Peanut Passion

Well, I knocked out my take-home exam yesterday, so today I’m going to finish my short paper and then get crackin on the long one.  All I really want to do is go for a run and spend the rest of the day drinking margaritas.  At least I have a mini-Cinco de Mayo fiesta with H to look forward to tonight.  I’m making Ancho Lentil Tacos from this recipe, posted Tuesday on the Post Punk Kitchen blog.  My lentils are currently simmering away, which I find very exciting.  We’re also going to have guacamole (duh) and Coronas.  Hooray!

Anyway, I don’t have that much time to post but I was feeling antsy about blogging so I am putting up some pictures of peanutty goodness that I recently enjoyed.

First up is the Love Bowl from Good Karma Café in Red Bank, NJ.  Menu description: Sautéed seasonal greens, brown rice, black beans and your choice of tofu or tempeh. Topped with your choice of sauces: Thai coconut, spicy peanut or sweet mustard sauce.

I chose tofu with spicy peanut sauce.

Good Karma is a vegan restaurant with alot of raw options and is close to my parents’ house so I gave it a try when I was visiting them for Passover a couple weeks back.  This thing was really…nourishing.  I mean, it tasted nourishing, if that makes sense.  The greens (I think they were collards) were quite bitter but the tofu and beans balanced it a little.  The sauce was really thick and filling.  Definitely not spicy, and I would have added hot sauce if I could have done so without having to travel past my grandmother’s watchful Passover eyes (tofu, beans, rice, and peanuts are all “kitnyot”…not strictly kosher for passover for many people) to get it!  I also think I would have enjoyed this more if the peanut sauce had been thinned and sweetened with a little agave for a better balance of flavors.  Overall, though, I liked it, and I’m looking forward to visiting Good Karma again next time I’m in NJ and trying some of the other yummy-sounding things on their menu.

Next we have my Easter dinner.  Ha, yes, I’m transitioning from Passover to Easter just like that.  H and I went to his family for dinner on Saturday night of Easter weekend and I was feeling a little awkward beforehand, since at that time I was contending with not only vegan food restrictions but Passover restrictions as well.  Hence, I brought my own dinner.  I felt like maybe this was a dick move, but his family was totally cool with it, and relieved too, I’m sure.  I hate being an inconvenience when other people are going out of their way to be nice and have me over for dinner.   Anyway, it all turned out fine, except that, like a fool, I left my camera at home so I don’t have a picture of the assembled dinner. But here are some of the components of what I ate:

This is my version of the Maple Ginger Mango Tofu from the Love Veggies and Yoga blog. It is Maple Ginger Peach Tofu, since I used this:

I sliced the tofu reeeeally thin, as instructed:

The veggies in the first pic are from the frozen packaged Trader Joe’s “Harvest Hodgepodge” mix.  Genius.  I always have this in my freezer.  I enjoyed the tofu and veggies over rice pad thai noodles, topped with Peanut Passion Sauce from Eat, Drink, & Be Vegan.

This is the sauce:

It is awesome.  Like, really friggin’ awesome.  I do not make it that often, because it is so high calorie, and H and I are both on the wedding diet so it’s not really a wise thing to keep on hand.  However, a batch of this is incredibly tasty and versatile, as you can use it as a dip for veggies or a spread for sandwiches or a marinade for tofu, etc. etc….or you could do like I do and mix in some coconut milk and then slather it all over some pad thai noodles.  That’s the stuff. I used part of this batch as noodle sauce, and contributed the rest of it as an appetizer (with crudité) for the Easter gathering at H’s house. It was a big hit!

Then I ate the leftovers (noodles, Peanut Passion sauce, veggies, and plain old sauteed tofu, since I finished all the Peach tofu at Easter dinner!) for lunch over the next week:

With a buttload of chili garlic sauce, obvi:

Finally, though it’s unrelated, I thought I’d share the fact that last week, the search engine term “me want honeycomb” was used four times to find my blog.  Yeah…I don’t know.

Woo! Much longer post than I’d anticipated writing.  That’s just how these things go!  Back to writing things that are not fun at all…

The Finals Chow-down

Once again it is that time of semester when I am exceptionally busy and constantly exhausted. Law school finals are no laughing matter, and I’ve got four of them to contend with in the next two weeks, so wish me luck! After this post it’s back to studying Civil Procedure and Sales Contracts for the next 12 hours, with a 30-45 min. walk/run break. Joy.

Despite my impending exams, I’ve been feeling pretty great lately, mostly due to the major improvement in weather, and the fact that it lets me study outside! It’s also put me in the mood to cook light and edge toward more summery dishes. I cannot even express how excited I am for long, warm days and amazing summer produce…

Anyway, the theme of this post, I guess, is kind of a mixture of quick eats (suitable for finals time) and lighter stuff (suitable for days of lighter eating…yay summer!!).

First up, a beautiful Hummus & Tabbouleh Collard Salad that I threw together recently.

This baby is seriously filling, mostly due to the large quantity of raw collards that form its base.  This is 4 collard leaves, rolled into cigar shapes and then chopped, 4 T. of hummus, and 4 T. of tabbouleh.  The entire thing has less than 200 calories and contains around 8g protein and 7g fiber.   And it’s delicious, obviously!

Next is a little thing I like to call Taco Rice. 

Basically this is basmati rice that I cooked up with “taco” spices (chili powder, a little cumin, some oregano) with a similarly-spiced hodge podge of diced tomato, black bean, and Smart Ground.  This is a really fast dinner idea that works really well with variations, depending on what you have lying around that needs using up.  Last night I made another version that let me use up the remainder of a red bell pepper as well as a jalapeño.  I had the jalapeño leftover from….

GUACAMOLE!!! 

Oh my goodness.  Whole Foods had a sale on avocados this past week–$1 each.  I couldn’t resist, and made 2 batches of guacamole, one for a dinner with friends, and one just to have around.  I also shared some with our neighbors since it unfortunately lasts, like, a day.  But it was soooooo good!!!   To make this, I used 4 ultra-ripe avocados (I spent time at WF finding some that were so soft that they’d probably have to get thrown out the next day), 1/3 chopped red bell pepper (orgaaanic of course), 2 T. lime/lemon juice, 2 tsp. sea salt, a few sprinkles of black pepper, and of course, a whole diced jalapeño.  The first batch I made was perfect, but the second one was not nearly spicy enough, so it eventually contained 1 3/4 whole jalapeños as well as a couple dashes of cayenne pepper.  Perfection!

Two more things (sorry for such a long post but I have been gone far too long!):

1) Scripp Networks has recently launched a really interesting new food & beverage website, Food2.com.  They have asked me to contribute blog posts on there, which I am obviously thrilled about!!! As the only vegan contributor, I will be doing sort of product-review/trend alert sort of posts, and posting about once a week. You guys should check it out 🙂

2) I’m participating in Chocolate Covered Katie’s New Foods Challenge, and here is my first entry!  Funny enough, I discovered that there aren’t all that many fresh foods in my WF that I haven’t tried, probably because I have such a love affair with produce!  So anyway, these caught my eye and I tried them: Dark Chocolate Covered Mulberries. 

I wasn’t aware that mulberries were, like, a real thing existing outside of a children’s song, but there you are. They are delicious and right up Katie’s alley! Highly recommended.