Homemade Pasta

While I was studying abroad, I took a trip to Rome and learned how to make fettuccine through Eat&Walk Italy. Most traditional Italian pasta is made with flour, salt, and egg, but a plant-based diet does not include eggs.

To make my pasta, I used this recipe from Bianca Zapatka with my homemade almond pesto recipe (linked here).

My tips:

  • Don’t stress yourself out if your “hole” of flour doesn’t work. Just continue to incorporate the extra flour. You might need to add extra water and knead for 15ish minutes, but that just means an extra arm workout!

  • Watch this video on rolling pasta - it’s very helpful if you’ve never done it before.

  • Add extra flour on the folded dough before your cut into strips. This ensures that the pasta doesn’t stick together when you roll into the nests.

  • Save extra pasta water to fold back into the cooked pasta with the pesto. The starchy water helps to make sure that pasta doesn’t stick together.

Oatmeal Pancakes

Last weekend, I took my typical oats (learn more about my recipe here) and turned them into pancakes. The recipe yielded a stack of pancakes. Since there was no flour, the pancakes weren’t as fluffy, but still tasted delicious.

INGREDIENTS:

  • 1/2 cup rolled oats

  • 1 cup almond milk

  • 1/2 banana

  • 1 tbsp milled flax seed

  • Toppings (maple syrup, fresh fruit, etc.)

DIRECTIONS:

  • Blend oats, almond milk, banana, and flaxseed

  • Heat a pan, coat pan with neutral-tasting oil (I used vegetable) and heat oil

  • Pour batter on the pan into pancakes

  • Cook for a few minutes and flip

  • Top with maple syrup and fresh fruit

Homemade Pizza

When my friend Elise shared she was making homemade vegan pizza, I had to jump in and make it for my family too! We used this recipe from Veggie Society as the base. I cut the dough into four different pieces (instead of the recommended 6-8). See more of my tips and toppings below.

MY TIPS:

  • My dough ended up being very sticky, so I had to add extra flour. If you have the same problem, add the flour little by little.

  • Line pan with an oiled piece of parchment paper. Oil 4 pieces of plastic wrap (or however many rolls of dough you have). Make sure to coat your hands in oil, so the dough doesn’t stick to your hands. Cover the balls of dough with the plastic wrap. All the oil makes sure that the dough doesn’t stick anywhere.

  • If you’re cooking the pizza for dinner, make the dough in the afternoon. Let it rest on the counter for 2 hours. Then, place it in the fridge until it’s time to bake.

  • We don’t own a pizza stone, so we just used regular pans (pizza circle and rectangular work fine). Coat the pan with a little olive oil so the dough doesn’t stick.

  • If you’re not using a pizza stone, you’ll have to cook the pizza for longer than the recommended 5-8 minutes. I didn’t end up timing how long each pizza took, but it was around 12 minutes each. Make sure to keep a close eye on it after 8 minutes.

  • Once you roll each pie into a circle, coat it with a little olive oil before adding toppings.

PIZZA 1: Tomato Pie

  • Marinara sauce

  • 1 clove of garlic (minced)

  • Oregano

  • Fresh basil

PIZZA 2: Homemade Pesto

  • Homemade pesto (used my recipe here)

  • Peppers

    • Grilled the peppers in the oven for 5 minutes at 350 before cooking the pizza

  • Sun-dried tomato (added after the pizza left the oven)

PIZZA 3: Homemade Cashew Ricotta and Grilled Veggies

  • Marinara sauce

  • Homemade cashew ricotta from Simple Veganista (only made half the recipe and still had extra)

  • Oregano

  • Veggies (asparagus, mushrooms, zucchini)

    • Grilled these in the oven for 5 minutes at 350 before cooking the pizza