Dinner

I came home and got to work almost immediately making dinner. I had purchased collard greens several days earlier and wanted to use them; I thought of the idea of collard rollups and found a recipe that suggested blanching the collard leaves and then filling; I may try this interesting recipe with coconut curry sometime. I didn't have time to cook beans so used a 13.4 ounce box of kidney beans and a bit of canellini beans that I had on hand. I cooked waterlessly (i.e., I covered the pan and heated it on medium high until the vapor release started jiggling, then I reduced the heat to low till the jiggle stopped for about 20 minutes) the beans along with a clove of chopped garlic, along with other chopped vegetables (a green onion, broccoli including stem, and about a half dozen olives), plus 1/4 t salt, 2T nutritional yeast, and 1/4 cup marinara. I blanched the intact collard leaves one at a time by putting each leaf in a pan with about an inch of boiling water for 15 seconds a sid...

Recently we stopped by Living Kitchen , a very nice vegan and (subject to ingredient availability) organic restaurant, and had a tasty thick cauliflower soup. I picked up a head of cauliflower today and decided to try making a similar soup. I had made a c auliflower soup back in February 2011  that was good but I wanted to better it. I found a roasted cauliflower soup recipe from a very nice site by a woman named Jessica  and it looked great. The key ideas were to roast cauliflower, coated in a little olive oil and along with garlic cloves, at  450°F for 15m, then blend with sauteed onion. I made a few changes; I used the convection ("air bake") function on my air fryer toaster oven  which cooks faster and went with 400°F for 15m, instead of using oil, I mixed in Coconut Secret brand c oconut aminos garlic sauce (soy sauce or their normal coconut aminos would have been fine), and I used oregano instead of thyme.  I didn't have any bouillon cubes on hand or bro...

I made an air fried eggplant dish with grits on the side. I used Ener-G Egg Replacer to have a sticky "egg" that I dipped eggplant slices (about 3/8" thick) into, followed by dredging them in a mixture of panko bread crumbs, along with a little nutritional yeast, sesame seeds, salt, and black pepper. I air fried with no oil for 5 minutes at 400°F. I also made a fresh tomato sauce by gently simmering cubes of tomato with onion, dried oregano, a little hot red pepper, and salt, and serving it atop the eggplant. I prepared grits by getting 3 cups salted water boiling then adding maybe 1/2 cup frozen shelled edamame. I cooked for a few minutes till the edamame was defrosted, then added 1 cup grits and a few tablespoonfuls of nutritional yeast. I stirred occasionally and cooked for 5-7 minutes until thick. Results Dinner was very good! My daughter particularly liked the meal and ate leftovers again later in the evening. The eggplant was nicely crispy and the sesame flavor wa...