Corn Porn: Tempeh Tostadas! Mexican Corn!

Fresh, local sweet corn is one of my favorite things about summer!! Corn is so perfect because it is so tasty, so versatile, and so easy to prepare! Of course, looking for local and/or organic corn is ideal for both health and environmental sustainability, but that is easy to find here in Missouri!
I am trying to do a lot of recipe testing for Terry's Vegan Latina cookbook this week, and corn is a huge staple in Latina cooking, so this seasonal delight is showing up on my plate often! No complaints here!

Dinner last night was pretty corn-happy:

Fresh organic corn! Turned into..

A Vegan Latina tester recipe: Mexican Side-Street Corn! Fresh corn is roasted and smothered in all sorts of spices and lime juice! whoa!

Another VL tester recipe: Tempeh Asado! The vegan version of the traditional (and cruel.) carne asada. Tempeh marinated in awesome spices and lime juice, then pan-grilled. It was soooo flavorful!! Tempeh is so wonderful for soaking up flavors and holding on tightly to them until they meet your tongue! The Tempeh Asado is perfect for tacos, burritos, or any Mexican-themed meal...

So I put mine in tostadas for dinner last night! I needed to use up the rest of my tostadas, so Tempeh Asado Tostadas were a great opportunity to reduce my waste. The corny flavor and crunch texture of the tostadas went perfectly with the chewy, savory, tangy tempeh...and some fixings like avocado, red onion, tomato, and local salsa, of course!

And I had some leftover Latina tester So Good, So Green Dipping Sauce which made the feast complete! BTW I moved to Kansas City last week (from Columbia...not too far away)! This was one of my first meals in my new apartment! yay! That made this meal all the more special!

And if you are in KC or thereabouts, holla at me and we can make/eat/demolish some food together or ride bikes or just cause some old-fashioned vegan mayhem in the city! yay!

Latina Tester Salad and Sauce!

Awesome in-season produce was the motivation for tonight's tasty dinner! The local tomatoes are in full swing, so I used the opportunity to put them in a tester recipe for Terry's upcoming Vegan Latina cookbook. I made the Ensalada Chilena recipe, which is actually the national salad of Chile btw, and it is made up of crisp, sweet vidalia onions, ripe tomatoes, and a tangy vinaigrette dressing. This was awesome and the perfect way to show off those local 'maters!

To accompany the salad, I made Pinto Bean Tostadas (just something I threw together, not a test recipe). They had homemade refried pinto beans layered with shredded lettuce, fresh cilantro, chopped jalapenos, green olives, locally-made salsa, and some tester Pickled Red Onions. But they just weren't complete without a special sauce....These just screamed for another Vegan Latina test recipe: the So Good, So Green Dipping Sauce! Truth be told, the tostadas were just an excuse to make this sauce...I have been eying the recipe in the tester forums for months! This dipping sauce is packed with herbs, garlic, and lime, and has the perfect balance of creamy and chunky textures! This sauce is just sooooo flavorful! Went very well with the tostadas, of course!
I could dip about anything into this.....put tostadas, tamales, tacos, empanadas, or just a plain old finger in this sauce and it would still be so rockin!

Tester Tostadas and.....drumroll.....My First Homemade Vegan Doughnuts!

So testing recipes for Terry's upcoming Vegan Latina cookbook just gets better and better....tonight for dinner I made the Black-Eyed Butternut Tostadas. Yeah, you heard me right. Black-eyed peas and butternut squash are mashed up with some spices and such to a refried bean texture and spread on crunchy tostada shells. Then they are topped with shredded lettuce, avocado, local salsa, and a few dollops of vegan sour cream. They are like little towers of deliciousness! I served them up with some of the tester Pickled Red Onions, since I eat them with everything these days!

And I made VEGAN DOUGHNUTS!! I got the urge today and had nothing to do, so I went for it! I used a recipe I found on Melisser's blog, The Urban Housewife, for baked doughnuts, and made up my own chocolate glaze. I hear doughnuts are the new cupcakes, and I am OK with that! Topped with some organic sprinkles, these plus a big mug of hot coffee made my evening absolutely perfect!! I even made them with whole wheat pastry flour, so they are kinda healthy! Woo!

Nekkid doughnuts, post-baking....Chocolate-glazed and sprinkled doughnuts....ready for me to attack...

On another note, I tried a new place to eat in Kansas City, the Record Bar! I thought I had found just about all the vegan food there is to be had in KC, but I was wrong! The Record Bar is part music venue, part bar and grill-type eatery. They have several vegan-friendly menu items, too! I went with my momma, before seeing HP6, so we each tried a different entree! Oh, the joys of a dining companion!

My mom got The Moby Sandwich, which was a roasted portabella with TONS of veggies and balsamic vinaigrette (sans mayo) on herbed focaccia. This sandwich was so tasty AND it came with awesome fries and was a big 'ol meal for not a lot of skrill! Very cool. But, being a bar and all, it didn't have good food porn lighting. Not so cool. As long as the food is good, I'm cool with it! I got the Ian MacKaye Pizza! It was their homemade pizza crust spread with homemade lemony hummus and, again, lots of veggies (including whole cloves of garlic! what a dream!) and kalamata olives. Very, very good!! Who knew bar food could be so vegan!?!