Vegan Alfredo

Can it be done? Sure. I was craving all things pasta, as I mentioned before, and ran across this vegan alfredo recipe. I remembered that I used to really enjoy those alfredo dinners "out of a box" and that last year I had tried an alfredo sauce out of a jar and it was terrible. So I decided to make my own, and actually make it stomach-friendly! The recipe I found seemed simple enough, it just required a little shopping trip (where I nearly broke my shoulder carrying it all home).

I assembled the ingredients and started simmering, and soon enough it was all mixed together, I had pureed, and it was ready to go!

Vastly more simple than I could have imagined. It smelled like alfredo, and it tasted very close. It needed a bit more salt, or some more zing to it. Next time I might take one commentator's suggestion and add some lemon juice.

For now, I simply enjoyed the creamy texture I always long for.

An Expansion and an Evening of Cooking

We have decided to abandon the theme of Arabesque and to embark on "following to-the-letter all good and sound recipes" that we might chance upon. In that mode, this weekend's cookery alighted upon a theme of pasta sauces. It started with my craving for Alfredo, vegan style, and ended in a super simple tomato pasta sauce that was delicious!! Along the way, some breadsticks and baklava worked their way in as well.

First stop, the red pasta sauce, which Talea found here, and which I forgot to photograph as it was cooking, and being consumed, because I was so wrapped up in enjoying the flavors. After settling it onto the stove to start its plopping and splattering, we turned to breadsticks.

Now, I am trying again a stint of gluten-free, to last in every nook and cranny I can find. So I bought some gluten-free flour (made up of garbanzo beans, fava beans, and other odd items) and we tried a recipe from here for breadsticks. Talea made hers partly whole and white wheat. Which I think turned out more successfully. Mine refused to rise, or even knead like dough, and promptly burned before being done baking, and essentially made my whole kitchen smell like falafel. C+ at best. They are not breadsticks, they are some alien kind of savory cookie. Matt would like them. I, am unimpressed.

While the breadsticks were "rising", I launched an attempt at baklava, which I'd been meaning to try for several weekends, and just never had the energy or the health to do. I combined the ideas from a couple of different recipes from here and here, and set to work on my own finished product. I was working with less than half a package of phillo dough, which was still semi-frozen, and several random ends of butter, melted. I ground together some walnuts and almonds, about a cup and a quarter total, and stirred them together with some freshly ground cardamom (which cardamom is now going on at least four years old because I bought it in Egypt last time I was there) and cinnamon. I poured some water and sugar into a pan and added some very sugared honey, which immediately thinned out delightfully. I layered the phillo and nuts and butter in the pan, popped it in the oven where it browned up nicely, and then poured the syrup over it. I couldn't resist a bite before it was finished cooking, and it was GOOD.

I might like this baklava making business.

This morning I got up and cleaned up the mess, and then enjoyed a bowlful of papaya and yellow honeydew to top it all off.

Breadsticks and tomato sauce

Proof of cookery

Pizza with roasted peppers

The crust for this pizza deserves an ode of its own. It is soft, elastic, glorious to roll out. I made this pizza all last summer using fresh tomatoes and basil from the garden. This time around, I topped it with roasted orange and red bell peppers, Kalamata olives, last summer's tomatoes, and feta cheese. Next time I might try baking the crust off a touch before adding the toppings, but the results were truly satisfactory. Thanks, Barbara Kingsolver!

Bagels

I was afraid these bagels might not turn out because I ran out of white flour and so made these using more than 50% whole wheat flour (I almost always make doughs using 50-50 white/whole wheat flours, but I didn't want to get too carried away). The dough came out a little dense, but really the bagels weren't bad. After boiling them in sugar water, I baked them for half an hour in the oven. A bit involved, but they're so lovely and chewy with that glossy outer crust. Well worth the trouble.

Pizza Capri-Monique Style

Combining the amazing crust of Talea's mom with the toppings of my favorite "Zorba the Greek" pizza from Pizza Capri, I attempted deliciocity in the home. Successful? Tastebud results flip over the 10's! Homemade pesto (with basil leaves from our prolific basil plant), home roasted peppers, fresh tomatoes, feta cheese, sundried tomatoes, and kalamata olives on a white and whole wheat crust baked on a pizza stone. I ate my half in one sitting, if that tells you anything.