Since starting to eat more healthy and vegan I have looked into what constitutes empty calories and unhealthy carbohydrates (yes, even for the vegan!). I am also learning how to tweak recipes to be gluten-free (GF), always vegan (V), and on occasion, paleo (P). I am currently trying to reduce legume and grain consumption and concentrate on whole vegetable, fruit and nut dishes. I am posting recipes that I have tried in the past year and will be adding more vegan paleo dishes in the coming weeks. Happy Eating!
Almond Christmas cookies with quinoa flour: GF, V
Summer Salad: GF, V, P
This is a super easy dish that is healthy and really filling. You will just need to compile and toss the following ingredients for a fresh summer salad:
Organic baby spinach, ripe tomatoes, one half ripe avocado, bean sprouts, walnuts, carrots, cranberries... add some organic peppers for extra antioxidants!
Stuffed portabella with sliced oranges and quartered persimmon: GF, V
I love portabella mushrooms and locally we can get a giant box for about five dollars from the mushroom facotry. Marc cooked these from a recipe but here are more simple instructions:
Set oven to 375 and spray a pan with olive oil, de-stem the mushrooms and wash
Make your favorite stuffing- I like 1/2 cup quinoa flour mixed with 4 tbs. nutritional yeast, a dash of liquid aminos, and 1/2 canned pumpkin. Flip the mushroom caps top down, stuff them and season to taste. Bake for 35 minutes checking to make sure the mushrooms do not burn.
Banana split: GF, V, P
This is so easy to do! You need 1/2 cup chia seeds, 1/2 can coconut cream (slightly frozen), carob powder, bananas, strawberries and the coconut milk from the can.
Just separate the coconut cream from the milk and place in freezer. Mix the milk with the chia seeds and place in the fridge. Wait about 4 hours from the chia to expand like tapioca and then top the chia/coconut milk with strawberries, banana, the frozen coconut cream and carob powder- really good!
Roasted brussel sprouts: GF, V, P
If you have a cast iron grill you can get some summer grill flavor in the winter months! I started by oiling the pan and adding halved brussel sprouts with liquid aminos and garlic powder. Cook them on medium to get the grill lines and then add a little water and lower the temperature to cook the sprouts slowly. When they are almost done, add your thinner vegetable strips (red pepper and onion here) for flavor and allow the water (if any is left) to evaporate.
Colorful coleslaw: GF, V, P
One of my favorites and packed with vitamins and antioxidants, this take about 10 minutes of prep and does contain some soy so it is not strict paleo. The ingredients you will need to chop up are: 1/3 red cabbage, 1 apple, 2 celery stalks, 1/2 red pepper, few carrots. Just chop your ingredients and add a splash of lemon and some veganese mayo. Top with cracked pepper and chill before serving.
Stuffed butternut squash: GF, V, P
Set your oven to 400, split and de-seed a butternut squash and place flesh-down in about 1-2 inches of water in a glass or metal pan. You will bake these for about 35-45 minutes depending on how soft you want the flesh to be. I usually cook them for 35 and stick the squash in the microwave it it needs further cooking. Scoop the squash meat out to allow for stuffing and fill with your choice. I used a olive oil-garlic-spinach mixture with red pepper flakes and fresh, raw walnuts.
Simple sweet potato pancake: GF, V, P
The paleo diet includes most vegetables but dissuades the dieter from eating white potatoes; however, I used yams and sweet potatoes to make a potato pancake as a brunch food. Just bake 3 potatoes (Japanese yams or sweet potatoes) on 400 for about one hour, cube and mash (I leave the skins on) and add the following: 2 Tbs. coconut butter, 1 cup almond milk, 1/8 cup nutritional yeast and dill and pepper to taste. You can eat the mashed potatoes or have leftovers to make into patties. Fry on medium in a pan after adding quinoa flower to solidify the mixture. Eat as a pancake or burger!
Falafel and spicy spinach with hommus: GF, V
The falafels take a while to prepare and cook so you may want to use a mix. They also use a lot of oil, but are great when you feel like something greasy to eat :)
To make the falafels from scratch, add 1 can of chickpeas with 1 medium chopped onion, 1 tsp corriander and 1 tsp cumin, a bulb of garlic (I love garlic so this may be a bit much!), black pepper and 3 Tbs quinoa flour. Combine in a blender/food processor and form into patties.
Cook in a deep fryer or a frying pan with plenty of oil and press on to a cloth when you remove them. They won't take more a a few minutes on each side to cook and will turn golden or light brown.
Add chopped vegetable salad, hummus and spicy red pepper brazed spinach for a tasty meal!
Veggie fajita mix: GF, V, P
Before...
After!
Spicy fajitas with guacamole: GF, V, P
I often will make a veggie fajita when I have a bunch of veggies and want to clear out some space in the fridge. The purple snap peas are technically not paleo, belonging to the legume family, but I am not strict about paleo- it is best to always have a variety.
My suggestions are to use a cabbage or lettuce leave as the taco "shell"- here I have a tortilla made out of almond meal/flour but the green leaves are much easier to use and I like the added crunch. Here again I have used the cast iron pan to grill the peppers, spring onions, sweet potato slices, zucchini and tomato. The black beans are also not paleo but you don't have to have them for a good fajita! Whip up some guac or salsa to go with and have some tequila :) My guacamole recipe is as follows:
2 ripe avocadoes mashed, 1 small yellow onion minced, 3 Tbs of lemon or lime juice, 5 garlic cloves minced, 4 small roma tomatoes diced and 1/2 tsp cumin, black pepper to taste, a splash of liquid aminos.
Super-stuffed, quartered butternut squash: GF, V, P
For this winter dish, just cook the butternut squash as mentioned in a recipe above and when it is finished fill it with the following:
Yellow or red quinoa cooked in a pressure or rice cooker with one veggie bouillon cube. Diced tomatoes and cracked pepper. A great side dish high in vitamin A and amino acids for a complete protein.
Sloppy flatbread pizza: GF, V
Pizza is something that is highly individualized but for all of the following I have used Red Mill Gluten-free crust with No-Egg egg substitute and olive oil. The topping and crust thickness vary but one simple rule to follow is to bake the crust first until it really is almost done. When you then spread the tomato preserves or sauce over the crust make sure you focus on the edges and not the center, you don't want to end up with a soggy middle!
If you don't happen to have soy cheese you can use tofu, which I have done in the above photo. I dry the tofu out a bit with a cheesecloth and then slice it, place in a bowl with olive oil, basil, Italian seasoning to taste and crush the ingredients together with tomato paste into a topping. Add your tomato preserves and sauce, then your mushrooms, peppers, pineapple, zucchini, etc... and cover with the tofu mixture. Add nutritional yeast and salt to taste, red chili pepper and other such items. Cook for 30 more minutes at 375, keeping an eye on the crust to see it doesn't burn.
Asparagus and "pepperoni" pizza: GF, V
Here I have prepared the crust in advance and then added tomato paste, soy pepperoni, asparagus stems and soy-free cheese. My favorite :)
Taco pizza: GF, V
This pizza follows the above method but is more spicy with onions, peppers, tortilla chips, soy-free cheese, Tabasco and black beans.
Green and yellow vegetable curry: GF, V, P
Curry with rice (sub cauliflower for paleo) is a great dish because you can pick yellow, red or green. I think both the red and green are quite spicy but in different ways so you will want to give all a try at some point. The meal above was made in essentially the same way with similar vegetables but different spices. It is easiest to always start with onions frying in a pan, add garlic, add some coconut milk and curry spice of choice. I simmer these ingredients while I boil the vegetables.
For the yellow curry I would suggest sweet potato, cabbage, yellow onion, garlic, carrot, bamboo shoots, basil leaves and pineapple. For the green, which is more spicy and my favorite- purple cabbage, white onion, garlic, spinach and basil leaves, yam, Indian peas, okra.
When all of your vegetables are just about cooked as well as you want them, pour the spice/onion/garlic/coconut milk into the vegetable mixture and let that simmer. I always end up having to put in more olive oil and curry spice at the end because I don't estimate well on how many vegetables I will end up having. This is a fabulous dish for leftovers!
If you are subbing cauliflower for rice, just cook the cauliflower in a pressure cooker on high for 3 minutes or steam it until it is soft like cous cous.
Vegetable sushi: GF, V
Sushi can take a while as far as prep time goes but you can make extra for the next day. I always cook my sushi rice in a rice cooker and then while it is still hot and sticky I add rice vinegar (to taste), mix it, and set it in the fridge to cool. It takes a while for it to be manageably cool enough to work with your fingers.
While you wait for the rice to cool, slice up some avocado, cucumber, cooked sweet potato, carrot, celery- always cut it thinner then you think you will need. Keep some sesame seeds handy to sprinkle on top and gluten free soy sauce and wasabi for dipping.
When the rice is cool, fill a bowl with warm salt water (for your hands in between rolls) and lay out sheets of seaweed nearby. Place one sheet on a cutting board and add some rice (don't be skimpy) then place vegetables about 1/3 of the way up the roll on the rice. Roll the rice/veggies/seaweed paper towards yourself, always pulling it tight to make a clean roll. When you have all the rolls you want, use a serrated knife to make sushi pieces. Keep the knife clean and dip it in the water (as you did with your hands) in between uses.
Chill a bit and enjoy!
More Mexican flavor: V
Taco salad mix: GF, V
I would just add that you can have a good paleo taco salad if you want to roast asparagus, spring onions and broccoli, cut up avocado, slice and simmer mushrooms and onions and garlic in coconut butter, make homemade salsa and spread it on a bed of lettuce. I will have to add our raw taco cashew meat to the recipes later...
Mini fajitas with avocado and roasted spring onion: GF, V
Use lettuce or cabbage wraps to go paleo as well!
Strawberry shortcake: V
This dish is delicious and not the most healthy of my choices, but I think a fine dessert here and there is absolutely deserved! With this I just follow the Bisquick recipe for shortcake and use No Egg egg substitute and almond milk. The strawberries are fresh and I added coconut sugar on top. You can use coconut milk and agave to really sweeten up the dessert. It's almost like eating a vegan strawberry pancake in a bowl :)
Autumn harvest lunch: GF, V, P
Marc is a great cook when it comes to soup. He follows recipes and I just make stuff up... Overall I would say he does better than I do with outcomes! Here we just had steamed asparagus and veggie soup. The potatoes are delicious when you use new potatoes coated in olive oil and rosemary and placed in the oven at 375 (on a greased pan) to cook for about 30 minutes. The skin should get crunchy and you can add more seasonings if you lose any in the oven. The pumpkin dumplings are made by mixing 1 can of pumpkin flesh with 2 No Egg egg subs, 1/4 cup nutritional yeast, 1/4 cup quinoa flour and 3 Tbs coconut butter. 1/4 tsp baking powder can be added as well. Just massage the mixture and drop Tbs by Tbs into a pot of boiling water, leaving for roughly 10 minutes- then strain and season to make either spicy or sweet!
Baked acorn squash with quinoa: GF, V, P
Acorn squash can be baked the same way butternut is, by flipping the squash and placing it in a pan with 1 to 2 inches of water and baking for about 30 minutes on 400 (varies by oven). After it is almost completely baked, pull the squash out and dump the water. Set the squash upright in a glass pan and stuff with pre-cooked quinoa. I add fresh craisins, nuts, apple pieces, tomato and garlic for a sweet-savory taste. Spray olive oil on top or mix it in and then place the pan back in the oven for another 20-30 minutes at 350.
