This is a very tasty seasonal item currently on the specials menu at Hugo’s in Studio City.

The “Blood Orange Salad” is made with “a blend of Napa cabbage, organic mixed greens, strawberries, slivered fennel, roasted baby beets, blood oranges and California pistachio nuts. Accented with a dressing made from balsamic vinegar and blood orange juice reduction”. It comes with a choice of protein, I had their grilled tofu which is always reliably good.

The salad was great, what with all it’s different flavors going on… it’s got your sweetness coming from the blood oranges, strawberries and beets, and it’s also got the unexpected licorice flavor of the crunchy, raw fennel (and carrots too), and all this is backup by the powerful underhanded punch coming from the balsamic vinegar. It makes for a unique and delightful (and not cheap) combination.

And so here we have it. I told you in my last post about the fantastic tempeh stuffed mushrooms we learned to make at the Spork Foods vegan protein cooking class (say that ten times, really fast). I loved this recipe so much and found it so easy to make that I immediately made my own version at home. Here’s the results…

The biggest change I made was using the super large portobello mushrooms whereas the recipe uses the small ones (really, there is a huge mushroom under all that stuffing, I swear). To compensate for size I also had to wing it on amounts when putting together the marinade as I needed a lot more to cover these beauties. The only other real changes I made were using garlic instead of shallots and I also added in a generous amount of fresh chopped ginger; a little voice inside my head told me to.

As I mentioned in the Spork Foods post, I won’t give away Jenny’s recipe, but in all fairness you can pretty much look at this and figure out how to make something similar. How about the Cliff’s Notes version? Make yourself up a nice balsamic based marinade for your mushrooms and let them chillax for a bit. Chop up some of your favorite veggies and cook them up for a few minutes along with some crumbled, seasoned tempeh… then stuff those lovely mushrooms, throw the whole kit-and-kaboodle in the oven and bake.

Oh. My. Yum.

The nice thing is that you can really adapt this and change it up in so many different ways, from the spices and seasonings used, to the types of veggies that go into the stuffing. So have at it!

I had another opportunity last weekend to sit in with Jenny of Spork Foods to take pictures during her vegan protein class. The class was called “Get Your Protein, Vegan Style!” and aimed to answer that age old question, “Vegan? But where do you get your protein?” by cooking up some delicious yet easy-to-make protein rich dishes. I’m not going to divulge any of Jenny’s excellent vegan recipes, you’ll just have to attend one of her Spork Food classes if you want to get the inside scoop. I will however tempt you with a peek at what we learned to make (because I know you like to watch).

Home-made Seitan (which got made into)
Cornmeal, Walnut and Herb Encrusted Seitan in a Lemon Caper Sauce
Balsamic Marinated Stuffed Mushrooms with a Tempeh Vegetable Crumble
Cashew Cheese in an Endive with Micro-greens
Chocolate Peanut Butter Cups

Everything was delicious and simple to make. I’ve already made my own version of the tempeh stuffed mushrooms here at home as that was my favorite, but we’ll get to that another time.

Jenny’s classes are always a lot fun and action packed with information. Everyone learns something, be they cooking newbies like me, or seasoned cooks. Upcoming vegan cooking classes include: Southern Cookin’, Spring Picnic, Brunch Party, South-East Asian Cuisine, Local and Seasonal Foods (Spring), Fresh, Fast and Healthy, Traditional Jewish Foods, All American Cuisine and more. Find all you need to know and more at: www.sporkfoods.com

I’m pleased to announce that my post on how to make Mugicha has been included in Veggie Chic’s awesome Vegetarian Blog Carnival. Not only that but she included my little article as part of her Top 5 favorites! w00t! w00t!

There are many other interesting and tasty posts to discover in her blog carnival listings, from fabulous vegan and vegetarian recipes, info on raw foods, apartment gardening, and a very interesting discussion on vegan snobbery and “veg*ner-than-thou” attitudes.

So click on over and check out all the fine stuff that Veggie Chic has included in this most recent blog carnival collection of links, where you’re more than likely to discover some great new blogs you may have not noticed before. Enjoy!
http://www.veggiechic.com/vegetarian-carnival-13-something-for-everyone

USDA recalls 143 million pounds of beef from California slaughterhouse under investigation.

And yet, I’m considered a “naive vegetarian”. If not wanting to eat the disease infested flesh of tortured animals makes me naive, I’m perfectly ok with that.

(photo: Roscoe the cow at Animal Acres)

I was down on Melrose to photograph some street art which of course lent itself as the perfect excuse for lunch at M Café de Chaya. But really, who needs an excuse when food this good is just a hop, skip and a jump away?

What we have here is the “Carolina-Style Barbequed Seitan Sandwich” consisting of “thinly sliced grilled seitan basted with our own zesty barbeque sauce and piled high on a house-baked whole heat bun with grilled onions, pickles, and creamy (vegan) coleslaw”. I got it with out the onions, natch, and had the peanuty kale salad on the side.

Maybe I was just really hungry after all the walking I’d just done (Highland to Fairfax thru the Melrose alleys then back up thru the alleys across the street). but everything about this meal was phenomenal. The delicious seitan was chewy and meaty, the texture reminding me a bit of Chinese restaurant-style BBQ pork (you know, the kind that’s usually some ungodly shade of florescent pink). The BBQ sauce was excellent, more on the sweet side than the spicy side but still with a nice, peppery kick to it. The bun was perfectly fresh, nicely toasted and had that wholesome goodness flavor to it. The salad was lovely too, the flavors of kale and peanut playing very well together.

I have yet to taste anything at M Café de Chaya that isn’t amazing. May that day never come.

This evening I found myself at home with very little food left in the house and no desire to go out. I created this dish out of basically everything that I had left that would play well together. Let’s call it a sweet potato and tempeh hash.

Ok, so it’s not really very hash-like but just go along with it and humor me. To start I used the food processor to shred two medium sweet potatoes, two small fennel bulbs and one red bell pepper. In a skillet I heated up some olive oil and pressed garlic (one large clove), then added in the sweet potato. After letting that cook for few minutes I added in one package of tempeh, crumpled. The easiest way to stir and mix this up was to use tongs. After about two minutes I added in the fennel and bell pepper, along with about a tablespoon of lemon juice and a bit of water. At this point I added in a few shakes each of corinader, cumin, ginger powder, black pepper, chili pepper flakes, a dash of yellow curry and about two tablespoons of agave nectar. I let this cook while occasionally mixing until the potatoes were soft and the tempeh cooked through.

Very nice! It was surprisingly tasty for something I just totally made up as I went. Would have been nice though to get it all a little more crispy… I’ll aim for that next time I make something like this.

Here’s a recent salad I made…

Torn spinach leaves, garbanzo beans, satsuma tangerine, fresh cilantro, walnuts, vegan baco bits, lime juice and Bragg ginger & sesame dressing.

I am obsessed with satsuma tangerines right now and eat them with everything, as well as on their own of course. The nice lady who sells the organic satsumas at the Hollywood Farmers market told me that this week was the last of the season (for her) and that the recent rains had messed up a lot of the local farmers crops. I did notice that all the offerings of these delightful tangerines this week were very tiny. How sad that their short season is nearly over. You better believe I stocked up.

The cold and rainy weather has got me on a soup kick. A Pho soup kick, specifically. Pho (pronounced ‘fuh?’) is a Vietnamese soup usually made with beef, fish or other kinds of gross fleshy bits, rice noodles, and an amazing broth spiced with cinnamon, star anise, charred ginger, cloves, garlic and usually garnished with green and white onions, cilantro, Thai basil, lime, bean sprouts and some kinda hot sauce or chili on the side. The broth is usually made from meat and bones, so you either need to make your own or seek out restaurants that make it vegetarian, including the broth.

So back to my Pho cravings, I’ve had it already twice in the past couple of days at two different restaurants. Allow me to present my findings.

Pho adventure #1: Blossom Restaurant, Downtown.

Appetizer first please. This is the “Vegetarian Fritters”, which are sweet potatoes, mushrooms and tofu. Served with mint, veggies and a tasty sweet chili type sauce. Very nice, light and not at all greasy.

Ok, now here’s the garnishes mentioned earlier. We have a lovely plate of fresh bean sprouts, basil leaves, some kind of very spicy green chili, and lime wedges. There’s also plenty of Sriracha, soy sauce, hoisin and other condiments over on the side as well to be added as per your liking.

And here’s the pholicious bowl of steaming hot pho, made with tofu, mushrooms, carrots, baby bok choi, cilantro, a ton of rice noodles underneath it all… and lots of green and white onions. I don’t do onions, and there’s like a raging onion party going on in my bowl. No need to panic. The thing is, I appreciate the flavor they give food, I just don’t like the things themselves. So after a serious onion hunt and extraction expedition, my soup was ready to be topped with all the extra goodies, and then was heartily consumed.

The soup was delicious, the ambiance of Blossom smack in the middle of downtown can’t be beat, and it’s only a very short walk from the Pershing Square Metro stop, and everything else.

That was last weekend. Today I woke with another rager for Pho. I still need to try the Vietnamese Soy Cafe in Silver Lake which is all vegetarian, but they keep funky hours, and I was hungry now. A quick search online and then a few phone calls later I tracked down a location right here in the valley serving vegetarian Pho.

Pho adventure #2: “Absolutely PHObulous” in Encino.

Despite the silly name, this place was awesome. First up, vegetarian spring rolls. Delicious, packed with vermicelli, fresh veggies and herbs. The dipping sauce was some sort of peanuty love.

Here’s the photastic pho as it was served. This version comes with tofu, carrots, broccoli and baby bok choy. And yeah, enough onions to feed a small village in Somalia for a year. No problem. I’m a professional. Below is my creation after I’d had my way with it…

I also squirted in a healthy dose of spicy Sriracha this time around (after I took the picture). This pho was great. Very nice to know this place is tasty and doesn’t involve me having to go over (or under) the hill. They have a West Hollywood location as well.

Neither of these two restaurants are all vegetarian, but there are a number of vegetarian and vegan options at both that will more than satisfy.

A recent edition of Vegetarian Times magazine had a vegan recipe for Pho, and I’ve found a few different versions online that look good too. My craving has far from passed so I think I’ll try making up some of my own soon.