This year for Thanksgiving I became an adult, well, in a way. After a lifetime of attending holidays, sitting at the kiddie table and being the girlfriend/daughter/wife who brought her own main entree because turkeys as food are not in my vocabulary, I hosted a holiday this year. Not just any holiday, the grand poo-bah of food holidays in America. Thanksgiving is about eating until you burst and I’ve never been a fan of that much excess, but I’m a fan of food. I’m happy to provide an excess of food and you can choose how much to (over) eat. I’m very blessed to have in-laws that were willing to make the trip over the mountains and through the woods to Portland to not only spend Thanksgiving with us in our new house, but to have a turkey-free Thanksgiving. I told people if they couldn’t live without the bird, it was their responsibility but everyone was happy and willing to try the seitan animals. We even had special guests at our table this year, the famous Tofu Phil of Small Planet Tofu and his girlfriend. Most people arrived Thursday morning, which meant by default that I did most of the cooking. I was excited to plan a menu for 12 and I went a little overboard. Hey, culinary school ruined me. I can’t just serve three courses and be satisfied. I was a little worried things wouldn’t turn out right but my husband and I worked on some dishes a few days leading up to the big event so the day of we were able to play a few rounds of hearts while the casseroles were in the oven. Everyone helped in the kitchen and I’m happy to say that the food was all hot at the same time, and I’m flattered that everyone ate their fair share plus some.

The savory spread

Let’s talk about what we ate, which is the meat of this post. For snacking there was a wide variety of hummus (even though that’s the stereotype of veg*n food, I do enjoy hummus and was happy to have a million kinds on the table plus chips and crackers and a veggie platter for dipping). The main meal was as follows: (excuse the poor lighting, we were hungry and setting up a light tent was not in the best interest of the group)

• Apple Sage Seitan Creatures (recipe here)
• Maitake-Shiitake Gravy
• Roasted Garlic Mashed Yukon Golds (I used almond milk this year, yum!)
• Green Bean Casserole, courtesy of FatFreeVegan
• Garnet Yam Casserole with Brandied Raisins and Walnuts (this year’s Gourmet holiday issue)
• Roasted Butternut Squash with Rosemary
• Roasted Brussel Sprouts off the stalk with Garlic
• Fresh Salad with tomatoes from our garden (yes we still have some on the vine)
• Dressings: Raw Caesar (ED&BV) and other bottled options

Dessert Station

Desserts:

• Pumpkin Cheesecake (SweetPea recipe, can not share, top secret) with Gingersnap Crust
• Apple Crisp (Mom’s top secret recipe, email me if you want it)
• Apple Cranberry Pie with Crumb Topping (easily veganized)
• Pecan Pie
• Strawberry Rhubarb Pie (courtesy of MIL)
• Truffles, 2 kinds. One had orange extract and chopped cherries mixed in and the other had banana liquor. They were rolled in toasted coconut, cocoa powder or ground pistachios. I used almond milk and 70% bittersweet chocolate as the base and agave as the sweetener

Apple Sage Seitan Animal-free Creatures

Here are the seitan creatures as they hit the grill pan. I didn’t take many pictures this day as I was focused more of cooking and feeding than blogging or pictures. Thanks husband for snapping a few shots so I can share how much we ate. My advice for people that want to have a big holiday (there were 12 of us) is to definitely prep the casseroles a day or two in advance. Also, make the mashed potatoes ahead and reheat then in a crock pot to save counter space. I did all the desserts the day before and assigned truffle rolling the morning of Thanksgiving to other people. I made most things ahead, especially the seitan, but we seared it off right before we ate. So if you want to know what I did the day of (with help): toss salad, make salad dressing, bake off casseroles, roast brussel sprouts, sear seitan, roll truffles, set up appetizers and reheat everything else. Once the food was set up for the buffet, I put the pies in the oven to reheat so they would be ready.

I sure haven’t but their drinks are amazing. It’s not all watery like rice milk is which has always disappointed me. I’m not looking to drink cream, but this “shake” is extremely satisfying to consume. Apparently Grainaissance has been around since 1979 and operates out of California but the thing I love the most about this drink is not that it is free of corn syrup, refined sugar or even cane sugar. It’s the pure fact that there’s no added sugar at all! This magical concoction is brown rice…fermented! So the sweetness comes from the carbohydrates in the rice being broken down by Koji, which is the same stuff (correct me if I’m wrong) used to make sake. But this tastes much better than sake and for something with such simple ingredients and feels so pure and unrefined, I’m impressed that it tastes so good and not all granola-y like some brands of hemp milk out there (Living Harvest excluded-they are the only ones that make hemp milk right). So I suggest trying one next time you have a sugar craving. I feel an at-home experiment coming on…

It is just entering beta phase, but I’m sure he’d let you play around and give feedback.

http://cookingcompendium.com/

Catchy name, eh? Muy intellectual and descriptive. These are some of the features he’s working on:

• Recipes costed per portion
• Nutritional info linked to recipes
• Base cost linked to ingredients
• Yield percentage of produce taken into account
• Uploading photos and linking them with recipes
• Star rating system allows the web to vote on your recipes (if you share them).
• On-line access to your cookbook.
• Recipes are printer friendly.
• You can build a menu, change the total served and it will be costed anew as well as the recipe re-written for the new yield.

How wonderful that two seemingly different career choices have been brought together for a software program that will revolutionize the food industry!

Salad: Wood sorrel, arugula, taro croutons, pickled fiddleheads, dried hibiscus, lemongrass vinaigrette

Intermezzo: Shiso granita, adzuki gelee

Entree: Macadamia nut encrusted tempeh, coconut lime sauce, mango salsa, forbidden rice, pea vines

Dessert: Mocha poi decadence, strawberry ice cream, li hing mui