Category Archives: Veganism

Meal Planning – Not Fun, but Worthwhile

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GroceryListbyMegStewart

Image by MStewartPhotography on Flickr

As Saturday evening approaches, I start to prepare myself for the festivities ahead. Party with friends? No. Out to the bars? Nope. A little time in the casino? Nuh uh. Movie and popcorn? Hardly. Saturday night is meal planning and groceries. Oh yeah, I know how to live it up!

Meal planning and grocery shopping are not my two favorite chores. I don’t actually know anyone who has them on that list (though I am sure some of you are out there). But, they need to be done and my life goes much more smoothly when they are.

Without meal planning, my grocery shopping strategy is to go through the sale ad, see what is a loss leader that we need to stock up on (far fewer than I used to when I was buying more prepared foods), catch a few other things on sale, and then try to remember everything we’ve run out of recently and restock. Some weeks, that works fine. Others, I get the groceries home on Sunday and realize that, while I have purchased $200 worth of groceries, I don’t seem to have anything to make for an actual dinner.  Ooops.

The better plan, for me, is to start my Saturday night fun by coming up with 5-6 dinners for the week. I consider what we haven’t had for a while, what seems fitted to the weather or to the most recent crops in my area, what I’m in the mood to make, and whether anyone has written something on the “Dinners that I Hope Happen Soon” board on the refrigerator. I only select 5-6 dinners to make because there will almost certainly be leftovers for 1 night, and there may be a pizza night or an event in there that takes up the other one. I try to vary the prep time across meals, so that I have some flexibility.

Once I have an idea of what I plan to make that week for dinner, I can then create a shopping list that includes all of the ingredients that I need. It also allows me to start making some tentative decisions about which meal to serve which night, though I leave those pretty loose, so that I can adjust based on how a day unfolds and the amount of time available. If I buy items that I worry will spoil quickly (though those are usually things for the omnis and not the vegans), then I know that the meal that involves them will probably be Sunday evening (grocery pick-up day) or Monday at the latest.

For breakfasts and lunches, because it is “serve yourself” around here, I don’t plan specific meals. Instead, I just keep a general list of things we should have available and try to replenish each week.

Once I make my list of dinners, and buy what I need for those, I can fill in the rest of the shopping list around that.

This process makes my week so much easier. Each day, I come home from work and look at the list and figure out what I am up to making that night, and what I have time to get done. If I am out of the house for a night and Mr. VeganAsana needs an idea, the list is available on my desk. Sometimes, I switch it up as I go, because I decide I want something different, I end up with a fresh ingredient that I didn’t plan for, or time becomes an issue. But, the plan is there, so I have a starting place.

Using this system also allows me to look at each meal for nutritional purposes and determine what I need to adjust. It’s easy for me to make too many carbohydrates and not enough of anything else if I just throw together meals at the last minute.

So, that’s my basic strategy for meal planning. What’s yours?

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Black Beans and Couscous

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Tonight’s photo shoot went south when I accidentally deleted all the shots and reformatted the disk. So, another shot was required, in the dark, which is much less good. Fortunately, the food was much more gooderer!

Ingredients

2 lb black beans, dried
1 medium onion, diced
2 celery stalks, diced
1 jalapeno
2 T veggie broth powder or 2 cups of broth
2 tsp turmeric
1 tsp chili powder
1 tsp salt
2 T olive oil
1 small can tomato sauce

Process

If you are not using a pressure cooker, presoak the beans for 6-8 hours.

Place beans, olive oil, onion, celery, and the whole jalapeno in your large pan or pressure cooker. Add fresh water to about 1.5 inches over beans.  Cook per directions. I used the pressure cooker, brought it to high pressure, and cooked for 20 minutes and then allowed it to depressurize naturally.

After beans are cooked through, add seasoning and tomato sauce and allow to simmer for an additional 10-15 minutes while you cook rice or couscous (or other grain) for serving.

Serve with or over a grain or use in burritos. I served it here with tri-color couscous and cantaloupe.

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Vegan Lasagna is Amazing!

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Vegan lasagna

Lasagna always seems like way too much work before I start, but then it’s really not that bad, and it’s so tasty and filling. This vegan lasagna won’t seem to be missing a thing without the cheese! I make it a little different every time, in terms of the veggies, so don’t hesitate to branch out.

Ingredients

Veggies

I love this picture other than the Biggest Loser advertisement. Oy!

12 lasagna noodles, cooked al dente
3 T. olive oil
3 cloves garlic minced
1 medium onion diced
1 stalk celery, diced
2 cups mushrooms, sliced
1 medium red pepper, diced
1 small zucchini, diced
1 cup carrots, diced
2 cups tomatoes, diced
1-2 cups kale, chopped
2 T Italian seasoning
1 large can/jar tomato puree
1 package extra firm tofu
1 T apple cider vinegar
1/4 cup nutritional yeast
1/4 cup raw sugar
Sea salt

Process

In a large pan, add onions, olive oil, and garlic.  Cook over medium temp, stirring often, until onions begin to soften and fragrance is released.  Add remaining vegetables (except the kale) and continue to cook until they begin to soften. Stir in tomato puree and most of the Italian seasoning (I like to save a little for the tofu ricotta).  Add sea salt to taste. If you like a sweeter sauce, add the raw sugar gradually, tasting for your degree of sweet. Allow to simmer 20 minutes over medium low temp.

While the sauce simmers, cook noodles to al dente and set aside in cool water or lay out on parchment paper.

Drain tofu and place in a bowl.  Using a fork, smash block until the texture resembles ricotta cheese.  Add vinegar, 1/2 if the nutritional yeast, the rest of the Italian seasoning, and ½ t. sea salt and mix.

Once your sauce has simmered nicely and noodles are ready, spread a layer of sauce over the bottom of the pan. Place a layer of 3 noodles on top, overlapping slightly. Crumble 1/2 the tofu mix across the noodles, add a layer of chopped kale. Now put in another layer of noodles, then sauce, then sprinkle on nutritional yeast. Repeat this process. You should end with a layer of sauce sprinkled with yeast.

Cover tightly with foil and place pan in oven at 375* and bake for 45 minutes.  Remove from oven and allow to sit for 10 minutes before cutting to serve.

If you would like to have some later, let it cool and then place in the fridge or freeze in single servings. For reheating, put in 350* oven or microwave.

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