Thanksgiving Recap

Well, considering Thanksgiving is now almost a full week ago, it's probably finally time to do a Thanksgiving recap. 

 

I hit the treadmill both Wednesday and Thursday last week to help balance out the overeating I knew would be inevitable on Thanksgiving.  Nothing too hard.  I did a leisurely 2.5 mile run on Wednesday, then did intervals Thursday - alternating 2 minutes of walking at 3.2 with 2 minutes of sprinting at 7.0 (yes, that's sprinting for me).  Just enough to perhaps negate half a slice of pie ...

 

Early in the day Thursday I got my cook on at home, making the two dishes I planned to bring to dinner: butternut squash tamales and caramelized onion sweet potatoes.  The tamales were quite involved time-wise, but the actual hands-on time was pretty minimal.  While I soaked the corn husks for 1/2 hour I sautéed frozen butternut squash cubes (make life easy whenever possible) with garlic, onion, and Mexican spices.  Right at the end I added fresh chopped cilantro.  I also mixed masa flour filling, then laid everything out to fill my tamales.  During all of this I also roasted my sweet potatoes in the oven for an hour (turning once halfway through).

 

While the filling process took a bit of time, the real time involvement with tamales is steaming them - which I did for 1 1/2 hours.  Actually, after checking the water level and making sure everything would be okay, this is the point at which I ran downstairs to get my quick workout on in the building's exercise room.  By the time I was done with my workout the tamales were all set and I pulled them off the heat and showered. 

 

Once I was all showered up I caramelized red onions and peeled and mashed my sweet potatoes.  I mixed the mashed sweet potatoes, Earth Balance butter, salt, pepper, and the caramelized onions for probably one of the simplest dishes ever.  The sweet potatoes mixed with onions might seem like an odd combination, but trust me ... it's very tasty! 

 

With all my cooking pretty much wrapped up by 1 pm, Josh and I made some quick Tofurky sandwiches before leaving for his parents' house.  We figured we owed it to the holiday to have some Tofurky, plus we shared a bit with Panda - one of her favorite treats.  I'm pretty sure she was thankful ... in her own way. 

 

At Josh's parents' house we walked the dogs then spent most of the rest of the afternoon eating tons of appetizers.  They laid out a huge spread that included olives, marinated artichoke hearts, roasted red peppers, dolmatas, and hummus with pita and falafel chips.  I really tried to reign it in on the appetizers, but I was still pretty much full by the time actual dinner rolled around. 

 

Because it was just the four of us, we tried to go pretty light on the number of dishes.  In addition to the two I'd prepared, Josh's parents made delicata squash stuffed with a wild rice mixture and soup.  I managed to get a picture of the soup, but somehow completely failed to get a picture of the squash. 

 

Possibly because at this point I was freaking out over my failure to successfully reheat tamales.  When Josh and I looked on the Internet, we found two different sources that said to unwrap the tamales from their husks, lay them in a baking dish with butter, and bake until the masa filling starts to brown. 

 

THIS IS WRONG.

 

Baking the tamales out of their husks just makes them a horrible dry mess.  I tried to compensate by adding tons of green salsa on top of the tamales, but it was no use.  They were pretty horrible.  I'm pretty sure the correct answer would have been to re-steam them for a bit until they are warm, then unwrap when ready to eat.  Which is why you have never been to a restaurant that serves you a tamale outside of its corn husk - they always give you a plate and you unwrap it yourself.  Oh well.  Unfortunately harsh lesson learned. 

 

Fortunately soon after the tamale failure it was time for dessert.  I mentioned earlier that Josh's mom planned to make a "real" (non-vegan) pumpkin pie and a vegan apple tart for me.  Translation: Lindsay gets an entire apple tart almost entirely to herself.  Luckily, it was an incredibly delicious tart which I had both for dessert on Thanksgiving and then again Friday morning for breakfast.  Maybe I should have spent a little more time on that treadmill ....

Vegan Brunch at Muse Cafe

This post has been several months in the making now, but it was pretty much worth the long delay.  It all started in mid-October, when Josh's parents sent me a gift certificate to Muse Café for my birthday.  They had read about the chef's special vegan Sunday brunch, where Todd Gray puts together a delicious vegan brunch buffet for the prix fix price of just $25 per adult - definitely not a bad deal at all when you see the huge spread.  Plus you sit right in the Corcoran Gallery in a beautiful atrium enjoying live music!  Lovely Sunday morning ambiance.

It was such a thoughtful gift, but of course it took me until early November to set a date when Josh and I were free.  They recommend reservations, and once we saw the small seating area fill up that definitely seemed like the right way to go.  Luckily, I picked a beautiful day and we metroed into DC with no issues at all.  The weather was so great we even walked around like tourists for a bit afterward, taking in the White House and a bit of the mall before heading home. 

The buffet is set up in the center of the seating area, and they give you a menu so you know all there is to offer - and there was plenty.  I got one of each of the savory options except for the soup, because it was such a warm day I didn't feel like I needed the warm food.  (But Josh did have it and said it was great.) 

It may not look like it, but I genuinely did try to exercise restraint when loading up my plate.  I got just a little of everything, but everything turned out to be quite a lot.  Both our favorites was the truffled macaroni and cheese.  I mean, what's not to like?  Truffles - yum.  Macaroni - yum.  Cheese - yum.  I really wish I could figure out how to get that recipe.  But really every single thing was so delicious.  It's a wonder I had room to try the sweet treats. 

But somehow I managed ... That's right, I got one of everything off the sweets table too.  Actually, I got two pieces of French toast because they looked so small and innocent.  And apparently because I'm a glutton.  It was a real struggle to finish the plate - but finish I must because it was soooo good.  The only thing I didn't eat all of was that little muffin - it was too dry and not very flavorful.  When you're getting ready to burst, any food that isn't perfection must be left by the wayside! 

My favorite of the sweets turned out to be the lemon poppy seed cake trifle with fruit compote.  Maybe if I hadn't gone so crazy getting everything else I would have had room for seconds of it ...  But then again, if I hadn't gotten everything then I wouldn't know if really the baklava or chocolate chip macaroon was my favorite.  That's right, no regrets! 

AAAAANNNNNNNNNNNDDDDDDDDDD .... our brunch didn't quite use up the gift certificate.  So we will just have to return to sample the Muse vegan brunch again soon! 

Basil Cashew Cream Two Ways

When we were out West a couple weeks ago, we visited the home of friends and spent tons of time hanging out in their back yard.  We admired all the lovely veggies they had planted in their garden, which of course led to them sending us home (on a plane!) with tons of kale and chard. 

 

Fortunately, the greens survived the trip.  But that also meant I needed to figure out what to do with them.  Feeling the need for wintery comfort food, I opted to use them in a pasta dish.  I sauteed the kale and chard with garlic and onion, then tossed the cooked greens with pasta and a basil cream sauce I adapted from my standard cashew cream version.  In addition to the usual cashew cream ingredients, I mixed in some fresh basil leaves.  You could definitely taste the basil in the sauce, and it made the whole dish taste a bit lighter and fresher (a bit ...). 

 

The next day I ran out to grab ingredients to use up the basil cashew cream in a whole new way - with roasted veggie sandwiches.  I roasted zucchini, red pepper, eggplant, and onion in the oven for about forty minutes (flipping halfway through), then used the basil cashew cream as a spread on the French bread.  The spread gave the sandwich a tangy sharpness that was amazing.  This may have been a quick attempt to use leftovers, but I think I preferred it even to the pasta dish! 

 

Basil cashew cream sauce = big winner! 

Thanksgiving Week

Happy Thanksgiving!  Today I'll be preparing caramelized onion sweet potatoes and butternut squash tamales to share at Josh's parents' dinner tonight.  More on that next week ...

 

But I've been in a Thanksgiving state of mind all week, preparing all sorts of fall dishes.  Josh's mom plans to make a vegan apple pie (for me) and a regular (non-vegan) pumpkin pie for everyone else.  Since I didn't want to miss out on the delicious pumpkin festivities, I decided to make this vegan pumpkin pie from Chocolate Covered Katie's blog, and I've been enjoying a piece (or two!) every day since.  It's sooo good.  It was just as creamy as she promised, plus it was super easy to make.  I know I'll be making this again and again all winter (and probably into summer!). 

 

When it comes time to plan Thanksgiving food, Josh always advocates for burritos.  His dream is to have all Mexican food for Thanksgiving and ditch the traditional stuff.  Obviously, I tried to appease him slightly by coming up with butternut squash tamales.  But I also tried to take the sting off of the non-Mexican Thanksgiving by making a batch of poblano soup Monday for dinner.  I got the recipe a couple years ago from a Mexican cooking demonstration we attended at the Mexican Cultural Institute and tweaked it a bit to make it vegan - which was easy peasy (sub in almond milk and veggie broth). 

 

Once I'd roasted and skinned the poblanos everything came together so quickly.  Sautee white onion in butter and oil.  Add poblanos then defrosted corn, salt, and pepper.  Sautee for a while before adding broth, then milk, heating through, and serving.  I kind of wished we'd had some sour cream for garnish, but somehow we survived ... In fact, we both ate two big bowls and seriously thought about a third.  But we managed to exercise restraint ...

 

Yup, pre-Thanksgiving eats definitely rivaled the big day this year.  But I'm still excited for tonight!  Hope your feast is fantastic! 

Baltimore Visit

Two weekends ago Josh and I spent the weekend in Baltimore.  We visited his parents, friends, and some of our favorite Baltimore dining establishments.  Of course at the top of our list was Cafe Spice in Timonium.  We ordered tons of food and enjoyed the leftovers for breakfast the next morning.  Mmmmm ... Indian breakfast! 

 

For lunch Sunday we stopped by Land of Kush right by our old apartment.  I got my favorite plate of food: lentil burgers, mac 'n cheese, and kale salad.  Again, I got more than enough to save for lunch the next day. 

 

We're lucky we're not so far away from Baltimore that we can still make these little trips on a pretty regular basis.  Because nothing compares to these places.  And I hope the owners never close them down! 

Boloco Dinner

After climbing for a bit at the gym, Josh and I decided to head out to dinner at Boloco (short for Boston Local Company), a burrito place that has migrated down to the Mid-Atlantic from New England.  In addition to all sorts of interesting burrito flavor combinations (think Asian, Indian, and even a special Thanksgiving burrito!), they also have quite the odd ordering experience.  You order on a touch screen (and have to have a credit card to pay), then sit and wait for your order to be called.  An easy way  to make sure your order is correct - plus it cuts out the pesky expense of cashiers. 

 

Otherwise the place resembles a sports bar, with comfy booths and big TVs playing on the far end of the room.  They even have a Boloco channel playing programming about their weird burrito flavors.  Very odd. 

 

Since it was my first Boloco experience, I went the traditional route and ordered a normal Mexican burrito.  (Hey, you have to compare apples to apples to really judge a place!)  I also ordered a berry smoothie that was really good.  What I appreciated most was that both the smoothies and the burritos come in varying sizes, so you don't have to get a monster drink or burrito, but can actually have a normal human-sized portion.  If it weren't so hard to park in Bethesda, I'd be frequenting this place a lot more.  But I'm sure we'll be back soon enough.  Next time I'm thinking ... Indian burrito!  Isn't that just a chaat?  That's not a bad thing ...

The Monser San Fran Trip Post

I've been quite delinquent in my blogging lately, and a lot of that has been a direct result of a recent trip Josh and I took to San Francisco for six days.  Though I took tons of pictures, I didn't blog while I was there, so I definitely got out of the habit.  And once you're out of the blogging swing, it's pretty hard to get back into it. 

 

And then of course once you want to get back on track, you're stuck with a sh*t ton of stuff and photos to recap just to catch up.  San Francisco was full of Mexican food, delicious vegan food, plenty of sweets, and good times with friends!  So without furher ado ... I bring you one monster post to recap our six day trip. 

 

Day 1:

 

Potbelly Mediterranean sandwich minus the feta.  (Yeah, this was breakfast at the airport ... You take what you can get). 

 

Rubios burrito.  Huge A+ from me.  This was my favorite burrito of the trip ... and there were many.  The proportions are all perfect, and when I asked for no sour cream the cashier actually suggested I add extra avocado in its place.  Um, yes please! 

 

Indian dinner at Kennedy's with friends.  I tried to scale back a bit by *just* ordering a vegetarian chaat sandwich.  Yeah, it was still huge ... But oh so tasty. 

Day 2:

 

Yet another burrito.  This one's from Orale Orale, and was my least favorite of the bunch.  For some reason they went way light on the beans, but heavy on rice and lettuce.  They also don't add salsa to the burrito, so you have to sit there pouring it on every bite.  Too much hassle for my burrito preferences. 

 

Dinner at Millennium with Josh and a friend of mine from high school was epic indeed.  We went all out (and paid generously for it - both with busted guts and wallets!).  We split a bottle of wine and appetizers, each ordered an entree, and split one dessert between the three of us. 

Unfortunately their menu online doesn't show the entrees we ordered, so I can't share the specifics.  I know the second appetizer was a raw "risotto", which wasn't my favorite. 

 

My entree, on the other hand, was an entirely different story.  I ordered the Potato & Chard Roulade, which had cashew Florentine filling with smoked onion and sundried tomato, mushroom Madeira cream sauce, seared broccoli di cicco, red wine, beet & fennel reduction, roasted maitake & lobster mushrooms.  It was amazing!  As was dessert.  I didn't get a picture of the Chocolate Almond Midnight - almond cashew crust, mocha chocolate filling, raspberry sauce, and white chocolate mousse - but trust me, it was delicious. 

 

Day 3:

 

Josh and I started the third day of our trip by heading to the Ferry Building for a quick breakfast.  Sadly, I couldn't partake in our favorite empanadas (I just took a generous whiff of Josh's to get jealous), but I did indulge in vegan doughnuts!  That's right, that's doughnuts - plural.  I picked up one pumpkin pie and one salted caramel doughnut from Pepples Organic Donuts.  My eyes were a bit bigger than my stomach, so I saved one for breakfast the next morning instead.  They were both delicious - even the one that sat around for a day!

 

We grabbed Thai lunch with a friend in Oakland, splitting an order of avocado spring rolls between the three of us. 

For my own lunch I got the mock duck curry, which was tasty and smoky - and not something I'd had before.  Basically, you can almost never go wrong with Thai curry in my book, so I was pleased. 

For dinner on the third night Josh and I had a little break from all the socializing with California friends and headed out to dinner just the two of us to one of our favorite restaurants - Cafe Gratitude.  We had scare a while back thinking this place was going out of business, but fortunately for us not all the locations closed, so we rushed into their Berkeley location extra "grateful" that they were there!   

Their menu items are all named a bit "uniquely", so bear with me ...  We ordered the "I am Honoring" - raw nachos - for our appetizer to split, which were so incredibly delicious.  We were so sad it only came with a few chips, so we had to gobble up the rest of the nacho toppings with our forks. 

 

Then we each ordered the same entree, the "I am Extraordinary", which is a BLT with their own maple coconut "bacon".  This is maybe our favorite dish ever.  We order it almost every time we get to a Cafe Gratitude.  Mine came with a strangely oily bun (like they'd accidentally set it down right in a bunch of oil - and Josh's wasn't like that), but even with that I still loved it. 

 

For dessert we decided to try their vegan carrot cake (I am Rapture - I couldn't even bring myself to say that to the waitress), which unfortunately was really underwhelming.  Actually, I would say it was almost bad.  And it's pretty hard for me to dislike any kind of dessert.  I wish we'd just gotten another "I am Extraordinary" ...

 

Day 4:

 

After starting the day with my day-old but still delicious doughnut, Josh and I drove out with a friend to Pinnacles National Park to go hiking, rock climbing, and caving!  It was a beautiful day and we grabbed snacks on our way out to tide us over while we enjoyed the outdoors.  On our way back to the East Bay, we stopped by La Plaza Bakery and Cafe, just outside of the park. 

 

I ordered my third burrito of the trip - a simple veggie burrito with no cheese and no sour cream.  While I waited for my order I spent a fair amount of time drooling over the bakery selection, but didn't think there was probably anything I would be able to get, so I didn't even bother to try to ask.  Fortunately the burrito came out quickly and it was quite good. 

Plus as soon as we got back (a two plus hour drive later) we were heading to dinner with friends at their house.  When I'm a guest in someone's home I don't like to snap pictures constantly of the food, so I have no pictures to show from that evening.  But the spread was amazing.  They went out of their way to make everything vegan for me - which was so thoughtful I couldn't believe!  They had all sorts of appetizers - fruit, hummus, bread, crackers, olives, and baked chick peas.  For dinner they served a salad, pasta, and roasted brussel sprouts - all delicious!  And for dessert our hostess made a beautiful orange cake - which I loved, but unfortunatley not every guest cared for :( 

 

Day 5:

Winding down the trip ...  For brunch on Sunday of our trip we headed out with friends to Burma Superstar in Alameda.  We started with one of their famed dishes - the tea leaf salad.  It was so tasty and not overly salty (which it can apparently be). 

We all also snacked on lotus chips while we chatted and waited for our food.  They are so addictive you have to be careful not to eat the whole basket by yourself!  Fortunately there were a bunch of other people vying for the chips too, so there wasn't much chance of that! 

 

I wasn't terribly hungry (maybe all the food from the trip was finally catching up with me?), so I ordered the samosa soup as my entree and shared a bit of Josh's curry.  The soup was plenty filling and (like everything else) was delicious. 

For dinner we met Josh's sister at A16 for tasty Neapolitan pizza.  I talked everyone into ordering their own pizza, so I had a marinara pizza (naturally vegan with no cheese!) all to myself.  And, yeah, I finished it ...  Definitely no dessert after that huge meal. 

 

Day 6:

 

Before heading to the airport on our last day, Josh wanted to make sure we got chaat from his favorite spot in Berkeley.  Unfortunately, when we arrived we found that they didn't actually open for a half hour, so with a little time to kill we headed into a little cafe nearby, Bittersweet. 

Their signature hot chocolate is naturally vegan - actually made with hot water rather than milk, though they offer both soy and almond milk for an extra charge.  Though the hot chocolate was quite good, I think I'll try it with almond milk if I ever stop in here again - for the added creaminess. 

 

After briefly stalling with our hot chocolates, we finally stopped into Chaat Cafe.  We each got a chaat to go and quickly ran off to the airport, where we actually got to enjoy our food.  My chaat was so good I almost wished I'd had two! 

Especially when it got a little closer to our flight and I realized we'd be in the air for five hours with no meal service (not even a snack offered on flights anymore - cheapskates!).  So Josh and I ducked into an airport store to grab food to go.  While Josh went the sensible route with spring rolls, I grabbed a vegan Pumpkin Apple Cupcake, which I enjoyed a few hours into the plane ride.  It didn't exactly fill me up, but it kept my stomach from grumbling too loudly until we got home. 

 

Whew!  Any time we go to San Francisco I know we're in for some epic food adventures.  The city (and area) is home to some of our favorite restaurants, and whenever we plan a trip we make sure to plan a way to hit all our most beloved spots while we're there.  This trip was no exception.  (Hence our down-to-the-wire trip to Chaat Cafe on the way to the airport.)  But we also got the chance to see great friends and have tons of fun, which is what the trip is really about anyway ...  That and the food!