Vegan Spicy Sweet Linguine

So like I mentioned in yesterday's post, I modified Rocco DiSpirito's Spicy-Sweet Linguine alla Vodka from his Now Eat This Diet. I thought I'd share the recipe with everyone in case anyone is wanting to try the vegan version.

Ingredients:

• 8 oz whole wheat vegan-friendly linguine
• 1.5 cups dairy free marinara sauce (some store bought sauces contain cheese)
• 4 oz jar fire-roasted red peppers, cut into strips
• 2 tablespoons vegan cream cheese
• 1 tablespoon soy milk (or other milk substitute)
• 1 tablespoon fresh chopped parsley
• 1.5 teaspoons hot pepper sauce
• Salt and pepper

Method:

1. Bring a large pot of [salted] water to a boil. Add the pasta and cook according to package.
2. While cooking the pasta, simmer the marinara sauce and peppers in a medium sauce pan. Cook, stirring occasionally for 5 minutes. Remove from heat
3. Mix vegan cream cheese with soy milk until combined. It should be the consistency of Greek yogurt. Add more milk or cream cheese as needed. Slowly whisk the cream cheese mixture into the sauce.
4. Drain the linguine and pour into a serving bowl or back into the pot. Add the sauce, parsley, and hot pepper sauce. Gently toss until the pasta is evenly coated.  Season to taste.

Enjoy! Check out Rocco DiSpirito because he has lots of great recipes and they're low in calories. His version of this pasta has only 307 calories and 7 fat grams, so this one's probably around there.

My Vegan Vacation

Note: For those of you who have said that you haven't been able to comment, I think I fixed that issue.

My Vegan Vacation: 4 Days in Melbourne, Florida

So I chose October as my month to go vegan because it didn't involve major food holidays (Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year's...) so I shouldn't run into many speed bumps. Well, I hadn't thought about the fact that I was taking a long weekend to go down to Melbourne to visit my undergrad for my sorority's alumni weekend. I had a fantastic weekend and was so happy to see so many of my Alpha Phi sisters. Love them.

Sunrise over I-10.

Food was complicated over the weekend. Thursday I drove down and brought food with me for the road trip (7.5 hour drive) so that was fine. Left super early in the morning, but I love driving before the sun is up.


Thursday night I went out for Mexican with a friend and easily found a vegan option, and the waiter assured me it was dairy-free. Friday breakfast consisted of a bagel and some coffee with a friend at Panera, of course. Breakfast was a little late so I didn't eat lunch. Dinner was the challenge. Alpha Phi was hosting the 3rd Annual Red Dress Gala, a formal dinner fundraiser to raise money for the Alpha Phi Foudation in support of heart health. My sister, Norah, who is wonderful and was in charge of the event worked so hard to get a meal I could eat. The hotel that the event was being held at clearly did not understand what it means to be vegan. My salad consisted of watered down lettuce with two slices of tomato. I say watered down because I thought at first that they had drizzled it with oil for dressing, but no they just soaked the lettuce in water. No dressing. I squeezed lemon juice onto it to add some flavor and ate the tomatoes last so that I got the most flavor at the end. I was a little worried about what would come next. The entree they served was a plate of vegetables. Just vegetables. They were delicious, and I was grateful to have them but there was nothing else. No rice. No beans. Nothing but veggies. I'm clearly a rabbit. My friend next to me has a bunch of allergies so she also got a special meal. They served her after me and she got a plate of veggies and rice. I looked at her plate and said "Why can't I get rice?"

Norah and I. She's awesome.

My plate of veggies. Delicious. Not fulfilling.

 Saturday was a lot better for food. Lunch consisted of a BBQ at the APhi house. BBQ doesn't typically scream vegan, but my Little was awesome and made me a vegan dish. She made this pan-asian noodle dish which was delicious. There was also fruit, and a salsa dip that I could eat. That worked out well. For dinner I had a fantastic veggie wrap at bar and restaurant we were at for dinner. Thanks to the website barnivore.com I can easily look up alcohols that are vegan friendly so that is always helpful. Sunday was the drive back and I didn't really eat much other than chips.

I didn't have a chance to go food shopping since I got back until tonight. So Sunday night and yesterday consisted of leftovers. Tonight though I made a vegan version of Rocco Dispirito's Sweet and Spicy Linguine alla Vodka (which has no vodka in it...). The recipe calls for yogurt and I didn't have soy yogurt, nor was I able to go downtown to Ever'man's to get some, so I experimented and mixed a little bit of vegan cream cheese with some soy milk. It seemed to make the right consistency so I gave it a try. It was delicious. And I tweeted about it and Rocco retweeted it which kind of made my night because I'm in love with him. Maybe tomorrow I'll post my modified version of the recipe. It really was good and it's pretty low in calories. Rocco has really great low-cal recipes with his Now Eat This Diet.

 

 

The sauce came out great with my yogurt substitution experiment.

Finished product.

Put it in some tuperware and brought it to my office for dinner.

That's all for now. I had a fantastic trip and made the best of it as a vegan. I didn't starve so I'd say it's a success. Look for some more posts soon.

Me and some wonderful ladies at Red Dress Gala.

Loved this in the Florida Tech alumni magazine.

My Life Month as a Vegan Day 11

Looked great. Tasted afwul.

Okay so tonight I had the biggest vegan fail ever. Seriously, I made three different meals for dinner because the first two went almost directly into the trash. So I started off with some apple cider tofu. I found the recipe from VeganDad and it looked so delicious that I thought I'd give it a try. Fail. I used less apple cider vinegar than the recipe called for and all you could taste was vinegar. So after a bite of that I threw it out (there was no salvaging any of it) and moved on to the next try. I had some tofu noodles and I made a "cream" sauce. Cooked up the noodles, poured some sauce over them, and topped it with some vegan-friendly meatless meatballs. I learned that tofu noodles are rather disgusting. The sauce and the meatballs were great, but they were ruined by the noodles. So after that I was tired of cooking. Heated up some leftover chickpea cakes and a few more meatballs and that was my dinner.



Last night I had a successful dinner attempt with only one try. I made some stir fry with bean sprouts, baby corn, mushrooms, water chestnuts, tempeh, and served it over rice. It was rather delicious, something that was super easy to make, and another one of those foods that you can just use whatever veggies you have.

Delicious tempeh stir fry which I served over rice (and have several servings of leftovers).

So one day last week I had the realization that since it is now October it is Mallomars season. If you're not aware, Mallomars are a delicious treat from Nabisco that is basically a smores cookie. It's a graham cracker-like cookie topped with marshmallow and covered in a chocolate coating. They are delicious. Over 70% of them are sold in the NY Metropolitan area though, so they are hard to come across down south. They are also only made from October to May since they melt so easily in the summer months. I got a packed from Mama Ceal this week and of course it had a box of Mallomars in it because she always sends me some when it's Mallomars season. Well, at least they don't go bad so they will be an amazing treat after my Vegan Pledge is over.

Sad that I can't eat Mallomars. They will make for a great post-vegan celebration.

Last night (or this morning rather) I had the sudden urge to bake cupcakes. It was 2am. I almost did, but then my rational thoughts took over and I knew that as soon as I would put them in the oven I would have the sudden urge to sleep. So I passed on that, but I plan on making some more chocolate cupcakes this weekend and possibly some cocount cupcakes as well.

Haven't had any other exciting vegan cooking extravaganzas. I'm hoping for some deliciously successful cooking adventures this weekend. And maybe a meal out at Sluggo's.


Here's the trailer to Food, Inc. It's a great documentary that has encouraged me to be a conscious consumer. I'm not trying to turn everyone (or anyone) vegetarian or vegan, but you should know where your food comes from and how it gets to you. I think I may see a documentary day coming up soon. This weekend perhaps?