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#VeganMoFo Day 28: AN ACTUAL TACO!!

My back is getting better, so I managed to get back into the kitchen after work tonight I didn’t want to leave such a good theme hanging without making something!

Since my my mom gifted me with a cast iron tortilla press, I’ve made fresh corn tortillas many times. It makes all the difference. I’m terrible with yeast breads, but tortillas? Pssshh. Easy. Only a little bit time-consuming, heh. It has to mix, then sit, then press each one, then cook each one.

Filling these flaky, warm, sweet, and toasty blank canvases? That’s the fun part.

First I made some tofu. I don’t usually do tofu on my tacos, but I had an idea. (Also, I should really look at how many of my posts this month featured tofu–I feel like I used it more than I normally do, but eh…) I did my normal baked tofu prep, but with a twist: red wine vinegar, dried oregano, red pepper flakes, and thinly sliced green bell pepper and red onion all went into the baking dish with the tofu on top (with a little marinade dredged on both sides), then baked for 20 minutes on each side at 400 degrees. I use my toaster oven because it doesn’t heat up the whole room, plus it bakes on a timer so it’s a total no-brainer. THe veggies roasted up nicely and the tofu has a lot of flavor.

Then I needed a sauce–getting back to basics, hello blog name!–but I also really wanted to use up some collard greens and mushrooms. Plus I picked up some nice saucing tomatoes, so I decided to make a cooked salsa with veggies in it: diced onion, sliced mushrooms, minced red jalapeno, lots of tomato, chopped collards, cook cook cook, then add several cloves of crushed/microplaned garlic (I want that PUNCH), followed by fresh cilantro and lime juice. It isn’t runny, but it is saucy and filling and flavorful.

So for the taco we’ve got sliced baked tofu, some roasted onion and pepper slices, fresh-cooked tomato salsa with mushrooms and greens, and some shredded lettuce and more cilantro to finish. Yum yum yum. Flavorful and good texture without being super messy–wow.

NOTE: I wanted avocado, but when I inspected them, they did not appear to be ripe. However, when my boyfriend appeared, he decided one of them was. But I had already eaten by then. HARUMPH.