One of the things that’s not really available around here is a good vegan breakfast sandwich. At least, not yet. But you can make your own. And it’s not all that hard, either. Especially with all the great products that are on the market now. I already had a package of Match Vegan Meats Breakfast Sausage left over from the batch they sent me to make holiday loafs. And Chicago Soy Dairy sent me some Teese to play with for their blogger challenge.
So here was my plan. Tall fluffy biscuits. This recipe made the fluffy awesomeness you see in the photo. For the “egg”, I started with Susan’s crustless tofu quiche recipe. I omitted the bell pepper, mushrooms, chives and rosemary and replaced the fresh garlic with a 1/2 teaspoon of garlic powder since I wasn’t going to fry it up. Then, instead of baking them in a muffin pan, I spread it out in a rectangular baking pan then cut into squares to go on the muffin. The Match was just formed into patties, fried in a pan with only salt and pepper as seasoning. To assemble, the biscuit was split, a couple of thin slices of the Teese creamy cheddar was put on the top half and then I slid it under to broiler to melt. Sausage and tofu egg was placed on the bottom half then everything was put together once the Teese was melty.
These were amazing! I do have a couple of changes I’d make though. I made 3 oz. sausage patties which were a little too much. 2 oz. might be thin enough. I’d try to make the tofu egg a little dryer. Maybe half the soy milk and cook it a little longer. And I’d probably switch to regular cheddar Teese so it would contain a little less moisture.
Atlanta’s vegan brunch options are definitely limited. Sometimes you need a place that vegans and omnivores alike can be happy. Stone Soup Kitchen can take care of everyone. Kevin and I even go there every once in a while just the two of us.
I usually get the Tofu Rancheros. Beans, tortillas, tofu, a bit if spicy. Yum!
Kevin got the blueberry cornmeal pancakes. I think he likes Soul Vegetarian pancakes better, but I like the cornmeal. They do have Earth Balance and soy milk for coffee, just ask.
Our flight was at 2pm so most brunch options would be cutting it too close. The Organic Grill’s brunch started at 10 and was pretty close by so we decided to try that. It’s not a vegan restaurant, but there were plenty of options. I got the tofu rancheros. I was completely happy with this. Right amount of food. Very satisfying.
Okay, so we might have gotten 3 breakfasts between the two of us. *blort* Kevin wanted the blueberry slamcakes. And he was glad we’d ordered an extra thing. The pancakes were pretty small and he didn’t love the scramble. I liked the pancakes but if you’re starving it might not be enough food.
The other thing that intrigued us was their tofu omelette. They really hype it up on the menu. And what could be bad about tofu stuffed with vegan cheese and veggies. We’re pretty sure they’re using Daiya cheese too. It was huge, like almost burrito sized. They seem to shred the tofu and maybe mix it with little batter to make it into an omelette shape. The Daiya really made it though.
After this, we walked around the corner to get falafels from Mamoun’s since Kevin hadn’t had them yet. We ate them later on the plane. Kevin wasn’t impressed. I still think they’re pretty good but not necessarily the best I’ve ever had.
Saturday after the wedding was another day of a ridiculous amount of eating. It started out innocently enough. We knew we were going to meet a bunch of folks for brunch at Counter around noon. But both of us are early risers and weren’t going to make it all the way ’til noon. So we went by Cafe Pedlar for coffee again and then got bagels.
Then later we headed over to Counter to meet up with a ton of people. We basically took over the back of the restaurant.
Now, I’ll give them a break on the service since we were such a huge group and arrived in waves. But again the food wasn’t worth the hype. I got the tofu scramble. It’s mostly up under the toast. I will say the potatoes were awesome. Nice crisp on them, soft inside. The tofu scramble was bland and uninteresting. How do you mess up tofu scramble? You can make it an infinite number of tasty ways. It’s inexcusable really.
Kevin thought his french toast was pretty good. But there should have been more of it.
Anyway, my overall impression from my two visits to Counter is that it isn’t worth the hype.
After brunch, we grabbed the rented evening clothes and headed downtown to return them. I’m glad I went with Kevin because I was able to see Trinity Church Cemetery.
Oh, we’re not done eating yet. Coming up, pizza and Veggie Conquest!
VeganMofo always burns me out on posting. Afterwards it’s a relief to eat without having to take pictures of it. Emblogination will resume shortly though. Sunday we got back from 6 days in NYC. So much to write about. There was gluttony. And lots of walking. The latter definitely did not cancel out the former. Urg.
So this week, I’m trying to detox. I’m having smoothies for breakfast. Lunch Monday was a package of R. Thomas wrap slices. Monday night I made raw pecan paté that I’ve been eating on red bell pepper wedges. We also had a spinach salad for dinner with that and baked tofu. Lunch Tuesday was leftover salad and red pepper paté wedges. And a pear. And some peanut butter crackers (hey, how’d those get in there?) Then last night I had butternut squash, corn and leftover tofu over rice noodles with Bragg’s, gomashio and flax oil. You’ll notice there are no cupcakes, donuts, ice cream, etc. in there. I might die. Although I will admit that Monday I ate a couple of tiny dick pops I found in my purse from the bachelorette party. Mmmm….tiny chocolate dicks.
Tuesday I had to take an all day class and then an exam at the health department in downtown Atlanta. It sounds kind of terrible but it was actually pretty informative. And the test was pretty easy. Anyway, we were only going to have an hour break for lunch so I had to figure out ahead of time what to eat. Calabash looked to be a bit too far to walk, so after some googling around I found Negril Caribbean Cafe. Their menu showed some veggie options. Cool!
Naturally, it was raining all day. So I stomped through the rain the 3 or 4 blocks to the restaurant. I asked about vegan options and it was pretty much all the veggie options. Cool! So I got the blackened tofu, peas and rice and green beans. She said the blackened tofu came with sweet and sour sauce. I asked for it on the side. The blackened tofu wasn’t really spicy. At all. So that was kind of odd. But everything was pretty good. The sweet and sour sauce was kind of like asian sweet and sour sauce. It also had a strip each of raw onion, bell pepper and carrot in it. And two tomato chunks. I ended up dumping it on half the rice and half the tofu. I think the green beans were just canned, but they weren’t cooked to death so I was fine with that. They also had some veggie stir fries, a curry and other stuff on the menu I’d like to try.
I almost forgot that I picked up a callaloo patty for later that became part of dinner. The greens had a bit of a kick. Very nice.
Holy crap! That wraps up my 2nd VeganMofo! 31 posts in 31 days. I might be a little blogged out….
Apparently I’ve been revisiting old favorites lately. The piles of Fall squash in the markets always make me think of this dish, Tanya’s Asian Creation from How It All Vegan. Another one that comes together quickly with ingredients that can hang out for a while without going bad. I love to have a few of those up my sleeve for weeks when you don’t really know what you’re doing one night to the next.
This time I used a cute little butternut I had hanging out. Even though it was small, I had extra that I put in the freezer already cubed for later use. Oh, and make the gomashio. It makes the dish and is quick and cheap to make.
Confused yet? We have a group that meets once a month, usually for lunch. But this past time, we had dinner. At Loving Hut. We had a nice turn out. You should join us. If you don’t have veg friends, it’s fun to hang out with a bunch of like minded folks. And even if you do, it’s nice to see every once in a while that vegans come from all walks of life.
Now, on to the food. I knew some of the things I liked from the opening day party. Their rice paper rolls were really enjoyable, so I got the basil rolls:
Kevin sneaked in an order for Heavenly Salad. I didn’t complain. I love the Vietnamese flavors in this dish.
This fried tofu also magically appeared on the table. I had a triangle and it was nice. Light crispy panko coating.
Ever since I saw Pho on the menu, I wanted to try it. It was pretty good, but I think I would prefer a more garlicy/gingery broth. This one was more beefy and had a hint of 5 spice powder. I don’t hate it, but it’s not my favorite thing.
Kevin ordered a coffee drink and it came with this lovely strawberry flavored decoration. Not sure how I would feel about strawberry in my coffee, but it sure was pretty.
Something else from the menu that I had my eye on was the rootbeer float. I mean, where can you get a vegan rootbeer float? The rootbeer was really tasty and the ice cream seemed to be standard soy vanilla. One pro tip for you, tell them to hold the ice. It seems unnecessary when you’re dumping ice cream into a cold beverage.
Kevin also ordered the hummingbird cake. If you saw my most from the opening, you’ll know I wasn’t happy with the texture of the hummingbird cake there. It was kind of mushy. This one was much better. It’s still not as good as Lisa’s, but then how could it be? 
This is just a quick post so you can all drool over my tofu sandwich from Soul Vegetarian. Inside the bun you’ll find sprouts, tartar sauce and a pickle. I ripped off the tomato because it was too thick for my tastes.
Dinner in a flash seems to be a recurring theme around here. If it’s not so flashy that I’m having someone else cook it, it’s often something that takes little fiddling. Bonus if it’s something that I can keep around for a quick meal without worrying about it going bad.
Enter the easy vegan cheese sauce mix. Your Vegan Mom posted the recipe a while back and ever since I first whipped it up I try to keep some around. I always keep frozen peas and pasta of some sort in the house. And I always have soy milk. So half a cup of the mix, plus one cup of milk equals sauce. If you’re feeling fancy, add soy curls, tofu, chopped up seitan log, whatever. Here instead of the peas, we had spinach on the side and I tossed in some tofu leftovers I had. Really you can just dump whatever you like in it. I only wish I had a vitamix to get the mix more powdery. I think the sauce would come out smoother.
One of the things that’s not really available around here is a good vegan breakfast sandwich. At least, not yet. But you can make your own. And it’s not all that hard, either. Especially with all the great products that are on the market now. I already had a package of Match Vegan Meats Breakfast Sausage left over from the batch they sent me to make holiday loafs. And Chicago Soy Dairy sent me some Teese to play with for their blogger challenge.
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