Vegan sloppy joes

The end of my blog is coming up fast. It's quite crazy how quickly this year has gone by. So many memories just sloshing around in my brain. Every time I grab one of those memories and look back over it, it's always a good one. Of course my year was filled with lower moments, but I'm going to choose to let those go and just hang onto the good memories, and the lessons that I've learnt from any struggle I've faced this year. This little reflection doesn't have anything to do with the vegan sloppy joes that I made today, but I thought I might share it anyways. 

So if you've been following my blog and Instagram, I'm sure you'll know how much I love burgers, and good ol' American food. Hence, I thought it would be fitting if I try and re-create the classic sloppy joe - vegan style. As a kid, I would always watch movies and TV shows where school kids eat sloppy joes in the cafeteria, but to be honest, I never really knew what they were until my later years of high school. Mince meat goodness in a bun. That's basically what it is. Don't get me wrong though, I think that sounds delicious!

I decided to make a vegan sloppy joe today because, number one: I've never made one, and number two: I've just found out that my local Weigh 'N' Pay store sells Textured Vegetarian Protein (TVP). TVP can come in different shapes, but the one that's available near me looks like dried mince meat. You just add moisture (i.e. water, stock etc) and it becomes like mince. It's actually pretty tasty, and has good texture too. It's super easy to cook, and I think this will be a winner for any future recipe I cook up which requires mock mince. Yay, I'm so happy I've found another vegan product! Happy days :)

Vegan sloppy joes, topped with coleslaw and a side of corn and snow peas.

Vegan sloppy joes
(Adapted from Hell Yeah It's Vegan)

Serves 4

Ingredients

• 1 Tbsp olive oil
• 1 medium onion, diced
• 1/2 c mushrooms, finely diced
• 2 tsp chili powder
• ½ tsp garlic powder
• ½ tsp dry mustard
• 1¼ c TVP
• 1 c water
• 1x 400g can crushed tomato
• ¾ c ketchup
• 1 Tbsp soy sauce
• salt and pepper to taste
• soft sandwich buns

 Directions

1. In a medium saucepan, saute pepper and onion in oil until onion is translucent.
2. Stir in chili powder, garlic and mustard.
3. Add TVP, water, crushed tomatoes ketchup, and soy sauce; stir well.
4. Cover and bring mixture to a boil.
5. Reduce heat, simmering for ~10 minutes covered.
6. Remove lid and simmer for ~20 minutes more, stirring frequently until most of liquid has evaporated.
7. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
8. Serve hot on toasted sandwich buns, with onion slices and nutritional yeast if desired. I added some vegan coleslaw onto mine.

Miss Kitty's Saloon, Inglewood

I took my two lovely cousin's out for dinner tonight at a place called Miss Kitty's Saloon on Beaufort st in Inglewood. I rarely ever venture down to this part of Beaufort st. I think I've eat along here once, and the other times I've been down this end is because I've gotten lost. Yeah, I honestly never went out much before this gap year. 

Even though Miss Kitty's has been around for some time now, today was my first time checking it out. This restaurant does American and Canadian tapas and as soon as I walked through the door I felt like I was back in Nevada or Texas. It had that very Western cowboy feel to it. Love it!

I had found out about Miss Kitty's through Urbanspoon, while I was searching for some vegan friendly restaurants. When I asked the waiter is some of the dishes were vegan friendly, we went off to check with the chef and ended up coming back with a whole list of all the vegan options. What great service!! I was so impressed, and luckily for me, they were able to make variations to a lot of their dishes in order to make them vegan. 

We ended up ordering heaps of tapas dishes because they all sounded so yummy and I for one couldn't make up my mind. The serving sizes for most of the dishes were quite small, as they are designed for sharing. 

The dish I liked most was the corn fritters with hot pepper jelly. It tasted great with the pear slaw that I ordered.

I had such a great dining experience here that I would go back again in a heartbeat. 

 

Starting us off with some peanuts.

Hot wing pancakes

Corn fritters with hot pepper jelly

Pear slaw with macadamia nuts

Mushroom salad with peanuts greens and salt and vinegar crisps

Charcoal tamarind pork ribs

Crisp tortilla, spiced tofu

Grilled local octopus

Those are pigs heads in the fridge there