The Spicy Meatless Thread... (ya I went there)

I know going into this that this thread is going to get meat bombed... but there's gotta be at least a couple other people on this forum that have herbivore tendencies.  Lately almost everything I have been cooking has been meat-free unless its for the dogs.  I've been toying with recipes and finding ways to get the flavors of dishes that usually have animal muscle as the main feature.  Hopefully some of y'all do the same from time to time and we can swap and share some spicy veggie recipes. I've held off on making this thread for a while because I know the ridicule that will inevitably come, but I guess its better to clog my own thread with my hippy food rather than all the other cooking threads. 
 
So here goes, last night per request I made some arroz congri and tostones.  
 
For the rice and beans, I chop up a green and red bell pepper, 2 onions and about 4-5 cloves of garlic. Cook up that in the pot before adding the rice and beans and sufficient water.  Season it up, and pretty much just leave it on the stove for a while.  I don't have any fresh pods yet so I seasoned my batch up with some smoked naga powder for good measure.  The tostones start by cooking them a bit on each side before pulling them from the pan.

 
After the tostones are cooked and pulled from the pan you gotta squish em dip em in cold water and throw em back in the pan, for the second round of frying. When you pull them out you can season them with whatever you want, I like to make a garlicky spicy sauce concoction to dip them in.  Also, make yourself a guava-lime rum drink for good measure. 

 
Eventually, after a long long time (especially if you use brown rice), your arroz congri will be ready.  

 
 
Happy vegetarian eating! (I also ate left overs this morning covered in cheese and a fried egg)
 
Let's see what you got....

 

[Rawkstah]

Dude had a fried chicken craving this morning.  I've been craving chicken n' waffles for a while now but didn't want to go through the process of making the seitan then battering and frying it up like chicken.  So I half assed it this morning and used faux chicken nuggets had them going in the oven while I made the waffles.  The nuggets were brushed with franks half way through.  The waffles are crispy eggless, dairyless waffles that are so easy to whip up.  1 cup ap flour, .25 cup whole wheat flour, 2 ts baking soda, 2 tb sugar, a dash of pink salt, 2 tb oil, 1.25 c almond milk, 1 ts almond extract, 1 ts vanilla extract, and I dust it with cinnamon too. The recipe I adapted from used water instead of almond milk, and skipped the cinnamon and went with 2 ts of vanilla extract instead of half almond.  The only bummer about these waffles is that they never get golden brown really.  Oh well, they taste great and I love the crispy over the big belgian waffles anyway.  Anyway... the best part of all this was I had this brilliant idea to mix el capitan with maple syrup.  OMG.... everyone needs to try this... I told DeeRoo that he should sell that as a product... It was so freakin' good.  Just writing this up makes me want to do it again for the syrup.  So. Damn. Good. 
 

 

[The Hot Pepper]

Very cool. By "Dude" you mean SmokenFire right?

 

[Rawkstah]

Very cool. By "Dude" you mean SmokenFire right?

Nah, by Dude I mean the dude that pays the other half of the rent here and puts up with my shenanigans and overwhelming amounts of white dog hair in exchange for home cooked meals.

 

[Rawkstah]

Tonight's dinner, marinated mushroom, zucchini, onion, and bell pepper kebobs, watermelon, and asian bbq tofu as a sandwich with pickle and fresh chives on a potato bun.  so good. 
 

 

 

 

[OCD Chilehead]

Both them dishes look delicious. The tofu sammie looks great.

I might have to try that with a creamy Sriracha style sauce. Mmmmm

 

[Rawkstah]

Both them dishes look delicious. The tofu sammie looks great.

I might have to try that with a creamy Sriracha style sauce. Mmmmm

Ooo that'd be good.  This bbq sauce was a concoction I threw together store bought bullseye bbq + liquid aminos, balsamic, fresh ginger and garlic, Dr. Peck's buckwheat honey, dijon mustard, smoked red habanero powder and some catsup.  that hab powder had me burning pretty good actually.  
 
I've grilled tofu in a sweet & hot mustard before too and it was good but this bbq was the best I've made so far.  Let me know if you try to sriracha style!  

 

[dragonsfire]

Great looking dishes

 

[The Hot Pepper]

Nah, by Dude I mean the dude that pays the other half of the rent here and puts up with my shenanigans and overwhelming amounts of white dog hair in exchange for home cooked meals.

 
Haha oh I thought maybe you chi-town peeps had met up... one of your posts said you and The Dude went out to eat...

 

[Rawkstah]

 
Haha oh I thought maybe you chi-town peeps had met up... one of your posts said you and The Dude went out to eat...

I just refer to the other half as the dude for his own personal privacy (and mine I guess).
 
But actually not too long ago SmokenFire, dude, and I met up for a couple beers.  It was good times, wouldn't mind doing it again sometime this summer.  People from this forum are pretty rad. 

 

[Rawkstah]

So I saw jackfruit in the produce aisle of the supermercato the other day and I had to grab it.  I'd heard about how you can make bbq jackfruit like pulled pork.  I did tried the Upton's jackfruit carnitas and hated it, so I was determined to make something with this jackfruit that I would like (and get to taste it plain).  Well when I started cutting it up I realized that my jackfruit was ripe and that usually for faux meat dishes you're supposed to use the unripened fruit.  No matter cause jackfruit tastes freakin' amazing.  I got all the ripe fruit out and put the seeds and I guess you'd call it rind in a bowl. The rind part was kinda like how artichoke has the layers around the heart, but without the prickly fuzz. It was still edible so I made a curry tonight with the jackfruit, chickpeas, jackfruit seeds, and green peas.  Curry sauce ingredients were 3 onion, 6 cloves garlic, garam masala, cumin, cinnamon, ginger, GIP's aji amarillo powder, turmeric, and some smoked paprika.  Sauteed all that and slowly added some vegetable broth, enough to cover the onion and soften it. Then added a can of tomato sauce and a can of diced tomatoes and let it simmer. Oh! and while I was doing all that I was soaking raw cashews in hot water.  I've learned that softened raw cashews can pretty much take the place of cream/butter in soups and curries.   I blended about half the curry and the cashews together, then mixed it back in with the rest in the pot. I added the chickpeas and jackfruit rind and seeds.  Let that cook a while to soften up the seeds and ate it over brown rice with some skilled fried naan.  It was delish. The curry sauce alone is a keeper for the future, can use it with tofu or something.  And tomorrow I get to eat the sweet parts of the jackfruit for breakfast.  Jackfruit is my favorite. 

 

[Rawkstah]

Burrito Bowls are becoming a staple around here.  We make a batch of rice and use it in various things throughout the week and it makes this a fairly quick dinner option. Super tasty too!
 
Cilantro Lime Brown Rice

 
The "filling" is sauteed onion and garlic, soyrizo, jackfruit, black beans, poblano, and red pepper in a chipotle adobo sauce and some DeeRoo Taco Tuesday.

 
Then topped with romaine, avocado, tomato, and smoked sweet potato.  Following by a blob of vegan 'sour cream', Pex's Taco Fuego and Valentina's.

 

[Rawkstah]

Made a big batch of chik'n seitan saturday night (had a drunken brunch party and made chik'n n waffles), I fried up the leftovers in an aji amarillo (thanks GIP!) cornmeal-flour tonight and made some taters, mushroom gravy, and smoked hab collards.  

 

[grantmichaels]

The 'chicken' looks really good. Just noticed the smoked sweet potato from before, which sounds interesting ...

 

[Tinnie]

Made burrito bowls for a long time now.... just never knew they were known by that name.... will have to give some meat free attempts soon.... yours look great!

 

[Rawkstah]

The 'chicken' looks really good. Just noticed the smoked sweet potato from before, which sounds interesting ...

I smoked some white and sweet potatoes ones night with cherry wood, I used the white ones to make mashed taters and the smoked sweet potatoes I cut up in to cubes and just added them to dinners, salads, whatever it worked with throughout the week.  Highly recommend, adds so much flavor. 

 

[grantmichaels]

I smoked some white and sweet potatoes ones night with cherry wood, I used the white ones to make mashed taters and the smoked sweet potatoes I cut up in to cubes and just added them to dinners, salads, whatever it worked with throughout the week.  Highly recommend, adds so much flavor. 

 
Sounds like a good move ... I'll have to try that for sure ...

 

[Rawkstah]

I smoked the sweet potatoes in slices and the white ones whole, next time I might cube them before hand see if that give even more flavor. (probably less cook time too I assume)

 

[Rawkstah]

I posted the buffalo chickpea patties before, today I made them into a sammich with a faux smoked gouda, extra frank's red hot, spicy ajvar, some romaine and tomato on an english muffin.  But i'm more excited about the drink in the background, I finally got my first batch of Jun tea fermented.  Its so light and tasty.  Jun tea is a form of kombucha but instead of black tea and sugar it is brewed with green tea and honey.  The glass in the pic is just straight Jun tea, but I have mixed it with some ginger lime juice and that is sooo good.  I just bottled a second batch and this time I tried added the juiced during the 3 day ferment.  Most of the bottles have a mango-ginger-lime juice in them but one of them I put a teaspoon of GIP's black currant jam in.  I'm excited for the end result on those! 
 

 

[fertilizer]

The trick is always to learn to eat properly. even though I eat meat a few times a year, I mainly am veg. Nuts and seeds in my main diet and they produce allot of protein. Their are many things that have more protein then meat. Elephants are vegetarians and their brity big lol.

Most vegetarian animals have multiple stomachs and way more efficient intestinal tracts for getting protein out of plants. That being said, if you eat loads of vegetables including those with lots of protein, or veg/vegan protein powders and you eat diverse, you should have no problem keeping muscle. The trick to veganism and vegetarianism is just eating enough, as caloric density in vegetables are quite low.
I'd recommend quinoa too for a complete protein source

 

[Rawkstah]

Most vegetarian animals have multiple stomachs and way more efficient intestinal tracts for getting protein out of plants. That being said, if you eat loads of vegetables including those with lots of protein, or veg/vegan protein powders and you eat diverse, you should have no problem keeping muscle. The trick to veganism and vegetarianism is just eating enough, as caloric density in vegetables are quite low.
I'd recommend quinoa too for a complete protein source

That's slightly true, its mostly grazing animals that have multiple stomachs. But vegetarian animals like horses and rhinos don't, the digest faster but have something like a fermentation that happens.  Most apes and monkeys are vegetarian, a closer ancestor to humans.  But even so their colons are different than ours and they process fiber better.  We've evolved from apes and we eat a variety of different foods these days, and luckily food science as evolved as well.  People can easily be vegetarian/vegan and get the calories/nutrients they need, and have it taste alright. 20 years ago maybe a different story, a good veggie burger back then was pretty much cardboard tasting, now a days the food has come a long way and there are so many options.  
 
Also I'm allergic to quinoa and they try to but that sh*t in every vegetarian dish these days .