Best Taco on Earth

A combination of several recipes from Viva Vegan!, this taco made me unspeakably happy. The marinated roasted eggplant (pictured on its own below) from the Eggplant Torta Sandwich recipe is tucked beneath Yellow Chile Grilled Tempeh (with aji panca instead of aji amarillo, so this was really red chile grilled tempeh) and it’s all topped off with chopped romaine, storebought tomatillo salsa, and Creamy Ancho Chile Dressing (I use ancho powder, not whole chiles), which along with its chipotle variation is the best use of vegenaise I’ve yet encountered. Is that enough brackets for you? Liberal use of brackets in this post.

Chickpea Spinach Curry, Again

There aren’t that many recipes I find myself making over and over, if only because there are so many things I want to try! Over the past few years, Hot Sauce Glazed Tempeh (I don’t even post it when I make it anymore, you’ve seen enough) and this one, the Chickpea Spinach Curry from Vegan With a Vengeance are definitely in the remake hall of fame. The fried mustard seeds are what make it what it is. I find you can mess with everything else (type of bean, other spices, heat level) but the fried mustard seeds are where it’s at.

Elliott’s Second Birthday Cake

Sporadic once again, geez! At any rate, have a look at this cake! Making cakes for little kids is a nice change: for some reason, even though most of the adults I know are pretty unrefined (which is, of course, a good thing) with kids’ cakes I really feel I can let loose with the whimsy. Animal crackers! Clouds! Balloons! I found these great vegan animal crackers at Shopper’s Drug Mart as part of their (usually quite inexpensive!) Organics brand/line. So naturally, an elephant holding a balloon was the direction this cake rightfully took. For the cake part, I used the marble cupcake recipe from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World: am I the only one that baked almost everything out of this book for about a year and a half, and now neglects the book full time due to cake burnout? Poor old chestnut. For the filling, I used the cashew mascarpone recipe from Nonna’s Italian Kitchen, with added cocoa. Was alright as fillings go, but I ended up wishing I’d gone the old fruity route. And, for the frosting, a regular old shortening/ icing sugar trial. Hooray for cake! (And for late entries– I made this back in May, for crying out loud!)