Vegan (not at all traditional) Banh Mi
Not my normal kind of post, but for ~the past four months, my husband and I have been eating a fully vegan diet. Living in Prague has helped facilitate this, as there are more amazing vegan restaurants than we can even begin to tackle.
But the real fun has come from exploring new recipes together. We've always had a pretty wide culinary range, despite me being a simply untalented chef (my husband on the other hand is a brilliant cook - damn Italians.)
So, to add a little something different to my photography, we've decided to start documenting some of our foods. We're going to start with something very simple - and honestly, I have oft said "who needs a recipe for a freaking sandwich," but here we are....
A vegan, but not at all traditional, Banh Mi.
prepare the vegetables.
pickle the veg.
press, cut, and season.
cut. sautee.
optional (non-traditional) sauce.
assemble.
chomp.
Now that you've seen the photos, lets talk steps. Of course, like I said, this is just a sandwich, so, I mean, how much direction does one really need? So let's do this in the simple steps way:
- Assemble and cut the vegetables and herbs. We used carrots, shallots, radishes, pickles, onions, sprouts, and cilantro.
- Soak all the veg in rice vinegar for 24 hours - actually, the longer they soak, the better (though, I'm a huge vinegar fan, so I may be biased.) If you don't have the time/energy, you can also buy pre-soaked Asian veg. We managed to find these in a not-so-well stocked grocery store in the Czech Republic, so I'm confident it can be found in many locations.
- Press the tofu! About an hour should be good. Warning: Using hand weights may lead to the weight rolling off and nearly breaking a plate. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
- Spice and marinate the tofu/tempeh (we used both). Soy sauce, and assorted spices work here. Even pre-packaged spice mixes do the trick!
- Sautee the tofu and tempeh. At the same time, you can make a sauce of your choice. I went with a tzatziki (enter the 'non-traditional' bit from the title of this post). Vegan tzatziki is super easy: non-dairy yogurt, dill, lemon juice, and chopped cucumber - and voila! Delicious.
- Assemble the sandwich. Make a mess.
- Eat the hell out of this delicious sandwich.
- ...
- Profit???
Thanks for playing along on my foray into food blogging. More to come!
