Chocolate Pie w/Graham Cracker Crust; Zandra's Veggie Noodle Soup

My last day off was Monday, the 5th...and, incidentally, the day that the two cookbooks I ordered online were allegedly shipped, so of course, I'm hoping that one, and preferably both, of them will show up today. Fingers crossed....Anyway, I did some cooking that day, the chocolate pie and the veggie noodle soup. Both of them turned out very well, and I was pleased.

The pie is vegan, except that I used regular margarine in the graham cracker crust, so you can use either oil or Earth Balance to veganize it, if you wish. I used the chocolate pudding recipe I posted back in December, but added more cocoa, more vanilla, and three tablespoons of corn starch, to thicken it.

The crust recipe is one I found in my old "Joy of Cooking" cookbook, and is very easy. 1 1/2C of crushed graham crackers, 1/4C packed brown sugar, and 6Tbs. of melted butter...yeah, yeah, yeah, I know: It's Blue Bonnet margarine, lol. Whatever! Anyway, mix all this together until all the crumbs are coated with the butter, and pat it into a 9-inch pie pan, bake for about ten minutes at 300º.

The pie recipe is as follows, with my changes in it:

Combine in blender:
1 pkg. silken tofu
2/3C sugar
3/4C unsweetened cocoa
2Tbs. vanilla extract
3Tbs. corn starch
Blend until creamy and thick, pour into pie crust, and bake at 325ºF for about 30 minutes. It will still be a little shaky when you take it out, but don't overcook it. The crust should be nice and crispy, and the pie, after cooling, should hold together enough to cut and scoop onto a plate. It's awesome, trust me...especially if you're a coolwhip freak like I am, lol. After you put the coolwhip on it, if you can see the pie, it's not enough coolwhip...got that from Paula Deen, lol.

Monday was a good day for soup, so I made Zandra's Veggie Noodle Soup, that I'd found on VegWeb.com. I only changed it a little bit, honest. You know I never, or almost never, follow a recipe exactly. So, here's the soup:

Zondra's Veggie Noodle Soup
10-11C water
2med. potatoes, cubed small
2-3 carrots, in small discs
2-3 celery stalks, small dice
1/2C onion, chopped
vegetable bouillion for amount of water used
2-3Tbs soy sauce or Braggs Liquid Aminos
2 1/2C rotine pasta
salt and pepper to taste
1tsp garlic salt.

Bring water to boil, cook potatoes and carrots until just tender, about 10minutes.
Add remaining veggies and bouillion, add soy sauce and garlic salt. Cook on med-hihg heat 5-10 minutes, covered.
Add pasta, cook 10 minutes or until pasta and veggies are done. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

Easy enough, right? So of course, I made it more complicated, lol. First, I sauteed the onion, celery, and one teaspoon of minced garlic in about 2Tbs. of olive oil and margarine. Then I added the potatoes and carrots, and let them saute just a couple minutes, and then added the water. I let all this come to a boil, and then simmer for about 20 minutes, when I added the pasta. My pasta was maybe two handsful of penne, a large, round pasta, as I didn't have any rotini. After everything was cooked the way I like it, very, very soft, I added about three good tablespoons full of the miso paste I bought last week, and let it simmer, very gently, for about ten more minutes, until the miso paste was dissolved into the soup. It turned out really good, I liked it very much, and have some of it frozen in the freezer for one of those times I odn't want to cook. One thing I will do differently the next time I make it, tho, is to add quite a bit more miso to it. I could just barely taste the miso, and since I love miso soup, it's just gotta have more in it. So, there ya have it!

Last night was one of those nights I didn't want to cook, so, I took some of the frozen vegan chili out of the freezer, and heated that up. With it, I made a cheese and salsa quesadilla, and honey, please, that was some good meal, let me tell ya! I ate like the proverbial pig, lol.

Tonight? Well, I'm not sure yet, but I "think" I'm going to finish up the pintos I cooked last Friday, before they go bad. It's come to my attention lately that I waste an incredible amount of food, and I'm trying to do something about it, it bothers me that I do. One problem is that sometimes I just don't like what I've cooked, like that bbq tempeh I posted in my first(I think)post. Altho I tried to save it, make it taste better, ultimately I ended up throwing most of it away. Another problem is that some recipes make wayyyyy too much for one person, and the stuff isn't always freezeable, so I end up losing part of it, too. Or, even worse, I forget about the leftovers in the 'fridge until they start growing grey fuzz, sigh, so those get thrown out, too. Anyway, I'm seriously trying to better about the waste, so, yeah, I guess it's the pinto beans, boiled 'taters...or maybe just baked...and the leftover french-style green beans from, um, whenever. They're still good. And a pint of chocolate cookie crunch tofutti for dessert!

One last thing, and I'm thru babbling for today. I think. I made another batch of granola today, and am out of oatmeal, coconut, and almost out of honey. There's about a cupful or so of cashews and walnuts together, so I'm going to mix the two together and make a nut butter with them. Should taste ok, I think, and that way, I'm not wasting the rest of the nuts.

Until next time, Happy Eating.

Vegan Fettucine Alfredo; Vegan Eggnog Cheesecake

I realized I had a couple more recipes I want to post here, here I am again. But first of all, I need to explain something, sigh, something stupid I've done...which isn't all that unusual, btw. Anyway, on the left of the blog there's a section called "Tags." When I did it, I had hoped that it would link itself automatically into my posts, but, um, nope, it didn't, and I don't know how to do it. I'm going to leave it there, tho, because it will give you some idea of what to expect to find here, even if it won't take you right to each category. Sorry about that,

This next recipe is for Fettucine Alfredo, it's vegan, and I found it on www.vegweb.com submitted by Melissa. It's incredibly good, and I was delighted with it, so, many thanks to Melissa for sharing her recipe.

Fettucine Alfredo

1Tbs. oil(whatever kind you like)
8(or more, or less{or none})mushrooms, chopped
5(or more or less)cloves of garlic, minced
1/2C coconut milk(you want the creaminess here, so I wouldn't recommend soymilk)
some vegan soy parmesan{I used quite a bit, but she said that she'd never used it.}
about 1/4tsp nutmeg(makes the recipe, don't leave out{I put it in, like she said, and don't know how it affected the recipe at all, lol}
1/2-1tsp black pepper(freshly ground is nice)
You can also add some lemon juice to the sauce, freshly squeezed is best, or garnish with lemon wedges{I didn't use any lemon, but next time I make this, and believe me, I will, I'm going to try the lemon...as well as add a little more nutmeg, just to see what happens}
Salt to taste

Directions:
Saute the mushrooms and the garlic in a pan over med-low heat, until it looks yummy. Separately, bring the coconut milk to a boil over the lowest heat possible, and as soon as it starts boiling, add the parmesan, nutmeg, pepper, lemon if you're using, and remove from heat. Mix it all together.

Add the coconut sauce to the mushrooms and garlic, and simmer onlower heat until the sauce reduces. Make sure to stir it constantly or else it will burn. Just stir until it comes to a consistency that looks like alfredo sauce, and serve immediately over fettucine noodles. I like to use black pepper fettuccine, but any kind is good. This recipe is awesome! Tastes as good as it sounds.

And yes, she's right, it's really excellent. I used plain old-fashioned egg noodles, as I had no linguine. I've never heard of black pepper fettucine, but I bet it's good, and will try to remember to look for it next time I shop.

This next one is from another blog I found, Fat Free Vegan Cooking, and I'm so ashamed to have to admit that I don't have the URL nor the owner's name. My very sincere apologies to this lady, and I hope she doesn't mind that I'm posting her recipe here, because it's an excellent recipe, and I will be making it many, many times in the future.

Vegan Eggnog Cheesecake
1(12.3oz.)pkg. extra firm light silken tofu
1(8-oz.)tub Tofutte "cream cheese"
3/4C sugar
1/2C vegan eggnog OR vanilla soymilk(I used Silk brand vanilla soymilk)
2T lemon juice
2 1/2 Tbs. brandy or rum(I'm a recovering alcoholic, so left this out.)
1/2tsp. vanilla
1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg
3Tbs.cornstarch
1 prepared graham cracker crust(the first time, I had to make it without a crust, and loved it anyway. The second time I made my own graham crust, and loved it more, lol.)

Preheat oven(I neglected to copy the temperature down, but 350ºF seemed to do quite well, altho 325ºF might be better...less chance of browning it.)
Drain tofu and put it and "cream cheese" into food processor and blend until smooth(I don't have a processor, so I used my blender, and it was fine.). Add sugar and milk, process again until sugar is dissolved, about 3 minutes. Pour into pie crust and bake in middle of oven about 55 minutes-do NOT brown(well, I did, and it tasted ok to me. Might not to you, tho.) Filling will be slightly jiggly, not set, until it has chilled.

Remove from oven, let cool, and chill, the longer, the better.

So, a couple comments here. The second time I made this, I used half the lemon juice, and a full tsp. of vanilla. The next time I make it, I'm going to use a full tablespoonful of vanilla...since I didn't add the alcohol, I need a boost of flavor. I also will add another 1/4 tsp. of nutmeg, for the same reason. All in all, tho, this is just plain wonderful, and like I said, I'm going to be making this over and over and over and over!!!!