Recent Eats

It's been awhile since I've done a recent eats post, and it's honestly because I've been too busy to cook and there just wasn't much to share. I'm only somewhat ashamed to admit that for many days in the last few weeks, I would just eat Larabars or mixed nuts throughout the day. But whatever -- I'm an imperfect person and Larabars are awesome.

Speaking of Larabar, they sent me some of their new Blueberry Muffin bars to sample. They sent them to my old Missouri address, so it took a little while to get to me. They are seriously delicious, though. Definitely in my top 5 Larabar flavors now.




Another Larabar flavor that could very easily rank as #1 for me is the peanut butter chocolate chip.

A bit too decadent for breakfast (most days), but the PERFECT dessert.


Those of you who are fans on Facebook may recall a couple of weeks ago when I mentioned cooking up some tri-colored quinoa. I was pretty excited: I had had white and red quinoa before, but never black, and never all three at once. I cooked it up with unsalted vegetable broth (my favorite way to cook grains) and it was delicious!

I whipped together a quick meal to go with the quinoa, adding in roasted broccoli and peppers and baked Gardein chik'n strips (I typically shy away from mock meats, but I had a coupon for a Gardein product, and these are actually pretty good!).


I was also on a Van's "Free" waffle kick for awhile (wheat- and gluten-free). At first, I ate them with Whole Soy yogurt and real maple syrup (seriously, if you're still using the crap with high fructose corn syrup, you're missing out).

The "flax" variety is quite crumbly.

See what I mean?


Last week I had a phenomenal salad at the Mellow Mushroom. (Unfortunately, their gluten-free crust isn't vegan, so no pizza for me.) This was their smaller-sized portion of the field salad, and I added their TOTALLY AWESOME TEMPEH and roasted red peppers.


A little more recently, I made something along the lines of the Polenta Stuffing from Appetite for Reduction by my vegan hero, Isa Moskowitz. I made some substitutions here and there (carrots instead of celery, used sun-dried tomato polenta, added kidney beans, served it with brown rice cous cous), and it was quite successful. I freakin' loved it.


And that's pretty much it. Pitiful, eh? And I still have a stack of cookbooks from the library, and I flip through them, usually at bedtime so I can fall asleep with visions of vegan sugarplums and other deliciousness dancing in my head, but I have yet to knuckle down and get my cook on. *sigh* One of these days.

So We Wheat Again

I had a few run ins with that bully, Wheat last week. I don't know if Wheat is more a bully or a sweet talker, but either way, Wheat is trouble!

I went to the Loving Hut in Tampa for the first time last week to listen to a presentation from Nick Cooney, the director of the Humane League. There also happened to be a very affordable buffet for the occasion, so I hopped in line. Unfortunately, most of the offerings were pasta-based. Ho hum.
At least there was soup, which was PERFECT because it was a cold night.

This soup had an interesting consistency. It was mostly creamy. It had coconut, rice, and tofu.
I went ahead and grabbed a little bit of everything, for the sake of reviewing. (The things I do for this blog, eh?)

Another con to the offerings: too many mock meats! Mock meats weird me out a bit. I definitely did not like the meatballs, and the chicken-esque bits in that creamy pasta dish were a little too realistic (I haven't eaten meat since 1995, but those chunks almost gave me a disturbing flashback). That dish could have used more broccoli and other veggies, less weird stuff, though the sauce was awesome. (I'm not sure if this was supposed to be like alfredo sauce or not. I don't remember what alfredo tastes like!) The tofu was fine and the eggplant chunks were a bit undercooked. So really, the offerings were VERY hit or miss. This tapioca-based pudding was fun, though.

The creamy pasta with mushroom and broccoli was the best of the options.

This was my first time at the Loving Hut, and a friend of mine there said that the buffet offerings didn't quite reflect their regular menu. I'd be willing to give them another try some day.

Then the next day, a friend invited me out to pizza. Oy. Not the smartest of moves, but when a nice person invites you to get pizza, you go, am I right? We went to Mellow Mushroom. Unfortunately, their gluten-free crusts are not vegan, but their regular crust and sauce is. They now offer Daiya cheese, as well.
My friend ordered a small field salad, which I helped eat.


Hummus was also ordered (note the cucumber slices - that'd be my wheat-free dippers right there).


We ordered the pizza with the most veggies on it: the Mega Veggie sans cheese. Since it included crumbled tofu, we skipped the Daiya.

sun dried tomatoes, green peppers, spinach, mushrooms, olives, onions, broccoli, Roma tomato, and artichoke hearts. Whew! Mellow Mushroom should make the Mega Veggie available as a salad, as well.

So, between Loving Hut and Mellow Mushroom, I was quickly wheated out. I'm ashamed to admit this, but because of my schedule these days, I hadn't cooked at home in days. I'd just been eating salads, raw veggies with hummus, Larabars, and then eating on the go with friends. On Wednesday, I was happy to get back in the kitchen and whip up a couple dinners for myself: Wednesday night I roasted Brussels sprouts with bell peppers and ate it with quinoa and spinach. Thursday night I made a cozy little pot of red lentil stew, throwing in the leftover quinoa at the last minute. It all worked together nicely. Unfortunately, I don't have pictures of either of these, nor of the dinner and dessert I made with my friend, D: stuffed green bell peppers and a fruit crisp. I've been slacking, folks!

I won a coupon for a free Tofurky product during Vegan MoFo and finally used it a few days ago on their Hickory Smoked Tempeh Bacon. Before trying this product, I hadn't been able to find a way to truly enjoy tempeh.

Let me say, I LOVE THIS! Granted, there is SOME wheat in it, but it's soooo good. I didn't even heat it; I just tore the strips into pieces and added them to a salad, and it was heavenly.

I will certainly be purchasing this tempeh again.
And of course, everything is better with Annie's goddess dressing.

Speaking of goddess dressing, I have turned TWO people to the ways of the goddess: a fellow vegan, and an omnivore. Goddess is quite the siren of salad dressings.

Also, check out this CLUB of Annie's I picked up at the Greenwise Market a couple of weeks ago.

BAM! You could seriously club someone with this bottle.

And it was less than a dollar more than what the normal size would cost at any other grocery store.