Chocolate cake, Queso blanco bowl, Tamale shepherd's pie, and Tempeh giardino

It's week 18 and summer is almost here. I've been cooking new recipes for almost 6 months!

Here's what I made this week:

• Just chocolate cake with gooey ganache

• Queso blanco bowl with crispy kale

• Tamale shepherd's pie

• Tempeh giardino

Just chocolate cake with gooey ganache

All sliced and packed to go!

• I would definitely make this again

• I made 0 modifications

• Would freeze fine!

I made this chocolate cake for a church potluck and it turned out really well. I think this might be my new favorite chocolate cake recipe!

It also came together using ingredients that I already had in my pantry, so I love that. It has a really nice texture and good moisture content which are important parts of any cake. The ganache is going to taste a little bit different depending on what maple syrup and what chocolate you use, but you really can't go wrong with that.

I'd be interested in trying to double into a sheet pan recipe for a bigger crowd.

Tamale shepherd's pie

It looks fancier in the pan

• I would make this again

• I made 1 modification

• Would likely freeze fine

The tamale shepherd's pie I also made for the potluck because even in the notes says that it makes a lot of food. I typically don't love a black bean and corn combination, but this one I was pleasantly surprised by and I would try this again. I didn't dread having leftovers like I thought I might.

I ended up having to add a lot more nut milk to the mashed potatoes than the recipe calls for to get it to a consistency that I like, and then I had to really cook it a lot to get it to reheat the next day. But even through that it turned out well. I left out the cumin, obviously.

Queso blanco bowl with crispy kale

• I probably won't make this again

• I made 1 modification

• Not good for freezing

For the Queso Blanco Bowl, I used a different queso recipe since I've already made this queso from making the nacho recipe. You use tapioca starch to make it "stretchy" and it is, but it's not really the same. I thought it turned out okay, but I did do a tasting party with my friends to try out different vegan nacho cheeses, and mine was not the winner.

I haven't done oven-baked kale in a while, and while it was good, it really doesn't keep its crisp well. Maybe you just need to keep it on the counter instead of the fridge, but this is definitely more of an eat it the same day recipe because of that.

Tempeh giardino

I overcooked my onions!

• I want to try this again

• I made 1 modification

• Not sure how this would freeze

I was really excited for this tempeh recipe because I feel like I haven't had tempeh in a while. But I was making it in a rush and forgot to take the tempeh and the onions out of the pan when I was supposed to. I think I might have made them a little bit bitter somehow, or the basil that I used was just not good. I don't always test my ingredients before I add them, but this just shows you that you should!

I also used a zucchini and a yellow squash because it's what I had on hand so I figured, why not.

This didn't turn out super flavorfully. That said, I want to try it again and follow the recipe more exactly and see if I like it more.

Weekly reflection

On Monday (Memorial day) I had some friends over for a "Summer Tasting Party" where we tried five kinds of vegan queso (three homemade) and ELEVEN kinds of vegan ice cream. It was so much fun!

Queso for days!

For the queso tasting, everyone just took a little dollop on their chip and we rated them on taste, texture, and appearance. The crowd favorite was local brand Darë!

Credo came in as a close second. There were some folks who enjoyed the funk of the recipe from School Night Vegan, but others found it overly spicy. The flavor from Rainbow Plant Life's recipe was good, but the texture didn't land as well.

Even with using a vitamix and nut milk bag for texture, the homemade versions just didn't match up to the smooth consistency from the store-bought ones.

For the ice cream tasting portion of the party, we had a great variety of options, including a local-ish brand Whit's, as well as a homemade s'mores option. We also had Walmart's house brand Better Goods, which was surprisingly ok!

The top ice creams were Jeni's brand and the absolute bottom was Oatly which almost everybody made a face when they tried. The Dream Pops were little ice cream coated chocolate bites and it was supposed to be birthday cake flavor but we thought it was something else, but they tasted good all the same. I was personally surprised by the Breyers, (which I had never seen vegan before) because I typically don't like oat milk texturally. This was really creamy, and I think would be a great base for an ice cream sundae or parfait. I also personally didn't like the So Delicious caramel flavor because I found it a little bit too sweet and artificial. But there were a few folks who enjoyed it.

To taste these we had an assembly line of little cups into which we scooped about a spoonful of ice cream into so we could just do little bites!

I've never had so much ice cream