Macaroni and chickpeas

Who needs all that cheesy fat? This recipe, which evolved out of a pasta salad, layers flavors for a bright and punchy but still comforting food.

6 oz. elbow macaroni
1 15 oz. can chickpeas, drained
3 sundried tomatoes, minced
3 black olives, minced
1 T minced red onion
1 T vinaigrette
1 T olive oil
2 T lemon juice
salt and pepper to taste
bread crumbs
makes 2 servings

Combine all ingredients but macaroni in a food processor or mash with a potato masher. Toss in cooked macaroni. Top with bread crumbs.

Lyfe begins

We were excited to visit the new Lyfe Kitchen in downtown Culver City (9540 W. Washington Blvd.), one of the first locations of a healthy fast-food chain with plans to open 250 restaurants nationwide in the next five years. The extensive vegan portion of the menu, designed by famed chef Tal Ronnen, includes the delicate, flavorful Gardein sausage and Daiya mozzarella ravioli, beautifully plated with kale, broccolini, cherry tomatoes, and basil, and a subtle, creamy kabocha squash risotto, made with farro, kale, carrot, and broccolini. We also loved the grilled artichokes and, for dessert, the apple and quinoa crisp with soy yogurt. The restaurant itself is bright and stylish. Here’s hoping this innovative and ambitious enterprise really does add new lyfe to the standard American diet.

Ravishing ravioli

Squash blossoms

Have you ever looked into the heart of an artichoke?

Artichoke soup

Here’s a really simple concoction we made in the Vitamix. (A regular blender would probably also get the job done.) It’s light, lemony, and green.

2 cups stock
1 can artichoke hearts, drained
1/4 cup fresh parsley
1 T fresh lemon juice
pepper
Serves 2

Put all the ingredients in the Vitamix, choose the soup setting, then serve. Garnish with parsley.

Banana pancakes

This recipe is a vegan adaptation of the apple pancakes in the Vitamix cookbook. A Vitamix is a powerful blender that performs all manner of miracle, in this case pulverizing both flax seeds and a frozen banana and emulsifying Earth Balance margarine. For best results with a regular blender, you need to make sure it is completely dry before adding the flax seeds. Blend them into a powder, then add water to the powder outside the blender.

1/4 cup whole wheat flour
3/4 cup white flour
1 T baking powder
1/2 t salt
3 T sugar
1/8 t cinnamon
1/2 t baking soda
1 cup soy milk or thick nut or seed milk
1 t flax seeds + 1 T water
1 1/2 t Earth Balance
1/4 t vanilla extract
1 medium banana, fresh or frozen, halved
makes 8 pancakes

Combine dry ingredients in mixing bowl. Place wet ingredients (including flax seeds) in Vitamix and use smoothie setting. Stir wet ingredients into dry ingredients and let batter sit for 5-10 minutes while heating griddle to medium-low. Grease griddle with olive or coconut oil. Measure out 1/3 cup of batter for each pancake. Flip as soon as pancakes are able to hold together and bottoms are golden-brown, cooking about 3 minutes on each side.

Roasted vegetables

These creamy, caramelized, savory veggies are a fine accompaniment to many a dish. Serve them with Field Roast or Gardein, plus rice and mushrooms, and you have a satisfying cold-weather meal.

3 Yukon Gold (or other young) potatoes, cut into quarters
1 parsnip
2 young carrots, with a bit of stem
1 turnip
1 white onion, cut into quarters
1 beet (optional)
thyme (fresh or dried)
olive oil
salt
pepper
Serves 2

Peel vegetables except potatoes; cut into chunks 1 ½ to 2 inches long (shorter for potatoes and turnips, longer for carrots and parsnips). Boil potatoes in salted water for 5 minutes. Add vegetables to casserole dish(es); avoid crowding. Drizzle with olive oil. Sprinkle with salt, pepper, and thyme. Toss. Bake at 400 for 45 minutes, stirring at 15-minute and half-hour mark. Bake uncovered for first 15 minutes and covered for remaining half-hour. Cook (optional) beets in a separate casserole dish. Store leftover turnip and parsnip chunks for another meal.

Porcini risotto

Mario’s risotto recipe is creamy without a drop of butter, cream, or cheese. The mushrooms are alarmingly meaty.
50 grams (about 2 ounces) dried porcini mushrooms
white onion, chopped roughly
1 cup arborio rice
½ cup white wine
1 cup chopped fresh curly parsley
salt and pepper to taste
1 t Earth Balance or other vegan margarine
Serves 2

Soak porcini mushrooms in hot water. Reserve the broth, adding a bouillon cube. Roughly chop the mushrooms. Heat extra-virgin olive oil in large skillet at medium-high heat. Sauté onions until tender, about 5 minutes. Add rice, stirring for 1 minute, toasting the rice. Stir in wine; let it evaporate. Add chopped mushrooms and about ¼ cup of broth. Keep adding broth, ¼ cup at a time, just enough to prevent the rice from sticking. Add parsley throughout, including a fistful at the halfway point (9 minutes in). After 18 minutes, turn off stove and add salt, pepper, and Earth Balance as well as more parsley. Stir a few times and serve.

Vegan again

In the past year, other obligations have called us away from this blog. We have economized by dining at home, and we have returned to the veganism to which we adhered through much of the 90s and the early part of the past decade. One happy result has been the loss of 10 pounds of belly bulge. Readers can therefore expect no more postings that rhapsodize over butter, cream, or cheese. What you can expect instead is reports about our cooking adventures and good vegan dining options when we find them. In the meantime, we will leave past reviews in place for those not yet ready to go all the way to veganism.