Bake Sale Success!

It was nasty, rainy and a little icy but people still came out. Atlanta’s Vegan Bake Sale for Haiti this Saturday raised $1365 for Doctors Without Borders. Holy Crap! A special thanks to Kristin for organizing the whole thing and Criminal Records for not just agreeing to let us do it in front of their store, but letting us take over the back of the store when the weather turned nasty. Those guys rock!

Kristin has a great round-up of participants here. I’d like to also add thanks to Alicia Simpson, author of Vegan Comfort Food, Alison Brown, Lisa Bennett and a guy named David, I think, for bringing out goodies to sell. The hard work of everyone involved enabled us to turn a bit of labor and ingredients into a much larger donation for Haiti.

And now, for some of my crappy pictures!

Setting up in the back of Criminal Records
Setting up in the back of Criminal Records
Becky & Kristin load up Table 1
Becky & Kristin load up Table 1
Front of Table 2
Front of Table 2
side of table 2
side of table 2

Some of my contributions:

hearts and flowers sandwich cookies, mini marble bundt cakes, brownies, beard-friendly mini cupcakes on a stick
hearts and flowers cookies close-up
nekkid bundt cakes before they got their glaze

Thanksgiving feast

Wait, didn’t I just blog a Thanksgiving feast? No, that was a Thanksgiving-themed feast. This here one was on actual Thanksgiving day! Totally different. This was a pretty small gathering of 3 couples, but we didn’t lack anything.

For my contribution, I baked because it’s what I do. I figured everyone would like ciabatta rolls, so I made some of those. There was also a maple walnut oat loaf made with white whole wheat. Kind of healthy but didn’t taste like it.

Somehow I didn’t get any pictures of the snickerdoodles I made. They were definitely a hit though. Who knew such a simple cookie could be so popular? The main dessert was this pumpkin cinnamon swirl cheesecake. Tasty, but I think I would have liked it a little denser. Others liked the fact that it was a little softer. It was perfectly set up though and cut and stayed together nicely. I forgot to swirl it though so it kind of looks like rock strata.

Here’s my plate of belt-loosening goodness, clockwise starting at 12: sweet potatoes with Dandies marshmallows, mac & cheese,  Stuffed Hazelnut Cranberry Roast En Croute By Field Roast, dressing and mashed potatoes under the gravy, Match Vegan Meats holiday roast (this time the pre-made version), the maple walnut oat bread and green bean casserole in the center. There were also two cranberry sauces: the regular jelled canned kind and a home made cranberry pineapple sauce. I had to clear some space before I could get them on my plate though.

Both the roasts were great but different. A more traditional person might like the Match roast better. I really enjoyed the cranberries, apples and crystallized ginger in the Field Roast. But I know ginger is a strong flavor and can turn some people off.

I’ve been cruising the vegan blogs today checking out everyone’s holiday meals in between working and mopping up drool. As with vegan cheeses, how much does it rock that we have an actual assortment of holiday roasts to choose from now?

A Southern Dinner

Friday night I made Kevin really happy by cooking something that was fried. I had starred this recipe for Country Fried Seitan Steak in Google Reader and planned to cook it some time this week. I already had the seitan, so just need to bread it, fry it and make the gravy. Oh, and make the collards and cook sweet potatoes to mash. It was a whole stove kind of meal.

I wouldn’t change anything about the seitan steaks. The breading was lovely. Seasoned nicely. The gravy seemed a bit bland to me so I added two tablespoons of nutritional yeast. Perfect! The sweet potatoes I steamed in the pressure cooker. It all came together really well but isn’t the kind of meal I would make on a standard week night. Too much work and too many dirty dishes. To add to the chaos, I was also baking off a whole wheat sandwich bread that turned out to be just cool enough to slice and eat with dinner.

Treats that don’t make you fat

How do you make delicious treats that don’t make you fat? You get them out of your house!

A friend of Kevin’s was having a vegan out of town guest and wanted to get some goodies. He’d been by the Atlanta Vegan Bake Sale and asked us to do a couple of things for him. Well, “us” is me, but that’s fine. This is the best kind of baking. I get to taste a little, and get the rest out of my house. I mean, how could you walk by these and not shove one in your mouth?

You also need breakfast for an out of town guest, right? How about cherry almond scones? Turbando sugar is the perfect grain to sprinkle on top. Damn, I would totally eat one if these if I had one here right now. See? That’s the problem with keeping that sort of thing around.

Reviving dormant sourdough starter

So what happens when you take an active sourdough starter, stick it in the fridge and ignore it for 6 months or more? Apparently nothing bad. This is exactly what I did. Actually, I have 4 starters in the fridge. Last week I decided to try and revive the Italian starter and attempt a batch of bread.

How did I do it? I pulled the starter out, stirred the hooch in (the liquid on top) and put it on the counter in a new bowl. Leaving it on the counter, I fed it with half a cup of flour and half a cup of water twice a day. At each feeding , I poured off about half the starter into a container of excess. But I’ll get to that later.

Friday night I began the Vermont Sourdough from Hamelman’s Bread. Saturday morning I worked through the shaping and then retarded the two loaves in the fridge overnight. Then Sunday morning I baked them off one at a time on my pizza stone. The first loaf I steamed once with ice cubes. The 2nd loaf I added a second steaming. The second steaming seemed to give the 2nd loaf a little more spring. The taste was mild but clearly the starter did its job. Nice rise, good crumb. Chewy crust. Sourdough bread is such a process that it’s even more satisfying when it all goes well.

So there have been sammichs, bread slice snacks, bread with salad, etc. And I haven’t cut into the second loaf yet! So what to do with the cast-off starter created when feeding? There are a bunch of things you can do with it, but this time I chose scones. (Obviously, I veganized that recipe.) It really doesn’t act to rise the scones, but flavors them a little and keeps you from having to throw the excess in the garbage.

tempeh salad sammich
tempeh salad sammich
apple pie sourdough scones
apple pie sourdough scones

It’s been a while, so I’m going to submit this post to WildYeast’s Yeastspotting. Head over there every Friday for a collection of baking porn from around the internets.