By Jamila Alfred, Maryland/DC Events and Outreach Coordinator

The winter season calls for savory items, carbs, and hearty eats—or all of the above if possible.

You see, “Junk Food” is my middle name, so I couldn’t help but pair two awesome recipes to make the ultimate comfort food dish! This hoagie and wedge combo hits the spot in more ways than one, and it was super easy and fun to make. Warm yourself up with this delectable delight and enjoy!

Grilled Sausage and Pepper Hoagie

Yields 4 servings.

Ingredients

Directions

1. Prepare a hot grill fire.
2. On a medium baking sheet, toss peppers with 1 tablespoon oil and ¼ teaspoon salt. Place onion rings on same baking sheet and drizzle with 1 tablespoon oil and sprinkle with ¼ teaspoon salt, keeping layers intact.
3. Grill peppers, onion, and sausages, turning as needed until vegetables are softened and partially charred and sausages are nicely browned.
4. Grill buns briefly to lightly toast, then divide sausages, peppers, and onions between buns.

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Garlic Potato Wedges

Yields 4 servings.

Ingredients

*Note that you can get every ingredient the Garlic Potato Wedges recipe calls for—aside from the olive oil, salt, and pepper—directly from Melissa’s Produce!

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 425°F.
2. In a bowl mix together the garlic, parsley, and oregano.
3. Roll the potato wedges in the mixture to coat all sides.
4. Coat a baking sheet with the olive oil and place the wedges in a single layer. Season with salt and pepper.
5. Bake in the oven for 30 minutes or until fork tender.

You can find the original Hoagie recipe here from Tofurky and the Garlic Potato Wedges recipe here from Melissa’s Produce. Thanks for the delicious meal, Tofurky and Melissa’s Produce!

By Alex Bury, VO Organizational Development Consultant

When my coworker asked me to make a recipe using a hemp food product for Hemp History Week, I thought of chowder right away. Hemp seeds have a mild, natural sweetness. I had already been craving a good chowder, and I knew the sweetness of hemp would be a perfect flavor.

Hemp seeds are high in quality protein, and they contain the omegas stearidonic acid and gamma-linolenic acid.

I created the delicious, nutritious recipe below, and I’ll definitely make it again!

This is a rich, filling soup with added protein from Tofurky’s Lightly Seasoned Slow Roasted Chick’n strips.

Hemp milk gives the chowder a wonderful creaminess. I roasted half the veggies for extra flavor—the deep caramelization of roasting adds a layer of taste. If I’d roasted all the veggies, it might have been too “roasty” and less like a delicate chowder. Simmering half and roasting half turned out perfectly!

If you’re wondering about the cabbage, trust me! When cabbage cooks, it becomes sweet and a little earthy. It adds a great background flavor that you won’t even recognize.

Serves about 6.

Ingredients

• 2 stalks celery, chopped
• ½ yellow onion, chopped
• 1 carrot, chopped
• ¼ green cabbage, chopped
• 4 cloves garlic, peeled and minced
• 2 bags frozen organic sweet corn, or the kernels from 4 ears organic sweet corn
• 4 medium red-skinned potatoes
• 1 32-oz container vegetable stock (or substitute with plain water)
• 2 tablespoons safflower oil
• 1 box Tofurky Lightly Seasoned Slow Roasted Chick’n
• 1 container unsweetened hemp milk
• ¼ cup fresh hemp seeds (I found them in the spice section of my store, but you may need to ask your grocer)
• Water as needed
• 2 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon black pepper
• ¼ cup nutritional yeast

Directions

1. Mix the chopped vegetables together in a big bowl (celery, onion, carrot, cabbage, garlic, corn, and potatoes). Divide in half.
2. Heat the oven to 450°F.
3. Add half the veggies and the entire container of stock (or equivalent amount of water) to a large soup pot. Bring to a boil, then let simmer.
4. Spread the other half of the veggies onto a cookie sheet or baking dish. Drizzle with the oil and then roast in the hot oven for about 15 minutes. The timing depends on your oven—you want them nice and brown but not burnt. It’s okay if they’re not tender all the way through.
5. While the two batches of veggies cook, make the Chick’n strips:
   1. Toss the Chick’n lightly in about 1 tablespoon of hemp milk.
   2. Coat with hemp seeds and toss.
   3. Carefully arrange on a baking dish (I used parchment paper and they came out perfectly) and bake in the same hot oven for 10 minutes. Set aside.
6. When the oven veggies are the color you want, carefully add them to the soup pot. Add water if you need to. You want enough liquid to cover, but it should still be on the thick side. Simmer for about 10 minutes until all the veggies are very tender.
7. Turn off the heat. Stir in the hemp milk, salt, pepper, and nutritional yeast.
8. Puree about ⅓ of the soup. An immersion blender is best for this step, but if you need to use a blender or food processor instead, wait until the soup cools first.
9. When the soup is partially blended, it should be rich and creamy with lots of tender chunks of vegetables. Taste and adjust for seasoning. If you used water instead of stock, you may want more salt. Add it carefully!
10. Serve hot bowls of chowder topped with baked hemp Chick’n strips and salad. I sprinkled more hemp seeds on my salad!

I’m enjoying the rest of the hemp milk in my morning coffee and I’ll have leftover chowder for lunch. It was a hit here at home, and I hope you like it too!

By Lori Stultz, Outreach Coordinator

I’m always a little skeptical when I come across a new recipe that claims to be a “quick meal.” On a number of occasions I’ve set out to make one of these quick meals and it has taken longer than anticipated. So for anyone who has shared a similar, frustrating experience, I’m here to validate that this recipe is, in fact, quick!

I bring this up because preparation and cook time wasn’t actually my motivation for making this dish, but it was a much-welcomed bonus! And I figured other quick-meal-seekers, curry lovers, and Gardein fans would appreciate it!

I encourage you to add or substitute any other kind of vegetable you like!

I added broccoli, and if I had eggplant on hand I would have added that too. I served this meal over long grain white rice, but it would taste excellent with whatever type of rice you have available. Keep in mind that some types of rice can take up to an hour to cook, so in the spirit of keeping this meal quick make sure you consider the amount of time it will take to cook the rice.

I highly recommend this recipe to anyone who is attending or hosting an event where there will be non-vegans. The flavors are so rich and the chick’n is so flavorful that even meat eaters will enjoy it!

Let your meat-eating friends know that Gardein is a favorite of David Carter—a 300 lb NFL player!

And keep checking Gardein’s website and your grocery store freezer section—they’re coming out with new products all the time!

Gardein’s Chick’n and Cauliflower Curry

Serves about 6.

Ingredients

Directions

1. Cook scallopini according to package instructions. Let cool slightly, then shred into small pieces and set aside.
2. Preheat non-stick deep skillet with olive oil at medium heat. Add onion, garlic, ginger and peppers and cook, stirring occasionally until soft, about 5 minutes.
3. Add coconut milk, agave syrup, curry powder, flour, salt and pepper and stir well. Bring to a boil and add cauliflower. Return to boil, then reduce heat, cover and cook for 15 minutes.
4. Add the scallopini pieces and cook another 5 minutes.
5. Serve the curry chick’n and cauliflower over your choice of rice and garnish with cilantro and/or green onions.

By Lori Stultz, Communications Manager

When I first went vegan, I very much enjoyed looking at vegan cookbooks with not-so-easy to prepare recipes that called for unfamiliar ingredients. I liked trying out new ways to prepare plant foods—spiralized sweet potato noodles, anyone?—because I was eager to get distance from the types of animal-based meals I had been brought up on. I don’t know why I felt the need to do that, nor do I particularly care because, after all, I acquired a lot of awesome culinary knowledge. I also had the idea that other people (i.e., non-vegans) would enjoy the obscure dishes I was preparing and it would spark their curiosity in adopting a vegan lifestyle.

Fast forward five years and you’ll find me sticking close to recipes that have short ingredient lists and often include one or more store-bought vegan meats and/or cheeses. Not only have I found preparation to be much quicker, I’ve noticed a difference in the way people respond to what I’ve prepared. More frequently than not, I hear how similar my vegan meal tastes in comparison to a meal that’s usually prepared with animal products.

The changes I’ve made over the years has also influenced the types of cookbooks I thumb through, as well as the types of cookbooks I choose to do a review on the Vegan Outreach blog. I now look for simple comfort foods recipes and close-to-home dishes that non-vegan friends and family members may be interested in preparing for themselves in their own kitchens.

When I was contacted by Jenny Engel and Heather Bell, authors of Vegan 101, about doing a cookbook review, I was excited to see that our approaches to cooking seemed pretty similar. The cookbook is beginner-friendly with easy-to-follow advice for those who’re looking to incorporate more plant-based foods into their meals. It has several easy recipes that won’t require a trip to a specialty spice market, or require a whole day’s worth of preparation.

I also want to mention that the authors, Jenny and Heather, are co-owners of a Los Angeles-based vegan cooking school, Spork Foods, which takes them to universities, health care companies, hotels, corporations, markets, and restaurants all around the world to teach chefs how to prepare tasty vegan meals. These women are sincerely dedicated to educating others about the fun and simplicity in preparing delicious vegan food.

Our first giveaway for the month will be, you guessed it, Vegan 101. So, whether you’re new to vegan cooking, or, you’re like me, and are looking to tone down the complexity of your plant-based meals, this cookbook will be a compatible friend in the kitchen.

This giveaway starts today, Tuesday, May 2 and ends on Saturday, May 20 at 12:00 am North American MDT. We’ll announce the winner on Tuesday, May 23 here on Vegan Outreach’s Vegan Living & Advocacy Blog! Enter by clicking on the giveaway link below!

Vegan 101 Cookbook Giveaway

In the meantime, here’s a sample of one of the many tasty, simple recipes Jenny and Heather provide in their book—Down-Home Seitan Fried Chicken. These patties take very little time to prepare and will be a major hit among your vegan and non-vegan friends and family members!

Down-Home Seitan Fried Chicken

Yields 4-6 servings.

Ingredients

Directions

1. To Prepare the Seitan: In a large bowl, combine creamer and vinegar. Set aside for 2 minutes to curdle. Add Worcestershire sauce. Add seitan pieces and toss to coat. Add sea salt and pepper. Set aside for 10 to 20 minutes.
2. To Prepare the Coating: In a large bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, ½ teaspoon sea salt, ¼ teaspoon pepper, mustard, ¼ teaspoon cayenne, and garlic powder.
3. Remove and reserve ¼ cup seasoned flour mixture.
4. In a medium bowl, whisk egg replacer and water until mixture is foamy.
5. In a small bowl, combine panko, remaining ¼ teaspoon sea salt, remaining ¼ teaspoon pepper, and remaining ⅛ teaspoon cayenne. Add reserved ¼ cup seasoned flour mixture and whisk until uniform.
6. To Cook the Chicken: Add oil to a heavy skillet and heat over medium-high heat.
7. Dredge each piece of seitan in flour mixture, then dip into egg replacer mixture, and finally coat in panko mixture. Shake off excess panko.
8. Carefully place coated seitan pieces into hot oil. Cook for 2 to 3 minutes, or until golden. Turn over and cook about 2 additional minutes, or until golden. Once crisp, place pieces on cooling rack over baking sheet. Serve warm.

Recipe Tips/Variations

• To test your oil for the perfect cooking temperature, heat it up until you see ripples. Then, stick a clean wooden tool into the oil. If bubbles appear, you’re ready to fry.