Appetizers and Dips

Pimento Cheese-Style Hummus

June 14, 2013
Thumbnail image for Pimento Cheese-Style Hummus

Years ago, I was making red pepper hummus at my parents’ house when my mother asked for a taste. “Hmmm,” she said. “It’s sort of like pimento cheese.” Now, I don’t know if that was a good thing to her or not; we’d never had pimento cheese in the house when I was growing up, [...]

Read the full article →

Ajvar (Roasted Red Pepper and Eggplant Relish)

March 8, 2013
Thumbnail image for Ajvar (Roasted Red Pepper and Eggplant Relish)

Someone once wrote that every good novel must contain at least one recipe. Although I wouldn’t go quite that far, I agree that food can be a window into a novel’s world and its characters’ culture. I always pay particular attention to what characters are eating, especially when a book is set in another part [...]

Read the full article →

Black-Eyed Pea Hummus

September 24, 2012
Thumbnail image for Black-Eyed Pea Hummus

Black-eyed peas have such a distinctive flavor that they may seem like an odd base for hummus, but I was so intrigued by a recipe for Black-Eyed Pea Hummus in our local paper that I decided to give it a whirl. I totally ignored the recipe, of course (it contained 2 cups of olive oil [...]

Read the full article →

Berbere-Spiced Red Lentil Hummus

July 30, 2012
Thumbnail image for Berbere-Spiced Red Lentil Hummus

Some couples read love poems to each other; my husband and I read restaurant menus. One of our favorite parts of planning a vacation is figuring out where we are going to eat. I like to ask my facebook followers for recommendations while my husband likes to use Google. We come up with a big [...]

Read the full article →

Hummus in the Blender

March 12, 2012
Thumbnail image for Hummus in the Blender

Always travel with hummus. That’s my advice to new vegans and to anyone trying to eat healthy on the road. Having hummus in a small cooler saved us last month when my family went to New Orleans for Mardi Gras. With the streets and streetcars closed for parades, we were limited to restaurants we could [...]

Read the full article →

Bryanna’s Low-Fat Veggie “Guacamole”

September 26, 2011
Bryanna's Low-Fat Veggie Guacamole

In my den, two bookcases sag under the weight of the dozens of cookbooks I’ve managed to cram into them. Cookbooks spill out onto the neighboring coffee table, line the counter between kitchen and den, and form heaps around my bed. Sometimes I read them like novels, the sidebars and stories especially, and sometimes I [...]

Read the full article →

Green Curry Tofu Cakes

May 9, 2011
Green Curry Tofu Cakes

If you made my last recipe, I know you have a jar of Thai green curry paste somewhere in your fridge, although you could have done the wise thing and stored it in your freezer. But, if you’re like me, you always believe you’re going to be using it right away, so you keep it [...]

Read the full article →

White Bean Salad with Za’atar

April 12, 2011
White Bean Salad with Zatar

Chickpea salads are very popular in my household. My daughter E likes them so much that she often helps me throw them together, and we never use exactly the same formula twice. Over the weekend, I decided to really shake things up and, instead of chickpeas, make a bean salad from great northern beans. I [...]

Read the full article →

Cucumber Hummus

August 12, 2010
Cucumber Hummus Recipe

Monday afternoon I got back from vacation with a suitcase full of dirty laundry, four camera cards full of photos, and an injured hand and rib.  The short story on the injuries is that after tiptoeing around for a week on Maine’s rocky shorelines and mountainsides, terrified I’d either break an ankle or wind up [...]

Read the full article →

Baked Spring Rolls and Low-Fat Lo Mein

May 22, 2010
Easy Baked Spring Rolls

Instead of having two recipes for you today, I came very close to having none.  If my husband and daughter hadn’t walked in right in the middle of my culinary meltdown, tasted a couple of the misshapen spring rolls I had managed to coax out of the dried out wrappers that had been buried in [...]

Read the full article →

Chinese Vegetarian Chicken with Simple Five-Spice Sauce

May 4, 2010
Chinese Vegetarian Chicken

Sometimes I’m a bit slow.  I decide to make something and then, for no clear reason, it takes me days, weeks, or months to get around to actually cooking it.  This time, it’s been close to three years since I first tasted this dish, blogged about it, and even bought the main ingredient for it.  [...]

Read the full article →

Saintly Black and Gold Salsa

February 7, 2010
Saintly Black and Gold Salsa

I don’t usually write about the Superbowl. Heck, I wouldn’t usually even know it’s going on, but this year it is a Very Big Deal around here. After 43 years, the Saints have made it into their first Superbowl, so there’s about 43 years worth of celebrating to do, and if there’s one thing New [...]

Read the full article →

Artichoke Tapenade

April 22, 2009
Artichoke Tapendae

When D and I got married, 13 years ago next month, we did the catering for our wedding ourselves. Now before you go and get all impressed, I have to point out that it was a small wedding, around 45 close friends and family members, and the menu consisted of finger foods and pasta salad. [...]

Read the full article →

Moin-Moin (Nigerian Savory Black-eyed Pea Cake)

January 1, 2009
Moin-Moin

Happy New Year! As you know, it’s supposed to be lucky to eat black-eyed peas on New Year’s Day. Every year around this time I scour my cookbooks and my imagination for new ways to cook them because the way I grew up eating them was, frankly, a little boring–as well as not vegetarian. Last [...]

Read the full article →

Mushroom, Lentil, and Wild Rice Timbales

November 23, 2008
Mushroom, Lentil, and Wild Rice Timbales

My Thanksgiving menu planning will always be an exercise in fantasy because we celebrate the holiday at my in-laws’, but if I were serving Thanksgiving dinner at my house this year, my menu would include Green Bean Casserole, mashed potatoes and mushroom gravy, cornbread dressing, Cranberry Relish, Sweet Potato Casserole, Double-Layer Pumpkin Cheesecake, and these [...]

Read the full article →

Spooky Black Bean Hummus

October 25, 2008
Spooky Black Bean Hummus

I have two standard Halloween recipes in my, ahhem, repertoire. One of them involves baking the equivalent of a 4-layer chocolate cake in the shape of a pumpkin; it contains a gazillion calories and takes most of an afternoon to make. As you can probably guess, I don’t make that one very often. When I [...]

Read the full article →

Roasted Eggplant-Almond Dip

August 15, 2008
Roasted Eggplant-Almond Dip

I’d like to take all the credit for this interesting version of eggplant dip, but I can’t; it’s minimally adapted from Paul Gayler’s A Passion for Vegetables where its called Bhurtho (Smoked Eggplant Dip). From the name he gives it, I suspect Gayler was going for an Indian-style dish, yet the almonds and the lack [...]

Read the full article →

Spicy Roasted Eggplant Spread

June 18, 2008
Spicy Roasted Eggplant Spread

Middle East meets Southwest in this wrap I concocted on the spur of the moment last night. I’d thrown an eggplant into the toaster oven to roast, intending to make my standard baba ganoush, but just before it was done I realized that I was all out of pita bread. Since our hearts were set [...]

Read the full article →

Portabellas Stuffed with Red Pepper Hummus

August 31, 2007
Thumbnail image for Portabellas Stuffed with Red Pepper Hummus

I’ve been afraid of cooking with hummus ever since I had a hummus pizza while on vacation in Colorado last year. The idea sounded good–pizza crust slathered with hummus, topped with kalamata olives–but in actual execution it tasted dry and bland. Perhaps that was the restaurant’s fault because I’ve come around to the idea of [...]

Read the full article →

Bruschetta with Roasted Baby Tomatoes

July 22, 2007
Bruschetta with Roasted Tomatoes

I’m taking a little break from my constant reading of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows to tell you about the most delicious thing I’ve eaten all summer (and keep eating again and again), which is also the simplest. I mentioned before that we are up to our elbows in cherry and grape tomatoes from [...]

Read the full article →

Baked Spinach Kofta with Cucumber-Yogurt Sauce

June 22, 2007
Baked Spinach Kofta

I never buy cookbooks for the pictures, but I broke that rule a few months ago after previewing Tropical Asian Cooking. It’s nowhere near a vegan book, though there are several vegetarian or near-vegetarian recipes, but the photos were just so lovely that I had to have a copy. So I bought it and it [...]

Read the full article →

Dal Bhaji–A Recipe Redux

June 14, 2007
Dal Bhaji

Think of it as the Indian version of sloppy joes. Pav Bhaji, the wonderful street food of Mumbai, traditionally consists of a potato and vegetable curry (or bhaji) served on a bun (or pav). I’ve never had the pleasure of sampling Pav Bhaji in Mumbai, but I did cook up my own version last year, [...]

Read the full article →

Baba Ganoush Vegetable Plate

March 22, 2007
Thumbnail image for Baba Ganoush Vegetable Plate

I absolutely love baba ganoush. I often say that I could live on it, and believe me, if it were eggplant season right now, I would have it almost every day. It wasn’t always so. In the past I had to ration my beloved baba, saving it up for an occasional treat. My self-denial wasn’t [...]

Read the full article →

Mini Crustless Tofu Quiches

December 4, 2006
Mini Crustless Tofu Quiches

I don’t have a lot to say about this recipe. I mean, there are only so many ways I can say something’s delicious—Mmmmm! Yum! Wow! Awesome! Kid-Friendly!—without sounding like a 4th grader. The story on these quiches is that I saw a non-vegan recipe for mini crustless quiches in a magazine and wanted to try [...]

Read the full article →

Patatas Bravas

November 9, 2006
Patatas Bravas

I was looking through a copy of one of those photo-filled, generic cookbooks that’s put out by magazines like Family Circle, and a recipe for Patatas Bravas caught my eye because it sounded good and I had all the ingredients at hand. All I had to do was swap the fried potatoes with baked ones–eliminating [...]

Read the full article →

Portabella Sushi Rolls

October 25, 2006

[I apologize for not posting the sushi recipe yesterday as promised; I tried all day, but Blogger just was not cooperating. Anyone else having this problem?] Those of you who are eager to get out your sushi mats might want to take a look at some of my older sushi recipes. In this recipe and [...]

Read the full article →

Hummus Salad

September 15, 2006
Hummus Salad with Pecan Dijon Dressing

Day 5 is finally here! It’s been a hectic week for me. Normally I do the bulk of my cooking at night so I can write about it the next morning, when I’m at my most energetic. Having to make a photogenic salad, photograph it, eat it, and then, still stuffed from lunch, write about [...]

Read the full article →

Ful Medames (Fava Bean Dip)

July 25, 2006
Thumbnail image for Ful Medames (Fava Bean Dip)

I’ve been taking a break from cooking for the past few days. On Friday I made my favorite lasagna, but after that, I didn’t cook one thing, unless you count steamed vegetables, until Monday night. With my husband out of town, my daughter and I happily dined on leftovers and take-out from the local natural [...]

Read the full article →

Roasted Tomato Bean Dip: A Garden Update and Recipe

July 7, 2006

I’ve been having to race against birds this summer. Not a flying race, of course, but an eating one. They want to eat all the best tomatoes in my garden just before they’re completely ripe, and I’ve had my heart broken several times when I’ve gone out to harvest the biggest, reddest tomato only to [...]

Read the full article →

Portabellas Stuffed with Pesto-Mashed Potatoes

June 23, 2006
Thumbnail image for Portabellas Stuffed with Pesto-Mashed Potatoes

I’ve been dying to stuff something into a portabella ever since I saw Catherine’s lucious-looking Portobellos Stuffed with Lentils, Stilton, & Walnuts last month. I’ve also been looking for a unique way to serve mashed potatoes, so last night I came up with this idea. (I had thought about stuffing them with hummus, but since [...]

Read the full article →

Grape Leaves Stuffed with Lentils and Rice

May 29, 2006

For months I’ve been meaning to make stuffed grape leaves; it’s been in the back of my mind ever since I saw Leslie’s delicious creations on her blog. If I’d made them then, it’d have looked like I was copying! So, I waited a respectable length of time and finally got down to work and made [...]

Read the full article →

Green Olive Hummus

May 27, 2006
Thumbnail image for Green Olive Hummus

If you are beginning to think my family lives on hummus, you’re very close to being right. We use hummus for just about everything around here: a snack with veggies and crackers, a salad topping, a sandwich filling, and dinner with pitas, tabouli, and other Middle Eastern dishes. We love hummus. We also love olives: [...]

Read the full article →

Artichoke and Roasted Red Pepper Dip

May 20, 2006
Thumbnail image for Artichoke and Roasted Red Pepper Dip

The photo above is of my dinner last night. You see, last night was the final day of a 5-day challenge I created for myself. For five days I gave up beans, grains, and most starchy vegetables and concentrated on eating more fruits and non-starchy vegetables. Why? Partly because I’d been relying on beans and [...]

Read the full article →

Almost-Instant Hummus Ghanoush

May 12, 2006
Almost-Instant Hummus Gannoush

I had a sudden craving for baba ghanoush, but it was much too late to roast an eggplant. So I decided on an unorthodox method of cooking it, in the pressure cooker. Within about 5 minutes, I had completely cooked eggplant and also a problem: The eggplant was hot, and whoever heard of eating hot [...]

Read the full article →

Vegan Onigiri

May 8, 2006

On Saturday, I made Onigiri to go with the Cabbage Nori Rolls I served to my family and our young guest. Though the rolls didn’t contain any rice, Onigiri are virtually all rice. They’re made by simply cupping sticky, hot sushi rice in your hand and pressing it into a triangle or other shape around [...]

Read the full article →

Cabbage Nori Rolls

May 7, 2006
Thumbnail image for Cabbage Nori Rolls

Here’s a recipe that proved to me that my daughter will eat anything wrapped in nori with baked tofu. Though the friend she invited to eat with us didn’t care for them (she’s not a fan of sushi either), E. couldn’t get enough of these. She must have eaten 12 of them by herself. If [...]

Read the full article →

Chipotle Chickpea Dip

May 6, 2006
Thumbnail image for Chipotle Chickpea Dip

I’d pretty much decided to leave yesterday’s lunch off the blog until my husband came home and devoured the leftovers, saying “This is the best hummus ever!” I pointed out that it’s not really hummus. “It doesn’t have any tahini at all, and the flavors are Southwestern rather than Middle Eastern. And it’s super-spicy. Maybe [...]

Read the full article →

Shiny Happy Hummus

April 22, 2006
Thumbnail image for Shiny Happy Hummus

When it comes to hummus, there truly are 32 flavors and then some. While hummus is always on the menu in my house, I like to shake things up often and try new variations. Recently, I was intrigued by the Moroccan Carrot Hummus served up over on 28 Cooks; I didn’t have enough baby carrots [...]

Read the full article →

Miang Kum Rolls

March 18, 2006
Thumbnail image for Miang Kum Rolls

What do you get when you combine a Thai snack food with a Vietnamese spring roll wrapper: Miang Kum Rolls, of course! Here’s the back-story: I was thinking of making up a batch of Spring Rolls, to go with the Korean Stew I was planning for dinner last night. And I also had a craving [...]

Read the full article →

Tamale Bites

March 10, 2006
Tamale Bites

A recent post at Vegan Lunch Box actually had me out looking to buy a Twinkie pan! Jennifer, inspired by a tip from a reader, made vegan corn dogs for her son using a Twinkie pan. This, I thought, was brilliant. After all, if you can put a veggie dog inside of corn bread, you [...]

Read the full article →

Pav Bhaji (Spicy Mixed Vegetables on Buns)

March 4, 2006
Pav Bhaji

Sailu’s Food recently posted this amazing recipe for Pav Bhaji, which she describes as “the quintessential Mumbai street food,” and I couldn’t wait to try it. After all, I love Indian food, and this recipe contains bunches of vegetables and lots of spiciness. So last night, while daughter E. (aka “the spice hater”) was off [...]

Read the full article →

Smoky Chipotle Guacamole

January 25, 2006

Lunch for me is usually an enormous salad topped with some kind of beans, either in the form of hummus or, when I’m in the mood for a Taco Salad, refried or chili beans. Today was a taco salad day, and since I had two avocados that had reached their peak of ripeness, I decided [...]

Read the full article →

Spicy Red Pepper Hummus and a Movie

January 14, 2006

Friday night is usually DVD night here, and we normally try to pick something that we can watch as a family. But since our 8-year-old daughter was having a sleep-over at the neighbors’, we were able to watch something a little more adult. We chose Hustle & Flow, which we really liked. Terrence Howard’s performance [...]

Read the full article →