Holiday Herbed Cheeze Ball

My sister used to make the greatest herbed cheese when my parents had a restaurant in Stockton, CA. I think we used it as a spread in a sandwich. (The restaurant was "St. George and the Duck" at St. Mark's Plaza for those who might remember it!) I was eating cheese in those days, still not realizing all that my dairy allergy entailed.

Fast forward to today, when I am a vegan with fond memories of herbed cheese and a longing to be able to eat a cheese ball at a party!

I've put them all together here. It might look fancy, but it's quite simple. You do need to plan ahead a little if you want to make it into a ball (it needs to firm up in the fridge), but you can even make and eat it in 10 minutes if you want to use it as a dip or spread. (Although the flavor is enhanced if you let it sit for a few days to really infuse the cheese with the herbs.)

You can use fresh herbs, but I've made mine with what I've got in the spice cabinet. All measurements are estimates since I just throw in what I think will work. You can adjust to your own tastes and contents of your spice cabinet!

Herbed Cheeze Ball
(Vegan, Gluten-free)

1 8 oz container non-dairy cream cheese
3 Tbs white wine (adjust amount for firmness)
1-3 tsp dried parsley
1-3 tsp dried rosemary
1-3 tsp dried thyme
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1-4 Tbs dehydrated onion flakes (these will help to firm it up)

Coating (if you are making a ball)
1/2 cup chopped nuts (I used walnuts)
1/4 cup dried cranberries (optional)

Serve with crackers. (Serve with gluten-free crackers if you've got GF friends. I like rice crackers.)

Instructions:
Put the first seven ingredients in a bowl and mix well with a fork. You are done now if you want to serve it as a dip or spread right away or you can let it sit in the fridge.

To make the ball:
Place the mixture in the fridge for 1-3 days to firm up. The longer it sits, the more the flavors develop. If you have used the dehydrated onion flakes, they will help soak up the wine and make it firmer.

Just before serving (or the day of the party), take the mixture out of the fridge. With clean hands, roll it into a ball shape (this is the messy part), and then either:

1. Roll the ball in the chopped nuts, covering the ball well. Place on your serving tray.

or

2. Place the ball on your tray and arrange cranberries in two lines over and across the ball, like a ribbon on a package. You can even place a row along the bottom edge. Carefully apply chopped walnuts in the areas between the cranberries.

A note on serving: when I made this for a party at someone else's house, I put my "naked" cheeseball on a small circle of cardboard covered with tinfoil. That way I didn't have to apply the nuts to it on a big plate that wouldn't fit in my fridge. I could still fit it in a container (wrapped loosely in tinfoil) and I dressed my plate once I was at the party.

Vegan Gourmet Tostada Part II

 Another easy tostada to make:

Chive-talkin' Tostada

Makes one

Corn tortilla
Tomato Sauce (I used my own Green"Red" Sauce)
Daiya Cheese (mozzarella)
Chopped walnuts
Chopped fresh chives
Chopped fresh basil
Cut up cooked yam or sweet potato

Layer on the ingredients. Putting the cheese on last helps it all to stay on the tortilla. Toast in oven or toaster oven until cheese is melted.

Pumpkin Walnut Chocolate Chip Muffins

This recipe is based on the Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cupcakes found in Isa Chandra Moskowitz's Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World. I made it gluten-free and substituted what I had on hand. Here's my version.

Pumpkin Walnut Chocolate Chip Muffins

Ingredients
1 cup of canned Pumpkin Pie Mix
1/3 cup oil
2/3 cup sugar
1/4 cup soy milk
1 tsp vanilla
1 1/4 cups flour
(I used 3/4 cup Bob's Red Mill Gluten Free Flour Mix and 1/2 cup Millet flour)
1 1/4 tsp xanthan gum (not needed if using regular flour)
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 cup vegan chocolate chips
1/2 cup chopped walnuts

Topping
1/4 - 1/2 cup chopped nuts
1/4 cup sugar


Directions
Makes 12 muffins
Preheat oven to 350 F

1. Mix Pumpkin, oil, sugar, milk and vanilla. 
2. I sifted in the flours, xanthan gum, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
3. Stir together with a  fork, but do not over-stir.
4. Fold in chips and nuts.
5. Fill muffin cups two-thirds full.
6. I sprinkled a little sugar and chopped nuts on top.
7. Bake for 22-24 minutes. Check with toothpick for doneness.

With these ingredients, the muffins were very moist and took forever to bake, easily 5-10 minutes longer than the recipe suggested. I made regular size muffins as well as mini-muffins, which take about half the time to bake. Don't over-fill, especially the mini muffins. They are a little crumbly and a big "muffin-top" doesn't hold up well. But eating your mistakes in this regard is not bad thing!

Next time I will reduce the oil and add some apple sauce instead.

The original recipe called for plain canned pumpkin, but all I had on hand was a canned pumpkin pie mix so I reduced the original sugar from 1 cup to 2/3. (I think I could reduce it further, either way.) And I left out the 1/2 tsp cinnamon. The original recipe also called for regular wheat flour, but I needed to make it gluten free so I used what I had left and added the xanthan gum. I also reduced the chocolate chips from 1/2 cup to 1/4 cup.

My family (including the finicky 9 year-old) loved these muffins as did my organizer friends at my meeting. I'm making these again very soon!

It's truly a toss-up whether these are muffins or cupcakes. I opted not to icing them, but just sprinkle some sugar and chopped nuts.

New Year's Black-Eyed Peas

This is my own creation after reading a number of recipes. No, I didn't make any cornbread, but next time I will.

I didn't measure a thing, so this is all approximate.

First I soaked overnight about 1.5 cups of the black-eyed peas I found in my pantry. (That was lucky!)

Then I drained off the water, rinsed and added enough water to cover by an inch, added about 3TBS of no-salt veggie broth powder, 2 tsp salt and simmered for about 30 minutes.

Next, I sauteed some onion (1 whole) and garlic (2 cloves minced). To that pan I added about 2 cups of the beans, some of the simmering broth, a little white wine and some veggie bacon bits (to add that Southern hamhock flavor without killing a pig).

And, heat it all up....serve and EAT!

I had beans left over, I could have added it all to this pan.

Someday I'll remember to take a picture before we eat it all!

Ingredients
1.5 cups black-eyed peas
2 tsp salt
3 TBS veggie broth powder

1 onion
2 cloves garlic
2 TBS veggie baco bits
1/4 - 1/2 cup white wine

What else would have been good?
Sauteed Mushrooms
Serve it on brown rice
Serve it on corn bread

Easy Gourmet Vegan Tostadas, Part I

 Pictured is a daiya cheese, pine nut, taco sauce and kale tostada.

I love fixing these quick and easy lunches for myself. I make one or two depending on how hungry I am. Make a bunch and cut in quarters for an easy appetizer. 

Pining for Pesto Tostada
(Makes one whole tostada or 4 quarters)

One corn tortilla
(I use Food for Life sprouted corn tortilla.)

1-2 TBS vegan pesto sauce
1-2 TBS shredded vegan cheese
1 TBS pine nuts

Spread pesto on tortilla. Sprinkle on pine nuts, then sprinkle cheese on top.

Toast in a toaster oven for about 5 minutes until cheese has melted. Cut into quarters to consume!

Truth be told, I don't measure the ingredients, I just put on what I think looks good.

Disclosure: I receive no compensation from the companies mentioned. I just happen to buy these things and like them.

Update: I also like Daiya Cheeses and they melt very nicely.

To Serve Vegetarians, the Birth of a Cookbook

While perusing the Veggie cookbook shelf at Copperfield's Bookstore in Sebastopol, I had a thought....

I should write a cookbook meant not necessarily for vegetarians/vegans, but for their friends, family and maybe somebody wishing to become the friend or family of a veggie. Something about "How to feed those crazy vegetarians," or "What to fix for your nutty vegan friends." And then synchronicity happened. (Oops, there's another idea. This time for a T-shirt ..."Synchronicity Happens."

DH (Darling Husband), DF (Dear Friend) and I were looking for a place to eat in Downtown Petaluma. We were outside the upscale, fresh, organic Central Market restaurant reading the menu, looking for the vegan options. (They weren't really there.) The chef and owner, Tony Najiola, poked his head out in an effort to cajole us in for a meal. When I asked if he could serve vegans, he said yes, especially with a ranch dip. Buh-dump-bump.

While there was no "vegetarian" entree, he promised he would feed me. I had a lovely plate of several sides. Alas, no protein. Unless beets have protein. (I might have consumed about 3-4g total protein by cleaning my plate of spinach, avocado, beets, potato, garlic, french green beans, asparagus and a glass of chardonnay. BTW, check out The Daily Plate to find out all the nutritional information you could ever want to know about any food.)

The titles for this site (It's a Cookbook!) and the eventual cookbook (To Serve Vegetarians) were born.

And just in case you didn't catch the reference to the cookbook title...there was a short story and a Twilight Zone Episode in 1962. "Helpful" aliens land on earth, and leave a book behind titled "To Serve Man." The first chapter doesn't get translated until it's too late. While trying to stop people from getting on the spaceship, the translator shouts, "It's a cookbook!"

So, it's a cookbook! Or so it will be at some point in the future. (A pox on you if you decide to steal this idea or title.)

Until then, it is a Blog about vegan and vegetarian recipes and a notebook of sorts for thoughts on the cookbook. So, tell everyone you know (or who might care) about this site and lets get the public worked up about this wonderful cookbook and and we can tell publishers that we have public demand for it already!

So let's start the conversation! Please send me your favorite recipes (vegan and vegetarian, that is) and I will deem if they be fit for the blog or the book. I'd like to see recipes that are fairly easy for the non-veg to create. More on this later. It's all a work in progress. Chapter titles will come soon to give you a better idea of where I'm going with this.

No, I don't expect to share any profits, but hopefully I'll send you a book and you'll get a credit when it's published.