Layered Mexican Cornbread by Cris S.

Heat oven to 350 degrees, and prepare an 8 X 8 or 9 X 9 square pan, or 10 inch round pie plate with butter or spray.  Bread is thick and layered with the peppers when finished baking. Also it is very moist.

1 cup cornmeal
1/2 cup all purpose flour
2 Tbsp. baking powder
2/3 cup Almond Breeze dairy free milk
2 eggs (or egg replacement to equal 2 eggs)
1/2 tsp. salt
1/3 cup vegetable oil (more if using egg replacement)
1/3 cup sugar (optional)
1/2 cup chopped onion, red is fine
1 14oz can creamed corn (I used frozen corn that I heated and put into food processor until about finely chopped and with a gritty consistency; about 2 cups chopped.)
1 cup grated, non-dairy, cheddar/jack combo
1 cup jalapeno peppers, seeds and membranes removed then chopped. Canned is fine. And quantity is negotiable.

Mix cornmeal, flour, baking powder, milk, eggs, salt, oil, and sugar until blended. Stir in onion and corn. Pour 2/3 of the batter into the prepared pan. Top with the cheese and the peppers. Pour the remaining 1/3 batter over the cheese/chili layer. Place in oven for about 35 minutes until top is golden brown and toothpick comes out clean.

This is soooo good!!!!   I used eggs, and the corn does add additional moisture.....this is very very moist and yummy.  Be sure that some of your cheese peeks out along the top edge of your bread before baking as it turns a beautiful dark orange after baked.

You will like this Alfredo

Vegan Alfredo is really cool because its so easy and so hard to tell that it's vegan. Its super creamy and has tons of flavor if you follow this technique I discovered. I usually have almost all these ingredients on hand so it shouldn't be a big expense to make.

Ingredients:
1 bag pasta
1 box extra firm silken tofu
4 or more garlic cloves minced
1 veg bullion cube
2 T Nutritional Yeast (optional)
1 1/2 C unsweetened soy milk
juice of 1/2 lemon
3 T Earth Balance margarine or vegan butter
Salt and pepper to taste
Add ins: broccoli, portabella, fake chicken strips

So you need a blender or food processor for this. Throw in the tofu (must must must be silken) and soy milk. Set aside.

Star boiling pasta. Add broccoli to boiling pasta during the last couple minutes of cooking time. This saves a step if you use broccoli. Dump the pasta and broccoli in the strainer together.

Melt the Earth Balance in a large skillet or wok and add minced garlic. Don't brown the garlic, just let it simmer for 2 minutes. Squeeze in lemon juice and add mushrooms and/or "chicken" strips if using. I highly recommend the portabellas though. Saute for 3-4 minutes until mushrooms are soft. This is when the flavors get really good. The lemon, garlic and mushrooms explode with deliciousness. Now add the tofu/soy milk mixture and bring to light simmer. Add bullion cube and let dissolve. Taste the sauce and add pepper, salt, lemon as needed. Add the noodles to the sauce and mix. Serve immediately.

Makes a ton of food and awesome left overs! This is one of our many favorites.

Stuffed Swiss Chard, submitted by Cris S.

8 large leaves Swiss chard
1 cup cooked white rice
2 (about 1/2cup carrots,coarsely grated)
1/2 fresh mint leaves, chopped
1/4 cup cucumber, seeded, peeled and coarsely grated
2 green onions, chopped
3 Tbsp low-sodium soy sauce
2 tsp fresh ginger, grated
1 tsp agave syrup or white sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp fresh-ground pepper
1/3 cup rice vinegar
3 Tbsp sugar
2 tsp toasted sesame oil
1 tsp red-pepper flakes
Directions
Prepare Swiss Chard:
Fill a large bowl with ice water and set aside. Fill a large saucepan with water and bring to a boil over high heat. Blanch chard leaves by submerging in the boiling water until the rib is softened and the leaves become limp -- about 1 minute. Transfer to the prepared ice bath, drain cooled leaves, and stack between sheets of towel until dry. Cut out the rib on each leaf and set leaves aside.

Make the Rolls:
Combine the rice, carrot, mint, cucumber, 1/2 the onion, 1 tablespoon soy sauce, ginger, agave or sugar, salt, and pepper in a large bowl. Place about 1/4 cup of filling in the center of a chard leaf and roll into a cigar shape. Repeat with rest of filling and leaves. Keep chilled until ready to serve.

Make the Dipping Sauce:
Mix the rice vinegar, sugar, remaining soy sauce, remaining onion, sesame oil, and pepper flakes in a small bowl until combined. Serve alongside rolls.

Hello , Cara....from yo' mama...

I think your pictures are great! Further, I strongly support your decision to become vegan. Little by little, I am trying to eliminate the eggs and milk from my diet. It is very possible that I will not be as diligent as you, but I am becoming more aware - primarily through you. You do know when I gave up meat and I have been diligent about that, for sure. So I have been watching the food channels, and learning some interesting techniques, and getting reacquainted with cooking. I baked a lot when I was young and after we moved to "electric stove" country, I haven't been able to produce expected results with the electric oven. (Maybe I should put an imu oven in the backyard ???) Anyway....I look forward to exchanging recipes with you and your wonderful contributors. But as you know, the area where we live is more "retro" so finding bolognie and white bread is no problem....milk-free cheese isn't as easy to find. Much love......Cris S.

Spring Food

More than anything, this is just a bad ass picture. I am starting to figure out how to take good pictures of food. Problem is, it requires natural light, rather than a flash and I usually cook at night when it's dark.

So these portabella burgers turned out pretty great. I made a marinade with balsamic vinegar, a touch of olive oil, a squirt of agave, a few drops of liquid smoke, a dash of thyme and minced garlic. I marinated the shrooms for about an hour and kept spooning the liquid into the gill side. I roasted them at 350, gill side up for about 20 minutes. Checking often.

The green beans are just steamed grean beans with some sauted shallots and toasted almonds with a squeeze of lemon.

Nice spring dinner.

Vegan Omelette Time!

So I have been curious about vegan omelettes for awhile now and finally decided to give it a try. I havent found too many recipes for this so I used Susan's recipe from her Fat Free Vegan blog. I have made this 2 days in a row now and I really like it. Its pretty close to what I remember an omelette tasting like. I put mushrooms, spinach and follow your heart monterey jack in it. You should try it. Here is the recipe.

Artichoke Pesto Pasta

So I am really getting anxious for winter to be a thing of the past and I was craving something kind of springy and decided to try a pesto of some sort. I looked online at some recipes and got the idea to use artichokes as a pesto and I thought I'd try it. This turned out pretty stinkin awesome!


1lb pasta. Penne or ziti or anything
1 or 2 15oz cans of artichoke hearts in water
1 can of black olives
1 can of diced tomatoes or 2 or 3 diced fresh romas
1/3 cup of pecans or walnuts
1/2 lemon juice
1/4 olive oil
1/4 nutritional yeast (optional)
3 or 4 cloves of garlic
handful of fresh basil (or 1 package you get at the store)
salt and pepper



Boil the pasta as you normally would.

Drain 1 can of artichokes and put in blender or food processor. I used a blender and it worked fine. Put lemon juice, olive oil, garlic, nutritional yeast, basil and pecans in the blender. Blend until smooth and creamy. Add salt and pepper as needed

Drain the noodles and put back into the pot you boiled them it. Stir in DRAINED diced tomatoes, sliced olives and chopped artichokes from can number 2. Stir and reheat until heated throughout. Thats all you do!

Now you dont have to add the 2nd can of artichokes. I thought it worked well. Also, make sure you drain the diced tomatoes. You just want the chunks, not all the juice. You could also add capers or sauted mushrooms and zuchinni.