Southern Pines, North Carolina

Today, the Vegan Traveler's family went to Southern Pines, NC. In my other role as mixed media artist, I created an art book as my response to the Mixed Media Madness Mission from the Carolina Mixed Media Art Guild. The opening for the show for all the projects submitted for the challenge was today at Artist's Alley at Southern Pines.

Shopping
Historic Southern Pines is a fun town with blocks of several unique and interesting boutiques and restaurants. There is also a working train than runs through the middle of the town. We had a great time walking around looking at all the shops. My favorite was the locally created art, while my 2 year old's favorite was the toy store. (Imagine that.) Here are a few scenes from the area.










Food
The town is about an hour and a half away, so by the time we arrived we were hungry. Happily, after passing an ice cream shop, a deli and a pizza place, we happened upon a Japanese restaurant called Ten-Ya. I love Japanese restaurants because there is always vegetable sushi. The decor was beautiful, nice and stylish. I got the vegetable tempura and veggie sushi. It was delicious. (I forgot to photograph the food).






Sage was not impressed by sticky rice and fried veggies and opted for beans instead.

Double Batch Cooking :Pot Pie/Mini Pot Pies

My family makes a double batch of pot pie filling, eats one for dinner, then freezes the mini ones for easy lunches later in the month. We used mushroom and brown lentils to try to get more of a beefy flavor. It wasn't beefy, but it tasted great.

Dough
Ingredients:

• 2 cups unbleached all purpose flour
  
• 1 tsp salt
  
• 2 tsp Herbs de Provence
  
• 1/4 cup vegan butter (we used Earth Balance)
  
• 1/4 cup non-dairy milk

Directions:

1. Blend flour, salt and herbs de Provence in a food processor until mixed.
   
2. Add vegan butter and process until mixed well.
   
3. Add non-dairy milk and process until dough is formed.
   
4. Refrigerate dough for 1 hour.

Filling
Ingredients:

• 2 Tbsp olive oil
  
• 1 cup onion, chopped
  
• 1 clove garlic, minced
  
• 1/2 tsp cumin
  
• 2 stalks celery, sliced
  
• 2 carrots, sliced
  
• 2 cups water (or vegetable broth)
  
• 1/2 cup brown lentils, rinsed well
  
• 1 lb Yukon Gold potatoes, chopped
  
• 1/2 cup frozen peas
  
• Mushroom Sauce
  
• 1/2 tsp salt
  
• 1/2 tsp black pepper

Directions:

1. Heat oil in large pot.
   
2. Sauté onion, garlic and cumin for 5 minutes.
   
3. Add celery and carrots and sauté for 3 more minutes.
   
4. Add water, lentils, and potatoes, bring to a boil and simmer for 15 minutes or until lentils and potatoes are soft. It's ok if they are not done all the way, since we'll be cooking them longer in the oven.
   
5. Add frozen peas and Mushroom Sauce and heat until warm.
   

Regular Size Pot Pie:
Directions:

1. Preheat your oven to 400 degrees.
   
2. Flour your rolling surface and roll out the dough to fit your baking pan.
   
3. Add 1/2 pot pie mixture (if you made a double batch) to your baking pan
   
4. Cover with dough
   
5. Place them in the oven and cook for 20-25 minutes.

While this is cooking, you can assemble the mini pot pies.

Mini Pot Pies
Directions:

1. Preheat your oven to 400 degrees.
   
2. Flour your rolling surface and roll out the dough and cut out 5' squares.
   
3. Add 2 Tbsp (or more or less depending on how much filling you like) on one square.
   
4. Cover that with another square. Press edges together, then decorate with a fork.
   
5. Brush tops with olive oil.
   
6. After all pies are assembled, place them in the oven and cook for 20-25 minutes.
   
7. After the are cooled, you can put them in a freezer safe container and enjoy later.

Hint: I like to assemble my pies on parchment paper and then just slip that paper onto a cookie sheet for easy transfer to the oven.

Mushroom Sauce

This sauce cooks up very quickly and is quite delicious.

Ingredients:

• 1/4 cup onion, chopped
  
• 1 clove garlic, minced (we put in 3 cloves, but we are the garlic-loving sort)
  
• 8 oz pkg. button mushrooms, chopped
  
• 1 cup vegetable broth
  
• 2 Tbsp olive oil
  
• 1 Tbsp flour

Directions:

1. Heat oil up in skillet.
   
2. Sauté onion, garlic and mushrooms until mushrooms turn brown.
   
3. Stir in vegetable broth and flour.
   
4. Simmer on low until thickened. Add more flour if necessary.