Vegan 'till 6: Savory Vegan Breakfast

Let me start with a basic assumption: you’re here because of Mark Bittman. You’ve read about the theory Bittman puts forth in his book Food Matters that first, our appetite for animal products is killing the planet and second, our appetite for animal products is killing us. I’ll go into this further in posts to follow but for now just say that I buy into this premise. I’ve adopted a basic idea from Bittman, that of eating vegan until dinner and then eating a sensible meal that de-emphasizes meat but does not exclude it and/or other animal products. I wanted to write about some of the strategies I’m using to help follow this plan.

The idea of eating a savory vegan breakfast has been the key to making vegan ‘till 6 work for me. You may have heard Bittman interviewed on NPR not too long ago describing how you could eat oatmeal with soy sauce and scallions for breakfast. You can go to the NY Times website and watch a video of Mark making this dish with wheat berries instead of oatmeal but the idea is the same. Wheat berries are probably a better choice but oatmeal is much better as an attention grabber. Below, find another breakfast idea which will help you get started.

I really like bulgur with nothing more than olive oil and salt. I buy bulgur in bulk from both Whole Foods and Wegman’s here in NJ. The cost is minimal this way, much cheaper than buying it boxed with a spice packet that you’d end up throwing away.

You cook bulgur much like rice in ratio of 2 parts water to 1 part bulgur. Combine ingredients, bring to a boil in a covered saucepan and then turn the heat down to low so you can just see wisps of steam escaping from the pot lid. Cook for 18 minutes then turn off the heat and leave the pot alone for another 10 minutes at which time you should have 2 cups of perfectly cooked bulgur. Fluff up with a fork and place about half a cup in a bowl. Add a small amount of your best olive oil and a pinch of kosher salt and eat.

Cooked bulgur keeps great in a sealed container in the refrigerator. To reheat put the desired portion in a bowl, add a tiny amount of tap water, stir to moisten and then microwave uncovered for about 2 minutes. This works for me every time. Keep in mind that your microwave will perform differently than mine so you may need to play around with the reheating time.

I’ve developed some other good savory breakfast recipes which I’ll share in the next few days. Feel free to post a comment or drop me an email.

A word about links: I could provide links to things mentioned in this post but I think that everyone can Google anything they find interesting on their own. For instance, I could give you a link to Amazon to buy the Bittman book which I encourage you go do but I don’t think you need my help to do that.