Easter Feast!

Today I worked my booty off to make an Easter feast for the family (M's side). I admit it was only 99.5% vegan...the Quorn Turk'y Roast I bought has a little bit of egg in it (I noticed too late...still learning to closely read labels!!).

And after a brief dilemma in the freezer aisle, I decided to go ahead and keep up my family tradition of making canned fruit salad with non-dairy whipped topping (which contains a small amount of sodium caseinate, a milk derivative). I felt like I've given up so much of the food I grew up with, I think I can give myself allowance 2 or 3 times a year to buy a crap (non)food product that has a tiny bit of milk derivative. In the name of avoiding obnoxious militancy; as well as maintaining tradition and conscious hypocrisy.


So, confessions aside. What was on the menu? (from left to right)

 --summer squash and tomatoes with cheesy pine nuts, take two (twice the topping was just the ticket! YUM.)
--Quorn turk'y roast with homemade vegan mushroom gravy (recipe from Whole Foods, HIGHLY recommended! (Click for recipe.)
--honey roasted whole carrots (thanks, Brooke!)
--lavender roasted purple potatoes



*Not pictured above: the red-headed stepchild of the meal --fruit "salad" (see left, below. Yeah, it's a family/Lutheran grandma thing.)

 And for good measure, a glamour shot of just the pretty lavender roasted purple potatoes with purple onions. I take eating the rainbow as seriously as wearing the rainbow. Recipe from Color Me Vegan! (Of course.)

It was all really delicious. I love cooking so much.

Summer food!

When I’m not swiping my recipes from the internet these days, I’m probably digging into this book (if you know me well, you are chuckling or at least slightly smiling at the perfection of me and this book, together):

I love it. I’m dreading the day I’ve cooked through everything, because I have yet to make something from it that is not completely delicious. Tonight was no exception…it's really starting to feel like Spring around here (and Spring here is Summer, since it's so hot in the summer you can't do much outside). So after some refreshing Apple Avocado Arugula salads (recipe here: http://www.shutterbean.com/2012/avocado-apple-arugula-salad/ ) we enjoyed summer squash with cherry tomatoes topped with ‘cheesy’ toasted pine nuts. Over quinoa, to boost the protein content and make this ‘side dish’ a main course. (To add to the summery feel, we sat out on the front stoop listening to the cicadas while we ate.)

Apple Arugula Salad (before I added the sunflower seeds)

Because I love you, I will now transcribe the recipe from the book. But I highly recommend buying it, no matter who you are, if you’re looking for delicious ways to incorporate more color and produce into your diet. (And who isn’t?) I have a feeling this recipe will be mind-blowing mid-summer, when these particular veggies and herbs are overflowing in the garden, so bookmark it!

(*I used dried thyme and left out the parsley, because I didn’t have either fresh. I doubled the basil to make up for it. It still turned out amazingly.) (Oh, and next time I make it, I'll double the pine nut topping and work half of it through the veggies before topping, because I really like salty, cheesy goodness.)

Summer Squash with Cherry Tomatoes topped with Cheesy Toasted Pine Nuts

Ingredients:

1 ½ pounds green and/or yellow summer squash, cut into ½ inch cubes

2 to 3 tbsp olive oil

1 tbsp minced fresh parsley

1 tbsp minced fresh basil

1 tbsp minced fresh thyme

4 or 5 cloves garlic, peeled and minced

2 cups grape or cherry tomatoes, stemmed and halved

salt and freshly ground pepper, to taste

¼ cup pine nuts

1 tbsp nutritional yeast

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 375 F.

Combine the squash, oil, herbs, and garlic in a large bowl and toss to combine. Add the tomatoes, salt and pepper, and toss gently. Set aside.

Add the pine nuts, nutritional yeast and salt to taste to the food processor and process until the pine nuts are crumbled and thoroughly combined with the nutritional yeast and salt.

Transfer the veggie mixture to a 9x9 or 9x13 inch glass casserole pan. Spoon the pine nut crumble over the top (mix a little in if you’d like).

Bake to 25-35 minutes or until the squash is tender. Remove from the oven and serve bubbly and hot.

Serve as a side dish or over quinoa to make it an entrée—because the squash and tomatoes break down from the heat in the oven, they form a bit of a thin sauce that is delicious (infused with the cheesy pine nuts and garlic!).

Happy eating! :)

Green smoothie...with a side of wood!

So today I made an attempt at a green smoothie. I'm drinking it now! So it wasn't a total failure.
However, on the topic of smoothies, I'm going to linger a moment on my longing for a Vitamix 5200 blender. You know, the high speed, industrial blender you see demonstrations of at Costco? Why, you may wonder, spend $500 (or $375 if you're a Costco member) on a BLENDER?

I wondered this too. (Pause to remove small chunk of wood from my mouth.)

I spent a ton of time reading reviews, thinking about how often and how I would use it, and if I was just being market-washed. (mmm, more wood!)

I've come to the conclusion that for a vegan family trying to make raw foods the dominant foods in our diets, there is no better investment than a high speed blender. I hope to ultimately be using it 1-2 times daily, and be grinding foods that are not a part of a typical diet (seeds, pits, and other things that would either not be processed in or would break a normal blender).

Besides the fact that the cooler kid is pretty and shiny, I've already experienced 2 extremely annoying things about owning a cheap blender, before even consuming smoothie #1.

Let's start with point 1: the flax seeds. I spent, oh, probably 30 minutes cleaning my coffee grinder with white rice, wiping it out, getting in all the little nooks and crannies, and scrubbing the lid with soap and a toothbrush, again scraping out the tiny corners with a toothpick. Then, I took my flax seeds (important because they are a vegan source of omega-3s), ground them into flax meal in tiny batches, and had to start the entire cleaning process over in order to ready my coffee grinder for coffee yet again. Odds I'll skip adding flax meal for awhile when I run out? Pretty high. With a high speed blender, I can just throw tiny seeds (or huge avocado pits) in whole, and I'm good to go.

Point 2: my cheap little Oster we snagged on sale at Target will do for now. But it doesn't move the ingredients on its own at first--you have to find a way to kinda shove the solid chunks down into the liquid part to really get it going. My genius idea for accomplishing this? The end of a wooden spoon! (Why, there's yet another piece now, as if on cue!) So yes, I ended up blending a few tiny chunks of wood in the rest of my green smoothie, which was unfortunate. And could be avoided altogether with that coveted Vitamix. For now I'm going to have to figure out an alternate solution... but hey, extra fiber?

My green smoothie is pretty good for a first try. Here's what's in it:

1/2 cup orange carrot juice (any juice will do)
1/2 cup purified water
1 tbsp flax meal
1 cup loosely packed chopped dino kale (spinach would also work)
1 fuji apple, cut into chunks
1/2 cup pineapple chunks (frozen would probably make the texture nicer)
1/2 banana (again, I'm going to try frozen next time)
a pinch of wood (I suggest omitting this ingredient)

It's really surprisingly tasty. Very fresh.

Tomorrow is gardening day here at the M&M homestead! We're decently sure that we experienced the last frost this week, so in go those summer fruits and veggies...sweet M has been working so hard building planter boxes and prepping the soil, and I love him for it. Planting carrots, lettuce, tomatoes, beans, strawberries, watermelon, and a few other things I forget right now. I'm really excited as I've only ever grown tomatoes in the past (though very successfully!). M has the garden experience, and I'm so glad and looking forward to feeling very accomplished tomorrow.

For today: I'm taking down the Christmas tree. It's time. And then making a summer squash and cherry tomato dish with quinoa for dinner!

Dinner tonight...

As I mentioned before--dinner making is my strength.

I finally got a blender to make smoothies for breakfasts and/or lunches, and I didn't have ingredients. I finally got ingredients, and I couldn't find my recipes. I found my recipes, and couldn't find the time today to actually get around to making a smoothie like I intended. So, I'm writing this on an empty tank. Very bad, Mandy. But dinner will be delicious and nutritious! Very good, Mandy!

I woke up late, since I was disoriented by M being gone on S's field trip and assumed it was super early when I first woke up and he was gone. So I slept until 11 AM. Oops.

I had intended to spend the day cleaning, doing laundry, prepping food, planning a fall retreat, and getting some writing done. I did some measure of all of those things in the 3 hours before M picked me up to spend a little time all together with S after school, including the first phase of making this No-Fu Love Loaf that my friend J introduced me to last weekend when I stopped by for a quick visit (see her blog here: http://veryveryverygreen.blogspot.com/).

It's a bit of a process; probably 2 hours when all is said and done (I'm a slow cook--so I know when it says 1 hour 15 minutes, that means 2 hours in Mandy world), so I did the cooking the oats and lentils, assembling the ingredients, pressing into a loaf pan part and put it in the fridge. The plan is to put on the topping and bake in the hour before dinner, as well as prepare salads and my favorite smoky roasted cauliflower as a side dish. Here is the recipe, originally found here: http://blog.fatfreevegan.com/2012/04/dreenas-no-fu-love-loaf.html

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup brown (green) lentils
• 1 cup vegetable stock
• 1/3 cup water
• 1 dried bay leaf
• 3/4 cup bulgur (toasted cracked wheat) (for gluten-free version, use certified gf steel cut oats)
• 1 cup water, boiled
• 1/4 cup natural ketchup
• 1 cup rolled or quick oats (ensure gf certified for gluten-free)
• 3 tablespoons tamari (use wheat-free for wheat/gluten-free version)
• 2 tablespoons nutritional yeast
• 2 tablespoons ground white chia (or can use flax meal)
• 2 tablespoons vegan Worcestershire sauce (see note for gf version)
• 2 tablespoons tahini or sunflower seed butter
• 2 teaspoons blackstrap molasses
• 1/4 teaspoon dried thyme
• 1/4 – 1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
• 1 teaspoon dried basil
• 1/8 teaspoon ground fennel (optional)
• Freshly ground black pepper to taste

Topping:

• 3 – 4 tablespoon natural ketchup
• 1 teaspoon vegan Worcestershire sauce (optional) OR 2 tsp vegan bbq sauce (optional)

Instructions

1. Combine the lentils, vegetable stock, 1⁄3 cup of water, and bay leaf in a saucepan. Bring to a boil, then lower heat to medium-low, cover, and cook for 25 to 30 minutes, until just about tender. Once done, add the bulgur and boiling water, cover, and cook on medium-low heat for another 8 to 9 minutes.
2. Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 375°F. Lightly oil an oven-proof glass loaf pan and line the bottom of the pan with a strip of parchment paper to cover (place it in to protrude along the short ends of the pan; this helps for easier removal of the veggie loaf from the pan). Combine the topping ingredients in a small bowl.
3. Once the bulgur is cooked, remove the bay leaf and add all the remaining ingredients (except topping). Stir very well. Transfer the mixture to prepared pan and pack it in. Spread the topping mixture over the top.
4. Cover the dish with aluminum foil and bake for 25 to 28 minutes. Remove the foil and bake for another 7 to 8 minutes. Remove from the oven and let stand for 10 to 15 minutes or so, before cutting to slice and serve. Serves 5-6.

Curious about that cauliflower? Seriously, if you have yet to be introduced to the wonders of smoked paprika, it's a must-try. See the recipe here: http://theshiksa.com/2011/12/06/smoky-roasted-cauliflower/

I'm thinking raw kale salads...kale ripped from the stems, rolled and sliced into shreds. Topped with sunflower seeds, tamari roasted pumpkin seeds, the red bell pepper that is threatening to head to veggie heaven sitting in my fridge, and my favorite dressing:

(ready for this?)
Equal parts lemon juice, olive oil, and Bragg Amino Acids. SO GOOD ON KALE.

OK, I'm making myself seriously hungry, so off to find a snack...I'll update this post with a picture of dinner, after it's done. :)

Update: DELICIOUS. M said,"This is exactly the sort of thing people make fun of vegans for. "Lentil loaf" like it automatically tastes like cardboard and is boring and disgusting. They have no idea." And they don't...

Post #1!

I decided I felt like writing about vegan issues and plant-based diet nutrition enough that I should really start a separate blog to deal with this stuff, and leave the other for the more personal stuff. 

To those wondering what the heck I'm doing with myself lately, I'm basically devoting myself to learning home ec full-time. I’m also really enjoying cookbooks and trying new recipes. This is such hard stuff! I hope when I have kids that I’ll have the energy to focus on teaching them the home economics most people of my generation are struggling to teach themselves. It’s an often sneered at subject that occupies the center of most of our lives, like it or not. 

We see this as an investment in our finances, health and the health of our future family: my long term goals are to reduce spending on groceries and eating out, learn to garden and harvest my own produce, and have a solid enough understanding of nutrition, food and cooking that I can effectively teach others.

So, here it is. I’ll be sharing my process here: what I’m learning about nutrients, a balanced plant-based diet, the challenging (and the surprisingly not-challenging) stuff. (Giving up cheese? Easy. NEVER. WOULD HAVE. BELIEVED IT.)

So far, here’s what has surprised me the most:

All my life, and I mean ALL my life, I have fought a (mostly losing) monster battle against sugar cravings. Many have commented on the coincidental rhymings of “Mandy” and “candy,” given that wherever I am, candy isn’t likely to be too far from my side. When I was a kid and my dad indulged me for the two or three weeks a year I spent with him, I always had spending money and thus I always had a brown paper bag of candy by my side. My cousins knew this. They would seek me out instead of walking to the Amoco when they wanted a Now and Later.

I didn’t grow out of this like most people do. I tired, to some extent, of kiddie candy, but I still constantly was plagued by this desperate need for ice cream, cookies, chocolate.

Since I’ve gone vegan, and I swear on everything holy I am not making this up to sound like a Miracle Diet TV ad (this is not a diet—I eat plenty of fat and calories!)—the cravings are gone. Seriously. Just gone. Every night, at the time I’m used to craving sugar uncontrollably, I stop and think about it. I focus on my body and search high and low for the desperation. I think about ice cream, cupcakes, frosting, brownies. And while of course the memories of how these treats taste are pleasant ones, I find that I don’t want or need them every night anymore. This blows my mind. Sometimes when I find myself wanting sweets, I notice that after 3 squares of dark chocolate I really don’t want any more. Where in the past I would have inhaled the whole bar in one sitting.

Maybe it’s the increase in complex carbs—I’ve been determined to avoid the vegan pitfall of eating too many white carbs and not enough protein and have thus drastically reduced my white rice and pasta intake. I stick mostly to brown rice, quinoa, beans and lentils, and sweet potatoes for my carbs (these foods are not only complex carb sources, but also add significant amounts of protein to my diet). I know this helps with blood sugar issues. Or maybe I was secretly lactose intolerant all my life and never knew. I did have a bad dairy allergy as a kid but seemed to ‘grow out’ of it—maybe my symptoms simply hid themselves better.

Whatever the reason, I’m beyond thrilled. I would crave the sweets and give in, and they would be so satisfying, but inevitably leave me feeling sluggish—that ‘lead weight’ kind of exhaustion every day. It was awful.

Now my typical dietary day (which is a work in progress) looks something like this:

Morning: coffee. (gah, I’m going to have to cut this when I try to get pregnant, which is going to suck.) a handful of nuts, a nut bar, or peanut butter with crackers. fruit. I’d like to upgrade to doing green smoothies (fruit and greens) and add flax seeds to give me the omega-3s I’m no longer getting from fish or fish oil. That’s my next project.

Lunch: the weakest spot of my day. On a good day, sometimes I’ll heat up dinner leftovers. On a mediocre day I’ll eat a raw veggie or fruit. Sometimes I fall into letting myself starve and then pigging out on chips. Trying to avoid gluten and not eating meat has rendered my old lunch sandwich standby obsolete, and my poor little neural pathway just doesn’t know where else to lead me. My journey to improve my mid-day nourishment will be documented here.

Dinner: This is my forte. I love planning and cooking dinners. I’m learning, slowly but surely, how to blend flavors without the crutch of a recipe, and how to put together the foods I have leftover without wasting them.

A typical dinner at my house might be something like: a stir fry or curry with veggies and tofu over brown rice. Sauteed brussel sprouts with apples and pecans and a side of quinoa. Sweet potato tacos with peach salsa on corn tortillas. Cajun red beans and rice (a southern classic I’ve become addicted to since moving to Mississippi). Sauteed mushrooms with wild rice. Chickpeas and spinach, modified and made the easiest thing ever from a pinterest recipe. Occasionally I’ll indulge in Thai-style spicy peanut sauce noodles (brown rice pasta; usually Tinkyada brand). YUM. My next dinner goal is to learn how to make vegetarian sushi (with seaweed wraps) and do it once a week, to increase sea vegetable intake (awesome source of vegan calcium, and satisfying ocean flavor for the former fish eater).

I also love being creative with salads and try to eat a big one before dinner—I love kale salads with sunflower and pumpkin seeds, sometimes with bell pepper and onion chopped in, with a lemon juice, olive oil and Bragg Aminos dressing (equal parts). A new favorite I just discovered—avocado, raw red onion, and half a sweet grapefruit (including all the juice) on top of greens. OMG. Sounds weird, but just believe me and try it. If the grapefruit isn’t quite sweet enough, I’ll drizzle just a teensy, TINY bit of agave on top. A little bit goes a long way. Like, runs a freaking marathon of sweetness long way.

Supplements: 5000 of Methyl B-12 daily. I use Jarrow Formulas and dissolve it under my tongue ($13 for 60 lozenges on Amazon). This, I’ve found through quite a bit of research, is the most important thing any vegan or vegetarian should do for their long-term health. B-12 is an essential nutrient and it’s only found in animal products—in significantly lower amounts in eggs and dairy than in flesh. It’s tough to absorb enough orally as it is, and drugs such as hormonal birth control will deplete your body of its stores, so even animal eaters should be cautious and ask to get your level checked with your annual blood work. I noticed from day 1 of taking my supplements that my anxiety, which had been increasing in intensity at an alarming rate in recent months, was immediately under control.

I need to add D3 from a vegan source (hard to find) and maybe omega-3s from flax as well.

I'll do fancier recipes with pictures and such in the future... but this was a long one on its own. So for now, a quick favorite weeknight dinner for my fellow mushroom worshippers:

Cook up some organic wild rice (I buy the bulk mixture at my local co-op) in vegetable broth instead of water (low or regular sodium, depending on your personal salt preferences).

Sauté ½—1 lb of mushrooms (whatever kind/s you like; slice larger varieties) in 1 tbsp coconut oil. Add 1 tsp or so of dried or fresh thyme and salt to taste when mushrooms are mostly done.

Mix up mushrooms and rice. Serve with side salad of your choice. Done!