Back to our regularly scheduled blog.

 So fast food.....wait, good food quickly is over and I need real food. Comfort food. Warming food.

If you don't know me, I am perpetually cold. It can be 75 degrees outside and I am cold. So warm food, both in flavor and temperature make me happy.

I decided to try another version of the veggie burger in the book. There are approxiamately 29 different veggie burgers in this book, so whatever my fancy is - it's got me covered. Today was black bean and broccoli burgers. Can of black beans, frozen broccoli, rolled thick-cut oats, chili powder, garlic powder, salt, pepper, done.

It's super easy to make a veggie burger, but a challenge to get it to hold together. Since I don't use eggs anymore, you need a binder. Eggs serve a wonderful purpose that way. They hold flour onto chicken, breadcrumbs onto anything, hold cookies and things like that together. So I was stuck.....what to use?

I didn't use anything. I did chill the burger patties before cooking them, and gave them a really long time in the frig to let the oats, well, whatever oats do. They suck up moisture.

I have learned that anything that doesn't make it's own grease (note, anything vegetarian then....) needs A LOT of oil in a pan. I cook in cast iron pans, so they need a lot of priming anyways. So after oiling the pan, I oiled the pan. Over a medium hot skillet I nestled my patties down and let them sizzle. If you don't add egg, you can remove them whenever you want. They won't be raw, cause there's no meat in them.

I like to let mine cook until slightly charred, it gives some more depth of flavor - like you were grilling them.

I topped mine with Daiya Pepperjack cheese, avocado mayo (thanks Pinterest!), BBQ sauce and punkin seeds. No bread needed. My daughter used bread and declared it so delicious she ate 3 more. So much for leftovers.

But.......when I do have leftover burgers, I chopped them up and added them as "meat" to my Chili Non Carne. Lovely.

Like I mentioned, I need warming food. I am sure our acupuncturist has a good explanation of why this is.

Enchiladas have been calling me lately and leaving voicemails.

Eventually I had to return their numerous calls.

The book has enchilada recipes that look so good. But they also have a stacked enchilada recipe that sounded very accessible. But I can't eat the canned enchilada sauce that I love so much. Stupid gluten.

So, I embarked on making my own sauce. I was so nervous that this was not going to live up to that smokey-flavored red elixir in a can. I was nervous that I would make it too spicy. Not spicy enough. Would it be thick enough? Enter the book.

One verrrrrrry easy enchilada sauce recipe coming up. Doubled. One very messy kitchen. But I digress.

The hardest part was soaking the chiles overnight. Waiting. Waiting. Waiting. Finally! They were softened! Into a pot to be cooked with diced canned tomatos, tomato paste, spices and onion. Stir and puree. Smelled divine. After I tasted it for what must have been twenty times, I just couldn't put my finger on what was missing. Something.

Yeast. It was yeast. Yeast is in the canned stuff. Why, I don't know.

So in went a large amount of nutritional yeast.

Nutritional yeast is what they put on Doritos and stuff to give them a cheesy taste. It's in cereals, chips, drinks, almost everything. I think it stretches the product additives further. But it also has a ton of , well, nutritional value. In our house, it is strictly for liberally covering celery chunks in. And now enchilada sauce. Bingo.

So, I decided to layer the corn tortillas and recreate the Enchilada Pie in the book. I used fresh tortillas, because there really is nothing like them. They aren't dry like the ones at the end of the Hispanic aisle. They are soft, moist and pliable. So, down went some sauce then a tortilla, then black beans, then corn, then sauce, then a tortilla, then black beans...well, 8 layers and two pies later they looked like a hot mess. I doused them with the remainder of the sauce, filling in all the nooks and crannies. Into the oven it went.

Patience. I am not good at waiting.

Out came that delicious smokey smell that I love! Presto!

Cutting them like a pie was easy. Topping them with cheese, kefir, leftover avocado mayo and pumpkin seeds made them just divine. I ate these for breakfast. I ate these for lunch. I ate them before bed.

I need to go to the store........