BBQ SEITAN RIBS

Store purchased seitan is difficult for me to obtain.  I can only get it when I go to Whole Foods over an hour away.  And I am also not impressed with commerically produced meat substitutes. So I went on a quest to make my own seitan and I was thrilled with my first venture!  I can't wait to try some other recipes. The first bonus was that is was so easy to make.....really easy.  The recipe makes about a 8 X 8 pan, and this is enough for dinner, and mucho leftovers to put into other recipes, and chop up into a salad for lunch tomorrow. It also has over 20g of protein which thrills me. This recipe and photo is courtesy of http://www.blog.fatfreevegan.com/2007/05/barbecued-seitan-ribz.html
You can also watch a video of the preparation on http://www.everydaydish.tv/index.php?page=recipe&recipe=106

The Gluten flour can sometimes be found in the flour section, but often it is in the health food section.

-1 cup gluten flour (I like Bob's Red Mill)
-2 tsp smoked spanish paprika
-2 Tb nutritional yeast
-2 tsp onion powder

-1 tsp garlic powder

-3/4 cup of water

-2 Tb of tahini

-1 tsp liquid smoke

-1 Tb of soy sauce

-1 cup of your favorite BBQ sauce....especially homemade

Preheat the oven to 350 and grease an 8 X 8 baking dish.  Mix the first 5 ingredients.  Separately mix the tahini, liquid smoke, and soy sauce.  Add to the dry ingredients and stir well.  Then knead right in the bowl for a few minutes.

Put the dough into the pan and flatten it with your hands.  With a sharp knife and cut into 8 strips, then rotate the dish and cut those strips in 1/2 to make 16 pieces.

Bake for 25 minutes and get your grill ready.

Remove from the oven and re cut the strips carefully.  Brush the top with lots of the barbecue sauce.  Invert the pan on the grill and brush with more sauce.  Watch that it doesn't burn, and when the first side looks brown and crispy turn and add more sauce if you like. When the 2nd side is browned remove to a platter and cut into individual ribs.

ZUCCHINI TOMATO CASSEROLE

This is one of my favorite vegetable dishes. My mother used to make something similar and through the years I have adapted a version of hers. There has never been a written recipe, and each time that I make it I sort of eyeball the measurements.  My husband is not a fan of green peppers...not at all.  But he loves this dish even though it is layered with peppers through out.  He doesn't know why, but to my knowledge this is the only time he likes green peppers. We eat this the 2nd day for leftovers.  It is a little mushier but we don't care....the flavors are great.

ZUCCHINI TOMATO CASSEROLE

-2 zucchini unpeeled
-2-3 large tomatoes (or 4-5 small ones)
-1 onion
-1 green pepper
-plain bread crumbs
-grated veggie Parmesan
-earth balance butter spread
-salt and pepper

Set over to 375.  Assemble all the ingredients along with a really sharp knife.  Grease a baking pan 9X9 or the one I use is about 8"X 12".  Slice into separate piles the  zucchini, tomatoes, onion and green pepper into about 1/4"slices.  Put 1/2 the zucchini into the bottom of the dish spreading out as evenly as possible. Sprinkle some bread crumbs onto the zucchini...about 2 Tbs. Add a handful of the onion slices, and another handful of the green pepper. Top with tomato slices until the other veggies are covered.  Sprinkle some more breadcrumbs and grated Parmesan cheese.  Add some salt and pepper and dot each tomato with Earth Balance.  Repeat the layers.  Bake at 375 for 1 hour, until bubbly and crisp looking.

HOMEMADE TORTILLAS CHIPS

This recipes is easy and healthy and so tasty right out of the oven.  We like to make these on the weekend when we are watching a movie.  What spices you add to the chips is optional depending on your taste.  You can make them hot or mild.  Store any leftovers in a zip lock bag.  I often have the leftovers for lunch with re fried beans as a dip (got to get that protein!). These chips taste amazing if you take the time to make your own salsa.....recipe for salsa is the next post. You can also use flour tortillas, or whole wheat tortillas.  Actually a mix of flour, whole wheat and corn is great.
 
HOMEMADE TORTILLAS CHIPS

-1 pkg of corn tortillas (white or yellow)
-vegetable cooking spray (butter flavor or olive oil)
-garlic salt or whatever spices you want to use....paprika, chili powder, cumin, cayenne pepper

Heat over to 350 and spray several cookie sheets with cooking spray.  Spray 5 tortillas with cooking spray, turn them over and spray the other side.  Sprinkle one side with garlic salt and a little cayenne pepper or other spices as desired. Stack the 5 tortillas and cut in half with a pizza cutter (or sharp knife).  Cut in half again.  You should have 4 pieces.  Cut these pieces again until you have 8 pieces.  Lay the pieces alternately on the cookie sheets. Spray the tops again lightly with vegetable spray.  Leave some space between each one or they won't get crispy around the edges. 

Bake for about 8-10 minutes until the edges are brown and starting to curl.  Watch them closely after 6-7 minutes because they burn quickly.  Dump them into a bowl and repeat process until you have as many as you want.

****Before you take them off the cookies sheet you can sprinkle come veggie mozzarella cheese on top and stick them back into the oven for a few minutes until the cheese starts to melt.

Serve with salsa, veggie sour cream, veggie cheese.

Spinach and Mushroom Lasagna

This recipe has the "hubby thumbs up" in spite of the tofu.  As a matter of fact this is one of the first vegan recipes that I  made, and it is still one of his favorites. I am not a big fan of red tomato sauce, so I have adjusted the amount of sauce in this recipe to suit my tastes. The original recipe calls for dry lasagna noodles....in other words you don't have to cook the noodles first like with most lasagna recipes.  You can simply layer the ingredients between the dry noodles.  Certainly makes life easier and the recipes goes together really fast.  But.....I didn't like it as much so the second time I boiled the noodles first and I was happier with the results. Try it first with dry noodles and see if you like it. It makes a typical large pan of lasagna, which fills my rule of having leftovers, and we still have some to freeze.

1/2 lb of fresh mushrooms
1 garlic clove (or 2 if they are small.  you need about 1 tsp of pressed garlic)
2 Tbs of water
I jar of spaghetti sauce (the original recipe called for 2 jars)
2-3 cups of shredded veggie mozzarella cheese (I use one 2 cup pkg)

Filling
10 oz of frozen spinach...thawed and drained
1 pkg of firm tofu (not silken tofu)
1 tsp of salt
1 tsp of nutritional yeast (this adds a cheesy taste)
1 1/2 tsp oregano
1/2 tsp of garlic powder
1 tsp basil
1/2 rosemary crushed (optional)
1/2 tsp of cayenne pepper (sometimes called red pepper)

Oven 350 degrees

Saute the mushrooms and garlic in the 2 tsp of water until tender.  Add more water if they start to dry out.  Remove from heat and add the spaghetti sauce.

Place the tofu and the spinach into food processor and pulse a few times.  Add the rest of the filling ingredients and process until smooth.  You can also do this without dragging out the food processor by using a potato masher on the tofu first, then add the rest of the ingredients.

Spread 1/2 the sauce into the pan. Top with three noodles.  Spread 1/2 the tofu mixture onto the noodles. Cover with another layer of noodles and then the remaining tofu mixture. Add 1/2 the bag of mozzarella cheese.  Another layer of noodles and the remainder of the spaghetti sauce.  Finally the rest of the cheese.  Cover the dish tightly with foil and bake for about 30 minutes.  Remove the foil and bake for about another 10 minutes until the top looks crusty.  Remove from the oven.  Top with some veggie Parmesan if you like.

The lasagna will set up better if you let it sit for about 15 minutes before serving.