Wednesday, February 27, 2008

Rollin'

Lately, we seem to be eating a lot of food that is either on a roll, or in a roll…

Soy Hot Dogs, reduced from $5 to $1! We bought a few packages and stuck them in the freezer, but then the freezer got really full and really icy, so we were on a mission to eat some stuff. The result, soy hot dogs twice in two weeks (and a bit of a belly ache each time). The first time, we ate them quite plainly, with just tomato and bbq sauce.

The next time, we had them with ‘the works’: mustard, tomato sauce, sautéed onions, and baked beans.

Now in a roll. During an exciting trip to the Asian grocery a few weeks ago we bought some yuba, aka tofu skin or bean curd skin. According to Vegan Planet, yuba is the skin that forms on the top of hot soy milk as it cools. We didn’t follow a recipe for these, but the filling is eggplant, leftover rice, capsicum and diced tofu, flavoured with hoisin and plum sauces. Yuba is funny to work with, and funny to eat—it’s chewy and so salty! We were gulping down water all night.

One rainy day when I was stressed out with some uni stuff, Andy made me a gorgeous meal from Vegan with a Vengeance: Sweet Potato Crepes with Coriander-Tamarind Sauce. He added spinach to the filling, and a bit of red dye to the crepe batter, but this recipe was basically followed completely. Except instead of coconut milk, he used coconut cream, which made the sauce really rich. I thought these were good, though not spectacular. Andy was so disappointed. He spent 2+ hours making this, and he just wasn’t bowled over with the results. This is a meal that looks much better than it actually is, I guess.

Our most recent rolled food, mango and beetroot rice paper rolls. In addition to the fruit and the root, these have mung bean threads and shallots. For such a simple combination, these were very good, though it was only halfway through rolling that I realised I wasn’t sure mango and beetroot would go together! Luckily, they do. The beetroot provides a delightfully earthy crunch to the sweet, soft mango. Andy made two dips for these, one soy-sweet chilli, the other peanut satay. Both were excellent.

Food on a roll is definitely easier to prepare than food in a roll (especially for me, I can’t seem to roll a pretty roll for the life of me! They are all so sloppy), but food in rolls is tastier and more fulfilling, in my opinion.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Rolled up foods are so much fun!

Lori- the Pleasantly Plump Vegan said...

i love rolled up food! i gotta look for bean curd skins. they look interesting.

Amy said...

Awww I'm sorry you didn't like the sweet potato crepes so much. They are one of my absolute favourite meals of all time (well of all veggie time anyway).

Unknown said...

Yay to rolled foods! All your food looks pretty, pretty, pretty good (Curb Your Enthusiasm reference) even if the crepes weren't up to expectations. What kind of soy hot dogs do you recommend? I haven't eaten hot dogs since going veggie and am worried that the brand I buy will be disappointing (I sometimes am not a big fan of fake meat stuff). I always love having a pre-spring cookout at the beginning of March and what's a cookout without (veggie) burgers and (veggie) hot dogs? Can you recommend a good 'dog to eat?

Liz Ranger (Bubble Tea for Dinner) said...

I saw yuba when I was shopping! So do you just eat it like jerky, or did you reconstitute it? your beet/mango rolls sound killer!

LizNoVeggieGirl said...

haha, wow, you certainly ARE on a roll, with your food! :0) the spring roll-type food looks AMAZING! too bad about the sweet potato crepes, since they did sound quite delicious!

Theresa said...

Alec--I eat Sanitarium brand, and I'm not sure if they're available stateside. They are pretty good, and a lot of omnis like them. Hopefully some North American vegans can be more helpful than I am, because I don't remember what brands are good over there anymore!

Liz--I dipped the yuba in water for, maybe 5 seconds. Much longer and they would have gone all mushy. They dried out a little because we made them a few hours before we ate, and they were chewy, and I think completely dry would be slightly unpleasant!

Ashasarala said...

Well, everything looks delish, even if some things weren't up to par. Before this last weekend, it had been at least two years since my last veggie dog and I couldn't believe I had left them for so long! I try to avoid pre-packaged foods due to the sodium content, but I have to have it sometimes, ya know?

My favourite kinds of food are always rolled up. It's like a big surprise of flavour bursting on my taste buds. The chunkier and 'meater' the insides, the better!