Blackest bean chocolate [soy curl] chili: Protein Ninja redux

Recently, I wrote a review of Terry Hope Romero's newest cookbook, Protein Ninja, and although I made a fabulous salad I loved from one of the recipes, I also cooked a couple of items I was less fond of. I'd put the book aside for a bit, intending to give it another try, when I read a review here on Chow Vegan that made my mouth water. The two recipes that intrigued me were blackest bean chocolate seitan chili and tempeh sausage sage gravy, which she served over potatoes instead of biscuits. I probably skipped over the chili recipe when I first searched the book for something to cook because of the seitan, since I can't seem to eat glutenous foods without unpleasant gastric symptoms, and because it was served over a hunk of corn bread, which I didn't feel like baking. But it occurred to me as I read the review,  I could substitute soy curls for the seitan, with the same chewy, savory effect, and polenta for the muffins. I immediately texted a dinner invitation to my son and daughter-in-law, because the recipe sounded like something my son, especially, would enjoy, and I wanted to try out the recipe on him. They texted back they could come, but Kate's parents would be in town so there would be two additional people, if we still wanted to do a dinner. Kate's parents, whom I adore, are committed omnivores — especially her dad, who might actually be more of a carnivore. How would the chili go over with them? And since I'd never made it before, I didn't know how it would taste. I briefly considered a different menu, but when I have my mind set on something, it's kind of hard to sidetrack me. Chili it would be. And salad.

The chili exceeded my highest expectations, as well as my hopes that my guests would enjoy it; the rich, spicy flavors of ancho chili, cumin and cinnamon were perfect. They loved it, and told me as much over and over. In fact, Kate's mom suggested I blog about the meal! And she asked for the recipe. She said if her husband likes a vegan meal, it's got to be good. He said it was the best vegetarian meal he'd ever had. Seriously, this is the recipe you need when you cook for meat-eating friends and relatives. I'm sure it would have been equally excellent with seitan, but the soy curls were a perfect solution for making the chili gluten-free. I prepared the soy curls the night before by soaking, squeezing and cooking them in a small amount of savory broth plus tamari plus lots of minced fresh garlic. Then I left them overnight in the refrigerator. I made 1-1/2 recipes of chili, and had enough left over for at least a dinner for two plus lunches. Why cook for just one night, right? In keeping with my latest dietary obsession to not use added oil in home cooking, I used no added oil in preparing the chili, besides what might have been in the chocolate, of course—nobody's perfect. The onions and garlic were sautéed in broth until they tasted cooked and sweet. I searched all over the Internet to try to find the chili recipe for you, but although I found lots of similar sounding chilies, none contained the unique combination of ingredients that made the chili stand out as the best I've ever tasted. Terry's recipe was nowhere to be found. You'll just have to buy the book!

One more thing. I've recently become aware of something called an air fryer, that fries foods with little or no oil. I read about it here on JL's blog. After doing some additional research and reading, I've learned that a convection oven, because it cooks with hot, moving air, can possibly accomplish the same thing. It so happens that my oven has a button to turn it into a convection oven, and I tried it out for the first time on the polenta I made to accompany the chili. I placed the polenta squares on a parchment-paper-lined cookie sheet and baked them in my convection oven, turning them over once during the baking. They turned out crispy on the outside and soft on the inside. I intend to experiment more with using the convection oven to roast veggies, tofu, potatoes, burgers, etc. If I don't 'have to' buy another kitchen appliance for my already crowded little kitchen, all the better. We'll see. The air fryer sounds pretty great.

Five-spice chickpea noodle bowl revisited plus other random edibles

Five-spice chickpea peanut noodle bowl.

In my last post — a review of Protein Ninja by Terry Hope Romero — I said I loved one of the recipes so much I was going to re-make it to bring as my contribution to a dinner at a friend's house. Well, I did just that on Saturday, and it was fantastic. I made a couple of changes to make it more of a salad than a bowl,  but basically it was the same. Instead of four to six ounces of long rice noodles, I used about 12 ounces of fusili, I added an extra half can of chickpeas, and possibly there was a bit more shredded cabbage. And I had way too much! After filling my large serving bowl about 1/2 full, I packed the rest away in the refrigerator to use for lunches and dinners!

Rather than wait until the last minute to make the salad, I prepared the components in the morning to be  assembled before leaving for the party at 4:30. While the chickpeas were roasting, I prepped the veggies, boiled water and cooked the noodles, and made the peanut sauce. I kept the parts separate until it was almost time to leave, then mixed all into a beautiful salad. Such a great dish!

On Sunday we took the ferry to Port Townsend to attend a lecture by Dr. Michael Klaper. I was inspired to try eating a little differently than usual, and I'll share the foods I've tried (amazingly delicious) in my next post, but I'd better post my saved random eats photos now, just in case Dr. Klaper has a lasting impact on my diet, and my photos no longer reflect my eating style. I suspect things will probably not change much, but you never know.



What you are looking at is my modern-day version of a gluten-free (or not) bannock, as might have been consumed during the 1700s in Scotland. (As an Outlander fan, I felt the need to make these one day.) My bannock, in this case, is filled with barbecued tempeh — not very 18th century Scottish, I know. The bannock recipe I concocted appeared on the blog, here. I received a letter from a reader not long ago saying she tried making the bannocks, and the recipe failed, so I immediately got to work making some. I tried the recipe twice, and it worked both times, but so many things can vary with baking ingredients, it's impossible to guarantee perfect results. I should ask my husband to make them, and watch to see if there's anything I can do to make the recipe better.



My husband made this, and after tasting one bite I said, "whoa, this is amazing!" Turns out he made ye'atakilt alicha from Teff Love by Kittee Berns. He tricked me by serving it with rice instead of injera. I had just read a blog post by Kittee and had been wishing for Ethiopian food, so it was perfect timing. If you don't own Teff Love, you should go buy it right now.



I do love my noodle bowls. This one has shredded red cabbage, cucumber, arugula, green onion, and microwaved extra firm tofu with Bragg's.



I'm getting pretty good at turning leftover stir-fries, stews, or whatever into burgers. These contained a lentil and rice dish (mostly rice and very dry lentils), leftover veggies (I think cauliflower and carrots), hemp seeds, garbanzo flour, herbs and spices, dried onion and garlic, and a bit of water and tomato for processing. Zip zip in the food processor, mold into patties and cook in a pan on the stove top or in the oven. They were great hot for lunch, and the leftover cold ones made delicious sandwiches to take on out ferry trip to Port Townsend. No recipe needed. Do you like to experiment and cook without recipes? Have you had a favorite success?



Last but not least, this is one of my typical breakfast bowls, with homemade yogurt, blueberries, o's, hemp seeds and raisins. And there's also a banana buried in there!

This post contains Amazon links to books I recommend.

Protein Ninja by Terry Hope Romero: cookbook review

I own and love all of Terry Hope Romero's cookbooks, so I didn't hesitate for a moment when offered her newest, Protein Ninja, to review. I didn't spend much time pondering what the title meant — just casually assumed it was a humorous reference to the "so, where do you get your protein?" question vegans are always fielding. I was wrong. The book is a serious guide for athletes and others trying to add protein to their diets to improve performance and health. Not being much of an athlete myself, I've never worried about my protein intake. In fact, I prefer to get my protein from foods that naturally contain it, rather than by adding protein powders and such to my food, and while adding protein powders like pea, rice and   hemp protein is a theme in the cookbook, there are still plenty of recipes that use beans, tofu, tempeh, seitan, nuts and seeds as protein sources. Those are the recipes of most interest to me, though if you want to add an extra punch of protein to your diet, you will find plenty of delicious ways to do it with Protein Ninja.



The first recipe I attempted was the baked veggie pan omelet. The protein punch came from the tofu plus garbanzo bean flour. I like tofu and garbanzo flour, and the photo in the book was so enticing I couldn't resist. I followed the omelet part of the recipe exactly, though for the roasted vegetable part, I substituted asparagus for green beans and added sprinkle of peas and mushrooms. One thing I noticed was when I followed the quantities in the ingredients list, I had so many veggies I couldn't fit them all on. For example, the recipe called for a pint of cherry tomatoes, but even a half pint was too much, as I was trying to approximate the appearance of the recipe photo.



The omelet was pretty, and over the course of several days we ate it all, but it wasn't a favorite of my mine. The main reason I didn't love it, though, may be the very reason you do — the texture was too much like a soft, moist (dare I say "wet") omelet of the undercooked style that I remember from before I was vegan. I only ate dry-cooked eggs, the dryer the better, but I might be in the minority there. I baked the omelet much longer than the recipe directions indicated, and still it wouldn't firm up enough for me.



Next I was going to make Korean tofu taco salad, but just the kimchi tofu part since I didn't have some of the ingredients for the rest of the recipe. However, the tofu was delicious, and I still intend to make the whole gorgeous dish sometime soon. A good recipe might give you opportunities to borrow and use just one component, and that's okay. Terry's recipes are comprised of various components that you can switch around if you like — lots of potential here.

I had to smoosh the patties into shape in order to take a photo.

Next up, my husband took a turn trying a recipe. I probably shouldn't even include the recipe for vegetable korma tofu patties in my review, since my husband made an unfortunate mistake, but we can learn from mistakes as well as successes, can we not? First, I want to say that it took him about two hours to get the patties on the table even though the cooking time listed was one hour. (If you think cooking the rice took part of the time, think again. He had a packet of instant rice up his sleeve for that part of the meal.) There are many ingredients and steps in the recipes, and though some cooks may be organized, nimble and quick in the kitchen, my husband is not. Anyway, part way into the cooking marathon, the house was smelling fantastic, and I was getting so hungry, I ventured into the kitchen to see if he needed help, but he sent me away. Too bad. The recipe lists tend to be long, and many continue onto the next page — a fact he didn't notice as he got to work. By the time he realized he needed pea protein powder, he couldn't think what to do, so he left it out. Had he asked, I could have provided him with lots of sample protein packets that I've never used. Needless to say, the patties were not extremely cohesive. He also made too many so they were less substantial than they should have been. The patties tasted good, but not great enough that I would want to make them again, though I'm tempted to see what they would be like if done correctly.



The next day I buzzed the leftovers briefly in the food processor, added some hemp, reformed the patties and cooked them on my griddle. The texture improved, but we were still not overwhelmed.



I saved the best for last. My husband wanted another chance to make something for the review, and he chose five spice chickpea peanut noodle bowl. We both love noodle bowls, and this one was amazing. So amazing, in fact, that I think I'm going to make it for a pot luck next weekend. There was still a long list of ingredients (the peanut sauce alone has nine), and multiple steps (you have to roast the chickpeas, make the sauce and make the noodles and the salad) but the results were worth the effort — noodles, fresh,  crispy raw shredded cabbage and radishes, a little bite from arugula, fragrant and deeply flavorful roasted chickpeas, and a spectacular peanut sauce. We both loved it so much — can't wait to have it again.

The photos that appear in Protein Ninja are voluptuous, and of course I wish there were more since they add so much to the book. The recipe ingredients and directions  are easy to read, though you might need a magnifying glass for the index! Sometimes the directions may be unclear for less experienced cooks. For example, listing whole peeled garlic and a cube of fresh ginger without saying what to do with them before adding to a sauce. If you're on the hunt for stealthy protein additions to your diet, or even if you just want to add clever, intensely flavorful food combinations to spice up your dining, I recommend you take a look at Protein Ninja by Terry Hope Romero.

Update: Here's a link to an addition to my review.