Isa & Terry, You Geniuses, I love you.

I made these "Peanut Butter Pillows" of theirs and they were so good. Not too hard to make, not too many esoteric ingredients and it's chocolate & peanut butter together. What else do you want? Eat these warm out of the oven with some cold milk.

This is what you need for the chocolate cookie mantle:
And this is what you need for the creamy peanut butter magma:
Use your kindergarten clay skillz to make peanut butter balls:


Wrap up the pb ball in a layer of chocolate cookie dough:

They cook up a bit, so give them space on the cookie sheets:

Did I mention that these are delicious?

SVS East: Mom Edition

Mom came out and stayed the night with us last week, and we made Vegan Dad's Crispy Cajun Chickpea Cakes in her honor.


I messed them up, but Pete took over and we had a delicious dinner nevertheless.


I think that next time I would have added more flour, but I was too excited that Mom was there to slow down and do things right. The recipe definitely made more than the three of us needed, and it took a while to fry them up in batches (maybe we should have used our much larger frying pan), so we ended up eating while standing around in the kitchen keeping Pete company while he cooked.


On the bright side, Mom was there! Double fun!

Two Easy Pieces

First of all, I can't believe I've already made two batches of these and haven't shared them. Via Vegetarian Times: Chocolate crispy rice treats!


Last time I made them I used carob chips, since they were languishing in the fridge and needed to be used sooner than our chocolate chips did. They were so delicious we used them again this time.


These are quickly becoming a favorite around here, and only take about twenty minutes to put together. The tough part is letting them cool off before you try to cut them apart. This time, almost as soon as I'd patted the top flat, Pete was asking when we could eat them. I said 15 minutes, but five is all I can stand. When they are warm, these are really nice and gooey. Just be sure you do all the cutting when they're still warm-ish (they're softer that way).

Second up, in the "actually healthy" and savory department, curried lentil burritos a la Pete. He made this up one day a few weeks ago, and we're guessing that he did it the same way tonight. We ate them too fast for a photo, but here's some of the ingredients he used:


So delicious. Maybe some day we'll get the recipe out of him, but I think he basically just cooks up some lentils, onion, garlic, maybe some cauliflower and potato, carrot, whatever's around, then throws it all in a big skillet and adds curry powder and a touch of cayenne. Wrap it up in a warm tortilla, and you're set!

Sunday Vegan Sunday - West Coast Edition

This is the west coast live and in person edition of Sunday Vegan Sunday. It's re-dubbed by me, Laura, and for some reason Jess turned out sounding like strongbad and I sound a little bit like a loopy Southerner. Enjoy!

Stir-Fried Leafy Greens and Marinated Tofu

I found two delicious, complementary recipes from Veganomicon, which I am greatly enjoying. One was Easy Stir Fried Leafy Greens and the other was Marinated Asian Tofu. I decided to use Kale for my leafy green, and it turned out really well. I was nervous because I've only cooked Kale once before, but this was a recipe that was difficult to mess up, which is my favorite kind of recipe.


I had originally intended for the tofu to be baked, but ran into a problem with the pressing draining process:
I think the problem was that I needed to get extra firm tofu instead of just firm tofu, or I pressed way to hard to drain it. For whatever reason (my theory is that tofu is a fickle substance to work with) it crumbled into lots of tiny pieces instead of the eight even pieces required for baking tofu. Using my newly acquired cooking improv skills, I decided to marinate the tofu anyway and fry it, making it into more of a tofu scramble. It worked out very well, and the tofu was very flavorful and delicious, blending nicely with the kale.


We made some jasmine rice and had the tofu and kale over it. It was delicious with white wine and made for awesome leftovers, as well. Ellen and I had a lovely dinner.

Happy Chocolate Day

I was going to make this chocolate raspberry whiskey cake for our friend Kelly's birthday while she was in town last week, but I got the flu instead. But I had been thinking about that chocolate cake for so many weeks that I couldn't NOT make it this week in honor of Kelly, Valentine's day, and chocolate itself.

The cake itself whips up pretty quickly. In fact, the recipe calls for an 8" cake to be cut in half (with raspberry jelly between the layers), but in my 10" pans, the cake turned out super flat, so I just whipped another one up for a second layer! Voila! It was almost too easy.

Unfortunately, the second cake somehow ended up completely crumbling when I tried to lift it up to layer it on top of the first, so it ended up being a bit of an "earthquake cake." Still delicious, though, and quite lovely when I added the glaze.

I think the glaze might be a bit too much sweetness for me, but it's good. I mean, it's chocolate and margarine with whiskey and sugar, so it's all good things. It's just all good, rich things.
If I made this cake again, I would
a) Make it when more people are around to help eat it. We now have way too much chocolate cake in our refrigerator. Anyone who wants to come over and eat cake tomorrow, in honor of President's Day, is welcome. Everyone knows George Washington & Abe Lincoln loved chocolate, whiskey, and raspberries. Especially together.

b) I would probably leave the glaze out of it, especially if I were making a version just for me. I like the rasperry jam filling. Or maybe I'd just smash up some fresh rasberries and spread them over the top of the cake.
Happy birthday, Kelly! I'm sorry you didn't get to eat this cake with us!
(This is Kelly in our kitchen. She would have been smiling even MORE if she'd had this cake too.)

Playing Catch-Up

My internet has been out at my house, which is endlessly frustrating and I'm also in the throes of sudden life change. Excuses aside, I haven't posted in a long time and I apologize for the delay in the deliciousness. Below are some photos from making chickpea cutlets, which were very yummy and a great meat substitute, not to mention really fun to make. We had to re-mix the chickpea mixture about three times due to forgotten ingredients. Combined with carrots and couscous, it made for a wonderful meal.



See, Matt enjoyed it.