Hiatus

I am really, really mentally and physically exhausted right now and keeping up the blog on a weekly basis is just not working for me. I have a lot of posts in the “almost ready to go” phase that I just haven’t had the energy to finish preparing, and this makes me sad.

I plan to be back. I just don’t know when, but I hope it will be soon. I just need to clear off my to-do list anything that’s not immediately essential for a while, while I try to get my mind back in good working order and myself out of constant stress mode.

So, until we meet again… have a lovely summerspring!

Virtual Vegan Potluck: Herbed Roasted Potatoes in Cheezy Sauce

For my contribution to this potluck, I chose to make a potato dish, because one Cannot Go Wrong with potatoes. And this is super easy to put together, and also very tasty.

You can see I had a whole meal of sides when I tested these potatoes. Yum.

Begin with:
5 cups red potatoes, skins on, diced into roughly 1″ cubes (you could use russets, but I tested both and the textural results were much better with the red potatoes)

Bring to boil and simmer 5 minutes. Remove from heat, drain, and set aside.

In a bowl, combine:
2 1/2 T white flour
2 T nutritional yeast
2 tsp onion powder
1 tsp salt
2 tsp basil
1 tsp tarragon
1 tsp garlic powder

Stir in:
1 T  veggie oil
1 1/4 c water

Whisk together until smooth and no lumps remain. Pour into a sprayed 2-qt casserole dish and stir in potatoes to coat.

Roast at 350 for 20-30 minutes, stirring every 10 minutes until golden brown and easily pierced with a butter knife.

Return to previous dish * On to the next dish * Start over again at the beginning

Cookbook Review: More Peas, Thank You

I got this book free via the Amazon Vine program. I had heard of the Peas and Thank You blog from a friend, but had never visited it, and really my only thought was, “Hey, free cookbook, and it’s already vegan.”

It arrived and immediately I fell in love. I have never gotten a cookbook and been so fixated on trying recipe after recipe. What’s the appeal?

Well, firstly, she uses ingredients that are readily available, and that I generally have on hand. The recipes are also pretty healthy, with lots of use of whole wheat flour and cutting back on fats, even in the desserts.

Secondly, the book is really colourful with pictures of almost every single recipe. I find food photography stimulating in a cookbook.

So, what have I tried from this cookbook? Here’s the rundown.

Breakfast Category:

Strawberry Multigrain Cereal Bars: I’ve tried several different variants of this concept now from different sources: press in a crust, spread on jam, crumble remaining crust on top. The one I grew up with is still my favourite. However, this one has considerably less fat and sugar in it. It was really good and GooGoo loved it too.

Oatmeal Cookie Granola: Very good. I can’t say that “oatmeal cookie” was really my first thought, though, probably because of the abundance of (tasty) roasty almonds. However, I enjoyed it.

PB&J Smoothies: Interesting. GooGoo wouldn’t touch it with a ten-foot pole after the first taste. As it ends up, I fail at reading directions and it said not to add the salt if using salted peanut butter, and so we ended up with a sort of salty smoothie. At any rate, not in a big hurry to try this one again.

Tempeh Bacon: I just heart vegan bacon. Usually I do the gluten bacon bits, but this was super yum. I made French toast to eat with it.

Pumpkin Cheesecake Muffins: I only had enough cream cheese to do half a batch with the cream cheese topping. So we had 6 plain ones and six with the filling, and I guess I actually liked the plain ones better. I couldn’t really taste the cream cheese and it was extremely sticky and messy. I think were I to make these again I’d just do it without the cream cheese, and reduce the nutmeg a touch as well. They tasted loads better when my friend made them, but she said she added a little oil.

Cherry Oat Scones

Cherry Oat Scones: These were AMAZING. We snarfed them all up very quickly for supper. I made a double batch the second time and they all disappeared into our tummies except for two.

Peach Cornmeal Muffins: These probably would have been pretty good except that I decided to use my new-to-me muffin tin from the thrift store. I HAD washed it, but apparently not thoroughly enough, because the oven, the house, yea verily the muffins themselves, were all infused with this absolutely vile scent and taste of STALE USED MUFFIN TIN.

Sometime I’ll have to try it again sans stale used muffin tin.

Pineapple Upside-Down Muffins

Pineapple Upside-Down Muffins: Mmm. I lack a jumbo muffin tin, so I went to the opposite end of the spectrum and made this as mini muffins. I cut pineapple slices into eighths, so I needed 3 slices to fill 24 muffin cups, and I topped with maraschino cherries chopped into eighths as well. Delectable.

Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls

Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls: I wouldn’t say these are “to die for”. We found them a bit dry. I really want to try adapting my own cinnamon roll recipe with the same spices and pumpkin, though.

Snacks, Sides, and Sauces:

Pizza Popcorn: I think this is the only recipe I’ve actually just plain not liked. I’m pretty sure it has to do with my iffy relationship with nooch, and I think were I to do it again I’d use almond parmesan instead of straight nooch for the cheesy flavour. And probably not bother baking it.

Then again, Mr Pine Nut has a very happy relationship with nooch, and he didn’t like it either.

Cocoanut Rice: This had promise, but something seems amiss in the directions. I felt like it needed more liquid and longer cooking time. I don’t know if regular brown rice is drastically different from jasmine brown rice? Anyway, it was still really chewy after cooking for the designated time and I’m going to have to add more liquid and cook what was leftover some more to be really edible.

Cracklin’ Cauliflower: I love curry tremendously… but these were a little too spicy for me and therefore definitely not something either Mr Pine Nut or GooGoo cared for. But I liked the texture of the roasted cauliflower (roasting veggies is kind of a new thing to me) and I think with slightly less spice I’d enjoy it more.

Soups, Salads, and Sandwiches:

Tofu Noodle Soup

Tofu Noodle Soup: I realised as I was making this that it’s supposed to be like Chicken Noodle Soup, except, well, tofu. It was good. It calls for cubed baked tofu but no instructions for how to bake tofu, and I hadn’t time to look it up, so I cubed it up and threw it in the oven at 350 and turned it once and it got this awesome texture. Next time, though, I’ll marinate it in some salt/mock chicken seasoning first, because the flavourless-ness was a little much. But otherwise, the soup was fantastic.

Green and White Bean Chili: I made this for company. I did a double batch and used 1 jar of Herdez salsa verde because I was in a hurry and fresh out of tomatillos. That’s less than a doubled batch would actually have called for (I think, I can’t do math), and it was pretty hot. None of the kids were really fond of it based on how much got left in their bowls. I liked it, though. It’s possible that the Salsa Verde recipe in the book isn’t nearly as hot as the Herdez stuff. One of these days I’ll try it – soon, I hope, because I love green salsa.

Cowboy Caviar

Cowboy Caviar: We ate this over baked potatoes, and it was super yummy. (I subbed lemon juice for the vinegar as per my usual.) I also made it with garbanzo beans once – delish.

Even the cat approved of Cowboy Caviar.

Dinners:

Tempeh Tamale Pie

Tempeh Tamale Pie: This was a little iffy in my book. I’m not sure if my cornmeal was bad, or what it was, but it tasted really off to me. My friend made it and liked it a lot. So who knows. It was really pretty, though, and my first attempt at a tamale pie that actually has the cornbread on the top.

Roasted Chickpea Tacos: Yum and a hit with the company to whom I served them.

Black-eyed Pea Veggie Burgers

Black-eyed Pea Veggie Burgers: As I was perusing this book on receipt of it, I noticed a few of the recipes called for black-eyed peas. As luck would have it, we had none in the house either canned or dried, but our local Thriftway happened to have cans of them for 69 cents a piece in their discard carts.

Desserts:

Pumpkin Gingersnap Cookie Dough Balls: Turned out nothing like the ones in the picture, although they tasted pretty good. Mine came out very very flat.

Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies: These also came out really flat and rather fragile, but OH were they tasty. I did half raisins, half chocolate chips.

Apple Cider Doughnuts: I don’t have a doughnut pan, so I did it in mini muffin pans. When I tasted one still warm from the oven I was not impressed. They tasted really weird to me, like I’d accidentally put in too much of one of the spices, and I was bummed. But then after they were cool I tried them again and they were really awesome. So I don’t know what was up with that, but at any rate, I will definitely make these again.

Blueberry Doughnuts: These are interesting because the blueberries get blended up, so there’s no worry about blueberries sticking to the pan. Very tasty and a hit with all three of us. Well, four, if you count Lou Who trying to get to them, even though she’s still too little for muffins.

***

In summation: I really like this cookbook, and I’m looking forward to trying more of the recipes out of it. I highly recommend it as an introduction to meatless cuisine.

Literary Post: Farmer Boy. Keeping House. Pound Cake.

I got a set of Little House books, paperback with the solid sky-blue binding, when I was seven. I deemed the first book “babyish” and “stupid”. My friend Edda tried to sell me on it: “But it’s so neat! They go spend Christmas with their cousins!”

Eh, thought I. Cousins are NO BIG DEAL. I only had one at that time in my life, and he was considerably younger and considerably far away. (These days I have to admit Edda had grounds to speak with some expertise on the awesomeness of cousins, however, having quite a horde of them herself.)

No, I was far more interested in the gruesome idea of putting one’s mouth on a pig bladder and blowing it up like a balloon. Aside from that, Little House in the Big Woods held little appeal for me.

The third one, Farmer Boy, I had no interest in, either. It was a BOY story, about BOYS, and surely it was therefore BORING. But finally I read it and it immediately became my favourite in the series, and I think it still is (though Little Town on the Prairie is awfully close.)

The entire series talks about food a lot. I have to admit, most of the food doesn’t appeal to me at all, but I felt I could hardly do a literary food series without giving some sort of nod to the Little House books. Pickled watermelon rinds were out. Salt pork was out, and blown-up pig bladders definitely out.

And then I remembered this:

That day they made ice-cream again, and they ate the last cake. Alice said she knew how to make a pound-cake. She said she’d make one, and then she was going to go sit in the parlor. Almanzo thought that wouldn’t be any fun. [...boring paragraph where Eliza Jane tells Alice not to sit in the parlor, blah blah blah...]

That afternoon he came into the kitchen to see if the pound cake was done. Alice was taking it out of the oven. It smelled so good that he broke a little piece off the corner. Then Alice cut a slice to hide the broken place, and then they ate two more slices with the last of the ice-cream.

(My friend graciously typed the quote up for me, since my own copy of the book is currently in storage. I left her bracketed comment in because it amused me.)

I decided to experiment with the notion of pound cake in the sense that the Wilders would most likely have eaten it: the 1:1:1:1 ration of butter, flour, sugar, and eggs. I tried it first with flax eggs, and that was a gooey, strange piece of denseness. I tried it the second time with Ener-G Egg Replacer. It was still fairly gooey, but extremely tasty. The third and final time I added a little baking powder just to lighten it up and make it less gooey.

So, here are the weights (quarter-pound of each of the main ingredients) converted to cups, because I hate weighing, and in the event you do too, this makes it easier for everyone.

1 stick vegan margarine
1/2 c sugar
7 T water
2 1/4 tsp Ener-G Egg Replacer
1 cup all-purpose flour
Pinch salt
1 tsp aluminum-free baking powder

Cream together margarine and sugar. Add water and egg replacer and beat together. Add flour, salt, and baking powder. Mix until incorporated.

Bake at 350 in a greased mini loaf pan for 55-60 minutes. Toothpick should come out clean.

The end result: It’s still not the light-fluffy-lemony pound cake we’re all familiar with today. However, it’s got a really lovely flavour and a nice tender texture that would be perfect for eating with fresh berries in the summertime.

Kind of like shortcake.

Maybe even with… ice cream.

Literary Post: The Boxcar Children. Jessie’s Stew.

By the end of last week, I was mostly back to normal, but here are two things that perplex me:

• I have a massive sugar addiction.
• I think Lou Who has a peanut allergy.

Regarding the first thing, I have such bad withdrawal symptoms if I try to just completely stop eating sugar that I’ve yet to make concentrated efforts to completely stop. I can go all morning if I need to. But then I get kind of grouchy and cranky and stuff. So I have a cookie (or two, or ten).

The solution that has worked in the past is to just stop making sweets that go into the freezer, because it’s too easy for me to run out there and grab cookies. I need to make them, take them somewhere, and make sure they don’t come back home with me. And then I’m fine. If it’s not here, I stop feeling like I have to eat it, and the withdrawal symptoms are almost nil. Interesting.

So, that being said, this week’s church potluck is getting a lot of cookies from yours truly, because there are a lot of cookies in the freezer at the moment.

As for the second thing, I have to let the rash around her mouth clear up first and then eat some peanuts again just to make sure it is indeed the peanuts and not something else. I’m bummed because peanut butter-jam sandwiches are about the best thing in the world, and I really just don’t like almond butter. It’s like tasteless paste in my mouth. Bleh. I like the crunchy, chunky, salty flavour/texture of peanut butter. So, I have to keep reminding myself: it could be worse. It could be gluten. I’ll either have to start salting my almond butter or try some other alternatives.

At any rate, it’s time for another LITERARY POST. It should have gone up last week, but I was just too stressed and didn’t have time to prepare it, so here it is today instead.

I was a huge Boxcar Children fan as a child. I read all of the 19 books in the original series, but many of the later ones I only read once. The first 6 or so were my favourites; they seemed to start repeating themselves more and more as the series went on (burning question: did Henry ever make it through college?) My all-time favourites were easily the first book, Mike’s Mystery, The Woodshed Mystery, Mountain Top Mystery, and Snowbound Mystery. I had a stuffed dog I named Jessie and always thought, “What FUN it would be to live in a BOXCAR and have to be INGENIOUSLY CREATIVE.”

No, the irony has not been lost on me.

To me the illustrations in the first book are iconic. I’ve never seen this kind of art in any other book and always was a little sad that this (as I recall) anonymous illustrator did not continue doing the rest of the series. Does anyone know otherwise? Please correct me if I’m wrong.

At any rate, I decided to replicate the stew described in The Boxcar Children.

I didn’t use baby vegetables, although for authenticity you’re welcome to do so if you are lucky enough to have them available. For my “meat” I used some basic gluten steaks chopped up. It had been in the freezer and I just put it into the crockpot frozen, but you could thaw it first if you want to or use it fresh – or substitute whatever your preferred beef sub might be.

Note on crockpots: I used my smallish Rival crockpot that is about 10 cup capacity. If you use a larger one or smaller one, cooking times may vary, but this is what worked for that size.

Stewy stew.

Jessie’s Stew

1 lb faux meat, cut in pieces
2 large turnips, cut in chunks
4 medium carrots, cut in chunks
2-4 green onions – I used 2 because mine are huge
1 tsp salt
1 tsp beef-like seasoning of choice
1 T tapioca flour (or cornstarch)
2 1/2 c  water

Layer the faux meat and veggies in your crockpot in the order given. Sprinkle salt, beaf seasoning, and tapioca flour on top. Pour water over all.

Turn the crockpot on high and cook 5 hours. (I stirred mine just once after 3 1/2 hours).

And now I’ve had a birthday.

And I’m 30, and I really don’t care. In fact, I’d like to flaunt it. 30, and flirty, and thriving, right?

Definitely.

So, my life this past week has been utterly insane and I’m reeling from all the insanity and struggling to keep my head above the water, so to speak. We had a bonfire on Sunday afternoon/evening (I’ll post about that later) and it was loads of fun but also loads of work and I made probably enough food to feed three times the people that showed up. I’m not complaining; we had very good attendance, but I think we’ll be eating Brasilian rice the rest of our lives.

Anyway, due to that, I haven’t slept well in about a week. I think too much while preparing for things and then I think too much afterwards. So. Much. Stimulation. And when I don’t get enough sleep, I begin to get incredibly irrational about everything, and life is miserable and there are lots of tears and everything is disaster and nuclear bombs and despair.

So I almost didn’t make myself a cake because I was feeling so low, but then I decided I would, because why not, even though I’ve been cooking a lot and I’m sick to death of the kitchen and I already have at least 3 kinds of cookies in large bags in the freezer and I’m kind of sick of sugar. Yes, me, sick of sugar.

So I made myself a cake. I call it the Minstrel Boy in Prison Cake. If you don’t get the reference, keep reading and you’ll get some hints later on.

I’m very picky when it comes to carrot cakes. I’ve tried a lot of recipes for them and while they’re all pretty good, the one I grew up with is still my favourite. It has all the elements I consider essential for a carrot cake, not the least of which is CRUSHED PINEAPPLE omnomnom.

So, let’s interject my mom’s carrot cake recipe here, veganised.

In large mixing bowl, sift together:

1 1/2 c all-purpose flour

3/4 c sugar

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp salt

In separate bowl, whisk together:

2/3 c veggie oil

4 T water + 1 T Ener-G egg replacer (this is equivalent to 2 eggs)

1 c finely grated carrots

1/2 c crushed pineapple in juice, undrained

1 tsp vanilla

Add liquid ingredients to dry and stir until moistened; beat 2 minutes at medium speed on electric mixer. [I did it by hand and just stirred it around a few times, definitely not for 2 minutes.] Bake at 350 in greased/floured 9×9″ pan for 35-45 minutes, whenever toothpick comes out clean. Cool for 10 minutes before removing from pan if you plan to remove it.

Cream Cheese Frosting

3 oz. vegan cream cheese (I had Follow Your Heart brand in my fridge, but you could also use Tofutti)

1 T vegan margarine, softened

1 tsp vanilla

 2 c powdered sugar

In small bowl, beat cream cheese, margarine, and vanilla. Mix till light. Gradually add sugar, beating till fluffy. If necessary, add a bit of non-dairy milk or water to make it the correct spreading consistency.

This cake does need to remain refrigerated when not in use. (Or “pie”, as GooGoo insisted on calling it. She wanted to eat the “HAPPY BIRDAY” PIE all morning.)

***

Now, what about the minstrel boy?

The minstrel boy to the war is gone,
In the ranks of death you’ll find him;
His father’s sword he hath girded on,
And his wild harp slung behind him;
“Land of Song!” cried the warrior bard,
“Tho’ all the world betrays thee,
One sword, at least, thy right shall guard,
One faithful harp shall praise thee!”
The Minstrel fell! But the foeman’s chain
Could not bring that proud soul under;
The harp he lov’d ne’er spoke again,
For he tore its chords asunder;
And said “No chains shall sully thee,
Thou soul of love and brav’ry!
Thy songs were made for the pure and free
They shall never sound in slavery!

Now, if you still don’t get it, read the poem carefully and go back and look at the cake again.

And finally, here is a picture of a seriously awesome birthday present for you to enjoy looking at.

Oh yes I will. Expect recipes with pinenuts (that you can sub sunflower seeds for) in the future. *rolls around in the culinary gold that is pine nuts*

Pinterest Roundup

Admit it: if you have a Pinterest, you have boards upon boards of recipes pinned. I know I do.

Reality has set in and I’ve quit being so liberal about pinning new recipes to my boards lately, but there are some I’ve actually tried (imagine that!), so here’s a roundup of some of those for you, with my comments – some good, some bad.

Chickpeas with Roasted Cumin and Tomatoes : This was yum. One might argue that I didn’t REALLY make this recipe, because I didn’t use an Actual Clove and Cardamom, subbing ground instead, but whatevs. It was super good. I didn’t add the chilies; I added some cayenne powder afterwards to mine because I have two spicephobes in my house.

Kale-Garlic Waffles : These were fantastic. GooGoo even loved them. I can’t remember now what we ate ON them (if anything), but they were good just buttered and munched.

Hasselback Potatoes : Okay, these tasted really good, but they were way more work than it was worth. It was hard to not quite cut all the way to the bottom of the potato, plus it was very oil-laden. I’d rather just slice the potato all the way through and bake them that way.

Roasted Red Bell Pepper and Basil Penne : This was very labour intensive, but so, so worth it. Were I to do it again, I’d definitely make a huge batch of the stuff and freeze it, and that would make it a lot less work.

Brasilian Black Bean Soup : This is a staple soup at my house now.

Jellied Cranberry Sauce with Apple : This was a huge success last Thanksgiving. I’ve never made homemade cranberry sauce before, but you can’t get simpler than this and everyone loved it.

Apple-Cranberry Bannock : This is so, so good. It’s like a scone on steroids. This is the one I chose to feature a photo of (because I’m just too lazy to go saving the images off the posts and reupload them here) because it’s amazing, and I think I’m going to make one for supper tonight.

Literary Post: Homer Price. Doughnuts Made With Minimal Labour-Saving Devices.

I have to admit: I’m rather appalled at how few of my friends, including friends I consider fairly well-read, have the slightest inkling who Homer Price is. I first made my acquaintance with him through an old school reader in which his first adventure involving Aroma the Skunk and some interesting radio robbers was (slightly abridged). Afterwards, the book was on my shelf as much as it was on the library’s. Maybe more.

At any rate, one of the most iconic stories in the book involves Uncle Ulysses’ newest labour-saving device, a doughnut machine, that has a technical glitch and won’t quit making doughnuts after a rich lady comes along and mixes up a gigantic batch of doughnut batter one night while Homer is alone in charge of Uncle U’s lunchroom. The machine was a new-fangled contraption that dropped the rings of batter into hot fat, flipped them over, and pushed them out a chute into a bin ready to gather up and eat.

In a whole doughnut
There’s a nice whole hole
When you take a big bite,
Hold the whole hole tight,
If a little bit bitten
Or a great bit bitten,
Any whole hole with a hole bitten in it,
Is a holey whole hole,
And it just plain isn’t!

I realise I already featured a Robert McCloskey book in my Literary Food Series, but who can pass up doughnuts?

I have two things to say about doughnuts:

• I reject the spelling “donut”.
• Baked doughnuts are da bomb.

So, with those two points in mind, here’s a doughnut recipe for you. This is (rather greatly) adapted from a recipe I first tried during home ec.

This is a picture of my first test batch of doughnuts. They were exactly like churros. See the end of this post for what to do if you want to recreate the churro doughnuts.

Preheat your oven to 400. Spray your doughnut pan(s).

With a handmixer, beat together:
2/3 c vegan non-hydrogenated margarine
1 c sugar
2 T tapioca flour
1/2 c water

Add, stirring by hand just until blended:
3 C flour
1 T baking powder
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1 c non-dairy milk

Put batter in pans, spreading evenly with a spoon. I had the batter come up pretty much to the rim. Put in the oven and bake 18-20 minutes. While they are baking, prepare the coating (described below) if using. Otherwise, just remove them from the pan when they’re done and allow to cool on a rack, or eat them while warm.

Optional coating:
1/4 c sugar
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 c melted vegan margarine

While the muffins bake, melt margarine in a small saucepan and mix sugar and cinnamon in a shallow dish. Immediately after taking the muffins out of the oven, dip them in the margarine and then the cinnamon-sugar. This amount is enough for dipping just one side. If you want to dip both sides, just double it.

I promise this recipe only makes 12.

Nomming on a sample doughnut from my 3rd and final test batch. Light, fluffy, perfect.

If you want a flavour/texture like churros, make the following changes: reduce water to 1/3 cup, fill doughnut pan slots only 1/2 full, bake at 350 for around 25 minutes, dip in the coating, and eat.

Curried Pumpkin-Acorn Squash-Carrot-Spinach Soup

Well, things have settled a little bit around here. We’re all on the mend. I’ve got a pulled muscle in my ribcage from coughing that hurts pretty badly, and I get tired easily. GooGoo still has a runny nose of epic gloppiness. But otherwise, things aren’t too bad. I spent my entire day pretty much washing laundry. I had a lot more than usual because my washer had some issues last week and Mr Pine Nut got a part just yesterday to fix the issues.

So, I not only washed clothes, but I’m working on washing all our sheets and blankets too, to rid them of the ickies from the flu. Kind of like how they burned everything in the Velveteen Rabbit, except less destructive. Tomorrow I get to wash diapers and more blankets. Woohoo.

In between loads of laundry, I made soup.

This is one of those soups that was born out of an urgent need to Use Things Up. In this case, we had an acorn squash, a pumpkin, some spinach, and some carrots. I decided to make a pumpkin soup. Curried pumpkin soup sounded good. So I asked The Google and The Google found me this recipe.

Squash is generally considered more autumn-y, but I don’t care particularly. One must use what one has, even in February. This soup will kill any bacteria residing in your digestive tract and clean out your sinusi* as well as taste delicious.

I changed it a bit from the original. This is what I did.

In your soup pan, stir together:
2 c chopped green onions
1 T cocoanut oil
4 garlic cloves, minced
1 1/2 T grated fresh ginger
2 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp ground coriander
1/8 tsp ground cardamom
1 1/2 tsp salt
3/4 tsp dried hot red pepper flakes

Saute a few minutes, until oil is melted and onions are tender.

Add:
4 c pumpkin puree
4 c water
1 1/2 c mock chicken or veggie broth
2 c diced carrots

Bring to a boil, reduce to a simmer, and let it cook about 20 minutes. Carrots should be to desired tenderness.

In a separate pan, stir together:
2 T cocoanut oil
2 tsp brown mustard seeds
2-4 c packed spinach (you could also use kale or another leafy green. I used 2 cups and next time would use 4.)

Stir oil and mustard seeds together until seeds begin to pop. Add spinach and continue stirring until wilted. Add to pot of soup right before serving.

Enjoy. I’m looking forward to eating the leftovers from this tomorrow.

——

*Neither of these statements have been validated by the FDA, but I am pretty sure I’m right.

Literary Post: Flicka, Ricka, Dicka Bake a Cake. THE Cake.

Maj Lindman’s “Flicka, Ricka, Dicka” series (and the corresponding “Snipp, Snapp, Snurr” series) were staples of my childhood reading experience. These girls are industrious, helpful, model little citizens without being preachy about it. They seek to help those less fortunate and the elderly, make sure they right wrongs, and are willing work hard for things they want, and unhesitatingly give up the things they’ve worked for to help someone else.

In Flicka, Ricka, Dicka Bake a Cake, the girls want to give Mother a surprise for her birthday and an aunt helps them to bake her a cake.

I always thought this cake looked so delicious. My mind’s mouth said it should be cherry-flavoured. The book was kind enough to detail what all the girls dumped into the bowl to make the cake:

…butter, sugar, eggs, flour, baking powder, cream, and raisins were all mixed together in the big blue bowl.

They frosted it with pink frosting and put small pieces of candied fruit all over the frosting. Here’s the picture of the girls rejoicing over their finished product:

So… where to begin? I decided to use a recipe from my Betty Crocker cookbook as a starting off point, and this is what came of it: a cake that tasted like a Pillsbury funfetti cake. In other words, totally a classic birthday cake flavour that is intensely sweet but quite fantastic.

(One note: I used almond milk. If you want a more creamy milk for the “cream” you could skim the cream off canned cocoanut milk and use that, but I don’t think it’d make that much difference in the end.)

The Cake

Sift together:
2 c all-purpose flour
3 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt

In separate bowl, mix with a mixer:
1/2 c vegan margarine
1 1/2 c brown sugar
1 c non-dairy milk
1 tsp cherry flavour (I used the liquid from a jar of maraschino cherries)

In small bowl, whip until frothy:
4 eggs’ worth Ener-G Egg Replacer (1/2 c water+2 T powder)

Combine the margarine and flour mixtures in a bowl. Using a handmixer, beat about 30 seconds at low speed and around 2 minutes on high speed. Fold in egg replacer and thoroughly incorporate. Then fold in 1/2 c golden raisins.

Bake in a bundt pan (I used an angel food cake pan) at 375 for 30-40 minutes and allow to cool. Remove from pan to cake plate when completely cool.

My finished cake

The Frosting

3 c powdered sugar
1/3 c vegan margarine, softened
2 T non-dairy milk
2 T maraschino cherries
A few drops red food colouring

Blend cherries and milk together in a blender until cherries are well pulverised.

In a bowl with a hand mixer, blend margarine and powdered sugar until crumbly. Add milk/cherry blend and beat until smooth and fluffy. You can add more milk if needed. Spread over the cake. Decorate with golden raisins (or, alternately, sliced almonds).