What we've been eating

On the menu this past week and weekend was a lot of old favorites. The dish to the left is actually a new one, but it was similar to a typical pasta salad I would make. It was Orzo with Olives, Broccoli, and Basil. It also had mushrooms and tomatoes in it. The recipe was from Vegetarian Planet.

We've been eating on the lasagna below all week. It is Spinach and Mushroom Lasagna from Fat Free Vegan Kitchen. It makes a lot and is very dense. I actually just ended up freezing half of it for later.













And last but not least, some delicious junk food. Nachos! These had refried beans, Boca ground meat substitute, spinach, tomatoes, salsa, and cheeze sauce. The cheeze sauce is called Awesome Nacho Dip and is from a website called Veganism for the Meat Eater. I don't even remember how long ago I found this recipe. Before I started reading vegan blogs, so a few years ago. For the nachos I made the dip without using the rotel, but I make this a lot with the Rotel and just use it as a dip. I've tried many other cheeze dips and this is the one I always go back to. It is easy to make and I always have the ingredients.

Sunny Sunday Meal

Last Sunday was such a beautiful spring day I just had to cook outdoors again. Well, a lot of this was made indoors, but I did use the grill for some of it.
I made Susan V's Barbeque Seitan Ribz. I love these things and make them often. They start off in the oven and then you finish them on the grill. To go with the Ribz I made baked potato and sweet potato fries (these were in the oven). And on the grill I made some asparagus. Both were simply seasoned with olive oil, salt and pepper.

Happy Vegan Face posted a Kung Pao Tofu recipe a while back. Kung Pao is my favorite chinese dish. I think I went overboard with the amount of veggies and rice in proportion to how much sauce I made, but the flavor was great. Just could have used more sauce.
I made some onsies for a friend of mine having a second baby soon. I used the freezer paper stencil technique which always turns out so nicely. My mom drew the pictures (Thanks Mom!). I only took a picture of the robot, but the other one was a duck pull toy. I have a few other friends having babies soon, so I might be making some more. I have lots of crafty projects I need to work on. A birthday present for my brother-in-law, a birthday present for a friend, those new baby gifts and the WIP stitch a long bunny and bear which I was planning to make for boys for Easter gifts. Better get going!

ABCs in 123

What is fast and easy to make, has veggies in it, and is gobbled up by my 3 year old?
Alphabet Soup!

Alphabet Soup

1 15 oz can tomato sauce
1 15 oz can petite diced tomatoes
1 cup vegetable broth
1 cup water
1 1/2 cups frozen veggie mixture
1/2-3/4 cups alphabet pasta

1. Combine the tomato sauce, diced tomatoes, broth and water in a large saucepan.
2. Bring to a boil
3. Add frozen veggies and pasta and rapidly simmer for 8-10 minutes.

See, I told you, as easy as 1...2...3.

Back to the routine

So SXSW is over. My husband is back home (he works for SXSW and was gone the whole time working), my mom went back home (she was in town helping me out with the boys), and now we are back to our daily routine. Which means back to cooking!


While my mom was still in town I made us some Vegan Chicken and Dumplings. She used to make the meat version all the time when I was a kid and it was one of my favorites. So I was happy to find a vegan version a while back. I have the recipe typed into my recipe manager on my computer and just have the source written down as the internet. So I'm not sure where exactly I got it. It uses the Morning Star Farms chicken strips and the dumplings have rosemary, basil and oregano in them. It is easy to make and such a comfort food. Sorry I can't find the recipe to link to, but Here and here are some vegan chicken and dumplings recipes that look great. I would say the first one is the most like the recipe I have.

On Saturday I cooked up a really delicious recipe from The Vegan Gourmet. Beets and Greens wtih Bulgur and Miso Tahini Sauce. I have made beets only once before and I really like them. I had never eaten the greens until now though. I love greens. I always feel so good after eating them. The absolute best part of this meal was the Miso Tahini Sauce. So yummy! After the bulgur and beets were gone I ate it with sauteed spinach and then today I had some falafel smothered in it. I will for sure be making this again.

This meal reminded me of Diet, Dessert and Dogs post on meals in a bowl. She has lots of good ideas for grains/greens/veggies and sauce combos. Check them out at her new website and while you are there enter her giveaway for a big jug of maple syrup. I'm completely out of maple syrup, so I hope I win!

I also made Veganomicon's Corn Edamame salad for the first time last week. I was inspired by Two Vegan Boys--she made this a while ago and it just looked so good.

I mentioned in my last post that I went to a SXSW panel on foodblogging. So I wanted to write a little bit about that. There were 5 panelists from all ranges of food blogs. Here is a write-up from Gourmet about the event. What I learned from the panel was there are a lot of different kinds of food bloggers out there. Some that post a few times a week, some that post a few times a day. No one way is better then the other as long as you are consistent with what you do. Kalyn of Kayln's Kitchen stressed how important good pictures are. I'm going to have to work on both of those--consistency and good pictures. Most of the panelists actually made money from their blogs with advertising and such. So that was interesting to hear about. I don't think it is a goal of mine right now, but nice to see people doing what love and making money from it.

I have some good meals planned for this week. I'm so excited to be back to our normal routine.

So much going on...

I haven't been cooking too much lately. SXSW is going on here in Austin, TX. It is a big Interactive, Film, and Music Festival that started March 13th and goes on until March 22nd. I am going to try to make it to some of everything. Tomorrow I plan to go to a panel discussion about food blogging. Should be very interesting, I'll report back.

On Friday night I had my sisters and some friends over and made a big pot of chili for us all to eat Frito Pie style. I also made Peanut Butter Swirl Brownies that Bryanna Clark Grogan recently posted the recipe for. They were really good. Rich, but not overly sweet. Almost light and fluffy.

My son loves alphabet soup and I finally found some alphabet pasta at a little Mexican market near my house. It was okay; it could have been better. I really wanted to put more veggies in it, but all I had was celery and carrot. As soon as I get to the grocery store I'll have to make it again and post a recipe. My son liked it though.

I just pulled some Double Chocolate Chip cookies out of the oven. I usually just make a veganized version of the Toll House Cookie Recipe. They are my favorite. But I thought I would try a new recipe today and went with the Millenium Cookbook. They are good, but a little too healthy. Not something I should really complain about I guess.

Sorry no pictures.

Muffins and such

I made some delicious Breakfast Muffins yesterday. They are another recipe from My Vegan Cookbook. He has so many recipes I want to try. They have pineapple and carrots and oats. I can't stop eating them. I wish my son would try them, but he won't even take a bite. Oh well, more for me.
I love this mug. I got it on etsy for my husband for Valentine's day a year ago. I should have gotten two. But he shares, so it is okay.

I didn't have anything done for W.I.P. Wednesday. I have been working on my garden though. We had to build a fence around it so the dogs won't get in and tear it up. So far I've planted carrots, beans, 3 different tomatoes, Ichiban eggplant, zucchini, red bell pepper, basil and hot jalapenos. It is raining here, so that should give them a great start. But it is also cold, so I covered them last night. It didn't freeze, but I didn't want to take any chances.
I had some leftover Lime Pickled Red Onions and some avocados from my salad and it seemed that both of those items would be really good on a black bean burger. So I made Veganomicon's Black Bean Burgers. I used the Grapefruit Mojo Dressing on the bun and it was a good combo.

Salad and Dinosaurs

This is another salad from the Millennium Cookbook. This time I made the Ruby Grapefruit, Avocado, and Pickled Red Onions with Baby Spinach and Grapefruit Mojo Dressing. Whooo, that is a long title. It had a lot of components. I made the oil-free version of the Dressing. It was tangy, sweet, spicy and minty all in one. The Pickled Red Onions were marinated in lime juice and zest. Also on there were Chile-Lime Toasted Almonds which added a nice spicy crunch. All together it made a really pretty and delicious salad.

There are a lot of great recipes in this cookbook. Most of them have a lot of components, but so far everything I've made has been well worth it. Here is what I've tried and recommend:
Marinated Seitan Medallions
Brownies
Millennium Tofu Spread
Fat-free Mashed Potatoes
Millennium Pizza Dough

Wow, that is not very many. There are so many more recipes to try. My husband suggested throwing out all our other cookbooks.

I got some dinosaur pancake molds at a garage sale the other day. 3 dinosaurs for $1.25! A great deal. Here they are in action.

With some leftover silken tofu I had, I decided to make Chocolate Covered Vegan's easy tofu pudding. I melted some chocolate chips and peanut butter together in a bowl in the microwave. I added the tofu and some agave nectar. Then I used my immersion blender to blend it. Not the best idea. It was a full bowl and it kept splattering everywhere. Ate it all up, no picture. It's pudding, so I'm sure you can imagine it.