Cooking in season!

I've found my new love (no offence to my husband of course): cooking in season!

We got a bunch of blueberries and fresh corn on the weekend and I looked through my recipes and found Corn Chowder and a Scones recipe I've been meaning to try (both from VWAV). I tell you when they say fresh is best they know what the heck they're talking about! Cutting corn directly off the cob into soup and watching plump fresh blueberries sizzle on the pan as the scones bake, it's an unreal feeling that makes you feel so good.
I've also taken to eating tomatoes with just salt and pepper. And greek salads with fresh tomatoes, cucumbers and onions. Also fruit salad with fresh peaches, blueberries and strawberries with just a sprinkle of sugar and a drizzle of maple syrup. Here's a picture of our fridge after we picked up blueberries.
So here are some meals I've made lately (lots of greek salad you'll notice). Below is some pesto garlic bread and pesto with a vegan roux mixed.
Below is a California type sandwich. The banana peppers were amazing! Yum yum. For more info see my other blog.
This was towards the beginning of summer when scapes were first out. Below is onions, scapes, beans, and mushrooms. A little pesto pasta (I swear it's not the only thing I eat, only like once every two weeks... not sure how it keeps coming up here)
Well that's a good enough update for now I think. I'll try and make my posts more frequent rather than huge ones all at once. What's in my future? A curry recipe... some cocoa-chocolate chip scones... some more birthday cupcakes perhaps... coconut pancakes with pineapple sauce, scalloped potatoes, pizza from scratch.... Very ambitious I know. The best part about summer is all the selection of fantastic fresh fruit and veggies... but unfortunately it's also a time when people are ridiculously busy and running around and vacationing etc. So you have all these ingredients but no time to do anything with them! Grrrr! The irony of it all! Oh well I'm only leaving for one more weekend this summer so I'll find some time hopefully. Until next time... love lots, laugh often and buy local!!!!

Well I went out for breakfast a couple times in the past month or so and my favorite thus far was The Pantry's Smothered skillet (without cheese and eggs) but I did cheat and have the hollandaise sauce (I know I know , it's made with eggs but it's yummy). And I would have had it without the sauce but then it would just be vegetables which are good and all but pretty dry. So I thought about it at home and made some little cubed hashbrowns with mushrooms, onions, peppers and hot sauce (I don't have banana peppers at home sadly) and then made cheezy sauce from Veganomicon and then topped it with tomatoes and green onions. Over all amazing but I added too much hot sauce but that's easily enough to fix next time. Oh and look how pretty it looks!!LOL! I just love this picture. I made my Dad Boston vs. Brooklyn Cupcakes for his birthday (lots of work but yummy) with chocolate buttercream icing and this is what happens when you don't pay a lot of attention. I actually did it 3 times.I also made a couple dozen cupcakes for my friends shower (VCTOTW the Vanilla made with whole wheat flour with chocolate buttercream icing).

Then below is Maple Mustard Glazed Potatoes and String Beans recipe but with Asparagus rather than beans, we decided it tastes better this way. My hunny made this! It's awesome!

Finally, I love love love love the following recipe. Whole Wheat Naan bread with spaghetti sauce as pizza sauce then onions and peppers then covered in beautiful pesto sauce (VWAV). I added pineapple as a topping and it just made it perfect with the salty pesto and sweet pineapple. This is one of my favorite things ever I think.

So that has been what I've been up to lately. Sorry all the pictures come at once, kind of overwhelming. The past week I've been doing the master cleanse and I ended up stopping after 5.5 days cuz of being sick. I just couldn't handle both and my heart really wasn't in the cleanse anyway. So I am weaning back onto food and loving every bite. Trying to start off on the right foot with lots of fruit and vegetables. The breakfast I am loving right now is chocolate almond milk with Vanilla Almond Cereal and a banana. I'm used to my hunny making me breakfast, he always makes us smoothies from the Thrive Diet book so I was kind of lost but I'm liking non-liquid breakfasts, haha. So I am excited about food again, feeling pretty creative! Hopefully lots more great recipes to come!

Update on my undercover status

Well I have been an undercover vegan for awhile now (4 months) I have not been the best vegan always, many slip ups but luckily I did it for health reasons rather than other reasons that may have made me feel worse for cheating. I have learned more about how my body reacts to foods in the last 4 months than in my whole life. I have definitely found a correlation with eating dairy and then feeling more pain the next day. Another thing that makes me feel worse are potato chips and deep fried foods. Chickpeas also make my stomach hurt. I have also noticed that eating lots of pasta or bread makes me feel sluggish. So these are all things I can work on now! So far very interesting undercover work. People are excepting everything much better now than at the beginning. My parents have become 10 times as excepting. People who we don't really discuss our life and meal choices with who we meet at potlucks always ask for recipes of what I make. My husband is starting to become a great cook btw. I'll point out a recipe and ask him to make it and it's always fabulous.

As for my family, at first my mom was like, I'll never be able to make you anything again!! Then I was letting her know what I was making and how good it was tasting. Then we went home to visit and my mom had bought us soy milk, made us brown rice and beans to have in the fridge, and she made vegan wheat germ, walnut, banana bread (with carob chips!) She must have done a lot of research, i was surprised she even knew what carob chips were. Then they have noticed how much better I feel and how much more energy and less pain I'm in. So obviously they are very happy I've made this change for myself. When I was home this past weekend I made a huge salad for lunch hoping to share and everyone had some and enjoyed it and then I made dinner and made portabello mushroom fajitas from scratch for dinner. True my mom made some chicken with taco sauce on the side but I think my sauce was damn good! And everyone enjoyed dinner. So my fajita mix is what I thought I would share with everyone!

I fried some garlic (3 cloves) in olive oil and added some sliced onions. Then I added some green and red peppers for about a minute. Then I added my sauce (a teaspoon or so of the following: chili powder, cumin, cornstarch and 1/2 tsp of onion powder, 1/4 tsp oregano, a little salt, juice from a lime and enough water to make it a sauce (1/2 - 3/4 cup) and I added the portabello mushrooms. I served it in whole wheat wraps with cut up lettuce, tomato, salsa and fresh guacamole. Yum Yum! I've discovered an amazing affection for portabello mushrooms since I found the portabello mushroom salad in Veganomicon. Justin also made us the maple mustard glazed potatoes which have made it into our regular rotation. Another recipe I try to use all the time is the tahini dressing from VWAV. I made it into a dip for a potluck which went over amazing. Oh and lastly I modified my pancake recipe again with chocolate almond milk, adding cocoa and mint extract with chocolate chips. Pretty yummy, more of a dessert pancake rather than breakfast though, lol

Well that was my update and I even managed to throw a recipe in there! The last four months have been an amazing learning experience and I will continue my adventures in vegan cooking!

Hello! Yah yah I'm over a week late. Ok first of all here are the Vanilla/Chocolate Marble Cupcakes I made for my Mom's Birthday/Easter. I gave her Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World and told her to pick one. I did the same with my Dad and of course instead of picking a nice easy one he choose Brooklyn vs. Boston Cream Cupcakes. But that's ok I like a challenge I just have to use some new ingredients. But my mom gave us Bunny Grahams for Easter and I put them on the cupcakes, don't they look adorable?
So we went home for Easter and I put myself in charge of dinner to relieve it from my Mom, partially because it was supposed to be my Mom's birthday dinner a few days earlier. I decided to go with a green theme (ok ok I lied it just happened) and I made Pesto Pasta from VWAV and Sesame Asparagus from VWAV and a green salad (with the green icing cupcakes for dessert).
Ooo pretty. So here is what the Sesame Asparagus looks like. It was so delicious. I have made it and the pesto so many times!! They are both absolutely amazing.


So this ended up turning weird. I made a quinoa pilaf and the asparagus and decided the pilaf had no flavor and mixed them together. It was weird... but ok.Finally my strange little corn tortilla burritos. I walked into the supermarket and fell in love with these little corn tortillas so I had leftover beans and rice and fryed them up with some pico de gallo and topped with some avocado mixed with more pico de gallo, They were tasty although the corn tortillas split easily. Definitely eat em all at once. After they are opened the dry out and crack and don't stay together.

Well that's what I've been up to. As I said I've been working full time so my hubby's been stepping up to the plate! It's been great! Anywho good eats to you all!

Update and stay tuned!

Hello

Unfortunately, I've been MIA lately. I've begun working full time and the energy isn't always there, not to mention the time. I have made some things though. I will get them together and post very soon. Most likely later today or tomorrow. Hugs to all!

Crepes!

Don't let the exclamation mark scare you... these are not scary they are delicious. And so pretty! Below are my strawberry chocolate ones and at the bottom there are my peanut butter banana ones (with a little chocolate drizzled).

So basically how I made these was using my pancake recipe. I veganized a pancake recipe that my dad passed down to me. I will tell you the veganized version:

Pancakes:
1 cup of flour
1 tsp sugar
1 tsp salt
1 cup soy milk (I use chocolate usually)
1 mashed banana
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp baking powder

You mix the first three ingredients together then the next three and add a little more soy milk if you want a thinner batter (it will go a little further). If I do this I add maybe a tsp-tbsp extra. Then you fold in the baking powder and let it sit for a few minutes.

So to Crepe this recipe I used about 1 & 1/4 cup soy milk (chocolate) to make it a little thinner yet.

Then you just put some batter on a pan and shake the pan at every angle to get it nice and covered in a very thin layer. This is what it looks like after a flip:

Below are the ingredients I used. There were amazingly tasty smelling strawberries which prompted me to have a crepe morning in the first place. Then I melted chocolate chips with some soy milk to have chocolate sauce.

So that was my crepe adventure, delish! There were leftovers but you can't have any nah nah! I did miss whipped cream a bit but not too much . Here's one more picture for the road of the banana, peanut butter chocolate one....

Soup, Sandwich & Salad

Latley I have been obsessed with pumpkin seeds. They are so delicious on salad. So that is why I posted this. My salad is pumpkin seeds, spinach, salad greens, cukes, onion, red pepper and Little Island Salad dressing.

This is what I was lucky enough to have my hubby make for me for dinner tonight. It was supposed to be a dinosaur kale quinoa wrap but after seeing Justin try to eat it that way, I tore my kale up and had a dinosaur kale, quinoa salad. It was delicious with the obvious ingredients in the name plus: tomatoes, avocado, grated carrot, & cucumbers. Add salad dressing and voila! It was super tasty (from the Thrive Diet).
So on Friday I made pesto, my first attempt. It was from Vegan with a Vengeance and it was really yummy but unfortunately i failed to read that it was a teaspoon and a half of coarse salt rather than what I used which was finely ground sea salt. Needless to say it was REALLY salty. But I still ate it up and again the next day and then for lunch yesterday. So overall a success. p.s. I LOVE WALNUTS (no gross pinenuts, ick)
I made miso soup last week sometime as well. It was half from the thrive diet (ground up sesame seeds, miso paste, green onions) but I added a little soya sauce and tofu (way too much tofu). It was good minus the copious amounts of tofu, oh well the first time you make something never goes perfect. I had it with a hummus, avocado, spinach and red pepper sandwich, toasted. It was a pretty quick, yummy little dinner.
That's all for this week, I made stir fry again but decided not to bore you with the same old same old. My hubby is making me a pizza from the Thrive book on Thursday if it's fabulous I will post it. Until then happy cooking!