HappyCow Cookbook review and giveaway

Is there a traveling vegan or vegetarian who hasn't looked at the HappyCow review list of vegan/vegetarian-friendly places to eat? I doubt it. We always check the list when we're heading to a new location, and even sometimes when we're going out to eat at home, to see what food options are available. It's such a terrific resource. We used it a lot in July and August when we were on the road between Seattle and Madison, and when we went to Cape Cod for several days to attend a wedding. We found interesting places we never would have known about otherwise.

Now there is a HappyCow cookbook by Eric Brent, the creator of HappyCow, and Glen Merzer, co-author of Better Than Vegan, and I'm happy to help introduce the book as part of the Summer Road Trip HappyCow Blog Tour. The HappyCow Cookbook is a collection of interviews with the owners and/or chefs of more than 40 favorite HappyCow-listed restaurants from the United States and abroad, plus one or two favorite recipes from each establishment. Not only is it fun to find recipes from favorite restaurants where I've dined, but I had a great time looking up recipes from places I've always wanted to try. Candle Café, Karyn's On Green, Hangawi, Millennium, Native Foods and Sublime are just a few of the restaurants in the book.

raw Green coconut curry

I was asked to try recipes from, and generally highlight, the Seattle establishments, since that's where I now live, and there are two Seattle vegan restaurants in the collection — Chaco Canyon and Wayward Vegan Café. I've been to both many, many times. I've even taken a raw foods cooking class from two of Chaco's cooks. (One of the dishes we made was green coconut curry, which I photographed (above) on one of our visits to the restaurant.) Chaco serves both raw and cooked vegan food, and in addition to the curry, I'm very fond of their simple "bowls." I didn't find any of my favorite dishes from Chaco in the cookbook, but the quinoa tabbouleh that we made, is now a new favorite. It was easy to make and extremely delicious. Quinoa is probably my favorite grain, and I think I liked the Chaco version of quinoa tabbouleh better than a traditional wheat-based one. Thanks to the publisher, I can share the recipe with you. I just want to note that we used half the amount of oil called for and half the salt. Also, I think the quantity will probably serve at least eight, in spite of what the recipe says.

Quinoa Tabbouleh

From Chaco Canyon in Seattle, WA
Serves 4–6 (as a side dish)

Quinoa is a grainlike crop originally grown in the mountainous regions of Ecuador, Columbia, Peru, and Bolivia. It’s considered a complete protein for humans, as it contains a balanced set of essential amino acids. It’s gluten-free and easily digestible, making it an excellent grain alternative. This is a great way to use extra quinoa.

• 2½ cups quinoa
• 3¼ cups water
• 1 cup minced fresh parsley (about ½ bunch)
• 2 cups peeled, seeded, and diced cucumber
• Leaves from 3 stalks of mint, minced
• ¼ cup diced red onion (¼" dices)
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
• ⅓ cup olive oil

Combine the quinoa with 3-1/4 cups water in a pot. Bring to a simmer and then reduce heat to low. Cover and cook for 30 to 35 minutes. Remove from heat and let sit covered for an additional 5 minutes. Fluff quinoa with a fork and cover and cool it in the refrigerator at least 4 hours. Once chilled, add quinoa to a large bowl with all the other ingredients. Mix together with a spoon and serve immediately or chill.

Tip: It’s easy to make variations on this recipe. You can mix red and black quinoa together with white (for example, cook 2 cups white quinoa with ½ cup red quinoa or ½ cup black quinoa) or use other grains like barley, farro, red rice, buckwheat, or millet.                                          

Homemade nutloaf served for lunch with summer squash and salad.

The second Seattle restaurant in the HappyCow cookbook is Wayward Vegan Café. Wayward is a vegan comfort food sort of place, and we've been going there since long before we moved to Seattle, when they were still at their old location. Back in the days before I had to give up gluten, my favorite dish was the nutloaf — except I think it was called a nutlet. I would order it exactly like you see it in the photo below — as an open-faced hot sandwich on grilled sourdough topped with mushroom gravy and a side of garlic steamed kale. Sometimes I'd get mashed potatoes, too, just to make the plate perfect.
The recipe for nutloaf isn't gluten-free, but was very easy to convert. I had planned to use leftover quinoa instead of breadcrumbs, but my husband 'accidentally' ate the quinoa, so I used some gf breadcrumbs that I'd made from a failed bread attempt, and stashed in the freezer. I also used two tablespoons of chia seeds instead of xanthan gum and flax, TSP* instead of TVP, and olive oil instead of vegan margarine. But even with the changes, it tasted exactly like I remember. I'm so happy to have my nutlet cutlet back!

photo and recipe courtesy of BenBella Books and Wayward Café

Nutloaf
From Wayward Café in Seattle, Wash.

Serves 6

• 1 cup chopped walnuts
• 1 cup slivered almonds
• 1 large white onion, diced small
• 1 tablespoon ground flaxseed
• 1 12-ounce block medium-firm tofu
• ½ cup textured vegetable protein (TVP) granules
• ¼ cup nutritional yeast flakes
• ⅓ cup bread crumbs
• 1 tablespoon ground sage
• 1 tablespoon soy sauce
• ½ tablespoon vegan chicken broth powder
• 1 teaspoon dried thyme
• ½ teaspoon xanthan gum
• 2 tablespoons vegan margarine, softened
• 2 tablespoons minced garlic

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. In a food processor grind the walnuts and almonds until they resemble a meal. Place all ingredients, including the processed nuts, in a large mixing bowl. Using clean hands, mash everything together into a paste. Mix very well. Spray a small cookie sheet with nonstick oil. Put the nutloaf dough onto the cookie sheet and spread evenly, filling all sides to the edge of the cookie sheet. Smooth the top to make sure the dough is level. Place the cookie sheet in the preheated oven for 45 minutes. Remove and allow to cool slightly before cutting.

Served as we do at our restaurant: either in a cold sandwich on toasted French bread with vegan mayonnaise, lettuce, and tomato, or in an open-faced hot sandwich on grilled sourdough topped with mushroom gravy and a side of garlic steamed kale. 

 (*I don't usually use TVP, and when I recently read a description of how it's made, I was leery of buying it for the nutloaf recipe, and eating it. However, I decided that a different form of the product, organic TSP, might be a reasonable choice. TVP is made using hexane, a chemical I'd like to avoid in my food. The organic TSP from Bob's Red Mill, is not. It's not something I'd want to eat every day, but occasionally consuming it seems reasonable. I had to order it online as I was unable to find TSP locally. Bob's also makes TVP, and that was all I could find at Whole Foods and our co-op. What do you think about these products?)

There are quite a number of recipes in The HappyCow Cookbook that I want to try, like the Thai Red Curry from Sublime, or the Moroccan Tajine from SunCafé Organic. Some of the recipes I would make as is, but many have way too much fat and salt for me, because this is restaurant food after all. While there are many recipes that look interesting, there are a few that appear overly complicated, and some where the directions seem unclear. But, it's a treat to be able to choose from so many esteemed-menu items and attempt them at home. And I can certainly alter the ingredients to suit my taste. Thanks to BenBella Books, you have a chance to win a copy of the HappyCow Cookbook so you, too, can recreate your favorite restaurant's dishes in your own kitchen. Just leave a comment telling me if you've ever used HappyCow, and if you have, name a great restaurant you found. (You needn't have used HappyCow to enter.) You have until Sept. 8 to enter. I'll randomly choose a winner and announce the results on the blog. Sorry, but the book can only be sent to addresses in the U.S. and Canada.

Thanks for all your comments. The giveaway has now ended.The winner was Lynsi, of Girl Goes Veggie!

Full disclosure: I received a review copy of the HappyCow cookbook for review. All opinions are my own. Recipes and nutloaf photo reprinted with permission.

Weather-weary | raw dinner x 2

On Friday evening I was having a severe "allergic" reaction to the weather. Specifically, that would be a reaction to the unrelenting rain, and the accompanying dark and damp. Day after day after day of RAIN. In an unrelated but strangely ironic connection, even the pipes under the bathroom sink had begun to leak, requiring a visit from a plumber. (A tall, cute plumber with an earring, but that's irrelevant.) My "allergy" took the form of intense agitation. I was irritable, crabby, in a bad mood, and ready to scream. It occurred to me that when we lived in Wisconsin, surrounded by mountains of snow, and freezing cold, I seldom had a problem with the weather. I only seemed to remember the good weather, and dismissed the bad. My family from Philadelphia and Florida would ask me how I could stand so much cold and snow, and I'd reply that it wasn't as bad as it sounded. And it wasn't. At least there was SUN! And it was mostly dry so the snow was powdery. Honestly, I hardly ever minded. But lately I find that I can only remember the bad weather. I can't remember the sun. I'm feeling hostile and irritated. What is happening?

Anyway, Friday night I was too pissed to cook (or be nice to anyone else who might cook) so we went out to dinner. We had a gift card to Chaco Canyon, a restaurant we really like, that we decided to cash in. I needed a large quantity of vegetables, and this seemed like the place to get them. You can eat raw at Chaco, and that's what I decided to do. I had green coconut curry — a large bowl of raw veggies with a Thai influence. It was a lot of green! After I finished, I needed something a little more lighthearted so I had a raw brownie. Okay then. I wished I'd brought the camera — should have but was in too bad a mood when we left the house.

The problem I have with raw food in the winter is it leaves me feeling chilly. As we walked out of the restaurant, my husband was nice and warm and I was still cold — though slightly less angry. I decided that what I needed was some nice warm, freshly popped corn, so we headed home so I could try out a corn-popping method I'd seen in a podcast earlier in the day. We didn't bring our air-popper to Seattle, and I've been unhappy with the microwave experiments I've tried. I popped the corn on the stove in a large stainless mixing bowl, like this. It worked great but I thought it was too oily (it would have been too salty, too, but I only used a scant 1/4 teaspoon), and I felt bad about using all that foil. I think I'm off to Goodwill soon to look for an abandoned air popper.

So, by now you're probably wondering, how did I get the photos without the camera? Did I steal them off the Internet? I considered it but no, I wouldn't do that. The truth is we went back to Chaco last night and used the rest of the gift certificate just so I could illustrate this post. Told you I was losing it. I ordered exactly the same thing figuring that two days of raw food would probably do me good. The coconut curry was even better the second night but the brownie not so much. The first night the brownie was creamy and delicious but the second night it was hard, and made me think I was eating chocolate-flavored solid coconut oil. Not good. It makes me shudder when I think about it.

I made the popcorn again, too, using one tablespoon of oil instead of three, and less than 1/4 teaspoon of salt. I think with less oil you have to pay closer attention so the kernels don't burn, but I liked the result much better. Try it both ways.
(Thank you M.C.!)

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Please help
I can't write a post without encouraging all the generous bloggers out there to make a contribution to help the people of Haiti recover from the horrendous earthquake. Here's a list of trusted places that will put your money to good use. Even a small donation will help.

The American Institute of Philanthropy (AIP) announces its top-rated list of charities involved in Haitian earthquake relief efforts. AIP, a leading charity watchdog that issues letter grade (A+ to F) ratings of nonprofit groups, identifies the following charities, which are providing aid to the victims that receive an “A” or “B” grade based on the portion of their budget going to program services and their fundraising efficiency. Contact the organizations below for information of specific relief operations now underway.

• Action Against Hunger (A)
  
• American Jewish World Service (A)
  
• American Red Cross (A-)
  
• American Refugee Committee (A)
  
• AmeriCares (A)
  
• CARE (A)
  
• Catholic Relief Services (A)
  
• Church World Service (A)
  
• Doctors Without Borders – USA (A)
  
• Habitat for Humanity International – N.O.
• International Medical Corps (A+)
  
• International Rescue Committee (A+)
  
• Lutheran World Relief (A)
  
• Medical Teams International (B+)
  
• Mennonite Central Committee (A)
  
• Mercy Corps (A-)
  
• Operation USA (A)
  
• Oxfam-America (A-)
  
• Partners in Health (A+)
  
• Project Concern International (A)
  
• Save the Children (A)
  
• Salvation Army (A)
  
• UMCOR (United Methodist Committee on Relief) (A+)
  
• World Concern (Program of Crista Ministries) (A)
  
  
• World Vision (B+)