my aim is true

Okay, kids, this is a good one! My good friend Amanda, the owner and creator of Bake It Pretty (the most awesome little indie business around) is letting me give away three (that’s right THREE!) $25 gift cards to the Bake It Pretty shop! Think of all the awesomeness you could buy with $25 at her shop! One of my favorite items is definitely the vintage button mold.

Maybe you’ve seen these featured on The Small Object? Learn how to make these fancy little guys and download free labels at the Candy Buttons 101 tutorial over on the Bake It Pretty blog.

I also looooove the Cupcakes 101 kit. Comes in an adorable suitcase with all sorts of goodies and cupcake finery. Or you could go for one of the best sellers. With all the cute things over there, you just can’t go wrong!

So! Leave a comment below for the chance to win a gift card. The giveaway will remain open until 11:59 pm Pacific time on Thursday, February 26. I will pick three winners on Friday morning with the help of the random number generator!

Good luck!

The holidays always get so busy that a lot of times I don’t get a chance to take pictures of handmade gifts, which annoys me since I like to document things! This year, several people got their gifts late, so photos were taken! Ha!

I decided this year instead of my customary box of cookies, to make healthier food gifts. I know people are inundated with all manner of sugar, flour and fat over the holidays and thought I’d give a few things that would make for a healthier start to the new year. These bean & pea soup jars were super simple and cheap to make. I added a tag (courtesy of Bake it Pretty) with directions on how to make the soup. Overall a really cute package and definitely quicker and not as messy as baking!

I also gave these spice mixtures in a little box with recipes. This is panch phoran, which is a Bengali spice mixture of five seeds. It’s incredibly fragrant and delicious and can be used in so many recipes. Here is a particular favorite.

Here is Tasha looking adorable in her recycled scarf. Whenever I am thrifting, I scour the racks for cheap, 100% wool sweaters for felting. I found some great sweaters in gorgeous earthy and fall colors. I felted them in the washer and dryer, then cut into strips and serged them together. The scarves came out super soft and really cute!

I also knitted these baby booties for a friend’s new baby girl. You can check out more project details on Ravelry. The pattern was super simple and the yarn was so soft!

Did you have any favorite handmade gift projects this year? Links - let me have them!

photo copyright © gwarcita

We got TONS of zucchini in the CSA this summer. I grated a lot and froze it so I could make zucchini bread this winter. I also sliced some and froze it, but wasn’t sure what I was going to use it in til I was flipping through a book on squashes and saw something similar to this recipe. I decided to come home and try it. It was delicious and so comforting on a freezing rainy night.

Curried Zucchini Soup
makes 2 big bowls

2-3 cups sliced zucchini
2 cups vegetable broth
1-2 tsp curry powder, to taste
1 tsp olive oil
1/2 small onion, diced
3 cloves garlic, minced
salt & freshly ground pepper, to taste

Heat the oil in a saucepan over medium heat. Sauté the onions til soft. Add the garlic and stir a few times, cooking til fragrant. Stir in the curry powder. Add the zucchini and broth. Simmer over medium heat for about 10 minutes. Puree with a stick blender or (carefully!) pour the soup into a blender and puree. Add back to the pot and taste. Adjust curry powder and salt and pepper as desired.

Nutritional Information: 98 calories, 2.5 g fat, 18 g carbs, 4.5 g fiber, 2.4 g protein

I wanted to share my favorite recipe for delicious and amazing vegan chocolate chip cookies, since several people in the giveaway thread seemed skeptical that such a thing exists. This recipe is from Vegan with a Vengeance, which is an awesome cookbook to have on hand, whether you’re vegan or not. There are plenty of creative and scrumptious recipes, there’s really something for everyone.

As Isa says in the introduction to the recipe, these are definitely not healthy. Some people thing vegan automatically equals healthy which isn’t always the case. According to the recipe, “this cookie was made for the sole purpose of proving to someone I work with that my vegan cookies were just as good as his unvegan ones, and it worked!”

Amanda, I’ll be shipping these off today, I hope you enjoy them!

Chocolate Chip Cookies
makes 3 dozen

1 cup non hydrogenated margarine (I love Earth Balance), at room temperature
1 1/4 cups sugar
1 tablespoon molasses
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups semisweet chocolate chips (Tropical Source or Sunspire are great)

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F.

Mix together the margarine and sugar til fluffy. Stir in the molasses and vanilla. Add dry ingredients and mix. Stir in chocolate chips. Make teaspoon-sized balls and place on ungreased cookie sheets about 2 inches apart. Bake for 8-10 minutes til slightly browned. Let them rest on the cookie sheets for about 5 minutes, then transfer to a rack to cool.

I have been a bad vegan and haven’t posted as much as I should have during the illustrious Vegan Month of Food, so I thought I’d do this survey, created by Jess of Get Sconed!

1. What was the most recent tea you drank? Adagio’s Casablanca Twist

2. What vegan forums do you post/lurk on? If so, what is your username? Spill! I post on the PPK as Amber_ and I started the veg*n craft*n group on Ravelry.

3. You have to have tofu for dinner, and it has be an Italian dish. What comes to mind first? Lasagna with tofu ricotta.

4. How many vegan blogs do you read on an average day? I think there are about 30 in my bloglines.

5. Besides your own, what is the most recent one you’ve read? Where’s the Revolution, where I got the idea to post this survey.

6. If you could hang out with a vegan blogger that you haven’t met, who would it be, and what would you do? I think it would be Melisser of the Urban Housewife, and I would force her to bake me something awesome.

7. If you had to base your dinners for a week around one of the holy trilogy – tofu, seitan or tempeh, which would it be? Seitan I think. Gluteny goodness.

8. If you had to use one in a fight, which would it be? Tempeh, it’s the hardest.

9. Name 3 meals you’d realistically make with that tough protein of choice! Chickpea cutlets, Philly cheezesteaks, and some sort of kick butt stir fry.

10. What’s a recipe in vegan blogland that you’ve been eyeing? This gorgeous Pumpkin Challah.

11. Do you own any clothing with vegan messages/brands on them? I have a “Factory Farms are Mean and Nasty” shirt and a “Vegetarianism is Environmentalism” bag from Herbivore.

12. Have you made your pilgrimage to the ‘vegan mecca’ yet? (Portland, duh) No, but soon. Very soon.

13. What age did you first go vegan? Did it stick? 25, it’s stuck since May 2007.

14. What is the worst vegan meal you’ve had? Who cooked it? Some recipe I made from Veganomicon where I put cardamom instead of coriander. Tasted disgusting: totally my fault! Also anytime I’ve made something with vegan cheese which didn’t melt all the way.

15. What made you decide to blog? I don’t even know. I’ve been doing it since I was 16, I just wanted a place to express my angsty little self.

16. What are three of your favorite meals to make? Lentil soup, pizza (dough from scratch - thank you stand mixer!) and breakfast (scrambled tofu, home fries, etc).

17. What dish would you bring to a vegan Thanksgiving-themed potluck? Something roasted or braised. Maybe the roasted masala cornmeal brussels sprouts from Veganomicon. They were a huge hit last year.

18. Where is your favorite vegan meal at a restaurant? How many times have you ordered it? Probably the Sesame Chicken at Kotobuki. I’ve eaten it at least 10 times I think.

19. What do you think the best chain to dine as a vegan is? Not really a chain, but whenever I’m on the road I usually pull into a strip mall and eat at a Chinese takeout place. Other than that, California Pizza Kitchen has several vegan options, and many of their pastas are vegan if you don’t get cheese. They also give nutritional info and tell what’s vegan/veg/gluten free on their website which I love.

20. My kitchen needs… A vitamix like crazy. Who’s buying me one for Christmas? Also a better camera. I have my eye on the Nikon D90.

21. This vegetable is not allowed in my kitchen…..! I can’t think of any I would ban! Although Jimmy would ban onions if I’d let him. Fat chance.

22. What’s for dinner tonight? Leftover split pea soup & brown rice.

23. Compose your perfect vegan sandwich, right now. Falafel! That was easy.

24. Add a question here! What are your favorite pizza toppings? Post in the comments!

I love going to the Friends of the Library used book sale. This is the second year I’ve gone and I always find awesome things. Amongst today’s purchases is a brand new copy of Amy Sedaris’ book I Like You ($3), a gorgeously illustrated, unmarred Smithsonian Gardener’s Journal, and my favorite find, Tofu At Center Stage. Or more accurately TOFU AT CENTER STAGE. I know this because the title is repeated every fifth word throughout the book. In all caps.

I love 70s vegetarian cookbooks. The illustrations are always pretty hilarious, the recipes disgusting (it’s usually all loafs made with some lentil or bean), the laughs abundant. This one does not disappoint.

In case you didn’t get it, this is the Frozen Tofu Dishes chapter. It includes such gems as Minted Tofu Salad (tofu, mint, onions, peas, celery and parsley in a buttermilk mayo dressing which sounds hands down DISGUSTING), Elegant Yams in Orange Sauce, and Stewed Tofu Millet Mound. Yes, mound.

Another favorite chapter: Seafood Tofu Dishes. According to this picture, even the angelfish and seahorses enjoy the wonders of tofu. It’s no surprise, since in the introduction the author states none too explicitly that tofu will bring about world peace and universal harmony.

I expected to find mock fish fillets or tofu lobster in this section, but this is not actually a vegetarian cookbook! The rest of the book is recipes for seafood and meat dishes with tofu just mixed in. So tofu is not really AT CENTER STAGE as this book implies, but still playing a bit part while beef gets the nicer dressing room with his name on the door.

Although I was taken with many of the dishes in this book including Mockamole (tofu blended with lemon juice, salsa and onion powder into a concoction that is going to fool exactly no one into thinking it’s guacamole), Gravy in a Snap, Meaty Meatless Turnovers, Grain Crust Pie and Perfection Plum Prize, my favorite recipe has to be…

Tofu Tuna Mold. Mmmmmm! You guys do not even know how long I’ve been looking for a protein-packed, fish-flavored jello recipe. The quest is over. You can thank me later.

Oh, and in the spirit of scary recipes, have I ever introduced you to the 1970s Weight Watchers recipe cards? Be afraid. Be very afraid.

Sunday before Mary and I headed back to Norfolk, Amanda (in her quest to convince us that Asheville is the place we need to spend the rest of our days) took us to the hugely impressive WNC Farmers Market. Here Mary demonstrates our extreme love of ugly maters (that’s tomatoes for you yankee types).

I have to say some of the orifices were downright scary. I didn’t choose this lovely variety (I believe it was called Candy Stripe) but took home two gorgeous Cherokee Purples.

The honey was excellent. I ended up with a small jar of the raw honey, as I like it to taste as if a bee has just puked it up in the last five minutes. (Bonus - my mom brought me a jar of raw New Zealand honey home with her from her trip to, well, New Zealand yesterday! Score!)

This farmers market had everything. A fiber booth with gorgeous local handspun yarn, herb peddlers, a bit of folksy artsy stuff (I seem to remember things carved of wood), TONS of canned jellies, jams, and every incarnation of pickled vegetable you could think of, local meats & cheeses, a bakery with fresh bread, a spice vendor, and pretty much any fresh vegetable or fruit that was in season. I was seriously impressed.

I left the spice vendor with the most AMAZING applewood smoked salt. It tastes/smells like bacon or ham and was delicious on those purple tomatoes. I also made collard greens and BBQ tofu the other night and it perfectly complemented that meal as well. I got a jar of smoky mountain hot pickled okra, which I am somewhat ashamed to say I have totally consumed already! I need more!

I think my favorite thing about the place was the apples. They are in season right now and totally dirt cheap. We got a peck (which is a humongous bag) for $7! I looked everywhere and asked every vendor for Rustycoats, which Tasha said were her favorite variety but no one had them! Alas.

My new favorite apple variety is Wine Sap. They are surprisingly tart for a red apple (this is a good thing) with just the right amount of sweetness, and they are incredibly crisp. I am eating one right now. I made Jimmy some baked apples with the Golden Deliciouses I bought and he has declared that should be a nightly thing. I think I’ll tell him I’m gonna need another trip to the farmers market if this is to become a reality.

We are the ladies who lunch. And dinner. And brunch. And eat fresh jam cookies at Amanda’s house. I have missed my friend so much! Mary and I went to visit Amanda in Asheville this weekend (and take a little side trip to Greensboro to get my feet tattooed, but I’ll post about that when they’re healed). We spent our time touring this lovely town and sampling its amazing vegan fare. I figured I could only post pictures having to do with food during our Asheville trip and play it off like I was doing special reporting for VeganMoFo, and maybe fool y’all into thinking our whole trip didn’t revolve around food. Yeah, that’s it!

First we hit up Rosetta’s Kitchen, where I thought I’d died and gone to vegan heaven. They had all manner of delicious looking things on the menu from straight up comfort food to General Tso’s Seitan. Did I mention they also had a huge case full of vegan cookies, cakes and pies? Oh wow. I ordered the “mini-favorite” which is a lunch portion (a big one!) of their special: peanut butter tofu, sauteed kale and mashed potatoes with gravy. Soooo good!

One thing I miss about not being vegan is comfort food that you don’t have to make yourself! I haven’t had mashed potatoes and gravy made by someone else in a year and a half or so! I enjoyed this way too much.

Mary got the tempeh reuben with live saurkraut and sweet potato fries. The bread was hand made rye. Delicious.

Amanda got the portabello burger on a homemade flax bun with a huge piece of avocado, vegan mayo, caramelized onions. We took several sweet treats to go. My favorite was a brownie/bar that had garam masala in it. Just the right note between savory and sweet.

We also hit up Laughing Seed Cafe, which specializes in vegan brunch. I could get in some serious trouble at this place. Here’s Mary all elated over the vegan eggs benedict which was a.maz.ing.

I got the blue plate. Gravy again! And hands down the best biscuit I’ve ever eaten in my life. We are going to beg them for the recipe.

Banana quinoa pancakes! These had an amazing crunchy texture from the quinoa that I really want to try to duplicate. I highly recommend either of these places if you’re in Asheville (although there is no shortage of vegetarian restaurants)! Tomorrow you get to hear about the farmer’s market and my new favorite fruit. Amanda is a good salesman, seriously the Asheville tourism board or someone should hire her, cause she has me convinced I want to move there. Throw some good vegan food, tons of local produce, open air markets, lots of artist/hippie types, hiking/nature galore, and two record stores in one block at me, and I’m sold. Stay tuned for more from the weekend.

Indian cooking, for all its complex flavors and aromas is often very simple! You chop some things, you heat some oil, you stir in some spices, you stir in the chopped things, you stir in your protein, cook, stir, cook, stir, serve! I highly recommend a cookbook called Indian Vegetarian Cooking At Your House, by Sunetra N. Humbad and Amy Shafer Boger, M.D. It breaks the recipes down into really easy steps and it’s what got me started exploring cooking Indian food (which is my favorite cuisine).

Dhal (also spelled dahl, dal or daal) is made with beans or lentils into a thick, spicy stew. It’s a mainstay of Indian, Pakistani and Bangladeshi cuisine and it’s very simple to make. I got this recipe from a friend who grew up in South India. Her mom is from Delhi and this is from her neighbors/friends.

Delhi Dhal
serves 8-10

2 large tomatoes, chopped coarsely
1 med red onion, chopped finely
1/8 tsp turmeric
4 - 5 HOT green chilies (or less if you want, I used 2 jalapenos and it was mildly spicy)
1 inch, by 1 inch, by 3 inches piece of fresh ginger, peeled
3 med cloves of garlic, chopped
2 tsp vegetable oil
1 tsp amchur (dried mango powder) OR 1 - 2 tsp lemon juice
salt
1.5 tsp garam masala
3 tsp dhania (coriander seed powder)
1.5 tsp jeera (cumin powder)
4-6 cups cooked whole mung beans (moong dal)
1/2 bunch cilantro, chopped coarsely

• In a large pot, heat oil.
• When oil is hot, add onions and garlic and stir - leave on med heat while the onions turn translucent. Add the turmeric and stir well. (note: at this point, if you spill any of this on you, it will stain)
• Add in the dhania, jeera, and garam masala, incorporating well into the oil. Add the tomato. Cook.
• Meanwhile, blend together the ginger and chilies in a food processor. If you can’t, chop it really finely. Mix it into the stuff in the pot.
• Add enough water to make a soupy sort of gravy and turn the heat on high. Add the cooked beans to the gravy and bring the whole mixture to a boil. When its boiling (the tricky part) taste it and add salt and amchur accordingly. The sourness/saltyness should be to your taste!
• Fish out some of the beans/gravy (maybe about 1 cup?) and blend until smooth and pureed. Pour back into the dhal. Or use a stick blender and blend some right in the pot. When heated through and cooked, garnish with cilantro.
• Serve with roti or cooked rice (if going traditional), or it’s good with cooked quinoa or crusty bread or a pita. Note: you can also make this with lentils, kidney beans, or any type of beans really!

This post is part of VeganMoFo, the vegan month of food. More posts here!

VeganMoFo is the Vegan Month Of Food. Based on NaNoWriMo, our collective goal as vegan bloggers is to write about food for the entirety of October. The rules are pretty loose, and different people are participating in different ways. You can get a list of all the participants here. There’s a flickr group here. And now they’re having Iron Chef Challenges. So clevah!

I wanted to post about these awesome muffins I baked yesterday. I had to whip up something to take to the 7 Cities Crafters monthly craft-together and I had a ziplock with overripe bananas in the freezer, so off I went. These are the Banana Wheat Germ muffins from Veganomicon, and I have to say they were extremely delicious. I used half the sugar and half the oil that was called for and they were still mucho tasty. The craft group ate all of them! The wheat germ gives them a nice texture and the cinnamon makes them smell out of this world and taste even better.

You can view the recipe in situ here on Google books or I’ll retype it for you below, cause I’m nice like that.

Banana Wheat Germ Muffins
makes 12

1 c plain soy milk
1 tsp apple cider vinegar
2 very ripe bananas
1/3 cup canola oil
1/3 c sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/4 c whole wheat pastry flour (or all purpose)
3/4 c wheat germ
1 tbsp ground cinnamon
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt

• Preheat the oven to 375F. Grease a muffin tin or insert liners.
• Pour the soy milk into a measuring cup and add the vinegar to it. Set aside to curdle.
• Meanwhile mash the bananas in a bowl. Add soymilk mixture to it along with oil, sugar and vanilla and mix well.
• In a separate bowl mix the dry ingredients. Add to the wet and use a spoon to gently stir until just combined.
• Fill the muffin cups 3/4 full and bake for 22 minutes. Remove from the oven and cool on a rack or serve warm.