Coconut-Cherry Muffins

This is officially the first baked-good recipe that I have developed 100% on my own, with no inspiration or measurements or anything from another source. And I expected to have to make a few trials, tweak it a bit here and there, but the first time was pretty perfect. Beginner's luck I guess. The muffins came out light and airy, moist but not soggy, and the flavors were wonderful together. The dried Rainier cherries came from Trader Joe's, one of those things that look good on the shelf so you buy them, thinking . . . some day. But now that my tiny little pantry cupboard is so full that things fall out of it when I open the door, it's time to use up those some day items. But I'm sure these would work fine with any dried fruit. Maybe that dried mango I bought for some day.

Coconut-Cherry Muffins

Makes about 7 muffins

1/2 cup dried Rainier cherries, soaked in hot water until plump, then drained and chopped
3/4 cup light coconut milk
1 Tbsp ground flax seed
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup whole wheat pastry flour
1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp baking powder
3 Tbsp canola oil
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla
Shaved coconut

Mix together coconut milk and flax seed and set aside until gooey, then add canola oil, sugar, and vanilla and mix well. Whisk together flours, salt, and baking powder, then add wet ingredients and cherries to flour mixture and stir just until combined. Fill lined muffin tin almost to the top and crumble shaved coconut on top of batter. Bake at 350 degrees for 18 to 20 minutes.

Dan's Birthday Dinner

Last week was my lovely husband Dan's birthday. But since we had just returned from our Seattle/Portland vacation (where we ate roughly 80,000 calories, I'm estimating) two days before, there wasn't much time to plan much of a celebration. On the cab ride home from the airport (at 11:30 on a Tuesday. ugh), Dan declared that he wanted cheesy mac and garlic bread for a birthday dinner. Now, due to those roughly 80,000 calories, I wasn't too stoked on this idea, as what he wanted was one of the first recipes I mastered when I was in college. I have no idea where the original recipe came from, as I think I received a stained print-out from someone along the way. It was incredibly creamy and velvety and delicious but called for loads and loads of both oil and margarine. Add super greasy garlic bread to that, and my vacation-stuffed stomach wasn't thrilled. So I decided it was finally time to de-fat (at least partially) the recipe and see how it turned out. It still needs some tweaking (I think the tempeh needs to be grated for a more "sausage" like texture, and it could maybe be a bit moister), but overall it was a (much-healthier) success. And it gets even better the next day. The tempeh sausage crumbles are straight from Vegan with a Vengeance (minus the spices I had unexpectedly run out of), but the rest is straight from my head.

Tempeh Cheesy Mac

1/2 cup nutritional yeast
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
1 1/2 - 1 3/4 cup water
1 Tbsp soy sauce
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1/8 tsp turmeric
3 Tbsp margarine
paprika
1 1/2 cups macaroni, slightly undercooked
1 recipe tempeh sausage crumbles

Mix nutritional yeast, flour, water, soy sauce, garlice powder, and turmeric together in a small saucepan and heat over medium until thickened. Melt in margarine. In an 8x8 casserole dish, mix together sauce, macaroni, and tempeh and sprinkle with paprika. Bake at 350 for 15 minutes.

And to totally mess up the "healthiness" of the cheesy mac, Dan made his "world famous" garlic bread. Whenever he cooks something, he calls it world famous, even (or maybe especially) when it's the first time he's ever made it. I think the only time I've disputed this title was when he found a cucumber in the fridge, thought it was a zucchini (not sure how one makes that mistake), and put it in chili! Then again, maybe that is world famous, just not in a good way.

And dessert. Strawberry shortcake, with biscuits from Martha, with WAY less sugar on the berries, and whipped Soyatoo. Oh my God, Soyatoo is the best thing ever. Seriously. I whipped it up with half a vanilla bean and a few spoonfuls of sugar, and it reminded me of being a kid and eating spoonful and spoonful of Cool-Whip straight out of the package. I loved that stuff. But knowing that it's 99% chemicals, 1% whey freaks me out now. So thank you, Soyatoo, for actually resembling whipped cream (or whipped-cream-like product) without being icky. The whole thing was incredible, and such an improvement over those weird little sponge cakes at the grocery store.