Seitan "Meatball" Subs

Twenty five days of vegetarianism under my belt and no desire to turn back.  I saw a picture of a roasted chicken in the market today and let's just say there was nothing appetizing about it for me.  Trust me here, I'm not preaching that everyone should be a vegetarian...it's just working for me right now.
Jack is on board by default, at least when he dines at home so I wanted to make something that would be very appealing for him and a little bit sinful for Joe and I.

Meatball Subs!  Yes!  Who doesn't love a meatball sub?

I combined some recipes and this is what I came up with.  Let me just say Y-U-M!  I'm not kidding...these rocked!

You'll need to make the seitan first, then make the "meatballs" using the seitan.  So, what is seitan?  See Wikipedia's article here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wheat_gluten_(food)

If you don't want to make your own seitan, you can buy it premade.  This is not for the gluten sensitive crowd!!!!

For Seitan:

Ingredients:
2 cups Vital Wheat Gluten Flour
1/2 tsp sage
1 tsp marjoram
1 tsp onion powder
1 tsp garlic powder
1/4 cup soy sauce
1 T olive oil
1 c vegetable broth
1 c water

Seitan Broth
6 cups water
2 T soy sauce

Instructions:

1. Combine soy sauce, olive oil, vegetable broth, water, sage, marjoram, onion powder, garlic powder and mix well.
2. Combine wet mixture with 2 cups Vital Wheat Gluten.
3. Get ready to mix with your clean hands and mix well!
4. Knead the mixture until it comes together and is very elastic.
5. Place the blob on the counter and use some clean paper towels to dry it a bit.
6. Boil the water and soy sauce for the seitan broth then turn to a simmer.
7. Cut the seitan dough into 2 inch pieces and drop into the hot broth.  
8. Let simmer for one hour.
9. Drain in a colander until cool.

"Meatballs"

Ingredients:

16 oz or so Seitan

1/2 c pecans

1/2 c breadcrumbs

1/4 c fresh parsley, chopped

1/4 c fresh basil, chopped

3 cloves minced garlic

1 tsp dried oregano

1 tsp garlic powder

1 tsp onion powder

1 cage free egg

3 T tomato paste

3/4 c water

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees
2. Place seitan in food processor with pecans and pulse until the consistency of cooked hamburger.
3. Place mixture in a large bowl.
4. Place egg, tomato paste, garlic powder, oregano, garlic, basil, and parsley into food processor and whirl well.
5. Add egg mixture and breadcrumbs to seitan mixture.  Fold together.
6. Place parchment paper on a cookie sheet.
7. Using a 1/3 cup scoop, scoop the mixture into your hand and form a meatball.
8. Place each meatball on the cookie sheet.
9. When you've formed all the "meatballs" put them in the over for 30 minutes.
10. When done place in a heat resistant container to cool.

"Meatball" Subs

Ingredients:

Seitan "Meatballs"

Crusty rolls

Favorite Spaghetti Sauce

Veggie Mozzarella Cheese

Instructions:

1. Place opened rolls on cookie sheet and toast in over for 5-7 minutes.
2. Cut meatballs in half and place on toasted rolls.
3. Sprinkle "cheese" over meatballs.
4. Top with desired amount of sauce.
5. Place back in the oven for a few minutes until heated thoroughly.
6. Remove from oven and ENJOY!

Green Goddess Smoothie

We're on a smoothie kick in our household.  We love this because, it is fast, nutritious and fun!

Jack asked me to write this recipe down because it is his new favorite breakfast drink!

Ingredients:
1/2 Granny Smith apple
1/2 orange, peeled
1/2 pear, any variety
1/2 kiwi, peeled
2 4" pieces of celery
Juice of a 1/4 of a lime
1 tsp Chia Seeds
1 tsp Hemp Seeds
5 ice cubes

Directions:
Cut all fruit into chunks.
Place orange chunks in blender first followed by the rest of the ingredients.  You may need to add a little water, depending on your blender's capability.
Blend well.
Enjoy!

African Peanut and Sweet Potato Soup (Am I a Vegetarian?)

I love documentaries and I love to cook, therefore, I watch many "food" documentaries.  Yesterday, I watched "Vegucated".  If you really love being a carnivore do not watch this documentary!!!!  I was so disturbed that afterward, watching Joe and Jack dine on turkey leftovers made me feel ill!  I had a meat aversion when I was pregnant with Jack and I think I've developed that aversion again after viewing the documentary.

So, here we go on a new culinary adventure.  I know it's going to be vegetarian and may lean heavily toward vegan.  I know any dairy or eggs consumed in my house from here on out will be from our local farms...if we do eggs and dairy.  Jack wanted to know if I would ever have a steak again.  Right now, I cannot imagine that I will.  I simply cannot rectify what our meat and dairy industries do to animals to feed us products that aren't necessarily good for us.  Jack and Joe may not join me in this journey and that's ok.

Tonight I made my first consciously vegan meal.  We've always done alot of veggie dinners, soups, casseroles but never because we felt it was a kinder way to live.  I searched the internet for vegan recipes and this soup caught my attention.  I looked at many different recipes and combined them into the following recipe.

African Peanut and Sweet Potato Soup

Ingredients:
1 large onion, chopped
2 cloves minced garlic
2 T minced fresh ginger
2.5 lbs peeled cubed sweet potatoes
2 medium carrots, sliced thinly
1 28 oz can diced tomatoes, drained of juice
3 vegetable bouillon cubes
4.5 cups water
1/2 t cayenne pepper
dash ground cloves
1.5 t cumin
1.5 t ground coriander seed
2 t salt
6 T peanut butter
2 T canola or olive oil

Directions:
Add oil to large soup pot over med-high heat.
Add diced onions and cook for about 10 minutes.
Add ginger, garlic, cloves, salt, cayenne, cumin, coriander and mix well.
Stir in sweet potatoes, carrots, tomatoes and cook for 5 minutes.
Add water and bouillon cubes; cover and cook for 30 minutes on med heat.
Use and immersion blender to blend the soup to a consistency of your liking.
Serve with crusty bread and earth balance buttery spread. :-)

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Accidental Vegetarian Split Pea Potato Soup

Jack loves split pea soup and I had promised him some this weekend.  I started the water,  threw in the peas and went to find the ham bone that I knew was in my freezer.  Or, umm, I thought was in my freezer.

Ok, so, the peas are in the water, so what will we make?  I saw a sweet potato and split pea soup recipe recently and I had some sweet  and white potatoes, so we combined split pea soup and potato soup and here is what we came up with.

Anytime I make soup, I try to use whatever is in the fridge.  I just happened to have some collard greens that looked to good to pass up at the farm down the road. I ended up throwing those in too.

Jack requested that I write the recipe down because it was so good!  Not sure WHY he'd think I'd need to write it down? :-)

Ingredients

• 15 cups water
• 3 cups dry split peas
• 1 cup barley uncooked
• 1.5 onions, chopped
• 7 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 sweet potatoes, diced
• 2 white potato, diced
• 8 stalks celery, diced
• 3 teaspoon dried oregano
• 1 teaspoon ground cumin
• 1 teaspoon ground celery seed
• salt and pepper to taste
• 1 bunch collard greens chopped (you could use frozen, and you could use spinach, kale, chard)
• Sour cream and cheddar cheese to top

Instructions: 

Fill a large soup pot with the water and split peas and bring to a boil. 

Turn down to a low boil and cook for around 30 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Add the onion,  potatoes, celery and herbs and spices, and continue to cook at a medium boil for about 20 minutes until the potatoes are soft, stirring occasionally. 

Add water if you need to depending on how thick you want your soup.  

Finally add in the collard greens and cook for about 10-15 minutes. 

 If you want this soup smoother, use an immersion blender.

Top with shredded cheddar and a dollop of sour cream.  

You'll be glad this makes a BUNCH of soup!