Danish Archives - Epicurean Vegan

Vegan MoFo, Day 25

Happy Thanksgiving!

About a week and a half ago, we had our first vegan Thanksgiving dinner, so today, we had our first vegan Thanksgiving brunch. As much as I love vegan food, particularly breakfast foods, today wasn’t all about the food. The last few months for us have given us many reasons to be thankful for what we have. Earlier this month we lost a friend to cancer. She left behind a husband and two young daughters. Another friend is battling leukemia, while a blogging friend shared her own family’s tragedy of nearly losing her nephew to drowning. Unfortunately, it often takes these situations to make us appreciate what we have, one of which, is our health. So it was a day of thanks and remembrance—served with delicious vegan food!

The star of the show was Stuffed French Toast:

INGREDIENTS:

1 loaf French bread, sliced 3/4″ thick
8-oz Tofutti cream cheese
1 small can crushed pineapple, drained
1/2 C walnuts, chopped

Batter:

3 tsp Ener-G Egg replacer + 4 Tbs water
1/2 pkg of Silken Tofu (which worked perfectly since I used the other half to make the hash brown casserole)
1 C almond milk
1 tsp vanilla

DIRECTIONS:
Cream together the cream cheese and pineapple. Stir in the walnuts. If making this step the night before (like I did), add the walnuts the next day, just before using. Otherwise, they’ll get too soft. To make the batter, combine the egg replacer powder and water in the food processor and process until fluffy. Add tofu, milk and vanilla; combine well and transfer to a shallow bowl. Basically, create sandwiches with the French bread and the cream cheese filling.

Dip each “sandwich” in the batter to cover each side. Preheat a flat griddle on the stove and use some cooking spray. Brown each side as if making a grilled cheese. I then transferred them to a plate in a warm oven until ready to eat. Top with some Earth Balance and syrup.

I also made my favorite hash brown casserole:

I also made vegan cheese danishes that I made before, but this time, used cranberries for the filling.

INGREDIENTS:

4 oz Tofutti cream cheese
1/2 can cranberry sauce with whole berries
1 Tbs sugar
3 Tbs Earth Balance, melted and cooled

DIRECTIONS:
Cream everything together. I used the food processor, but I recommend using a mixer—I pureed it a bit too much.

Click HERE for the danish recipe.

We also had a great fruit salad with an agave-lime dressing. (I’ll get the recipe posted soon)

For dessert, my mom made Vegetarian Times’ Vegan Pumpkin Pie

Isn’t it gorgeous?! My mom has always made beautiful and delicious pies. The taste and consistency was outstanding and sure tasted like pumpkin pie to everyone. It was the perfect ending to a perfect brunch.

I hope everyone’s Thanksgiving has been filled with thanks, love and amazing food!

Impress your neighbors and wow the in-laws with your pastry chef-like skills by making this surprisingly easy danish. The original recipe is from Nigella Lawson‘s How To Be A Domestic Goddess cookbook and so for some time, I’ve been dying to veganize this recipe. I made several alterations, but I am so impressed with how flaky and delicious they came out. Don’t freak out by all the directions–it was actually quite simple. Plus, you don’t actually need to use a food processor–a mixer will work just fine.

INGREDIENTS:
1/4 C warm water
1/2 C soy milk
1 large egg (1 Tbs ground flax seed mixed with 3 Tbs water)
2-1/4 C all-purpose flour
1 pkg (1/4 oz) rapid-rise yeast
1 tsp salt
1 Tbs sugar
1 C unsalted butter, cut into thin slices (Earth Balance sticks)
Filling:
Pinch of salt
1 C ricotta cheese (Tofutti cream cheese)
1 Tbs lemon zest (I used a lime)
1 large egg, beaten (again, 1 Tbs ground flax seed + 3 Tbs water)
3 Tbs unsalted butter, melted and cooled (Earth Balance)
Glaze:
1/3 C sugar
1/4 C water

DIRECTIONS:
Pour the water and milk into a measuring cup and add the flax seed mixture, beating with a fork to mix. Put to one side for a moment. Get out a large bowl, then put the flour, yeast, salt and sugar in the processor, and give one quick whirl just to mix. Add the cold slices of Earth Balance and process briefly so that the butter is cut up a little, though you still want visible chunks of at least 1/2″. Empty the contents of the processor into the large bowl and quickly add the wet ingredients. Use your hands or a rubber spatula to fold the ingredients together, but don’t overdo it: expect to have a gooey mess with some butter lumps pebbling it. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap, put in the refrigerator, and leave overnight or up to 4 days.

To turn it into pastry, take it out of the refrigerator, let it get to room temperature, and roll it out to a 20″ square. (This was fairly easy–it rolls out very nicely). Fold the dough square into thirds, like a business letter, turning it afterward so that the closed fold is on your left, like the spine of a book.

Roll out again to a 20″ square, repeating the steps above 3 times. Cut in half, wrap both pieces and put each in the refrigerator for 30 mins. (Just gently fold and wrap with plastic wrap–worked great).

So for the filling:
Combine the cheese, sugar, salt, lemon zest, egg-replacer, and Earth Balance. (I used the food processor)
Then you’re ready!
First of all…the recipe is intended to make 6 large danishes. For the first batch I made 3 large ones and decided on the second batch to make smaller ones, which I personally thought worked much better.
Roll out one of the pastry dough halves into a big rectangle (recipe doesn’t specify exactly how big…) Divide into thirds and place a tablespoon of cheese filling on each piece of dough. Fold the opposite corners up together and seal with a pinch.

Place on baking sheets prepared with waxed paper and brush with the sugar/water glaze. The recipe then calls for them to rise for about 1-1/2 hours. Yeah, that didn’t happen for me, but apparently that was no big whoop because they came out great. Preheat oven to 350 and bake 15 mins or until puffy and golden brown.

I then made a lime icing (since I used lime zest) by combining about a cup of powdered sugar and then drizzled in lime juice, stirring and adding more juice to get the consistency I wanted. I then drizzled the danishes with the icing…