Vegan chili dog & waffle fries

I don't always know exactly what I'm going to do for my 'something new' before I get out of bed and start the day. In fact, I only decided on my something new at about 3pm today. I did some very quick Googling and went out to buy my ingredients to make some dinner before the shops closed at 5pm. 

Now for all of you who have been following the blog, you'll know how much I love trying out different hot dog recipes. There's just so much you can load up in your hot dog to make it tastier (and messier) to eat. 

Today I went for a vegan version of the American classic chili dog (In Australia chili is spelled "chilli", with two letter "l"s). It was surprisingly so easy to make, and I was chowing down this baby in no time. 

I got the recipe for the vegan chili from Oh She Glows. It's a simple and delicious recipe which can be easily changed and adapted to suit each individuals taste. I added some vegan mince into the recipe to give it a bit more of that hearty feel. I used Sanitarium Casserole Mince which can be found in the health food isle of Cole or Woolworths. 

Now I just can't have a hot dog without some sides. As I was googling some photos of chili dogs, I came across what's called waffle fries (aka lattice fries). These looked so cool that I wanted to make my own. I was lucky enough to actually have potatoes in our kitchen as well as having the appropriate slicing apparatus to make these! It was meant to be! :)

I thoroughly enjoyed this chili dog! I don't have any words to describe how much I enjoyed it. I'll just sign off by saying that food is great :)

Vegan chili
Adapted from Oh She Glows

Ingredients:

• 1 tbsp oil
• 1-3 cloves garlic, minced (I used 1)
• 2 bell peppers, chopped
• 1 sweet onion, chopped
• 3 carrots, chopped 
• 1 can Sanitarium Casserole Mince (or 1 1/2 cup vegan mince)
• 1 tbsp cumin
• 3 tbsp chili powder
• pinch sea salt
• pinch cayenne
• 1 can each: black beans, white kidney beans, red kidney beans (rinsed) (I used 1 can of mixed beans and 1 can of kidney beans)
• 1 can diced tomatoes with juice 
• 2 tablespoons tomato paste
• 2 tsp oregano
• 1 can organic mushrooms, drained
• 1 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder (optional)
• juice of 1 lime (optional, I didn’t include)
• Secret Ingredient –> 2 tbsp CHIA SEEDS (it thickens up the sauce, but you don't have to use it if you don't want to. I didn't have to because mine was thick enough but I still added it anyways)

Directions:

1. In a large pot, heat the oil over medium. Add garlic, peppers, onion, carrot and sauté until everything is soft, approximately 5 minutes. 
2. Add the rest of the ingredients, cover, and cook for about 20 minutes on low to medium heat. Add more water if it becomes too thick and cook for longer if needed. 
3. I served mine up with a bun, vegan sausage, mustard and diced white onion; and of course the lattice fries. 

 For the waffle/lattice fries, I followed the instructions from the video below and then deep fried them in sunflower oil. 

Makeshift on William and The Moon Cafe

I had a really good day today. A large reason why is because I met a lot of lovely, happy and chatty people today and their good vibes brightened up my day. I donated blood today and the lady who was taking my blood told me all about her trip to Vietnam. It sounded like her had the most amazing time and it just made me so happy to see someone reminiscing about their favourite memories. 

My friend Kate invited me to come out to Northbridge and Perth City to check out some of the events for Makeshift On William and the Perth Fashion Festival. Unfortunately I had to work til evening so we missed a lot of the free events, but we managed to hop on into the enex100 where the Lips & Lashes Bar were applying free fake lashes and lip gloss. For free!! The lady who did my lips and lashes also was a lovely and bubbly person and it was so great just having a laugh with a stranger. 

We then headed out to Northbridge to go and try and collect some of the free things up for grabs. Makeshift on William is a cool idea where you go around to the stores and restaurants and pick up pins, patches and recipe cards. There were heaps to collect and each of the stores had a cool display that you could interact with. The only store that was open when Kate and I got out there was Fi & Co. The girl serving behind the counter was another cheerful person that made it a good night. She told us about the display in the shop where we could put on a head piece and take photos with our heads in the hanging picture frames. We were originally going to just go into the shop, grab our pin and walk out, but the girl told us to check out other parts of the store upstairs and out the back. It was an awesome vintage store and it was so well decorated and everything for display and for sale was gorgeous. 

Kate also took me to The Moon Cafe on William St. I have heard a lot about it over the years, but I've never gone in. The food was modern kind of food, including pastas, pizza (dessert pizzas too!), burgers, nachos and the list goes on. I really enjoyed this place, and it was very busy, so I'm guessing a lot of people enjoy it too. Be warned though, the serving sizes are pretty massive! We ordered a side of fries which in all honesty could feed a family of four. The food was great, and vegan friendly too :) I had the veggie burger which had a tofu patty, roast veggies, lettuce and tomato. It was delicious. 

So many fries!! I finished my fries and we ate half of the bowl before we couldn't eat anymore. Good effort, but food won today.

I'm feeling really blessed to have met such lovely people today. I think it pays off to take an interest in other people, even if it is for a short 15 minute conversation. Give them your time and attention, and in return you'll feel good for making someone else feel special :)

Baked vegan zucchini fries

I am so excited about sharing a recipe that I found for zucchini fries!! They were surprisingly AMAZING!

I can't remember where I first heard of zucchini fries, but I did a search for a vegan recipe the other night and came across quite a few different ones from these following food sites: Trans-planted, The Vegan Pact, Chocolate Covered Katie, and Laws on Wellness.

You might think that it is a waste of time looking through all these different recipes, but I'm all about being resourceful and using up what is in my kitchen before going out and having to buy more ingredients. Plus I like to hunt around and look at all my options before picking one to make. 

I ended up choosing the recipe from the Laws on Wellness website because it was the only one that did not require a vegan egg substitute. Although I have flax seeds at home, in order to use them as an egg substitute, I have to grind them up and I just get too lazy sometimes. Mind you, I REALLY REALLY liked this recipe and I highly recommend it to everyone!

Even though these fries would have tasted fantastic on their own, I didn't want them to be lonely on my dinner plate so I also made up a giant vegan burger using a new veggie patty that I found in the frozen food section of Woolworths. 

I'm always looking in the cold food section of the grocery store to find all of the vegan/vegetarian food items (e.g. tempeh, falafel, vegan sausages etc) but I never stopped to look in the frozen food section. The other week I found some great vegan food as I was searching for vegan puff pastry to make an apple strudel. Along with the pastry, I picked up a box of vegan veggie patties made by the company Syndian. I've never heard of them before, but what caught my eye was how unprocessed all the ingredients were. The ingredients list all pretty much just vegetables and other things that you would find in your pantry like brown rice and spices. There was nothing artificial about it and so I though it was a healthy choice. 

The burger patties turned out to be very tasty. Be very careful to follow the cooking instructions though. With these patties, you are meant to cook them on a pan without thawing them, and it is strongly recommended to not cook them in a microwave. I think it's because there aren't many ingredients that bind the patty together. But if you follow the instructions then they stay in shape. 

This seriously was a great dinner tonight. Try the zucchini fries! If you don't like them (which I highly doubt), then call me over and I'll finish them for you ;)

My burger was a veggie patty on a multi grain bun with lettuce, raw mushroom, tomato, dill pickle, white onion, green relish, tomato ketchup and vegan mayonnaise :)

 
Baked Vegan Zucchini Fries

Serves 4

Ingredients

• 1 cup plain almond or soy milk
• 1 1/2 tablespoons dijon mustard
• 2 cups Panko breadcrumbs
• 1/2 tsp Kosher salt
• 1/4 tsp black pepper
• 1/2 tsp garlic powder
• 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
• 1/4 cup whole wheat flour
• 1 large zucchini (mine was about 12oz), cut into any thickness you desire

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F (200C).  Line a 12×18-inch baking sheet with parchment paper.
2. Whisk the almond or soy milk and mustard together until combined in a shallow pie dish or bowl.  In another shallow pie dish or bowl (glass baking dishes work great too), stir the breadcrumbs, salt, pepper, garlic powder, and cayenne pepper together until well-blended.  Set both dishes aside.
3. Place the flour in a large zipper bag and toss in all of the zucchini sticks.  Seal the bag well and shake up the zucchini until all of the sticks are coated with flour.
4. Taking a few sticks at a time, roll them around in the milk-mustard mixture then coat them in the breadcrumbs, lightly patting the breadcrumbs onto the zucchini if needed.  Try to not to handle the zucchini too much at this point or the breading with fall off.  Carefully transfer the sticks to the baking sheet, spacing them about 1/2-inch apart.
5. Bake for 18-22 minutes until golden brown and delicious-looking. Turn the fries half way through the cooking time so that they are crispy and golden on all sides.
6. The best way would be to reheat leftovers would be to pop them in a 375 degree F (180C) oven for 5-7 minutes until they are heated through.

Chicago style hot dog with polenta fries and garlic aoli

I think of hot dogs and burgers as cousins. They're related, but different in their own way. The basic skeleton of hot dogs and burgers are the same: you've got the meat tucked snug between the buns; but then the rest is up to you. You can make your hot dog or burger become anything you want it to be. The possibilities are endless.

Although I am always keen for a burger, the fact that there are less vegan hot dogs out there, I always get a bit more excited when I find one, or find a recipe for one. Now I'm not into fancy material things, but when it comes to my hot dogs (and burgers), I like the fillings to be fancy. I'm talkin' a real gourmet hot dog. None of that plain sausage in a bun business. I want there to be so many fancy fillings that I struggle to keep it from dripping out when I bite into the thing. That's the real hot dog experience. 

I haven't tried many of the vegan hot dog joints in Perth yet, but I will be sure to get on that ASAP. Until then, I'm quite happy to try some of the recipes that I find online. 

I came across the Chicago-style hot dog the other week and I wanted to try it because it was vegan friendly. There wasn't any cheese so it was easy to veganise. 

The hot dog consists of a sesame seed bun, sausage, tomato wedges, green pickle relish, diced onion, dill pickles, mustard, celery salt and sport peppers. If you're not drooling right now...then I just don't understand why not :P

Now for all you readers in America, these ingredients might be very easy to find, but over here is Perth, Western Australia, it's not that easy. I couldn't find any hot dog buns with sesame seeds, and I had no luck with the sports peppers either. Although I would have loved a more authentic Chicago-style hot dog, it still tasted really good once it was all assembled. 

Another similarity between hot dogs and burgers is that they both go great with a side of fries. I've never had polenta fries before, but I liked the sound of them so I baked some up to accompany my hot dog. 

The fries were nice and crispy and even my brother liked them. I whipped up some garlic aoli as well. This was much easier to do ever since I found vegan mayonnaise in the supermarket. 

This was such a good dinner. I was so sad to put that last bite in my mouth. 

 

Polenta fries
Original recipe from here

Makes up to 3 dozen fries

Ingredients

• 1 cup polenta
• 3 cups water
• 1 tsp dried oregano
• 1 tsp dried cilantro
• ½ tsp garlic powder (or 1 clove garlic minced)
• ¾ tsp salt

Directions

1. In a medium saucepan, add polenta, water, dried oregano, dried cilantro, garlic powder and salt and stir. Bring to a boil, then simmer for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally.
2. Grab a baking sheet and line with parchment paper. Spread the hot polenta evenly on the baking sheet until polenta is about ¼ to ½ inch thick. Put the baking sheet into the refrigerator and cool for 15-20 minutes.
3. Preheat the oven to 200C. Use a pizza cutter and cut the polenta into fries that are about ½ inch wide. Remove the polenta from the baking sheet and re-line it with foil. Add the polenta fries to the foil and spray with cooking spray, then season with salt.
4. Put the polenta fries into the oven for 15-20 minutes until polenta fries are lightly browned. Serve with tomato sauce, ketchup or aoli.

 Vegan Garlic Aoli

Serves 2

Ingredients

• 1/4 cup vegan mayonnaise
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard

Directions
Combine all ingredients and mix well

Aioli

I love anything with garlic in it. Before my vegan days, aioli  (ay-oh-lee) was definitely a favourite. I had a bit of a craving for aioli and fries today so I pulled out my Veganomicon cook book and tried out TWO aioli recipes. One was just not enough. I coupled this with some homemade super crispy (almost burnt - that's the way I like it) sweet potato fries. 

I made garlic and basil aioli using the soya mayo-dressing from the book, and the other aioli recipe used white beans. Both were super delicious with the fries. The white bean aioli was a bit thicker while the mayo-dressing had a thinner consistency because it was made from silken tofu. 

The great thing about aioli is that it's so versatile. You can have it on some bruchetta, in a burger or just as a dip for veggies. 

Aioli cravings status: satisfied.