Raw Vegan Pizza

I love raw vegan pizza.

Dinner tonight was Perfect Pizza Crust topped with chopped heirloom tomatoes, mushrooms, green olives onion and topped with raw cashew cheese that I froze and grated.















Here is the crust in the dehydrator. That is enough for 2 personal pizzas or four slices.
















I put some of the cheese on a cracker and put in in the toaster oven to see if it would melt.









It did not.





Layer the ingredients. I like to put a thick layer of tomatoes on first and build up from there.


A little shredded cashew cheese and tomatoes















Mushrooms on top of that.














And keep loading it from there. I put green olives, onions and a bunch more cheese then cut it in half and we each had a slice!
















Here is the cheese before freezing
















Here is some of the cheese after freezing and grating














Just a basic cheese, nuts, nutritional yeast, salt and lemon juice in the food processor until a very smooth paste (this was like play-dough) then roll it up in a piece of wax paper and freeze until hard. Grate and sprinkle quick cuz when it melts it's play-doh again.


Anyway, that is how easy it is to make raw pizza. I hope you try it soon and I hope you take photos and share them!

Raw Vegan Fermented Cashew Sour Cream or Yogurt Recipe

This recipe changed my life!
Blend a cup of soaked cashews (or any other nut you like) with enough water to make a thick paste about the consistency of sour cream. More water if you want a thinner kefir, yogurt or buttermilk consistency
Put the nut paste in a jar. Leave about 2 inches of room at the top of the jar because it will GROW.

Put the jar in your dehydrator (remove the trays) with a loose lid. Set it at about 95F. (This can be done in any warm place but it may take longer. See note below)

Leave it over night and it should look like this in the morning:

















See the bubbles? It's alive!















Stir it down and add salt or other seasonings if you like. I like it plain.
Store covered in the fridge almost indefinitely. Use just like you would sour cream in just about any recipe, as far as I know.
The longer you let it set the more sour delicious it gets.

I like to take a jar of this on road trips with me. It tastes better every day!

Note for those of you who don't have a dehydrator: If you don't have a dehydrator keep it in a warm place and it will ferment, it just may take a bit longer. My MIL preheats her oven to the lowest temp, turns off the oven then puts the jar in a water bath in the oven overnight and that method works for her. I also know someone who uses a heating pad on low heat in a box. A home yogurt maker might work, too.

RAW Dinner or Lunch Idea: Veges Au Gratin and Salsa Salad

Happy kitteh sleeping in the window















Chipmunk eating the seed the birds drop from the feeder











Salsa Salad
2 roma tomatoes
half a ripe avocado
2 or more tbs chopped onion
juice of one lemon
pinch of cane sugar
pinch of salt
big pinch of finely ground black pepper








And finally! Veges Au Gratin



Broccoli, cauliflower and carrot cut up in bite sized pieces and some curly kale, shredded.

Make some seed cheese subbing cashews for the seeds and adding 1/2 of a ripe avocado and enough water to make it sauce-y.





Pour cheese sauce over the veges in a shallow baking pan and dehydrate at 125F for 1 hour or more.

The shorter the time in the D, the crisper the veges will be. ooo, that rhymes :)

Serve with steamed quinoa or wrap in a collard leaf, that's what I did with mine.

What did you have for dinner?

My New Dryer and More Egg Free Challenge!

Energy saving, green, good for the environment vegan and freegan
















It's solar powered and really quiet. It dries 4 loads in about 3 hours on a sunny day so it saves time. It's a space saver, that's for sure, what with being outside and all. Downside? It's not gonna work in the rain.


This is the heavy duty area where I dry over sized stuff like rugs













Hey, as long as I don't have to WASH them by hand, I don't care, are you with me?

When is that belt coming? I don't know.

I got the free package of Teese that I "won" by sending a recipe to Compassion over Killing.
Um, what's the word? I don't like it very much. It tastes like plastic and doesn't melt at all. I put it under the broiler, no melt. But, it was free and I don't want to complain, so Thanks, Noelle, you are awesome! I hope you like the egg free breakfast recipe! The rest of you click and go, commit to 30 days of egg free! You can save the lives of chickens and reduce your cholesterol, too!

VEGAN Eggplant Manicotti Recipe

Filling
1 cup cooked nettles, drained very dry
1 med onion chopped
2 cloves garlic
1 tsp oregano & thyme
2 tbs vege broth (or enough to mix it all well
1/3 cup eggplant
1/2 cup chopped seitan sausage

Processes all together with s-blade in food processor and set aside.

Assembly
Peel a large eggplant and slice it in to long, thin slices, like lasagna noodles
Put 1 tbs of filling on the skinny end of the eggplant slice and roll it up. Put it in your baking pan seam side down. Keep doing that until you fill the pan, I manage to get 12 out of mine, yours may vary.

Sauce
1 cup agar cheese or sunflower seed cheese
4 tbs yeast
1 cup vege broth
1 clove garlic
Blend well and pour over the rolls.
Sprinkle quinoa over the top
Bake covered for 2 hours.

Shown with baby greens salad, a salad made from kale, cucumber, sauerkraut and a spoonful of veganaise, some leftovers, and a slice of bread with vegan buttery spread.















I thought this was very good and so did the man but our dinner guest found it mushy and yucky.

Snacking Happens! Raw Living Vegan Nachos :: RAW Snack Ideas and Party Foods

My Recipe for Raw Vegan Nachos














Nachos. Short for Ignatius as far as I can see. Anyone know why they are called nachos? Aside from that joke about the little boy who stole the cheese from the cheese truck and they chased him yelling "that's NACHO CHEESE!!" (Not Yo Cheese, get it? I know, it isn't funny, but do you GET IT?).

Anyway, I posted this the other day and got a response from this guy requesting the recipe.

Here are all the individual recipes for the components of the RAW LIVING VEGAN NACHOS!

Raw Vegan Nachos
As far as I am concerned, this serves 1. Me. But there is always someone who wants to share so you might want to make extra.

Here we go...

Flax Seed Chips.
These are easy to make but you need a dehydrator and you should make them the day before to be sure they are crisp enough to be used as chips.

1/3 cup each whole flaxseed, sunflower seed, sesame seed, soaked over night and rinsed.
1/2 cup vegetable pulp from juicing or 1/2 cup vegetables such as carrots, onions, tomato or a combination
1 1/2 tbs nutritional yeast (optional. I like the cheesy flavor it lends to the crackers)
1/8 tsp salt
Mix well, smooth on a plastic sheet and dehydrate until crackers. There are more detailed instructions to be found by following the link above.

Sunflower Seed Cheese

Soak your seeds over night and rinse then mix in blender:

3 tbs olive oil
1 tsp salt
juice of one lemon, about 1/4 cup
1/3 cup sesame seed
2/3 cup sunflower (add 1/3 at a time)
water to blend
All ingredients in blender except 1/3 c sunflower seeds. Add enough water to keep it moving.
Could be made spicier with the addition of some cayenne or chili powder.
When it's pretty well blended, add the rest of the seeds and some more water. It will thicken as it sits, so make it sort of thin.

Salsa!

Apple/celery salsa is apple and celery in equal amounts (about half an apple and two small ribs celery), diced
one clove garlic, 2 tbs yellow onion and a tbs ginger, finely chopped,
2 roma tomatoes, diced
4 tbs lemon juice
1/4 tsp salt
Mix all ingredients well and let sit overnight or for at least one hour.

Here is another, more complex recipe that I call Mango Salsa! Ai yi yi!
Ingredients:
One very ripe mango
One roma tomato
Half red bell pepper
One small onion, finely chopped
Two cloves garlic, minced
One rib celery, finely chopped
One Tsp fresh ginger, finely chopped
Fresh Oregano leaves, chopped.
Juice of one lemon, about 1/4 cup

Chop all ingredients, mix together well and let set 1 hour or overnight

Last, but not least

Guacamole

1 med avocado
1/2 roma tomato
2 tbs lemon juice
1/8 tsp onion powder
mix well. sprinkle lemon juice over the top and store lidded.

If you need heat, and I know some of you must, here is a bonus recipe:
Raw Pickled Jalapeno Peppers!

4 Large jalapenos about 1 cup
1 1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp curry powder
pinch asofoetida

mix together in a clean dry jar and leave for 4-6 hours so the peppers can marinate in the spices. The salt will draw the water out and there will be liquid in the bottom of the jar.

Then add 3 tbs lemon juice
1 1/2 tbs apple cider vinegar

Leave jar with contents for a day then it is ready to eat. Shake the jar every couple hours to mix it up and make sure all the peppers are covered.

Ok, I hope this was helpful. Here is another photo of nachos that I made back in January

Raw Vegan Pizza By The Slice

Raw flax seed crust smeared with sunflower seed cheese, vegan sausage (leave the sausage off if you want it really raw), apple/celery salsa* and vegan "parm"** sprinkled over the top.

I put the avocado on the side and ate it like fries, yum yum yum. Best lunch EVAH!!


I wanted to let the world know that this blue funnel:












Is my new favorite kitchen utensil. It is a canning funnel and it makes any jar into a wide mouth jar so it is SOOO easy to get ingredients in.














Thanks again to Goodwill for that.

Footnotes:
*Apple/celery salsa is apple and celery in equal amounts (about half an apple and two small ribs celery), diced
one clove garlic, 2 tbs onion and a tbs ginger, finely chopped,
2 roma tomatoes, diced
4 tbs lemon juice, 1/4 tsp salt
mix all in a jar, let rest for an hour and EAT!
** Vegan Parm Sprinkle:
3/4 cup almonds
1 cup nutritional yeast
1/4 tsp salt
blend until powder, store in a jar in the fridge.

Vegan Recipe! Dairy Free Mac N Cheese! Easy Dinner

What do you get when you cross a snowman and a vampire?
Frostbite! HAHAHAHAHA!

Last night's dinner was:
Vegan Mac n Cheese!














I didn't get a photo before it was cut but believe me, it was even prettier than it tasted!

Serves 4 as a main course or as a side dish for more.

Ingredients:

2 cups COOKED vegan elbow macaroni
3 cups oat cheese
2 roma tomatoes
About 1 cup chopped vegan sausage
1/4 cup bread crumbs
Lemon pepper

Instructions:

First cook about 2 cups of elbow macaroni until NOT QUITE done. That way the noodles will still have some firmness after baking in sauce for two hours or more.
Next make a batch of Oat cheese for the sauce. Follow the oat cheese recipe up to the part where you pour in a mold... but don't pour in a mold. Fear not, this will take you no more than five minutes, it's a blender recipe consisting of water, oats, nutritional yeast, sesame, lemon, onion powder and salt.

Assemble in a 2 qt casserole:

Half the cooked macaroni on the bottom
Pour some of the warm cheese on top, enough to cover, about a cup.
Two roma tomatoes, cut in thick slices are the next layer
The rest of the macaroni on top of that
A bit more cheese, but not all of it, you have one more layer to go.
Chop together: one cup of vegan sausage and one roma tomato, this is your third layer. Mix them well and spread evenly over the macaroni and cheese.
Pour the rest of the sauce over that and spread it around so no sausage is showing.
about a 1/4 cup of bread crumbs. I processed two small slices of my home made bread in the blender until they were fine crumbs.
Lemon pepper all over the top.

Bake covered for at least two hours at 350F. 15 minutes before you are ready to eat, remove the lid and let it brown. Ready to serve immediately but it's even better the next day!

Vegan Pizza with Oat Cheese and Vegan Sausage :: Hail Seitan!

I have been making raw pizza. plenty of raw pizza. I love raw pizza. But I wanted a cooked, vegan pizza. One that I made myself so I would know what was in it, on it and around it.

So I made up some bread dough, rolled it out and put it on my handy pizza pan.















Topped it with raw marinara, sliced onion and tomato, sliced vegan sausage and slices of oat cheese, and fresh tarragon and thyme leaves














I am really not sure how long it baked. About half an hour, 45 min at 400F. The man was in charge of cooking time for some reason.













The whole wheat crust was thin and crispy and the toppings were hot and juicy. It was everything you could want in a vegan pizza pie and as one of my favorite vegan food bloggers would say "we ate the shit out of it".

There were no leftovers, sadly because I would go for a cold slice right about now.

Money shot














Oh, yeah. It was good.

Sliceable Vegan Cheese For Sandwiches :: Oatmeal Cheese Recipe :: Vegan Cheesy Sausage Biscuit Breakfast Sandwiches

Yar, a hearty pirate's breakfast for a Saturday morning!















Biscuits I made from soda bread dough with a little more flour. I rolled them out and cut them with a coffee cup and baked them at 350F for about 30 minutes. First biscuits I have made in many years.
I heated the vegan sausage slices and the biscuits in a cast iron pan with a spray of olive oil then assembled them on a plate with slices of cheese, roma tomato and fresh basil. Beautiful!

Then I took the picture, gave them to the man and came back here to write all about it. They were good, trust me! I didn't eat any cuz I'm trying to juice today. It's hard with people all over. I want to cook for everyone all day long. I am cooking beans and will be making chili for dinner tonight. I will try to make some tortillas today. It might be a disaster, I will let you know.

Oatmeal cheese on a flax and quinoa cracker.














I was looking all over for an agar cheese recipe and found this here
Reprinted without permission from No Milk dot com

--------- Recipe via Meal-Master (tm) v8.00 (BB)

 Title: Mostarella Cheeze
Categories: Vegetarian, Vegan, Sandwiches
 Yield: 3 cups

 2 c  ;water
1/2 c  Nutritional yeast flakes
1/3 c  Quick-cooking rolled oats
1/4 c  Tahini
 4 tb Arrowroot or cornstarch
 4 tb Fresh lemon juice
 1 tb Onion granules
 1 ts Salt

Process all ingredients in a blender for several
minutes until very smooth.

Pour into a saucepan and cook over medium heat,
stirring constantly, until very thick and smooth.

Pack into a lightly oiled, 3 cup rectangular mold,
loaf pan, or other small, rectangular conainer and
cool. For round slices, pack into a small, straight
sided, cylindrical container. Cool, cover and chill
overnight. To serve, turn out of the mold and
carefully slice. Store leftovers in the refrigerator.

Still in the mold after chilling overnight.














Released from the mold and on my cheese plate.
















It really worked. What a great way to use the power of oatmeal to my advantage!
It's soft, but I was able to slice it and put it on the biscuits over hot sausages. It tastes VERY cheesey.
I made the recipe exactly but I used garlic powder instead of onion granules and 1/2 cup of raw, hulled sesames seeds instead of tahini.

Last night the boy ate dinner with the family. We all had grilled cheese, mozz for the omnis and seed cheese for me, tomato soup that I made from scratch and salad.
The boy ate some of everything and didn't have anything special made for him! First time EVER!!

Amazing SUCCESS!