More Goodness from American Vegan Kitchen!

Here's a treat for you: Seitan Katsu with Tonkatsu sauce from American Vegan Kitchen. This is the perfect meal if you're craving crunchy and savory! Any of you craving chicken out there but don't want to fall back on your vegan diet? This should do the trick. You get all that southern fried goodness and none of the murder to our feathered friends!

Vegan MOFO Day #10: Maggie's Fried Green Tomatoes

I couldn't write about Maggie without having her cook something green. Get it, Maggie Greene? Groan. I kill me. So you want to know the secret to Maggie's badassery? It's not the chutzpah gene from her daddy, it's fried food. Yes, fried food.

Just look at those babies frying in oil. Everything is better when fried.

No recipe needed. These are just green tomatoes fried in some cheap batter mix. Which kind, you might ask? You won't believe me if I told you. After Maggie and Glenn did some of their lovin' at the pharmacy, they found a discount bin chock full of Larry The Cable Guy's spicy batter mix.  No joke. Who knew that a piece of that d-bag would survive the zombie apocalypse. That's a way to Git-R-Done. These turned out to be more chewy than crispy, but that's okay.

Test Kitchen: Fried Green Tomatoes

I'm still working this recipe for fried green tomatoes. A couple weeks ago, I had a ton of them, and they're still coming in by the bag full! They weren't bad, but they weren't what I imagined them to be. Most of the time, one can fry just about anything and it turns out awesome, but not so with these. I used flax seed as the egg to dredge the slices in and the sticking power lacked. So back to the drawing board. Once I have them just the way I want them, I'll add them to my 2012 MOFO theme. So there, readers--there's a hint for you. Fried green tomatoes, and no I'm not doing a theme on Fannie Flagg.

I'm also messing around with a recipe for a dipping sauce for the tomatoes. It's a base of veganaise, tofutti sour supreme, basil, sun-dried tomato, and regular tomato. I did not photograph it because it looked kind of gross, but it was tasty. It just didn't have the punch I was looking for, so I will also be dinking around with that as well. What sounds better to you, a basil based dipping sauce, or a garlic dill sauce?

MOFO Day #17 True Grub: Sheriff Bellefleur's Beignets

It wouldn't be right if I made an entry dedicated to Chris Bauer's character Sheriff Andy Bellefleur without referencing the love affair with cops and doughnuts.

Cops like doughnuts and coffee. It's true. While some prefer ones filled with custard or jelly, Andy enjoys his spiked little V. Since this is a True Blood themed MOFO, I couldn't go the entire month without making beignets. So I did.

Andy is also a fan of Peet's Coffee. FoodBuzz's Tastemaker Program sent me a care package with two different kinds of Peet's and I chose to pair the Cafe Domingo with Sookie's Sticky Buns, then paired the lil' fritters with Cafe Solano. This was a match made in heaven. The robust flavor of Solano was just the thing with the deep fried sweet goodness of the beignets. Seriously, my house smelled like a doughnut shop and for an elastic second I pretended that I wasn't me, but the owner of the Bon Temps Bakery. Thanks to FoodBuzz and Peet's Coffee for making this experience so complete.

Have I mentioned I've never had or made these babies before?

I glossed over many recipes on teh interwebs, and all of them were basically the same: flour, fat, evaporated milk, eggs, yeast, and deep fried. I figured I couldn't possibly fuck this one up because it involved frying.

I was correct. Check out this recipe I veganized and have a little Cafe Du Monde at home. To fill these with your V spiked custard, take one 6 oz. container of vanilla vegan yogurt and add a little strawberry or raspberry jam to it. You can use a piping bag with an extra fine tip, but I got all punk rock and used my kids wide mouthed plastic syringe. Hardcore, right?


Sheriff Bellefleur's Beignets

*Patience pants: you WILL need to refrigerate this dough overnight. So don't make these in the morning thinking you'll surprise everyone with fresh doughnuts. That ain't gonna happen. This recipe makes a shit ton, so you can half the recipe if you so desire, but I just threw the leftover dough in the freezer. I'm such a scientist.

• 2 1/4 t. yeast
• 1 1/2 c. warm water
• 1/2 c. sugar
• 1 t. salt
• 2 T ground flax seeds
• one 6oz. container of vanilla or plain vegan yogurt-room temperature or warm
• 1/4 c. vegan liquid coffee creamer-room temperature or warm
• 7 c. AP flour
• 1/4 c. spectrum shortening
• powdered sugar for dusting fresh doughnuts
• oil for frying

Get a mixer or a food processor with a dough hook to mix this. Combine your yeast, sugar, and water--set aside. You want to see it foam so you know the yeast is good. Measure out your flour, salt, flax seeds, and put this in the food processor/mixer. Add your water/sugar/yeast mixture, then the yogurt, then the creamer, and add tablespoons of the shortening last. The dough will be SUPER sticky, so don't freak out like Sheriff without his V. Using a rubber spatula scrape out the dough and put in a greased bowl. Cover it and put in the fridge overnight.

In the morning, dust a clean counter space with extra flour and roll out your dough in small batches. Get your Fry Daddy or stock pot ready for frying by filling it with several inches of oil. If you're gonna go big and fry the whole recipe, heat an oven up to 200 degrees so you can put finished batches in the oven to keep warm.

Get the dough about 1/8 inch thick and cut into little squares with a pizza cutter. Once the oil has heated throw a few squares into the heated oil and watch 'em float. This is really cool. Monitor closely, they'll puff up quite a bit, and turn them over to fry on the other side. Once a golden brown, take the finished beignets out to drain on paper towels. Immediately sprinkle with the powdered sugar so it sticks to the hot doughnuts.

Play some zydeco and enjoy these with coffee with cream. I served these to my family and friends and all were really impressed. They could hardly believe they were vegan. I ended up being the only one that liked the custard filled ones, so don't feel like you have to fill these, they are fine plain.

MOFO Day #14 True Grub: Jason Stackhouse Po Boy

You have made a mighty fine mess of things Jason Stackhouse. You've charmed the pannies off women from Bon Temps to Dallas, was blamed for several murders, had a run in with V that led to a crazy boner, was possessed by a maenad, killed The Love of Tara's Life, fell for a meth cook in Hotshot, thought you might be a werepanther, and stole your best friends' gal. That's a lot of stuff for one guy to shoulder. But I've got something that will make you forget about everything.
Tofu Catfish. Fried stuff with sauce makes EVERYTHING BETTER.
See the magic happening as the nuggets bathe in hot canola oil?
Slap that on an everything hoagie bun with all the fixin's and Alcide's Dilly of a Comeback Sauce.
OOOOOOhhhhh.


This recipe was inspired by Dallas Vegan's post about vegan catfish. For the life of me, I couldn't find the recipe, so I had to improvise and come up with something from memory. For you new to veganism or omnis making food for your vegan friends, the key to capturing essence of the sea is seaweed and some Old Bay Seasoning. If you don't have OB, you can make your own or grab elements of the seasoning blend: hot pepper, black pepper, salt, bay leaves, and some paprika.

Tofu Catfish
1.5 c. garbanzos
14 oz pkg firm tofu
1/4 t. lemon pepper seasoning
1/4 t. fresh ground black pepper
1/2 t. salt
1/2 t. red pepper flakes
1 T powdered Nori
1/2 t celery flakes

Pulse everything in food processor, you want it chunky and not smooth. Set aside

Coating

1/3 c. cornmeal
1/4 c. oat flour
1/2 c. Rice Krispies (to make gluten free, you need to find GF crisp rice cereal, because Rice Krispies have barley malt in them, which some cannot tolerate)
1/4 t. cayenne
1 t. onion powder
1/2 t. garlic powder
pinch of coriander
1-2 t. salt
black pepper
couple dashes of paprika

Heat oil in your Fry Daddy or in a deep skillet at least 1 inch deep. Wait patiently.
I tried making shrimp shapes out of the tofu, but they ultimately fell apart. Make nuggets or patties out of tofu mixture and roll in the coating. Once the oil is hot, gently place your nuggets or patties in the oil. For a lower fat version, you can bake these in a 350 oven, just make sure you spray your pan with some non-stick spray and flip the patties or nuggets over after 7-9 minutes and cook for another 10. But baking these won't be as awesome as frying them. Duh.

Fry for a few minutes on one side, then several more minutes on the other. Drain your tofu catfish on paper towels and prepare your buns for some lovin':

Everything hoagie buns- (get GF if you are GF)
Italian flat leaf parsley
Fresh tomatoes
Thinly sliced red onion


You're in luck That PITA Vegan readers--I'm giving you a bonus recipe. Don't worry, I actually made TWO versions of Alcide's Comeback Sauce and will post the sweet version in another post. Rather than uncontrollably giggle while trying to explain what comeback sauce is, just click on this link. I personally think the savory dill version works better with the tofu catfish, but that's up to you. There are sweet pickle people and dill pickle people.

I'm a dilly fer sure. Totally.

Alcide's Dilly of a Comeback Sauce

1 c. PLAIN UNSWEETENED vegan yogurt
1/2 c. olive oil, set aside
1-2 t. Louisiana hot sauce
1 t. dijon mustard
1 t. nutritional yeast
1/2 t. miso
1 t. apple cider vinegar
1-2 big cloves of garlic
1 t. onion powder
1/4 t. cayenne pepper
1T Bragg's liquid aminos
1 T fresh dill

Blend everything together minus the olive oil, then slowly pour that in last. You will have a gorgeous, thick, and delicious chili dill mayonnaise perfect for everything, especially this sammich.


I realize I forgot about Food Blogger Friday last week! Silly me. Here's a fantastic fellow blogger that I met at Vida Vegan Con: Samantha at Novel Eats. She's super nice and her site is way informative, especially if you are new to planet vegan. Let's not forget the recipes! I envy her organization.

Okay, okay, okay--there's more to life than sandwiches!

Southern Fried Tempeh with Gravy. You had me at fried!

After child #1-(2007-8) and during the pregnancy of child #2,-(2008-9) I did some testing for Bianca's upcoming Southern Vegan Cookbook. Whuuuut? Yes, there are more vegan cookbooks to buy. After looking at my food porn archives, I noticed I tested more than a few recipes of hers. She's been working on this for a while, and the hard work has paid off. These pics are my favorite recipes from the book. The release is slated for 2012. Sigh. I'm kind of broke, so every time one comes out I get all @)*%#$ me! Quit writing cookbooks, y'all! I can hardly keep up with the ones I have! My solution is asking the library to order it so everyone gets exposed to vegan love and my limited budget is a little happier.

Smart, ain't I?

And if you are a hardcore reader of my blog, you'll notice this entry is a rerun of sorts. That's not a bad thing because a) it's a gentle reminder to save up more $$ to buy another cookbook by an awesome vegan and b) I'm keeping up with blogging. My foodbuzz money to charity goal is about getting more traffic. Well, I'm not going to get more traffic if I don't blog. Duh.

Country Potato Soup-Easy on the wallet and really filling.

I couldn't make an entry without talking about this sandwich. I said it when I blogged about it way back then and I'll say it again: I nearly had to have my jaw surgically removed to eat this. It was a sandwich of hedonistic proportions.