VegMoms

Monday It’s Vegan Night! An all-American, stick to your ribs BBQ Tofu and mashed potatoes meal at http://bit.ly/c9IU2y

Monday’s Speedy Vegan: This stir fry recipe was inspired by necessity. We were low on groceries and had very few veggies in the house, a block of tofu, lots of fruit and nuts and some rice. Necessity is the mother of invention, and I’m sure glad I invented this sweet dinner treat.

Fruity Stir Fry 

2 cups red cabbage, shredded

3 carrots, thinly sliced (I used a food processor)

4 celery stalks, matchstick sliced

2 clementines, peeled and spilt into individual slices

2 garlic cloves

1/2 cup blueberries

1/2 cup walnuts

1 lb. extra firm tofu block, cut in 1-inch cubes

For the marinade, stir together in a medium size bowl:

1/4 cup light vegtable oil

1/4 cup maple syrup

1/4 cup shoyu (or soy sauce, low sodium preferred)

2 TB mango nectar

1/4 tsp cayenne pepper

1. Spray cast iron skillet lightly with oil. Saute vegetables until tender, leaving garlic and walnuts to add in last. Once garlic and walnuts are in pan, only heat until garlic is lightly browned.

2. Add in fruits and tofu.

3. Pour marinade over veggies, fruit and tofu. Let simmer over med-low heat until tofu is warmed.

4. Serve with basmati rice.

Tuesday’s Natural Health: I’ve recently become a bit suspicious about an old standby favorite: Soy. Don’t get me wrong, my local orders to my tofu supplier won’t dwindle, nor will I be giving up my occasional Tofutti Cuties. But since reading Michael Pollan’s latest book In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto I have cut back on buying most things for my family that contain “soy protein isolates” and other funky, multi-syllabic words attached to the simple three letter s-o-y.

Pollan doesn’t outright say that these new food creations derived from soy are bad, but he does indicate that they haven’t been around long enough to know for sure, that they aren’t granted GRAS (“generally regarded as safe”) status by the FDA, and that because of these sneaky soy compounds in a multitude of foods Americans eat more soy than the Japanese or Chinese do, who eat soy in time-tested ways, like tofu or the edamame bean itself.

I’ve also started reading anything in the medical journals scattered through my home about soy and estrogens. Turns out, soy is still a favorite of the mainstream medical community to help reduce cholesterol, lessen menopausal symptoms and maintain bone density. However, studies mentioned in the American Academy of Family Physician magazine American Family Physician state some subjects in these studies who ate soy products including isoflavones and soy supplements have experienced some negative effects, including gastrointestinal symptoms like diarrhea, menstrual complaints such as prolonged menstrual periods, headache and musculoskeletal complaints. In my own experience, I have found when I ate more soy products, a streak of hair on the right side of my temple turned grey, an anecdotal side effect of over-consumption of soy. Was my grey caused by stress or soy?

Either way, I’m taking the advice of Pollan and the AAFP and sticking to whole soy protein like tofu while cutting back on all other forms of soy in my diet. It’s easy to do with some label reading and simple substitution.

Monday’s Speedy Vegan: I sat enraptured for an hour last month listening to Here on Earth: Radio Without Borders, as guests and callers sang the praises of garlic. (Listen here: http://www.wpr.org/hereonearth/archive_080905k.cfm). From cold and flu cures to love potions and hundreds of ways to flavor a meal with this funny little bulb, it became clear to me that garlic is beloved around the world.

Unlike the centuries old writings about garlic’s health and healing properties, however, my relationship with garlic is only about a decade long. People with Norwegian heritage like myself tend to shy away from strong, spicy flavors like garlic. My Italian husband, however, couldn’t imagine life without garlic. He cooks everything with it, has sprinkled it on his dogs’ food, and once tried to eat an entire garlic head raw to ward off an oncoming cold (Keyword: Once. That didn’t turn out so well). 

Here’s a secretly speedy vegan recipe that relies heavily on garlic (the bottled, chopped version for speediness). No one will know this is a 30-minute recipe — by look and taste, it’s gourmet.

Secretly Speedy Garlic Tofu on Wilted Spinach (serves 2)

1) Preheat oven to 400. Spray a glass baking dish or pan with sides with high-heat cooking spray.
2) Slice 1 lb. extra firm tofu diagonally, then down the middle to form four triangles.
3) Coat the tofu slices with a blended (simply with a whisk or fork, no blender needed) marinade of:

2 T. red curry paste
1 T. soy sauce
2 t. lemon juice
1 t. olive oil
1 t. bottled crushed garlic

4) Place tofu in dish or pan. Bake 15 minutes. Flip. Bake 15 minutes more.
5) Meanwhile, place 2 lb (2 bags) of prewashed, fresh spinach in your cast iron skillet. drizzle about 1/2 t. olive oil on top, and a light scattering of bottled crushed garlic. Stir to coat spinach with oil and garlic. Wilt on medium heat.
6) Place spinach on two plates. Place tofu over spinach. For a nice touch, cube some pineapple onto of tofu. For a heartier dish, serve over basmati rice.

copyright Dana Villamagna, 2008

Monday’s Speedy Vegan: In my home, Monday is not the night to take on a complex recipe for dinner; in fact, that kind of recipe is the recipe for a cranky mom at the beginning of a busy week. This weekend, I prepared a fantastic vegan carrot cake with vegan cream cheese frosting; BBQ tofu in apple butter; curried rice salad; and a big pancake breakfast. My creativity, patience and measuring abilities will remain on “E” until I can fill them up on Friday with an hour in the middle of piles of cookbooks and a trip to the grocery store.

So tonight it’s the Speedy Vegan at work. One pot, no pans, no measuring cups. A one-pot, one bowl per person curry that packs as much flavor as it does nutrition:

Tofu with Spinach, Curry and Coconut Milk
(serves 2-4) 

*1 can of garbanzo beans.
*1 lb tofu, cubed
*I can coconut milk (Goya is my favorite)
*Smattering of yellow Madras curry (mild, hot, medium, whatever you like)
*I onion, sliced
*I package of fresh spinach leaves (or a block of frozen spinach will do in a pinch)
* Enough rice to feed yourself and whoever else is fortunate enough to have you cooking for them tonight.

1) Put the pot on the stovetop, add just enough oil to fry up the onion. Do so.
2) When onion is soft, not browned, turn heat to low, add the can of coconut milk. Stir.
3) Add just enough curry to give it that nice yellow color that we all love to see in our bowl. Stir until blended.
4) Add the cubed tofu and the garbanzo beans. Simmer for 10-15 min.
5) Add the spinach, cover just until spinach is wilted.
6) Pour curry mixture over rice into individual bowls.

There’s little cleanup and it’s delicious. I probably should be using dried beans, soaking them overnight, getting all technical with exactly how much curry should go into this dish. But then this wouldn’t be Speedy Vegan Monday and no one in my home would be eating tonight.