I always swoon over photos of negimaki. Beautifully grilled teriyaki rolls stuffed with vibrant scallions. See? Did you swoon?

A vegan version is easy enough. The meat = seitan and the scallions = well, those are already vegan, silly! I tried to keep the ingredients list as simple as possible. The characteristics that I wanted to really shine were the charred grilled flavor and, of course, the scallions. The simple marinade of hoison and mirin really does its job, keeping things juicy with the perfect marriage of sweet and savory.

Don’t feel like you can’t serve these unless you’re having an all-out Japanese feast. If you’re hosting a little garden soiree (or just watching TV, or catering a bar mitvah…) you can serve these rolls right along hummus and stuffed mushrooms. I guess I take a fairly laid-back approach to menu planning; it’s more about the balance of the overall menu rather than following a strict flavor profile outlined by national borders. So I just try to have a good mix of fresh and cooked items, grains and proteins. The more flavors the merrier.

That said, these would be wonderful served alongside sushi or a Japanse noodle dish. Maybe with a fresh, gingery salad? You can even serve negimaki over rice, with some steamed veggies, as a main course.

However you choose to serve, have fun with it! It’s a really playful and delicious grill recipe that is worth the extra effort. SWOOOOON.

My midwestern summer has been severely stunted. I’ve planted at least three times because: SNOW IN MAY?!??! But hopefully things are on the right track now. Snap peas are poking their little green heads out of the soil, and I’ve even got some strawberries that look like they might ripen any day. But, thankfully, I’ve also got the grocery store and I’ve been stocking up of fresh, juicy pints of organic strawberries almost every single day.

I use strawberries in a million ways, from ice cream to barbeque sauce, but I really really love strawberry salads, especially when the little guys are at their ripest. The berries take to tangy ingredients so beautifully, their aromatic sweetness providing a perfect balance. I love this simple salad with mâche, which, if you’ve never had it, is a velvetty salad green with a complex flavor; earthy, nutty, grassy and peppery all at once! It’s pronounced like “mosh” for all you punks, and sometimes it’s called “corn salad” or “lamb’s lettuce.” I know that gardens and CSA boxes are overflowing with mâche this time of year, and I was even able to purchase some at my local Whole Foods.

The end result is dizzyingly delicious with the addition of fresh basil and toasted almonds. If you’ve never strawberried a salad, now is the time.

I love that zucchini can be cut into noodly strips and called “raw pasta.” But I also love that you can make a raw zucchini salad!

Despite what a lifetime of overcooked zucchini might have you believe, zuke actually has flavor. It’s delicate, yes, but fresh and verdant. When eaten raw, it’s delightfully crunchy, and perfect for a light lunch or alongside a sandwich or veggie burger.

I dressed it really simply, but don’t be deceived, it still has flavor to spare. There’s lots of garlic; like, enough to ward of kisses for at least several days. A touch of olive oil and some fresh tomato dress it beautifully. And basil makes everything pop like a springtime garden in your mouth.

Sometimes it’s the simple things. Enjoy!

I just took my first trip to London and I’ll write more about that soon, but the first thing I felt like making when I came home was…Vietnamese-inspired food! Perhaps my palette was overloaded with mashed potatoes and delicious gravies, and I needed the bright fresh flavors of ginger and mint.

I have an obsession with Southeast Asian food, and until I take my dream trip to Vietnam, I’ll gratefully settle for my favorite Vietnamese here in the states, like Lan in NYC and Jasmine 26 in Minneapolis. And, of course, whatever I make at home.

This time, it’s rice paper rolls. Call them summer rolls, if you prefer! They are the perfect appetizer for any occasion, really. I served these with a rich coconut curry, but they’d be just as at home at a summer BBQ or on their own for lunch.

For me, the most important characteristic of a rice paper roll is freshness. Fresh ingredients and fresh wrappers. The rice paper should be supple, and the temperature should be chilly. Inside, there should be crunch and clean flavors. I like to save the spicy assertive notes for the sauce.

I love how beautiful my cutting board looks with the simple ingredients for stuffing inside!

Here we’ve got my favorite cabbage to eat raw, nappa cabbage. It has a gardeny flavor and the perfect amount of snap; not too difficult to chew. Carrots, cut into matchsticks, for their color and crunchiness. Avocado to add a creamy fattiness that is the perfect foil for all of the veggies. And you can’t have rice paper rolls without fresh herbs! Mint and cilantro make these rolls pop. Since I served these as part of a larger meal, I didn’t feel a need to add tofu, but you totally can, if you like. Baked or sauteed and sliced into strips is ideal.

The peanut dipping sauce employs a little cheating ingredient: red curry paste. This way, we don’t have to do any more chopping or cooking, everything goes into a little blender and 30 seconds later a spicy, peanutty, gingery, tangy sauce appears. Magic! Just double check your red curry paste for fishy ingredients. Thai Kitchen paste is widely available and vegan.

If you’ve never worked with rice paper wrapper before, don’t be intimidated! Follow my notes below and you can not go wrong. And even if you do, no big deal. There are, like, a million wrappers in a package last time I counted. But really, it’s all about the fun, so grab a friend and get rolling! You’ll be a pro in no time. Now go get fresh.

This combo is basically heaven to me. Butterscotch and bacon have a caramelly affinity for one another and I love the sweet salty combo. As for the bacon craze: I get it. Add some smokiness to the mix and you’ve got something really special. But I love pigs, they are cute and smart, and so my bacon comes in plant form.

Now, this recipe really elucidates vegan rule #14 “Vegans can and will make bacon out of everything.” Hide your eggplants, protect your carrots and build a safehouse for your coconut because the vegans are coming for their BLTs. And cupcakes.

But before you yell at me about how inaccessible this recipe is, let me state: you can make these into plain old (but deliciously amazing exceptionally wonderful) Vanilla Cupcakes With Vanilla Frosting. I, however, had just come into a windfall of Coconut Bacon and I was determined to use it. My boyfriend does this blog, The Laziest Vegans In The World, and he purchased a bunch of Phoney Baloney’s Coconut Bacon. Honestly, I mostly ignore the stuff he eats (unless it’s chocolate, duh), but I was pretty intrigued because, well, see above. I love vegan bacon. And I especially loved the simple ingredients list and, yum, is this stuff ever smoky and good! Because it’s made from coconut, it just seemed right to put it in a sweet treat. You can order Coconut Bacon or make it yourself.

The second exciting part of this post is about the coconut-based frosting and cupcake. Not to get too heavy-handed in a post about cupcakes, but I also love orangutans. Just today I saw a heartbreaking article about what palm oil production is doing to orangutan habitats. Although there are claims of sustainability from some companies, there is too much conflicting information about it. And so, awhile ago I decided not to use palm oil in my recipes. Which, unfortunately, means I won’t be using any vegan butters (for now.) So this recipe uses an applesauce-coconut oil concoction that I find works perfectly for buttery baked goods.

Now that I’ve made this recipe totally depressing, let me brighten it up! As I mentioned, these make perfect vanilla cupcakes as well. The cupcake is already vanilla, so we’re good there, and for the frosting, simply replace the extract with pure vanilla. Since vanilla is much less powerful than butterscotch, use a bit more. Say 1 1/2 teaspoons. And dress ‘em up with some cute naturally colored sprinkles or whatever else makes you forget about all of the misery in the world.

OK, now go forth and be sweet and salty!

A few things happened this week that had me searing up this succulent tempeh with a bright, fresh, tangy, garlicky, herby sauce.

One was a long conversation at Omaha Vegan Drinks with our friend Hector, who is from Argentina, the land of chimichurri. I would love to visit someday, and he was telling me about some of the traditional foods. (PS They are verrry meat-centric.)

And then the next day, I heard this fabulous story on NPR about a tempeh cooperative in Jakarta, another place on my travel wish-list: “Journey To Java’s ‘Tempeh Village’: Where Soybean Cakes Are Born.” You can read or listen here.

It got me thinking about traditional vegan foods and food history and food future. And how vegan cuisine plays with traditions from all over the world bringing together every corner of our little planet. And so here we are, with Tempeh Chimichurri.

One of my favorite quotes from Hendeko, the tempeh coop manager: “My world revolves around tempeh, I have tempeh every day. Even though there are other dishes, a meal just wouldn’t feel the same without tempeh.”

Soulmate!

I sliced the tempeh thin here so that it would soak up plenty of marinade. Simply slice tempeh into four slabs, then cut each slab in half, like a sandwich. See?

And then I reserved plenty of chimichurri for pouring over the finished dish, so that you get all those bright, fresh flavors. Saute up some asparagus for a few minutes, before cooking the tempeh, and you can serve with a baked potato as well.

And there you have it, a trip to Indonesia and Argentina, all in one.

My mailman rarely talks to me, but he made sure to tell me that this soup smelled great when I was cooking it. So, there you go, endorsed by the US Postal Service.

The thing about this soup, is that it’s almost the only time in the world where I don’t rinse the canned beans. The whole shebang is poured right in, creating a flavorful full-bodied broth that is so monumentally satisfying with the chewy quinoa. Of course, we have our usual black bean soup suspects — cumin, oregano, bay, cilantro — and all that flavor just gets sealed into the delicious broth. It’s familiar but definitely not ordinary.

You can certainly customize to your desires; add some kale at the end, maybe even potatoes with the carrots, or corn. I would have used jalapenos if I had some on hand, too. But the red pepper flakes provide a nice heat and this soup hits the spot if you’re craving something spicy and filling, that you can throw avocado on.

These cakes are just lovely and darling. The crumb is somehow both dense and fluffy. The edges are crispy and sweet. And the almond flavor is simply bangin’.

And you know how I came up with the recipe? From my box of almond paste! Yes, I shamelessly ripped open the package and veganized one of the recipes that came inside. I actually made it several times, because I didn’t have the correct sized loaf pan, and instead of going out and getting the right size, I thought it was a better idea to futz with the recipe like five times.

Well, by the sixth time, I decided to just make them minis. Minis are so fun and giftable, and you can slice them up and serve with a little vegan cream and strawberries. It’s totally worth it to get a mini-loaf pan, I recommend this one. But if you have a 9×5 loaf pan, you can use that instead. I think the baking time will be more like 50 minutes to an hour, lowering the heat to 325 F after 40 minutes.

I received this question on Facebook after posting Rice Noodle Salad With Grapefruit-Sriracha Vinaigrette:

“What is the secret to getting nicely browned, crispyish tofu, like what a restaurant would serve? Mine always comes out kinda soft, mushy, etc. I recently tried a firmer tofu – I even pressed out the water. It was better, but still not what I was hoping for. Any tips?

Signed, Soggy Soy In Sacramento”

Dear Soggy Soy,
You are definitely off to a good start by using firmer tofu. I recommend extra-firm tofu, but you can even find super-firm varieties. And yes, pressing tofu is great for soaking up marinade. But the secret to nicely browned tofu isn’t necessarily the tofu itself. The secret is (cue ominous music)….your equipment.

Now, I’m not saying to go out and purchase a $12,000 Viking stove (but if you get one, pick one up for me, too.) The tools I recommend are affordable objects that will take you a long, long way.

1) A cast iron pan. A well-seasoned cast iron pan, to be specific. Even a good quality stainless steel pan won’t do the trick, unless you’re frying it in tons of oil. And even then, your “mush risk” may be high. And those cheapo non-stick pans, well, they may work for a few months, but yuck.

Cast iron will last you a lifetime. And through that lifetime, it’s functions will only improve, because the more you use it, the smoother and more non-stick it becomes.

Because it heats quickly and evenly, it’s ideal for tossing around tofu with minimal oil, without fear or burning or mushing. And another added benefit is that it can go from stovetop to oven, if you ever need to finish something off down below. So get yourself a preseasoned cast iron pan and fall in love. Or better yet, steal a really well-seasoned one from your best friend’s mom, like I did. It’s from the seventies and works like a charm!

And the next most important tool is….

2) A thin, flexible metal spatula. Nothing fancy. Those big ergonomic plastic spatulas may seem friendly, but they’re like clumsy uncles on the dancefloor, tripping everyone else up. You can tell just by looking at them: they are way too thick to flip tofu efficiently. Even if you get your tofu perfectly browned, the spatula can not physically get under the browning to keep it intact. Instead, it tears the “skin” off, leaving the beautifully cooked layer stuck to the pan, and a sad mushy piece of tofu floating around willy nilly.

Before you ask: Wooden spatula? No, pretty much the same problem. Save that for soups. Thin plastic spatula? Uh-uh. Not strong and not precise enough. Some other kind of metal spatula? Not those stiff stainless steel ones. Your spatula needs flexibility. It’s all about sneaking it’s way between the browned surface and the pan.

The good/bad part is that they don’t make spatulas like they used to. The best ones that I’ve found come from thrift stores, and cost under a dollar. Fancy-ass kitchen supply stores tend to only carry the tofu-hating kinds of spatulas. So if you’re buying new, look for those super cheap ones in your supermarket or at a dollar store.

Allow these Instagrams to demonstrate:

Now that we’ve got the equipment covered, let me give you a little advice on actually sauteeing your tofu.

Preheat the cast-iron pan to medium. Don’t add tofu to a cold or luke-warm pan. It needs to hit heat so that it can sear. If you don’t hear a sizzle immediately, your heat is too low. Don’t be shy, turn it up.

Always lightly oil the pan before adding the tofu. A little spray of oil should do it. In fact, I think the less oil you use, the better. You can add a little more as needed during cooking.

Once tofu is in the pan, sprinkle with a little salt, for flavor and for drawing out the moisture.

Let it cook for a few minutes before flipping. The beginning stages of cooking, when the water is being drawn out, aren’t ideal for flipping. The skin may be adhering to the surface of the pan too much. But in a few minutes, when it’s lightly browned, it will release, and become easy to sneak your spatula underneath to flip.

And, that is pretty much it. Flip tofu to brown on all sides, but don’t fuss over getting it perfectly uniform. It really shouldn’t need more than 10 minutes. Then your tofu is ready to be smothered in sauces, stuffed into sandwiches and sacrificed in stir-fries. If you use this method, you don’t even need to press the tofu beforehand, a cursory squeeze over the sink should suffice, just to get a bit of the water out.

So, I hope this wasn’t so long as to be intimidating. Really, it’s nothing. You flip some tofu around in a hot pan. End of story. End of mush. Now let’s get some tofu browning!

And if you want to read more about cast iron and seasoning, here are a few great links:
A very thorough investigation of cast-iron seasoning and upkeep

How to season a cast-iron skillet. But read the entire series on the Ktchn.

I know. Adorable, right?

A tender roasted potato with a creamy, eggy filling. Sprinkled with a little paprika and a sprig of dill, they taste as irresistible as they look.

My first meeting with deviled potatoes was when my friend Lauren made them for an Omaha potluck. And of course I came to expect an inviting trayful at all subsequent potlucks. But then Lauren moved away and I was stuck staring at a tray of…nothing. Only my own tears.

The recipe she used (and I think most people use this one) is from VegWeb, called Potato Angels. Awww!

I wanted to make a version that would be perfect for Passover or Easter. Pop them into one of those vintage egg trays and impress everyone.

Happy first day of Spring, everyone!

~A little black salt, called kala namak, is used for the eggy flavor, but you can use regular old salt, too. Just reduce the amount to 3/4 teaspoon. But kala namak is a really fun ingredient, and great in tofu egg salads, or vegan omelets, so pick some up at a specialty shop or order it for good times.

~I actually didn’t have a vintage egg tray, so I cut off just a tiny sliver of potato at the bottom, to prevent wobbling. But a little wobble isn’t going to hurt anyone.