Sweet Treats

Last weekend, and again this past weekend, Jeannette asked about the possibility of me making sweet treats for her to consumer.  For reasons that are unclear to me, I didn't quite get around to making anything particularly sweet to eat last weekend.

When the request was lodged again this weekend I decided that I couldn't put it off any longer, I was going to have to make something on the sweet side of things.

I turned to the Oh She Glows cookbook for inspiration.  Since my parents gave us a copy of this book last spring we've both found it to be a good source for relatively healthy recipes that taste good.  Because all of the recipes are also vegan it is particularly handy.

I soon settled on the Chilled Chocolate Espresso Torte at least in part because it called for 3/4 cup of hazelnuts, which we just happened to have in the cupboard.  Of course, what I didn't know when I settled upon this recipe was that the 'chilled' was really 'frozen' and that the while the prep time for this recipe wasn't all that bad, the final chill was to take some number of hours (like quite a number of hours).

Maybe this is why it is good to read the full recipe (and not just the ingredient list) before you settle on a recipe?

Anyway, before long I had the crust in the oven and was on to preparing the filling.  The only real delay was the baking of the crust, which was delayed by 30 to 45 minutes because our oven has started taking quite a long time to heat up.

Soon enough everything was assembled and the torte was in the freezer for the required chilling time.

When all was said and done that evening we were finally ready to sample the torte.  Much to my surprise, I was a little disappointed by the crust - which was definitely a little cardboardy.  Sadly, I think the my equipment and ingredients may be to blame - as the recipe made sense.  

On the equipment front, I think that even after about an hour in the oven I may not have really toasted the crust quite enough.  I suspect that this process didn't quite manage to impart the desired flavour.  Bummer.  

On the ingredient front, I had a sense that the oat flour I was using may have been a little off even before I used it.  Now I'm almost certain the oat flour is off.  Guess it's time for new oat flour.

That said, I think that possibly using granola instead of rolled oats might be a good improvement to the crust.  Jeannette and I agree that this might be a good way to add a little extra flavour to the dish without really adding much sugar (or other nutritional components we don't want).  Alternatively, we also wondered how this might work with a completely different crust?

Once I realized that I'd begun making a dish that wouldn't be ready for many hours I continued to flip through the cookbook a little more, this time settling on the 'Yolo' recipe.

What was striking about this recipe was the simple ingredient list, really just a handful of ingredients the primary being chocolate chips and dates.

The general premise of the recipe is a date-based faux-caramel enrobed in chocolate.

The date paste takes almost no time to make, though does require some chilling before it can be handled properly.  Even with this chilling I found working with the paste tricky.  I think that the next time I make this recipe I will opt for a much more extended chilling process, and I may even try to find a way to freeze the past in a shape that will be conducive to handling while almost frozen.

Once the date paste is in the desired shape (and chilled again) all you have to do is dip it in chocolate and let it cool.

The end product was amazing.  It was hard to believe it was date.  Had I been served this blind I never would have guessed that they were date based, or that they were so easy to make.  

On Sunday Jeannette finally talked me into making yeast-based doughnuts.  I'd long been putting these off because of the length of the process and because even a half batch of the Joy of Cooking recipe would leave us with about 12 doughnuts.

On the other side of the equation, I've long been curious to try making this style of doughnut (as I've always made cake doughnuts in the past).

Much to my surprise, the Joy of Cooking recipe was relatively easy to veganize.  I think that the only ingredients I had to swap out were the butter and eggs.  

Once I got going what I liked about the process is that though there were several stages, each stage was relatively discrete and simple.  In all, only a few minutes of labour was required before the donuts were to rolled and fried.

The downside of the process was that, like the torte, several hours of waiting are required before the product is ready.

Another downside is that even once we'd made it through all the waiting, the doughnuts were a little dense and fat-clogged.

At least they looked like doughnuts (once we figured out the glazing process).

While I'm glad to say that I went through this process once, I'm not sure I'll be too keen to do this again just to end up with a dozen greasy, not-to-pillowy doughnuts.

Fortunately, aside from the doughnuts, the first two dishes weren't too unhealthy, nor do they demand to be eaten within minutes of being made.

Cameron - 5
Neil - 0

Yup, that's still a thing

Much to my surprise, it's a month and a half later and I'm still updating my vegan food identification blog It's Already Vegan!

Who would have ever expected a non-vegan like me would ever have such a blog?

Though I guess that since Jeannette has become vegan I've become much closer to becoming vegan than I ever though I would.  And it hasn't hurt that at about the same time Jeannette became vegan I learned that red meat consumption can encourage kidney stone formation.  I'm kind of inclined to think that trying to avoid another kidney surgery would be a good idea.

All of this is basically just a way of saying that if you're looking to kill time on the internet by reading a second rate blog that I've got you covered (in more ways than one, two, three, or four).

Because wasting even more time seemed like a good idea

On any given day I waste an embarrassingly large chunk of time on the internet.  While some of this time is spent doing semi-worthwhile things like checking my email or reading news, most of my internet time is spend mindlessly refreshing webpages hoping something will have changed in the past 30 seconds or making posts to an increasingly large gaggle of blogs.

And to top things off, I have recently added another new blog to the list.

This new one's called It's already vegan!

The idea for this blog came from my interactions with friends who are vegans.  Over the past few years I have been thinking about foods that could I could serve them in social settings.  The more I thought about which foods were vegan the more I realized that all kinds of things that we consume on a day-to-day basis are vegan, or can be with a little forethought.  Maybe most importantly, the apparent stigma associated with 'Vegan foods,' a stigma which at one point in my life I may have helped further, is completely ridiculous.

Anyway, I'm not sure that vegans need my help identifying vegan foods or if non-vegans care which foods are vegan or not, but if learning about which foods are vegan from a site that doesn't take things too seriously sounds like something you might be interested in feel free to check this one out.  Maybe from time to time I'll even post something that isn't a failed attempt at humour.

(Oh yeah, and because kids these days demand virality and all that stuff It's already vegan! is already on Twitter.)

Mostly vegan

Since just after Christmas I have almost completely eliminated meat from my diet.  Since just after Christmas Jeannette has been vegan - meaning she doesn't consume any animal products at all.

Because I try to prepare food with Jeannette's diet in mind I have been thinking vegan for as long as she has been vegan, and in many instances eating vegan for longish (at least for me) stretches.

While I realize that I am not vegan, I do think that it fair to say that I am mostly vegan (you know, vegan except for butter and an occasional piece of beef).  Such claims annoy Jeannette quite a bit - she thinks I shouldn't use vegan in any way to describe myself if I am not vegan.

I disagree.  Firstly, thinking vegan has to be a big first step.  If you don't think vegan it's hard to be vegan. Secondly, I am clearly facilitating veganism - and I think that has to count for something.  Thirdly, I am clearly moving in that direction myself.  Once we get rid of the eggs and remaining animal products I don't really plan on replacing them - and I think that also has to count for something.  If we mapped veganism to the Kinsey scale I think it is fair to say I would be predominately vegan.

Maybe Jeannette is right and you are either all vegan or not at all vegan, but shouldn't thinking vegan count for something?  If I put all the time into planning vegan meals shouldn't I get at least some vegan credit?

Cameron: 27
Neil: 0

Three ingredient bread pt. 5

After a seeming unending period of rising, the liquid-less pumpkin dream bread was finally approaching a level of risen-ness I was comfortable with.

Obviously, I then placed the risen dough in the oven.

Placing the dough in the oven reminded me how dirty our oven door window is.  Gross.  I need to get on this cleaning project soon.

Oh, and while I was fooling around with this project (and doing some work), Jeannette baked and iced another batch of vegan cupcakes. 

This batch is chocolate-zucchini with chia seeds replacing the eggs.  Unfortunately I have an issue with zucchini so I won't be able to try them, even though they look great. 

Vegans are my favourite vegetarians

I’m not always so hot on vegetarianism generally (especially those ‘vegetarian’ diets that consider fish to be an acceptable food for a vegetarian), but I tend to think that veganism is pretty great.  Not only have they fully committed to the ‘no animal products’ position, but so many of the foods I do my best to avoid are also avoided by vegans.  Because of these dietary similarities I always feel that I have a special bond with vegans and, thus, I do my best to accommodate their needs whenever I preparing foods for vegans.  Even if there are no vegans present, if I have prepared a vegan meal I will often make a point of announcing it to those present (and I will then try to remember the recipe in case I need to prepare food for a vegan in the future).

Given my feelings towards vegans I thought I should come up with a (hopefully only) mildly insulting and very personal list of the six best things about vegans/veganism.

6) Vegans tend to read labels and know what they are eating.  Though I don’t always do this myself, I am in favour of people being informed eaters.

5) Vegans take the heat for picky eaters.  If there is a vegan around I know they will make me look good because I won’t be the pickiest eater present.

4) Vegans never add unnecessary cheese or dairy products to recipes. 

3) Vegans never slip shrimp or the other invertebrate seafood into dishes. 

2) If there’s white stuff in a vegan dish I now that it isn’t mayonnaise, and this is good because mayonnaise is the grossest.

1) The best thing about vegans is that they never add honey to recipes as a sugar replacement.  Knowing that I never have to worry about this makes eating vegan deserts a real treat.

New/re-branded stuff on the internets

Today marks the launch of the re-branded/organized/titled/conceptualized version of the podcast/public radio show The Sound of Young America now called Bullseye with Jesse Thorn.  As was the case with TSOYA, Bullseye has pop-culture-y interviews and comedy stuff.  Oh, and in the first episode Jesse interviews a few cast members from everybody's favourite costume drama - Downton Abbey.

In honour of this event I thought that I might mention three other things from the internet that are either new or in the process of re-imagining themselves.

1) When Jessica, an early reader of this blog, moved to Korea about two years ago she expressed an interest in engaging in some form of blogging or blogging-like activity to communicate her experiences in her new place of residence.  It seems that the prospect of being "a blogger for the government of Korea" finally motivated her to create her own blog a few weeks ago.  And now that she has been selected by the Korean government to participate in their blogging program she will also be posting on their blog.

3)Andrew, a fellow Brinton Memorial Elementary School alumnus, has also recently started a blog after seeming interested in the prospect for some time.  Andrew's blogging goal is to watch and review at least 365 movies over the course of 2012.  At last count he has posted five such reviews.  If he doesn't watch out me my overrun his goal, and that wouldn't be fun for anyone would it?

3) To get back to the re-branding/imagining theme I first touched on with Bullseye, Jeannette has recently re-imagined her long-ignored Chinafax blog and is now using to document her exploits in the uncharted territory that is veganism in Wolfville.  This one is definitely worth checking out as I even get a shout or two as being someone who is not entirely antagonistic towards such a venture.

I think that just about wraps it up for new things on the internet.  I can't imagine that there might be more than three of them, that would probably be just a little too much for the information super highway to accomodate.

Note: Using 'blog' so many times in a single post makes me feel like a bit of a loser.  Sorry to have tarnished so many fine endeavours with this questionable word.