Black Truffle Mushroom Vegan Quiche

Maybe I should start filming the "how" portion of how I make things?

We just finished a savoury, smooth vegan quiche, and a quick French salad.

   

Doesn't this just look like the picture of a thoughtful, well-planned romantic lunch?

OR.....

Maybe it's the combination of a half a package of mushrooms, a half a block of tofu, a half a loaf of hard-as-a-rock baguette and some creative thinking, seasoned with some risk.

Bill is enthralled with a book today, and since we both are not working it is a good chance to catch up.  No- not with each other... with cleaning, laundry, fridge cleaning and cupboard organization for the long weekend.     When that stuff is done, I'll be in the mood for connecting with him.  For me, Mazlow's Pyramid (Shelter, Food and other stuff should include things like clean floors and laundry.  

I am reading Sheryl Sandburg's book "Lean In" which is a masterpiece.  She references a book called "Porn for Women" which contains supposedly contains pages like a man calling to his wife "I did the laundry and put the towels away"... and "...I'll do the dishes".  I laughed out loud at the thought.

But there's something to it.  We all have engagements that take our minds to a higher place.  For some it's reading.  For others, it's gardening - or a walk.  For me, it's organizing.  

An organized kitchen and pantry makes it much more possible to freestyle.  Hence, the elegant lunch.

While there were a cup of sliced mushrooms, some tofu and a baguette calling out to me there was also:

Braggs Liquid Aminos in my pantry - adding amino acids and a salty, meaty flavour to the blended tofu mixture,

Nutritional Yeast Flakes - on the counter, adding a parmesan-like cheesiness to the quiche

Organic Spring Mix - washed, ready to eat in the fridge, for a quick salad.

Raw, shelled sunflower seeds on the counter, in a clear jar - reminding me to sprinkle some on our quick salad.

Avocado Oil - a luscious, luxurious oil craving to be used in its raw form in the most simple of preparations

Lemon White Balsamic Vinegar - a lighter version of the well-known favourite, which won't discolour salads

Gray Sea Salt - crystals of the gods.

and finally...

Black Truffle Paste - Nothing puts a tuxedo on any food faster.  If you're not sure how to use black truffle paste, think of it where you'd use mushrooms or meat.  It is full bodied, rich, extraordinarily decadent.  I used a whole tablespoon in the humble tofu mixture.  Like when Richard Gere takes Julia Roberts to the opera in "Pretty Woman" in that red velvet dress.  Perfect cinema - perfect cuisine.  I had a dress like that once in the eighties - and loved it.

I blended the tofu, truffle paste, 1/4 cup of the nutritional yeast and some sea salt in the Vitamix.  When smooth, I oiled two oval ramekins and poured in the mixture.  I sauteed the mushrooms with some earth balance and black pepper (plus a bit of white truffle salt).  I studded the mushrooms on top of the tofu mix.  Once the mixture was baking in a 350 degree oven, I poured an 1/8th cup of bread crumbs on a plate, added a tablespoon of Earth Balance to it and squished them together.  Splashed a bit of white wine and some earth balance to deglaze the pan, along with a teaspoon of dijon mustard.  Poured the sauce over the quiches.  As they were nearly finished baking, I sprinkled the crumbs on top to finish them off.  

Remember - texture, Texture, TEXTURE!

Tossed the salad with a bit of avocado oil and white balsamic, and mixed with my hands.  I was very proud of plating the salad without salting it.  Instead, I pinched some grey sea salt over top for a salty, crystalline surprise every few leaves.   

After about 25 minutes, the tofu puffed up like a quiche, and I plated it with the salad.  The crumbly, crisp top was the perfect counterbalance to the soft, rich quiche.  The mushrooms were beautifully flavoured, the dijon was a flavour burst and the salad was a fresh, crisp accompaniment.

What a perfect start to a long weekend.

The greatest Caesar Salad dressing

On the weekends, I find a system that REALLY works for me is to have three pots on the stove, all turned to medium heat.

Then I grab everything in my fridge, on my counter and in my cupboard that might make a meal and then just "GO!".

The more you cook, the better you get at this.

A head of cauliflower, some dried red lentils, and some red potatoes were destined to be a curry.

Some leftover tomato sauce, a new can of sauce, some red kidney beans and some frozen peppers were obviously going to be Monday's red beans and rice.

Brown rice in the rice cooker has now become quite the staple and we make 4 cups at a time so it's always ready.

Leftover cauliflower and potato were going to be soup.

Chopping one massive tear-jerking onion and some organic celery made adding the right amount to each of the four pots quite easy.  More celery in the red beans and rice, a little in the soup and just a seasoning amount to the curry was quite easy.

Cauliflower potato soup was quite good, and I did add two tablespoons of miso paste and a half a cup of brown rice to the finished product.

I had one head of romaine lettuce and about three final ribs of kale.  I chopped them each into pieces, kale much smaller than romaine, so they would spread throughout the salad.

My favourite Caesar dressing is a secret weapon to packing a lot of greens into my family.  The secret is capers - so use lots!

1/4 cup vegan mayonnaise, I love (organic, non GMO) Vegenaise.
1/8 cup avocado oil, but you could use EVOO (extra virgin olive oil) also
1/2 cup lemon juice, plus the zest if you love lemon.  If you're out?  White vinegar.
1 clove garlic
1 tablespoon capers with their brine

Buzz up in a magic bullet, or blender and taste.  Adjust if it is too acidic or sour by adding more oil, or by adding more salt if it just doesn't taste Zangy.

White Matters

Sometimes I think Harrison isn't moving fast enough on this vegan train that I'm on.

Sometimes I think he's only there because we are.  He'll eat what's going, but if he had his 'druthers he would eat differently.

The experts on the cruise, one in particular, urged me not to push too hard.  He encouraged good substitutions, providing non-judgmental information and above all patience.

I sometimes even lose some sleep thinking about the piece of chicken he ate at some family function, or the bacon I know he wants on his sandwich, which I say he can't have.

As a parent, one never knows which lessons are actually breaking through to a teenage boy.


Then I get a glimpse into how far he is already and what he is actually absorbing.

Yesterday the family and I attended a benefit for the Alzheimer's society.  The theme was Mardi Gras.  Beads, masks, music and colours were abundant.  I knew to expect a 10 course meal, but wrongly assumed that it would be mostly meaty fare.

The chef is to be commended, as the dinner table was abundant with cajun veggies, a vegetarian pasta, delicious salads, and a gumbo which was PACKED with okra, tomatoes and peppers, and served over rice.  

The beef entree was at least HALF sauteed red, yellow and green peppers so one couldn't really gorge without getting a healthy dose of veggies.  However, I was AMAZED as my entire family passed on the beef entree, with the exception of my mom who took only a few bites.  This is real progress.

Being "vegan-ish" helps on nights like this, as I don't utterly reject food I can eat around.  I met many on our cruise who don't do this and can only say that it seems their lives are filled with unnecessary stress in the name of plant based eating.  No Subway Sandwiches cut with a meaty knife, no non-vegetarian restaurants who might grill their veggie burger on the same grill as the hamburger, etc.. etc..

Let's face it.  As healthy as we plant eaters purport to be, stress is also a killer.  Stress is also a fattener.  Stress is also aging.  And stress is also a cause of sickness and disease.  So I am really striving to reduce this kind of stress by rolling with things.  Laissez les bonnes temps roulez!

So back to the young man.  Course after course, I saw him dive into everything for at least a bite.  I saw him season his food with some chili peppers, some wedges of lemon, and eat the veggies and spicy food with gusto.

Most notable was a five year old girl seated at my table.  Her dinner consisted of two cups of apple juice (aka sugar bombs), white rice with no sauce, white bread rolls with butter and white pasta with parmesan cheese.  Dessert was white vanilla ice cream.

I know theoretically that "kids" eat like that, but haven't really seen it live and in person.  Every dish passed before her was declared "too spicy" by her father, without even giving her a taste.  To each, their own - but I desperately wanted to put at the very least a few carrots, some zucchini and peppers, some tomato sauced pasta with basil, some saucy okra and lots more water in front of her.

Our waiter refilled our water pitcher 8 times!  Harrison can really pound that stuff back.

On the ride home, he commented on the girl's dinner choices.  (Although "choice" is putting it mildly, since every entree was unceremoniously declared unfit for her before even tasting it).

"Did you notice that everything on her plate was white?  It had no nutrition at all!  It was just white rice, white pasta, white bread, butter, white cheese and vanilla ice cream! 

And then he said an utterly profound sentence that will stick with me until the day I die.

"It wasn't even food."  He searched his brain for the right word.  

It was just...  matter".

We talked a bit about how the body instantly converts processed items like that to sugar almost immediately.

                                                  "It was just...  matter."

Bill talked a bit about unprocessed whole grains, like rice and oatmeal, and I mentioned how I am loving the proportions of my new Macrobiotic-ish way of eating.
                                                                                                "It was just...  matter."

He clarified his position (as if he needed to) that he wasn't about to "go vegan" for his choices, and that he just liked many of the vegetables and grains that we eat, and that he just liked eating healthy "most of the time".

"It was just...  matter."

He recounted a story about once going to a buffet, eating like that and feeling bloated and gross afterwards, and that's how he figured out that no matter how much the food looks good, he had to at least include things which had some nutrition in them.
                                                                                                          "Just...  matter."

He worried that unless kids learn to eat a variety of foods, their kid energy turns to teenage overweight and under health.                                      

Just when I think things are never getting through.  It matters.  He gets it, even if he's not there all the way.
                                                                                   
                                                                              "It was just...  matter."

The fact that he can recognize these things made me very calm.

I slept like a baby, regardless of what we ate.

Go Green and a Full Stop for Red

In life there are moments where you literally wonder - "How did I get here?".

How did I get to a place where I feel comfortable and satisfied and balanced WHILE sitting at my computer eating a pile of red river cereal, topped with kale which was blanched in the miso soup I am drinking from my favourite coffee mug?  And loving it?!

I have been travelling for the past two weeks, and this is the first chance I have had to blog about the healthiest vacation I have ever taken.

Enter "Holistic Holiday at Sea", a vegan cruise designed to rebalance and subtly reboot body, brain and soul.   I first learned of the cruise in a great magazine called "Veg News", a contemporary vegan magazine.  Great articles - great recipes (another batch of brie is culturing on my kitchen counter right now!), and great and provocative ideas.

We weren't able to go for the past two years for a host of reasons.  But we did make it a priority for 2013.  This cruise was exactly where we needed to be.

I am 100% vegan about 94% of the time, and I am comfortable with that.  There are some times when I yield to a familiar, yet non-vegan edible, but it really isn't often any more.  I have noticed such a huge improvement in my overall health that I don't want to go back.

I have more time.
I have more disposable income.
I have a better figure
I have a healthier spouse
I have a healthier child
I have perfect blood pressure and perfect cholesterol levels
I have better dental checkups
I have a smaller environmental footprint
My body eliminates toxins more easily and can focus on those which I can't consciously avoid, like air quality and VOCs.
I sleep well at night knowing that no animal or fish suffered for my sustenance
I recover more quickly after workouts
I have cleaner, more efficient energy for my workouts.

and...here's the kicker...

I eat food that is more delicious than before I went vegan.

The cruise was spiked with the most intellectually delicious lectures I have ever attended. My friend Andy described the guest list of lecturers as "Vegan Rock Star Royalty".

T. Colin Campbell, Neil Barnard, Warren Kramer, Rory Freedman, Coleen Patrick-Goudreau and Jessica Porter to name just a few.

To hear Dr. Barnard's simple explanation for why humans are literally DESIGNED to eat colourful plants was one of those "lightbulb moments".  We have colour vision!  Dogs, cats and other predators are colour blind.  They are designed to catch their prey through sensing and seeing movement.  And scent.  Anyone who gardens knows that the ripe fruits and veggies literally beg to be picked.  They are bursting off the plant, vibrant with fresh smells and ripe juices.  It's like one giant STOP sign that says "EAT HERE!"  It's why fast food restaurants draw you in with red and yellow signs, not to mention a rainbow of other colours, and then proceed to serve you white and brown food.  

Our eating impulses are driven by colour.

Even our teeth, flat molars and all, don't have the fangs and ripping power of even the most docile cat or dog.  And people have an extremely long digestive tract designed to assimilate plants, and perhaps the occasional scrap of animal food or insect, unlike our carniverous friends whose digestive innerds are much shorter.

Point is, this cruise was extraordinary for me.  I slept at night, awoke at dawn, meditated, exercised, ate regularly, stretched my mind, made time for loved ones and nurtured friendships.  I let go of some baggage and about five pounds.

I can't wait to get back to these blogs, write recipes and meal plans for my friends, and share photos of my offerings.  For now, though, I will get through my kale porridge, and polish off the last few sips of miso soup.