Wednesday, April 27, 2011

The Curry Guest Blog... Finally.

I promised Meagan I would guest blog about curry forever and a day ago. So here it is, the curry guest blog you've all been waiting for.

I personally love curry, It is one of my staples. It is so versatile, you can make pretty much anything into a curry and it'll taste good.

I compiled a list of a few of my curry recipes so that you could all enjoy curry like I do.

  • Thai Massaman Curry with Tofu


This is by far my favorite curry. Meagan said it's the only curry she has ever tried and liked. It's a thai curry, so it's a little on the sweeter side. I tend to make my sweeter as well, using sugar and peanut butter. This curry is a little more time consuming than the other curries, but it is well worth it.
Check out the recipe here.

  • Instant Chickpea Rice Curry


     

    This recipe is just an easy one. Like most quick curries. It doesn't take a lot of work, and it tastes awesome. It uses golden curry blocks which you can get at the asian market as well as chickpeas, which are my just awesome.

    Check out the recipe here.

    • Instant Coconut Curry Rice

      This is another really easy recipe using instant rice that is a sweeter curry, almost dessert like. It uses coconut milk and peanut butter. It's great for pot lucks because it is quick and it'll make you look like you spent time when really it was easier than buying a bag of chips.

      Check out the recipe here

      • Quick and Easy Potato Tofu Curry


     This curry may not look the prettiest, but it is quick, easy and tasty. It uses the Golden Curry blocks from the asian market. A must have staple in my kitchen.

    Check out the recipe here.

    • Curried Couscous


      I love couscous, it is like pasta, rice and potatoes all mixed into one. Only natural that it should be made into a curry. This quick recipe is just as easy as making normal couscous, just switching out the vegetable broth for a curry broth.


      Check out the recipe here.



      I hope you enjoy these recipes. 

      Use them as a guide for your "experiments in the kitchen" (ba-da-bing). 

      -Jordan Halliday

      Militant Vegan Cooking

Wednesday, April 6, 2011

Vegan White Cake & Lemon Frosting!

I got my kitchen all nice and extra clean today, which of course meant it needed to be dirtied again! I had no idea what I wanted to make so I sent out a tweet and had a friend suggest I make a cake because she has only ever baked one cake ever.... I was a little surprised and decided I'd google white cake recipes and see what I could find... Because to be honest, making cake from scratch doesn't usually end well for me, and vegan cake isn't something I've had much luck with either....

I found this recipe for Simple White Cake and thought I'd try my hand in making it vegan.... SO here goes nothing.... The best homemade white cake I've ever made!

Simple Vegan White Cake

1 cup white sugar
1/4 cup vegan margarine
1/4c vegetable shortening(CRISCO)
2TBS flax(heaping) + 4tbs water
1TBS vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 3/4 teaspoons baking powder(slightly heaping)
3/4c + 1/8c milk

Beat together sugar, margarine and Crisco until smooth. Then add flax/water mixture and vanilla. Add your baking powder and flour, mix well then slowly add milk. Mix until smooth.

Pour in a greased and floured 9in round pan.

Bake 350 for 30-40min

Let cool before taking out of pan, frost and enjoy!

I get bored with playing 'white' cake so I tend to do things like add food coloring to it so it isn't so boring.... I added blue food coloring to the second cake I made. Sorry I don't have a better picture.

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Some side notes with this.... I made a beyond stupid sweet lemon frosting for it. I wouldn't use such a sweet frosting for it, but maybe that is just me, I've never been one for overly sweet stuff.

I made two so that I could make a layered cake... They were a tiny bit on the crumbly side, but I think that is because I didn't let them cool enough before I decided to stack them... Test it out and see what you think and let me know. Let me rephrase that.... The cake is super moist and super yum! The outer edge is what crumbled a tiny bit.

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For my frosting I used about 1lb powdered sugar, 1/2c-3/4c Crisco (vegan margarine will work just as well) and about 3/4 can lemon-aid concentrate (from can), creamed it all together and yum! Add your lemon-aid slowly and only add until it gets to your desired lemon flavor.... Add some food coloring if you want, keep in fridge until ready to use.

I added some yellow food coloring to it, for a happy yellow to contrast the blue of the cake.

Tuesday, April 5, 2011

Veganized Killer Cookies!!

Some time last year I posted a recipe for Killer Cookies... It's a recipe I got from a friend years ago, and is by far the best chocolate chip cookie ever! Sadly... It wasn't a cookie I could share with my vegan friends... So I made it a goal to revamp the recipe, find vegan chocolate chips and figure out a way to substitute the eggs and guess what?! They ROCK!! The best part about it is all of my friends devoured them and none were aware that I had made them vegan! Yay for that!

The only downfall to this recipe is that it is huge! It makes 80-100 cookies depending on how big you make them, so I recommend halving it.

Vegan Killer Cookies

1 3/4c Shortening
2c sugar
2c brown sugar
4 heaping TBS ground flax + 8TBS water mixed (use for egg)
2tsp vanilla
3c flour
2tsp salt
2tsp baking soda
6c oatmeal

1/2 to 3/4c chopped nuts
1/2 to 3/4c coconut
1 12oz package chocolate chips

It'll be a little on the dry side, pour in some vanilla soymilk or whatever milk you have handy until slightly sticky. Scoop them in to 1in balls.

Bake at 350 for 9-12min

Sunday, April 3, 2011

Pizza Dough & Garlic Bread!!

So over a year ago I was given an awesome large Pampered Chef pizza stone that until Thursday I had never even taken out of the box. I had been putting off making pizza because I had never gotten a good recipe for pizza crust. I asked someone I knew would have a good one finally and sure enough.... Awesome!! So here goes...

Gram's Pizza Dough.

2 cup flour

2 tablespoon sugar

1 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon yeast

Olive oil

warm water. (about 3/4c seemed to be about right.)

Place flour in bowl, add the sugar , salt, yeast swirl around to mix.
take the olive oil and swirl a few time around the flour mixture, add warm water to make a dough, dough might be sticky just flour hands and shape into a ball place in greased bowl and let rise until double in bulk.

Once it is done rising, sprinkle a little corn meal on whatever you choose to bake it on and spread out your dough to the desired shape/size. Bake the dough for 2-3min at then take out and cover with sauce, cheese or whatever else you choose, then put back in the oven for 10-15min or until your crust is brown on the edges and your cheese is melted.

Bake at 410, makes one large pizza.

Pineapple & Tomato Pizza

Olive & Mushroom Pizza

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I loved the pizza dough so much I decided I needed to use it to make some garlic bread, so this recipe is very similar and can also be used for a pizza crust if you like. I'm sure it would be awesome!

Garlic Bread

2 cup flour
2 tablespoon sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon yeast
Olive oil (I used a little extra for this recipe cuz I wanted the flavor)
warm water. (about 3/4c seemed to be about right.)
1 heaping TB minced garlic
and a couple shakes of both Oregano and Basil

Let rise to double, form to desired shape.. bake for 10-20min at 410

I served it with some marinara sauce for dipping.