To Live and Eat in L.A. - A Vegan Food Photo Blog

When making food for myself, the simpler the better. Here’s a few recent meals…

This was an easy salad I put together of shredded purple cabbage, garbanzo beans, red grapes, fake bacon bits and Bragg’s vinaigrette dressing. Good stuff I tell ya.

This was two firsts in one. My first time making the ‘Vegetarian Nature’s Burger’ by Fantastic Foods and my first time using my new cast iron grill. The veggie burger mix comes in a box and you just add boiling water, then cook ‘em up. I’ve been wanting to try my hand at the chickpea cutlets from Veganomicon that everyone is raving about, but I don’t have the book yet (it’s on the way!) and this was the closest thing I had going on in my pantry that would satisfy the craving in the meantime.

Once I concocted the mixture I could tell it didn’t smell all that flavorful, so I added in some chopped fresh garlic and ginger as well as about a tablespoon of the FYH ‘Unforgettable Balsamic BBQ Sauce’. The grill worked out really nice and the burgers were quite good for something out of a box as well, though I’m glad I added the embellishments as without them they would have tasted quite plain.

This was a quick saute of broccolini, bell pepper, shitake mushroom and baked tofu in a little bit of fresh garlic and ginger, sesame oil, rice vinegar, chili flakes and a dash of nutritional yeast and gamasio to seal the deal.

…and it went without a hitch thanks to the fine ladies of Spork Foods. Their specially prepared vegan menu included:

Truffle Scented Thyme and Mushroom Gravy
Sage Whipped Mashed Potatoes
Sourdough Stuffing with Caramelized Onions, Apples and Pecans
Juicy Herbed Vegan “Turkey”
(the asparagus in the photo was made by my aunt)

Everything was very tasty. The faux-turkey was moist and flavorful and had a very meaty texture to it. I don’t actually know what it was made of but I assume it was some sort of seitan/gluten concoction.

Here’s how it was lovingly packaged for me beforehand, and I even get to keep the cute bento-like tupperware. Score!

This was the yummy dessert, ‘Maple and Cinnamon Apple Turnover with a Coconut Whipped Topping’. It had just started to burn as I was heating it but I got it out just in time (the dark parts look darker in the photo than they really were). It was delicious and the coconut topping was fantastic as well.

See my previous post for more info on Spork Foods…

This was one of the most satisfying meals I’ve ever made and the coolest thing about it is that the extent of my cooking simply involved cutting a few things and opening a bottle.

So the tempeh that got left out of the previous post made it’s way into this one (I used flax tempeh). First I steamed it for about 10 minutes. I cut up some green beans and portobello mushrooms then along with the tempeh coated everything in Follow Your Heart’s “Unforgettable Balsamic Barbecue Sauce“. I covered with foil, let cook for 15 minutes, removed the foil, stirred and let cook uncovered for another 15 minutes.

This sauce is the bomb… seriously finger lickin’ good. The balsamic vinegar takes the BBQ flavor to a whole new level, it’s slightly spicy too (I think there are mild and spicy versions). The tempeh and veggies came out cooked perfectly, with the tempeh getting just slightly crispy around the edges. It was served with quinoa which I cooked along with some fresh crushed garlic, dried onion flakes, dried sage and fresh parsley.

Pick the sauce up if you can find it near you or order it directly from Follow Your Heart. You can thank me later.

Look! I cooked! I’m reigning in my indulgences for a while and attempting to cook and eat in more often. I’ve got plenty of backlogged restaurant meals to still share with you though so hopefully you won’t get too bored while I get rid of a few extra pounds that crept on outta nowhere (she says, directly above a post about fried gluten in sweet sauce).

So this here is a roasted vegetable dish I made using all organic veggies from the farmers market. I used broccoli, fennel, sweet potato, yam and a couple of those cute little red carrots as seen over on the left of the picture. I mixed up some olive oil, lemon juice, agave nectar, curry powder, coriander, black pepper and sambal. The ingredients were coated in this mix then roasted at 425 for about 40 minutes. I had planned all along to add tempeh into this as well, but realized only after it was all cooked and out of the oven that I’d forgotten to add it. Duh! I still wanted the dish to have more protein in it but was too hungry and impatient to prepare the tempeh seperately, so I quickly improvised by mixing in a can of white beans. Served sprinkled with nutritional yeast it was quite tasty.

Organic fruit and nut plate. Figs, grapes, walnuts and agave nectar.

I’m one of those people that likes to buy and look through cookbooks. It’s not often that I bust out a book and cook right from a recipe though, but they do give me inspiration and I sure do like to see them lined up on the shelf.

I recently found a very good vegan cookbook at the used bookstore for only $4. It’s called ‘150 Vegan Favorites‘ by Jay Solomon. Many great sounding recipes, most of which seem pretty easy to make. I had most of the ingredients on hand called for in the ‘Curried Squash with Chickpeas’ so that’s what I made.

1 tablespoon canola oil
1 medium red onion, diced
2 large cloves garlic, minced
2 - 3 teaspoons minced fresh ginger root
1 jalapeno seeded and minced
2 medium tomatoes, diced
1 tablespoon curry powder
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground turmeric
2 1/2 to 3 cups of peeled, diced butternut squash
2 cups water
1 can (15 ounces) chickpeas, drained

In a large saucepan, heat the oil over medium-high heat.
Add the onion, garlic, ginger, and jalapeno and cook, stirring, for 3 minutes.
Add the tomatoes and cook, stirring, for 3 to 4 minutes.
Stir in the curry, cumin, pepper, salt and turmeric and cook 1 minute.
Add the squash, water and chickpeas and bring to a simmer over medium-high heat.
Lower heat to medium and cook, stirring occasionally, until squash is tender, 20 to 25 minutes. To thicken, mash the squash against the side of the pan with back of spoon. Remove from heat and let stand for 5 minutes before serving. Serves 4.

It was very tasty and easy to make, though peeling and chopping the squash took forever. Getting pre-diced onions was a timesaver though, and for an onion-impaired individual like myself, it’s the only way to go (I don’t mind them once they’ve been cooked). It was pretty spicy, I may have used a slightly large jalapeno. I did everything according to the recipe along with the addition of about 1/4 teaspoon of coriander, cuz that’s how I roll. It was served over couscous.

I had these lovely organic heirloom cheery tomatoes at home needing to be used, so when I happened upon a nice locally made herbed pizza dough at Whole Foods, I was inspired to put together my first vegan pizza. It was also initially inspired by this picture from Seitti on Flickr.

The Italian herbed crust was first rubbed with olive oil then a thin layer of tomato pasta sauce. Topped with fresh garlic, spinach, fennel, red bell pepper, sweet cherry tomatoes and Follow Your Heart’s vegan Mozzarella and popped in the oven (it’s finally cool enough to turn it on again) at 425 for 15 minutes. The cheese wasn’t super melty but it had a nice taste and texture. The addition of the fennel here, as in most things, was a stroke of genius.

Update: Darn it. Found out after that fact that the crust was not vegan as it contained butter.

I feel somewhat silly labelling this as “raw” mainly because I’m not a raw foodist, just someone who happens to eat plenty of food that just happens to also be raw.

The salad consists of chopped carrots, fennel bulb, tomato, baked flavored tofu, chickpeas and fresh basil. I added in a few splashes of Bragg’s “Healthy Vinaigrette”, lemon juice and couple dashes of black pepper. I guess it doesn’t qualify as raw now that I think of it, considering the tofu. Either way, it was a cool and refreshing dinner on a hot and humid SoCal night.