San Diego Vegan

Tap, tap, tap....

2011-12-29T19:44:00.000-08:00

Is there anyone still out there? I can't believe it has been 4 months since I posted anything here! So much has happened since I posted last! I joined the SDSU Marching Aztecs as an alumni and played cymbals in the drumline for the last 4 months. It was a crazy busy time at work as well which lead to my not cooking very much. I relied on a whole lot of farmer's market tamales, canned soups, boca burgers and a ton of granola bars. Now that the marching season is over though I am slowly getting myself back in the kitchen but still haven't made it back to many whole foods. Case in point; tonight's post.

Vegan California Burrito

If you've never been to San Diego you may have never heard of this wonderful creation. In my high school days this was a staple of my diet. A couple of friends recently reminded me of it and it made me want to create a vegan version. The staples of a California burrito are:

Carne Asada
Guacamole
French Fries

In addition, they usually include cheese and tomatoes and can sometimes have sour cream.

Here's what I started with:

Alexia salt & pepper crinkle fries

Daiya cheddar style shreds

Smart Strips chick'n style

Guacamole (I generally would make this myself but this guac is made by a little start up company run by a guy I used to work with so I thought I'd go with that)

Roma tomato

Tortillas (disclaimer: I love La Fe tortillas and they do make vegan versions that I buy and eat most of the time, but the burrito tortillas unfortunately have whey...but I let it slide when I really want a burrito)

While the oven preheated for the fries, I marinated the chick'n strips in some bragg's liquid aminos to hopefully turn them into more of a carne asada than a pollo asada.

Once the oven was preheated, I cooked the fries. When they were done I put the tortilla on the hot pan to soften it and I added the cheese in hopes it would melt but the tortilla was soft before it had a chance.

While the fries were cooking I heated the carne asada in my tiny cast iron skillet (I wish I had a picture of that...oops. Rusty I guess). It browned up quite nicely and looked quite a bit like carne asada.

Next I added the fries, carne asada and tomatoes to the tortilla and cheese.

Finally I topped the whole thing off with guacamole.

Rolled the thing up, took a bite and died and went to heaven. This may have been one of the greatest things I have ever veganized. Try it. I dare you not to! Only, make sure you ran 5 miles at the gym before you got home so that you do not feel one ounce of guilt for the ungodly amount of calories that is probably in this thing.

I hope you all enjoyed my first post in a long time. No guarantees that I'm back regularly but as inspiration strikes it's nice to have an outlet!

So there is this one thing I made....

2011-08-10T06:42:00.000-07:00

I ~~had~~ still have a bounty of zucchini from my garden this year. One recipe I have fallen in love with is this chocolate zucchini bread. The recipe said it was brownie like so I took a chance and cooked it in an 8 x 8 pan and let me tell you, that is one of the best brownies I have ever tasted. Ever. Uuuuunfortunatly, despite their deliciousness, they do not stay together very well and you end up with brownie crumbles. Not that I'm complaining. I am going to experiment with baking them in muffin tins to see if they hold up better to travel that way. As soon as I work through the 2nd of two batches I baked and froze about a month ago. Zucchini, by the way, picked fresh from the garden, survives remarkably well in the fridge unwrapped.

So this was all leading to a picture, and a description of what I did with the frozen brownie bits.

That's right, I ate it with ice cream. Sometimes I warm the brownie first and other times I eat the whole thing cold. It reminds me of Coldstone where you get to mix in whatever you want. I love So Delicious coconut vanilla ice cream because I can mix in whatever I want. I usually only eat a small portion and mix in whatever sounds good. Last week I had frozen cherries. Yum. This ice cream you may notice is a bit green. While I wish I could say that it was spinach in that ice cream, it's not. It is however matcha. The flavor was a little strong for me to eat by itself, but mixed with the brownie it was very good.

Hi, My Name is Allison and....

2011-08-08T18:17:00.000-07:00

I have been really failing in the photographing of food and my garden departments lately.

I have a cookbook addiction. Seriously, I just bought Babycakes, Peas & Thank You and Vegan Diner. So far I have made enchiladas from P&TY and chili from Vegan Diner. Neither have disappointed. I also made the Summer Succotash Quesadillas from the Peas & Thank You blog but did not have any garbanzo beans to make the Mmmm Suace. Next time. They were delicious by the way.

I went to Comic Con, watched a bunch of new shows on netflix, went on some hikes, worked in my garden shopped at some farmer's markets, have been drinking way too much Starbucks and have generally been enjoying life.

How have you been?

Busy Busy

2011-06-11T08:17:00.000-07:00

Good morning everyone! Sorry to have disappeared for so long. Life has been quite filled lately. The accounting office where I work recently had our largest client acquire another company and thus double their size. This led to increased work loads and promotions. I gained a new position at my company (one that involves mostly solving puzzles and reconciling bank accounts which I find fun because I am a dork) and also was given permission to log on remotely from home and work some overtime. A number of people ended up working some 55 hour weeks for about 4-6 weeks. Luckily, the worst should be over and we can all resume our normal lives. And thank goodness, as an extra 15 hours of work a week means that there is a trade off somewhere. For me it was working out and cooking. I ate a lot of tofurky sandwiches, quick salads and simple no fuss roasted veggies over the past month. Not to mention some super quick breakfasts, which is actually the first thing I want to show you. Last weekend I went to Costco and purchased a large container of kiwis that smelled super ripe. One day genius struck and I put some berry jam on a piece of toast and topped it with a sliced kiwi. Since then, I think I have eaten this for breakfast just about every day.

Throughout all the chaos, I did take some time at the end of May to have my family over for dinner for my dad's birthday. I made a whole soft taco spread complete with spanish rice, refried beans, taco seasoned tvp, lettuce, guacamole, tofutti sour cream, olives, tomatoes, salsa, chips and a tiny bit of cheese. It was a delicious dinner and a great time. In addition to dinner, I attempted a vegan version of my dad's favorite birthday dessert, a sheet cake. My mom's mom used to make this cake for my dad and so I had some high standards to meet. Luckily I found this recipe and it turned out fabulous! Not only did everyone love it (and go back for more), they said that it might be closer to my grandma's recipe than the version my mom makes. Win! Admittedly, it's pretty hard to dislike a cake with as much sugar as this has, but since it was my dad's birthday I didn't want to go all crazy health foodie on him. I used all purpose flour and made no substitutions.

I still have a piece in my freezer which is the only reason I haven't jumped into the kitchen to go make these Fudge Daddies from Chocolate Covered Katie. How yummy do those look?

And finally, I'll leave you with a teaser in hopes that it will get me to write up another post tonight or tomorrow:

I bought a Vitamix!

Do you have one? What's your favorite thing to make with it?

The Best Boyfriend Ever

2011-05-15T20:57:00.000-07:00

I received a text on Friday night from my boyfriend on his way home from work saying that he was bringing home yum yums. This job and his last were at restaurants and at his old job that would have meant either chicken or tofu. I was out and about, and when I arrived home I found this in my kitchen:

3 different kinds of hummus and grilled bread slices. Can I just say that hummus is an infinitely better gift to come home to than flowers. Oddly enough, his new job has enabled to me to awaken to surprise flowers as well.

Nevermind that they were leftovers from a private event (as was the hummus) and that his boss made him take them home to his girlfriend (shh...I didn't tell you that). Still, it was quite a surprise to wake up to flowers. Hummus is a way better gift though. What holidays are coming up? I need to capitalize on this idea.

Vegetarian Cooking Class

2011-05-04T07:00:00.000-07:00

Good morning yet again! I think I have determined that daylight savings, mixed with needing to get up and water my garden, with a pinch of going to bed at a reasonable hour are all coming together to bring you (almost) daily morning updates. Weird.

About a month ago my mom surprised me by taking me to a vegetarian cooking class at this cooking store called Great News. She had told me about this store filled with cooking gadgets and also that they often held cooking classes. I was slightly disappointed when I learned that the class was not going to be hands on, but it turned out pretty great regardless and I had a lot of fun. Everything had the option of being vegan and we got to eat samples of everything made. The class was a little high on the tempeh and seitan levels but all in all, pretty good vegan food (especially for non vegans). I would love to find another vegetarian cooking class that focuses more on fruits, veggies, beans, grains and nuts. Now that would be cool. Sorry for the fairly low quality photos as I was a bad food blogger and forgot my real camera (and had to use my phone). In addition, I also forgot to take a picture of the first dish until my mom reminded me and my bowl was already cleared.

If you can read that, it lists the menu and the venue. The first dish was a coconut milk curry corn chowder. It was really good considering how few ingredients it contained. They served it with tempeh bacon which was not a winner in my book.

Next up was fried falafels in warmed pita bread with tahini sauce and smoked paprika tomato onion relish. This was so good. And convinced me to buy smoked paprika.

Tempeh reuben with vegan cheese and spinach, mushroom and..and...something else. Can't remember now. This was just all right.

This was the star of the show. Seitan risotto bolognese with portabello mushrooms. My friend Rachel and I recreated this that week with brown arborro rice and leaving out the seitan. A lot of work, but if you have a friend in the kitchen (especially one who likes to cook) it isn't really that hard. And it is mighty delicious.

And finally, coconut pudding with crushed pineapple. Really simple and really delicious. I recreated this at home but failed on the cornstarch front and had lumpy pudding. It was salvageable though since it was sort of like rice pudding.

I did also try the coconut curry corn chowder at home but I wasn't as impressed.

Alrighty, I am off to work now. Have a great day!

Have you ever been to a cooking class?

Any Plant Experts Out There?

2011-05-03T06:45:00.000-07:00

Good morning! Just popping in quickly to say hi and show you some pictures from a recent and a not so recent hike around Mission Trails. Saturday my friend Rachel and I embarked on a hike up Cowles Mountain. We proceeded past the summit to Pyle's Peak in a hike that ended up lasting 3 hours in probably 80 degree weather. I ended up extremely starving and a bit sun burned despite having applied sun screen but it was a fun hike.

Which brings me to this plant you see here. It was growing everywhere! It looks like a 7 foot tall asparagus stalk with stems coming out of the top which are either covered in flowers (whitish with purplish ends) or as below

With fruits that look like mini bell peppers. This plant was fascinating! There were also dead dried up old ones along the way as well. I thought perhaps someone might know what they were? Long shot I'm sure, but you never know.

As for the past hike, these are from Mission Trails heading out of Santee near the Old Mission Dam about a month or two ago.

The picture of the mini water fall is shaded pretty poorly, but I love looking at it and remembering that even though I live in a suburban area, there is still water and life to be found only a short ways away.

I hope you all have a wonderful day! I'm off to work!

Dehydrator Fun

2011-05-01T13:44:00.000-07:00

This morning I set out to make Oh She Glows' Carrot Loaf. I was thinking about how healthy this loaf seems utilizing only maple syrup for the sugar. I got to wondering if I could replace the sugar with something less processed or more whole. I thought dates might be nice but would probably completely mess with the texture. I ended up following the recipe exactly (except I had no walnuts and so I used pecans instead), but this got me thinking about dates and how they could be used to make a sugar substitute. I have seen date sugar but it is pretty expensive. My solution? Dehydrator and either a food processor or a coffee grinder. Here's the before:

I'll get back to you with the after in about 8-12 hours. Or tomorrow.

And since I had the dehydrator out and on anyway....

Mango and banana

And an apple.

Who Am I?

2011-04-25T07:01:00.000-07:00

Just a quick post this morning as I have found myself, yet again, with a bit of time to spare before work (seriously, who am I? This is such a weird feeling). I thought I would show you two yummy eats from recently.

Grilled Oasis garlic sourdough bread with Earth Balance stuffed with Tofutti cheese singles, sliced tomato and red onion. A little bit of comfort. On the side, lettuce and tomato topped with a Costco veggie patty. These things are really good. They are sold in the deli section of Costco and are 100% vegan and delicious.

So, I'm sure you've all heard of peanut flour by now. I'm sure you've probably also heard the rumor that Trader Joe's is discontinuing this incredible product. Of course I discovered it right at the tail end. Se la vie.

My friend Rachel was making some cookies to give to some people at an event and I joined her to help bake (and steal goodies). Rachel does not eat 100% vegan but is very open to vegan food and often makes it on her own. In addition, she eats mostly gluten free which is something I haven't really experimented with much. One of the cookies she made that night were Averie's Vegan GF Peanut Butter Caramel Chocolate Chip Cookies with Peanut Flour. Name is a mouthful, taste is unbelievable. I went right home (after Trader Joe's) and made a batch of my very own. Seriously, you have to try these. I took them to a family event and everyone raved about them and one person even asked for the recipe. Now if only I can figure out how to grind peanuts into peanut flour without making peanut butter....

Those Silly Fates

2011-04-22T21:18:00.000-07:00

So, in a stunning twist of fate, yesterday I was up early enough to blog before work and today? Up 50 minutes after my alarm went off, 20 minutes before I had to leave for work. I felt perpetually behind today. Fortunately, towards the end of the day I picked up steam and kicked this days behind. After a productive day at work, I spent some time in my garden (so many of my seedlings have sprouted indoors and will be ready to go outside soon!), I played through a few levels of Portal 2, I made the best dinner and attempted to make a single version without apple sauce of Mama Pea's Chocolate Lava Cake. I made a lot of substitutions including coconut oil and butter in place of apple sauce and using 1/2 whole wheat pastry flour and half peanut flour. I also tried to divide the recipe by 5 to get a single serving. I don't think I used enough flour. It was just ok.

As for dinner, here, take a look.

It all started out with needing to use up some green onions. And some chard. And an avocado. Ooh and I have sun dried tomato tofurkey sausages. Oh, hell yeah and leftover mashed potatoes and cauliflower. Amazing. I cooked the green onions in my tiny cast iron and then added in some garlic and the greens as well as some salt, pepper and lemon juice. Once cooked, I added half to a mashed avocado and added the leftover mash to the cast iron. This dinner made me sooooo happy. It was unbelievably delicious!

Hope you enjoy!

Weird Kind of Morning

2011-04-21T06:52:00.000-07:00

Usually when my alarm goes off I do not want to get out of bed. I consider myself mostly a morning person. I am definitely not a night person (I'm usually in bed by at least 10 every night), but I'd almost always rather stay in bed than get the day started. Today, not so much. I was out of bed with gusto when my alarm went off and as a result, I'm almost ready for work a full 30 minutes early. Your benefit I suppose. Here are some things I've been meaning to show you.

I bought a box of the Amy's Bistro Burgers and regardless of the fact that I had no buns and had to improvise with a pita, managed to make a fairly good recreation of a quarter pounder from my youth. Tofutti cheese singles are not the greatest thing ever, but in combination with other foods they make for some decent nostalgia.

Quarter pounders don't typically have tomato, but I did, so there. This was delicious by the way.

I went through a couple of weeks where I was making burritos like every other day. I developed this lovely technique of putting the burrito seam side down on a hot cast iron skillet to keep it from opening. Genius? You tell me.

Mostly I use refried or whole beans with rice, lettuce and salsa for the boyfriend and add in some avocado for myself, but these were tofu scramble, greens and potato burritos.

My boyfriend never really shops for food. He works in a grocery store 2 days a week and usually the only thing he'll buy is bananas but one day he bought a couple of things including some chocolate for me! And here's how I used it.

First I mixed some peanut butter with some oats and I think a few mini chocolate chips.

Then I added on the melted chocolate and it was almost like a lazy, more healthy resee's. Only more healthy in that it had oats. Delicious.

One day I was wandering the interwebs when I came across the idea for cinnamon roll pancakes. The recipe was not vegan so I just winged it the next morning, before work mind you. The cinnamon swirl kind of cooked into the pancake instead of staying clearly swirled, but topped with a drizzle of icing, these were unbelievable.

Not exactly every morning food.

And finally, I leave you with the tofu omelette that I made Sunday morning. My boyfriend was not a fan as they were a bit more mushy than he would have preferred, but I thought they were delicious!

Alright, that's enough from me as it is now almost time to leave. Thanks for keeping me company while I wasted time before work!

Roasted Pepitas

2011-04-18T19:04:00.000-07:00

Ok, so just a quick post today. I have a tendency to notice bruises every now and then that I believe indicate a bit of an iron deficiency. Last week, I was feeling it. In my process of looking up iron rich foods, I discovered pepitas are high in iron. So I stocked up on raw pepitas.

Separately, I had purchased a tiny new cast iron skillet at a garage sale a few months ago. It's almost the size of my hand.

Put the two together.

Yummy! Cooked over a medium heat and stirred occasionally until they started cracking. These were a bit addicting just on their own. I also ate them on a salad and in a bit of a trail mix. And I thought I would never find a use for that tiny thing. Perfect!

Good Results

2011-04-17T19:04:00.000-07:00

To me there is something about baking that just makes me so joyful. I find very few things in life bring me as much satisfaction as taking something out of the oven. When that something is beautiful and tasty as well? I bet they have these muffins in heaven.

Last night I stumbled across a recipe for beet blueberry muffins. I'm not sure if I've ever mentioned it here before, but I have made beet brownies that were delicious. I even brought them into work and no one knew there were beets hiding inside. Of course, beets in a muffin of the non chocolate variety is no easy thing to hide. Good think I like my food funny looking. I think it spices up life. I altered the original recipe a bit in two ways. The first batch I made without beets and with apple sauce instead and for both batches I changed up the flour types.

Blueberry Muffins

3 Tablespoons non-dairy milk
2 Tablespoons lemon juice

1 ¼ cups apple sauce
½ cup canola oil
¾ cup sugar sugar
1 ½ teaspoons vanilla extract
1 teaspoon salt

1 1/4 cups whole wheat pastry flour
1 cup high gluten bread flour flour
1 ½ teaspoons non-aluminum baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda

1 cup blueberries, fresh (sliced in half)

I mixed the lemon juice and the soy milk in it's own dish, then combined the apple sauce, oil, sugar, vanilla and salt together. I whisked the dry ingredients and then added both the wets. Then I folded in the halved blueberries.

Add by ice cream scoop (or utensil of choice) into 12 silicone or paper muffin cups.

I fudged the temperature as the original recipe tells you how to roast beets but I left the oven at 400 degrees for this version. 25 and they were perfect. Original recipe actually called for them at 325. Or maybe you don't even know the real temp of your oven and it wont matter. I set mine for 400 lately and it shoots up to 450. Se la vie.

Without further ado...

I think it's the bread flour that did it, but the un-beet muffin is light and fluffy with a beautiful top. Delicious. Then I made a second batch for myself. The same recipe as above, but puree 2 beets to replace the apple sauce. I think mine was a bit thick and could have used a bit more non-dairy milk, but they turned out equally delicious. I would seriously say that these are the best home made muffins I think I have ever made, vegan or not.

I only have one set of silicone molds so I made the second batch without anything and I wish I had some paper lines because the bottoms lost their beautiful pink color. Hope you enjoy!

This Post Is About Muesli

2011-04-04T20:51:00.000-07:00

Sometimes, typing the first few words is often the hardest. That simple transition from what you will be doing to what you are doing can sometimes be tough. I find often in life that the things I dread or procrastinate doing, are often made monumentally worse only in my head by putting them off. Today has been a day where this has been made clear on a number of occasions. All day at work I didn't really want to go to the gym. It wasn't that I was super tired, or anything was wrong, I just didn't feel like exerting the energy to go to a class at the gym. In the end, I reached the end of my work day and told myself to suck it up and just go to the gym. I could always half ass it if I really didn't feel into it once there. But in the end I had one of the best work outs in a long time. Once home, I sat at my computer for a good hour and a half procrastinating blogging. Not because I don't enjoy it, but because it takes time and effort to edit pictures and think of something to say that doesn't sound like rambling. After my computer procrastination, I further procrastinated blogging by going to the kitchen to reheat pizza for dinner. While in the kitchen, I procrastinated doing the dishes in the sink for a few minutes until I finally decided to just put away a few of the dishes in the dish drainer. Once I started, I put everything away and washed everything in the sink in a matter of 15 minutes. Finally, as I sat down to eat my dinner, I decided to just download my pictures from my camera and see what I had to work with. Within minutes I had discarded the crappy ones, chosen some to edit and decided on a post. A few more minutes and I had edited them and that brought me to here. It is amazing how just a simple step towards the things you want/need to accomplish can snowball. But enough with the philosophical random musings...I have food to show you!

A couple weeks ago I was at a grocery store that I do not normally shop at. It is a Mediterranean shop with many foreign foods but also a fair number of mainstream products as well. I was taking extra time to peruse everything to see if I could find anything new and different, and while I did buy some not so normal items, that is not what this post is about. This post is about muesli. Bob's Red Mill muesli, specifically.

I had just seen some people posting about muesli days before this and I had never had it before so I decided to try it. I can't say where any of my inspiration for this meal came from as I tend to read through blogs that I don't normally follow and forget where I see things. I don't think the inspiration came from any one person though. Regardless, here's how I have been enjoying my muesli.


Thinly slice banana and add about a tablespoon of peanut butter

Microwave for about 30 seconds until banana is nice and mushy and then stir, stir, stir

Add in 1/4 to 1/3 cup dry muesli

Stir, stir, stir some more

Add in about as much soy milk as muesli

And stir, stir, stir some more

Mmm, banana, pb, muesli mush

Don't let the mushy texture fool you into thinking this is not a delicious breakfast. I was amazed at how good this was considering that I added no maple syrup, no cinnamon, no chocolate...I have been eating it most mornings for breakfast before work and I am not tired of it after almost two weeks. Which reminds me, my boyfriend always ate a good amount of bananas but I never really did. Well, since I've been eating this breakfast and I have been making a few smoothies lately, we have been going through a lot of bananas and I may or may not have bought 9ish pounds of bananas from 3 different stores yesterday. The Mediterranean market is the only store in town I know that puts overripe bananas on sale and I got some for .49/lb!

Well, that's it for me tonight. Hopefully I'll be back sooner next time, I just need to remember to take that first step.

A Veggie Kind of Weekend

2011-03-13T11:11:00.000-07:00

Lately I have been feeling a little sluggish and tired so I have been trying to decrease my sugar and up my veggies, beans and grains. What follows is my trip on Friday to the grocery store. I usually get most of my veggies at the farmer's market, but since I had nothing to do on Friday night, I really wanted to pick some stuff up to make to eat over the weekend. It had been a long time since I had just gone crazy in the produce section of a grocery store and I really ended up going a bit crazy.

Green Leaf Lettuce
Red Chard
Red Grapes

Brussel Sprouts
Kale
Romain Lettuce
Broccoli
Celery
Mango

Bananas
Lemons
Kiwis
Garlic
Pears
Onions
Limes

I have made a couple of green smoothies over the last week. Kale, soy milk, protein powder, ground flax, banana, a date, some ice cubes and one time I used frozen blueberries. Really good.
I have been having oatmeal for breakfast a few days. I used to eat steel cut oats but this week I have been eating rolled oats because I can cook them quickly.

1/3 cup water, 1/3 cup oats. Cook for 1 minute. Add 1/3 cup oats and microwave for 30 seconds more. Separately microwave a banana until it gets all melty. Add that, a handful of chopped pecans, a pinch of salt, some frozen blueberries, some ground flax, a little protein powder and a tiny bit of maple syrup. This has been really a surprisingly delicious breakfast though I find that I am hungry a few hours later.

I used a small portion of this broccoli to throw together a salad I brought to a family get together yesterday. The salad took less than 10 minutes to throw together and was quite a hit. Unfortunately I do not have a picture but there are left overs so maybe I'll take one later. And then give you the recipe.

These grapes were delicious!

I mixed this sliced kale with some garlic infused olive oil and balsamic vinegar and then let it marinate. And if you can see in the back there, those are presoaked garbanzo beans ready to be cooked. I'm not sure if I have mentioned it here (I probably have) but I am madly in love with my pressure cooker. I used it three nights this week to make beans after work. It is genius.

Love.

My boyfriend recently brought me a bunch of tangerines from the tree at his moms house. Most of them sat in my fruit bowl for a long time as they had a number of seeds and were quite a pain to eat. I decided to juice them and make the orange glazed beets from Vegan with a Vengeance. The glaze never really set up, but the beets were great none the less.

My dinner last night consisted of:

Previously mentioned marinated kale topped with some sliced grapes
Tangerine Beets
Shredded Brussel Sprouts

This recipe was modified from one I found on the internet but I changed it so much that it does not even really resemble the original recipe except that it contains shredded brussel sprouts and toasted walnuts.

I melted some earth balance in my cast iron skillet and then added in the brussel sprouts that I put through my food processor and a tiny bit of liquid smoke. (The original recipe called for bacon) I cooked them for about five minutes and then removed from the heat and mixed in some toasted walnuts and a dressing of apple cider vinegar and a little sugar. I topped my serving with some nutritional yeast. This was a very delicious and nutritious dinner.

And that's mostly what I have been up to the last two days. Got any good ideas for some vegetables? Especially broccoli or chard? How about a smoothie recipe? Or oats combos?

Pancakes!

2011-03-05T07:57:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, Miss Elise over at Hungry Hungry Hippie posted a picture of the most fluffy, delicious looking pancakes ever! Luckily for me and you, she posted the recipe this morning and I have already tried it. I used all whole wheat pastry flour since I did not have coconut flour. I wasn't sure if my not over ripe banana would work, but it seemed to do the job just fine.

I topped mine with some earth balance and some strawberries and blueberries that I let marinate in some maple syrup. For a recipe with no sugar and no oil, these turned out so much better than the usual pancakes I make and I think I may have just found that simpler = better when it comes to pancakes.

I tried to get an inside shot so you could see the fluffiness, but the sun interfered. I guess you'll just have to go check out Elise's much better pictures so you can drool over the fluffiness. You're only about 15 minutes away from pancakes in your belly. What are you waiting for?

Banana Everything Cookies

2011-02-28T19:59:00.000-08:00

About a year ago I acquired a most wonderful recipe for a cookie using up over ripe bananas. I need to keep better track of my sources so I could give credit where credit is due, but alas, back then, I did not keep track. I just wrote down recipes, tried them and then kept them or tossed them. This one I kept. When I first made this cookie I added walnuts and raisins to make a sort of trail mix cookie. While I loved them like that, my chocolate loving boyfriend would never touch raisins or nuts and so I began making one batch my way and one batch with chocolate chips. These cookies are serious winners either way, and if you decrease the sugar, I say they aren't that bad for you (no health claims are made here as I am not a dietitian or nutritionist). I have tons of pictures of the process for these cookies as I make them all the time. So, let's begin. You will need:

1 medium ripe banana
1/3 cup canola oil
2/3 cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla

3/4 cup flour + 2 tbs if dough is too wet
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
2 cups oats

1 cup mix ins. For example, 1 cup chocolate chips or 1/2 cup chopped walnuts and 1/2 cup raisins but be creative. Anything you have on hand would work. And just about everything goes with chocolate, right?

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Perfectly ripe bananas.

I like to make the wet portion of this recipe in my food processor so that the bananas get really pureed. Some recipes call for hand mashing the bananas so that you have chunks, but I like it nice and smooth.

Banana and sugar

This is a sugar that I cannot remember the name of. I believe it is similar to, if it is not actually, sucanat.


Add in vanilla and canola oil


And process

Meanwhile, whisk together your dry ingredients. Ooh, I wish I had a picture to show you my two favorite baking tools. If you've read many posts then you know I love my citrus press for cooking. For baking, I could not live without my whisk and my silicone spatula.


Oats


Oats & flour


Whisk it all toghether


Add your mix ins

These chocolate chips I used a few months ago were really too large for these cookies. This time I used regular sized and they worked much better. So, let's pretend these are regular sized chocolate chips.

Once everything is good and mixed, add in your wet. Oh, hey, there's my spatula. I love that thing. Can you propose to a spatula?


Gooey

And apparently I have no pictures of the after mixed stage or the rolling stage. But here's how it goes down. I use a cookie sheet covered with a silpat (I used to use parchment paper) and I scoop out the dough using a cookies scoop. This works really well and the cookies turn out mostly the same shape and size. You could always use your hands and a spoon though.

Bake for 10 - 12 minutes and then let cool for a minute or two on the cookie sheet before transferring to a wire rack. I have found that the trick to vegan cookies is usually to undercook them. This leaves them moist and chewy. Of course, I am probably biased since that is how I like my cookies. If you prefer a crunchy cookie, this recipe isn't the best place to start. And while I am on the topic of undercooked dough, don't forget to taste the dough as you are rolling out the cookies. It is quite delicious. Though it is not nearly as addicting as my go to chocolate chip cookie dough is. Or the dessert hummus. But the baked version of these cookies is more addicting than the blueberry muffins I made this weekend. But not by much. By the way, I have all of those in my house right now. Dozens of cookies, muffins, dessert hummus and even pancakes. Thank goodness for the salad I had for lunch and the taco I'm about to go make for dinner. I don't really want to see any sugar for the rest of the night.

Enjoy!

Guacamole Bowl

2011-02-27T20:37:00.000-08:00

Yesterday my friend and I embarked on a journey of gluttony. We attended the 8th Annual Guacamole Bowl in Balboa Park. Upon paying our $5 entry fee, we were handed a bag of tortilla chips and some stickers to use to vote for our favorite guacamoles. Out of 30. I was a little put off when the first three we passed had bacon listed in their ingredients, but was mighty happy that every booth had ingredients well displayed so I could avoid those with meat and dairy. We did come across one booth that listed "dairy" and "love" as two of their ingredients. We stayed well away from that booth.

The event was a charity event to raise money for sports for children with disabilities.

It was a really awesome event and, even passing by the booths that had meat or dairy, we still had plenty of guacamole to indulge in.

Everyone was mighty spirited and encouraged us to try their guac and vote for them.

There were decorated tables, costumes and even a theme song or two.

It was really fun reading the ingredients, tasting the guac and then figuring out first if we liked it (we didn't find any we didn't) and secondly what flavors stood out and what made the best ones the best. I was quite a fan of the ones in which I could taste cumin and lime. I was surprised by the contrasting sweetness of the yellow bell peppers in one we tried.

There were pounds upon pounds of fresh vegetables floating around the building.

We managed to stuff ourselves silly in only a short hour. Luckily I had already been to the gym earlier in the morning and ran a 5K on the treadmill (have I mentioned I am going to attempt a 5K run/race on March 26th?) so I didn't feel so bad.

I'll leave you with one final picture that we took extra care to bring to you. You see, my friend doesn't so much like people in costumes, and this guy disappeared and we had to hunt him down. But here it is, for your viewing pleasure.

Hope you enjoyed my guacamole bowl festivities.

Black Bean Tacos

2011-02-21T21:01:00.000-08:00

Do you ever have one of those days where you just know exactly what you want for dinner and it totally peps you up? No, just me? I go to the gym straight from work Mondays, Tuesdays and usually Thursdays along with coming home for a brief 1/2 hour first on Wednesdays. This results in my starting to throw dinner together anywhere from 6 to 7:30 at night. Obviously that doesn't leave much time for intricate dinners. Some nights I rely on weekend leftovers. Sometimes I throw together something quickly like a salad or sandwich and sometimes I rely on boca burgers or meatless balls, jarred spaghetti sauce and whole wheat spaghetti. Occasionally though, as happened tonight, I was struck with inspiration and put together a meal I'd like to share with you.

A few months back I mentioned that I had made Oh She Glows' Easy Avocado-Lime Black Bean Salad. When I set out this afternoon, that was what I was going to make. I saw someone in my office eating tacos for lunch and I instantly thought of throwing that black bean salad on some corn tortillas and having me some yummy tacos for dinner. Luckily I had already set some black beans to soak before I left for work this morning and I had my fabulous new Pressure Cooker to cook them up in no time flat. A trip to the store on my way home to pick up some tortillas and cilantro resulted in a slight shift in the dinner plans. I started thinking about what else I could put on the tacos to jazz them up a bit. I thought about some lettuce and salsa, but those seemed like they would take away from the lovely combination of this recipe, so I ended up picking up a head of red cabbage.

I didn't measure ingredients which is probably a good thing as my salad turned out a bit too oniony for even my onion loving tastes. For the original recipe, make sure and check out Oh She Glows' post and then add in the cabbage if you'd like.


First: Chop your onion


Then add chopped cilantro

Next add the juice from your limes


Blurry picture, but the most used contraption in my kitchen next to my food processor.

Add in some cumin and salt

Slice up your cabbage

I ended up not mixing the avocado in since I didn't want to leave it overnight in the leftovers.

Apart from using too much onion, these tacos were unbelievably delicious! And considering that I could put this together after the gym and a shower on a week night, I'd say we have a winner.

Oh, and I <3 my pressure cooker. I see a long and happy life together.

Key Lime Pie

2011-02-14T20:33:00.000-08:00

When I purchased some graham cracker crusts during the holidays my first thought was key lime pie. Months later, I still had not managed to find a suitable recipe even though I scoured the internet searching. When I found key limes on my grocery trip last weekend I knew the time had come. Recipe or no recipe, I was making key lime pie.

I really had no recipe even to base my recipe on so I went with my gut. Silken tofu, lime juice, lime zest, agave, cornstarch and a little vanilla (and a little bit of food coloring). I didn't really imagine it would set up so super well, but I imagined it would taste delicious. Unfortunately, when I poured the concoction into the crust, it fell short of the top by a good 1/4 inch. What to do!? I vaguely remembered Katie's post on making your own coconut butter out of shredded coconut so I tried to do something along those lines to make a creamy coconut topping. Note the word tried. I processed and processed and processed my coconut but it remained grainy. I mixed it with some agave and coconut oil and even tossed in a bit of water, but it remained grainy. So I went with it.

The result is a pretty darn good pie.

Yum. Unfortunately, the rest of the dinner I prepared last night was not as photo worthy. Lentil rice loaf, mashed cauliflower and onion gravy. Have you ever made onion gravy? I cannot believe how easy it was. Melt tablespoon of earth balance in cast iron skillet, add onion. Cook until brown. Remove onion. Add in 4 tablespoons earth balance and 4 tablespoons flour. Cook until well mixed. Add back in onion and 2 cups veggie broth. Stir until thick. Season with salt and pepper. I almost ate this off the spoon it was so delicious.

Have you tried dessert hummus yet? Want some more incentive?

Graham crackers. Banana slices. Dessert hummus. Need I say more?

Dessert Hummus

2011-02-11T18:34:00.000-08:00

I know what you're thinking. But hear me out. Today I read a tweet from @mama_pea about having to make the choice between grocery shopping and making dessert hummus. I was hooked instantly. I had everything at home except something to dip in it. I went to the store and got some graham crackers and I was ready.

Once home I rinsed the garbanzo beans, pulled out the food processor, tossed in some peanut butter, maple syrup, vanilla and a pinch of salt and started that baby up. Minutes later I mixed in some mini chocolate chips I conveniently had on hand and tasted one of the most intriguing foods I have tried in a long time. It wasn't oh my goodness love at first bite, but after a few bites I was hooked. Luckily my desire to produce a great picture for all of you stopped my boyfriend and I from devouring the whole batch in one sitting.

This is currently chilling in my refrigerator. Can I have dessert for dinner?

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Dessert Hummus. This guy's a genius.

A Jalapeno Kind Of Dinner

2011-01-15T20:15:00.000-08:00

Tonight's dinner (which took me a good 2 hours in the kitchen to make) centered around farmer's market finds. Last Sunday I bought a basket of jalapenos and a basket of tomatillos with absolutely no plan for them. Over the past week, a plan was formed. I give you:

A Jalapeno Kind Of Dinner

I have a couple more things I'd like to get done tonight so I'll leave you with only a short description, some links to recipes I used as well as two more pictures of kitchen basics.

Back during MoFo, Vegan Eats & Treats did a post about pupusas. I was immediately intrigued but forgot all about it until Wednesday when I went to the Ocean Beach farmer's market and my friend and I started discussing the pupusas they were selling on the side of the street. I googled Viva Vegan Pupusas and found this recipe. I may have to look into actually buying this cook book because these were (apart from some minor trials and tribulations) delicious and fairly easy. I stuffed the pupusas with a veggie mix that contained roasted jalapenos, garlic, onion and sauteed chard, bell peppers and more onion. For my boyfriend I stuffed his with refried beans and a little cheese. Note: I do not recommend refreid beans for stuffing. Use only solid foods for ease of preparation.

Next, I made jalapeno cornbread from this recipe. Oh! And while I'm thinking about it, I have to thank reader Becky who suggested that I try google bookmarks for keeping track of the recipes I'd like to try. This was exactly what I was looking for! I hit bookmark, change the name, add a category if I choose and then there is an app on my phone that I can click on to bring them right up. Genius! But back to the muffins. I left the roasted jalapenos out of half of them for my boyfriend and used whole wheat flour because that was all I had on hand. These were really good topped with a little Earth Balance.

The main goal I had when I set out 3 hours ago though was to use up the tomatillos by making a green salsa. I roasted garlic, tomatillos, jalapenos and onion and here's where you get kitchen tip #1 and #2.

Roasting your veggies in muffin tins is super easy and convenient!

An oven thermometer (even a dirty one) can really help when baking to show you whether or not your oven is really at 400 degrees or not.

But back to the salsa. I roasted everything and then took the seeds out of all the jalapenos. I threw everything except for about half the jalapenos, a quarter of the onion and one of the heads of garlic into the food processor with some cilantro and lemon juice and blended it up. I used no specific recipe for this and it turned out delicious!

Finally, I made a wild rice blend that I seasoned with lemon juice and salt and pepper after cooking.

Plated, I added refried beans and the veggie mix to the top of my pupusas and drizzled with the salsa. This was way too much food but was definitely delicious. Now that I know how all the ingredients go together I think I will be making these more often.

Sorry for the detour from Portland. Probably one more post before I get to it as well as I have one more food I am dieing to tell you about!

Portland: Saturday

2011-01-09T16:57:00.000-08:00

I'm still here and I haven't forgotten about the rest of my trip. I'm sure you are all on the edge of your seats waiting for the rest of the story (or at least you were 3 weeks ago when I posted Friday's recap). Without further ado, I give you: Saturday in Portland.

As when someone learns the fact that I am vegan is so often met with the question "Where do you get your protein?", so too is the fact that I want to live in Oregon often met with the question "You know it rains a lot there, right?". I patiently explain that I am well aware of this fact while I roll my eyes in my imagination. My mom and I were pleasantly surprised to find that it did not rain once on Friday. Of course, we joked, it would rain all of Saturday when we had plans for doing things outdoors. Boy were we ever right about that. One of the major things I wanted to check out while we were there was the Farmer's Market at PSU. So we set out Saturday morning with the plan to go there and to the Saturday Market which is a sort of art market. When we left the hotel it was already raining. But, if I was to ever move to Portland I would definitely not let a little rain stop me.

We headed out once again across the Willamette and easily found the market. We also managed to find a parking space pretty close. The market was mostly deserted but was filled with so many beautiful stands of fresh vegetables and fruit. We made our way around about 3 times just to make sure we didn't miss anything before I decided what to get. Since we were staying in a hotel there was very little I could do with vegetables, but fruits I could bring home with me. The only thing I hated about the rain was that I didn't want to have my camera out and get it all wet, so there are no pictures of the actual market but I do have some I took later of my finds. This was especially sad because on my 3rd trip around when I had stopped once again at a stand filled with vegan baked goods, I ran into the fabulous Sayward of Bonzai Aphrodite and her beautiful family! At this point though I was totally drenched and freezing so we didn't stay long and chat.

And when I say drenched, I mean drenched. I had an umbrella and what I thought was a rain proof jacket. I gave the umbrella to my mom as I had a hood and said jacket. This did nothing to protect my legs and as I learned later, really no part of me. My pants were soaked all the way down and my hands were frozen. We left the market after a fairly short time and headed to the Saturday Market.

My mom had suggested the Saturday Market and I am so glad she did. I dried up only a tiny bit on the way there and then we were back out in the rain but with so much to see. There were hundreds of artists of all kinds selling their handcrafted work. I ended up buying some gifts as well as some artwork for myself.

I got this hanging glass art for my boyfriend's grandma as well as a rainbow necklace for his sister that I neglected to get a picture of. I also neglected to get a picture of these totally awesome earrings I bought for her that were made with this metal that changes colors at different thicknesses.

I got these two pieces of art done by artist Sienna Morris. They are drawn entirely with numbers of the clock. There is not one line drawn. If you have the time, I highly suggest checking out her site.

Walking out of the Saturday Market we were even more soaked than before and I suggested we stop in some place to dry off a little bit before getting back in the car. We happened upon Kell's Irish Restaurant & Pub and our initial thought was possibly some Irish Coffee but then my mom asked what kind of soup they had and would you know, it was vegan!

Hot apple cider, Irish soda bread and kale and white bean soup! This was so delicious and clean and warming and I absolutely couldn't wait to get home to try to recreate it. I am pretty sure it was just vegetable stock, kale, carrots and white beans but it was sooo yummy. I have recreated it since then and mine turned out a little too oily (I don't think oil was even necessary). This restaurant was great though, they took our coats and we attempted to dry off at least a little. This was when I learned that my jacket was not rain proof. Oops.

After we left Kell's we headed out with no specific agenda. We drove around a lot that day and the heater in the car managed to get me almost 100% dry. We went to a couple of used clothes stores but nothing was too great. We went to Bridge City Comics which was a very nice store.

We drove past my Aunt's old house.

I studied the street structure of Portland. There are little inlets on each corner where water flows and stays instead of an underground sewer system. Also, many, many houses had raised gardens in their frin yards! I absolutely love the look of the older houses in Portland.

We traveled to a Trader Joe's that is right across the street from a 24 hour fitness. We didn't go inside either but the Trader Joe's had to have been 3 times as big as the one I shop in.

For a late lunch we ended up at the most awesome block I have ever seen. On the left was Sweet Pea Bakery, then Herbivore Clothing and finally, Food Fight Grocery. All vegan! If I could move in right across the street I think I'd be the happiest vegan on the planet!

At Sweet Pea Bakery I got a seitan filled sandwich. I can't remember what it was called or exactly what was in it, but it was delicious.

My mom and I also got a slice of carrot cake to split after our leftover Thai food back at the hotel. Sorry for the horrible picture. Bonus points though, the container was compostable. And according to blogger, compostable is not a word....Get with the times blogger.

Back at the hotel I was finally able to take some pictures of the days goodies away from the downpours

Delicious gingerbread spice cake with lemon ginger icing.

Peanut butter & chocolate crispy treat.

Hot pepper marionberry jam.

Apples and Pears.

And that takes us pretty much to the end of Saturday. It was a wet but wonderful day and I felt like I got a true taste of Portland.

Hopefully it wont take me three weeks to get back to you about Sunday and Monday.

Thanks for reading! Also, please pardon the formatting of this post. I am tired and do not have the energy to figure out why I can't get the spacing right.

Oh My Yum!

2010-12-21T20:06:00.000-08:00

Before I started my dinner tonight I already knew it was going to be a winner. Sometimes you just know. I took a bunch of pictures because, I just knew. And sure enough, it was out of this world. I got the recipe from Busy Vegan Mama and since I had some spinach leftover from my CSA I thought it would be the perfect dinner for one of these nights right before Xmas and end of the year when I am so uber busy. Without further ado, I give you:

Spinach Pesto Pasta

Sorry for the super up close picture. I have yet to master taking pictures of certain things. Bowls of food being one of them. But don't let that detract from the beauty of this bowl. I followed Sara's recipe to a T except for adding a few extra vegetables to my pasta so ~~check out her site if you'd like to~~ get yourself over to her site and try it out for yourself.

Spinach

Pine Nuts

Garlic

Salt

Chili Flakes

Olive Oil

Blend

Stir & keep blending

Perfect!

Add pasta to boiling water per package directions. About 3 minutes until the end, add all veggies except tomatoes. I used zucchini, green beans and red pepper. Add tomatoes when there is only one minute left on the pasta. Seriously, they only need a minute.

Toss together gently and try to master the art of taking a picture while simultaneously blowing steam away from the camera.

Go back for seconds.

Seriously, if it hadn't been for trying to take some artistic photos and posing my ingredients, this dinner would have taken me 15 minutes to make and that includes boiling the water and cooking the pasta. It helps that somehow I managed to buy whole wheat pasta that only took 4 minutes to cook. Ok, but really, go make this. Right now. You are only 15 minutes away from a delicious dinner.

Now I'm off to wrap presents!

Portland: Friday

2010-12-18T14:38:00.000-08:00

My entire life I have dreamed about moving to Oregon. I think it's the blackberries. Or maybe the creeks. All I know is that every summer my family used to travel from San Diego by car to visit my Aunt and Uncle in Oregon and ever since then, I have dreamed of living there. If you'd asked me what stopped me from going there for college I wouldn't have an exact answer for you. If you asked why I didn't go after college I'd say a number of reasons. I have recently gotten to a point in my life where I feel that the time might be right. And by that of course I mean probably 3 more scouting trips over the next 1-3 years before making any actual plans. Personally, I could probably up and move tomorrow but my boyfriend is not so quick to upend his entire life. That's ok though, I have patience (sometimes). This first scouting trip to my hopefully someday future home town was taken not with said boyfriend but instead with my Mom. My mom is anything but vegan, and in fact made her living as a manager of meat departments all across San Diego Vons stores but she hardly complained at all that in 4 days we went to only one restaurant where she ate meat. She did however want it noted that we did not encounter one vegan restaurant that served Diet Coke. ~~This post is not planned to be super in depth as~~ it is the weekend before Xmas and I still don't even have my decorations up from the garage, I have biscotti to make for a gift and a gift or two to try to track down but I wanted to share with you all the amazing things I saw.

We flew into Portland at 9:40 on Thursday night. We had rented a car and our hotel was the Phoenix Inn in Beaverton. I would have liked to have stayed a little closer to Portland and I would love on my next trip to try and take the public transportation for most of the trip, but this worked well for my mom and I. The main things on my scouting list were:

Grocery Stores
Comic Shops
Restaurants
Farmer's Markets
Saturday Market
24 Hour Fitness
Places to Hike
Resale Stores (Clothes, Furniture, Cookware, etc)
Getting a feel for which part of town I would look on Craigslist for a house

We succeeded on all fronts. Except maybe the comic shop, but I will get to that. The car we rented was a Chevy Aleo, which I had never heard of. Turned out to be a totally cute car that got about 25 miles to the gallon driving all around Portland.

Friday morning we woke up bright and early and headed out to explore. First on my list was the People's Co-Op not to be confused with the OB People's Food which is also a Co-Op.

Ever since I heard about this place at Bonzai Aprodite I couldn't wait to check it out. As a result of this being the first place we visited, it became my main point of reference. We used my mom's GPS and had plotted out a list of places to check out before we left. Let me tell you, a printed map with everything roughly plotted goes a long way towards understanding the roads you are driving. I loved the GPS but it was difficult to get a feel for the streets. We drove all over the city that first day, back and forth. I think we crossed the Willamette about 6 times, each time across a different bridge.

At the Co-Op we got lunch (we had eaten breakfast at the hotel. Not so great but not the worst.). I went a little crazy and bought some Gingerbread beer that sounded delicious and festive along with some Theo chocolate bars that I had just seen Hungry Hungry Hippie talking about and my favorite eat of the entire trip:

Vanilla Creme with Karmal & Chocolate. Oh my god. Coconut, cashews, cocoa, maple, maca, mesquite, lucuma, vanilla, salt, soy lecithin. Vegan, raw, local and oh so decadent. We went back right before we went to the airport so I could get one for the plane, but they were out. And I was sad. In case you have delusions that this is all I would eat for lunch you are oh so wrong. I had a raw mock tuna salad wrapped in chard. It was decent but not the best thing ever.

Friday we also went to:

Excalibur Books & Comis (ok)
Gilded Closet (ok)
Seams to Fit (really expensive and not my style but very nice)
Village Merchants (freakin awesome shop!)
Vintage Pink (not on my list but I am soooo in love with this shop)

In fact, I found this coffee table there that I really want to find someone to recreate for me. It had the perfect size display coves for comics.

In our search for one place (and due to our GPS's lack of knowledge that Burnside St and Sandy Blvd become one way at one point) we got turned around and ended up at Voodoo Donuts. I had written their downtown location on my list and then crossed it off. I had heard that they had vegan donuts but that the lines were long. I figured we would be going to enough vegan restaurants and bakeries that I wouldn't need an extra donut. Who am I to argue with fate when we stumbled upon a second location so easily? Besides, who doesn't love a maple bar?

This is not a maple bar but is instead, a voodoo donut. It is shaped like a person (sort of) and then it has a pretzel stick stuck in it like a pin. The kicker?

It's filled with "blood". Mmm vegan blood. That makes me smile. We may or may not have hit this place up before the airport to take home some vegan donuts.

The other comic shop we visited on Friday (please note, this is all still the first day there) was Bridge City Comics. I liked this store quite a lot. It was well stocked and well set up. It was a little more north than I would have loved, but travel for good comics is not the end of the world. Oddly, I happened upon one other comic shop on our way to the airport that had not been on my list. It is called Future Dreams and it was in the basement of a building that looked to be making furniture. I only got a chance to glance inside but we will definitely be checking out these two locations when we come back. One of the reasons that we feel Portland is the right sort of city for us is that my boyfriend is working towards being a comic book writer and Portland seems to be the west coast comic creator central. Comics are quite an integral part of our lives.

So day one, as it started to get dark, we were debating what else to do. I didn't want to go back to the hotel but we weren't quite hungry enough for dinner. We ended up at one of the resale clothes shops (I can't remember if it was even on my list or which one it was) and decided to go across the street to this little bar and get a drink. I got this oh so yummy cocktail of vodka infused with strawberries (made by the bar) mixed with soda water and lemonade. It was delish!

Afterward, we went to a Thai restaurant for dinner. I ordered a mostly mediocre stir fry with tofu and my mom got a curry bowl. We took the leftovers home in the tupperware that I had brought my plane food in. (Just a note, tupperware is great for saving the throw away to go containers, but make a note to get a hotel with a real sink rather than just a bathroom sink. It was a pain washing them and I think I may have clogged the sink a bit). Finally we headed back to the hotel and called it a night.

And with that, I think I may have to extend this trip into more than one post if I hope to get everything done today that I need to. Please join me again next time for Portland: Saturday.

Insane Goal for the Morning

2010-12-04T23:30:00.000-08:00

Update:

Ultimate Vegan Oatmeal Raisin Cookie

1/2 dozen baked, 1.5 dozen frozen

Salt Kissed Chunky Peanut Butter Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies

1/2 dozen baked, 1/2 dozen frozen

Pumpkin Pie Banana Chunk Oatmeal Cookies

1 dozen baked, 1.5 dozen frozen

Vegan Dark Chocolate Peppermint Cookies x 3

6 dozen baked, 1/2 dozen frozen

Ultimate Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies

1 dozen baked, 1 dozen frozen

Added bonus:

Pumpkin Ginger Snaps (cause I didn't have enough on my plate)

Chilling in the fridge to be rolled out and frozen. 2 dozen.

Morning success!

Going to a cookie party tomorrow at noon. Bringing 6 dozen of the peppermint cookies but I also wanted to make chocolate chip for my boyfriend. I couldn't decide between the two so I am making both. I have an over ripe banana on hand and some pumpkin thus the pumpkin pie banana chunk and the oatmeal raisin sounded so healthy and yummy to take on my upcoming trip. Thus, 5 types of cookies; 7 batches in total, before noon tomorrow so I still have time to go pick up my CSA. Can I do it? I think so. Luckily I will be freezing a good portion of them without baking so that cuts down on my time. Now if I could just find a sous chef. Or at least a dish washer.

Oh, and my upcoming trip? To the vegan mecca? That's right! Portland, Oregon! I am so excited. I leave on Thursday night and am there through Monday afternoon. Anyone have any tips or suggestions for while I am there?

Thanks!

So Much Time, So Little To Do!

2010-11-28T10:28:00.000-08:00

Wait, strike that, reverse it. While being sick gives me a whole lot of time to spend not doing the things I would normally do if I was feeling better, there are always books to read, movies to watch and blogs to read. It is the later that leads me to the conundrum I am in today. Whilst scouring the internet looking at delicious food and recipes, I collect links to try at a future date. I copy the link from my desktop computer and then put it into an email which I send to myself so that I can pull up the recipe on my phone in the kitchen and not have to waste paper. This results in the majority of my inbox being from myself. Not to mention how full it's getting up in there. So I thought today I would post all those links that I have yet to try in one place so I can clean out my email. And if anyone has a better way of organizing recipe links online I would love to hear about it!

Sweet

Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins

Pumpkin Pancakes

Chocolate Chip Granola Bars

Pumpkin Cupcakes

Ginger Cookies

Pumpkin Ginger Snaps

Chocolate Banana Brownies

Pumpkin Butter

Almond Milk

Almond Pulp Oatmeal Cookies

Oh She Glows Energy Truffles

Chocolate Chipotle Sweet Potato Pie

Coconut Whipped Cream

Black Gingerbread Bars

Coconut Banana Flax Waffles

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Muffins

Home Made Powdered Sugar

Chocolate Chip Cookies

Baked, Yeasted Doughnuts

Caramel Bon Bons

Hot Fudge Cake: Two Ways

Almond Biscotti

Cranberry Almond Biscotti

Savory

Process for Fried Tofu Cubes for Stir Fry

Seitan Christmas "Turkey"

No Knead Bread

Black Bean Burgers

Vegan Dad's Tofu Stack

Moroccan Carrot Salad

Moroccan Harira

Green Onion-Garlic Flatbread with Creamy Spinach-Chickpea Filling

Russian Black Bread

Thanksgiving Meatless Loaf

Crispy Seitan for Stir Fry

Vegan Deli Slices

Need to Veganize

Doughnut Muffins

Cauliflower Tots

Already Made But Want To Keep Handy

White Fluffy Dinner Rolls

Flourless Chocolate Almond Butter Cookies

Zucchini Pancakes!

Fruit Nut & Energy Bites

Banana Loaf

Refrigerator Pickles

Eezeee Cheeze I haven't made this one in about a year...

Veggeroni

Maple Chocolate Chip Cookies OMG I had it the whole time! This is my go to choc chip cookie recipe.

Sweet & Sour "Chicken"

Blueberry Banana Bread

Banana Bread

Peas and Thank You Brownies

Can you see why I don't do much other than bake, cook and work out? I think, after compiling this list that I will probably never get to even half of, I really should look into a career in the kitchen. Too bad I already have a degree and a career. Never too late to switch, but would it really be worth it?

Breakfast of Sick-o's (and a Thanksgiving Recap)

2010-11-27T10:13:00.000-08:00

I have been feeling really sick with a sore throat for about 24 hours now. This may or may not have something to do with running myself too thin on Thanksgiving day and being a little dumb. We'll get to that in a few. Meanwhile, here is the breakfast I am currently enjoying to combat the illness in my throat.

Thank goodness I had some chamomile tea in my cabinet. I had 2 cups last night and I am on my first today. It is the only thing making my throat feel better. Next up is some iced tea to combat the stupid caffeine headaches I have been getting on days I don't work and thus do not drink coffee. I am in the process of weaning myself off coffee because I do not like being a slave to caffeine and having it ruin my weekend if I don't get it. And finally, Naked juice in the flavor of Power-C Machine for a dosage of Vitamin C. 8 oz doses of these three things should get me feeling right as rain immediately, right? Here's to wishful thinking. I'm not sure if I have any soup in the house so I may drag my butt to the kitchen long enough to make a small pot. I'm thinking some lentil soup might be yummy. But onto why I may have gotten sick.

For Thanksgiving at my Aunt and Uncle's house, I had offered to bring rolls and pumpkin pie. They were going to make me a Tofurkey roast along with some roasted vegetables. I had attempted to make Oh She Glow's Fluffy White Dinner Rolls when she first posted the recipe but had a major flop on my hands. I tried using all whole wheat pastry flour and for some reason the dough just didn't come together right. I had to keep adding flour and by the time they made it into the oven they were almost like biscuits. Delicious, but definitely not fluffy. Just to be safe I bought some rolls from the store and set out Wednesday night to attempt them again. I decided to try half whole wheat pastry four and half high gluten bread flour and this seems to have worked wonderfully. Let me tell you, most times I try to make anything with yeast I end up practically never wanting to touch the stuff again, but these turned out very yummy.

When they came out of the oven I didn't know what to do because I wanted to try one to make sure they turned out but I didn't want to mess up the presentation. In the end, a reassurance from my boyfriend after feeling their fluffy tops led us to the conclusion that they would be delicious and I left them as is.

Thursday morning I woke up bright and early to get a start on my pie. I also had lofty intentions of climbing a nearby mountain while the crust chilled, but I quickly ran out of time. The only other time I have made pie crust is last Thanksgiving and it turned out incredibly well for my first attempt but for some reason I was terrified I was going to mess it up this year. The crust and the pie recipes both come from The Joy of Vegan Baking. I love this book for baking for people who eat the S.A.D (Standard American Diet) and who are not as adventurous in the food they eat because the recipes are not exactly healthy and just try to recreate foods that taste good.

I gathered my crust ingredients:

And my 2 page long recipe:

And got to work. Using a food processor, I have found that this recipe is really not very difficult but both times I have made it I have had to add extra water. I think it is because I use whole wheat pastry flour instead of all purpose.

Once the dough came together, I divided it and wrapped each half in plastic wrap as a thin disk and refrigerated for at least 30 minutes. Here's where my day may have taken a turn for the worse. Actually, let me take you back about 45 minutes before the disks came together. The recipe calls for everything to be chilled for 30 minutes before beginning; the flour, the water, the sugar, the shortening. This was good since I started the day with a sink full of dishes from the night before. After putting everything in the freezer I set to work on the dishes. I finished in about 20 minutes and debated what to do with my remaining 10 minutes. I had been listening to the radio and someone had mentioned bloody mary's while cooking and I thought, hmmm, I have some champagne in my fridge and a bunch of citrus that is getting rather old, maybe I'll make a mimosa. And so I did. I squeezed some oranges, limes, lemons and grapefruits and made myself a little mimosa.

And it was delicious. I sipped on it while I made the crusts and felt all kinds of jolly holiday spirit. After the crusts were in disk form and chilling in the fridge, it was about 10 o'clock and I decided I'd really like to get a workout in. So I changed my close and jogged to 24 hour fitness. That's about a 20 minute slow jog. Then I did resistance training and weight lifting for 35 minutes and headed home, another 20 minute jog. It was on this final 20 minute jog that I realized the silliness of my ways. Have you figured out what I did wrong? In my business in the kitchen and wanting to get in a workout, I had been up for 4 hours, worked out for 1 hour 15 minutes and fueled my body with only....a mimosa. Yeah, I hadn't eaten anything. I was going to eat when I got home and I had just been so intent on getting the pie crust done that I had neglected food to fuel my workout. When I got home I was in a weird sort of place. I was super in need of food but I was so worked up that I didn't want anything. I had a tiny bite of an energy bar but found it was way too sweet. I tried a slice of bread and that was ok. I smeared some peanut butter on it and that did the trick enough to let me get in the shower and cool down. I am the sort of person who gets really rosy cheeks just running for a minute, so 20 minutes of jogging really gets me worked up. The shower cooled me down and then I proceeded to make a real breakfast. I made a wrap out of a tortilla, tofu scramble, tofurkey slices and salsa with a Trader Joe's hash brown on the side. And I felt much better. Mind you, this was now 12:15 on Thanksgiving when we were having dinner at 3, but it had to be done. Unfortunately, the damage had already been done. Do you ever work out and over do it and then feel the effects the rest of the day? I get this a lot. If I work out too hard I feel a bit of a headache and just a little off the rest of the day. I tried to fix myself by drinking tons of water but to no avail. This coupled with the aforementioned caffeine withdrawals led to a headache the entire day. Fortunately it did not ruin my mood and I was able to finish the pie with only 15 minutes to spare before I left the house.

If you managed to read all of the above, you are my new best friend. To reward you, here is the finished pie and my Thanksgiving dinner.

Tofurkey roast, cranberry sauce made by my mom, roasted yams, shallots, brussel sprouts and carrots, roll with earth balance, roasted potatoes and tofurkey gravy. Yummy! Just about everyone tried the tofurkey roast and was quite impressed, even though they are all omni's!

Pumpkin pie with Soyatoo whipped cream.

And finally, I leave you with a poster in my Aunt and Uncle's kitchen that I am madly in love with. It is from World War II I believe. I wish more people lived like this.

Not to mention how great it would be if the FDA could still say things like this. Can you imagine the FDA putting out posters saying to eat less meat? They would be crucified!

Thanks for joining me on my Thanksgiving and I hope yours was fabulous!

Just Checking In

2010-11-18T19:23:00.000-08:00

Hey Guys! I know I totally spoiled you with 4 days of posting in a row and then totally disappeared on you! What can I say? I've been busy. In fact, this little vegan who is normally in bed around 9:30 or 10 most nights has been up past 11 o'clock four consecutive nights this week. Anybody out there watching the Walking Dead? Do I have any comic book fans as readers? Do I have any readers? My boyfriend and I spend a great deal of thought and time on comics (he is trying to break into the comic writing business) and I highly recommend The Walking Dead as well as Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes. But that's not why you come here, is it? No, I know you. You want food! And I've got it for you!

Ok, so I am aware that that is a radio and not food. But I wanted to share with you my day in the kitchen from Saturday before last and no day in the kitchen is complete without my trusty radio. Sometimes I listen to CDs (my favorite are musicals!) but most of the time you'll find me listening to my local public radio station KPBS and the great news and programs they play. Anyone listen to Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me? A Way With Words? This American Life? Wow, I sound like a commercial. Well, now that we are set with something to listen to, here's how my Saturday started.

I have enough food stored away to feed myself for months. I couldn't wait to get into the pumpkin! On the agenda was:

Pumpkin Waffles (from Vegan Without a Vengeance)
Pumpkin Muffins with chocolate chips (also from VwaV)
Chocolate Chip Cookies (I have had this recipe so long I don't remember where I got it)
Pumpkin Granola

Pumpkin waffles were first up since they would be breakfast. I mixed up the batter and started them cooking while I started on the muffins.

I don't know that I will ever get over the fact that I got this thing for $2 at a garage sale!

Another thing I will never get over is how much I love these silicone muffin liners! The muffins/cupcakes just pop right out of them and there is no need for added oil or putting anything into the garbage! Win/Win

While the muffins cooked I ate waffles (plain and eaten with my hand is my favorite way to eat waffles oddly enough). I also mixed up a double batch of chocolate chip cookies. I think I've mentioned it before but my boyfriend is quite the lover of chocolate chip cookies and so I try to always have some in the house baked up and some in the freezer as well.

Here are the muffins and the first batch of cookies. I was going to make a second batch of muffins and try to alter the recipe but I ran out of both oil and sugar! The horror! My intention was going to be to reduce the oil and replace with apple sauce and reduce the sugar slightly and add fresh cranberries and walnuts. Still haven't gotten around to this yet, but I will soon!

Whilst all this was going on, I realized I had just a bit of pumpkin left in the open can and I decided to make my normal granola recipe into pumpkin granola.

Looks delicious, right? Totally is. Mmmm. Granola. Maybe that's what I should have for dessert...Sorry, back to granola.

I think granola is one of the easiest things to make. If you have never tried it you totally should!

While all this was going on, I forgot to mention that I was cooking up a batch of garbanzo beans as well.

Needless, to say, it was a very productive day in the kitchen! Now I'm off to visit my mom where we are going to be purchasing tickets for my first vacation in at least 3.5 years! I am so excited. I haven't been on a plane in about 8 years and it is going to be so nice to do some traveling! Not to mention I am going to the west coast mecha of vegan food! Any guesses as to where?

No Use Crying Over Burnt Caramel

2010-11-08T18:11:00.000-08:00

Ever since Mama Pea posted about making vegan caramel apples, it has been practically all I have thought about. Mostly just trying to come up with a place where I could share caramel apples since I really didn't need to be eating an entire one much less 4. But wait, I'm getting ahead of myself. My obsession actually goes back a bit further. A few months ago someone in my office brought in a chile covered caramel apple and was sharing it with people. I know, sharing a caramel apple? She ingeniously used an apple corer/slicer to cut the thing into 8 wedges that were then sharable. Genius, right? I commented how utterly genius I thought that was and how utterly useless that bit of information was going to be to me as I would likely never eat a caramel apple again. Fast forward to October 12th and Mama Pea posted this. It was like all my dreams had come true. Oh, except for the one where I actually had a reason to make 4 whole caramel apples.

Then the Halloween potluck at my work occurred and I thought it a perfect opportunity to try. I bought my candy thermometer and had all my ingredients. I got to working on making some dinner and my aforementioned hummus platter and before I knew it, it was 8:30 the night before the pot luck. I decided I was setting myself up for disaster if I attempted to make temperamental candy an hour and a half before I should be in bed. So I patiently waited. But not so patiently that I didn't attempt it the next day. I had all my ingredients all laid out.

I wasn't trying to multi task (which is what I almost always do in the kitchen). I was focused, I was prepared. And you know what happened? I overcooked the caramel. I do not know what happened. Everything was going fine until I got to the step that said cook for 9-11 minutes. At about 5 or 6 minutes in I started to think it looked too dark. I stuck my candy thermometer in and it immediately shot up to over 250 degrees when the whole thing was only supposed to get to 235. I knew I was going to have hard caramel but I tried it anyway. I took it off the burner and immediately dipped my apples.

The first one looked ok, but by the third one, the caramel started getting clumpy and I knew I was done. I tried to cut the first apple.

But the slicer wouldn't go through the caramel. So I used a knife that mostly cut through it ok. But the caramel was way too hard. I had failed. The only thing I can think is that Mama Pea's pot might have been thicker than mine and thus heated more slowly. Oh well, sometimes you have to live with disappointments, right? But now what to do with the one sliced and 2 caramel covered apples? I pried off the failed caramel and the skins were a little cooked from the heat. So I decided to slice them up and make these.

Apple Chips! Based on the recipe posted here from Oh She Glows. They took forever to dehydrate and they never really got chipy but they are definitely delicious!

More CSA Yumminess

2010-11-07T17:50:00.000-08:00

Two CSA's in a row now (I only get them every other weekend) I have gotten eggplants. I had never really eaten eggplants so I was a little shy on what to do with them. The first time I tried my hand at baba ghanoush but the eggplants were so tiny that I didn't really get much flesh. What I did get was pretty decent but I did not fall in love with it.

Baba ghanoush, the aforementioned red pepper hummus (not Sabra), my attempt at meatless meatballs (kind of a flop), carrots, broccoli and the best freakin pita bread on the face of the planet. Seriously, when I first became contious of what I was eating and started liking pita bread, I had to drive really far to get good pita bread with the right texture but without a list of ingredients 10 miles long. I'm going to have to do a whole post dedicated to this pita bread one day. It has, I think, no more than 5 ingredients and is the most fluffy, pocketed yummy pita bread ever. I'm gushing. Over pita bread. You know you're a foodie when....

Meanwhile, back to the point. So the next time I got eggplants I wanted to go a different route. They ended up sitting in my fridge for days and days until they were some of the last vegetables in there. Then I ended up making pizza using dough I had bought at Trader Joe's (I love this dough!). I was going to make bbq seitan pizza for my boyfriend and was debating what type of pizza to do for myself. I was down to limited options in the veggie department so here is what I went with. I sliced and roasted with a little oil and salt, the two eggplants, a yellow bell pepper and some red onion. This got done roasting well before I was ready to make my pizza and so I decided to just try a bit of the eggplant and it was love! It was the most flavorful, delicious thing ever! Ok, so I say that a lot. But it was good. I snacked on it while my boyfriend's pizza cooked and my dough came to room temperature.

I then topped my dough with some jarred spaghetti sauce (it was a really thick one too, but that made it kind of extra yummy) and piled on the vegetables. When searching for vegan eggplant pizza online I had seen someone make a pine nut cheeze so I decided to add that as well. I blended together some soaked pine nuts, nutritional yeast, lime juice (didn't have any lemons...this is a recurring theme) and I think just some salt...now I can't remember. I should really try to find that recipe again... Let me tell you, I was a little worried. It was really chunky and didn't taste like very much raw, but it was so good on the pizza.

Yum! And even though it's not vegan, here is my boyfriend's pizza. Vegetarian at least with seitan strips from Trader Joe's.

I am so excited that my CSA will have eggplant again this week!

Vegetable Soup

2010-11-06T17:41:00.000-07:00

While I'm on the subject of CSA vegetables, I would be saddened not to share with you the delicious soup I made this weekend. Whenever my CSA gives me celery, the first thing I think to make is soup. This week my soup included:

Celery
Chard
Carrots
Green Beans
Butter Beans
Red Onion
Dill
Fire Roasted Tomatoes (Muir Glen, these are the best!)

This soup was so easy it is kind of ridiculous. Chop veggies (or use food processor). Heat onion, celery and carrots in a little oil until flavorful and/or a little soft. Add the green beans, tomatoes and water and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to simmer until carrots and green beans are almost done. Add in precooked beans, chopped chard and chopped dill and cook until the greens are just wilted. I added a little salt at this point. Some days I ate it and it didn't taste like enough salt, but today when I was starving it tasted just fine!

Soooo good! And so good for you! This pot ended up huge and my boyfriend doesn't like soup. I shared a bit with my mom and froze one portion, but I have been working my way through this for days now.

And I'm not even close to sick of it!

When Life Give You Lemons...

2010-11-05T17:41:00.000-07:00

Or in this case: When your CSA gives you limes and cilantro.

Two weekends ago my CSA included a bunch of cilantro and a few limes. While I like both of those ingredients on a normal basis, my love for them has blown up over the last two weeks. My work was having a pot luck last Friday for Halloween and I decided it would be cool to bring some orange and black hummus and some dips. For orange hummus I went with roasted red peppers (I cheated and used a jar from Trader Joe's). I have actually made this a couple of times now as my boyfriend loves the roasted red pepper Sabra which is a fairly expensive habit. For the black hummus I decided to make it with black beans. I was going to go about it in the same way that I make normal hummus but once I got the beans opened inspiration struck! I added a couple cloves of garlic, a handful of cilantro, juice from a couple of limes, a little olive oil and a pinch of salt to my food processor and created one of the best things ever. My boyfriend was jealous that I wasn't leaving it at home and he could only try a bite.

I put the two hummus's (hummi?) together and created a festive little bowl. I then added some dippers around the side (secretly they were also to be sandwich toppings for me as I brought full pita bread for myself as I don't eat much at omni pot lucks).

Pita chips, pita bread, red and green bell peppers, cucumbers, pepperoncinis and some green olives.

Then, a few days later, I was reading Oh She Glow's latest post at work and saw her recipe for Avocado Lime Black Bean Salad and decided to continue the flavor combination love. No pictures of this one but it was delicious!

A few months ago I made some rice and decided to gussy my own serving up with some lemon and cilantro because I didn't think my bf would like it. Turned out he did and the other night he asked me to make it again. Having no lemons in the house at the time, I altered it by making it with lime juice. Delicious!

Then last night when I got home from the gym all I could think about was making black beans with cilantro and lime and then making a burrito out of it. So that is what I did. I had the most delicious burrito (which I neglected to take a picture of) with lime cilantro beans and rice, heirloom tomato and mashed avocado...I'm getting hungry just thinking about it.

Do yourself a favor and try some lime and cilantro with anything and everything.

Iced Coffee

2010-10-17T18:41:00.000-07:00

A number of years ago I worked as a barista at Starbucks. I was an opener which meant that I was usually off work before many people had even started their days. However, this meant that I was at work at 4:30. In the AM. Yeah, that's early. To endure such early mornings (at a time when I had a lifestyle that was not so accommodating of getting to bed early) I compensated by drinking espresso. It was not unusual to have a shot of espresso sweetened with some sugar shortly after opening and then take a break in a couple of hours and drink a venti whatever with another 3 shots of espresso. I was easily up to 4 or 5 shots of espresso before 10 o'clock in the morning when I finally moved on to bigger and better things. When I started my current job about three years ago my stomach had gotten to the point that even the hint of coffee made me sick and so I stayed away from it for a good long time. Then, around a year ago I decided to give a tiny bit of coffee a shot. And it was ok. I started off drinking only half a cup maybe once or twice a week. Then it started to be a few days a week every week, then mostly every day every week. Now I am back up to a cup or two of coffee every day I work and I am making coffee at home. I used to sort of like the fact that my stomach couldn't handle the coffee because then I wasn't tempted to drink it. Working at Starbucks, I know that it can be an expensive habit. Luckily my work offers free coffee and since I once was a barista, I can make quite a decent cup of coffee. Still sometimes, when I am out and about, I am tempted to stop at Starbucks and get something quick and easy. A few weekends ago I was out looking for garage sales and was tempted to stop and get some iced coffee. I broke down and stopped. I got out of my car, walked in the door, saw the line was 15 people long and walked straight back out. By now though I had decided it was ok to stop and get coffee so it made sense that I should go to a different Starbucks, but when I got there, it was no longer there. I took this as my sign that I should just go home and make it myself. So that's what I did. Why is any of this of interest to you? Because I'd like to teach you how to make Iced Coffee at home! Hope you're still with me.

First things first, you need coffee. If you are making Iced Coffee, you need coffee brewed at double strength. The suggested proportions for normal coffee are 1 TBS of ground coffee for every 6 oz of water, so if you are brewing double strength you want 2 TBS of ground coffee for every 6 oz of water. If you have a coffee machine, use it. I am mostly happy just using my french press. Pour the grounds in the bottom, add boiling water, set for 4 minutes and then push the plunger down.


Brewing

Pressed

While that is brewing you need to make a simple syrup. As you probably know, sugar does not mix into cold drinks so well and so you need to make it into a syrup to get it mix properly. All you need is sugar, water and possibly some vanilla. I am not sure what the exact proportions should be but I just added some sugar and then a little water to get it liquidy. Really technical here, I know. Cook that until all the sugar is dissolved and remove from heat.

As soon as that is ready it is time to assemble everything. You will need:

Soy Milk
Simple Syrup
Coffee
Ice

I spooned some of the simple syrup into a little dish to help it cool off a bit.

First you want to fill your glass to the top with ice.

Then you want to pour in the syrup.

Next, you want to pour in the coffee.

You want to fill the cup about 3/4 of the way full (if you had espresso you would use less but since coffee even at double strength isn't as strong you need a bit more).

Next you want to give it a good stir. The key here is to get the coffee cooled down so that when you add the milk it doesn't get warm and, I hate the imagery of this word, coagulated.

The ice will melt a little which is exactly why we brew the coffee at double strength. (Side note here: If you are going to refrigerate the remaining coffee and use it at a later time to make more iced coffee, make sure you heat the coffee back up prior to assembling or else you will have a seriously strong drink. Or maybe that's your thing and you should try it. Who am I to judge?) Anyway, back to the drink at hand. Next you want to fill the cup to the top with soy milk.

This is my favorite part. Look how pretty it all looks.

The final step is to give it one last stir and pop a straw in it.

And there you have it. Iced coffee to rival that of any coffee house and at what I am sure is a fraction of the price. I hope you all enjoyed this as I think it may have been my first real procedure post. I never quite understood how much work it is to put one of these together. Please let me know if you try this!

Living with a Picky Omni

2010-09-28T20:06:00.000-07:00

My boyfriend leans mostly vegetarian and has no problem with most vegan meals. He likes cheese and he likes pizza and if we go out to eat at a restaurant he will sometimes get fish or chicken but he was also a fan of tofu before I even knew what it was. He has no problem with meatless meatballs in spaghetti, bean and rice burritos (with cheese), tvp chili, chickenless nuggets and veggie burgers. He just has one request; that there be no onions, greens or chunks of tomatoes or peppers in anything he has to eat. This seemingly simple request, coupled with the fact that those happen to be some of my favorite parts of cooking, creates quite a situation. In the beginning I tried to cater to him so that he would eat more healthily. This worked well but after a while I felt bummed I had to miss out on some of my favorite foods just to get him to eat my cooking. This led to a completely opposite approach wherein I cooked what I wanted to eat, the way I wanted to cook it, and if he didn't like it then he could have a boca burger or make some spaghetti (did I mention he hates cooking?). This worked well for a while except that it had us eating different meals almost every night for dinner and I never wanted to make anything complicated because is it really worth it to spend 2 hours in the kitchen making every last thing from scratch just to be the only one to enjoy it? The answer is no. So I ate a lot of roasted vegetables, salads and sandwiches and grew to miss creating masterpieces of dinner in the kitchen. I have finally come to a middle ground and I have to say that while it is mostly satisfying, it also sometimes means 1.5 to 2 times the work. Let me give you an example.

Sunday morning I was going to make a big breakfast when I got home from the markets and my boyfriend woke up. I ended up getting home at almost noon and he had already eaten and I was so hungry I almost gnawed my own arm off in the car on the way home (not vegan). The whole day I was craving some breakfast so I decided to do breakfast for dinner. I made tofu scramble and breakfast potatoes and here is how I compromised. (I forgot to take pictures of his food so you'll have to use your imagination).

I used to make tofu scramble by first sauteing onions, garlic and greens in oil and then adding in the tofu. Now I just heat up some oil and add in the tofu and some spices. This time I added in a little chopped seitan sausage that I had made last weekend to give it an extra breakfast feel. Once the tofu is cooked to my liking, I dump half (ok, more like 2/3s. He definitely eats more tofu than I do) onto a plate and put it aside. I then add to the pan some chopped chard and cook until it is soft.

I love my breakfast potatoes with tons of onions and bell peppers. Yum. I experimented with leaving the peppers and onions in and just having my boyfriend pick them out, but that lead to a good deal of wasted food. The solution I have come to is cooking up a pan of potatoes in oil with a sprinkling of salt until they are done, and then onto a plate they go. I then cook up my own potatoes, with as many onions and bell peppers as I please.

The only problem I can find with this solution (apart from it taking extra time and effort) is that his food is always done before mine. Luckily there is a simple solution, he doesn't mind microwaving his food back to temperature.

The result of this compromise is that I get to eat exactly what I want:

He gets to eat exactly what he wants, I get praised as a great cook and it only takes minimal extra effort. Now if only I could get him to help in the kitchen...

Tonight's Dinner

2010-09-25T21:51:00.000-07:00

I have a number of pictures that I need to write up posts to go with but I had to share my dinner from tonight. I spent a good chunk of yesterday and today going to three of the 4 grocery stores I frequent and tomorrow I will hit up the fourth along with the farmer's market. I have (possibly unrealistic) intentions of not having to stop at a store to get more than one or two things for the next couple of months. One of the stores I shop at is the People's Co-Op in Ocean Beach. I love going to this store and wish it was closer to my house because, if it was, it would be the only store I needed in addition to the farmer's market. Se la vie I guess. So once every couple of months I make the trek out to OB with my tupperware, glass jars and canvas bags and go to town in their bulk section and their wide selection of vegan friendly items.

Last time I went to People's (at least I think it was the last time) I ate lunch there in their deli. See this post for more detail. This time I thought I might pop up to the deli and see if I couldn't get some of that mock tuna salad to take home and try to recreate a tuna melt. Sadly they did not have the mock tuna but I did take home some mock chicken salad. I settled on a chicken salad melt and I'm so glad I did.

I started by grilling two pieces of bread spread with Earth Balance. I then topped one piece of bread with slices of an heirloom tomato I bought today while I left the other piece of bread in the pan with a Tofutti cheese slice on it to melt.

I then topped this with some lettuce.

Then topped that with the mock chicken salad.

Finally I stuck the two together and cut in half.

Can you tell me that doesn't look delicious? While I definitely don't think it is something to be enjoyed every day, it was a nice to eat something that reminded me of my pre vegan days but in at least a slightly healthier manner.
In addition, I was going to eat this with some spicy thai kettle chips but I had so much tomato left over and it was so delicious I left it at that.

Yum!

Don't You Hate It When....

2010-09-01T21:17:00.000-07:00

You make a dinner that turns out to be ridiculously yummy but neglect to take a picture of it? Tonight I baked some fries and browned some sliced tofurkey sausages. That was going to be dinner until I looked in the fridge and saw avocado and salsa. Then the thought of breakfast burritos hit me and that was that. I filled up a tortilla with some of the fries, the sausage and some mashed avocado mixed with a little lemon and garlic salt and ate the thing with some salsa on the side. Holy hell it was delicious. Now I'm thinking about how I could make some scrambled ~~egg~~ tofu to put in there as well. Perhaps this weekend.

On an unrelated note (but one that comes to my attention as I type this), I have recently learned that when typing you are only supposed to put one space after the period. This is something I had never heard of until about two weeks ago. I was always taught to space twice after a period. Let me tell you, after 15ish years of typing, this is a hard habit to break. How many spaces were you taught to put after a period? Sorry for the tangent but this sort of thing fascinates me.

But onto the food!

I have recently fallen in love with tofurkey slices. I try not to eat too much fake meat and instead stick to less processed foods, but lately I have had a hankerin for a good sandwich. My office orders sandwiches every Thursday but as my only option would be veggies with mustard, avocado and oil and vinegar for $6, I don't participate. This lead to the first purchase of the tofurkey slices. Yup, you read that right, first. Of two. I also bought some veganaise back before Comic Con to make this broccoli salad and had been contemplating in which manner to use the remainder of it. This was the perfect excuse. There is something really comforting about a "turkey" sandwich with "mayo" and tons of veggies.

Oh, and did I mention I bought prepackaged onion rings too? I hate it when I do that. Oh well, at least my failure tasted good even if it did cost an arm and a leg.

Lately I have been feeling a little iron deficient. Granted I am self diagnosing with no real nutritional background, but I had been feeling really tired and had a recurring headache. That coupled with four unexplained bruises made me go on an iron deficiency cure diet.

I started with spinach. Added some lentils. And threw in some broccoli for good measure.

There is also carrots, onions and wild rice mixed with dried cranberries and pepitas (didn't turn out as god as I'd hoped). I call this plate the Iron Deficiency Cure.

After this I tried to take the leftover lentils and rice and make them into a loaf. Notice the use of the word tried.

I am making it my personal mission to make a vegan loaf that does not fall apart. You are all my witnesses. I will have success! Oh, and that's one of my homemade refrigerator pickles in the back there.

I also used spinach to make a crazy concoction that worked out unbelievably well.

This beauty consists of:
Spinach
Juice of half a grapefruit
Juice of one lemon
Chopped ginger
A tiny bit of honey
And some water.

I was going to make a strawberry lemonade but ended up deciding to put some spinach in and leaving out the strawberries. Then I just kept adding things and I was really afraid when it came out all foamy, but it was soooooo unbelievably delicious.

And while we are on the subject of beverages...
I talked a couple of weeks ago about the margarita I was drinking while blogging and I wanted to show it to you.

It was all Trader Joe's fault. I don't even remember what I went in there for, but on a super hot day they had displayed right in front tequila and margarita mix. Sometimes I am a sucker for advertising and the thought of an ice cold margarita on the hot summer day sounded so appetizing. I did a quick google search on my phone to find out the ingredients in a home made margarita since the mix they had had high fructose corn syrup in it and I found that all I needed was tequila, triple sec and limes. I believe the recipe was 1 part lime juice, 2 parts triple sec and 3 or 4 parts tequila. This was a darn yummy margarita.

Until next time, thanks for joining me!

Garden Bounty

2010-08-22T19:01:00.000-07:00

Ok, so in actuality, my garden has not provided near the bounty I expected for the amount of work, time and money I put into it but I hardly expected a perfect harvest in my first garden. Regardless, my garden has provided some bounty and I'd like to share it with you.

Let me begin by introducing you to my new acquaintance. I say acquaintance as we are far from friends. This little guy was munching on one of my cherry tomatoes and had gotten huge before I knew to look for him. He is about 2 inches long and has a scary looking spike that is apparently harmless. I have since learned to look for evidence of these guys before they get so large.

You may remember this sunflower that was a beauty of my garden which I didn't even have to plant. I was so looking forward to some sunflower seeds but after this picture was taken, this baby started wilting and produced no seeds. :-( I ended up pulling it.

I had high hopes for this little butternut squash but it has been stunted at this size for weeks now and I don't think it is going to make it.

But onto happier subjects. This is the second heirloom tomato my plant produced. It was soooo delicious. I literally stopped buying tomatoes and thus eating tomatoes because the ones you get in the store and even most of the ones from the farmers market just do not taste like tomatoes. This is what a tomato should taste like....wow I wish I had one now...

Here is the above tomato along with some cherry tomatoes and some green beans. I didn't think the green bean bush was ever going to produce but it just lately has started. I think it is due to the fact that we have had such a mild summer so far. Hopefully things will explode now that it is finally getting hot around here.

And finally a dinner using my garden bounty. Garden burger, Trader Joe's soy nuggets, cherry tomatoes, heirloom tomato and green beans. YUM!

Refigerator Cucumbers

2010-08-22T18:48:00.000-07:00

My CSA gave me pickling cucumbers and I have never canned anything before. I do not have the equipment to properly can so I set about on the interwebs to locate a method for making pickles without actually going through the canning process. The process I found was relatively simple. Of course, since this was a couple of weeks ago I have since lost the actual link, but it went something like this.

Take 7 or 8 pickling cucumbers, 3 or 4 sprigs of dill, 2 cloves of garlic, vinegar, salt and water.

Slice cucumbers to about 1/2 to 3/4 inch thick and slice garlic.

Add to jar with dill and about a teaspoon (I think) of salt and fill half way with vinegar.

Fill to the top with water.

Place lid on jar and put in refrigerator for at least 8 hours. I am told these should last at least a month. I don't think they are as good as if I would have made proper pickles, but they do the job.

Birthdays!

2010-08-21T10:55:00.000-07:00

It is this happy vegan's birthday! What am I doing today? Since it is Saturday morning I am most likely at the gym but hopefully I have been on a hike and will be getting some dinner at this restaurant I keep meaning to try. And don't do a double take. I did indeed title this post birthdays as in plural. My boyfriend's birthday happens to be the day after mine. My boyfriend's mom is planning a dinner tomorrow for us. She also invited my parents for desert and this will be the first time they meet. I'm so excited! Pictures to follow at a future date and time! See you all later!

Some Random Dinners

2010-08-20T18:07:00.000-07:00

Since this post is going to be so random I think I will refrain from much commentary save for expliantion of what it is.

Cantaloupe halve filled with blueberries, grapes, strawberries and cherries.

That thing was nothing compared to this cantaloupe. I cut this thing open last night and I think it is easily the best cantaloupe I have ever eaten. I have yet to cut open that watermelon. Those are both from the farmer's market last Sunday.

Chicken Boca Burger mania. Wrapped in lettuce with Spicy Sabra Hummus. Yum.

And the full plate.

Chicken Boca Burger on a sandwich thin with Trader Joe's hash brown, tomato form my garden, steamed broccoli and corn and a smidgen of hummus.

Black beans, corn and oven fries.

Fennel potatoes that my boyfriend didn't like and so ate with ketchup. I thought they were delicious.

Oven fries with a salad of CSA goodness. Lettuce, cucumber, heirloom tomato and some hummus.

Boca burger with lettuce and avocado, hash brown and tomato sprinkled with pepper.

Lentils cooked with onions and shredded carrots topped with avocado and salsa with a side of rye bread with earth balance.

This was a fantastic dinner! I learned a new trick to toss my spaghetti with a little olive oil after cooking. It makes the sauce stick to the pasta so much better and leftovers are a million times better! I also make toast and spread with earth balance and then run a piece of cut garlic over it to make quick garlic bread. The salad consisted of lettuce from my CSA, cherry tomatoes from my garden and topped with hummus. The spaghetti also has Trader Joe's meatless meatballs. Yum!

This was one of the first meals I ate at home after Comic Con. Defrosted tofu quiches, hash brown with ketchup and two pieces of toast. One had jelly and the other earth balance along with a lonely piece of frozen broccoli.

A few nights ago I tried my hand at making home made tortilla chips. They turned out decent but I didn't have quite enough oil to get them exactly right. Still delicious.

I paired them with some salsa, steamed corn, broccoli and carrots and some pan fried prebaked tofu.

A few weeks ago I went to an off site meeting with my boss with one of our clients and on the way back to the office he stopped at Denny's for us to get lunch. I was pleasantly surprised to find that Denny's offers Boca burgers! I got this with onion rings, bbq sauce, tomato, onion and lettuce and it was quite good. I should post this in an ongoing series of "Proof That Vegan's Can Eat Anywhere!".

At one of the other restaurants I sort of work for, Indigo Grill (I am a bookkeeper for multiple restaurants) I got a plate they call Good Things Growing that they made vegan. This plate is a mash up of a bunch of different vegan options. One time when I came in they made it with this rice with cranberries and pepitas that was so delicious but I have yet to have that again since. This plate consisted of butternut squash, an anaheim pepper stuffed with corn and other veggies, a chunk of tofu, a salad with pears, red pepper and a fried beet slice, roasted garlic, roasted potatoes and grilled plantains. Yummy!

And here is my boyfriend's half chicken with beans, rice, guac and I believe a mole sauce.

And here is my plate of leftovers combined with some toast with earth balance.

And that is the end of my randomness. Promise the next post will have more structure. Assuming I get a next post written....I mean, for sure. See you tomorrow!

Pancakes & Garage Sales

2010-08-17T17:35:00.000-07:00

This was my first attempt to make pancakes without a recipe. It was decent but landed more in the fail column than in the win column. I wanted them to come out a bit on the thicker side so I was afraid to add too much liquid and in the end they turned out half an inch thick. Definitely were not bad though.

I wanted to show you how I cook my pancakes on my garage sales finds.

This is my beautiful cast iron skillet (I love it so much I should give it a name. I think I'll call it Vera. Firefly, anyone?). As I have mentioned before, I got this baby at a garage sale for $1! Find of the century for me. I had been wanting one for so long and even looked to buy one new but they were about $20 - $30. For something that I wasn't 100% sure I would ever need, I didn't think it was worth the price so I continued to look at garage sales until one day the garage sale gods smiled down on me. Now, while I love Vera and she makes great pancakes, she only makes one at a time. And me, I'm a multi-tasker. I don't do one thing at once hardly ever. Luckily I made another garage sale find that fixed this problem.

When I first started coming over to my boyfriend's house, I noticed one day that his mom had a cast iron griddle that sat upon two burners. I thought this was one of the most genius inventions ever and immediately wanted one. Could I find one? Of course not. I looked for months and then one random day, this showed up at a garage sale. It only sits across one burner but it lets me cook two pancakes at a time which means, combined with Vera, I can make THREE pancakes at once! Score!

What are your thoughts on cast iron? I personally think it is the most amazing, incredible equipment I have ever used.

Basil Strawberry Creamy Goodness

2010-08-16T16:17:00.000-07:00

I store my compostable scraps in a container on my counter until it is full and then I take it downstairs to the compost pile. One day when I opened the container I was met by an intriguing smell. Usually I try to keep from smelling when I open the container as it is not generally a pleasant smell but this time was different. When I investigated further I found that the aroma was coming from a combination of strawberry and basil. This smell combination fascinated me. I googled strawberries and basil and found a number of people had already discovered this genius combination. The next time I got some basil and strawberries in my CSA I decided to take this flavor combination for a test drive.

It's been a while since I made this but I think that in the mini food processor are frozen strawberries, basil and soy milk. Pulsed for a minute or two, this came out nice and creamy and delicious.

I love the little flecks of green. Don't be afraid to give this a try.

Comic Con

2010-08-15T21:56:00.000-07:00

Every year my boyfriend and I wait 51 weeks for our favorite time of year. No, I'm not talking about Christmas, though it is a little like Christmas for the two of us. I am talking about the San Diego Comic Con. I had been to Comic Con before meeting my boyfriend but it wasn't until we started dating that I started actually reading comics. Now I could tell you so much about the Marvel Universe that your head might explode. Comic Con isn't simply about comics anymore but is a place where sci-fi, fantasy, gaming, movies, pop culture and comics all collide. It takes place over a 4 day period and we suck up every last minute of it. We go to panels where we hear people talk and answer questions about books, authors, shows, movies and anything else we love. We walk the floor where there is art, previews, merchandise, celebrities and even some movie set pieces. We people watch including taking pictures of people dressed up like their favorite characters. But mostly we just geek out at getting to spend a weekend away from the reality of life and immerse ourselves in the culture that we love. I would like to share, with you all, some of that culture.

If you've never seen the BBC show, Dr Who, then do yourself a favor and start watching it. I started on the 9th doctor which is season 1 of the relaunch from I think 2005 or 2006. It is a fantastic show! I didn't manage to get any pictures of people dressed as the doctor (there were a ton!) but I did get pictures of people dressed as the Tardis, an alien, robot enemy and a Dalek!

I also got a USB hub (which I needed anyway) that is shaped like the Tardis and makes the Tardis noise when you plug or unplug anything! It is brilliant!

One of my favorite shows to see people dress up as also happens to be one of my favorite cartoons.

Here we have Baron Underbite, Sargent Hatred, Dr Mrs The Monarch and the Monarch. They look pretty fabulous. I have also seen a number of Molotov Cocktease's in years past but did not see any this year.
From another adult swim show, I saw Dr Rockso, the rock 'n roll clown from Metalocalypse, but I will spare you that horror. Be grateful.

My boyfriend and I love Marvel and usually spend a great deal of time at the Marvel booth. This year since we didn't get to the floor as much as we'd like, we didn't spend too much time there, but we definitely did get to see some set pieces from upcoming Marvel movies.

This is Odin's throne from the upcoming movie Thor.

And here is Captain America's shield from the upcoming Captain America movie. We also saw the crowns from Thor for Loki, Thor and Odin but I neglected to get a picture. The throne was the talk of twitter while we were there with numerous people posting pictures of random people in the throne. The most awesome one was a bunch of slave Leia's all crowded around. See a picture here.

Thursday night was a little lacking in anything we actively wanted to see or attend and so my boyfriend and I decided to cut out early for one night and go to a restaurant downtown that I sort of work for. Henry's Pub can be quite the happening place any night of the week. It is a great bar/club with some pretty great food. We were lucky enough to get a table and get some great food. Bonus points to the restaurant as they actually had a vegan entree on the menu that was soooo delicious. But before we get to that, booze was had. Let me preempt this by saying that I am not a drinker. (Ok, so right now I am actually drinking a margarita for the second day this week, but really, usually I am not a drinker). But Henry's Pub had Comic Con themed drinks.

First there were Avengers shots. My boyfriend ordered the Captain America which was layered with something red and something blue and I ordered the Hulk shot. My boyfriend also got this:

Lord Vader consisting of Jager and Root Beer. I had never heard of this combination but I have to say that it is THE most logical combination I have ever heard of.

Here is the Vader and the Cap shot.

And here are the Hulk and Cap shots together.

And here is my food. Rice, beans, steamed veggies, salsa and avocado. Good lord this was fantastic. We spent most of the weekend eating foods that didn't have to be heated or refrigerated so it was nice eating something hot that was absolutely delicious (and vegan!).

My boyfriend got the chicken tacos that he said were also delicious. Henry's Pub was definitely a win for Comic Con dinner.

And I'd like to close with one final picture. While waiting in a line that wrapped around a nearby hotel to get into a Venture Brother's panel, I got to witness first hand how our bananas are delivered.

A banana boat! That's a lot of bananas. Yum!

Hope you enjoyed my Comic Con journey. More vegan food tomorrow!

Fashion

2010-07-19T18:39:00.000-07:00

A great fashion sense is something I mostly lack. I choose functionality over fashion 95% of the time. That doesn't mean I don't appreciate fashion, it just isn't something I have really ever "gotten". I admire someone who can go into a used clothes store and see some piece of clothing and have a vision of what it could be like in an outfit. Even more I admire someone who can pick out their own fabric, find a pattern (or make one themselves) and make something beautiful and unique. I stumbled upon a blog yesterday of someone who fits these categories incredibly well. Out of Order is an incredible blog filled with wonderfully assembled outfits and a an amazing joyous outlook on life. I have spent the last hour or two looking at past posts and let me just tell you, this girl should be working in fashion. She has fantastic style and a great personality. And to top it off, she has inspired me to try to step my style up a notch. (Or maybe just a half until I have some time to go shopping for some used clothes). Check her out even if you don't like fashion. She has some great pictures of other things as well.

Daiya Cheeze

2010-07-11T22:34:00.000-07:00

Recently, the topic of vegan cheeze was brought up and I mentioned Daiya was the craze of the interwebs but that it couldn't be found in stores yet. My boyfriend then informed me that the grocery store he works at does indeed carry it now. He brought me home a package of the mozzarella style and I made quick work of it. I enjoyed it well enough but it is not something I couldn't live without. My omni boyfriend on the other hand, said it was horrible and nothing like cheese. Oh well. You can't please everyone. The first thing I made with it was a meatless ball sandwich.

Then of course I attempted pizza. I use premade dough from Trader Joe's and veggeroni from Fat Free Vegan.

The taste was decent enough and it definitely melted but it did have a weird sort of stick to the roof of your mouth quality. Enjoyable enough, but I am just fine with cheeseless pizza 99% of the time.

The next weekend when I was at the Co-Op I shop at I found that they had the cheddar version so I bought some of that as well. This was used to make burritos and quesadillas.

The above burrito is using a gluten free tortilla from Trader Joe's made of brown rice. I do not recommend. They did not roll, did not soften in a pan and didn't taste all that great. Below is using a traditional burrito tortilla. Much better.

I have been having lots of foods topped by avocado and pico de gallo lately.

Barley chili inspired by Vegan Eats & Treats and from 500 Recipes.

Roasted potatoes. I have become a little bit obsessed with potatoes the last week. I have always loved them but I have been making them a lot this last week.

Be back with some more yummy pictures hopefully tomorrow. I did a whole lot of baking between the last two weekends.

Friday Follow

2010-07-02T19:22:00.000-07:00

So, since I don't really use my twitter for anything but following people and I know I have at least 2 readers here, I thought I would do a quick Friday Follow here.

First up is a blogger whose recipes I use quite often and am about to embark on a journey with tonight to make the yummy looking blueberry banana bread. Fat Free Vegan

Next is one of my favorite bloggers for her amazingly upbeat outlook on life and her ability to always make me smile (not to mention some great recipes), Chocolate Covered Katie

And finally, the blog that brings a little bit of laughter into almost every single day, Peas & Thank You

Thank you lovely people for bringing so much knowledge and joy to my life.

Fruits & Vegetables

2010-06-29T14:00:00.000-07:00

I may have gone a little overboard this weekend. This is the supplement to my CSA. I probably should have read what I was getting before I went through the rest of the market picking things up. Things I got in duplicate: Cucumbers, cherries, carrots and green beans. In addition I got: Avocados, a red pepper, peaches, nectarines, plums, apricots, broccoli and chard.

And in my CSA I got: Blood oranges, squash, strawberries, beets, lettuce, grapefruits and basil in addition to the aforementioned: Cucumbers, green beans, carrots and cherries.

Good thing this gives me the opportunity to have meals like this:

Sushi with brown rice, cucumber, chard, and teryaki marinated yellow squash topped with avocado and teryaki sauce. Nomnomnom.

And this one that I just enjoyed:

Proof that a girl can live on fruit alone....

Well, fruit and water.

Being a Creative Vegan

2010-06-28T14:38:00.000-07:00

People seem to always think that eating vegan must be difficult. My number one answer to the question "isn't being vegan hard?" is that it is super easy for me since I mostly make my own food. However, when it comes to eating out it is never all that difficult. If I am going to someones house I try to verify that there will be a salad or some roasted veggies and then offer to bring or ask if they'll have some hummus and pita bread or veggies. Going to my boyfriend's family's house this is almost never a problem. They usually have a salad and are pretty good at providing some hummus. I can make quite a dinner of veggies (raw or roasted) with hummus and some bread. If you add an avocado in there somewhere I might feel like I am eating better than everyone else is.

When it comes to restaurants it gets a little more complicated. I do frequent a few vegetarian restaurants with many vegan options but that is usually just my boyfriend and I. If we are joining family members for a meal of their choosing it is time for me to get creative.

Today was my boyfriend's sisters birthday and her breakfast choice was Ihop. My first reaction was "What the heck am I going to be able to eat there?". Then I checked out their menu and continued along that line of thinking. Pancakes, eggs, bacon, sausage, omelets....oh dear. Then I saw that they had a fruit bowl. And hash browns. And toast. And I knew I was set. I ended up getting all three and adding omelet toppings to my hash browns. They had spinach, tomatoes, onions and green peppers. I also got coffee and orange juice.

I kid you not when I say that this was the best breakfast at the table and I was so excited to get to eat such a yummy, creative breakfast. Proof that, being creative, a vegan can eat just about anywhere in this meat and potatoes world we live in.

Cats! (For Reals This Time)

2010-06-27T14:38:00.000-07:00

I have three cats. This may or may not qualify me as a crazy cat lady. As much as I adore my three cats, I will never have three at one time ever again. Regardless, they do make for some interesting photo ops.

This is Fluffy.

This is Jinx (he and Fluffy are brother and sister)

And this is Precious. She is ironically named as she seemed Precious when I first got her and then she later turned out to be quite a handful. She has a number of "quirks" that ~~only a mother could love~~ annoy the hell out of me. She's darn lucky that I love her regardless. As I have mentioned before, Precious has a love of greenery. This is her nibbling on the top of a carrot I pulled from my garden.

Wait, you mean I didn't tell you I harvested a carrot? Here, let me show you!

You know, maybe I have a better picture. Maybe one without a blurry cat tail in it?

There, that's bett....oh wait...Jinx! He is going after the plastic bag filled with vital wheat gluten. He loves plastic. I have heard it is like kitty crack (more so than catnip). Precious and Fluffy may go crazy for my home grown catnip but Jinx is happier with a plastic bag to lick.

Ok, so enough cats and let me tell you about a new discovery. Gena at Choosing Raw had a guest poster about a week ago from Oh She Glows. I had yet to come across this blog and was blown away with it. Angela could not have come up with a better name for her site. She has such amazing energy and every post seems to glow. I have been inspired a lot by a number of her posts (not to mention that I want to order some of her Glo Bars) but the one that kept popping out at me as I read further and further into her archives was Vegan Overnight Oats (VOO). I decided to try it this weekend. I am happy to report that it turned out fabulous. I layered the cold oats with some peanut butter mixed with maple syrup for a delicious breakfast.

Gosh darn cats. Can't escape them.

I also topped the oats with this chocolate/sunflower seed/peanut concoction I made the night before.

Can't I get one picture without a cat in it? No Jinx, you can't have my oats.

Finally, a catless picture. Hope I didn't scare anyone off with my silly cat centric comments.

Be back tomorrow with proof that a creative vegan can eat anywhere.

CSA Farm Tour

2010-06-20T18:03:00.000-07:00

I get my CSA at the Hillcrest Farmer's Market every other Sunday from JR Organics. Every week on Monday or Tuesday I get an email telling me the contents of this weeks box. A few weeks ago a second email was also sent telling us about a chance to visit the farm. I jumped at the opportunity, and on June 12th I visited JR Organics. It was a wonderful experience! We got to see how the seeds are started & transplanted, how they rotate crops, keep pests at bay, compost, harvest and package the vegetables and fruits I simply pick up from them. They also provided us with a delicious lunch! There were many offerings for everyone including vegans! It is so rare to get to eat food that I don't have to prepare or ask a million questions about that this was such an added treat. And as an added bonus, we got to eat strawberries that we picked ourselves.

Rice & veggies, roasted veggies, pico de gallo, guacamole, cucumber salad, tortilla chips and a salad with nopales. Everything except the chips was made that morning by the women who work/live on the farm.

Pinto Beans.

Lentil Soup. Yum!

And I think I will throw in some lingering random CSA pictures.

And finally, proof that my cats like CSAs too!

Precious (the black one) loves greens.

I hope I haven't spoiled you with three postings in a row. That was most all of the pictures I had to share and since the cinnamon rolls I made this weekend failed, I am afraid I might not be back for a bit....we'll see.

Foods! Omnomnomnom

2010-06-19T19:42:00.000-07:00

I'm going to give this to you with relatively little commentary.

Lunch at People's Co-op. Kale salad, tofu and the best "tuna" salad ever.

Banana Hammock in honor of Chocolate Covered Katie.

Really yummy bean dip I made for my mom for Mother's Day to go along with this:

Carrot Cake. How cute is that carrot!

One day I was feeling a little like I was getting sick so I used the oranges from my CSA and made blood orange juice.

I had a couple of weeks where I didn't get to eat the apples fast enough and so they got a little soft. I used them to make muffins. These turned out remarkably well considering I misread apple cider for apple cider vinegar. They were a little tart but delicious regardless.

Taco salad. This is from a while ago but along the lines of what I ate all week. This one had steamed broccoli, frozen peas and corn, salsa, black beans, lettuce and tortilla chips. My salads of late have added avocado.

Waffle with strawberries and some maple syrup with a little cocoa powder mixed in.

This was sad face was actually a delicious dinner. I had some everything bagels in my freezer. I toasted and then topped with spaghetti sauce and some meatless balls. Most of the time my boyfriend does not care for my dinners. This one he was envious of. Not the toast with lentils though. That was another great combo. Toast with earth balance topped with cold lentils that had been cooked with garlic and onions.

Speaking of lentils. Familiar meal.

And to round off this yumminess, Sipz Vegan Caterpillar Roll. Teriyaki mushrooms, sweet potato and I think cucumber.

And some imitations.

Mine has meatless balls and bbq sauce in it.

As does my boyfriend's.

Thinking: but that's not sushi...

How about this one??

That's vegan pepperoni. I say, if it has rice and is wrapped in nori, then it's sushi.

And finally, I leave you with a message presented to me upon entering the farmer's market one weekend.

Thanks for listening.

Cats!

2010-06-18T19:32:00.000-07:00

Just kidding! They may come later but for now, I can't wait to show you my garden.

I started out with this beautiful space and absolutely no experience.

I can claim none of the skill that it takes to build the retaining walls as that was entirely my neighbor. He did a fantastic job. My contribution was digging up all the dirt and sifting out the rocks. They ranged from the size of a tiny birds egg to the size of a large grapefruit. I had almost forgotten how much work that was.

I did a really poor job of planting back in April and thus didn't know where anything was planted. I just watered everywhere and hoped for the best. Not too long afterward I started getting some sprouts.

Unfortunately, most of them failed. The whole left section did not take off. I suspected the sprouts were being eaten. Around this time my neighbors transplanted one of their plants (we think a squash) to my middle section. It was planted along side the most prominent thing in my garden: a sunflower that I didn't even plant.

Said squash and sunflower chugged along but seemed to have been eaten over night. It was at this time that I was trying to figure out what was eating everything. I read to switch from watering at night to the morning to deter pests from eating my plants at night. One of my first mornings watering, this is what I found.

I kindly asked them to get off my plant and relocated them across the yard (they took an entire leaf with them as payment for having to evacuate). At this point I knew I had to do something. I scoured the internet for ways to keep them off my veggies but without much luck. It was either keep them off using chemicals or kill them using natural solutions (beer). I ended up going to an organic gardening store and they sold me some organic slug repellent along with some fertilizer. The fertilizer is not vegan and that is something I am going to have to come up with a more friendly way eventually. For now, I was overwhelmed and I caved. Sue me.

The plants that did survive are mostly all tomatoes. These are two heirloom tomato plants. I have about 10 cherry tomato plants as well. This is getting into May when things started doing fairly well.

Other survivors: 4ish carrots, one head lettuce, one snap pea plant, a couple of peppers I started in pots, an onion or two.

For a few weeks this lettuce was the only thing doing great. I even harvested it!

The other success story of my garden was one of my pots which contained catnip! I always knew cats liked to chew on grass and I didn't doubt my cats would feel any differently. Precious (the black one) loves to chew on corn husks and many of the greens I bring into the house.

Sometimes they got so rough with the grass that they knocked the pot over. They loved it!

The only other thing I have been able to harvest is some cilantro and a little bit of parsley.

Cilantro grown from seed!

But back to that measly little sunflower that was the highlight of my May garden.

In June, it has not only grown up nice and strong (and continues to amaze me every day with how it chases the sun) but it has some large companions. The stunted squash that refused to grow after the snails feasted on it finally took off. It is spreading itself out and has grown two flowers.

This section has been moved around a lot but there are some carrots, lettuce, peppers, onions and lots of tomatoes.

The cherry tomato plants have blossoms all over them and I now have a few mini tomatoes coming in, including this:

My very first cherry tomato ever! Even with no experience and a number of failures, that is success! If I get nothing but tomatoes I would be happy.

In the back there you can see my heirloom tomato plants coming along. They are not as strong as I would like, but they have flowers as well.

As for the plot to the left of the sunflower, it failed a number of times. I am currently on my third complete redo of the area. I got really excited when I dug and found worms but the ground just wouldn't stay wet and not even weeds were growing there. This time I moved 2 of my tomato plants over there along with what I think is broccoli that was the sole survivor of the last attempt. I also bought 2 plants to try out since it didn't seem seeds liked coming up there. I got a bell pepper plant as well as a green bean plant.

The first time I attempted to transplant tomatoes over to this section I uber failed. They died instantly. I transplanted them around 6 at night and by 6 the next morning they were looking pitiful and by 6 the next evening, they were goners. Live and learn.

So that, my friends, is my garden. Hopefully the next time I talk about my garden it is to show you my bountiful harvests! I will be back tomorrow with pictures of all the yummy foods I have eaten since I've been gone along with adventures at the farm where my CSA comes from.

And look, only one cat pictures. :-)

Spring is here!

2010-06-17T18:59:00.000-07:00

Ok, so Spring has actually been here for some time now. And while I have been absent from this blog I have been doing some really great things. I began my garden a mere 8 weeks ago, and while it is not the forest that my neighbors garden is, it is nothing to scoff at, especially for my first attempt at growing anything. As my 120 pictures transfer to my computer and I prepare to edit them for upload I am contemplating what direction I will take this post. I have tons of pictures of my garden as well as tons of food pictures. I also have some random pictures of my cats and some pictures of my CSA boxes. In an attempt to keep your interest and keep you coming back for more I think I will separate this into those 4 categories starting with my garden. Be back after editing. :-)

Question:

2010-04-27T19:44:00.001-07:00

Do you compost? Still no pictures. Sproutling pictures to come.

Malfunction!

2010-04-11T15:41:00.000-07:00

For some reason that I have not had time to investigate the photoshop on my current computer will not open. This means I cannot resize my pictures. I have not determined if I can upload photos without resizing, but for now I am assuming I cannot. Very productive day in the kitchen. 4 dozen chocolate chip cookies, 12 apple muffins and a kale salad marinating. And I found that even when a recipe calls for apple cider and you mistakenly think apple cider vinegar, they still taste pretty good with the crumb topping from Vegan with a Vengeance.

Busy weeks!

2010-04-09T20:09:00.000-07:00

I have been crazy busy in so many different ways lately. :-) Lots of pictures but I traded computers and have some programs I need to transfer. I <3 computers but a lot of things to think of. Got a pretty sweet set up going at the moment though.

Pictures to come soon!

Left you hanging...

2010-03-27T17:35:00.000-07:00

Sorry about that folks. Sometimes dinner and a good tv show that we are currently obsessed with via netflix streaming win out over ~~posting~~ everything. As for what was in this blender here:

Beets and a banana! One time a while back I made brownies where I replaced the apple sauce with pureed steamed beets. In this second attempt I tried using a recipe that called for banana and apple sauce. While it turned out decent, this time it was not as good.

Pre-bake

Looks like brownies, right?

They were definitely better warm and would have been delicious along side some ice cream but I didn't try that.

Today I got started in my soon to be garden. I purchased stuff to make starter soil and I bought seeds! Too many I am sure, but I got excited.

I will try to post about my plans tomorrow if I have time. Have a great rest of the weekend!

PS: I have been noticing that no matter how hard I try to get my spacing before and after pictures right, it just doesn't seem to work. For now I am going to just let it post however it chooses to. If anyone has any tips on how to fix this, please let me know. Thanks!

CSA Box #3

2010-03-24T23:35:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I've got 20 18 minutes until I have to check on my soup. Let me show you CSA #3 and what I have been doing with it.

Celery
Carrots
Broccoli
Beets (with the darkest leaves I have ever seen!)
Lettuce

Spinach
Leeks
Strawberries
Blood Oranges
Fuji Apples
Mint

I should have paid more attention to my CSAs website because Saturday I went to Costco and purchased this:

Strawberries
Spinach
Cherry Tomatoes
Pasta

This alone is more spinach and strawberries than I thought was humanly possible to eat by myself since my boyfriend doesn't eat either, but then to get both in my CSA the next day? That was poor planning on my part.

Luckily I have been eating a lot of plates that look like this:

And even more snacks consisting of just strawberries. On the toast above and also in the picture yesterday is one of these:

Specifically the Roasted Red Pepper & Artichoke. So far this has been delicious as a toast topping, mixed with hummus on pita bread and a sandwich and tomorrow I am testing it out in a salad. The pasta salad above was my attempt at a no recipe pasta salad with frozen corn and peas and fresh red onion and red and green bell peppers. The sauce I made out of mostly garlic and olive oil. Sadly it turned out a little too garlicky and not quite so creamy but was definitely edible.

Monday night I steamed up some of the carrots and the broccoli and served them along with some mashed potatoes and pan fried tofu.

I dipped the tofu in ener-g first and then a mix of nutritional yeast, flour and spices and then quickly fried in peanut oil in my cast iron skillet. It wasn't quite flavorful enough but the method was fabulous.

At the moment I am making a soup using the leeks, celery, spinach and some chard I bought. I will post more when I have some pictures of the brilliant greenness.

As for the picture I posted last night?

...4 hours after my soup finished...I'll tell you tomorrow.

Goodnight!

I take too many pictures!

2010-03-23T19:32:00.000-07:00

Everytime I sit down with the intention of blogging I run out of time/energy just from transferring my pictures, resizing and naming them all! Promise my CSA #3 post is coming (cross your fingers for tomorrow). Meanwhile, I will leave you with a couple of random pictures.

I tried Tofutti sour cream for the first time. Man that stuff tastes unbelievably like sour cream. I have been enjoying taco salad/bowls/plates/burritos so much lately! Oh, and that is a TVP chili I made with some spanish style rice.

I have been eating a ton of these two red items lately. I'll tell you why in my next post.

And this my friends I am dubbing "The Last Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe I'll Ever Need!". Of course that wont stop me from experimenting with a new recipe either tomorrow or Friday. That has something to do with my CSA as well though. Until then, I leave you with one last picture of which you could never guess the ingredients of. Try if you might. Perhaps I will give you a cookie if you deduce correctly.

Sipz and Sweet & Sour "Chicken"

2010-03-13T17:44:00.000-08:00

One of the few vegetarian restaurants that is extremely vegan friendly in San Diego is a place my boyfriend took me to shortly after I became vegan. It is called Sipz and they serve Asian style bowls mostly but also make vegetarian sushi. On our first trip there I was not so impressed as at that time I was really trying towards a more whole food, less fake "meat" way of eating and I didn't really want to go back. Luckily for me my boyfriend liked the place so much that he talked me into giving them a second shot. I think the first time I went I got a bowl with mushrooms instead of tofu or "chicken" and it was ok. The second time we went I had a grilled vegetable salad that was delicious. I also tried a bit of my boyfriend's sweet and sour "chicken". At this point I had been a vegan for a number of months and had discovered what seitan was. This was by far the best seitan I have ever tried. The texture was unbelievable. The next time we went we ordered an extra meal to take home with us to eat for leftovers. I gave my mom a piece to try and she told me that the restaurant had tricked us and really served us chicken. I explained that it was a vegetarian restaurant and no chicken to be found and she was blown away. I am so infatuated with the texture of this chicken and am bound and determined to recreate it some day. Here is my first attempt.

First I made seitan

I attempted two different recipes for seitan; one that was boiled and one that was baked. They both turned out fabulous but this boiled version was so flavorful all on its own; I think because it was cooked with ginger.

Then I cut the seitan into bite sized pieces and coated them in ener g egg replacer and corn starch.

Then I fried up the pieces in a little oil. Bonus love points if your boyfriend does the frying and endures the crackling hot oil for you. <3

Then in my wok I stir fried some carrots, onions and bell peppers.

Meanwhile I made a sauce based on a recipe I don't recall now. It was not the best sauce and I am now looking to find a better one.

This one consisted of rice vinegar, pineapple juice, ketchup, molasses, brown sugar and soy sauce.

Once the "chicken" was all fried, I added it to the wok along with the sauce and about half a can of pineapple chunks.

All in all it was very decent. My boyfriend couldn't stop raving about it. I definitely want to make some tweaks and try again but it's nice to know I have the process down pretty well.

This is the bowl from Sipz. I don't know how they get such a red color. Mmmm. Did I mention that when my boyfriend and I went there on Thursday night we each got orders of this on top of our dinners to take home for leftovers? Yeah, I really need to perfect this recipe or we might go broke. Meanwhile, here is what I had for actual dinner when we went.

Caterpillar roll with yams and teriyaki mushrooms. This thing was soo good and I am going to try to recreate it this week. I am always surprised at how filling sushi is. And how cute it can be. This is one instance where it is perfectly ok to eat food with a face.

CSA Box #2

2010-03-12T20:58:00.000-08:00

What could be inside? Precious wants to know too!

Omnomnomnom. Farm fresh organic fruits and veggies!

This weeks box features:
Swiss Chard
3 Avocados
5 Navel Oranges
Carrots
Strawberries
Rosemary
Radishes
Red Leaf Lettuce
Butter Lettuce (I think)
Broccoli Leeks
3 Apples (I think Pink Lady)

So far I have used the broccoli and the rosemary to make this:

Baked tofu, marinated in lemon juice and mustard, rosemary garlic potatoes and steamed broccoli. The tofu texture was awesome but the whole meal was a wee bit bland and the potatoes just did not come out right. Whenever that happens I am so happy to have a fridge full of condiments.

Ketchup and mustard to the rescue!

We also enjoyed some of the carrots and the rest of the broccoli steamed for dinner last night (my tummy was a wee bit upset and I overcompensated by eating almost a whole sleeve of saltines so I wasn't very hungry come dinner time).

The oranges are delicious and have a texture that reminds me a lot of a grapefruit but they are very sweet.

The avocados were a bit under ripe but luckily I had a couple left over from visiting my love's grammy's house (she has an avocado tree, grapefruit tree, a couple lemon trees, tangerine and orange trees. <3)

The strawberries I sliced up and ate a few of and then used the rest to make this out of some failed biscotti and the chocolate I used to dip them.

I have a mountain of failed biscotti. I made two recipes for my boyfriend's mom for her birthday. The first one from the People's Co-op cookbook turned out great, the second one from the interwebs, not so great. Of course the failed one made twice as much as the non failure. And it just occurred to me that I took no pictures of the finished biscottis. Next time I suppose!

Pancake Roll Ups

2010-03-11T21:36:00.000-08:00

I totally slacked on uploading my pictures these last two weeks and managed to accumulate 116. Granted I was trying to get some real pretty pictures for a printout I was doing, but still that's a daunting amount of pictures to go through. This resulted in my procrastinating uploading them and thus missing out on the deadline for a contest that was hosted by Miss Chocolate Covered Katie. Since I made them and took pictures though I might as well share.

The contest was to make pancake roll ups. Check out Katies posts for some unbelievably yummy looking versions; especially these blueberry ones. Being the odd duck that I am I wanted to do something different. And different is definitely what I got.

First I made pancakes (I believe they were sweet potato pancakes but at this point who can remember details like that?)

Then I spread them with some of the Chocolate Spread from Love Street Living that I purchased at a discount with samples thanks again to Katie. After that I rolled them with some odd fillings.

And sprinkled them with shredded coconut. They may look beautiful, and they may have tasted alright, but they were nothing like I expected.

But what can you really expect when you stuff your pancakes with pineapple or even better, beets?

Definitely not a recipe for the history books in this one. But a fun experience none the less.

That Kind Of Week

2010-03-05T17:56:00.000-08:00

My poor blog has been so neglected! It is really hard for me to have busy weeks and weekends and not overwhelm myself even with things I enjoy. These last two weeks have been the kind where I get stressed about "having" to go to the comic shop and read the comics I enjoy...I need to learn to relax and chill out. In honor of which I am finally sitting down at my computer, catching up on some blogs and enjoying some semi failed chocolate chip cashew babies that resemble the last ones pictured here. In other words, a big blob of yumminess.

I had planned to write up a post about the "chicken" stir fry I made a couple of weeks ago, but now that I am here typing, I think I might go enjoy the fact that my boyfriend is home on a Friday night, eat some leftovers and watch the new episode of our newest find, Spartacus and leave the post for tomorrow.

Good night!

I'm Allison. I Love to Eat!

2010-02-27T08:22:00.000-08:00

Gena at Choosing Raw most always has some sage advice to impart on the world. And as a woman who would rather spend her time in her kitchen or at home editing than out partying it up in New York, she is someone I tend to look up to as a bit of a role model. Gena posted a great blog about National Eating Disorder Awareness Week where she asked us:

"If this post speaks to you at all, I encourage you to echo this statement. Say it on your blogs, to a friend, in writing, or out loud–I like to eat. I enjoy food. Say it in your head, if you want to. Say it in private, or in public. But if it’s true–and I hope very much that it is–say it. Say it with pride. Our hunger makes us human."

As someone who loves to cook and bake and prepare foods, it is pretty safe to say that I spend a good portion of my time thinking about food. I do not always eat the most healthy of foods but I try to live by a few simple guidelines that work for me that allow me to almost always feel like it is safe to say I love to eat!

1. I do not deny myself. If I want something that is not the most healthy thing here is what I do:

Ask why do I want it. If it is a sugar, fat, carb sort of thing I usually give in. If it is a comfort sort of craving I might debate why I want it or simply come up with a more healthy alternative. Example; if I want something chocolaty, I might have some peanut butter and a handful of chocolate chips instead of baking brownies.
If I do want something sweet or fried or semi unhealthy, I make it myself as much from scratch as possible. There is nothing that weeds out whether or not a craving is really strong enough like having to dirty a sink full of dishes and waiting 30 minutes to an hour to indulge.
And finally I strive for balance. If I eat 3 cookies today I can feel less guilty knowing that I also ate a kale salad or some roasted carrots and broccoli. Not to mention that I did indeed feed my soul.

2. I eat when I feel hungry. This one is sometimes a struggle for me because even when I eat breakfast, a snack and lunch at work I still sometimes come home starving! So I eat. Also, sometimes this manifests in a different way. Such as when I am on a kitchen marathon journey of baking and find that 4 hours has past and it 10 o'clock at night and I haven't eaten dinner and I'm just not hungry. So I do not eat.

3. I do not fear foods or my body. I may not be in the best shape (though it is debatable if I am not in the best shape of my life) but I am healthy. I need to develop some more muscles and that is most definitely a fact, but in general I am healthy. I do not worry how the foods I eat are going to affect my weight because I know that I have gotten to a point where I have good balance.

No one is perfect but I am definitely perfectly content in saying that I love eating and I love food and not fearing those statements.

I hope you can join me in saying these simple phrases that contain so much power.

Thanks Gena!

Embrace Your Inner Consumer?

2010-02-24T09:00:00.000-08:00

But generally only out of necessity, buy items of quality that will last, and whenever possible shop second hand. I may not have adhered to my own advice in all of these purchases, but at least I try.

I have 3 cats. One of which (I'm not pointing any fingers...)

Jinx...ahem...

Has a love of scratching up carpet when he is locked out of a room. I had temporarily fixed this problem by laying a piece of cardboard underneath our bedroom door to keep him from reaching the carpet. Unfortunately that was only one of the bedrooms and I realized that he has been getting at the other door as well as a spot next to our heater. In the interest of saving our security deposit and keeping our house from looking like it is infested with cats (which it sort of is) I decided to get some rugs to cover the spots. I only went into a Khols for the first time a few months ago and since Mervyns closed before Xmas last year (or was that 2 years ago...?) it has sort of become my go to department store when department stores are needed. I don't particularly care for department stores and would much prefer to shop in more neighborhood stores, but outside of the realm of food shopping I am quite unknowledgeable about where to get things. I blame it on growing up in too big a city. If anyone knows some good places to shop for pretty much anything in San Diego I would appreciate the info. Particularly clothing and kitchenware although as I'll get to in a moment, I did find a decent second hand clothes store a couple weekends ago. But back to my shopping trip. The first thing I saw?

Can you tell why I fell in love with these rugs instantly and had to have them? It's like they were designed for me. The only thing that would have been more perfect is if they had had one of these as well.

While at Khol's I couldn't help but peruse the kitchenware and pine over the many gadgets and gizmos I did not need and could not afford. But then I happened upon a sale on something I have wanted since the very first time I saw the infomercial for it. That's right:

The Magic Bullet!

I had debated for quite some time on whether or not this purchase would be worthwhile. Finally, after Katie talking about hers all the time I asked her if she thought it was worth it to have. She told me that she uses it just about every day. That topped with the fact that it was on sale and since I was making so many purchases I figured I would open a Khol's cc and get 20% made it a great buy.

So far I have only used it to make salad dressing and an attempt at a smoothie that wasn't so great but I can't wait to use it to make fudge babies!

The clothing store that I mentioned above is apparently so new that it is not listed on google and even in google maps when I pull up the building it is a for rent sign. Haha. The address I believe is around 8270 La Mesa Blvd and hopefully I will be heading back there and can report the name when I do. I found this shop to be so much different than my usual second hand clothes shopping which was always way over worn clothes with holes. These clothes were in top condition and the jeans I bought were in fact brand new with original tags still on them.

Regardless of the fact that I do not care so much for the bedazzled look, these jeans fit me incredibly well which was my whole goal. I also got a shirt and a dress that I am not sure I have anywhere to wear but I loved it.

And now, since this is me we are talking about, I leave you with some good eats from the past couple of days.

Tofu scramble with spinach and hash browns. Sadly the hash brown was a bit too oily for my stomach.

The most surprisingly good meal. Remember the kale I was talking about? Monday night I mixed it in with some mashed potatoes and added some mustard. This along side a homemade black eyed pea burger and some roasted veggies was soo good I repeated it for dinner again last night.

Till next time!