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The Perfect Chocolate Cupcakes

Posted in Recipes, tagged , , , , on February 6, 2012| 5 Comments »

This weekend was busy but fun…minus that unfortunate game last night but we’re just going to pretend that didn’t happen.

Renee, me and Rachel. Happy Birthday, Renee!

On Friday night, I went over to my friend Rachel’s to celebrate our friend, Renee’s, birthday. We had lots of yummy food (including this black bean salsa) and I brought these cupcakes with me. They were a big hit. I won’t tell you how many Renee ate but let us just say she really enjoyed them…and probably didn’t have any grounds for yelling at her boyfriend for over doing it with the frosting on his cupcake.

Then Sunday, we had our Super Bowl party. After Rent-a-Center told me it would cost me $500 to rent a TV (seriously?!), we stuck with our little inherited TV. We had a ton of food for only 9 people, all of it delicious and most of it vegan (someone brought boneless wings but that was the only non-vegan item). Bonnie made a super yummy avocado tomato bruschetta and a chipotle hummus I may share with you later in the week. I made my black bean salsa, again, and these cupcakes, again, which got thumbs up all around. Melinda made the artichoke spinach dip I shared with you last week. It was kind of a delicious spread!

Vegan Chocolate Cupcakes
from Brown Eyed Baker 

  • 1½ cups all-purpose flour
  • ¾ cup unsweetened cocoa powder
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • ¾ teaspoon baking soda
  • ¾ teaspoon salt
  • 1 avocado, pitted and peeled
  • 1 cup pure maple syrup
  • ¾ cup plain almond milk
  • 1/3 cup canola oil
  • 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350°F. Line 12-cup muffin pan with paper liners. Whisk together flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in bowl. Purée avocado in food processor until smooth. Add maple syrup, almond milk, oil, and vanilla, and blend until creamy. Whisk avocado mixture into flour mixture.

Spoon batter into prepared cupcake cups. Bake 25 minutes, or until toothpick inserted into center comes out with some crumbs attached. Cool.

These cupcakes are so perfect because the avocado and maple syrup make them super moist and rich but not too sweet. They are just so darn good! No worries though, you can’t taste the avocado in the cupcake. It’s too mild of a flavor. The chocolate and vanilla easily mask it.

Sooo…I sort of don’t have a frosting recipe for you. For Renee’s birthday, I attempted to make vegan nutella frosting. It was a big fail…or so I thought. I was running late and instead of a fluffy frosting of amazingness to present to her, I had liquid goop.

So I bought a can of rainbow chip frosting on my way to her house…45 minutes late. Darn you nutella frosting!! I was the only vegan there though so no one cared that the rainbow chip frosting had dairy and oodles of chemicals in it. Cheers to birthday cupcakes anyway!! (Rachel, in the gray shirt, is ‘cheering’ with my cupcake and hers so I could take a picture. That isn’t my hairy arm in the foreground- promise. Sorry, Ryan…)

Then Sunday, after working all day, I had some perfectly baked cupcakes ready for thefootballgamethatshallnotbementioned and I couldn’t bring myself to make the Cherrybrook Kitchen chocolate frosting from a box. Yes- it’s vegan. Yes-it’s free of chemicals. and yes- I will make it for you eventually and review it but I just couldn’t bring myself to use it on my perfect chocolate cupcakes. Nothing makes homemade cupcakes go to the dogs quicker then store bought frosting. So I dug out the massive bowl of should-have-been vegan nutella frosting from the fridge and to my delight… it was solid and spreadable. Granted, more like a icing then a frosting, but I’d take it!!

Then I piped confectioners sugar mixed with a little water for the stitching. I just used a sandwich bag and cut a tin hole in one of the corners. Super easy. Aren’t they cute? That 83 in the heart was made for my dad for his man, Welker, obviously!

My roommate, Bonnie, rocking some serious Pat's attitude. Hmm...Maybe we'll just put those Pat's jersey's away for a while...

I have the day off so I’m going to go wash all our dirty dishes from last night and maybe try to be productive. Now that the Super Bowl is over I guess I should start brainstorming some Valentines desserts for you guys? Or maybe, like that awful game last night, I’ll just pretend it isn’t happening…

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BLACK BEAN SALSA

Posted in Recipes, tagged , , on February 5, 2012| 6 Comments »

IT’S SUPER BOWL SUNDAY!!!

My roommates and I are having people over and I still need to:

– Buy a few more things to make another batch of this below bean salsa (like, um, the beans! Totally forgot those yesterday on my shopping trip)

– Make and decorate cupcakes (they are seriously the best cupcakes ever. I’ll give you the recipe tomorrow)

– Clean up the kitchen a bit and tidy the house, find enough chairs, etc.

Oh yeah, and do all this in the 90 minutes I have after I get out of work and before the game starts. Really? Whose going to go to a book store today? It’s practically a national holiday in New England people. Grocery stores? clearly need to be open.  Packies? Definitely! (though I bought my beer yesterday just in case! I forgot the black beans but hey, I remembered my beer!! Priorities!)

Anyway, so here is my last recipe for the super bowl. This was suppose to go to you last week since I usually don’t post on the weekends but after I talked about how I had no life and went to bed at 8:30, suddenly I got a life again. How annoying!

Black Bean Salsa
from Cooking Light

*the measurements for this recipe were weird. Who measures out 2 TBSP of chopped out jalapeno? If you do actually do that, please see the Cooking Light recipe above. 

  • 1/2  red bell pepper, finely chopped
  • 1/4 red onion, chopped
  • 1 cucumber, chopped
  • 1/2 plum tomato, diced
  • 1/2 – 1 seeded jalapeño pepper, chopped (depends on how much heat you like)
  • 1 tablespoon chopped fresh basil
  • 2 tablespoons olive oil
  • 2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
  • 1 tablespoon fresh lime juice
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons minced fresh or 1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
  • 1/2 teaspoon chili powder
  • 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
  • 3 garlic cloves, minced
  • 2 (15-ounce) cans black beans, rinsed and drained

Combine all ingredients in a medium bowl; stir well. Cover and chill 2 hours. For best results, chill over night.

As you can see, my chopping skills are a bit lacking. I had about 15 minutes to throw this first batch together so it could chill overnight before heading to a friends. So, my tomatoes are more chunky then chopped BUT it still tasted delicious. You could also throw in some chopped avocado if you wanted because, really, what doesn’t avocado make better?

Oh yeah, one last thing:

GO PATRIOTS!!

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LASAGNA!

Posted in Recipes, tagged , , , , , on February 1, 2012| 2 Comments »

I’m such an old lady.

tofu ricotta

Monday night I had a laundry list of things to do, including post this uber yummy lasagna recipe. What did I end up doing? Having dinner, crawling into my bed (because it was so frickin’ cold in my house that night!) to watch back episodes of New Girl and Once Upon a Time and falling asleep at 9.

…I’m so exciting…

Spinach mixture

I did manage to call Rent-a-center to see about renting a big screen TV. $500!! FOR ONE DAY! I laughed out loud when they told me that because my brother rented a TV from there in December and it was about $25 for two weeks. Talk about inflation. Is that even legal?? So despite practically having already planned out my menu for the Super Bowl, we kind of hit a snag with what we are doing. Ideas are welcome because our TV is really bad.

 

On a different note, I realized while looking over old posts that I’ve been giving you a lot of desserts and a lot of soups/stews. I thought I’d spice things up and throw in a comfort food recipe. After all, what is the winter for but to hibernate…which is clearly what my body is trying to do.

Vegetable Lasagna
adapted from my Mom’s veggie lasagna recipe

Marinara Sauce – homemade or jar (1-2 jars, depending on how saucy you like it)

12 lasagna noodles

2 medium zucchini, cut into ¼ inch thick slices

2 TBLS olive oil

¾ tsp salt

¼ tsp ground black pepper

1 garlic clove, finely chopped

1/8 tsp crushed red pepper

2 TBLS all purpose flour

2/3 cup non-dairy milk, warmed (I used unsweetened, unflavored almond milk)

2 pkg (10 oz each) frozen chopped spinach, thawed and squeezed dry

2 TBLS plus ¼ cup nutritional yeast

1 bowl of vegan ricotta cheese (see below)

1-2 cups of vegan mozzarella cheese

Vegan ricotta cheese
from Healthydiaries.com 

14 oz. box medium firm or firm tofu
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped or 1 tsp garlic powder
1/4 c. olive oil
1 tsp basil
1 tsp oregano
1 tsp parsley
1 tsp salt (or to taste)
dash of black pepper

Mash tofu with a fork. Add all other ingredients. Continue mashing until it has a ricotta-like texture. Set aside. (If you want it super smooth, you could put the tofu in a blender or food processor before adding the other ingredients. I just mashed it with a fork and it came out great.)

Prepare Marinara sauce, if making homemade.

Meanwhile, in a large saucepot, cook lasagna noodles as label directs.  Drain and rinse with cold running water.  Return noodles to saucepot with enough cold water to cover.

Preheat over to 450.  In large bowl, toss zucchini with 1 TBLS oil, ¼ tsp salt and 1/8 tsp black pepper.  Arrange zucchini slices on large cookie sheet and bake, turning once, until tender, about 12 minutes.

Meanwhile, in nonstick 12-inch skillet, heat remaining 1 TBLS oil over medium heat.  Add garlic and crushed red pepper; cook until garlic is golden.  Stir in flour until blended.  With wire whisk, gradually whisk in warm non-dairy milk with wooden spoon.  Cook, stirring constantly, until sauce has thickened and boils, about 2 minutes.  Remove from heat and stir in spinach, 2 TBLS nutritional yeast and ¼ tsp salt.

Turn oven to 350.  Drain lasagna.

In 13 x 9 baking dish, spread about 1 cup marinara sauce.  Arrange 4 lasagna noodles over sauce, overlapping to fit.  Spread tofu ricotta mixture on top of noodles.  Arrange 4 more noodles over “ricotta” and top with all of zucchini, overlapping slices to fit.  Spread with 1 cup sauce and sprinkle with half of mozzarella; top with all of spinach mixture.  Arrange remaining 4 noodles on top and spread with remaining marinara sauce.  Sprinkle with remaining mozzarella.

Cover lasagna with foil and bake 30 minutes.  Remove foil and bake until cheese is lightly golden, about 10 minutes longer.  Let stand 15 minutes for easier serving.


Fresh Outta the Oven

I was super excited to try the tofu ricotta. It was actually really good. Though, seeing as regular ricotta gives me the heebie jeebies, I was clearly going to favor the tofu version!

Overall though, this lasagna has a ton of flavor. I’m not a marinara sauce kinda gal. I was the type growing up who had her spaghetti with butter and salt…cause I didn’t like the shake from a can parm either.  So, I only used one jar of sauce. It didn’t go very far, though, so if you want your lasagna saucy, definitely pick up two jars.

 

I’m off to go act my age. No more 9 o’clock bed times for me! Er, what do 20 somethings do? Drink copious amounts of alcohol on the beach? Have sex with strangers? Let my vajayjay hang out while I dance on bar tops? I mean, that’s what those Jersey Shore kids do right? That’s totally appropriate behavior for a work night, right???

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Spinach Artichoke Dip

Posted in Recipes, tagged , , , , , on January 26, 2012| 7 Comments »

This post is dedicated to Amelia…because I stole her recipe… even though her sister gave it to me and told me to try it. Then again, she also put open markers in Amelia’s bed when she was little so maybe I shouldn’t trust her with Amelia’s things…

Anyways, I never had artichokes growing up. I’d never even tried one until I think after college when my roommate ordered it on pizza. I still don’t really get them and I certainly couldn’t make them edible if I was presented with one.

BUT…

I can saute them out of a can and then bake them into a dip! Oh yeah! Mad cooking skills right here! Hollah!

…I’m so cool…

Anyways, consider this part 3 of my Super Bowl recipes- BBQ Chili and Funfetti Footballs being Parts 1 and 2.

Amelia’s Spinach and Artichoke Dip
courtesy of  Theprettyvegan at Food.com

  • 1/2 yellow onion , diced
  • 1 (12 ounce) package frozen chopped spinach (I believe Amelia used fresh and it worked great but I’ll let he comment on that below if she wants)
  • 1 (8 ounce) jar marinated artichoke hearts*
  • 1 tablespoon olive oil
  • 1 (12 ounce) package firm silken tofu
  • 1/2 cup nutritional yeast flakes
  • 3 garlic cloves
  • 2 -3 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
  • 1 teaspoon dried basil
  • 1 teaspoon dried parsley
  • 1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
 
Preheat the oven to 350. Saute the oil, spinach and artichoke hearts over medium heat for about 6 minutes or until the onions are soft. Set aside
 
In your blender, combine the rest of your ingredients until smooth.
 
Pour the tofu sauce into the pan with your spinach and artichokes and mix until fully incorporated. Transfer to a baking pan and bake for 15-25 minutes or until the top is golden brown (the recipe says 15-20 but mine needed the extra 5 minutes. Also, I used a 9″ round cake pan). If your pan is not non-stick, give it a quick spray with cooking spray before pouring your mixture in.

*I have no idea what “marinated artichoke hearts” are. Like I said, I’m an artichoke virgin. All I know is, nothing at Whole Foods had this on the label. So I opted for a can of organic artichoke hearts packed in water, not oil, and salt and pepper. They worked perfectly!

uncooked

This. Is. Delicious. I know my pictures are atrocious because I opted for that awful yellow background (sorry about that) and because quite frankly, artichoke and spinach dip just isn’t pretty! But trust me.

It’s also significantly healthier then a traditional spinach and artichoke dip which has tons and tons of cheese and mayo. It will help you and your friends keep those New Years Resolutions. Yeah, remember those?

In fact, I can’t think of one reason you shouldn’t make this recipe! So there!

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Funfetti Cake Balls

Posted in Recipes, tagged , , , , on January 24, 2012| 9 Comments »

 

 

PATS ARE GOING TO THE SUPER BOWL!!

I’m so excited! I can’t say it’s because of their stellar performance, though. Where the hell were their heads during that game? We have to give a special kudos to the Ravens’ kicker, Cundiff. Without him, who knows if we would have made it to the superbowl! And of course, my Dad’s man, Welker. Definitely caught a good portion of those catches. And he was all smiley the entire time. Love him!

I’m sorry…I know not everyone is a football fan but we’re going to the super bowl!

So in preparation for the game, I’m hoping that this week and next week I will be able to give you some recipes you can serve when you have all of your closest friends over for the game! Last week, I posted a BBQ chili recipe, which would be great if you are hosting. Its yummy enough for all your vegan and non-vegan friends a like.

Today, I’m giving you funfetti cake balls. I was hoping to show you these last Friday but, er, I had some issues making them. For instance, I cooked the sprinkles into the cake my first time around and well, the cake balls turned out a lovely gray color.

yeah…that doesn’t work for me. I want color in my cake!

Funfetti Cake Balls

cake
adapted from How Sweet Eats

  • 1/2 cup Earth Balance vegan butter
  • 1 cup sugar
  • 2 Ener-G eggs
  • 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
  • 1 1/2 cups flour
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1/3 cup milk

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Cream butter and sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer until fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add “eggs” and vanilla and beat until combined.

Combine dry ingredients in a bowl. Add half of the dry ingredients, mixing until just combined. Add the milk. Once mixed, add remaining dry ingredients.

Bake in 9″ round pan for 30-35 minutes.

Allow to cool completely.

Cake Balls

  • 1 batch of the above cake (or any vegan yellow/white cake)
  • 1/8 c. vegan condensed milk (I followed the steps I used to make the almond joy cake balls, except I used vanilla Silk soy milk this time and it was so yummy! You don’t have to use soy milk but definitely used vanilla flavored non-dairy milk)
  • Place the 1/8c. of condensed milk into a 1/2 c and fill the rest with Vanilla Soy milk. (This recipe is halved from the almond joy cake balls so the liquid ingredients are kind of wonky).
  • 1/3 cup of colorful sprinkles
  • 1/2 bag of vegan chocolate chips
  • 1-2 TBSP of vegetable shortening

Crumble the cooled cake into a large bowl. Add the vanilla soy milk and the condensed soy milk to the bowl. With your hands, mix the ingredients in the bowl together until they are well combined. Add the sprinkles in last and mix them well into the dough. Roll into balls and place on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Chill for 1 hour.

Melt the chocolate and vegetable shortening in a double boiler on the stove.* Roll the chilled cake balls in melted chocolate and place back on the parchment paper. Return to the fridge until read to serve.

*I used a decent amount of shortening in the chocolate because I really wanted to thin it out. The first batch I made, when the cake turned out gray, also had too much chocolate. The dark chocolate overwhelmed the cake so I wanted to just put a very thin coating on it. If you have vegan white chocolate, I would definitely advise using that. I haven’t been able to find any so I just used the semi-sweet.

I love how these are all black and white and then you bite into them and its all…WHAHBAM hello color! Ok…these picture don’t do them complete justice. But I certainly couldn’t bite into all of my cake balls until I found a good picture-worthly one! Trust me, they’re awesome…

So you could make these into balls like I did above or, if you want to get super fancy for the superbowl, you can make them into footballs!

Aren’t they so cute?! ok…I know…these aren’t the best footballs. I actually got this idea as I was rolling the cake calls out so there wasn’t a whole lot of preplanning involved, like 5 seconds of preplanning. If I did them again, I would probably pipe the stitching on so it looked cleaner but I worked with what I had at the time!

If you aren’t trying to make these vegan, you could also use the Wilton’s colored chocolate discs they sell at Michaels and dunk these in Red or Blue for the Pats. If you use those, you won’t need the vegetable shortening. OR, if you could find red and blue sprinkles, you could do the sprinkles in Pats colors. That would actually be really cute while still staying vegan!

I had too much fun with taking these pictures…

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BBQ Chili

Posted in Recipes, tagged , , , on January 19, 2012| 2 Comments »

 

Within the last few weeks, one of the posts that got the most hits was the BBQ Tofu Pitas. One can conclude from these statistics that either you A. Really like BBQ or B. you were really bored on January 5. Chances are its the latter but I’m just going to pretend that your obsession with BBQ sauce is as pathetic as mine.

I could have said C. really like tofu, but let’s be honest. No one really likes tofu. It’s just kind of a wiggly mass of soy you use as a vehicle for awesomeness like BBQ.

Now, since I’m banking on A. being the reason that that post got so many hits, one can hypothesize that by posting this BBQ chili recipe, that it will also get above average hits per day.

Clearly, I was super good at science…

BBQ Chili
directly from Oh she glows, because this recipe was too frickin’ good to change!
serves 5 

ngredients:

  • 1 tsp extra virgin olive oil
  • 1 sweet onion, peeled and chopped
  • 4 garlic cloves, peeled and chopped
  • 1 red pepper, chopped
  • 1 jalapeno pepper, seeded and chopped (optional)
  • 2.5 tbsp chili powder, or to taste
  • 1 tsp ground cumin
  • 1 tsp smoked paprika (optional)
  • 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper (or crushed red pepper flakes)
  • 1 1/4 cup dry/uncooked black beans*
  • 6 cups vegetable broth
  • 1 (28-oz) can diced tomatoes, liquid drained
  • 2 tbsp tomato paste, to thicken
  • 1 tbsp chia seeds (or ground flax), to thicken (I used ground flax)
  • 1 cup frozen corn
  • 2 tbsp your fav BBQ sauce (I used  1/4 c. Bone Suckin’ Sauce)**
  • 1/2 tsp kosher salt, or to taste
  • couple handfuls of chopped spinach, or other greens like collard, kale, etc (I used baby spinach)

1. Soak the beans in water overnight or for at least 3-4 hours. This part is optional, but it helps reduce cook time and makes the beans more digestible. Rinse and drain beans before using. In a large pot, add the oil and sauté the onion and garlic over medium-low heat for about 5-6 minutes, until translucent.

2. Add in the pepper and optional jalapeno and sauté for another 3-5 minutes.

3. Stir in the spices (chili powder, cumin, smoked paprika, cayenne) and sauté on low another couple minutes. If you want, you can add just a bit for now and then add the rest to taste after it has cooked.

4. Add the dry black beans, broth, and drained diced tomatoes. Stir well. Now stir in the tomato paste. Simmer on low with the lid ajar for about 2.5 hours, checking often to make sure it doesn’t dry out. If it does, add a bit more broth to thin out.

5. About 15 minutes before it’s done cooking, stir in the flax, corn, and chopped greens. Also stir in the BBQ sauce, starting with 1 tbsp at a time and tasting as you go. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Can be made 2-3 days in advance and frozen if preferred.

Note: You can probably use canned beans, but you won’t need as much broth. I would add it slowly.

*Oh She Glows original recipe called for 1/2 c. dried black eye beans and 3/4 cup of black beans. I couldn’t find dried black eye beans anywhere in whole foods so I just used black beans. I think it worked really well. There’s so much going on in the chili, one type of bean was not a problem.

Also, I think I’m a total dry bean convert! Yes, I had to soak them over night but how is that any different from remembering to take the chicken out to thaw for dinner or something? They were so fresh and had a nice bite to them and weren’t slimey at all. I’m totally switching to dry beans…you know…until I grow super lazy and stalk up on cans…

** I’m OBSESSED with Bone Suckin’ sauce. OBSESSED! I just needed to repeat that incase you missed it capitalized the first time. It taste JUST like the McDonalds BBQ which I never get to eat anymore because I would rather commit some heinous crime then eat there. But, their BBQ sauce was always my favorite. I liked to get french fries at Burger King and BBQ sauce at McDonalds. It totally worked! The only thing about this Bone Suckin’ Sauce (which despite the name is totally vegan) is that it is thinner then most BBQ sauce so I added 1/4 c. into the chili…and then I may  have added a few more TBSP to each bowl of this I ate because I love it so much…and then I may have had a spoonful one night at like 12 pm when I was aimlessly meandering around the kitchen for something to eat.

I’m weird though, so I wouldn’t recommend doing that.

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Hot Veggie Salad

Posted in Recipes, tagged , , , , , , on January 17, 2012| 1 Comment »

Here’s the thing: Blogging can be hard!

Sometimes, it’s late Sunday night and you should be posting recipes but you are sitting in the Cheesecake Factory shoveling the 800th guacamole-ladened tortilla chip in your mouth with a friend under the pretense of “planning your week”. Ok, whatever…do we get free refills on the guac?

Other times, it’s a freezing cold Thursday and you should be posting recipes but you are at a friends soaking in the warmth of their apartment under the pretense of lending an ear to their woes. “oh man, that’s awful! Why don’t I just stay here a few more hours to comfort you…”

Or sometimes, I just plain forget! I take pictures of all my meals, I plan out my week for when and what I’m going to post, and then I just forget. It’s kinda pathetic.

But this recipe is amazing for lunches, so if you can pull yourself away from restaurant eating/socializing/whoring-yourself-out-for warmth, I would seriously recommend preparing a batch of this to be consumed throughout the week. It comes together pretty fast.

Hot Veggy Salad
from Healthful Pursuit

makes 2 cups (I tripled the recipe so I could have it for lunch during the week. )

Ingredients

Rice

  • 1.5 cups water
  • 1/2 cup brown basmati rice, uncooked (the original recipe called for wild rice but I just used what I already had)

Cayenne roasted veggies

  • 1 yellow pepper, diced small
  • 2 carrots, diced small
  • 10 asparagus spears, diced small
  • 1 tbsp coconut oil, melted
  • 1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
  • pinch cayenne (the cayenne is SO subtle. If you want spice, you definitely will need more)

Maple dressing

  • 1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
  • 1 tbsp maple syrup
  • 1 tbsp unpasteurized apple vinegar
  • 1 tbsp gluten-free mustard
  • 1/4 tsp Herbamare or salt
  • dash freshly ground pepper
  • 1/4 cup sunflower seeds (if you are making this ahead of time like I did, keep the sunflowers to the side and add them right before you eat so they don’t get soggy)

Directions

  1. Prepare the Basmati rice (or your rice of choice) according to the package
  2. Meanwhile, preheat oven to 400F.
  3. Place pepper, carrot, and asparagus in a large bowl. Stir in the coconut oil until all the veggies are coated. Your veggies will not taste like coconut. Sprinkle with cinnamon and cayenne. Place in the oven for 20 minutes, or until veggies are tender. (Alternatively, healthfulpursuits.com says you can do this on a stove top, cooking on medium heat for about 8-10 minutes, but I like the taste of baked-in-the-oven veggies more, I don’t know why…)
  4. Remove veggies from oven and place in the bowl with rice.
  5. In a small dish combine olive oil, maple syrup, vinegar and mustard, salt and pepper. If you are making this head of time, store separately from the salad. I used an old, glass olive oil jar. It worked perfectly!
  6. When ready to eat, microwave the rice and veggies for a few minutes. Pour the dressing over the salad, stir, and top with sunflower seeds.

Aren’t the colors super pretty in this salad?! I was super excited for this recipe because I wanted something loaded with vegetables that wasn’t your standard romaine lettuce/carrots/dressing salad. That gets so boring after a while. Plus, its warmth and color helps fight off the winter blues, which has definitely hit Boston- finally. But all the colors in the world won’t motivate me to eat this if it isn’t easy and yummy, which it was. I was able to package this up into servings for lunch and just grab it in the morning! Love how easy that is!

Reused Olive Oil bottle works excellent for home made dressings!

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to go make a few phone calls to see who with heat I can bribe with cookies in exchange for letting me crash on their futons/couches. It’s an icebox in my house!

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Mixed Berry Protein Breakfast Cakes

Posted in Recipes, tagged , , , , , on January 9, 2012| Leave a Comment »

Alright everyone, I love you but let us keep this short and sweet. I’m exactly half way through Catching Fire, book 2 in the Hunger Games trilogy, and every second I take writing this is time I could be using to read about Katniss and the oh-so-perfect Peeta. (even though I already know what happens!!)

One of the things I have really strived for since going vegan and revamping my diet is getting rid of cereal. I was majorly addicted to the convenience of cereal and would often have it for breakfast and occasionally dinner. yeah…sort of missing out on a few food groups when you do that!

So I’ve had to find new breakfast foods, which I find a lot harder then new lunches or dinners. Second only to the green monstah (which I’m still uber addicted to!), I think this has been my favorite new breakfast. It’s one of those unfortunate recipes that has a lot of really odd ingredients but it comes together pretty easily once you have everything.

Though, all I can think of as I post this is, I had a lot of people scoff at the Green Monstah smoothie (Major kudos to Aubrey for giving it a shot and letting me know she enjoyed it!! ), I can’t even imagine how people are going to react to hemp protein powder…

Mixed Berry Protein Breakfast Cake Parfaits
adapted from Healthful Pursuit
serving: 1 cake

Ingredients

  • 1/4 cup Egg Replacer egg whites
  • 2 tbsp hemp protein powder
  • 1 tbsp coconut flour
  • 1 tsp melted coconut oil (you can also use 1 TBSP of coconut butter but I couldn’t find it anywhere)
  • 1 tbsp apple sauce
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract
  • 5-10 drops liquid  stevia – I used 10
  • 1/4 cup frozen berries (you can also use fresh but I used frozen in the cake and fresh on the side)
  • 1/2 container of vanilla non-dairy yogurt (I used So Delicious Vanilla Coconut Milk yogurt. super yummy)
  • handful of fresh mixed berries

Directions

  1. Preheat oven to 375F.
  2. Combine all ingredients but berries in a small bowl and mix until fully incorporated.
  3. Stir in berries.
  4. Put mixture into one cup of a muffin tin.
  5. Place in the preheated oven and bake for 25-28 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.
  6. Serve with the yogurt and fresh berries (I like to crumble up the cake and mix it in with the yogurt and the berries to form a mushy bowl of deliciousness)
So, this recipe doesn’t originally suggest serving it with yogurt and berries but I found the cake really hard to eat alone. It just has a very unusual flavor with the hemp protein powder and the stevia that I wasn’t used to. It also wasn’t terribly filling on its own. When I mixed it with the yogurt though it became a sweet, hearty breakfast that would last me all morning. When I make this, I will make 5 cakes at once so I have breakfast for the week.
I’ll admit, the first time I made this, I felt like a huge crunchy-granola hippie. Hemp protein powder?? Come on! Who actually uses that?! BUT the results were yummy. hmm…Maybe those hippies are onto something. Who knows…maybe I’ll start rocking some major bellbottoms and fringed vests. Right on, man…
NOW BACK TO HUNGER GAMES!!


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BBQ Tofu Pitas

Posted in Recipes on January 5, 2012| 4 Comments »

These are a few of my favorite things…right now:

1. Green Monstah smoothies- Seriously, I’ve had one for breakfast everyday this week and have gone through more almond milk in the last week then I ever did regular milk. Good thing these things are healthly.

2. C.O. Bigelow Coconut Lip butter- so yummy. so rich. so totally addicted.

3. The Hunger Games Series– This is especially pathetic because I’ve already read the stupid things! I know how it ends!! That didn’t stop me from reading it every spare minute I had today. Please tell me you have read it…

4. Making these. You think I would do something productive with my evenings now that I’m not working every single day. I did try…Monday I tried to hang up all my new curtains and when I got home Tuesday, every single one of them had fallen down, thus wasting an entire evening. Serious? Fine! I’ll just make these bracelets and continue to read Hunger Games, thankyouverymuch

5. Going back to Siena. This is due 100% to the fact that before Hunger Games, I read Juliet. Now all I can think about is getting the hell out of dodge and relocating to Siena, where I will obviously live in a swanky loft  in the best contra around and do something non-cubical related like write a book. hmm…maybe I should add that to my new years resolutions…

6. Gotye- Somebody That I Used to Know. GAH! I’ve listened to it like 800 times. I need to have the internet taken away from me. Also, I’m on another A Day to Remember kick. They need to come to Boston, right now.

7. and last but not least…these sandwiches:

BBQ Tofu Pita Sandwiches
inspired by Clover Food Truck in Boston and BBQ Seitan on Thekindlife.com
serves 3-4

1 block of extra firm tofu
1 yellow onion
1TBSP olive oil
12.5 oz (about one bottle) of you favorite BBQ sauce. I used Annie’s Organic Original
2 whole pitas, cut in half
romaine lettuce
tomato
daiya cheddar cheese
lots of napkins
Press the tofu overnight if possible. (I’ve taken to putting mine in my tofu press and then forgetting about it for a day or two. It comes out  super solid and doesnt have the wierd jiggly texture).

Heat your olive oil in a skillet over medium heat. Saute the onions until soft, about 3-5 minutes. While the onions are softening, cut the tofu in bite size pieces. Add them to your skillet once the onions are done. Let cook for about 15 minutes until the tofu has began to get brown. Add the BBQ sauce and reduce heat so that the BBQ sauce is simmering. Let simmer for about 25 minutes, stirring occasionally and making sure to scrap the bottom well so nothing sticks and burns.

Mix in about a handful or two of cheese, as much as you like. Stir and let the cheese melt. Assemble the rest of your sandwich while you wait, lining the pita halves with lettuce and thinly sliced tomatoes. When the cheese is melted, add the BBQ tofu. Shove unceremoniously in your face and watch the BBQ sauce get everywhere!

Though I’ve been eating this all week and I adore it, I think next time I would used a whole wheat wrap. The pita pocket has been falling apart on me , though its possible its just the brand I bought. Either way, my lunches have been an extreme mess and I even got BBQ sauce on my copy of Hunger Games. Not. Cool. So DEFINITELY make this, but maybe when you are in the privacy of your home or when well stocked with napkins!

PS. See that bottle of J.K. Scrumpys hard cider in the background. Best. Hard Cider. Ever. Add that as number 8 on my obsessions list. I could drink that stuff all day…while eating this sandwich…and listening to Goyte…

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Bringing in the New Year with a Green Monstah!

Posted in Recipes, tagged , , , , , , on January 3, 2012| 2 Comments »

Happy 2012, everyone! I hope you had a safe and happy New Years. I kept things chill. I had dinner with a friend and then we dragged our butts to The Common. We attempted to watch the fireworks but had a meh view. But it was a good evening. I knew I didn’t want to start 2012 with a hang over- I wanted to be productive and start the year on a positive note- so we kept the drinks to a minimum. It was a perfect mix of celebratory and low key.

Now that the new year is here, I’m sure we are all sick of seeing chocolates and sweets everywhere. I know that I am! My body started to revolt against all the junk food the week before Christmas. I just couldn’t take it anymore! Everywhere I went there was sugary confections and big bowls of comfort food. I need something green and healthy, which is why this Green Monster Smoothie (or Green Monstah Smoothie, as we Bostonians call it!) is perfect for your post-holiday, new years-resolution diets.

Green Monstah Smoothies

from Oh She Glows

1 cup  almond milk
1 TBSP ground flax seed
1 TBSP nut butter (I used peanut butter)
2 handfuls of baby spinach
1 banana, frozen
3-4 ice cubes

Add all ingredients to a blender in that order and blend until smooth. Consume and feel awesome!

I’m not even exaggerating when I say that this smoothly will make you feel great and full of energy. The week of Christmas, when I was working at my retail job after a full 8+ hours at my regular job, I had about 15 minutes to myself from when I arrived home to when I had to leave for my second job. I would make this and drink it in the car. It gave me so much energy that it was actually a problem one night when I was working behind the cash register and didn’t have any customers. I was dancing around my co-worker, John, because I couldn’t stand still. He kept giving me weird looks.  “It’s this awesome Green Monstah smoothie I made!!!” I said . “Did it have crack in it”, he asked. In fact, it does not! But it will help you shed that sluggish, junk food haze and help give you energy for all those New Years Resolutions. Yeah!

Speaking of resolutions, here are mine. I decided to put them on the back of my door so I can check in and see how I’m doing every once in a while.

Do you like number 5? That one comes courtesy of my friend, Haley. We have a $10 bet riding on that one so I definitely have to keep it! lol!

I’m pumped for 2012. I think its going to be great! What are some of your resolutions? You know, besides eat more vegan meals 😉

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