Scribbles and Scrambles ~ Wednesday Wordless.

Scraps and Snippets ~ So Delicious Coconut Chippers...For Reals

So Delicious Coconut Chippers

3/4 Cup room temperature coconut oil
2/3 Cup sugar
2/3 Cup coconut sugar (or use brown)
2 TBSP egg replacer (I used EnerG)
6 TBSP So Delicious vanilla or original coconut milk
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 1/3 Cup flour
2/3 Cup chocolate chips

Cream the sugar, coconut oil, milk and egg replacer. Add baking powder and salt and mix well. Add vanilla and stir. Stir in flour until blended and finally add the chocolate chips. Roll dough into balls. 

Preheat oven to 350. 

I made half the batch in a 20 count silicone pan and baked them for 14 minutes.

The rest I baked on a cookie sheet for 12 minutes.

Makes about 3 dozen. 

I'm entering this recipe in the Spring Fling So Delicious Recipe Contest. It's open til May 19th. Got a recipe to enter? Go there. 

Scraps and Snippets ~ Fudgy, Chewy Brownies AKA Panic Brownies

I had about 5 minutes to find a brownie recipe on Friday. My day had gone differently than I had planned and I had just enough time to whip up brownies, get em baked and get out the door. I looked through 5 vegan cookbooks trying to find one. They were in there...but each called for time consuming or unavailable or texture tweaking ingredients like coffee, espresso powder, tofu, two different fat sources, bittersweet chocolate, maple syrup etc.  Sometimes brownies are cake-like anyway so I didn't want to gamble on texture. I grabbed a traditional 1,000 recipe cookbook and spied a blondie recipe. Since I wanted the chewy of a blondie, I thought that would be a definite, but I needed chocolate. 

The blondie recipe was kind of the inspiration for these brownies as the time wound down to nothing. I say inspiration because I changed every single ingredient. Seriously. And this is what came out. And they were delicious. This might be THE brownie go to recipe. A huge plus for this on that particular evening was that they were a thinner batch that didn't need to bake for 40 minutes. 

Panic Brownies

1 and 1/2 sticks Earth Balance (3/4 Cup)

1 1/3 Cup sugar

2 TBSP egg replacer (I used EnerG)

6 TBSP water or non-dairy milk

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon vanilla

1/2 teaspoon salt

2/3 Cup cocoa

1 2/3 Cup flour

1/3 chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350. Grease a 9 x 13. Mix Earth Balance and sugar until blended. Add cocoa, egg replacer and water/milk, vanilla and mix well, add salt, baking powder and vanilla and stir. Pour in flour and mix. It will be thick and more like cookie dough. Press into pan. Bake for 23-26 minutes. I believe I'll try it in an 8 x 11 and bake it for 10 minutes more and see how it does in a thicker brownie.

Frost with failed Easter candies experiment. (Ha. Ha.) That's what I did. Unfortunately,  I'm not able to recreate that easily. Nor do I want to. 

A simple chocolate ganache or frosting would be great.  

Scraps and Snippets ~ Quinoa Muffuletta...Fun with Quinoa Part Two

Quinoa and Easter.

I took this cold quinoa muffuletta salad to one location and the ring to the other.

Follow the directions below for the basic quinoa to make either dish. The amount of cooked quinoa will be slightly over 2 cups.
1 Cup quinoa
1/4 Cup dried mushrooms
1/4 Cup diced onion
2 Cloves garlic minced
2 Cups veggie broth

Toss all in a pan and bring to a boil. Turn down to simmer and cover and let simmer about 15 minutes.

The ring recipe is here. 

Cold Quinoa Muffuletta Salad

Dressing: 

3 TBSP lemon juice

2 TBSP olive oil

1/2 teaspoon garlic powder

1/2 teaspoon dried oregano

1/2 teaspoon of agave or maple syrup

1/2 teaspoon of yellow or brown spicy mustard

dash salt

Mix well. 

Add the following:

1/2 Cup chopped mushrooms

1/4 to 1/2 Cup chopped green olives

1/4 to 1/2 Cup chopped kalamata olives

1/2 Cup shredded kale

The dressing 
The cooked quinoa mixture

Mix well. 

Scraps and Snippets ~ Quinoa Ring...Fun with Quinoa Part 1

First prep the quinoa to make enough for two separate dishes. This amount makes a quinoa ring and a medium sized side salad. I'd definitely cut it in half if you only want to make one or the other. The amount of cooked quinoa will be slightly over 3 cups. If you want to make just the ring follow the directions in the parentheses and this will make approx a cup.

1 1/2 Cup quinoa (1/2 Cup)

1/3 Cup dried mushrooms (2 TBSP)

1/3 Cup diced onion (2 TBSP)

3 Cloves garlic minced (1 clove)

3 Cups veggie broth (1 Cup)

Bring to a boil, turn down to simmer and cover and let simmer about 15 minutes.

Split the cooked amount into thirds into two separate bowls (one of them can be the pan) 1/3 for ring, 2/3 for salad. The salad recipe is here. 

To make the Quinoa Ring you also need the following. 

1/4 of a container of vegan cream cheese (2 oz or 2 TBSPish)

1/4 Cup chopped mushrooms

3/4 teaspoons garlic powder

1/2 TBSP finely chopped onion

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 1/2 TBSP nutritional yeast

Add all these to the smaller amount bowl full of the quinoa and mix all together very well.

Crescent rolls (1 can, make sure it's vegan) You could also use your favorite pizza dough and make this a pocket or calzone. 

To make a crescent roll ring separate the 8 triangles of dough. Lay each of the  longest pointiest ends over the rim of a large pie plate or round baker. The shorter two point ends will overlap each other and there will be a hole in the center. It's going to look kind of like a stick drawing of a sun. Press the overlapped edges in the pan together. 

Scoop the quinoa filling onto the flat inner circle of dough. Then take each outside point and pull it over the mixture and tuck it slightly under the inner ring of dough. 

Bake at the temperature called for on the can (or in your pizza dough recipe) Bake approximately 4 - 6 minutes longer to make sure everything is done. You want it golden and cooked through. 

Serves 8 slices.   

Scraps and Snippets ~ Carrot Cake Truffles

Carrot Cake Truffles

3 small carrots (remove the ends, peel and chop)

1 1/2 Cup nuts (I used pecans)

1/2 tsp cinnamon

12 Medjool dates (pits removed, of course) 

1 tsp vanilla

Dash salt

flaked coconut or powdered/crumbed nuts

Place carrots in food processor, add nuts and dates and process. While running add cinnamon, salt and vanilla.  Process until mixture is uniform and sticky. 

Roll into balls and roll in coconut, nuts or both. 

Chill a couple hours before serving and keep in fridge. Makes about 20. 

Scraps and Snippets ~ Orange Maple Tempeh

I had to take a meatless dish to Easter dinner. The omnivores in the crowd were going to be chowing down on ham with a sweet mustardy sauce, and though that doesn't tempt me I wanted to offer something with some bite and some similarities. 

Enter tempeh, Now, this shouldn't really appeal to omni's. Tempeh is fermented grains and tofu, after all. I mean, no omni is going to order this off a menu if they could have meat instead. 

But. Can I tell you that omni's gave this a try, and two thumbs ups? I just did. Scout's honor. 

Make this the night before (or at least an hour so the marinade can soak into the tempeh.) 

Orange Maple Tempeh

2 packages tempeh (I used TJ's)
3 cloves chopped garlic
3 - 4 carrots cut into sticks
1/2 to 3/4 Nuts (optional)

Glaze
2/3 Cup orange marmalade (I used Trader Joe's)
1/4 Cup apple cider vinegar
1/4 Cup maple syrup
Mix together and set aside until ready. 

Cut tempeh into chunks, squares, triangles, rectangles, strips. Place in a steamer basket and steam for 10 minutes. Tempeh should be double the thickness. 

Oil a 9 x 13 pan. 

Toss garlic chunks, tempeh pieces, carrot sticks and nuts if using into the pan/dish.

Scoop marinade/glaze over the tempeh pieces and drizzling over the dish. Cover and refrigerate several hours or overnight.  When ready, heat the oven to 350 and bake for 25 or so minutes. You want the carrots tender and the marinade to caramelize.