Sequestration Meal #448

 

A holiday weekend can be an excuse for elaborate meals; certainly I wasn't in the mood to go out. For one thing, it was hot. For another, I'm really battling to keep depression at bay, along with trying to make myself stay interested in eating well enough to stay physically able to do stuff. And thus, this remarkable meal was born.

Here we have maple mustard tempeh (recipe at the First Mess); red Swiss chard with lemon, quinoa, fried capers, and olives (veganized from the Wimpy Vegetarian), steamed carrot slices. It was colorful--eat the rainbow, right?--and the flavors went pretty well together. I loved this.

I hadn't had tempeh in a while. Tempeh was something I only learned existed shortly after I went vegan (I don't know if non-vegans actually eat tempeh; someone has to let me know sometime), and I can overlook it. I have never been bothered by the supposed "odd" taste tempeh has, though maybe I'm just lucky. In any case, I picked up some tempeh on my last shopping trip, because it's a good stovetop-cooked food during these no-oven-allowed times. I really should eat more tempeh. It's so different in such a good way.

The Swiss chard was something I bought because I am trying to stick to the seasons with my produce more, and that was in season and locally grown. Also, it ended up such a gorgeous color! It's beautiful raw and beautiful cooked, though I was surprised that red gave way to fuchsia and the quinoa in this recipe also got a bit pink. This recipe includes some of the most delicious but neglected flavorings: capers and Spanish olives. Maybe Spanish olives aren't proper snobby olives--they are after all the very cheapest olives at my local market, at just over $1 per jar--but they bring a great, salty, briny flavor here. I veganized this by leaving out the mozzarella (it was optional anyway) and using vegan butter. I tasted it before I added the vegan butter and it definitely makes a huge difference to put the butter in. I would make this again in a heartbeat. It's absolutely delicious.

I chose carrots in part because I love them, in part because they're very easy to cook, and in part because they're orange and I like the pop of color they bring. Carrots are just carrots, and I have nothing to say about them other than they are probably always going to be my favorite veggie.