My favorite vegetable...and pudding!

And the carrots continue. Thanks for stopping to get these mom :D We still have a couple carrots in our garden, but they always come up so small. So I'll wait it out.

Carrots are by far my favorite veggie (if you can't tell already.) They are soo versatile, raw with hummus, steamed, roasted, stir fried, or baked into yummy casseroles, or muffins, or even stirred into soups.
I love them soo much, I'll go through a bag of full size carrots in 3 or 4 days. No joke.

I can't believe tomorrows Friday...it really is insane! I've felt pretty chill all week, with a little extra time than normal (NOT FOR LONG!) and not a ton of theatre guild practice. We have cue to cue on halloween, from like 11 AM to 9 PM, so no trick or treating for us! boo hoo. Oh whatever, it is only 9 in the evening after all, its not like I can't sneak out to scope out the few houses that hand out dark chocolate and gum, and just give the milky ways and other candy to my friends :)
Speaking of holidays and such, my friend Emily had a birthday yesterday. Happy birthday Emily if you're reading! The vegan cupcake she gave me was VERY yummy. Some sort of chocolate cake with custard, but there was something really gooey about the cake itself that was awesome.

So about that pumpkin pudding-I've been trying over the past few days to get it right. The other day I almost had it-but it was too "jelly" like. The flavor is spot on, but I can't seem to get the texture. I'll notify you guys the second I get it....silken tofu? Hmm. I'll do more research. In the meantime, I had an avocado to use up so I came up with Raw chocolate pudding! Yum!!

Urg. Natural light can be a bit weird sometimes, especially at 7:30 PM. I need better picture techniques.

Raw chocolate pudding:

8 pitted dates

2 bananas

1 avocado

2 tbsp cocoa powder

2-3 tbsp agave or maple

pinch salt

Whiz together in a food processor. Feel free to add chocolate chips, walnuts, or whatever! This is soo yummy and silky smooth. Definetly reccomend it.

I have some english thesis statement waiting for me to tend to, and some cleaning of my room! Talk to you soon, bloggie.

A new week

Ello 'der.

I had a great day today!! I ran a 5k with my dad and sisters this morning. A few players from our soccer team were in it-thats the reason for my soccer shirt. It was really cool, and the route wasn't extremely hard, but I think it was a bit harder than the last 5k.

I finished at 29:55 chip time, which is 1 second off from the last 5k!! That time was 29:54. Bummer. But I still had fun, and I hope to improve next time. Beforehand I had a massive honeycrisp apple, and later in the day I cooked this beauty:

Barley casserole from The Kind Diet. All I can say is MMMMM. I'll look forward to this tomorrow for dinner! It has barley, I threw in some spelt berries, carrot, celery, shoyu, spices, and a delicious tahini dressing with onions and spices. Its then layered and baked, and the tahini dressing hardens a bit on the top, but is still oozing when you eat it. So good!!!
I've had various attempts this week on making vegan pudding. Thats right. So first I tried chocolate pudding...FAIL. I tried it again, even more of a fail! Today I tried pumpkin pudding, and the first time it was so runny, and I tried to reduce it more and little pearls formed of like, cornstarch. I was really confused. Now in the fridge I have a little pumpkin 'pudding' but its more of a weird custard. Whatever. I'll try again!! I know I can do this!!

I have a busy busy week plans, so I apologize in advance for not posting a ton. Have an awesome week you guys :)

My friends, honeycrisp and maple.

Hello readers!! How has fall been for everyone? I've been enjoying tons of honeycrisp apples with cinnamon and walnuts...


It's dark in my room...the pictures aren't PERFECT.
I baked up a batch of these delicious pumpkin oatmeal cookies!! So perfect. I gave them out to friends at school. The recipe is from Vegan with a Vengeance, and I always add a tablespoon or 2 of nut butter, for flavor. I used Mighty Maple this time! I'd never tried it, and it's super yum. It has the texture of Jif peanut butter, but the taste is OUT OF THIS WORLD.

I also tried this, which has been talked about on tons of other blogs. Little did I know it was made right here in Michigan!! I liked it, but it was a bit grainy. The taste was great though-so many different kinds of seeds and nuts. I'll have to try their other flavors.

I would show you a picture, but uh...yeah.

I always take these pictures early in the morning or at night, so theres no natural night! Ugh!! That's why they are blurry/ugly/dark. I'll try to improve.

Schools been good this week, but I'm so glad tomorrows Friday!! I don't know if I'll have much cooking planned for the weekend, but maybe for the sake of the blog I'll do something fun! We have our first grades mailed home tomorrow...I'm pretty confident with the way they'll turn out. But who knows, right?

Fall is such a great season in my opinion...I love the cool weather where you can wear a sweatshirt with flip flops and still be OK. Halloween is always really fun, and I still have to make a Thanksgiving plan! That'll be fun. So far in advance though... I never think that far because things always seem to come up. Winter is fun, but its just so dark, and before you know it it's pitch black at 7:00.

I have a little homework to finish up, and I hope to post for the weekend. I'm doing a 5k on sunday, so there has to be some post regarding that! See ya :D

So I found this little grey cord...

and it's called my camera cord!

Sparkled Ginger cookies from Vegan with a Vengeance. So very yum.

Kabocha...hmm well okay.

Cookies for Daphne's birthday! These were taken late so the lighting SUCKS. Chocolate chip :D

Roasted apple, onion and sweet potato soup from Fresh and fast vegan pleasures. Very distinct and well bonded flavors. Great for the fall!

Pumpkin oatmeal cookies from Vegan with a Vengeance. I say no more.

I'm sure you can guess what these are...

Hmm. Well I've been pretty darn busy lately, involved in a musical, art, guitar, writing, singing, sports, biking, and homework. Oh, theres also cooking :D

Things have been going very well, surprisingly, the homework load isn't INSANE. I do find time to cook in the evening, although I do the more elaborate things on the weekend. I'm really enjoying biking home, its relaxing and basically all downhill so it's an easy ride.

I missed blogging a ton!!! My mom found the camera cord (thanks mommy!) at her office, and I was very releived and excited to see that I'd be able to be connected to the blogosphere once again. Thank you guys so much for reading....I'll try to definetly post a lot! I got a new photo editing system on my computer, Adobe lightroom photoshop, so expect some strange playing around of photos to come. Now if you'll excuse me, I have a dishwasher to unload.

Olivia :)

Reviews...and a BATH?!?

There are a few foods that I want to talk about, that I've bought recently. For as long as I've been a vegan, I've never really tried a vegan cheese. The other day at Hillers my dad came across this cheese. It's like a parmesan imitation, The Vegetarian Express. It's local, and made in Michigan, so I decided to give it a try.

The ingredients are pretty innocent: blanched almond meal, nutritional yeast, sea salt, dehydrated onion, and citric acid.

I personally like the taste! It does have a parmesan flavor, and my dad reccomended using it in pesto which sounded good. I was thinking of sauteing up an eggplant and some other veggies tonight, so I'll try it sprinkled on that. Overall, thumbs up on the parmesan stuff!

At whole foods, I thought of trying another kind of cheese. I had never tried a toffuti product in my life, which even I'm surprised at! I guess something that I think about is that I gave up dairy for ethical and health reasons, but I got used to not having it and I didn't really seek out the milk/cheese taste after a while. You may notice that I don't eat too much meat imitations, like tofurkey or fak-in, and I think it's because my body doesn't want that taste anymore. I feel like I don't really need it, I may have it only a few times a year! I would say the most veganized product I have is almond milk, and soymilk. Other than that, my foods are normal. I eat hummus, beans, bread products, veggies, fruit, and foods that anyone would eat. I just don't see the reason to immediatley replace the meat with a meat taste. That may be just me!!

But it's cool to experiment with different veganized versions of meat and dairy. I bought this toffuti cream cheese today, which wasn't too expensive. Thank you, Whole Foods!

The texture was very cream cheesey, and it spread well. I assume it would be a good cream cheese replacement in baking.

The taste was surprisingly good! Actual cream cheesey, and even though I havent had real cream cheese in over a year, I think it is very much like the real thing. I mixed a little with some TJ's pumpkin butter, and put it on a wasa cracker. I also tried it mixed with some local strawberry jam on a cracker. Yes, a bite made it into my mouth before the picture was taken! Oops!

Yumzo. This would also be good on toast or a bagel. :)

Gazpacho talk! I promised I would post about the gazpacho I made the other day. I based it on a recipe out of Fresh and Fast Vegan Pleasures, but changed 2 or 3 things. Mine was definetley a lot spicier, and I added a little bread crumbs beause I never got around to making the spicy paprika croutons. (Didn't want to turn on the oven!)

Spicy gazpacho soup

2 lbs ripe cherry tomatoes (I used an assortment from our garden-we had/have a ton!)

1 cucumber, peeled and seeded

1 garlic clove, chopped

1 red chili pepper, finely diced

3 spring onions (I used 1/4 red onion and 1 shallot)

3 tbsp olive oil

scant 1/4 cup panko bread crumbs (optional)

1 tbsp red wine vinegar

2 tsp sugar

small handful arugula (I used parsley)

1 tsp sea salt

Put all the soup ingredients in the food processor, no need to seed the tomatoes!! Process to the desired consistency, Mine still had some chunks. You may heat the soup if you want like the recipe in the book says, but I have been having mine cooled.

This was great with some franks hot sauce, some more fresh cucumber, and black pepper. Perfect for a hot day, and super easy! Great way to use up tomatoes erupting in your garden.

Once a year, we give my cat, Bourbon, a bath. Since he's an outdoor cat, we figure it's good to because we don't know what he gets into out there! (Yuck...) Cats do naturally clean themselves, and he does a great job doing so. In the past years we've given Bourbon a bath outside with a hose, but every time he has broken free afterwards and gotten dirty outside. So this year I gave him a bath inside, in our bathroom! Just wet him down, with a little mild baby soap, rinsed, and dried! He was so upset during the bath, I bet the thoughts going through his head were "how could you betray me? You sick people!!!" But my mom and I tried to use quiet voices, and he actually didn't do too bad. He's currently stretched out on the upstairs couch, and is QUITE soft and pretty.

Like his white tummy? :D

I'm going to finish up reading more blogs, while I make myself chug this water sitting in front of me. See you guys later!! Thanks for stopping by.

Ups and Downs

Well I took a picture of my breakfast today, (UP!)which I am proud of. Not too pretty, but I walked to school today because I delivered the pumpkin bread to my sister for an early mother's day present. We'll be away in Washington, D.C. for a wedding this weekend, so I figured I should give the bread to her while it's still fresh! UP!

I packed kamut puffs with a few oats thrown on top, 2 lil' strawberries, and a few raisins in my peanut butter jar. (clean) I had it with rice milk and cinnamon, and ate it on my walk to school! While listening to my iPod. Great way to wake up, if anyone needs it. UP!

I had a rough day (care not to share...) down...and went for a very sprint-iful run to work it out. Its actually good to exercise when you're mad, I've found out. I was able to run faster! Cool.

My dad picked up "the best middle eastern food ever" in Belleville, MI. (?) UP! I ate his leftovers for dinner, super yummy baba ganouj, with carrot, red pepper, and cherry tomaters. Some tabbouleh as well, which was uh-freaking-amazing. So flavorful. I didn't know parsley had so much potential.

(NO, I didn't have that much baba ganouj. I just took the tupperware out of the fridge.)

A big strawberry for dessert

Well my science binder is waiting for me to study it, (down...) so I had better tend to that...I'll probably blog tomorrow, but forgive me if I don't as I'm leaving for D.C! Well definetly Sunday I'll blog.

Why hello, Wednesday!

I woke up sort of late today. Kinda well rested and stuff, I was happy and not all grumpy and grumbly like I usually am. :) I set out my "mis en place" for the pumpkin bread I was making later that night. Which is in the oven now, smelling like heaven.

I packed kamut puffs, a small handful of oats, a sprinkle of raisins, and strawberries in an earth balance container with almond milk. I ate it in class, and it was perfect! No pictures though, my carpool rolled up to my house and I had to go:(

I picked up my nephew today, walking to his house was nice, not too hot or anything. But shortly after arriving at my sisters, it started POURING. We played soccer in the basement, he beat me 25-24. I actually got somewhat of a workout, running back and forth and crashing into walls and falling and such. Oh well, its not too bad that a 6 year old beat me in soccer {:

(Sorry about the lack of pictures. There are some to come, I am extremely lazy about it.)

I worked on my pumpkin bread for a while when I got home, and made a salad with the massive bag of Field greens in the midst of it all. Field greens, (very unripe) avocado I had to smash several times on the kitchen floor to make it remotely ripe (shh...), tomatoes, broccoli, red pepper, and leftover balsamic Dijon dressing. I cooked up a lil' bit of quinoa for protein AND grains, mixed it with beloved rooster sauce, and threw it on top of the salad.

Don't you LOVE this picture?

My pumpkin bread...before it went in the oven! This would be another delicious recipe from The Kind Diet. The recipe is in one of my early blog posts. I promise. This time, I MELTED chocolate over the top. NO macadamias, this time I used pecans and walnuts. Another important piece-I used 1/2 pumpkin, and 1/2 sweet tater puree. Let's see how it turns out! I think it'll be better.

I'll show the finished product of the pumpkin/sweet tater bread by tomorrow. I'll be back tomorrow evening, for sure! No baking tomorrow:( oh well, less cleaning!:)

Last day of April...really?

Does anyone else think this month has gone by unbelievably fast? Maybe it's because I had a week off...who knows. But it just seemed to be over quickly.
Sorry about the lack of pictures! I ate on the go/out today and didn't have a chance to take any pics! But tomorrow-if I do anything exciting (may be trying granola bars again) for my relatives in Pennsylvania. Is that a good idea, or should I make vegan rice krispie treats? Hmm...so many desicions.
I woke up late today (teeehee) and packed cinnamon vanilla pumpkin oatmeal. Its my new obsession. (That and my thermos!) I took it to school and ate it in class-it smelled yummy!! And it made me really warm!
For dinner, my friends and I went to a vegetarian resteraunt downtown, called Seva. There were so many options! I didn't know what I wanted-I ended up getting the Veggie Nirvana which was a boatload of raw veggies with a lil' saucer of super magical hummus. Whats with me and hummus?! We all shared the (addicting) yam fries, I had mine with hot sauce and ketchup. I almost got a veggie-hummus wrap in a pita, but decided that I would be having yam fries, which were soo worth it.
Sorry about the stale post!! I'm going to do pics tomorrow. I know it. Wow I fail at blogging.

Lazy Saturday

Today started early...7:00! I haven't been able to sleep in since like, summer! It frustrates me. I figured since my dad needed to leave and he was making breakfast for himself, I would start mine as well.

Big surprise! I made oatmeal. Plus 2 figs. The rolled oats, because my dad was about to sit down and I needed something quick. THE MIX:

Scant 1/2 cup rolled oats

1/4 cup almond milk

1/4 cup water

pinch salt

1 tbsp plus a lil' more pumpkin butter

pinch cinnamon

tsp ground flaxseed

topped with raisins. Sorry the picture is dark! I really need to get better at my food photography...any tips?

Later in the day, I went to the gym for a fast workout. 15ish minutes on the treadmill, some jumprope, situps, and random lift weights. Then my mom and I wandered around at the farmers market and got apples, and a big bag of fresh spinach. I then had a guitar lesson with my new teacher! It was a lot of fun.

My mom and I went out to lunch at Jerusalem Garden. (No pics:( )If I lived there, I think I would be the happiest person on the planet. All middle eastern-all the time. Just picture the excellence. I got the hummus (duh) with cucumbers, pita, and tomato. Then my vegetarian grape leaves came which were very very yummy! I just recently started liking grape leaves.

I cleaned a little at home, did some homework, explored blogs. Then around 4:30 I walked up to trader Joes because we desperately needed to go shopping. Its about 1.5 miles from my house. Here's the list: (I actually got a grocery cart this time!)

cubed butternut squash

yellow onions

carrots

sweet taters

whole grain Dijon mustard

2 zbars (1 for my niece, 1 for my nephew:)

Dried pineapple rings

Pita pillow puffs chips

(Dry) Brown rice

Quinoa

Steamed vacuum packed lentils

2 mangoes

2 bell peppers

1 very un-ripe avocado

I was very happy with my purchases! (And the prices!) The only thing I didn't find was sesame seeds. When I got home, I wanted to make Squash 'n' onions from The Kind Diet.

Serves 4

1 medium butternut squash (I used a bunch of chunks)

2 medium onions

1 tablespoon olive oil

1/2 tsp dry oregano

1/4 tsp fine sea salt

Wash and scrub the squash, (leave peel on) and cut it into 2" pieces. Peel the onions, halve lengthwise, and slice crosswise in 1/2" slices.

Heat the oil in a saucepan. Add the onions, saute until transparent, about 5 minutes. Add the oregano and squash. Saute for another 3 minutes. Add 1/2 cup water to the skillet and add the salt. Cover the pan, reduce to low, and simmer for 25-30 minutes. (Took longer for me.)

This was so good! I had it with my dinner along with salad, which had a yummy Dijon-balsamic-lemon dressing, along with and hummus and veggies. Very strange cursed hummus that I made and is just kind of weird. Its not going bad, it just doesn't smell like hummus. I used all normal ingredients!! Help?!

2 hours after dinner, I finished off with some amazing Indian tea from Teahaus, 1 or 2 dry pineapple slices and 2 squares of trader joe dark chocolate. Great day!

Finally Friday!

It was soo relieving to know it was Friday! Just knowing the weekend is in your grasp motivates you to get through school/work. Yay!

Since Trader Joes is on the way home on my walk, I stop there a lot to get treats for my nephew, quick things I need for dinner, or just samples! I wanted to try making granola bars so I got a few ingredients after school.

Organic oats, unsalted sunflower seeds, dried apricots, and a new item. Pumpkin butter. (like a jam, its not dairy. Calm down.)

I got home, blogged a little, and then got crackin' on my bars. I kinda made up the recipe as I went along (?) at least I learned what to do next. (And at least I made a small batch!) These bars were sooooooooooo delicious. You could taste every flavor, and the pumpkin I could have eaten so many of them! But they weren't exactly sticking together like proper granola bars should. They were crumbly-perfect for having on top of a smoothie, soy/nut milk, or oatmeal. But not exactly a munching bar. Unless you wanted it to be super messy!

1 cup rolled oats

About 1 more cup cereal of your choice (I used kamut puffs and ezekiel wheat free cereal)

Scant 1 cup nuts (I used sunflower seeds and walnuts)

1 cup dried fruit (Apricots and raisins for me)

2/3 cup maple syrup (I didn't use enough-so feel free to play around with this until it's the consistency good for "packing.")

2 tbsp canola oil

1 tbsp wheat germ

1 tbsp flaxseed

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp vanilla

3 tbsp pumpkin butter

Mix the oatmeal, cereal, flaxseed, and wheatgerm in a bowl. Toast the nuts in a 300'f oven for about 4-5 minutes, until golden brown. Add the nuts to the cereal mix, add the dried fruit. Then add the maple syrup, pumpkin butter, vanilla, salt, and oil. Mix, and change if you think the texture/taste needs a lil' somethin somethin. Bake for 20-25 minutes, and LET COOL COMPLETELY before digging in/cutting.

For dinner, I was in a rush (no pictures:( ) I went to see Peter Pan, which was really good but very long! I didn't remember how much I loved that movie...

I was in the oat-spirit of things, (and in a rush...) So I made oatmeal (rolled, I'm shocked with myself!) with some thrown in ezekiel cereal, pumpkin butter, sunflower seed butter, cinnamon, and raw apples. I threw this in a thermos as I ate it in the car! I also brought steamed broccoli with a balsamic vinaigrette, and raw carrot sticks.

I do have to say I prefer steel cut oats for straight up eating, but I'm sure I just say that because I'm so used to having them. I have no problem with rolled, I think there's more freedom to do stuff with the consistency, plus they are done soo much faster so I can make them on school mornings without having to wake up early! YAY!

I'll post again tomorrow, not sure whats going on quite yet, so bye for now.

Pumpkin Bread

Yummy...PUMPKIN BREAD!! I've never liked pumkin pie, so I wasn't sure I'd like this. But it ended up being amazing! It was from The Kind Diet. This was classified under breakfast, but it could be enjoyed for a dessert or snack easily. Its really moist and delicious, but crumbly. So if you want to leave it in a bit longer than the recipe says I'm sure that's fine.

Makes 2 smallish/medium loaves

5 cups cooked pumpkin

2 cups maple sugar (I used mostly date sugar plus 2 tbsp organic evaporated cane juice)

2 "eggs" (2 tbsp flaxseed pureed with 6 tbsp water, mashed banana, ener-g egg replacer, or other.)

1 cup almond/nut milk

3/4 cup safflower oil

1 tsp vanilla extract

4 cups spelt flour (I used whole wheat flour)

3 tsp baking soda

3 tsp baking powder

1 tbsp cinnamon

1 tsp nutmeg

3/4 cup vegan chocolate chips or carob chips

1 cup whole (Or crushed-I didn't like the whole) macadamia nuts

Preheat the oven to 350'f. Oil 2 9x5 loaf pans.

Combine the pumpkin puree, sugar, "eggs", milk, oil and vanilla extract in a mixing bowl. In a seperate bowl, combine the flour, baking soda and baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg, and the chocolate chips and nuts. Add the wet ingredients to the dry and mix until well combined.

Fill the prepared baking pans with the batter. (It will rise, so leave some space.) Top with extra nuts and chocolate if you'd like:)

Let the loaves cool, then transfer them to a baking rack and let them cool some more.