Tastes Like Comfort Food: Vegan Banh Mi Sandwiches

I just recently learned of the deliciousness that is banh mi sandwiches, and I've been hooked ever since! We are lucky enough to have a great Vietnamese sandwich shop within walking distance of our apartment, but now Mr. Cool and I have started making them at home thanks to this recipe from one of our favorite oil-free vegan cooking blogs, Happy Healthy Long Life.

We follow this recipe almost exactly, except I like to double the amount of garlic and sriracha, since we love spicy, spicy food. This time, I used leeks instead of green onions, since that's what we had in our refrigerator:

When Mr. Cool and I tell people about our "no added oil" diet, they often wonder how we get around sauteing vegetables in oil. The solution is simple - we use vegetable broth instead. You won't get a true "saute" by using this method, but the ingredients will cook through in broth or water just as they will in oil:

I always keep a "scraps bowl" handy when cooking so that I can dump our green waste into the compost bin we keep on our back porch. This limits the number of trips I have to take outside, and keeping our bin on the porch keeps nasty fruit flies out of our apartment. Win, win!

The sauce in this recipe is to-die-for delicious. I usually double the recipe since I love gooey, saucy banh mis. To cut down on dishes, I usually mix the sauce right into a Pyrex measuring cup, and mix it with the tablespoon I use to measure the ingredients:

It also helps when we have plenty of my husband's homemade sourdough bread on hand. This photo was taken before the holidays, but we had another loaf this week which we put to good use in constructing these banh mis. I added even more sriracha on top since I love my spice!

Yum. That is all.

Are you a fan of banh mis? And do you love spicy food as much as Mr. Cool and I do?