Tuesday, December 27, 2011

A Very Vegan Christmas: Milanesa

My favorite home video of all-time involves me riding my grandparents’ dog while eating a giant milanesa. Somehow they hadn’t thought that it might be a poor choice to let a 2 year old on top of a dog twice his size with a highly desirable chunk of meat. Luckily, this dog was my personal protector, and she subverted her animalistic desires to allow me safe passage from the den to the backyard.

Some brilliant individual once thought "How could I possibly make steak better? I know I'll fry it!." And before his arteries finished clogging, he shared his genius with the world. Milanesa is the one thing I always request when I go home, and whenever I’m at a Hispanic restaurant I immediately scour the menu for it. As a result, I was most intrigued when my sister told me she had created a vegan milanesa. The results were beyond anything I could have hoped for.

Vegan Milanesa
From the brilliant mind of my sister
Servings: One fun party platter
Time: 15 minutes
Fake meat looks even better after squishing

1 bag Gardein beefless tips
Bread crumbs
Flour
Vegan butternut squash bisque
Grapeseed oil for frying
Vegenaise
Ketchup
Horseradish
Crushed red pepper flakes


  1. Defrost the beefless tips either in 30 second intervals in the microwave or for several hours on the counter.
  2. Use the palm of your hand to squash the beef tips down to a flatter form.
  3. Coat the tips in a mixture of bread crumbs and flour (with more bread crumbs) then dip them in the bisque and coat again. The bisque serves as your super tasty vegan egg replacer.
  4. Fry in grapeseed oil until golden brown. You can test to see when the oil is ready by throwing a pinch of flour in it. When it sizzles, it's ready.
  5. Transfer to a plate lined with paper towels to remove excess oil.
  6. Place fun colored toothpicks in each piece.
  7. Mix together the vegenaise, ketchup, horseradish and red pepper to make a dipping sauce. 
  8. Enjoy wonderful fried goodness (it's probably redundant to say fried goodness).


This is by far the most delectable I have ever had the gardein beef tips. By themselves in this dish they are a flawless meat substitute that embraces the fried bread crumb casing to make something that my grandparents’ dog would’ve been a fool to not fight me for, but with the dipping sauce they transcend anything my ancestors could’ve hoped to craft. This is definitely one dish I can't wait to make again to share the vegany goodness with my friends.

One of my goals in life is to plunge food violently into dipping sauce like in commercials. I imagine this results in getting sauce all over the place and having everyone else at the table hate you.
There's plenty more excitement to come from a Very Vegan Christmas including Cucidatis, "Oyster" Patties, Beignets, Frittatas, Dog Treats, and the world's most incredible Holiday Punch. It's a mad dash of posts coming to end the year!

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