Author: Cassie

A vegan lunch for old college housemates

Adventures, Menu, Recipes

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I really lucked out when I shared a house with two girls while going to college at the University of Arizona. I found the house on the dreaded Craigslist, met the owner of the house, but did not meet the girl who would be living across the hall and sharing a bathroom with me until after I moved in! Here we are today, graduated, doing big things, and still friends. What could have turned out to be a miserable year turned out to be the beginning of a great friendship and a bond created over both of our love for FOOD. Devynn Hawley, your the best!

On December 29th, 2012, we made plans to get together for lunch, coffee, whatever… we just knew we wanted to see each other. Sure, we keep in touch through facebook, etc, but there is nothing like an in-person hangout.

I decided I would cook lunch for my amiga – just like old times! We both wanted something light and healthy after overindulging over Christmas. So, what better than a nice, nutrient-filled, vegan lunch? I decided to make acorn squash filled with a whole wheat couscous mixture of cranberries, walnuts, parsley, and green onion. I paired this with my favorite spinach salad that I used to make for Devynn all the time at the old house. It consists of grilled or sauteed onions, spinach, apple, walnuts, cranberries, and a simple dressing of apple cider vinegar and olive oil (oh, and salt and pepper of course).

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To wash it down, I made a mocktail of Trader Joe’s Cherry Cider, Hansens Diet Soda in Tangerine-Lime, and apple slices. For dessert, we had a couple of those no-egg chocolate chip cookies I made the night before.

A vegan lunch for old college housemates

It was awesome catching up and gossiping about boys and such. I made a friend for life while living in that house and at the core is, once again, food.

Let me know if you want any of these recipes and I will gladly post them!

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Chocolate chips cookies and a tip if you don’t have eggs

Adventures, Recipes

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“Good food makes everything better”
A quote from my brilliant son. It is so true! Tonight the bf is sick so I made a delicious dinner and finished it up with these bad boys here shown in the picture. Chocolate makes everything better in my world plus it’s national chocolate day so I figured, sure why not? Plus I still had a bag of chocolate chips in the cabinet.

I had just creamed the butter and sugars to perfection in the stand mixture when it occurred to me… I have no eggs! The recipe called for 2 eggs! What’s a girl to do? So, being the skilled problem solver that I am, I took from my experience with vegan baking and poured some apple cider vinegar into about a half a cup of milk. I let it sit for about 5 minutes and then beat it into the butter and cream mixture. I followed the recipe as usual after that.

To my relief the cookies came out amazing! I much prefer them without the eggs now.They are not as cakey and still slightly chewy in the middle. They also are a little thinner and I like them like that. This recipe could have easily been made vegan if I had Earth Balance available instead of regular butter.

So there you have it. Don’t be afraid to be daring and take risks in the kitchen. You might discover a new trick or shortcut for something you have made million times before.

If you want the exact recipe for these chocolate chip cookies, just let me know!

December 28 – National Chocolate Day

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YES!!!

Unknown's avatarFoodimentary - National Food Holidays

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National Chocolate Day

Five Food Finds about Chocolate

  • The word “chocolate” comes from the Aztec word, “Xocolatl”, which ironically means “bitter water”.
  • The biggest bar of chocolate ever made was created in 2000 and weighed 5,000 pounds.  Turin is the city in Italy that can be proud of this accomplishment.
  • While the US produces the most chocolate and consume the most pounds every year, the Swiss consume the most per capita,  followed closely by the English.
  • Chocolate manufacturers currently use 40% of the world’s almonds and 20% of the world’s peanuts.
  • Every Russian and American space voyage has included chocolate bars.

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Today’s Food History

1763 John Molson was born. Founder of Molson Brewery, Montreal, Canada.

1869 William Finley Semple patented the first chewing gum, although he never commercially manufactured any gum.

1886 Josephine Garis Cochran patented the first commercially successful dish washing machine. It became a huge hit at the 1893…

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My Experience Going Vegetarian, Then Vegan

Adventures, Running

My Experience Going Vegetarian, Then Vegan.

This blog post was inspiring to me because I have been flirting with the idea of going Vegetarian and Vegan for a long time. Especially now, after bowl after bowl of posole, ham and more ham, tamale after more tamales, I am feeling the side effects of extreme overindulgence. I need to get back on track not only with my diet but also with my running. I feel the best when I am running 3-4 times a week and the last few months it has been 3-4 times a month (embarrassing!). New running shoes have been ordered online, re-joined my gym, and now all that’s left is what I put in my mouth.

Yeah, I’m one of those that can’t doesn’t want to give up cheese and ice cream, but I totally think I should. The very idea of what dairy is makes me kind of sick but I separate myself so far away from the idea when I’m digging into that bowl of cookie dough ice cream or cheesy pasta. And meat… well, my body doesn’t like when I eat it but eat it anyway.

I have pulled out my Skinny Bitch book to re-read and I think I will watch Forks Over Knives again for some more inspiration and a good kick in the ass.

Manny’s hash browns

Adventures, Favorites, Recipes

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Like mother like son. My son, Manny, loves to cook. Today he made his famous hash browns for an afternoon snack. He used three large russet potatoes, bell peppers, hatch chile, garlic, green onions,white onions and cilantro. We cooked them first with the top on the skillet and then the last few minutes with the top off to let them crisp up. I enjoyed mine with a Blue Moon and it was awesome.

Mom’s cinnamon roll French toast

Adventures, Recipes

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This morning, the day after Christmas, my mom made this delicious creation. It’s already made cinnamon rolls- you know the ones in the can that pops open- cut in quarters, milk, sugar, cinnamon, and egg. She topped them with sliced almonds and baked them at 400 degrees for about twenty minutes. When they were done, they were like a cross between French toast, custard, and cinnamon rolls. They were so good with our morning coffee! Thanks, Mom!

P.S. I have a lot of catching up to do on posting so stay tuned!

Success! Cheesy Potatoey Goodness

Everything else

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Success!  I have conquered scalloped potatoes au gratin and am inspired to make them again – but better! I would  definitely add more cheese on top because I like them to be a little more cheesy and a more substantial “crust” on top. I am thinking about putting in some finely chopped oyster mushrooms between layers of potatoes. Bacon or pancetta would be good, too. The possibilities are endless! All in all they were really easy to make and are perfect for a Sunday night dinner because they do take a while in the oven.

 

I researched several different recipes and ultimately came up with my own recipe. I started out with Ellie Krieger’s recipe but I used 2% milk instead of 1%. I warmed the milk with whole garlic cloves to infuse the milk rather than have actually garlic chunks. I also used this awesome Gruyere Cheddar cheese blend I found at Trader Joe’s. I also decided not to cook the potatoes first and put them in raw instead. My recipe follows.Image

Ingredients:

1 3 lb bag of gold potatoes or some other yellowish waxy potatoes

1 – 2 cups grated cheese – I used this Gruyere-Cheddar blend but any semi-hard cheese would probably do

3 cups 2% milk

two garlic cloves, whole

one sprig of thyme

dash of nutmeg

salt to taste

oil spray

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees

2. slice the potatoes about 1/4 inch thick with a mandolin

3. warm the milk in a saucepan with the garlic cloves, thyme, sprinkle of nutmeg, and salt

4. Grate the cheese and set aside

5. Spray a baking dish with the oil spray and arrange about 1/3 if the potatoes on the bottom of the pan and sprinkle on some cheese. Repeat until all the potatoes are arranged in the dish. Top with the last bit of cheese.

6. Pour warmed milk over the entire thing. It is going to seem like a lot of liquid but, trust me, the potatoes soak it all up. Remember that when you are adding salt to the milk mixture  – you’re going to want to put more than you think.

7. Bake covered in foil for 45 minutes then take out, take off the foil, and put back in for another 25 – 30 minutes. Let cool and (if you can wait) DIG IN!

And that’s what I did! Yum!

Pizza and wine night with crazy good caramelized onions

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Pizza and wine night with crazy good caramelized onions

Friday was screaming to be pizza and wine night and that’s exactly what it became. I decided to get fancy and caramelize some onions to put on the pizza and oh-em-gee they were good! I usually prefer fresh veggies on my pizza but the caramlized onions with the hot Italian sausage was so effing good.

Oh yeah and that’s Addie in the background like a ghost trying to get a taste. Crazy dog.

For the caramelized onions, all you do is thinly slice a ton of onions. I used two whole onions and by the time they were done, I had enough for half a pizza. Put some oil down in the pan, put the thinly sliced onions in the pan, put the heat on medium low, and wait. After about 30 minutes you will find caramelized onion goodness.

Scalloped Potatoes Au Gratin on the Food Network

Adventures, Recipes

Scalloped Potatoes Au Gratin on the Food Network.

Making these tonight! I always like how Ellie Kreiger makes lower calorie recipes but still uses some really good ingredients – like Gruyere cheese! I’ve never made Potatoes Au Gratin so I hope they turn out delish.

Does Giada di Laurentiis have a scalloped potato recipe? If she does I couldn’t find it (sad face).

Another post-run snack that hits the spot: Chocolate Soy Milk

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Image It’s low in fat, it has some carbs, some protein, even a gram of fiber, and  – hello – it has chocolate! This Trader Joe’s version is even fortified with vitamins. It’s perfect to replenish what was lost during a run. I’m going to try and double up my miles this week and am probably going to need something a little more than chocolate soy milk. Any suggestions?