So, let’s say you consider yourself a fancy food person (I hate the word “foodie” – reminds me of a “plushie”), and let’s say you have a fashionably adventurous palate. You’re throwing a dinner party and there’s a vegan among your guests. You’re not gonna dick over that vegan, are you? You can throw down in the kitchen sans animal products, can’t ya? Done right, no one will even notice you’re spread’s entirely cruelty-free.
Part II: Spreads n’ Dips
Last time we talked I was dropping some knowledge about breads and crackas, and so now we need to discuss what we’re gonna put on these things. I’ve broken this down into a few different sub-categories of yum.
White Bean Spread
White Bean Spread is cheap, easy, and tasty. Just grab a can of (organic, low-sodium) white beans, aka Great Northern or Cannellini beans, drain and rinse ‘em, and toss ‘em in a blender or food processor with a couple tablespoons of olive oil, a finely minced or grated garlic clove (or two or three cloves of roasted garlic if that’s too crazy for you) a few pinches of sea salt, several shakes of fresh black pepper, and a squirt of fresh lemon juice. Blend it, dump it in a bowl, and let it sit in the fridge for an hour (ideally longer, but who plans ahead?) so that the flavors can hang out and get freaky with each other. If the finished product looks too colorless and unsexy, sprinkle some chopped fresh parsley on there and quit your bitching.
Vegan Factoid: White beans are a good source of calcium, believe it or not, as well as protein and fiber. Plus it’s mega-filling, so your vegan guest won’t get embarrassingly way drunker that everyone else at the affair. Vegans loooove white bean spread (at least, vegans who are me), especially slapped on a nice toasty, garlic-y slice of bread.
Tapenade n’ Pesto
I have a major savory tooth, and now that meat and cheese are out of the picture, olives do it for me. The only thing better than olives is olives blended into a paste with a little bit of, well, olive oil, along with some fresh pepper, fresh lemon juice, and fresh thyme. Kalamata olives are optimal for this purpose. You can either make your own or buy some at most grocery stores. As with most things, making it at home is slightly cheaper, and awesome because you can mess around and try different seasonings and herbs in there.
Some a-holes out there do not like olives, but fear not – there’s always sundried-tomato pesto, which has approximately the same consistency and is a nice foil to white bean spread or hummus, in addition to being good by itself. Check the ingredients to make sure there’s no parm cheese in there, but otherwise you’re good to go. I’ve never made it at home myself, but I suspect that throwing some sun-dried tomatoes (the kind that are marinated in olive oil) into the food processor with some dried basil, salt and pepper would be a great way to go.
Basil pesto is not vegan about 99% of the time, but if you’re really dying to incorporate some vegan-friendly pesto into your spread, Amore pesto (in a tube!) is a good option. It’s kind of lame as pestos go, but I just doctor it up with a squeeze of lemon juice and some sea salt. I like to use it as mix-in with Vegenaise (for sammies), hummus, or tofu-cashew ricotta. Yum!
Hummus
Hummus is a real hot-button topic in the vegan food lexicon. Most of us have at some time or another burnt out on the stuff, but I for one love it as long as it’s the good stuff. There are plenty of lackluster, boring hummuses (hummii?) out there, but a few are worth noting. My all-time favorite, bordering on obsession, is Bobbi’s Jalapeño Hummus, which is whipped up in small batches by the eponymous, Philadelphia-based Bobbi (her son, actually, I think). Anyway, I’ve only seen it at Whole Foods in NY, but I think it’s also available in the NJ and the PA. Anyway, the ingredients are literally just chickpeas, fresh garlic, fresh jalapeno, and olive oil. Yes, please. My runner-up store-bought choice is Sabra, which I hear tell is the real deal and the best you can get outside of the Holy Land. I like the plain, but they have a bunch of yummy (and alliterative) flavors, such as Luscious Lemon and Supremely Spicy.
Bruschetta
Vegans are not just carb-loading, olive-oil-guzzling fiends. We do, in fact, enjoy snacks of the vegetal variety. Instead of some sad, raw veggie crudite, why not chop up some tomaters and make a bruschetta? There are all kinds of recipes available for this. My personal approach is just diced tomatoes, diced red onion (a little bit), minced garlic, fresh basil, and the usual – a drizzle of olive oil and some salt and pepper. But why not get weird with it, and make a gazpacho-like concoction featuring yellow heirloom tomaters? Or a salty/savory watermelon balsamic “bruschetta?” Oh, and sorry food bloggers, but if your’re pronouncing this word “brew-shket-uh,” you’re making a dick move. I don’t care if it’s the correct way! Sometimes the right way is also the dick way.
In conclusion, this should point you down the path to a yummy spread that will more than feed your vegan companion and, I suspect, all snack-minded revelers on the scene. Thanks for joining me for another culinary rap session. Stay tuned for Part III: Olives, Pickled Things, and Nutz!
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