What I've been eating (basil stir fry)

It seems I haven't made a new recipe in the last few days.  I realize that's rather common for a cooking blog, but I still feel bad about it.  I've been wandering findingvegan and searching "vegan" on tastespotting looking for things to make, but I just haven't settled on anything yet.  In the mean time, I always resort to my classic dishes.  If I'm busy on the weekends... it ends up being a PB&J, apple, and banana.  For larger meals though, asian food is a must!  My favorite local restaurant (Fargo, ND) is the Drunken Noodle.  They have a dish called Vegan Tofu Basil.  While I was too lazy to press and stir fry tofu, I made a great asian stir fry no less. [...]

Homemade Sunshine Burgers

This recipe hales from The Vegan Chickpea, and is a near identical recreation of the a store bought Sunshine Burger.  Both versions contain ground sunflower seeds, brown rice, shredded carrots, herbs, and sea salt.  That's it.  I had a few failed attempts at making them myself, as simple as they are, which is not likely to happen to anyone else making them.  With that, I suppose I should mention that they're quite delicious!  The nutty subtle taste of the sunflower seeds make for a great taste.  This recipe is by no means meant to taste like meat, but rather a healthy patty alternative.  There's also no oil used in this recipe!  On to the recipe. [...]

Butternut Squash Mac & Cheese

This recipe comes from the site That Was Vegan.  I searched high and low for what looked like the best vegan mac & cheese recipe I could find, and I settled on this one, which turned out amazingly good.  The perfect childhood comfort food, for good or bad.  I was hesitant at first, as it used butternut squash and Daiya dairy free cheese as the creaminess in the dish.  If you aren't familiar with Daiya, myself included, it's a very unique cheese alternative that melts like real cheese.  As stated on Wikipedia, "It does not contain soy, casein, lactose, whey, wheat, barley, gluten or nuts."  The primary ingredients are Cassava, a tropical root, and arrowhead, a popular herb.  The company was founded in 2008 in Vancouver, British Columbia.  Now that you know a bit about the products, we'll get into the recipe. [...]

Healthy Vegan Bean Dip

This is actually considered a refried bean recipe, though it never gets fried to begin with.  I believe I ran across this recipe yesterday while looking through the site tastespotting.  While I have yet to make nearly any recipes of my own, I still feel as though I should repost ones that I have tried.  This one comes from the site Little House of Veggies.  Funny play on words right?  The interesting thing about this recipe is that it uses a crock pot to slow cook everything, a fact I realize is not uncommon.  I was in a hurry to get to work, so I decided to throw everything in and give it a shot.  It turned out pretty good.  Maybe a bit too spicy, which I kind of liked.  I will definitely make this next time there is a get together of some kind as a bean dip, or use as the base in a vegan burrito.  Read on for the full recipe. [...]

Product Review - Lara Bar

A friend of mine recommended these bars as a simple snack on the go.  They are complete healthy, vegan, and have very few ingredients. As an example, the Coconut Cream Pie bar has - dates, unsweetened coconut, almonds, and cashews.  That's it!  Another one I tried yesterday was Cherry Pie, and it honestly tasted just like a cherry pie.  So delicious.  They are a bit expensive if you choose to eat them often.  My local grocery store charges $1.59 per bar, while Amazon had them for an average of $1.24.  Either way, I would choose these every time over the average processed granola bar.

Check out their website for more information.

Green Walnut Taco

So this recipe was a completely new experience for me.  It was my first foray into raw vegan cuisine.  This comes from the book Rawvolution, by Matt Amsden.  Getting right to the point, I decently liked this recipe, though I might change a few important things.  First off there are too many spices in this recipe.  Try putting in only a small pinch, taste and repeat as desired.  Another issue for me is temperature.  It turns out to be around room temperature when finished.  One suggestion would be to heat the walnut meat up on the store on medium until warm, but not hot.  The goal of a raw diet is to not heat food above 105º(body temp.)  Another caveat to overcome is texture.  Eating a whole collard green leaf seems a bit odd.  We as civilized humans are not accustomed to eating in this manner, just like eating only fruit and greens for a meal is strange.  It just feels unnatural, and goes against our entire upbringing.  Once the mental idea of no tortillas sets in, it's really a decent taste and consistency. [...]

Strawberry Cheesecake Vegan Style!

For starters, this recipe comes from the site purplecarrotkc.com.  It's a great blog based out of Kansas City.  This recipe is an exact rewriting, with a bit of commentary from me.  One thing to keep in mind, is that this cheesecake is by no means healthy, but it does provide nutrition usually absent a regular dairy based cheesecake, and it's even raw.  In other words, eat this instead!  The ingredients are expensive as well, but incredibly worth it.  I would reserve this recipe for special occasions, as the raw organic cashews I bought were $11.99 per pound.  While it's expensive, it's so easy to make that even a complete beginner like me made it perfectly on the first try.  Everybody loved it at the Super Bowl party I attended.  In fact I'm eating a piece as I write this post!

Vegan Meat Sauce (First Attempt)

After catching the smell of spaghetti and meatballs at work today, I just had to make it!  The problem was I didn't have time after work to find a recipe, so I just winged it.  My base was fantastic, but it didn't hold together and ended up making a meat-less meat sauce instead.  Surprisingly it was exceptional, and had an almost rich and creamy meat taste.  Now I'm not one to care about meat substitutes, but this one was nearly on par.  Even the color matched.  I think if I had seitan it would have held together like a meatball, but who cares, this recipe is awesome!  The key to the color and texture was the red quinoa.  While new to quinoa, it is quickly becoming an instant classic. [...]