Satisfying a craving for tomato salad!

I was standing in the kitchen tonight thinking about going out to get something for dinner when I had a sudden craving for tomato salad…which, luckily, I have the ingredients for! I’m eating it right now…mmmm eating something you are craving is the best feeling.

This salad really just involves a lot of chopping and a wee bit of sauteeing..very easy!

In a bowl mix:
1/2 of a cucumber chopped
3 vine tomatoes seeded and chopped (if you don’t take out the seeds it makes the salad too wet)
1 ripe avocado chopped
A few basil leaves chiffonaded (leaves rolled up and finely chopped)
Some crushed walnuts
A sprinkling of hemp seeds
A sprinkling of salt
A drizzle of olive oil
A drizzle if pomegranate vinegar (balsamic or your fav fruit vinegar works too)

Then roughly chop some red onion and saute it on med-low until translucent. Note that you can add the onion in raw but it hurts my stomach so I saute it a bit to take the edge off…if my bbq was set up I would have grilled it instead! Smokiness mmmmmmm.

When the onions are done I put the pot in the fridge to chill a bit. Teeth mix into the rest of the veggies and go nuts! So tastey and full of raw veggie goodness!

Easy and delish red coconut curry and tropical rice!

I made this recipe (adapted from my quick fix vegan cookbook) a while ago and have been craving it again so that means it’s a keeper in my books! I love making it even more because it’s pretty easy and there are always leftovers. Leftovers lead to better eating decisions (aka not bread and crackers) when I’m seeing hunger red and need to shove food in my mouth asap!

For the curry:

Start with a big pot on medium with a Tbsp or so of oil in the bottom and saute
1 onion roughly chopped
4 carrots roughly chopped
2 cloves of garlic chopped
1/2 a head of cauliflower roughly chopped
1 Tbsp (amount really depends on how spicy you want it) of red curry paste
Saute these ingredients until the onions are translucent and the curry paste had melted and covers everything. Then add:
1 big can of diced tomatoes (or two little ones)
That empty tomato can full of water
1 cup or so of cooked/canned chickpeas
1 can of coconut milk (I like the fatty kinds with the solid on top! Numnum)
1 cup or so of fresh peas (or frozen ones…but ew if you can get em fresh, do it…don’t worry about taking the extra time to de-pod them…so much better, so worth it)
A bit of salt and pepper
Now let this come to a simmer and cook until the cauliflower is fork soft! While that is going on…

Tropical rice:

I like to use a rice blend for this recipe for extra flava and nutrients!

So cook the rice as usual (1 part rice to 2 parts water, heat on high till boiling, reduce to low and simmer till water is absorbed), then add some chopped fresh pineapple (or canned but I like the acidity of fresh pineapple) and pumpkin seeds! Mmmmm so good. I imagine that some other tropical fruits would be delightful in this as well but I have yet to try!

The pineapple and curry flavours are a killer combo when you have these two together! Mmmm can’t wait to eat this again tomorrow!

Light vegan breakfast for summer! Or for a snack…

As always, I’ve been so swamped lately that I haven’t been cooking as much as I’d like and have been relying heavily on Bandidas on commercial drive for their tastey vegan burritos to keep me going at dinner time. I’ve also been making burritos in our new place (mostly because the kitchen is still in disorder..moving sucks) but my burritos are really just random chopped veggies, cilantro and some kind of beans rolled up in a wrap….so lazy!
I got a little off topic there explaining my vast silence between posts…breakfast is where I’m headed. My friend Kelly introduced me to puffed grains recently and I’m pretty excited about it so I wanted to try out some puffed quinoa I got at Donald’s market. I also got some almond yogurt to try out and this morning I put two and two together and voila, healthy and filling vegan breaky!
To jazz up this almond yogurt and puffed grain combo I added some chopped fresh pineapple and mango as well as a sprinkle of poppy seeds. I think this bowl would be great with other fresh or dried fruits and nuts too. I have some papaya in the fridge that I may try out with strawberries tomorrow….yum! Just love summer!

Raw vegan brownies!

When I have a chocolate craving these days all I can think about is the raw vegan brownie that mom and I had at Heirloom restaurant while she was visiting. So I finally made up my mind to stop eating banana chips and chocolate chips (alternately…like banana chip, chocolate chips, banana chip, chocolate chips…the laziest dessert ever) and really get down to the mystery of what was in those delicious brownies!

I found a few sources that had fairly similar recipes, so I kind of took those and used what I had at home and made a glorious experimental batch using my new food processor. (I love getting any new kitchen tools…but the food processor is SO great.)

This recipe is approximate because I didn’t really measure anything:

1 cup of dates (you can soak them beforehand to make them softer if they are super hard)
2/3 cup of walnuts
1/2 cup of raw cocoa powder
1 really ripe avocado
Drizzle of maple syrup
Pinch of salt
Dash of vanilla

Put all in the beloved food processor.

Num num. Now taste to make sure you don’t need to add more maple syrup. Then put it in a baking dish or ramekins or just wrap it in plastic wrap and chill so that you can cut it into brownie shapes before serving. (or you can just grab a spoon and start eating it which is what I did).

Note: Because this has avocado in it, it’s probably best to eat the day you make it. I ate mine the second day and it was still good but because it’s so brown it’s hard to tell when the avocado is too oxidized.

Voila, the best gluten free, vegan, raw dessert EVER.

Nutritional supplementation

I’ve been concerned about not getting enough in the vitamin and mineral areas on days when I’m busy and don’t really eat that well (think avocado and tomato sandwiches, veggie chips, and too much chocolate). To solve this I bought a couple of powdered supplements to make into smoothies on those days. I am a big proponent of eating your nutrition and that supplementing with powders and pills doesn’t really help your health in the end, so I’m torn. I imagine that there are other people out there facing this same dilemma – any thoughts?

I’m trying out the Vega brand. The smoothies are kind of…powdery? But not bad tasting, so I’ll continue to use the powder on those days when I work with the dogs for the entire day (14 hrs of work leaves little time for cooking) and hopefully it will do more good than bad to my system!

Exceptional vegan dip!

I’m always up for some delicious dipping, especially when the dip is easy peasy to make! This dip is rich from the chickpeas so is pretty filling…if you eat too much you may be too full for dinner. You’ve been warned!
One lucky dip recipient called it chickpea pesto which I like better than the original recipe name! I altered the recipe a bit…the original comes from my quick-fix vegan book.

Blend all ingredients together in a food processor:

Handful of Arugula (or spinach or other tastey green)
8 (or so) basil leaves
6-8 oz artichoke hearts
4 or 5 sun dried tomatoes (packed in oil or freshly dried at home!)
1-2 garlic cloves (I add extra garlic mmmm garlic)
6-8 oz chick peas (canned or cooked at home)
Juice from 1 lemon
3 Tbsp olive oil

You could also add some olives and capers to this one. Decrease the chickpeas to make it less thick and less filling. I played around with the amounts of ingredients depending on what I was serving the dip with. It works well as a pasta sauce with less chick peas added!

Recipes coming up!

So I’ve been super busy because running a business is a nightmare sometimes and you have to fire 2 staff members in the same week, and the hot water tank at the daycare is leaking water everywhere, and the insurance on one of your dog walking trucks runs out and then the truck doesn’t pass air care….barf! All while you’re working extra hours to cover the staff you fired…not that my job is so bad….monitoring tug-O-war is mostly just super cute…

On that note I haven’t been cooking much and have been super lazy with my diet this week….the other night I ate just a raw cucumber whole and then dipped some crackers in salad dressing. Ya not the most nutritious dinner.
So this morning I got into my new vegan cookbooks from my lovely sis “Quick Fix Vegan” and “Vegan with a Vengeance” and listed out the ingredients I need to make a few of the recipes. I’m also taking some recipes from the Navita Naturals website for goodies to make with the cocoa nibs I bought (the have a lot of tastey looking recipes on their site that don’t have cocoa too) Navida Naturals website.
I also have been lazy about breakfast. I’m not an early riser. I get up with just enough time to do the least amount of getting ready and arrive just on time. So lately I’ve been grabbing a vegan muffin with my coffee in the morning at JJ Bean. Not that the muffins aren’t good (too good…I keep showing up at work with chocolate on my face from the zucchini chocolate chip muffin…I’m starting to credibility)…I just imagine that there are better ways to start my day.
I came across Celestia’s Yoga and Yum blog that I’m really excited about. She had some great smoothie (among other) recipes, but my favorite part about the blog is that she lists out the nutritional and medicinal qualities of the main ingredients. I love learning more about different ingredients and how they are being used in my body! I’m going to try out some of her smoothie recipes for breaky over the next bit and post up my favorites!
Okay back to minding the mutts…cooking time tomorrow!