Blossom Cafe (West Village, NYC)

I cannot express just how excited I am that Blossom - yes, that Blossom, the vegan goddess of 9th  Ave. in Chelsea, is opening up in my neighborhood!  The West Village comes up short with vegan restaurants, unlike the nearby East Village but we now have one more!  Actually, technically, they will be open as of 6 p.m. tonight for dinner...Finally, a gourmet vegan restaurant practically next door!  Can't wait to try it... I just walked by and it looks very nice when I peaked in, with those doors that open onto the street so it's almost like you are dining outdoors enjoying this lovely Spring day (but you are not actually dining on the sidewalk)...

Guess where I will be for my birthday next Monday night (and possibly before then if I can't wait)...

Namaste! Vegan Indian dinner

Okra masala

Sweet coconut chutney

Fragrant coriander chutney

Dinner is served...

There's nothing quite like cooking with friends and sharing a cozy meal.  I just love it!  Thank you to Zita and Mio for helping prepare the meal and for your lovely company.

This was my first foray into Indian cooking and I used recipes I collected while traveling in India earlier this year.
On the menu was: coconut chutney and coriander chutney with whole wheat naan (the naan was bought at Whole Foods and not homemade), and okra masala.  For a decidedly un-Indian dessert, we had my vegan banana bread and the inaugural batch of vegan chocolate hazelnut butter with organic salted pretzel sticks for dipping.  Quite an eclectic combo, yes!

In preparation for this meal, I went grocery shopping at Patel Brothers in Jackson Heights, Queens - a mecca for Indian food, spices and so much more.  More on the restaurants in this neighborhood another time.  This was the only place to get fresh okra, not to mention every single other item on my list.  By the way, the E train subway station in Jackson Heights (Roosevelt Ave) actually smells like Indian spices - it doesn't get much better than that!

The Recipes:

Coriander Chutney
Ingredients:
50 grams coriander leaves (we used almost all the leaves from one bunch of coriander)
1/4 green chile
1 pinch cumin seeds
1/4 t. salt
1/2 lemon or dry mango powder

Serving Size: about 4 (there are no serving sizes on my Indian recipe cards, so this is based on our actual cooking)
1. Wash the green chile and cut off the stems
2. Wash the coriander leaves
3. Blend the coriander, cumin and green chile together in a paste
4. Add salt and squish (yes, it says "squish") the lemon over the top, then stir.

We used both the mango powder and the lemon juice.  It was not the right consistency with just the mango powder alone.  We needed the liquid from the lemon to further break down the leaves into smaller pieces and to form a paste.

At Patel Brothers, I was overwhelmed by the (two) choices of green chile sizes - small or medium.  Rather than leave it to guess-work, I asked a friendly customer who informed me that the smaller chiles are spicier so that made the decision easily enough - I bought the medium-sized chiles to be on the safe side.

The finished product was delightful on our naan.

Coconut Chutney (from Vegetarian Indian Cooking, by Manju Kumari Singh):
Ingredients:
1 cup grated coconut, dry roasted on a pan (at 250 degrees for 5-10 minutes)
2 green chiles, chopped (seeds removed if you don't want too much spice)
2 onions, chopped
1/2 cup water
salt to taste
1 cup coriander or mint leaves, chopped (we used mint)
2 T. lemon juice

Put all the ingredients into a food processor or blender and blend to a smooth paste.  Store in the fridge.

Easy enough.

Serving size: (again, none is listed on the recipe) - seriously, this recipe made a mountain of chutney, so let's say 100. :)

This was very good, nice and sweet but if anything, just a tad too onion-heavy for me.  I do love coconut chutney; it's usually my favorite part of a dosa meal.  If I make it again (and I will, assuming at some point I will run out of leftovers), I would only use one onion or maybe even none.   It made for a perfect appetizer on warm naan.

Okra (bhindi) Masala:

Ingredients:
1/2 kg. okra, chopped (do not use the ends)
1 large onion, chopped
1 t. cumin seeds
2 green chiles, chopped (seeds removed if you don't want too much spice)
1/2 t. dried mango powder
1/2 t. red chili powder (I thought I had some at home but turned out I only had cayenne, which we used but it was milder so I feel like we essentially skipped this ingredient)
1/2 t. turmeric powder
1/2 t. coriander powder
salt to taste
1. T. coriander leaves, chopped
2 T. cooking oil (I used canola)

1. In a karachi (not sure what that is but we used a large frying pan as you can see in the photos), heat the oil and cumin seeds
2. After cumin seeds start to sizzle, add onions and cook until onions are golden brown
3. Add okra and cook for 5-7 minutes
4. Add all the powders and salt
5. Stir gently for 8-10 minutes
6. Garnish with coriander.

Serving size: 3-4 large portions

Don't forget the salt like I did.  It really does help with the flavor, otherwise, it is a bit bland.  We added it at the table and all was good.  This was really delicious and satisfying, with a nice mix of subtle flavors.  Ayurvedically-speaking, okra is a perfect food for fall since it is slimy and therefore good for those dry vata constitutions!

Namaste!

Vegan Divas cupcakes

So scrumptious!  Can you see the flecks of gold?  It was a beautiful cupcake and received rave reviews from everyone who tasted and devoured them.

Shining beauties!  A pure delight for my taste buds!

I had one of those deal coupons from Living Social for eight vegan cupcakes (I think three big cookies were another option) and I could not wait to use it.  It works a bit differently than most deals, meaning you have to send them an email and the Vegan Divas let you know when to pick up the loot so don't expect them right away, as it does take a few days - four in my case.  The pickup location was at The Plaza Hotel.  I wish the exact pickup location within the food hall was specified because I was wandering for a bit until I asked at the FC Chocolate Bar counter (other dessert businesses had no idea what I was talking about when asking for vegan cupcakes).  Fernanda (one of the "divas") tells me I have found the pickup location for Vegan Divas delicious treats.   It happens to be a traditional French patisserie.  I do have a weakness for French pastries and everything looked delectable and so artful there.  As it so happens, there are a few vegan options there such as coconut macarons and certain donuts.  She soon hand-delivers the bag of eight cupcakes to me and to my surprise, they are all chocolate.  I expected more variety but certainly was not disappointed with chocolate.

As you can see in the photos, they are beautiful so I could hardly wait until I was home to taste them (but I did)!   They are incredibly moist throughout, which is amazing for vegan cupcakes, which tend to be on the dry side.   There is no way you could tell these were vegan creations.  The cupcakes were outrageously scrumptious, both the frosting and the cake, and so pretty with flecks of gold laced into the frosting.  My favorite part aside from the eating aspect is their products are sweetened with maple syrup, evaporated cane juice and sucanat - yah for natural sweeteners!  

Check out the nearest locations to you that carry Vegan Divas products on the website:

http://www.vegandivasnyc.com/

I know which store I will be headed to to get my fix. 

YUM.

Sacred Chow (Greenwich Village, NYC)

I wasn't even planning to blog about my lunch at Sacred Chow, even though it was fantastic, as always.  I was just thrilled they were open til 4 on this "hurricane Irene" weekend.  This food here never disappoints - vegan, organic and kosher.  Just plain clean food prepared with love - my favorite!  Now I am sorry that I didn't even take photos of my three tapas (3 for $18) but for the record I had root vegetable latkes (delish, nice and crisp on the outside - it maybe my fave tapas item), spicy soba noodles and sesame collards (mmm, I needed a green infusion)....but when this dessert arrived, I knew I had to capture its decadence.  Chocolate truffle cake with strawberry ganache and pralines was simply divine!  The strawberry jam perfectly cut the dense chocolate and the pralines gave it that satisfying crunch.  It cost $8.50, which is a bit steep for dessert but it is huge so it's really two portions, if you need to justify it.  Trust me, it is pure chocolate heaven...

The NY Vegan Dosa Cart (Washington Sq. Park South)

The vegan dosa guy serves up fresh and delicious South Indian food, all vegan and very reasonably priced (and cash only).  Dosas are made out of rice and lentils.   If memory serves me, $6 was the priciest item on the menu and it's great value for generous portions of high quality food for lunch.  The service was warm and friendly, too, which I always appreciate in New York or anywhere for that matter.

Thiru Kumar, the talented and friendly chef was all smiles as he posed for me.

This is my perfect veggie uthappam on the grill.  YUM!

Absolutely scrumptious uthappam, crispy outside and fluffy inside, with lots of veggies.  Good sambhar (see above photo, cup top left) for dipping and the coconut chutney side (see above photo, chutney on the top right) is just plain amazing.  I could eat a cup of it alone, easily.

Samosa filled with potatoes and peas, served with the mint chutney, which was a delight!  The mint flavor really complemented the samosa nicely.

Vegan Tastes of Rajasthan India!

It's been a long time coming and I've wanted to get my India photos uploaded so here they are, most without captions -- for the moment.  Mange! (OK, that's French, but I don't know how to say "eat" in Hindi.) ~Namaste.This was from one of our first lunches on the tour.  The cashew curry (at about 7:00 on the plate to the left) was amazing. I talked about how much I loved it the entire trip and on one of the last nights, I got to cook it (with some help of course), using ingredients from the local market.  There is a photo below of the pan while I am cooking the cashew curry...So delicious...

Food from the Bishnoi village, an all vegetarian village.

This is the market where we haggled (only when appropriate considering how cheap everything was compared to the US) for the ingredients used during our night of cooking.

Cashew curry in progress

Thali

Gulab jamun - my favorite dessert.  I recall having thirds of this syrupy sweet little dish!  I couldn't help myself!

Mmm, vegan banana bread loaf

My favorite baking resource is Colleen Patrick-Goudreau's Joy of Vegan Baking, which, of course, is legendary. I've adapted the banana loaf recipe to make it even more healthful by re

moving the chocolate chips (no, that is not a typo), using organic whole wheat pastry flour and using either SUCANAT or jaggery as the sweetener. I used to sweeten with agave nectar and adjust the rest of the liquid proportions but I no longer use agave after all the recent news about its processing. Coincidentally, I also subbed in unsweetened applesauce for half the canola oil today because I was low and that worked very nicely.

The modified recipe is as follows:

Ingredients:

2 c. 100% whole wheat organic pastry flour

1 1/2 t. baking soda

1/2 t. unrefined sea salt

1 c. SUCANAT or jaggery, if you have time to grate

1/3 c. canola oil (I split this evenly 1/6 c. each of canola oil and unsweetened applesauce. Next time I plan to use the full 1/3 c. of applesauce)

4 ripe organic bananas, mashed

1/4 c. water (filtered)

1 t. vanilla extract (with no alcohol or corn syrup added; I use Trader Joe's brand)

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease the loaf pan.

In a medium bowl, mix the first three ingredients. Set aside.

In a large bowl, beat the sugar and oil (applesauce) together, then add the mashed bananas. I find it's easy to mash the bananas right in the bowl, using a fork. Stir in the water and vanilla and mix thoroughly. Add the flour mixture and stir to mix.

Fill the baking pan about 90% with the batter leaving a generous portion in the bowl. I will get to the leftover batter in a second.

Place in the oven and bake for 40 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean (normally 40 minutes on the dot for my oven).

Ahh, as for that last 10% of batter (you won't find this in any cookbook)...The best part of vegan baking is my favorite past-time -- licking the bowl! A delicious treat for when the bread is baking. What, were you going to do the dishes??

Enjoy the baked bread once it cools, and try not to eat it all at once. I won't tell if you do, though...

V-Note (Upper East Side) for dinner

We had the best table in the house...

The photos are out of the order they were eaten; it's hard to control the picture order using Blogger. Really, I did not have dessert first, although with me, it's not totally out of the realm of possibility.
Fondue! The fruit was a little too cold for my taste and the fruit, especially the strawberries, weren't the ripest (I shouldn't be too picky, I realize it's not strawberry or pineapple season). It is worth noting that our table would have been perfectly content with all bananas for dipping (they were perfect), and maybe one or two of the yummy cookies. Technically the fondue was for two but it was a fine serving for the three of us.
Soy chicken cutlets (special) with mushroom sauce and brussels sprouts. The whole dish was tasty, especially the sauce.
The small-sized Caesar salad was a good portion with nice flavors.
Mushroom risotto entree with mushrooms galore, seaweed and basil. Creamy, warming goodness on a cold night. Yum yum!

Seitan schnitzel appetizer with blueberry sauce and potato salad. The potato salad had lots of mushrooms, which is a plus if you are a mushroom fan like I am (though the person who ordered this was not, unfortunately). The seitan was good though heavy because it was fried and a sizable portion for one person.

The pumpkin and sweet potato gnocchi appetizer with sage cashew cream and kale was heavenly; it was my favorite course. Yes, even better than dessert, which doesn't happen often. Last photo but definitely not least!

V-Note is owned by the same people as Blossom, which is consistently great and one of my top picks in NYC. The quality was excellent, both food and drinks. The atmosphere is chic and modern, with spacious tables and lots of space between tables, which I like and is so rare in Manhattan.

Vegan Thanksgiving 2009

Apple pie in a spelt pie shell (dessert pictured first, of course)
Butternut squash soup
Delicato squash risotto
Roasted sweet potatoes with orange zest and cinnamon (a little blurry)
Clockwise from the top left: 1. delicious, sweet cashew cream sauce to pour over the roasted sweet potatoes, 2. herbed stuffing made with sprouted grain bread and fresh rosemary, thyme, sage, parsley and celery and carrots, 3. cranberry sauce sweetened with date sugar.
Close up of the cranberry sauce, which was ever-so-slightly tart. I love the brilliant red jewel color.
Close up of the stuffing.

My nutritious, vegan Thanksgiving dinner was a huge success. Some of the toughest, non-veggie loving critics paid me kudos for days afterwards and even took home doggie bags. I was in complete shock and of course, pleased to pieces! Eveything was made from scratch, from fresh, organic ingredients except the pie shell, which was store-bought from Wegman's but was organic, vegan and made from spelt (never fear). It's all about quality ingredients and loving preparation. The proof is in the pictures (and the fact that three of my smoke detectors went off while I was cooking)...