The End of Year One

As 2015 draws to a close I've been pondering this vegetarian journey I've been on and I have to say it's been a good thing for me - I feel better having eliminated meat products from my diet, I've lost a few pounds and I feel like I have more energy. With the exception of Dan's coconut and almond crusted tilapia (which I'll be having on New Year's Day) and the famous garlic and onion turkey burgers I haven't missed eating meat so for the most part I'll continue the vegetarian lifestyle (and blogging too). 

What I've learned along the way:

• People who don't understand your food choices can be annoyed by them and they may try to thwart your efforts, convince you that you're wrong or behave rudely. I think this is the thing that surprised me the most although it probably shouldn't. I've spent a good part of my existence not eating products derived from a cow and have encountered a broad range of responses, from deciding I was too picky, to being accused of wanting attention, to being told "A little won't hurt me"  - thanks but no thanks - please understand that it's an allergy issue not a vanity issue. 

• I don't understand why my food choices are a concern to others? I've not asked anyone to conform to my lifestyle, I'm willing to bring my own food (and often do) to events, I've not asked anyone to purchase special food for me or change their way of cooking - yet it still seems to be a point of contention; go figure.

• Many restaurants that tout themselves as "vegetarian friendly" think that means cheese (as a replacement for meat) and ice berg lettuce and sometimes even those who support you - just want you to order that salad so they can get dinner and move on. In the same way carnivores want something tasty - I want something tasty that happens to be vegetarian, not something that you've simply removed the meat from - altering a dish and truly having vegetarian options are not the same thing.

• With the exception of a very few brands, most "fake meat" products taste like fake meat and should be avoided at all costs.

• Healthy cooking takes time, plan accordingly.

• Read labels if you can't pronounce or have no clue what ingredients are in something you shouldn't eat it - put it back on the shelf

• Experimentation is fun! Try one new food each week, if you don't like it don't eat it again it's not the end of the world. When Dan and I first met he told me he didn't like brussels sprouts or squash, turns out he'd only been exposed to pureed squash and boiled brussels sprouts - no wonder he didn't like them. Say hello to the oven and roasting - he's now a huge fan of both and regularly asks me to make them.

• Tempeh over tofu - while I like and will eat both, I prefer the texture and nuttiness of tempeh.

• Take a vegetarian cooking class or two (or four). I've learned so many new recipes by taking community ed and un-cooking classes at the local raw food restaurant, many are now my go to favorites.

• Vegetarians and Vegans need protein be sure to include beans and other sources of protein on a daily basis - protein is important but it doesn't have to come from an animal.

Thanks to those of you who have supported me, followed & shared my blog, shared recipes with me and tried my veggie creations - it's been a great journey and I hope you'll continue to follow my blog.

Wishing everyone a Happy and Safe New Year - see you in 2016!

A Different Perspective - Dan's View of AVFOY

Ann's movement to a vegetarian diet for a year has made me a healthier eater. However, unlike Ann, I am not a strict vegetarian. I still enjoy fish and brats (I do love brats). So I guess I am a technically a Pescaterian-Bratatarian?

My primary concern about pure vegetarian diets is that they sometimes lack good protein. Although I love mock duck and tofu, Ann is not a huge fan.  She will eat tofu if I prepare it in a specific way, other than that we have to be creative.

One of my findings is that black beans are a great source of protein. We've also explored high-protein grains like Freekeh [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freekeh] and quinoa and played around with alternative vegetarian/vegan products with mixed success.

When it gets cold in November and December we like to make soups. Ann makes a fabulous Forest Mushroom soup. So I modified her Mushroom soup recipe based on things we had available. Something you should know about me is that I love onions and I hardly ever follow a recipe. I often lookup various recipes and look for patterns (yes, design patterns I'm an architect geek by trade), but I like every dish to be different.

We had a large amount of dried mushrooms in our pantry and I wanted to use them up. We get them at a local Oriental grocery store, and as Ann has mentioned, they are much less expensive then at the traditional grocery stores. I put them in the crock pot in the morning thinking they would be soft by suppertime. I was wrong! They were still hard as a rock and rubbery; especially the stems. I tried to cut the large parts up and put them back into the crock pot. Yet even the small parts were tough after another hour. So I finally had to put the mushrooms in our Ninja blender and grind them all up into very small parts.

I then added two large onions (sautéd in olive oil until golden) and a cup of Freekeh.  I put the Freekeh and ground mushroom on the stove and let them boil for about 1/2 hour.  Then I added two cans of black beans (high protein) and put everything back into the crock pot for another hour.  I added a bit of salt and pepper and some cumin and that was about it.  I like to serve the soup with a good artisan bread (from Costco) and a bit of cheese (Brie is my favorite).

Ann's one comment was that she thought the soup lacked color, which I totally agree with.  She suggested adding carrots, which most of my other soups do have. Next time I would grid the mushrooms stems up in the Ninja blender before soaking. Rubbery mushrooms really are not a good texture.

Thanks for supporting Ann's blog - and thanks to Ann for letting me guest post this week. 

- Dan

With Gratitude

Yikes I looked at the date of my last blog post and all I can say is I've been busy. I decided to take the NaNoWriMo challenge this year and I'm excited to say I finished around 6 am this morning. I woke up at about 4 am and knew exactly how my novel needed to end and I couldn't go back to sleep because my mind kept running through the end of my story so I decided to get up and finish! This is the 4^th time I've finished a novel – one day I'd like to go back and edit one and end up with a "real book" that I could send to a publisher.

I've also been editing a novel for one of my friends who is a "real writer" – you know the kind who gets royalty checks on a regular basis for writing books. She's a romance author and her books have a paranormal twist which I really like. Her characters are interesting and her style is elegant I'm looking forward to seeing the final version.

And then there was Thanksgiving – we had a whirlwind weekend. On Thanksgiving Day we had dinner with Dan's family (I was in charge of  appetizers) and then we headed to Fargo, to have a Friday Thanksgiving with my family. It had been a few years since we all were able to get together – there was lots of food, fun and laughter. I got to spend time with 2 of my nephews and 4 of my great nieces and nephews - something I throughly enjoyed.

Amid all of that driving and eating and laughing I did do some cooking. For those of you who have been following for a while you know we were "those kind of people" – we had a bumper crop of acorn squash so I offered to bring a baked squash dish to my family celebration.

I started by roasting 1 ½ acorn squash and about 1 ½ lbs of butternut squash with just a brush of olive oil and a few grinds of sea salt. While the squash was roasting, I diced a large onion and sautéed it in 1 T of olive oil until it was soft. To the onion I added 2 grated apples, cinnamon, 1 clove of garlic minced, coriander and cumin, covered the mixture and cooked it until the onions were slightly caramelized. I removed the pan from the heat and let the onion mixture cool.

When the squash was cool I put it into a blender added the onion mixture and then blended until it was pureed. I poured the pureed squash and onion mixture into a baking dish added 2 T of agave and sprinkled cinnamon on top.

When I got to my family celebration I heated it in a 350-degree oven until hot. We had so many good dishes that I came home with a lot of leftovers but we're eating it and I'm pondering either vegan lasagna or vegan mac n cheese with the squash as the sauce for dinner on Tuesday night.

For me the holiday season is a time of reflection – I'm grateful for the many things in my life; good health, a loving family, amazing friends, a job I enjoy and the freedom to make choices about how I live my life and what I believe in. I know I'm lucky and I try not to take these things for granted because I know it could all change in an instant. 

Ciao

Eight Hours to Dinner

For those of you who read last weeks post where I was raving about our Minnesota November; today it was 61, sunny and again beautiful – I'm happy and speechless – I know right!

With that being said, our weather has been a bit odd, we had one day of super rain, a couple cold an brisk days (which are great for walking) and warm days – all in all it seems like the weather is undecided – which is so Minnesota. On the bright side we put up the Christmas lights out front in short sleeves yesterday, which is better than parkas, mittens and snow so we're all good.

On Friday morning  (one of the chilly and crisp days) I decided a hearty soup was needed and I remembered that a bag of red lentils sat in our pantry waiting to be put to good use and I knew exactly how I would use them.

It was 7am – since I had all day to cook I decided to toss a few things in the crockpot and let them simmer. I diced an onion, added 2 cups of lentils, 2 cans of fire roasted tomatoes, 3 carrots roughly chopped, 3 cloves of garlic – minced, 32 + ounces of vegetable broth, 1 tsp. basil, 1 tsp. salt, ½ tsp. fresh ground black pepper and 3 large shakes of Penzeys Northwood's fire spice.  Cook on high (I have an older crockpot) for 8 hours –Done – I love simple!

We've been enjoying it for most of the weekend – Friday with whole grain bread, Saturday with spanakopita and tonight with whole grain bread.

On another note I tried a new banana bread recipe given to me by a co-worker – I loved that it had 100% whole wheat (no white flour), agave (the recipe called for honey but I'm not a fan) – I loved how moist it was and the agave gave it a slight sweetness but not too much sweetness – I liked it.

As Thanksgiving looms I'm reminded of all that I have -  a loving family, good friends and good health – I am truly grateful. 

Have a great day!

Root for the Roots!

Repeat after me; it's November 8^th, we have no snow and it was 58 degrees in Minneapolis today. I know it will snow in time but I can't recall the last time it was this nice in Minnesota in November. And Camille knows it too – she's been bugging us to take her out most everyday – she doesn't always stay out a long time but she wants to go out nonetheless.

Normally I'd be hunkering down and looking for a nice stew recipe about now – I did make my black bean soup recipe for our Halloween party last week, which we finished up and combined it with the last of the cornbread – it was delicious and it only had 170 calories per serving.

In my family (actually both our families) I'm known as the veggie queen. One of my favorite things to do to kill time is search for new veggie recipes – that's why I'm such a Pinterest freak – it's on-line recipe heaven to me. When I first met Dan he told me he didn't like brussels sprouts – I was amazed and confused in the same moment – my only response was "You've never had them cooked correctly, I guarantee that you will love my brussels sprouts" which by the way he does.

Before I started A Vegetarian for One Year, I would wash, trim and then cut small "x" in the bottom of each brussels sprout and then steam them until they were still crisp. While they were steaming I would sauté an onion in olive oil and cook a few strips of bacon in the microwave. When the brussels sprouts were done, I would cut them in half and add them to the onion and bacon mixture, add salt and pepper – and they were ready. I never got a bad review.

Since A Vegetarian for One Year, I've been roasting them. I wash, trim and slice them in half, toss in olive oil and then give them a few grinds of pink sea salt and black pepper. They are even better and they don't have bacon (my apologies to those of you who think bacon is part of the food pyramid).

How I digress, while I do have brussels sprouts in my fridge I took a different route this week. I had a pie crust in the fridge because I used it's mate to make a slab apple pie a week ago. I wanted to use it up and my first thought was a veggie quiche but I wasn't really in the mood. As I was going through the fridge for inspiration, I spied the beets I bought a week ago, some cauliflower, sweet potatoes, turnips and spinach. I knew exactly what I was going to make.

I started by chopping all the veggies, tossing them with olive oil and adding a few grinds of pink sea salt and black pepper (see a pattern) and put them in a 400 degree oven until they were tender. While they were roasting I caramelized a very large onion and then tossed a couple handfuls of spinach in and cooked it until wilted.

I combine the veggies, onion/spinach mixture and feta cheese in a large bowl and mixed well then poured it into the unbaked pie shell and baked it for about 30 minutes until the cheese was melted. 

It was delicious and we had leftovers for Saturday night too – what more can a girl ask for? In a couple weeks we'll be celebrating Thanksgiving with my family in Fargo. I'm looking forward to a good time with family and great food. If you have any favorite Thanksgiving recipes send them my way - I'm always interested in trying new things. 

Curry + Eggplant = Deliciousness

I've been craving curry lately- ok I crave curry often and yes I eat curry often - it's my purpose in life.

We went to the farmers market a bit ago and purchased many many vegetables with the intent of having Dan's daughter Alona and her friend Nate over for dinner. But alas, the best laid plans oft go awry. We ended up at a local vegetarian friendly restaurant - with mixed success. I had a deliicious pumpkin hand pie and mixed greens but Nate had to send his pork back - too fatty.

One of our purchases was eggplant. I like eggplant but I'm not fond of recipes that require frying it in oil - simply because eggplant is like a sponge and I'm not fond of too much oil. So I'm always on the lookout for alternate cooking methods.

I pulled out one eggplant last night and decided to make a coconut curry eggplant with onions and tomatoes. I recalled seeing a recipe that roasted the eggplant first. It took me a few minutes to find it again but it was worth the effort. I started with this recipe and because I never have all of the ingredients or i have similar ingredients or I'm not a fan of some of their ingredients I usually modify it in some way. This time I didn't use the ghee, I added a can of fire roasted tomatoes instead of the roma and I didn't have canned coconut milk but I did have coconut/almond.

I really liked the flavor of the roasted eggplant it added depth to the dish and the roasting process was fairly painless so I'd definitely try it again. Now what to do with a head of cauliflower, a bunch of kale and 2 eggplant?

My original plan for the cauliflower was simple, roast it with a bit of olive oil and add a few grinds of pink sea salt and black pepper - which is what I did with half of it. I've got book club this week and I'm contemplating this sweet potato, quinoa and cauliflower dish. I'm intrigued because the cauliflower is cooked, pureed and seasoned to act like a sauce. With luck I'll have time to make it and the ladies will like.

Remember, if you have any great Halloween party appetizers send them my way - the party is coming up soooooooooooon.

The Transformation of Carrots

For the past 2 years I've planted carrots in the garden and for those of you who have seen my garden and noticed the nice straight lines and even spacing, I use the seed tape - mostly because I really, really hate thinning anything. I feel like I'm killing viable food and yes I intellectually understand it's all about the survival of the fittest, I'm a softie at heart.

With that in mind, it's humorous that Dan is so adamant about the fact that he can't tell the difference between a carrot pulled from the ground and one from the grocery store. People I hear your outrage - OMG really!  I know I say it too. I have no response.

About a week and a half ago I pulled the last of the carrots from the garden, I roasted a few for dinner and then we got busy and I forgot about them. But tonight as I was heading home from my walk I remembered they were in the crisper and thought they would make a lovely Curried Coconut Carrot Soup - which they did.

I started with this recipe and and made a few adjustments. I used 2 onions instead of one, substituted almond/coconut milk for the full fat coconut milk, I grated the ginger (to release the flavor), added garlic and increased the curry powder.

I started this project before Dan got home from work and was delighted to hear his "What smells so delicious" as he walked in the house. The smell of coconut, curry and ginger wafted through the house. Actually as we were sitting out on the deck enjoying a glass of wine we could smell it outside, with the door closed - it was that good.

Loving fall and fall foods and looking forward to some roasted brussel sprouts and beets for dinner tomorrow.