Recently, my sister Julie and I made plans to get together for an evening.  She loves to cook.  She just bought a new cookbook called Veganomicon: The Ultimate Vegan Cookbook.  She is not vegan, I am not vegan, my boyfriend is not vegan, and my daughter is not either.  In fact, none of us are even vegetarian. Cooking a vegan meal, with my sister’s insistence that she had some awesome recipes to share, sounded like a nice plan for the night.   Please remember the truthful descriptive word in my blog title “delicious”.  It is a unanimous opinion from all of the taste testers that evening.  So, I am suggesting to take a full night of cooking and enjoy this recipe or any other if you dare to buy this super informative, personality filled cookbook. It is great! And if this looks overwhelming, invite a friend to help.  It’s really not that bad 

Mac Daddy 

Serves 8-10

Time: 1hour and 10 minutes

Double recipe cheezy sauce

2 cups of veggie broth

¼ cup flour

1 Tbsp olive oil

3 cloves of garlic

Pinch of dried thyme

¼ tsp of salt

Several pinches of ground pepper

1/8 tsp turmeric

¾ cup nutritional yeast

1 Tbsp fresh lemon

1 tsp prepared yellow mustard

Combine the broth and flour in measuring cup and whisk with a fork until dissolved. 

Preheat small saucepan over medium-low heat.  Place oil and garlic in pan and cook 2 minutes.  Stir often. 

Add the thyme, salt, and pepper.  Cook for a bout 15 seconds.  Add the broth, turmeric, and nutritional yeast and raise heat to medium.  Use a whisk to stir constantly. Mix should start bubbling and thickening in three minutes, if not, turn heat up a bit higher.  

Once this happens, stir and cook two minutes.  Add the lemon juice and mustard.  It should resemble thick, melted cheese.  Taste for salt, turn off heat, and cover pan to keep warm until ready to use.  Top may thicken while sitting, just stir and it will be fine.  Serve warm. 

The other part of this recipe…. 

¾ pound elbow macaroni

1 pound extra-firm tofu

1 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon olive oil

2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil.  Add the macaroni and cook according to the package directions, about ten minutes.  Meanwhile, prepare your Cheezy Sauce.  Preheat the oven to 325 degrees Fahrenheit.  When the pasta is ready, drain and set aside.  When sauce is ready begin assembling. 

Crumble the tofu into an 11 x 13 inch glass or ceramic baking dish.  Mash the tofu with your hands until it resembles ricotta cheese.  Add the salt, olive oil, and lemon juice.

Add ¼ cup Cheezy Sauce to the tofu and stir.  Use a dry measuring cup with a handle so that you can just dip it into the sauce and pour -  you don’t need to be very precise.  Add the macaroni to the tofu, along with 3 more cups of sauce and stir well. 

Smooth the top of the pasta mixture and pres it down with a spatula to level it.  Then pour the remaining sauce over the pasta and then smooth again. 

Bake for 30 minutes; the top of the macaroni should be slightly browned.  It’s a good idea to wait about 20 minutes before serving, so that it can cool down and firm up a bit, but if you can’t wait, more power to you. (My sister and I did not wait that long).

Also…Roasted asparagus

A lot of asparagus

Salt

Ground pepper

Olive oil

Remove rough ends of stems.  Place in bowl with the ingredients. 

Toss and coat.   Have the oven at a temperature of 400 degrees Fahrenheit.  Cook for about 10 minutes and flip half way through.