Virtual Vegan Potluck: Spiced Maple Butternut Crisp

Welcome!  I hope you’re enjoying the December 2014 Virtual Vegan Potluck so far.  Thanks for stopping by A. Cook in the Making!

For the dessert course of this year’s VVP, I’m bringing a Spiced Maple Butternut Crisp.

Featuring tastes and aromas that evoke late autumn and the holidays, this not-too-sweet dessert is warm and familiar but still a little unique.  Plus, you can feel good about eating it because it’s technically made from a vegetable 🙂  Leftovers heat up very well and make a terrific breakfast too!

Spiced Maple Butternut Crisp
Vegan, dairy-free, soy-free; gluten-free option
Serves 8-12

Ingredients
For squash:
1 medium butternut squash, peeled well and sliced into thin half moons (think apple slices)
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1 tablespoon orange zest
1 tablespoon freshly squeezed orange juice
1/3 cup pure maple syrup
1/3 cup brown sugar
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
3 tablepoons Earth Balance buttery spread (optional…use soy-free blend if necessary)

For topping:
1/3 cup flour (all-purpose or gluten-free)
1 cup rolled oats (certified gluten-free if needed)
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup melted coconut oil or Earth Balance

For serving:
Non-dairy vanilla ice cream (I use So Delicious Vanilla Bean coconut ice cream and it is divine)

Directions
Preheat oven to 375.  Grease a 9 x 11 baking dish and set aside.

Place butternut squash slices in a large bowl.  Add cornstarch, orange zest, orange juice, maple syrup, brown sugar, cinnamon, ginger, and nutmeg, and stir until well coated.  Add mixture to prepared baking dish.  At this point, if you wish, add Earth Balance on top, like so:

To make the topping, combine all ingredients and stir until well incorporated.  Spread evenly over squash mixture.  Cover baking dish with tin foil, poke a few holes in the top with a fork, then place in the oven and bake for 40-60 minutes, until the squash is easily pierced with a fork.

To serve: I recommend stirring this before serving, because a lot of the sweet gooey stuff tends to collect around the bottom.  Once stirred, place in a bowl, top with vanilla ice cream, and enjoy!

If you would like a sweeter crisp: sprinkle an additional 1/4 cup of granulated sugar over the crisp while still warm and stir to incorporate.

To move on in the potluck and see what dessert Apsara has brought, follow this link to Eating Well Diary.

To go back and revisit Koren and Alana’s submission, follow this link to She Makes Magic.

Happy Potlucking!

I Love Goats, and Potlucks

Hello friends!  So even though I am still basking in the awesomeness of Virtual Vegan Potluck, I figured it was time to post again so I can share a little bit about the day that H and I had at the animal sanctuary.

But first of all…seriously, how awesome was VVP?!  I lost count of the number of new-to-me blogs I discovered and incredible recipes I bookmarked.  Huge props to Annie of An Unrefined Vegan for coming up with such a fantastic idea, and for being willing to put in the immense amount of work it takes to organize it.

Anyway, as I mentioned last week, the day after the Virtual Potluck, H and I went to a real-life potluck at Sunny Meadow Sanctuary in central Massachusetts.  Before the potluck though, we spent several hours working around the farm. 

It was a grey fall day, a little chilly but not terribly cold, with a few spots of rain.  I was bundled up to begin with, but quickly shed layers as we began working hard!   First, we cleaned out the goat barn, removing all of the soiled bedding and hay, sweeping, and replacing it with fresh shavings.  This required several trips across the farm to empty our wheelbarrows on the manure pile.

 We also cleaned out the goats’ water buckets and gave them fresh hay and water.  Once the goat barn was clean, H and I took a short break to walk around and see some of the animals.  I felt so peaceful seeing them out in the pastures, just enjoying life, free from the horror, noise, and filth of a commercial “farm.”

Afterwards, we visited the pigs and helped to clean up their pasture area.  And then, I got to play with goats!!!

Anyone who knows me knows that I seriously love goats.  I have always thought they were such funny, mischievous, intelligent creatures, but now I think I love them even more!  The five young male goats at Sunny Meadow are some of the sweetest animals I’ve ever met.  The pictures show me hanging out with one named Alex, but all of them were equally affectionate, leaning right into you to let you scratch them behind the ears or tilting their heads up to nuzzle you.  Oh my God, I had so much fun hanging out with the goats on Sunday! 🙂

Anyway once darkness had fallen and the work was done, it was time to feast!

My plate included a big helping of a delicious salad made with lots of fresh parsley, marinated tofu cubes from Whole Foods cold bar, an absolutely incredible quinoa and bean salad, mashed spiced sweet potatoes (from a Veganomicon recipe, I’m told), a two-bean salad (chickpeas and green beans), Tofurkey roast with wild rice stuffing and gravy, and toasted baguette slices.  I had seconds and thirds of the mashed sweet potatoes…they were incredible!

There was also a really delicious split pea soup, plus the dish that I brought, which I somehow failed to photograph (derp).  I made Red Lentil Cauliflower Curry from Veganomicon, though I had to take some serious ingredients liberties.  I’m happy to report though that it was very well received 🙂

Overall it was just a really nice day, and a great chance to meet some big-hearted people trying to do some good for the animals.

So now I have officially kicked off the season of cooking stuff to share with other people.  It’s important to me that I share really high-quality, well-prepared vegan food when serving to an omnivore crowd.

This Thursday night is my work holiday party (super-early, I know!) and because I feel confident that there will be nothing vegan to eat, I am going to make at least two appetizers and at least one (but more likely two) dessert to bring along.

The first appetizer I’m going to make is this super-simple Chipotle White Bean Dip using as a base the recipe from the Plant Based on a Budget blog, which I like to tweak by adding additional spices and lime juice.  Click here to see the original recipe.

The other is going to be the Spinach Artichoke Dip with Garlic Cashew Cream that Glue and Glitter shared in the Virtual Vegan Potluck (click for recipe).  And for dessert, I have options, options, options!  The one that’s jumping out the most at the moment is Chloe Coscarelli’s Chewy Ginger-Molasses Cookies (click for recipe), but I’m also weighing some peanut butter and chocolate concoctions, because those always seem to go over well.

AND I have to make a decision ASAP about what to bring to Thanksgiving dinner next week, both for sharing with omnis and for my own dinner.  Same deal with Christmas dinner a few weeks later!

Finally, I just found out today that there is a Thanksgiving themed vegan potluck coming up this weekend, followed by a tour of another animal sanctuary, Maple Farm Sanctuary in Mendon, Massachusetts.  Not sure if I’m going to be able to get to that one but man does it sound fun.

Whew! It’s time to start making some lists.  🙂

An Apple a Day, Vegan Potlucks, and More!

Woo hoo, it’s Friday!!  Gotta love a shortened work week.  I’ve also been extremely productive this week, both in the office and out, which for me always makes time go by more quickly.

Also I have lots of fun stuff coming up!  Tomorrow is the Virtual Vegan Potluck and I am bringing an appetizer which incorporates the featured ingredient, beets!  Be sure to check in tomorrow to see what I made, and to check out all of the other incredible vegan goodness being brought by bloggers all over the world.

On Sunday, H and I are going to a real-life potluck at Sunny Meadow Sanctuary, an animal sanctuary in Central Mass.  It’s actually a “work day” and potluck, which means that we will be going over in the early afternoon to volunteer around the farm as needed for a few hours, followed by feasting.  I have been wanting to do this for SO long but something always comes up.  As for this weekend, the stars aligned: H and I are not out of town for the first time in months, and the Patriots aren’t playing on Sunday, so I’m finally going and am super-excited!!  I’ll try to get some good pictures while I’m there.  Now I just have to figure out what to bring…

I have a few other projects in the works that I’ll reveal in the next week or two.  But for now I just wanted to share a confession, which is that I’ve recently been eating an unholy amount of apples.

We may not be able to have avocados growing in our backyards (SoCal = SoJealous), but Massachusetts does manage produce apples that are absurdly delicious and plentiful all autumn long.  On the last day of our local farmer’s market, October 29, I bought around 20 lbs. of them.  My original intent was to wait until early December, then slow-cook them down into apple butter (Vanilla Rum Apple Butter, to be exact) to give to neighbors and co-workers as holiday gifts.  But…now I’m not sure that’s going to happen, because I’ve already eaten like half of them.

Mostly at breakfast time as Apple Butterballs (as I call them):

This involves slicing open an apple, scooping out the seeds, and then filling the remaining little well with raw almond butter (or any other kind of nut/seed butter).  Then you sprinkle it with cinnamon, put the apple back together, and wrap it in tin foil to bring to work for breakfast.

Sometimes when you unwrap the apple, you’ll find that the almond butter got a little gooey and melted out the end, but I don’t mind this.  I just scoop it off the tin foil and put it back on the apple when eating it. 🙂

I find the apple butterballs very filling, but for something even heartier, I go for an Apple Breakfast Sandwich:

You’ve got a toasted whole wheat English muffin, spread with raw almond butter and topped with hemp seeds and apple slices.

Sprinkle on cinnamon (always cinnamon. Always.):

And add a drizzle of agave, if you dare:

Try to tell me there’s something wrong with this and I’ll call you a liar!  At least I know I’m getting my apple a day. 🙂

Pile on the Miles Update: I hit my goal of 10 miles this week, but at this point I’m below where I should be at the halfway mark of the month (goal is 43 miles during this 30-day month and I’m at 17.25 as of the 15th), so I’ll probably try to get another 4-5 miles in tomorrow.  Yay for having a weekend where I’m not traveling and can stay home and actually do stuff I want to do!!!

Also, by some miracle, my running fitness has returned relatively quickly.  I did a really fun four-miler last night and it felt great the entire time.  That’s not to say I didn’t have some precarious moments.  As with many small New England towns founded in the 17th century, mine has a lot of trees.  Old trees.  With big roots that grow underneath and ripple the sidewalks.  Being accustomed to running and training in the spring/summer (read: with daylight), I didn’t realize how dark and poorly-lit parts of my town actually are, and how difficult that makes it to avoid the tree roots!  I might have to start wearing one of those silly-looking head lanterns, Ragnar-style:

(Just now realizing I wore that exact white longsleeve and reflective vest combo last night.  The headlamp would just totally complete the look.)

What should I bring to the Sunny Meadow potluck on Sunday? Any fun plans for the weekend?? Let me know in the comments!