Small Plate #3

Still feeling nostalgic and mildly extravagant, I made a vegan version of one of the meals I used to make in early adulthood, when I was first living on my own: Tuna noodle casserole, steamed veggies, and garlic toast.

The casserole was a toaster oven special; we're apparently back to that time of year (although it's also been unseasonably hot here lately). It used some egg free ribbon noodles, some leftover cashew cheese sauce I had, peas, onions, celery, mushrooms, and Franklin Farms vegan tuna as the base, and then I topped the mixture with shredded non-dairy cheese and buttered bread crumbs (buttered with Earth Balance, of course).

This was delicious and so nostalgic. I rarely cook like this these days, as you know, in my current frugal focus on whole foods. But sometimes, I look for comfort, and sometimes, I find it. I love the Franklin Farms vegan tuna, too. I have my own recipe for a vegan tuna casserole with a chickpea cake in place of the tuna, and that's good, too, but this one is virtually indistinguishable from my memory of the casseroles I used to make in my 20s.