mains

Summery White Bean ‘Tuna’ Sandwich

June 21, 2017 By Anya 8 Comments

This post was created in partnership with USA Pulses and Pulse Canada.

Everything tastes better on the beach. The sun and saltwater create a special kind of exhaustion that will make even the blandest piece of food taste mind-blowing. When I was a kid, we were usually handed fresh peaches after a long, tiring swim. The peach juice would inevitably end up all over our faces and running down our arms, but no one cared because the way they tasted made the whole world go quiet. Those same peaches never seemed quite as delicious at home, and one year I even made a point of only eating them when at the seaside. Today’s sandwich can be eaten anywhere and anytime, but it will also make for one very special beach snack.

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Italian-Style Lentil and Mushroom (Not)Meatballs from Pantry to Plate

May 31, 2017 By Anya 8 Comments

I’m so excited to talk bit about Heather Crosby’s new cookbook Pantry to Plate today. When I received my copy and took a scan from cover to cover, I was immediately blown away by the way this book kindly invites the reader to be both spontaneous and practical in the kitchen by working with the ingredients that are already on hand. With thirty clever recipe templates, Heather demonstrates how to improvise your way to delicious, plant-based meals. For example, Dense Veggies + Protein + Herbs + Binder + Spices = Vegan Meatballs (or Veggie Burgers)! The templates specify the required amount for each component, as well as which components are a must and which ones can be skipped altogether. In addition to the templates, the book is full of other useful tools that help make intuitive cooking a breeze: besides a regular recipe index, there is a cook by ingredient index, as well as mini-templates for creating flavor with aromatics, a whole bit on pairing spices, and a dressing and sauce section that has pretty much every staple sauce recipe you’ll ever need. If you don’t have a particular ingredient for a recipe, chances are you have something on hand that could act as a substitute, and there is a whole chart of interchangeable mix-and-match ingredients in the book to help you work through that.
I’m quite terrible at sticking to recipes myself, since I always want to play, add, subtract and find alternative ingredients, so it’s as if this book was made for me. How Heather managed to define freestyle cooking in such clear, comprehensive terms, will remain a mystery to me :) Some more sections/recipes I’m most excited about: Coconut Yogurt, Dairy-Free Milks, Probiotic Cream Cheese, Veggie Fries, Cheesy Comfort Food, Hand Pies, Sneaky Brownies, Nice Cream. YUM! Onto the (not) meatballs.

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May 17, 2017 By Anya 81 Comments

My first experience with South Indian fare was in Toronto, in a buzzing, cafeteria-style restaurant that looked like a food court in any American mall, but instead of fast food, the offering consisted of the most mind-blowing, bold-flavored South Indian dishes that weren’t like anything I’d ever tasted before. That ended up being one of the most memorable meals of my life. Since then, I’ve continued to seek out restaurants that specialized in South Indian cuisine, but rarely considered trying my hand at any of the dishes at home. Chitra Agrawal’s debut cookbook Vibrant India changed all of that for me. Chitra has spent years documenting her family’s traditionally vegetarian South Indian recipes on her blog, as well as adapting them to use the local, seasonal produce that she comes across in Brooklyn, where she lives. Her cookbook is a stunning collection of modern recipes, which honor her mother’s South Indian heritage, rooted in the ayurvedic tradition. The cookbook truly opens up a whole new world of cooking to those of us used to a more Western approach to food (and we are giving away a copy, see below :D ).

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Portobello Nachos

May 10, 2017 By Anya Leave a Comment

This post was created in partnership with Newman’s Own Organics.

Roasting up a bunch of goodies and serving them up right on the baking sheet together with sauce and toppings is a sure way to a fun dinner or a low-maintenance spread for last minute company. In the winter, I’ll bake an assortment of roots rubbed with plenty of spices, and slather them with herby sauce or tahini/cashew cream to go alongside some beans or grains. In the summer, it’s all about the slow-roasted tomatoes, eggplants and peppers served with some sort of bread, herbs, greens and good olive oil. Nachos definitely fall into this throw-together oven meal category, and we tend to crave them often around here, so I’m constantly thinking about ways to freshen up the format.

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