This is so simple, so good, and more healthy than the alternative.

Prep time 45 minutes. Serves 4 – 6.

• 1/2 cup Earth Balance margarine
• 1 cup of organic sugar
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 2 cups flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 3 mashed bananas (to a paste)
• 2 Ener-G egg replacements
• 1/2 cup nuts

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Cream the sugar and margarine. In a separate bowl, sift the flour, salt, and baking soda. Blend with the wet mixture. Add the bananas, Ener-G, and nuts. Stir until mixed. Spoon into a mini-muffin sheet (like Pampered Chef’s) and bake for 15 – 17 minutes. Allow to cool for 5 and them pop ‘em with some coffee or hot chocolate.

Sticky gooey “Cinnabon-like” rolls for the vegan? Yes, you betcha. Any recipe can be converted to  vegan one. While these are not the bastion of good health, they are still better for you than the regular ones. Vegan cooking always makes gains with lower saturated fat and no cholesterol. Very important for heart health as you approach 40 (or 45). Anyway, these are from scratch and take 2 hours to make (don’t get all discouraged, oh Microwave Generation).

Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 tsp active dry yeast
• 1 tsp sugar
• 1 cup warm water
• 4 cups flour
• 1/8 tsp vitamin C powder (not needed but will REALLY help your dough rise)
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 cup melted Earth Balance margarine
• 1/4 cup canola oil
• 1 cup chopped pecans
• 1 cup raisins
• 1/2 cup melted margarine for brushing on dough
• 1/4 cup melted margarine for topping
• lots of cinnamon sugar mix
• 1/2 cup soy milk
• 2 – 4 cups of powdered sugar
• 1/4 tsp vanilla

As with all breads, combine the water, yeast and sugar. Set aside and let rise for 5 minutes. It should be as thick as a head of Guinness. Pour the mixture into a mixing bowl (hopefully a KitchenAid with a dough hook) with the margarine and oil. Gradually add the flour, salt, and vitamin C. Mix for 5 minutes with a machine dough hook or 10 minutes by hand. The dough should be very soft and should stick to your fingers, but not leave any residue. Cover the dough and let it rise for 30 – 60 minutes or doubled in bulk.

Get your oven pre-heated to 425 degrees.

After the dough has risen, plop it on a floured surface. Cut it in half. Put 1 half back in the bowl. Roll the other into a rectangle at least 12 inches high and 18 inches long. The dough should be rolled to almost a 1/4 inch in thickness. With a brush, liberally apply melted margarine to the rectangle piece of dough. Cover the dough with a healthy sprinkling of the cinnamon sugar mixture. Next, spread the nuts and raisins. it is up to you how much you want in the rolls. I put about a handful of each. Carefully roll the dough lengthwise like Clark Gable would roll a cigarette (not like I have EVER seen any of his movies start to finish).  You should have a nice thick roll.

Grease a 9×13 baking pan. Slice 2 inch pieces with a serrated knife. Take each piece and gently place it in the pan face up. Push the roll down to about half it’s height. Continue this process. You should get 6 – 8 rolls out of it. Repeat the same process with the second half of the dough.

Once completed, you brush the tops of the rolls with more melted margarine and sprinkle with cinnamon sugar. Place them in the oven for 15 – 20 minutes.

While the rolls are baking, create the topping.  Combine the soy milk, powdered sugar 1 cup at a time, 4 tbsp of melted margarine, and vanilla in a small mixing bowl. Beat with a whisk. Keep on adding the powdered sugar one cup at a time, You will not believe how much sugar 1/2 cup of soy milk will consume. You want this mixture to be like sludge. Really thick. When in doubt, keep on adding.

Pull the rolls out of the oven. You want the tops of the rolls to be golden brown. Pour the sludgy white stuff all over the rolls. It will melt and then harden. Let the rolls cool for at least 5 – 10 minutes. After that, dig in with a cup of stiff french roast coffee. There is no way you will be able to eat just one.

Here is a no-nonsense throw down bowl of hearty Mexican chow. There are no limits to what you can throw into the bowl as everything goes together and the more you mix it, the better it tastes. This bowl of warm Mexican goodness is a great meal to walk into after a cold fall day.

Ingredients:

• 2 diced potatoes
• 1 diced green pepper
• 2 diced scallions
• 1/2 diced red onion
• 3 minced garlic cloves
• 1 package of silken tofu
• 1 package Trader Joes vegan soy chorizo
• 2 slices of vegan soy pepper jack cheese
• 1 tbsp soy milk
• soy sour cream
• guacamole
• hot sauce
• lime juice
• cilantro

Pour the oil into a large skillet and get it hot! Add the potatoes and garlic. They should sizzle. Cook them for 3 minutes. Add all the other vegetables and cook for an additional 5 minutes until the potatoes are soft. Add the silken tofu block and work it into the mixture. The tofu should break apart into really small chunks. Add the soy vegan chorizo (I love this stuff). Keep on stirring the mixture over high heat until it is cooked through (2 minutes). Remove from heat.

In a small bowl, break up the slices of soy pepper jack cheese and add the tbsp of soy milk. Microwave it for 30 seconds. Take it out of the microwave and whisk it with a fork. This will give you that creamy cheese sauce (vegan, of course) that you find slathered all over your traditional Mexican burrito without having it stop your heart or simply pad it on your thighs or gut (part of that weight loss deal).

Scoop the Mexican mixture into a bowl. Pour the savory melted soy cheese over it. Add a large scoop of soy sour cream and guacamole. Stir it a little until it is nice and sloppy. For kicks, squeeze some fresh lime and sprinkle some fresh chopped cilantro over the top. Get yourself a big spoon and start shoveling in this warm, healthy, filling, fall vegan meal.

I am the village idiot when it comes to making bread. I have either made rolls that could double over as weapons grade tank shells or loafs that are like that astronaut freeze dried ice cream we all thought was really cool when we were kids (you have never been to Epcot Center?). This last week was a complete breakthrough in my artisan brick (or bread) making ability. I had a brief conversation with a friend of mine who happens to be a commercial baker and she gave me 3 tips that took me from the village idiot to the medicine man of the crusty loaf.

Start with ascorbic acid. Yes, good bread requires acid. You may also know this as vitamin C. Vitamin C is a dough stabilizer. It turbo charges the rising of the yeast and also helps with freshness. After you drop some acid in the bread dough, don’t mix it too long. I have a Kitchen Aid mixer with a dough hook and bowl. I mix the dough no longer than 6 minutes. The first minute is mixing the wet and dry ingredients and the last 5 are kneading. Speaking of wet and dry, add your dry ingredients to your wet. In other words, start with your yeast/water mixture in the mixing bowl and then add the flour.

With all that said, here is the village idiot-proof vegan bread recipe:

• 3 cups of bread flour (if you want to be the village idiot,  use all-purpose flour )
• 2 1/4 tsp (one package) active dry yeast
• 1 tsp of sugar
• 1 3/4 cups of water (a little more or less)
• 1 1/4 teaspoons of salt (that 1/4 makes a difference)
• 1/8 tsp of ascorbic acid (you can buy this in powder form or just pulverize a vitamin C tablet)

Do this exactly as I say or risk becoming the village idiot:

Pour the yeast and sugar into a 1 cup measuring cup. Add hot water until the cup is almost full. The water should be almost too hot to the touch. Stir the mixture in the cup and let it sit. In a bowl, add the flour, salt, and vitamin C. Wait about 5 minutes. The yeast mixture should have a foamy surface about 1/4 inch thick (kinda like the thickness of a head on a Guinness). Pour the yeast mixture into the Kitchen Aid bowl (with dough hook) and turn on the mixer to the lowest speed. Gradually add all the flour. Start pouring in the remaining 3/4 cup of hot water a shot at a time. Be patient until all the water is absorbed (you may not need it all). Keep on adding water until all the dough mixes. This should be happening in under 1 minute. The dough should wrap around the dough hook and not stick to the bottom of the bowl as it spins. If it does, add pinches of flour and wait. Repeat until the stickiness stops. Eventually, the bowl should be spotless without any residue as the dough has picked up all this up. Let the dough spin on the hook for no more than 5 minutes. Stop the mixer after 5 minutes and feel the dough. It should be soft enough to *almost* stick on your fingers, but it won’t.

Remove the dough from the hook and the bowl. Knead it a couple times into a ball. Spray the mixer bowl with Pam and drop the dough back in. Cover and let it rise for 45 minutes or until it is roughly twice the size. I put the bowl on the stove-top and turn on the oven to 200 degrees. The heat from the oven vents warms the stove-top and helps the bread rise. Ideally, bread dough should proof above 80 degrees.

Take the dough out of the bowl and shape it into a loaf on a cookie sheet or a Pampered Chef baking stone (the best). Don’t manhandle it too much. I gently shape it into an oval, making sure not to squeeze all the air (or CO2, really) out of it. From there, put a couple toothpicks in the dough and gently place a couple sheets of plastic wrap over it. It should look like a tent. Put the baking sheet on the stove top and let it rise for 2 hours until it is doubled in size.

Fifteen minutes before baking, put a brownie pan with some water on the bottom tray of the oven. The water will start to boil and make steam. The steam will help give the bread a nice hard crust, but not dry it out. Get the oven up to 425 degrees. Remove the plastic wrap from the baking sheet and stick it in the oven. Bake the bread for 25 minutes. The crust should be light golden brown. Remove the bread from the oven and place it on a cooling rack for at least 20 minutes. This will enable the crust to settle.

If you have made it this far, you should have a kitchen that smells like a Parisian bakery. The vegan bread should have a warm and soft center with a nice and chewy crust. There should be a good yeast and salt flavor to the bread.

I have made this vegan bread 3 days in a row now and it has turned out exactly the same. Our days of paying $5.99 for a Panera loaf may be over. Hopefully, I will stay a medicine man. I can also cancel my military contracts for tank shells.

The most common question people ask us about our vegan diet is “What about X, how do you get enough of it?” The “X” is usually protein or iron or some other critical nutrient. Here is a power drink that Aleta and I slam down every morning before we start our day. The shake has all the ingredients I talked about in the “Superfoods for Vegetable Haters” posts. The recipe is below:

• 1 cup vanilla soy milk
• 1 cup of water
• 1 tbsp chia seed
• 1 tbsp hemp seed
• 2 tbsp flax seed
• 1 tbsp blackstrap molasses

Pour the soy milk and water into a shakable container. Grind all the seeds in a coffee grinder and pour into the cup. Add the molasses last. Seal your container and shake until your arms fall off. Open the container and slam down. It will taste like a sugar/gingerbread cookie.

Below is a comparison of what you just drank to an 8 oz trimmed (1/8 inch) sirloin steak.  All I did in creating this chart was use the facts printed on the nutritional labels of all the food ingredients.  Obviously, this drink does not substitute the satisfaction of gnawing on a juicy steak over a bottle of red wine on a Friday night. Still, the nutrition speaks for itself. The one thing the steak has over the shake is the concentration of protein. Still, the shake gives you 25% before you start your day with 3 meals left and plenty of nutrients to get your brain engaged (think twice about coffee, this is a natural stimulant).

We love our weekend big breakfast. Historically, this has been full of pancakes, eggs, bacon, and even biscuits. I love all the flavors and the time with my family. One would think that since we are eating vegan, we are now eating salads with brussel sprout juice for breakfast. Not a chance. We have devised a vegan lumberjack breakfast that is both tasty and filling without all of the burps, heartburn, and nodding off during church.

We start with pancakes. I found a great recipe for pancakes in the “Joy of Vegan Baking” by Colleen Patrick. I have modified the recipe to look like this:

• 1/2 cup whole wheat flour
• 1/2 cup unbleached all purpose flour (the key being unbleached)
• 1 tbsp baking powder
• pinch of salt
• 1 cup vanilla soy milk
• 1/2 cup to 1 cup of water
• 2 tbsp canola oil
• 3 tbsp of blue agave sweetner (you can buy it at any food store)
• 1 1/2 tbsp of ground flax seed
• 1 1/2 tbsp of ground chia seed

Combine all the dry stuff. Combine all the wet stuff (except the water). Throw it into a bowl and stir it just until it is mixed. Add water for desired thickness. The thicker the batter, the fatter the pancakes. We make ours about as thin as pea soup. Spray a griddle and spoon them out one quarter cup at a time. Cook until golden brown. Serve with a pat of Earth Balance margarine and some real maple syrup.

These pancakes will be sweet, a bit nutty, dense, and full of additional iron, calcium, fiber and protein. They (like everything else) will be lower in saturated fat and have no cholesterol. This is the one food that my two picky eater kids absolutely love. These make the Sam’s Club sack of Krusteaz taste like saliva sucking hardtack.

Moving on to eggs and meat…

Grab a half brick of tofu and break it onto pieces (like scrambled eggs). Get some veggie chorizo (if I can get it in Tulsa, you can find it) and dice it. Dice 1/4 of an onion. In a saucepan, get two tbsp of canola oil REALLY HOT. Throw in the onion and chorizo. It should sizzle! Cook until all is nice and brown. Add the crumbled tofu (another sizzle). Throw in two slices of soy american cheese and let it melt. Keep it all mixed. Throw in a dash of salt and pepper. Once all mixed through, add 1/4 cup salsa. Cook for another 30 seconds. Remove it from the heat and serve with the pancakes. Be sure to get out you mexican hot sauce.

You will be able to notice the difference in taste of the chorizo, but the tofu is almost exactly the same as eggs. In terms of the texture of it all, it should be identical to using meat products. I know as I used to eat the meat version of this every Sunday at a mexican restaurant when I lived in Los Angeles. BTW, do you know what the ingredients are in Mexican chorizo? (click here at your own risk).

There you have it, a vegan lumberjack breakfast. I guarantee you that it will be good, filling, and satisfying. Have you been trying to picture what exactly a lumberjack vegan looks like? Hemp flannel shirt, trimmed bearded, horn rimmed glasses, a ethanol burning chainsaw????