This sandwich beauty is stacked tall with BBQ tempeh “bacon,” lettuce, tomato, avocado, and vegan mayo. BBQ tempeh is super easy to make and SO delicious!
Actress Tabitha Brown (one of my favourite people on Instagram!) started the internet obsession with the TTLA when she posted this video below of herself loving the sandwich from Whole Foods. It’s a vegan BLT packed with tempeh bacon, tomato, lettuce, and avocado.
Tabitha filmed herself outside of Whole Foods unwrapping the second half of her sandwich. She says she planned to save half of the sandwich for later, but it was just too good not to eat and share with the world!
The TTLA is available at Whole Foods in Toronto, but rest assured that if there isn’t a location in your area, this sandwich is a relatively effortless one to make in your own kitchen. I’ve taken this sandwich to new levels with the BBQ tempeh, which adds a sweet and smoky flavour.
If you’d like to plan ahead with meal prep, make all of the components in advance and assemble your sandwich whenever you’re ready to enjoy it! I recommend refrigerating the sliced tomatoes, washed lettuce, and cooked BBQ tempeh in separate containers.
You don’t have to marinate the tempeh in advance, however, for meal prep purposes you can store the uncooked tempeh with the BBQ sauce in a container for a day or two before you’re ready to cook it.
I highly recommend bookmarking this recipe because it’s super easy to make and soooooo good!
Tempeh Bacon please because pandemics aren’t really my thing…
Choosing to eat pigs poses a serious threat to our health and safety. Pig farming creates deadly strains of swine flu that could go on to cause pandemics and kill hundreds of thousands of people.
Recently, we’ve seen in the news that a strain of swine flu from pig farms in China has been noted as significant due to its pandemic potential. Pigs are susceptible to both human and bird influenza viruses which means that they can act as intermediary hosts or mixing vessels in which new influenza viruses can arise. This isn’t a geographically specific problem as strains of swine flu are detected all over the world. We know exactly what causes swine flu and we know that pig farming is the number one risk factor in the creation and spread of swine flu.
This is particularly problematic when coupled with the fact that pigs are raised in universally deplorable conditions, whether it be in here in Canada, in China, the U.S, or the U.K. The geographic location doesn’t matter as pigs are raised consistently the same - living in concrete pens, mutilated, piled on top of one another or immobilized in crates so small they can’t even turn around.
The condition in which pigs are forced to live and their narrowed population gene pool (through selective breeding) makes for the perfect environment for an infectious zoonotic disease to mutate and spread. Although intensive factory farming significantly increases this risk, it can’t be ignored that all systems of animal farming create a risk that otherwise wouldn’t exist if the farming wasn’t happening in the first place.
By choosing to consume animal products and continuing to pay for these systems to continue, we threaten the very existence of the human population.
The truth is that we are not powerless in the face of future pandemics. As consumers, we can vote with our dollar when it comes to protecting both ourselves from infectious diseases, as well as, the lives of non-human animals.
As the current pandemic has shown us, the next outbreak can happen at any time, anywhere in the world. As long as we keep farming animals, the issue of the next pandemic will always be a “when”, and not an “if.”
To learn more watch Earthling Ed’s IGTV video “How 2020 could be about to get a LOT worse.”
Source: @earthlinged.
This is my take on the TTLA - the Vegan Sandwich that broke the internet - recipe below…
This sandwich beauty is stacked tall with BBQ tempeh “bacon,” lettuce, tomato, avocado, and vegan mayo.
BBQ tempeh is super easy to make and SO delicious!
Here’s everything you need to make my BBQ TTLA sandwiches.
Make your own low-waste Mayo -
My go-to vegan mayo recipe is Lauren Toyota’s homemade vegan mayo from her cookbook: Hot for Food Vegan Comfort Classics: 101 Recipes to Feed Your Face. Her recipe is super simple to make and it always turns out really well. I love how easy it is to make your own staples at home, like mayo, to help reduce your waste. Lauren’s cookbook includes a dedicated aioli section with variations including the roasted garlic aioli, the sundried tomato aioli, and the spicy sriracha aioli!
DIY low-waste Barbecue sauce -
Making homemade barbecue sauce is generally fool-proof and can last in the refrigerator for 1-2 weeks! There are two barbecue sauce recipes that I make often from Super Fresh, a cookbook from Fresh Restaurants, a long-standing vegan restaurant in Toronto that I have been going to for many years! There’s a no-cook recipe for mexican bbq sauce, as well as, a second option for bbq sauce which is also easy to make.
BBQ TTLA Sandwiches
Yield: 2 sandwiches
Ingredients:
4 slices of bread (you can use gluten-free bread if you prefer)
1 Tomato, sliced
1 Avocado, sliced
Lettuce
Vegan Mayo, to taste
1/2 cup vegan BBQ Sauce
Tempeh (about 225g-250g)
(use organic ingredients)
How to:
Preheat oven to 350°F. Line a baking tray with unbleached parchment paper. Slice tempeh into thin strips - but not too thin.
Add BBQ sauce to a shallow bowl, add tempeh and gently stir to coat.
Place tempeh on your baking tray and bake for 10 minutes. Remove from the oven, flip, and then bake for another 5 minutes, checking to make sure that it doesn’t burn.
Assemble your sandwiches: spread mayo on 4 slices of bread (toasted if you prefer), stack tomato, avocado, lettuce, and BBQ tempeh.
My take on the Vegan Sandwich that broke the internet: the BBQ TTLA, stacked tall with BBQ tempeh “bacon,” lettuce, tomato, avocado, and vegan mayo.
I can’t wait for you to give this recipe a try! I'd love to see if you make this recipe - tag me when you share on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter so that I can see and share your creations!
Much love,
Avra
This post is not sponsored. The Squirrelly Bread™ that was used in this recipe was kindly gifted by Silver Hills. I only share products that I personally use and that are made with the highest integrity. The Amazon links provided are affiliate links, which means that if you visit Amazon through these links and purchase product, I’ll get a commission. Don’t worry – the price doesn't increase if you use my link - you'll receive a discount while helping to support the free content that I share.
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