Vegan Sloppy Joes

We've returned from an amazing road trip (I'll post later) and I'm back to cooking.  I absolutely love traveling, especially with my hubby.  We visited some interesting places, ate some awesome food, and saw one of my good friends along the way.  One thing I love about traveling though is that it makes you really appreciate the comforts of home so much more.  I love eating out, but after a week away I was anxious to get back to cooking some vegan goodies.

I may have overdone it this week.  I made some vegan skewers and also sushi for the first time ever.  I see a lot of meals on sticks for my family in the future.  I love experimenting, but sometimes you need to keep it fairly simple especially on busy week nights.

I've been craving lentils (I know, that sounds weird) but really they are delicious!  They're good for you too!  We've been trying to minimize our processed food intake.  As much as we love Gardein their products are highly process and should be considered a special treat.  I've been trying to incorporate more tofu, tempeh, beans, and lentils into our meals.  Here's one way I incorporated lentils…

Ingredients

• one package of Trader Joe's precooked lentils
• one 15 oz. can of tomato sauce (I used Trader Joe's organic tomato sauce)
• 1/4 cup BBQ sauce
• 1/2 green pepper chopped
• 1/2 onion chopped
• 2 cloves of garlic chopped
• salt and pepper to taste 
• your choice of bread (I bought a baguette at TJ's and sliced it)

I love how this child and husband approved meal came out.  It was a hardy dish loaded with healthy ingredients.  It was super simple to make as well.  I cooked the sloppy joes in a cast iron skillet, but you could use any pan.  First I sautéed the garlic and onion with a minimal amount of vegan butter then added the peppers.  Once this was fragrant I added the precooked lentils, can of tomato sauce and BBQ sauce to the pan.  I stirred and let this simmer until the lentils were heated.  I piled the lentils on some bread with lettuce, vegan mayo, and some avocado I had on hand.  Boom.

I couldn't make this meal too simple, so I decide to throw some homemade back onion rings into the mix.  This meal was a hit.  The lentil sloppy joes also can make a great topping on a salad as well.  I know I've been snacking on them all weekend.  Whole food goodness (with onion rings).     

Vegan Quiche

Well I have been terrible at this whole blog thing.  I have a ton of excuses, I had an incredibly busy month at work, I'm taking a Sheltered English Immersion class which is about as fun as it sounds, and life is just busy in general.

Don't worry, I haven't neglected feeding my family.  In fact, I've come up with some recipes that have been well received in our house.  Now it's time to share...

I've always been partial to quiche.  Mainly because it helped me pass French class in high school.  I'll explain...

 I was terrible at French because 1. I was/am a terrible speller 2. I was completely uninterested.  My guidance counselor used to give me a hard time because I could get an A in AP English, but was sliding by with a B- in French class.

Well that B- took a lot of work!  Mostly my mom's work and by work I mean she made me quiches for extra credit.  Yes, I am dating myself here.  I went to school when you could actually bring food in for the class.  Oh the good old days before all these food allergies and worrying about kids' BMI's.  So yes, I earned a hefty 10 points of extra credit for bringing in quiche and passing it off as my own creation.  A web of lies...

So today, as you know, my family and I are vegans, but quiche is still on our menu.  I did a little experimenting and came up with something that's pretty damn close to quiche, is super versatile, and


is packed with protein and veggies.

Ingredients

•  1 block of silken tofu
• 1/4 cup nutritional yeast
• veggies of your choice (I used onion, garlic and broccoli)
• 1 cup vegan cheese
• salt and pepper to taste

I've been branching out in the world of tofu.  Silken tofu is awesome!  You can make smoothies, desserts and so much more with it.  If you've never cooked with silken tofu before don't be alarmed by it's appearance, it's delicious.  You not press silken tofu but I would recommend wrapping it in a cloth for about 20 minutes to get the extra water out.  Next you are going to throw your tofu in a blender with some nutritional yeast and salt and pepper to taste and blend together until the mixture is smooth.  

Next saute your veggies.  I used garlic and onion and threw in some frozen garlic.  Once that was cooked I placed my veggies a large mixing bowl.  I added the vegan cheese and then mixed in the tofu and nutritional yeast.  Mix everything together  I sprayed a Pyrex pie dish and added the mixture.  I sprinkled some more vegan cheese on top and cooked it in the oven at 350 degrees for 30-40 minutes.  Obviously this is a crust less quiche, I have yet to make this using a crust.  Let's just pretend we're trying to be healthy here.  

It came out looking like a quiche!  My husband really loves this recipe.  We have a CSA box starting in June and I think this will be a great way to incorporate some of our veggies.  I want to to try this with kale sometime for sure.

Bon appetit!
     

Soup Night

I don't know about you, but I had a major case of the Mondays this morning.  It was tough getting out of bed.  My husband and I started our day with a Vitamix smoothie and we headed off to work.  One of the highlights (and I'm not just trying to justify the purchase) was drinking out of my $32 dollar water bottle (so worth it).  I drank a lot more water today than I have in a long time.  

When we got home we hit the gym together and then had dinner.  I said this dinner really doesn't go together too well, but thankfully neither of us are picky.  

I threw together a dish with mixed frozen veggies and vegan buffalo chicken since I was craving spicy food, though my husband corrected me that you can't crave something you eat all the time.  I don't agree!  I also have a new obsession (pictured above).  It's one of my summer favorites before my vegan days, the classic combo of tomato, basil and mozzarella.  As wonderful as many vegan alternatives are cheese is hard to replace, I'll admit it.  I decided to substitute mozzarella with extra firm tofu.  I pressed it first to get the water out and then sliced it up.  I tossed it in with tomatoes and fresh basil from our "garden" and topped it off with salt, pepper, and balsamic vinegar.  I think I'm going to be making this a lot come summer time and hopefully we will have our own tomatoes to add!

We did have some leftovers as well (and obviously bread).  We had a quick visit with my parents yesterday and my mom had soup waiting for us.  I think I ate two and a half bowls in one sitting.  My mom has made a non vegetarian version of this before and she was kind enough to make a veggie version especially for us.  Even my dad was eating it!

Ingredients

• 1 onion (chopped)
• 3 cloves of garlic (minced)
• 32 ounces of vegetable broth
• 2 cans of fire roasted diced tomatoes
• 2 cans of chopped green chills 
• 1 pound of veggie sausage (my mom used LifeLight)

First sauté your onion and garlic.  Once this is cooked add it to the crockpot with the veggie broth.  Then add your canned tomatoes, chills, and vegan sausage.  My mom said she cooked this for awhile in the crock pot, I would give it at least a couple of hours.  The great thing about this soup is you can really play around with it.  You can add vegan cheese, tortilla chips, more broth and additional veggies!  I definitely see this soup in our future!  Happy Monday!

Weekend Warrior (Not)

 This has been a weekend of complete generosity and kindness.  My mother-in-law watched the boy so we could attend our friends' awesome post-Christmas ugly sweater party (they're spectacular hosts), my parents stored all our Christmas decorations in their basement AND made us soup, and my husband earned some major hubby points.   He always takes good care of me (and I like to think I take pretty good care of him!) but this weekend he did so much.  He cleaned and organized our entire apartment (it looks amazing), he drove us everywhere (we did a lot of driving), and he didn't mind that I bought myself a $32 water bottle at Whole Foods.

I've mentioned before that I would love to be able to do all my grocery shopping at Whole Foods.  Now I do love that place, but I don't know if my frugal self could ever buy something I know I can get cheaper other places.  I do love to wander around Whole Foods and they will have deals if you look out for them.  I bought Gardein chicken scaloppini (I can't find it anywhere else) and that was $3.99 which is an excellent price (obviously it was on sale).  However, there are some item I get at Whole Foods that I can't find anywhere else…

The Beast Burger:  My husband and I tried the Beast Burger awhile ago so I can attest that it is amazing.  It's not your average veggie burger.  It's juicy and honesty it tastes like real meat.  It was so close to meat that as a vegetarian it was almost concerning.  I recommend this especially if you're a meat eater who is looking to be a little bit healthier, I think it's a better alternative than a turkey burger, especially if you love that beef flavor.  One burger is 260 calories and 23 grams of protein.  

Seitan.  Dining out at vegetarians restaurants has introduced me to seitan.  I've had some delicious dishes (black pepper beef at Grasshopper in Allston especially).  I've a little surprised it is not as easy to find as tofu and tempheh.  Seitan is wheat gluten, the main protein in wheat.  It's a great alternative if you want to get away from soy based alternatives.  I'll make sure I post what I end up doing with these.

Earth Balance Vegan Cheddar Flavor Squares.  I grew up on Cheez-its.  Well not really, but we always had them in the house.  I'm pretty sure my parents have a box of reduced fat Cheez-its in their cabinet right now.  They are delicious and the ultimate snack food if you ask me.  As a vegan, however, they are off the table.  I love Earth Balance, and I always have their butter in my refrigerator.  Their cheddar squares are great, and I will always want to munch on them, vegan or not vegan.  

I also bought a new basil plant since my other one was not successful.  Still getting the hang of this whole "gardening" thing.  Here's to another healthy week!  

English Muffin Bread

I hope everyone had a great Christmas.  I had a wonderful first Christmas as a married lady with my hubby.  As much as I love Christmas, I'm a little bit relieved the holidays are winding down.  I enjoy the whole month of December, with all the decorations and parties, but it is a lot of work (and spending money and not eating so great!).  

One of my gifts this year to coworkers and family was English muffin bread.  If you haven't had English muffin bread before you are missing out.  My gift to you is that I will share my (veganized) recipe for you to enjoy yourself.

I used to beg my mom to make me a loaf of English muffin bread.  It tends to disappear quickly.  My mother's recipe is not vegan but the other week she gave us a loaf…a vegan one!  I didn't think it was possible, but it was so good, and my husband and I polished off half the load before breakfast time.  All it took was two simple substitutions and you too can have a (vegan) loaf of your very own.  

I'll admit.  It's a little bit of a pain in the butt to make and messy.  Well maybe I'm just messy.  Dylan had to clean the kitchen after I was done…flour everywhere.  Once you get the hang of it it's really not so hard to make.  Here's what you'll need…

Ingredients

• 5 1/2 cups four (spoon cups with a spoon to pack lightly)
• 2 packages of active dry yeast
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 2 cups unsweeted soy or almond milk (be conscious of allergies!)
• 1/2 water
• cornmeal
• vegan butter (for lining pans)

First you're going to combine 3 cups of flour, the yeast, sugar, salt and baking soda into a bowl.  Heat your milk and water in a separate pan until they are warm.   Since I was making these for coworkers I used soy milk because I wasn't sure if their kids had any nut allergies.  You have to be careful these days.  The soy milk came out fine and I used almond milk for my family at it was perfect as well.   After your water and milk are heated add this to the dry ingredients and stir in more flour to make a stiff batter.  I would recommend using an electric mixer for this.  Grease two 8.4x4.5 inch pans with vegan butter and sprinkle cornmeal on the sides.  Next you spoon your batter into the pans.  Cover your pans and let rise in a warm place for about 45 minutes.  I don't have too many warm spots in my apartment so I keep it in the oven on the warm setting.  

Next cook your breads at 400 degrees for 25 minutes and you're done!  Remove the bread from the pans right away and let the loaves cool.  Make sure you toast this bread before you eat it!  I recommend slicing it nice and thin.  I've also used this bread to make garlic bread.  Yum.  

I have a couple more packs of yeast calling for me to crank out some more loaves of this bread while we are on winter break.  I think I'm in trouble.  As you can see from the meal above, we've been eating very well this holiday!

Sophie get's some mashed potatoes as well!  Merry Christmas everyone!

Vegan Meatballs

As you can probably tell by now, I love feeding people.  My husband and I had our parents over for dinner on Saturday night and I was super excited to cook for them.  I love having people over and you can guarantee I'm going to make way too much food (who doesn't love leftovers?).  Having people over (especially on weekends) allows me to really bring it to the waltz when it comes to meal prep.

Since our parents were our guests I'm made everything from scratch. I'm kicked the husband and child out of the house (don't worry they had fun seeing Santa) so I could really get to work (and clean this place up!).  I dressed the puggle up in her best Christmas outfit and got to work…

I mentioned my sauce recipe on here before so that was in the works because I'm made (drumroll) vegan  meatballs!  How do you make vegan meatballs you may ask, well I'll tell you.  The main ingredient for my meatballs is mushrooms.  Don't turn your nose up yet.  Mushrooms are a nice meat substitute because (not to be redundant but) they have a nice meatiness to them.  You've probably seen portobello mushroom burgers on menus before.  My husband it not really a big fan of mushrooms but he likes when they are disguised in a recipe.  I've tested these meatballs out on him before and he approves so stay with me...

Meatballs are fun to make.  Vegan meatballs are especially fun because you don't have to fret about contamination from meat or eggs.  You can really get your hands dirty (literally) with vegan meatballs (after washing them first of course!).

I've seen quite a few recipes for vegan meatballs online, and I took inspiration here and there depending on my family's preferences.  My (now vegan) husband always talks about his nana's meatball recipe and how they had oatmeal in them.  Of course I couldn't make vegan meatballs without oatmeal so I incorporated that into mine.  Here's what I did…

Ingredients

• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 1/4 cups oatmeal (uncooked)
• 10 ounces of sliced mushrooms 
• 1 chopped onion
• 3 cloves of garlic chopped
• 1 shallot (you don't really need the shallot, but I love them!)
• 1/4 cup of whole wheat flour
• vegetable oil (for frying)
• salt and pepper to taste

First in a pan I sautéed the onion, garlic and shallot in olive oil until they were lightly browned.  I then added the veggies to the Vitamix (you can use a food processor if you don't have one).  I added my flour and oatmeal (add spices here!) to the mix.  

You should get a sticky brown mixture and you should not be able to differentiate between onion, oatmeal and so on.  This mix is going to be pretty hot after sautéing the veggies so let it sit in the fridge for a little bit.  Once it's cooled I scooped out about two tablespoons at a time and rolled it into a ball.  You can really make you meatballs any size (tiny ones would be great for sliders!), plus you don't really have to worry about internal temperature (since it's vegan!)

You know I like to be healthy, but sometimes you need to fry…these meatballs are a perfect example.  I put my meatballs in a pan with some vegetable oil.  I cooked and flipped them over medium heat until the meatballs were browned on the outside.   

I then added my meatballs to my homemade sauce and served over pasta.  I know they're not your traditional Italian meatballs but everyone seemed to enjoy them!  Cheers!

Chili II

My husband and I have a lot in common.  We're both special education teachers, we're both terrible at putting away laundry, and we both make a mean chili.  Those are actually the three reasons why we got married…

Okay not really, but I think it's nice to have a friendly rivalry when it comes to cooking.  We're having friends over next week and we're planning on making both of our chills.  I've introduced my version on here before, but my hubby's is very different (hence why we can serve them at the same time without being redundant).  His is very…let's say "collegey"???  And not in an educational sense, more like poor college kid throwing everything in his fridge together and some how amazingly making something that tastes good.

.  You'll know what I'm talking about when you see the ingredients…Also, please notice how the dog is stalking my husband in the picture above...

Ingredients

• 1 can vegetarian baked beans
• 1 can black beans (drained)
• 1 can red kidney beans (drained)
• 2 packages of veggie crumble
• 1 onion chopped
• 5 cloves of garlic
• 1/2 cup ketchup
• 1 red pepper
• 1 can diced tomatoes (with the juice)

All you need to do is mix everything together.  We made ours in our crock pot and cooked it on low for six hours.  I was skeptical, but it was delicious.  We threw some sliced jalapeño peppers and Daiya cheese on there and in the words of my husband "BOOM"!

It's certainly a hardy chili with all the protein varieties.  The baked beans add a unique flavor too.  It's something that would satisfy vegetarians and non vegetarians alike.

We'll see who makes the better chili next week though...

Cast Iron Fun

So as I've mentioned before, Friday night is homemade pizza in our house.  It's pretty much my favorite night of the week.  Last night I tried to experiment a little though.

My husband and I both bring pizza stones into the relationship.  Thankfully, when we moved in together we hung on to both.  However, last night I broke out the cast iron skillet to make pizza.

It was awesome, and allowed for a thicker crust (who doesn't love more crust?)  I covered the bottom of the skillet with my corn meal and flaxseed mixture and then spread out the dough.  I don't' have a picture of the final product because I think we were too excited to eat it.  We thew some veggie chicken  nuggets and olives on top of the pizza above.  So good.  

The hubby and I had some Contadino pinot grigio with our pizza.  I'm usually not a huge pinot grigio fan, but this wine has a little bit of carbonation to it.  It's delicious.  It's a more expensive wine for us ( and by that I mean this was $6 dollars).

Happy weekend!

Review: Tofutti Cuties

Growing up we always had ice cream sandwiches.  Well maybe not always, but it seemed that way.  I'm not a huge dessert person but I always can appreciate an ice cream sandwich.  

I've found a vegan alternative that reminds me of my childhood.  Tofutti Cuties.  

And they are exactly that.  Cute.  They come 8 to a box and are "snack" size (aka the perfect size according to my mom).  

If you appreciate a good ice cream sandwich, but can't do dairy (or are vegan) I recommend these 100%.  They honestly taste just like the ones I had as a kid. I really love the Tofutti brand, so many vegan alternatives can be pricey, but I always find their products to be very reasonably priced.

Enjoy!

Vegan cream sauce

I made Thanksgiving in a bowl tonight.  I cleaned out our freezer and some of our pantry veggies to make the ultimate vegan comfort food.  It's a cold rainy night here,  and it's been a long day so obviously it's no time to watch calories (not like we ever do).

I'll spare you the recipe of everything I made tonight to focus on what pulled this meal together, vegan creamed onions.  You can't go wrong with Thanksgiving in a bowl.  Everyone's Thanksgiving is different. Our family's usually includes creamed onions.

I made homemade mashed potatoes, squash, and added corn, peas, and green beans to our bowl version of Thanksgiving.  Instead of turkey we had Trader Joe's "chicken" nuggets.  Now here's the point of me posting thing, the cream sauce.

I texted my mom today, thinking about this meal and that I could probably easily make this sauce vegan.  It was super easy and honestly didn't taste any different than the non vegan version.  Here's what I did:

Ingredients

• 3 tablespoons vegan butter 
• 3 tablespoons flour
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/8 tsp pepper
• 1 cup unsweetened almond milk

First you melt the vegan butter over low heat with a wooden spoon until it is smooth and bubbly.  Next remove the butter and flour from the heat and add the cup of almond milk.  Put this back on the stove and bring it to a boil for one minute.  Cook the mixture for about ten minutes until it is thickened.  I chopped two onions and one shallot on the side and cooked in a separate pot with a little vegan butter.  I added this to the cream sauce once it was cooked.

I made this my top layer to my Thanksgiving in a bowl combo.  When we serve this as a side dish on that special Thursday we usually use pearl onions.  

Not the healthiest of meals but very tasty.  I'm so looking forward to the holidays!

Friday Night Pizza

Yes, I realize it's only Wednesday, but I'm behind and I'm already looking forward to Friday.  It's not so far away!

Pizza.

Friday night is probably my favorite night of the week, even more so than Saturday.  Friday night is full of promise and potential.  In our home, making pizza on Friday night is one of our special traditions.  I get my pizza dough at Trader Joe's.  I buy it earlier in the week and store it in the freezer.  I take it out the night before I intend to use it.  They have several varieties to choose from so I usually buy one of each.  It's even labeled "vegan" which we appreciate!

So here' the secret.  I use a pizza stone and I roll out my dough in corn meal and flaxseed meal.  I make sure the dough is covered in the mixture (I usually about 50/50).  I cover the pizza stone with the mixture and just throw my dough on top and use a rolling pin, flipping the dough at least once.  It makes for a crispier crust that does not stick to the stone, plus you get the nutritional benefits of the flaxseed.

The hubby and I love playing around with different combinations of pizza.  This last Friday I marinaded some Gardein chicken strips in BBQ sauce and threw that on top of the pizza with onions and garlic.  You can't go wrong.

Vegan Shepard's Pie

It's been a busy week for the hubby and me (did you know teachers don't just work 6 hours a day???)  There's been some late nights at work so I actually went on my weekly grocery shopping trip on Wednesday.  Felt a little weird.  

Friday night is pizza night of course and this weekend my college roommate is getting married, so I really only had to worry about Wednesday and Thursday night.  I went with Shepard's pie.  

Ingredients

• 4 potatoes (I used two regular and 2 sweet potatoes)
• 2 tablespoons vegan mayo (I used Just Mayo)
• splash of unsweetened almond milk
• 1 package of precooked lentils
• 1 shallot
• 1 onion
• 3 cloves of garlic
• 1 six oz. can of tomato paste
• as many veggies as you can fit/like (I used fresh celery and carrots and added frozen green beans, corn and peas)  
• 1/4 cup olive oil
• salt and pepper to taste

This was so good.  I wouldn't post anything on here that wasn't a hit of course.  Sometimes when you're a vegetarian you miss out of going to restaurants and having some good comfort food.  Shepard's pie is definitely one of those foods you typically don't see a vegetarian version of.  I have made veggie Shepard's pie before but I used veggie beef crumble.  Last night I experimented with lentils and I didn't miss the veggie beef at all.  Trader Joe's sells a precooked package of lentils, so I went with that to make my life a little easier.   

Prep for this meal was super easy.  The hardest part was the mashed potatoes.  I've actually never made mashed potatoes before so I'm sure many of you have a better way of doing it.  I did get to break out my new potato masher though that I purchased at Crate and Barrel.  It was fun!  I have a picture of it on my Instagram attached to this page.  

So yeah, make mashed potatoes how ever people who know how to make mashed potatoes do.  I did mine with half sweet potatoes, pretending to be healthier.  I also mixed them with a splash of almond milk and some vegan mayo (vegan butter would work as well but I wanted to experiment).  I sautéed the garlic, shallot, and onion in my cast iron grill.  Then I added the fresh and frozen veggies and sautéed those as well.  I added the tomato paste and stirred that into the veggies.  

I spooned the mashed potatoes on top and added a little Daiya cheese as well.  I want to say I cooked it for about 15 minutes.  Figure, the mashed potatoes are already warm as well as the veggies.  The beauty about the cast iron grill is you can stick it in the oven (thanks Kiel and Rudy!).  It came out looking like this.  

It was a hit and (obviously) we had some leftovers for lunch the next day.  It's a pretty healthy version of a Shepard's pie too.  I served it with some farm fresh squash from my parents'.  It's a great dish to bring to a party or to make for the token vegetarian at the Thanksgiving dinner table.  

Enjoy!

Vegan Alfredo Sneak Peak

Monday was a long day for the hubby and me.  Tuesday is going to be even longer, so might as well make Monday count right?  

For Christmas my mother-in-law got me Chloe' Coscarelli's Chloe's Vegan Italian Kitchen cookbook.  I love it and have used several recipes from it.  Her dishes are simple, use minimal ingredients, and are easy to follow.  I hate when cookbooks have seemingly simple meals that call for twenty different ingredients that you need to go to Whole Foods for, this is not the case with this book.  

I can't really post someone else's recipe on here, but I'll give you a hint that the alfredo sauce is primarily made of cauliflower.  

I followed Chloe's recipe (I'm sure there are other vegan cauliflower ones online) but I added peas and vegan chicken to it to make it a well-rounded meal.  

For dessert we had some decaf espresso (we're coffee snobs of course) with some vegan vanilla ice-cream.  If you have never put ice cream (vegan or not) in your coffee you are missing out.  I saw this first when I visited Charleston, SC and had to try it.  

I know this wasn't really a recipe, but I had to share.  It's a great way to sneak veggies in for kids or to enjoy alfredo without all the calories.  I'm hoping to post a vegan shepard's pie later this week and I'll also share my secret to for making a delicious homemade pizza.  

Tofu Scramble

Tofu.  It's a wet block of soy with endless possibilities.  Have I sold it yet?

As a vegetarian, tofu is something I need to be well versed in.  It's loaded with protein and the options are endless as to what you can do with it.  

I've been extra inspired lately.  The hubs and I are lucky (for many reasons) but mostly because we live in walking distance (though we've never walked there) to an awesome Chinese food restaurant.  I measure Chinese food "awesomeness" by two criteria…

1. Does it make me feel disgusting after?
2. What are my vegetarian options?

First of all this place does not make me want to beach myself afterwards.  The ingredients are fresh and the food isn't greasy.  Second of all this place has an entire page of vegetarian/vegan options.  Awesome!

Last night we order a ton of food including two tofu dishes (they list it as "bean curd" mmmm bean curd).  They were both delicious as well as very different from one another.  That's the beauty of tofu.  

I want to share with you one of my favorite tofu go to's, the tofu scramble.  This is a dish my husband introduced to me (I use slightly less butter, and by slightly I mean not a whole stick).  Tofu scramble is super versatile, in that you can really do whatever you want with it, adding what ever veggies and sauces you wish.  I'll share with you our favorite tofu scramble.

Ingredients:

• 1 block extra firm tofu
• 1 pepper
• 1 onion
• 1 sharlot
• 1 clove of garlic
• 1 crown of broccoli
• 2 tablespoon butter or olive oil
• 1/4 Bragg's amino acids

Again, you can use any veggies you want.  I try to make this for my family every Saturday morning and I use whatever I have on hand.  Below is a picture from one of my more aggressive Saturday morning family breakfasts since I don't have a good tofu scramble picture.  

Back to the tofu scramble.  Basically you're going to start with sautéing you're garlic and shallot.  Once those are cooked add the peppers and then the broccoli. 

 The most important part is the tofu.  Make sure you by the extra firm version of tofu.  There' are all different consistencies of tofu out there but the extra firm version is going to give you the most scrambled egg like texture.  Tofu is packaged in water, therefore it's important to wrap the tofu in a dish towel before using it.  If you can place a heavy-ish object on top of the wrapped tofu that is even better and will get a lot of the water out.  They do make tofu presses but we don't have one yet.  

Once your tofu is pressed crumble it up with your hands over the veggies and add your sauce.  Tofu scramble!

Super easy, as healthy as you want to make it (you can use more or less butter and oil), and super flexible.  You can't go wrong.  Once I added a cup of rice to our tofu scramble for fun and my husband loved it.  I hope you do as well.  

Here's Sophie doing what she does for 95% of the day.  Sleeping.  

Taco Tuesday

I'm a slacker.  It's been very busy around here lately.  Busy in a good way but also busy in a Chinese food/ pizza way.  Well not tonight.  Tonight was Taco Tuesday…well mine was taco salad because I'm pretending to be healthy.  

Super easy.  Somewhat healthy.  Totally vegan.

Ingredients

• 1 package soy chorizo (I get mine from Trader Joe's)
• 1 package hard taco shells
• 1 head of lettuce
• salsa
• vegan sour cream (we use Tofutti)
• 1 onion
• 2 cloves of garlic
• guacamole 
• 2 tablespoons vegan butter

Again.  This meal was super easy. The only portion you need to cook is the chorizo.  I started with sautéing the garlic and onion in a pan.  Then I added the soy chorizo until it was heated.  

That's it!  I topped off the tacos with all the sides we had.  For me I made taco salad, crushing up the taco shells.

So here it is.  Super easy, quick, vegan Taco Tuesday!  

Veggie Lo Mein

Everyday I wake up with the intention to be healthy and active.  Most of the time it happens, not aways though.  In an ideal world I will run, walk, or go to the gym every day, easier said than done of course. On our honeymoon in NYC my husband and I walked 12 miles one day.  Dylan thinks I took him on a death march, but I loved it.  When we got home from work last night we attempted to take a walk with the dog, but it started pouring rain.  I think Dylan was a little relieved.  We opted for a glass of wine on the deck instead, that's good for your heart too right?

So if I can't be active everyday I figured I could at least make something healthy for dinner.  We've been incredibly busy lately.  It seems as though all our friends are getting married, having babies or celebrating birthdays.  I feel like I haven't pulled together a blog worthy meal in while (I'm sure everyone knows how to make pizza right?).  

I have so many fresh and frozen vegetables in our kitchen so it's not too difficult to throw something together that's healthy.  I decided to make a veggie lo mein with zucchini noodles.  Here's what I used:

Ingredients

• 1 zucchini (made into noodles with the Sprialfix)
• 1/2 package of Trader Joe's Healthy Chopped Veggie Mix (I used the other half in a salad last night, you can use any chopped veggies you'd like!)
• 1 onion chopped
• 3 cloves of garlic chopped 
• 2 tablespoons sesame oil
• 1/4 cup Bragg's Amino Acid (it's an earthy crunchy soy sauce)

For a little something else on the side I made Trader Joe's Thai Vegetable Gyoza (Japanese dumpling) with their Sweet Chili Sauce on the side.  This sauce is super tasty if you haven't tried it already.  It's great for dipping veggie chicken nuggets in.  

To cut down on oil I made the gyoza in a pan with water, they came out pretty good!

Now back to the lo mein.  I broke out my wok and sautéed my chopped onion and garlic in sesame oil. If you haven't cooked with sesame oil before, you are missing out.  The smell is incredible and it gives whatever you're cooking a real authentic Asian flavor. 

After I sautéed the garlic and onion for a bit I added the rest of my veggies and zucchini noodles to the wok.  I threw in a some leftover veggie chicken as well to add a little protein to the dish.  I topped everything off with the Bragg's sauce. 

I said to my husband this meal was 95% veggies, well that's what I estimated at least.  With the zucchini noodles I honestly don't miss the real noodles.

  So here it is, some guilt free Chinese food.  You'll never have to order takeout again.  Ok, I'm kidding about that...