The Elbow Bone's Connected to the Vegan BBQ Rib Bone

There is currently a WinTech racing single spanning the length of my living room and jutting into my kitchen.

Does this lack of space deter me in my quest for delicious vegan food? Of course not!! I've already mastered the art of cooking on a stove with only one full-sized burner, what's a little less elbow room?

On the menu this weekend (after what was unfortunately my first trip to the Athens' Farmers' Market) was barbeque. Fresh corn, fresh green beans, fresh peppers, fresh potatoes. It doesn't get much better. Prepping the tempeh takes a little extra time so prep it a day before or the morning of. Having everything chopped and blended ahead of time also helps. Or you can do like I do. Take time to enjoy the cooking process and keep the ice cubes at the bottom of your gin&tonic from getting too dry.

So here's the menu for my soon-to-be-famous "Don't Bump the Boat Barbeque Feast." Fresh lemonade or a citrus-forward wine or beer (a NZ sauvignon blanc or maybe Conundrum; something like Oberon or Shock Top or Magic Hat #9) would have rounded this meal out nicely.

Elbows In Tempeh Cutlets

Cut a package of tempeh into strips and place into a pot of rapidly boiling water. Reduce heat and let simmer for 10-12 minutes. This takes out some of the bitterness and readies the tempeh to soak up the marinade.

While the tempeh is cooking, mix together until very smooth:

1/4 cup warm water

2 tbs peanut butter

1 tbs soy sauce or tamari

1/2 tsp garlic powder

1/4 tsp black pepper

Pat the tempeh with paper towels to absorb some of the water. Place in a 9x9 Pyrex dish and pour the mixture in, turning the tempeh to make sure all the sides are coated. Cover with saran wrap and let sit in the fridge for at least 6 hours.

When you're ready for dinner and while you're making the barbeque sauce, potatoes, and salad (see below), bake the tempeh at 350 degrees for 15 minutes. Turn and bake for another 10. I leave the timing up to you. These don't really dry out so you can leave them warming in the oven for a while and the longer they cook the crispier the PB marinade gets. I started these cooking while the sauce was simmering.

BBBQ Sauce (the extra B is for bitchin')

Saute in a medium sauce pan:

2 tbs oil

1 onion, chopped

1 heaping tbs cheater garlic

Stir in:

1 cup fresh tomato puree (I blended up three from JSK's garden. Yum!)

3/4 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup yellow mustard

1/2 cup water

1 tbs molasses

1 tbs fresh parsley, chopped

1 tsp allspice

1/2 tsp cayenne or chipotle pepper

Bring to a boil and add:

1/2 cup apple cider vinegar

2 tbs soy sauce or tamari

Bring to boil again, reduce heat to simmer, and very slowly (to avoid any lumps) stir in about a teaspoon of cornstarch until the sauce thickens slightly. Let simmer for 15 minutes.

While I was cooking the sauce on the full-sized burner, I had a frying pan of oil heating on small burner. When the sauce was ready to simmer I presto-chango! switched their places (with only one small oil-burn to show for it!) to begin cooking the Tri-Color Potato Hash

2-3 potatoes, chopped into bite-sized or smaller pieces

1 large green pepper, chopped

1 large red pepper, chopped

2 ears of raw corn, cut off the cob

Fry the potatoes in a pan of oil. I have been eating fried potatoes for longer than I can remember (homefries and homemades, smothered in ketchup? The ambrosia of my youth). Yet I still cannot figure out how to fry potatoes on my own without most of the potato sticking to the bottom of the pan in a black mess. Is it because my frying pan sort of bows in the middle so it's hard to coat it evenly with oil? Is it because I don't put enough oil in to begin with? Is it the fact that I am usually impatient to start eating and try cooking the potatoes over too high heat? Just another culinary mystery that we may never solve.

After opening a window and fanning the smoke away from the beeping bedroom smoke alarm, transfer the cooked potatoes to a large bowl. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Add the raw peppers and corn to the bowl, stir to mix and cover with a plate to keep the heat in and slightly steam the raw veg just a bit. You could saute the veg in the potato pan if you prefer but I like a little crunch. And there was far too much charred potato on the bottom of my pan to use it again.

We rounded out the meal with microwave-steamed green beans (I may get cancer from the plastic steamer basket but it's a helluva time saver) and a microgreens, spinach, and shredded carrot salad topped with my gramma's secret recipe vinegar & oil dressing. No you can't have it, but I'd be happy to make it for you sometime. Just invite me over for dinner.

Other than about 2 cups of left over BBQ sauce (most of which Roomie has earmarked for tuna sandwiches) there was nothing but alot of dirty pots and pans left in the kitchen at the end of the night.

Well, that and a giant, red boat.

Back and Better Than Ever

Roomie and I triumphantly returned to Athens last Friday and were met with throngs of well wishers tossing flowers into the path of the van, singing songs of jubilation, and sounding trumpets to herald our arrival after so many months abroad.

What I mean by that, of course, is a stuffy, humid apartment that had not been properly cleaned since before I left for the beach and a barren refrigerator.

The former was remedied with a two-day cleaning-stravaganza; the latter by a mega-trip to Kroger which I could barely afford.

I guess the vacation is over.

It hasn't all been real-world responsibilities though. Kev came to stay for a few days while he finished up his illustrious undergraduate carreer; and any time a guest (even one so un-guest-like as Kev) comes to stay is an excuse to cook.

Monday night I jazzed up that old favorite Mock-soto!! by subbing walnut oil for the Enova and adding a bag of frozen carrots, celery, and onions. Delicious and filling.

Tuesday was Italian night, inspired in part by the huge bag of tomatoes from my BFF JSK's garden. Possibly the best tomatoes I've ever eaten. Since the pasta was the cheap, "comes-from-Sam's-in-a-6-pound-bag" kind, I decided to class up the evening with appetizers. Tomatoes are delicious with salt (as a kid, my gramma and I used to eat them straight from the garden like apples, sprinkling salt on them inbetween giant bites). Olives are salty. I just happened to have a deli container full of olives that needed eaten. I love it when dishes come together so seredipitously

Kalamata-'Mater Bites

3 cups Kalamata olives, pitted
1/2 cup olive oil
2 tbs lemon juice
handful-ish of chopped fresh parsely
1/8 tsp fresh black pepper

Blend everything but the olive oil in a high-speed blender. Slowly add the oil until the mixture is smooth. If you can, make this a day ahead of time (or at least a few hours) so it can sit in the fridge for a bit. Don't worry if the oil separates from the olives; just stir it back together.

We spread this onto hot slices of take-and-bake mutli-grain french bread and topped with bite-sized pieces of tomatoes and spinach shreds. Add a moderately priced Chilean CabSauv and music from True Blood and you've got yourself a dinner party. Very classy.

Today I wasn't really in the mood to be standing in the kitchen...or wearing anything but a bathrobe and my PJ's or putting my contacts in... (we closed the Oak Room down last night) ...so it was my crock-pot to the rescue.

Pyjama Day Lentils

1 pound lentils
1 onion, chopped
1-2 tbs of cheater garlic
1 can chopped tomatoes, with liquid
3 1/2 cups vegetable broth
2 carrots, chopped (or you can just throw in the half-bag of baby carrots languishing in your crisper)
handful of fresh parsley, chopped
1/2 tsp salt
1/8 tsp marjoram
1/8 tsp sage
1/8 tsp thyme
1 bay leaf

Throw everything in your slow cooker/crock pot and cook on high for 4-5 hours or until the lentils and carrots are soft and have absorbed the liquid. The longer you cook it, the thicker it will be. I threw an extra fresh tomato in the mix as well and if I had had any celery on hand I would have chopped some of that in as well. Occassionally stir the pot if you'd like or just let it go while you lounge in a recliner all day watching Starz and facebook stalking and rehydrating.

This was so hearty and very filling. Serve over rice or noodles (Roomie made tri-color rotini) or raw vegetables; garnish with ketchup (or catsup), hot sauce, or cheddar cheese.

And continue to lounge the day away remembering why you no longer close down bars.

It's good to be back .

On the Road Again

Hi to the ello friends and enemies.


It's been donkey's years since I've posted. The main reason? I've been travelling. It's kind of hard to be whipping up delicious vegan meals when you're eating out of a cooler in the back of a van.


I left Athens the last week of July to stay with my parent's for a few days to celebrate my mom's birthday. My gift was homemade sangria that we started drinking around noon.

Mom's 57 Golden Sangria

2 bottles (750ml) white wine (Nothing too expensive; I used Frontera Sauv Blanc once and Bohemian Highway pino grigio the next time)
4 tbs of lemon juice
2-3 tbs agave nectar
3/4 cup Grand Marnier
2 cups fresh, chopped pineapple
3 nectarines, chopped (get organic and leave the skins on)
1 pint of raspberries, frozen (see below)

Mix everything but the fruit in a large pitcher until the agave is disolved. I have one of those in-fridge jars with the spigot on the bottom which works quite nicely.
Add the pineapple and nectarines to the jar. Stir well. Add a couple handfulls of ice and let sit in the fridge for at least 12 hours.
While the the sangria chills, place the raspberries on a parchment-paper-lined cookie sheet/plate in the freezer until solid. You can freeze these ahead of time too.
To serve, fill a wide mouth wine glass with equal parts wine and the wine-soaked fruit. Garnish with a few of the frozen raspberries (a mint sprig if you're feeling saucy) and a spoon. My mom has some very excellent milkshake spoon-straws (spraws? stroons? Nicer than the ones at this website but similar) which work wonderfully for this sangria. Let me tell you, you haven't had pineapple until you've had pineapple that's been soaking in wine and GranMar for 48 hours. Word.

After the birthday merriment, I was off to Cleveland for a night with my cousins, J & The Demon Baby. The latter got a trampoline for her third birthday. They wanted my to join them on said trampoline and I did but I was probably the least fun trampoline-jumper in the history of trampolines. My imagination is far to vivid for me to enjoy a bouncy length of tarp stretched between some springs. My brain kept sending up pictures of snapped necks and broken legs. Hardly conducive to, "jump us higher!! jump us higher!!"


From Cleveland, I pointed Frankenstein in a north-easterly direction to meet up with Roomie in St. Catharine's, Ontario for the Royal Canadian Henley Regatta. I was let into Canada by a man that I'm convinced was simply posing as a border guard. His questions were cursory at best and upon leaving Canada, I was told that I should never have been allowed to enter the country with the amount of fresh produce that I did. Most of the fresh produce was eaten in a hotel room with a very nice, duty-free bottle of Canadian wine.


From Canada, Roomie and I drove back to his sub-let in Philadelphia. I will summarize this road trip simply by saying: wind turbines unsettle me in a vague, undefinable way. I can't look too long or too directly at them without experiencing a very acute and potent kind of vertigo.


Philly was great. The car remained un-broken-into this time (the battery died instead), and we spent three hours walking around museums. Modern art is far easier to appreciate when you've had a strongly mixed Beefeater and tonic. Thank you again Philly Museum of Art's "Art After 5." Also delicious: water ice. It's the Philadelphia version of italian ice; kinda like a thicker slushie with way better flavors. Nothing rounds out a 6 block walk to the liquor store like an orange-creamsicle-flavored water ice.


From Philly, Roomie and I have returned to Marion for a week or so of being kids again. Translation: free room and board, no real responsibilities, and plentiful dinner that neither of us has to cook or pay for.

Soon, though, I'll be back in Athens having to feed myself, teach some college frosh, and writing all about it.

Wish as I might, it just can't be summer vacation forever.