Pizza!

I've broken from the hold of 5 Spices, 50 Dishes and cracked open one of my other books! I chose Grilled Seitan Caponata with Lemon Pilaf from The Sexy Vegan Cookbook for a birthday dinner for my gentleman friend. Since the recipe for the Caponata yields more than I would need, I went ahead and took Brian L. Patton's advice and made some pizza.

One of the things I'm starting to think about this book is that nothing is easy. I would have to make 4 different recipes to make the Grilled Seitan Caponata with Lemon Pilaf (keeping in mind that I already had seitan made), and to make the simplest of his pizzas, I made 6! Now, I had already made the Tomato Killer, which was part of the Caponata, so maybe that was a bit of a freebie. But I still have a LOT left over for which I'm going to have to find a purpose.

With that made, I still had to make the dough, which was easy, but took a hella long time to rise. That's fine by me though, and it's one of the better doughs I've made at home. My major complaint is that Patton claims that the recipe will give you three 14-inch diameter thin crusts or two thick. As far as I can tell, that's not true. I used all of it to make a a thick crust pizza for The Mario.

I'm glad I did though. Once I rolled it out, and topped it with Caponata and Patton's Not-zzarella Sauce, it was so heavy, a thinner crust might have perished. The Not-zzarella Sauce is unlike any cheese-style sauce that I've ever made because it's a thin liquid. Additionally, I found it a bit bland right from the blender, so I added a bit of lemon and pepper. As with the Caponata, I had way more than I needed, even after loading up the pizza with more than the recipe mandated.

So after all of that, I got the pizza in the oven, and I still had to make the Parmesan Topping and the Balsamic Glaze. At this point, I was tired and indignant about making two more recipes with such a tremendous yield. The Parmesan Topping was easy though, and I just reduced the amounts. It is really good and will probably be my new go-to.

The Balsamic Glaze annoyed me though because even if I had two cups of Balsamic vinegar hanging around, I'm not going to make that much glaze. So I halved that one too, but I have to admit, it was unbelievably good, and I'm sure I'll pour it on all kinds of things.

Finally, after all of that, the pizza was out of the oven, and doused in the glaze. I skipped the arugula garnish because the grocery list for these recipes already broke the bank this week. I did add the basil leaves I wouldn't be using later in the week though. It didn't look like the pizza you'd get in a shop, which I expected, and it was not an elegant eating experience - if you're not comfortable licking your fingers, then you'll need a fork, because you're not going to want to leave anything behind.

This pizza was fantastic, and incredibly filling. Additionally, I felt like I got a lot more nutritional bang for my buck with this than I might have from a Johnny Rads or Tofurky pizza. I'll undoubtedly use his dough from now on, and maybe even the Not-zzarella Sauce, but I'll probably stick to more basic sauces and just add veggies unless I happen to have another odd gallon of Caponata lying around.

10. This Isn't Even My Soup

In exciting news, I got my awesome new, purple vegan T shirt from Sparrow Media. I can't wait for those Ask Me Why I'm Vegan totes to be back in stock.

Today's food comes from the west coast where my sister cooks macro-biotic meals and has her pick of all-vegan restaurants. (Stay tuned for a quest post on how to work with mochi from her, because I still haven't figured it out).

First up, we have a lovely French Onion Soup, from The Self Healing Cookbook : A Macrobiotic Primer for Healing Body, Mind and Moods With Whole, Natural Foods (which I just bought for $0.01 plus shipping). Between the parsley sprig and the sparkle effect created by the flash, this soup looks like magic!



This second picture leaves me envious. Delivered from Cruzer's Pizza, it is 100% animal product free, just like the rest of their pizzas. In DC, I'm pretty excited about places like Busboys & Poets, Z Pizza, and Pete's which provide vegan options. I would do a happy dance to find a place that was all vegan though.



Hopefully my dear sister will weigh in and tell us exactly what toppings grace its surface.

This post marks the 1/3 mark of Vegan MoFo posts! How are the rest of you holding up?

Bring Your Dog to Brunch!

I've lost this entry three times now, so be assured that it was a labor of love.

This month has been a good one for DC-area vegans. Thanks to our friends at Compassion Over Killing, there are loads of events and promotions going on for VegWeek. Between this, Earth Day, and the Worldwide Vegan Bake Sale, we're well set with treats and celebrations.

In this spirit, I loaded my own vegan buddy, Mr. Darcy, into the car and we traveled to Arlington VA for Bring Your Dog to Brunch at Toscana. Toscana has a generous vegan offering all of the time and during the month of April, they are entirely vegan on the weekends.



The food was really great. Due to a website error, I was too late for brunch food, but the Sinatra Pizza made up for it. I'm not much for analogues these days, but the Daiya "Cheese" and Gardein "Chicken" was super good. I can't say it's the same as the real stuff, but taste and texture are stellar, and no one had to die or give up their young for me to eat, so it's an all around win.


Dessert stole the show though (though I feel I should disclose that's usually the case in my view). I ordered a vegan tiramisu and was presented with fluffy, chocolatey bliss. The picture doesn't do it justice - this thing was massive. The decaf coffee was super excellent too!

I didn't want to give my dining companion any chocolate or pizza, but luckily Max & Ruffy's was on the scene to share their human-grade, organic, vegan dog treats! Mr. Darcy is a junk food dog though and turned up his nose at the hippie treats, much to my embarrassment, but hopefully I can coax him to give up his poor eating habits over time.



I will definitely be going back for actual brunch in the future.