No, this is not a hilarious dance performed by the natives to this continent–it’s a tofu scramble made with local ingredients, namely wild rice and acorn squash. I like to imagine this as the Thanksgiving Breakfast, pilgrims and natives alike feasting cruelty-free on tofu and native crops. No one gave anyone smallpox and everyone lived happily ever after. The end. Manifest Destiny only required that the food was delicious.

We made this for a brunch this morning (well, this afternoon). This being the Year of the Brunch, it’s been a real challenge to make a sufficient variety of breakfast foods without (a) repeating ourselves and (b) overlapping with what others are making. Remember that brunch where you all made potatoes?

This was inspired by a scramble we had some time back at Seva, a local vegetarian restaurant. It’s a little labor intensive for your usual breakfast, so it’s more ideal for a brunch-type scenario. Accordingly, this recipe is for a double batch–so be sure to halve everything if you’re only feeding a few people and/or don’t want a ton of leftovers.

Indigenous Scramble

• 2 medium-sized white onions, diced
• 2 lbs of tofu, drained
• 1/2 medium – large acorn squash
• 1 cup (uncooked) wild rice
• 2 cups water
• 1/3 cup nutritional yeast
• 1 tsp turmeric
• 2 tsp herbs d’provence
• salt & pepper, to taste
• high heat cooking oil

Preheat your over to 425 degrees Fahrenheit. Cut the acorn squash in half and place on baking sheet in a small drizzle of high heat cooking oil (like Safflower). Bake for 30 – 40 minutes, until you can remove the skin, but the squash is still solid enough to cut into pieces. Don’t worry too much about overcooking it–it’ll still be awesome, but you’ll lose a little something in texture.

Meanwhile, in a medium-sized saucepan, heat 1 tbsp cooking oil over high heat. Add in the wild rice, tossing, and cook for about 3 minutes. Add in the water, bring to boil, then reduce heat and cover, cooking until the water is gone and the rice is done.

Meanmeanwhile, saute the onion in oil in a large pot over medium heat. Once the onions are soft, add in the tofu, crumbling. Now add in the nu yeast and the turmeric. When the squash is done, peel the skin off and cut it into bite-sized pieces. Add it to the tofu. When the rice is done, add that too, Finally, add in the spices, salt, and pepper. Mix it up. Eat it up.

Potato pancakes have always been something of a mystery to me. I think I always just assumed they were like regular pancakes, but made with some sort of potato flour…maybe a bit less sweet? For people with gluten allergies? It all stems back to my childhood. In my home town, there’s a restaurant called The Potato Shack (of little interest to a 10 year old boy in the 80s), which I would often confuse with Radio Shack (of great interest to a 10 year old boy in the 80s), and consequently found to be a big letdown. So, it stands to reason that potato pancakes would also be a big letdown.

Not so, not so.

They’re much less like pancakes than hashbrowns in delicious cake form.

And they’re pretty simple to make.

Potato Pancakes

• 5 medium-sized russet potatoes
• 1 large white onion, peeled
• non-sweet replacement for two eggs (Energ-G(tm), ground flaxseed, etc)
• 3/4 cup all-purpose flour
• salt and pepper, to taste

Grate the onion and potatoes into a large bowl. Mix them. Then, mix in the remaining ingredients. The consistency should be paste-like–you can add flour or water to control this in either direction.

Heat oil or Earth Balance in a frying pan over medium heat, and dollop in some “batter”. When the bottom is brown, flip. The pancake, not you. Well, I guess if you can flip, now would be an excellent time. Do a flip both before and after flipping the pancake. And then again before serving, if possible. The pancake is done when both sides are brown (golden brown will produce a softer pancake, darker brown, a more crispy pancake–I prefer the crispier/darker).

What makes or breaks potato pancakes, though, is what you serve them with.

We have served these with applesauce and cashew cream (traditionally, potato latkes are served with applesauce and/or sour cream). I thought they were stellar with the cashew cream.

This time around, we served them with the leftover filling from our momelette–sauteed onions, peppers, mushrooms, and tomatoes.

So what makes this a “momelette” instead of an “omelette”?

The letter ‘M’.

I give this 9 points for looking awesome, 8 points for tasting awesome, and 6 points for being kind of like a traditional egg momelette, or “omelette”, if you will.

We modified this recipe from VegWeb.

Tofu Momelette

• 1 lb extra firm tofu, drained and shredded into long strands
• 1 small – medium white onion, diced
• ~ 6 medium-size mushrooms (optional), diced
• 1 small – medium green bell pepper, diced
• 1 small tomato, seeded and diced
• 1 clove of garlic, pressed or grated
• 1/8 tsp turmeric
• 1 tbsp nu yeast
• salt and pepper, to taste
• Earth Balance(tm)

The interesting part of this recipe–the key to it, you might say–is using a cheese shredder to shred the tofu into long strands (use large-holed face/shredder). This makes it pretty malleable, but not so crumbly that it’s just a scramble. A smaller–but no less crucial–key is to cook the vegetables separately.

So.

In a large non-stick (or well-seasoned) pan, melt enough Earth Balance to lightly cover the bottom of the pan over medium heat. Don’t front like regular oil is gonna get you out of this one. This is much better with Earth Balance. Next, pack down enough shredded tofu to make a solid circle, as big around as you’d like your momelette to be (ideally, use half–then you get two momelettes). It shouldn’t be loose like hash browns. Cook on this side until the bottom starts to brown–this took at least 10 minutes on our stove.

Meanwhile, in a different pan, but also over medium heat, sautee the veggies (and mushrooms, if using) until they are soft. You may use oil here if you wish.

When the time is right, flip the momelette. Let it cook for about 5 minutes, then spread half of the veggies on one half of the momelette. Fold the non-veggie-fied half onto the veggie-fied half. Cook for a few minutes, just for good measure then flip and cook for a few more.

Serve with ketchup, catsup, or salsa.

It was the best of quiches, it was the…well, I guess, okay, of quiches?

Here’s the gimmick: one quiche is almost entirely from scratch, the other is almost entirely from pre-packaged ingredients. In the battle of the century, which will win?! Sundaysundaysunday! Be there!

(Genius battle plan devised by Amy)

Obviously, we were pulling for from-scratch, as we try to keep our consumption of packaged/processed foods to a minimum.

Pre-packaged ingredients on the left; fresh, local, organic ingredients on the right

We unveiled these bastages at yet another brunch (this summer’s been lousy with the things)–to mostly omnivores, served alongside a “real” quiche. About half of each was eaten, which isn’t half bad given the competition, but isn’t as good as being inhaled within minutes.

The consensus, ultimately, was that the more homemade-y variety was superior, though the soysage in the faux-ass quiche was much better then the tempeh crumbles that I invented (poorly) for this recipe. Additionally, even though I took precautions against it (by using 1 block of non-silken tofu), neither quiche ended up as springy as a “real” quiche. Amy likes to think of these as “breakfast pies”. To me, that sounds a lot like “breakfast failures”.

So color this a “work-in-progress“. Consider some improvements below!

L’ Quiche au Naturale

Filling

• 1 lb extra firm tofu
• 1 pkg extra firm silken tofu*
• 1.5 – 2 cups chopped kale or spinach**
• 1/2 large white onion, diced
• 1/3 large green bell pepper, diced
• 1 tbsp tahini
• 1 tbsp white miso
• 1/4 cup nu yeast
• 1 tsp onion powder
• 1 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp garlic powder
• 1/4 cup faux milk beverage (preferably, unsweetened)
• 1.5 tsp arrow root powder
• tempeh sausage crumbles
• faux-made cheez

Tempeh Sausage Crumbles

• 1 pkg or a 5″ x 3″ x 1/2″ block tempeh***
• 1/2 tsp onion powder
• 1/2 tsp paprika
• 1 tsp oregano
• 1.5 tbsp soy sauce/tamari/shoyu
• 1 tbsp liquid smoke(tm)
• salt and pepper (lots of pepper), to taste

Faux-Made Cheez (nabbed [and modified slightly] from Scrumpdilly)

• 2 cups water
• 1/4 cup raw cashews
• 1 cup nutritional yeast flakes
• 2 Tbsp. cornstarch
• 1 Tbsp. fresh lemon juice
• 1 1/2 tsp. salt
• 1/2 tsp. onion powder
• 1/4 tsp. garlic powder
• 1/2 tsp. cumin

Crust (I know, this shit is getting ridiculous. That’s what being awesome means.)

• 2.5 cups of all-purpose flour
• 1 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp sugar
• 1/2 cup ice-cold water

* As far as I know, this only comes in packages. Fuck. Being good is so hard.
** Whatever is available locally. Kale seems easier to find in our neck of the woods.
*** Our local coop sells locally made tempeh in bulk. This is in Ypsilanti, MI. You can find this. If you can’t, use homemade seitan.

Directions

Crust

Sift 2.5 cups of unbleached all-purpose flour into a large mixing bowl. Cut in (with two battling butter knives) 1/2 cup butter or shortening (Earth Balance makes both). You want the mixture to form large crumbs. You may need up to an additional 1/2 cup of butter or shortening–but take it easy. You want crumbs, not giant shortening boogers. Once you’ve got this crumb-ified, add in 1/4 cup of ice water, a little at a time until all the crumbs are sticking together. You want this just wet enough. Knead the dough into a big ball then separate into two smaller balls. Put this in an airtight-ish reusable plastic bag or plastic wrap. Refrigerate at least four hours. Then roll and rock, in that order. Easy!

Tempeh Sausage Crumbles

Chop tempeh into crumbles. I’ve documented this ad nauseum in the biscuits and gravy post.  In a large pan, brown the tempeh over medium heat in soy sauce/tamari/shoyu and liquid smoke, tossing in remaining ingredients once the tempeh is coated. Cook until nice and brown. Fantastic. You are a champion.

Cheez

Follow Jennifer’s recipe, sans pimiento and jalapeno.

Filling

In a medium-sized pan, over medium heat, sautee the onion, garlic, and green pepper until soft. Combine the water and arrow root powder. In a food processor, or Vitamix(tm) if you won the lottery, blend all of the filling ingredients except the kale and sautee-fixins, along with the arrow-root-water. In a large bowl, combine the sautee-fixins, the kale, the tempeh sausage crumbles, and the filling. You may want to save a few tempeh crumblins to sprinkle on top of the quiche.

Finally

Pour the filling into the crust. Drizzle faux-made cheez (and crumblins if you saved any) on top of the filling. Bake for about 45 minutes at 375 degrees. Tada!

L’ Quiche au Faux

• 1 lb extra firm tofu (packaged and sealed [oooh! Go with Whitewave(tm), they're total bastards!])
• 1 pkg extra firm silken tofu(Mori-nu(tm))
• 1.5 – 2 cups chopped store-bought, bagged or boxed spinach (go with the box, that’s really offensive–fuck you nature!)
• 1/2 large white onion, diced (I think some places you can buy this pre-packaged)
• 1/3 large green bell pepper, diced (you’re gonna have to do this yourself…maybe you can put some cans in the garbage to offset the positive effect?)
• 2 tsp salt (is it still possible to get pre-Gandhi British tax-oppression salt? If so, use that.)
• 1/2 soysage log (Litelife(tm))
• 1/2 block of cheddar or nacho cheese (Follow Your Heart(tm))
• 1/2 block of mozzarella cheese (Follow Your Heart(tm))
• 1/4 cup faux milk beverage (preferably, Silk(tm), oh, where to start…)
• 1.5 tsp arrow root powder (sorry, arrow root powder is totally awesome!)

Directions:

In a medium-sized pan, over medium heat, sautee the onion, garlic, and green pepper until soft. In a different medium-sized pan, over medium heat, sautee the processed soysage. Use a spatula to mash it into largish bits.

Combine the water and arrow root powder. In a food processor, blend all of the filling ingredients except the spinach, soysage, and enough faux cheese to sprinkle on top, along with the arrow-root-water. In a large bowl, combine the soysage, spinach, and the filling. You may want to save some soysage crumblins to sprinkle on top of the quiche.

Pop the filling into your convenient store-bought crust, sprinkle on some processed soy cheese and soysage, and bake that badboy for about 45 minutes at 375 degrees Fahrenheit or 463.555 degrees Kelvin.

Au Naturale on the left, Au Faux on the right

Possible Improvements to Au Naturale

• Use seitan instead of tempeh; this will improve the taste and will work better as larger chunks
• Use VeganYumYum’s cheese from the Mac & Cheez instead of Scrumpdilly’s nacho sauce (which is great, but not really suited to this)
• add broccoli (duh! what was I thinking?)
• tone down the salt (I know, I know, hard to believe I could ever say such a thing)
• add in something “bready”–bread crumbs, bread makings, anything to make this a little lighter–more like a bake and less like a pie

With no end to brunches in sight, I’m sure I’ll come back to this at some point. In the meantime, I’d welcome any comments/suggestions/anti-quiche hatemail.

And for the record, the Nip is all about the natural:

Due to recent advances in brunch frequency technology, this summer’s been a veritable brunchfest. For the triple-T brunch, we made a Southwest Scrapple. Yes. Scrapple. Not “scramble”. I decided this was a scrapple because it features not only tofu, but tempeh as well. But also because it felt like a scrapple. I didn’t even really know what scrapple is.

Well, it turns out scrapple is like a breakfast meatloaf made of congealed pig scraps and various flours. Sounds like just the kind of thing worth emulating. I’d sooner eat my words than crapple, so “scramble” it is.

Southwest Scramble

• 1 onion, peeled and diced
• 1 green bell pepper, seeded and diced
• 1 small can of diced mild green chilis
• 1 cup cooked or 1/2 can pinto beans, drained and rinsed
• 1 lb tofu, drained
• 1 package tempeh, cut irregularly
• 1 tsp turmeric
• 1 tbsp chili powder
• 1/2 tsp paprika
• 1/2 tsp ground cumin
• 1/2 tsp oregano
• 4 tbsp nu yeast
• salt and pepper to taste

Like most scrambles and probably most crapples, this is pretty simple. In a large-ish pot, sautee the onion, green bell pepper, and chilis in oil, over medium heat. When the onions and bell pepper begin to soften, add in the tempeh and cook for 5 – 10 minutes, until the tempeh starts to brown a little bit. Crumble in the tofu, mashing up the remaining large bits with a spatula. Do it with gusto. But without alacrity. Once everything is mixed well, add the spices and nu yeast, in order. Finish off with some fresh ground salt and pepper.

Garnish with sliced avocado and salsa.

It will look like this in a pot, if you make this correctly and your pot looks exactly like ours: