About That Faux Pot Roast Recipe...

I think I finally came up with a seitan in the crock pot winner yesterday. To accomplish this, I took the best parts of both recipes, came up with a meal that was ready at 5:00pm and my family demolished it. Here's a peek at my technique.

First, I greased the crock pot because nothing chafes me more than trying to peel my food off the sides of a ceramic bowl. I turned the crock pot on high while I did my prep work. Yes, there's prep work, somehow it seems to be vegan and frugal there must be prep work. (Get over it and move on, I'm trying to.)

Robin Robertson's recipe calls for browning vegetables in olive oil before putting them in the slow cooker. I did this begrudgingly but it does make it all taste better in the end. As usual, I subbed the veggies I had for the veggies the recipe called for. It was mostly little substitutions like quartered potatoes for new potatoes.

I put the veggies in the bottom of the slow cooker and went about making the seitan. I initially planned to use Isa's recipe but at the last minute switched and used the Seitan O Greatness recipe. Since I'm always feeding a crowd, I doubled the seitan recipe.

I placed the uncooked seitan on top of the veggies and went about adding some liquid. I whisked together a cup of water, 3 tablespoons of tamari, some thyme and onion powder. I poured this over the top of the gluten, said what passes for a cook's prayer in my house (God I hope this doesn't taste like s--t), put the lid on and switched the slow cooker to low heat.

8 hours later...

I whisked 1 tablespoon of cornstarch into 1/4 cup of water and set it aside. I removed the seitan from the cooker and sliced it to serve. The seitan will have chunks of potato stuck in the bottom so I flip it over to slice it more easily. I poured the liquid from the slow cooker into a small pot, whisked in the cornstarch mixture and cooked it over medium low heat until it thickened. This creates a gravy to serve over your meal.

The texture was much better than any slow cooker seitan I've ever made. I served this with tomato salad and polenta fries which everyone really enjoyed. Personally, I think they taste even better after they've cooled off. Of course I didn't have polenta or grits so I ground up some organic popcorn into cornmeal (thank you Chile for giving me the courage!) and it worked beautifully.

Fashion, Felting & Food

I don't know how it happened, but my two teenage daughters actually decided to go through their closets this weekend. Sure Eileen talked about it before, but talk and action are very different creatures. The end result of this endevor are two very uncluttered looking closets and the back of my station wagon filled, and I do mean all the way to the top, with clothes to be donated. I'm dropping it all off today before they can change their minds.

The girls did compile a "mom might like" pile from which I gleaned 3 practically new sweaters and two pairs of pants. (The rest were mostly hideous, shapeless sweatshirts. Am I that unfashionable? Should I be offended?) The pants I'm actually going to cut into strips to add to my rag ball collection. What's this, saving stuff after declaring a war on crap? Hey, I know those rag balls are just a rag rug in waiting so they are ok to save in my book.

Speaking of rag rugs and other rescue projects (ie. projects that used rescued materials), I have found myself in possession of 3 bags of 2 1/2 foot pieces of yarn that I just discovered were wool. At first I was just irritated, what good are little snips of yarn that masqueraded as hanks of yarn? Then a calm took over, perhaps I could use them to make some felted mittens?

I've had so-so luck felting in the past, but I think this is worth a try. It certainly seems like a better idea than throwing all these aggravating little pieces out. So, to that end, I've begun knotting the pieces together into actual balls of yarn while watching movies with my husband.

A google search revealed a plethora of free felted mitten projects but I like this one because it uses a size of double pointed needles that I already have. It also has no gauge which really appeals to me as well.

Since I'll be busy all day today, I'm making the Not Your Mama's Pot Roast recipe from Fresh From the Vegan Slow Cooker. It's been almost two years since I made seitan in the slow cooker but now that I'm trying it again, I'm going to use Isa's seitan recipe in Robin's recipe to see if we can get that texture problem straightened out.

Now I must go; food prep, laundry and a shower await me!

A Corn Trick & a Bedwetting Solution - How's That For an Odd Pairing?

As you might have guessed, things didn't go smoothly packing the car last week. In fact, it resulted in a trip to the emergency room for our youngest who tumbled down a hill in the melee almost breaking his hand. After Jim spent hours in the emergency room with Kyle, I gave up. We left Friday morning instead, grateful that Kyle's hand wasn't broken. Things got a lot smoother after that.

I was particularly pleased with the food I made. It was all very simple but a few experimental things worked very well. I cooked corn on the cob in the slow cooker on low with just enough water to cover the bottom of the pot. The results were fabulous, especially since I have no microwave, only a three burner stove and a very small oven to do all my cooking.

We had a lot of company on Saturday so I gave up on the standard burger/dog fare and instead made a baked ziti using Follow Your Heart vegan mozzarella. I served this with the fancy biscuit recipe from How it All Vegan and a vegetable that I can't remember (how sad is that??) For dessert I broke my own rule and tried a new recipe, Chocolate Upside Down Pudding Cake, also from How it All Vegan. (We needed a birthday cake ASAP, I had no choice but to break my own rule!)

This recipe was a big hit served with a scoop of ice cream on top. By itself it had a slightly chalky taste, although no one noticed except for me. I suspect if you incorporated some powdered soymilk into the pudding mixture the result might be creamier tasting. The leftovers of this cake, with a scoop of ice cream, reappeared at almost every meal much to everyone's delight.

I used the leftover biscuits as buns for the veggie burgers I made the next day. I used Isa's recipe from Vegan With a Vengeance. It's always a hit. In fact we eat a lot of the burger mix uncooked while we cook the burgers. Ah, the simple joys of vegan cooking! We served these with homemade oven fries, the aforementioned corn and baked beans.

So now that I've been back to reality for a few days, here's what's going on.

First of all, if you've got a bedwetter on your hands, listen up. This is my second go round with bedwetting and, as near as I can tell, the end result is always a ruined, foul smelling mattress. My frugal solution, in addition to the usual plastic sheet/absorbent pad/etc, has always been to give the bedwetter hand me down mattresses. So for example, this weekend we had to replace the girls mattresses. One was in just horrible shape with springs coming through, the other was ok for a lighter child to sleep on.

The ok one replaced a foul smelling one that was beyond repair (believe me I know, I've even used the carpet steamer on mattresses to give them a little more life). Here's where I accidentally made a frugal discovery. Bunk boards are the supports used in place of box springs in bunk beds. (If your bunk bed has enough support slats no bunk board is needed.) Bunk boards may be the most crappily constructed thing I've ever encountered. Aside from a wooden frame, they are made of cardboard and covered with low quality fabric. A piece of plywood would work just fine and probably be less expensive, but I digress.

When I removed the old mattress, I discovered the stink of it still lingered. The smell was coming from the bunk board. I dragged it outside, ripped off the fabric, removed the cardboard. This left me with just a wood frame, which thankfully didn't smell. Originally, I thought I'd have to recreated the cardboard and fabric cover but then I thought, "WHY??"

I put the naked frame back on the bed, topped it with the mattress and it worked perfectly.

I'm still working on my log cabin blanket. In an effort to use up scraps, or perhaps because I've gone nutty, I've taken to combining colors to finish out a particular patch. I'll post pictures and explain more about this tomorrow.

Baby Its Cold Outside

This morning when I woke up, there was frost on the ground. I don't mean a little frost, I mean real frost. The current temperature outside is 27 degrees! So, for the first time this season, I started my morning by lighting the woodstove. It's so hard to get up in a cold house. (The thermostat said it was 60 degrees inside.)

Despite the extra work, I'm glad the cold weather is here. I like the feeling of slowing down and settling in for the winter. I like perusing projects that I've wanted to start or finish but haven't had time for. The wood stove draws everyone to the living room and I like that as well.

This morning we enjoyed steel cut oats, already hot and waiting for us, in the slow cooker. What a welcome sight it was! If you've never tried it, I highly recommend it on cold mornings. The ratio I use is from 125 Best Vegetarian Slow Cooker Recipes. It calls for 1 1/4 cups steel cut oats and 4 cups of water. Everyone adds their own soymilk in the morning to cool it down a bit. It does take a little longer to eat than a muffin or quick bread that you can take in the car but sometimes we need to force ourselves to slow down.

However, instead of slowing down today, I'm going to be extremely busy. There is a laundry list of errands to be run and things that must get completed before the day ends.

Don't Be Such a Crabapple!

Jim picked a huge bag of crabapples at my mom's house last weekend. Yesterday we finally began the business of cooking them. I'll be making them into a spicy apple butter since that seems to be the best use of them from everything I've read. Unlike my usual apple butter, this one will probably require some sweetener.

Yesterday I was able to rehabilitate some overcooked pasta by using it in a frittata recipe. It wasn't the angel hair pasta the recipe called for, it was ziti but we cut into into little pieces and it worked wonderfully. The last of the overcooked pasta will find its way into the minestrone soup that I'm cooking in the slow cooker today. I'll stir it in just before serving to avoid it just disintegrating.

I'll also be making some baba ganoush to use up some of my excess cooked eggplant. Its one of those dishes I've always wanted to try but never did.

Vegetarian Article & Fleece Project Update

The link to a very intriguing article about kids, IQ and vegetarianism has been making the rounds on many of the lists I belong to. It turned up yesterday in our local paper as well. Jim clipped it out and hung it on the fridge. Just in case you missed it, here's the link to it.

I've heard others mention fatfreevegan.com but I never realized there was a crockpot section at this site. Its definitely worth checking out. I'm especially happy about it because I'll be working some pretty long hours this week and this will make dinner time a breeze.

I've had some great success in my fleece projects. So far I've made hats for each of the boys and I'm working on my first pair of gloves for them. The source of fleece for these first projects has been a pair of fleece pants that Leen outgrew. The beauty of this is the sides of the hats were already sewn (the legs of the pants) I just had to pin and stitch the tops! I simplified the pattern to make the hats for the boys by rounding the top of the fabric rather than doing elaborate folding. This seems to eliminate some of the lumpiness the folding caused. They must be coming out ok because when Leen saw them, she asked me to make her one as well.

Cajun Red Beans and Rice

This recipe was posted Jennifer C. on the Healthy Vegetarian Crockpot Cooking yahoo group last week. It was very easy and very delicious. I've put my substitutions in parenthesis. As always, most of my substitutions are based on using what I have in the house rather than making a trip out to the store.

Cajun Red Beans and Rice

1 pound small red beans
1 tablespoon boullion (1 Tbs All Season Blend from The Ultimate Uncheese Cookbook by Joanne Stepaniak)
2 tablespoons Cajun seasoning
Several dashes of hot sauce (I skipped this and let everyone add their own)
2-3 bay leaves
2 small onions
1 green bell pepper (finely shredded kale)
5-6 stalks celery (1 celeriac and some chopped collard stems)
2-3 cloves garlic
Salt
About 6-7 cups of water (I used boiling water because I was nervous the beans wouldn't cook up by dinner time).

Serve with:
fresh parsley, minced
prepared brown rice

Dice the veggies very finely. Throw everything into a pot and let it
simmer for several hours (or throw everything into a crockpot and let
it cook 7-8 hours). Once the beans are very tender, remove several
scoops of them and purée them to make a paste. Or just put them in a
bowl and mash the heck out of them. Stir them back into the pot. Serve with brown rice and fresh parsley.

I cooked this in the slow cooker and didn't bother to mash or puree the beans. The result was a yummy dinner with minimal effort. If you're wondering why I used kale in place of the pepper but collard stems in place of the celery, it was because I had already used the leaves from the collards in something else and the stems were just sitting their in the fridge. I also find that collard stems work best in a long cooking recipe since they tend to be tougher than kale stems.

Last night I discovered that one of the teenage girls I recently hired is a veggie also! Isn't that a happy coincidence.

No Tricks Just Frugal Treats

My schedule at work has definitely improved but not quite as much as I'd hoped. Oh well, such is the life of a manager. At least the gym doesn't have horrible hours overall or I'd be sunk.

One of the challenges I have at work is to constantly make my members feel special without spending too much money out of my own pocket or compromising my beliefs. I have to confess, I despise Halloween. I'm not sure if its the nutritionist, the vegan or the mother in me but I do hate Halloween. The whole thing seems like a shakedown to me.

That having been said, I'll be hitting the store tonight to grudgingly buy candy for neighborhood children, (although they have these little bags of pretzels that intrigue me). I've also heard of people giving out little toys, a la Oriental Trading Company, but that stuff can be such junk plus I never think of it soon enough to order. Never you fear, my kids do trick or treat. We have two 80's chicks, Batman and Harry Potter living at my house right now.

I wanted to do something special for the members of my gym as well. Lets face it, deep down we all want a treat, don't we? Snack foods after a workout seemed like a bad idea so I opted for an non-edible Halloween treat. I bought several boxes of votive candles in fall colors from the dollar store and put them in a large clear candy bowl with this poem:

Trick or Treat
Here's something that smells sweet
And you can't feel guilty
'Cause its nothing to eat!

I'll let you know on Wednesday what everyone thought of it.

For tonight's dinner I'll be trying Autumn Harvest Stew a recipe that Sally Parrot Ashbrook posted a few days back. I've also been making batch after batch of apple butter and freezing it. Unfortunately, my new job responsibilities coincided with canning season and I don't have the solid block of hours to dedicate to canning this fall.

Apple Butter Pancakes

All those apples we picked last weekend inpsired me to make some Overnight Crock Pot Apple Butter. I doubled the amount of cinnamon and nutmeg that I used last time and the results were delicious. I also pureed the cooked apples before turning the crock pot up to high since everyone prefers a smoother apple butter.

This morning I used some of that apple butter to make Apple Butter Pancakes. I was making a quick, before work breakfast for Jim so its a very small recipe but I don't see why you couldn't double, triple or even quadruple it.

Katie's Apple Butter Pancakes
Combine:
1/3 cup whole wheat pastry flour
1/3 cup rolled oats
1/3 cup flax seed meal
1/3 cup crushed walnuts
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp brown sugar

Add:
1 cup apple butter
enough plain soymilk to make it the right consistency

Cook on a hot griddle. If you went a little heavy on the soymilk, you might want to cover the pancakes while cooking to help avoid gooey middles.

We rarely use syrup on our pancakes. Instead we'll either eat them as is or top with apple butter or other fruit. In most cases, it doesn't even occur to my kids that they should ask for syrup with pancakes. I think this is one of the best things about a largely unprocessed, vegetarian diet. Your taste buds are more open to the nuances of the flavors of foods rather than the things we add to them, like syrup.

With obesity on the rise, the last thing we need to give our kids is more sugary (calorie laden) foods. To those of you new to a veg lifestyle or unprocessed foods, never fear, taste buds do change over time.

BTW, I've begun archiving my older posts by topic so keep an eye on the topic list on the left side of my blog. I've started at the oldest posts and will work my way forward but with 448 posts, this could take some time! Along the way I'm also adding in some links that were missing from the original posts. I was a little slow at learning how to add links. I hope this makes my blog more user friendly for everyone.

One More Time in the Slow Cooker

Today should be the last of the truly, hellishly overscheduled days for quite a while. Today's fun events include a days worth of training for my job followed by a 30 minute window to pick up my daughters and rush them to their physical appointments. The joke, of course, is that I'll be rushing to get there on time knowing that I'll be sitting and waiting for quite a while once I get there. I'm planning to bring a cross stitch to work on while I wait. It makes the time pass.

I can't bear the thought of another crock pot meal tonight (I want some tender crisp veggies for a change!) so I will only cook black beans and barley in the slow cooker today. They will be ready for me to toss into a black bean, barley, chopped vegetable and vinagrette medley I've been concocting in my head. If it turns out well, I'll share the recipe.

Scheduling Insanity

Did you ever notice that right before your schedule eases up it has to get super crazy? Mine is no exception. Through a rare stroke of scheduling brilliance, I'm slated to work at the gym until 5pm and then do a fitness program at the Girl Scout Council, across town, from 5:30pm - 7:30pm. The only good news is the Girl Scout Council is 2 minutes from my house. Its another, slow cooker night.

For tonight, I'll be making a lentil & rice casserole inspired by the one in Miserly Moms by Jonni McCoy. I usually make this in the oven but it will work just as well in the slow cooker, although since I am using the slow cooker, I will use barley instead of rice. I prefer French lentils to regular lentils because they have less of a sandy texture and they maintain their shape through cooking. The original recipe doesn't call for vegetables, except onions, to be added. I always add in whatever I have on hand; root vegetables work very well. I skip the cheese that the original recipe calls for.

Click here to see my review of Jonni's book.

Money vs. Time

I guess for me it all comes down to quality of life. Right now, despite the extra money I've been making working extra hours, my lack of time at home is affecting the quality of all of our lives. There are tell tale signs everywhere. (The mountain of laundry is just the first clue.) Getting dinner on the table each night has been a real challenge as well. The slow cooker has been a life saver during this time and tonight I'll be relying on it again.

Since our CSA pickup is tonight, I'll be using the last of the veggies left over from last weeks pickup. That means the primary vegetable will be winter squash, although I do have a bit of daikon as well.

I'll start by tossing a bit of scallions and collard stems (already chopped and frozen from earlier in the season) into the slow cooker. Next, I'll add some of the winter squash that I cooked over the weekend. I might puree it if it seems too stringy (or I could wait and puree the whole thing after its cooked). Finally, I'll be adding dried split peas, water, some thyme and some vegetable broth powder. I'll set the whole thing cooking on high for now, because crunchy split peas are a bummer. When my daughters get home from school, I'll have them turn it down to low. (Another option is to boil the water before adding it to the slow cooker and cook the whole day on low.)

UPDATE:
I accidentally forgot to call my daughter to put the slow cooker on low. As a result, there was no need to puree anything because both the split peas and the squash had gotten so soft. Simply stirring before serving was enough. I have to say the flavor of the squash really lent itself to the split pea soup. It was a big hit.

Seitan in the Slow Cooker

I upgraded to Blogger Beta yesterday and so far so good. Its going to take me quite a bit of time to organize my posts by topic but I'll try to do a few each day. Keep an eye on the Label list right above the archives.

Courtney asked how I cook seitan in the slow cooker. The short answer is, never from scratch. I've tried over and over again to make it from scratch in the slow cooker using Robin Robertson's recipes in Fresh from the Vegetarian Slow Cooker and I always end up with a rubbery mass. I don't know if its her recipe or if seitan from scratch just doesn't lend itself to the slow cooker experience. I may try the slow cooker again but using Isa's recipe this time.

Instead, I prefer to make seitan on the stove, let it cool (it makes the seitan firmer) and then cube it or slice it to use in the slow cooker. So when I made my concoction of seitan, quartered potatoes, cubed pumpkin and kale the other day, the seitan was already cooked. In fact, it was frozen (in its broth) and so was the cubed pumpkin. Both were cooked during my bulk cooking extravaganza.

I placed both the frozen pumpkin and the seitan into the slow cooker first and then filled in the spaces around them with the potatoes and kale. I added just enough water to cover the bottom of the slow cooker to prevent scorching while the broth was beginning to defrost. I placed the lid on and set the slow cooker on low for the day.

More Crockpot Cooking

Yesterday's crockpot concoction of seitan (with broth), quartered potatoes, cubed pumpkin and kale was so delicious that I decided to do a variation on it again.

Last night I put chickpeas in the slow cooker. In the morning I drained them and added the last of the broth from the seitan, chopped stems from collards and sliced fennel. I let this cook all day on low. Right before serving I added some uncooked whole wheat couscous to absorb some of the excess liquid. It was really delicious as well. I really like the flavor the fennel added.