A while back, when we first got our copy of The Best Veggie Burgers on the Planet the first recipe we tried was for the Denver Omelet Burger. While we really the idea, the resulting texture was described as pasty and it felt like the peppers and onions overwhelmed the vegan bac’n bits. I’ve always wanted to return to this and try changing a couple of things to create something very inspired by Joni Marie’s original recipe, but with a bit more texture and less oil. The Great Vegan Gluten-Free Burger Experiment is the perfect time to revisit the recipe!

I actually removed all the oil called for in the recipe save some spray oil for sautéing the pepper, onion, and garlic as well as some for the cast-iron drop biscuit pan. Once again this pan is the perfect thing for baking vegan burgers!

Other changes: I used a single, large orange bell pepper and only half a medium onion, both diced quite small. I used a couple of cloves of chopped garlic too. This I sautéed in a cast iron skillet until the onions started to caramelize.

I pressed the heck out of the tofu, thinking this was part of the texture problem the first time we tried. Next, rather than blend the tofu with oil and spiced, I just crumbled it up fine in a bowl, added all the spices in with the tofu and mixed it up by hand.

To bind this all I stuck with the chickpea flour (besan), but reduced to 1/2 cup and added 1/2 cup of gluten-free, instant oats as well. I also decided to throw 1/4 cup of nutritional yeast in there for stickiness and saltiness. I left out the salt the original recipe called for, but I think it should stay in with the next try with this revamped recipe.

One little change I make with all recipes calling for liquid smoke; I use smoked paprika instead. Since the original recipe called for 1/4 teaspoon of paprika, I just increased to 1/2 teaspoon of sweet, smoked paprika.

The results, all squished together by hand, were promising and held together well, especially after letting the mixture stand for five minutes to let the oats hydrate.

The drop-biscuit pan came out of the oven, heated to 350. I made 6 good-sized breakfast burgers and put them into the oiled cups.

These baked for 10 minutes. I turned them and then baked for 10 additional minutes. They came out nicely browned. Next attempt I’ll use red bell pepper for a more striking look. The oat/besan mixture gets a nice color and these held together beautifully in a nice patty.

I served them alongside hashbrown squares from Trader Joe’s, a pile of steamed broccoli, and a little avocado on top.

There’s a couple of small changes I’m going to make, and I want to see how these pass the “freeze test”, but these may become a great breakfast to-go, particularly for long travel days.

This week’s Burger Experiment comes to us from Lindsay S. Nixon‘s cookbook, Everyday Happy Herbivore cookbook. I have decided that in the Great Gluten-Free Burger Experiment I’m going to try substituting instant oats (GF, of course) any time I see Vital Wheat Gluten called for in a recipe. I also sub Tamari for anytime soy sauce is called for.

We’d already tried the recipe for the Pinto Burgers (same cookbook, page 86), which is already gluten-free, and loved them. In fact, they inspired my Summer Cilantro Slaw recipe! However, I wanted to try a new recipe and since this book has several bean-burger recipes to try I went for the Kidney-Qunioa Burgers (page 85) merely because I like kidney beans a lot.

First of all, this recipe comes together so quickly it is great. These could be whipped up from scratch on a weeknight. They were very flavorful, even though I totally forgot the tablespoon of Italian Seasoning it called for. The instant, GF oats worked perfectly, especially since I gave the “dough” about 10-15 minutes to rest and let the oats get sticky.

Last week, after the Scarborough Fair Burger Experiment, Christie had the idea of trying out our English muffin cast-iron pan for cooking the burgers. It would heat them more evenly and it would keep them in a nice, uniform burger shape (one which perfectly squishes out to fill an average bun). I heated the pan up in the oven while it preheated and sprayed lightly with oil before putting burger patties into each mini-pan. I must say, this idea is a winner and I will be using it for all burgers despite what cooking directions suggest.

Also known as a Drop Biscuit Pan, this works perfectly for English Muffins and scones too. Oh, and clearly vegan burgers as well!

Once again, the Wild Buns from Happy Campers Gluten-Free were the bun of choice. I loaded mine up with grainy mustard, vegan mayo, avocado, red pepper relish, a little ketchup, and some salad greens. It was pretty awesome (blurry, impatient photo indicates my rush to eat this all up).

On the reheat in the morning these, similarly to the Pinto Burgers, were a little dry. One patty is frozen to see how it does with the thaw/reheat test. One possible idea for these might be to par-bake them to help to retain the shape, freeze, and then reheat in a cast iron skillet.

I’ve decided just to write about cooking rather than always wait until I have a recipe “just right” to post. It will help me recreate delicious things so I can put together a recipe later. These posts will be noted “Food Porn” to show that there’s no recipe and have the tag FoodPorn as well, just my going on about something delicious.

Onto the food porn.

Best. Tempeh. Ever. Seriously.

We had in the house pounds of string beans from the garden and Christie asked for tempeh tonight. I stood around in the kitchen for a few minutes before deciding to make a stir-fry. Made up a marinade of ginger, garlic, tamari, red miso, agave, peanut oil, canola oil, hot chili oil, and water all whisked up together. Diced tempeh went into this yummy mix.

Pulled the the tempeh out of the marinade and set it aside. The tempeh then went into a rather hot wok with some canola oil. Kept tossing it and frying with a lid on until the tempeh was browned. Then I added in a little bit of the marinade to coat the cubes further.

Some sweet onion, a carrot and a little red bell pepper for color were cut up small. All were stir fried with a pile of the green & yellow beans chopped up. After they cooked until the beans started to soften I added in most of the marinade. After the beans were cooked all the way I added the tempeh into the pan and tossed everything together.

Cooked up some rice noodles, vermicelli, which were the weakest part. Tasty, but not great. I’m really going for more of a Vietnamese bun. The noodles were a fine, just not as great as the stir-fry. Added some shredded, Farmers Market lettuce and sliced up cucumbers from the garden.

Yes, I will admit to nearly dancing in glee in the kitchen as this came together. We sat out on the deck in the breeze to enjoy. It was a lot of fun sitting a few feet from the golden string beans growing up the south side of the deck as we ate them for dinner.

Will have to try this whole thing out again with the “right” noodles as well as some cilantro, lime to squeeze over the top and mung bean sprouts. Those things would be a really nice addition to all the flavors. Christie also noted it would be great to have the cucumbers in a little rice vinegar as well. A recipe will be forthcoming on this and really, pictures soon.

Tonight Christie tasted the dressing and we both agreed that this one needs to be saved. For sometime now she’s wanted something kind of like the ginger dressing they serve over monk bowls at Blossoming Lotus. I’ve wanted something kind of like the Hollyhock dressing (from Hollyhock Cooks)they serve at Great Vow. This dressing is a delicious hybrid of the two!

A couple note on this — since this is a raw dressing and won’t be used for cooking I went all out with the ingredients. Bragg’s Aminos, raw hemp seed oil, nutritional yeast, and miso — these are all good things for you!

The Stuff

• 5 inches fresh ginger, peeled & cut into chunks
• 2 Tbs. agave
• 2 Tbs. white miso
• 1/4 c. good oil (I used hemp seed) OR 2-4 T of tahini
• 1/4 c. water
• 1 Tbs. toasted sesame oil
• 1/3 c. nutritional yeast
• 1 Tbs. Bragg’s Aminos (or tamari)

The Making

This is easy — put all of the above into a blender and process until smooth. I usually pop the top off mine mid-process and slowly add in the nutritional yeast so it doesn’t clump at all.

Pour into jar, keeps in the fridge a couple of weeks. Take out when needed and pour all over your food! Yum! Repeat.

Somebody in my life who’s been dipping their toe in the waters of vegetarian eating has been wanting New England-style clam chowder. This is a recipe mash-up that I came up with that works pretty well. Still missing that sea-food-y taste, but I think if I add powdered kelp, we may get even closer. IMO, it also needs some acid, like lemon. No matter, this tastes great! (Warning: a bit high in sodium…) Due to the mushroom base, this chowder comes out more brown than classic white, but it’s still better than that nasty NY/Jersey red business they call “chowder” 0.o

• 1 large onion, chopped
• 2 cloves garlic, chopped roughly
• 2 tbsp Earth Balance butter sub
• 4 medium (1 lb. total) red potatoes, diced
• 2 cups vegetarian broth
• 2 cups crimini mushrooms, torn into chunks
• 1 cup frozen corn kernels (I used fire-roasted from Trader Joe’s)
• 1-2 cups celery-chopped (with leaves)
• 1/4 cup minced fresh parsley
• 2 bay leaves
• Freshly-ground black pepper (to taste)
• 1 tbsp smoked paprika
• 1 tsp Old Bay seasoning
• 1/2 tsp sage
• 2 boxes IMAGINE-brand potato-leek soup -OR- 4 cans creamy potato soup of choice, -OR- make your own potato soup.
• 1tbsp Wondra gravy thickener.

DIRECTIONS:

1. Steam fry the onion in the butter sub 3min. Add garlic and steam from 4-5 min more.
2. Add in mushrooms and veggie oyster sauce and steam fry 3-4 more min, or until the mushrooms start to release their juice.
3. Add potatoes, celery and corn. Stir and combine with other ingredients. Add broth and bring to a simmer.
4. Lower heat and add in potato soup and seasonings. Bring to boil, stirring regularly. Reduce to low and simmer for 20min, or until potatoes are tender.
5. Whisk the Wondra or like thickener into 1/4 cup warm water, then add to soup pot and stir. Turn off heat and let stand.

Christie had two requests today while we were walking around downtown enjoying the gorgeous July day: salad and something with Asian inspired flavors. We enjoyed these delicious, hearty salads for dinner outside in the cool breeze this evening.

Dressing

• 1/3 liquid from 1 can of mandarin oranges
• 2 teaspoons agave
• 2 tablespoons Bragg’s Liquid Aminos (Tamari would be fine)
• 1/2 inch fresh ginger, minced
• 1 tablespoon brown rice vinegar
• 1 tablespoon canola, avocado, or peanut oil
• 2 tablespoons raw tahini
• 1/2 – 1 teaspoon toasted sesame oil
• sea salt, to taste
• chili flakes, to taste
• Siracha, to taste
• Black sesame seeds (because they look particularly awesome, however, white could be used)

Whisk together all ingredients until smooth in the bottom of a large bowl.

Into the bowl add:

The Veggies

• Small handful of fresh string beans (I got to use the fabulous red ones from our garden)
• Small handful of snow peas
• 1/2 small head Nappa cabbage
• 1/2 small head of Bok Choy
• 2 small carrots
• 4″ from a large cucumber
• 1 cup spinach
• 1 can of mandarin oranges (set aside)
• 1/2 red bell pepper
• **Sunflower seed sprouts to top (if you grow them or can get at a market)

All of the veggies are eiter sliced into thin, 1 – 2″ pieces or shredded. Feel free to improvise, but I used this assortment.

Ginger Orange Tempeh

• 1 pack of tempeh cut into 1/2″ strips
• 1/2″ fresh ginger cut into thin, long pieces
• 1/3 liquid from mandarin oranges
• Sea Salt
• Spray Canola oil for frying

Heat pan and add oil, a cast-iron grill pan is ideal for this. Add in strips of tempeh and cook until browned with a lid to keep from getting dry. Spray top of tempeh before turning in pan and cooking the other side until browned, adding a little sprinkle of salt. Flip again, add ginger then juice. Cover until juice has cooked in and ginger browned slightly. Set aside to cool, then cut into small pieces and tossed into the dressing.

Toss everything in the dressing until evenly coated; go ahead and use your hands! Garnish with sprouts & mandarin orange slices and serve.

Makes two dinner sized salads or could serve 4 as a first course.

This is another installment of the ‘Ode to an Inexpensive Pressure Cooker‘ series. One of our favorite, in fact. Yes, this can be made without the pressure cooker, but I highly recommend one. I haven’t bought canned beans since we purchased it.

So, here’s the soup. There’s comments about doing stove top, some variations, etc. below.

The Stuff

• 2 cups dried split peas (yellow or green)
• 1 onion* diced
• 2 large cloves garlic, minced (or one enormous clove)
• 4 medium carrots, diced
• 4 large stalks of celery diced (or equivalent)
• 2 T nutritional yeast
• 1/4 – 1/2 t garam masala
• 1/4 – 1/2 t ground cumin
• 1/4 – 1/2 t sweet, smoked paprika
• 2 T olive oil
• Salt & Pepper to taste
• 6 cups water

The Making

In the pressure cooker heat olive oil and saute onions until translucent (about 5 minutes), then add garlic. Continue cooking until these begin to caramelize a little, about 5-7 more minutes, then add carrots and celery. Cook together until carrots & celery brighten in color and are more aromatic (3-5 minutes).

Add cleaned, rinsed peas and water. Stir together all ingredients then lock down the lid. Bring pressure cooker up to high pressure, reduce temperature, and cook for 7 additional minutes.

Remove from heat and let sit for several minutes before releasing the valve. Remove lid when lock releases then add yeast and spices. Let sit several minutes for the spices to blend into the soup before serving.

Variations:

• Add curry powder and additional garam masala – more like a Indian dish then
• Add some squirts of Siracha when serving
• More smoked paprika will give a much smokier flavor
• Add some chopped veggies, like cauliflower
• Add diced potatoes to this
• We like to serve it with a little quinoa & some nice bread
• Give it a drizzle of Bragg’s Aminos instead of salt at the table

Yes, you can make this without the magical pressure cooker. You just need to cook everything about 45 minutes until the beans are cooked through. Once they are cooked through the spices & seasonings can be added.

I was inspired by a radish greens & kale saag a friend of mine mentioned recently and wanted to give it a try. While at the co-op I was thrilled with some gorgeous beets with lush greens and brought them home to try out. I am going to be making this again and soon, so a picture of this beautiful dish will be up soon.

Leaves & stems of at least 4 beets are needed. You should end up with about a cup of chopped stems and around 4 cups of leaves. I’ve also made this with a mix of beet greens and chard. Kale would be great… pretty much any greens will do!

The Stuff!

• beet stems, chopped
• beet greens, large leaves torn a little
• half a medium, sweet onion, diced
• 2 inches ginger, peeled and minced
• 1 teaspoon garlic paste or 2-3 cloves minced (out of garlic, oops)
• 1 T mild oil
• 1/2 t Panch Poran (check out a Desi shop for this)
• salt & lemon juice to taste

Saute onion in oil until it begins to brown and caramelize. Add in garlic, ginger and then the Panch Poran, cooking until fragrant. Then add in beet stems, a little salt, and cover. You may want to add a tablespoon or so of water to help steam the stems. After the stems start to soften a little add the greens and cover until they begin to wilt. Toss greens with stems and onions below to blend all together. Continue to cook covered until stems are cooked (we still like them kinda firm). Toss with a little more salt and lemon juice before serving.

I take only 1% of the credit for this, the remaining howevermany percent going to Radioisotope at Sparkpeople, Joanna Vaught, and Julie Hasson (y’all can fight over proportional credit).

By mashing together Radioisotope’s fantastic pepperoni spice recipe (she uses tofu) with the steamed seitan sausage numminess of Joanna and Julie (and a little wingin’ it on my own), I came up with a pretty decent pepperoni.

Dry ingredients:

• 2-1/4 cups vital wheat gluten
• 1/2 cup nutritional yeast
• 1/4 cup garbanzo or soy flour (replace with another 1/4 cup vital wheat gluten for firmer pepperoni)
• 1 T paprika
• 4 t ground black pepper
• 2 t salt
• 2 t fennel seeds, crushed
• 2 t Frontier vegan beef broth powder
• 2 t smoked paprika
• 1 t crushed red pepper
• 1 t anise seed, crushed
• 1 t garlic powder
• 1 t onion powder
• 1 t ground mustard
• 1 t cumin

Wet ingredients:

• 2-1/2 cups water (opt: replace 1 cup of water with your fave broth and delete the broth powder, above)
• 2 T olive oil
• 2 t liquid smoke (or sub 1-2 t smoked paprika in addition to the 2 t smoked paprika above)

Method:

1. Put a steamer’s worth of the water on to boil. I use a stock pot with probably a quart of water.
2. Mix the dry stuff.
3. Mix the wet stuff.
4. Mix ’em together. The dough is really easy to work, so you don’t need to dirty up the mixer. Just throw it in a bowl and mix it with a spoon or by hand. Hand-mixing bonus: pepperoni-flavored fingers.
5. Using a 1/2-cup measuring cup, scoop out a hunk of dough. Drop it on a piece of foil (Julie suggests muslin as a less-waste alternative). Whip out your trusty bamboo-placemat-that-thinks-it’s-a-sushi-mat to shape the foil-wrapped dough into a sausage shape. Alternatively, you can just use shape the dough manually, but what fun is that?
6. Repeat until you’re out of dough.
7. Arrange your soon-to-be pepperoni sausages in steamer trays and steam them for 30-40 minutes.

Let ’em cool. Fridge ’em. Slice ’em. Eat ’em. Why not dig out the springform pan you bought for that ill-fated cheesecake experiment and make a stuffed pizza?

Tip: If you’re using a food processor to slice your pepperoni, freeze the sausages for half an hour or so first. The sausages are a little soft, but they’re moist enough to take a good freeze without getting unworkably hard.

Ingredients:

1 bag (or 12oz) of mock chicken of choice
1/2 white onion
3 tbsp minced garlic
1.5 cups frozen veg (peas, carots, etc)
1 cup sliced crimini mushrooms
1 cup chopped celery
3 cups Imagine Potato Leek soup
Salt & Pepper to taste
3 cups Bisquick** baking mix
approx 1 cup water or rice milk

1) Brown chicken in 3 tbsp canola oil on med heat in a cast iron dutch oven (aprox 5min).

2) Add in onion, mushroom & celery & brown for an additional 5 min, or until onion gets some color. Make sure to not over-brown garlic.

3) Add in frozen veg, stir in well, cover & let cook an additional 5 min, or until all is evenly hot throughout.

4) Take soups, empty into a mixing bowl, and reconstitute with half the called-for water. Whisk together. Pour into dutch oven, and stir to combine. Allow to come to a gentle boil at med-low heat.

5) Mix Bisquick powder & liquid, making sure not to over-mix. Get to a sticky runny dough. Add spoonfuls of dough to dutch oven, making sure to leave a full inch of headroom. Add all dough until stew is as covered as need be.

6) Cook on stove-top uncovered for 10min. For dumpling topping, cover and steam for an additional 10min, or until a toothpick comes out of a dumpling clean. For southern biscuit topping, preheat oven with broiler on HI. Turn broiler to LOW. Spray dumpling top with spray oil, and place dutch oven on 2nd to bottom rack. Broil until dumplings (now biscuits) are just golden brown (approx 5-10 min, depending on your oven.

** Yes, Bisquick is vegan. Who knew!?