- [Carla] Oh, my goodness Rachel. It looks fantastic.
- You want a lady in the trumpet? That's weird.
- It's good.
- Hi, my name is Rachel
and I am here in Connecticut visiting my parents
and while I'm here
my mom actually has been telling me
how much she misses getting foods
from some of her favorite restaurants
and she's like extra, extra cautious about COVID
so she doesn't even really like to order takeout.
So I thought this could be a perfect opportunity
for me to recreate one of her favorite restaurant meals
so I'm going to go talk to her and find
out what she's been missing the most.
Hello Mum
- Hi Rach
- I know that you haven't been eating a lot
of restaurant food lately
- Not in a long time
- Yeah, so I was just wondering what restaurant
meal you're missing the most
- I miss going to the diner
and one of their specialties is chicken souvlaki
I love that, I get it almost every time
- When's the last time you had it?
- at least a year.
It's this tender chicken and then it has
feta cheese and kalamata olives
and this Tzatziki sauce and coleslaw, French fries
and a Pita that you can stuff it into
- Ooh, well that sounds very good,
I have an idea of how I can make this for you.
I'm not only going to recreate this restaurant food for you
but I'm also going to make it Vegan.
- That's good
- I'm excited, let's do this.
- Okay, I can't wait.
- Okay, so for this chicken souvlaki
I'm going to be using tofu to replace the chicken.
So I have my tofu pressing here,
it's been pressing for about 20 minutes or so.
I think that tofu is one
of the best substitutes for chicken.
I also know my mom loves tofu
so I think it's going to be a really good fit
in this recipe.
And so now I'm going to work on my marinade.
So first I'm going to add some olive oil,
lemon juice, nutritional yeast, which I'm using here
for a savory flavor, dried oregano, garlic powder,
dried rosemary, sweet paprika, one bay leaf,
some minced fresh garlic
and some salt and pepper
and mix that all up.
Now after that's well mixed, I'm just going to
break apart my tofu. So they don't have to be perfect
but just so they resemble the rough shape of chicken pieces.
Then I'm going to mix this until it's well coated, cover it
and let it marinate in the refrigerator for about two hours.
But I'm going to give it a stir every 30 minutes
just to make sure all the pieces are getting evenly coated.
Okay, So the chicken souvlaki also has feta on top of it
and I could have just gotten some store-bought vegan feta
but where's the fun in that?
So I'm going to make my own homemade feta
and the first thing that we're going to do is
we're going to blanch some almonds.
So I'm going to boil the almonds for about five minutes
so they're a little bit tender and easier to blend
and also it will make the skins easier to remove.
Then I'm going to drain them and rinse them with cold water
and then the skin should just peel off pretty easily
and if you don't have the patience for this
you can definitely just buy some blanched almonds
without the skins and then you can
just skip this whole step.
And now to a blender I'm going to add
some olive oil, nutritional yeast, lemon juice
apple cider vinegar, the brine from some kalamata olives,
some fresh garlic, salt
and water
and then I'm going to blend
that all up until it's really smooth
and then you can just transfer that mixture
into a small baking dish or ramekin
that's lined with parchment paper
and then I'm going to bake it for 45 to 50 minutes
just until the top starts to crack and turn golden brown
Then when you take it out of the oven
you're going to want to let it cool down and then pop it
into the fridge to let it chill for about an hour
which is going to help it firm up.
You should be able to crumble it apart with your fingers
so that it resembles the texture of feta.
So the next thing I'm going to be making is the Vegan
Tzatziki sauce.
That's traditionally made with yogurt
and I'm going to be using some cashew yogurt today.
So to a bowl, I'm going to add some cashew yogurt
some lemon juice, olive oil, apple cider vinegar
garlic powder, and mix that up really well.
So you can't have Tzatziki sauce without cucumber
so I have two mini seedless cucumbers here
that I'm going to grate up,
you just want to make sure to squeeze
out all of the extra water in a dish towel
because you don't want that to dilute your sauce.
Now I'm going to add my shredded cucumbers
into my sauce along with some salt
and pepper and mix that up until it's smooth.
And then you just want to chill this
for at least an hour to help it thicken up.
Okay, so I just took our tofu out of the fridge
and it's been marinating for about two hours.
It looks and it smells so good.
So now comes the fun part where I'm going to skewer these
because when it's on a skewer, then the heat
from the oven can hit it from all angles.
So I'm just going to grab my pieces
of tofu here and carefully slide them on the skewer.
You want them to roughly be the same size
but it doesn't have to be perfect
and then I'm going to lay my skewers
out over my baking sheet.
That way the baking sheet will catch any grease that falls
and then I'm just going to bake them
and I'll rotate them halfway through.
Okay, so I just took the chicken out of the oven
and it's looking crispy and delicious, so flavorful
and now it's just time to assemble.
So first I'm going to lay out some warmed pita
and then I'm going to add on my tofu chicken
which looks so good.
I'm going to drizzle on some of my Tzatziki sauce
and at the the diner she always gets some tomatoes,
red onion and olives, so she can kind of customize her pita
and then I'm also going to add on my homemade
feta, then a big spoonful of some vegan coleslaw
and a dill pickle. To finish it off
I'm just going to garnish with a little bit of fresh dill
and then this platter also always comes
with some French fries
so I've got some of those for her too.
This looks so good and I am so excited for my mom to try it.
Here you go
- Oh my goodness Rachel
this is an enormous platter
- Oh, but wait, there's more.
- Oh my gosh.
- French Fries
- Wow, it looks fantastic, Oh, you even got the pickle.
- I know, but I know you love the pickle.
- I do a little bit of everything like I normally would
Wow, it tastes like chicken.
- It's all about the removing the liquid baby,
that's all you gotta do
and then just bake the (beep) out of it.
- Texture is really good, you know how usually
you get tofu and it's like spongy in the middle
this has a nice firmness.
I'm telling you if you gave this to someone
and didn't tell them, they would think that was chicken.
- Really?
- Yeah
- What do you think the feta is made out of?
- Cashews?
- It was almonds actually.
- It's not exactly,
I mean this is more like chicken,
than this is like feta
- Yeah
- but it's still good, you know, especially
mix it all together
- I agree. So how did I do?
- This was so good, I have to have a bite
of the pickle
- Okay, you want a lady in the trumpet?
That's weird
- Good.
Thank you, sweetheart.
- You're welcome.
- Am I supposed to say something?
I want to keep eating.
(laughter)