V is for Variety and H is for Homemade
Welcome to the Vegan Month of Food (VeganMoFo) I intend to post 20 times during the month of September – all about vegan food. Check out the gals who organize the project here, and search out other fantastic vegan bloggers. I decided on the theme of “V is for Variety” because, honestly, once I quit the chicken breast – my food choices exploded! Join me!
One of my favorite memories is making pasta with my kiddos
when they were little. How they loved turning the crank and catching the fresh
noodles. Everyone had to have a turn. Flour all over the counter. Trying not to
fret over flour on the floor. Accepting the thick, ugly strands of pasta along
with the super long thin ones. Playing around with different colors of dough:
green from spinach, red from beet juice, orange from baby food carrots.
Watching them devour what they had created.
Nowadays I can get a batch of pasta done in about 1 hour,
and that’s including the 30 minutes you need to rest the dough. Practice makes perfect, as they say.
This pasta was very soft, which surprised me because it
called for semolina instead of regular flour. I always thought semolina was harder flour,
but I do think we cooked it a bit too long, and as you probably can tell from my photo at the top of this post, we
mixed it too vigorously, so it broke apart. But none of that bothered us. I am
definitely making this again – especially the sauce!
Here’s what
you need for the pasta:
2 C semolina
flour
2 T olive
oil
1 T water
½ -3/4 C silken
tofu (replaces the egg, which you don’t really even need. The tofu helped
create a really silky dough)
Here’s what
you do for the pasta:
Place all
ingredients in a food processor and blend until it all comes together. Wrap in
plastic and allow to rest for about 30 minutes. Cut dough in quarters and run
it through a pasta machine. Don’t overcook it….maybe 2-3 minutes at most!
Here’s what
you need for the Incredible Mushroom Sauce:
Minced onions
– to taste, but don’t be hesitant to load them on
Dried oregano
Minced garlic
Portabella
mushrooms – remove the stem and gills and slice
Shitake
mushrooms – remove the stem and slice
White button
mushrooms – sliced
¾ C dry red
wine
Fresh tomatoes
– lots!
Here’s what
you do for the sauce:
Sautee the
onions for a few minutes. Add the oregano, garlic, mushrooms and some salt. (A
great trick to enhance the oregano is to rub it between your hands which
releases all the beautiful oils of the dried leaves. Sprinkle the herb directly
on the onions and you will love what a difference this makes to the
flavor.) Continue to cook the onions and
mushrooms for a bit. Add the red wine and fresh tomatoes. Cook until it all
gloriously comes together. Maybe 30 minutes or so. Add fresh basil at the end.
Wow! You make you're own pasta! I've never ever tried but might just give it a go after reading your post. I only have a rolling pin though! :)
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