I’m embarrassed to admit there are no photos with this post. Not even an attempt with a phone photo. We were just too hungry.

There’s a bit of a hiatus going on with the Great Gluten-Free Vegan Burger experiment. We’re getting ready to go on a big trip, so I may not be making burgers again until November. However, in keeping with the theme, I am going to be trying to hunt down vegan burgers on our trip and will be writing about them here.

That said, we did have burgers this week, just not homemade. Trader Joe’s have their own label version of the great Wildwood Veggie Burgers. These burgers are really tasty, satisfying, hold together well enough to be cooked on a BBQ, but taste just as good done in a cast iron skillet.

It used to be that we’d stopped having these burgers because we thought the higher fat content in them gave Christie heartburn. After finding out about Christie’s gluten-intolerance it turns out it wasn’t the burgers, but the buns that were causing the problem! Now we’re able to enjoy them again.

A word about buns and bread in general. If you can find it, we cannot recommend Happy Campers Gluten-Free Bakery highly enough. We’re partial to their Stompin’ Good Seedy Buckwheat Molasses bread and everyone of the burgers seen on the blog during the experiment has been served on one of their Wild Buns. This Thanksgiving I’m looking forward to using their Burly Bird Buckwheat Stuffing mix.

The real stand out to this week’s burger dinner were the fries. Usually we make frozen fries. Yep, that’s the truth. Usually the skin on ones from TJ’s.

This week I wanted to use some Yukon Gold potatoes I’d picked up when I made lentil soup since I’m trying to use up a lot of produce before we’re gone. I decided I was going to try my hand at making homemade, convection roasted fries. I feel I under utilize the convection settings on our oven and have had some good luck with roasting potatoes before, so I set out to make our fries.

I cut up all the potatoes into thin slices, tossed in a bowl with a few tablespoons of avocado oil and a couple of teaspoons of the salt blend I’d picked up at Bob’s Red Mill recently. They took a little longer to roast than expected, but were so delicious that I’m posting with out a picture because we ate them all.  In November you can expect a recipe coming soon for these delicious, healthier & budget-mindful fries.

The Whole Grains Store has a bulk spice & herb section where I find “Montreal Seasoning” which contained salt, garlic, black pepper, chili flakes, and dill seed. It was an intriguing combination and smelled awesome, so I had to get some. It seemed like the perfect thing to roast fries with… was I ever right!

In honor of St. Patrick’s day I thought I’d try to make some potatoes and cabbage for us. I found myself really wanted roasted potatoes rather than boiled. I was inspired to add some herbs and mustard and the result was so fantastic that I quickly snapped a photo with my phone and jotted down the recipe. Such an easy recipe it is too!

This was the first time I think I’ve used the roast feature, one of the convection options, on our oven in the new house. Wow, such a great feature. My “convection oven” before was a decent toaster oven with a convection setting, having an oven that has “regular” and “convection” modes is a treat. The upgrades to our kitchen are such an improvement!

The Stuff

• 1 pound small red potatoes
• 1-2 t dijon mustard
• 1/4 t thyme
• 1/2 t dill
• 1 T olive oil
• 2 cloves garlic
• black pepper and sea salt to taste

The Making

Preheat oven to 350.

Scrub potatoes and quarter. Toss with other ingredients in a bowl and pour out on to a baking sheet. Distribute evenly

Roast potatoes at 350 for 35 minutes, turning at 25 minutes, or until tender. Serve alongside more delicious food or eat right off the pan.

I served this alongside some cabbage and Gardein beefless tips, inspired by a recipe from Meet the Shannons. I say inspired by because I didn’t start early enough or have pickling spice on hand. Really, I remembered seeing the recipe online and being really intrigued by it, but only decided to make it while I was at the market and only could remember that it used the Gardein beefless tips.

Here’s my kind of short-cut of their very cool recipe:

I just tossed the beefless tips in a bowl with 1/4 cup pickle brine (from a jar of Bubbies Bread & Butter Chips) with some mustard seeds, ground coriander, allspice, and cloves, along with some minced garlic and a splash of nigori-style sake (I didn’t seem to have a bottle of white wine in the house, how the hell did that happen?!). I used half a sweet onion and sauteed the marinated tips with it, getting some nice caramelized bits on the bottom of our 3-quart saute pan, before adding some broth (2 cups hot water + 1 no-salt bullion cube) and putting the cabbage in to simmer with a little Alaea salt.

It came up in conversation recently that both Christie and I love twice-baked potatoes so I decided to give them a try for dinner. I’d made them before a few years ago using Earth Balance and soy milk to mash the baked potato filling, but I wanted to try out a cashew creme that Christie whips up with she makes her fabulous mashed potatoes. Since we had fresh parsley on hand I used some of that in the cashew creme.

I used one largish, long even Russet, a quite small Russet and a small yam. All of these were first “baked” in the microwave and set on the counter on a plate to cool enough to handle easily. I then sliced the big Russet carefully in half and scooped out some of the insides into a bowl, being careful to leave enough potato behind to make a stable “boat” to fill.

The cashew cream was made with about 1/2 a cup of raw cashews soaked in hot water and then drained. These were processed with 1/3 cup fine flake nutritional yeast, some sea salt, some garlic pepper, the juice of one lemon, and some fresh parsley. This was pretty pasty so I ended up adding in a few tablespoons of water (I wondered about reserving the soaking water for this).

I mashed the scooped out insides with about 3-4 tablespoons of the cashew creme. This honestly was pretty sticky and I should have went with that initial observation!

The stuffed potatoes were put in a cast iron dish and tossed under low broil until the tops were golden. The all-potato one turned out extra lovely.

Gorgeous Golden Top!

I filled my potato “boat” with a mixture of potato and yam; a combination I like a lot. It needs less time under the broiler since the sugars caramelize faster than on the all-potato one. Still, pretty awesome looking.

Love me some yam!

These were paired with a saute of curly green kale and tempeh that was finished with a little drizzle of balsamic vinegar and fresh parsley.

The verdict: Sadly the potatoes were a little dry and sticky (I knew I should have paid attention to thinking it at first!). That said, they were very tasty. When I talked with Christie about the cashew creme she makes she revealed that hers has a thinner consistency than the thick, rich paste I’d made. I think it would be good to add either a little water (perhaps reserving the soaking water for the cashews to mix back in) or rice or soy milk.

In the latest installment of “follow the squash”, I took the overly sweet gratin I made Tuesday night and turned it into a pretty awesome chowder tonight. There won’t be a recipe for this since it goes from some roasted squash we weren’t too fond of to fantastic squash & cashew sauce to a squash & potato gratin we thought we too sweet.

I sauteed some cumin seeds in a little canola oil before adding a medium onion, diced, and 4 cloves of garlic, minced roughly. Once the onions started to brown I added 2 cups of water and a quart of rice milk. Into this I put the leftover gratin and the kernels off of 4 small ears of fresh corn. Brought this up to heat and simmered for a little while until the gratin really started to break down. Then it was time for the immersion blender!

The pureed soup went back on low heat and I added in 3 cups of cooked black beans and the kernels off of two more ears of fresh corn. Into the soup went some dried marjoram and oregano, garlic pepper, powdered cumin, sweet paprika, sweet smoked paprika, chili powder, a pinch of cinnamon, about 1/3 cup of nutritional yeast, and a little salt. Simmered for a while to let the flavors come together.

It was really pretty tasty! I think I’d love to add a swirl of cashew creme and some chopped cilantro. Maybe even some diced avocado and toasted corn tortilla strips too. The cumin and dried chilies really mellowed out the sweetness of the squash. The corn did add more sweetness, but it had such a brighter note than the squash that it didn’t make it too sweet. I was glad I reserved two ears of corn in order to have some whole kernels in there. In the future I think I might add all the corn whole rather than blend 2/3 of it.

I finally tried out my idea for a gratin! The sauce I experimented with last week using winter squash & raw cashews as a base turned out great and I ended up with quite a lot of it leftover. My mind immediately turned to the scalloped potatoes that I had as a kid.

Only better. And vegan!

I had 2 pints of the leftover sauce to work with. I used up two large Russet potatoes and half of a medium-sized kabocha squash (leftover from making Tom Yum soup this weekend). The thinly sliced potatoes and squash were mixed together in a bowl, by hand, with the sauce. I then put it gently into a 9 x 12 Pyrex baking dish that I’d sprayed with Canola oil. Baked at 375 for an hour with foil over the top. Removed the foil, put it under low broil for a few minutes to get a golden crust. Served with some balsamic glazed tempeh strips (those were fab, of course).

Yeah, it looks pretty fabulous

And…. well, actually, it was a little disappointing. We both found it a little on the sweet side. The kobucha squash is pretty sweet and when combined with the mild sweetness of the sauce it was too much. Maybe with a less sweet squash? Not sure, but I am going to roast up the acorn squash we have on hand and try making this again with just potatoes (the option seconded by Christie).

The leftover gratin? It is totally edible, but it is just not what I was going for. That said, I think the leftovers will become the base of a corn & black bean chowder.

Tonight’s experiment gave me another opportunity to play around with the Benriner Cook Help Spiral Vegatable Slicer we were given as a wedding gift. Tool verdict: still the most amazing thing ever for spiral cut, raw zucchini noodles and it worked great slicing super thin potatoes. However, the odd-shaped squash was a bit of a challenge. I think for this particular application I’d use the food processor slicing blade to get my thin pieces of squash and potato again.

• 1 8oz. package of tempeh
• 1 stalk or 2 pounds of fresh Brussels sprouts
• 1/3 c. maple syrup
• 1/4 c. balsamic vinegar
• 2 T. olive oil
• garlic pepper
• Canola oil (spray preferable)
• Sea salt & pepper

This is a riff on the old Taco Hell “meat & potato burrito”, only better, because it won’t give you Creutzfeldt–Jakob Disease. It can be very easily veganized.

For each burrito, you’ll need roughly 7-10 seasoned tater-tots. I have the magic of a convection toaster-oven to get them deep-fried crisp from frozen in about 12-15 min. Also, don’t try this with a 12″ tortilla; they’re just too small for the amount of stuff you’re putting in there.

INGREDIENTS:

* 18″-24″ restaurant-sized flour tortillas
* Bag o’ Classic frozen tater-tots
* Taco spice
* Taco Grounds (I luuuv me some El Burrito SoyTaco*)
* Refried beans
* Diced onion
* Green onion
* Fire-roasted frozen corn (optional)**
* Daiya Cheddar Shreds
* Shredded lettuce
* Guacamole
* Tofuti Sour Creme
* Salsa Picante OR can of diced tomatoes -drained (“salsa fresca”-w green chilies is goodness).
* Sliced black olives (optional)
* Sliced pickeled jalapeño (optional, but if you opt out, you’re a wuss. Go make yourself some farina).

DIRECTIONS:

1) Toast up your tots. If you want good, crispy tots in a regular oven, ignore the bag destructions, use an air-bake pan, preheat to 350f, and bake them longer. Or, use the broiler at the last minute. You want crisp, because they’re going into a skooshie burrito.

2) While tots are a’toastin’, prep all your other fillings. I tend to make my refried beans more restaurant-style by adding extra water or veggie broth to thin them, then heating in the nuke-box. If you’ve ever slung taco for a living, you know what I mean about thin frijoles, and you know its utility to good burrito assembly.

3) Heat your meat filling in the microwave. If I’m doing the frozen corn, I typically add it into this step.

4) When the tots are done, spritz lightly with spray oil, then toss in a bowl with taco seasoning.

5) Microwave or moist-towel oven-steam your tortillas. Soft tortillas are key to proper and safe burrito structural integrity!

6) Lay out your tortilla on a large clean flat work-surface. Get your mise uhhh… in place.

7) Stripe the side nearest you with a nice line of refried beans. Then a line of taco filling. Sprinkle shredded cheese on the beany-meat to encourage melty-goodness.

8) Place your seasoned tots on and near the melty-line.

9) Add the rest of the optional components in rough lines throughout the rest of the field of play, making sure to leave at least 1/3 of the tortilla empty. To this last 1/3, place a very thin later of refried again, but leaving about 1″-2′ of the outer tortilla lip empty. The scant extra frijoles will help bind the universe together.

10) Lastly, sprinkle a layer of shredded lettuce. This is a capillary safety-net that keeps the good goos in the burrito, and not ooozing out on to your plate to languish in a shameful puddle of fail and lack of burrito-making mojo. You’re better than that!

11) Start by rolling the bean/meat edge up first. When you get to the tot demarcation line, pleat and tuck your ends in. Keep rolling and gathering in as you go, until you have a burrito.

Eat, be happy and thank me later…

* = http://www.nowcasting.com/~elburrito/soytaco.html
**= Trader Joe’s carries frozen fire-roasted corn. It’s a staple to me. If you don’t have a TJ’s by you, it must really suck…