At today’s vegan cooking class at Nea Guinea we made chickpea cutlets from Veganomicon, lemon dill caulipots from Appetite for Reduction, sweet onion and mushroom gravy (recipe below) and my chocolate peanut butter pudding.
Ingredients
for the sweet onion and mushroom gravy
2 Tbsp olive oil
3 yellow onions, diced
1 cup mushrooms, diced
1/3 cup white wine
2 Tbsp agave nectar
1 Tbsp mustard
1 Tbsp balsamic vinegar
1/4 to 1/3 cup vegetable broth
thyme, salt and pepper
Heat the olive oil in a saucepan over medium heat and cook the onions until caramelized, about 15 minutes. Add the mushroom and cook for additional 10 minutes. Add the wine and all the other ingredients and let the sauce simmer for 1o more minutes. Blend the sauce with an immersion blender until smooth and serve.
cutting the veggies
cooking the chickpea cutlets
blending the sauce
the table is all set
serving the food
delicious vegan food!
This is a classic Mediterranean dish, very popular in Greece (and Turkey of course) during the summer and fall that eggplants are in season. It doesn’t look pretty but it’s very tasty. You can add more (yes!) or less garlic depending on your taste buds. Luckily Sean loves garlic as much as I do (probably more than I do). You can also add a couple of potatoes in your baking pan (I always do).
Ingredients
4-5 long eggplants
1/3 cup olive oil
2 cups thinly sliced onions
4 cloves garlic, peeled and sliced
4-5 tomatoes, blended in the food processor for few seconds
1 teaspoon oregano
1/2 teaspoon sugar
Salt and pepper to taste
Imam Baildi
Using a sharp knife, slit the eggplants lengthwise on the one side only. Open them slightly so you can put the stuffing. Brush them with a little bit of olive oil and bake them for 15 minutes or fry them gently in a little bit of olive oil. Arrange the eggplants side by side in a baking pan and season them with salt and pepper. Heat 2 Tbsp of the olive oil in a pan over medium heat and saute the onions and the until golden. Add the tomatoes and half a cup of water. Season with salt and pepper. Add the oregano and sugar and simmer for 15 minutes. Use a spoon to fill the eggplants with the onions, tomatoes and garlic mixture. Drizzle the rest of the olive oil on top of the eggplants and bake in a pre-heated oven at 350F/180C, for about 40 minutes.
On another note to my Sunday’s post I forgot to mention that I also sun-dried tomatoes. It’s pretty fun spending time in the country 
sundried tomatoes
I know it’s weird, but one of the things I mostly miss since I became vegan, is our traditional Greek (horiatiki) salad. It is served pretty much everywhere. Of course I can always get it without the feta cheese but oh well… one of the things that Greeks are most famous for, is the feta cheese. So this salad is not the same without it. I’ve been trying to recreate the taste of the feta cheese in various ways. The most successful vegan feta I made so far is a version of an almond cheese which I will be posting soon. But while marinating some tofu for a totally different use I ended up with this delicious tofu feta like.
vegan Greek salad
Ingredients
for the tofu feta
1 cup tofu, cubed, pressed, drained
1 TS white miso paste
1 cup water
1/4 olive oil
1 TS oregano
1 TS lemon juice
for the salad
1 large tomato (not very ripe)
1 medium cucumber
1 medium red onion
1 green pepper (bell pepper will do)
1/3 cup olives
1 TS capers
3 TS olive oil
pinch of salt
1/2 ts oregano
To make the tofu feta, mix all the ingredients in a bowl and let the tofu marinate in the fridge overnight. To assemble the salad, cut the tomato in moon halfs, slice the cucumber, the onion and the pepper. Place them in a salad bowl, add the tofu feta cubes, the olives and the capers, top with the olive oil and season with salt and oregano.
