Thanks for posting this! Looks like a very practical plan with recipes that won’t take too long during the week.
And now i want ful medammas for breakfast!
He lost me with toast and black beans.
I find articles like this interesting, but I always notice how much dairy is in the food. After years of eating vegan, dairy still jumps out at me in recipes, especially in pasta and grain dishes.
It’s a thoughtful mean plan, though. Lots of interesting cuisines are represented.
I’m not vegetarian, but this give me ideas for some dishes, thanks.
This breakfast dish can help me use up the sumac and pines nuts:
I’ve been cooking vegan for a few months, and since I’m an omnivore when I eat out, haven’t found a vegan cookbook that suits my needs-- for example, I have no interest in vegan approximations of meat/dairy recipes and the better Indian recipes take forever to make. But Serious Eats has been a treasure trove. Some of their recipes that I like so far (anything with butter I’ve substituted coconut or olive oil):
- Butternut squash kale tacos with cashew crema Inventive and utterly delicious. Halve cashew crema recipe, /'d reduce lime and salt even more than noted. roast squash in coconut oil instead of cooking on stove.
- Lettuce soup I add two minced stalks lemongrass at the beginning; alternatively, some sambar masala or another spice at the end.
- cherry tomato sauce pretty quick
- olive miso condiment intense all purpose vegan seasoning. 3 sprigs is plenty of rosemary, two should be fine
- Colombian soup shelling frozen fava beans takes a few minutes, but otherwise quick and delicious
- Basic guacamole awesome. I have only a small mortar and pestle, so make half recipes. I also like the variation with doubanjiang, Sichuan chili paste
- Tomato soup with corn guacamole tomato soup, with heirloom tomatoes, topped with some maldon salt might be my favorite summer recipe. The corn guacamole, partly done in a mortar and pestle as per their regular guac recipe, is a great add on but not necessary.
- Roasted cauliflower with tahini olives, currants, and parsley Add more olives. Heat of cauliflower softens currants, so wait 20 min before serving.
- Black bean salad with corn cilantro lime dressing
- Chana dal Great fresh, freezes okay
- Sweet corn with toasted coconut
- Harissa carrots I roasted for longer, and rotated trays, and skipped the creme fraiche dressing. But more often, I make Mark Bittmans simpler roast carrots with cumin
- Smashed cucumbers
Less success with these:
- Quinoa with chimichurri oregano was overpowering
- Chana dal
That’s an awesome list! You made all that? I’m impressed. I made smashed cucumbers and they were great, they’re in regular rotation during cucumber season.
When I was eating vegan, I just left the meat and dairy out when cooking, messed around with proportions and seasonings. I never got into nut butters and protein substitutes and food like that. Asian and Italian food is pretty easy to make vegan.
Kenji is so great when he is eating vegan for a month. So funny that he does it in February.
Serious eats has some fantastic vegan recipes! Those smashed cucumbers were a food group for me this summer, i often add in some edamame or smoked tofu and just call it a meal.
And the olive miso condiment is really brilliant
This chickpea salad is one of my favorites
Food52 has some great vegan recipes too. I’m not much of a cookbook person but i find great recipes on post punk kitchen, thug kitchen, oh she glows, and i often just modify ottolenghi recipes as needed
Wow, that’s a lot bolder than I am! I tend only to modify a recipe the second time around, and haven’t been trying new ones that have dairy or meat in them. For example, even though I know from experience that some of his recipes have unnecessary and time consuming flourishes, my Ottolenghi books are collecting dust right now because I can’t bring myself to tweak what read like perfectly balanced recipes. His recipes also tend to have lots of sweetener or dairy.
What are your vegan go-to dishes?
That’s very true! I’ve been using Eatyourbooks to identify the recipes in my bookcase that happen to be vegan, and lots of recipes from my Italian and Asian cookbooks come up. I cook from Fuchsia Dunlop’s Every Grain of Rice frequently, in particular the section on leafy greens and cold appetizers.
In addition to being tasty, I recently found out a little factoid that might explain why Kenji’s vegan recipes work so well for me— I have allergies that make it difficult to eat common vegan ingredients (certain raw foods and soy milk). Apparently Kenji has the same allergies, so he seems to avoid using those ingredients in his cooking.
I wonder if it’s because the type of produce available in February tends to be the kind of stuff that’s available all year long, and that means the recipes are easy to make any time of the year. Plus, summer is about BBQs and BLTs, fall has all the meaty holidays, and spring veggies go oh so well with butter and salty cheese.
Vegetables?
Really, I ate thing whatever fruits/vegetables were in season, with some whole grains thrown in.
Examples: mushrooms sautéed with tarragon, frozen or fresh vegetables simmered with one tablespoon Earth Balance and 1/4 cup veg broth (thanks, Serious Eats) or braised celery. Really basic stuff.
When cooking real recipes, I simply left out meat and dairy. For example, seaweed hondashi and miso for miso soup. Or chicken paprikas stew with carrots and potatoes instead of chicken. Mushroom, squash or potato tacos. I’ve even made beef bourgiogne without the beef, just added more onions and mushrooms. Flour slurry instead of roux works for most gravies/sauces.
Or here is a perfect example of a recipe that I have made without meat, this Persian recipe for a stew I love (Chowhound’s COTM is doing My Persian Kitchen this month, which made me think of this).
I just left out the meat.
I cooked several vegan recipes from Serious Eats during the fall. I’m excited to see what Kenji posts in February, and to hear if others have recommendations for SeriousEats recipes!
I’m not sure if it’s universal for the site, but Kenji’s cooking times seem to exclude prep-time and thus can take way longer than listed.
Stellar
- Best slow cooked tomato sauce Truly a gem. Make sure to follow Kenji’s tips for how to sauce pasta. I divide the sauce into 4 portions, each for 8oz. Spaghetti, and freeze three (an Italian might consider these portions big enough for 16 oz. pasta). The slow cooker version makes 3 portions and benefits from reducing on the stove while the pasta boils. The recipes work equally well with both butter and Miyoko vegan buttter. I doctor the sauce with fish sauce, but will consider leaving it out if serving to a vegetarian— the sauce pairs well with miso olive topping
- Vegan aquafaba mayo I couldn’t get this to thicken like mayo, but it tasted fantastic anyway and is a great way to use leftover chickpea water.
- Best roasted potatoes ever I accidentally over boiled the potatoes, but these still lived up to the name. I did not feel the need to reintegrate the garlic and rosemary solids.
- Braised beet salad with golden raisin vinaigrette Even skipping the vinaigrette, the beet recipe is good enough I’ll doubtfully use a different technique again. I skipped the beet greens and added some extra water to the pot to take their place. The vinaigrette has a tamarind-like tanginess.
- Vegan carpaccio
Very good
My memory escapes me on a few of these, but I rated them highly after I made them.
- Chickpea soup with toasted breadcrumbs Basic and easy bean soup recipe. I used dry chickpeas (cooker 40 minutes, unsoaked in an Instapot pressure cooker).
- Carrots with tahini Even better the next day.
- Sikil pack from yucatan Charred/burnt flavor, but in a good way. Skins took a while to shake off.
- Cinnamon flavored black eyed peas
- Pink Greens
- Vegan peanut, sweet potato, and kale soup with coconut
Recommended pending garnish
- Deborah Madison’s cauliflower with saffron, pepper flakes, plenty of parsley, and pasta The recipe was fine, but was delicious with an umami boost. She optionally recommended cheese, I used Kenji’s miso olive paste.
- Spicy carrot ginger soup with harissa Boring without pine nut topping, excellent with.
Unsuccessful
-
Turnip, apple, and sunchoke soup Very austere, not the best use of sunchokes. To redeem the flavor of the finished product, I added lemon juice to give it some life, some smoked salt, which brought out the apple, and toasted pine nuts. Still, and unpleasant texture of pureed small
crunchy stuff in a watery liquid. - Hearty Vegan Polenta and Kale Soup With Miso and Toasted Sesame Oil Recipe Way too salty. Might have been better accompanied by bread.