Vegan recipe: Veggie Chick'n Taquitos with Guacamole

Hey, whaddaya know? The Veggie Guy has posted a recipe for the first time in... well, too danged long. Really, it's a pretty simple recipe, but it turned out very well.

Okay, first, the guacamole.

I have a confession to make - I've always used those seasoning packets from the produce aisle - you know, mash 2 avocados, add the seasoning packet, and... instant guacamole.

But tonight, I decided to make guacamole from scratch. Here are the ingredients (minus the tomatoes, which were fashionably late for the event):



Clockwise from top: 2 monster avocados (really, these were the biggest danged avocados I've seen in a while), 2 cloves of garlic, a few sprigs of cilantro, a red jalapeno, a small red onion, and a jar of cumin. As I mentioned, 2 roma tomatoes showed up just after the picture was taken. Prima donnas...

Step 1: Peel and mash the avocados.

Step 2: Dice 1 roma tomato, about 1/2 of 1 small red onion, 2 cloves of garlic, 1 jalapeno, and cilantro. Add all ingredients , plus 1/2 tbsp cumin, to avocado.

Step 3: Mash all ingredients with a fork and mix. Put in a bowl and refrigerate for 1/2 hour to allow flavors to combine.

Now for the taquitos:

1/2 package Morningstar Farms Veggie Chick'n Strips

4 small flour tortillas

1/2 tbsp adobo seasoning powder

4 oz. Veggie Shreds cheddar and pepperjack flavored soy cheese

1 roma tomato, diced

1 red jalapeno, diced

1/3 tbsp olive oil

4 oz beer (or whatever you don't drink while cooking)

1/2 small red onion, diced

In a medium skillet or wok, add olive oil, Veggie Chick'n strips, adobo seasoning, jalapeno, 1/2 of the diced red onion, and beer. Cook over medium heat for about 5-6 minutes.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

At this point, my 5-year-old daughter confiscated the camera and snapped a shot of the Veggie Guy in his favorite place in the house:

Place 1/4 of the Veggie Chick'n in each tortilla, add Veggie Shreds. Roll into taquitos and place in a baking dish. Bake for 5 minutes.

Serve with diced tomatoes, remaining red onions, vegan sour cream, and guacamole. (Kroger had Tofutti vegan sour cream on sale for $1.88 today!)

So there you go. The Veggie Guy has resurrected, like the proverbial phoenix or Jesus or that guy from the Evil Dead series... Only I make way better guacamole.

The Garden of Evil

This year marks the first time I have tried to grow anything since I helped my dad with his garden some 20 years ago. I decided to just start out with some peppers. While the harvest is a bit light, I'm happy to say that I do have some peppers to incorporate into my recipes.

First, the cayenne peppers:

Next up, jalapenos. I let these ripen a bit longer than I intended - jalapenos turn red when fully ripe - but I've read that red jalapenos have a slightly sweeter, more complex taste than the standard green jalapenos. I'm making Mexican tonight, so we shall see:

These are Peruvian purple peppers. I chose these on a whim, and I'm really not sure what to do with them. But rest assured, I will figure something out:

Finally, the kings of evil - habanero peppers. Out of all the varieties, these seemed to do the best. Mind you, I only use one of these in a whole batch of chili, so I really don't know how I'm going to use all of them.

So there you go... my Garden of Evil. I'll be using these in recipes in the next couple of weeks (although I might dry most of the cayenne peppers and use a coffee grinder to make cayenne powder).

All hail the mighty power of capsacin!