Wednesday Food Blogging

Food News for Wednesday

I've never heard of The Cheesecake Factory, but apparently you can order miso salmon (in cheesecake form?) there. Sounds gross, but it's actually not, according to people who've eaten there. The problem is it's laden with calories...1,673 to be precise. The other problem is that it tastes good, which is a problem because, as Ezra Klein points out, it's hard to get people to stop eating things that taste good.

This looks like it tastes good.

Ever wonder about the nutritional benefits of nuts? Here they are, in a nutshell.

It turns out that convenience foods aren't all that convenient.

Have you seen the film The End of the Line? Worried about sustainable fish? Try substituting tofu in fish recipes. I do it all the time, with excellent results.

Look, Bazu's giving away a cookbook!

This is my beef (sorry!) with vegetable gardens. Most people do not have the time, inclination, proper soil, or knowledge to successfully grow vegetables at home. And there's absolutely nothing wrong with supermarket carrots.

Looking for a recipe for ginger ale? No, I wasn't either.

Why you should eat your crusts.

The Washington Post food writer thinks you can be a vegetarian except for a burger once in a while from Five Guys. How about if you make it a veggie burger?

Home is best

A perfectly prepared meal, courtesy of the next generation

I haven't had much time to cook lately, and when I have, I've been preparing tried-and-true favorites for houseguests. Yesterday I spent the day in Bath, with my niece who's here for a few days. When we got home, after a full day of sightseeing, Daughter Number Two had prepared a delicious meal for us.

She made a black bean casserole, corn, and saffron rice, and my husband opened a nice bottle of Rioja Reserva. After a long drive home through the rain, I was famished—I passed peckish somewhere around Swindon and had a full blown starve on by the time I got to Reading. So it was nice to come home to such a perfect meal.

For dessert, she whipped up these wonderful Lime and Coconut Cupcakes:

Lime and Coconut Cupcakes

Hopefully she'll share the recipe for the casserole later—it used tortillas, black beans and tomatoes. The cupcakes were from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World, a book we're eating our way through.

Speaking of cookbooks: When DNT arrived home in May, she was looking at my shelves of cookbooks, and said, "When you die, can I have your cookbooks?" Nice to know the cooking gene has survived for another generation.

Polenta Stacks with Portobellos, Eggplant, and Basil Cream

A rather elegant stack of food, which is deceptively simple to prepare.

Polenta Stacks with Portobellos, Eggplant (or Aubergine) and Basil Cream. It's a mouthful, isn't it? Try eating it—I bet you can't without taking it apart.

It's easier to prepare if you take it in stages, too. Let's dissect:

First, a pool of Cabernet Tomato Sauce (deceptively simple to make with a jar of ready-made pasta sauce and a bottle of Cab). Then a round of polenta. Next, some Tofu Spinach filling, and then a layer of grilled eggplant. Top that with another round of polenta, repeating the sequence until you cap it off with a grilled portobello mushroom.

But before you serve, you must drizzle a healthy portion of Basil Cream sauce, and then garnish with some snipped basil.

Sounds complicated, right? There are a lot of components to this recipe, but the good thing is, most of them can be prepared ahead, making this an ideal meal for a dinner party. I served it to my family, for my daughter's last night at home before she headed back to the US. Alongside, I served some lima beans prepared like this. And the rest of the Cabernet, of course.

A lovely meal.

Here's how, in easy stages:

Wasabi Potato Salad

 

For your Independence Day picnic: Wasabi Potato Salad

When I saw that the White House had served Wasabi Potato Salad at its luau the other day, I knew I had to try that. After all, anything Michelle Obama can do, I can do better. Okay, maybe not, but I figured my Wasabi Potato Salad would be better than hers, and vegan to boot.

First I tried Google, and found some unappetizing non-vegan recipes. No help there; I was on my own.

Fortunately I had some salad potatoes. You must have good salad potatoes if you're attempting to make potato salad. If you live in America, you probably can't find any good potatoes, in which case you need to come to Britain. Tickets are cheap now; American Airlines is offering a deal. When you get here, look for Charlotte, Maris Peer, Anya, or the variety I used, red Roseval. All are small and have a waxy flesh, ensuring a clean slice with your knife.

Procuring potatoes is the most difficult part of making this salad. It's ridiculously easy. Normally I don't prefer mayonnaise-based salad, primarily because I don't eat mayo, but you really need mayo to mix with the wasabi paste. It's pretty easy to find vegan mayo, and my version doesn't call for much.

I also added toasted pecans, but no onions. Onions introduce a taste you just don't want. Celery is fine, and altogether, not counting salt, this recipe only has five ingredients! Which means you can easily make it for your Fourth of July picnic.

Provided, of course, you visit the Mother Country first for those potatoes.

Here's how:

Food news, Sunday edition

News alert: don't cut your carrots before cooking them. No word on if you should peel them.

What not to eat: supermarket salad.

What's fatter than the Fat Duck? The Fat Duck in London: Heston announces new restaurant in London.

What to do with chiles: Make hand grenades.

I have never wanted to grow my own. But some people learn the hard way.

From what I'm reading, in the U.S. coconut is the new soy. It will be awhile before the trend hits the UK, sadly.

Sparkling water is still bottled water. And also tastes nasty.

Burger King have finally figured out that sex sells. Seriously. (I stick with their BK Veggie whenever I visit the States.)

Good news: Most of the NY Times Healthy Foods for Under $1 are vegan. 

Blog friend Chris discovers the Carnivore's Dilemma. My sympathies, but really, a vegan diet is better than you imagine.

Comfort food: Vegan (Not) Meat Loaf

Like Momma's, only better!

After being sick for a week, I needed comfort food. My digestive system seemed to be working again, but the thought of spicy or acidic food—the mainstays of my diet—didn't appeal.

The situation called for potatoes, mashed. Comfortable, easy cooking, and with the delicious Red Mozart potatoes from Waitrose, a simple mash was taken to new levels.

But what to serve with my bowl of perfect mashed potatoes? Meat loaf. Not, of course meat loaf, but something resembling the comfort food of home, with plenty of ketchup on top.

Fortunately I had a couple of hours until dinner, because this loaf doesn't come together in minutes, the way many of my recipes do. No five-ingredient recipe, this: Brown rice, mushrooms, lentils, pecans, oatmeal—even a carrot made its way into my loaf, plus healthy flax seeds. And I smeared the top with plain old Heinz ketchup. The result? Better than mom used to make. Lots better. And lots healthier too—needless to say, the old style meat loaf doesn't contain fiber, or any anti-oxidents, but it does contain lots of fat and cholesterol.

So try (Not) Meat Loaf instead of meat loaf the next time you're longing for comfort food. As a bonus, it's even better the next day!

Food News: Calorie-laden edition.

Sorry for my absence of late; I was on vacation in the Alps where I was not enjoying good food. Still not up to eating adventurous edibles, so don't look for recipes from me this week. (One note: I should say I discovered boil-in-a-bag rice in Austria. Not bad.)

Let's talk calories. The Whopper with cheese has 62% of your daily recommended calorie intake. And something called "Fried Macaroni and Cheese" has more calories than a stick of butter—and 69 grams of saturated fat. Don't you think restaurants should have to post this information on their menus? The Senate thinks so too, and plans to include such requirements in the health-care reform bill.

Speaking of fast food, I haven't seen this Burger King commercial, but it sounds creepy. Also sounds like it's not working.

And, the twelve most expensive foods. There are actually a few of those I'd eat, including the diamond martini. Though right now I'd prefer the Tieguanyin tea.

Should we tax meat? Or simply allow its cost to reflect the true cost of producing it?

Don't believe Mother Jones; the White House garden is not "contaminated".

An interesting article about tempeh, that almost put me off tempeh. Can't get over that image of dirty feet making tempeh? Try these slides.

How does a chocolate chip cookie wield such power? Even over the head of the FDA?

The benefits of red wine, from lowering risk for Alzheimer's disease to reducing the harmful effects of smoking.

Now, go burn some calories.

Southwestern Enchiladas

A taste of the Southwest, veganized and climatized.

About the only American food I ever really long for is Southwestern. Corn, black beans, chipotles, tortillas—all rarely seen on British menus, but often found on my stove.

My daughter couldn't believe I paid so much for fresh sweetcorn, sold already shucked here, and very dear. I wasn't sure what I'd do with it, but as I shaved the kernels from the cob, I decided to roast it and use it in a filling for enchiladas.

These featured two different types of vegan cheeze, black beans, and a green chile. The sauce I created in my blender with some leftover chipotle peppers, which add a nice kick to otherwise bland ingredients.

This was also the debut of my new camera, which has a "food" setting. The only problem was, I couldn't wait to eat so I had to photograph the leftovers. What you see are cold enchiladas.

I served white wine, rather than the usual margaritas. Because this is still Britain, after all.

Food News to fill you up

Did you know there's an island off the coast of Greece where one out of three people live into their nineties? And that they eat a lot of greens and drink herbal tea?

"My bologna has a first name, it's c-a-n-c-e-r". That's right; your bologna is full of carcinogens. Don't eat it. (Unless it's vegan, of course, then it's not called c-a-n-c-e-r.)

And for good measure, try these cancer fighting grains: kasha, quinoa, millet, and spelt.

Here's the gossip section of this publication: Well-known food writer runs into the Obamas at her neighborhood restaurant.

(Sequé) When I go through Germany next week, I'm going to look for this, Spicy Obama Mustard.

"Your waistline in charts": Food prices over time. Conclusion: Not only should we tax bad-for-you foods, but we should subsidize healthy foods.

In green tea news: Green tea is good for your teeth. And your knees.

Something to do with those obnoxious weeds: Put them on your pizza.

I really love this weight-loss tip: Eat bread with olive oil to curb hunger pains.

British supermarkets are accused of destroying the rainforest by selling meat from irresponsible farms. Well duh! Not only are cows grazed on former rainforest land in Brazil, but where do you think animal feed given to your local cows and chickens comes from?

Just in case you were wondering, Pringles are potato chips. (Though I must warn you, the Pringles you get here don't taste the same as US Pringles. They're even more like cardboard here, if that's possible.)

When In Ireland, Do As The... Italians Do?

By Daughter Number Two and her friend Millie

In Ireland, there are a lot of Italians. Probably more than there are in Italy. We think it's because there is a special deal to fly between countries that start with the same letter—we're going to look into tickets to Ukraine for our next trip.

When a vegetarian and a vegan go to Ireland together, the most exciting thing to do is play the "what can we eat?" game. We looked up a few vegetarian cafés before we went so that we'd have places to eat lunch (college students don't eat dinner. We just drink beer.)

The first place we went, Cornucopia, on Wicklow Street (off of Grafton), turned out to be our favorite. We ate there shortly after arriving and dropping our things off at our hotel. The food is served kind of cafeteria-style, which is helpful because you can see for yourself what looks good to eat. Millie had a courgette lasagna, with cheese, and came with two salads (~€12.50). DNT had a mushroom and something illegible soup (they write everything on the chalkboard, and DNT has horrible eyesight, so who knows what else was in it--it was vegan, anyway.) The lasagna was filling and delicious, according to Millie, and she recommends trying something other than a garden salad (which doesn't come with a dressing.) DNT's soup, which she ate with a piece of bread and cup of coffee, was equally delicious, and the price was good—about €7.50 for the meal. They have a good selection of vegan spreads, bread, and pastries (as well as main dishes) and they clarify which things are vegan, gluten free, dairy free, containing nuts, etc. They have fresh squeezed juices, which neither of us tried, but they sounded good.

The next restaurant was called Fresh, located on the second floor of the Powerscourt Townhouse Centre, which has a lot of soups and sandwiches for a good price. Millie had a mozarella tomato basil sandwich, which came toasted, and a lentil and squash bisque. DNT had a hummous and pita sandwich with an asian salad and fruit salad (apparently in Ireland one salad is not enough, because both restaurants offered two salads with their main courses rather than one.) The mozarella and tomato sandwich was good, as well as the soup. DNT's sandwich was a bit soggy and a little heavy on the hummous side, but the fruit salad came with mint, which was a nice touch. We did try the freshly squeezed juice here—orange—which didn't disappoint. Overall, the vegan options, for sandwiches, at least, weren't too satisfying. The main courses might be more suitable, and there are a lot of vegan desserts and pastries that looked very appetizing.

Here's where we started taking photos of our food. Next on the list was Gruel, on Dame Street, which isn't vegetarian, but still worth a stop if you're hungry and rained on (the latter of which is likely to happen in Ireland.) We stopped in there on a Sunday morning, and they were still serving brunch, so the menu was somewhat sparse, although we both found something good. Millie had a traditional Irish breakfast (the non-sausage option, which has salmon and eggs, and comes with a yummy tomato and caper salad.) DNT had a vegetable soup, which came with three thick slices of bread. The food came in generous, healthy-looking portions, at a good price with friendly service. The restaurant itself is cozy in all senses of the word-- a little crowded, but in a good way.

Our friends pose in front of the tomato soup cans at Gruel, above a pink fireplace.

Spelt Banana Bread

A perfectly baked loaf of banana bread.

You might have noticed I haven't posted too many recipes here lately for baked goods. There's a reason for that: everything I baked burned. I tried focaccia a couple of times, and each time I got crisp, dark brown bread that was barely edible. I made cupcakes, Irish soda bread, and other bakey things, most of which got thrown away.

I figured I'd lost my touch. Okay, I never had a touch—baking was never as good to me as straight out cooking. But then Daughter Number Two came home, and tried her hand at cupcakes. She's an excellent baker—I blame it on the fact she's studying engineering. But even though she carefully set the temperature, converting Fahrenheit to Celsius, and subtracting a few minutes for the fan assist (convection), her cupcakes still burned in record time.

So I deduced it must be the oven. Today the repairman came over and replaced the thermostat. As a test, I baked a loaf of banana bread, substituting spelt flour for the whole wheat I normally used.

I couldn't believe how perfectly baked the bread was, after 45 minutes at 180C. I kept poking a toothpick in, sure I'd find it gooey, since the top wasn't even burnt. It's been so long since I've seen a loaf with a perfectly browned top I had to set it by the window just to admire it for a while.

Lesson: If you're experiencing difficulty baking, maybe it isn't you. Maybe it's your oven. 

Asparagus with Sesame Seeds

Asparagus with Sesame Seeds: a quick and easy side dish

It's asparagus season in Britain, so we're eating a lot of asparagus. Almost every day I find myself staring at a bunch of local asparagus (my last bunch was from Herefordshire, near Wales) and trying to decide what to do with it.

The other day we were having a Chinese stir-fry, so I gave asparagus the Asian treatment. After breaking off the tough ends (simply hold them and break them at the natural breaking point) I cut the stems into 1 inch pieces.

I heated some sesame oil in a wok, and added the asparagus. Meanwhile, I toasted some sesame seeds in an iron skillet, watching carefully to see that they didn't burn.

When the asparagus was done, I removed it to a plate, and sprinkled the seeds on top. Voila! Nearly instant side dish to accompany our stir-fry.

The pieces were really nice dipped in the dipping sauce for the spring rolls, made with two tablespoons tamari and one tablespoon rice wine vinegar.

Asparagus season lasts throughout May. If you have any more ideas for cooking asparagus, please post in comments!

Ligurian pasta with pesto and green beans

 

A taste of northern Italy in southern England...pasta with pesto, green beans and potatoes.

Pesto was invented in the Ligurian region of Italy, where I visited a few months ago. While there I enjoyed the Ligurian dish trofie pasta with pesto and green beans. I was determined to make it myself, even though trofie pasta, a twisted pasta made with no eggs, isn't easy to come by outside of Italy. I found some gnocchetti sardi pasta which has roughly the same shape, and last night, with two hungry college students to feed, and a package of green beans, I attempted to make Ligurian pesto and pasta.

Most commercial pesto is not vegan, but you can make your own. It's very easy, especially if you have one of those basil pots growing on your windowsill. It took most of the leaves from a rather large plant, which loosely filled up the small bowl of my food processor.

The result, while not as good as the Ligurian version, was perfectly adequate. I suspect eating it on a cool day in England rather than overlooking the harbor at Manarola had something to do with it...the phrase "your mileage may vary" comes to mind, though not for the obvious reason.

Find a sunny patio, and escape to Liguria with this almost-authentic vegan version of a classic. Imagine the waves hitting the harbor if you have to, but the taste isn't far off.

Fasting for Food News

I am currently fasting for a blood test that doesn't occur until 2 p.m. So I'm trying to avoid websites with food. Which makes it really hard to compile Food News.

But while surfing through Andrew Sullivan's blog I came across this link: Can people distinguish pâté from dog food? Here's the study (pdf), and it makes for some disgusting reading. No, not the dog food part, but the whizzed Spam part. So the idea of pâté took away my appetite. Then I read they served it on Carr water crackers...oh god. Get me a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Stat.

By the way, if you're looking for high quality dog food in England, check out Pero. It's made in Wales, and my dog says it's excellent. But then my dog would eat Spam, so what does she know?

See, I need to stay away from blogs written by my favorite cookbook authors. Like this.

And read more articles about things I hate, like tomatoes. Even non-leak tomatoes are disgusting. There, just looking at that slimy tomato takes away the edge a little bit.

And I should definitely not read about the UK's Five Most Vegetarian-friendly Uni's. (A uni is what they call a university here. The memory of my university days is starting to nibble away at my appetite—donuts at Tolliver Dining Hall that had the same mass as a linebacker, hitting your empty stomach with the same force...oh god.)

Here we go: Burned meat linked to pancreatic cancer. Not hungry at all now.

And I was going to read this article on The New Veganism but that bowl of chickpeas is way too appetizing.

Thank god for Boing Boing, who found someone inserting spaghetti into hot dogs, for a truly appetite-suppressing photo.

And I'll leave on this note: totally man-made food. I'm thinking of eating my keyboard.

Borlotti Bean and Spelt Soup

Soup, for those days when swine flu has you down.

It's still cold enough here that soup is a viable option, especially when your husband is sick with swine flu a cold. So with temperatures in the 50s, I took the opportunity to make soup from the borlotti beans I had soaked overnight.

This is sort of reminiscent of red beans and rice. Except it's Italian in origin and flavor. I really like the spelt, which is shaped like rice, but is chewier, grainier. Nice.

This made a lot. I'll have to make room in the freezer for a few bowls of leftovers, which will be perfect for lunch on a cool spring day.

Keep reading for instructions...

Spinach Stuffed Shells

Surprisingly simple Spinach Stuffed Shells

You probably wonder how people come up with new recipes. For me, it begins at the gym. I spend about 20-30 minutes on the rowing machine, a boring exercise that uses very few brain cells. (But is very good for your brain cells, as is any exercise.)

While I'm rowing, I'm usually planning my grocery list, which means I plan my menu for the evening as well. The other day I decided I absolutely had to use the pasta shells I'd had for a while, and the bag of spinach I'd only had one day. I'd stuff the shells with a spinach mixture, I decided, setting aside any thoughts of using the artichoke hearts from the jar in my fridge.

Within the space of a few hundred meters, I'd come up with the basic outlines of a recipe, which turns out to be quite simple. Although I'd never stuffed shells before, they turned out to be surprisingly easy to fill with the spinach-laced stuffing. You simply hold the shells in your palm, long ways, and squeeze them gently like a coin purse. They open up for stuffing, then snap back to close around the filling. Fun!

A food processor is a great tool to have, too, but you could probably use a blender. Or in a pinch, mash the ingredients with a fork. To save time, I used a jar of prepared pasta sauce, but you can use your own favorite recipe for pasta sauce if you wish. I came up with more shells than sauce, and ran out of room in the pan, so I used a second dish and opened another jar. This one will go into the freezer and be a perfect meal for a more harried day.

For instructions, keep reading.

Food News, Sunday Edition

Useful site: Stilltasty.com tells you how long you can keep anything in the fridge. Including the jar of chipotle peppers I opened four weeks ago.

Does "health aura" explain why the mere presence of salad on a menu prompts people to order French fries more often? (Be sure to read the amusing first comment from Sheila.)

Good news for chocoholics: Now you can breathe in chocolate to curb your chocolate cravings. I'd prefer the patch approach myself. 

And more reason to eat chocolate: It improves your maths.

My favorite way to prevent lung cancer: Peanut butter.

(Maybe this peanut butter and chocolate tartelette will cure your lung cancer AND make you soar at sums!)

"Yes We Can" Flan? Does that rhyme? Maybe if you speak British, where the letter A can do all sort of crazy things. There's also the Barack O'bhuna, a spicy curry dish, invented to pay homage to Obama's cultural heritage.

When the National Resources Defense Council met for a $2000 plate dinner recently, the menu was vegetarian. It's about time they walk the walk, err, eat the eat.

I'm sure this article in Grist is great, but I can't get beyond the beautiful photo. Yellow squash, how I love you. And miss you.

"Vegan pie", in Unnecessary Quotes. Well, is it? Or isn't it?

It's about time supermarkets in the UK recognize how unnecessary their excessive packaging is. But asking customers to tear it off and leave it at the till?

High fructose corn syrup examined: the conclusion isn't as clear as you'd think.

One last reminder: Fish suffer. Don't eat them. And vegetarians don't.

Stuffed Red Peppers with Curry Sauce

If you visit my home, you'll see a lot of red and yellow. That's because I love the color combination, even, it turns out, when it's on my plate.

These stuffed red peppers, wading in a delicate curry sauce, were not only lovely to look at but easy to make, too, and delicious to eat. I served them with a scoop of brown rice, which made them healthy as well.

Even if you don't have a yellow and red-themed home, you can still make Stuffed Red Peppers with Curry Sauce for dinner. Here's how:

Lima Beans with Lemon and Garlic

Beans: Good for your heart!

Beans as a side dish? Vegetarians are more used to featuring beans in the main dish, but since discovering how useful they can be as a complement to a meal, rather than the centerpiece, I keep several cans of beans on hand for those nights when pasta isn't quite enough.

Lima beans, often called butter beans when canned, are a great source of fiber and protein, and like other legumes, can decrease risk of heart disease. Plus they're low in fat and calories. When combined with garlic, they're not only tasty but offer even more heart protective benefits.

But forget all that. They taste great, and are a snap to prepare. To find out how, keep reading.

Nettle Gnocchi

Stinging nettles never tasted so good.

No, this isn't an April Fool's joke; you really can make gnocchi with stinging nettles. You can also make soup with them, but I thought the idea of gnocchi sounded much more exciting.

Although when you're dealing with stinging nettles, maybe exciting isn't the thing you want to add. Which is why I recommend rubber gloves, at least for the first part of this recipe.

Here's how this works: First, put on rubber gloves. If you have no rubber gloves, maybe you should substitute spinach.

Then go into the back garden. If you have no back yard, look for a pesticide-free public area where stinging nettles grow. At this time of year, they're still tender young shoots (tender being a relative term).

Pick a good bucket-full (I used an 8-cup plastic measuring bowl). Most of what you have will be stems, and they will cook down a considerable amount, so be generous.

Still wearing rubber gloves, pick the leaves off the stems and drop them in a sink full of water. Swish them around to loosen the dirt. Still wearing your gloves, place them back in your measuring bowl and rinse them with water another time or two to make sure the dirt is removed. Wring out the water. You should have 2-3 cups of loosely packed leaves.

Meanwhile, bring a pan of salted water to boil. Pour the leaves into the boiling water, and remove your gloves. Set the timer for 5 minutes, and when it rings, scoop the nettle leaves from the water into a food processor container.

For the rest, keep reading. At this point, you have nothing to fear from the nettles. Trust me. They taste a little bit like turnip greens, only wilder. Not bad at all.

Butternut Squash and Black Beans with Polenta Triangles

Butternut Squash moves to the Southwest and spends its days in a spicy red pool.

Dinner dilemma: I had some frozen polenta pieces, and a butternut squash. I also had chipotle chiles from a can I'd opened earlier in the week that needed to be used.

Southwestern Butternut Squash and Polenta? Why not, I thought? Butternut squash would look really striking with black beans, sort of Halloween-y. Earlier in the week I'd experimented with a chipotle sauce that would provide a pool for the polenta to rest upon. And for the top, I could quickly whip up a creamy dollop-y sauce with the coriander (cilantro) and lime I'd bought at the Asian food store.

Within minutes, I was in business, chopping, whizzing, roasting, and simmering. The chipotle sauce is very quick to make, and while the butternut was roasting I defrosted the polenta and sauteéd some onions.

Altogether, I spent less than an hour making dinner (admittedly shorter since I'd already made the polenta). But it tasted like I'd spent hours in the kitchen. There's something about the texture surge of the crisp-fried polenta bathed in the red sauce, speared on a fork with the bean mixture and topped with silky cilantro cream that really wakes up the taste buds and even causes sentences to run on. Whew!

This is a great dish to make ahead: Freeze the polenta, make the Chipotle Sauce and the Cilantro Cream a day before serving time, and all you need do is roast the squash and warm up the bean mixture and serve. 

Beware, though: You'll want to season according to your needs. Those chipotles are mighty fierce, but the creamy cilantro-tofu sauce tames them somewhat.

Review: World Food Cafe

World Food Cafe, near London's Covent Garden

I've complained in the past about the scarcity of vegan food in Britain, but maybe things are looking up. Literally.

World Food Cafe is located near Covent Garden in Neal's Yard, on the second floor of a building bearing a blue plaque proclaiming it the home of Monty Python—or at least where several of the shows were recorded. The short climb up a flight of stairs is worth it. World Food Cafe, the same cafe featured in two books of the same name, is a funky, friendly little place, with several vegan items on its chalkboard menu, including a couple of daily specials and at least one vegan dessert.

We ordered the West African and the Maldivian specials, then took our seats at one end of a large table overlooking Neal's Yard. It was a warm, sunny day, so the window was open. The food arrived quickly, so we turned our attention away from the activity outside and dug in.

Digging is appropriate, for both plates were piled high. My West African dish was topped with leaves and slivers of carrot and beetroot. It also had three decorative strips of banana, which only added to the exotic meld of flavors. The stew was served over brown rice, which was dry and bland. Perhaps millet, a grain grown in Africa for thousands of years, would have been a more authentic choice. Or couscous, which  would have soaked up the stew much better than the dry grains of rice.

But that's a minor quibble. My daughter's Maldivian dish was Indian in its origins, with coconut milk-based curry, sweet potatoes, potatoes, chickpeas and the ubiquitous rice. She also ordered a fresh lime soda, which was sparkly and tangy.

Neither of us wanted dessert, though we were assured the carrot cake was vegan. I avoid cakes in Britain unless I have a completely empty intestinal tract—nothing like a sweetened brick on a full stomach for making you wish you'd Just Said No. We could also have had one of the date balls in a jar near the till, but those didn't sound too exciting either.

Prices were reasonable, especially for London: £5.95 and £6.95 for our meals. With drinks, we got out of there for less than a twenty pound note. Not bad for good food.

World Food Cafe doesn't seem to have a website, but they do have two vegetarian cookbooks, which are available for flipping through at the restaurant. The photos were gorgeous, and really get you in the mood for enjoying a global meal.

To find World Food Cafe from the Covent Garden tube stop, walk two blocks down Neal Street and follow the signs to Neal's Yard and look up.

Free Food News!

We gave away our St Patrick's Day vegan cupcakes and all I got back was this photo.

That's right; there's no charge for this installment of Food News. So keep reading.

You've heard about pathogens in our pork? This applies to my readers in the US, where the deadly bacteria MRSA (pronounced "mersa" in the US and MRSA in the UK) is primarily found in meat, particularly pork. It results from high levels of antibiotics that are routinely given to farm animals, which encourages the worst bugs to become antibiotic resistant. Here in the UK, where antibiotic use isn't as prevalent, MRSA is found in dirty hospitals. Food for thought.

Cilantro: love it or hate it? Or perhaps you call it coriander. Either way, it appears that if you hate it, perceiving its taste as soap, you may lack a taste receptor that allows the rest of us to perceive its fresh goodness. Trust us; eating cilantro is NOT like eating Irish Spring! Although, like Irish Spring, it may kill some bacteria.

Against obnoxious recipes. Sign me up.

This is why you're fat.

Speaking of fat, the Fat Duck reopens after making people sick. Hey, I tried to warn you guys about snail porridge.

Best Flickr comment:  "The first time a bowl of soup has reminded me of US Airways Flight 1549."

Obesity can take years off your life.

Try consuming a little less salt. Well, okay. Maybe.

Someone you know have a birthday coming up? (Ahem.) "The Face on Your Plate" would make a great gift, wouldn't it?

Speaking of birthdays—I have to go make a birthday cake now.

Vegan Mushroom Gravy

The search is over: Vegan Mushroom Gravy

For a long time, I was on a quest for vegan gravy. Those little packets of gravy mix sold at the health food stores were okay in a pinch, but I wanted something homemade, rich and thick. I found several recipes, and soon realized there were many different techniques and approaches to vegan gravy—far more than the old "add flour to the drippings" approach of regular gravy.

And here's a thought...there's no reason why non-vegans wouldn't appreciate this gravy. And with healthy ingredients, rather than simply fat, flour and water, this gravy shouldn't be forbidden from any dinner table.

I served this with some seitan slices (I'm still searching for the perfect seitan recipe), which I smothered in amongst the tiny button mushrooms. While I was cooking, I kept sneaking pieces of seitan to eat, and realized it was the gravy, not the seitan, that was so tempting. So that's the recipe you get, at least until I perfect a seitan recipe.

This made almost two cups of gravy, plenty for four people. The ingredients cook down quite a bit, so don't be deceived by the amounts. I used button mushrooms, but if you use larger mushrooms, chop them roughly instead of slicing, for smaller, less obtrusive pieces.

Edamame Salad

Edamame Salad springs eternal from the freezer.

The eternal question: What to serve with a stir-fry? Well, it's the eternal question in my house, where stir-fry happens a lot. This time, I was invited to a friend's, and wanted to help out by bringing a side dish. But I also didn't want to brave a trip to the supermarket on the weekend—it's a real nightmare here, where parking is at a premium at the best of times; impossible on the weekend. And my local grocery store is small and doesn't always have what I need.

But I remembered I had two bags of frozen edamame in my fridge. I wasn't sure if one bag would be enough; it's hard to judge how many beans are left after the pods are discarded. But two turned out to give me roughly a pound (or 500g) of bright green beans.

Other than removing the pods, the dish was a snap to prepare—ready in less than an hour.

If you're looking to increase the soy in your diet (edamame is soybeans—you knew that, right?) or if you simply want a dish to go with a friend's stir-fry, try Edamame Salad. It's also, I must say, rather spring-like, with its bright green beans.

Which can lead to all sorts of corny captions.