

King Ranch Chicken Casserole ala Brandon!

Our friend Brandon sent us this wonderful recipe for King Ranch Chicken Casserole. Get your elastic pants on!!

2 8oz pkgs of Mexican-style marinated baked tofu cubes (see link in comments about how to prep your tofu for this recipe. Prep your tofu.....you know you want to).
1 cup finely chopped onion
1 cup finely chopped green pepper
1 clove of chopped garlic
1/2 tsp of chili powder divided
1/4 tsp of ground cumin
1 cup of vegetable stock
2 1/2 tbs of flour
1/4 cup of tofu sour cream (or reduced fat sour cream for non vegans)
salt and pepper to taste
8 corn tortillas ( i usually use the whole package of 12 but whatever floats your boat)
14.5 oz can of diced rotel tomatoes with green chilis drained
1 1/2-2 cups of soy cheese, tofu cheese, or almond cheese ( again whatever floats your boat but i use soy cheese)
paprika

pre heat oven to 350. lightly oil a 2 qt casserole dish. in a large bowl combine onion, green pepper, tofu, garlic and half of the chili powder and set aside.
put stock in a small sauce pan and combine flour and cook over medium heat. whisk until sauce thickens. remove from heat and whisk in sour cream, the rest of the chili powder and salt and pepper to taste.
in a casserole dish layer half the tortillas ( i like to cut them in to inch thick strips) half the tofu mixture, half the can of rotel, half the sour cream mixture, and half the cheese. then layer again with the rest of the tortillas and so on making a second layer ending with the cheese on top. sprinkle with a little paprika and garlic powder. place inthe over and bake until cheese is bubbly and a little brown around the edges (about 30-35 mins) remove from the oven and let cool for about 5 mins.

Playin' with Pepperoni

So, I was at the store the other day and saw a vegetarian version of pepperoni. Now, the fact that pepperoni is meat is not the only reason I won't eat it anymore. Every brand I have seen is chuck full of preservatives and other assorted poisons. So I checked out the ingredients of this soy based pepperoni and decided to give it a try. I also spotted another new product, Fleischman's yeast made especially for pizza crust. I make homeade pizza about every two weeks or so, so I decided to try that too.

The yeast was very easy to use, and quite miraculously you don't have to let the dough rise. (How did they do that?) One package makes exactly the right amount for one large pizza when following the instructions on the package. It was a very fast mix, a quick knead to get it the right smooth and slightly spongy texture, and then it said to roll it out. I did, and the next instruction was to put your sauce and toppings and slide into the oven. I did this and it came out looking great.

So, was it as good as it looked? No. The crust did not rise at all, although if you like a very thin crust it might be passable. The pepperoni not too surprisingly I guess, did not taste like pepperoni. I ended up feeding the pepperoni off my pizza to the dogs who thought it was great. I will stick with vegetable toppings next time and my own crust recipe which I will post in a few days. I do make a delicious pizza, but it wasn't this one.