This Weekend in Food

I made falafel for the first time ever! It's one of my husband's favorite things and he almost always orders it if it's offered on a menu. It's just never done it for me, so I never bothered to try making it. (That sounds rather selfish, doesn't it?). Well, we were sitting on the couch and I was flipping through VwaV and my husband saw the recipe. Of course, I'd never mentioned it was in there because I had no intention of making it. Since I was busted, I gave it a go and am happy to say they were really delicious! Now I'm a convert, but from tasting Jim's in restaurants, I think I'll stick to homemade once in a while rather than the restaurant version. The tahini sauce is awesome and makes a great salad dressing, too.


We also had another first: Pho! I have no idea if this is how it's supposed to be, but we really enjoyed it. I used the recipe from Robin Robertson's book Quick Fix Vegetarian. Now I really want to try the real thing. In the meantime, this hits the spot in a really pleasantly spicy way.

This is the Almost No Knead Bread posted at the PPK, originally from Cook's Illustrated. If you like a bread with a softer crust, this is the one for you. If you like a crunchy crust, stick to the original No Knead Bread. The flavor on the Almost recipe is good, slightly sweet and it had a nice texture. The coolest thing about the recipe is the parchment trick to move your loaf into the hot pot. The recipe is worth that trick alone! I'm sticking with the original recipe from now on. I like a crust that bites back!

I finally made my first recipe from My Sweet Vegan: the Caramel Macchiato Cheesecake! The crust was fantastic, the filling had a lovely coffee flavor, the white 'sour cream' topping was right on.. the only thing that wasn't quite up to par was the caramel sauce. The sauce was good, but not as great as the rest of the cheesecake. It needed something. I tried to doctor it with vanilla, but that wasn't what was missing. Would I make it again? You bet, when I'm feeling decadent. I'd have to tinker with that sauce a little more though. Just for the record, the sauce was in pretty pattern before we took it on the car, instead of the 'all-over look' in the picture.

Dinner tonight: still debating.