Foodie Friday: A whole lot of cooking going on.

It's Foodie Friday! Foodie Friday is my weekly feature that gives you a window into my kitchen. I love to cook, I love to eat, I love to read cookbooks, and I love to inspire people to give vegan food a chance. Thus, Foodie Friday was whipped up and baked to perfection.

A note: I don't post the recipes that I make from cookbooks, and there's a reason for that. I don't feel like that material is mine to put out there. I didn't put the work into writing them, and cookbook authors don't sell any books if all of their recipes get tossed online. That said, I am happy to share a recipe or two with people who would like to take a vegan dish for a test drive. And then I hope you'll consider buying the cookbook it came from!

On Saturday I felt like having a dinner straight from the garden. Of course, I don't have a garden, so I consulted my crisper drawer and this is what I came up with:

Spaghetti squash with tomatoes and basil (from 1,000 Vegan Recipes), sautéed broccolini with garlic, and garlic bread.
The squash recipe gave me a chance to use basil from my newly-acquired organic basil plant. Lola approved of this. There's just something about fresh basil. It looks nice, it smells amazing, and it makes everything taste better. I ended up re-potting it in a cute little Peter Rabbit planter I had sitting around.

After a trip to the commissary on Saturday afternoon, I mentioned to Jason that I had bought us some fresh strawberries. He immediately asked me if I would make him some strawberry shortcake. But of course!

So after dinner on Saturday I got out my trusty box of Heart Smart Bisquick and set to work. Strawberry shortcake is ridiculously easy to make, but don't tell Jason that. Actually, maybe you should. Because then he would know that there's no excuse for him not to make shortcake for me!

The shortcake biscuit recipe is super simple if you're using Bisquick (and the recipe is right on the box): just stir 1 cup of Bisquick, 1/3 cup of (soy) milk, and 2 tbsp. sugar into a sticky dough, plop heaping spoonfuls onto a pan lined with a silicon mat, and bake at 425 degrees for 10-12 minutes. I doubled the recipe because I like big biscuits (...and I cannot lie, you other brothers can't deny...):


I gave Jason the heart strawberry. He thought that it was cute, but he didn't notice it until I pointed it out. Men!
On Sunday I made the customary special breakfast for his highness:

Flax-berry pancakes from Robin Robertson's Vegan Planet.
This recipe incorporates ground flaxseeds, which are a good source of Omega-3s and fiber, can reduce cholesterol, and can be used as an egg replacer when mixed with water. Healthy pancakes? Maybe not entirely, but they sure were good. The recipe calls for the blueberries to be mixed into the batter, but I decided to mix them up with my leftover shortcake strawberries and put them on the plate for more of a "fresh fruit" experience.

I've cooked a lot throughout the week, too.

Monday: Vegetable fried rice and stir-fried sesame asparagus from 1,000 Vegan Recipes.


This used up the extra brown rice that I had left over from last week's General Tao's tofu.

Wednesday: Red bean and bulgur chili from 1,000 Vegan Recipes.


Bulgur is hearty and filling. I used Bob's Red Mill.

Thursday: Miso soup from 1,000 Vegan Recipes.


This was a grand success. It tasted exactly like the miso soup from Kotobuki, my favorite Japanese restaurant back in Norfolk. Jason doesn't like brothy soup, so I ended up doubling the amount of tofu and mushrooms called for in the recipe and using an entire bunch of green onions. My changes did the trick, because he ate his bowl without complaint and only left a small amount of broth when he was done.

Come back next Friday to hear about my project for this weekend: veganizing quiche!