PBu

1 Part peanut butter
2 Parts almond milk (or soy milk or any other non-dairy milk)

Tasty and filling and lighter than nut butter. Also, not full of scary ingredients and creepy texture like some nut butter alternatives I've seen.

I want to try this with the Nutty Vermonter's Cinnamon triple nut butter* and rice milk.


*Eventually, everyone I know will get a jar of this for their very own.

I've not been baking as much. I wonder if it's to do with the lack of counter space. More likely, it's due to wanting to lose weight. Whatever.

It's strawberry season. Woot! I love strawberry season. It's late spring, so there's just NO winter left and plants are growing almost aggressively. The days start to feel hot but the temperature still drops at night. Lightning bugs and farms shares!

This weekend we wound up with lots of strawberries. At least three quarts, probably between 4 and 5. This evening I divided them into 4 types: cobbler now, eat soon, eat this week, and dip in chocolate for the neighbors.

I made cold-brewed coffee last summer and love it. I also made a royal mess every time. By the end of the summer, the Toddy was looking mighty attractive. It's a uni-tasker, though, so I won;t make room for it in the kitchen.

This year's first batch of cold-brew was far less messy. I used the extra-extra-large ball jar for steeping, and bought a metal colander. In all I used two large glass bowls, a colander and fine mesh handheld strainer, large metal serving spoon, a canning funnel, a pair of long chopsticks, and two glass jars. Thankfully, this production generates enough coffee for at least two weeks. Mess was minimal. I'd like to streamline the process somehow, though.

Sunday Morning's cold coffee

1/4 C cold-brew
1/4 C Mimicreme
1/4 C water

blend for 30 seconds
serve over small ice cubes.

Last night Becky and I got to talking about local food and love. Fresh
local strawberries became a metaphor.

Strawberries are available year-round. You can have strawberries any
time you like. They're good sometimes, too, but sometimes they are
tart, bland, or too crisp, hard.

On the other hand, if you've ever had strawberries from a local field
when they are perfectly ripe, you know what strawberries are supposed
to be. Sun-warmed and deep red all the way through, they just about
fall into your fingers when you pull them from the vine. A
freshly-picked strawberry just about melts as you bite into it and
your mouth fairly aches from how sweet it is. It's worth it to wait
all year if you have to before having them again. It's just that good.

Loving someone who loves you back is like that. It's fresh warm
strawberries instead of off-the-shelf pretenders. We're human, though,
and a year is a long time.

I'll stop before I take this way too far.

well, one last bit: the first time I had the real thing I thought, "Oh
my goodness. This is what I've been missing. This is the real deal."

I had garbanzoes left over fro ma patch of cutlets. I had favas for the same reason. I didn't have enough to do much with either, so I threw them together and made hummus and ful mudammas. It's good on carrots, celery, bagels, and so on.

HUMMADAMMAS
a hybrid bean puree*

3 C beans (50/50 favas and chick peas)
3-4 T tahini
1 t garlic powder
1 t tamari
1 lemon, zested and juiced**

combine it all in a food processor.



blend until smoooooth.
I enjoyed writing all of those "m"s.





*"bean puree" sounds just about as nasty as it gets. So much for accuracy.
**if you use a microplane to zest, flip it over and use it to strain the juice for seeds.

Baked tofu has always kind of mystified me. I enjoy it. Baked tofu is
firmer, browned, and always super-tasty on a sandwich. I wished I
could make it at home. I've tried. It never really worked. Until now.
It is, of course, just about the easiest thing in the kitchen. As
usual, a few minutes on the internet was all it took to figure this
out. Why did it take me years to figure this out?

Baked Tofu

1 # tofu
2 T soy sauce (or Braggs or Tamari)

Cut the tofu into 1/2" slabs.
Pour the soy sauce into a baking dish (9" square should do) at one end
of the dish
Lay each tofu slab in the sauce, flip it over in the sauce, then move
it into place at the other end of the dish
When all the slabs are dipped, flipped, and positioned, your baking
dish should be pretty full.

Let it sit for 10 minutes or until the oven heats to 375F.

Bake tofu for 15 minutes.
Flip the tofu over.
Bake for another 15 or 20 minutes.
Voila!

This would work with any sauce or marinade. I'm thinking about
teriyaki sauce, an orange juice-sesame-ginger combination, lemon juice
and basil, garlic with diluted balsamic vinegar and sea salt... The
possibilities just go on and on.

Dinner last night was baked tofu with peanut sauce over steamed
spinach. Adam made the sauce.
Lunch right now is leftover baked tofu with peanut sauce over mesclun greens.

Adam and I have cooked meals ahead for the past two weeks. We got
through all of last week and through Wednesday this week on what we
made on the weekend. I've enjoyed it, but probably more than Adam has.
We pick out recipes and go shopping together. It's nearly heaven to
me.

We've made Indian Pulao two weeks in a row (because it's yummy),
spiced lentils with green apples (lasted for-damn-ever. Note: always,
ALWAYS, halve a lentil recipe), quinoa three-bean salad (protein
wa-pow!), an experiment with vermicelli that we called Vegan Splat
(not giving that recipe out, but thanks for asking), and curry noodles
with veggies.

We also decided to try to duplicate a garlic-kale-feta roll Adam got
at the farmers' market a few weeks ago. I made Betta Feta from the UnCheese Cookbook, a book I forget about and am
always thrilled with the recipes from. To save hassle and/or tears, I
bought a store-made pizza dough. To simplify things even more for this
test run and to maximize filling, I made one large thing instead of
little rolls. Next time I'll make hand-pies and my own dough. Well, at
least hand-pies. This might also make a good pizza.

Sara and Adam's Garlic-Kale-Betta-Feta Roll.

1 onion, chopped
1 bunch kale, chopped sort of fine
6 cloves garlic (more if you like, or add powdered garlic to required intensity)
1/2 recipe of Betta Feta from above book. break the chunks into little pieces
1 pizza dough

preheat oven to 400F.
like a cookie sheet with parchment paper
Saute onion until brown.
add garlic and mix it all up.
add kale and water as needed.
stir to combine.
cover to steam kale.

roll the while the kale is cooking, roll out pizza dough out as thin
as you can or like.
if rolling out the dough takes more than a few minutes, turn off the
heat under the kale and remove it from the burner, leaving it covered.
pile the filling onto the dough either:
(1) all over leaving a 1/2" margin on one edge and a 1" margin on the
others for a stromboli OR
(2) on half of it with a 1/2" margin
Close it up
(1) roll it up starting at the 1/2" edge. pinch the edges together as
you go and seal it with a little water when you get to the end. the
extra space is for the inevitable squishing of filling all over the
place. what I call the sleeping bag effect.
(2) fold it in half and pinch the edges shut
Transfer it to the parchment paper.
Prick it on top with a fork a few times.
Bake 25-40 minutes, depending on how thick it is and how tight you rolled it.

This was delicious. It makes amazing leftovers. I want this every day forever.

I'm a little tired of eating out. I have much affection for my local
restaurants. It's actually difficult to put into words how excited I
got when I learned I could get Vegan Hot-n-Sour soup (2 different
types, no less) 4 blocks from home. And Pad Ki Maow! There are
sandwich shops, noodle shops, coffee shops that roast their own, a
falafel place, pan-Asian, Thia, Vietnamese, Indian, Mexican, sushi,
home-style and so on restaurants and pubs within a mile of where I
live. I love my city and its capacity to make my butt bigger. I have a
deep affection for my city and want to support her locally-owned
eateries.

But I also like to cook, and eat home-cooked meals. They are cheaper
and typically better for you. Also, we had pizza twice last week. How
lazy can you get? When I don;t make dinner, that means I don't have
leftovers for lunch. That gets expensive quickly.

For reasons I haven't figured out yet, I had a huge amount of energy
on Monday. Maybe it's the exercise I've been getting. Whatever. I
carpe'd the diem and made dinner (and therefore lunch) for the whole
dang week. I felt really proud of myself. Adam has since pointed out
that the three entrees I made are all bean-y somehow. I don't see this
as a problem, but it could be for some people I guess.

I made

1. Curry Yellow Split Yellow Pea Soup with Sweet Potatoes
   and Collard Greens
2. Muhjadarrah (lentils and rice with caramelized
   onions
, and
3. something that might be chili, which I
   improvised too much to cite a recipe for

.

I started the soup first. Onions 1 and 2 sauteed while I chopped
everything else.

While it was coming to pressure, I started onions 3 and 4 for the
Muhjadarrah. While the onions were caramelizing I started the lentils.
Once the onions were done, I added the lentils and rice and pepper. By
then the Soup was ready to come off the heat and settle down.

While the rice and lentils simmered, I got the chili going (onions 5
and 6). Two cans of red bean, whatever frozen corn I had, a 28oz can
of crushed roasted tomatoes (note to self, grow a lot of tomatoes and
start canning! Greg Brown is right.*), fat load of spices, some frozen
peas, 2 carrots. and whatever else I threw in there.

I got home at 6 and had three entrees done by 8:15. Score!

There are pictures of the thing on my camera. I'll hopefully remember
to post them.


* There's only to thing that money can't buy...True Love and
home-grown tomatoes.

The first trial was a failure. I threw out chocolate. That's how bad it was.

Kittee to the rescue! I used her peanut butter rice crispy treat
recipe and made a crunchy base for the cake. I made VCTOTW ganache for
on top. It was excellent. THe crunchy base was a little too thick and
not quite gooey enough, but this is certainly the combination to use.

Here's the recipe I made last night. It was really quick and easy.
Next week for the birthday I'll double the recipe and make it a 4 layer thing.

A Cake that Crunches, by request

Crispy base

Ingredients:

* ½ C corn syrup
* ½ C sugar
* ½ C peanut butter
* 3 ½ C crispy rice cereal 2 C crispy rice cereal


Preparation:

Grease the pan you will bake the cake in.
In a small saucepan, heat the corn syrup and the sugar until the sugar
melts and the liquid barely boils.
Remove sugar mixture from heat.
Add peanut butter and mix until smooth.
Mix the cereal in, adding more if it's too gooey.
Press the mixture into the cake pan and allow to cool. Try to make the
top flat, but don't knock yourself out.
Once cooled, remove it from the pan and set aside.
(to be done in two cake pans, to make a couple of thin slightly gooey layers)

Ganache topping

Ingredients:

* 4 oz dark chocolate
* ¼ C soy milk
* 2 T maple syrup

Preparation:

In a small saucepan, heat the soy milk until it barely boils
Working quickly, add the chocolate and maple syrup and mix until smooth
Allow to reach room temperature before spreading over the top of the cake.
(I'll make a triple batch for frosting the cake next week)

Chocolate Cake

Ingredients:

* 1 1/2 C unbleached all-purpose flour
* 1 C sugar
* 6 T unsweetened cocoa
* 1/2 t baking soda
* 1/2 t baking powder
* 1/2 t salt
* 1 t vanilla
* 1 T vinegar
* 5 T vegetable oil
* 1 C cold water

Preparation:

Preheat oven at 350F.
In a large mixing bowl, mix flour, sugar, cocoa, soda and salt.
Make three wells in the flour mixture.
In one put vanilla; in another the vinegar, and in the third the oil.
Pour the cold water over the mixture and stir until moistened.
Pour into an 8" x 8"-inch pan or a 9" circular pan.
Bake at 350°F. oven for 25 to 30 minutes, or until it springs back
when touched lightly.
Allow the cake to cook completely, then remove it from the pan, place
it on the crispy, and top with ganache.
(I'll double this recipe and make two cakes next week)

The first experiments with crunchy fillings went poorly.Let's call
them informative and move on.

It looks like I'll make Kittee's peanut butter (cashew butter?) rice
crispy treats as a layer or two in a tall cake.
Cake:cricpy:cake:frosting:repeat. I'll post pictures later.