Remember I told you about the friend who got me Daiya? I may have used it in everything. It turns out I am not a fan of the cheddar slices. It tastes too processed, a lot like those completely processed slices individually wrapped in plastic that you can get at the supermarket and that I never liked before I went vegan. But the mozzarella is a lot milder and I don’t think people really notice the difference between this and what’s on regular frozen pizzas. Anyway, it is really good so I put it on everything. I put it on a hummus-pesto-hybrid made from fresh green peas, pine nuts and mint. It was really good.
A little bit of sriracha gave it more of a kick, which I like. I am the only one in our household who likes the kick, so the sriracha and hot sauce lasts forever. The look of melty Daiya is different to melty dairy-cheese. This could be because I don’t heat it high enough. I just find that it never really loses the shape of the shreds, even though it is melty and stretchy. But I know that you of the American blogosphere have heard more, more than enough about Daiya. You, for some incomprehensible reason, find Cheezly irresistible and exotic and marvelous.
Having had a chance to try Teese, Sheese, aforementioned Cheezly, Tofutti, Violife, Wilmersburger and Daiya, and some tofu-feta-goat-cheese thing from a Berlin health food store that was so good I had three blocks of it in 5 days, I can say that some of those have their use. I recommend you completely ignore the first three. They’ve ruined otherwise perfectly cheeselessly delicious meals for me. Tofutti slices are doable, but their cream cheese is perfect, exactly that same fatty, little bit bland, rich weird creamy thing that is regular cream cheese, with not a hint of soybean. Violife is quite similar to what you can get in Dutch supermarkets pre-sliced in packets, and the same goes for Wilmersburger. Quite nice, not a very outspoken taste, not melty, but good on a slice of bread, tastes exactly as much of plastic and nothing as supermarket cheese made from dairy does. I quite liked the Violife one with herbs, because that did have a taste that reminded me faintly of a nettle-cheese I at some point had a pregan obsession with. There was green bits in there, eating it was a nostalgic experience. Daiya is the only one of these that melts even somewhat realistically and the mozzarella (though it taste more like “all purpose cheese” to me, especially compared to the home made stuff) is good with almost anything. When I get back to Berlin, I will try and find the feta-chèvre-tofu again and then I’ll let you know. Because it’s the healthiest of these by far and it was super tasty, mainly because it didn’t try too hard to be dairy cheese. I will also be taking ridiculous amounts of it back to the Netherlands with me if I ever find it again.
Right, my initial point of this post was that chili is really tasty with a handful of Daiya, and I made a discovery: they have smoked paprika powder at a store just a short bike ride away. If you’re visiting the Netherlands and see a Dille & Kamille (translation: Dill & Chamomile) you should check it out, I sometimes just go there to be surrounded by pretty cookery-items. I had been looking for smoked paprika for the longest time and there it suddenly was, next to the cash register. It is the best thing ever to have happened to both chili and BBQ. And sauces. And tomato soups. And salads that need a bit of heat or smoke. And tofu rubs. I’ve found the sweet variety there as well, so now I put it in almost everything. It’s like a really low-budget version of liquid smoke.
As you can see, my mum’s cooking course is really paying off. The structure of her breads has improved drastically. I am learning from a distance, and have now learned to make the best pasta I’ve had in my life so far. Penne all’ arrabbiata is something new, but it’s a kind of spicy even my family enjoys on occasion. And you can make it as spicy and with as much vegetables as you want. It takes a maximum of 20 minutes? 30 if I am very precise and finicky about it. So you should try it. I used a Jamie Oliver recipe (without dead anchovies of course), because his method of cooking is roughly similar to that of the course. You cook your pasta until just south of al dente (for me, with spaghetti that’s probably 5 minutes, 6 with a bigger pasta) and then cook it the rest of the way with a cup of cooking water added to the sauce (takes me 3 minutes usually). It makes for a really nice bite and a sauce that actually sticks to your pasta without clumping or the need for olive oil to prevent said clumping. Nigella Lawson uses the same method. It’s so simple and so much better that I don’t know why we didn’t start cooking pasta like this years ago!
