The Truth About Jalapenos

A couple nights ago Andy and I tried our hand at making some jalapeno poppers. It was a fiasco. It's safe to say I will never work with raw jalapenos again. They turned out delicious, although it was really difficult to keep the breading on the popper. When we washed out the insides of the popper, it got on our skin, under our nails, in my eyes [[apparently after washing your hands several times, it's still not safe to touch your eyes]]-- upon reflection, some gloves really would of been smart to use. The steam from the hot water brought up all the spiciness into the air, so it got in our throats, noses, and eyes. It was like cutting an onion on crack. I really didn't know jalapenos could be so spicy-- these seem so mild in restaurants, it's truly deceiving. And even after we completely removed everything from the insides, it was like playing Russian Roulette-- every now and then, one of them was unbearably spicy [[I didn't get one, but Andy, the spicy food master, was forced to drink soy milk to curb the spiciness-- a true rarity]].

But if you're braver than I and want to make these, too, I recommend not using hot water to clean them and wearing gloves. For the insides, I used some horseradish brown mustard, tofutti cream cheese, and a little vegenaise-- turned out really tasty. The breading was difficult and didn't turn out well, so maybe you have a better idea, I just dipped them in soy milk and then rolled them around in some panko bread crumbs and pan fried them in a little oil. Some stayed on but most didn't. [[I'll have pictures up soon]]

Andy also made some philly cheese steak sandwiches. We used a cheesy sauce recipe from the Veganomicon, and grilled some onions and seitan with steak seasoning. THAT turned out to be delicious.

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