Oatmeal

Hello on the 13th day of the Vegan Month of Food! Today is the final day of my dollar store vegan week, so this morning, I used three items from the dollar store – oats, soy milk, and raisins – to make my super simple breakfast.

Quick to prepare; just combine 1/2 cup oats with 1 cup soy milk, heat in microwave, and add a handful of raisins and any other toppings you'd enjoy (my additional toppings were cinnamon and chia seeds).

A warm, filling breakfast; can't complain.

Overall, I didn't notice much difference in taste with this soy milk, but comparing it nutritionally to the soy milk I normally get, this one isn't as great. While it does have the same amount of calcium, more vitamin A, less fat, and less sodium, it also has less vitamin D, less protein, less potassium, less iron, less riboflavin, and no B12. So, I think I'll stick with my usual soy milk.

During the day, I had a variety of snacks: A banana, some trail mix, hummus with pita, and chips. And then dinner was a quick quesadilla with tortilla chips and salsa.

Bonus pic of the cute squash from my mom:

Tomorrow begins my health food store vegan theme, so stick around to see what fun foods I discover in the third week of Vegan MoFo!

This morning, Leela enjoyed snuggling into the shallow box I set out for the kitties to try.

"Thank you, human; this will do just fine..."

"...much better than that silly bed you bought me."

And Buttons was very leery of the bird puppet Zach brought home later today...

*sniff sniff* “What's this?”

“Oh **** no!” *backpeddles*

Peace. :)

Snack Time!

Hello on the 12th day of the Vegan Month of Food! Tonight's post showcases just three of the many vegan snacks you can find at the dollar store: Soft pretzels, trail mix, and wheat crackers.

I gave the soft pretzels a try last night.

I'm used to the Super Pretzels kind, so I noticed that compared to them, the dollar store soft pretzels are a bit thinner, as well as being more of an oval shape than they appear on the box, haha. I had my soft pretzel with a bit of mustard to dip it in, and I enjoyed it.

Apparently Buttons was interested as well...

Maybe I'm just not that picky, but I don't really find much of a difference between these and the Super Pretzels (other than their outward appearance), so I'll probably start going with these instead and save a bit (of course, that will be after I try out these two pretzel recipes from fellow Vegan MoFo bloggers at KZ Cakes and AfroVeganChick).

The next dollar store snack is the fruit & nut trail mix.

It's pretty good, a nice combo of salty & sweet, but nothing overly exciting.

The last of my dollar store snack items, the wheat crackers, are ones I've had before (my mom was the first to find them), so I already knew of their awesome tastiness.

You can snack on them plain, have them with soup & dunk them, or even try out various toppings if that's your thing (like adding little pieces of vegan cheese on top, perhaps?).

Lunch today was a repeat of yesterday's, burrito with leftover brown rice & black beans, with tortilla chips and salsa.

Dinner was chicken (TVP) noodle soup (featuring the dollar store items of pasta, salt free seasoning, and wheat crackers on the side).

Here's a silly sleepy Leela, who thinks cat beds are great in theory, but that nothing really beats the floor when it comes to napping surfaces.

Peace. :)

Burger, Fries, Veggies, and Spice

Hello on the 11th day of the Vegan Month of Food! Tonight's dinner bounces off from last night's, with the dollar store French fries and veggies making a grand return, accompanied by a third dollar store item, the salt free seasoning, which was used to spice up a bland Boca vegan patty (extra from the picnic). Additional items for the burger included a bread slice “bun” (extra from what was bought for the French toast), Daiya cheddar cheese slice (extra from the picnic) and the staples of ketchup and mustard.

So, here's how I made the burger: I thawed out the Boca patty and the butt-end of the loaf of bread. (I'm sorry, that's what I call the first/last slice of bread... Is there another name for it? OK, I just googled “what is the last slice of bread called” and I'm seeing “heel,” “crust,” and “end slice/piece/crust.” I think I'll stick with calling it a butt-end because I'm so mature & find it humorous! What do you call it, dear readers?) Next I heated the patty in the microwave and lightly toasted the bread. Then I folded/broke the bread in half, cut the patty in half, shook 1/4 teaspoon of the salt free seasoning on the inside of one of the bread halves, atop which I layered a half-patty, a folded piece of Daiya, another half-patty, and the other half of the bread. I heated it in the microwave just long enough to melt the Daiya, then added a bit of ketchup and mustard to the top half-patty. A work of art!

My first bite, I didn't notice the seasoning, but by the second, I noticed it, and it was spicy! This was definitely the best way I've had a Boca vegan burger; the salt free seasoning really does the trick; I'm glad that this was one of my dollar store finds.

Ingredients: Corn meal, oat bran, onion, spices, garlic, carrots, orange peel, tomato, parsley, citric acid, natural lemon oil.

But the burger wasn't the only thing to get spiced up this meal. I figured I needed to do a bit more with the fries this time, but I didn't want to have the salt free seasoning on two things in the same meal, so instead I sprinkled some chili powder, cumin, garlic, pepper, and salt atop the fries before they went in the oven. When I flipped them, I added a second round of spices, and put them back in the oven to finish crisping up. This turned out to be an awesome idea; they were much improved over yesterday's fries, so much so that they really didn't need any ketchup, but I still had a bit anyways.

And finally, the veggies were good, with a welcome plainness to balance out all the spices in the burger & fries. (P.S. The dollar store frozen veggies have now been used up; I ended up getting 4 servings out of the bag, which said it had “about 5” servings. Close enough, I guess.)

Lunch was based off of some leftover brown rice, and I had an extra can of black beans from my cookbook week, so I used the recipe from Tuesday and made a new batch, using up the last of my green pepper. I combined the rice & beans together in a burrito, which was served with tortilla chips and salsa.

Leela and Buttons were apparently a bit grumpy this morning and got into a minor scuffle with each other; I clearly took one minute too long getting downstairs to give them their breakfast and their tempers were short. Goobers. But the rest of the day, they got along well and even collaborated on their next performance piece, which seems to be the polar opposite of their “loaf kitties.”

Peace. :)

French Fries, Veggies, and a Smart Dog

Hello on the 10th day of the Vegan Month of Food! Tonight's dinner features two dollar store food items (French fries and mixed vegetables) as part of my dollar store vegan theme, along with a smart dog (extra from the picnic) on a piece of bread “bun” (extra from what I bought for the French toast), and the staples of ketchup, mustard, and salt.

Super simple meal to put together, and while it wasn't anything too exciting, it was still good for a dinner that came out of the freezer. 

Lunch was leftover black beans from yesterday, with more brown rice from the dollar store.

Buttons and Leela have been their usual funny selves. Leela tried to wake us up early this morning; she focused on Zach first, and when he burrowed under the blankets, Leela turned to me and ended up curling up at my side, purring and purring... Until Buttons tried to jump up onto the bed... In the exact spot where Leela was... and then thought better of it halfway through the jump. 

Leela is still trying to figure out if she wants anything to do with her scratching mat.

And Buttons has been loafin' it up ever since I posted the first “loaf kitties” photos.

Peace. :)

Brown Rice and Black Beans

Hello on the 9th day of the Vegan Month of Food! Continuing my dollar store vegan week, my dinner tonight was brown rice (leftover from last night) and black beans. 

I'd been planning to redo the back-to-basics black beans recipe to spice up my dollar store beans, but then I noticed that Goya included a recipe on the can, and I just so happened to have all the other ingredients on hand (other than the seasoning mix and cider vinegar they mentioned). The onion, green pepper, and garlic were left over from last week, and the others were staples I've had for a while: olive oil, oregano, and pepper (my addition).

Ingredients:
--2 T olive oil
--1/2 cup white onion, diced
--1/4 cup green pepper, diced
--2 cloves garlic, minced
--1 can black beans, undrained
--3/4 cup water (I'd use less next time, maybe 1/4-1/2 cup?)
--1 tsp oregano
--1/4 tsp pepper 

Look at these cute little measuring cups from my sister! :)

Directions:
Heat the olive oil in a saucepan over medium heat. Add the onion, green pepper, and garlic; cook for 10 minutes. Add the remaining ingredients, bring to boil, then lower heat and simmer (I covered it for a bit, then uncovered it). Directions on the can said to simmer for 10 min., but there was still a lot of liquid (probably since their recipe called for a seasoning mix to be included), so I ended up raising the heat a bit and cooking for longer. So, yeah, less water next time.

Apart from taking longer than I'd expected, the black beans turned out really well, and I liked my addition of the pepper (using much less than in the back-to-basics black beans). Now I have two recipes for black beans; woo-hoo! Served with the leftover rice that only needed to be reheated in the microwave, it was an easy meal and only required one pot, the kind of cooking I like, haha! 

Lunch was a combo of dollar store (pasta) and leftovers (salsa, tortilla chips, and Daiya cheese from the picnic), as well as the staples of soy milk, vegan butter, salt, and pepper to complete the mac & cheese. 

Leela and Buttons have been in rare form recently. Leela was a whirlwind of energy this morning, darting from here to there, so I helped her get out her energy by playing with her with various toys and yarn. And Buttons has been perfecting her jumping skills. Last night she was crying and crying for more food, but she'd already had enough, so I was ignoring her as I made Zach a PB&J for work the next day, but Buttons demands attention: She jumped up onto the counter, startling me, and kept trying to get at the peanut butter. I was able to hold her at bay long enough to finish making the sandwich, thankfully, and then she hopped down. And then tonight, Leela was trying to finish her dinner, and Zach sat down in the doorway to block Buttons (who'd already eaten), but she was determined and leapt over his legs the second he let his guard down to turn his head and tell me something.

So, here's pictures of Leela and Buttons at calmer, more relaxed moments.

Peace. :)

Brown Rice and Orange-Sauce Veggies

Hello on the 8th day of the Vegan Month of Food! Tonight's dinner features more dollar store food (brown rice, frozen mixed vegetables, and orange preserves). 

I had planned to just do rice and veggies (more of the frozen veggies I'd used yesterday), with Bragg's Liquid Aminos to season (I've started using that instead of soy sauce recently), but then I remembered the orange preserves I'd also picked up at the dollar store, and that made me think of the Mandarin orange crispy chick'n from Gardein, so I figured maybe I could make a similar orange sauce for the veggies. At the end of the veggies sautéing, I mixed in a spoonful of orange preserves (which included actual pieces of orange!), some Bragg's, some lemon juice, and a light sprinkling of salt (maybe I should have thrown in some minced garlic, too?). It tasted similar enough to the sauce I'd had before, and it definitely gave the veggies a nice flavor; served with the rice, it was pretty good overall. 

P.S. This jar was SUPER hard to open... 

I tried several times, both with and without one of those lid gripper things, and it just wouldn't budge, plus the boxy shape made it awkward to grip... I was grumbling and growling and just about ready to give up when I tried again one last time, and pop! It opened! Hooray! And so ends the thrilling tale of Julie opening a jar of orange preserves. Hahaha!

Oh, and breakfast and lunch were leftovers, yum! 

French toast

Classic Cornbread and Down-Home Chili

Leela and Buttons have been getting better at hanging out together. Here they are playing with the yarn. 

And later, Buttons noticed that Leela still had some scrappins' in her food bowl, so she decided to lick the bowl clean for her, how considerate! 

Peace. :)

Simple Pasta and Veggies

Hello on the 7th day of the Vegan Month of Food! Today is the start of my dollar store vegan theme, wherein I will feature various vegan foods that can be found at dollar stores! Tonight's dinner features two of these foods, plus some leftovers. 

Earlier today, Zach and I made a quick trip to Dollar Tree and filled a basket with some of the many vegan goodies we discovered. Some items in the store looked promising until I scanned the ingredient list and found them to contain completely unnecessary animal products. But overall, there's quite a lot of vegan food items to choose from at Dollar Tree stores. 

14 items, $14 total.

Tonight, I wanted something quick, so pasta and frozen veggies it was! The frozen vegetable mix contained cauliflower, zucchini, Romano beans, carrots, and red pepper. I left out the carrots because I still had some leftover agave-glazed carrots to finish. 

Seasoned with Bragg's Liquid Aminos, served with carrots and tomatoes.

It was a quick, simple dinner, nothing fancy, but still good.

Before the dollar store, we stopped at the pet supplies store to pick up some things for Buttons and Leela (scratching post & mat, litter). Zach noticed a cricket loose in the store, and we realized that he was an escaped cricket, one the store had intended to sell as lizard food. I wished the cricket well as Zach helped scoot him under a shelf so he wouldn't be spotted by the staff.

Buttons was more interested in the catnip that came with Leela's scratching mat, so much so that she actually jumped up onto the table to try to get some. Zach put a sprinkling of catnip on her new scratching post, and Buttons had a blast.

"Oh, yes, that's the good stuff!" *lick* *lick* *lick*

He also sprinkled some catnip on the floor for Leela, but she was uninterested. 

"Thanks but no thanks."

Peace. :)