The Joy I found in feeding Vegans..What I do every Monday

Monday is my "work"day. I call it work for my employers benefit and a little bit to justify my existence.I am a private chef for a lovely family in Norfolk.The family prefers a vegan diet. If they came to your house and you were serving Steak Au Poivre they would push it around the plate and maybe feed your dog or cat rather then ask you to accommodate them.Work is not a good description for many reasons, a list of which I will share with you now.
1. First and foremost it is my great fortune to have a job that serves two purposes in my life; Therapy, cooking and  baking  is for my mental health, it also helps me to stretch my intellectual muscles, could you make a vegan lasagna?
2.Every week it is a visit with the best of my almost grown children's toddler years..Bella and Zachary are so delightful.
3. On Sunday part of my morning is spent planning and shopping for the menu. What is fresh and good?
4. I have experimented with different ethnic cuisines that my family would turn up their noses at.
5. The reward that my skills as a cook, maybe chef, can be applied to such a different lifestyle and bring others joy.

I have been feeding my vegan family now for 26 weeks give or take a week. There have been some great surprises, astonishing failures, and most important happiness. I have blazed through a lot of the learning curve for a beginner vegan. I would say I think I have become an intermediate vegan cook; its kind of like a temporary fairy. For those out there discovering vegan eating for the first time I think I can help. This post will have some of  the favorites for my family as well as a Autumn  twist on Lasagna. Within  these recipes you will learn as I have how to make some very useful alternatives for things like ricotta or the base for a basic cheese sauce. One ingredient that was new to me , that is essential now is Nutritional yeast..every good vegan should know this one.When you finish here the evidence should be plain that with a little education you can expand a vegan diet to be much more than hummus, salads and prefabricated food at Trader Joe's :)
Lets begin with the Basic Cashew Cheese

To replace the protein and fat that please many in cows milk you need to have a alternate source for just those things. So vegans use raw nuts, in different combination with soy,rice or almond milk, vegetable broth and even soft silken tofu. Never forget the Nutritional yeast. Above is the trusty food processor filled with raw cashews and raw almonds, skins on. Before  I put the raw nuts in the processor I have found that soaking them for 30 minutes in really warm water then draining them helps them to blend into a smoother consistency. Step 1. process soaked nut in food processor.

Here it is the super special magical dust , or simply nutritional yeast. Step 2. add to ground nuts ( the measurements for the ingredients will be listed below)

The consistency that you need for this can been altered by the addition of liquid. For a thick ricotta like paste it would need about 1/2 cup of broth or vegan milk. to make a cheese sauce you will add up to 3 cups of soy milk. 

Above I have described the base for a home made vegan cheese. You can change the taste by adding things like garlic, cayenne, pesto, silken tofu. It is a great spring board for creating recipes closer to a traditional diet.

Vegan Cashew Cheese
1 pound  Raw cashews ( I soak mine in warm water then drain)
1/2 pound Raw Almonds
1/2 cup Nutritional Yeast
1/2 cup liquid (vegetable broth or vegan milk)



Old Stand by  ( Bella's request)

Pot Pie

If the filling is wrapped in flaky crust no one cares really what is inside, right? Well my secret to lots of pies is the crust. I vary things for my family by sometimes using different flours, different spices or fats. Vegan eating is not fat free. Basic is best and experimentation is encouraged.

Pie Crust
3 cups flour
1T  Sea Salt
1 cup + 1 T Shortening
1/2 c water (ICE cold)

In a large mixing bowl add the flour and salt (you can do a mix of flours, wheat, corn meal but unbleached All purpose should make up 2/3 ) Cut the vegetable shortening into  medium chunks onto the flour. Hands are the best tool for cutting the fat into the flour. I pick the flour and shortening up in my hand and rub it together so that it wraps itself around every grain of flour. The powered light flour mixture will then look like
course sand. It calls for ice cold water; this is to quickly firm the fat so that it will do its job to make the flaky layers of your crust. I actually put the measuring cup in the freezer while I am preparing the flour..
Make a well  in the center of the flour and add most of the water, 2/3 of a 1/2 cup! Reserve the other for
pulling the dough together. Once you have added the first of the water toss it through your flour with a fork. It should resemble a shaggy mass.The remaining water is sprinkled over the mass and used to smooth it into a disc. Wrap it in wax paper and refrigerate for 1 hour.

Potpie Filling

6 -8 Yukon gold creamer potatoes
3 carrots peeled and sliced
1 medium onion diced
1 T Olive oil
1 package Mix vegetables or Soycatash
2 cups vegetable stock
1lb. Extra firm Tofu diced
1/4 cup flour
6 sprigs Thyme ( 1 t dry)
1/2 bunch Italian Parsley, chopped
S&P to taste  
1 t Turmeric (optional,)


In a large saute pan or dutch oven sweat your onions, carrots and potatoes, olive oil , 3 sprigs of Thyme and parsley until onions are soft. Add packaged vegetables and remaining thyme, season with salt and pepper. Add diced tofu and cook 3-4 minutes. Sprinkle with Flour and fold together .
Allow to cook for a bit then add vegetable stock and simmer until thick. Remove thyme stems. Check seasoning.

Liberally flour a counter or board and divide pie dough in two. Roll out a circle that is approximately 2 inches large then your pie plate. There is plenty of dough here to achieve this at 1/ 8 inch thickness.
Add filling to pie plate. Roll out second circles just as before, fold in half  then place over filling. Now fold upwards the with both crusts and pinch , repeat around the edge of  the entire pie. In the center Cut a vent hole or holes.

This is what it should look like after filling.

Here is what you get once you have added the top crust, pinched your sides and cut a vent.
Then bake in a preheated 375 oven for 45 minutes.

The finished product taste nom-nom!

For most this might be all you need for a vegan lesson but I can not stop here. When was the last time you served Swiss Chard in your house? It does not count as a garnish on a platter. You have to cook it and eat.

Here is a Fall Lasagna that is far from Italian.

Swiss Chard and Pumpkin Lasagna

1-32 ounce can Pumpkin (about 3 cups of packed pureed pumpkin)

1 cup Soy creamer

1/2 t ground nutmeg

s & p

1 recipe basic Cashew Cheese

1/2 pound silken tofu

3 -4 cloves of fresh garlic

1/2 cup soy creamer

1large Bunch Swiss Chard, stems removed and torn

1 large onion julienned

2 garlic cloves minced

2T olive oil

12 Whole Wheat Lasagna Noodles( boiled for 5 minutes)

Clean and tear the Swiss Chard. Slice and mince onions and garlic. Heat saute pan and begin heating olive oil, add garlic and onions. cook on medium high heat until onion is soft. Add Swiss Chard and turn until it just begins to wilt. Season with S&P. Set aside. Lay three noodles on the bottom of a 9x13 baking pan. Begin layering the the noodles first with Pumpkin Sauce, then Swiss Chard and finish the layer with Cashew Cheese. Repeat with the remainder of ingredients. Cover tightly with foil and bake for 45 minutes in a 350 oven. This can also be topped with Diaya Vegan cheese shreds but is delightful with out it too.

Now combine the pumpkin puree and the creamer and season with nutmeg and S&P to taste.

The noodles layered with pumpkin sauce.

Sauteed Swiss Chard and Onions

Cashew Cheese before the silken tofu is added

A complete layer of Autumn Lasagna

 So I will wrap up this post with a recipe for cinnamon raisin bread that I make quite often on Monday. It is actually the first thing I will do when I get there, so that it has plenty of time to rise.Bella loves to watch and loves to roll the dough around in her little hands and chew on it too.The most favorite part is when I take the risen dough from a big bubble and squash it and punch it.She is really tickled by that. I make sure that I make a special loaf and mark it with a B just for Bella and me. this week she had the tummy flu and it was not wise to have this bread. I removed the temptation and made one giant loaf and braided it.

Cinnamon Raisin Oat Bran bread

Ingredients:

Yeast jump start

1 ½ T Active Dry Yeast

¼ cup warm water

1 t  Sugar

2 cups hot water (noticeably hot to your skin)

½ cup dark brown sugar

1 T sea salt

½ cup canola oil

Dry Ingredients:

4 ½-5 cups King Arthur AP flour (this is were we begin,  will use up to 2-3 cups additional flour)
2t ground cinnamon

¾ cup High Quality Oat Bran (found with hot cereals)

2 T Vital Wheat Gluten
1 cup Raisins

Prepare yeast Jump start..add sugar then Yeast to ¼ cup warm water, set aside. In a LARGE mixing bowl add Hot water, sugar, canola oil and stir. Then add your raisins and stir again. Mix all dry ingredients in a separate bowl and stir with a whisk or fork to combine. The yeast mixture should be moist and have begun to bubble. Add yeast to the water mixture. Then scoop the dry ingredients onto the top of the wet mixture and yeast. Stir and combine so that all flour is moist but not completely mixed in. Now add up to 2 cups more AP flour sprinkling it all over the wet mixture. Stir and be sure to push the dough along the sides of the bowl to gather flour into the dough ball. If it remains sticky add flour in ½ cup increments until it forms a ball. Now begin kneading the dough, turning the bowl ¼ of a turn each time. This will continue for 5-7 minutes, if dough is sticky sprinkle small  amounts of flour until it is smooth.

This is what I do on Monday. Do you blame me for loving it? It is the best "job" ever.