Dressing; toasted whole wheat bread cubes, mushrooms, onions, hazel nuts, dried cherries, celery, fresh parsley.
Mashed potato.
Gravy; add flour to hot walnut oil and stir, when it starts to fry add vegetable broth, black pepper, paprika, thyme, salt, red pepper flakes. Simmer a few minutes add a dusting of corn starch if not thick enough. (Not to much flour or it will taste like crap. Also, we think the best tasting vegi broth is "Imagine" Organic, some vegi broth can be disappointing, try a few brands to find a good one. Follow this recipe and your gravy will taste like it was meat based, or at least almost.)
Cranberry relish: the wife made this Wednesday, not sure but it had cranberries, walnuts, golden raisins, a little sugar.
Green beans (frozen).
Fresh spinich leaf salad.
Pumpkin pudding; (pie without the crusts) We baked several pie pumpkins a month ago, scraped out the meat, mashed it up and froze it in small containers. My wife substitutes ground flax seed for eggs in the pie, it tastes fantastic, but it makes for a browner appearance. The pie looks better when made with eggs, but we are OK with it and prefer the flax. Flax can take the place of eggs in baking, but it requires some adjustment of liquid volumes in the mix, experiment before you try it on a valued guest.
Multiple glasses of wine.
It was really good, I don't miss meat, I didn't once wish I had a piece of turkey. Eating a big vegi meal is different than a meat pig out, you get stuffed, and in a few minutes you can get to work, I spent almost all afternoon working on two sculptures, I got a lot done. Then I diluted some orange and lemon juice with rum, and watched the sun set.
We are over 3 months, almost 4 maybe, into the vegan diet. My wife has had salmon at home 3 times, cod in a restaurant once. I have had fish the same amount, plus a small sliced beef sandwich and a salad with a small grilled chicken breast, so 6 times non vegan. The beef and chicken were at business lunches at places without any good vegi choices, but later I figured out I could have ordered a number of sides and made it work, since then I do that and it works just fine. I don't mind eating meat if I must, but I prefer not to, and really do like damn near every fruit and vegi, even mustard greens and chard. Follow the asian african and south american poor peoples recipe, I swear many are more fantastic in flavor than meat dishes.
Darrel,
ReplyDeleteWhen I finally get to see you again - You and the wife look like your asses walked out of Dachau and you will be going to the Golden Corral! I having steamed cod tonight. Red beans and rice - with sausage Saturday and then my beloved chops on Sunday after the possums lose again. I did the menu for 12/1 thru 12-20 yesterday and adhere to this - cuts down on my grocery bill.
The turkey will be used for the hot browns I mentioned. I am doing soup and salad once a week - Campbells white chicken chili soup. Now,
pasta is there every Monday. Bt I counter that with Chinese veggies and either shrimp or chicken. I do have some shrimp low mein.
What is wrong with seafood? Or shell-fish? SKM was a vegan - I broke her with Escanaba River trout - caught by me - in butter. Then Nicolas's in Marqette.
I admire what you and the wife are doing - Not for me.
Bests,
Ron
Ron,
ReplyDeleteI weigh within 5 lbs of what I did at 21, I can still wear my Viet Nam era air force uniform. Always been trim. My waist is an inch or so bigger, and my face thinner than then. We both lost 5 lbs when we started vegan, I gained mine back a month later, she may have gained some of hers back, not all.
Wild caught fish is all I will eat when I eat it. And no tuna or other high mercury collectors, no bottom feeders or filter devices.
Tonight we are having spicy lintel soup, lintels, white beans, onion, garlic, ginger, cayenne, saffron, carrots, peppers,lime juice, fresh cilantro.....something else I forgot what. That with avacado and salsa/tabasco
Oh, forgot, tonight also includes an ale, the pride of Chippawa Falls. Oh tip it over.
ReplyDeleteI'm coming along too, D, slow but sure. I still have meat at least once a day but usually not twice. And mostly turkey, chicken and either cod or haddock. Occasionally salmon or wall-eye.
ReplyDeleteI've whipped up some pretty good veggie stir fry and doing brown rice more and potatoes rarely.
Eating too much bread though, I'm sure. And cheese. ; )
NAC,
ReplyDeleteCheese. Jezz man, yer from friggin Wisconsin!
Sarge
Kevin,
ReplyDeleteGood transition. We got here that way, smaller and smaller portions of meat and skipping a day, then two days. If your eating lots of potatos, pasta, and bread other than the coarse whole grains, it's too much glycimics and starch. They change to sugar to fast in the body and then change into triglicerides. They are all OK but just don't do to much of it. Cheese is a killer, wonderful and pure animal fat that sticks right in the little blood vessels in your heart and prick, prick first, thus the sale of viagra, cut way down on the cheese.