Chipotle-kissed Red Beans and Sweet Potato Chili

No, I’m not done with the bowls but I did save some other posts to break them up a bit so it wasn’t bowl, bowl, bowl, bowl, bowl….

Slow cookers are awesome if you don’t know that already. You can turn dried beans into a big pile of mouth-watering bits to eat as is or freeze in batches to use in recipes. All without pot watching. Nothing better than getting home from work to find your kitchen already smells delicious.

This one is Chipotle-kissed Red Beans and Sweet Potato Chili from Robin Robertson’s Fresh From the Vegetarian Slow Cooker. Look at that color! If you follow the recipe it’s pretty mild, so punch up the hot stuff if you like to feel the burn. And there’s only a little bit of oil in the whole pot so it’s pretty much just a bowl of goodness. Not pictured: unhealthy bread or corn bread slathered with Earth Balance.

 

 

This Potluck Had a Theme

Over some silly conversation at a previous potluck we joked around about having a potluck with a theme that was a topic of conversation. I debated revealing the theme since there are going to be some folks dropping by for Vegan Mofo that aren’t expecting that sort of strangeness, but fuck it, Mofo or no this is my blog and if someone is offended they can just not come back, right? This is also the warning for the easily offended to stop reading, don’t click any links, and just look at the food pics and move on. Actually some of the pictures are pretty silly. Best just skip it.

Anyway, at this potluck, we got onto the topic of docking. Not the horrible practice of docking dogs’ tails. Not parking a boat. Something else entirely. What foods could we use to represent that? So this potluck represents the result. Some of the food strayed off topic a bit, but not too far.

So I made artichoke and hazelnut cannelloni with lemon soy bechamel sauce or docking stations.

My plate loaded with tasty bits: a docking station, fish taco, wiener in a blanket…

You can never have too much dessert, so we had three. Vegan Twinkies. Yes, we’re all 12-year-old boys.

I also made the chocolate strudel from Vegan Italiano.

Ice cream sandwiches!

Queenie was unimpressed with the theme, but loved all the extra attention she got.

Then we headed to the roof to check out the view of Atlanta. Look at my crappy picture. LOOK AT IT.

 

 

 

 

A Beefy Stew

Oh, hey Vegan Mofo people. So I was warning folks earlier this week that most food I’ve cooked lately has come in bowls. And I wasn’t even kidding. The top rack of my dishwasher is full of bowls and there are two plates in the bottom part. Ridiculous. But something about the turn to Fall makes me immediately start craving soups and stews. And it isn’t even really cool yet. It’s just no longer unbearably hot. Which is a good thing.

There are a few beefy type stews I enjoy making. This happens to be the one from Vegan Vittles, the Chuckwagon Stew. Instead of the tempeh, I used about a half a cup or so of dehydrated faux beef chunks and just tossed them in and let them rehydrate in the stew. I also tossed about a half a cup of frozen peas in towards the end of cooking for extra vegetabular goodness.

 

 

I’m a copycat

Because I have no original thoughts, I totally copied Leigh’s meatball subs. When she posted about them a couple of weeks ago I knew it was only a matter of time before I had to make them. Last night was the night. A couple of soft rolls, Italian Sausage Match Meat, Teese, and a jar of Trader Joe’s marinara. Pretty lazy food, but really tasty! I was surprised that the marinara needed no doctoring.

I defrosted the Match Meat and formed it into balls, Then I baked them on a cookie sheet for about 20 minutes at around 400 degrees F. Around halfway through they should be turned. It was more like 3/4 of the way through for me because I wasn’t paying attention. Then, I tossed the marinara into a sauce pan and simmered the balls in the sauce until everything was good and warm. The rolls were split, Teese slices placed along both sides and then it we broiled until the Teese melted. Slapped on some balls & sauce, then ate it up. Yum!