Sunflower seeds are way less expensive than pine nuts

Continuing my foray into making seed cheeses, this batch uses Miyoko Schinner's Sharp Vegan Cheddar as its jumping-off point, substituting soaked, shelled sunflower seeds for cashews, coconut yogurt for the rejuvelac, and omitting the oil.

This batch has great flavour, and is far more economical than the batch I made with pine nuts. I think prefer using agar as a "gelling" agent, 'though — the carageenan "sheets". Overall, this was a huge success and I'm looking forward to attempting it with agar in the future.

More homemade bao

I think I've gotten the hang of making homemade bao. I actually remembered to account for the second rise this time, so I have much fluffier bao than my previous attempt. Also, this batch used all-purpose flour, rather than the bread flour I used last time. I think I'll switch back next time, I prefer the chew I get from using bread flour. I purchased a bamboo steamer basket from the local Seasons Foodmart yesterday and set to work on my most recent batch of bao today. I got the 18 cm steamer and can find two large, folded bao in it. They take about 20 minutes to steam-bake.

The first two out of the basket were filled with dairy-free Buffalo chicken sauce, a homemade coconut-based mayo (which I omitted from the third bao — it's too sour when paired with the other acidic ingredients), fresh cilantro, carrot do chua and pan-seared chicken breast.

It was a helluva brunch and I'm looking forward to having more over the course of the next couple of days!