One Year Veg

1 Year Later...

2011-01-05T08:50:00.000-05:00

And not a scrap of meat. I made it the entire year without consuming any meat.

How do I feel? Pretty good. I set out to see if I had the discipline to do so, I think I nailed that. I also learned a lot about vegetarian cooking, discovered new foods and new ways to cook them. Overall, it was a good experience.

But now the time has come...

I have decided to start eating meat again, with the following caveats: Lean, local, & sustainable, with the occasional bacony or wing indulgence. I will continue to eat veg at home, and most likely about 90% of the time I'll eat veg outside the house since there are only a few places locally that offer meat like that.

And I'm leaving it up to you, the three of you that actually read this blog, to decide where my first meaty meal will be after 1 year of no meat. Over there on the right è you'll see a poll. Make my choice, poll closes 11:59PM on Friday

Thanks for sticking with me!

Jamaican Me Crazy

2010-12-21T20:49:00.000-05:00

Ok... confession time.

For as much as I make fun of my mom's Shepherd's Pie, I actually like it. A lot. So much that I've made a couple different vegetarian versions of hers. They were good, but not like hers, they were all missing that secret ingredient only moms can add (Hint: it's love)

So... the other day I was brainstorming a new version. Coincidentally, it was cold and snowy, and I was thinking of a line from Jimmy Buffett's Boat Drinks: "Lately, newspaper mentions cheap air fare, I gotta to fly to Saint Somewhere" and it hit me...

Jerk Shepherd's Pie!

A quick survey of what I had on hand revealed I had all necessary ingredients, so cooking commeneced. It turned out better than I expected - sweet, spicy, and very filling. Carol loved it, and she's finicky as anything It only lacked one thing, mom's special ingredient.

Here's how I made it - feel free to improvise with what you have on hand.

Jerk Shepherd's Pie

1 12 oz bag Morningstar Farms Grillers Crumbles
1 small onion, chopped
1 16 oz bag frozen mixed veggies
8 oz fresh mushrooms, sliced
1/2 cup Caribbean jerk sauce (I used World Harbors)
4 cups mashed sweet potatoes
1/2 cup low-fat shredded cheddar cheese.
1 tbs Olive oil
Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

Preheat the oven to 375. Heat oil in a large skillet, then add crumbles and onions and saute until onions soften and brown slightly. Stir in the jerk sauce, mushrooms, veggies, salt & pepper and cook about 5 minutes more. Spoon the mixture into a 9x5 baking dish and sprinkle with the cheese. Spread the mashed sweet potatoes over this (Note: This works best if they are warm. Cold mashed potatoes don't spread very well) and pop in the oven for about 10 minutes or until it's heated all the way through.

That's it, makes about 6 servings. Douse it with some Pick-a-Peppa or other hot sauce of your choice and dig in. You'll be glad you did.

A Bowl of Awesome

2010-12-12T20:31:00.000-05:00

What do you do with leftovers on a snowy winter day.

Soup... soup is always good.

And how do you take this bowl of awesome and make it even more awesome?

Awww yeah.

I call this "Leftover Veggie, Pasta, and Bean Soup" and pronounce it "Awesome." Feel free to improvise with any leftovers you have.

Leftover Veggie, Pasta, and Bean Soup

1 Tbsp olive oil
1 small shallot, finely chopped
1 garlic clove, minced
1 medium yellow onion, chopped
2 medium carrots, sliced (I used a crinkle cutter to be fancy)
1 medium red bell pepper, seeded and chopped
1 large yam
1 cup cut green beans
2 cups Pacific Natural Foods Organic Broth Organic Mushroom Broth
4 cups Pacific Natural Foods Organic Broth Organic Vegetable Broth
1 tsp freshly-ground black pepper, Or to taste
1 tsp kosher salt, or to taste
1 tsp dried thyme
15 oz can Bush's Great Northern Beans, undrained
4 oz Barilla Whole Grain Penne, cooked

Heat oil in heavy bottomed pot over medium heat. Add shallot, onion, carrots, and garlic; stir and cook one minute. Add the yam, bell pepper, green beans, seasonings and broths; increase heat to med-high and bring to a boil. Reduce heat, cover, and simmer until yam is tender, about 30 minutes. Add cooked pasta and undrained beans (you can drain the beans if you want, but this really makes it nice and thick) and heat through. Just before serving, stir in the parsely and correct the seasoning.

We had it with some crusty bread, it was most delicious

Scenes from Findlay Market

2010-10-23T19:02:00.000-04:00

After walking the Queen City Underground Tour, I was going to head to Soho Sushi, but I decided to put that off until Carol could join me. Instead, I headed to the Findlay Market nearby.

Findlay Market has been around since1852 and is the longest running public market in Ohio. Local farmers come and sell their produce, crafters sell their goods, and all kinds of other trinkets and goodies abound

Fresh produce of all varieties make this a vegetarian's heaven.

Or other offerings appeal to the carnivores

Trotters? No thanks.

You can grab a quite bite at several places there, like the World Food Bar

Taste of Belgium (Get a waffle, you must.)

Dojo Gelato - Dogfish Pumpkin Ale Gelato, you can thank me later

Or something a little sweeter

When I lived in University Heights, I used to shop at Findlay Market all the time, I could take the bus right down the hill and get all my groceries for the week. Carol and I are going to start shopping there more, we're planning weekly menus that will concentrate on fresh ingredients and minimal waste. What better place than Findlay Market?

Simple Pasta Sauce

2010-09-13T13:43:00.000-04:00

Ok, first off this isn't going to be one of those fancy cooking blogs where more time is spend composing and setting up pictures than is actually spent making the food. Unless someone wants to gift me with a Canon EOS 7D. Then we'll talk f-stops and apertures. Or go see my friend Leigh for a gifted camera-slinger.

This is a simple pasta sauce, suitable for vegetarians, vegans, or anyone who likes pasta. Seriously, as long as you have some basic knife skills and can work a can opener, you're good to go.

First step - gather the ingredients. You will need:

1 - 28oz can whole tomatoes. I like Muir Glen Fire Roasted
1 - 6 oz can tomato paste. Again Muir Glen
3 cloves of chopped garlic - more or less to taste. I used two since Carol doesn't like a whole lot of garlicky goodness
1 small onion, chopped
1 tbs. chopped fresh oregano or 1 tsp dried.
3 tbs. chopped fresh basil
Olive oil
Sugar (vegan sugar is available or use Stevia)
Salt

Got all that? Good. Now, heat a tablespoon of olive oil in a good-sized saucepan over medium heat and add the onion, garlic and salt to taste. Saute until the onions are getting a little soft, but be careful to not burn the garlic or else you'll have to start over, because that will taste nasty. Trust me.

Open the can of tomatoes and start grabbing them out. You can use your (hopefully recently washed) hands since you're going to crush those suckers into the saucepan anyway. Or you can be a wimp and fish them out with tongs. Either way, hold it in your hand over the saucepan and squeeeeeeeeeze them all into the pan. The idea is to make little pieces from big chunks. Do this with all of them, then dump the juice from the can into the pan, Stan.

Starting to look like a sauce now, right? A bit runny, but it's getting there. Now, add in the oregano, maybe 2 tsp of sugar to knock back the acid a bit, and the tomato paste. Stir that up good until the paste is all incorporated and the sauce is nice and thick. Make sure it's all heated through and toss in the basil.

You're done. This stuff will taste better than anything you can get out of a jar, and you can tweak it how you want. Throw in some roasted red peppers, more garlic, olives, mushrooms, whatever strikes your taste buds. I tossed in a 1/2 bag of Morningstar Farms Grillers Crumbles that we had in the freezer and served it over whole-wheat penne.

Yum.

Corn Cob Cutter

2010-07-18T20:38:00.000-04:00

I have had one of these in my kitchen for quite a while now. I thought it was a pretty cool tool, it would just zip the kernels right off the cob. Easy, right?

Wrong...

For a couple reasons. First, I like corn on the cob just the way it is, no need to remove it from the cob prior to eating. And B, on the occasions I have tried to use it, the corn is too big. Today for example - I stopped at a roadside stand (Ok, it wasn't really on the side of the road, it was in the parking lot of Westen Bowl) and bought some fresh corn, tomatoes, and a yellow zuchinni for a dinner idea. After shucking and steaming the corn, the cob cutter just wasn't up to the task. My trusty santoku was more than adequate though.

It not only made short work of decompiling the kernels (nerd alert), it also chopped three tomatoes and chiffoned some fresh basil. These all got tossed into a bowl with about 3 Tbs of olive oil, 1/4 cup of fresh lime juice, some zest from the lime, and a 15oz can of drained and rinsed chickpeas.

While that tasty mixture was being assembled, a box of whole-wheat spaghetti was busy boiling in anticipation of the tasty sauce.

An interjection: Carol is not used to pasta not being smothered in a red sauce. She looked at what I was making, and asked if I was going to add anything else to it while pointing at the can of tomato paste in the open cabinet. I said nope, this is the sauce right here. She looked a little leery, but she trusts my kitchen skills :)

When the pasta was done, I tossed in the de-cobbed corn to heat it just a little more, then drained it all. Back into the pot it went along with the sauce. A couple good stirs and it was good to go.

Yeah, it was good. Pretty dang good. Carol had seconds...

And to cap it off, fresh, seeded watermelon. Not that unseeded, tasteless crap. Real watermelom has seeds.

Cheap cheeps

2010-07-04T20:10:00.002-04:00

OK, so if you're still drooling over the hummus in the last post, be aware that I just made two more batches. Yes, you can have some, come on over. But what to have with it? I mean, I would never, ever just eat hummus by the spoonful. Never.

Quit looking at me like that.

The healthy answers are veggies like baby carrots, celery sticks, and red pepper strips. The answer you probably came up with was chips, be they potato or tortilla. You could grab a bag of those ridiculously expensive pita chips, but... I have a better idea.

Make your own pita chips. They are almost too easy to make, unless you're the type who has to make their own pita bread, then use that to make chips. Me, I just went and bought pita bread. I'm not that ambitious yet.

Here's how I made them. Promise me you won't kick yourself when you realize how easy they are and how much you've been overpaying.

You will need:

1 8-count bag pita bread
Olive oil spray or mister (Dan got us a nifty one for a wedding gift)
Seasoning of your choice, I used Lawry's Seasoned Salt but feel free to experiment.

Preheat your oven to 350 and line a cookie sheet with parchment paper Cut the pita's into wedges - 4, 6, 8 depending on how big you like them. You can seperate the two layers of the pita or leave it intact if you prefer a thicker, crunchier chip. Spray them lightly with the olive oil, and dust with the seasoning. Place in the oven and bake for 12-15 minutes. Check at 12 minutes since these will crisp up very quickly, especially if you've seperated the layers. Remove from the oven, and cool on wire racks. I just lift the piece of parchment off the sheet and move it to a rack. And once they're cooled I store mine in gallon-size freezer bags.

See how easy that was? So what are you waiting for - go make some! Have fun, get crazy with them.

Hummus

2010-06-21T21:08:00.000-04:00

I love hummus. If there was one food I had to have every day, it would probably be hummus. Hear that in there? The "ummmmm" sound. Hummmmmmus. Good stuff.

I made a fresh batch tonight to break in our new Cuisinart food processor. We got the little guy, it's just the two of us, plus the cat, and I don't think Whisper likes hummus...

There's hardly any prep to do at all for hummus. Chickpeas, tahini, olive oil, lemon juice, and garlic. The basic recipe I use is:

1 - 16 oz can of chickpeas, drained - reserve 1/4 cup liquid
2 cloves of garlic, crushed
1 1/2 tablespoons tahini
3 tbs fresh lemon juice
2 tablespoons olive oil
Salt to taste

Dump all this in your food processor and whomp it (That's a technical cooking term, whomp. It means to blend the bejeebers out of it) until it's nice and smooth.

That's it. You've just made hummus. It doesn't taste like it should be that simple, right? Well... if you want to get fancy you can:

Add few roasted red peppers
Sprinkle on some toasted pine nuts
Chop some cilantro or parsely and sprinkle on top
Add Chipotle Tabasco
Crumble some feta on top
Blend in some kalamata olives

You get the picture. You can pretty much add anything you want to hummus. My faves are feta and olives. What are yours?

Tofu Xpress

2010-05-16T17:10:00.002-04:00

Entering into the world of vegetarian eating has opened up new avenues of cooking and ingredients. I've done a lot of cooking in my days, and I've used a lot of different ingredients, but one thing I've never cooked with before was tofu.

Tofu... the name brings up images of a tasteless, white blob. Pretty much accurate, except that tofu is very versatile and can be used almost everywhere meat is. I'll admit to a certain amount of apprehension when I first used tofu. When the results were, to put it lightly, less than edible, I was ready to give up on cooking with tofu. But, I did a little research and picked up a few tips.

The big thing I found was draining/pressing the tofu. Pressing removes the water from tofu, allowing it to absorb more flavor from the ingredients it cooked with. So I had a block of extra-firm tofu wrapped in paper towels on a cutting board, and a 10" cast-iron skillet sitting on top of it to push the water out. It worked, to a point. There weren't enough towels to absorb the water so it ended up running all over the counter, but the tofu was reduced to about 3/4 the thickness. I sliced it into portions and fried it, and it came out good, better than prior attempts, but it still wasn't quite there.

Back to the interwebbernets for more research. That's when I stumbled on the Tofu Xpress. I looked at it, and looked at it, and finally, after months of waffling, went for it. Holy cow! I should have ordered this months ago!

It's pretty simple in concept, the developer talks about how she came up with it on the website. A container for the tofu and a lid that locks down and puts constant, steady pressure on the block. The first time I used the Tofu Xpress I was amazed at how much water came out of one block of extra-firm tofu after one hour in the fridge - more than I got out using the cast-iron press on the counter. And bonus, you can marinate the tofu in the same container after you're doing pressing it, it comes with a lid as well. You can also use it for pressing the water out of thawed frozen spinach or eggplant slices.

The tofu dishes I've made since I got this have been great, the texture is very dense and meaty - very similar to the tofu I'm used to from Thai and Chinese restaurants.

I'll be making this this week:

Spicy Orange/Garlic Tofu

1 block extra-firm tofu, well pressed and diced into cubes

2 cloves garlic, minced

2 tbsp olive oil

3 tbsp soy sauce

1/2 cup orange juice

Sriracha sauce, to taste.

2 tbsp seasoned rice vinegar

1/2 tsp fresh ginger, minced

1 1/2 tsp cornstarch dissolved in 3 tbsp water

Sauté tofu and garlic in olive oil for 3-4 minutes, until tofu is just lightly browned. In a seperate bowl, wisk soy sauce, orange juice, rice vinegar, Sriracha, and ginger. Pour over tofu and stir to coat Heat for 3-4 minutes, then add cornstarch and water, stir andrbing to a boil and cook until thick.

Serve over brown rice

Check out the Tofu Xpress website, it has a lot of good info and demos. It's a worthwhile investment, buy yours here!

I'm still alive!

2010-04-12T19:14:00.001-04:00

The lack of meat hasn't killed me, in fact, I'm feeling pretty good. It really hasn't been all that hard. Sure, I miss meat, but not as much as I thought I would. Specifically, I miss bacon and goetta. They've been talking about goetta at work recently, and it's got me wanting some in the worst way.

I think I'll try to make a vegetarian version of goetta. I'll let you know how it turns out.

Why?

2010-03-01T21:24:00.000-05:00

The question I'm most frequently asked, when I tell people I've given up red meat and poultry, is "Why?"

It's pretty simple actually. There's no grand reason, it's simply this: I wanted to.

Carol already eats this way, she has for eleven years, and she did for moral reasons. When we got married and moved in together, I said I would eat this way at home as well, since that would save us money and time; not having to buy meat or cook separate meals. I would eat meat when we were out, or at when I was at work. It was going pretty well, so I thought I could take it a step further and do it full-time.

That's it in a nutshell. No big dramatic reason or purpose.

Myra's

2010-02-21T20:53:00.000-05:00

This past Friday, Carol and I went to dinner with our friends Shawn and Katy, of Foodluv.net fame and more. Our destination: Myra’s Dionysus. It's been quite a few years since I've been to Myra's, and this would be Carol's first visit. It was pretty much as I remembered, small, quaint, cozy, and filled with incredible smells and a display case of goodies right inside the door.

After negotiating the parking lot tundra and the Sidewalk of Doom, we were lucky to score a table right away, right - if you've never been to Myra's, the seating is at a premium. But the food is well worth it. Seriously - vegetarians/vegans and carnivores alike will find something there.

The menu is full of choices to suit anyone's palate, and the four of us all found, after some hemming and hawing, tasty comestibles on which to sup. Carol went with the baked tofu with kecap manis and lime over sesame noodles with vegetables. I couldn't decide on any one thing and went with a sampler plate of pulao - Indian spices with coconut and raisins in brown rice served with a hot parsley chutney, the same baked tofu as Carol, and warm sesame noodles in a spicy peanut sauce. Oh yeah.. it was tasty.

Shawn went with Hoppin' Juan - Brown rice and black beans with a picante tomato salsa and onions - it usually has cheese, but since he and Katy are vegan, he opted not to get it. Katy chose one of the dishes I had been considering, Claudia's Creation - Chinese black bean sauce with sherry & garlic, garnished with mandarin oranges & broccoli and served over brown rice. She wasn't overly pleased with that, so I'm glad I didn't order it. Shawn was happy with his however.

Myra's is a great stop if you're looking for an inexpensive vegetarian meal, just be aware that the service can be a bit slow sometimes, but everyone who works there very friendly. They feature artwork from local artists which changes on a semi-regular basis, and they have a free(!) parking lot, which is a rarity in that neighborhood. We will definitely be repeat customers, especially in the warmer months when the patio is open.

40 Days of Water

2010-02-13T12:59:00.001-05:00

Want to help?

Super Wings

2010-02-10T21:03:00.001-05:00

Superbowl Sunday me and some other pals were at my friend Nick's house to watch the Saints lay a whuppin on the Colts. No need to recap the game, we all know who won...

But, as with any gathering of men to watch a game, there's lots of man food around. Lots of it. And right there in the middle of it all was something that took more effort than even bacon has so far.

Buffalo wings. Hot, spicy, saucy wings. Just sitting there in the tray staring at me and daring me to eat them. Oh, how I wanted them. I wanted them like nothing else, those beautiful wings swimming in sauce. It didn't matter that there was chips and salsa, shrimp, pretzels, and even the pizza (mushrooms, spinach, and roasted red peppers) that I brought. I wanted a wing, dangit.

Look at them, all seductive and crispy...

But I was stronger than that, despite the urge. Despite the fact that I could already taste the sauce. I held out. I was strong. I ate pizza and shrimp and cake and chips and salsa.

But I really wanted a wing,

The Challenge This Week

2010-01-30T06:42:00.001-05:00

Most of the week was pretty easy. I planned some decent meals for Carol and I, vegetarian chili in sourdough bread bowls, vegetarian cheese coneys - made with the leftover chili and Lightlife meatless hot dogs. Nothing fancy, but simple and satisfying.

Then came Friday... Friday there was a lunch at my customer's site to kick off their workstation refresh project. The catering of choice: Montgomery Inn.

For those of you outside of Cincinnati, Montgomery Inn is the premier rib restaurant in the city. It's not barbecue for you purists, but they do make some darn tasty ribs, and the sauce is outstanding. It's one of the restaurants where the "in crowd" likes to hang out, especially the Boathouse location on the river. Pictures of celebs, sports stars, and politicians decorate the walls, like this guy:

But... enough about the ribs. What did I do?

When the invite was sent out, I sent a message to Dave, the program manger, and told him I didn't eat red meat or poultry, and asked if I could get the Greek Salad instead. Of course I would still eat the Saratoga chips and other sides, but no meat for me.

When we got there, Dave handed me a pretty good sized bag. I figured it was the salad and some bread, but when I opened the bag, this is what it contained.

That,my friends, is what I like to call a "Big Honkin' Salad". This was easily a pound of lettuces, carrots, feta, eggs, olives, tomatoes, and pepperoncini. It was huge. I was impressed. I didn't think I would be able to eat the whole thing. And I was right. Between the Saratoga chips and the mac and cheese, I was able to eat about 1/2 of it, Even the people around me that were chomping on pulled pork sammiches were impressed by the size of it.

So, challenge met and passed. And on a side note, since I've stopped eating meat, I've lost 6 pounds. Maybe there's something to this vegetarian diet...

Real Men Eat Quiche

2010-01-22T07:42:00.000-05:00

Yes, I made quiche last night. Specifically, tomato, spinach and feta quiche. It was pretty freaking tasty, and simple to put together. I got the recipe here and tweaked it a little to our tastes. I wasn't a big phan of the phyllodough, it got a little too brown around the edges and flaked everywhere, but it was tasty.

I do plan on making it again, but I'll use regular pie crust, and mix up the veggies some. Carol's only complaint about this was "Too much spinach, not enough cheese."

And my pal Jill shared this with me after I posted I made quiche.

Admittedly, that would have been be not so long ago. But 22 days into this, and it's going alright. And on a side note, my total cholesterol when I started this was 175. Seriously, 175. It''l be interesting to see where it is one year from now

Did I also mention...

2010-01-18T09:56:00.000-05:00

That I gave up soda as well?

Yup, no more diet soda. Water will be my be beverage of choice, and of course coffee and iced tea.

Goodbye, Diet Mountain Dew

And this week brings...

2010-01-15T12:53:00.004-05:00

Success! Still no red meat or poultry, despite serious bacon cravings. A group of us from work went to the Gameday Sports Cafe before the Cyclones game Wednesday night, and while they have pretty much standard bar food, there was a Three-cheese grilled cheese on the menu, with the option of adding tomato and/or bacon.

Bacon...

Tasty, smoky, meat candy...

Oh how I wanted it. I wanted it to the point of drooling at the thought of it. I looked around and thought, "No one here knows I've given up bacon. No one will say anything to me if I order bacon and tomato on my grilled cheese."

But no... I held firm. No bacon, just tomato. But that did give me an idea... Bacon Salt! I have three different flavors already, I can use them the next time I make grilled cheese at home. Bacon bacon bacon bacon bacon!!

On the recipe front, I tried something I saw on the interwebbernet, Chickpea and Tomato Curry. Since Carol is not a big fan of curry, I cut back by about 2/3 the amount of curry powder it calls for, and it came out decent, but I think more curry would have helped it. Chickpeas are pretty versatile, as my friend Leigh can attest, and they add a nice change of pace from regular beans. Leigh takes some pretty awesome photos as well - check her out.

If you want to give it a shot, here's the recipe. It's very easy to make, and I served mine with quinoa instead of brown rice for a switch.

Chickpea and Tomato Curry

1 tablespoon olive or vegetable oil
1 medium onion, chopped (1/2 cup)
3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 tablespoon finely chopped gingerroot
1 tablespoon curry powder
2 cans (15 oz each) chick peas, drained, rinsed
2 cans (14.5 oz each) Muir Glen organic fire roasted diced tomatoes, undrained
1/2 cup finely chopped fresh cilantro
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
1/2 teaspoon coarse salt (kosher or sea salt)
Hot cooked rice
Plain Greek yogurt

1 - In 3-quart saucepan, heat oil over medium heat. Cook onion, garlic, gingerroot and curry powder in oil about 2 minutes, stirring frequently, until onion is tender.
2 - Stir in chick peas and tomatoes. Heat to boiling. Reduce heat; simmer uncovered 15 minutes, stirring occasionally. Stir in cilantro, lemon juice and salt.
3 - Serve over rice; top each serving with yogurt.

Peace!

Week 1 down

2010-01-08T21:17:00.004-05:00

It went well, there wasn't any real challenge to overcome. The first week I planned on taking things easy, I have bigger things planned for coming weeks...

I improvised a casserole with Quorn nuggets instead of chicken, potatoes, and mixed veggies. Came out pretty well, and very filling. We had pizza one night - tomatoes and spinach, and had enough left over for lunch the next day. Salmon & tilapia found there way into our bellies as well.

Some recipes I have my eye on...

Vegan Curry

Root Vegetable Shepherd's Pie

Traditional Baked Ziti (I'll make my own sauce for this one)

My pal Chaz hooked me up with some stock recipes, I'm going to make a big batch of veggie stock to freeze into portions - we'll be using a lot of this for making brown rice, quinoa, and soups.

And check out Foodluv's post on vegetarian/vegan options at Dunkin Donuts!

Hi There

2009-12-31T09:07:00.000-05:00

Hi! This is the first post in my year-long experiment of eliminating red meat and poultry from my diet. Fish, dairy, and eggs are ok, and of course tofu/seitan/tempeh and many of the products from Morningstar Farms, Quorn, & Boca, among others.

Drop in from time to time and see how I'm doing, offer suggestions/praise/encouragement/, check out recipes and experiments, and product reviews.

Peace!