Vegan MoFo – Fiesta Brown Rice Salad and Vegan Pizza

Vegan MoFo – Fiesta Brown Rice Salad and Vegan Pizza
Pizza!
I finally made a successful Vegan Pizza!!! It was awesome – the cheese melted and everything!! Woo-hoo!! My first attempt several weeks ago was not good – I managed to have both a burnt and soggy crust and non melted cheese. Terrible! Then I found a recipe on-line and I feel terrible but I can’t reference here I have looked all over! I will try to find it an add it in later. The blogger had the great advice to cook the veggies first as the mushrooms can make your crust soggy. Also, I invested in a cheese shredder and the cheese (Follow Your Heart Mozzarella Cheese) melted perfectly. Although, my inspiration said you may need to broil the pizza to melt and brown the cheese, I didn’t find it necessary. I sautéed in safflower oil (I use safflower oil in place of olive oil because it is still healthy at high heats), fresh mushrooms and cut up Ives Deli style Ham. IN another pan I sautéed (in safflower oil) frozen “stoplight” peppers. I put these in another pan because frozen peppers (also onions) release a ton of water when cooking and you will need to drain them several times. Also, my bff T had the great suggestion of soaking up the excess water with a paper towel. Worked perfectly – you want them as dry as possible or your pizza will get soggy. I purchased tomato paste but I didn’t like that at all so ended up just brushing the crust with olive oil. I used a stone ground wheat crust that I found near the bakery department at Whole Foods. I then piled on the toppings and grated “cheese” over the top.
Oh no! I forgot I have some really lovely vegan parmesan cheese that I could have used. Boo!
Sorry about that! I’m back. Anyway, it turned out really nicely and my roommate and I ate the whole thing. It really would be enough for three people.
Fiesta Brown Rice Salad
I also made this recipe I got from the e-newsletter of WHFoods (World’s Healthiest Foods) by George Mateljan. Honestly, I get the vibe that he is a bit of a creep show but the recipes are often healthy and very good. I’m just going to include it here and then tell you about my modifications.
WHFoods: Fiesta Brown Rice Salad
Fiesta Brown Rice Salad
This health-promoting rice salad not only tastes great but can supply 114% of
your Daily Value (DV) for manganese, 141% DV for vitamin C and 26% DV for
magnesium to your Healthiest Way of Eating.
Prep and Cook Time: 50 minutes -includes cooking time for rice
Ingredients:
4 cups cooked brown rice
1 medium red bell pepper, diced
1 medium green bell pepper, diced
1 cup corn
1 cup black beans
your favorite vinaigrette
1 tsp ground cumin
pinch of cayenne
2 TBS chopped cilantro

Directions:
Combine 4 cups cooked brown rice, diced bell peppers, corn, and black beans.
Toss with your favorite vinaigrette.
Add 1 tsp cumin seed and a pinch of cayenne to dressing. Sprinkle rice salad
with chopped cilantro
Serves 4
© 2001-2009 The George Mateljan Foundation

The only real difference is that I only had one green pepper and so I used the left over sautéed peppers from the pizza (I purposely made extra). Also, I always put 1 tbsp of safflower oil in my rice while cooking. And of course I added lots of cracked pepper and celtic sea salt to everything! I also put extra cilantro in because I really love cilantro. I think adding red onion and tomato would be very good and I will try that next time.
It turned out really nicely and my roommate loved it too. She did pick out all the raw green peppers so next time I will keep those separate. I had it for lunch again today and it was still very good. I actually warmed it up a little which was nice. I am currently reading, “The China Study” so I am going to be limiting my protein for awhile. Although, so far it sounds like plant protein is ok I am not taking any chances!