Wednesday, October 29, 2008

VeganMoFo: Survey Catch Up

I thought I'd tackle a few of the fun surveys before the month is up. Here are two.

Survey I:

1. Favorite non-dairy milk?
Living Harvest's hemp milk.

2. What are the top 3 dishes/recipes you are planning to cook?
My friends want my to try and make pumpkin ice cream for the fall season. Plus, forever I've been wanting to make Matthew's Spicy Tomato Peanut & Kale Pasta from La Dolce Vegan. Then anything from Get it Ripe! which I finally purchased and looks great.

3. Topping of choice for popcorn?
Nutritional yeast or hot sauce.

4. Most disastrous recipe/meal failure?
I baked brownies recently that were like bricks.

5. Favorite pickled item?
Dilly beans, okra, beets, cukes, any pickled veggies really.

6. How do you organize your recipes?
Ever growing cookbook collection with many loose leaf recipes falling out of each tome.

7. Compost, trash, or garbage disposal?
Trash and garbage disposal for now. Compost someday, when living less urban.

8. If you were stranded on an island and could only bring 3 foods...what would they be (don't worry about how you'll cook them)?
Fresh berries, dark leafy greens, and lentils.

9. Fondest food memory from your childhood?
All the just picked produce from our farm, especially corn.

10. Favorite vegan ice cream?
Any ice cream I make. Temptation also is great.

11. Most loved kitchen appliance?
Our toaster oven because it is like a mini-stove.

12. Spice/herb you would die without?
Cumin is important. We ran out the other day and I almost died.

13. Cookbook you have owned for the longest time?
My mom's copies of Laurel's Kitchen and The Joy of Cooking.

14. Favorite flavor of jam/jelly?
My mom's black raspberry jam, which is great spread on anything.

15. Favorite vegan recipe to serve to an omni friend?
Cupcakes or other desserts usually do the trick. Also nourishing, homemade soups that wow Progresso fans.

16. Seitan, tofu, or tempeh?
All three, please.

17. Favorite meal to cook (or time of day to cook)?
Weekend, low pressure baking is my favorite.

18. What is sitting on top of your refrigerator?
Cloth napkins in container and vegan cat food. Possibly the cat.

19. Name 3 items in your freezer without looking.
Broccoli, whole wheat tortillas, vodka.

20. What's on your grocery list?
Brown rice and dried beans are staples.

21. Favorite grocery store?
Our new, next door Safeway has to win for convenience. I do wish we had a local coop.

22. Name a recipe you'd love to veganize, but haven't yet.
Ethiopian honey wine, could we make an agave version?

23. Food blog you read the most (besides Isa's because I know you check it everyday). Or maybe the top 3?
I'm still new to regular blog reading and need to catch up.

24. Favorite vegan candy/chocolate?
Green & Black's vegan chocolate. The espresso bar is the best.

25. Most extravagant food item purchased lately?
Umeboshi plums.

26. Ingredients you are scared to work with?
Arrowroot, phyllo dough, pie crusts.

Survey II:

1. What was the most recent tea you drank?
Yogi ginger tea, to which I am addicted. I like the feel-good quotes on the tea bags.

2. What vegan forums do you post/lurk on? If so, what is your username? Spill!
I'm not a vegan forum poster but I've been meaning to lurk more.

3. You have to have tofu for dinner, and it has be an Italian dish. What comes to mind first?
An old favorite from when I first went vegan was red sauce with loads of crumbled tofu stirred in, served atop penne and broccoli.

4. How many vegan blogs do you read on an average day?
I generally read a few from my daily google alerts for the word "vegan."

5. Besides your own, what is the most recent one you've read?
Through this blog, I've discovered and enjoyed cravin' veggies, Heathen Vegan, Life on the Vegan Highway is good!, The Pink Apron, Spotted Devil Cat and his Vegan assistant, and more.

6. If you could hang out with a vegan blogger that you haven't met, who would it be, and what would you do?
It'd be fun to sample some of the amazing food that everyone is cooking. Especially the creations of Tami from Vegan Appetite.

7. If you had to base your dinners for a week around one of the holy trilogy – tofu, seitan or tempeh, which would it be?
Maybe tempeh. It'd be a hard challenge because I do like to mix it up.

8. If you had to use one in a fight, which would it be?
Frozen tofu blocks would do well in a fight. Or a soft tofu pie in the face.

9. Name 3 meals you'd realistically make with that tough protein of choice!
Reuben-style tempeh sandwiches, grated tempeh sloppy joes, and Asian-themed tempeh stir-fry.

10. What's a recipe in vegan blogland that you've been eyeing?
Sweet potato rosti made by Heathen Vegan. I haven't had rosti since I was a teen, traveling in Canada.

11. Do you own any clothing with vegan messages/brands on them?
Herbivore and Spicy Brown t-shirts are my yoga class staple. Very ahimsa duds.

12. Have you made your pilgrimage to the 'vegan mecca' yet? (Portland, duh)
No. Portland, ME was pretty vegan friendly when I visited this past summer.

13. What age did you first go vegan? Did it stick?
Yes, 25 and it stuck. I was a well-intentioned but misdirected lacto ovo vegetarian before that.

14. What is the worst vegan meal you've had? Who cooked it?
Home cooking for me is the best stuff, tasty and nutritious. I eat out at least once a week and the worst is when it turns out the restaurant's dish isn't vegan as promised. Most recently, this happened at Teaism in Penn Quarter, when I found a large chunk of raw, uncooked meat in the veganized tempeh plate. Not cool.

15. What made you decide to blog?
Blogs are a nice way to capture and share the vegan lifestyle. They are proof that vegans don't starve or just eat raw tofu every night. Plus, this particular blog is a nice visual tribute to the culinary talent of my boyfriend Matt.

16. What are three of your favorite meals to make?
I love vinegar and we often make three dishes that feature it: vinegar burritos, vinegar-garlic pasta, and hot and sour soup.

17. What dish would you bring to a vegan Thanksgiving-themed potluck?
Man, I would love to go to such a potluck. I don't think our family celebrations this year will be "gentle" Thanksgivings. We do have supportive moms, so we'll have lots of veg options. If it was all vegan food, I'd probably break the Thanksgiving mold with a portable seaweed salad.

18. Where is your favorite vegan meal at a restaurant? How many times have you ordered it?
At Java Green, I get the chicken rice bowl with lots of hot sauce. I think I've had it a dozen times at least.

19. What do you think the best chain to dine as a vegan is?
Maoz falafel is really good. We ate at many locations on a recent trip to Barcelona. They also have locations in NYC and Philly. The DC location is coming soon.

20. My kitchen needs ………
Pie pans. I want to make pie someday.

21. This vegetable is not allowed in my kitchen…..!
Iceberg lettuce.

22. What's for dinner tonight?
Leftovers, I'm thinking because we have lots of food in the fridge.

23. Compose your perfect vegan sandwich, right now.

Tofu hoagie from Fu-Wah in West Philly. It's perfect.

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