VeganMoFo Day 1

To make up for my long silence I present to you my lunches, times four! In September I bought a Laptop Lunchbox to bring my own healthy lunch with me to work.

My first lunch was full of V'Con's Chickpea Cutlets, rice pilaf, veggies, apple slices, salad dressing in the tiny container and a bag of dark chocolate covered blueberries. Was good!

My second lunch was my own take on a BLT with Lightlife's Smart Bacon standing in for poor dead pig. And honestly, who doesn't put Avocado on their BLTs? This was a dip-tastic lunch with ketchup in the kitty and elephant containers to plunge the tater tots into. A container of grapes rounded it all out nicely.
Next I made my very own Cornish pastry from the Vegan Lunch Box cookbook. These were so very very good! The pie crust was easy to make, the filling was delish and it traveled very well. No wonder hand held stuffed pasties have been around for centuries!
And finally I have a picture of a lovely bunch of broccoli! Ok it is really leftovers from my excellent dinner of Smoked Tofu with Lemon Pepper Broccoli over Mixed Grains

Let me know that store bought plantain chips do NOT hold a candle to homemade fresh ones. Now if only I could make these myself all thin and crisplike.

I hope to keep posting all month. I am throwing a potluck at my home this weekend for several VegWeb friends. Expect lots of yummy food posts from that as soon as I catch up on all my September backlog, which consists of 3 more food photos. Doh!

I had intended to post more!

Honest, I did.

And tonight I turned on my home computer and got the blue CHKDSK screen of death, indicating that my hard drive was toast. LB has plans to try to resurrect it tonight but until then it makes my computer centric life difficult. No surfing (work blocked) web comics, no playing EQ2 and not being able to upload photos.

I have all of last week's lunches, Monday through Wednesday, on film. As well as dinner last night and today's lunch. Until I can get them here I will share my recipe from last night's dinner. It was a complete improvisation.

Smoked Tofu with Lemon Pepper Broccoli over Mixed Grains

2 cups Water
1 Knor Vegetarian Vegetable Bullion Cube
1/2 cup Brown Rice (10 minute 'instant' version)
1/4 cup Amaranth
1/4 cup Quinoa, Inca Red - rinsed
1 package SoyBoy Smoked Tofu
2 tsp Vegetable Oil
1/2 - 1 cup water
1 Tbsp Lemon Juice, concentrate
1 tsp Lemon Pepper no salt seasoning
2 cups Broccoli florets
2 Tbsp Earth Balance
Salt & Pepper to taste

Directions:
Bring the 2 cups of water to a boil with the bullion cube to dissolve. Rinse the quinoa and add it and the rice and amaranth to the boiling broth. Cover and cook on low for 20 minutes.

In a large skillet, with a lid, bring the oil to medium heat. Slice to tofu horizontally to make 4 pieces out of the two and then diagonally. Place these in the heated pan and sear both sides. Add the lemon juice to the pan and shake to get all the tofu in the bubbling sauce. This will brown up the bottom of the pan but don't worry, the extra water deglazes it in a moment.
Add half a cup of water to deglaze the pan. Quickly add in the spice and broccoli and cover with a lid. Allow to steam for 3 to 5 minutes to your preferred doneness. Add in the Earth Balance, salt and pepper and cover for another minute.

Plate the grains and mound the tofu and broccoli on top.



This was fantastic. Smoky hints making the tofu taste slightly like bacon. The sharp hint of lemon simply enhanced the flavor of the broccoli and the grains were a smooth yet chewy texture with a mild background flavor. I need to find a local source of smoked tofu or make my own because I hope this recipe is on the menu frequently!

Weekend Cookery

Saturday's Lunch Chickpea Salad with veggie dippers.


Sunday's Dinner Beer Battered Tofish w/ batter fried potato and onion. Another of Quintess' excellent recipes. She even included a mayo and tartar sauce recipes!