Jess and I make a trip up to Ithaca, NY every month or two. We pick up some grocery items that can't be found in Corning and stop for a bite to eat at one of the many veg-friendly restaurants, such as the famous Moosewood. One of the items we pick up nearly every visit is a container of Macro Mamas' peanut noodles.
Here I create peanut noodles that don't require my wife and I to travel 45 minutes. This dish is absolutely delicious and goes together quickly and easily.
Ingredients:
1 package (~10.5 oz) soba noodles
1 cup carrot, cut into matchsticks
1 red bell pepper, cut into matchsticks
6 green onions, sliced thinly
1/2 cup peanut butter (I like crunchy variety for texture)
1/4 cup soy sauce
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 Tbsp fresh ginger, minced
1 Tbsp sesame oil
1 Tbsp water
2 Tbsp fresh lime juice
1-2 Tbsp Siracha hot sauce (depending on your taste)
sesame seeds
Cook soba noodles according to package directions, running under cold water afterward to halt cooking.
Place noodles in a large mixing bowl along with carrot, peppers, and green onion.
In a second bowl, whisk together all remaining ingredients to create the dressing. Pour the dressing over the noodles and vegetables.
Toss it all together, sprinkle a few pinches of sesame seeds on the top, take a bite, and imagine you've been whisked away to the magical land of Ithaca.
(Also, baking some tofu to throw into the mix would be a pretty tasty decision, too, but baked tofu is a post for another day.)
This is probably the unhealthiest meal I have ever prepared. I got the original (non-vegan) recipe from an old boss of mine. I honestly don’t know if the original was better or worse, but he even went as far as to top it with crushed Cheese-Its! I often bring this dish to parties with omnivores. No one ever knows that it’s vegan unless they know that I brought it. It’s always a huge hit!
There isn’t a picture with this recipe because I didn’t want to be tempted to eat it. I have a doctor’s appointment tomorrow and I have to face the dreaded scale! Next time we make this, we'll be sure to update this post, though!
Ingredients:
1 lb macaroni
1 stick Earth Balance or other vegan margarine
1 small onion, diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 tbsp salt
1 tsp thyme
1/4 - 1/2 Tbsp crushed red pepper (depending on your taste)
3-6 Tbsp flour
1 pint of soy creamer
1 bag of Daiya cheddar or mozzarella style shreds
1/4 cup bread crumbs
Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees.
Cook the macaroni al dente and transfer to a greased 9" x 13" casserole dish.
Melt the Earth Balance in a sauce pan over medium heat. Add the onion and garlic and cook until soft.
Add salt, thyme, and crushed red pepper. This may seem like a large amount of salt, but it is needed to counter the sweetness of the soy creamer. Taste the sauce while putting it together and add more salt or crushed pepper if needed.
Add the flour and cook until thickened and bubbling – about 4-5 minutes. Stir constantly under low flame. Don’t let it brown or burn.
Add slowly, but stir voraciously at first, the soy creamer. Keep stirring until all of the creamer is in. Increase the heat to medium flame and bring to a simmer.
Add the Daiya to the sauce and continue to stir over heat until it has melted. The sauce will separate easily at this point, so stirring constantly is important.
Pour into the casserole dish over the cooked macaroni and stir until the sauce covers the pasta evenly.
Cover the casserole with bread crumbs. Place into the oven and bake for 20 minutes.
Enjoy! (But in moderation, Hahaha.)
So, if any of you scroll down far enough on the Confession Time! post, you may notice that Quincy Leah of the blog Shugurcan commented to us a nomination for the Liebster Award!
The Liebster Award is a cool little award that is given from one blogger to another, like a chain letter. Unlike a chain letter, though, you pass on the Liebster Award not to avoid a curse or ensure an ideal romance or whatever other superstition the given letter may choose to prey upon, but instead it's passed on to help build a stronger community of bloggers.
The Award builds community by asking participants to: Thank the blogger who nominated you with a link back to their blog; List 11 random facts about yourself and your blog; Answer 11 questions from the nominator; Nominate up to 11 blogs with 200 followers or fewer with a comment on their blog; Ask 11 questions for your nominees to answer in their own blog.
So, we may as well get right into it!
11 Random Facts About Jess and Josiah:
- Jess is deathly afraid of moths.
- Josiah broke his knee in two... while bowling.
- Jess has weird thumbs. They're too short. Look up Megan Fox's thumbs on Google Image Search if you're needing a visual.
- Josiah works for Corning Incorporated, mixing all sorts of nifty chemicals together.
- Jess works as the Director of Corporate Compliance for an area nursing home.
- Despite hating most of the contestants and despising most of the foods the show pushes, we continue to watch The Biggest Loser.
- We're expecting our first child on or around May 5th.
- We don't know the gender of the baby. Jess won't even venture to guess at it. Josiah thinks it's a boy. Then he thinks it's a girl. Then he thinks it's a boy. Right now he thinks it's a girl.
- Jess's favorite dinner is hands-down Kale with Black-eyed Peas (The baby likes it, too)
- Josiah's favorite dinner is Dogfish Head 60-Minute IPA.
- Our dog Obi often has gas so bad that it smells like a skunk has entered the room.
Answering Quincy of Shugurcan's 11 Questions:
- What made you interested in food and fitness?
Food tastes good; vegan food tastes good and kind. Josiah is certainly interested in cooking. That was sparked when he was bedridden after a knee surgery. He had to watch more than his fair share of television. Lo' and behold, when he was back on his feet, he had absorbed a lot of cooking technique from the Food Network and was enthusiastic about trying them out.
- What was your favorite subject in school?
Jess liked French and Psycology. She liked French so much mostly because she recalls her French teacher telling the story of her being stuck on a raft, smoking weed during the 1972 flood of our fair city, Corning, NY.
Josiah was always an art student, through and through. Any extra study hall time was spent in the art room. And of course, he moved on to study Design and Imaging in college at RIT.
- Do you own any pets and if so, what kind?
We own two dogs, Ella and Obi. They are Boston Terriers, are obsessive snugglers, and are occasionally good.
- How long have you been blogging for?
The blog has been online for about a year and a half, though it had a period of hiatus while home improvement projects and a pregnancy consumed all free time and energy. A Tempeh Tantrum is back to active now, though!
- What the first concert you went to?
Oddly enough, both of our first concerts were in fact the same concert! Well before we had actually met--nearly a decade prior--we both saw Hootie and the Blowfish (Remember them!?)
- If you could live in any decade, which would it be?
We would both choose the 60's. Jess would live then because of the cultural changes going on and all of the great music of the era. Josiah would live then to be with Jess. And he's a fan of mind-enhancing drugs.
- Are you a night person or a morning person?
It most certainly depends upon the day of the week. If there's a day of work ahead, we'll take the night. Also, with Jess being pregnant, she's been awfully tired more or less all the time.
- If you could only eat one food for the rest of your life, what would it be?
Pineapple. Jess hasn't craved too many odd foods with her pregnancy, but she has craved pineapple, pineapple, and more pineapple. If our count is correct, we have gone through 8 fresh pineapples in just the past 2 months or so. Also, we've eaten one or two cans of pineapple on tonp of that.
- What is your favorite hobby?
Josiah is still a child at heart and plays video games when he has the time. Running is the hobby of choice for Jess. And being pregnant is getting in the way of that. In that regard, she is more than ready to not be pregnant anymore.
- Do you like coffee or tea (or neither)?
Jess misses her blueberry coffee, but she's moved to mint tea since our baby's started growing in her. Josiah isn't pregnant, so he still drinks plenty of coffee. Maybe even too much.
- Do you prefer big parties or small group gatherings?
Small group gatherings. We both love all our friends dearly, but get anxious with too many people around.
Now, I'm sure you're getting sick of hearing all about us, so let's move on to our list of Liebster Award nominees! Drum roll, please! (Reader's Note: You're responsible for providing your own drum roll.) Our Liebster Award nominees are as follows:
11 Questions For Our Nominees:
- How long have you been blogging?
- What's your all-time favorite post on your blog?
- What do you think is the king of vegetables?
- What's a typical dinner look like for you?
- What's your favorite book?
- Dogs or Cats?
- What was the first thing you wanted to grow up to be?
- What are some of your favorite TV shows?
- Where would you most like to go if I were to hand you a plane ticket right now?
- Which would you choose: robotic super-legs or robotic super-arms?
- What are you wearing? *Sly Wink*
And there we have it! Our acceptance of the Liebster Award! We had fun and urge you all to check out Shugurcan, who nominated A Tempeh Tantrum, as well as all the blogs we have in turn nominated.
Thanks for reading! Eat green!
Saint Patrick’s Day is just around the corner. That means it’s time to celebrate the sliver of Irish blood that courses in my veins. I may not have matured all that much, but I’ve matured just enough so that I won’t be taking the day off from work to drink it away with my friends like I have in prior years. So, instead of overindulging in holiday appropriate beers and liquors, I overindulge in holiday appropriate foods.
Nothing says St. Patty’s Day like corned beef and cabbage (besides perhaps soda bread, but I have to save something to post for the holiday next year). So, I’ve come up with this recipe for the vegan-friendly alternative, corned seitan.
This seitan would go outstandingly roasted up with some cabbage, or sliced thinly and put onto some rye with some sauerkraut for a fantastic vegan reuben.
Ingredients:
1 c. vital wheat gluten
2 Tbsp nutritional yeast
2 Tbsp paprika
2 Tbsp brown sugar
1 tsp salt
1 tsp onion powder
1 tsp garlic powder
1/2 tsp ground pepper
1/4 tsp ground ginger
dash clove
dash allspice
1/4 c. vinegar (white or apple cider)
1/4 c. yellow mustard
1/4 c. gin
2 Tbsp olive oil
Firstly, this can be cooked in a couple different ways. You can either simmer the seitan in a pot of water, or if you have a steamer basket it can be steamed. In my experience simmering will provide a lighter, less dense texture—that my wife prefers—while steaming makes the seitan a bit meatier—which I prefer. So, get a pot of water on the stove on high to come to a boil—three inches deep or so if you plan to simmer, only about one inch deep if steaming.
While the water is heating, combine all dry ingredients in a large mixing bowl. Mix the ingredients thoroughly (I sieve all ingredients through a mesh colander too, just to ensure there’s no clumps). In a second bowl, mix the wet ingredients and stir together.
Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and stir together until uniformly moistened. Knead the mixture for 2 minutes. Then form into a loaf-like shape and wrap into either some cheese cloth.
If simmering, drop the wrapped seitan into the water and simmer for 40 minutes. If steaming, set the wrapped seitan onto the steamer basket and steam for 30 minutes.
Once the 40 or 30 minutes are up, remove the seitan and let rest for 5-10 minutes. Unwrap the seitan and cut it up in thick slices for the dinner plate or thin slices for sandwiches.
Hope you enjoy! May the road rise to meet you!
Because we haven’t posted anything in ages, we haven’t had a chance to announce that we are expecting our first child in the beginning of May! We do not know if it is a boy or a girl. So far, it has been a fairly easy pregnancy, but here is where the confession comes….
Hello, my name is Jessica and I’m a cheese-a-holic.
For the first two trimesters, I fell off of the Vegan wagon. I cannot explain in words the exhaustion and nausea that I felt in the first trimester. I didn’t want to eat anything at all, but just the thought of vegetables made me sick. Of course, that’s the worst food aversion possible for a vegan. If I didn’t eat, the nausea just got worse. Thankfully, I never had any actual morning sickness. Some days I thought it might have been better, though.
I used all of this as an excuse and started eating dairy and eggs again. Am I mad at myself for this? Of course I am. However, I refuse to beat myself up over it. That isn’t going to help or change anything. I know myself well enough to know that if I do that, I’ll never get back to veganism.
I started to feel better in the second trimester, but the addictive properties of dairy had their hold on me. Also, by this point, our friends and family knew that I had gone back to a vegetarian diet. It was hard to tell them that I changed my mind… again. So, I continued eating this way and feeling guilty.
A funny thing happens when you’re pregnant. The opinions and concerns of others seem to make you worry more, especially if it comes from a medical professional. For example, I asked my doctor at my first appointment if I could continue running. I had heard from other runners that it was okay as long as you were already running regularly. My doctor actually told me no! He said that I would be putting the baby at risk for having a low birth weight. I now know that this isn’t true and I should have trusted my own instinct and research. When someone tells you that you will hurt your baby, and that person is a doctor, you will believe them.
So, then came the nutrition lecture. At my doctor’s office, they require all pregnant women to sit down with a Registered Nurse to discuss nutrition, things to avoid, family history, etc. They also weigh you at this visit which made me mad, but that’s another story. Josiah didn’t come with me to this appointment. When I told the nurse that I didn’t eat meat, I thought her head would explode. So, to make up for it, I told her that I drank milk. I still haven’t drunk any actual cow’s milk, but I figured that she didn’t need to know that this was of the plant variety. She immediately sent 100’s of doubts into my mind. I should have known better because I am aware of how little education they receive on nutrition. Funny enough—despite the pressures she laid on me to eat meat—when she went on to explain all of the foods that I should avoid most of them were meat and seafood. I wanted to make a smart comment, but I kept my mouth shut.
What has gotten me headed back towards veganism? An old friend of mine contacted me with questions and needed advice after watching Vegucated and Forks over Knives. This girl was the queen of bacon and cheese. She seemed really motivated and excited and it reminded me of why I first chose this lifestyle. Another thing was an image that I saw on Pinterest. It said “The reason people awaken, is because they have finally stopped agreeing to things that insult their soul.” What the hell was I doing!? I had gone against everything that I believed in. I consider Veganism to be like a religion to me and I had abandoned it. I have a strong desire to raise our children to respect all living things and I wasn’t doing it myself.
Then there is the health aspect. I can’t think about it too much right now, because it freaks me out. Actually—not going to lie—the whole having a human inside of me thing freaks me out. However, I’ve also been reading Happy Herbivore’s blog every day. She has always inspired and motivated me, but it seems to be more so now that I need to stay healthy for my baby. Luckily the vegetable aversion has gone away by now. I’ve also noticed that my weight gain has slowed significantly now that I’m not eating dairy and eggs.
I suppose I should mention that I never went out and bought gallons of milk, dozens of eggs, or pounds of cheese. I was consuming these things in foods at restaurants or foods that were already prepared. In other words, crap that I shouldn’t have eaten anyway. I can make all of the excuses in the world, but I will never say that it was out of laziness. I honestly did not feel like myself. My whole body felt out of whack and it was as if I wasn’t even in it anymore. I was lucky to stay awake for an entire day. Feeling that tired just made it seem okay to reach for the first food item that sounded even remotely appetizing.
I’m going to face a few struggles going forward. They are all social issues, which are the hardest for me. Right before finding out that I was pregnant (7 days before to be exact), I accepted my dream job. By the time that I started, four weeks later, I was eating as a vegetarian. This job is in a less rural area than the last one and the way that I eat seems completely alien to everyone there. I’ve had to remind people who try to get me to eat something with meat in it numerous times that I’m vegetarian. It’s gotten to be almost awkward. Yesterday I lied and said that I had errands to run on my lunch break to avoid the conversation of why I couldn’t eat the subs that someone had brought in. I’m such a chicken sometimes. I obviously need to work on my backbone again.
Another thing that I need to remember is to plan better! Just the other day we went to a family event and I hadn’t planned anything to bring. I brought some vegan blueberry bread, but that wasn’t enough for a whole meal. I ended up eating a very small quantity of the vegetarian foods just to be polite. Next time, I’ll remember to make some more food. I blame pregnancy brain.
Josiah and I have every intention of raising this child as vegan as we possibly can. I’ll even be that mom who brings a separate cupcake to parties if I have to. Luckily, the day care we have chosen has an excellent vegetarian menu and it should be easy enough to avoid the small amount of dairy in it. We will cross that bridge when we get to it. We have decided that we will not freak out if our child eats something that isn’t vegan. As we have mentioned before, we live in a relatively small town and not many people know what vegan means. Adults around here also LOVE to give children treats. I’m sure that’s everywhere, but I’m just starting to notice it. So, it’s bound to happen. I’m sure that this is going to be a huge learning process and our philosophy may change along the way. This is where we are starting and I’m really excited about it.
It feels good to be back.
Justin Timberlake hosted SNL this past weekend which I've found to be a pretty good indicator that it's going to be an entertaining episode. Justin has been featured in a huge portion of the most memorable sketches to come out of SNL in the past few years. He's shown us all how to love a mother, how to give the most memorable gifts, and how to conduct oneself around the ladies.
One memorable sketch from 2007 had Justin dressed in an enormous, foam cup o' soup suit. They rehashed that premise with the latest episode, but rather than a cup o' soup, Justin donned a suit fashioned to look like a giant brick of tofu! He danced and sang to encourage passers-by to "Bring it on down to Veganville", the new vegan restaurant on the block.
Not only was veganism featured on television, but it was funny! And not only was it funny, but the sketch ended with veganism winning over the sausage-peddling rival!
Kudos to SNL and Justin. I'll keep my fingers crossed that his next appearance on SNL will likewise include a nod to those of us with a kinder diet.
The day has finally come. The Cooking Channel has at last featured a special—first aired a few weeks ago—all about the benefits of a vegan diet. It’s about time! Well, let’s plop ourselves down on the couch and enjoy some How To Live To 100 With Jason Wrobel. This ought to be great, right? Right? …right?
I really, really wanted to like this show, but in the end, there were too many elements that turned me off and I came away feeling like it was a poor representation of a vegan diet and culture. As a matter of fact, my first complaint is that the show seemed to go out of its way to avoid saying that it was proposing a vegan diet. The V-word was only used once in the entire show and it was used derogatorily when Jason’s “neighbor” called him “vegan boy”. I know it was just a jest, but the show could have benefited from at least one instance of “vegan” being used in a positive tone.
All the recipes, of course, are vegan, but the show makes it seem coincidental. The foods are presented as having health benefits from their antioxidant-rich ingredients. This is fantastic, but the health benefits of a vegan diet cannot be summed up in the foods that it includes. Equally important are the foods that a vegan diet excludes. The foods highlighted in the show all sounded delicious and healthy, but if they’re eaten as a side to a double cheeseburger or a 24 oz. steak, the benefits are sure to be slim.
Aside from the show’s issues regarding the presentation of veganism, I found the show was just too difficult to enjoy. Jason Wrobel has an on-screen personality that is just too over-the-top. The jokes were seldom clever and he punctuated the poor jokes with outrageous expressions that did nothing but prompt my eyes to roll. Wrobel has said in interviews that his intent was to create a “cooking show meets sitcom”. It all comes off as trying far too hard, though. Especially disappointing is that this ineffectual humor element ends up consuming so much screen time that the recipe segments seemed to take a sideline to Wrobel being a ham. I for one prefer my cooking shows to be cooking shows and my sitcoms to be sitcoms.
So, my excitement over a vegan television show on the Cooking Channel has been tempered by the realization that I don’t actually enjoy the show, but in the end, it is an important step for veganism. With luck, How To Live To 100 will be at least successful enough to motivate additional vegan shows in the future. And for that reason, I still urge you to check out the show if for no other reason than to buttress the show’s ratings. Though I didn’t care for it, perhaps To Live To 100 With Jason Wrobel will resonate more with some of you.
Thanks for reading!
It’s been quite a while since I’ve posted any recipes. This one is pretty cool, though, so it will hopefully make up for the lull in posted content.
Deviled eggs have been a staple of dish-to-pass occasions since the days of ancient Rome (according to Wikipedia) and command a passion from fans unmatched by most other dishes. What other foods can brag that there are serving platters in thousands of kitchens designed specifically for them?
Unfortunately, though, egg stuffed with more egg isn’t very vegan friendly. This recipe instead opts to use potato in the place of the eggs, but keeps all the deviled flavors that are found in the traditional egg dish.
Ingredients:
6 egg-sized potatoes, peeled and halved
1/4 c. vegenaise
1 Tbsp sweet relish
1 Tbsp grated onion
1/4 tsp turmeric
1 tsp Dijon mustard
1/4 tsp fresh ground white pepper
Paprika or chili powder, for garnish
Put potatoes into a pot of salted water. Bring pot to a boil and cook until potatoes are fork-tender. Carefully strain potatoes from the water.
Once cooled, gently scoop a yolk-sized piece of potato from the center of each potato half. A melon baller worked perfectly when I made my test batch.
In a mixing bowl, mash all potato “yolks” until as smooth as possible. Add all additional ingredients to the mashed potatoes and mix thoroughly.
Place the potato shells round side down on a platter and lightly salt the upright side of each. Fill each potato shell with a scoop of the mashed potato mixture.
Dust with the paprika. Serve cool.
UPDATE: After posting this recipe to reddit, user smallwhiteflower had a great suggestion. Check out their comment here.
