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Showing posts from March, 2023

Collard Greens Rainbow Salad Wraps - High Plant Protein

This super refreshing, colorful, and hand-friendly wrap is like a nourishing salad you can pick up with your hands and eat on the go! They are packed with lots of different veggies, tofu mayo, tofu skin, avocado, and ofc, sooo many flavors! You can easily adapt this recipe and use whatever vegetables you have on hand. This recipe is a super easy, no-fuss, and basically no-cook meal that's healthy and delicious. The only "cooking" part is to blanch the collar greens to soften them so that they become more flexible and will seal the wrap better. Everything else can be kept raw, or if you prefer, you can always roast some of the vegetables or pan fry some tofu. Lots of vegetable wraps, though very healthy, can seem dry and underwhelming sometimes. But not this one! I layered up lots of luscious, rich, and creamy silken tofu mayo inside that adds that satisfying flavor and texture but without any "bad stuff"! Instead, it also acts as a great protein source. I also d

Flower Shaped Vegan Gimbap

Spring is in the air and blooms are everywhere~ It's time to bring some flower power to our table! I romanticized the Korean gimbap and made them into flower shapes, filled with colorful vegetables, umami shiitake mushrooms, and tofu. Gimbap, sometimes also spelled as Kimbap, is a Korean rice roll wrapped with roasted seaweed sheets and filled with a variety of meat, egg, and vegetables. The origin of Gimbap remains debated, some say it was created during the Japanese occupation of Korea when Korean people adapted Japanese sushi. On the other hand, it could also have been a natural invention from eating rice and living ocean-adjacent.  While seeming similar at first glance, gimbap and sushi are in fact quite different. Sushi rolls are made of rice that's seasoned with sushi vinegar and usually filled with seafood and sometimes vegetables. Whereas gimbap rolls are made of rice that's seasoned with toasted sesame oil and salt, and traditionally filled with sauteed beef, slice

Cold Soba Noodle Bowl with Seared Maitake Mushrooms

This chilled soba noodle bowl is refreshing, flavorful, and super nutritious with 100% buckwheat soba noodles, which are naturally gluten-free, tofu hard boiled "egg" and pan seared garlicky maitake mushrooms. It's also super quick to put together, you can whip up two servings under 15 minutes! Soba is a type of Japanese noodle made from buckwheat. They're thin, chewy, has a lovely buckwheat aroma, and if they're made of pure backwheat (some varieties do have wheat flour in them so read the ingredients carefully if you are allergic ) then they are natrually gluten-free!  And did you know buckwheat is also a complete protein source? Mean it contains all nine essential amino acids! That makes buckwheat one of the rare superfoods. Traditionally, soba noodles are served either chilled with a dipping sauce or hot as in a noodle soup. This noodle bowl is like a twist on the chilled soba noodle dish but instead of serving the sauce separately, I kept them all in one bowl

Vegan Hard Boiled "Egg" - Made of Tofu!

Prepare to be mind-blown by these ultra realistic 100% vegan hard-boiled "eggs"! They are made from only real food plant based ingredients and not only do they look, and taste like eggs, they are also high in protein - even higher than actual eggs! If you've been eating vegan or plant-based for a while, I'm sure you're familiar with some classic vegan "eggy" creations like tofu scrambles and tofu quiche , which are both on my weekly meals rotation and two of my favorite things to make. However, sometimes I do feel the absence of another type of egg, hard-boiled egg, especially when I'm craving a bowl of ramen or soba. In the past, I have carved out firm tofu into egg shapes to make vegan "eggs" for my noodle bowls but of course, it was nearly impossible to carve the "eggs" perfectly. So I set out to create a much more realistic version while keeping the same spirit of real food and never losing sight of nutrition . That's h

Orange Tempeh Lettuce Cups

These little cups are my recent favorite lunch. They're colorful, vibrant, refreshing, and packed full of flavors and nutrients! It's almost like an Asian style salad but individually wrapped in lettuce and hence hands friendly! Tempeh is such a wonderful protein source especially if you're vegan or are eating a plant-based diet. It is made of whole soybeans, fermented for better digestion, and minimally processed. However, I haven't been a huge fan of tempeh because of its strongly earthy and sometimes bitter taste, also its hard and dense texture. The only way I enjoy tempeh is with a strong sauce. like sweet and spicy glazed tempeh , or tempeh bacon , or as tempeh meatballs . Then I recently tried this orange tempeh from Jackie's new cookbook - the Clean Vegan cookbook and I was instantly in love! The sweet, sour, and citrusy sauce works so well with the earthiness of tempeh and it's very reminiscent of orange chicken! I made some adjustments to the original

Tomato Tuna Nigiri Sushi Vegan Sushi

These tomato "tuna" nigiri are a little bit of magic to your eyes and taste buds. They are vibrant, red, and curvy - just like tuna; and they taste fleshy, tender, juicy, and savory - again just like tuna! Except that they're made out of plants which our bodies are designed to consume and not at the cost of our ocean ecosystem. If we can make "salmon" out of tofu (see my tofu salmon bowl recipe), and lox out of carrots, it's only logical that we make some "tuna" out of tomatoes right? ;) Tomatoes naturally have a curve that resembles the shape of tuna pieces, and their vibrant red color and meaty, fleshy texture also come close to the fatty tuna. With just a simple marinade we can turn this garden vegetable into an ocean flavor dish! Before we let the tomatoes go through the magical transformation in the marinade, there is one thing we need to do - peel the tomatoes. Tomatoes have very thin, film-like skins and they can be very hard to peel off wh