Almesan

This is my first post for "Sauces and Fillings." I'm pretty sure I've made others but just haven't posted them separately. If so, I'll get those added.

Anyway, their fake "parmesan" recipe is a total hit in this household. We used to spend $4 on a small bottle of fake vegan "parmesan," and it was full of fillers. This version is just as tasty, if not tastier, is less expensive and we know exactly what's in it: just 4 basic ingredients.

It has a great nutty taste and texture with just the right amount of tang from the lemon and a hint of bitterness from the toasted sesame seeds. I add about a half tablespoon of nutritional yeast to give it just a bit more tang, but you really don't need it. I'm nothing if not a king of doctoring things up.

To prepare this, I like to use a coffee grinder and blitz the hell out until it's mostly fine with a few larger chunks of almonds.

We use this on pasta, rice and risotto dishes and anything else that calls for parmesan. In fact, we use a lot more fake "parmesan" now that we know how to make it at home.

Cost: About $1 - $1.50 per recipe. We usually double the recipe.
Difficulty: Way easy.
Modifications: About 1/2 tablespoon of nutritional yeast.
Cleanup: Super easy.

This recipe is on page 207 of Veganomicon.

Spinach Linguine With Basil-Cilantro Pesto And Artichokes

I love pesto. I love spinach fettuccine. I love artichoke hearts. I liked this dish.

I figured a dish that combined so many things I loved would be something I loved, but I came away thinking of this as just a good dish.

I have my own pesto recipe, which I partially used to make the pesto for this dish. I followed their recipe, except I replaced parsley for basil and didn't use cilantro (don't make me say how much I hate cilantro again). But it was the lemon juice that I think, at least for me, took this from a great dish to a good dish. I actually sometimes use a little lemon juice in my pesto recipe, but this one has two tablespoons, which took it from a background flavor to the foreground. I like my pesto to taste garlicky, but I could barely taste the garlic here.

The red onions were a great addition, adding some nice sweetness and crunch. I may even try that in my own pesto sometime. And I will say that the next day leftovers were better. The tanginess had faded and the garlic flavor was allowed to come forth.

Oh, a couple of additions I made: the toasted almonds on top and some sauteed rainbow chard. You can't ever go wrong with toasted almonds. I also wanted an extra nutrition boost, so I added the chard, which I had never made before. That was the best surprise of the night, as it was a perfect balance between soggier spinach and tougher kale.

In the end, I won't be craving this, as the authors said, but I think it's a dish that should at least be tried once. You may have a different reaction to it than I did.

Price-wise, this was about $8. Not bad at all.

This recipe is on page 191 of Veganomicon.