the curious chickpea • Page 2 of 7 • vegan food for everyone

Spicy Roasted Tomato Salsa

September 12, 2017 By thecuriouschickpea 3 Comments

Making your own salsa is super easy to do, and the results are so incredible. It’s so much more flavorful than the bottled stuff, and you can adjust it to meet your exact tastes. There’s no better time to make it than at the end of summer, when tomatoes are ripe, juicy, and bursting with flavor. This salsa is made with traditional ingredients: with a thick roasted tomato base, hot peppers, a healthy dose of garlic, sweet red onion, lime juice to brighten the flavors and let them sing, and cilantro for a fragrant citrusy fresh finish….

Vegan Chipotle Cheese Spread

September 7, 2017 By thecuriouschickpea 3 Comments

If you’ve been following along with me for a bit now, you know that I like my bread and I like my [vegan] cheese. But as of yet, I haven’t shared a recipe for my everyday cheese-spread. While sometimes I spread creamy almond cheese on toast, I tend to gravitate towards flavored cheese spreads for my bread. I’ve always been a flavored cream cheese over plain type of girl, what can I say. For a long time my go-to was a cultured creamy cashew cheese. And while I tried a lot of different mix-ins over the years, I’d always gravitate back to a chipotle one. Something about the smokey flavors of chipotle makes cultured vegan cheese even cheesier tasting. This cultured version is still probably my go-to for the depth of flavor it achieves, but over the past year I’ve developed a non-cultured version. It’s perfect for busier times, and is nice because there’s no chance it will go off while culturing!…

Vegan Mexican Pizza

September 5, 2017 By thecuriouschickpea Leave a Comment

When I hear the term “Mexican pizza” I can’t help but think of that version I’d order at Taco Bell — Mexican pizza, add beans and hold the meat. It’s probably been almost 20 years since I’ve ordered that, and it’s nothing like the recipe I’m sharing here today. Here there are no crunchy flat tortillas sandwiching any filling. Instead, the toppings are piled high over a perfectly doughy pizza….

Vegan Singapore Noodles

August 31, 2017 By thecuriouschickpea Leave a Comment

Have you ever had Singapore noodles? Contrary to the name, they are not from Singapore at all, but actually a popular dish served at Chinese restaurants! It’s traditionally made with BBQ pork and shrimp, and has fish sauce in it, so it’s not the most veggie-friendly dish to order out. But, an easy one to make at home! For me, the dish is all about the sauce–it’s essentially a curry flavored Chinese noodle stir fry. Two of my favorite cuisines (I probably say that of all the cuisines), Indian and Chinese, in one flavor packed dish! …

Coconut Ginger Custard Filled Doughnuts

August 29, 2017 By thecuriouschickpea 2 Comments

Calling all doughnut lovers! These doughnuts are everything you want your doughnuts to be. Or at least, everything I want in a doughnut. They are yeasted and fried. No baked or cake doughnuts here! They are light and airy inside, with a bit of a chew. Eaten while still warm, they practically melt in your mouth. If you’ve never had a homemade doughnut before you are in for a treat! These doughnuts are filled with a coconut ginger custard that’s so delicious you could just eat it with a spoon. Which, you can do, because the recipe definitely makes extra!…

Thai Curry Cauliflower Lentil Soup with Chickpea Croutons

August 24, 2017 By thecuriouschickpea Leave a Comment

DC is a cool 72 degrees as I write this post this morning (and the high is only 79 ºF today). It feels like a godsend after the last week, which was around 20 ºF hotter. We’re taking advantage of this brief respite with some soup. I mean, ok, we actually don’t have any more soup. It’s too good! We ate it all! But you should take advantage of a cool day (I’m not sure when I started calling 70s cool weather) with some soup. But having had this in 95 degree weather I will attest that it’s great then too….

Beer Braised Zucchini

August 22, 2017 By thecuriouschickpea Leave a Comment

So, we bought a house last week! We are super excited about it. The house is in a neighborhood of DC that we love (only a few blocks away from our rental apartment), and we have a yard for the first time ever (as adults)! It’s also been an incredibly busy and stressful time, with only 4 weeks from contract to settlement. Everything has been in high gear and I’m ready for a vacation–or rather, a staycation because I never want to leave our new house! We moved on Sunday and are 98% settled in, everything is unpacked but we still have artwork to hang and a few things left to arrange. Our dog Selkie loves her yard and all the squirrel watching she can do, while our cat Minx feels like she should be allowed outside as well. As for me, I’m so excited to cook in our beautiful new kitchen! I actually baked my first 2 loaves of sourdough bread this morning, and they came out SO perfectly!

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Vegan Fried Bacon Mac and Cheese

August 17, 2017 By thecuriouschickpea Leave a Comment

Fried bacon mac and cheese (vegan, obviously), is the food of my dreams. Creamy, cheesy macaroni is pan fried with your favorite meat-free bacon. See, it’s the food of your dreams too! If you haven’t already been lusting after having some fried bacon mac and cheese in your life it’s probably because you’ve never heard of Upton’s Breakroom in Chicago. It’s owned and run by the same people who own Upton’s Naturals, and has tasty tacos, sandwiches, soft serve, and, of course, fried bacon mac. We didn’t go there often when we lived in Chicago, because it was on the other end of town and more of a lunch spot, but when in the area I’d go out of the way to get some of their vegan bacon mac….

Favosalata: Yellow Split Pea Dip

August 15, 2017 By thecuriouschickpea Leave a Comment

Back in June Omar and I ate out at a Kapnos, a pretty vegan-friendly, Greek restaurant in DC, where we discovered this amazing dish called favosalata. Is that not incredibly fun to say? Favosalata! It was creamy and super flavorful, despite only really being flavored with scallions, olive oil, white wine, black garlic, and a squeeze of lemon juice. Made from yellow split peas, it was a bit reminiscent of hummus, but really only in the fact that it’s a legume purée. We really enjoyed dipping our freshly made flatbread into the flavorful bright yellow spread. It was one of the highlights of the meal for us! So much that when I was at the grocery store the following week I picked up a bag of split yellow peas to recreate it ASAP. And then they sat in my pantry for 6 weeks….

Homemade New York Style Bagels

August 10, 2017 By thecuriouschickpea 2 Comments

What makes bread a bagel? Is it the shape? The texture? Where they come from? Yes, yes, and no. Let’s start with the last question: I emphatically believe that you can make or get a damn good bagel anywhere in the world… provided you can source the correct ingredients that is. Now a disclaimer – I’m not from NYC, nor have I spent a crazy amount of time there (but I have eaten NY style bagels). But, I’m excellent at research, both book research and hands on experimenting. And a lack of good locally available bagels has led me to do a lot of bagel baking over the years. And these bagels have been tested on people from NY. Plus, the recipe is adapted from Peter Reinhart, and would he steer us wrong? No. As for the first two questions: the shape and texture of a bagel are related, you wouldn’t be able to get that quintessential bagel texture without the hole in the center. The hole allows for the entire bagel to have a chewy crust, without would lead to a soft and tender center….

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