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Liz Holding Food Gallery: entry #27 – BROWNIE-STYLE
I tried T’ai Chi today for the first time! That’s got nothing to do with chocolate, sure, but I feel really good right now! Like a natural chocolate high. Or a, uh… non-sugar induced high, yes. Seriously though, I feel like a dancer, I bounced all the way home in my high tops, and then threw together the roasted vegetables I’d made that morning into some whole wheat penne and home-soaked chickpeas for a really attractive dinner. It needed something parmesan-y, but I have leftovers to subject to ground almond & lemon zest, there is always tomorrow.
So back to cupcakes!
I made the Brooklyn Brownie cupcakes for a friend’s 25th birthday in the park. We played duck duck goose, Stella Ella Ola, a fun game called Sheep… I love being a nonkid, it’s so natural to be. And the cuppers were a big hit! These are dense dark weighty cakes with a huge woodsy whiskeyness that probably needs refreshing milk around for maximum enjoyment, but definitely brownie-ish and definitely good. Super moist, too. I think I like the regular chocolate VCtotW recipe better, but hey, I got to bake with whiskey, and I’ve been wanting to do that for, like, ever!
Then something a little more virtuous… I made the Mole Roasted Cauliflower from the Swell cookzine that involved – of course! – cocoa powder. REALLY good preparation for cauliflower, I had to resist buying another whole head and roasting it up the exact same way, which says something, that I would repeat a recipe so soon. Not that it was hard to eat a whole giant head of this, it’s pretty addictive like better than popcorn good. It was the star of the plate next to the mango slices, and some creamy mint & basil polenta I made, but actually the whole combo worked really well and I recommend it – mango with dinner I mean. (what? mango with everything!! of course!)
Oh yes yes, I made some luncheon meat, via Vegan Dad’s recipe. It is a bit dry as he says, but the flavour and texture is eerily spot on and I made some really satisfying sandwiches and I froze most of it into little single-servings for later. Next time I thaw out a packet I’ll be sure to have some cheap yellow mustard around, because it would just work with this stuff, mmmm yeah.
What else? Tofu nuggets! I saw the Tofu Skewers with Espresso BBQ Sauce on Vegan Appetite and knew exactly what to do with the half pound of tofu I had in the fridge. I’d not skewered food before, and you know, it actually does make a difference to the flavour! The leftover tofu-bobs I cooked sans-impalement were less succulent and fun. Like, you couldn’t gnaw on them at all, boo, I like skewers now. Oh, and the sauce was great! I added cayenne cause I can’t leave well enough alone and insist on mouth burning when it comes to anything BBQ.
Right, and finally, this is definitely the result of my new love affair with my wonderful freezer. Never could have concocted something so specific without being able to freeze tiny bits of things throughout my cooking. The whole door is filled with single cookies, 1/4 cups of icing, cake shavings, and other fun detritous I collect, mwahaha. For this little cake that I made for a dinner on friday, I started with a disc of leftover Brooklyn Brownie cupcake (the recipe really does make a LOT of extra batter). Then I made a base cheesecake cream in the blender, divided that into two and stuffed one with melted chocolate and the other with peanut butter. I layered and baked that at 350 for 45 minutes, then I made a quick chocolate agar-gel for the top and was really really pleased with myself for rocking agar finally. And then! Crushed-up peanut butter cookies for the sides. You know the awesome kind that are essentially just peanut butter and sugar? Yeah, those kind. And I almost forgot – star dollops of leftover chocolate cupcake frosting! PIMPED. OUT.
Now I just need to get myself a cheesecake tin that’s bigger than 5″ across. ^_^;
It’s taken me enough time, but I think I might pursue some serious explorations into raw food this summer. It’s probably because of this festival in the woods that my friends organize each year… this year I’m a part of the kitchen crew, and that means providing raw options on top of the fully vegan menu. Which I’m actually pretty excited about! The way it’s set up we each get about one full day of leading the kitchen, and I have no clue what I’m going to make… but I am collecting ideas, and I figure I should start practicing my skills now.
I took out a book from the library – Nettie Cronish’s New Vegetarian Basics – and figured I would actually cook something from it instead of just flip pages. Well… it’s a mint and tahini sauce up there and it seems like it would be great on paper (and I’m not exactly sure how one messes up tahini sauce!) but there was like, no flavour in it whatsoever, so I had to double the tahini and add some ume vinegar and then it was pretty good. (I should mention that I like how she uses a lot of pumpkin seeds and seaweeds in creative ways in her book, though!)
To ease into Rawville I approached my blender with a lot of vigor and an open mind (and about 3 open recipe books!). I think I did okay for a try… I would never ever EVER call those thin bits of celery “pasta”, but the tomato sauce was a sort of marinara and actually quite delicious! I used both red wine and balsamic vinegar with some fresh basil and it definitely wasn’t salad-y, in fact surprisingly sweet and piquant and actually went pretty well with crispy celery. The soup was hella fun!! It involved…. (I wrote this down)…..
a full stalk of broccoli
3″ of zucchini
1/2 cup of corn
1 kale leaf —- THE CULPRIT!!
knob of ginger
3 cloves garlic
lemon juice
apple c vinegar
olive oil
flax oil
juice of 2 grapes
tamari
regular soy sauce
sunflower seeds
1/2 a green apple
cumin, coriander, cayenne, paprika, salt, pepper
whole corn niblets
Good and good for you… but I read only afterwards that adding leafy greens to raw soups make them characteristically bitter, and this definitely needed those two grapes to balance things out. I felt really energized afterwards, but next time I think I’ll keep my kale on the side. I do love making food like this, though – I feel like a scientist, cutting off bits and bobs of things to create a harmonious liquid whole.
Last and the sweetest! Mocha chia pudding, as per Swell Vegan’s recipe, made with some probably unraw ingredients (cocoa, instant coffee certainly isn’t), but in principle sure. Really quite good! Like tapioca pudding with the texture of strawberry seeds and the flavour of chocolate, and intriguingly… gloopy. In a good way! Like you can stir it up and much as you like and it will reconstitute back together immediately, which I think is a huge bonus, not liking runny pudding all that much. Plus this fills you up, so I hear, being hydroscopic and thus able to soak up all your drinking water… so it’s the dessert that could save your life in a desert, aha!
Like a fine wine, this cookie here presented has been aged to perfection, acquiring deep notes of CHEWY and TOFFEE-BURN and OMFG I LOVE LIFE. Did it require barrels and equipment? Naaaaaah, just some forsight. Friday night I made a batch of Dreena’s homestyle chocolate chip cookies (which I think I’ve made at least ten times before, they must be my favourite or something) with two extra tablespoons of cocoa, a pinch of instant coffee powder, and coarse salt instead of fine. And then the dough sat in the fridge all weekend, getting dryer and more flavorful every day. I must pledge my allegiance to this NY Times article by the way, for spilling the perfect cookie beans… because….
I want to run away with this disc of chocolate bakery love. I am so glad I made just one, or I’d pretty much still be in the kitchen contemplating all the cocoa-laced angels that were trumpeting every bite as I sank deeper into tri-textured molten crispy chewy transcendence.
That is all. :)
(oh, except that I threw a couple basil leaves onto a few bites and that was even fabulouser. There’s no stopping it!)
Kamutflake Girl 
