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Archive for the ‘Cooking’ Category

Cooking: Vegetarian / Vegan Alternatives?

In another post, there is a recipe for using leftover foods from a recipe. It contained a recipe for a quiche with cheese cracker crumbs used as a pie crust. (See https://tiogaherald.com/category/cooking/). My own experience is to consider vegan or vegetarian alternatives. Thinking about such alternatives, here is what I offer as alternatives for the cooking mentioned in this link.

Cheese crackers: not familiar with vegan “cheese” crackers. If there is such a product, then it can be used. Otherwise, one might need to bake their own cheese crackers. If one searches Amazon.com, one finds plant-based, dairy-free “cheeze” crackers from Simple Mills or Real Food from the Ground Up brands.

Eggs: I have found a product called Just Egg – Eggs from Plants – to be a great alternative. Otherwise, there are recipes using flax to create a vegan alternative to eggs. Recipe using nutritional yeast to produce scrambled “eggs.”

Cheese: Daiya, Madly Hadley or brands. Often the word “cheeze” is used to identify such products.

Ground meat: Impossible or Beyond “meats” and sausages.

There are also good programs from PBS / Create TV which discuss vegetarian / vegan ideas and alternative cooking. For example: The Jazzy Vegetarian. Conscious Living, Christina Cooks (Christina Pirello, America’s Healthy Cooking Teacher).

Category:

Cooking, Vegan, Vegetarian

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Cooking: Idea for Using Leftover Ingredients from Recipe

When preparing eggplant parmesan for only two people (see recipe in another posting in Tioga Herald), I had leftovers I did not wish to toss in the garbage. The skins were boiled and simmered in water for about four hours. I strained the water to get rid of the skins and saved the liquid as a veggie broth to be refrigerated (perhaps frozen) and used later.

I also had leftover Cheez It cracker crumbs. How did I use these crumbs without tossing in the garbage? (1) I made cracker crumb dumplings with flour, water, and ricotta cheese. Need to look into an actual recipe for this because mine did not turn out well. Too dry.

I also used the Cheez It cracker crumbs to make a pie crust for quiche. This turned out a wonderful quiche. The crust had a neat cheese flavor which enhanced the flavor of the cheeses in the egg quiche filling.

The crust:

  • 2 cups cheese cracker crumbs (I used Cheez It)
  • 1 stick melted unsalted butter
  • 1 egg

Mix the ingredients together and press the mixture into bottom and side of a pie dish. Fill with quiche filling. Back for one hour at 400 degrees F.

Quiche egg filling:

  • 8 eggs
  • dash water
  • 2 tablespoons sour cream
  • 2 tablespoons half and half
  • 1/4 cup grated gruyerre cheese
  • caramelized onions and peppers (I keep caramelized onions and peppers, including cubanelle peppers, in freezer)
  • other ingredients, perhaps from leftovers (I had leftover spinach and fried mushrooms)

This recipe made two quiches, but I had cracker-crumb pie crust enough for one quiche. The second quiche was a crustless quiche.

Enjoy! Ooooooh so good!

Category:

Recipe, Cooking

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