Cheesy Rice and More Good Food!

Hi everyone! Hope you're doing well! Something new I tried this week was Annie's vegan cheesy rice, which made for a nice lunch and then some leftovers!

Another good meal was Gardein fishless filets with oven fries and pickles!

More pumpkin bread, this time half buckwheat flour, half oat flour (I'm trying to use up some of my random flour collection)...

Some delicious chicken noodle soup with barely any broth, so let's just call it chicken noodles lol...

And some salad with pepperoni bits!

A sunset pic from after kayaking on Sunday...

And Cringer says she has the comfiest pillow in all the world, thanks to Daisy!

Peace. :)

More Good Food and a Couple Puzzles

Hi everyone! For lunch on Thursday, I made the green chili macaroni and cheese from My cat loves Daiya! I’d made it before, so I knew it would be delicious again, and the leftovers have been so good, too!

For dinner, I made oven fries, which I had with Gardein fishless filets and golden wax beans… 

And for breakfast this morning, I had waffles with mixed berries and powdered sugar… 

I figured I would share the puzzles I’ve been doing; the first was a gift from Zach’s family, the second from my mom… 

Here is some more spring happiness from a walk… 

And here is Daisy being absolutely adorable; she wanted to hang out with me yesterday morning while I meditated, so I scooped her up and she snuggled in, gently kneading the air with her paws… 

(When I wasn’t taking this picture, my right hand was rubbing her belly!)

Peace. :)

Rice Salad with Avocado Dressing (Giant Food)

The new recipe I tried this week was the rice salad with avocado dressing that my aunt had clipped out for me (the recipe can be found online here). I was especially excited for the dressing, since I’ve been enjoying avocados recently, and this one was absolutely perfect when I cut it in half! 

I made some changes to the recipe, though: I was able to grill the zucchini on the panini press/grill but not the corn, so I boiled it instead. I left out the red onion because I’m not a fan of raw onion, and I used just a bit of dried cilantro as a garnish instead of fresh. The dish worked out with these modifications but it took me longer than the recipe’s estimate of 35 minutes, and the end product was just OK. I probably won’t make it again, but if I did, I’d leave out the red wine vinegar (it made the dressing taste a bit odd) and add more salt. 

Served with tortilla chips and salsa.

And here’s what I had for a quick and easy dinner tonight… 

Gardein fishless filets, golden wax beans, and tater tots with ketchup

Here’s the Sharpie sketch that I did yesterday of a cross-looking kitty… 

And the one I did today, of the mini automaton my D&D character is going to be working on building hehe… 

I went to a writers group last night, and I was a little nervous; while it was my third time attending, it was the first time that I’d submitted something to the group to critique. It was a 4,000-word excerpt from a story I wrote for National Novel Writing Month; the first person narration shifts between five characters. I knew I needed to do a better job making each character’s voice more distinct and unique, and this was reinforced in the feedback I got. (Especially since what I’d shared only included the perspective of the first two characters, and they both sounded a bit too similar to the people reading it, haha!) But yeah, everyone provided really helpful feedback, and they all seemed to have enjoyed reading it. I marked up my copy with all the comments, suggestions, and questions that came up, and three people gave me their copies with recommended edits and other notes. So that was pretty cool, and now I have lots of things to think about and rework!

Here is a cute little Leela… 

Peace. :)

Fish Sticks and French Fries

Hello everyone! I hope your MoFo is off to a great start, fueled by all the awesome breakfasts from yesterday! Today's prompt is “Recreate a meal from your childhood.” During Vegan MoFo 2013, I did a “Nostalgia Week,” so a lot of my favorite childhood meals can be found there. Since I've already covered a bunch of the ones I enjoyed, today I decided to recreate one that I hadn't been a fan of, hoping to put a more positive spin on a vegan version of it...

So, do you remember how I loved “Chicken Nugget Wednesday” as a kid? Well, every year, there would come the one day when we'd have fish sticks instead of chicken nuggets... 

image source: http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lv3rldxfMQ1qdhyvx.png

That day was Ash Wednesday, the start of Lent, a day of fasting and no meat (the Catholic Church not considering fish to be “meat” never made sense to me, but oh well). I was always so bummed about not getting to have chicken nuggets, and I really didn't like the taste of fish. Needless to say, eating fish has never been something I've missed as a vegan. 

I have, however, heard good things about the Gardein fishless filets, so I figured this would be the perfect time to try them. I baked the “fish” and the fries in the oven for 10 minutes at 425°F, flipping them midway through, and serving them with carrot slices and grape tomatoes. 

They had a definite fish-like taste and texture to them, but they were much more enjoyable than the fish sticks of my childhood. While they weren't my absolute favorite thing from Gardein (that's still the Mandarian orange crispy chick'n), they were really good, and I'll probably get them again. 

In other MoFo news, I've been so excited to see people blogging about Polish foods! I have a couple planned for this month, but here are the ones I've seen so far by other bloggers: A Spin on Vegan Kapusta and Pierogies - Vegan and Gluten-free. (Let me know if I've missed any; I would love to check them out!)

Tomorrow will be another Veganlist post, so stayed tuned for that!

Here's a pic of (blurry) Leela and (distant) Buttons from a month ago; this was taken at night during their routine of hanging out in the hallway during thunderstorms; it's where they seem to feel safest. 

Peace. :)