VeganMoFo in November for 2016

Vegan Month of Food (a.k.a. VeganMoFo) is going to be in November again this year. IIRC, it was November the first year they had it, too.

If interested in joining, go to the VeganMoFo page for details.

I didn't participate last year because I really didn't like the idea of having to follow their themes and daily prompts for posts, but it seemed a lot of other people disliked it, too, and didn't follow them. Because of that, it's not going to be an official requirement this year.

Right now I'm following a really stripped down version of the McDougall program, eating close to how Dr. McDougall has said in webinars he and Mary currently eat and how Jeff said to eat in my last post. Weekend dinners I make the old tried and true McDougall soups; twice a week I make rice and veggies; once a week we're again having baked or mashed potatoes with veggies and one of Mary McDougall's gravies, now that I can eat spuds again; another day we have sweet potatoes with either broccoli or saurkraut and black beans. The seventh day changes weekly - sometimes it's a McDougall chili, or a Jeff Novick SNAP recipe, or just a pot of spaghetti with jarred sauce and a bag of veggies tossed in. Breakfast every day is oatmeal with fruit. Lunch for my husband is a hummus sandwich or 2 with a handful of romaine, Boston lettuce, baby kale, or baby spinach. My lunches are either leftovers or some rice or taters with veggies.

I really don't have the energy or inclination to start making more elaborate recipes again, and at this point in my life, anything with 5 or more ingredients is "elaborate" to me now Because of all this, I'm most likely not going to participate in VeganMoFo this year, either. I'm not closing to door on it entirely - when the new McDougall book comes out later this month, The Healthiest Diet on the Planet, there's going to be a recipe section of some of Mary McDougall's favorite tried-and-true recipes with full color pictures. I may be moved enough by this to do a month of these recipes to get non-believers interested in the book, even if I already wrote blog posts, even past VeganMoFo posts, on the exact same recipes. I guess I'll find out in about 3 weeks what the 60 recipes are and see then.

Isa Has A New Book Coming Out!

Sadly, it's not for me any more, but for those who don't need to lose weight and can afford a few extra calories around the holidays or have family gatherings to cook for, Isa always has the most fantastic recipes!

Vincent the Vegetable Vampire

This was posted to the PPK forums recently:




How I miss the old Electric Company shows!

Isa's Been Busy

Is there anyone who reads this blog who doesn't know Isa Chandra Moskowitz, author of a slew of vegan cookbooks and owner of the Post Punk Kitchen web site and blog?

Her latest book, Isa Does It, was recently released. I haven't bought it yet and may not get it at all, even though I own all her other books except Vegan Pie in the Sky. I skipped that one because I could never make a decent pie crust when eating SAD, and with all added fats now out of the picture, I doubt I could make a decent fat-free vegan crust, too. Besides, with the triglycerides as high as they are, I don't dare eat anything sugary, even if they are fruity! I didn't buy the new one and may not buy anyone else's cookbooks in the future because I'm really trying to simplify our meals. But more of that in a future post.

Back to Isa.

I just discovered that she did a series of videos and a free Kindle ebook titled  Breville presents Make It Vegan: Recipes from the Yiddish-speaking, Nebraska-living, post-punk vegan, Isa Chandra Moskowitz.

Yes, FREE!!

All 10 recipes and videos are included in the ebook, so it does take a while to download and install to your Kindle, so have patience.

If you don't have a Kindle and don't want to bother putting the Kindle app on your computer, pad or phone, you can still see all the videos here on YouTube.

As with all of Isa's other recipes and books, not everything will be McDougall-safe as-is and may require some tweaking to make them compliant. But I sure do love looking at these foods and dreaming of the day I might be able to indulge in them all once again.

Enjoy!

Dr. Neal Pinckney - Healing Heart Foundation

Since he's home, my husband's appetite has been poor. Granted, before all this he would rarely eat breakfast - maybe once a month, lunch at work consisted of a white flour potato roll and a slice of yellow American cheese (usually) or a slice of seitan (once in a blue moon) or leftovers on weekends. Dinner was always our big meal for the day and aside from his weekly cheese & pepperoni pizza, would be WFPB, no SOS (Whole Foods Plant Based, no sugar, oil or salt). I think I already mentioned his evening potato chip habit.

None of the old tried and true meals appealed to him this past week, and he's just been picking at everything. He would eat most of his breakfast, but some days skipped lunch and just had some applesauce. At dinner, if he ate about a cup of the meal offered that was it. As a result, the weight is dropping off of him. He's also weak and fatigued probably more than other post-op CABG patients because this is on top of his expected post-op fatigue and anemia. Add to this the effect of being on both a beta blocker and ACE inhibitor so his blood pressure is hovering around 86/50. Unfortunately, I suspect his cardiologist will be happy with the weight loss, even if it does mean he's too weak to even walk around the apartment without feeling like he's about to pass out. My husband's BMI was officially in the overweight category, but he's been at the exact same height and weight since he graduated high school back in the 1960's. The only time he lost was when he had the "Martian Death Flu" back in the early 1970's, before we started dating, when he and his mom were both so sick neither had the energy to get dressed to buy food so they went hungry and slept all day until it was over. As soon as they were both well, the weight came back on within days.

So I went looking through my cardfile for different recipes to make. I looked through Susan V's recipes, Jan Tz's, all the Esselstyn's and McDougall's, the nutritarian ones, Marla's and Sandy's and Jeff's, the EDTV ones, HH and the people she first ripped off, the PPK.

Then I came across a row of recipes that had been neglected for a while, those from Dr. Neal Pinckney's Healing Heart Foundation web site and his book, The Healthy Heart Handbook (available in its entirety at the web site). As I looked over the recipes I realized I hadn't made some of these in ages, that maybe that's what hubby needs to whet his appetite. I went back to the web site's recipe page to see what else is there, and was pleasantly surprised at how many I had passed up in the past that now look appealing! I spent over an hour just copy/pasting recipes, and will most likely spend even more time there later gathering more.

So now I have a list of meals I'm going to be trying as the weeks go on. For this week, hubby already warned me not to make anything fancy, in fact, not to plan on making anything at all, that he has no idea what he'll feel like until the time comes to eat. Really makes it hard to shop and prepare, you know! I do have a container of Jeff's Longevity Soup in the fridge we've been working on, and my freezer is full of veggies and the pantry filled with a variety of grains and pastas, as well as several forms of tomatoes, so most meals I can make up with no notice. For instance, today I hope to make Ann Esselstyn's Potato, Pea and Couscous Hash for dinner, but I won't know until it's time to start cooking if that's what I wind up making. But by next week his appetite should be back and I plan on making a menu to stick to, and I know a number of Dr. Pinckney's recipes will be included on it, like Lima Linguini Diablo and maybe even Okonomiyaki if I feel adventurous. Well, if the doctor eases up some of the sodium restrictions, that is. I'm sure that sauce is pretty high in it, even if I do use only the lower-sodium version. If I do wind up making some new dishes, I'll be sure to pop fresh batteries in the camera and take photos and notes on them.

Post Punk Kitchen Theme Song

While searching for a recipe on my computer I came across this little ditty from a number of years ago:

Damn! I can't figure out how to upload an audio file to Blogger! Oh, well, at least I can find it with the title card of the old TV show on YouTube:




There's something about this song that never fails to cheer me up.

Too bad Isa can't find her copies of the shows to post them to the PPK web site or YouTube or something.

Turkey Seitan In A Bread Machine

I love seitan. I've been making this stuff since I saw my first package of gluten mix from Harvest Direct, then found vital wheat gluten in bulk in The Mail Order Catalog and have been ordering it from there ever since.

 I have so many recipes for the stuff in all sorts of flavors, but for decades I made it the plain, semi-chicken flavor simmered in a pot of water, because recipes that claimed to make your seitan taste like corned beef, roast beef, even kielbasy, well, didn't. Then I discovered Bryanna Clark Grogan's chickenish cutlets. And Julie Hasson's Italian sausages. And Chef Brian McCarthy's turkey roast (encrouton, of course, for the holidays).


But the main problem with all of those recipes is that they took time to make after the dough is mixed. Cutting and shaping and wrapping and steaming/baking/frying. I wanted something as simple as old fashioned simmered seitan that was even easier to put together on days when I feel sluggish (like now, after almost 2 months of passing the flu back and forth).

Enter this recipe from Lazy Dave! I first read about it in a post on the PPK forums, where the people who tried it loved it. I filed it away to try in the future, a time that never came until the other day. Life has been hectic around here, between the flu and the impending death of the elderly relative I've mentioned in previous posts. She's been hospitalized twice in the past month, and the other day she was sent back to the nursing home in kidney failure and now receiving hospice/palliative care. Since my husband and I are about the only family she has left and we're the ones who have been responsible for her care the past 5 years, we're also the ones who will take care of her burial and estate when she's gone. My husband's job has been crazy the past few months (Remember me mentioning mandatory overtime? That's now going to go on indefinitely.) so we're trying to get as much prepared ahead of time as we can, so that means trips to banks, phone calls to various agencies and departments, and even a trip to the funeral director to finalize the arrangements. The funeral parlor is owned by the aunt's best friend, too, so we spent a lot of time talking with her reminiscing about the fun she and the aunt had over the years. All this while I'm sitting there with a box of tissues and a bottle of hand sanitizer coughing my head off. I'm still not allowed to see the aunt because of this flu but at least yesterday the nursing supervisor on duty deemed my husband non-contagious and allowed him to spend some time with her while I was relegated to a corner of the lobby.

Anyway, I needed to make something to have on hand for quick meals grabbed and eaten on the run, and seitan sandwiches was my former go-to meal, but I didn't have any in the freezer at the moment, and since I really needed to take a nap the other day (I'm still only getting a few hours sleep each night, thanks to this cough) I wasn't able to make traditional seitan because I knew I would fall asleep with it on the stove, and that's not good. Then I remembered the seitan in the ABM recipe I had and dug it up.

My changes:
Wet stuff - there was no way I was going to use an entire half cup of soy sauce! Even the lower sodium stuff has way too much sodium, so I watered it down to half strength, so 1/4 cup soy sauce and increased the water to 1 3/4 cup.
Dry stuff - And I skipped the added salt.

Those were the only changes to the ingredients.

I first started putting the ingredients into my Mini-Zoji bread machine and then thought this may be too much dough for the machine and dragged out my old full-sized Oster ABM. Next time I think I *will* use the Zoji, because the seitan loaf really wasn't that high at all, maybe 2-3 inches, sort of like a slab of over-cooked corned beef on Saint Patrick's Day. Here's a photo of half the log with some chunks I couldn't slice any thinner. The chunks will get chopped up smaller and tossed into a pasta meal later in the week.

One more change I'll make next time I make this recipe (And I WILL make it again) is to use the Light setting on the ABM. Dave used the Medium setting so I did, too, but fresh out of the pan the crust was so hard my sharpest bread knife had a hard time cracking through it. After spending a night in a ziplock bag it softened a bit, but it would be much better with a softer crust to start with.

As far as taste goes, my husband loves it and made himself three sandwiches. He said if I didn't tell him it was seitan he would have thought it real turkey. I didn't think it tasted anything like turkey because all I could taste was the soy sauce. I think that was all in my head, so to speak, knowing how much of that stuff was in there. In fact, I was reminded of it all afternoon and all night, as I'm so bloated my wedding ring and shoes are all tight on me this morning and my mouth has been so dry that glass after glass of water still hasn't quenched my thirst. But of course, some of that may be because of the flu and my constant coughing and frequent sneezes, and another part could be that we did a lot of running around yesterday and the only time I drank anything was when I took my medications in the morning. I wasn't going to be stuck in a car an hour from home and no clean restrooms in sight with a full bladder!

Saint Patrick's Day is fast approaching. Maybe instead of the cabbage dish I have planned I'll tackle Brian's corned beef seitan again. It's another one of those simmering seitan recipes, so I hope I have some degree of health back by then!

Revised Chickpea Cutlets

A recipe that used to be a staple around this house was Isa Chandra Moskowitz's Chickpea Cutlets. There was always at least a half dozen in the freezer at any given time for quick sandwiches or a complete dinner with all the fixings.

Then I stopped making them. I wanted to be a good little McDougaller and avoid all processed foods that these fell by the wayside, as did Julie Hasson's sausages. I started to follow Jeff Novick's advice and just add extra vegetables and greens to a lot of dishes, like our weekly pasta meal. Yes, all those extra veggies did add bulk, but not satiation or even much flavor. About 2 hours after a veggie-heavy dinner we were both hungry again. My husband, being a non-McDougaller who's the same weight at age 62 that he was when he graduated high school, reached for the cookies and potato chips and I would either white-knuckle it and eat nothing (and be awake half the night with hunger pangs), eat some fruit or more veggies (and be awake half the night running in and out of the bathroom), or make the occasional on-plan quickbread (which didn't keep me awake but gave me weird dreams).

Then I used some crumbles in a VeganMoFo recipe in October and it almost brought tears to my husband's eyes having "real food" back again. I then used some more the other day in a tater tot casserole recipe and got the same response.

He also wanted more to our pasta then just veggies and so I made a batch of Julie's sausages. We used 2 of them for the three of us (plus leftovers) and the rest are in the freezer for future meals.

During the blackout after Sandy we had to toss all the perishables from the refrigerator and freezer, leaving only things that really didn't need to be refrigerated but we kept them in there anyway:

Yes, my refrigerator is this small-the left wall is right after those water bottles - you can see a few molecules of it in the upper left hand size of the photo. If I raise that top shelf up one notch the bottles and milk container hit the top. The freezer is only about as large as that second shelf, the one with the nooch. 

The rice milk is unopened, the lettuce was only 2 days old and is un-refrigerated in the store so we decided it would be fine in there for the 2 more days it would take to eat it; our son doesn't mind warm soda, and the many times the stores display the dairy cheese (American cheese-like food product) in un-refrigerated cardboard displays so our son said to keep those, too. Surprisingly, the temp in there never rose above 50, probably because that was the room temperature most days, too.

One of the things tossed was my husband's beloved hot dogs. Every day off work he would eat 2 sandwiches with 3 dogs total for lunch. It took 20 years to get him to stop putting a slice of cheese on each sandwich but he would never give up the dogs, nor would he eat veg dogs like Smart Dogs or any of the other brands I tried. But after we got our power back and we started to restock the fridge and freezer he told me not to buy any more hot dogs, that he would eat "something else" for lunch on those days. For the past 2 weeks we were lucky and I had "planned-overs" ready for him, but this week - nothing. There isn't a leftover in the house and I know there won't be any after today or tomorrow's dinners.

First I made up another batch of Jeff's burgers, the Southwest this time, but he usually complains they're too much for lunch, that he'll want something lighter.

Chickpea cutlets to the rescue! I found the recipe in my AZZ Cardfile program and made a double double-batch of them and used the tomato paste instead of olive oil option and cooked them like I always did, in the oven. Here's how they came out:

As you can see by these cooled ones, they do have an orangy tinge to them in places. The quadruple recipe made over 20 cutlets (I used my ice cream scoop to get uniform sizes, just perfect for a burger roll) plus a few tester meatball sized pieces. This is the first time I used tomato paste instead of oil (Gasp! Yes, I used oil in the past!) and contrary to some of the commentors comments, you do taste the tomato and they are a bit drier. I'll see if he notices the difference this weekend. I placed this entire batch into the freezer with circles of plastic cut from container lids between them so they don't stick together. When we're ready to eat them we just remove a few, place on a plate and nuke for less than a minute. Always perfect for a quick sandwich.

Next week I plan on making Bryanna's chickenless cutlets (no recipe, just a photo - sorry) and soon maybe dabble in regular seitan loaves again.

VeganMoFo Is Coming in October

For those new to the blog, every year the Post Punk Kitchen site & forums sponsors what is affectionately known as VeganMoFo - Vegan Month of Food, loosely inspired by NaNoWriMo - National Novel Writing Month. If you look at the links to the left you'll see links to previous VeganMoFo participants. I've participated the past few years and always did a McDougall foods theme, and this year is no different.

But this time I'd like to get more specific. So many people on the McDougall forums do a round of Mary's Mini and many use potatoes

as their starch.I once made of list of all the potato-centric recipes I have in my AZZ Cardfile and MasterCook programs and believe me, there are more than enough to cover a 31 day month!

Key to the below list: CP=CrockPot, e2l=Eat to Live/Nutritarian, MMI=McDougall Made Irresistible DVD , SNAP=Jeff Novick's Simple Nutritious And  (Oh, gee, I can't remember now)


Here's the list I'll be choosing from:

List of Potato Meals

MasterCook

Potato Casserole
Potato Casserole - MWLP Version
Potato and Bean Soup
Potato and Cauliflower Curry
Potato Chowder
Potato Curry
Potato Enchiladas
Potato Kugel
Potato Medley
Potato Mushroom Casserole
Potato Peppers
Potato Ratatouille
Potato Rice Medley
Potato Stuffed Cabbage
Potato Zucchini Stew
Potato Pea & Couscous Hash
Potato Cauliflower Soup
Potato Leek Soup
Philly Potato Chowder
African Peanut-Potato Stew
All-Wrapped Potatoes
Cauliflower Potato Curry
Cheezy Potato Boats
Chili Potato Soup
Chili Taters
Chili/Cheeze/Potato Casserole
Chunky Vegetable Stew with Chickpeas
Colcannon
Country Potato Patties
Country Stew
Country-Style Stuffed Potatoes
Creamed Peas & Red Potatoes
Creole Potatoes
Cuban Potatoes
Curried Vegetable Stew
Dijon Mushroom Potatoes
Easy Roasted Potatoes
Eggplant Stew over Baked Potatoes
Forty Cloves Chickpeas and Broccoli
Frijole Stuffed Potatoes
Garlic Mashed Potatoes
Hearty Dal Soup
Hearty Potato Vegetable Curry
Irish Bean Stew
Irish Peasant Stew
Irish Vegetable Stew
Italian Potato Casserole
Jan Tz Minnesota Hot Dish
Maple Mustard Glazed Potatoes and String Beans
Marilyn's Crispy Potatoes
Mark's Veggie Spuds
Mashed Potatoes with Punk Rock Chickpea Gravy
No Hurry Vegetable Curry
No Fuss Potato Soup
Red Flannel Hash
Samosa Stuffed Baked Potatoes
Shelly's Cheeze Please Soup
Shepherd's Vegetable Pie
Skillet Gradener's Pie
SNAP Curried Indian Potato Stew
Southwest Red Potatoes
Southwestern Hash
Spicy Lentil Potato Stew
Spicy Potatoes, Cabbage & Peas over Rice
Stovetop Stew
Succotash Soup
Tex-Mex Potatoes
Texan Vegetable Casserole
Twin Sisters Vegetable Soup
Veggie Hot Pot
Yukon Gold Potato Soup with Roasted Garlic & Red Peppers
Yukon Stuffed Peppers

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
AZZ Cardfile
from the Cheap McD Newsletter:

Simple Split Pea Soup
Stovetop stew
Garbanzo Stew
Potato Pancakes
Potatoes, Corn & Cabbage
Mike's Favorite Quick Meal
SNAP Curried Cauliflower
SNAP Curried Potato Stew
SNAP Curried Potato Stew 2
SNAP Curried Split Pea, Potato, Broccoli & Veggie Soup
SNAP Potatoes & Veggies in Tahini Sauce
Potatohead's SNAP
Minestrone Soup (Mary's 1 Pot Meals)
Costa Rican Potatoes & Beans (1 pot meals #2)
Beefless Stew
Carrot Cabbage Medley
7-Layer Casserole
Harvest Bake Casserole
Layered Veggies Casserole
McDougall Right Pie
Pat's Husband's Casserole
Potato Casserole
Potato Dumplings, Sauerkraut & Brown Gravy Casserole
Rice & Tater Hot Bowl Casserole
Tater Tots Casserole
Cauliflower Chowder
Cauliflower Kugel
Any Cheeze Sauce over baked, mashed, chunked, HB or tots
Colcannon Puffs
Corn & Potato Chowder
CP Pizza Potatoes
CP Veggie Stew a'la Sandy
CP Autumn Veggies
CP Easy CP Winter Stew
Creole Potatoes
Lentil, Potato & Cauliflower Soup
e2l Tomato, Vegetable Pot Soup
Potato and Red Bean Goulash
Layered Casserole
Lori's Sausage Casserole
Maple Mustard Glazed Potatoes & Green Beans
Mashed Potatoes Enchiladas
Mashed Potato Manicotti
Mashed Potatoes, Baked Beans & Corn
MMI Hearty Split Pea Soup
MMI Potato Chowder
MWLP Letha's Potato Carrot Soup
MWLP Stovetop Stew
New Brunswick Potato Soup
Pea & Potato Croquettes
Pepper Flecked Potatoes & Lentils
Pepper-Potato Casserole
Poorman's Pie
Pot Roastless Potatoes
Potato and Carrot Stew
Potato & Corn Chowder
Potato Burritos
Potato Cabbage Soup
Potato Casserole
Potato Cauliflower Kugel
Potato Croquettes
Potato Dish
Potato Dumplings with Sauerkraut & Gravy
Potato  Cabbage & Onion Casserole (potao ideas)
Potato Kugel 2
Potato Latkes
Potato Medley
Potato Pancakes
Potato Portabello Gratin
Potato Puffs
Potato Spice Mixes - use with roasted potatoes
     Roasted
    Herbed
    Chili Fries
    Cheese Fries
Potato Tacos
Potato Vegetable Soup
Potatoes Corn & Beans
Creamy Scallopped Potatoes
Fry Baked Potatoes
Meatloaf-esque Potatoes
Southwest Twice-Baked Potatoes
Pizza Style Potatoes
Potatohead's Pot of Potatoes
Poutine a'la PPK
PPK Potato & Black Bean Soup
Roasted Garlic & Potato Soup
Samosa Pot Pie
Samosas
Sandy's Mixed Mashed Spuds 1
Sandy's Mixed Mashed Spuds 2
Sandy's Pizza Potatoes
Sandy's Scallopped Potatoes
Skillet Garden Potato Medley
Skillet Peppered Kale & Potatoes
Skillet - Super Quick Succotash
Skillet Taters & Cabbage
Skillet Veggie Hot Pot
Alphabet Soup
Autumn Chowder
Bistro Broccoli Chowder
Can Can Soup
Corn Lima Chowder
Creamed Cauliflower Potato Soup
Gypsy's Potato Soup
Minestrone Soup
Potato barley Soup
Potato Carrot Soup
Potato Corn Soup/Chowder
Potato Kale Soup
Quick & Easy Potato Soup
Roasted Cauliflower Soup
Roasted Garlic Soup
Split Pea Veg Soup
Split Pea (with changes)
Thick and Hearty Split Pea Soup
Velvet Garlic Soup
Velvety Carrot Soup
Cheezy Broccoli Soup
Mary McD Low Energy-Dense Soup
Spinach Potato Soup
Lazy Sunday Stew
Potato & Red Bean Goulash
Roasted Veg Stew
Stovetop Stew
Tater Tots
Vegan Cheezy Potatoes
Three Sisters Corn Chowder
Twice Baked Potatoes with Hummus

Another Veganomicon Recipe

Halloween. Ever since childhood this was one of my favorite holidays. I got to be someone else for the day and not my usual fat boring self. I could be a princess with curly golden hair and a sparkly dress with a waist, or I could be a lumberjack and wear my dad's flannel shirt and my corderoy after-school play pants (This was the 1950's, when girls had to wear dresses to school), or just be something mythical and out of this world. And the rewards at the end of the day were great - a giant bag full of the best junkfood around, mostly chocolates. Imagine how disappointed I was as an adult when my own son expressed a dislike of the holiday, a couple of years choosing to wear a t-shirt that said "This IS my Halloween costume!" instead of dressing up! And at the end of those days he gave me all his candy except for a few chosen pieces, because unlike his mom, he really doesn't like chocolate all that much and preferred the Smartees and candy corn. I frequently ask him to this day if he's sure he's my kid. As a reward for giving me all his candy, we had our own ritual of going candy shopping on November First, with him given a ten dollar bill and allowed to choose any candy he wanted, up to that amount. He chose wisely and that candy always lasted him until well into the new year. Tomorrow we'll continue that tradition even though he's in his late 20's.


Back in my S.A.D. days I would always make a beef stew for Halloween dinner, calling it Witch's Stew. When I started eating vegetarian I would make the same meal, just omitting the meat chunks. When I started McDougalling, things had to change, since the gravy I used wasn't exactly McDougall-friendly, and those that were didn't stand up to the length of time the stew would be simmering away in the slow-cooker. Imagine how happy I was when Vegenomicon came out, and included in it was this fantastic recipe for a great Halloween dish - Pumpkin Baked Ziti with Caramelized Onions and Sage Crumb Topping.


This is a nice, easy dish to put together, very flavorful, and can be easily McDougallized by using whole wheat pasta, cooking up the onions in a non-stick pan, using tofu ricotta instad of the cashew one, and omitting the topping and just shaking the spices from it mixed with some breadcrumbs on top of the pasta before baking. Not only is the margarine from the topping not McDougall-legal but my husband has this weird reaction to walnuts - every time he eats them he gets a gout-like pain in his big toe. Lab work says it's not gout, but the podiatrist said the pain sure sounds like it is.


I will probably also drop some of the canned pumpkin and a bit of spice into this morning's oatmeal. If I have the time and energy this afternoon I may even bake up a batch of pumpkin muffins from Mary McDougall's recipe, again omitting the walnuts.





I was hoping one of the stores around here would be selling Silk Pumpkin Spice nog, but once again it didn't arrive before Halloween. Last year none had the pumpkin OR the regular nog until after Christmas. Too late for the holiday season but just fine on a cold winter's afternoon.






I guess that concludes VeganMoFo 2011. I wish to thank all the people on the PPK Forums for making this another fruitful and enjoyable time. I haven't had the time to go visiting other blogs, but I do have the link to the blogroll right on this page so I can go back in the future to see what goodies I missed.


Let me leave you all with the best song I've ever heard:

SNAP Meal - Mexican Fiesta

It's almost a year since Jeff Novick released his Fast Food DVD and I wrote a post about it. For a while I was making at least one of his SNAP meals each week. Then we started to get sick of them, because each one made SO much we would be eating it for days on end. We're the type of people who get bored with our food very fast, but unlike what Dr. McDougall hypothosizes (Get bored, eat less), we tend to swing in the opposite direction and seek out other, more flavorful, usually higher calorie, foods. The times I would go off the McDougall program were usually after a long stretch of being 100% compliant.


So I stopped making so many SNAP meals. Now, when I do make one, it's much more enjoyable and we don't mind the leftovers so much. Some of these leftovers even go great mixed in with pasta. Like this Mexican Fiesta one.


The official recipe, as posted on Jeff's Facebook Photos section:


Mexican Fiesta


2 28 oz Can Whole Tomatoes (no salt added)
2 lbs Frozen Mixed Peppers and Onions (Birds Eye)
.5 lb Frozen Corn
1 can Eden Foods Pinto Beans
1 Can Eden Foods Black Beans
Spices (I used garlic, cumin, chili powder and cayenne)


Put all in a pot, bring to boil, simmer 10 minutes.


Serve over Cooked Long Grain Brown Rice


Top with fresh Cilantro


~ ~ ~ ~ ~
This is one meal I pretty much stick to the recommended brands, at least when it comes to the peppers. Name brand veggies cost almost twice as much as store-brand in many cases, and it's certainly true for this pepper/onion mix, but I tried making it with a bag of sliced peppers and a bag of diced onions and it somehow didn't seem right, like there was too much of a pepper taste. I tried a few cups of fresh sliced peppers and onions, and got a different texture. Still, if finances are tight or the store doesn't have the Bird's Eye, store brand it is and I just add a bit more onions or spices.


For the beans I use either store brand or Goya, depending on what's in my pantry that I picked up on sale. I just rinse them well and dump them in.


I always have corn in the freezer, but I'm preparing for another winter like last, and plan on having a good supply of canned veggies on my newly acquired shelving unit, and if I make this in February, with 5 feet of snow outside my apartment, I'll use canned corn and like it.




For the spices, I had found a recipe for a fajita mix that tastes a lot like the Old El Paso one I like.







Here's the recipe as I copied it:


Fajita Seasoning Mix
Linda Larsen
Make your own fajita seasoning mix using this easy recipe. If you are simply going to rub the mixture on steak, chicken, pork, or seafood before grilling it, omit the cornstarch.
Prep Time: 10 minutes
Total Time: 10 minutes

Ingredients:

    3 Tbsp. cornstarch
    2 Tbsp. chili powder
    1 Tbsp. salt
    1 Tbsp. paprika
    1 Tbsp. sugar
    2-1/2 tsp. crushed chicken bouillon cube
    1-1/2 tsp. onion powder
    1/2 tsp. garlic powder
    1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
    1/4 tsp. crushed red pepper flakes
    1/2 tsp. cumin

Preparation:
Combine all of the ingredients in a small bowl. Pour into small glass or plastic container, seal tightly and store in a cool, dry place. Makes the equivalent of 3 packets of commercial or purchased Fajita Seasoning Mix

~ ~ ~ ~
I made up a whole jar-full of this stuff and leave out the salt and it still tastes fine. Just before I'm ready to serve I'll add a tablespoon and taste, and keep adding and tasting until it comes out just right.


To go along with this meal I might make the cornbread I mentioned yesterday, Jan Tz's sweet corn bread. Unless I break down and make the cornbread my husband wants me to make, a very UN-McDougall one - the cornbread recipe by Isa and posted on-line at the PPK web site.   This has got to be the MOST delicious cornbread in the world. It's not too sweet, not too heavy or gritty (Unless you use a larger grit cornmeal, that is) and it makes so much I usually divide it in half and serve half at one meal (and still have leftovers for snacks) and freeze the other on a piece of cardboard covered in plastic wrap. I tried McDougalling this recipe by using substitutes for the oil, like Wonderslim, Lighter Bake, or applesauce, but it changes the taste and texture too much. Perhaps if I let my husband have the rest of yesterday's sally cake I can afford to eat a small piece of this cornbread and not feel too guilty. Besides, it also goes with tomorrow's meal so I'll only have to bake once.

Hey! Portland People! See THIS?

If you live in Portland (You lucky dogs!) go visit Julie's food cart! I've been visiting her web site, Everyday Dish TV, for years and am so happy for her getting all this publicity - and having all this FUN - in Portland doing what she loves.

Post Punk Kitchen Forums

The PPK has finally moved to their new home! It's been more than a year since the move was first announced, and finally last week they made the official move. It's a so much nicer format than the old forums, so stop by, re-register, if you belonged to the old forums, and jump right in.

<<<<< Over There, On the Left-Hand Side of this Page

I guess nobody was looking over there in the left-hand column where I had all the McDougall-friendly and other vegetarian blogs listed. All but one that was suggested in yesterday's Comments is already there.

And I had to edit one of the widgets. It seems that Flickr has been inundated recently with a load of photos for the Walther PPK gun so all the photos appearing in the Flicker PPK widget was for guns and neo-nazi groups. Sorry about that. I changed the keywords to VWAV and Vcon and now all the good food photos are back. And I was able to add a slide-show for the McDougall Foods Flicker group photos, too.

Vegan MoFo Days 5 & 6

Sunday is burger day around our house, and yesterday was no different. Unfortunately, I don't remember which burger recipe it was that the burgers in the freezer were made from, one of Bryanna's recipes she posted to VegSource years ago or the one from the PPK/VwaV cookbook. Damn, I just did a Search over there and can't find it! I know it used to be on-line because that's where I found out it needed more flour than the recipe originally stated!

Today there's a definite chill in the air - perfect weather for a hearty stew and a loaf of crusty bread. The recipe I'm using today is Easy Crock-pot Winter Stew and I'll run to the bakery for a loaf of crusty whole grain bread or go through my recipes for one to make in the ABM.

The recipe was originally posted to the Vegan Crockpot Cooking list on Yahoogroups back in 2004. Things have been a bit slow there lately, but the archives are jammed with gems like this, so why not come over and join and share your own favorite slow-cooker recipes.

edited to add:

Here's a photo of the stew in the Crockpot. Not too shabby a photo for not having a usable viewfinder on the camera.



And I also decided to make this Black Bean Soup from the McDougall Made Easy DVD to go with it.



All this, plus a salad, and it's a very filling dinner. We'll stick with our usual piece of fruit while watching The Big Bang Theory tonight as our snack. Our son *is* Sheldon!