The Veat Meat + Ensaladang Talong

Mark is always on the look out for meat alternatives every time we are doing our grocery shopping. Here's one of his new discovery.

Veat Pandan Chicken Style.

Image from : Kawan Food

The Veat alternative meat products are soy-based. We tried the Pandan Chicken Style. It can be deep fried, baked, or just microwaved. My cooking time last night was consumed by my eggplant grilling so the pandan chicken style ended up in my microwave.

Taste: It is very flavourful, although, if you hate ginger, this might not suit your taste. The ginger, in my opinion, is very prominent. I hardly tasted the pandan. But pandan leaves are usually flavourful when it's fresh. Since this is frozen, the pandan flavour is not as tasty, so I didn't expect much. The spiciness is just right. It won't make you sneeze.

Texture : It was a bit soft and smooth in my tongue, but I suppose it's because I microwaved it. Maybe if it was prepared in the oven, or deep fried, it will give a better texture.

Overall, I find it yummy. Some soy-based alternative meat products usually taste like soy (well it's made from soy :P), and you can easily tell that it is fake meat. This usually gives people a hard time to transition to a vegetarian life style - if you know you are eating fake meat, plus it taste super fake. I guess, if you are just getting started to go vegetarian, it's important to find tasty and flavourful meat alternatives so you don't easily crave for the real one. Well, until you are used to no meat at all. The Veat pandan chicken style seems to work for me.


I matched it with ensaladang talong (eggplant salad) and garlic fried rice. Here's the recipe for ensaladang talong:

Ingredients
- 3 medium size eggplants
- 1 Tbsp honey
- 3 chopped tomatoes
- 1 small white onion, chopped
- 2-3 Tbsp of vinegar
- salt and pepper to taste

1. Grille the eggplants, until it's blistered and sort of burned in the outside. Set aside and let it cool down.
2. When it's cold enough to touch, remove the outer skin. Remove the branch and top head.
3. Mash it on a mixing bowl.
4. Add the chopped tomatoes, onions, vinegar and honey. Add salt and pepper to taste.
5. You may add more vinegar according to your taste, if you like it more sour.

Serve chilled.

Read more...

Vegetarian Burger

My dear husband has recently publicized this blog to almost everyone he knows, and took the liberty to make me a facebook page for my home cooking. I know, he's my biggest fan (because he have no choice but to eat what i cook :P), I really am flattered and I feel like saying "awww", but at the same time I feel pressured now to update as often as I can as well as to make quality postings!

Here's a vegetarian patty recipe that's tasty, even a non-vegetarian would enjoy!

Ingredients :
1 cup dehydrated mock ground meat (soy based grains)
1/4 cup fresh coriander, finely chopped
1 small carrot, grated
1 medium white onion, finely chopped
4-5 pcs swiss brown mushrooms, finely chopped
1 small red bell pepper, finely chopped
1 large egg
1 tbsp. butter
1/4 cup all purpose flour
1 tbsp cumin
salt and pepper to taste
Arugula
pickled green pepper, sliced
honey-mustard sauce


1. Put the dehydrated ground meat (soy based grains) in a bowl. Pour hot water until completely submerged.
2. When it's soft enough, drain the excessive water and put it in a mixing bowl.
3. Toss the grated carrot, onion, coriander, bell pepper and swiss brown mushroom and mix well. At this point you can also add the cumin, about 1/2 tsp of salt and pepper (according to your liking).
4. Divide the mixture in to two. Keep half of the mixture in the freezer. We will only cook half of it as it makes about 5 patties.
5. Add the egg and butter.
6. Sprinkle the 1/4 cup of flour. The flour's purpose is to hold together the mixture. If 1/4 cup is not enough, add flour gradually until you reach the desired firm texture to mold the mixture.
7. Prepare your frying pan and heat oil.
8. When the oil is hot enough, make a ball out of the mixture and put it in the pan. Flatten it with a spatula.
9. Turn the patty to the other side when it's golden brown and ready.

I usually cook in low heat so i can evenly cook the inside of the patty as well as not to burn the outside.

To serve:
1. Toast your burger buns.
2. put a good amount of arugula on the base. Top it with the burger patty.
3. Spread some honey mustard on the patty and top it with the pickled green peppers.

Don't be afraid to free style. You can put fresh onions, caramelized onions or tomatoes. Guacamole also works as a dressing for the burger if you want to skip honey-mustard.

Read more...

Sweet Potato for Breakfast

As usual, when I run out of ideas of what to cook, I food hunt in my favorite food blogs. This morning's breakfast, I was in the mood for something simple. I found Potato Latkes recipe and was immediately inspired to make one. On a side note, my husband loves sweet potato so I replaced the ingredient with sweet potato instead. I am not too crazy about sweet potatoes because of a childhood myth I grew up with that it makes you fart like crazy. A lot of sweet potato lovers might probably object, but like I said, it's just a myth - with or without sweet potato, we will fart. It's just my mental issue.

Ingredients:
- 1 cup (packed) grated sweet potato
- 1 large beaten egg
- 1 small white onion, minced
- salt and pepper to taste

1. Squeeze the grated sweet potato and remove the excess liquid in it.
2. Put all the ingredients in a bowl and mix well. Add salt and pepper according to your liking.
3. Heat pan with cooking oil.
4. Pack a tablespoon with the mixture and put it in the pan. Cook for about 3 minutes or when its golden brown. Turn to the other side when ready.

1 cup makes about 5 small pieces. If you wish to make more, the proportion of grated sweet potato and beaten egg should be 1:1. The egg is present just to hold it together. We wouldn't want the egg to overpower the flavor of the sweet potato. You can serve it with ketchup, or sour cream as a dip.

Read more...

Baked Herbed Vegetables

I've been thinking of herb usage since my mini herb garden's been blooming. I always feel bad to trim them and then not able to use them. So this evening, while I was cleaning up the fridge, an idea came - that is to make a vegetable side dish, infused with herbs.

This vegetable side dish is a great partner for the vegetarian meatballs I prepared together with it.

Ingredients:
- small broccoli flower head, chopped and washed
- 1 small carrots, sliced in circles
- 1 medium yellow bell pepper, chopped in big chunks
- Baguio beans, cut it in half if it's too long. You may also use french beans.
- 2 tbsp of corn kernels
- 3 tbsp of extra virgin olive oil
- 2 tsp fresh oregano leaves
- a few sprigs of fresh rosemary
- a few sprigs of thyme
- salt and pepper
- 1 tbsp butter (optional)

1. Toss all the vegetables in a mixing bowl.
2. Sprinkle the olive oil and herbs. Add salt and pepper according to your taste and set aside for 15 minutes to marry the flavors.
3. Preheat oven to 200 C.
4. Make a bag out of aluminum foil and put the vegetable mixture, including the marinade in it. You may add about a tablespoon of butter.
5. Seal it and put it in the oven. Bake for about 15 minutes. Make sure you do not overcook the vegetables inside. I love the carrots when it's still crunchy :).

Read more...

Eggplant Sandwich

Getting back on the healthy eating track, I made a simple eggplant sandwich for dinner - healthy and tasty.

Ingredients:
- bread, preferably whole wheat
- 2 eggplants cut in 3 parts and then lengthwise
- slices of swiss brown mushrooms
- fresh romaine lettuce
- Salsa (optional)
- fresh tomato slices
- slice of mozzarella cheese
- salt and pepper to taste

1. Grill the eggplants. If you have no time to grill, you can also fry it but blot the eggplants with paper towels to remove the excess oil.
2. When cold enough to handle, sprinkle a bit of salt,pepper, and spanish paprika on both sides. Set aside.
3. Saute the mushrooms and sprinkle it with a bit of salt and pepper. Set aside.
4. Toast your bread.
5. Put the lettuce on the bread, then top it with the eggplants. Then put the salsa or tomato slice, mushrooms, and then the slice of mozzarella cheese.

I think this recipe works better in panini style.

Read more...

Grilled Vegetables with Rice Noodles

OK, I want to begin this blog entry by saying that this vegetarian dish is a blockbuster! We had this 2 nights in a row and we seemed we can't get enough of it, I did it again in the same week. A week after, I cooked it again, twice on a separate occasion for friends who came over for dinner - and both gave 5 stars! Thanks to Natalie Ward, the owner of Cook Eat Live Vegetarian, for sharing this wonderful vegetarian dish! Her blog is always my avenue for yummy vegetarian recipes - and also worth to mention that her blog is a huge inspiration to me to live a vegetarian lifestyle.

We Filipinos love our meat so much, and we will make a way to put meat in every dish even when not necessary :P. We ordered vegetable fried rice once, only to find bits of ground pork in it. My caterer for a post wedding family luncheon, served pancit with seafood - when I specifically asked them to remove all meat in the pancit during our food tasting. When I complained, they said "Maam, there's no meat, we removed it". Apparently, they thought the word "meat" only refers to pork, chicken, and beef - but not seafood. It's disappointing that even the manager didn't have an understanding of what vegetarian food is. There are soups served in some restaurants, that the food servers thought vegetarian, and then you'll eventually find out it's not since you can taste the beef/pork/chicken broth cubes used in it. In short, I find it quite a challenge to become a vegetarian here, due to lack of vegetarian options in the menu of the majority of restaurants here, not to mention lack of vegetarian information.

See, there's a common misconception about going vegetarian (at least where I come from), and that is to become a goat. Meaning, you only eat green leafy vegetables, and those chunky, juicy ones. Being vegetarian means giving up the delicious food around you. These are examples of the many reasons why most people are discouraged to go vegetarian, and I perfectly feel and understand - it's not easy to give up meat. However, one thing that's not realized is that vegetarian food are nutritious and yummy too - you just have to know what to cook and collect as many variations of recipes as you can!

I'm not 100% vegetarian, but I make a point to eat vegetarian at least 5 times per week, or only when there's no vegetarian option when we eat out. My husband, however, is really working hard and would really refuse meat at all times - which of course, pushes me to cook all vegetables when we are at home, and motivates me to eat vegetarian when we are out (if guilt trip is considered as a form of motivation).

OK, too much blah blah! On to the recipe!

Ingredients:

For grilled vegetables :
- 1 large broccoli head, stem discarded, cut in to bite size.
- french beans, ends trimmed
- Swiss brown mushrooms, washed and sliced
(note: the amount of the vegetables will depend on how much vegetables you'd like to top/mix with your noodles, so just estimate)

For noodles:
- 250g rice noodles, egg noodles, or vegetable noodles.
- 4 garlic cloves, thinly sliced.
- chili powder
- sesame seeds
- 2 Tbsp of soysauce + 1 Tbsp honey mixture
- 1 Tbsp vegetarian oyster sauce (or the regular if it's not available)
- 75ml olive oil
- 3 Tbsp of olive oil
- fresh coriander, coarsely chopped
- lemon wedges
- salt and pepper to taste


Noodle preparation:
1. Cook the noodle according to the instructions found in the packaging. Set aside.

Preparing the vegetables:
1. Boil salted water in a pot.
2. Blanch the broccoli and french beans for exactly 2 minutes. Be careful to not over boil.
3. Drain the vegetables and then soak it in cold water to shock it so it stops from cooking. Drain when it's cold.
4. Spread the vegetables on a clean towel to dry it.
5. Get a large mixing bowl and toss the broccoli, french beans, and then swiss brown mushrooms with 3 tbsp of olive oil. Sprinkle salt and pepper to taste.
6. Heat a griddle pan (or whatever grilling tool you have) on high heat for 5 minutes and start grilling the vegetables. Do this in a batch so it's not too crowded in the pan. Make some nice char marks on each side of the veggies.
7. Once done, set aside.

Preparing the vegetable toppings:
1. Heat the 75ml of olive oil in a sauce pan.
2. Fry the garlic slices until they are golden brown. Do not burn, else it will taste bitter.
3. Sprinkle sesame seeds.
4. Remove from heat and pour it on the vegetable. Toss well.
5. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Stir frying the noodles:
1. Heat 2 tsp olive oil in a large wok over a medium high heat.
2. Add in the cooked noodles, the soy sauce + honey mixture, and oyster sauce. Mix well.
3. Sprinkle chili flakes.
4. Pour the vegetable mixture (including the oil) and toss it well with the noodles.

To serve:
Get a bowl, fill it with the noodles and vegetables. Sprinkle fresh chopped coriander and serve with a lemon wedge. Best when you eat with chopsticks!

I did some improvising in the recipe since I didn't have sesame oil and chili when I cooked this dish. I also added mushrooms just because I love mushrooms :). You can get the original recipe from Cook Eat Live Vegetarian blog.

Read more...

Finally, Married and Happy!

Photographed by : JM Abania, the coolest, most creative, and far one of the best (aside from my hubby hehe)photographer of all time!

Will be back to blogging business next week, to tell more about the wedding, the people behind our successful celebration, and of course back to two of my favorite things in the world - FOOD and photography :).

Read more...

I'm Officially On Leave

The month of July is going to be extremely busy so I'm announcing my leave of absence from food blogging.

I'm getting married!!!

Since Mark and I have taken a year to procrastinate in planning, we are now paying the price of the delay - cramming. We have always pictured a simple and intimate gathering, far from the traditional wedding. But planning a simple celebration wasn't as simple as we thought it would be. Budget, invitations, guests, ceremony, venues - all these things we have to take care of in a very limited time. So wish us luck :)

I might post wedding updates here and there - and maybe, if you like to cram like us, you can get an idea how to plan a wedding in less than 2 months.

Read more...