BBQ Tofu

Derived from this recipe.

1 package tofu
1 3/4 teaspoons paprika
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon chili powder
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1 1/2 tablespoons olive oil

Press tofu to dry.  While it's pressing, preheat the oven to 425.  Mix together all the spices in a big mixing bowl.  Add oil & mix into a paste.  Tear tofu into bite-sized pieces, add to spice paste.  Stir until all the tofu has seasoning on it.  Spray a baking sheet with oil, dump tofu onto it, bake for 25 minutes or until you like the texture, stirring every 10 minutes or less.  Dip in BBQ sauce, or toss with sauce.

The spice paste is really tasty & could probably be used for other stuff too (veggies, etc.).

Banana Cookies

I had some bananas that were getting too ripe.  I didn't want banana bread.  Behold, cookies!  They're the fluffy kind, like pumpkin cookies.

Based on this recipe.  Makes about 18 cookies, maybe 20 if you don't eat any dough.

1.5 cups flour
1.5 tsp baking powder
scant 1/4 tsp salt
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup butter, softened but not melted, and whipped
1.5 eggs (I used 1 egg and a half egg's worth of egg replacer)
2 bananas (mine were small)
3/4 tsp vanilla

Mix together the dry ingredients.   Add the butter.  Add everything else.  Put them on cookie sheets -- they'll roughly double in size.  Bake at 400 for 5-8 minutes.

I frosted half of them and left the other half plain.  I haven't tried the frosted ones yet because I'm waiting for them to dry.  For the frosting, I used 2 tbsp butter, 1/2 tbsp half-and-half, 1/2 tsp vanilla, and powdered sugar until it came together.  It covered 8 cookies.

They're very basic when they're plain, but I like them.  You could add raisins, pineapple, nuts, cherries, peanut butter frosting...

Frosted above, unfrosted below.

Vegan Banana Oatmeal Cookies

While visiting home for the holidays, we baked some delicious vegan banana oatmeal cookies.  We had just a few too many bananas around the house, and these were a super delicious way to use them up.  We added raisins to the last batch of them, and those were good too; I'd guess you could add any pretty much any chopped dried fruit to these and they'd be tasty.

Based off the recipe here: http://allrecipes.com/recipe/banana-oatmeal-cookie/

Vegan Banana Oatmeal Cookies
1 1/2 cups flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
1/4 tsp nutmeg (could be doubled)
3/4 tsp cinnamon (could be doubled)
1/2 cup applesauce
1/4 cup oil
2/3 cup brown sugar
1/3 cup white sugar
1 cup mashed overripe bananas (about 2 bananas)
1 3/4 cups old fashioned oats
1/2 cup chopped walnuts

Mix together the first 5 ingredients.  Add everything except the oats & walnuts, mix together.  Add the oats & walnuts, mix together.  Place cookies on a greased/silpat'd/parchment papered cookie sheet & bake at 400 for 15 minutes or until they look done.

Honeyboat Squash with Chile Honey Glaze

Squash is something I've only recently discovered.  And it's fantastic.  I bought this one at the farmers' market because it was pretty.  I asked the guy selling it what it was called, and he mumbled it at me twice; all I could tell was it started with "honey".  If you type "squash honey" into Google, it'll suggest the right name: honeyboat squash (which is a pretty sweet name for a squash), aka delicata squash.  It's stripey & delicious.  I also learned (from the Googs) that squash will keep for 1.5-3 months at room temperature, and 3-6 months in the fridge, so now I won't feel like I have to use up all my squashes right away.

I only made one squash, and I certainly didn't have the ingredients suggested lying around, and I completely forgot to add the cumin, so here's what I ended up with (based on this recipe).

Sauce (part 1):
1/2 tsp red pepper flakes
1/2 cup water
less than 1/4 of a purple onion (which was leftover in the fridge)
1 garlic clove
a dash of salt

Put the water & red pepper flakes on the stove; bring to a boil/simmer.  Chop up the onion & garlic in the food processor.  Add everything to the boiling red pepper flakes.  Let all/most of the water boil off (oops, but it worked out) so that everything is softened, then set aside.

While that's going on, cut the stem off of one honey boat squash, and slice it longways to make two little squash boats.  Scoop out all the seeds & stringy stuff.

Sauce (part 2):
1 tsp honey
1 1/2 tsp oil
a dash of salt

Mix a heaping teaspoon of sauce part 1 with everything in sauce part 2 & mix.  Split it between your two squash halves.  Brush it all over the exposed squash insides (I used my fingers); leave the remainder in the boat.

Bake on a foil-lined cookie sheet at 400 for 40 minutes, or until squash is soft but not really dark or anything.  Enjoy everything but the (still pretty) peel; the squash should come off from the peel really easily.

Oreo Cheesecake Cookies

These tasted basically like Oreos, but with the texture of a normal cookie.  Pretty tasty, very easy, and a great way to use up the stale Oreos that were in my cabinet from my last Oreo baking adventure.  I didn't have any mini chocolate chips, so I skipped them.  The cookies still turned out.  I have no idea what makes them rise, but they don't fall flat like I was expecting them to.

http://www.browneyedbaker.com/2011/03/22/oreo-cheesecake-cookies/


½ cup butter (or margarine), softened
3 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature (or straight out of the fridge & tossed in with your slightly-too-melted butter)
1 cup granulated sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup Oreo cookie crumbs

Mix together everything but the Oreo bits.  Make little cookie dough balls, roll them in the Oreo bits, put them on a baking sheet.  Bake at 375 for about 12 minutes.  I could tell they were done because when I took one off the tray, the bottom was golden brownish.

The first batch before baking.  They don't change size or appearance much after baking.

The second batch after baking.  I had a little less than a cup of Oreo crumbs, so I ran out before the end of the dough, but they still turned out well!

Cinnamon rolls

Found this gem while browsing the baking subreddit:

http://www.reddit.com/r/Baking/comments/1ig2fl/mini_cinnamon_rolls_not_all_perfect_but_delicious/

I halved the recipe & it made 8 totally delicious cinnamon rolls.  They weren't hard at all to make.  I skipped the glaze -- I like icing better, and these were plenty decadent without it.  They also only needed about 8 minutes in the oven.  They were perfect when they were hot & fresh out of the oven; the filling gets a little crumbly once they cool, but it's still delicious.

Here's the recipe with instructions.

Dough:
2 cups flour
2 tbsp sugar
4 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
3 tbsp butter, softened/melted
3/4 cup milk (I used almond milk and it was fine)

Filling:
4 tbsp butter, melted
1 cup brown sugar, packed
3 tsp cinnamon (+ a dash extra because it's delicious)

Combine all the dough ingredients in a bowl.  Spread the dough out in a rectangle-ish shape on a not sticky surface (I used a plastic cutting board).  If you're making the full recipe, you may want to make 2 rectangles instead.  Make the filling.  Spread it all over the dough, getting it as close to the edges as possible (especially the long edges -- you can leave a little bit of dough exposed on the short edges).  Roll up the dough into a tube (put the long edges with all the goo on them at the ends of the tube).  Slice the tube into whatever thickness you want your rolls to be (mine were about 3/4 inch, & I got 8 from the half recipe).  Bake at 400 for 8 minutes or until done looking.

Edit: If you're going to eat these after they cooled (I had 2 for breakfast and am snacking on the other 2 now), you could definitely get away with less filling, since it just crumbles all over the place and is super sugary.