Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

I bought pumpkin pie mix (pumpkin, cimammon, nutmeg, cane sugar) the other day by accident when I meant to buy plain canned pumpkin, so I decided to make something sweet with it instead of the planned breakfast muffins. These cookies turned out sweet and cake-y and fabulous!

recipe:
1 3/4 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup sugar
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda

1 cup canned pumpkin pie mix
1/2 ish cup water
1/3 cup oil (I used safflower)

Stir, bake at 350 for 15 ish minutes.

Mushroom Risotto

Mmmm.. risotto!
Before adding the arborio rice to the pan I fried some onion, garlic, and re-constituted dried shiitake mushroom slices. After it was cooked I added were some salt, black pepper, and about a half cup of a mix of nutritional yeast and ground almonds. The risotto was to die for!
I served it with baby greens and balsamic vinaigrette.

Does anyone know if arborio rice is a whole grain or if it is a "white" rice?

Koshary

A friend of mine's parents are Egyptian, and she told me about this delicious and very popular Egyptian meal. Basically you need pasta, green lentils, rice, and tomato sauce. There are variations. I added some cinnamon and cumin to my pasta sauce because I found that in one recipe on the net. I also added red bell pepper, which sort of took away from the traditional-ness of the recipe.. next time I'll leave it out and I'll use macaroni instead of rotini.
It was great, though!

Thai Yellow Curry

Tonight's dinner was thai yellow curry.
I fried some cubed tofu in a little olive oil, and then I added a couple of tablespoons of thai yellow curry paste, coconut milk + some water, chopped eggplant and chopped zucchini. Served over short grain brown rice.
Very delicious but rather high-fat because of the coconut milk so we don't have this dish often, or other thai curries.

Burger and Fries Night!

Tonight was sweet potato oven fries with a tempeh burger. One of our* favourite meals!
*all meals featured are eaten by me and my boyfriend, mr. www.iheartmusic.net

I cut the block of tempeh (like tofu but more fun) in half, and then lengthwise through the side, so that it was two thinner pieces. I marinated the pieces a bit in some tamari, corriander and garlic powder, and then I fried it with some olive oil.

On the burger: Veganaise (I bought this for the first time!), pickle, tomato, Dijon mustard, and colby block cheese from The Uncheese Cookbook.

I really like these new thin burger buns from Loblaws!

Red Lentil Dhal

Indian lentil soup is amazing. I'm not sure about the best recipe/method yet, so I won't give you the recipe I used, especially since I can't really remember.

Tofu-Bacon and Tofu-Egg Breakfast Sandwhich

Saturday morning breakfast sandwich! I left it open for the picture but I put the two sides together to eat it.

"bacon":
tofu marinated in tamari (soy sauce), a bit of apply cider vinegar, some drops liquid smoke, garlic powder and then fried with some olive oil in frying pan

"egg":
tofu coated in nutritional yeast + salt and pepper and fried

tofu mayo:
soft tofu, lemon juice, apple cider vinegar, salt

+ tomato

Chinese Orange "chicken" with Brown Rice

I used TVP chunks for this delicious meal, which are made of soy flour. I used this sauce from about.com:

• 2 tablespoons Chinese rice wine or dry sherry
• 1 tablespoon cornstarch
• Sauce:
• 1/3 cup orange juice*
• 2 tablespoons dark soy sauce
• 1 teaspoon sesame oil
• 1 teaspoon brown sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon chile paste
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 1 slice ginger, minced
• Oil for stir-frying, as needed

Chilli lunch!

This is a cute new lunch container set that I got when I was in Alexandria, VA. I love the bento-style boxes that have click-y tops, they seal so much better.

Tomorrow's lunch is leftover chili with corn, fruit juice gel hearts (made with agar, in an Ikea silicone ice cube tray), raw red pepper and roasted chickpeas. If you've never had/made roasted chickpeas, do it now! They are best right out of the oven. Here is a basic recipe. I like them best with curry powder, but here I used nutritional yeast and salt.

Chili

Chili adapted from the Vegan Lunchbox cookbook. She uses dry beans but I used canned. I also added organic local kale for extra calcium and iron. It's a great recipe and a great cookbook! I start a new job tomorrow and therefore lunch pictures start tomorrow, yay!

Pumpkin Oatmeal Bars

These bars are from the 'Pumpkin Oatmeal Cookies' recipe in Vegan With a Vengeance. I added chocolate chips, and I used less oil but added some applesauce. They are soooo good. I think I'm going to make them again with only a bit of sugar and eat them for breakfast.

Fajita night!

My boyfriend suggested fajitas for dinner tonight. Yum!
Whole wheat tortillas, grocery store salsa, grated vegan cheese (FYH), homemade tofu sour cream, and the filling: TVP chunks, zucchini, mushrooms, paprika, other spices.