Christmas Dinner

Christmas. The most wonderful time of the year. Especially this year, as Hanukkah was at the same time (so it's very ecumenical). To celebrate, we had an traditional Christmas feast - or as traditional as one can do when one is vegetarian.

The main protein was a Tofurky - slathered in a generous amount of coconut oil and slow-roasted. Not being stingy with the coconut oil is key, as this was the tenderest Tofurky ever (in our experiences - your results may vary).

My partner made delicious puff pastry tarts stuffed with vegan brie and cranberry sauce (you can see the leftover cranberry sauce on the table).

I made a salad with a sriracha vinaigrette, but what I was most proud of was the vegan mashed potatoes.

Vegan Mashed Potatoes

Oil
3 pounds Potatoes (a starchy type like Idaho or Russet)
1.5 cups white wine
Dash of hot mustard
Salt and pepper

Dump the potatoes (unpeeled!) into a pot and fill with water. Bring to a boil and add some salt. Cook for 15-30 minutes. Periodically stab the potatoes and when there's no resistance they're done. Drain in a colander.

If you want you can let dry for a bit and then wrap in tinfoil and store in the fridge. Or, you can start on part 2 right away.

Put some oil in the pot over medium-low heat for about a minute. Then, add the potatoes and start mashing away with a suitable instrument (something that looks like this). Add the wine, salt, pepper and mustard and keep on mashing until you get the right consistency.


Serves 6

The potatoes were really nice and fluffy and I didn't miss the milk/butter at all. Because there were plenty of leftovers, we got to have mashed potatoes in the days to come. I even tried some unsuccessful food experiments with them which will not be blogged (because unsuccessful).

Kimchi Fried Rice

Fried rice. It sounds unhealthy. And yet unlike other fried foods which evoke some seedy diner, fried rice is quick and wholesome. It's not particularly fried.

One of the nice things about fried rice is that it's a great use for leftover rice, rice that's had a chance to sit is an even better ingredient. While you can often just throw veggies that were in your fridge the below recipe relies on a hit of kimchi for a hit of extra flavour.

Kimchi Fried Rice

1 cup rice
1 head broccoli or cauliflower
1 block tofu
1 small bell pepper, diced
2 eggs

1.5 cups wine
1/4 cup soy sauce
pepper
4 cloves garlic
2 cups kimchi
Drizzle of sriracha

Put the rice on in the rice cooker or stove (despite what I said above about using leftover rice, I've given the amount for the dry rice). As the rice is on, cook the broccoli/cauliflower and pepper on low heat, stirring occasionally. Add the tofu a little afterwards.

During this time, you can make the sauce (just whisk the wine, soy sauce, pressed garlic and pepper together). Once the rice is done, add a little oil to another pan and sautee the rice in it on medium-high. After a minute or so, create a little "pocket" in the middle of the rice and crack the eggs into it. Then stir the eggs and rice together.

Next, add the tofu/veggies and the sauce to the rice and stir together. Finally, add the kimchi and cook together until the kimchi's warmed up.

Drizzle sriracha over it and serve.

Serves 5

The kimchi is Daebak brand Kimchi, which is vegan and - I assume - fair trade.

Try It Again: Non-chilly chili

Six years. Yeah, it's been a while since my last post. While the world's changed a lot in that time, people still have to eat. So I thought I'd restart this blog with - hopefully - better photography. We'll see.

2342 days ago I launched a feature called "Try It Again", where I'd redo one of my older recipes. So today, I'll refresh one of my classic recipes: non-chilly chili. The problem with my original recipe was unnecessary complexity: there were multiple steps. If any recipe cried out for just dumping all the ingredients in a pot it's this one.

Chili con tofu


Oil
1 Onion, diced
4 garlic cloves, minced
1 Chili pepper
1 tablespoon cumin
1-2 tablespoon(s) assorted chili powders
3 cans assorted assorted beans, drained and rinsed
1 can whole tomatoes with juice (28-ounce)
1/2 block frozen firm tofu, frozen for a few hours, thawed (takes about a day), pressed and crumbled

Sauté the onion in the oil for about 30 seconds to a minute. Add all other ingredients and simmer for about 20 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Serves 6

I like to have some black beans and chickpeas in the chili. The beauty of chili is its endless customizability. I put a half a cup of edamame this time and it worked out great. When I'm serving this at a dinner party I like to top it with some diced avocado.