Red Lentil Sloppy Joes (and an obnoxiously short depth of field)

It's a little bit strange to go to such great lengths to recreate a dish that is so completely meat-centric, especially one that I never ate as a child (thought they were gross for some reason... had no problem with hamburgers or taco salad, but put them together? No sir). I can at least promise I won't be making seitan chicken fingers or soy pot roast any time soon.

We mostly followed the recipe in Veganomicon and used the Vegan Dad recipe for how to handle the red lentils (I've done it once before but they turned into interminable mush). So where Veganomicon says to add the cooked lentils, we instead added the dried lentils and water, along with all the sauce, tomato paste, and spices. This cooked for maybe 30 minutes. Open-faced on a toasted roll it was totally delicious, though I have to admit it evoked "french bread pizza" for me a little more than sloppy joe. And while it was not wholly unlike the chili I made last week, contextually it fulfilled a completely different craving.

Kristen par-cooked, smashed, and pan fried some yukon gold potatoes on the side, and they were awesome. Think this might be my new preferred method for cooking potatoes.