ShannieCakes

2008-10-04T21:18:00.000-07:00

I'm not dead... just poor! Haha!

My newly empty wallet has me headed towards new horizons, check out my delicious vegan meal ideas for $7! There will be seven new meals each Tuesday.

I'm about to head back to school for another BA (I just can't get enough of that college thing can I?) and my job has turned into part time... leaving little money or time for extra baking on the side. I still have to make the basic foods though, which has lead me to my new project

Shannie's Sinful Seven. Hope you'll check it out!

http://shanniessinfulseven.blogspot.com/

EGADS!

2008-07-28T12:26:00.000-07:00

I can't believe it's been a month since I last posted! I'm such a bad blogger! I've been far too busy taking in the sights of the Oregon coast to bake, woe is me.

My parents came to visit from Florida and we spent a week going down the coast and saw some beautiful places. To the right is a picture of Crater Lake's Wizard Island. Crater Lake is this incredible lake that was created by volcanic eruptions like... seven thousand years ago.

A friend of ours works as a researcher there this summer and we're hoping to arrange a camping trip soon (my parents idea of roughing it is no cable tv).

Even though I grew up in Florida, I'm not a big beach girl. I blame my irrational fear of the sun and bathing suits. For my money Oregon beachs totally trump the boring sand pits that are Florida's beaches-- my parents strongly disagree... but really you can't beat this. Sure the water is too cold for swimming, but it's just absolutely gorgeous to look at, even on hazy over cast days that are prevalent on the Oregon coast.

As a thank you to our friends who took great care of our Lylah Bean & Fitzgerald while we were gone (and answered my 1.5 million phone calls to check in on them) I whipped up a cherry cake. I found some amaretto cherry pie filling at Crater Lake and I thought it would be delicious in a dark chocolate cake. I remembered my mom making some cake from a box cake mix and a can of cherry pie filling about a million years so I decided to try to replicate it without the box mix. It turned out great. I pulsed the jar (13.5 oz) of cherry pie filling in the food processor and added it to my chocolate (vegan) mayo cake recipe (which I left out the water). The batter was VERY thick so I added a dash of soy milk to thin it out and separated the batter in two cake tins. I baked the cakes for about 20 minutes until done but still moist. While the cakes were cooling, but still warm I glazed them in some black cherry preserves I had found at the co-op. Instead of using "buttercream" between the layers I used the cherry preserves. I added about 4 tablespoons of the black cherry preserves to my basic "buttercream" recipe which gave it a lovely pink color (which the Oregon lighting doesn't really capture even with two photo lights directed at the cake and my amazing camera) dotted with some cherry skins.

I was surprised that the cherry flavor was not overwhelming. It was great-- cherry isn't exactly my thing so next time I'm going to throw in some amaretto extract into the cake and frosting and decorate with some dark chocolate ganache splatters on the icing next time to give it some more flavor profiles. The amaretto flavor wasn't as pronounced as I would have liked once I added the preserves and icing.

In other news, I'm on a roller derby league thats just starting up and we're having a bad ass bake sale sometime in the near future, so I'll be sure to be baking and posting a lot more now that the summer has calmed down. So far the best derby name I've come up with is TNT (Tits N Tofu) which is a hommage to my old nickname in high school TnA (Tits N Apathy-- I used to have no ass what so ever, that has changed in my "old" age).

I leave you now with the reunited (and it feels so good) Lylah Bean & Fitzgerald.

Summertime!

2008-06-30T18:52:00.000-07:00

Ah... summer. Time to sit back, relax and enjoy a little R&R.
Unless your name is Shannon Pfingsten! I have been ridiculously busy lately. Nicole came and went and we had an absolute blast! The following weeks my in-laws visited and we're just recovering from that. In two weeks MY parents come for a week long tour of the Oregon Coast.

Whew.

Unfortunately I haven't had all the time in the world to bake for pleasure, but I have been eating some incredible food!
(Yes, probably the least attractive picture of me, of all time, but theres a great vegan donut in it, so it's totally worth it!)
Our first stop on the "Eat your way through Oregon" tour with Nicole was Voodoo Doughnut which we visited as soon as her plane landed. I haven't had many vegan donuts in my time, but these are hands down the best I've had. Great texture and flavor... not dense at all! We grabbed lunch at The Hungry Tiger Too... but I've already reviewed that here.

Next stop was Newport, my friend is an eco-tourism guide there so we were excited to go out whale watching with him. Unfortunately we didn't see anything as far as whales went but we still had a blast. We did get to see Sea Lions though, they were awesome! I was worried about finding vegan options in Newport since the whole town is fish crazy. Ever wonder what happens when you go into a seafood restaurant and ask for something vegan?
Spicy tempeh and vegetables over thai noodles. Delicious! This restaurant didn't even have any vegetarian items listed on their menu so I was so pleased they had tempeh on hand for us and they came up with something more interesting then a green salad with oil & vinegar.Nicole was excited to hear that one of her favorite bands, Sea Wolf, would be performing in Portland while she was in town. Since I live outside of Portland we decided to spend the night in the city. We prepared for the show by drinking beer out of mason jars at Bye & Bye and eating AMMMMAZING food. It's an all vegan bar which is great-- Nicole and I aren't used to have quite so many choices and we took forever to make our dinner selections... but it was worth all the thought. Nicole had the meatball sub and chili. I had a chili dog. We split a side order of tofu, chips & salsa, and more chili. Delicious. The service was great too.After a few mason jars... our pictures began to look like this...
After a great night in Portland we woke up and ate vegan sausage and the best maple syrup I've ever had wrapped in a waffle. Crazy, ridiculously, good. The Flavour Spot isn't just a small waffle cart in the parking lot of a video store... it is a diamond in the rough. They don't advertise their vegan options on their menu (what the heck) but the owner (who was nice enough to chat with me) told me they just opened another location as well! They have a few vegan options... peanut butter & jelly, vegan sausage and maple syrup (not to be confused with their veggie sausage which is not vegan), and strawberry & vegan whipped cream. Yum, Ian & I stopped by Flavour Spot again after dropping Nicole off at the airport.

I was sad to see Nicole go, but I had to hurry into "in law" mode and get everything ready for their visit. We had some friends over, as well as Ian's family, for dinner and conversation while they were in town. I think I made a pretty decent spread, and the non-vegans were just as happy as the vegans.
We had... homemade gaucamole, homemade roasted red pepper hummus, asian dumplings with miso ginger dipping sauce, balsamic marinated portabello mushrooms, champagne & mushroom pate', salad, and "chicken" fingers with honey mustard dipping sauce.

"Chicken" Fingers (Southern Style Seitan from this post. I doubled the recipe and made them into strips instead of patties)

Asian Dumplings, soooo simple to make. I bought premade vegan wonton wrappers. Sauteed some garlic & bagged coleslaw mix (carrots, cabbage, etc) until it wilted. Stuffed the wontons with about a tablespoon of the veggies and baked for ten minutes.

Now I am off to badger Nicole into uploading her pictures from the vacation... hope everyone is getting some much needed R&R this summer!

Got yelp? Me too... add me!
http://shanniecakes.yelp.com

Somewhere, over the rainbow...

2008-06-10T03:47:00.000-07:00

I know, it's 4am...
who wakes up in a cold sweat with the desire to bake cupcakes at 1am? I do.

Who takes 3 hours to make said cupcakes? I do.

Who comes out with a batch of beautiful cupcakes but is still not satisfied? I do!

My sleeping schedule is completely messed up lately... I went to bed at 5pm! With nothing better to do at 1am when I woke up (it's my one day off a week from the bakery) I decided I should just jump in and try to make my rainbow cupcakes again.

Instead of focusing on flavor combinations I focused entirely on the best way to get the perfect looking rainbow cupcakes.

I mixed a regular ole batch of vanilla cupcake batter. Seperated the batter into 4 bowls (a 1/2 cup of batter in each) and mixed red, yellow, blue & green batters.

Starting with the red I portioned out 1/2 a tablespoon into the bottom of a sprayed (but not lined) cupcake tin. I stuck the tin into a preheated 350 degree oven and baked for about 4 minutes, until the top was cooked. I should have used a full tablespoon for the bottom layer... more on this later.

I repeated this step with the yellow batter. Using the back of the tablespoon I gently evened out the layer of batter (not shown). Because my red layers had separated from the tin (due to the cooking spray) some of the yellow batter seeped into the sides of the other layer.I baked for 4 minutes and repeated the steps for the green and blue layers. After the blue layers were done I wanted a bit of a larger cupcake so I added another red layer with some left over batter. All in all I got 6 complete cupcakes and 3 that did not have the final red layer.

I allowed the cupcakes to fully cool and then inverted the tin onto a kitchen towel. The cakes slipped out easily-- along with my hopes & dreams.

The cupcake looks good-- but not great-- from the outside. The layers seeped into each other a bit. This cupcake is the best looking of the bunch with a fully defined bottom red layer.

A few of the cupcakes you couldn't see the bottom layer at all from the side.

The cupcakes were MUCH better looking on the inside.
Vibrant, rich colors. Defined layers (though the yellow IS a bit lost). I eased my unhappiness about the outside of the cupcake by reminding myself that cupcakes are frosted-- and in this case I was planning to frost it completely in some of that left over fondant I still have on hand.

I punched out some fondant stars, painted them silver...and created this monstrosity of tacky cakeSo while this attempt was not a complete success the final product looks like something David Bowie would like-- and I'm cool with that.

In other news one of my oldest and dearest friends is coming to visit me this week! The impending visit got me feeling very nostalgic and thumbing through some old photos on my computer (unfortunately most of my old photos are still in a box in my parents barn in Florida).

I found this gem though... I'm between the guy in the Good Riddance t-shirt & the girl in the grey. Nicole (my friend whose visiting) is the 2nd on the right in black. This was EIGHT YEARS AGO (I was 16 awww) which just is insane to me. That night we we're going to see H2O and I remember being so bugged that Nicole came because we hated each other back then (a boy, it's always about a boy isn't it). My trip down memory lane also got me thinking about all the bands I listened to back then... not to get too terribly mushy but I 100% believe that music saved my life & made me into the awesome vegan baker I am today. *end nostalgic mush fest*

I hope everyone has a great week... mine will be filled with whale watching, vegan waffle carts, some random show Nicole wants to go to, and listening to my favorite CDs from when I was 16.

An adventure in food...

2008-06-02T10:13:00.000-07:00

Since I was MIA for awhile, I have a giant post of food & friends to make it up to you!

Ian & I rarely eat out, there's the obvious "problem" that we're Vegan but mostly I just really like to cook-- and I tend to think I cook better then restaurants (oh no! blaspheme!). When we heard that a new upscale Slow Food establishment was opening up we decided to try it out for our 5 "monthaversary". Strega is beautifully decorated and has a great atmosphere. Of the 27 things on their menu... two of them were vegan and we were told the cooks would be happy to put together something special for us. We decided to stick to their menu and split the Butternut Squash Curry. It was an Indian Curry and very good. I'm not a huge squash fan but I loved it. It was missing spice and they served it with an unusual flat bread instead of the traditional naan... but I was pleased, or perhaps just drunk. Knowing me it was a bit of both. :D

I happily received an e-mail from Melisser of The Urban Housewife fame letting me know she was going to be in Portland for a few days! We decided to meet up for Donuts at Sweetpea and the Saturday Market. I've eaten at Sweetpea before, and reviewed it here. Truthfully, I am still disappointed. The baked goods are... good. They aren't great. Ian made the observation that they seem to make up for flavor by adding sugar-- I completely agree. We picked at a few snacks and I was sugared out the rest of the day-- Which doesn't happen to me. Sugar? Me? We're like best friends forever! I feel like as vegans we sort of forgive the mishaps of a lot of places... we're just happy to have options. We shouldn't be! Vegan food can be amazing food. It SHOULD be amazing food. We put more thought and effort into our day to day diets... we should expect to be dazzled! Sweetpea's baked goods just aren't for me, I've met with people who think they're great. I'm not one of them and probably won't go there again-- which bugs me! I want to hang out in an awesome space with awesome vegans and eat amazing food!

The donuts are a speciality they have a few days a week. They're yeast donuts-- but the texture is more of half way between cake and yeast. They were doughy and lacking in flavor. The jelly donut had perhaps a tablespoon of "red" flavored jelly... it was a tasty filling but none of us really knew what the flavor was. The boston cream's chocolate topping was the high light of the donuts. It had a bit of a cappuccino flavor too it and was tasty on its own. The cream was tasteless and runny. The glazed donut was good-- I'm not a cake donut fan so the texture of these may have just thrown me off... even though they were yeast donuts they were too dense for my personal preference. The flavor just wasn't there for me. If the jelly donut was filled with more jelly it probably would have been my favorite.
The scone and snickerdoodle were Ian's choices. I don't like snickerdoodles so I didn't review it, it wasn't a hit at our table though. The scone was a bit too dense for my tastes, it had a bit of a buttery flavor which was nice... Ian thought it tasted more like a biscuit so we took it home, toasted it and topped it with Earth Balance and he seemed to enjoy it then. We also split a cupcake three ways, but by that time we were all pretty sugared out so it (like everything else truthfully) was not finished.We met up with a friend of Melisser's, Emily who recently moved to Portland. Then Ryan, Melisser's husband, finished up from his "nerd convention" and we went off to lunch together. The group was kind enough to forgive me for not sleeping the night before. I was an exhausted mess so I'm stoked everyone was understanding of it! We ate lunch at The Hungry Tiger Too, and I thought it was pretty great. My nachos were my favorite, though the cashew cheese did make the chips soggy. Ian got amazing Mac & Cheese, I think they used cashew cheese as the base for this as well and it did not disappoint. Emily & Ryan both got sandwiches they seemed to like. Melisser got Black Bean Soup & Polenta Fries. The fries weren't exactly what we expected... they would be great drunk food, oily and dipped in garlic "mayo" (vegan mayo with minced garlic... who knew it would be so tasty?).

I'd definitely eat there again-- even though the service left much to be desired. The prices were good, down right cheap... and everyone seemed happy with their meals.

I had a great time exploring the city with Melisser, it was nice to meet her in person since we've been lurking each others blogs for awhile now. I finally got some sleep before my bake Saturday night and was able to turn out some down right delicious treats!

Vegan Lemon Poppyseed Puffs with vanilla glaze

Vegan Apple Cherry Bran Muffins

Vegan Strawberry "Buttermilk" Coffee Cake

And my whole bakery case in all of it's glory:Melisser & I were talking about the best way to make rainbow cupcakes, so I decided to test out two ways. The first way I stacked blueberry and lemon batter one of top of the other. This was the way I was most weary of... afraid the different densities of the batter would cause them to swirl... I was right, haha.
Good, but not good enough.

The second way was a method I've seen to make these German "tree" cakes somewhere or another. You spoon batter into the mold and stick it in the oven for a few minutes until it begins to bake on the top, then spoon the second batter on top and follow the steps until finished. This would have worked perfect if Ian hadn't called me to meet him for lunch, damn that husband of mine for wanting to spend time with me between classes and teaching and working in the lab! So I made these quicker then I should have... and just did two layers but if I had the time, it would have been great, promise!Perfect layers, or close enough.

The inside of the first batch. Not exactly what I wanted, but pretty enough. Check out that blueberry layer! I used Italian Soda Syrup as the flavoring and then a bit of food coloring to get the blue color, instead of the purple the syrup was.

The inside of the second batch. I really feel like if I had made smaller layers they would have stayed more even in the center. The blueberry layer began to rise before I put on the lemon layer, if I had done smaller layers they would have set before rising.

So there it is, my huge food post! Phew. It was a great weekend, now I need to go for a run to try and curtail some of the damage done!

I'm alive! I promise!

2008-05-28T19:27:00.000-07:00

I have been such a bad blogger lately! My husband was sick for over a week... and then I of course caught it, thankfully my cold wasn't nearly as bad and didn't stick around as long. But there's my excuse! I did make one of my specialties while Ian was sick, so I thought I'd share it here. It's a perfect use for that week old chinese take out rice still in your fridge (though I'm pretty sure our rice was more then a week old, oops!). I start by spraying a small sauce pan with cooking spray and warming the rice to get it back in "rice" shape instead of shaped like a box. I like to burn a few kernals of rice a bit to give it some crunch. Then I add a cup of vegetable broth, we use a powdered broth that you add water to so it's always on hand. These powdered broths can tend to be a bit bland so I added about a teaspoon of garlic salt and some red pepper flakes to the pot as well. The amount of broth should just thicken with the rice, meaning there shouldn't be more broth then rice. I allow that to warm a bit and then add a cup of soy milk (I actually used hemp milk because we had a little bit left and I knew I wouldn't use it in anything else). At this point there should be a "soupy" but thick texture to the dish, add more vegetable broth if desired. The soy milk gives the dish a nice creamy flavor but don't over do it for fear it will come out too sweet or "beany" tasting.

When we use broccoli I always save the stems to use, as well as any bits of carrots I happen to not need in any particular recipe (usually I just get sick of chopping carrots at some point so I save the other bits for a rainy day). So I did a coarse chop on these bits and pieces as well as some mushrooms that had been in my fridge WAYY TOO LONG. They were all dried and shriveled but had not yet developed any mold or anything. Then I throw in a few pats of Earth Balance to taste and maybe a sprinkle of salt and pepper.So there you have it. Sort of an everything but the kitchen sink rice dish. It tends to be bland, depending on your left overs but it's nice to warm you up and soothe the aches and pains from a cold (or a bad day at work).

Since I bake every night I decided to take some pictures of where I bake... sort of a get out of jail free card for now!

So this is my awesome work station. Notice the anti-SUV sticker and the mock "Gingerbread Man" horror poster... I work in an awesome bakery! Haha I just noticed you can see my book all the way at the end of the table there... I never leave home without a book, it sort of a compulsion of mine. That was Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver. If you're at all interested in food culture, slow food, or heirloom vegetables it's a great read. Hell if you just like food a lot it's pretty great to read too.
Hey, did you know bananas split into three equal pieces? Well I sure didn't my husband showed me, I was throughly wowed! I make two coffee cakes, bran muffins, gingerbread muffins, two specialty muffins, 6-8 types of cookies, 3-4 types of scones, a brownie, a trail mix bar, and a specality bar, macaroons, and peanut butter chocolate cookies every day! It's a mix of conventional and vegan baking which is nice, of course I'd rather it be 100% vegan but I'll take what I can get for now! Though I did see a bloody egg yolk the other day and was cemented in my own food choices from that point on. My vegan chocolate chip cookies sold out by 10am last saturday! I was so proud.

Speaking of which...Two dozen of these little guys are on their way to LA California to meet their fate at the hands of some of my buddies. It's a recipe I've been working on forEVER and I think I'll keep it top secret for now... they're perfectly chewy and they just make my heart so happy, I've made probably 5 batches in the last 2 weeks because Ian keeps gobbling them up. But Your Vegan Mom did post a link to a GREAT cookie recipe the other day... try that one out and mess around with it... you'll probably be pretty close to mine :).

Speaking of Your Vegan Mom, I made the recipe for Southern Seitan she posted the other night... it was delicious.This southern girl was disturbingly happy with the results. It was delicious to say the least.

I hope everyone is enjoying their spring! Melisser The Urban Housewife is visiting my part of the world this week and it looks like we'll be hitting up the Saturday market in Portland... I hear rumbles of vegan elephant ears that just make my heart pitter patter.

Spring is in the air...

2008-05-06T05:00:00.000-07:00

It's 5am & I have not yet been to bed yet (well that's a lie I'm in bed now)... I LOVE my bakery gig and I'm so excited it's turned into 5 nights a week, but this recent trend of not getting to sleep until Ian wakes up for class (usually around 7am) is mighty frustrating. Sleeping in until 1 or 2pm (no matter that I'm still only getting 6-7 hours of sleep a night) makes me feel incredibly lazy!

Fitzgerald (our cat) LOVES it by the way. He can cuddle up with Dad and when he gets bored come over to Mom for a petting and stretching session. I wonder if my cat has always been an insomniac or if he's recently developed similar sleeping habits to me? Lylah (our dog) isn't bothered in the least by my new habits. She sleeps all night with Dad and all day with Mom-- pretty perfect plan in her opinion. They both sleep all day anyway (see picture, yes that's how they sleep I'm telling you they're BFF's it's so weird) so I guess my habits don't effect them much.

While browsing the aisles of a craft store today I got the (in my opinion) genius idea to try regular 'ole rubber stamps on fondant-- it works! I made some medallions to top cupcakes with-- all the beauty of fondant decoration but without the need to eat it. These little guys just fancy a cupcake up and can (but don't have to be) eaten.

I made 5 pounds of fondant when I made my batch last time-- which was silly of me of course but I wasn't sure if it would turn out right, if I'd have to cover the cake 1 million times (hey I had to do it twice since my cat sat on the first one)-- so I have LOTS left over. I decided to test out my stamp hypothesis and make a new cupcake recipe at the same time-- both were stunning successes in my humble opinion.
You may (or may not) recall a post I had here before I was a vegan about Chocolate Mayonnaise Cake. While making Ian a sandwhich today I wondered if the recipe would work with Veganaise. I was worried that the eggs in the Mayo were an important part to the recipe-- but I'm glad I finally decided to try out the substitution... it worked, and worked WELL. When I went back to the original post I noticed I didn't list sugar-- that didn't seem right, and it wasn't so here is the new, improved and animal friendly recipe:

Chocolate No-Mayo Cupcakes
2 cups flour
1/4 cup cocoa powder
1 cup sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup Veganaise
1 cup water
1 teaspoon vanilla **Next time I make these, because there will be a next time, I will use a Tablespoon of vanilla**

Preheat Oven to 350. Sift the dry ingredients together. "Cream" The rest together, combine wet with dry. Bake for 25 minutes. Yup. It's that easy. These tend to rise a bit more then I expected so don't over fill your cupcake liners (as I tend to do because vegan cupcakes don't seem to rise as much)!

These cupcakes are moist and light but aren't super rich or flavorful. I will add more vanilla next go around and maybe some espresso powder or carmel extract!

I dolloped them with a generous heap of V.B.C. (Vegan Butter Cream) and my little fondant toppers. I think they're super cute for spring!For the toppers I rolled out some green fondant (colored with green gel food coloring) about 1/4 inch thick. I pressed in the rubber stamp with firm, even pressure. I used the lid of a spice jar to cut out the circles and then lightly dusted some edible pearl powder with a paint brush.

And just for kicks, because I'm incredibly bored:

1. Favorite non-dairy milk? EdenSoy "Spy" Milk (thanks to Melisser The Urban Housewife) though we always have at least Soy, Hemp & Hazelnut milk in the fridge at any given time.

2. What are the top 3 dishes/recipes you are planning to cook?
this week?
vegan pizza purses from VeganYumYum
mini green bean casseroles (I got the BEST little mini dishes)
bean ball subs

3. Topping of choice for popcorn? thai chili oil

4. Most disastrous recipe/meal failure? i followed a recipie EXACTLY from VWAV but it was WAY too salty-- i had to throw it away ):

5. Favorite pickled item? jalapenos or dill pickles

6. How do you organize your recipes? In a recipie box

7. Compost, trash, or garbage disposal? Trash & Compost at work

8. If you were stranded on an island and could only bring 3 foods...what would they be (don't worry about how you'll cook them)?
mashed potatoes (with LOTS of earth balance and dill)
italian marinated tofu
ginger marinated portabello caps

OH NO I FORGOT DESSERT! THIS IS IMPOSSIBLE I CAN'T DO IT (thankfully I don't do island/beach/deserted things so I will never be in this cake-less situation)

9. Fondest food memory from your childhood? my grandma's "church windows" (dark chocolate log peppered with mini colored marshmallows)

10. Favorite vegan ice cream? Coffee Coconut Bliss, incredible

11. Most loved kitchen appliance? my cast iron skillet

12. Spice/herb you would die without? dill

13. Cookbook you have owned for the longest time? i have my stepmom's first copy of The Joy of Cooking-- not exactly vegan friendly but a great jumping off point.

14. Favorite flavor of jam/jelly? strawberry

15. Favorite vegan recipe to serve to an omni friend? buffalo style tofu

16. Seitan, tofu, or tempeh? tofu

17. Favorite meal to cook (or time of day to cook)? i'm a big brunch person

18. What is sitting on top of your refrigerator? haha vegan fondant decorations (they're drying in a paper bag) and posters we need to frame (its the only place in our house our animals cant get to!)
19. Name 3 items in your freezer without looking. I honestly do not have three things in my freezer-- we're big "fresh" heads here, but I do have local, organic frozen mixed berries & strawberries for making smoothies.

20. What's on your grocery list? We actually went today so nothing (for once). Today the long list included soy milk, roasted red peppers and hearts of palm

21. Favorite grocery store? First Alternative Co-Op

22. Name a recipe you'd love to veganize, but haven't yet. Creme Brulee. My all time favorite desert

23. Food blog you read the most (besides Isa's because I know you check it everyday). Or maybe the top 3?
TasteSpotting
Vegan Yum Yum
How To Eat A Cupcake
The Urban Housewife

24. Favorite vegan candy/chocolate? (premade?) I know this is so bad to admit but Oreos : /

25. Most extravagant food item purchased lately? a ten dollar bottle of vanilla extract o_o

Wedding Bells are Ringing...

2008-04-28T16:15:00.000-07:00

Marriage. I guess it's what happens when you enter your mid-twenties, but it's still pretty weird. I was one of the first in my group of friends to do it, but it still weirds me out. We're dropping like flies! I got married at the end of last year (yes thats us in the picture to the left, yes we took professional picture with beer cans in our hands haha), a had two of my very favorite people in the world get married a few months before. My wonderful Jen got married a few months ago (On the Starship Enterprise!!!), I have a wedding in 20 days, I have a wedding in August, and I have another set of friends who got engaged on New Years Eve. Sheesh!

I think I have more wedding fever now then I ever did planing my own wedding! All these weddings have got me thinking about my favorite part of the wedding... cake. I won't be able to eat the cakes at most of these weddings-- eggs, butter, milk... yuck. Before I became a vegan most wedding cakes were still a no-no because of fondant (gelatin and glycerin were always on my "no" list). So you can imagine my joy when I found a vegan fondant recipe (PPK message boards for the win!)!

According to Wilton's personnel their glycerin is completely corn derived and their pre-made fondant is completely animal ingredient free! I wanted to try my hand at making my own fondant, but was so glad to hear the pre-made stuff is safe for animals of all shapes and sizes!

Following the advice of the PPK message bored I used Wilton's fondant recipe and replaced the gelatin with agar-agar powder. Worked like a charm! I've never worked with fondant before so I decided to do a small cake and make it like the top of a wedding cake. I kept my friend Jen (the Starship Enterprise) in mind while designing the cake. I wanted it to be simple but dramatic. I was planning out something pretty elaborate-- it wasn't really working on my average sized cake, so I wasn't too upset when my cat sat on it and I had to start over (okay thats a lie, I was pretty pissed, but whatever my cat is awesome)

I used the same cake recipe as I did for Ian's birthday cake. Instead of adding food coloring I added 1/4 cup mini carob chips to one batch of batter and 1/4 cup colored sprinkles to another batch. I ended up with 5 layers (we ate the 6th layer while watching a movie haha). I prepared the cake with a light layer of butter cream frosting (the same recipe I always use) before draping it in the fondant.
(As you can probably see from the picture, I forgot to layer the cakes in any sort of order so there are two chocolate chip layers on top of each other. Oh well!)

Here are the results. For my first time I'm pretty proud of it. It can only get better from here, right?
I marbled the fondant on the side by just patting the cake with a wet paper towel dipped in black food coloring (I use the gel type that comes in jars). Some of the shades came out a bit green-ish for some reason.

I made the marbled fondant roses by mixing in black food coloring in the white fondant-- but not fully mixing it in. The roses needed 24 hours to dry, so I made these the day before making the whole cake. The mini flowers were made with a small fondant color and lots of black dye fully mixed into fondant (also dried 24 hours). I used a small icing tip to put the white middles in the day I made the cake. The flowers were "glued" to the cake using vegan butter cream.

While it wasn't exactly as I had imagined it in my head, I think my first time playing with fondant was a success. I feel my original idea would have worked better with a taller, thinner cake-- so I may invest in some specialty sized pans soon.

A note, we had some friends over for pizza (made with Teese) and cake last night-- they enjoyed eating the fondant (I think it tastes disgusting) so maybe vegan fondant tastes better then regular? I've never heard of people actually enjoying the flavor of fondant!

Here's the fondant recipe in case you don't want to search around the Wilton site:

1 tablespoon (+2 teaspoons) agar agar
1/4 cup cold water
1/2 cup glucose
2 tablespoons vegetable shortening (I used Earth Balance shortening sticks)
1 tablespoon glycerin (I used Wilton)
4-6 cups powdered sugar

Combine agar and cold water; let stand until thickened. Boil 5 minutes or until agar has dissolved. Remove from stove, add glucose and shortening, mix until dissolved. Add glycerin. Cool until lukewarm. Make a well in 4 cups of powdered sugar, pour the agar mixture into the well and stir with a wooden spoon, mixing in sugar. Add more sugar little by little until mixture is no longer sticky. Knead in remaining sugar until fondant is smooth, pliable and does not stick. If fondant is too soft/sticky add more sugar; if too stiff add water one small drop at a time.

When ready to use, knead fondant until soft and workable.

2008-04-13T21:25:00.001-07:00

This is the newest edition to my kitchen. Thanks to Jessie over at Cakespy! I'm just totally in love, I think it's fantastic! I messaged her about a wedding themed piece as a gift for my kitchen and this is what we came up with.

The line is from an ee cummings poem, one of which was very important in the beginning of my relationship with my husband. Falling in love is SCARY and this poem spoke to me due to my husband's work with birds of prey. I actually have a ridiculous phobia of birds, but they interest me (from afar... truly, hearing a bird "sing" makes me nauseas [yea, I'm crazy]). Eventually I began to refer to my husband as bird and it stuck!

I am just so thrilled with my new picture, so I thought I'd share!

I'm well on my way to making my own little photography studio for food, my EGO lights should make it here next week, so expect some stellar looking food in the next coming weeks!

Perfect Party Cake?

2008-04-03T14:30:00.000-07:00

I, like most of us, have been hungrily eyeing all of the Daring Baker's 'Perfect Party Cake'. They've all been so beautiful! My husband's birthday was coming up and I decided to make MY version of the perfect party cake. It has the delicate layers from the 'Perfect Party Cake' but it's vegan AND has awesome colors. 'Cuz, at least in our household, it's not a party unless it's colorful and fun!
I was pleasantly surprised with how easy this was to make. My largest concern was my layers. I usually make cupcakes, not even usually... I haven't made a cake in 2+ years. I would LOVE to try and make multi-layer cupcakes... but that'll take more time then I have right now working two jobs. I was fearful that the layers would rise too much, making them uneven. I don't have a serrated knife and I didn't want to try and cut layer's even. So, I used a recipe that's actually disappointed me in the past due to it's lack of rising.

I was also worried about the amount of batter to put in each pan. As I've already mentioned I'm not too "up" on the cake baking and I ended up using a cupcake recipe for the batter. I decided to split the cupcake recipe in half and then add food coloring. To make sure I made a perfect spilt (because of my worry about the layers being even) I used a 1/3 measuring cup to spoon batter into each bowl. Ultimately both bowls ended up with a cup of batter each. Two cupcake recipes = four layers. I only have two 9" cake pans, so I baked two layers at a time.

I used 7 drops of food coloring for the red layer, 4 for the yellow layer, 8 for the blue (I was so worried about this layer coming out funky!) and 5 for the green layer. I am so happy the colors came out so vividly and the taste was not affected in the least!

I'm not the best cake decorator or the most artistic person on the planet, but I really wanted to use white frosting to insure the colors of the cake "popped". I doubled my frosting recipe to insure I had enough frosting for a "crumb layer" (which I had never heard of until I was an undergrad in college and read 'The Hours'... weird how my lit degree comes up in day to day life!). I used an ice cream scoop and a half of frosting between each layer (honestly I had to google search the correct order for the rainbow haha) and then used quite a bit of frosting on the outside of the cake (I once heard it's easier to take frosting off then to put it on). Then I put the cake in the fridge for about 30 minutes to allow the first layer of frosting to set a bit. When I was frosting the cake I wished I had a lazy susan and a larger spreader (all of mine are cupcake sized!) it would have made it much easier!

After the cake had set for awhile I frosted the rest. It is VERY homespun looking, but I did the best I could with what I had!
Of course my main concern wasn't the outside. I was nervous when cutting the cake that the colors wouldn't be great and my layers wouldn't look even... but when everyone oo-ed and ahh-ed (yeah we still do that) I was extremely happy with how it came out!Of course, by the time we got to cake cutting I was having more fun partying then taking time out to snap pictures, so these aren't great... but I am pretty proud of my rainbow plates matching my rainbow cake! So, on to the recipes!

As per usual (lately) I ripped off the recipe from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World (have you bought your copy yet???)

Golden Vanilla (Cup)Cake(s)

1 cup soy milk (I always bake with SILK even though it's not what we usually drink because SILK seems creamier in recipes)
1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar
1 1/4 cups all purpose flour
2 tablespoons corn starch
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup Earth Balance (non-hydrogenated margarine)
3/4 cup granulated sugar
2 1/4 teaspoons vanilla extract

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees
2. Whisk soy milk and apple cider vinegar in a glass bowl and set aside for a few minutes to allow it to curdle (I usually have great success with the curdling, but for whatever reason [it was cold in the house maybe?] it didn't curdle this time... but it didn't seem to effect the recipe)
3. Sift flour, corn starch, baking powder, baking soda, and salt into a large bowl.
4. In another large bowl use a mixer at medium speed to cream the margarine and sugar for about 2 minutes until light and fluffy. Beat in the vanilla. Then alternated the soy milk mixture and dry ingredients (I did this in three steps each).
*5. I sprayed my 9" cake pan with non-stick spray. Then scooped the batter into two separate bowls (I had put the drops of food coloring in the bottom of the bowls) and mixed well. They took about 12 minutes (I took my dog for a walk so I'm not positive on the time, oops) until finished. I cooled the pans in the fridge for a moment and then transfered the cakes onto a parchment lined plate to fully cool (the layers are a bit sticky so the parchment is a must). Repeat for the next two layers!

Vegan Fluffy Buttercream:
1/2 cup non-hydrogenated shortening (I use Earth Balance brand)
1/2 cup Earth Balance margarine
3 1/2 cups confectioners' sugar, sifted if clumpy
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1/4 cup plain soy milk or soy creamer (I use SILK Hazelnut Creamer)

Beat the shortening and margarine together until well combined and fluffy. Add the sugar and beat for about 3 more minutes. Add the vanilla and soy milk, beat another 5 to 7 minutes until fluffy.

As I said before I made two separate batches of the frosting to frost the cake (I had a bit left over from the second batch).

The fancy cake was nicely complimented with Vegan Hotdogs and Tempeh Bang-Bang!

Everybody's working for the weekend...

2008-03-30T14:26:00.001-07:00

At least I am. Now that I'm working two jobs I find myself counting down to the weekends. Time to relax with my family, read a good book... and of course my favorite part of any weekend? Brunch.

Ian & I tend to do brunch at least once a weekend. We may go down to Sunnyside (the cafe I bake for) or just eat scones in our pj's at home, but brunch is definitely something we love. This weekend marked our "three monthaversary" and it's the weekend before Ian turns a quater century old so I decided to go all out and make French Toast & Tempeh "Bacon". We loved it so much on saturday that I replicated it on Sunday. It may become a weekend tradition.
I modified the recipie for "Fronch Toast" in the Vegan with a Vengeance Cook Book, the smoked tempeh bacon is the exact recipe from the book, and the basic staple recipe I've seen just about every where for tempeh bacon.

I remembered French Toast as a child having vanilla & cinnamon/sugar. Which are omitted from the VWV recipe. I am one of the rare birds out there who absolutely hates cinnamon. I hate the way it smells, and certainly the way it tastes-- so I left out cinnamon in my peices of toast, though I did sprinkle a bit in my husbands batch.

On to the recipe....
A Loaf of Italian of French Bread, stale (Saturday we made it with stale bread, Sunday I used fresh there was really no difference in flavor or texture to be honest)
1/2 cup soy creamer (which we didn't have so I just used soy milk)
1/2 cup rice milk (which we didn't have so I just used soy milk)
2 tablespoons cornstarch
1/4 cup chickpea flour (I only have chickpea and fava mixed flour so I used that and there was no problem)
3 teaspoons vanilla (my addition)
1 cup sugar sprinkled with a teaspoon (or two) of cinnamon (my addition)

Slice the bread into 1" rounds. Pour the soy milk (or creamer/rice milk) into a wide shallow bowl. Mix in the corn starch and stir until fully dissolved. Add the chickpea flour and stir until dissolved. Add vanilla extract.

Heat a nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Add enough oil (we used seasame oil) to create a thin layer on the bottom of the skillet. Soak the bread slices in the soymilk mixture, toss in the cinnamon sugar and transfer to the skillet. Cook each side for about 2 minutes. They should be light brown with dark flecks of brown.

I slathered on a little earth balance and served immediately. Delish.

In other news, Ian & I have found a new obsession. Coconut Bliss "ice cream". It is vegan. It is gluten free. It is soy free. It is organic. It has NO SUGAR. It has FOUR INGREDIENTS. It is in a word... incredible. Unfortunately it's a small local company from Eugene OR. so their distribution is limited to Northern California and Oregon. But if you're in those areas it is SO WORTH hunting down and divoring. Honestly, it's better then high end "real" ice cream. We tried the cappucino flavor and were floored. There was a LIGHT hint of coconut (since it's made from coconut milk) but nothing over powering, just gave the coffee flavor of the ice cream a bit more depth. It was deliciously creamy. It's of course high in fat and calories... but supposedly coconut fat is that "good for you" fat (and I don't care, this stuff is good for my morale). And they don't use sugar! It's Agave.

I finally got my two pound sample of Treeze which everyone has been salivating over. I'm going to try it in a "cheese" soup... see if it really stands up to the melt test.

Ian's birthday is Weds, so we're having a picnic themed birthday party (not enough chairs to seat guests? no problems, make it picnic themed!). We have all kinds of guests coming... a glueten free vegan, a freegan, and my favorite New Zealander who just doesn't get the whole "no meat" concept. It shall be a grand meal. I'm making rainbow cakes! So I will post about that soon!

Until then, here is the husband and I enjoying our favorite American brewery, Rogue.
That's me feeling like a complete dope for doing the Rogue brewery's iconic fist. Ian made me do it!
They had Dachshund on the menu... as an owner of a Dachshund I do not approve (though is is kind of cute they called them "Haute Dogs").

I made Ian do the fist (:

The truth...

2008-03-18T01:54:00.000-07:00

Truthfully, there are a few things I miss now that I'm a full fledged, card carrying vegan. Not enough that I regret my decision, and not enough that I would momentarily forget about all the gross stuff thats in it or anything. Just stuff I see on menus and wistfully wish they weren't made with milk from a cow's mammary gland.

I am on a mission, to veganize these particular non-vegan dishes...
Creme Brulee my all time, favorite desert. My "go-to" dish at any fine dining establishment. Lots of restruants don't get this right-- no matter how much cream or how many eggs they may use. I've gotten soggy topped, cold topped, pudding rather then custard more times then I'd like to recall. This dish has many variables-- much less adding in the "vegan" aspect. On top of it all, it may be the one desert in history I've never made. Being that it was my favorite I never wanted it to feel like a "chore" to make. Just a treat. Well I miss it and I will figure out someway to veganize it. So far I've found this which seems like a nice jumping off point, I am going to over view some other (non vegan) recipies and see what I can come up with soon.

Ranch Dressing, lets face it, I was one of "those" people. I rather liked the taste of ranch dressing, and often preferred it over the taste of my salad. I liked it in mashed potatoes, I liked it on french fries... anything and everything. I never ate the stuff from bottles, only homemade or in a restaurant (and boy did it piss me off if you could tell they used one of those Hidden Valley packages...). Tonight I broke down and attempted a vegan ranch I came up with on the fly... equal parts Veganise & Soy Milk, garlic powder, dill, pepper, etc. etc. If it comes out well I will post about it, if it comes out poorly I'll probably still post about it. I'm giving it overnight in the fridge to allow flavors to meld.Blue Cheese Dressing this actually calls for a story because I never liked blue cheese. I never touched the stuff, or in an attempt to see if my taste buds matured a small taste of blue cheese left my nose wrinkled and my palate rather unhappy. Until I tried the dressing at the restaurant I was serving at my senior year in college. We had to try all the dressings, one of our selling points was our "fresh in house" salad dressings (which were truly incredible)... the dressing was good. Damned good. And thus my love affair with blue cheese began, similarly to Ranch, I never touched the stuff from bottles and was quite weary of it at restaurants. I never made it on my own... and I know it'll probably be impossible to replicate... but I'm going to try. All this talk about dressings must make some of you think that I'd like anything drinched in Mayo-- which is completely untrue and weird. I hate mayonnaise and have my whole life-- I even have a rule that its not allowed in my car because the scent makes me down right ill. That being said, I've never had a problem with Veganaise-- though I wouldn't ever top a sandwich with it.

Brie I know, I know wishful thinking... but boy that would make me happy!

I have attempted other non-vegan favorites with steller results:
Case in point
Nutella vs. "Knew"tella. My version is simple and delicious, fresh Hazelnuts ground with peanut oil, cocoa powder and Earth Balance buttery spread... even better then the real thing if you ask me, or my husband. The texture is different (not as smooth) and it has a "dark" chocolate flavor vs. the "milk" flavor of the original... both of which I prefer.

Clotted Cream vs. I can't think of a clever vegan name for Clotted "Cream". My version is (as far as I can recall) spot on for taste. The texture is a bit thinner-- but not enough to mar the delish spread on anything really... scones, cookies, bread... we've eaten it on pretty much any baked good out there and lots of good for you fruits and stuff too (cuz I mean really does fruit have to be good for you ALL the time, spice it up a bit, geeze). The recipe for my clotted cream (and scones) can be found here, just a few posts down

Lastly, and certainly not least. Cheese cake. My original version of cheese cake wasn't that great by culinary standards in the first place. In fact, when we learned how to make it in High School Home Ec, we called it "ghetto" cheese cake because we were insensitive brats who couldn't understand that people who lived in the "ghetto" didn't worry about things like cheese cake. But y'know stupid kids and all that. So my original "Cheesecake" which I would make anytime I was interested in shoving sugar and fat down my gullet (not often) was comprised of a tub of cream cheese, some vanilla, and some sugar mixed together and poured in a prepared pie crust. I never liked "real" cheese cake-- maybe because it tasted like... cheese? And I thought that was weird? Who knows. My vegan version is just Better Than Cream Cheese with vanilla, and sugar (and this time, chocolate chips) poured into a prepared wheat pie crust. It got the job done. The job meaning satisfy my sweet tooth in less then 15 minutes. By no means something I'd make often, or recommend making often, it just tastes good enough to get the job done and takes no time in the world. And no oven to boot!

In rather sad news (and probably why I haven't been baking this week) my wonderful, cheap, little hand mixer bit the dust last weekend making vegan chocolate chip cookies (that were gross by the way, totally not worth busting my mixer!). It was just 6 months old and cheap, but will be missed....

In other news, time to convince my hubby that refund money would be well spent if going towards a stand mixer... an orange stand mixer... to match my blender of course (:

2008-03-17T22:51:00.000-07:00

food & fashion? life is good.

things are going super well on the baking/home front.
my "real" job? not so much. i'm supossed to be part time and work from 10-2 everyday, i've been there past 6:30 everyday for the past three weeks. uck.

i ordered some of the pre-release of teese and hopefully it'll be coming soon(ish). i'm excited about it's "meltability"... i really want to try and make a beer/cheese soup... we'll have to see how melty it can get! i'll let you know (with pictures) once it gets here!

hope all is well with you! here is a picture of my "family totem pole" lylah bean, fitzgerald, and my husband's knees... just relaxing... on top of each other.

Just Checking In...

2008-02-22T11:30:00.000-08:00

So...
I got the job at the bakery. I am now the weekend baker for Sunnyside Up I'm baking vegan and conventional goodies, but what ever-- I'm baking. It's super relaxed... we recycle AND have a compost bin. I can come in whenever... ie the middle of the night or the butt crack of dawn to do the bake (middle of the night for the win!). I shake my butt to whatever hippie dippie music is in the CD player and bake the night away... it's lovely really.

I'm keeping my other job and hoping that my weird hours at Sunnyside Up won't affect me at my retail job. We shall see.

In still other, and psedo-vegan related news. I have an appointment to meet with Ryan Mason of Scapegoat Tattoos (a vegan tattoo shop) for a consultation for my beer theme sleeve. Very excited about that.

Just so I don't leave you hanging without a picture....
Scott, of the Scottie-Boom-Bottie BBQ Tempeh sent me a picture of his successful attempt.
And because my wonderful cat refuses to leave me alone right now, a few of him...
My favorite picture from the road trip to Corvallis from Orlando. Fitzgerald sits like a person because he has no tail. It's adorable.
Incriminating evidence he does, in fact, love his baby sister.
I'll bring my camera tomorrow night and take some pictures of my Sunnyside Up Goodies!

Long Live the SCONE...

2008-02-19T14:41:00.001-08:00

We have a new obsession in my house, the scone. My husband never liked scones much, he always thought those dry and crumbly messes served in most chain coffee shops (*cough, starbucks, cough*) were scones... they're not. I think those are better used as door stops...

Anyway, we have this great little tea shop with the best scones and incredible clotted cream just down the street. I was craving these scones, seriously homicidally craving them. Instead of breaking my veganism I decided to make my own scones and clotted cream! I used this eggless scone recipe, subbing Silk Hazelnut creamer for the heavy cream and Earth Balance for the butter. I used chopped hazelnuts I had around the house and drizzled it in dark chocolate ganache. They were incredible, I've made four different batches since (because they're incredibly easy to make) with dried cranberries, dark chocolate chips, and mixtures of them all.

The vegan clotted cream was delish and totally quenched my craving. I merely mixed equal parts Earth Balance with Better Than Cream Cheese, 1/2 as much Soy Creamer, a splash of vanilla, and 1/2 as much confectionary sugar (meaning if I used 2 tablespoons of earth balance, I'd use 1 tablespoon sugar).

In non-sweet related treats my best friend requested a BBQ Tempeh Recipie. He was unfamilar with the wonderful world of Tempeh until his recent trip to Sundance (yes I can brag on him 'cuz he's my bff).

So here is my Scottie-Boom-Bottie BBQ Tempeh recipe:
1 8 oz package Tempeh
1/2 cup red wine
1/4 cup prepared BBQ Sauce ('cuz I know he wouldn't ever make it from scrach)
2 tablespoons Olive Oil
2 tablespoons Tamiri
3 tablespoons Lemon Juice (the stuff from that little plasic lemon is fine, but fresh is better!)
2 (or more) cloves garlic, minced
1 teaspoon cumin
1/2 teaspoon chili powder
1/8 teaspoon cayenne

Bring a medium sauce pan of water to a boil.

Wisk all sauce ingredients (everything but the tempeh) together. Taste it. If you want more of something, put it in-- like more BBQ perhaps because we all know (well I know) Scottie is a sauce freak.

Cut the tempeh in half. Then cut the squares into two triangles. When the water has reached a boil put Tempeh in for about 10 minutes.

Drain excess water from Tempeh and place in BBQ Sauce mixture-- coating well. Put Tempeh on a cookie sheet and pour a few tablespoons of sauce over the top. Broil (on high) for 5 minutes. Flip and pour some sauce over the new top. Broil for 5 minutes-- spoon some more sauce on top and give it another 30 seconds to a minute under the broiler.

Serve it with salad or soup. Something like this:

In life related news I just got back from a pre-interview at a local bakery. They seem super interested, and super excited that I had brought cupcakes and scones in when I dropped off my resume. I am nervously awaiting a call and I can't think of much else... eeeek.

So until then, and to waste a bit more time, here I am with Scott, of the Scottie-Boom-Bottie BBQ Tempeh Recipe when we were like 18 and only used the George Forman to make veggie burgers and the like
and now from my wedding after party

Sweets Treats & Picnic Salad Sandwiches!

2008-02-12T16:39:00.001-08:00

Hello there! So far this week has been great, considering it's only Tuesday I think that's pretty good odds! I am counting this weekend in the greatness of the week. Ian & I treked over to Sweetpea Bakery (link can be found in my side bar) to taste some of their vegan treats. I had the Chocolate & Coconut Cupcake. It was a beautiful cupcake drizzled with chocolate ganache and sprinkled with a bit of toasted coconut.
Unfortunately it was a good cupcake. I mean this because it was only good, not great-- which frustrated me. There was a nice "milk" chocolate flavor to the frosting-- which is a nice change from the typical dark chocolate found in vegan baked goods. Unfortunately there was little to no coconut flavor. I was expecting a nice mellow nutty flavor to smooth out the chocolate and I was disappointed at the lack of coconut flavor. Ian didn't taste any coconut at all. Hurmph!
Ian ordered a "Chicken" Salad Sandwich, since my Picnic Salad (my version of Chicken or Tuna salad) is one of his favorite sandwhichs of all time. Sweetpea delivered in this department, it was very tasty. Lots of celery-- which Ian loves, and topped with Vegan Mayo and a thick tomato slice. We really enjoyed Sweetpea, the people there were extremely nice and there was a great selection of bagels, bagel schmears, two or three cakes, donuts a few days a week, and a few cupcake varieties, as well as some gluten free treats! It was pretty busy, which was definitely nice to see. Ian and I continued our journey next door at Herbivore and stocked up on animal friendly t-shirts (I got the Praise Seitan Tee), bumper stickers (factory farms are mean & dirty), and I finally got my hands on Yellow Roses Recipes which was printed by Herbivore and is a local PDX blogger- Really good classic tastes, I'm excited to try a few of the recipes soon.This is my Picnic Salad sandwich, it's Chicken Salad without the Chicken, Tuna Salad without the Tuna... Potato Salad without the potato... anyway, it's good and SIMPLE to make. I know this is good because I brought in some for my lunch yesterday to work and a co-worker who is a devote Anti-Vegan (oi vey) offered me money for my lunch! I just gave it to him and chocked it up to saving that chicken that he would have eaten otherwise (sort of the opposite idea of a bully stealing your lunch money!). Here's the recipie, try it out and tell me what you think!

12 oz Tempeh, cubed
1 cup vegetable or vegan chicken broth (I find vegan chicken bouillon cubes at Food Fight! A Portland vegan grocery store and dissolve one cube in one cup water)
Vegan Mayo to taste (about 1/2 a cup)
1 teaspoon dill
1/4 teaspoon celery seed
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
salt & pepper to taste

Bring the broth to a slight simmer and add the cubed tempeh. Simmer for about 10 minutes, drain & cool Tempeh (I usually just throw it in the fridge). Mix 1/2 a cup of vegan mayo (more or less depending on how you like your mayo to tempeh ratio) with the dried spices and add the tempeh once its been cooled. Chill for 30 minutes to allow the flavors to meld. We throw it on wheat bread with roasted red peppers and baby spinach!

In other news, I had this great idea recently. Because my job had given me the 13th & 14th off (and Ian & I are not really "Valentines" people) I was going to bake 4 dozen Valentines Day themed cupcakes and drop them by various bakeries, coffee shops, and vegetarian restaurants around town to see if anyone was interested in my baked goods. Of course, right after I bought all the ingredients I get told I now have NO days off this week (yay to part time jobs that don't stay part time!).

I did manage to whip up some cupcakes this morning for Ian's graduate committee meeting, and I will still attempt my original plan! These are Chocolate cupcakes with Raspberry "Buttercream" frosting and Marzipan hearts. They turned out pretty cute in my humble opinion and all 24 of them got eaten in about 10 minutes!

Since I only had the morning off of work, I just used Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World recipes (which I will be happy to post if anyone is interested). One major modification was made from the basic recipe and it is of note because it is a modification I ALWAYS make. Whenever a recipe calls for Canola Oil, I use Safflower Oil. I truely think it gives me a much moister cupcake with a lighter texture then is typical of Vegan cupcake batters. The frosting recipie was a bit too buttery in my opinion and I will play around with it a bit more.

I hope everyone has a great Valentines Day full of lots of sweets and sweetie pies (Hey, I'm a newly Wed I'm supposed to be a goober!)Check in soon to see what I'm doing with these little guys...

Comfort Food & Vegan Mini-Malls

2008-02-07T12:20:00.000-08:00

Cupcakes, Fried Tofu & Mac & Cheese (vegan of course) comfort food at it's best!

I was waiting to post another blog until I get the html stuff worked out the way I want it but alas, it is taking me too much time to find time for that and I have all these pictures and recipes piling up on my computer.

So cuddle up with something (or someone) fuzzie and enjoy some comfort food at it's best. It's still quite chilly and rainy in Oregon and this dinner washed those winter blues away!

Fried Tofu: (I attempted to make the batter for this rather bland, my husband was craving fish & chips so I attempted to recall the catfish breading my grandmother used when she fried catfish.

1 pound tofu, drained & sliced into 16 triangles... like so:

1 cup soy milk combined with 2 tablespoons corn starch (make sure all corn starch is fully dissolved)
1 cup corn meal
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cumin
2 tablespoons black pepper
1/4 tablespoon white pepper
1 1/2 teaspoons salt

Mix all dry ingredients well.

Heat about a 1/4 inch of oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Sprinkle in a bit of soy milk to test if the oil is ready (it will hizz and bubble rapidly). Dip the tofu individually in the soy milk/corn starch mixture. With your other hand move the tofu into the dry ingredients and coat on all sides. Place about 1/2 of the tofu into the oil fry for 2 - 3 minutes on each side. Remove the tofu and bring oil back up to temperature (this should only take a second) before frying the other 1/2 of the tofu. Drain and pat tofu with paper towels!

We served it up with Mac Daddy, The Veganomicon recipe for mac & cheese which I need to play around with a bit (too little tofu in my opinion, too "mustardy" in my husband's opinion, but I think he was just turned off by the color). We still ate every bite and it was great, just not as good as it could be.

For dessert, we had black & white cupcakes with chocolate hazelnut butter cream!

Chocolate & Vanilla Marble Cupcakes (from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World)
1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar
1 cup soy milk
1/2 cup margarine, softened
3/4 cup, plus 2 tablespoons granulated sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons plus 1 teaspoon cocoa powder

Preheat oven to 350. add the vinegar to the soy milk and set it aside to curdle (*note i've made lots of vegan cupcakes and I've found that Silk brand soy milk curdles better then Soy Dream or West Soy). sift flour, baking powder and salt in separate bowl.

in another bowl cream margarine & sugar for 3 - 5 minutes until light and fluffy. add the vanilla and almond extracts and cornstarch. mix to combine.

alternately add some of the curdled milk then the flour and mix with a hand mixer for about 15 seconds to incorporated the ingredients well. mix until batter is smooth.

fill a saucepan with 1 inch of water and bring to a boil. put the cocoa powder in yet another bowl. add 3 tablespoons of the boiled water and whisk until smooth. take one cup of the cupcake batter and stir in the cocoa. mix until all the batter is chocolatey.

fill liners full by alternating the chocolate and vanilla batters. i did mine side by side and did not mix them because i thought it looked cool that way, haha

bake 24-26 minutes until a knife or toothpick comes out clean.

Chocolate Hazelnut Butter Cream (a modification of VCTOTW's chocolate buttercream)

1/4 cup of Earth Balance Margarine, softened
1/4 cup shortening
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
3 tablespoons Silk brand hazelnut coffee creamer
1 1/2 teaspoons almond extract
2 1/2 cups of powdered sugar, sifted (I never end up using this much)

cream together margarine and shortening until well combined. add the cocoa powder and incorporate well. add about 1/2 cup of the sugar and the creamer and extract. beat well. add the sugar in 1/2 cup batches, beating well and tasting after every addition. I tend to use much less then the 2 1/2 cups because I like bitter dark chocolate.

I crushed some hazelnuts and spun the cupcake in the hazelnut pieces!

Check in next week as I will have some pictures from the Vegan Mini-Mall that opened about a month ago in Portland. It combines my favorite tattoo artist (Ryan Mason at Scapegoat), food fight vegan grocery store, herbivore (which has a clothing line and publishes a magazine), and a vegan bakery (sweet pea)! I finally have a weekend off so Ian and I are finally gonna go for a visit!

Seitan, Seitan, How I do love thee...

2008-01-27T12:28:00.000-08:00

I worship at the alter of Seitan. I am officially a Seitan worshipper. Though I've been some form or another of vegan/vegetarian since I was eight years old I had never tried Seitan until this week. Wheat gluten? Seriously? That's supposed to be good?

I picked up a few vegan cookbooks last week to aid in my culinary journey and so many of the recipes I wanted to try feature Seitan, so I finally broke down and bought some to try. I first tried it in a mushroom and spinach dish that was absolutely delicious! So last night, when I returned home at 10pm to find a starving husband I knew my new friend Seitan would get us out of the pinch.

As I mentioned, I hadn't really been cooking vegan on my own yet-- just sticking to tried and true recipes until I got the hang of it. Last night I was excited to come up with my own dish, and I think it turned out really well. Ian & I loved it.

It feels like it has a bit of French/Vietnamese flavor to it-- but I haven't thought of a cute name for it yet...

It took no more then 15 minutes from stove to table and it was delicious, I hope people try it out!

On to the recipe, I wasn't measuring anything while cooking last night so these are rough guesses on amounts, but they should hold pretty true.

1 tablespoon Sesame Oil (I'm sure olive oil would work fine too)
1/2 a sweet yellow onion thickly cut
1 cup sliced crimini mushrooms (which my husband the mycologist says are the same as baby portabella's as far as he knows)
1 package Original flavored Seitan, sliced
1/4 cup white rice wine (I'm sure "real" white wine would be good too, but I don't drink it so I never have it in the house)
1 tablespoon Earth Balance buttery spread

Heat the oil in a large sauce pan over Medium heat. When the oil is viscous (smoothed and thinned out) add the onion. Allow the onion to soften up in the oil (about 3-5 minutes). Add the mushrooms and Seitan and combine well with the onion. Add the rice wine and turn down heat to medium low. Allow to simmer for a few minutes and stir in the buttery spread. Allow to simmer with lid off for about 5 minutes until everything is heated through.

Truly delicious!

I leave you now with a picture of my husband, excited about the snow and a picture of Lylah our mini- dachshund who is entirely unimpressed by the snow.

vs.

Woops...

2008-01-26T13:49:00.000-08:00

Hello my neglected web page. I guess in all of the holiday/wedding hoopla, this little guy has fallen by the way side.

But we're back, and better then ever!
And also MARRIED!

Being married is the greatest thing ever, in my humble opinion. I was finally able to stop using my wedding cake as an excuse and I am now 100% vegan. It's almost been a month (that wedding cake being the last non-vegan thing I've eaten)!

So while I will still focus this on my baking expeditions, they will now be vegan baking expeditions. I will also throw in some general vegan dishes as I see fit! So lots of posts coming up soon.

Ian's parents gave us the wonderful gift of a honeymoon to Savannah, GA. The couples massages and thrift stores were the high light. I found a wonderful 70's canvas print of two owls, I am currently embroidering it. I'll probably post some of those crafty things here too now.

So, check back soon, and often as I am blowing the dust off of my blogging and will be back in full swing.

Until then here are some pictures from my wedding. I'm glad I wore a wedding dress, I'm glad it wasn't traditional. I really think all of the handmade touches gave it a great feel! We named our tables after our favorite love songs (The Pouges, David Bowie, ect.) and there were lyrics on our cake, our tables, our programs... it was a blast!

I made the aisle runner out of burlap and felt.

My motto for the day "You only wear it [the dress] once, get it dirty!"

My only regret from the day? The 85 degree HEAT and not being able to take my wrap off because of my tattoos. I don't regret the tattoos, I regret not giving my parents a harder time about "letting" me show them. Oh well.

I'm A Southern Girl...

2007-10-26T19:13:00.000-07:00

I may have recently relocated to Oregon, but I was born & raised in the indoor foliage capital of the world... A place where "mudding", "hunting", and "monster trucks" are part of every day vocabulary. There were obvious ups and downs to my hometown... and the food it is a definite up.

For Retro Roundup #9 I decided to make a long time favorite of mine, Chocolate Mayonnaise Cake. It was a cherished recipe in my household. My stepmom had it made for her birthdays growing up (so it's definitely older then 1984!), and made it for my birthday as well. It's an incredible moist, dark cake. Not too sweet, and really mellow. I thought it was a cherished recipe in most homes... imagine my surprise when I'd discuss the cake and people would look at me like I was crazy! A little googling on the idea and I've learned it is yet another "southern thing".

Now, let me be the first to say, I HATE Mayo. It smells gross, it looks gross, and it has been banned in all forms from my car. That being said, this cake does not taste like Mayonnaise! The Mayo replaces the eggs and butter from traditional recipes and allows for a moist but airy cake.

I decided to make the recipe in cupcake form. Cupcakes bake faster and I was in a bit of a time crunch today. I have also been on the search for the perfect butter cream. My search for the perfect wedding cake revolved solely on the flavor of the butter cream icing... but my escapades in the kitchen have left me disappointed. I used this search as a quest for the perfect butter cream-- meaning I called my grandma!

What goes best with chocolate? Carmel. I adjusted a basic butter cream recipe to be a Salted Carmel Butter cream. It is to die for. I could seriously eat it by the spoonful!

On to the recipes! This is straight from my stepmom's recipe card so it's pretty straight forward!

Chocolate Mayonnaise Cake:
(as always all ingredients organic [and local when possible] unless otherwise noted)

2 cups flour
1/2 cup cocoa (I used a lightly sweetened bakers cocoa)
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup mayonnaise
1 cup water
1 teaspoon vanilla

Sift together dry ingredients & Cream together remaining. Add dry ingredients to creamed mixture a little at a time, hand wisk until smooth. Bake at 350 (since i was doing cupcakes it took about 25 minutes, there is no time listed on the recipe [i guess we all should just be born with that knowledge huh?] but i assume 35-40 minutes for a cake pan).

I filled the tin almost to the top (I also greased and powdered the pan with cocoa to prevent sticking as I did not want to use cupcake liners).

Salted Carmel Butter Cream:

(I basically came up with this on my own, my grandmother told me to take 6 eggs whites and 1/2 cup sugar over a double boiler... then she went on and on forever but I had already had my vision)

1 package caramels
1 1/2- 2 tablespoons salt
1/2 cup whipping cream
6 large egg whites
1/2 cup sugar
1 pound butter

Melt the carmels over medium heat. I melted half the bag first before adding the rest. I wanted some carmel to burn because I LOVE that smokey flavor. The carmel begins to get tough. At this point add the cream and salt (if desired).

Stir caramels and cream until fully combined and smooth

From this:

To this:

WARNING: I almost melted my cheap plastic spatula so please make sure yours can handle high heat, or just use a spoon!

Set aside carmel to cool.

In a heat resident bowl combine egg whites and sugar. Place this bowl over simmering water and stir until sugar has melted. Remove bowl from water and use mixer on Medium High until stiff peaks form:

Add butter in a little at a time. At this point all of my butter creams have failed. They get goopy and lumpy-- this one was not exception, but I kept on to it. Add the caramel in two batches (the frosting began to smooth out at this point) and mix with electric mixer until smooth (took longer then I expected, but well worth it). I mixed it until smooth, but not fully combined in order to acive this look:

mmmm swirl!

Finished product:

ENJOY FALL! It's beautiful here in Corvallis... we definitely didn't have fall in Apopka FL!

A Two in One For Ya...

2007-10-20T23:49:00.000-07:00

My future hubby...

[pictured here]

was craving Bread Pudding. I didn't have the time to be bothered with making an egg custard and slaving over a stove (bad wifey, I know). So I threw one together from a Blueberry & Coconut Coffee Cake I had made a few days before...

From This:

To This:

In just a few simple steps...
(Recipe modified from this recipe here.)

2 tablespoons butter, melted
3 eggs
2 cups whipping cream
3/4 cups sugar
1 teaspoon true vanilla extract
1 teaspoon cinnamon

Tear up coffee cake (or egg bread, or anything else you see fit-- I used a about 2/3 the loaf) and place into loaf pan. Pour melted butter over the cake.

Combine eggs, cream, sugar, vanilla and cinnamon in a medium bowl. Mix well, but don't allow to thicken. Pour mixture over coffee cake crumbs (I sprinkled more coconut on the top at this point). Bake at 350 for 45 minutes or until done.

Straight from the oven...

It was incredible good, the custard-y parts were perfect!

We went to a mushroom festival this weekend (My fiance studies mycology) and I took some great pictures I'll post soon!

kicking it old school...

2007-10-10T13:12:00.000-07:00

i made peanut butter and jelly cupcakes.

they're totally better then anything my mom ever packed me for lunch!

my cat even wanted them, which is a rave review by my standards!

ahh sugar and butter, my favorite part of any cupcake recipe.

here are some pictures. mind you my camera isn't up to "food porn" standards... nor is the lighting (or lack there of) in my new apartment!

i tried the frosting two ways. something about a hand frosted cupcake just makes me happy

the cake itself actually turns a bluish grey color after baking, im sure adding food color would stop this from happening and give you a true "grape" color.

on to the recipie (all ingredients organic unless otherwise noted, not that that would make a difference in the baking)!

grape jelly cupcake:

1 Cup Unsalted, Sweet Cream Butter (softened)
1 Cup Sugar
3 large eggs (I normally use 4 eggs but because of the addition of fruit juice cut one out)
2 Cups all purpose flour (i normally bake with wheat flour but went with white for the color of the cupcake)
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 cup grape juice (I used RW Knudsen "Just Concord" Unsweetened, it is 100% pure grape juice, no sugars or sweeteners added)
1 cup almond milk (this is like soy milk but from almonds haha, regular milk can be substituted, I used almond milk to bring out a nutty flavor in the cupcake-- worked great)

Cream together butter, sugar, and eggs adding eggs one at a time to blend. Sift dry ingredients together (flour, sodas, powders, salt). Combine juice and milk. Add 1/4 flour mixture to creamed mixture, combine. Add 1/3 juice mixture to creamed mixture, combine. Alternate between flour and juice mixture until all is combined a smooth.

Bake at 350 for 18-22 minutes (22 minutes was perfect time for me and my 20 cupcakes)

Peanut Butter Buttercream:
1/4 cup creamy peanut butter + 1 tablespoon (i used jarred, normally i get that fresh squeezed stuff but decided jarred would probably be a bit sweeter for this recipe)
1/4 cup butter (softened)
3 cups powdered sugar
4 Tablespoons Heavy Whipping Cream (plus a little extra)

Combine and cream ingredients. I originally only used 1/4 cup peanut butter but the frosting was too sweet. I added an additional tablespoon and a splash more of the cream-- and the icing has gotten rave reviews.

I think I found my cupcake round up recipe.

I'll post the revised tomato soup recipe soon... they were a hit though I know it's strange combo!

2007-10-01T20:35:00.000-07:00

i had a phone interview for our local co-op.
i want this job so bad!
to celebrate i went to the kitchen!
i had an idea so i made a batch of cupcakes...
it needs a little work but i think it's definitely an idea i may submit to chockylit's cupcake roundup.

i'm also working on a few other old favorites (ie peanut butter and jelly... waffle... haha i have ideas!)

my camera is being finicky today. maybe its the lighting in the new apartment, either way i've gotta work on taking some better pictures of these cupcakes

(this one was taken with my i-mac camera haha)

heres what was in the cupcakes...

*drum roll*

it's a tomato soup cupcake! (with peppered brie and thyme "icing" and a candied tomato slice)

i didn't count the oil that was in the tomato soup. so i definitely used too much butter-- not enough that it takes away from the taste, but enough to feel a little greasy. but its definitely a cupcake (not a muffin). i was worried about the flavor being too "muffin-y" because i used whole wheat flour, it was definitely the right choice for this cupcake- its still sweet and light & fluffy. i like these a whole lot more then i thought i would. i can barely keep ian from gobbling them all up-- which is fine by me since i definitely don't need to be eating them!

ill keep working on it and let you know how it goes! we have a bbq to go to on weds. to meet all of his fellow classmates, i hope to have it perfected by then.

Hello!

2007-10-01T13:26:00.000-07:00

I'm new to this whole bakey-bloggy thing but here goes.

I'm Shannon, Shannie to basically anyone I've known longer then a few years, and I love to eat. Specifically sweets, especially cupcakes.

This is my refrigerator

I'm an organic baker-- food tastes better when it's organic, that's the long and short of it.

My profession is "seeking employment" currently-- my partner and I just moved across the country from Orlando, Florida to Corvallis, Oregon. He is getting his PHd in Conservation Biology/Botany at OSU. I graduated with my BA in English Lit and a love for cooking and baking.

All this free time has given me so many creative spurts as far as my baking goes... but the lack of funds for super high quality ingredients is lame. Not to mention that we don't even have an electric mixer of any kind currently.

We're getting married in December and hopefully I get lots of baking goodies off my registry. Otherwise I'll have to start splurging on myself.

I started a blog because I want to begin submitting recipes and pictures for cupcake round ups and all the fun stuff "daring bakers" do.

So here I am. Right now I'm focusing on Chockylit's cupcake round up. I'm also excited for Quirky Cupcakes' Cupcake Hero and I want to start getting involved with Daring Bakers... I'll have to get started!