A Few Eats From The Weekend

Hey there!  I hope everyone is doing well!  I got a surprise in the mail Saturday.  I got my new Everyday Happy Herbivore cookbook....YAY.   I glanced at it Saturday night and saw a lot of yummy simple recipes that I can't wait to try.  The first one that I tried was a breakfast recipe.  Sunday morning I made the Marmalade French Toast on page 40.  The recipe called for apricot marmalade, which I didn't have, so I used orange marmalade.  Tony and I both thought it was great.  I put a little too much maple syrup on mine, so it was a tad to sweet for me.  I had not problem devouring it though.

Saturday night I made HH's Cajun Meatloaf and Brown Gravy.  The brown gravy recipe can be found here on her website.  I'm trying to stay away from wheat for a while, so I used brown rice flower instead of whole wheat pastry flour, and it was just as good...maybe even better.  :o)   I've tried HH's other meatloaf recipes, but hadn't tried the cajun yet, so I thought it was time to give it a try.  I'm so glad that I did, because it was very good.  I also made twice baked potatoes.  I didn't have any vegan sour cream, but  did have some vegan cream cheese, so I used the cream cheese to replace the sour cream.    I thought the cream cheese was great in the potatoes.  In fact, it was so great that I doubt I'll ever use sour cream again.  I topped it with vegan cheddar cheese and imitation bacon bits.  It's been a long time since I've bought imitation bacon bits.  When I opened the jar, I poured some in my hand and threw them into my mouth.  At that moment I had a flash back into my childhood of getting in trouble for eating all the imitation bacon bits as a snack...ha  I had forgotten how much I loved them.

Sunday night I made some potato soup.    This was the first time that I didn't use a recipe.  I totally winged it, and it turned out great.  I cooked my potatoes in just enough water to cook them, then added a can of cream of mushroom soup, about 1 to 1 1/2 cups of vegetable broth, 1/3 container of vegan cream cheese, 1 tsp onion powder, salt, and pepper. The soup is done once you get the cream cheese incorporated into the mixture..  I then topped it with vegan cheddar cheese and imitation bacon bits....YUM!

Last night we made pizza.  Looks good right?  Well, in this case looks are very deceiving!  First off, I was supposed to have gone some where last night, so I hadn't planned on being home to cook.  Yes, Tony was going to have to fend for himself.  My plans fell through though, and I ended up being at home with no idea of what to cook for supper.  We had a can of crescent rolls in the refrigerator, so we decided to make a pizza crust out of it.  Tony rolled it out and put the dough onto our pizza stone.  He then added the sauce and our toppings and  put the pizza into the oven.  I cooked it for about 15 minutes.  I took a big ole bite of my pizza that looked so good and bleh....  The "pizza crust" was all doughy!  With that being said, we will never use crescent rolls for pizza crust again.  It may have been better if we had cooked the crust some before adding everything, but we didn't do that...oh well.  My half of the pizza is the left side, and the stuff that looks like meat is some cajun meatloaf.  The topping part of the pizza was very good.   We sorta turned into kids and ended up just eating the topping off the pizza....ha 

Oh, one more thing about the pizza.  Tony thought he would sit the pizza stone on the stove eye and try to cook the crust a little more. He had the stove eye on a med/high heat.  BIG mistake!  All the sudden I heard a loud pop and what do you know....the pizza stone broke...it broke into three pieces.  I guess the lesson learned here is to never use your pizza stone to cook with on the stove eye!  :o)  Lucky for us we have an extra one that we have never used.  :o)

~Peace~

Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow....

This morning I woke up to snow on the ground.  Yay, our first snow of the year.  I don't ever remember us getting snow this early in the winter though.  I wonder if this is what's to come for the cold winter season?  I do love snow.  It makes me wish I was still a kid, so I could have snow days and get to stay home.  Luckily this snow didn't stick to the streets.  Even though the snow didn't stick the the streets, I can guarantee that everyone was at the grocery store yesterday stocking up on bread and milk.   The mention of snow around here puts people in a panic state of mind.  :o)

Yesterday afternoon I was having some serious stomach pains.  I'm not sure what they were from, but they lasted until about 8:00 last night.  With that being said, I did not feel like cooking supper, so Tony dove right in and took care of things while I laid on the couch cuddled up with Maggie.  We had planned on having pizza last night, and below is what my pizza looked like after Tony got finished making it.  How good does that look?  He even took the picture.   He used my left over fajita veggies that I brought home from Casa Marina (our favorite Mexican place) Saturday night.  He also added some Roma tomatoes and used some Newman's spaghetti sauce along with some Daiya mozzarella cheese.  He told me to remember that if it wasn't good that it was made with love.  :o)   No worries though....It was delicious, and actually better than the ones that I've been making lately.

~Peace~

Pizza with Potato Cashew Cheese

Happy Friday!  Wow, this week has flown by!  This is going to be a pretty short post, because I have to get to work.  I wanted to tell you about the Potato Cashew Cheese that I made the other night though.  I got the recipe from Zombie Cats Eating Plants.  Her recipe can be found here.   Amber really out did herself with this recipe by combining potatoes, cashews, nutritional yeast, and some spices for a delicious cheese sauce.   As you can see in the picture below it is so creamy.  I used half a cup of nutritional yeast in mine, because I wanted it to be cheesier tasting.  I was wishing I had some tortilla chips to dig into the cheese while I was waiting for my pizza to cook.  My husband thought it was weird to be making cheese out of a potato, but after I was finished, he admitted how good it looked.  He still opted for the real thing on his half of the pizza though.  For better pictures of the cheese and some great looking pizza's check out Amber's blog. 



Here's the pizza right out of the oven.   Roma tomatoes and mushrooms were my choice of toppings this time.  I sprinkled a little dried basil, salt, and pepper and then drizzled a little olive oil on top before it went into the oven.

Doesn't the cheese look like real mozzarella melted?

The first part of the week, I had breakfast for supper.  I made scrambled tofu.  I used Happy Herbivores recipe, but instead of taking the time to chop veggies up, I used a bag of frozen broccoli and cauliflower.  I also threw in a few chopped carrots that I had left over from lunch.  It was delicious.  I had fried potatoes and biscuits with homemade muscadine jelly to go with it.  Muscadine jelly is my absolute favorite jelly.  What's your favorite kind of jelly?

I hope everyone has a great weekend.  I plan on doing some baking that I didn't get to do last weekend! :o)

~Peace~

Major Carb Overload

Hey everyone!  Quick post about supper last night.  Tony decided he wanted pizza last night, so I whipped up some Cashew and Sunflower Nut Cheese that I saw Jesse make over at The Happy Go Lucky Vegan.  Her recipe can be found here.  I didn't have the miso paste, so I decided to use tahini in it's place.  I'm not sure what it would taste like with the miso, but it was awesome with the tahini.  I've made several nut cheeses and this one is by far the best that I've had.  OMG....I could have sat down and just ate the cheese all by itself.  I see cheese and crackers in my very near future!  You need to go check out her pictures of the nut cheese on her blog, because mine doesn't do it justice.  I was about to starve last night, so I dug right in and then realized that I needed some pictures, which I took with my phone, so they turned out dark.  Here's the cheese after I had put the leftovers in a jar.



I did manage to take a picture of the  pizza before I added the toppings.   I had some marinara sauce on the pizza crust, so as I was smearing on the cheese, the sauce sorta blended in with the it.  Yes, Tony decided he needed the real stuff.  

I also made some olive oil and garlic pasta, per Tony's request. 

This morning I was about to starve, and my smoothie just wasn't cutting it, so I went the the cafeteria and got some seasoned  fried taters and a slice of toast with jelly on it.   For lunch I had left over pizza.....major carb overload over the last 24 hours.  :o)  Hopefully tonight and the weekend will be much healthier.

~Peace~

Giveaway Winnings and More......

Happy Friday!!!  When I got home yesterday I had a package sitting on the table that came in the mail.  It was some goodies that I won from Sarah over at This Is What I Eat.   Her giveaway was for some homemade treats, which I am always happy to receive.  Shen over at The Shenandoah Vegan had requested Sarah's Half Baked Truffles, so there was 2 cute containers of those, and 2 cute little boxes of Mexican Hot Chocolate Snickerdoodles.  Sarah also sent a sweet cupcake card along with her fantastic goodies.  Shen, thank you so much for requesting those truffles....OMG...I've never had a truffle that good.  Sarah, can you please send me some more?????   :o)   I ate one right away, and thought that I had died and gone to heaven....they were soooo good!  I decided to be a sweet wife and let Tony have one.   He was blown away that they were vegan....score!!  :o)   Later after supper I had a cookie, which was also fantastic, but I have to say...those truffles can NOT be beat.  After I ate the cookie I had another truffle.  :o)   I will be making some of the truffles...for sure.  Sarah, thank you so much!!!   Your goodies rock!

Yesterday for breakfast I decided that I needed to try the Iron Woman Gingerbread Smoothie that Maud over at FoodFeud blogged about the other day.  It was soooo good.   You've got to try it!

Wednesday night I made nachos with HH's Nacho Cheese Sauce.  This is the best homemade cheese sauce that I've had so far, hands down!  I couldn't stop eating it.  The nachos were so good that I had the same thing for lunch yesterday.  My nachos consisted of tortilla chips (of course), black beans, corn, tomatoes, jalapenos, and nacho cheese sauce...total yumminess!  I also had some Mexican rice on the side that Tony made.

Last night for supper I made pizza.   Surprised?  You know I have to eat pizza at least once a week.  :o)  I used Whole Wheat Naan bread for the crust.   I used some of the left over Nacho Cheese Sauce for my cheese, and added some spinach, pink lady tomatoes, yellow yummy bell peppers, and some black beans.  I hesitated about adding the black beans, but I'm glad I added them.  Great pizza last night!

For my afternoon snacks this week I've been having a handful of this trail mix that I made up the other day.  It has cashews, almond slices, walnuts, carob chips, dried cranberries, and some shredded coconut in it.   A handful of the trail mix in the afternoons hits the spot and actually holds me over until supper time.  What all do you put in your trail mix?

Maggie had the right idea this morning. She wasn't getting out of her bed for anything...not even to see me off to work.  Her little sleeping buddy is Flipper.  :o)  I really don't see how she can breathe with her nose buried down into her blanket like that, but she does.  Anyway....I was jealous of her sleeping in this morning.

Have a great weekend!

~Peace~

T G I F and PIzza....again

Happy Friday!!  I hope everyone is planning on having a relaxing weekend like Maggie's doing here.  :o)   I'm for sure going to be doing this in the mornings.  We're supposed to have cool mornings over this weekend, so I plan on sitting outside and clearing my mind.  This is something that we never do.  A couple of weeks ago it was a cool morning, and I went out back to check on the garden and ended up staying out there just relaxing for almost 3 hours.  It was great....very refreshing!



Last night for supper I made pizza again.  It's been a hectic work week, so I just wasn't in the mood to cook a big meal.  I had 4 pieces of whole wheat Naan bread, so I used that for our pizza crust.  My topping this time was zucchini, cherry tomatoes, little yummy bell peppers, and fresh basil.  Total yumminess!

The best part of last night was the dessert pizza I made.  OMG..this was AWESOME!   I used one of the whole wheat Naans for the crust.  I then spread some plum jelly over the bread and put that in the oven for 10 minutes. After the 10 minutes was up, I took the crust out and let it cool for about 5 minutes.  I then spread some Tofutti Better Than Cream Cheese over the jelly and added some blue berries, raspberries, and kiwi.  To finish it off I sprinkled some powdered sugar over it.   I was so full that I could only eat a few bites.  The next time I think I'll just eat dessert pizza.  :o)   I can't wait to make this again with another kind of jelly and other fruits. 

Yesterday for my mid morning snack I had some raspberries and blueberries with a little granola and some homemade almond milk.  I don't normally keep raspberries and blueberries at home, but that's about to change.  I really enjoyed this yesterday morning.

I have a Peace Lilly on my desk at work, and it's blooming....woohoo!  Why do I say woohoo?  Because I do NOT have a green thumb when it comes to house plants.  I even killed a cactus, so that should tell you enough there.   I've been feeding this guy a little green tea and coffee here and there.  Apparently it likes the caffeine.  I've actually had this plant for about 3 years and it's still alive.  I've killed all my house plants that I have (had) at home.   So now you see why I'm sharing about my Peace Lilly blooming.   :o)

Have a FABULOUS weekend!

~Peace~Love~Happiness~



What I've Been Eating This Week.....

Happy Thursday!   Here are a few things that I have been eating this week.  The absolute best was what I cooked for supper last night.  I had Mexican and it all came from my Happy Herbivore cookbook.  First up were these amazing Chili-Lime Corn Chips.  They were made from corn tortillas and seasoned with garlic powder, chili powder, salt, and lime zest.  Lime juice was also squeezed over the chips right before they were served.  I had a feeling these were going to be good, but I had no idea how good.  These chips were awesome.  I think these would be a big hit at a party.

After I made the chips, I made the HH's loaded nachos.  The nachos called for tortilla chips, tomatoes, onion, corn, black beans, jalapenos, olives (I left these out, because I don't like em), nacho cheese sauce, and sour cream.   Lindsay has a nacho cheese sauce and a quick queso sauce in her cookbook.  I decided to try the quick queso instead of the nacho cheese sauce and it was delicious!   The queso over the corn/bean mixture just made the nachos.  I left off the sour cream too.  She has a recipe for that in her cookbook also, but I just wasn't in the mood for sour cream last night.  I did squeeze a little lime juice over the top of the nachos before I dug in though, which was da bomb!   Forget eating Mexican out.  I had much rather have these nachos, which were so easy to whip up.  Making the chips took the longest.  If you use store bought chips you could be eating this in less than 30 minutes.  Now that's what I'm talking about.  :o)

Tuesday night I made a personal pizza out of pita bread, some left over spaghetti sauce, veggie cheese, chorizo, spinach, and tomato with some salt and basil sprinkled on top.  I also decided to finish off some asparagus before it ruined.  I'm working on cleaning out the frig and have almost succeeded.  It's now time to go grocery shopping again. 

Monday night I had a salad.

Monday morning I had a smoothie.  I've been making very simple smoothies lately, because I've been working some overtime.  I opted to go into work early instead of staying late, so that doesn't leave me much spare time in the mornings.  This smoothie was so good!  Here are the ingredients. 

1 1/2 cup soy milk (or any non-dairy milk)
1 scoop Chocolate Amazing Grass
1/2 scoop protein powder
1 frozen banana
1 cup frozen cherries.

Throw it all in the blender until smooth and creamy.  Poor it in a glass and run out the door.  :o)  
I've never been a real big fan of cherries, but they make the best smoothies!  I am now a fan of cherries...frozen ones at least.

~Peace~Love~Happiness~

My Best Veggie Pizza by Far!

 Happy Tuesday!  Yay, my blog is fixed.  Everything is in it's original home again.  Thank you Molly for the tip and the link.  Apparently a few pictures were too big in a couple of my previous post, so it caused my right side bar to disappear to the bottom of my blog.  Hopefully that won't happen again.

For supper last night I made pizza.  One half was for Tony and the other half for me.  As you can tell by the picture, my half rocked.  :)   I actually made my own pizza crust this time.  I got tired of rolling it out, so Tony took over in that department.  He was a pro at it.  Maybe it helped that he worked at Domino's a long time ago.  ha   The pizza crust was fast and simple.  No waiting for the crust to rise as it was yeast free.  I used a recipe that I found on line, but can't find it anymore.  I also threw my printed copy away...sorry  It was good, but I don't think I will make it again. I want to find that perfect crust, and this one wasn't it.  After I had made the crust, I remembered about BlessedMama's pizza crust that she made a while back.  I'll be trying hers the next time!  After the crust had cooked for 5 min, I added some herbs to the crust (rosemary, basil, oregano, and garlic) and then added my pizza sauce, which was fire roasted tomatoes that I blended up in the blender.  I then added some vegan mozzarella cheese, spinach, kale, a few pieces of broccoli, mushrooms, red bell peppers, and sundried tomatoes.  I let Tony fix his side of the pizza the way he wanted it and then he drizzled a little olive oil over the top. 

 Look at all those great looking veggies.....totally yummy!

 I had a great green smoothie for breakfast.  This one had 1 cup of water, 1 date, 3 medium size kale leaves, 1 teaspoon fresh ginger, 1/2 cup frozen mango, 1 frozen banana, 1/4 teaspoon maca powder, and half a scoop of pea protein powder.  This was the first time that I used fresh ginger and it made a big difference....very good.  From now on fresh ginger will be in tha house!

Lunch was a veggie burger made with a 3-ingredient burger patty that I made Sunday night.  I used pita bread for the bun, and added some spinach, the veggie burger, some homemade thousand island dressing, and a few pieces of sun dried tomatoes.  I strayed away from chips today and had some carrots dipped in hummus along with some sweet pickles.  You just can NOT go wrong with those 3 ingredient veggie burgers.

~Peace~Love~Happiness~

What...Pizza.... Again ????

Happy Friday! It snowed here again late yesterday afternoon, which left the roads in pretty slick conditions. I was not a very happy camper on my way home yesterday. I do NOT like driving on ice, which was what was under the beautiful snow....YIKES! I so wanted to take a snow day today, but my husband got me to work all safe and sound (Yay!). I had to find out the hard way that snow days aren't as much fun when you don't get paid for them.

I am very thankful that we didn't get a huge snow and get snowed in, because we are out of almost everything. Our frig is bare! I don't think it has ever been this empty. No milk of any kind, no juice, no veggies...nada! Maggie has a few muffins left in the frig and we have cheese...that's about it. With that being said, you can imagine how big my grocery list is.

Tony found some sliced bell peppers that we had put in the freezer a while back, and I found half a bag of frozen spinach. After some scrounging around for a few minutes, we came up with enough things to make a pizza. My half consisted of Prego mushroom sauce, vegan mozzarella cheese, vegan sausage, onions, red bell peppers, frozen spinach (thawed and cooked a bit), garlic powder, basil oregano, salt and pepper.


Oh and we had some pasta also. What a carbolicious dinner!

I think I am going to have to start making weekly goals instead of yearly goals. I'm not doing so hot with my yearly goals. So, my goals for next week are:

eat less carbs

no oreo cookies for my night time snack :-(

eat more veggies

eat a salad a day

work out at least 3 days

study one hour a night

use my cookbooks

I have high hopes and determination for these weekly goals! I hope everyone has a great weekend!

~Peace~Love~Happiness~

Where do I begin????

Hello! "Where do I begin" is appropriate for today's post, because it's been crazy! Tony and my mom have had the crud (head cold & nasty cough) for the last few days, so that hasn't been much fun. Tuesday when I got home, Tony was on the couch with Maggie, (Maggie was eating that up) complaining that his stomach was cramping. Shortly after that he was in major pain. When my husband complains about pain, it's serious. I kept asking him if he wanted me to take him to the doctor, and of course his response was "NO". So, I went into the kitchen and started doing some prepping for dinner. I noticed he kept going to the bathroom, then he asked me to get him wet wash cloth. He was doubled over with the pain in his stomach. I told him to get up that he was going to the doctor. Next thing I knew he was in the hallway floor in excruciating pain.

I took Tony to the convenient care, where I finally got them to give him a shot for his pain. He was in so much pain that he couldn't stand up straight, and he was begging me to help him....now that is serious pain folks! It sucks when your man, or any family member is in excruciating pain and there is nothing you can do about it. The doctor did an xray of his stomach, but didn't see much. He was very concerned that it could be his appendix, so he sent us over to the emergency room for a cat scan. After waiting for 3 hours in the ER waiting room, they finally got him into a room, where his stomach pain started coming back with a vengeance. They gave him an IV and a shot of phenergan/morphine. About 5 minutes later he said "this is some good stuff!". I had to laugh when he said that. Of course he doesn't remember saying that now. Anyway, around 3:00 Wednesday morning, they finally did a cat scan of his stomach. It appears that he passed a kidney stone....WOW, I sure hope I never have one of those! I've never seen a person in pain like that!

We finally got home around 5 am Wednesday morning and I was pooped! My alarm goes off at 6 am....ugh. I knew I would never make it at work without a few hours of sleep, so I called and left a message for my boss explaining to her what had happened and told her that I would be in around lunch time if that was okay. I ended up rolling out of the bed around 9:15, so I could get to town and get Tony's prescriptions filled and bring them back home to him. Phew....I was exhausted last night. I did get a little sleep last night, but Tony kept waking me up with his nasty cough. I am off work Monday, and I sure hope no one expects us to do anything this weekend, because I am RESTING...oh and cleaning house. I just realized all my Christmas decorations are still up including my Christmas tree. I guess that will go along with cleaning house. :o)

My sister-n-law and her family were supposed to fly in from New Jersey on Monday to celebrate Christmas with us. If you've been watching the news, then you can probably guess that they didn't make it. Their flight was one of the many that got cancelled. It looked like they were going to get to fly out Tuesday, but then that flight also got cancelled. They were told that the next available flight for them was going to be next Monday. Needless to say, they aren't going to get to come, because the kids have to go back to school. We were all bummed about that! I like to try to make something positive out of things, so I look at the bright side and thank God that they are home safe and sound. :o)

Okay...on to the food. Pizza was on the menu for last night and it was GOOD! The pizza sauce was made from a can of Fire Roasted Diced Tomatoes (chopped into sauce form in my mini chopper), 2 cloves of garlic (minced), 1 tsp of oregano, 1 tsp of basil, salt and pepper. I let the sauce mixture simmer on the stove in a small sauce pan for about 20 minutes. After adding the sauce to the whole wheat pizza crust, I added some cooked onions and green bell peppers, then added some leftover Tofurky Italian Sausage. I sprinkled some nutritional yeast over the top. Talk about yummy, it was yummy! Oh yeah, there were a few pieces of leftover cooked spinach thrown on the pizza too.....that would be the green blobs that you see :o)

We had lunch catered in at work today. Normally I'm not excited about that because they usually end up getting barbecue, fried chicken, or pizza. Today was different though. We were given the option of a deli sandwich or Pizza. Thank God that the majority wanted Deli sandwiches. The best part about this is that it came from Panera Bread....woohoo. Finally, I was able to enjoy a catered lunch. We all got boxed lunches. Mine consisted of the Mediterranean Veggie sandwich, baked chips, a dill pickle (yum), and a huge oatmeal raisin cookie. The cookie sure did look good, but I knew it wasn't vegan, so it is going home to Tony. I also forgot to tell them no cheese or red onion. I don't know what it is, but I do NOT like red onion. If a recipe calls for it, I use yellow onion instead. Anyway, I had to pick a couple of things off, which was okay. I am so thankful that we have Panera Bread now! Hopefully we will use them for future meals that we get catered in.

~Peace~

Pizza / Green Tomato Salsa

I hope everyone is having a great day! Tuesday nights menu was PIZZA. I feel like the cookie monster when I say that. I think I love pizza as much as he does cookies! My portion of the pizza is the right side. We don't have to talk about what's hidden under all that cheese on Tony's side. ha I don't know about Tony's half of the pizza, but my half rocked! The sauce was made from canned diced fire roasted tomatoes. I had some vegan mozzarella sliced cheese, so I put a couple of slices of that over the sauce and then layered on the veggies. The veggies consisted of sauteed onions and red peepers, mushrooms, spinach, asparagus and some fresh Roma tomato slices. Tony thought asparagus on pizza was very odd, but it was awesome! He had veggies on his side to. I just had to omit the spinach and asparagus on his portion. :o)



Next on the agenda for Tuesday night was my first experience with canning. I have two recipes that I am using to make some green tomato salsa. I made the first recipe Tuesday night and am going to make the second one this weekend. The one that I am going to make this weekend actually sounds better than the one that I made last night. The 2nd recipe was recommend by Food Snobbery is my Hobbery, which sounds awesome! I have a feeling that the 2nd recipe will be the winner, but I will let you know after the taste test has been done over the weekend. I'll then share the recipes with you or at least the winning recipe. :o) I also want to say thank you to The Kuntrageous Vegan for recommending that I check out Food Snobbery is my Hobbery for some canning recipes.


I ordered a 5 piece home canning kit and porcelain water-bath canner with a rack from Amazon.com yesterday to make my canning easier. I am hoping that they will be in before the weekend. I had to use my stock pot to sterilize the jars and to process them after I had filled them with the salsa. I then had to use regular tongs to put the jars in and get them out of the boiling water. That was very interesting, but it was a success. I do believe that there will be a lot more canning done in my future. I actually had fun doing it, but let me say that I could not have done it with out my husband. He chopped all the tomatoes up while I chopped the onions and peppers. He's just sweet like that! :o)

~Peace~

Cinnamon Maple Roasted Chickpeas & Mexican Pizza

A while back I found a recipe for honey roasted chickpeas. I didn't think that sounded so hot, but as time went on, I really wanted to try it. Since I cooked a big batch of chickpeas over the weekend, I decided I would try to make some maple roasted chickpeas instead of honey roasted.
The outcome was a success! Tony tried one, but made the worst face ever. He doesn't like chickpeas to begin with, so I wasn't surprised that he didn't like them. The whole texture thing gets to him...ha. For me though, I thought they were excellent!

2 cups cooked chickpeas
2 tablespoons pure maple syrup
1 tablespoon agave nectar
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
2 tablespoons organic sugar

Lay the drained chickpeas out on a towel to dry for 15-30 minutes. Spray a nonstick cookie sheet with a nonstick cooking spray. After the chickpeas have dried, transfer them to the cookie sheet in a single layer. Bake on 325 for 45 minutes. Meanwhile, in a medium size bowl, whisk together the maple syrup, agave, vanilla extract, and cinnamon. In a grinder, grind the 2 tablespoons of sugar until it is in a powder form (I used a coffee grinder). After the chickpeas have cooked for 45 minutes, transfer them into the maple syrup mixture and stir until all the chickpeas are coated. Once the chickpeas are coated, sprinkle with the sugar, gently stirring until all the chickpeas are coated. Transfer the coated chickpeas back to the cookie sheet and put them back in the oven for another 15 minutes. Watch closely though to make sure they don't burn. Take them out of the oven and let them cool on the cookie sheet. I couldn't wait until they had completely cooled. I had to eat a few while they were still warm. They were the perfect afternoon snack today!

Last night for dinner, we had pizza. It's been a few weeks since we made pizza, so it was time. I used my leftover fajita veggies for my pizza. I added some spinach, tomato and veggie mozzarella cheese to it. So, I guess you could say that I had a veggie fajita pizza, and Tony had a chicken fajita pizza. :o) Left over Mexican veggies make for a great pizza topping!

~Peace~

Pizza and Choc. Chip Peanut Butter Banana Muffins

Happy Friday! Last night was a pizza night for us. In case you can't tell, I LOVE pizza! I made some more cashew cheese Wednesday night, so I spread some of that on a whole wheat Naan pizza crust. I did make one change to the cashew cheese this time. I used cilantro instead of the basil. Other than that the recipe was the same. Here's a picture of the cheese on the pizza crust before I added everything else to it.

After I spread the cheese on, I added some fire roasted tomato sauce. I took a can of fire roasted tomatoes and put them in my little chopper to make a yummy pizza sauce. To me this makes the best sauce. I then added some red and yellow bell peppers, onions, spinach, mushrooms and some slices of Roma tomatoes. I also sprinkled a little dried basil and garlic on top to season it a bit more. I have to give last nights pizza a two thumbs up!

Today we had a bake sale at work to raise money for Relay for Life. I just couldn't bring myself to make "regular" food for the sale, so I decided to try out Amber's chocolate chip banana muffins over at almost vegan. I did make a few changes to her recipe though. I used 1/4 cup of safflower oil instead of 1/3 cup of canola oil, 3/4 cup of sugar instead of 1 cup, and I also added 1/4 cup peanut butter. So, I actually made chocolate chip peanut butter banana muffins. :o) While mixing everything together, I accidentally got some of the batter on my finger. Yep, you know exactly what I did.... I licked it of....BIG mistake! The batter was delicious! Needless to say after the muffins went in the oven, I scraped all around in the bowl with my spoon and ate what raw batter was left.....yummy! That brought back memories of my grandmother baking cakes when I would stay with her in the summertime. I always got to lick the batter off the spoon and scrape out the bowl. Here's a picture of the yummy tasting batter....

Here are the muffins hot out of the oven.

And this little muffin barley got his picture taken before he was devoured.

I did manage to make it to work with some muffins for the bake sale, but it sure was hard to leave them alone. I see now why Amber makes some mini muffins along with the regular sized ones. I could go crazy eating these. Tony and I ate only one for dessert last night. That was very hard to do though. I have to say that everyone at work seemed to really enjoy them. Now they know how good vegan food can taste. :o)

I hope everyone has a great weekend!

~Peace~

Pizza

Last night we had pizza…YUM!!! It was another night when we didn’t want to stand in the kitchen for an hour and a half to two hours preparing dinner. This was something we could fix pretty quick without having to do a lot of cooking. Tony’s pizza was almost vegetarian, but a little meat found its way onto his pizza some way. Don’t tell anyone, but vegan or not, I’m pretty sure that my pizza was much better than his! ha



For our pizza sauce I used half a can of diced fire roasted tomatoes. I put the tomatoes into my small chopper and made it into a sauce. I added cooked spinach, some slices of yellow squash (that I cooked for about 2 minutes on each side in a non stick skillet), sliced roma tomatoes, and then sprinkled some pepper and basil on top. This was the first time I added basil to my pizza. I think simply put, it made the pizza! I am slowly learning what spices compliment certain foods. The basil definitely complimented this pizza.

Well, the PB&J made it’s way into my lunch bag again today. Here it is along with two fried potatoes. It actually hit the spot today.

I had two plums for dessert….two hours later, but they were camera shy. I think plums are by far my favorite fruit. I was curious about the nutritional value of plums, so I did a little research. This is what I found….I had no idea about these health benefits.

Plums are engorged with vitamins. It has vitamin A, vitamin K and vitamin C. The fruit also has niacin, riboflavin and thiamin.

Plums also have pantothenic acid, folate, vitamin B6 and vitamin E.
Plums prove to be good laxatives and are good for the digestive system. The vitamin C and phenols in the fruit has antioxidant qualities, which look after the eyes and prevent macular degeneration; boosts immunity; improves cardiac health; and, protects against cancer.
Plums are rich in antioxidants, which provide protection from the superoxide anion radical. These antioxidants also prevent damage to our neurons and the fats that are part of our cell membranes.
Plums also lead to better absorption of iron.
The vitamin c in plums is good for the body tissue and for the immune system. It can prevent flu and colds and can even prevent the cholesterol from getting oxidized.
Since the vitamin C in plums can neutralize the free radicals, it prevents diseases like rheumatoid arthritis, osteoarthritis, colon cancer and asthma.

I'm sure I'm the only one that didn't now the health benefits of plums, but hey...I'm still a vegan newbie...learning more every day. :o)

~Peace~