Two weekends ago saw the return of a couple of old favorites - vegan brie and the chicken ring. Unfortunately, neither of these old goodies turned out quite the way I was hoping.
My vegan brie recipe comes from the Non-Dairy Formulary (in fact, it's still the only recipe I've actually made from the book yet), and I loved the way it came out last time. But when I went to make it again, I realized that I had misread the recipe and completely omitted an ingredient. The recipe reads "1/4 cup tapioca flour plus more for dusting" and then the text of the directions say "add remaining ingredients". So somehow I read this and interpreted it as "no tapioca in the mix, just use it for dusting". Obviously I realized this was a mistake and proceeded to add it on my second go. Since I'd still liked it the first time, I fully expecting it to work brie miracles this round. No such luck. The texture of my tapioca floured brie was way too sticky and off. Of course I have no clue why this would be - you would think adding a dry ingredient would do just the opposite. But I'm definitely not going to make it per the books instructions again. I'll stick with my mess-up version, thank you very much. 
Fortunately it was still more than tasty enough for delicious brie and apple sandwiches! Yeah, I ate these for dinners three nights in a row. Yum!
Meanwhile, right when my vegan brie was starting to run out I decided that the best way to make up for a weekend full of carbalicious sandwiches was to make another carb-heavy treat - the chicken ring. Yes, that ring of Pillsbury goodness reared its delicious head again! I mean, seriously ... what's not to love?! Crescent rolls, broccoli, red bell pepper, gardein chicken, mayo, and cheese! 
But when I went to pull out my trusty Daiya, I found that alas I had inadvertently started on a homemade vegan blue cheese project. Yup, it was completely covered in mold. As exciting as it might have been to see where this vegan blue would take me, I decided to play it safe and toss it out. Without a cheese component for the ring that was already underway, I fell back on the only thing I had in the fridge - parmesan. Turns out I probably should have just run my lazy butt to the store. I added the same amount of parmesan that the recipe called for of regular cheese, and it was too salty. In fact, I realized after the fact that I had actually forgotten to add salt, though the recipe called for it, and it was still too salty. Whomp whomp. Not so salty of course that I didn't devour the whole ring in just a few days. But enough that I'll be sure that next time I actually look at my Daiya before I start laying out my crescent roll triangles. And yes, there will definitely be a next time. Long live the chicken ring!
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