Happy Holidays!

Hey all! I hope everyone enjoyed their holiday.
I have much to post, so let's get to it!

Last Saturday, before Christmas, we had a big Holiday/ Solstice party with a few friends of ours. It was an after-dinner party, and I made a few big pots of Chai Latte from The Joy of Vegan Baking (no pics, sorry... just imagine a big pot of.... chai. ;) ), and Lemon Cheesecake from the same book. Holy hannah, that lemon cheesecake rocked my world like crazy. Yikes. Sure, it was pricey, and a good $20 worth of soy cream cheese went into it, but damn. I was pretty sure that my cheesecake days were over, but I am so relived that they are not. Oh yum. I topped with a raspberry coulis. Ah, life is sweet.
Each of my guests took home a goody bag full of holiday baking: Jam-Print Cookies, 5-Spice Cookies, and Chocolate Mint Melties from ED&BV, Sparkled Ginger Cookies from Vegan With a Vengeance, and Mexican Wedding Cookies from The Joy of Vegan Baking. Mmm.

Our christmas dinners (one at my mom's, one at my dad's) consisted of tofu roast, potatoes, veggies... the usual suspects. Nice!
One of my sisters is in university right now, so to save on cash, she made everyone treats for christmas instead of buying gifts. Fine by me! Here's what she made us: Double-Chocolate Almond Explosion Cookies and Fudgy Brownies from Vive, and chocolate-covered pretzels. Holy crappola. Chocolate covered pretzels rock my world, and I haven't had them in years. Le sigh. I heart my family.

Speaking of loving my family, can we talk gifts for a minute? My awesome hubby got me a mug from VeganDish that I am in love with! And look at how cute my guys are in their new Herbivore duds.
And here's a cute picture of my Grandpa ( vegetarian for 25+ years) sharing some cashews with Quinn. Awww.

For our post-christmas Boxing Day dinner, I made Fresh at Home's Golden Curried Dahl, and a batch of ExtraVeganZa's Spelt Chapatis. (On a side note, a dear friend just pointed out that me, and a few other friends, have been pronouncing this book Extra Vegan Za, although it seems like it's actually extravaganza. I feel like an idiot.)

Although I didn't mention it last month, I got a big ol' gift certificate to a bookstore for my birthday, which I, naturally, used to buy cookbooks. :) I picked up Fresh At Home, Real Food Daily, and The Joy of Vegan Baking (which I looove so far). Does anyone have any recommendations for what to make from which?

And, last but not least, (not-so) little baby Teague had his first not-from-the-boob food tonight! Some organic steamed pears, pureed, obviously.
I have done a lot of research on vegan infant nutrition, and have am quite nearly finished my holistic nutrition school, so I feel confident in doing a full post on the subject in the near future, if anyone would be interested. I will be following a feeding guide given to me by my naturopath, as well as my own knowledge on the subject.

Happy Holidays, everyone!
xo

Quickie

I am insanely swamped right now.... trapped under a seemingly endless pile of sewing, baking, and card making/ writing/ sending.
Anyways, back to the food. My mom and stepdad came for dinner last week, and I made V'Con's Chickpea Cutlets, with Mustard Sauce, and some roasted veggies (blue potatoes, parsnips, and carrots). Hot Damn I love those cutlets.
And, since we're covered in snow, and super cold temps, I made the husband and I a batch of ED&BV's Cocoa. All I had was full-fat coconut milk, which I used the whole can of, against Dreena's advice. I really should've listened to the well-meaning advice, because it was way too rich. Still good, but more like.... if-I-drink-a-whole-mug-of-this-I-might-throw-up good, y'know? I must add light coconut milk to my grocery list and try this again.
Oh, and a quick side note.... have any of you tried VitaSoy's Chocolate Peppermint Soymilk? Oh. My. God. If you haven't tried it yet, then run to your nearest health food store and buy a case...erm, a carton asap. Seriously. You will not be disappointed. Mmmmm. Damn the seasonal soymilks!

Yikes!

Holy crappola it's been a long time since I've done a food post. It's about time, no?
Last week Quinn and I made a batch of muffins from the Pretend Soup cookbook (by Mollie Katzen). This cookbook is very un-vegan, but easy to veganize and super fun for kids. These were called Hidden Berry muffins.... or something (I'd check, but there's a baby sleeping on my lap, and I daren't wake him).
I'm a bit of a muffin addict. Yum.
My husband's employers bring breakfast in every morning for their 300+ employees. Among the fresh fruit, cereal, and soymilk (!!!), are carrot muffins with cream cheese frosting which he pines over. So, because I'm the greatest wife in the world (har har), I made him some vegan ones, using VWaV's carrot muffin recipe, and VCTOTW's cream cheese frosting. These hardly lasted 2 days, which is a little sad...
Here's Veganomicon's Chickpea Noodle Soup. It was good, but the rice noodles I used were very absorb-y, and didn't keep well.
And just for fun, here's how my silly toddler ate his sushi last week...
Thanks to everyone for the well wishes. :) We are all better now. We've been crazy busy though (xmas, sewing, craziness....), and had a bit of a cat-knocking-camera-over-and-breaking-the-lens incident. We bought a new lens, but I don't love it, so I hope we can get a better one soon.
I hope you are all well! There's snow like crazy here.... stay warm and cozy!
xo

Blargh!

So, we're all sick. Well, all except me, the momma bird. So, I've been busy trying to take care of everyone and doing lots and lots of yucky laundry.
But, I do have one quick recipe for you! I made this super healthy soup tonight, and it is really tasty, and full of immune-boosting ingredients.

Julie's Immunity Soup

2 tbsp olive oil
3 large cloves garlic, minced
1 med. onion, finely chopped
1 tbsp minced garlic
3 stalks celery, chopped
2 parsnips/ carrots, diced
1 tsp each: dried oregano, thyme, mustard seeds
2 tsp dried rosemary
1/2 tsp salt
freshly ground black pepper, to taste
1 cup amaranth
5 1/2 cups water or veg. broth
2 dried bay leaves
1 1/2 cups aduki beans

In a large saucepan, heat oil over med. heat. Add garlic, onion, ginger, celery, parsnips/ carrots, oregano, thyme, mustard seeds, rosemary, salt, and pepper. Saute for about 5 minutes, until onions are softened. Add remaining ingredients and simmer, covered, for about half an hour.
Optional: Add 1 cup of frozen peas in last minutes of cooking.

(P.S. *waving* Hi! I'm Julie! Believe it or not, VegMomma is not my real name. Tee hee!)

Happy Thanksgiving, American neighbours!
Stay healthy everyone.
xo

Vegan MoFo Questionnaire

Here's a MoFo questionnaire copied from Peggy the Veggie. :)

1. Favorite non-dairy milk?
So Nice Plus, or Ryza Vanilla.

2. What are the top 3 dishes/recipes you are planning to cook?
Oh my goodness, top three??? How about every recipe I haven't made yet from ED&BV, Veganomicon, and ExtraVeganZa. There. How's three cookbooks instead? :)

3. Topping of choice for popcorn?
Earth Balance and nutritional yeast.

4. Most disastrous recipe/meal failure?
Pre-vegan zucchini feta pancakes. Blegh.

5. Favorite pickled item?
Beets!

6. How do you organize your recipes?
They're in cookbooks, organized for me. :) Otherwise on the computer.

7. Compost, trash, or garbage disposal?
Compost or trash.

8. If you were stranded on an island and could only bring 3 foods...what would they be (don't worry about how you'll cook them)?
Eep! Quinoa, red peppers, and garlic!

9. Fondest food memory from your childhood?
Hmm....this is a toughie! My mom, who worked full-time, always managed to prepare a home-cooked meal. I really can't think of any bad food memories, or any that particularly stand out... Yeah, I have no good answer for this one.

10. Favorite vegan ice cream?
Purely Decadent's Turtle Trails. Mmmm.

11. Most loved kitchen appliance?
Oh, my food processor, without a doubt.

12. Spice/herb you would die without?
Fresh basil. Mmm.

13. Cookbook you have owned for the longest time?
How it All Vegan.

14. Favorite flavor of jam/jelly?
Raspberry. Although, I have to give a honourable mention to Elderberry jam. My mother-in-law picks Elderberries and makes jams and syrups that my husband lives for.

15. Favorite vegan recipe to serve to an omni friend?
Any cupcake from VCTOTW, or a good, hearty rice and bean dish.

16. Seitan, tofu, or tempeh?
Tofu, then seitan. Tempeh just hasn't won me over yet.

17. Favorite meal to cook (or time of day to cook)?
Dinner. Or dessert....

18. What is sitting on top of your refrigerator?
Two cake platters.

19. Name 3 items in your freezer without looking.
Flax meal, peas, hemp seed nuts.

20. What's on your grocery list?
Umm.... onion powder, paprika, chickpeas, kale/ chard, rice milk, frozen berries... I could go on and on...

21. Favorite grocery store?
Organic Roots.

22. Name a recipe you'd love to veganize, but haven't yet.
A recipe my stepmom makes called Treasure cookies.

23. Food blog you read the most (besides Isa's because I know you check it everyday). Or maybe the top 3?
Tiger the Lion, Vive le Vegan, and Chocolate-Covered Vegan (isn't she the cutest?!).

24. Favorite vegan candy/chocolate?
Crispy Cat bars. Holy crap, these rocky my vegan world.

25. Most extravagant food item purchased lately?
My birthday's on Sunday, so I was frivolous and ordered myself assorted chocolates and a box of champagne truffles. Mmm.

26. Worst kitchen injury?
Slicing my finger open while chopping onions for Thanksgiving this year.

Happy Friday!

Just a short (late!) post today. We're super busy, and the boys are really sucking my energy, so I haven't been doing much exciting cooking.
Halloween was last week, and we gave out some organic, vegan chocolate balls wrapped in "Earth" foil. Cute! Too bad they weren't very tasty.
We hardly got any kids anyways. We live in a community with lots of families, but we also live close to a mall, so I think the majority of kids flock there.
We go for dinner at my mom's every Sunday, and for dessert this week, we had the Chocolate Upside-Down Pudding Cake from How It All Vegan. (My first vegan cookbook! A x-mas gift from my mom about 5 yrs ago.) The cake was delicious, and ridiculously easy. Mmmm..... I could go for another slice about now....

I made my first Veganomicon recipe this week, the Chickpea Cutlets. To accompany them, I made some mac 'n' cheeze (using the Amazing Mac 'n' Cheese recipe from The Ultimate Uncheese Cookbook), and some sauteed chard with tahini sauce (from VWAV). I didn't make a sauce for the cutlets, but did smother them in HP sauce. Hot damn. I love HP sauce, and I haven't eaten it in years, so the cutlets (which were really good on their own too!) were a perfect vehicle for this "steak sauce".
Yum. They were really easy to make and will certainly become a regular dinner.
Tonight, we're off to dinner with my sister and some friends to the only vegan restaurant in Edmonton, which happens to be run by the nicest man you will ever meet. Seriously!
Have a good weekend, everyone!

Cookies, Veganomicon, and more!

I had a bit of a posting hiatus.... my apologies! Life's been crazy, and it doesn't look like it's going to slow down any time soon. But no matter, let's get to the goods!
ED&BV's Mellow Lentil Sniffle Soup
I love red lentils. I think they may surpass garbanzos as my fave legume. Mmmm.
Vegan Lunch Box's Tofu Fish sticks, paired with sauteed purple and green curly kale and a tomato-basil salad drizzled with olive oil and balsamic vinegar. Yum!
And, from ED&BV, the Quinoa Chickpea Confetti Casserole and Raw Red Pepper Aioli.
And, of course, cookies! (All from ED&BV)
Super-Charge Me cookies (for my sisters)
Walnut-Carob-Cranberry Clusters
The Double-Carob Cashew cookies (again), and Green Tea Cookies I made up (I'll post the recipe later in the week).
And look what I got in the mail today!
I'll try to do a Halloween post later in the week!
Happy Halloween all!

ED&BV....le sigh

I am borderline obsessed with this book. I think the anticipation built prior to receiving the book, combined the fact that it is truly an awesome cookbook validate the obsession.
My favorite recipe so far is the Lemon Garlic Pasta. Yes, I made this twice in two weeks. I think it is my new lazy supper. But I will make it even when I'm not feeling lazy, because it is wonderful. Mmm. Goodbye store-bought tomato sauce, hello lemon pasta. I threw in some tomatoes and spinach from the Farmer's Market for extra health and yumminess. (I used spinach rice pasta both times I made this...hence the colour.)To accompany the pasta, we had the Living Caesar Salad, which was lovely and yummy, and will certainly be made again in the near future.
And for last night's dinner, the Brown Rice and Beans "Jumble-aya". We didn't have a can of diced tomatoes, or kidney beans, so we compromised, using diced cherry tomatoes and black beans. It was so simple to make, and really good.
For breakfast yesterday morning, we made the Peanut Banana Tortilla Turnovers with Molassa-Dip. They were, of course, so good!
And for a snack while we watched America's Next Top Model (oh reality tv....my terrible guilty pleasure.....), we made the Softly Spiced Nuts, though I failed to get a picture.
One last ED&BV item.... The Chocolate Mint Melties. I took these out of the oven less than an hour ago, and my house smells minty-licious. Mmmm. I am bringing them to my step-sister's birthday party tonight (Happy 14th Birthday, Nicole!), and am fighting not to eat them all.
Okay, so I think my husband is scheduling an ED&BV intervention as we speak, so I'll move on.
A few weeks ago, my lovely new friend Nicolette and her son (who's just a tad younger than Quinn) came over to spend the morning with us. Not only are they vegan, but Nicolette is also a Holistic Health Practitioner, which is super cool. Anyways, we decided to make some smoothies with veggies (which, oddly enough, Dreena posted about a few days later). I didn't get any pictures that day, but here's a picture of my smoothie-covered boy on a different day, and the recipe Nicolette shared with me.
This smoothie had purple kale, hence the purple-ness.
Nicolette's Pear-Mint Smoothie
4 ripe pears, cored and sliced
4-5 leaves kale
1/4 cup mint leaves
4-5 dandelion leaves
2 cups water
Throw is all in a blender and enjoy!
This recipe is great, because the sweet mint really overpowers the flavour of the kale. I like to add a few tablespoons of Udo's DHA oil as well. :)
I'm going to a potluck this weekend, and will be making the tofu roast again (by request), as ell as some other goodies that I'll post about early next week.
Peace!
xo

Lots and lots of stuff....

Yikes! I have so much to catch up on. I have pre and post-Thanksgiving food to post about, so let's get to it!
Here's a batch of Energy Cookies from Vive. My sisters recently moved out together and went veg. One of them has heard some veg*n horror stories, and is super-concerned about iron, so I made them a batch of these yummy iron-rich cookies. They loved them, and are asking for more.
Next up is a picture of the leftover tofu roast, just so you get an idea of what the inside looks like. (This little piece was all that was leftover from two roasts!)
And from ED&BV, Lemon Pasta, Popcorn Fries, 5-Spice Almond Cookies, and Double-Carob Cashew Cookies.
Holy hannah... it was all so good. The pasta was perfect and easy, and I want more! The fries were....oh my goodness.... the best fries I've ever had in my life. Seriously. Wow. (Hubby made them and I was very impressed with his potato cutting skills! I gave myself a giant cut while preparing Thanksgiving dinner last weekend, and am feeling a little leery of knives...) The cookies were both super good, and I can't get the carob ones out of my mind. (Okay, so, to be honest, I made them with chocolate, because we had company, and I wanted my vegan goodies to impress, and you know how some people can be about carob. I promise to use carob next time.)
My step-sister and brother-in-law (the aforementioned company) came for dinner on Friday, and I made the Potato Squashers and Chickpea Sensation Patties, both from ED&BV, along with some steamed swiss chard. Yum! These were really good, and the picture does them no justice.
Cooking and breastfeeding, because that's how we roll. :)
In other news, we got a new fridge! Yay! I had to take a picture when it was all clean and organized.
And in one last bit of non-food-related vegan-ness, check out the cute Isabooties I got Teague! The blue pair is for xmas, so shhh!

Tofu Roast

This recipe was such a hit! I found a copy online (posted with permission from Sarah Kramer) to share with you all!
I have been cooking from ED&BV this week, and will have a big post coming up this weekend.
xo

The Thanksgiving Post

Phew! It's been a while! We have been so busy, it's ridiculous. I keep waiting for life to calm down, but it just never seems to happen. Our trip to the mountains was lovely, but not as relaxing as I'd hoped. I have lots of things to post about, but I think I'll save it for later, and make this an exclusively Thanksgiving post.
This Thankgiving, I am thankful for family, friends, and Canadian cookbook authors! Did I mention that I got my copy of Eat, Drink and Be Vegan this week? Yahoo! I think I spent a good couple of hours looking through it with awe and excitement. Naturally, I had to put it to use in my holiday meals. Being the daughter of divorced parents, we generally have 2 celebrations for each holiday (if my husband's family lived nearby, we'd likely have 3). To make my life a little easier, I decided to make the same dishes for each dinner, varying only the desserts. Here's what we had (2 nights in a row...):
The Tofu Roast from La Dolce Vegan. This received rave reviews from pretty much everyone. I think it will definitely become a holiday staple. In the midst of my cooking/ eating frenzy, I neglected to take any pictures of the final product, so all I have for you are 2 pre-oven, pre-basting pics. Sorry!
Saturday night was dinner at my dad's, and for dessert, I made the Pumpkin-Cheese Pie from ED&BV. Yum! It was awesome. I used the Brown Rice Pumpkin Seed pie crust from ExtraVeganZa. It was so good. Everyone loved it, and my grandma wants the recipe (for this and the tofu roast!). (On a side note, my grandpa has been veg for over 25 years... how cool is that?!)
Tonight we had dinner at my mom's, and I made the Chocolate-Pumpkin Pie from ED&BV (which Dreena has kindly posted here). Wow. Seriously... go make this now. It is that freaking good. Everyone loved it. It is super rich and decadent, and oh-so yummy! Why are you still reading? Go make this pie!
Pre-oven:
And post-oven:
I made the Walnut-Cocoa Crust (or something to that affect) from ExtraVeganZa. Not only is it healthier than store-bought, but we couldn't find any vegan chocolate pie crusts. (Which is actually quite odd, since Oreos are vegan... We were able to find vegan graham cracker crusts, which is also odd, since graham crackers usually contain honey. Strange.)
My side-dish contribution was the Roasted Root Vegetables and Squash from ExtraVeganZa. It's filled with sweet potatoes, beets, carrots, rutabagas and more! And look how pretty it is...
Apparently I mostly take pictures of things before they're cooked. Ah well. You get the idea.
I also whipped up the Traditional Cranberry Sauce and the Thick 'N' Rich Gravy from ED&BV. So good!
Here's tonight's dinner, all put together:
My sisters made the super-yummy vegetable salad, and my step-sister made the green salad (with walnuts and a pear-vanilla vinaigrette, which was awesome).
And here's a pie of Chocolate-Pumpkin Pie, that I saved just for you!
Mmmm. (Yeah, I think every member of my family - my sisters, my mom, my dad, and I - has the plain white Corelle plates. Weird.)
It was a busy weekend, and I'm looking forward to slowing down and relaxing tomorrow.
Oh, and by the way, check out what we got from the csa this week:
Yay!
Have a happy Thanksgiving, Canadian friends. Everyone else, enjoy your weekends!
Peace!