#19: Be ✨Different✨ this Aquarius Season!
Cheesy Italian enchiladas (basically), soy mushroom noods, and big Korean food energy
Listen up, it’s Aquarius season!!
Wanna know how we know?
It’s the best season of all, it’s our birthday season! Tay starts the party this weekend, Meeks rounds out the celebrations in a couple of weeks.
We have details to come, but just know, the birthday cake Meeks made Tay was a flippin’ masterpiece and delight.
With Aquarius season comes idealism, eccentricity, and a smidge of anarchy. Tay loves a birth chart, but the overall ✨vibe✨ of Aquarius season is doing things different… and telling everyone you’re doing things different.
What do you want to do different over the next 4 weeks?
Wanna swap oat milk for soy? Or buy free range instead of free run?
Wanna move all the furniture in your home, or reorganize your book shelf by colour?
Wanna rename your senior dog, quit your day job to pursue floral design, or buy a bee farm, even though you know NOTHING about bees?
As two bonafide Aquarius’susis WE APPROVE THAT THOUGHT! 👍👍
At this point, Marzy hardly has a name after the descent of unhinged nicknames. Most recent contender: Chicken Parmesan. Or in the words of Tom Haverford, Chicky-chicky Parm-parm.
Do we know why chicken parmesan?? It sort of just fell out of our mouths in a moment of brain short circuitry?? Is this why she has little to no name recall?? We’ll never know.
So allow yourself to descent into chaos, follow your heart, and remember: we have your back.
This is a good food week ya’ll - uncle and writer of
gifted Meeks The Korean Vegan Cookbook from Joanne Lee Molinaro for Christmas. It’s unbelievable in the best way. Perhaps we’re late to this one… it’s already been awarded best vegetable-focused cookbook of 2022 by the James Beard Foundation… but we pay no attention to the times! Different! After the initial flip and drool, we knew it would become a mainstay in our regular cookbook rotation.We also have Stracci! Further Christmas inspo after a delish Christmas eve meal, we knew we wanted to recreated the magic of the pillow-y Italian dish. Tay describes Stracci as Italian enchiladas, Meeks says they’re more like ooey-gooey-creamy-cheesey. It’s our flav of the week.
HUGS!
xo, Tay & Meeks
Monday: Korean pear salad from The Korean Vegan Cookbook by Joanne Lee Molinaro
Tuesday: Caesar brussels and walnuts from Salad Freak by Jess Damuck
Wednesday: Soy butter mushers and noods from More is More by Molly Baz
Thursday: Kimchi stew from The Korean Vegan Cookbook by Joanne Lee Molinaro
Friday: It’s a date night!
Saturday: Stracci! This one is a combination of these crepes, this filling, and this béchamel. It’s our flav of the week!
Sunday: Sweet n’ Sour mushers from The Korean Vegan Cookbook by Joanne Lee Molinaro
Hot tip: don’t have one of the above cookbooks? Give the good old google a spin, you might be surprised by what you can find!
Fruit & Veg 🍓🥬
Brussels sprouts
Lemons
Mixed mushrooms (dried or fresh)
Shiitakes
Garlics
Cabbage
Korean pear
Perilla/Shiso leaves (if you can find them!)
Red onion
White onion
Fennel
Scallion
Ginger
Potato
Carrot
Bell peppers (mix)
Apple
Spinach
Dairy 🥛🧀
Pecorino
Butter
Plant milk
Whole milk
Ricotta
Pantry 🥫
Walnuts
Grainy mustard
Mayo
Capers
Ramen or udon noods
Slivered almonds
Kimchi
Protein 💪
Tofu
Black beans
Eggs
OSS (Oils, Spices & Sauces) 🍯
EVOO, salt, pepper
Maple syrup
Doenjang
Sesame oil
Gochujang
Soy sauce
Veggie broth
Potato starch
Rice vinegar
I’m Stracci’n My Waistband Over Here
Ingredients
Fruit & Veg 🍓🥬
300g spinach, chopped
Dairy 🥛🧀
4 eggs
1 cup ricotta, extra water drained
2 tbsp butter
1.25 cups milk, heated
Pantry 🥫
1.5 cups AP flour + 2 tbsp separated
1 cup grated parm
OSS (Oils, Spices & Sauces) 🍯
EVOO, salt, pepper
lil nutmeg
Recipe
Crepes
Preheat your oven to 350F
First we’re going to whisk together 3 eggs and 1 cup of water.
Next, slowly add in the flour while whisking so that it’s smooth. Let sit for 30 mins
To cook, heat your pan (we used a 12” skillie) to med-low and oil up
This part will take some calibration. Pour out a half ladle or so into the hot pan, and shake/stir/fling it around until the pan has no parts left un-egged. Let it cook, real slow and nice, until cooked through. Remove to a plate or cutting board.
Repeat this a bunch, you probably will get 8-10 of these suckas.
Filling
We did this the easiest way. Just blanch the spinach first, and have everything else ready to go
To blanch, boil some water and dunk the spinach in when rolling. Remove after 30 seconds. Chop it!
Mix EVERYTHING! Spinach, ricotta, egg, parmie, and nutmeg. Add in some salt and pepper too
Béchamel
First, warm the milk in a saucepan until you get lil bubbles around the edges of the pan. Remove from the heat.
In another saucepan, melt the butter, and stir in the 2 tbsp of flour. Let it cook and thicken for 2 mins, but don’t let this brown. No roux. nuh uh.
Slowly add in the heated milk while whisking. Bring it to a boil and watch as this béch thickens. Add some pepper (I omit the salt here, there’s loads in this recipe already)
Assembly & Baking
ok! This is the easy part. In each crepe, scoop in some of that ricotta mixture and roll it up like a burrito. Not too thick, not to skinny. Add this to an oiled casserole dish, and repeat until you’re either out of ricotta/crepes or the dish is full.
By now, the oven will be hot. Pour the béchamel over the filled crepes, covering all that you can, and cover with foil
Bake for 30-40 mins, take off the foil, and broil for 5-10 afterwards.
Let rest 5 mins and munch! Bon app’ baby!
Post-stracci thots
We made a béchamel here because that’s what we thought would be best! It was fantastic, but next time I would make a thinner type of cream sauce to top it. You’ll also find recipes that use a tomato sauce!
This is quite a heavy feeling recipe, which means it’s perfect for sharing during a dinner party. If it’s just you and all those crepes, a side salad works wonders here.
How’d that recipe go? Share with others what the flip happens when you replace olive oil for ranch — we love to hear it! 🙃