Month: July 2019

No Oil Tabouli Salad

No-Oil Tabouli Salad

28 Jul 2019 Plant-based Bear

I’ll not get into a debate about whether it’s Tabouli, Tabouleh, or Tabbouleh, but needless to say, when the weather is hot (or even not), this is a great thing to make and have a cup or two of! It’s one of my favorite prepared salads!

I’ve long followed a recipe which I think I got online somewhere long ago. However, most tabouli is made with olive oil, and, well, that’s not going to work for me. So I’ve made some adjustments:

No Oil Tabouli Salad
Print Recipe

No-Oil Tabouli Salad

Parsley-based, cold, fresh salad.
Last updated July 28, 2019.
Prep Time1 hour
Cook Time5 minutes
Total Time1 hour 5 minutes
Servings: 6 large servings or more
Author: Plant-Based-Bear.com

Ingredients

  • 1 c Bulgar wheat dry
  • 1 1/2 c boiling water
  • 1/4 c lemon juice or put as much as you like!
  • 2-3 T tahini (pre-made or grind your own)
  • 4-5 cloves garlic minced
  • 1 t to 1 1/2salt
  • black pepper
  • 4-8 green onions minced
  • 4-6 c parsley packed, minced (about 4-8 bunches)
  • 10-25 mint leaves chopped
  • 2 medium tomatoes diced

Instructions

  • Put the Bulgar wheat in a big bowl, cover with the boiling water, and cover with lid or plastic wrap for 10-15 minutes, which should get it mostly tender.
  • In the meantime, start mincing, and then add lemon juice, tahini, garlic, salt, and pepper to the big bowl with the Bulgar, and mix well. (Salt can be left out or left until the end if you want to monitor it.)

Notes

If serving immediately, mix in the rest of the ingredients, but do try to chill for just a bit first. This one is great COLD!
If serving much later, consider leaving out the greens until right before serving time, and then mixing together.

I have a big Tupperware bowl that I use for this, and while I haven’t measured the parsley in years, I basically just fill the bowl until I don’t think any more can get in! Then I carefully stir, with one hand mixing, and one hand holding it in the bowl.

I’ve also done it where I mixed in all the liquids into the Bulgar, and then topped with the greens, leaving them this way in the bowl until ready to serve, and then mixing it up, instead of leaving them completely separate.

For today’s version, I added extra lemon juice, and I also had some fresh dill, and diced cucumbers. While it may not be “authentic,” I’ve never been one to care, and I like the little bit of extra crunch and it’s certainly delicious, although I learned that a little chopped dill goes a long way!

At the top, I said this is a great salad to make on a hot day, but that’s a bit of a lie. It’s actually great to EAT on a hot day, and working endlessly mincing is never that much fun. But, if I do make it on a hot day, I know there will be a delicious reward waiting a bit later, and for that, I’m willing to do it!

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No-Oil Tabouli Salad.
The big bowl isn’t full already, before I can even get this into the refrigerator!

Plant-based Cheese Sauce

27 Jul 2019 Plant-based Bear

Most plant-based cheese sauce uses a lot of cashews, nutritional yeast, and a bunch of other less-than-common ingredients. But, the author of this cheese sauce claimed it was the ultimate, and it was pretty much just basic plants (and those ever-present raw cashews!)

https://www.veggiesdontbite.com/ultimate-cheese-sauce/

So, for my plant-based omelette attempt, I knew I’d want some good cheesy sauce, so why not make it first!

The recipe called for boiling the veggies (and yes, those cashews) for 20 minutes or so, but one person had used an Instant Pot. I haven’t had the chance to use mine in awhile, so went this route, chopping up the veggies, adding them to the Instant Pot, setting it for 5 minutes at high pressure, and then mostly letting it naturally depressurize.

Then I added the ingredients in the specified amounts (for example, I’d cooked up too many potatoes for the the 2 cups I needed) and blended them all up in my Ninja blender.

Tasty cheese sauce!

And, it worked! I still think I can taste a bit of the potato and carrot in this, but it’s rather cheesy tasting, and quite delicious. It also went well with my plant-based omelettes I was making! (If only those omelettes were as good as this cheese sauce!)

Delicious with the pretzel crisps!

By the way, those dark specs in the sauce are because I didn’t peel my potatoes. To me it’s not a problem!

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Plant-Based Omellete #2.

Plant-based Omelettes

27 Jul 2019 Plant-based Bear

I thought I’d try a few things this morning, and, as some of them would take longer than others, I was in my kitchen for quite awhile.

First, I was craving an omelette. When I ate real eggs, I sure did like an omelette for breakfast on the weekend. I’d saute some veggies, add way too much cheese, and enjoy!

But alas, I’m paying much more attention lately, so I didn’t want to use eggs, cheese, or oil.

I reviewed a bunch of online recipes, settling upon parts of this one:

https://lovingitvegan.com/vegan-omelette/

Printable: https://lovingitvegan.com/vegan-omelette/print/4694/

I didn’t care to make my veggie “filling” as indicated and I wasn’t going to use butter or oil to make this happen. And, I chose this recipe as it didn’t require putting anything in the oven, would help me use up some chick pea flour from a couple failed cheese-making attempts, and seemed reasonable.

I made the batter, and started to cook like a pancake. But, I left it too long, and it got dark brown. My 2nd and 3rd omelettes worked much better, with my water-sauteed vegatables, some olives, and a cheese sauce.

Plant-Based Omellete #2.
Plant-based Omelet #3

So the looks were good. But the taste? Eh? Alright. I think I’m quickly determining that maybe Besan or chick pea flour is just not my thing. When I tried to use the besan for this plant-based cheese, the cheese never got firm and tasted, just, eh, weird, twice, as I wanted to make sure I didn’t mess anything in the recipe up. In this omelette recipe, things seemed to work better, but I could still taste what seems to be a rather nasty taste to it, just like the cheese. I mean, the omelettes are okay, but I don’t know that I’m going to be craving another one any time soon.

As far as the besan, I’ve purchased one more kind of chick pea flour, from the high-quality “Bob’s Red Mill.” This will hopefully not have the taste I don’t like and may help. Not sure if will try the cheese recipe again with it, or just stick with some cheeses that I have been enjoying!

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