The Happy Gluten-Free Vegan

Has this ever happened to you? You open a brand new package of Lightlife sliced tempeh (also called ‘tempe’ by some), such as the bacon flavored tempeh, and it is covered in what appears to be black mold or some sort of black spoilage? So you freak out, check the ‘best by’ date (which is likely still weeks out), and try to figure out just what could have gone so horribly wrong?

It’s almost pumpkin spice season, and it’s definitely ice cream season, so we figured we’d get ahead of things and give you our new vegan pumpkin spice latte ice cream recipe now! Of course, if you don’t like the “latte” part you can always just leave out the coffee!

Our vegan rose cardamom ice cream recipe was done in our Ninja Creami, but of course you can use it with any other ice cream maker or ice cream making method! You will not believe how incredible this ice cream is, it’s quickly become one of our two favourite ice cream recipes, so far. (The other is our Lapsang Souchong ice cream, which we will post soon, we promise!)

The reason we say that this very easy, vegan spicy Asian peanut sauce is versatile is because you can use it for so many things! Toss baked, steamed, or fried tofu with it, put it over rice, or use it over noodles to make dan dan mein. Or thin it out a bit and use it as a dipping sauce for potstickers, spring rolls, or vegan egg rolls!

Did you know that there are some things that you can just dump into your Ninja Creami with no extra preparation?! It’s true! Things like premade vegan pudding, Orgain protein shakes, boxed silken tofu, Laird superfood creamer, Oats Overnight, Bird’s custard, applesauce, canned peaches, canned pineapple, canned tomatoes, and even canned corn can all be frozen and made into ice cream!

This is part of our “Will it Creami?” series, in which we dump something in the Ninja Creami and see if it will turn into an edible ice cream, sorbet, or other divine frozen concoction! In this episode we try dumping premade vegan chocolate pudding into the Creami container, freezing it, and “spinning” (i.e. churning) it. In fact, it was the first thing we tried for “Will it Creami?”

Did you know that the Ninja Creami (pronounced “Ninja Creamy”) ice cream maker is awesome for vegans? If you have a Ninja Creami languishing, barely used on your counter, or maybe even hidden away unused in a closet, this is the Ninja Creami quick start guide for you!

As we have dedicated our explorations with our new Ninja Creami to lazy vegans everywhere, we have determined to discover as many “dump and freeze” things as we can, giving rise to our “Will it Creami?” series of posts and recipes. Today we are turning our attention to that unsung hero of the tofu world, the shelf-stable silken tofu. We can just hear you now: “Tofu in ice cream??” Yes, our pretties, tofu not only in ice cream, but tofu as ice cream! We promise that it will blow your mind, because it’s actually deeeelicious!

In case you’re not familiar with the Ninja Creami, it works a bit differently from other home ice cream makers. With many home ice cream makers you have to freeze a relatively large, double-walled metal bowl, then put your ingredients in and process it. Of course, you still need your ingredients to be frozen with the Creami, but instead of having to freeze a big old bowl, which you will need to refreeze after you use it before you can make more ice cream, the Creami ingeniously has you freeze your ingredients right in the pint (or “larger pint”, depending on which model you get) containers in which you will blend and also store your frozen confections. This also means that you can have several in your freezer, pre-frozen and ready to go! Brilliant!!

A vegan caramel sauce recipe made with olive oil and maple syrup?? Yes! And our twist on it brings it to a whole new level of foodgasm!The Internet is a’buzz with @fitgreenmind’s viral TikTok video showing a very simple recipe, or hack if you will, of taking olive oil, maple syrup, and a pinch of salt, and turning it into smooth, delicious caramel sauce. Now, this is not as outlandish as it may seem at first glance. Traditional caramel sauce recipes nearly all call for butter, cream, and sugar. In other words, to make a delicious caramel sauce you need fat and something sweet. In the olive oil and maple syrup recipe, the olive oil takes the place of the fat from the butter and cream, while the maple syrup provides the something sweet, and together they provide the mouthfeel.

This easy recipe can be done two ways to yield either delicious vegan and gluten-free ginger snaps, or vegan, gluten-free hermit cookies. In case you’re not familiar with hermits, they are a sweet, spicey, raisin-studded cookie or bar that was popular in (and probably originated in) New England. Of course, they were neither vegan nor gluten-free, as are ours.

Of all of the best millet recipes, this one is tops in our opinion! Easy, simple, and delicious, our Simple Sweet Millet recipe is nourishing and packed with protein and other nutrients! Serve it for breakfast or as a dessert! Shhhh, they’ll never know their dessert is so good for them!

One of the coolest things about the shelf-stable, aseptic-boxed Mori-Nu organic silken tofu is how utterly versatile it is. Yet this unsung hero of the vegan world is often overlooked, passed by on store shelves for its water-packed, refrigerated cousins. Hopefully our easy creamy vegan salad dressing and dip recipe will change that! (By the way, the Mori-Nu organic silken tofu is considered ‘soft tofu’; it doesn’t say it anywhere on the box but that has been confirmed by Mori-nu. This is important to know as there is such a thing as firm silken tofu and even extra-firm silken tofu.)

Our baked pumpkin custard is super easy to make, has an incredible silky texture, and of course is both gluten-free and vegan! You can serve it plain, or dress it up with vegan whipped topping or vanilla ice cream; sometimes we even top it with some of our Super-Easy, Super-Awesome Homemade Fresh Cranberry Sauce, it’s super yummy!

After perfecting our gluten-free vegan bread (no yeast, either!), we were hankering for some rye bread, and we figured out that our basic bread recipe was hearty enough to masquerade as rye bread if we just added some caraway seeds. But then we also started craving some sourdough bread but without, you know, both the hassle of keeping a sourdough starter alive, not to mention trying to make it gluten-free. And that’s when we realized that our magic secret ingredient could do the trick!

Vegan meringue? Yes! If you haven’t heard of aquafaba, you are in for a delightful surprise! It’s very easy to make vegan meringue! Here’s how!

We did it! Building on the blender bread craze, we created the holy grail of breads: easy gluten-free vegan white bread! How easy is it? You throw all of the ingredients in a blender (hence the term “blender bread”), blend it, then pour the batter into your loaf pans! That’s how easy it is! And you get honest-to-goodness gluten-free white bread!

This dish has a decidedly southwestern flavor owing to the combination of pumpkin, pumpkin seeds, and green chili. It’s delicious, and so good for you! We use soy curls to make this, but you can also use cubed tofu. You can either cook this on the stove top, or in a slow cooker (if you have an Instant Pot you can use the slow cook function on it).

Whether you call it nougat, Torrone, nogat, or something else, it’s rarely vegan, being, as it is, made with egg whites and honey. Until now. Our vegan soft nougat recipe is going to make you and your tastebuds so happy! And the best thing about it is that it is infinitely customizable! The vegan nougat that we made and that is featured in our picture is pistachio chocolate swirl nougat, but really the sky’s the limit! Traditional nougat has almonds and sometimes a bit of flavoring like lavender or orange essence. Here’s our easy, completely vegan soft nougat recipe!

Our vegan copycat Lil Smokies cocktail wieners recipe will blow your mind. It is so improbably delicious, and ridiculously easy to make, and uses – wait for it – baby carrots! And yes, it tastes like the “real” thing, only better, with less icky ingredients, and more good karma!