The most delicious and clean tacos ever! Sweet Potato with Greens and Plantain Tortillas, Paleo, Vegan and Awesome

Today is Cinco de Mayo (yay!) it is also the middle of a strict springtime vegan-paleo goal for me. So what to do. I looooove Mexican foods, it will be one of my favorite cuisines ever and always. My eyes were first opened to mind blowing vegan Mexican food at Gracias Madre in SF. I was lucky to eat there many times, but it was a taco plate when I first fell in love. There were piles of cooked leafy greens, spiced sweet potatoes, and all the crunchy toppings. I think there were beans and loads of their wonderful freshly made tortillas. This today is my homage to them.  The tortilla making is easy as pie, but if you love corn tortillas-by all means use those!

Paleo Plantain Tortillas 
with
Chili Sweet Potato, Leafy Greens, and Avocado

Tortillas:
Makes about 14 tortillas (taco "corn-tortilla" sized)

• 4 green plantains
• 1/4 cup hot water (or more)

Leafy Greens:

• 1 bunch collards, swiss chard, or kale
• 2 cloves garlic
• 1/2 cup water
• 1 teaspoon ground cumin
• salt

Sweet Potatoes:

• 4 sweet potatoes
• 1-2 teaspoon chili powder
• 1  teaspoon garlic powder
• 1 teaspoon cumin
• salt

Also: 

• Avocado
• Cabbage
• Raddishes
• Cilantro
• Salsa

For these tortillas I want a savory or neutral sort of flavor so we use the unripe or green plantains. Peeling them can be a little bit of a chore, here is a link to my earlier instructions how to do this quickly. The plantains need to be peeled and sliced into chunks before boiling for 20 minutes. You will see the raw plantain is a very pale yellow color, once it has cooked in the boiling water there's a much deeper yellow color to the flesh. 

When the plantains are fork tender drain into a colander in the sink. Wait 5 minutes so they cool a bit. Place plantains in the bowl of a standing mixer, mix on low for about 5-8 minutes. If you have the plastic guard that keeps things from jumping out the sides of the bowl now is the time to use it. If not you can hold a tea towel around the top of the bowl until pieces stop trying to jump out. 

At first it may seem very dry and crumbly, but there is a nice point when everything comes dough like. Depending on your plantains and how ripe and cooked they are this may take more time than you expect just keep the mixer on. If everything is looking very dry, which happens due to moisture escaping through the steam, add a splash of hot water until you have a consistency like cookie dough. 

With our plantain massa ready we can move onto shaping and cooking the tortillas:

You will need a tortilla press or two rigid cutting boards. Parchment paper folded in half or a plastic bag cut into two pieces.Some coconut oil or other oil of your choice. A hot griddle or frypan. 

1. Heat the griddle.
2. Apply a tiny bit of coconut oil to the inside spots of the full department where you will flatten the dough. 
3. Roll a ball of the dough in your hands.
4. Place in between the two sheets of parchment or plastic
5. Position this parchment sandwich in between your two cutting board or tortilla press. 
6. Press straight down, with all your bodyweight. 
7. Remove the top cutting board and check your tortilla. 
8. Peel off the parchment carefully, this is easier than you imagine.
9. Move the tortilla in hand directly to the griddle.
10. Cook on each side for about 5 minutes. They will look dry, pale, with not much color. The edges will turn out just a bit. 

Repeat until the dough is all used up! 

Cut a bunch of collards or Swiss chard into thin ribbons. Cook on the stove with two cloves of minced garlic, salt, a teaspoon of cumin, and a 1/2 cup of water. Simmer and sauté until the water has about braided and your greens are tender and bright. 

Cube your sweet potatoes into roughly half inch pieces. Toss to coat with olive oil  and 1 to 2 teaspoons of chili powder, 1 teaspoon of cumin and 1 teaspoon of garlic powder. Spread on a sheet pan in one layer. Bake roast at 350° for about 30 minutes, until they're tender. There is no need to stir the sweet potatoes while they are roasting see you can just forget about them until the timer beeps!

Clearly, tacos should be assembled right as you are going to eat them. Place a small bed of greens as a base on the tortilla, followed by sweet potatoes, then topped off with thin slices of avocado, radish, cabbage and cilantro. salsa or hot sauce is always a good idea in my book.

 Enjoy!
***The tortillas will keep for a few days in the fridge kept sealed up in a bag. Very good just microwaved for 20 seconds to warm them up again. Or even better, throw on a hot dry pan till warm.

Warming Sweet Potato, Cabbage and Black Bean Vegan Casserole

Aren't sweet potatoes the most pleasing things? Comforting, soft, warm, bland but not tasteless. And they come in different colors, I got orange ones and white ones with purple skins for this recipe. They look stunning in alternating rows. This recipe takes just a bit of roasting, and is so pretty presented on the table. I made a southwestern inspired casserole here, some chipotle, some wine, some beans. All the good stuff. 

Savoy cabbage waits next to a bowl of sliced sweet potatoes tossed in olive oil, salt, pepper, sage and mexican oregano. This way they are nicely coated with oil to brown up in the roasting of the casserole process.

One head of savoy cabbage is sliced up into roughly 1/2" - 1" wide pieces. Rustic is ok! White wine, olive oil, and a sprinkling of chipotle powder are added into the pan for flavor. Lets begin the roasting, 350°.



Look, after 15 minutes or so in my convection oven the cabbage is won over. Wilted into silky strips, with charred tips which say lots of flavor.



The sweet smokey cabbage is placed in the bottom of my most beloved baking pan. (Anthropologie makes the craziest dish-ware, I love it!)
What is a casserole anyway? Instead of describing the food, its comes from the French word for the pan itself, used in both the oven and serving of the food. Casserole meaning both the very cool cookware one receives as awesome wedding gifts, and of the vegetables layered inside of it. Clearly casseroles have an image problem in popular culture, but I have no problem with them. I think anything baked together is probably better than baked alone!



Spoon a layer of black bean on top of the cabbage. Next time I make this casserole I will experiment in putting the beans at the bottom and cabbage on top of them. I feel it would make the beans more succulent. You could try it either way. So, about beans, I made mine using a dried heirloom variety, soaking and then cooking in my pressure cooker for 20 minutes. You can use black beans or pinto beans out of a can, that is easy. Remember to rinse them.



Sprinkle some chipotle on top of the beans if you are in the mood. Next comes the very fun part. Craft time with food! Arrange the slices of sweet potato in scolloped rows, alternating by color.




Bake entire cassarole in a 350° oven for 30 - 45 minutes. Crisped sweet potatoes and warmed through.

The potatoes retain their color difference after roasting, although I lack a really good photo because the evening lighting in my house is lacking and it didn't look pretty the next day. We had devoured it and it was a mangled mess of leftovers. We will make do with this one until I make this again!  Or you make it and send me the photo perhaps?

It was really impressive looking. Dinner party or pot luck worthy. Even Thanksgiving perhaps? We ate it along with salad and mustard on top. It served about 6  portions that way. Next time Ill take better measurements in the kitchen, but honestly it was really good, just wing-it, you can't go wrong.

Warming Sweet Potato, Cabbage and Black Bean Vegan Casserole

4-6 sweet potatoes
1 savoy cabbage
1 1/2 cups cooked pinto or black beans
1 teaspoon dry sage
1 teaspoon Mexican oregano
olive oil
salt pepper
1/3 cup white wine
1 teaspoons chipotle powder

Camp cooking and the best Loaded Spicy Sweet Potatoes.

Iv'e just returned from a long weekend of camping on Grand Isle in the middle of Lake Champlain. Very beautiful there, like the rest of Vermont but flatter and very rural. Lake swimming was awesome! My favorite bit about camping is (obviously?) camp cooking. Cooking in a fire is different than a oven or stove and I love making do with a very very tiny kitchen in the way of equipment.

I packed very minimally, 2 fry pans and one small pot. My dear husband said "What, you don't need to bring 3 pans!!!" To which I replied "In fact, I do." And I did and he ate his words once we got there. And anyway we were car camping so who cares!

Bare Bones Camp Cooking Equipment

•8" fry pan
•Small fry pan 4"
•Stainless steel pot (to boil water)
•Metal spatula
•Sharp useful 6" knife
•Aluminum foil (its amazing for everything.)
•Tongs (I forgot these and we made do but they are so useful for taking things out of the fire.)
•Forks and spoons for eating that can also be useful when cooking.

SNACKS
Besides the chips and salsa we had an appetizer of savory stuffed mushrooms. Made at home and packed up in the cooler. Having only to warm them over the fire. Smoky and savory stuffed with parsley, sage, red onion and garlic. It would be awesome to stuff them and cook them over the fire next time. That would take about an hour most likely.

These were really good, and different than usual stuffed mushrooms, so ill make them again and post the recipe.
(Check out my Modern Stuffed Mushroom recipe here!)

POTATOES
We had a battle for the best potatoes two nights in a row. Baked Potato with Fire Roasted Garlic and Herbed Goat Cheese. vs Baked Sweet Potato with Goat Cheese and Spicy Blue Corn Chips

Why does food eaten outside often bring the feeling that it is the best EVER!?  That was this roasted garlic, it tasted like the best ever.  Sweet, perfectly soft and even smokey. Instead of drizzling olive oil on the garlic like usual I had spread some coconut oil on it. And left it in the coals for a while.

The sweet potato was an inspired combination. I always love sweet potato and goat cheese so I had packed them both. The real inspiration came upon seeing the bag of Red Hot Blues chips was almost gone, all little chip bits at the bottom with lots of the spicy dust. It resulted in the most silky, creamy, crunchy and spicy dish. Roast whole sweet potatoes until they are so soft and silky, split them open, shove in lots of delicious fresh chévre (preferably with herbs and garlic in it) and top off with spicy blue corn tortilla chips. I am going to make them again, like now.

DESSERT
Obviously s'mores are the best thing, it brings us all memories of being little, happy, and stuffing our bellies with hot marshmallows. Puffy molten burnt sugar and melty chocolate. How did we ever go to sleep after the sugar bombs i'm not sure. Like any reasonable person I can only eat one or two now. I did go with an unorthodox combo of super dark chocolate, vegan marshmallows (no GMOs) and vermont artisan graham crackers by Caselton Crackers. All awesome products on their own, all wicked good together. I was wishing for a bigger stomach so I could eat it all!














BREAKFAST

I have no good photos of breakfast because it is too early to be thinking of camera phones at breakfast. The importance of breakfast is in the rapid making and eating of it. And the consumption of wonderful black tea. And the feeling of "ahhh" that I get with a full belly in the morning. I panic when I get hungry.

Breakfast was mostly eggs, grilled tomatoes, and english muffins. All cooked in coconut oil in the same pan. First grill the muffins, keep them warm in tinfoil. add more oil, the tomatoes, and a piece of canadian bacon for those that feel like eating meat. And finally the eggs. Fried are easier to clean up after than scrambled.

A cool thing about eggs, if you can get them straight from the farm before they are washed or refrigerated then they don't need to be kept in a cooler. Eggs can keep at room temperature for weeks, dont take my word for it, this lady has more to say. This is just cool and also handy when camping.

Roast Sweets and Scapes

Garlic scapes roasted along with sweet potatoes become a veggie dish with infused flavor and nuance.

Fresh garlic scapes

Roasting with oil caramelizes the flavor of garlic scapes. They softened, as did the garlicy bite.

The flower bulbs transformed into amazing creations. The outside crispy and salty, the inside soft, succulent, pungent and nearly sweet.

I find, when roasting sweet potatoes, olive oil tastes the best, but other higher temperature oils like sunflower or peanut oil will crisp and color up the outsides better. I drizzle on some of each for the best of both worlds.

garlic scapes and sweet potatoes ready to roast

Sweet potatoes and garlic scapes

Roast Sweets and Scapes


5 garlic scapes
4 medium sweet potatoes
olive oil
peanut oil (or sunflower)
sea salt


Dice sweet potatoes into 1 inch chunks.
slice garlic scapes into 1/4" pieces. Leave the top bulb intact.

Roast Sweets and Scapes

Place potatoes and scapes onto a roasting tray.

Drizzle equally generous amounts of olive oil and peanut oil on the tray. Sprinkle liberally with sea salt. Toss it all by hand to coat in oil.

Cook in a 350° oven for 30 minutes, or until the sweet potato has softened through.  Toss the potatoes once towards the end of cooking to crisp all sides.

Enjoy hot or at room temperature. 4-6 servings as a side dish.

Sweet Potato Dessert Waffles

It was late evening and I really wanted a waffle. So I pulled down the waffle maker, it was worth it.

The sweet potato waffles are good, and I will make them again. Sometimes I have roasted sweet potatoes in my fridge, but this time I used this frozen-mashed-sweet potato that you can sometimes find at Trader Joe's. And when they do have it, i buy a lot. Because its just cooked mashed sweet potato with nothing else in it, and you can use it in baking! And waffles!

I put super dark Taza chocolate chunks on top of my waffle. Covered it with another waffle. Put in in the microwave for 30 seconds...to melt it...Yes I did, this is a dessert waffle!

 

Topped it off with fresh organic strawberries. And maple syrup, obviously! It was decadent and hit the spot. 

Sweet Potato Waffles

2 cups almond flour

4 Tbs coconut flour

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp nutmeg

1 1/2 cups mashed sweet potato

4 eggs

1/4 cup maple syrup

1 Tbs coconut oil, melted

2/3 cup almond milk

Extras:

Dark chocolate chunks

Strawberries 

Maple syrup

Turn on the waffle maker so it heats up.

 

Mix the dry ingredients together in a bowl. Mix the wet ingredients together in a second bowl so they are very smooth.  Then combine them, mixing thoroughly.

Make your waffles, per specifics to your waffle iron. Easy as pie.