WHITE BEAN & SPINACH ENCHILADAS and CILANTRO LIME BROWN RICE

These are great enchiladas to make for spring or any time if you like. These were a hit at Easter one year, everyone said how much they loved them and there were none left to take home. So here's to Karina at Gluten Free Goddess http://glutenfreegoddess.blogspot.com/2007/03/enchiladas-griegos-for-two.html for very tasty encho's. My version is down below eliminating the dairy and tweaking it a bit. Do to the cannelini beans these are more on the creamy side. I do add a few tablespoons of tofutti sometimes if I want it even more creamy. Also I have used the original recipes sauce and it is really good but the green sauce makes it a bit lighter.

Next CILANTRO LIME RICE! When I saw this recipe in VegNews months ago I knew I had to make it. The result? Ahhhhhhhhhhhh Gooooooooooooood! We all loved it! This went so well with the enchiladas I made. I am already planning to make this for my in-laws and for many future guests.

Recipe for Enchiladas

Preheat oven to 375
Makes 10 Enchiladas

1 lg can green enchilada sauce
10 corn tortillas
1 med yellow or white onion, diced
1 red bell pepper, thinly sliced
1 16 oz. package frozen chopped spinach, thawed
4 garlic cloves, finely chopped
2 15oz cans cannelini beans
2 tsp cumin
1 tsp oregano
1/2 tsp sage

dash of nutmeg

1/4 c. cilantro(optional)

1/4 c. tofutti cream cheese (optional)

sea salt & ground pepper to taste

Heat a T. olive oil in large skillet over med. heat and add onion, garlic and red bell pepper. Cook until the onions are on the soft side. Next add the spinach, stir a bit until most liquid is gone. Thoroughly stir in the seasonings then add the beans. Take off heat and mix in the cilantro and tofutti if you choose to.

Coat the bottom of a large casserole dish with sauce. Next heat up half the sauce in a med saucepan, just until warm. Take a corn tortilla, dip into the warm sauce just to coat, then fill with mixture. Repeat until all the filling is used. Pour the rest of the sauce(you probably won't use all of the sauce but use however much you like) over the enchiladas and cover with foil. Bake until cooked through about 30-35 min. Take out and let it sit for about 10min. or so.

Berry Smoothie

You know people are always asking where do you get your protein. I know it's frustrating but to you non-vegans who may read this, this shake has about 18 grams of protein. The banana is also good for calcium absorption. More on the protein issue at a later date.

This berry smoothie I made for my husband before he went to work. We usually have fruit smoothies to start the day out. This one consists of 1 lg. banana, 1 cup frozen mixed berries, 3/4 cup soy milk, 1/4 c. organic cranberry juice, 2 T. flaxseed and 2 T. hemp powder.

Barbecued Vegetable Salad with Seitan Ribz

Warm days, lot's of salads. My husband is a fan of the barbecued salads. You get the flavor of bbq and then use ranch dressing and then drizzle on the bbq sauce. We like the Follow Your Heart Garlic Ranch or something like that, it's the vegan one. We then bbq extra firm tofu or Seitan Ribz, recipe from Susan at http://blog.fatfreevegan.com/ fatfree kitchen. I usually don't use iceberg, but for this one I add it to mixed green lettuce. This picture doesn't show the avocado or tortilla chips. I took the picture too soon and then my camera was acting up. Also the Real Food Daily cookbook has a really good cilantro dressing that goes well with this also.

Recipe:
Add as much as you want of the following this is what I used.

Vegan Ranch
Barbecue Sauce
Mixed Lettuce Greens w/iceberg
1/4 c.cilantro(optional)
1 red onion, diced
3 tomatoes
2 fresh corn, I boil for 15 min. then grill it.
2 zucchini, sliced
2 yellow crookneck squash, sliced
1 bunch asparagus, trimmed
2 bell pepper, slice
2 carrots,(I love grill carrots)
1 can 15 oz. black beans, drained
1 avocado
tortilla chips, broken up
tofu or seitan ribz(optional)

If you are grilling tofu, I smother it in bbq sauce and let it sit for about an hour. I grill the tofu or Seitan ribz last. Slice the zucchini, bell pepper, yellow squash about 1/4 inch thick, and carrot,
put in large bowl or casserole dish. Trim asparagus and add to bowl. Mix with some olive oil and salt and you are ready for the grill. I like to grill the vegetables until they have that grilled look to them. When you are done boiling the corn you can brush on some olive oil and salt and add to vegetables. In a large bowl I mix the lettuce, red onion and tomatoes. Crush tortilla chips for topping. When everything is done grilling. Chop the vegetables and tofu or seitan. In the lettuce bowl add the vegetables, black beans. Plate the salad,add avocado, dressing, drizzle with barbecue sauce and top with tortilla chips. Wallah! SO GOOD!

BABY SHOWER CAKE

This is the cake I made for my cousin's baby shower last Saturday. The cake flavor I made was one I have previously posted. I was practicing. I also made the cupcakes. This was my second time using fondant and a bit of a mishap due to the chocolate. I had brown food coloring but when I was adding it to the fondant it was a clay color not brown! What to do in so little time before I had to leave. So I had to use cocoa again which dries out the fondant,those of you who use fondant would know this. So I didn't get a dark brown look like I wanted and it was a bit harder to work with because of it being dry. Anyways, it turned out alright. I actually preferred my practice cake the week before. Oh well. The baby's room is decorated pink & brown and the comforter has a ladybug on it, that's why I went with making the ladybug on top. My cousin and everyone loved it so I guess that's all that matters. I really need to take cake decorating classes.

Tofu Onion Tart w/Lentil Sauce

This Tofu Onion Tart is sooooo goood! I once made this for my in-laws when my son was going to stay the night at their house. No one knew that it was made with tofu. They loved it! The recipe comes from the cookbook The Voluptuous Vegan by Myra Kornfeld , it actually uses leeks but I didn't have any on hand so I used onions. The lentil sauce goes so well with this. I served this with brocollini and salad. The nice thing is that you can change up the ingredients, once I made it with green chilli's, onion and corn, delish! There are alot of really good recipes in this book, and well worth the time spent.

Stuffed Bell Peppers

Stuffed peppers are one of our family favorites. It's so easy too! Usually I use vegan sausage, for this, one of the rare times I use store bought faux meats. I didn't have any on hand so I crumbled tofu and mixed with herbs and sauted in pan. Here is the recipe that again I got from Karina at Gluten Free Goddess, and just changed it up. Oh these are a picture before they went into the oven. I forgot to take one after and well, we ate them up!

Serves 6

3 whole bell peppers, cut in half and seeded

3 cups cooked brown rice or white

1 med. yellow onion, diced

1 cup corn, cooked

2 T. pine nuts

2 tsp. cumin

1 1/2 tsp. oregano

2 T. cilantro

1 package of vegan sausage crumbled

If using tofu I used firm and crumbled it and add following herbs: oregano, red pepper flakes, sage, garlic, fennel, caraway seeds, soy sauce, cumin, olive oil. and sauted until cooked through.

salsa

tofutti

Preheat oven to 375. First saute sausage through or tofu. Put into a bowl and set aside. In another pan or saute onion & garlic in oil. Add corn and saute. Add pinenuts and saute for about min. Next add cumin and oregano for a couple more min. Add rice, sausage and cilantro to the pan a stir through.

Lay the halved bell peppers in a casserole dish. Fill up peppers. Top off with a Tablespoon or so of tofutti and salsa.

Pour hot water into the dish about 1/4 inch or more and cover with foil. Bake for 1 hour until peppers are soft.

Bee hive

UPDATE!! THE BEES ARE GONE!!!! 5 DAYS!

See that mound of brown in the tree? Well those are bees. The other day we saw many bees flying around our tree and noticed this. We called the "Bee Control" and the lady said if they are in a tree 95 percent of the time they won't stay there so give the 4 or 5 days to leave. Today is day 3!
We can't mow the lawn, we have to watch to dog. I love bees but it would be nice if they could move on to somewhere safer. We'll see.

Angel hair pasta with roasted asparagus, tomatoes and pesto

First off this picture is a bit dark, when I used the flash it was too bright. Oh well!
Everyone wanted pasta tonight and we didn't want anything too heavy and I had a bunch of asparagus and basil. Since it's still cooling down at night this dish was perfect. It smells so wonderful as the veggies are roasting in the oven. The idea behind this recipe comes from Karina at Gluten Free Goddess. Again just tweaked it a bit and added pesto to it.

I cooked 3/4 pack of angel hair pasta according to directions. Meanwhile in the oven I roasted some chopped Roma tomatoes, garlic, capers, olive oil, basil, oregano and just a bit of jalepeno for a kick and a bit of balsamic in 400 oven until done.
Then I made a basil pesto. Once everything is done stir it all in a nice pasta bowl. Drizzle a bit more of balsamic syrup and a couple sprinkles of red pepper flakes. Serve with a nice caesar or salad of choice and garlic bread.

Corned Seitan and Cabbage

For St. Patty's day my mother-in-law used to make my son Corned beef and cabbage in his pre-vegan days. So his first year as a vegan I found a vegan recipe for it and it was just okay. This years recipe is a keeper! I've never eaten it before so I didn't know what it really was supposed to taste like, but I was given the thumbs up on this one.
I used the "Vegan Corned beef" recipe from
Vegan Dad, but added some fennel and a bit of molasses to it. This recipe is so good, my son said it tastes so much better than last years recipe.
Then I used Susan's recipe at Fatfree Kitchen for the rest of the recipe. I boiled some potatoes and added it to it at the end.

Animal Care Foundation in Solvang, CA

Recently in our local paper I read about an animal rescue just 5 minutes from us! Never knew about this until reading about it. It's called Hacienda O'Holland Animal Care. They take in animals that are unwanted or abused. With the costs of everything going up, this animal rescue is going to have a "white elephant" sale to raise money to help with vet. care, food, etc. and you can also visit with the animals, it's this Saturday, March 14th from 8:30 a.m. - 3:00p.m. Now I know most of you reading this don't even live around here but just so you know you can donate anytime. I haven't had a chance to go check it out as of yet but I definitely will be. Check out the website to read more about it http://haciendaoholland.org/homepage.html. Also I will try to write more about it after my visit.

Chilli

Although the weather is starting to warm up a bit, I think yesterday we were in the 60's, the nights cool way down. We were in the mood for some chilli and cornbread. This particular chilli I've been making for quite a few years now and my husband and son love it! When I first started making this chilli I used to add a meatless ground product to satisfy my husband, then I just gradually added more beans and took out the faux meat product and the end result is he likes it better this way! Every once in a while I will have a guest that eats animal products and hardly any vegetables, so I will make it like the original and they never know that it's a faux meat product until they see me eating it too. hee hee. Also our favorite cornbread recipe is from The Joy of Vegan Baking.

Chilli

Canola or olive oil
1 1/4 C. yellow or white onion
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 med. - lg. red or orange bell pepper, chopped
1 1/4 C. butternut squash, diced
2 tsp. cocoa powder, unsweetened
1 T. oregano
2 tsp. cumin
2 T. chilli or to your liking
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. -1 tsp. chipotle chilli in adobe sauce
1 1/4 C. water
1 28 oz. can diced tomato(do not drain)
1 15 oz can black beans, rinsed
1 15 oz can cannelini beans, rinsed
1 15 oz can kidney beans, rinsed
cilantro for the top

In a large soup pot, heat oil and add onion, bell pepper and garlic, saute until almost soft. Next add the butternut squash for about 10 minutes, saute until butternut squash starts to soften a bit. Add together the cocoa powder, oregano, cumin, chilli powder, salt and chipotle (the chipotle has alot of heat so adjust accordingly to what you can handle). Stir for about 2 minutes until seasonings are thoroughly mixed in. Next add water & tomato, you will simmer this with the lid closed for about 15 min. stir every so often. Next you will stir in the beans and again simmer with the lid on for about 30 minutes, just to let the flavors cook in. When it is done you can serve with cilantro or any topping of your choice. Enjoy!

Stir fried brown rice and veggies

If you don't have a lot of time or just don't really feel like cooking but don't want to eat out. Or if your budget is tight, like us, this dish is easy & quick to make, tastes good and you can use whatever veggies that you like or have around.
I made a pot of brown rice. 7 oz. extra firm tofu cut into chunks, I tossed them in some soy, put them in my cast iron skillet and threw them under the broil for a few just to get a bit firmer and slightly brown. Next in a Medium cast iron pan(you can use whatever pan you like) I heated just a small amount of canola oil. I then added 1/2 a yellow onion cooked until soft. The following vegetable took less time to cook, it's nice to keep them somewhat crisp. Once the onion was done I added a large carrot, red bell pepper, 2 cloves fresh garlic and cooked for about 3 minutes. Then added zucchini and peas just until cooked. Next threw in some chopped scallions and turned off heat. The sauce was a mixture of soy sauce, hoison, fresh ginger, brown rice vinegar & a little sesame oil. You can add more hoison or a bit of agave to sweeten up more.
Once veggies are done I add the tofu to the pan, sauce and the rice. Stir to combine. To plate I put a couple of scoops in a bowl, add more scallion to top, a few sprinkles of seaweed gomasio, and a drizzle of sesame oil. Yummy!

Pecan & Chocolate Chip Biscotti

I love, love, love, biscotti! It's light and crunchy. I love the crunch. It's just a thing I have.

So I took the recipe from V'CON and altered it slightly. I used spelt flour, used 1/2 cup sugar instead of 3/4 cup(I usually use less sugar than is asked for, I think when you start cutting back on eating sugary treats your tastebuds change)I only used vanilla extract and used rice flour instead of arrowroot powder. Oh I used pecans and chocolate chips too, my favorite combo. The cute little mug that is pictured, my friend made that for me.