Here's an easy alternative to Pancakes and it's Vegan! - Franc

As a certified big "American Breakfast" lover, one of the things I had to adjust to when going vegan was no more bacon, eggs, and fatty pancakes. While my waistline thanks me, it took a little while for my tastebuds to adjust to more lighter fare. So here's one small alternative to Pancakes that I've actually been eating since I was a kid... Corn Meal Mush Cakes. My dad and uncle made these ever so often in my Italian American home. Oh memories.... Here's what you do -



Corn Meal "Pancakes" - Vegan Baby!

 Buy one package of Corn Meal Mush. Mush is very similar in taste to Polenta. You usually find mush in the dairy section near the eggs. It comes in a tube shaped package. Slice up the mush into 1/8 inch thick rounds. You want all the slices to be as uniform as possible so that they cook evenly. In a large fry pan melt about 2-3 table spoons of Vegan Butter (we like the Earth Balance brand), then add the mush rounds in a single layer. Flip as needed. Simply cook till the mush is soft and cooks through. I personally like it when the edges get just a little tiny bit crispy. Serve on a plate with a little extra vegan butter and natural maple syrup. They are yummy and a nice alternative to pancakes. Yes, I fatten them up a bit with the butter, but you can use less if you like ;-)   I also like to serve this dish with a little fried potatoes on the side. Makes a great meal on the weekend when you have the time to do a big breakfast for the family.

- Franc

Franc - Day 12 Vegan Sausage

Yes, I've been out searching for more sausage again. Picked up a pack of the TraderJoes brand chorizo sausage and it was really tasty. An important note... you definitely need to remove the casing before cooking! I made this silly mistake and wondered why the casing was so plastic like and inedible - the reality was it is plastic and inedible, and the package plainly states that you should remove the casing before cooking. Opps ;-)

I also had another realization last night. I like to have a few pints with my buddys now and again. I'm a pretty big guy so I could put a few down easily without getting too tipsy. It seems that since I've gone vegan I don't seem to have much of a tolerance for alcohol any more. I wonder why that is? Perhaps I'm just imagining things. Weird. If anyone else has experienced this sort of thing I'd love to hear your feedback.

-Franc

11th Day Franc Vegan Pizza

It was our first attempt trying Vegan Pizza today. And I can thoroughly say, it was great. I wouldn't think that having a pizza without cheese would be very appetizing, but it was totally fine. I would say that if you blindfolded the average person and gave them a pizza with lots of good veggie toppings, but no cheese, they would barely notice that the cheese was missing. I realized that the taste of the pizza comes mainly from the sauce and the toppings. Yes cheese does add some creamy, melty texture, but I don't think it adds a huge amount of extra flavor. Just try it and see for yourself. *I think I ate like five pieces it was so good!

Here's our simple Vegan Pizza we whipped up in just a few minutes...

We stared off with some 12" pre-baked pizza shells we picked up at the store.
We added about a half of a can of pizza sauce. I think when not using cheese you should always have extra sauce, so be generous here.
Earlier we sauteed about a cup of red onion and a cup of portabella mushrooms in EVOO to soften them up a bit. I think this is important since we were working with pre-baked crusts and the pizza will not have to cook as long as a raw dough crust would. I also crumbled up and sauteed in EVOO one Italian Tofurkey sausage, and cooked till a little crisp.
We then took all the sauteed ingredients and added to our sauced up crust.
The last couple things we added were some minced garlic (about 1 teaspoon or to your taste), some mild pepper rings, about a teaspoon of Italian seasonings and about a teaspoon of garlic salt.

We popped the whole thing in the over for about 8 minutes (follow the cooking instructions on the pizza shell package) and it was done. Super Easy!

One extra note. I'm sure the hard core veteran Vegans will see some of our recipes and note that we are using some packaged or prepared items and not doing everything from scratch or organically. While we strive to do the best we can with all the ingredients we use, please understand that this is a big change for us and that with our busy schedules and a family we are doing our best to make this work. We hope that over time we can perfect our technique, but I also hope that newbies to this lifestyle will also see that there are some easy recipes that taste good and are simple to make, and you don't have to feel like your just eating beans and rice every day. I think that the reason that most people are afraid to go vegan is they feel that they will have to give up all of their comfort foods like pizza and burgers and just eat a bunch of spinach and tofu, or that the food will be so difficult and time consuming to prepare that they couldn't possibly make the change. We're here to show that you can have alternative items that give you that same comfort, simply by approaching the ingredients in a new way. Also by keeping things simple you may not be a "perfect" Vegan (if there even is such a thing), but you will gain a huge benefit of eating healthier with really a very small effort and sacrifice.

- Franc