Category Archives: Vegan Mofo

VGNMOFO 2018: Oreo Truffles

September 5, 2018

I can’t remember when my sister first made these. I remember I was near the end of college or was just out when my sister first made these. They were pretty simple, just crushed up oreos and cream cheese. I was pretty skeptical of them, but they were really yummy. She made them every christmas and birthday party for several years, but not so much anymore.

This recipe is fairly new, but dates earlier than 2009 when I got out of college. AllRecipes has a recipe for Oreo Truffles, and the earliest review I could find was 2003. It is clearly a favorite treat, there are over 800 reviews of the recipes. Most everyone loved the ease of the recipe, but complained that it was too sweet. All Recipe has a simple ingredients list, oreos, cream cheese, powdered sugar, and chocolate for coating.

It isn’t a surprise to see why people love this recipe. They are practically just a cake pop but made with a premade cookie. So they can easily be decorated and if you use white chocolate, the skies the limit. It is pretty easy to customize as well, just use mint oreos, or peanut butter. If you cut down on the cream cheese you just use the speciality flavors. Some people stuff cherries or marshmallows in the middle.

But I wanted to try and make this as accessible as possible to everyone. You can use ANY creme filled cookie sandwich that is vegan. Sorry to all the UK readers who don’t have vegan oreos. Store brands are fine, hydrox check, Newman O’s if your fancy. I also made a homemade “cream cheese” that is a mix of silken tofu and cashews. I made a special post the other day about it. I explain why in the post. But don’t worry, you can just use a container of tofutti if you really want to.

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Posted by Jennifer in Recipe, Vegan Mofo, Vegan Mofo 2018 Tags: american candy, cream cheese, oreos, truffles, Vegan MOFO, vegan mofo 2018

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VGNMOFO 2018: Cream Cheese

September 4, 2018

This vegan mofo has been a little ambitious. So many sweets, so little time. I feel like I will have to eat salad for the next month to give my body a break from all the sugar. But many American recipes rely on some pantry staples. I’ve read so many recipes that use a container of cool-whip or a block of cream cheese.

Yes you can find vegan versions of these things, but I know for some international readers this implies paying a lot for imports. Or maybe you just don’t feel like shelling out $3+ for a container of cream cheese. And sometimes the homemade versions just don’t give the same texture.

So here I am sharing this quick little cream cheese recipe. It isn’t my favorite for a bagel topping, despite the photo, but it works perfectly in the recipes needed this month. All you need is a box of extra firm silken tofu, cashews, lemon juice, and apple cider vinegar. Super simple recipe.

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Posted by Jennifer in Recipe, Vegan Mofo, Vegan Mofo 2018 Tags: cashews, cream cheese, silken tofu, Vegan MOFO, vegan mofo 2018

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VGNMOFO 2018: American Cakes: Martha Washington Great Cake

September 3, 2018

This is a cake I was very excited to try out. I never really had too many fruit cakes, but I found the photos very interesting. There was something very pretty about a pretty golden cake with lots of little berries baked inside. And there was also booze in the cake. I am always down with that. This cake has been altered quite a bit in the American Cakes cookbook. Many changes I am happy about, omitting the citron and lemon peels, and using white wine instead of the more heavy sweet fortified wines like brandy or madeira. Many online recipes also offer a frosting/icing to go on top of the cake, which I think it is too much. This is a rich dense cake, very similar to a pound cake with spiked fruit inside. I think it stands very well by itself.

This cake was made by Martha Washington– the first First Lady. She supposedly made this cake when George was returning home from serving as president, making it in time for Christmas. The recipe was written down by her Great Granddaughter Martha Parke Custis and is the main reason why the recipe still survives today.

Another thing that I liked from it’s modern adaptation is how much it has been scaled down. Part of the “great” in “great cake” is the sheer size. Readers of the blog might remember me describing the massive size of Election Cakes, and this cake was quite large as well.

Take 40 eggs & divide the whites from the yolks & beat them to a froth then work 4 pounds of butter to a cream & put the whites of eggs to it a spoon full at a time till it is well work’d then put 4 pounds of sugar finely powder’d to it in the same manner than put in the Youlks of eggs and 5 pounds of flower and 5 pounds of fruit, 2 hours will bake it add to it half an ounce of mace and nutmeg half a pint of wine & some fresh brandy.

I’ve even taken the size of the recipe down even further! The original recipe calls for a pound of currants, and I had to buy bulk organic currants. It wasn’t terribly expensive, but I found that the currants were quite old, and very dry. So they soaked up a LOT of wine. I later found that it was easier to find 10 oz boxes. The original recipe calls for a larger than normal loaf pan, so I figured I would scale the 16 oz currants to one box. I crunched the numbers and worked out well.

When I first baked the cake I replaced the butter for oil thinking that it would be dense enough to handle the softer texture. I added some baking soda to the mix for some rise, as the original recipe didn’t. And finally I replaced the eggs with aquafaba since the cake was light in color and I wanted to keep it flax fleck free. As I started to mix the aquafaba to the sugar-oil mix, I noticed it acting very similar to a pound cake. It made me wonder if I could skip the leavening agent all together.

So the second time making the cake was when I scaled down the size, and baked like a normal pound cake. I was VERY nervous. But it worked! Surprising I know! The photos might look like the cake is under baked, and it might of been just a smidge. I think I over soaked the currants (I did it overnight) making the cake a little too moist. But the texture was definitely cooked!

So here are some important notes about the ingredients. You will want a nice white wine. Pick something you would drink, but still have it be on the lower end of cost. I omitted the mace from the recipe, but it should traditionally be in there. I also used Earth Balance and specified it in the recipe. It worked for this, but I can not promise how homemade butters would work.

The oven is also on low and slow! This cake takes over 2 hours to bake! Plus 2 hours of soaking! This is going to take a loooong time to make, but very hands off. I hope this doesn’t scare off too many people, because this does make a great cake for the holiday season. One that might get people to question what they think of a “fruit cake.”

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Posted by Jennifer in Recipe, Vegan Mofo, Vegan Mofo 2018 Tags: 1650-1799, American Cake Off, American Cakes, booze, currants, fruit cake, Vegan MOFO, vegan mofo 2018, white wine

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VGNMOFO 2018: Needhams

September 2, 2018

It’s been a hot summer, and it really has been a damper on my desire to bake lots of cakes and pies. Ouch. But that doesn’t mean I wasn’t busy in the kitchen. Nope. I’ve just been busy exploring other parts of American desserts- candies. I am not a big candy maker, but I do have fond memories as a child of buttering my fingers and cutting hot sugar and rolling them into hard candies.

The first candy I was happy to feature on the blog doesn’t use melted sugar. It is a very simple candy to make, like most American candies, but has an ingredient that is unexpected- potato. I’ve made them twice before, once from a vegan recipe from Homestyle Vegan. I’ve simplified and more readily “veganized” the recipe today. But… let’s take a step back- What is a needham? Where are they from? And what’s the history?!

Well, a needham is made with sugar, coconut, mashed potatoes, and butter. They are cut into squares and coated in chocolate. If you are an American and never heard of this candy, chances are you haven’t been to the New England area, specifically Maine. This is a local treat that is kind-of overshadowed by lobster, blueberries, and whoopie pies for tourists. But many Maine natives have fond memories of the dessert.

This history of the Needhams. Like all candy it is shadowed in a bunch of folklore. One story tells about a priest who made the candies to increase church attendance. Another story tells about a candy maker who named the candy Needham after a popular evangelical priest in hopes to increase sales. If you need a non-priest storyline, supposedly one year there were “too many potatoes” for crops and a competition was set up to find new ways to eat them. And guess which recipe won- the needham of course! Most historians think most likely there WAS a competition, but it wasn’t because of a surplus of potatoes but because it was set up by a company that sold potatoes. The facts are that the earliest recipes for Needhams go as far back as 1926/1930

Regardless there is a little something about using potatoes in the candy. It does have some binding properties, making it so you don’t have to do any of the usual candy making heating. Some people claim it cuts down of the sweetness, but I think there is something to be said about the starchy texture in your mouth. If you have time to cover these gems in chocolate give this recipe a go! Don’t be like me who got tired towards the end and just poured the chocolate over the remaining candies. I didn’t include those in the pictures. lol

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Posted by Jennifer in Recipe, Vegan Mofo, Vegan Mofo 2018 Tags: american candies, candy, coconut, Maine, new england, potato, potatoes, Vegan MOFO, vegan mofo 2018

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VGNMOFO 2018: Introduction to American Desserts

September 1, 2018

I’m back for Vegan MOFO! Let’s hope this works out as I hope this year, having a kid makes life pretty hard. At least it makes blogging life hard. lol But I am hopefully I stick to my theme and get more posts than last year. The theme?

AMERICAN DESSERTS! Yes, I have a weird obsession of making good old American desserts rich in dairy and eggs and making political and liberal by veganizing them. What are you going to get? Well hopefully delicious foods, though I will admit, some of these desserts are not my favorites. *shrug* But I’ve been loving the history and recipes from American Cakes, and now this time around I want to expand on some of the non-cake desserts that are very American. What can you hope for? Maybe the Southern version of apple dumplings, depression era vinager pies, and green tomato pies.

If I didn’t already loose you, GREAT! Join me on this journey as I rush to bake a fuck load of goods and give away 50% of them so I don’t vomit from sugar overload. If you can’t wait till tomorrow, you can check out these already veganized American goods:

Cowboy Cake

This cake has a fun twist of using a gose. Although this sour and salty beer is German, Americans go nuts for that shit. So why not give it a try?

Apple Dumplings

This is the REAL apple dumplings- baked apples in a pie crust. Originally a Pennsylvanian-Dutch breakfast, it is now a dessert commonly associated with the Amish.

Election Cake

Ready to bust out the yeast?! This cake takes some time, and booze, but it is a great way to treat your friends for voting (perhaps in THIS current election cycle?!)

Spiced Blackstrap Cake

This is a simple recipe and is soooo yummy. It’s the first recipe from the American Cakes cookbook, and I add my own little flair by using blackstrap molasses to give it a kick.

Irish Potatoes

Traditionally these have no potatoes, nor are they Irish. But my recipe puts a little potato in them, making them not your traditional South Jersey/Philadelphia treat.

Wacky Cake with Caramel Icing

Every vegan knows about this cake- one of the first vegan cakes out there! You can use any frosting, but I adapted the caramel icing from American Cakes so you don’t even need to wait for your cake to cool to frost.

Chocolate Sauerkraut Cake

Before we were sneaking veggies into kids food, we were adding sauerkraut because- well we didn’t have much else sometimes. Even though it seems a little odd, the kraut add a nice moistness to the cake.

Applesauce Cake

Apparently American were the first to use applesauce in baking. A tradition that haunts almost all vegans who don’t regularly find the stuff on their grocery shelves. It might be an American obsession.

Posted by Jennifer in Vegan Mofo, Vegan Mofo 2018 Tags: Vegan MOFO, vegan mofo 2018

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Vegan MOFO 2017: In the Weeds

October 31, 2017

Okay so this isn’t a scary drink or cake for Halloween. This drink was GOING to be posted last week but I didn’t quite squeeze it in. Which means my last cake post will be tomorrow (or later in the week) as a result. Not quite making it for Vegan MOFO. NOOOO!

But if you want something spooky, might I recommend making the Masala Bloody Mary, Green Mary, Reanimator, Suspira, Spiced Pumpkin Carriage, or the Pumpkin Spice Macaccino for those who don’t partake in alcohol.

I could of named this cocktail something like Spicy Cucumber Lemongrass Spritzer, but cocktails need names damn it! Names that tells you NOTHING about the drink itself. Bloody Mary? Tells you nothing about ingredients (I mean other than something’s red), Tom Collins still nothing, Death in the Afternoon, nope. Manhattan– well you get the point.

So how did I get this name? Well, similarly to the Green Mary, I have a lot plants going into this drink. And for the most part, they are things I don’t use often enough. The lemongrass set forever in my fridge, cucumbers always go bad, and I have to be very careful with jalapenos since they can make the air toxic when cooking. Add in the slightly green color of the cocktail, I thought it was a great name.

I like this cocktail because you muddle the cucumber with a little bit of sugar. That way you don’t need any simple syrup or a juicer. Heck you don’t even need a fancy muddler- I just used the other end of my ice cream scoop.

As usual I am too lazy to actually buy citruses so I used some orange bitters to top it off and some lemon seltzer. I am glad about that choice because it gives the whole drink a nice light and clean taste.

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Posted by Jennifer in Recipe, Vegan Mofo, Vegan Mofo 2017 Tags: cocktails, cucumber, lemongrass jalapeno vodka, Vegan MOFO, vegan mofo 2017

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Vegan MOFO 2017: Green Mary

October 26, 2017

I’ve finally made this cocktail! I had the idea to make a bloody mary with tomatillos for awhile. But was nervous about where to start, so I googled it and there are MANY people who had a similar idea. At first I was going to make a recipe for a recipe roundup (the tomatillo edition will be coming up soon!) but I never seemed to have all the ingredients. I didn’t want to spend a lot of money for something that isn’t really food.

It also didn’t help that I never had vodka on hand. I am not a huge vodka person, I don’t quite see the point. So it doesn’t have any flavor? Isn’t the fun of booze to have the flavor? I get it- there is a time and place for vodka, and some of the liquors I like are pretty much infused vodkas.

So when it became tomatillo season here I knew I really HAD to make some cocktails with tomatillos. I jazzed things up a little and made the jalapeno lemongrass vodka, and decided to use it in the bloody mary. Since the vodka uses lemongrass, I tried to use more “asian” based mix ins. Instead of tabasco sauce, I used a little Sriracha. Instead of vegan Worcestershire sauce, I use some sweet soy sauce.

If you are interested in this drink but not a spicy person, simply make the lemongrass vodka without jalapenos. I would recommend keeping in the sriracha, it add just a hint of spice. The recipe makes 4 drinks, and they aren’t very strong. If you want to make them stronger just change the ratio of water to vodka, though you might want to change the serving size to 6 glasses instead of 4.

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Posted by Jennifer in Recipe, Vegan Mofo, Vegan Mofo 2017 Tags: bloody mary, cocktails, lemongrass jalapeno vodka, tomatillos, Vegan MOFO, vegan mofo 2017, vodka

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Vegan MOFO 2017: Infusing Vodka- Jalapeno Lemongrass

October 25, 2017

I am always shocked at how many vodkas aren’t vegan. Stupid filters! And it gets more complicated when you start going into the flavored vodkas. Is the bacon vodka vegan? So cake vodka is vegan but not candy bar vodka? It can get all so confusing.

But in many ways, buying these flavored vodkas are pointless. It is so easy to make your own at home! It is literally as simple as dropping crap in a bottle, adding vodka, and waiting to two weeks, drain. Okay it involves a little foresight on your end, you need to start making the vodka before creating the cocktail.

I originally made this infused vodka last year… when I was pregnant. haha. I didn’t drink it for awhile. See my CSA started to grow lemongrass, and I didn’t have time to make a curry paste with it. So I soaked it with vodka, waited several months till I could drink again. I was going to make some recipes for cocktails, but I couldn’t find any lemongrass vodkas available commercially. So I knew I would have to make a recipe for the blog.

So now I decided to give the recipe. But I added a little twist. I had a jalapeno from my CSA and couldn’t use it because they were super spicy. Long story short- baby- can’t use it. So I thought make something ONLY for adults (and didn’t involve heating up the pepper). There is a slight trick to this, the jalapeno infuses MUCH faster than the lemongrass and only needs a few hours.

So make this vodka, and I will have a recipe soon posted to use it.

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Posted by Jennifer in Recipe, Vegan Mofo, Vegan Mofo 2017 Tags: cocktails, infusing, jalapeno, jalapenos, lemongrass, Vegan MOFO, vegan mofo 2017, vodka, vodka infusion

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Vegan MOFO 2017: The Cowboy Cake

October 19, 2017

Rations, rations, rations. That is what motivates people to cut out eggs and dairy from their cakes. So I have yet another cake to share that was already vegan. Naturally I made some modifications, but let’s start with the history.

Many kids in America has played The Oregon Trail. I have not. But if you haven’t played it, the premise was pretty easy. It was a computer game where you traveled across the United States on the Oregon Trail to get to the west. On the REAL Oregon trail, you probably would of made this cake. Or if you were traveling anywhere really, whether you were a cowboy or relocating. Most everything in this recipe is shelf stable, making it great for most pioneers.

The recipe may look familiar with other cakes- boiled raisin cake, war cake, depression cake, or my favorite milkless eggless butterless cake (thanks wikipedia) What makes this version pretty awesome is that you don’t dirty up too many dishes. Unlike the Wacky Cake, which tries to only use one pan, this one really isn’t mess when mixing the batter. Sure you will have to dirty up another small pot, and something to drain the raisins, but overall it is a pretty easy clean up

Now I could of just made the recipe line by line, but I thought this could use some jazzing up. First I stuck with raisins, but you can easily swap out any other dried fruit. The recipe even suggests it. Just chop up any large fruit, and just follow the recipe.

But I thought I would use a little booze in the recipe. I thought and thought about what kind- and finally settled on a gose beer (pronounced go-suh). A Gose is a sour beer originating in Germany. It is spiced with coriander, and is known to be salty. It gets it’s name since it originally was brewed in the town Goslar. The style almost disappeared in obscurity, but it has recently become really popular since the rise of sour beers.

Can’t find a gose beer? Any sour beer will work just fine. If you don’t know a lot about beer, just ask someone who is working at the liquor store or look for any bottle with sour, lambic, or wild ale. If you choose just a sour beer (or any type of sour juice) remember to add a pinch of salt, gose beers are naturally salty.

I used Sixpoint Jammer. It is a gose that is vegan and American, so I like that. I was lucky enough to buy the can individually from Total Wines and More, but you can also see if you can order it online. But remember, this isn’t the ONLY vegan gose out there. There are tons, and it might even be from the country you live in.

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Posted by Jennifer in Beer, Recipe, Vegan Mofo, Vegan Mofo 2017 Tags: 1800-1869, American Cake Off, beer, booze, cake, cowboy cake, gose, raisins, Vegan MOFO, vegan mofo 2017

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Vegan MOFO 2017: Chocolate Sauerkraut Cake

October 18, 2017

“Why can’t you make normal cakes?” asks my husband. Duh- that would be boring. I am very much that type of person who hears about something weird and crazy and instead of thinking “that sounds gross, I should stay away” I think “my god, that sounds gross! there must be something to it!” I’ve ordered a mustard cocktail, miso ice cream, and spicy pepper ice cream. This is one of those instances- sauerkraut? In a cake?

Another appeal of this cake is that it has Pennsylvania Dutch roots. I probably should make a post of all the regional recipes featured on this blog. And this isn’t the only Pennsylvanian dutch recipe featured in the book. There the shoofly pie, which pushes the definition of a cake (and a pie) and the Moravian Sugar Cake, which sadly I know I will not have anytime to attempt (it uses yeast.)

Since it is National Chocolate Cupcake Day, here is a little fun chocolate cake history. It took quite sometime for bakers to add chocolate to their sweets. Originally chocolate was viewed as a medicine, and was more focused in Europe for melting in milk, or making milk chocolate bars. I think you can hear more about this evolution from Stuff You Missed in History Class But slowly it made it’s way in a cookbook in a very small amount in a spiced cake. Sarah Roerer takes the credit for pouring melted chocolate into a cake, to make a “healthy” cake. Do you think we will be laughing about how we make “superfood” desserts by adding spirulina and maca to our cakes in the future?

And there may be many of you wondering “what’s up with Devil’s Food Cake?” This is something I’ve been wondering for a LONG time as a child. According to Wikipedia and American Cakes– not much. Early recipes used a lot of different things in the batter- sour milk, heavy cream, sour cream, baking powder, baking soda, white sugar, brown sugar, melted chocolate, cocoa powder, spices, and even mashed potatoes. Confusing huh? Make things even more confusing not all Devil’s Food cakes has the same frosting. What can be agreed on that Devil’s Food Cake is a fun name next to the other American classic- Angel’s Food Cake. And in general, there’s more chocolate than normal so the cake is super rich and dark.

The recipe in American Cakes calls for chocolate sour cream frosting. The recipe reminded me of the simple chocolate mousse recipes I’ve seen using silken tofu. I would make my own sour cream from silken tofu anyways, so I just used the Chocolate Mousse from The Post Punk Kitchen (from the Cupcakes Take Over the World cookbook) Depending on how you like the frosting you can halve the recipe. I use maybe 60% of the recipe, but it is plausible to use the whole thing.

Just like the book, I used canned sauerkraut. It worked out fine, but I think you would probably get dreamier texture by using homemade or “fresher” sauerkraut. I normally buy jarred sauerkraut but I didn’t have two cups. If you don’t really like sauerkraut but want to give this recipe a go, I suggest sticking with canned. It will have exactly enough you need.

this is what happens when you try and take photos for the blog with a kid… they just want to see what is going on.

Like any cake recipe this really isn’t “healthy.” But it does have a fair amount of iron and vitamin c (from the sauerkraut and cocoa powder). So I guess if you are a menstruating pirate- this will help fight anemia and scurvy! If you are a fretful parent who is thinking about making a fruit cake for their baby’s first birthday, this one isn’t the worst. You can cut down on the salt and sugar. And the frosting is made with tofu so you get a little bonus protein!

That being said, I am all for just straight up enjoying your cake. I liked the taste, and I think I would just chop the sauerkraut more in the future. It is super moist and easy to make. Oh and a little extra fiber. What is there not to like?