Holiday foods cooking class / herb-infused spiced cranberry-orange relish

Almond tuiles with pumpkin mousse

When I was very young, my family had a habit of going out to dinner on Sunday night — and I don't use the word 'habit' lightly. We went to a Chinese restaurant in Philadelphia's Chinatown, and then to my cousin's house in West Philly. When I say we went to a Chinese restaurant every Sunday, I mean we went to the SAME restaurant every single week - the exact same one in a neighborhood of hundreds of choices. Not only did we go to the same restaurant each week, we ordered the same food. We didn't need to see a menu because my father ordered won-ton soup, egg rolls, chicken chow mein, pork fried rice, spare ribs, and either egg fu yung or lo mein. When I started going to Chinese restaurants as an adult, before I became a vegetarian, I was overwhelmed to see page after page of food choices. There were an overwhelming number of dishes that had no resemblance to chow mein. Where had I been? I started trying different things. (Now that I'm a vegan, one of the things that bugs me about going out to dinner is the limited choice vegans have at so many restaurants! At normal (as opposed to vegan) Chinese restaurants there are usually about five things.)

Holidays can be kind of like my family's Chinese restaurant habit, when we get locked into a pattern of serving the same favorite foods over and over. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, as the holiday menu becomes a family tradition that we look forward to. But sometimes it's nice to shake things up a little and try something different — maybe add one new dish to the menu.

This was what my husband and I had in mind when we recently attended another cooking class at PCC Natural Markets. The class was called Vegetarian Holiday Feast and was taught by Birgitte Atonsen N.T.P., nutritional therapy practitioner, professional whole foods chef and culinary instructor. Birgitte, owner of Nature's Way Food, has been developing and refining her recipes since she became a vegetarian at the age of 12.



This was the menu: roasted vegetable nut loaf with mushroom béchamel sauce, mashed yams with rosemary, herb-infused spiced cranberry-orange relish, and the spectacular dessert combo of almond tuilles with pumpkin mousse. This was seriously delicious food, and I wish I could give you all the recipes, but Birgitte is working on a cookbook at the moment. The cookbook is not vegetarian, but rather it will be a cookbook filled with recipes that can be altered to accommodate any dietary need. Birgitte wants to provide people with a way to cook for friends with special diets without having to go out and buy different sets of cookbooks. Need those cookies to be GF? She will tell you how. Are you an omni with veggie friends coming to dinner? Brigitte will offer alternatives in the recipes to make them vegetarian or vegan.

This Thanksgiving I plan to incorporate two of the dishes from the class into my menu. I'm going to serve the cranberry-orange relish instead of my traditional cranberry-apple sauce, and the almond tuiles with pumpkin mousse instead of pumpkin pie. I admit I just can't break my 'holiday habits' enough to change my favorite dishes, and I'm looking forward to seitan stuffed with wild rice, and potato kugel. This will be the first Thanksgiving in a very long time that our entire immediate family will be together, and the first Thanksgiving my husband and I will spend with our little granddaughter, so it should be exciting, fun and delicious.



Herb-infused, spiced cranberry-orange relish
Makes about three cups.
Preparation time: 10 minutes
Cooking time: 30 minutes

• 1/2 organic orange with skin on, cut up for ease of blending
• 1/2 cup orange juice concentrate
• 1 cinnamon stick (2-1/2 inches)
• 3 whole cloves
• 1 sprig fresh rosemary or 3 sprigs fresh thyme
• 1 cup Rapidura sugar (or other evaporated cane juice-type sugar)
  
• 1/2 cup filtered water
• 1/3 cup port (optional but recommended)
  
• 2 (approx. 10-ounce) bags fresh cranberries - mine had 12 ounces each
  

1. In a food processor or blender blend orange and orange juice concentrate until smooth.
2. Pour the mixture into a medium pot and add cinnamon, cloves, rosemary or thyme, sugar, water and port (if using).
3. Bring mixture to a boil, then turn down the heat and simmer for five minutes.
4. Add the cranberries and simmer until the cranberries burst and mixture starts to thicken, about 20 to 30 minutes. Stir often to keep from burning.
5. Place relish into a container and refrigerate.
6. When chilled, remove the cinnamon stick and rosemary or thyme.

I also added 1/2 teaspoon of pure vanilla extract after the sauce was removed from the heat, although it wasn't in the recipe. When I make the cranberries for Thanksgiving, I'm going to slice the leftover half orange, cut the slices into half-moons and make a pinwheel garnish in the center of the dish. Sorry to say I ate the orange before thinking of the garnish when I made the dish for this post.
(recipe © Birgitte Antonsen. Please do not reproduce.)

................................................................

Try something new
If you'd like to add something new to your holiday celebrations this year, you might consider purchasing the e-cookbook, In a Vegetarian Kitchen: A Bountiful Vegan Thanksgiving by cookbook author and artist, Nava Atlas. It's filled with recipes, cooking information and tips for holiday meals by the author, and also includes recipes from other well-known cookbook authors and bloggers. It's only $8.95, and profits from this project will be donated to humanitarian charities concerned with hunger, micro-financing for women in developing countries and the alleviation of human trafficking.

...............................................................

Vegetarian alert - What's in that jar of Planter's Dry Roasted Peanuts?
Peanuts, Salt, Sugar, Cornstarch, Monosodium Glutamate (Flavor Enhancer) Gelatin, Corn Syrup Solids, Dried Yeast, Paprika, Onion and Garlic Powders, Spices, Natural Flavor.

Gelatin is an animal-derived product so look elsewhere for your peanuts if you're a vegetarian or inviting vegetarians to your home. You can find other varieties of Planter's peanuts and mixed nuts that are gelatin-free, so READ THE LABEL to know what you're getting!

Post Thanksgiving wrap-up (only a week late)

After reading about so many of your amazing Thanksgiving celebrations, I'm finally getting around to noting ours. We went to a potluck celebration at our friends' house in the country, and the amount and variety of food was astounding. Naturally, I forgot to bring the camera, but you can get a little sense of the celebration here. For our contribution to the meal, I made stuffed roasted seitan and apple-cranberry sauce. My husband made delicious chocolate chip cookies.



I photographed the seitan still in its baking dish (top photo) before we left the house, and we took the serving platter with us. On the plate l'm showing leftovers that we had the next night, since as I said, I didn't bring my camera to the event. The seitan was stuffed with brown basmati rice, wild rice and whole wheat bread cubes with onions, mushrooms, garlic, celery, chipotlé, dried apricots and I can't remember what else. One of these days I should write down a recipe so I can make it the same way twice, but it hasn't happened yet.



And this is my after Thanksgiving breakfast—oatmeal topped with cranberry-apple sauce. Wisconsin is a big cranberry growing state so both the cranberries and the apples were local.

Cranberry-chocolate chip muffins and Cranberry-ginger corn muffins

I have a muffin recipe that's so old that many of the words are rubbed off and I've had to rewrite them on the back. I use it as a base recipe on which to build variations. The original was not vegan, and I've adapted and changed it over the years. In its current state, it acts as my starting point for whatever muffin I have in mind. I hunted it down when I started thinking about Thanksgiving and the fact that I still have cranberries from last year in the freezer, and I really should use them up before getting fresh ones. The freezer isn't that big but it does tend to become a den of antiquity, if you know what I mean. So I decided to make muffins - and store the extras in the freezer... . In addition to the cranberries, there are chocolate chips, and the combination is even better than I thought it would be. I don't think the extras will be around too long.

This batter is stiffer than most muffin batters but the muffins themselves are tender and light. I've added a touch more sugar than I normally do, to balance the tangy cranberries, but they are still pretty low-fat and low-sugar compared to most recipes. I pop blobs of batter into the tins without worrying about the shape. They look like regular muffins when they are done but with a rough rather than smooth top. The recipe makes 12-15 delicious muffins, depending on how much batter goes into each cup. I tend to fill mine generously because they don't rise that much.

Cranberry chocolate chip muffins

• two cups white whole wheat flour
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• one teaspoon cinnamon
• one level tablespoon baking powder
• 1/3 cup sucanot
• one heaping tablespoon frozen orange juice concentrate plus enough non-dairy milk to make 1-1/3 cups
• 1/4 cup canola oil
• 1-1/2 cups frozen or fresh cranberries
• 1/2 cup vegan chocolate chips

1. Put the orange juice concentrate in a quart measuring cup and add enough soy (or other non-dairy) milk to make 1-1/3 cups. Add 1/4 cup oil and mix together.
2. Stir or sift the flour to lighten it before measuring. In a large bowl, combine two cups flour, 1/3 cup sugar, 1/4 teaspoon salt and 1 teaspoon cinnamon. Mix well.
   
3. Place 1 cup cranberries in a food processor with 1 tablespoon of the flour mix. Buzz a few times until the cranberries are chopped but still fairly big. (You could also cut each one into four pieces by hand.)
4. Mix the baking powder into the flour mixture.
   
5. Add the cranberries and 1/2 cup chocolate chips to the flour and mix well.
6. Add the liquid to the dry ingredients and fold in quickly but thoroughly. Do not over mix.
7. Fill lightly oiled muffin tins and bake in a preheated 400˚ oven for 18-20 minutes or until done.
   

Cranberry-ginger corn muffins



Here's a little bonus variation since I still had cranberries left over. These were big, gorgeous cranberries by the way. They were purchased fresh from a grower at the indoor winter farmer's market last year. They looked like glowing jewels, and I was tempted to just let them stay in the freezer a bit longer, but Thanksgiving is just around the corner and it's time for a new crop. These muffins also have crystallized ginger bits for a spicy-sweet bite.

• one cup white whole wheat flour
• one cup yellow cornmeal
  
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• one teaspoon cinnamon
• one level tablespoon baking powder
• 1/3 cup sucanot (evaporated cane juice)
  
• one heaping tablespoon frozen orange juice concentrate plus enough non-dairy milk to make 1-1/3 cups (I used rice milk)
  
• 1/4 cup canola oil
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
  
• 1-1/2 cups frozen or fresh cranberries
• 1/2 cup crystallized ginger bits

1. Put the orange juice concentrate in a quart measuring cup and add enough rice (or other non-dairy) milk to make 1-1/3 cups. Add 1/4 cup oil, 1/4 teaspoon vanilla and mix together.
2. Stir or sift the flour to lighten it before measuring. In a large bowl, combine one cup flour, one cup cornmeal, 1/3 cup sugar, 1/4 teaspoon salt and 1 teaspoon cinnamon. Mix well.
3. Place 1 cup cranberries in a food processor with 1 tablespoon of the flour mix. Buzz a few times until the cranberries are chopped but still fairly big. (You could also cut each one into four pieces by hand.)
4. Mix the baking powder thoroughly into the flour mixture.
   
5. Add the cranberries and 1/2 cup chocolate chips to the flour and mix well.
6. Add the liquid to the dry ingredients and fold in quickly but thoroughly. Do not over mix.
7. Fill lightly oiled muffin tins and bake in a preheated 400˚ oven for 18-20 minutes or until done.

Cranberry-apple sauce

I always stock up on cranberries in the fall. I buy them at the farmers market and freeze them so I can make cranberry sauce or cranberry muffins the rest of the year. If you don't have any, you can usually find them in the frozen fruit section of the grocery store.

This cranberry sauce usually shows up at most holiday dinners at our house. I've never had a recipe for it and it has kind of morphed over the years from strawberry-cranberry to apple-cranberry. I'm not sure when that happened, but I probably was out of strawberries one holiday and substituted apples and liked it better. I never measure the ingredients and usually give vague quantities when asked for a recipe, but this time I tried to keep track of what I was doing because I've been asked so many times for the recipe that I decided to make one. Here's what I think it is - more or less. The basic idea is to have approximately equal amounts of both fruits, so depending on the size of your apples, you may need more or less than five.

If you cook the sauce with apple juice you will need less sweetener. I prefer my sauce on the tart side so I add very little sweetener - maybe 1/4 cup - to get the taste I like. I usually use apple juice but forgot to buy it so I used water this time, but it was still pretty sweet because of all the apples, so I think I added about 1/4 cup of agave syrup. Sometimes I use maple syrup and sometimes Sucanot or sorghum. Use your favorite in the amount you prefer.

Cranberry-apple sauce
-1 bag of cranberries (about a pound, more or less)
-about 5 cooking apples, cut into cubes about the size of cranberries
-handful of raisins
-cinnamon stick or 1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon good vanilla
-2 teaspoons agar agar flakes plus 1/4 cup cold water
-1 tablespoon kudzu or arrowroot plus small amount water for dissolving
-1 cup apple juice
-sweetener of your choice (I use maple syrup or agavé syrup)

Sprinkle the agar agar into the 1/4 cup cold water and let soften while you wash and cut the apples. Combine the cranberries, apples, raisins, cinnamon stick and water or juice in a large pot. Bring to a boil, add the agar agar and stir it in. Reduce the heat and bubble gently for about 10 minutes - or until the cranberries open, the apples soften and the agar agar is dissolved. Place the kudzu or arrowroot (or cornstarch) in a cup and add just enough water to dissolve it. Add this to the sauce and bubble for a minute until the sauce clarifies. Add the sweetener of your choice in the amount you prefer. (Start with 1/4 cup for tangy sauce.) Add vanilla. Transfer to a bowl and cool.

Cranberry fizz

Here's an easy, appropriately colored, non-alchoholic beverage to serve on Valentine's Day—or any day. In the fall it can be made with fresh cranberries, but frozen cranberries also work well. I love cranberries, and tart things in general - not much of a sweet eater - but if this is too tart for you, add the sweetener of your choice to the blender. I think it's very refreshing and pleasingly sweet without being too sweet.
Cranberry Fizz
2 cups sparkling water, chilled
2 cups apple cider or apple juice, chilled
1 ripe banana (must be ripe)
1/2 cup raw cranberries (at this time of year, these would be frozen)

Whiz the cider, banana and cranberries in a blender for three minutes at high speed until smooth. Stir in the sparkling water just before serving. It will be a beautiful, rosey pink with dark red flecks.