Fasting for Orthodox Christians: Milk Alternatives

Having to do without dairy is difficult for me. Fortunately, there are a number of plant milks available, but they can be quite expensive. I recently decided to order a nut milk maker, and I'm really pleased with it. 

I made coconut milk with it and it was the best-tasting I had ever tried. Then I made oat milk (which turned out too thick, but that was easily corrected). This one makes 2 cups at a time, which is just about perfect for a person living alone.

There are numerous possibilities, and this also functions as an electric kettle, which is nice for those cold days!

With dairy alternative milks running $2-$3 per quart, even if a nut milk maker seems pricy, it may be worth it. 

Fasting for Russian Orthodox Christians: Potato Soup

With the no-oil days home cooking can be a bit difficult. Today was cold and I decided I was in the mood for potato soup.

Yes, there's a whole lot of dill, parsley, and black pepper in there.

If you follow this blog, you will know that I already tried to make this once and ended up making mashed potatoes instead because the cashew milk split. I still don't know what caused that, but today's experiment went quite a bit better.

I cooked 4 hefty potatoes in the pressure cooker on a rack (5 minutes, natural release) and left the skins on because I like it that way. I drained out the water and put the potatoes back in, minus the rack, and filled the pot with cashew milk about halfway up the sides of the potatoes, put it on to boil, added dill, parsley, black pepper, and two bay leaves. Once the cashew milk was boiling I lightly mashed the potatoes for a little body to the soup, served, and finished with a sprinkle of salt. That made two heaping bowls of soup. Just what I needed on a cold day!

Fasting for Russian Orthodox Christians: Fruit compote

So I had a tiny amount of wine left in a box, and a freezer full of partially-opened frozen fruit of various sorts.

Pull out a pot, add some honey or your favorite vegan sweetener: sugar, brown sugar, agave syrup, brown rice syrup, stevia, monkfruit, etc.;, a cinnamon stick; a sprinkle of black pepper; and a tiny bit of mace; and voila! Fruit compote. Heat everything up until the wine reduces and thickens (most of the alcohol will boil off). Just make sure you have disabled your carbon monoxide detectors before you start, and you have plenty of ventilation.

I started this off in the pressure cooker, but then I had second thoughts and decided just to cook it in an open pot.

It got topped off with a dehydrated orange slice from last year's dehydration marathon, and it's quite delicious!

Fasting for Russian Orthodox Christians: Garlic Mashed Potatoes

Sorry, no picture this time. I was too hungry!

This started out as potato soup and was a failure, so I turned it into mashed potatoes. Delicious!

I used potatoes, cut into chunks, and added cashew milk, along with a little garlic and some black pepper and dill weed. I cooked all that in the pressure cooker, and the cashew milk "split." Not being inclined to waste food. I got out my trusty potato masher and mashed the potatoes, added a little salt, and it was delicious!

Next, I'll be trying potato soup with cashew milk again, but this time I will add the cashew milk after the potatoes are cooked. Live and learn!

Fasting for Russian Orthodox Christians: Shrimp Coconut Curry in the Pressure Cooker

It's that time of year again, when the Orthodox world begins fasting, so here's another quick and easy recipe to get you through until Christmas!

This ranks among my easiest recipes, so feel free to throw this together when you have only minutes!

First, toast rice in your pressure cooker until the kernels give off a nutty aroma. Add a heaping spoon of curry powder and stir. Add coconut milk in the ratio of 1-1 liquid to rice, and a package of frozen spinach, and stir food again until well mixed. Lock the lid and cook on med (not high) until the pot reaches high pressure; for a stovetop cooker, lower the heat until the jiggler is barely rocking, time 18 minutes and then use natural release to unlock the lid (don't wait any longer!).
Open the lid, correct your seasonings (go easy on the salt) and add a package of frozen shrimp. Stir thoroughly and replace the pressure cooker lid. Wait ten minutes.
If the shrimp isn't cooked thoroughly at this point, heat the food in the pot for a few minutes until the shrimp are opaque and pink. Serve!

No pressure cooker? Toast rice and spices; cook rice in usual proportions with coconut milk instead of water. When done, add frozen spinach and shrimp, and stir; keep pot on low heat until shrimp is cooked.

Fasting for Russian Orthodox Christians: Thai-Inspired Peanut Butter Soup

This was a hit at trapeza the last time I took it there!

Thai-inspired peanut soup

Vegetable stock
Peanut butter (I prefer the crunchy kind because the little bits of peanuts add texture)
Coconut milk
Thai spice mix
Spinach, kale, carrots, celery or other vegetables, chopped, grated, or julienned

Put vegetable stock in pot. Add peanut butter and heat. It will look curdled at first but stir and keep stirring until smooth. Add spices and coconut milk to taste. Add chopped vegetables a few minutes before serving if you like them tender/crisp; otherwise add them earlier to cook and add any greens at the last few minutes.

I finished it off with fresh cilantro at the end.

Fasting for Russian Orthodox Christians: Shellfish

Even on no-oil days, Russian Orthodox Christians may eat shellfish. But how to prepare it without oil?

Whether you choose a pot on the stove or something more exotic, shrimp are easy to prepare without oil. For an Asian taste, you can simmer them in coconut milk and curry powder; use your vegetable stock and make them into soup; or add them to rice or rice and lentils. Stir in some cooked vegetables and you have a meal in a few minutes.

If you have shell-on shrimp, don't throw away those shells--yet. First transform them into a court-bouillon by boiling the shells in water until the shells release their flavor, about 10 minutes. Let the broth cool and strain into a container. (Okay, now you can throw away the shells.) Refrigerate, freeze, or use the broth as you would vegetable stock, including saving the broth for when you cook shrimp next.

Fasting for Russian Orthodox Christians: Vegetable Stock

Making your own vegetable stock is easy and fairly foolproof, but what you can do with it during a fasting period?

Make soup: add mushrooms, kale, potatoes, carrots, parsnips, or whatever you have handy. If you like you can thicken this with a little alternative milk (cashew milk works well).

Use as a flavoring agent for rice, lentils, beans, or whatever grains you enjoy such as quinoa, barley, buckwheat. In my house a pot of rice and lentils cooked with vegetable stock instead of water, mixed with a few salad greens to wilt at the end, and perhaps a leftover potato, is a favorite.

You can also use this as a broth to cook shellfish in (more on that next time).

So how do you make vegetable stock? You can use a pot on the stove, a slow cooker, or a pressure cooker.

Add trimmings from vegetables: root vegetable tops, trimmings from asparagus, celery leaves, or whatever else is left over after prepping vegetables. In a pot on the stove or slow cooker, cook until vegetables are mushy. In a pressure cooker, that's about twelve minutes on high. Remove from heat and let cool until you can sip it without burning yourself.

In my house we freeze this as is in freezer bags, so that we can spice it up according to the dish we're making with this. Think beyond salt and pepper; experiment with oriental spices, central American spices, until you find a combination that works for you. You'll find your dinners a lot more interesting!

Fasting for Russian Orthodox Christians: Potatoes

Potatoes without oil, sour cream, cheese, or butter? Yes, they can be delicious!

Mashed potatoes: cook potatoes in your usual way. Add alternative milk (unflavored, unsweetened cashew milk works well here), salt, garlic powder or garlic cloves, black pepper, some dry mustard, and a bit of nutmeg. Mash (with or without skins, up to you). Put under the broiler for a few minutes.

Roasted potatoes: Cut potatoes into small chunks; brush each chunk with mustard thinned down with water. Sprinkle with salt, pepper, and fresh or dried rosemary. Bake until they turn brown, correct seasoning and serve. You can use either ballpark (yellow) mustard or spicy brown mustard.

You can even use potatoes to fill vegan pierogi dough or ravioli dough!

Fasting for Russian Orthodox Christians: Avocados

What can't be done with avocados? You may or may not remember that avocado toast is a thing, and it's easy to dress up that toast into something pretty enticing.

Avocado toast is easy. Toast some bread. Cut open an avocado. Spread avocado on toast.

But making it tempting can be a bit more difficult. Fortunately, there's more than a few ways to make that avocado a bit more enticing.

Add salad greens on top
Add salsa on top
Mash the avocado with lemon or lime juice, and add black pepper. Top with olives, capers, or cooked or raw vegetables.

But avocados are great for other uses, too. You can make avocados into chocolate pudding by adding cocoa powder, sugar, alternative milk, vanilla, and cinnamon. Make smoothies and add whatever fruit or vegetable strikes your fancy (I make mine with coffee for the liquid). Use avocado in place of cheese or mayonnaise, including salad dressings, and you can even make a green alfredo sauce with avocado, basil, lemon or lime juice, and a garlic clove.

In short, the avocado satisfies your craving for fats and its mild taste is versatile enough to be used in all sorts of cooking.

Fasting for Russian Orthodox Christians: Pasta in Tomato Sauce

There are times when you just want to get dinner on the table fast, and this one-pot dish will do it. I've blogged about cooking pasta in sauce before, both in a traditional pot and in the pressure cooker.

Toast black pepper and garlic powder in dry pot for about 20 seconds, until you smell the spices. Add some canned or jarred tomato product (the kind doesn't matter; you can use canned tomatoes, tomato sauce, or jarred pasta sauce). Add pasta until pasta and sauce are level. Then add enough water to raise the liquid level about 1 inch over the pasta. Stir until pasta is evenly coated and water and tomato product are thoroughly mixed, and mixture begins to simmer. Add whatever herbs you may want to use (basil, parsley, italian seasoning, etc.)

If you're doing it in the pressure cooker, add water until the level of sauce and water is even with the pasta, stir until the mixture simmers, add herbs, put on the lid, bring to pressure, cook one minute, and use the natural release method.

If you're using a pot, continue stirring occasionally until pasta absorbs the water, about 8 minutes depending on whether you're using whole-grain pasta and how tender you want it.

Correct the seasoning, stir, and serve. If you've got some leftover raw or cooked vegetables, try stirring them in. They will parcook and add some nutrition and additional flavor.

Fasting for Russian Orthodox Christians: Hot Cocoa

Fasting in the Russian Orthodox Church has its challenges, but being that I'm holding myself out as an expert, I thought I'd give it a try. There are a lot of fasting, vegan and vegetarian cookbooks and recipes out there, and those are all well and good, but unhelpful for the particular requirements of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia. So I thought I'd give things a go and help out.

The problem most of us run into is the strict fast days (no animal products except honey; no oil or wine). That leaves grains, legumes, fruits, and vegetables. Most of the fasting cookbooks use oil, but thanks to modern tastes, fasting is easier than ever!

Right now I'm drinking hot cocoa that is totally within the rules, easy, and fast. A breakfast drink that you will find comforting on chilly mornings!

Yield: 1 serving

2T cocoa powder (the type doesn't matter)
1T (adjust to taste) sugar
Coconut milk, almond milk, cashew milk, rice milk, or whatever alternative to milk you prefer (if you use the pre-sweetened kind add the sugar at the end).

Measure cocoa powder and sugar into a cup. Add a splash of alternative milk to moisten the cocoa and stir until you have a smooth paste.

For microwave: add alternative milk to fill up the cup. Stir and adjust ingredients as necessary. Heat in microwave for approximately 1 minute (microwave times vary).

For stovetop: measure out alternative milk into pot. Heat on stove until hot but not boiling. Slowly add to cup, stirring until smooth.

If you like, you can add spices to the mix, or substitute honey, maple syrup, or agave syrup for the sugar. If you're going for spices, experiment with black pepper, cinnamon, cardamom, smoked paprika, fennel, star anise or anise, cloves, nutmeg, ginger, galangal or allspice.