VEGAN Mashed Potatoes (makes 5 lbs, serves 8 ish):
- 5 pound bag of organic yukon gold or yellow potatoes (Central Market has had them on sale for a few weeks now)
- 1 can of organic coconut milk
- 1/2 - 1 cup olive oil
- salt and pepper to taste
Cover the potatoes with water in a large pot, add a tablespoon of sea salt, turn up the heat and let them boil. Once a fork slides easily through the biggest potato turn off the heat, drain the water, return the potatoes to the pot, add the coconut milk & olive oil and mash with a potato masher or big fork. Add the salt and pepper to taste. I usually forget that I have them cooking on the stove, so by the time I get to mashing them it's really easy. I am all about keeping it quick and easy! These keep for about a week in the fridge and are easy to heat up in a fry pan, you shouldn't need to add anything to reheat.
VEGAN Almond Shitake Gravy (makes enough for 5 1lbs of potatoes):
- 1 cup almonds
- 6 big shitake (and/or chantrelle mushrooms)*
- 3 cups vegan milk or vegetarian broth or hot water
- 4 tablespoons oil (I save my good olive oil for things that are raw, because of the high heat in this recipe I usually use organic canola oil)
- 3 tablespoons flour (we don't use any wheat products, so I've used organic soy flour just because it was the only flour I had in the cupboard!!)
Broil the almonds in the oven on high until they are well toasted, but not unpleasantly burnt. Blend them to a powder in the blender. Heat the oil in a sauce pan, when the oil is hot add the flour. Continue to wisk until they are well blended. Remove from heat. Add your two cups of milk, broth or water, heat to boiling. Add the powdered almonds. For chunky gravy chop the mushrooms to your desired consistency and add them to the sauce pan, blend them in a food processor for a smoother consistency. Let everything simmer together for a while to meld flavors and ENJOY! THis is also easy to reheat and keeps for about a week in the fridge. Reheat only the portion you intend to use per meal.
*I added the shitakes at Bret's request, so if you're not a big fungi fan the gravy is just as fabulous without them. Shitakes are an "adaptogenic" mushroom, meaning that they help the cells in your body/mind be more receptive to change and growth. Many herbs have these properties as well, we like to use our food for "medicine" as much as possible. Who knew?
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