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Arghhh, so my one-blog-a-week resolution just went out the window about 3 weeks ago. I don't really have much of an excuse, just that things have been crazy-busy with work and baking.
Oh! Some news-ish. My baking business got mentioned in the Philippine Daily Inquirer, a major daily in my neck of the woods. You can check it out here. It's tiny, the article is essentially a list of websites that can help you be more eco-friendly, in the spirit of celebrating Earth Day last April 25. Kitchen Revolution is "eco-friendly" because it's vegan and I don't use parchment paper and disposable frosting bags. Wheee!
Anyway, on to real food. I've ranted in the past about the suckiness of pizzeria-pizza. My feelings have not altered, except maybe they've been a lot more strongly opposed to lazy vegetarian pizzas pizzerias try to sell to us lowly vegetarians. It's like we are afterthoughts! Pizzerias, you know who you are.
I love my aunt / tita Colette because she always tries to accomodate my and my brother's veganism when it comes to food for family reunions or dinners at her home. She invited me and my brothers to an impromptu pizza night last Friday and again, we made pretty awesome homemade vegan pizza which pwns any pizzeria pizza any day.
This time I used mini wholewheat tortillas, which are great because [a] they're wholegrain and [b] they're so tiny you can stuff yourself with 2-3 pizzas and not feel guilty. They crisp up nicely despite the overload of toppings -- I believe the trick is to be sparing with the tomato sauce.
My tita made a thick tomato sauce out of tomato paste, garlic, onions, and basil which tasted surprisingly sweet -- tomato paste is usual sour. It was quite thick, I had to use a spatula to spread it on the tortilla.
Toppings include: leftover roasted vegetables (zucchini and broccoli), roasted eggplant, mushrooms, slivered onion, chopped garlic, sliced green peppers, Italian herbed tofu, and toasted pine nuts. Out of the oven, I added torn arugula leaves, parsley, and chili-infused olive oil. May I just say, pine nuts on pizza are aMAzing. Try it please.
I swear, best pizza ever, nevermind a wholewheat tortilla isn't a traditional pizza crust.
I've got 2 recipes to share: the Italian herbed tofu and the chili-infused olive oil. I employed a version of Isa Chandra Moskowitz's Italian marinated tofu from Vegan with a Vengeance. The chili-infused olive oil, I winged it :) Seriously, please don't waste your money on store bought infused oils when you can simply make your own.
Italian herbed tofu
Ingredients:
1 block of 350g firm tofu
1/2 cup white wine
2 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp white balsamic vinegar (may use regular)
2 tbsp soy sauce
2 tbsp apple cider vinegar
3 cloves of smashed garlic
1-2 tsp each: dried basil, marjoram, and rosemary
oil for frying
brown sugar
Drain tofu and wrap in a dish towel, lumpia style. Place something heavy on top, such as a huge can of tomatoes or a marble mortar and pestle. Let press for 15-30 min.
Meanwhile, make the marinade: mix the other ingredients together in a glass / ceramic bowl or measuring cup.
Slice the drained tofu thinly, like 1/4-1/8 inch in width. Make it thin like how you would slice cheese. This will help crisp up the tofu. Place the sliced tofu in a container and cover with the marinade. Best if you marinade the tofu overnight, but since last Friday was impromptu pizza dinner, I marinaded it for about 15 minutes.
Heat some oil (3-4 tbsp if I recall correctly) in a skillet on medium heat. Fry the tofu slices until crisp on both sides. I drizzle a bit of the marinade and sprinkle a bit of brown sugar on both sides in between flipping -- it makes the tofu all yummy and caramelized. That's it!
Chili-infused olive oil
Place 1/3 cup olive oil in a cold saucepan. Add in about 2 tbsp dried chili flakes. You may add chopped garlic as well (as much as you want). Heat the pan on the lowest heat setting, until you see bubbles appear on the oil's surface. Do not raise the heat! The point is to let the oil draw out the chili's and garlic's flavors, not the fry them.
You can store your infused oil in a bottle in room temperature. Drizzle this lovely oil on anything and everything.
Photo taken from here
These are my results: I’ve saved 420 animals thanks to my vegetarian diet.
If I stick to it, I will save over 15,680 more animals from dying and 184,800 pounds of CO2 emissions from polluting the Earth during my lifetime.
Happy earth day people! I know I know, earth day’s still tomorrow (at least in my time zone). For those of you who don’t know, according to our friend Wikipedia, Earth day is a day designed to inspire awareness and appreciation for the earth’s environment. It was founded by peace activist John McConnell in 1969 partly to generate awareness on overpopulation.
Anyway, if you’d like to celebrate earth day in your safe bubble, why not go vegan? For the day, for the week, for 3 weeks! Slowly adapt to 1 vegan meal a day, to 2 meals, to 3, to meriendas. Get ideas from here, here, and here.
These are the reasons why veganism = environmentalism without mentioning animal cruelty, as quoted in the UN Food and Agriculture Organization 2006 Report by Vegan Outreach.
- The livestock sector is a major player in climate change, responsible for 18% of greenhouse gas emissions measured in CO2 equivalent. This is higher than emissions of transportation vehicles.
- Livestock is responsible for 64% of anthropogenic ammonia emissions (read: POOP and URINE) which contribute to acid rain and acidification of ecosystems.
- Livestock accounts for over 8% of global human water use, mostly for irrigation of feedcrops. It is probably the largest sectoral source of water pollution. The major sources of pollution are from animal wastes, antibiotics and hormones, chemicals from tanneries, fertilizers and pesticides, used for feedcrops, and sediments from eroded pastures.
- 70% of previous forested land in the Amazon is occupied by pastures and feedcrops cover a large part of the remainder, all for livestock production.
- The livestock industry is the leading player in the reduction of biodiversity since it is a major driver of deforestation, land degradation, pollution, climate change, overfishing, sedimentation of coastal areas and facilitation of invasions by alien species.
A vegan diet requires 300 gallons of water per day while a meat-eating diet requires more than 4,200 gallons of water per day, says this site.
A 2006 University of Chicago study found that a person switching from the average American diet to a vegan diet would reduce CO2 emissions by 1,485 kg per year.
Something to think about, guys :)
