Foodbuzz 24, 24, 24: Seven Course International Affair Gone Vegan!

What do you get when you combine two friends who are two vegans with two blogs who love foodbuzz and have a desire to entertain and just plain have fun? Why, you get one great Foodbuzz 24, 24, 24 event! For those of you who don’t know, 24, 24, 24 is 24 meals, 24 hours, 24 blogs. 24 Foodbuzz Featured Publishers (or teams, like Ryan and I!) from around the country (and in some cases, around the globe!) submit proposals for their ultimate foodie fest. Foodbuzz selects 24 proposals and provides a stipend to allow all of those proposals to come to fruition on the same day! It’s awesome!

Ryan and I dreamed up a Seven Course Vegan Feast with an International Theme. I have a love of creating recipes and menus, so this was right up my ally! Ryan is becoming quite amazing at raw vegan foods, so it was perfect to incorporate some raw foods, too!

We first started our afternoon with a mass Whole Foods shopping extravaganza.

Then it came time to actually prepare our feast! Our finalized menu was as follows:

First Course: An Italian appetizer of Tomato Basil Bread Crostini with a Bruschetta consisting of tomato, basil, lemon, extra virgin olive oil, cannellini beans and a sweet balsamic reduction.

Second Course: An African Sweet Potato and Peanut Soup

Third Course: A French vegan version of a Nicoise Salad.

Fourth Course: A simple palate cleanser of a Moroccan Mint Sorbet with coconut water, coconut milk, lime and fresh mint.

Fifth Course: Mexican Vegan Tamales with Masa and a Black Bean, Salsa Verde, Corn and Green Chiles Filling

Sixth Course: Jamaican Jerk Seitan with raw Plaintain Chips

Seventh Course: An All American, Vegan and Raw classic dessert of S’mores

It was ambitious, especially since we had never attempted some of the recipes or cooked with several of the ingredients before, but we were ready!

For our Crostini and Bruschetta first course we sliced some Tomato Basil bread into thin slices and toasted in a 375 degree oven until slightly toasted (about ten minutes). When the crostini came out we took a peeled garlic clove and quickly rubbed it over each piece of toast.

We served the crostini with Bruschetta and a Balsamic Agave Reduction.

Bruschetta:

• 1.5 pounds tomatoes, chopped
• 1 can no salt added cannellini beans (drained and rinsed!)
• juice from 1/2 a lemon
• 1/4 cup roughly chopped fresh basil
• 1-2 Tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• sea salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Balsamic Agave Reduction:

• 1 cup balsamic vinegar
• 2-3 Tablespoons agave (depends on desired sweetness)

*In a small sauce pot, reduce the balsamic and agave until you get a thin glaze type texture.

Next up was the second course! African Sweet Potato and Peanut Soup!

Source: http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/African-Sweet-Potato-and-Peanut-Soup/Detail.aspx

I won’t type out the recipe here since I didn’t make any changes and followed that recipe exactly, but this was an amazing soup! We garnished it with some fresh cilantro and roasted unsalted peanuts, and I believe that took it over the top.

Soon after the soup disappeared we sent out the third course, a French Vegan Nicoise Salad.

Source: http://www.wholefoodsmarket.com/recipes/2172

Once again we followed the recipe almost exactly, so please see the link for the recipe! The only things changed were the fact that we doubled everything except the tempeh, and we forgot the tomatoes and parsley! Ryan and I actually never got a chance to try the salad, but we heard it was quite good.

 

More on our guests in a minute, but most of them were bloggers and some were other Featured Publishers! Here they are in action!

 

Traditionally in a seven course meal, the fourth course is a palate cleansing sorbet. We went with a Moroccan themed sorbet and created a Moroccan Mint Sorbet! While it didn’t turn out how we envisioned, I think it actually turned out better! I think I even heard it being compared to a delicious, melty, frozen mojito.

Ingredients:

• 3.5  cups coconut water (coconut water from about three fresh young Thai coconuts)
• 1 cup vegan cane sugar
• 1 cup coconut milk
• 1/4 chop chopped fresh, organic mint
• 3 cups ice

Directions:

1. Place the sugar in and coconut water in a pan. Bring to a boil, stirring constantly until the sugar has dissolved completely. Reduce the heat and simmer for 5 minutes to make a light syrup.
2. Stir the coconut milk, lime and fresh mint into the syrup.
3. Pour the mixture into a shallow pan and freeze for at least 1 hour. Take the sorbet out of the freezer, add liquid to a blender with ice and blend until smooth.
4. Serve in small bowls and decorate with coconut and the mint leaves (optional).

Post-palate cleansing it was time for the entrees! Our first entree, or the fifth course, were Mexican Vegan Tamales.

To be honest, the tamales were so close to being a disaster. Neither Ryan nor I had ever made tamales, and I don’t even think we ever had homemade tamales, either! The knowledge of how time-consuming tamales can be was rather daunting, but after googling "how to make tamales" we felt empowered with enough knowledge to tackle our fifth course with confidence. And fortunately they turned out great, with a couple people even proclaiming the tamales their favorite dish!

Tamale methods source: http://www.chow.com/stories/11984

Masa Ingredients

• 6 cups Masa
• 1 cup nonhydrogenated organic vegetable shortening
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 Tablespoon garlic powder
• 1 Tablespoon cumin
• juice from half a lime
• 1 teaspoon sea salt (*although I’d up it to 1 T. next time because the masa was pretty bland)
• 6.5 cups water

Masa Directions

1. Using a fork or a pastry cutter, cut the shortening into the masa until the shortening is in tiny pea-sized pieces.
2. Add in the baking powder garlic, cumin and sea salt and combine all the dry ingredients until they’re one even mixture.
3. Add the water and lime juice. Combine until you have a smooth mixture (should be rather paste-like).

Filling Ingredients

• 2 cans of no salt added black beans
• 2 small cans of chopped green chiles
• 2 small cans of Herdez salsa verde
• 1/4 cup arrowroot powder (cornstarch can also be substituted)
• 2 teaspoons garlic powder
• 2 teaspoons cumin

Filling Directions
Combine all ingredients!

Other Ingredients
Corn Husks (you will need to soak these in hot water for 20 minutes)

Assembly

1. Take a softened corn husk and shake off excess water.
2. Holding the corn husk in your hand, spread a generous spoonful of masa inside (leave room on all edges, more room on the top and bottom where you will fold).
3. Spoon a small spoonful of the filling in the middle of the masa.
4. Roll the corn husk until the masa is touching (creating a masa wrapping around the tamale) and make sure the corn husk doesn’t get stuck inside the masa/ it seals all around.
5. Fold the bottom of the corn husk up.
6. Place in a large pot with a steamer basket with a bowl or jar in the middle to help the tamales stand up.
7. Put some water in the bottom of the pot (you’ll need to refill this throughout the steaming process) and cover and steam the tamales for around 90 minutes.

Notes: Even if they seem a little soft when you first take them out, they will firm up! We made 20 tamales with some masa and filling leftover to make a small casserole to fill an 8×8-inch pan.

 

I can’t believe they turned out so well! These would be perfect to make and stick in the freezer for quick meals, too!

The sixth course was Jamaican Jerk Seitan with Raw Plantain Chips.

 

Ingredients:

• 6 packages of store-bought seitan (or you can make your own!)
• 1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil or canola oil
• Juice and Zest of 4 Limes
• 4 Scallions (chopped)
• 1 Tablespoon each of Jamaican Allspice, Cinnamon, Thyme, and Garlic Powder
• 1.5 teaspoons sea salt (or more to taste)
• Cayenne Pepper to taste

Assemble the marinade in a large bowl. Break apart the seitan as it naturally falls apart. Marinade the seitan in the mixture anywhere from 30-60 minutes (or longer if you so desire!)

Bake in a 375 degree oven for 20-30 minutes (the seitan is already cooked, so the time variation is based on your personal preference for how chewy/ crunchy you want your seitan).

 

 

Last but not least, it was time for dessert – our seventh course that led us back to the United States with Raw Vegan S’Mores!

Source: http://www.pure2raw.com/2009/11/raw-dessert-smores-marshmallow/

Follow Pure 2 Raw’s recipe exactly – these girls know their raw goodies! Just a note: we didn’t add a top cookie to ours like Michelle and Lori did.

All in all it was such an amazing evening! I still can’t believe it happened, because it went so smoothly and so quickly! We had the most amazing guests to enjoy the evening with, too. The guest list included:

• Me and my husband, Ross
• Ryan and her boyfriend, Evan
• Caitlin and her husband, Kristien
• Angela and her husband, Eric
• Megan and her friend, Mark
• Meghann
• Ashley and her boyfriend, David
• Katy W. and her husband, Lucas
• Katy H. and her husband, Adam
• Evan’s (Ryan’s boyfriend) brother’s fiancee, Dana
• Kelly and her boyfriend, Anthony

 

 

 

 

Please also check out this awesome video that Ryan put together that captured our whole 24, 24, 24 experience from shopping to the end!

This was an amazing opportunity, and I’d just like to thank foodbuzz once again!

Once our foodbuzz feast died down, we took the time to honor the birthday of one of our friends, Katy, while we were all there. I have my "top secret vegan chocolate chip cookie recipe" and used that to make a cookie cake.

Happy birthday katy! And thank you again to everyone for coming and for being such great guests and especially to foodbuzz for making this possible!

Until next time?