Saturday, November 17, 2007

MillenniYUM, his and hers

His...Hers...
For my birthday last year, the Cap'n surprised me with The Artful Vegan after our trip to San Fran. While an amazing and inspiring cookbook, it's chock full of ingredients I've either never heard of or can't get my hands on, and many of the recipes are pretty involved. I did make Seitan Skewers that were divine so I know it's worth the effort....it's just not getting much use just yet in our kitchen.

He also ordered their first cookbook, The Millennium Cookbook, but it took until just last month for it to get to me! It has a bit more of their 'basics' in it and I can see me relying on this cookbook a whole lot more than the other. Knowing I wanted tempeh, I just had to try their tempeh marinade. Knowing, also, that the Cap'n loathes all things tempeh, I decided to improvise. The marinade calls basically for two packs of tempeh. Having only one anyway, I made the whole marinade but dumped in a half bag of soy curls to fill up the rest of my baking dish before putting it in the oven. The recipe calls for cooking the soy in their marinade in the oven for an hour and a half. This was more than ample time to clean up the kitchen, chop some spinach and garlic, whip up some rice, and convince my pregnant self that all the alcohol would cook out in both the marinade (it calls for nonalcoholic red wine but i opted for cooking wine, as that's what we had) AND the marsala sauce I so love and haven't had in ages. I boiled the heck out of it so I'm sure it was okay to consume, right? ;)

The verdict? BEST DAMN MARINADE EVER. Seriously, I opted to thin out the tempeh by slicing it in half to make it two long thin versions of the original block then cutting it in thirds. All the bitterness of typical, store bought tempeh? Gone! (even the Cap'n tasted it and admitted it was the best flavor he'd ever experienced from tempeh!) And the soy curls? Oh. My. Dog. Fantastic. I took them out of the marinade, coated them in cornstarch, and browned in grapeseed oil before topping with the marsala. I should admit that not all of them even made it to his plate as I snatched up a ton and ate them right out of the pan, sans marsala. Soooooo good!


The tempeh, I did the same but with flour rather than cornstarch. I cannot wait to try some of their other ideas. This cookbook was definitely worth the wait, even for this one amazing recipe, and I'm sure it won't be the last I dive into anytime soon.
Don't let my five month wait put you off ordering it, tho. I just ordered it for my sister and have already received confirmation that it's on it's way!

And yes, this meal was so tasty, so delicious that each of our plates deserved more than just one pic a piece! Best add the Millennium Cookbook to your Giftmas Wish List!!!! ;)

13 comments:

LizNoVeggieGirl said...

I have the Millennium cookbook, but have never used it, haha. wow, the tempeh dish sounds FABULOUS (too bad your husband doesn't like tempeh - he's missing out)!! especially the marinade :0)

jess (of Get Sconed!) said...

holy hell! I have the Artful Vegan, but have only made a couple things. Time to get cozy and reread and decide on something. All the awesome cookbooks lately!

Lori- the Pleasantly Plump Vegan said...

yummmm marsala! i was thinkin the other day that i might never have that again. now, maybe i will.

Anonymous said...

2 more books for my wish list :)

the food looks awesome!!

Kayla said...

Awesome looking dish. Right up my alley, too. I bought Artful Vegan for a friend of mine a while back. He loves to cook, and was an omnivore at the time. A short time after I gave him the book, he went veg! I can't wait to go to Millennium when I visit San Fran.

Melisser; the Urban Housewife said...

I loooove Millenium! We go to the Aphrodisiac Dinners when we have the extra funds; so good!
I just started working with tempeh, I'll have to wish list the book or pick it up at the restaurant!

Vegan_Noodle said...

Thanks for the tip! I have the artful vegan, and same as you, haven't really put the time in to make anything since they're so complicated.

Oh, love your little countdown to the arrival of your little one!

Isil Simsek said...

Hi there,
congratulations on your pregnancy!
keep up the good work!

Rose said...

It's that good, huh? I guess I better get myself the Millennium cookbook then :)

TB said...

I have this cookbook but I think I have only used it once or twice. The recipes mostly seemed way more involved than I was willing to commit to. I haven't looked at it in ages, though, so you're inspiring me to break it out and give it another shot!

Emilie said...

Yum. I always appreciate seeing new recipes from the Artful Vegan that I should sink some hours into. I love that book--it's annoying but also fun to discover some of the more random ingredients and figure out how to use them in dishes that won't take 3 hours to make as well.

aTxVegn said...

I have both those books and the recipes are quite involved. I've done like you did and just picked out some of my favorite components from the long recipes. Everything is so good you can't go wrong!

Kate said...

Oh wow, that looks amazing!