Blood Circulating Smoothie and Artichokes

Hey everyone!  I can't believe Thanksgiving is in two more days.  What are you having to eat?  We are going to my sister-n-laws to eat with the Tony's family.  I'm still trying to decide what I'm going to eat.  I'm taking a Shepard's Pie as my one dish to take, but now to figure out what to take for myself while everyone else indulges on the "bad" stuff.  :)  I thought about making the Tofu Turkey in Happy Herbivore.  Has anyone ever tried that before?  If so, how was it?

This morning I made a green smoothie to try to help improve my blood circulation.  I stay cold all the time...I mean I literally freeze, so I decided to do some research on the web and I really think that I have poor blood circulation. All the symptoms described me to the T.  I read up on what spices and herbs are supposed to be good for improving your blood circulation.  Ginger and Cayenne pepper happen to be among them, so here's my blood circulation smoothie for this morning. 

1 kale leaf

1 small banana

1 Clementine (peeled)

1 tbs ginger

1 tbs black strap molasses

1/2 apple

1/4 cup frozen mango chunks

1 cup water

a pinch of cayenne

a few ice cubes (I used 3)

Throw it all in a blender and blend until smooth.  I've never been a big fan of spicy drinks, but I have to admit that I really liked this.  Today I used a very small pinch of cayenne, but tomorrow I think I will use a little more.  The smoothie was sweet when I took my first drink, but all the sudden the spiciness came out, which I liked.  Another plus is that it gave me a good boost of energy. I always need energy! 

For my mid morning snack I had a bowl of Kashi Cinnamon Harvest cereal.  This stuff is GOOD!  Thanks Shen for recommending it.

About the artichokes...well, I like them...I mean really like them.  I decided to make FoodFeuds "Artichoke to Death" dish, and all I can say is WOW!  This was one of the best meals!  It was so different, in a very good way.  The tahini sauce was to die for.  I decided to try a bite at first without the sauce and then a bite with the sauce to see which way was the best.  The addition of the sauce was the only way to go.  Maud...you're a genius.  :o)   I think I will try artichokes in a salad next.  Oh yeah....Tony decided that he needed some pineapple with his supper, so he fried some pineapple in some coconut oil....OMG...talk about good!

I tried the chocolate soy pudding for my afternoon snack yesterday.  It was rich and creamy and tasted like the dairy pudding that I used to eat in my pre vegan days.   I'll definitely buy this again.   



I hope everyone has a Happy and Blessed Thanksgiving! 

~Peace~

Weekend Eats........

Hey everyone! I've been pretty busy, so I haven't taken the time to blog over the past several days. Here's a few pics of what I've been eating. First up is my favorite....a mango green smoothie. I had to post it, because the bubbles on top look like two eyes and two little nostrils. :o)  Do you see it?

 

Last night I made a sweet potato casserole for two.  I was watching the Food Network channel Sunday and saw Anne Burrell make a sweet potato casserole that sounded so good.  I tried to remember her secret ingredients, so I could make it last night.  I didn't want to make a large batch just in case it didn't turn out good.  It turned out wonderful though.  I loved addition of the citrus!

1 large sweet potato
2 tbs vegan butter
1 tsp cinnamon
juice of one Clementine (Ann used an orange, but a Clementine was all I had)
the zest of one Clementine  (Ann used the zest of an orange)
a splash of almond milk

  TOPPING
1/4 cup old fashion oats (I may have used a little more, I didn't measure...sorry)
1 tbs vegan butter
2 tbs brown sugar
a dash of cinnamon

Peel and chop the potato then boil for about 20 minutes or until tender. Once tender, transfer the potatoes to a bowl and mash with a fork, then mix in the butter, cinnamon, Clementine zest and juice. Add a splash of almond milk if the potatoes are to thick. Transfer mixture to a small casserole dish.
For the topping, put the oats, butter, cinnamon, and brown sugar in a small food processor and pulse until everything is mixed and lumpy. Sprinkle topping over sweet potatoes and bake at 350 for 20 minutes.

I also made a veggie stir fry for supper last night....not the best combo...I know.  It sure was good though.

One night Tony cooked supper and made veggie fajitas.   They consisted of onions, peppers, zucchini, tomatoes, and roasted chickpeas.  They were so good.  This was the first time that I put roasted chickpeas in my fajitas, and it won't be the last.  They were a great addition. Tony is now in charge of making fajitas, he just doesn't know that yet.

I did roast the chickpeas though.  I drained, rinsed, and dried the chickpeas, then put spread them out on a baking sheet.  I sprayed them with a little cooking spray and then sprinkled some chili powder, paprika, and a little salt on them .  I put those bad boys in the oven on 350 and baked them for about 30 minutes.

So far this is my favorite spice blend for the roasted chickpeas. The next day I added the leftover chickpeas to a salad and topped it off with some AWESOME Goddess dressing. I've seen Goddess dressing all over the blog world for a year now, and I just finally bought some the other day. Why do I wait so long to try things.....ugh I have really been missing out by not having Goddess dressing!

We went to Tony's parents house for lunch on Sunday for soup and chili.  She made some vegetable soup just for me.  :o)   She sent some home with me, so I added some kale to the leftovers for supper that night.  It had all kind of veggies in it.  Very Very good!  And, I have no idea why the picture ended up posting turned the wrong way. 



I hope everyone is having a good week!

~Peace~

Green Smoothie, Bok Choy, and Grilled Portabello Steaks

Happy Tuesday everyone!  Wow, I just realized that's it's been several days since I blogged.  I had some baking plans for over the weekend, but once again my weekend didn't go as I had planned.  Hopefully I'll get to do a little baking one night this week, because I'm past due on blogging about something that I've really enjoyed.  :o)    Hopefully that will appear in my blog in the next couple of days.  

Okay, moving into some food.  Yesterday morning and this morning I had this green smoothie. I've been smoothie deprived over the last couple of weeks, so I'm sure I will be having all kinds of smoothies this week.  Right now I'm feeling the green ones though.  :o)  This smoothie was made up of a cup of almond milk, and hand full of fresh spinach, 3 tablespoons of hemp seeds, 1 teaspoon of flax seeds, a dash of cinnamon, a frozen banana, and frozen mango chunks (about a cup).  You may or may not need to add a little more liquid.  Sometimes mine is to thick to blend, so I end up having to add a little more milk or water.  And, because I have an inexpensive blender, I always blend my greens, liquid, and seeds first.  After that's all smooth, I add the frozen fruit and blend until it's all creamy.   :o)

We went to the Farmers Market Saturday and I found some bok choy...woohoo.   So, last night we had steamed bok choy with an awesome ginger vinaigrette to go on top of it..  I used this recipe to make the ginger vinaigrette.  The only change that I made was that I used agave nectar instead of sugar, and I added some sesame seeds on top.  It was delicious! I found some Smart Strips (chick'n style strips) at Kroger the other day when I went grocery shopping, so I sauteed them with some bell peppers and carrots to go along with the bok choy...a perfect combo! 

Sunday was an absolute beautiful day, so we grilled out for supper. I had a grilled portabello mushroom, grilled asparagus, a sweet potato, and some fresh french bread that we picked up at the farmers market.  Now this is my kind of dinner.   I marinated the mushrooms in a red wine, garlic and onion powder mixture for about an hour before Tony grilled them.   I think these are my fav so far.  I tossed the asparagus in a little olive oil and then sprinkled some herbamare on them before they went on the grill.....YUM!

I had a portabello left over, so yesterday for lunch I had a couple of small grilled protabello sammies.  I wanted to make Maud and G's sammy, but I didn't have all the stuff.  I spread a little cashew potato cheeze (more on that in the next day or two) on some French bread , added some Russian Kale (my first time find at the farmers market),  and then some portabello.  These two little sammies were perfect for my lunch!  I still want to make Maud and G's though!  Oh yeah, I also had some sesame sticks to go with them.  I got those from the farmers market too.  I scored big at our little farmers market this past weekend. :o)

I hope everyone's having a great week so far!

~Peace~

Recap From My 3 Day Weekend

Happy Monday!  I hope you had a great weekend.  I was off work Friday, so I made the best of my 3 day weekend.  I did have full intentions of blogging over the weekend, but that didn't happen.  Here's a few good things that I had over the weekend.  Thursday night we had baked ziti.  I had planned on making Sarah's Baked Ziti, but I didn't want to pull the tofu thing on Tony yet.  I ended up leaving out the tofu ricotta and broccoli...this time.   :o)   Her recipe can be found here.  We love pasta, so I knew this would go over well, and it did.  I can only imagine how good it would be with the tofu ricotta.  Sorry for the dark picture....not too sure why it turned out so dark.

Saturday night we had leftover baked ziti and some fried green tomatoes.  Yum..yum..yum!   I picked some green tomatoes up at the farmers market, since we don't have any in our garden.   I was hoping for a large crop of green Romas like we had last year, but no such luck this time.   Maybe next year!

Saturday afternoon I made some juice with my juicer, which I hardly ever use.   I'm really trying to change that.  Here's what's in it - 2 carrots, 1 apple, 1 pear, 1 kale leaf, 1 tbs lemon juice or 1/2 peeled lemon.  This was sooo good! 

Sunday morning I had a Peanut Butter Chocolate Coffee smoothie for breakfast.  This tasted so much like a milk shake that I almost felt bad about drinking it for breakfast.   If I had a blender at work, I'd be having one of these every afternoon.   Here's the recipe:

1/2 cup cold brewed coffee
1/2 cup soy milk
1 heaping tbs peanut butter
1 tbs maple syrup
1 scoop Chocolate Amazing Grass
1 to 2 frozen bananas (I used about one and a half)
3 tbs hemp seeds
dash of cinnamon.

Blend all the ingredients in the blender until smooth and creamy.   If you don't have any of the Chocolate Amazing Grass, you can always use cocoa in it's place.

This morning I made a similar smoothie, but left out the coffee and used a full cup of soy milk.  I also threw in some frozen cherries....delish!

I had to be at work an hour early today, so I didn't have the chance to really fix anything for lunch.  I grabbed this bowl of Annie Chun's Miso soup.  This is actually the first Miso anything that I've ever had, and I totally loved it.  I can't find Miso where I live, but you can bet that I'll be on the hunt for it at Whole Foods the next time I go.

Here's a quick update on Tony's progress at giving veganism a try.  He went one full week as a vegan...YAY.   We had a dinner at church last night, and he did have some chicken with his meal.  I asked him what his take on the whole vegan thing was, and he said that he was sure that he would still eat meat to some extent, but he wasn't sure how often. For now I'll just keep cooking vegan meals for both of us until he tells me otherwise.   And, as of Saturday he had lost 4 pounds.  I am so proud of him for giving it a try.  At least he is more open to trying new and healthier meals now.

~Peace~

Time to Prove Myself....

Happy Monday everyone!  I finally watched Forks Over Knives Saturday night.  I really wanted Tony to watch it with me, but wasn't sure if he would or not.  Just so happens a man that I work with watched it last week, and it really made him think and realize some things.  I was able to share his thoughts with Tony, which in turn got him interested in the movie.  He said "WOW" a lot thru the movie.  It was so eye opening.  I think everyone could benefit from seeing it.  The man I work with started questioning me as to what all I ate and how I ate.  I talked to him some about it and let him and his wife borrow a few of my cookbooks.  He said they were changing the way they ate, but that he wasn't 100% sure if they would leave meat out all together or not, but for now they were....YAY.  The best news is that the movie really got Tony's attention, so he has agreed to try the vegan diet for a week.  I'm not sure if that's long enough to really be able to tell a difference, but I'll take what I can get.   With that being said, I have to prove myself to him this week and show him how good and healthy vegan food is.  Wish me luck everyone!  This is going to be pretty tough, because he doesn't like a lot of vegetables.  He's willing to try them though.  :o) 

 

Tony said his diet would start today (Monday), so I wasn't prepared to really cook last night, but he decided he wouldn't eat any meat last night for dinner.  I cooked some crowder peas, roasted veggies, wild rice, and fresh corn out of the freezer.  This was not one of my best meals, so I begged him to not judge the vegan diet on my meal that I cooked last night.  This was actually the first time I roasted veggies, and they didn't turn out so hot.  The corn was chewy for some reason, and the crowder peas just didn't taste right either.  I've got to really step it up tonight.   If any of you have any really good recipes that you think might when him over, please share them with me.  :o)  I need all the help I can get here.  Now that I'm trying to impress him, I can't think of a thing to cook....how crazy is that? 

For dessert last night I fixed us a bowl of fresh fruit (bananas, strawberries and kiwi).  Thank goodness Tony loves fruit.  

This morning I fixed myself a green smoothie.  It had a frozen banana, a cup of frozen mixed fruit (peaches, strawberries, mango, and cherries), a date, hemp seeds, one large leaf of kale and a cup of water in it.  I made Tony the same thing minus the kale.  I talked to him before lunch, and he said the smoothie made him sick....WHAT?  How is that even possible?  He normally doesn't eat breakfast, so I'm hoping that it just threw his stomach for a loop.   Anyway, I know he won't be wanting a smoothie for a while, so looks like I'll be cooking some muffins for him tonight.  :(

Last night I chopped us up some veggies for a salad (broccoli, cauliflower, tomatoes, yummy bell peppers, and cucumbers).  This morning I finished throwing our salads together, and sliced an apple up for both of us for our morning or afternoon snack.   I threw some nutritional and dulse flakes on mine. My salad hit the spot, I just hope Tony's did as well. 

In Forks Over Knives they talk about the Engine 2 Diet.  I thought about getting that for Tony.  He's also wanting to loose weight and of course get healthier.  Does anyone have that book and would you recommend it?  I'm going to try my best to not cook any processed foods this week.  I want Tony to get the full affect of a plant based and whole food diet.   So, if any of you have any suggestions that could help me make this transition for Tony easier, please share.  :o)  I'm hoping to win him over.  He may not totally rule out meat, but maybe he will want to eat less of it at least.

~Peace~

Catching Up.....

Happy Hump day! I'm playing catch up today on blogging, since I've been so busy the past few days. I'll start off with my green smoothie that I had this morning. The past two mornings I just had regular fruit smoothies with a scoop of Amazing Grass added in, since I was out of greens. I had to run by the grocery store yesterday after work to get my mom some groceries, so I grabbed a few things for my self and kale just happened to be one of those things. What kind of greens do you prefer in your smoothies? I've been swapping back and forth between kale and spinach, and I'm leaning towards kale as being my fav. This was one of my typical green smoothies with water, kale, a date, a small frozen banana, a dash of cinnamon and ginger, frozen mango chunks, and hemp seeds.....total yumminess!

 

We ran some errands over the weekend and I came across this great little snack.  These little granola clusters didn't last long at all.  Tony and I scarfed them down....very good.  I've got to go get some more of these!  The brand is Mrs Mays.  Have you ever tried any of these snacks?  I hope they have a bigger variety when I go back to get more!

Sunday night I made HH's Mexican Cabbage.  I had brown rice to go with it.  Very..very good!  The recipe just happens to be on her website.  You can find it here. 

For lunch one day I had a humms and tomato sammy with a side of baby carrots for some crunch.  :o)

Monday night we had spaghetti and a salad.  I put some Dulse Flakes on my salad this time.  I bought some when I went to Whole Foods a while back and forgot about them.  I love this little seaweed!  It's a perfect addition to a salad. 

Monday night I made some health bars.  I'm tweaking my moms recipe.  This has always been my all time favorite thing that she made for me.  I would request these for my birthday over chocolate cake (shocker).  I haven't gotten the recipe where I want it yet, but when it gets there, I'll be sharing the recipe with you.  

For lunch today I had a Peanut Sesame Noodle Bowl.  These were on sale yesterday at Kroger, so I picked up 3 different kinds.  This is my first one to try and OMG...delish!  Don't laugh but this is actually the first Peanut Sesame anything to try.  I've been meaning to make my own, but just haven't done it yet.  After having this, I can't wait to make my own. 

Here's a picture of it all made up.....yum!  Talk about full...I couldn't even eat it all. 

For a morning snack this morning I had a Gala apple with Almond butter spread on it with a few cranberries sprinkled on top.  It's not the Honey Crisp apples that Sarah's been flaunting around, but I guess they'll have to work.  :o)  I'm so jealous of her Honey Crisp apples.  Tony broke the bad news to me last night that we don't have them where I live....booooo   Gala's are our favorite though...they are sweet and crispy too....just how Sarah describes the Honey Crisp.





~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~

Holiday Weekend Recap...Not So Much....

Hello!..I hope everyone is doing well and had a great holiday weekend.    I was pretty bad as far as eating over the holiday weekend.  I did a lot of eating out and ate a lot of processed foods.  By the time Monday afternoon rolled around, I was feeling a little bluh.  We did grill Monday night though.   Have you ever grilled Boca Chik'n patties?  I decided to give it a try Monday night, the outcome was great.  I had a grilled Boca Chik'n Pattie, fried okra (the only way I eat okra), a baked potato with some nutritional yeast on top, a couple of jalapeno poppers, and a roasted yummy bell pepper. 

Tuesday Morning I had a smoothie made out of soy milk, a frozen banana, frozen strawberries, and scoop of chocolate amazing grass.  I was running short on time, so my smoothie had to be a quick fix.  

For my mid morning snack on Tuesday I had a whole wheat English muffin with "bacon" and a much needed cup of coffee.  Seeing everyone else blog about their English muffins made me want one.  :o)  

Yesterday for lunch I had a salad with a left over grilled Boca Chick'n Pattie.  I didn't have time to whip up dressing for my salad, so I thought that I would just get some at work.  I totally forgot about the cafeteria being closed yesterday.  I happen to remember that I brought an orange, so I sliced it open and squeezed the juice over my salad.  To my amazement it was delicious!  Shen, I think you asked me if our cafeteria had a salad bar, and I don't remember if I answered you or not....sorry!  They don't have a salad bar, but they make salads every day and put them into plastic containers. All of their salads have meat and cheese on them though.  There's a very sweet lady that works in the cafeteria that will make a salad just for me when I want one. I just tell her in advance in the morning time that I would like a salad, which I think is super sweet! 

Last night for supper I had made some succotash (my own way)  I actually had a can of succotash, so I dumped the contents into a colander and rinsed it (yes, rinsed all the spices right off).  It was mostly tomatoes with a very few butter beans and corn, so I added some frozen corn, edamame, and some cabbage to it. I added some spices such as salt, pepper, cumin, and graram marsala...mmmm.  I put the succotash over some brown rice and topped that with nutritional yeast.  This was another successful and quick dinner.  :o)  Leftovers are for lunch today!

For breakfast this morning I had oatmeal made with steel cut oats.  I added a little molasses, goji berries (much better used in oatmeal than eaten dry), sliced almonds, and a dash of cinnamon.  I then poured a little almond milk over it.  It was too cold (55 degrees) this morning for a smoothie....brrrrrr  I'm not complaining though.  I had much rather have this cooler weather than the 95 plus temps.

Now that I'm all caught up on my foods from the last couple of days, I should be back to my normal blogging tomorrow with not as many processed foods....hopefully. 

~Peace~

Veggie Pasta and Soooo Ready for the Long Weekend!

Happy FRIDAY!!!   I am so glad the weekend is near, and so glad I have 3 days off work.  Do you have big plans for the long weekend?  We'll be staying home and hopefully painting/redecorating our home office.  I'll have to take a before and after picture for you and post that on Tuesday.  I doubt I'll be doing much if any blogging over the holiday weekend, so that's why I say I'll post it on Tuesday.  :o)

Yesterday was Maggie's "Spa Day" at the vet.  As you can tell in this picture, she was not very happy to be getting dropped off.   I do believe she was saying "Mom, do you really have to take my picture, and PLEASE don't leave me here!"  Poor baby!   After I picked her up from the vet yesterday, I took her to the chiro to see what he could do to help her to walk better.  She hasn't been in a while, and she hasn't been getting around so well lately.  She had a big hump in her back, so I knew something was out of whack.  He did some adjusting on her and it seemed to help a little.  It was hard to tell at the chiro's office how much it was really going to help, but after we got home she was getting around a lot better.  She was only able to walk a few steps before she would fall down in the sitting position.  She's able to walk a lot farther now.  Chiro's are wonderful...even for pets!   And her eye, well it looks great.  She looks like she's winking all the time.  She has fully adjusted to it being gone now.  My baby has such a big heart!  

Bananas are back in my house, so I've been able to make my smoothies again.  This one was a VERY green smoothie!  This one consisted of water, banana, a date, frozen mango, fresh ginger, and a LOT of spinach. 

Wednesday night for supper I made some veggie pasta...it totally hit the spot and was very yummy!  I used whole wheat pasta, zucchini, spinach, chickpeas, Roma tomatoes, minced garlic, olive oil, and some red wine.  I  also made Happy Herbivores Corn Cakes to go along with it.  They were very good also.  They reminded me of the Jiffy corn bread mix.  That was the first time that I had ever actually put flour in the mix to make cornbread.  I've always just used straight corn meal.  They turned out great though.

 

For 3 nights in a row, our dessert has been chocolate covered strawberries.  I love chocolate covered strawberries!  I don't know why I don't make them more often.  Every night they would get eaten before I got a picture of them.  The last night we had them I had just sat on the couch beside Tony with the plate and thought of a picture.  We both were ready to dig in, so Tony took the plate and held it under the lamp and snapped a picture of them.  This is why the berries are all over the place on the plate.  :o)

Have you ever tried any of the Odwalla smoothie drinks.  I got this superfood one the other day at Kroger and it was pretty good.   Not as good as the Naked though.  :o)

I hope everyone has a great and safe Labor Day weekend!

~Peace~Love~Happiness~