Last night's dinner was delicious, but I'm afraid to say that I don't think it was worth the pain that resulted from it!

This is the raw beet raviolio with cashew cheese filling, tarragon, and pepper puree from the great "cook"book Raw Food Real World. It is absolutely delicious, super easy (especially for a raw recipe!) and nice and filling for a cold winter's night. Unfortunately, we didn't use a very good mandoline slicer to cut our thin beet sheets. As a result:

Both my mom and I sliced our fingers open trying to slice the ravioli sheets (that's my grandma, the nurse, on the left, fixing us up!) Next time, I won't try to use something that isn't a mandoline slicer to make thin rounds. (Of course, the next morning, we realized that our food processor can do mandoline slices. Go figure.)

And here was this morning's breakfast: the most scrumptious pancakes that you will ever taste, vegan or not! As can be seen above, my grandma and I both had ours with bananas, organic maple syrup, and chopepd pecans. My mom had hers with some butter (she's not vegan) and strawberry reserves and seemed quite content with that as well. My dad just drowned his in maple syrup, as usual. You can find the original recipe on vegweb: http://vegweb.com/index.php?topic=5138.0

2 1/2c. flour (I used half unbleached white and half whole wheat pastry)
2 tbsp. sugar
2 tbsp. baking powder
1 tbsp. vegetable oil
1 tsp. salt
2 1/2c. non-dairy milk (I used rice milk)

Lightly mix all the ingredients; mixing too much will result in tough pancakes. Let sit for 5 to 10 minutes to rise. Gently fold the batter, and then let sit to rise for another 5 or 10 minutes (I skipped this second rising time because I was too hungry!) On a lightly oiled skillet, drop tablespoon fulls (or bigger, depending on how big you want them) of batter and cook until lightly browned on both sides. Enjoy!

Peace!

I've been doing my fair share of holiday baking! Sorry if the pictures are a bit small, but I'm still getting back into the swing of flogging.


In the lower left hand corner are my grandma's infamous peanut butter date balls, which are full of powdery sugar goodness and coconut and then covered in chocolate - so good! On the bluish plate is a veganized version of marshmallow fudge using vegan ricemellow. (The other desserts are non-vegan peanut butter date balls and divinity).


This is the macrobiotic dinner that my boyfriend and I had last night: hambulghur helper from the Hip Chick's Guide to Macrobiotics. It's full of carrots, celery, tempeh, onions, and bulghur wheat. Very refreshing!

Another macrobiotic dish from the same cookbook: strawberry kanten (vegan jell-o, essentially) layered with tofu cream. Really good, but very rich. I spilled half of mine on the carpet and still couldn't finish it all!



Mmm, banana nut muffins! I was going to make low fat banana pancakes, but these sounded way better. Check the recipe out here: http://vegweb.com/index.php?topic=5712.0

For Christmas, my boyfriend's grandma got me a really cute dessert set (with a serving tray, plates, and cups,) and my mom got me a mechanical pastry bag. On top of that, I got Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World, and there were recipes for a tea/craft party in Vegetarian Times. You don't have to be in tune with the universe to figure out that message! So I had a vegan tea party. Above are tea sandwiches with soy cream cheese (mixed with either chives or green olives), tofurkey, and cucumber. The teas I served (which I didn't photograph) were chamomile with ginger and cranberry, and green tea with pomegranate and orange.


This was amazing brazil nut cheese, which is coated in a mixture of herbs (parsley, thyme, rosemary and pepper) and then baked and drizzled with olive oil. I got the recipe out of Vegetarian Times, and I'm sure you'll be able to find it on the website in the next few months, after the issue is off the shelves.

These were the first cupcakes I made from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World. Holy freaking cow. Pictured above are chocolate cupcakes with chocolate frosting and low fat vanilla cupcakes with strawberry jam and icing.

These were requested after all 24 of the other cupcakes had been consumed (by only 8 people, I might add!) They're coconut cupcakes with coffee buttercream frosting. You're supposed to use coffee extract, but I didn't have any and used coffee liqueur instead. I would highly recommend making this substitution.


But of course, some people disliked coconut, so then I was requested to make these: chocolate cupcakes filled with peanut butter cream, drizzled with chocolate ganache, and then topped again with more peanut butter frosting. Some of the responses included: "I don't even like cupcakes but these are amazing!" and "I thought you said you were vegan?!?! Because these obviously aren't." Mwahaha! Vegan victory!


Peace!

After a three month hiatus, I'm back!

School was insanely busy this quarter; 15 credits make a full load and I took on 21, plus two different honor societies, college applications, occasional work, and my senior project (for which I'll be starting a vegetarian club at my high school, I'm so excited!)

I took a class this quarter all about sustainable agriculture and American consumption and I'm more into organic and local produce than ever - which, of course, isn't too easy in winter in Washington. I'm now of the opinion that no one should live in Washington because there isn't any local seasonal produce possible from November to March, except for the occasional pear or winter squash (and I'm definitely not living off that!)

With the holidays, I've been doing a ton of cooking - plus my grandma came out, so we've been baking up a storm making all of her old holiday candy recipes, like chocolate dipped peanut butter date balls and a veganized version of her marshmallow fudge.

Yesterday, we dined on yummy tempeh reuben sandwhiches from the new cookbook I got for Christmas, "The Hip Chick's Guide to Macrobiotics." They were super simple and even my carnivorous grandma liked them!

This afternoon for lunch, I whipped up a super yummy "chicken salad" from left over chick-style seitan we made on Christmas eve, some vegan mayo, some red pepper miso mayo (if you can get your hands on this, try it! It's amazing), some celery and some pickle relish. I served it right on top of some poppy seed crackers with pear. It was amazing; tasted just like the real stuff! (at least to someone who hasn't had the real stuff in awhile, lol) Tonight my boyfriend and I made morrocan winter squash and carrot stew with quinoa for his dad, another meat eater, and that went over very well! (Get the recipe here: http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/recipe_views/views/233714)


On the menu for this week? Lots of fresh foods to help me detox after I went for my third slice of Vegan Eggnog Cheesecake from the Fat Free Vegan Kitchen blog and second slice of Bryanna's Pumpkin Pie! Recipes will include:

Macrobiotic "hambulghur helper" with lots of fresh veggies, mainly being made because I'm easily amuseable and the name cracks me up
Macrobiotic Strawberry kanten (vegan jell-o) with creamy topping (the strawberries are ones that I froze this summer, so I suppose that's technically not out-of-season)
Seitan stir fry with cashews from Vegetarian Times magazine
Raw red beet ravioli with cashew tarragon filling - so good!
Brazil nut cheese on crackers (from Vegetarian Times) along with tea sandwhiches and green tea cupcakes from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World, for a tea party I'm having


My camera is kind of spazzing out on me - it will only take pictures when I press the button in a circular motion for 15 some seconds - but I will still do my best to take photos of these dishes and share them!

Midweek Munchies: What Teen Vegan is contributing this week Bold Indicates Organic! Ketchup Relish Sourdough Bread Sauerkraut 2 8 oz. packages of tempeh 1 medium onion 1 large carrot Bulghur wheat (to make the hambulghur helper recipe from my new macrobiotic cookbook!) Whole wheat elbow pasta 1 ear corn 2 stalks celery Apple juice Agar Agar flakes Brown rice syrup 1 lb. firm tofu Umeboshi vinegar Raw cashews 2 lemons 2 green onions Tarragon Parsley 3 yellow and orange bell peppers 1 red bell pepper 1 large bunch red beets Frozen edamame Ginger 1 head garlic 1 12 oz. package seitan

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PURPOSE of Midweek Munchies: Put together by a small group of Veg Women, we hope to spread the word about healthy vegetarianism while obtaining idea starters for meals, recipes, learn about new products, and meet other female veg*n bloggers. Visiting and commenting on other participants lists are encouraged but not required.
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