Dane, The Other Leg: the second half of the KC Vegan Crawl!

Welcome to Day 5 of Vegan MoFo!! I want to rep KC vegans today!! Sundays are getting coined as the "Vegan Crawl" in Kansas City because it is an all-day celebration of delicious, local, vegan food. The crawl starts at my house, where I do the underground restaurant thing, and it ends at Dane's house! Dane's thing is all about sustainable food systems and lifestyles, and eating well for nourishment of the body and the earth. After dinner at his house, he gives a talk (or video, etc.) as part of his "sustainability Sunday" series on living locally. He even creates handouts to take home so you don't forget all the good info he gave you! Awesome!

Dane's Tower o' Local Produce:

He's actually an artist by trade, but has been honing his vegan cooking skills most recently, in order to share his passion for local, vegan food. He wants to show people that eating kindly and sustainably can taste good, too! Go figure!
Here are a few dishes he has prepared for his Sustainability Sunday dinners!

Baked Acorn Squash stuffed with a saute of kale, garbanzo beans, garlic, onions, and walnuts;

Candied Yams;

Roasted Turnips with Crystallized Ginger and Garlic

(all with local produce!)For dessert: Whole Grain Traveler Bread from local bakery, Fervere, schmeared with Dane's homemade local pumpkin butter!Another night: Wild Rice Pilaf with Cannellini Beans and a Mushroom Cream Sauce;

Herbed New and Sweet Potatoes;
Coconut-Ginger Roasted Carrots and Radishes

Last night's awesome meal: Apple-Watermelon Gazpacho, made with his homemade fruit stock and topped with fresh apples

And, because you can't have soup without something for dipping: Homemade Kamut Pita!Bread is for sharing!!For dessert: Vegan Puff Pastry (made by Dane's boss, a former pastry chef) filled with custard and toasted almonds, and then topped with powdered sugar and blackberries. mmmmm.Rosemary Olive Oil Flatbread with Apple-Pear-Walnut Chutney, both homemade, of course.

And, from the first night I went to his sustainability dinner, Fruit Rotini Pasta made by local Pappardelle's pasta makers, topped with local Tomato Peach Marinara;

Ciabatta Bread from Fervere Bakery

Dessert: Orchard Bread, also from Fervere Bakery, with Whipped Agave "Butter" (which he made. duh.)
I love it!

Alfredooooooooo! I've missed you!

I am in a veeeerry good mood after my dinner tonight! I made Vegan Alfredo Sauce over Local Sweet Potato Pasta, with Sauteed Kale and Homemade Italian Sausages!!! This meal is exciting for a number of reasons!! I think they will make you happy, too!

1) The Italian Sausage is homemade, for my DIY post this week. Homemade sausages are sooooo much better than store-bought, and a whole lot cheaper! I must admit, I do love a Tofurkey Beer Brat or Field Roast Apple-Sage Sausage when I am feeling lazy, but it is realy worth the effort to make my own! Did I mention that it's cheaper?! I used Julie Hasson's famous steamed sausage recipe from the Everyday Dish site. These are so good! I should have made a ton of them and frozen them for later use....maybe next time. 2) I finally got to have Alfredo Sauce! I haven't had any alfredo-type sauce since going vegan, which is about three years now! I know, I know, there are tons of vegan alfredo recipes out there. I just never remembered to make them, really! Soooo, with the help of some PPK'ers, I found Lachesis' Vegan Alfredo recipe on the PPK forums, and it is so wonderful! Another DIY part of this meal...homemade sauces kick the crap out of store-bought sauces. This is a fact. Decadent, yes, but we could all use a little extra fat in our meals now and again! Oh goodness this was so flavorful and creamy and just like I remembered alfredo sauce being in my pregan days! JOY!!!3) I used the local Sweet Potato Pasta from Pappardelle's, a local pasta-maker here in KC. And I loved it! The sweet potato flavor wasn't too strong, but definetely there! Thanks farmer's market! :)4) This was a healthy and complete meal, pretty quick and easy to make, and it tasted amazing...what's not to love?!??!

(No Animals) Sufferin' Succotash!

Yeah, cheezy title. sorry. This post is aptly named because I discovered a new vegan-friendly restaurant in Kansas City today: Succotash! This was the first Saturday of the season that I went to the farmer's market in downtown KC, which was exciting in itself, but while I was there, I of course had to eat lunch! So when I saw Succotash, it was obvious what my job was. I had heard it was great before AND my mom had a gift certificate AND I was at the City Market, where it is located....how could I not eat there?? The restaurant is in a warehouse-type space and it is decorated really cool, lots of bright colors, paintings, retro lamps, etc.....Also, they have great food! The Pitch voted them best breakfast in Kansas City! I wouldn't say this applied to vegans, as there weren't really many vegan breakfast items, but the lunch food was wonderful! About 90% of the people who worked there were really nice and helpful, but I guess you always remember the 10% that wasn't. Anyway, one of the girls who worked there was vegan, and she pointed out some options on the menu and substitutions and whatnot.

I had the Veggie Wrap: spinach tortilla stuffed with lemony lima bean hummus (subbed for the eggs and cheese. yuck.) , succotash, sun-dried tomatoes, and spinach, served with a HUGE side of home fries! This was amazing! The succotash was really crisp and flavorful, with tons of dill in it, and the lima bean hummus was amazingly creamy and fresh-tasting. I am in love!My mom had the Veggie Quesadilla: spinach tortilla with grilled succotash, tomatoes, spring greens, sun-dried tomatoes, and lemony lima bean hummus (subbed for cheese again), served with also a HUGE side of home fries. She really, really liked this, too! It was a lot like the wrap I had, since we made so many substitutions to make the items vegan, but we both loved what we had! And it was really reasonably priced! Yesssssss!While we were at the farmer's market, we picked up some Sweet Potato Pasta from Pappardelle's, a local pasta maker/vendor. They had a wide selection of pastas to choose from, but many of them had eggs in them. Luckily, they were really helpful in picking out which did not contain eggs, and I knew which one I had to have when my eyes landed on the words "sweet potato" and "pasta" since I am a carb lover and proud of it! Now I just need to figure out a meal special enough to use this in!We also stopped by a local natural foods store, Green Acres Market, to pick up a few groceries. While shopping, we discovered they had a new vegan item in their bakery: Vegan Chocolate Chip Raspberry Bars! I was pumped, because I love the raspberry chocolate chip blondies from VWAV, and these were inexpensive and already made for me! Lazy points! These were really good...not even close to as good as Isa's, duh....but quite tasty for a natural food store's bakery section! The crust was nice and dense and there was just the perfect amounts of both raspberry and chocolate. Very nice. In unrelated news, we had Waldo Pizza for dinner last night! Waldo is a KC local pizza place that has Follow Your Heart Vegan Mozzerella as a topping option, toooooons of veggie topping choices, and several vegan crust and sauce choices! They even sometimes have vegan cookies and brownies, but only if you go on the right day. Figures. We had the standard Veggie Pizza with Vegan Mozzerella...I added some Italian-Baked Tofu I made once we got it home, you know, for a litte more protein. It was so freakin' delicious!! The traditional crust is just the right thickness and it is soft and flavorful and crisp on the edges and perfect! It is nice to know you can always get a good vegan pizza in Kansas City!

Also eaten this week was my Green Tea-Almond Noodles! It's a recipe I have been working on and thinking about (you know how it is....) for a while now, and I think it is pretty much "there." This Asian-style dish is basically udon noodles, toasted almonds, veggies, and the Green Tea Almond Sauce (below), and it makes for a pretty quick and filling meal on a busy weeknight! This was a perfect pre-LOST treat!

Green Tea-Almond Sauce (makes approx. 2 1/2 cups)

2 cups water plus 2 bags green tea

1/4 cup cold water whisked with 2 Tbs cornstarch

1/4 cup soy sauce

1/2 tsp ginger powder

1/2 tsp garlic powder

1/4 tsp black pepper

1/4 tsp crushed red pepper (optional for extra heat)

1/4 tsp almond extract

1 Tbs maple syrup or agave nectar

2 Tbs Dijon or spicy mustard

Bring water to a boil and add tea bags. Remove from heat and let steep for 5 minutes. Remove tea bags return to medium heat. Add the cornstarch slurry and the rest of the ingredients and whisk constantly for about 5 minutes, until the sauce has thickened to a honey-like consistency. Toss with noodles, veggies, and almonds, and then serve hot or cold!

p.s. Is everybody ready to make Easter dinner tomorrow? What are you fixing?