My coworkers (aka rivals) who work on PETA's blog The PETA Files have challenged me to a friendly competition. They think that their readers will create a better ad for their blog than my readers will create for the VegCooking blog. Let's prove them wrong.

You can enter PETA's BlogAds contest now by creating your very own ad covering any one of our campaigns—but I know you want to promote yummy vegetarian food, right?

If chosen as one of 10 finalists, your ad will run on blogs across the Internet, making you and me famous. This will surely make Jack over at The PETA Files jealous. He sees this contest as his opportunity for Internet domination.

Oh, and did I mention that the winner will receive a $500 Apple gift card? To see examples of great blog ads and to enter the contest, visit PETA.org today.

So, let's shout it from the rooftops and make sure that Jack hears: A-M-Y, A-M-Y! (Yeah, Jack, that's right—I stole your song.)

New Orleans is famous for many reasons: the architecture of the French Quarter, the destruction done by Hurricane Katrina, the massive party known as Mardi Gras, the historic plantations, the unstoppable Saints, and the Cajun and Creole cuisine native to the region.

Because I was born there, the city looks a little different to me. My New Orleans looks more like this: levees to roll down, sno-balls on a hot day, humidity that you could eat with a spoon, visits with my mamère and papère, powdered sugar storms from biting into a beignet, and huge pots of jambalaya, gumbo, and red beans and rice on my mom's stove. I see New Awlins as a full-flavored city with just a hint of crazy in the air—I'm pretty sure that comes from the humidity.

When I found out that my friend Christine's birthday party would be today, I jumped at the chance to make gumbo for the event in order to celebrate her Cajun heritage and mine. The delicious gumbo recipe was supplied by Christine's own Cajun mama.

It starts out like any Cajun dish, with a dark roux and the holy trinity—onion, bell pepper, and celery—as the base. If you're from New Orleans, these are two things you are born knowing how to make. You simmer these in water, vegetable stock, okra, "chicken" strips, and spices, and then serve over white rice. The result is a deep, rich flavor with just enough spice. Just like New Orleans.

Happy birthday, Christine! And for more on vegan Cajun, check out this great resource.

My first love—food love, that is—was the taco. I'm talking about your standard hard shell, filling, lettuce, and salsa—nothing fancy. It's the first food I remember discovering on my own and realizing that I loved without any influence from my family. You can call it my "taco rebel phase."

Memories of my first love came rushing back when my friend Corey passed along this recipe for Take-and-Go Tacos. They are much healthier than the tacos I knew as a child, but that's why they are perfect for back-to-school lunches.

All the ingredients can be prepared ahead of time, and then in the morning, you simply reheat the ingredients that need reheating, pack, and go. Perfect for a busy family—or any child in his or her own taco rebel phase.

For more back-to-school lunch ideas, check out "Pack a Lunch With Punch."

I will go ahead and admit that this attempt at focaccia turned out to be kind of a disaster. I don't think it's a bad recipe—I just think I'm a little impatient. OK, I can be very impatient.

Focaccia needs to be thick and spongy, almost doughy, so you have to allow it time to rise properly. The end result can ideally stand on its own, with no need for an olive oil dipping sauce—which I love to need—because the flavor is so rich. What I was left with—after only an hour in the kitchen—more closely resembled, let's say, cardboard. It looked OK but was dense and flavorless.

Next time I try this recipe—and there will be a next time, because I refuse to give up—I will ignore the timer and allow the dough the time it needs to rise. I learned this as rule number one working in a bakery in Athens, Georgia, so I should have known better. But as I said, I'm just a little impatient.

I could feel myself gaining weight as the vegetable oil was heating on my stove Sunday afternoon. Not one bit of food had yet touched my lips, but I could already feel it on my thighs.

It was the first Sunday of the football season, so we had to kick it off the right way in my house—bad food and drinks all day, along with about 10 hours of football. Oh, good times.

The bad foods—and by "bad" I mean delicious but dangerously fattening—of choice were potato skins and nachos. The deep-fried skins were topped with Follow Your Heart "cheddar cheese," soy bacon bits, and scallions. The nachos were made from homemade deep-fried corn tortillas, more Follow Your Heart "cheddar cheese," refried beans, jalapeños, and guacamole.

The deep-fried feast made me feel like I was at any neighborhood sports bar, rooting on my boyfriend's beloved Browns. They didn't win this week, and neither did my Saints, but our football-obsessed Sunday was still fun anyway—and there is always next week.

For more game-day snacks, check out these great recipes fit for even a Super Bowl feast.

My sweet tooth comes and goes in waves, and it is definitely here right now. Last night, I enjoyed store-bought vegan chocolate chip cookies, but taking the time to make homemade desserts is really where it's at. The satisfaction of making a difficult dessert is almost as rewarding as the taste—almost.

Since I'm in a dessert-craze phase, I decide to compile a list of my top 10 favorite desserts of all time. Kind of a "my life wouldn't be complete if I never ate these things again" list. Most have some connection to my childhood, while others I discovered as an adult. And my favorites are…

1. Pecan Pie: The crunch of the pecan layer on top of the pie is perfectly complemented by the gooey filling inside.

2. Grasshopper Cake: Grit-style chocolate cake layered with mint icing and chocolate chips.

3. Glazed Doughnuts: Simple, classic, and delicious warm.

4. Brownie à la Mode: Top homemade warm brownies with store-bought vanilla soy ice cream. Get really crazy and top with chocolate sauce and cherries.

5. Chocolate Chip Cookies: Even better when you use two to make a cookie sandwich.

6. Strawberry Shortcake: This has been one of my favorites since the age of 3, when my entire birthday was Strawberry Shortcake—the doll, not the food—themed.

7. Anything Lemon-Blueberry: The flavor combination works well in a pie or in a cake with lemon-flavored layers and a blueberry topping.

8. Carob-Mint Cookies: I fell in love with these scone-like cookies at Real Food Daily in Santa Monica.

9. Pecan Pinwheels: Someone please veganize these!

10. Pralines: SusanV at FatFree Vegan Kitchen says to create this Southern staple by substituting Earth Balance margarine for the butter and Silk Creamer for the creamer or half-and-half in any good praline recipe.

What are your favorite vegan desserts?

Many vegetarians have one meal they miss more than all others. I am very surprised to find that for many, that meal is pho.

Pho—pronounced "fuh"—is a traditional Vietnamese rice noodle soup that almost always contains thinly sliced strips of beef in a clear beef broth—a meal that is seemingly difficult to make into a tasty vegan version.

People reminisce about the comforting layered flavors, the strong aroma of the broth (which usually contains cinnamon, star anise, and ginger), and the variety of garnishes that you add at the table. Just a few of the standard options are mint, cilantro, basil, lemon, lime, bean sprouts, and chili peppers.

Luckily, the VRG has posted a popular recipe for vegetarian pho bo that contains a rich broth. The broth, made from charred ginger to enhance the flavor, acted as the perfect base for my version of pho that I like to call "Poor Man's Pho." It's one of those "I'm going to make do with whatever random vegetables I have in my refrigerator right now" kind of meals.

I used VRG's Vegetarian Vietnamese broth as a start, then substituted seitan for tofu and spinach for the cabbage and finished the soup off by adding carrots and shiitake mushrooms. Of course, I piled on the Sriracha, because no pho is complete without it. The beauty of this soup is that the broth and the rice noodles are the key ingredients, so from there you can add what you like.

Now, when I eat a bowl of this delicious pho, I can close my eyes and imagine myself on the bustling streets of a Vietnamese city and be happy to know that there are vegans out there who are no longer missing their favorite meal.

On a recent trip to a Norfolk gas station, I encountered the infamous Kool-Aid pickle—we can refer to him as Tuco. This was a pickling experiment gone very wrong. Tuco, the grotesque and non-edible red pickle, would be more appropriate starring in a B-horror flick than sitting proudly on a counter.

After trying the Kool-Aid pickle, I needed to reassure myself that pickling can actually be good. My grandmother used to make the most amazing pickled garlic, so I decided to find her recipe and try it myself.

The result was crisp and spicy. I used a large dried chili, but if you can't take the heat, use the smallest dried chili you can find. The garlic was perfect on salads, in wraps, and all by itself as an appetizer. An added perk to pickling is that it takes minimal effort to make and keeps for up to a year.

Your pickling ways don't have to end with garlic and cucumbers. Try kimchi—the Korean staple usually made of cabbage—or giardiniera, the Italian topping often served on Chicago-style sandwiches. Or keep it simple and try pickled okra, ginger, or asparagus. I promise that none of these will look quite as scary as Tuco the Kool-Aid pickle.

To mourn the end of summer, my friend Corey and I decided to have one last barbecue for the year. It was really just an excuse to play Will Smith's "Summertime."

It was necessary to have our party at Corey's house, because I'm pretty sure it would have been a bad idea to hold the party on my fire escape—the only outdoor space I'm allotted at my tiny apartment. We clung to the hope that we'd have at least one last day of heat for our bash, but instead we got chilly air and leaves in various shades of autumn.

The theme to the farewell feast was food that is super easy to make but tastes like it took hours to prepare. I picked up some vegan Boca burgers and marinated them in Stubb's Mopping Sauce Bar-B-Q Baste for 30 minutes. We cooked the burgers and thick onion slices directly on the grill, along with sliced mushrooms stuffed into foil packets. To give the burgers an extra-smoky taste, we toasted the buns right on the grill.

Two of the many side items were Jalapeño-Corn Salad and Red Potato Salad. Both stuck with our "fast summer feast loaded with flavor" theme. The corn salad has a little kick, and if you're a fan of the heat—as I am—add another jalapeño or keep the seeds in.

Our barbecue was a hit—not quite as exciting as Will's, but still fun—and the perfect way to say goodbye to "summer, summer, summertime."

I recently read in What Einstein Told His Cook: Kitchen Science Explained that salt is just, well, salt. All salt is made of sodium chloride, so no matter what part of the world it comes from, or how much you paid for it, at its core, it is the same as the plain old table salt you can buy for 50 cents at your local market.

This may bring you back to that childhood moment when you realized that the "weird" cereal in the bag was exactly the same as the stuff in the colorful box that contains a free toy. The world no longer makes sense, and you wonder, "How could I have been fooled? How does one taste so much better than the other if they're the same? And why would anyone buy the more expensive stuff?" As a child, you probably just said, "Give me more cereal," but stick with me here.

The answer is simple as to why we pay more for something that we know is basically the same as its cheaper, albeit less fancy, cousin—you're buying the complete package, the full experience, not just the main ingredient. With salt, it's not just sodium chloride that affects the taste but also the size and shape of each grain, along with the additives that are native to the salt's region of origin.

So yes, salt is salt, but varieties vary in taste because of factors beyond their main ingredient. Large grains take longer to dissolve and therefore result in a saltier taste. Flakes interact with a larger surface area of your tongue, so they, too, create a saltier taste. Additives ranging from magnesium and potassium to smoke and volcanic clay all have an impact on the taste of the finished product.

Here is a quick review of a few of the most common types of salt used today:

•Table Salt: The most popular refined salt used today. Generally has a fine grain and is often iodized in the U.S., resulting in a slightly metallic taste.

•Kosher Salt: A coarse grain salt used in professional kitchens. Rarely contains additives, and because of the size and shape of the grain, seems to have a "saltier" taste.

•Sea Salt: Typically unrefined salt from an ocean or sea. Often contains trace minerals that affect taste. Available in a variety of sizes, from coarse to extra fine.

•Fleur de Sel: The mother of all salts. Harvested from the top layer of salt evaporation ponds in France and Portugal. Best used as a condiment to finish a dish, not in preparation.

There are hundreds of varieties out there. From Peruvian pink to Cyprus black and from Danish Viking-smoked to Japanese nazuna, the varieties are seemingly endless.

Get crazy with it, and take a step back to that childhood impracticality when you had to have the cereal that came in the colorful box with the "free" prize. The subtle differences in the world of salt are definitely worth the taste.

If your experience in public schools was anything like mine, then you will have similar horror stories about the shockingly bad food. During my years in high school, I was already vegetarian, so lunch for me was often tater tots, plain baked potatoes, iceberg lettuce, and a side veggie—if I was lucky. Not exactly what I would call a wide variety of mouthwatering choices.

It has been a long time since I chowed down on anything off one of those plastic trays, and the food in some schools has since improved immensely. I recently read an old post on 101 Cookbooks about the Oxbow School, which in 2005 had a chef from Chez Panisse(!) whipping up school lunches—and she always included a vegan or vegetarian option.

For those of you who can't coerce chefs from the nation's most famous restaurants into wearing hairnets in Lunch Lady Land, don't worry. There are other ways to get healthy vegetarian options into cafeterias.

Great new resources, such as the Earth Voice Food Choice manual, walk students, teachers, and parents through the steps necessary to get these options on their school's menu. The manual provides recipes as well as tips for promoting the options to students and explains the problems that poor diets cause. Following the advice of the manual is a surefire way to get healthier, tastier options into any cafeteria.

Umami is defined as the fifth basic taste and can be described as a savory, fuller flavor that involves all the senses. But to many chefs, the word means so much more.

Kevin Dunn, a chef who teaches the ins and outs of plant-based cuisine in Michigan, defines umami beautifully—and yes, I'm jealous because his palate has clearly isolated the taste:

"Umami is a Japanese term that means a true memory of flavor. One Japanese philosophy relates this to MSG and to a meaty mushroom or seaweed taste. My philosophy is that umami is a memory of flavors created by your experiences. Have you ever driven down the road and been hit with an all-consuming taste for something—say, apple pie—and the feelings are so real that you could taste the apple pie—the cinnamon, the crust, the crispness of the apple? That is umami, and all great chefs possess the ability to bring those flavors into their minds in order to develop keen flavors in their cuisine."

Just a few of the umami-rich foods out there are green tea, tomatoes, soy beans, and mushrooms, such as shiitake and enokitake. Dried shiitake mushrooms have an especially high level of umami, and that's why they are the perfect ingredient to use in chef Dunn's own mock eel recipe.

The super-savory shiitakes make this simple recipe full of flavor. I added sliced carrots and jalapeños into the mock eel recipe, and then served it over brown rice. I have no clue what eel actually tastes like, so I can't say if this is a convincing imitation, but I can say that it was good, and it may be one of the first times I've found umami.

Be sure to check out the recipe for mock eel, and read more about chef Dunn.

For most of my life, my knowledge of figs was limited to the Fig Newtons I ate as a child. Not bad, but definitely not something great that stood out as a food I had to have again. That is, not until I had a ripe fig picked right off the tree at my friend CK's house.

We were enjoying an afternoon snack in his kitchen (which happened to be the location of Athens' infamous Barn Parties) of fresh tomato slices sprinkled with sea salt and pepper. CK disappeared for a few minutes and returned with fresh figs. They were quite different—and much better—than what I remembered the center of those cookies tasting like. Since then, I have obsessed over ways to use figs in a dessert, and I think I've now found the perfect recipe: figs poached in tawny port.

I was amazed at how well this recipe turned out. The flavors in the sauce were perfectly balanced, as was the consistency. The figs were served over thick slices of pumpkin bread (more on that later in the week), which added another rich layer of fall flavor to the dessert.

When you read the title of this post, you might have been worried that I would tell some mushy story—maybe about an ex-boyfriend I referred to as pumpkin—but don't worry. I'm cheesy, but not that cheesy. As I promised yesterday, I am going to share more on pumpkin bread today.

The bread's subtle flavors were the perfect backdrop for yesterday's figs poached in port, but there are many other uses for pumpkins. They can be roasted, puréed, used as a main ingredient in beer or a latte, or smashed on Halloween (I'm kidding!), but none of these is quite as comforting as using the fruit in baked goods. To me, this method seems to mellow the pumpkin flavor, allowing the spices to really shine.

This pumpkin bread can stand on its own—the lone pumpkin in the patch—with only a dollop of vegan cream cheese on top, or can be used in stuffing or as a foundation for desserts. If you're using fresh pumpkin, be sure to save the seeds for roasting. Simply toss the roasted seeds with melted Earth Balance, and then you can season them, like, a million different ways—the possibilities are endless.

A few out-of-the-ordinary pumpkin recipes I've stumbled upon are Pumpkin Curry, Sicilian Sweet and Sour Pumpkin—which can easily be veganized—and Pumpkin Chocolate-Chip Squares. Do you have a unique pumpkin recipe to share, too, pumpkin?

With references to "the magical soybean" and "cosmic oatmeal," it's no surprise that the cookbook by Bruce Brennan and James Ehrlich is titled The Hippy Gourmet's Quick and Simple Cookbook for Healthy Eating.

The book is brought to us by the host of the hit PBS show The Hippy Gourmet, who travels the world to find delicious food on every continent. Fortunately for our taste buds, his adventures help the cookbook's recipes break the mold of what we usually think of as traditional hippy food.

Sure, many of the recipes are quite granola. There are lots of recipes for beans, greens, and quinoa—and even one for a solar pizza—but the recipes that highlight world cuisine are what make this cookbook a little less crunchy. There are African, Mexican, traditional Native American, and Ukrainian dishes for the reader to explore, to name just a few.

While not strictly vegan, the cookbook offers a variety of recipes for vegans and vegetarians. Vegan desserts in the book are practically nonexistent, but there is a section dedicated to vegan and vegetarian main course meals, and there are plenty of options in the soups, sides, and starters categories.

When flipping through the pages of the book, I wasn't immediately blown away by the recipes, but after trying a few—Chinese Tofu Salad, Japanese Style Beans, and Pasta With Butternut Squash Sauce—I realized that they are very balanced, solid recipes. Not flashy, just good—exactly what I'd expect from a hippy.

The mortar and pestle is one of my all-time favorite kitchen tools. I love the ease at which they grind, mix, and inspire me to sing R. Kelly songs.

In my kitchen, the tool is primarily used for grinding herbs to use either in a paste for coating baked tofu or as a key ingredient in a mojito—one of my favorite cocktails. I sometimes like to use my mortar and pestle for making guacamole, too, but the tool has traditionally been used for much more.

In African countries, large wooden versions are used to pound yams and other ingredients and are a kitchen staple. In Mexican kitchens, the mortar and pestle, or molcajete, is made of volcanic rock and is used to mix salsas and moles and to grind corn—proof of which dates back more than 6,000 years. The tool is even commonly used for a little medicinal bump and grind.

Enough about my favorite kitchen tool, and on to the inspiration for this post. Today, my fellow blogger over at Almost Vegetarian launched the "Now It's Your Turn!" contest. She's giving readers a chance to win the most expensive gadget she reviews during "gadget week," and it immediately made me think of my favorite kitchen tool.

All you have to do to win is leave a short, yet painfully brilliant, kitchen-gadget story as a comment—come on, let's represent the VC blog. And make it good—if she likes it, you win.