September 2009 Daring Cooks Challenge

Indian Dosas

Serves 4

This month's challenge was hosted by Debyi from The Healthy Vegan Kitchen. Thus, the major requirement was that this dish had to be free of animal products. That means no cows milk, butter, meat, poultry, fish, chicken/beef broth, etc. This dish is also 99% oil free, using only what you need to keep the dosas from sticking, which isn't too bad with a nonstick pan. It's healthy, vegan, and delicious!

This recipe comes in 3 parts, the dosas, the filling and the sauce. It does take awhile to make, but the filling and sauce can be made ahead and frozen if need be. You can serve them as a main course with rice and veggies, or as an appetizer.

Ingredients:

Dosa Pancakes
1 cup (120gm/8oz) spelt flour (or all-purpose, gluten free flour)
½ tsp (2½ gm) salt
½ tsp (2½ gm) baking powder
½ tsp (2½ gm) curry powder
½ cup (125ml/4oz) almond milk (or soy, or rice, etc.)
¾ cup (175ml/6oz) water
cooking spray, if needed

Dosa Filling

5 cloves garlic
1 onion, peeled and finely diced
1 carrot, peeled and finely diced
1 green pepper, finely diced (red, yellow or orange are fine too)
2 medium hot banana chilies, minced
2 TBSP (16gm) cumin, ground
1 TBSP (8gm) oregano
1 TBSP (8gm) sea salt (coarse)
1 TBSP (8gm) turmeric
4 cups (850gm/30oz) cooked or canned chick peas (about 2 cans)
½ cup (125gm/4oz) tomato paste

Coconut Curry Sauce

1 onion, peeled and chopped
2 cloves garlic
½ (2½ gm) tsp cumin, ground
¾ (3¾ gm) tsp sea salt (coarse)
3 TBSP (30gm) curry powder
3 TBSP (30gm) spelt flour (or all-purpose GF flour)
3 cups (750ml/24oz) vegetable broth
2 cups (500ml/24oz) coconut milk
3 large tomatoes, diced

Dosa Pancakes
1.Combine the dry ingredients in a bowl, slowly adding the almond milk and water, whisking until smooth.
2.Heat a nonstick skillet over medium heat. Spray your pan with a thin layer of cooking spray, if needed.
3.Ladle 2 tablespoons of batter into the center of your pan in a circular motion until it is a thin, round pancake. When bubbles appear on the surface and it no longer looks wet, flip it over and cook for a few seconds. Remove from heat and repeat with remaining batter. Makes 8 pancakes.

Coconut Curry Sauce

1.Heat a saucepan over medium heat, add the onion and garlic, cooking for 5 minutes, or until soft.
2.Add the spices, cooking for 1 minutes more. Add the flour and cook for 1 additional minute.
3.Gradually stir in the vegetable broth to prevent lumps. Once the flour has been incorporated, add the coconut milk and tomatoes, stirring occasionally.
4.Let it simmer for half an hour.

Garbanzo Bean Dosa Filling

1.Heat a large saucepan over medium to low heat. Add the garlic, veggies, and spices, cooking until soft, stirring occasionally.
2.Mash the chickpeas by hand, or in a food processor. Add the chickpeas and tomato paste to the saucepan, stirring until heated through.

Use coconut and cucumbers as garnishes, and enjoy!

Cooking in the Dorms - A Delicious Chocolate/Kidney Bean/Tofu Cake

Continuing to blog while living in the college dorms was more concerning to me than fears of going somewhere new to start a new chapter of my life.  Where would I obtain access to a stove and oven?  It all seemed like a lot of fuss and hassle.

However, it can be done.  Using the communal kitchenette on the first floor of my dorm building, some friends and I had a delicious experience baking a chocolate vegan cake using a modified version of the Black bean chocolate cupcakes with tofu frosting based on the ingredients we could find.

How we obtained our ingredients is rather exciting.

We bought miniature sized four, sugar, and canola oil from the store, along with baking powder, baking soda, cocoa powder, and chocolate chips.  Confectioner's sugar, vanilla, and maple syrup was borrowed from fellow college students.  Visiting friends were able to provide cake pans, spatulas, utensils, and pots in which to mix our ingredients.

In order to save money, we used my meal points to buy takeout from the dining commons.  Unfortunately, the dining commons was all out of black beans by the time we got there, so as a last minute decision, we decided to substitute kidney beans.  (Our options were: kidney, soy, or garbanzo beans)  We filled a box full of tofu and kidney beans, and a cup full of soymilk.  I couldn't help but smile at the other college kids shooting us funny looks.

We did have access to a food processor, but we forgot to bring it with us when a group of us, en masse regrouped in my dorm room.  Thus, we decided to mash the kidney beans by hand, instead of in a blender.

Mashed kidney beans plus wet ingredients. (above)

(below) Dry ingredients and wet ingredients.

While the cake was in the oven, we started on the chocolate tofu frosting.  

Again, sans-blender/food processor, we had to resort to mashing the tofu by hand.  It took significantly longer than expected to achieve a fine enough texture.

At this point, we realized we didn't have enough pots and pans to set up a double broiler for the chocolate chips AND hold the tofu, so we switched over to a tupperware.

Double broiler on the stove, full of melted chocolate.

The cake was such a hit that I didn't even have a chance to take a picture of it before people started eating.  You wouldn't be able to guess that the secret ingredients are kidney beans and tofu.  This cake is perfect for a late night dormitory snack, coupled with some delicious vegan ice cream!

Both my vegan and non-vegan friends present absolutely loved this recipe.  Although I was initially a little concerned about using kidney beans as replacement for black beans, it worked out well!