Chinese dinner | Spinach and tofu soup | Cold Chinese Noodles | Blurb

We spent about five weeks in July and August visiting our "real" home in Madison, Wisconsin, and my posts from July and August about traveling, doing upkeep on our house and garden, and spending time catching up with friends — usually while enjoying food — are continuing into September. I still have some territory to cover, but got sidetracked by an unexpected, all-consuming project that I'll mention later. Anyway, no diary about our summer would be complete without a story about the special dinner cooked for us by one of my husband's graduate students. To be accurate, I'd have to say, "former graduate student," because Katrina successfully defended her dissertation this week and is now a PhD.

To call the meal a "dinner," is like calling a Bengal tiger a "kitty." It was more like a banquet. Every dish was gorgeous and delicious. Katrina is an accomplished cook and gracious hostess. I had forgotten my camera, but we live only a few minutes from Katrina, and my husband went home to get it. I'm so glad he did.

Here she is preparing the spinach soup with tofu. Like all good cooks, she carefully tastes and seasons her creations. She spooned some soup into a bowl and tasted it before deciding it was perfect.

Below, you can see the amazing, colorful variety of dishes Katrina prepared.

Squash.

Zucchini with peppers

Broiled tofu

Noodles with garlic and nori

Mushrooms

Asparagus and peppers

Fruit platter

Our hostess and one of her happy guests.

I'm including recipes for two of the dishes. One has appeared on the blog before, but it's such a favorite of ours I've decided to reprise it here. The other recipe is for the soup. It is a very light and simple soup, but very delicious — perfect as the first course of a complex meal. It only takes minutes to prepare.

Katrina's cold Chinese noodles

• 8 ounces spaghetti (I used Ancient Harvest quinoa pasta but Katrina used whole wheat spaghetti.)
• 1 tablespoon toasted sesame oil
• 1 teaspoon tamari or soy sauce
• 1 tablespoon Chinese black vinegar (or brown rice vinegar)
• 1/2 teaspoon red chili sauce (sambal oelek)
• 1/2 teaspoon sugar
• 1 inch fresh ginger root, cut fine (about 1 tablespoon)
• 1 large clove garlic, minced very fine
• few grinds black pepper
• 1 sheet seasoned or plain toasted nori, cut with scissors into small rectangles
• chopped cilantro, optional
  

1. Cook the spaghetti according to package directions al dente. When cooked, drain and rinse under cold running water to cool quickly. Drain noodles again and place in a bowl.
2. Add the oil and toss to coat the noodles.
3. Add vinegar, tamari, chili, garlic, ginger, sugar and pepper, and mix well.
4. Just before serving, add the nori. Mix some in and transfer the noodles to a serving bowl. Arrange the remaining nori over the top of the noodles.
5. Optional: Sprinkle with chopped cilantro.

Makes four servings as a side dish.

Spinach soup with ginger and tofu

• 2 tablespoons finely minced or grated fresh ginger
• 1 to 2 tablespoons oil, as you prefer
  
• 6 cups water
• 12 to 14 ounces soft tofu, cubed
• 2 tablespoons tamari or soy sauce
• 5 ounces fresh baby spinach, washed
• salt and fresh ground pepper

1. Sauté the ginger in the oil for a minute or two in a four quart pot. I grated my ginger on a microplane grater so it was very fine.
2. Add the water and the tofu and bring to a boil. Boil the tofu for several minutes.
3. Turn the heat to simmer and add the tamari.
4. Stir in the spinach to wilt.
5. Season to taste with salt and pepper. I ground both pink salt and mixed peppercorns. A few grinds was all it took to bring out the flavor.

Some variations:
Sauté minced garlic with the ginger.
Add grated or match stick carrots with the tofu.
Add sliced scallions just before serving.
Use low-sodium vegetable stock instead of water.
Make miso broth to use instead of water.

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Blurb
I mentioned an intense project I worked on this past week that kept me from blogging or even reading blogs. Actually it kept me from sleeping and eating regularly, too. My son attended a conference this summer that was partially sponsored by Blurb, an online Web site where you can make your own photo books. They gave each participant coupons worth a substantial amount of money to put toward making a personal book, and to give away, and my son gave one to me. He pulled his baby blog into a fantastic photo album chronicling the first two years of his daughter's life, and suggested I use my blog to make a cookbook. Well, that was in July, and we were in Wisconsin enjoying the summer. Plus, I didn't have my computer with my photo-editing software, or my original photos. The photos on the blog have all been made too small to print well. So, I just blew off the coupon. Then, four days before the coupon expired, I suddenly realized I wanted to make the book, and went slightly berserk, laying it out and finding and processing the photos. I was up until 2 a.m. several nights in a row, trying to complete a task that seemed impossible. I thought the deadline, September 1, was Tuesday, and having finished the book by 8 p.m., I frantically tried to send in my book before midnight, but the upload kept getting interrupted. I tried everything I could think of, to no avail. Then I learned that September 1 was actually Wednesday, and I went to bed, exhausted. The next day, the actual September 1, after fruitless exchanges with the Blurb tech people, at my son's suggestion I re-installed the Blurb software and the book finally went through. Now I'm waiting to see what it looks like, and how many typos didn't get caught! I've already revised it in case I want to order a few for gifts. If it looks good, I may add a few more recipes that I didn't have time to add before, or which need new photos. Most of my older photos are pretty embarrassing.

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Katrina's cold Chinese noodles

© 2009 Andrea's easy vegan cooking

We were recently treated to a dinner at the home of Katrina, one of my husbands graduate students. The food was all wonderful (I forgot my camera, of course) but I particularly wanted to share one of the recipes - a cold noodle dish - with you. It's perfect for summer, tastes fabulous and is so easy to make. I used Ancient Harvest quinoa noodles which are made with corn flour and quinoa and are gluten-free. I had considered making this with udon noodles or whole wheat spaghetti but opted for the quinoa instead, and it was perfect. I also think buckwheat noodles would be a good choice.

Katrina, who is from China and thus knows the best ingredients to use for this traditional Chinese dish, gave me a package of specially seasoned nori to use in the recipe, but I think you could use plain toasted nori as well. When she gave me the noodle recipe, Katrina told me what ingredients she used, but didn't give me any quantities, so the amounts I'm listing are what I decided to use. The finished dish tasted wonderful, but feel free to make adjustments if you disagree with my quantities.

Katrina's noodles

• 8 ounces spaghetti (I used Ancient Harvest quinoa pasta)
• 1 tablespoon toasted sesame oil
• 1 teaspoon tamari or soy sauce
• 1 tablespoon Chinese black vinegar (or brown rice vinegar)
• 1/2 teaspoon red chili sauce (sambal oelek)
• 1/2 teaspoon sugar
• 1 inch fresh ginger root, cut fine (about 1 tablespoon)
• 1 large clove garlic, minced very fine
• few grinds black pepper
• 1 sheet seasoned or plain toasted nori, cut with scissors into small rectangles
• chopped cilantro, optional

1. Cook the spaghetti according to package directions al dente. When cooked, drain and rinse under cold running water to cool quickly. Drain noodles again and place in a bowl.
2. Add the oil and toss to coat the noodles.
3. Add vinegar, tamari, chili, garlic, ginger, sugar and pepper, and mix well.
4. Just before serving, add the nori. Mix some in and transfer the noodles to a serving bowl. Arrange the remaining nori over the top of the noodles.
5. Optional: Sprinkle with chopped cilantro.

Makes two average, or three to four very small servings.

© 2009 Andrea's easy vegan cooking

We served the noodles with barbecued seitan and steamed kale. The seitan was supposed to be barbecued, but since we don't currently have a barbecue, we marinated it in sauce and pan fried it in a small amount of oil. You could also broil it.

© 2009 Andrea's easy vegan cooking

Eating raw garlic doesn't agree with my digestive system, but these noodles are so good I was willing to feel a little sick in order to eat them. Maybe next time I'll try drinking a big mug of peppermint tea with my raw garlic.

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Vegan restaurant alert
Have you ever worried that the restaurant food you were told was vegan, contained animal products? If yes, then you might want to read about this startling undercover investigation taken on by two foodies in LA. It's a long but amazing post, and worth reading all the way to the end. (from quarrygirl)

Scallion pancakes

When I write posts for this blog I usually try to stick to my theme of "easy" to prepare foods that can be created in a relatively short time. Sometimes I include something that is easy to make but might require a bit more time. That may be the case for today's offering. It wasn't really very hard to do, but it wasn't quick, and it wasn't something I'd whip up after a hard day of work. Maybe I'd do it on a leisurely weekend when I had some time to play with my food.

The recipe comes from a Chinese cooking class that my husband and I recently attended. The version I offer here uses half whole grain flour instead of the all-purpose flour used in class, and in my version, the nutty-wheaty taste and texture of the flour has a presence that was missing in the class version. If you prefer a lighter, more authentic taste, I suggest you substitute 2-1/8 cups unbleached white or all purpose flour for the flour mix I list. The pancakes tasted great, so if you're used to whole grains, go with this version.

The scallion pancakes the teacher demonstrated were really delicious, and though a bit oily, they were much less greasy than the ones we had at a Chinese restaurant in Seattle, which were probably deep fried. But, I think the pancakes are meant to be a little oily. My first attempt was so oil-phobic that they lost some of their essential character. The amount of oil is so small, I think it would be better to just use the oil and enjoy the taste.

Scallion pancakes

• 1 cup whole wheat pastry flour (stir before measuring) (see above story)
• 1 cup unbleached white flour (stir before measuring)
• 4 ounces boiling water
• about 2 ounces cold water
• 4–6 scallions, white and green parts—slice each scallion lengthwise, then mince finely
• toasted sesame oil
• salt to taste
• oil for the pan (peanut is traditional) and oil to brush or spray directly onto the pancakes

1. Mix the two flours together on a board.

2. Make a well in the center and add the boiling water. Flip and scrape the flour around with a dough scraper or spatula to incorporate the flour and water. (Be very careful about not using your hands here, as the water and forming dough will be burning hot. It will quickly become cool enough to handle and you can start using your hands at that point.)

3. When all the water is incorporated, gradually add the cold water until you have a flexible, kneadable dough. Don't make the dough too stiff. Knead the dough until, as our teacher says, you have the three shinings. (1) Your hands are clean of sticking dough, (2) the board is clean and (3) the dough is shiny. (I'd say, "more or less" shiny.) Step 3 takes about 5 minutes.

4. Cover the dough with a damp cloth and let it rest 20 minutes. Or more. After its rest, cut the dough into 2 sections and wrap 1 of them in the damp towel. Roll the other into a rectangle that is about 1/8" – 3/16" thick, and about 6" x 9". Brush toasted sesame oil (or spread with your fingers) all over the dough. Use 1 teaspoon. Cover with minced scallions and sprinkle with salt (1/4 teaspoon).

5. Roll into a log shape starting with the long end. Then coil the log into a spiral, tucking the last end underneath.

6. Pat the coil into a flattened round, and then roll into a round pancake about 1/8" thick, with your rolling pin. Be gentle, as the dough may have a tendency to rip around the scallions and oil. Try to roll to the edge rather than over it, as much as you can. If you roll over the edge, the pancake may break and some of the oil will ooze out. This is probably unavoidable to some extent, and is OK.

7. Heat the pan and coat lightly with oil. Spray the pancake with oil. Use a wide spatula to ease the pancake up and into the pan, sprayed side down, then spray the top side of the pancake.

8. Fry over low heat, flipping a couple of times, until both sides turn golden with patches of deep color. Cook the pancake slowly, over low heat so it doesn't burn before the inside cooks. (about 10 minutes) If you prefer, you can use a non-stick pan and cook the pancake in a light coating of oil. Peanut oil is traditional, but I used canola to spray the pan and the pancake. I tried both types of pans and thought the pancake came out better in the cast iron.

9. Drain on a paper towel if desired. Cut into 8 or 12 triangles (like pizza) and eat immediately. Repeat with the other dough section.

Note: I made these pancakes so many times to get the recipe right, that just the thought of eating anymore is making me weak. I learned a few things, though. The first dough I made (not included here) was a little tough. It was a larger recipe and more than we could handle in one day, so I stored the leftover dough in the refrigerator overnight. When I made a pancake the next day, it was much lighter and more tender. Really good, actually. So, you could probably make the dough a day ahead and roll and fry them when needed. I used a mix of white whole wheat and unbleached flour but decided to switch to whole wheat pastry flour for the second batch. I think I made the first batch too stiff, so I added a little more water to the second batch, and it worked much better; not enough to require adding flour for kneading, but enough to produce a softer dough.

Update: I would try making these with white whole wheat flour, which produces baked goods very much like those made with unbleached white flour.

Wedding weekend

Well I've been totally wiped out after a packed four-day weekend trip to Philadelphia to attend a niece's wedding extravaganza. Haven't even READ any blog posts since before we left on our trip, let alone write one. I prescheduled something to post last Saturday and even completely forgot I had done that but, after two intense days back at work that just added to the exhaustion, I'm home today and starting to feel somewhat normal again. So, here's the "condensed" version of the weekend.

Tempeh reuben from French Meadow Bakery

Last Friday, I dressed at 6:30 a.m. (in Wisconsin) in the outfit I planned to wear at the rehearsal dinner some 12 hours later in Pennsylvania. And I discovered that if you wear a long skirt for air travel, you will get patted down at security. Good thing I didn't tape a soy yogurt to my leg. We changed planes in Minneapolis and headed to our favorite pit stop, French Meadow Bakery Café, for an early lunch. I've posted about this before and it's still a great airport find. I had a bowl of vegan chili that was too much to finish. It was a bit too heavy on tomatoes and light on beans but still tasty and filling. It came with two slices of sourdough bread. Ken ordered a grilled tempeh reuben. After 20 minutes he went to check on it, and twenty minutes later went to cancel it and get his money back. This was an airport—we had a plane to catch. This brought the manager out and she got the sandwich, packaged it to go and gave him a refund! (French Meadow has two airport locations. The main, full-service restaurant (packaged food also available) is at the end of the main shopping area just before entering concourse C. There is also a small satellite shop with packaged food and beverages at a different location.)

When we arrived in Philadelphia, we picked up the most garish red rental car I've ever seen and headed to Lai Lai Garden restaurant in Blue Bell. An indication of the festivities to come, the rehearsal dinner had 90 guests! I first want to say I had plenty to eat—was, in fact, obscenely stuffed and loved my dinner—but since I'm writing about vegan stuff here, there are a few things I'd like to point out. When the appetizers came, the non-vegetarians (NVs) received plates with a large egg roll, a large spare rib and a third thing. It may have been a fried shrimp—can't really remember. We vegans (Vs) received a plate with three small steamed dumplings. Okay, ours was probably much healthier, but theirs was much BIGGER. Quality and quantity are different things altogether, but still. They had three DIFFERENT things. Why didn't they get a dumpling? Why didn't we get some other interesting vegetable thing to go with our dumplings?

We Vs were then given a choice of three entrées. We could have tofu and veggies, string beans or a third thing that I can't remember. (I do seem to have a problem with third things.) We all chose the tofu.

Their food (only some of it!)

Then the NV entrées started coming. There was a giant lazy susan in the middle of our very large table and it was soon filled with meat, chicken and seafood dishes. More and more kept coming until the turntable was packed to capacity. And still more dishes came. The Vs were each brought a plate with tofu and veggies. It was really good, and I couldn't finish it, but it's the principle of the thing I'm pointing out. Is it assumed that NVs should be provided with an extreme assortment of food and Vs are limited to only one thing? I also wonder why NVs are unable to have vegetarian dishes along with their meat. None of this is meant to be a reflection on our hosts, just on the general state of food consumption in the US.

The wedding the next night was very beautiful and very big. There were 270 guests, making this the biggest wedding I've ever attended. The bride was beautiful and the groom dashing. Everything was in good taste, especially the food. After the ceremony, we had a cocktail hour with lots of interesting dishes. I'm sorry to say I was so involved in eating that I completely forgot to photograph anything so a description will have to suffice. I visited the pasta bar first and received a plate of perfectly cooked pasta on which I chose to add a chunky tomato sauce. There was all sorts of non-veg stuff to add for the so- inclined, but I was happy to find a bottomless bowl of black olives and another of a finely chopped kohlrabi salad. After that I headed to the bruschetta station where all sorts of spreads (including hummus) were stacked up. There was a vat of artichoke salad, a gorgeous roasted red pepper salad and who knows what else. Roaming the room, the Vs found plenty of delicious food to eat, as did the NVs. A cosmo from the bar, artichokes and olives and I was happy.

When we finally started dinner around 10:30, I wasn't all that hungry, but managed to eat my baby greens and a good portion of my —guess what?—tofu and vegetables. Good thing I never get tired of tofu and veggies. It was delicious. I wish I had some now.

The great band stopped playing at 12:30 a.m. and we made our way back to the hotel room (we stayed at the wedding hotel for the night of the wedding.) by about 1 a.m., and crashed.

Pumpernickel bagel, roasted asparagus, marinated mushrooms, salad.

The next morning we attended a brunch at the hotel. You wouldn't think we could eat any more, but we did. The brunch was a revelation. I never got past the salad with ginger vinaigrette, marinated mushrooms, balsamic roasted asparagus, bagels and fruit, but the room was laden with every imaginable breakfast food an NV could dream about. And Vs could find plenty to be happy about, too, unless they were looking for protein! I wish I had photographed the long table filled with gorgeous NV pastries.

Bagel, salad, hash browns, fruit.

We are originally from Philadelphia, and still have family and friends in the area, so in between wedding events we visited with relatives and friends, trying to make the most of the short amount of time. It was wonderful to be with my family, my husband's family and old friends. I wish it could be like this all the time. It was exhausting but worth it.

Oh, and did I mention that our oldest son, daughter-in-law and their fabulously amazing baby were there from Seattle?

Chinese dinner

My husband is a college professor and he advises many graduate students and hosts visiting scholars from a lot of different countries. Last night, one of his graduate students from China, and a visiting scholar from China, invited us for dinner. They prepared numerous dishes and cooked a vegan meal for us. Each dish was unique and delicious. We started with a tofu and corn soup and then we had:
asparagus with red pepper

green beans with Chinese black mushrooms

broccoli with garlic

spicy tree fungus with cucumbers and ginger

fresh fruit salad

and the only thing store-bought, chocolate cake.

And I forgot to photograph a yummy large, round potato pancake that I wish I knew how to make!.

Eating out in Seattle

There are more vegan and vegetarian restaurants in Seattle than I can believe. The choices go from quirky to gourmet and we've dined in the whole range of options from the weirdest to the toniest. You can find many vegan Chinese and Thai establishments as well as vegan sandwich shops, pizza places and bakeries. We've had an elegant dinner at Carmelita and a wedding brunch at Café Flora. We've enjoyed Chinese food at Bamboo Garden and sandwiches from Hillside Quickies. One of the oddest places (said fondly) we ever ate was a throwback to the sixties called Good Morning Healing Earth and was owned by a Vietnam veteran named George. George did the cooking and joined in the conversations in his one-room converted first floor of a house. He had sound equipment in one corner for open-mike music nights. I'd describe the food as hearty American-style vegan with ethnic overtones. George had a Vitamix that he used to make amazing all-fruit ice cream that he served over waffles. He once told us that his dream was to save some money, sell the restaurant and move to Hawaii. Sadly, that never happened. George died some years ago and the restaurant has changed hands and names several times. We've never been back since George died, so I don't know what it's like now.

We ate out three times in two different places on this visit. Sunday night in Seattle we passed on our usual vegan favorites to eat at a neighborhood Chinese restaurant that serves mostly Asian diners who order in Chinese from a Chinese menu. (We had an infant with us and wanted to be conveniently close to home.) N, who has been to China, said the food is pretty authenic. In addition to the regular menu and the Chinese menu, they have a vegetarian menu. (Yay Seattle) The first night we went there we had ma po tofu, home-made noodles with veggies, szechwan eggplant, dry-cooked string beans, and yuba wrapped mushrooms. Unfortunately, I forgot to take photos before we gobbled everything up, so we had to return a second night. Oh darn. The photo above is my plate on the second visit. It has Chinese broccoli with enoki and black mushrooms, tofu with broccoli and the mushroom stuffed yuba, which, in addition to the noodles, we had to get again.

When we tried to order Chinese broccoli the first night, the waiter talked us out of it, saying Americans don't like it because it's too bitter. We knew he was wrong about us but we went along with his suggestions. Our waitress on the second visit didn't question our choices, and this time we got it. Yum. We also had pea vine, but the photo is kind of scary, unlike the actual dish, so I'm posting only the Chinese broccoli. 


The thick and chewy homemade noodles are definitely on my list of things to try at home. I used to make noodles often and it's really not hard. I was also very fond of the tofu (below) but deep frying at home is not really my thing. 
The last dish I want to try to make is the yuba wrapped mushrooms. Yuba is also called bean curd sheets or bean curd sticks and is made by skimming off the film that forms on the surface of heated soymilk, and drying it. You can find it in Asian markets as sheets, or rolled into long tube shapes — bean curd sticks. I've used the sticks before but not the sheets - something new to learn.
The restaurant is in North Seattle and is called Chiang's Gourmet. Try it if you're in Seattle, and you're not afraid of a little extra oil.
 

We visited the vegan lunch buffet the following Saturday at Araya Vegan Thai Restaurant. I kept forgetting to photograph my beautiful plate of food, and when I went back to the buffet to take pictures, it was so crowded I couldn't see the selections. So, I have photographed my dessert, which I didn't like and didn't eat. It was some sort of mooshy banana thing with coconut cream that looked good. I put some slightly sweetened crispy noodles on top and those were actually very good in an interesting way. You did notice that I said vegan Thai buffet? No joke.
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