Christmas Pizza

Christmas pizza. Well it's red and green, right? Sauce and oregano. I got a new camera for Christmas, so hopefully I'll be creating some more artful photos in the future. Currently I'm practicing on the pizza. Light life pepperoni, canned mushrooms (yessss, canned mushrooms, they're awesome on pizza) and the breakfast sausage browned with some Penzeys Italian sausage seasoning and follow your heart mozzarella.


And since I'm obsessed with British period pieces, I might as well watch one about cooking. I'm watching the Duchess of Duke Street from 1976 starring Gemma Jones (the mother in Bridget Jones.)

Roasted vegetables and super cool Japanese rice

Nothing warms up the house on a cold winter's day like a 400 degree oven. I roasted some beets and butternut squash. I like to peel and dice the veggies before roasting, so each piece gets coated and crispy.
Here's the rice mix. It's Kagayaki brand premium short 6 grain rice. I got it at the Japanese grocery on 41st in NYC. It's a mixture of black rice, hulless barley, red rice, purple barley, rye berries and short grain brown rice. Let me say, this rice blend will force you to chew your food! It's very hearty and filling and is quite flavorful even just plain.

Breakfast Sausage

This is my first go at the seitan-in-foil sausage technique. The recipe is from Alicia Simpson's Quick and Easy Vegan Comfort Food. You know how I love the field roast and tofurky sausages, but this is so easy I might just have to start making my own more often. Not sure these will fool the ninja, but I'll have to try it out in something. They are decidedly breakfast sausage flavored, but would go well as an appetiser with mustard sauce. This is how I ate them for actual breakfast (it's 10AM) because I didn't have any tofu to make a scramble to go with them. Anyway they were really good this way. Eating with toothpicks is so sophisticated. I sliced the steamed sausages and then pan fried them in a little oil. The mustard sauce is just some whole grain mustard and vegenaise. Here's the sausages after they have steamed in foil.

This is a great technique. The finished seitan has a nice texture that isn't the sometimes rubbery of boiled seitan or dried out of baked seitan. Because you also know I love Penzeys, I'll have to try this with one of their sausage seasonings. The Italian and breakfast sausage seasonings are great. I use them in pasta sauce and in scrambles to get sausage flavor without the meat. Sausage is one of those great vegan items that is so much more about the seasoning than the meat that it's really satisfying veganized.

There are a lot of great recipes in Alicia's book that I'll have to try as well. Spicy buffalo bites, sweet potato waffles, "egg" macguffin, tahini coffee?!?, peach cobbler and tortilla soup are the ones I'm lookin' at right now. Alicia also has a bunch of product reviews on her blog vegan guinea pig. I really need to get me a tofu xpress.

As a side note I like Deathcab for Cutie and all, but seriously Pandora, does every other song need to be DCFC or the Postal Service? Really. OK, now they're playing Lost in the Supermarket by the Clash just to make me happy. I've got the roku which plays the streaming netflix on the TV and now hooks into pandora, too. So I've got Deathcab in surround sound. Awesome.

If you're wondering what I'm doing not at work making sausage, complaining about the otherwise awesome pandora, and blogging on a Tuesday morning, my last day at my old job was yesterday and I start a new job on Monday. OK, so the office buildings are across the street from each other in downtown NYC, but still change is good. I'm excited about the new job. Can't wait to sneak some vegan treats on the unsuspecting office workers.

Snow days are for vegan waffles and British period pieces

It is indeed snowing in New York. Hiding out from work and armed with the roku remote, I have camped myself on the couch. I'm watching all the streaming netflix British period pieces that I haven't seen before.

Here are the Old-Fashioned Chelsea Waffles from Vegan Brunch. I like the bit of cornmeal in them. It adds a nice dimension. Topped with a little Earth Balance and some New York maple syrup. Yum. This is the only thing that got me off the couch all day.
Now on to the movies...

Starting with a 2009 version of Wuthering Heights that I quite enjoyed. Ah, the Bronte's. Not as light and fluffy as the Jane Austen collection. I always want to hate Heathcliff, but I never really do. I don't even hate Cathy in this one. This version retains the passion, but isn't quite as gritty as some of the other versions. I give it two thumbs up.

Next on to Under the Greenwood Tree. I've never read any Thomas Hardy and this was very cute. Love triumphs through the classes. Starring Keeley Hawes from MI-5. Actually you could do a whole period piece feature with the cast of "Spooks", but I'll save that for another day.

On to Where Angel's Fear to Tread. I've never read any E.M. Forester either, but you can bet the movie has got Helena Bonham Carter in it. So far it's good. There's always some twist though. I usually like the E.M. Forester shows better after I've seen them again. There's a newish Room with a View that I like a lot, too.

Back to the couch...Ciao!