St. Patty's Day Feast

Okay I know I'm late AGAIN!  At least I have a good excuse.  This week has been crazy with putting my apartment back in order.  All of our hard work has finally paid off!  I'll have a separate post all about it, but first lets get caught up with St. Patricks day.  I don't even know how I even pulled all of this off.  Please forgive the photos they aren't the best. On Thursday the apartment was a mess from painting, then we had to pack up all of our stuff to get ready for carpet.  This was after we both worked a full day's work, cooking/eating this feast and still getting up early for work.  I'm tired just thinking about it.  I feel like I haven't sat still for the past week until now.  Feels GOOD!!

I wanted to make soomething authentic to the Irish culture.  Rich and I aren't Irish so who knows if what I made was truly authentic but I tried.  I started with colcannon which I found online.  It blends three of my most favorite things, potatoes, cabbage and garlic.  Pretty much a guarantee hit.  I got the recipe from Vegan Yum Yum.  I follow the instructions exactly except for subbing the kale for cabbage which I think is more "Irish" and using red potatoes instead of yukon gold (they were on sale and I'm a sucker for a deal). 

Next I made a root veggie stew.  I wanted something to go with the colcannon and everything I had originally thought of was based on potatoes which didn't make sense to eat potatoes on top of potatoes.  I searched and found a few stew recipes but none were exactly what I was looking for.  Most had potatoes and/or a lager.  I do NOT like beer.  Not a little, not any kind or any way.  So I figured putting a dark beer like that ina stew wouldn't be a hit for me.  I ended up using a recipe from autonomieproject and subbed the potatoes for root veggies.  I'm going to list the way the original recipe states for liquid.  I ended up using 4 cups of broth but I think it wasn't quite right.  I would follow the original if I was re-making.

Ingredients:
3 Cups of water
2 1/2 cups of broth
3/4 lbs of Turnip
3/4 lbs of Parsnip
8 oz can of kidney beans (or you can sub for chickpeas, or 1/2lb seitan)
3 Large carrots
1 Medium onion
1 Stalk of celery
2/3 cup of barley
2 T soy sauce
1 Tsp of Thyme
1 Tsp Rosemary
1/2 Tsp salt
Black pepper to taste

Directions:
1. Cut all veggies into large stew like chunks (peel parsnip).  In a large pot combine water, broth, barley, onions and salt. 
2.  Bring to boil and cook at med heat for about 20 minutes
3. Add in turnip and cook another 10 minutes.  Next add carrots, parsnip, beans, celery, soy sauce, and all spices and cook another 20 minutes on low setting
4.  Spoon over bowl of colcannon and eat!  I added some hot sauce but that probably isn't very Irish.  You can't take the Cajun out of me I guess.  =)

We couldn't have stew without traditional Irish soda bread!  I found the recipe from Happy Herbivore.  I followed the recipe except for using unbleached flour for whole wheat, and no raisins.  It was good.  A little tough on the outside and gummy on the inside but that is my ovens fault and I was out of foil to stop the top from browning too much.  Otherwise it was good and Husband loved it!  It was SUPER easy to make the prep was quick and you stick it in the oven and let it cook.  No waiting for the bread to rise or anything. 



Before Baking



Since I was feeling a little happy from the prospect of an actual working apartment I decided to make some pineapple cupcakes I've been wanting to make for months.  I just haven't gotten around to it.  The recipe said they would make 12 cupcakes but it made me about 22, maybe my cupcake pan is small?  Luckily because it made so much I got to share with my office.  I even tinted them green for St. Patty's Day.  They were yummy but not as fluffy as I was expecting.  They were pretty dense.  Since I already had a lot on my plate I just bought some pre made icing.  I got the recipe from my vegweb iPhone app, Snack Day Favorite Pineapple Cupcakes submitted by Magenta512:

Ingredients:
2 Cups of flour
2 Cups of sugar
2 teas baking soda
1/4 teas salt
3 teas ener-G egg replacer
2 T water
1 teas vanilla extract
1 20 oz can of crushed pineapple

Directions:
1.  Preheat oven to 350*.  Grease or line cupcake pan.  Mix Flour, sugar, baking soda and salt together
2.  Mix egg replacer with water.  Add the "egg", vanilla, and pineapple (juice and all) to the flour mixture.  Mix.   This is when I tinted the batter green
3.  Pour batter into cupcake pan (fill 3/4 way) and bake for 15-20 minutes.  Check if done with a toothpick.
4.  Then ice and decorate as/if desired

I forgot to take a picture of the inside of the cupcake so you could see the green...oh well.  They were gone too fast I guess.  =)  I was really excited about the cupcakes.  I haven't been a big baker but I'm enjoying it and am going to try and cook some more sweets.  Next up is my FAV red velvet cupcakes!  Since St. Patty's day I've been cooking pretty easy stuff.  Left overs and veggies over quinoa, or with a veggie burger.  Easy stuff.  I'll be back soon with more yummy things.  Now that things are back in order I'll have more time to focus on new recipes.  I can't wait!  Till Next Time!

Laissez Les Bon Temps Rouler!