#29-32

I've been falling behind considerably on my summer challenge. Part of the problem is that it's been close to 100 degrees for the last week here in the midwest, and I rarely feel like turning on the oven too much. I want to bake fairly badly, but turning on the oven seems counterproductive.

Another bar to cooking too many new recipes has been that I have fallen in love with several of the recipes I have already learned this summer. I have remade Tuscan Bread Soup 2 more times- whenever the CSA box has come in with fresh basil and tomatoes. I have loved a number of the soups I have made this summer. I have gorged myself on fresh fruit, including balsamic strawberries. Also, Annie is winding down. Tech week starts Sunday, so the show has been taking up a little more of my time. I also have developed one of my own recipes for a broccoli and cauliflower salad that I have been eating a great deal of. And occasionally, I have to let the Baker cook, too!

Despite that, over the past few weeks I have made 4 new recipes. After getting some fresh cilantro from the CSA box, I decided it was begging for some tomatillo salsa from Viva Vegan by Terry Hope Romero. it was so simple to make, and I learned how to operate my broiler as well. The salsa itself was very tasty, A+. I will use this recipe again, though probably not as much as the green sauce made with tomatillos in the same chapter that I made last summer. In order to keep our waistlines down, the Baker and I pledged not to buy ice cream or chips for home some time last summer, though we can have them when we are out to eat. The consistency of the salsa would be best for chips, whereas the sauce would have worked better on the burrito concoction I was attempting to make.

I also made the "white" seitan from the same book. Are there any experienced seitan makers out there? I think I overcooked it. So far my seitan experiences have not been incredible. I've made overly dry and overly wet seitan, neither of which was bad in taste, but not good in texture. I can only imagine there is a certain amount of user error and experience I need to develop to figure out how to best make good seitan. Considering the whole package, it was a B, and it reminded me of overcooked turkey.

Next up comes some more PPK food, but this time I have to rave. The Creamy Tomato Soup from Veganomicon knocked my socks off. It utilizes potatoes in order to give it that creamy texture, and I was concerned the texture of the soup would not resemble creaminess, but rather starchiness. I was wrong. It was pitch-perfect, though I think I will add spinach or kale from time to time to dress it up a little more. A++

Also from Veganomicon was the roasted potatoes I made for lunch today. Yes, I know I could have made roasted potatoes without a recipe, but I used this for reference, and I hadn't used the recipe before, so it counts, right? I tossed them in olive oil, rosemary, and sea salt, and had them with a side of roasted Brussels sprouts tossed with garlic olive oil and sea salt. It was a lovely lunch, and I say that the roasted potatoes will probably replace my occasional trip out for fast food French fries. These were close enough in taste, cheaper, and probably better for me. Besides, no place that I've been yet serves rosemary baked fries.

I may not finish my 100 recipes before Labor Day, as planned, but I will keep cooking any way. Summer ends September 21st, right? Maybe I'll make it by then. Maybe it will become a fall challenge. As long as I keep trying new recipes I don't care.