bunnies! and some food, too.

Our neighborhood seems to attract bunnies in the spring, and this year we think we have a warren* in our backyard! Ken took some photos of this cute bun bun.





Eee! I want to love him and squeeze him and call him George! But I doubt the bunny would be cool with that.

Anyway, I made more food this week. Gotta eat, right?

Probably the healthiest dinner we had this week was Moroccan Stew from The Vegan Table. This was a nice way to have sweet potatoes with a bit of sweet spice. I served it over quinoa for some extra protein. The recipe is formally called Saffron Spiked Moroccan Stew, but I skipped the saffron. I just couldn't justify buying saffron threads for this one dish when I probably wouldn't use them again anytime soon. But hey, it was still a great stew!



I haven't made anything from Yellow Rose Recipes in a while, so I whipped up the fast and easy recipe for Sloppy Joannas. Like all of the recipes I've made from YRR, these are just mighty fine. Nothing fancy, just easy and tasty. I was kinda sad to hear that YRR author Joanna Vaught will no longer be writing cookbooks, but I totally understand why. So I'll just have to enjoy her upcoming zine, and keep cookin' from YRR.



Another cookbook that's been out a while that I love everything I make from is Cozy Inside. I purchased the pdf download for a measly eight bucks, and I get plenty of kitchen mileage out of it. I found probably the most fattening dish I've ever eaten in this cookbook though, the recipe for Pasta Alfredo. THIS IS AWESOME. I don't even care that the sauce contains an entire tub of Tofutti cream cheese, because it is damned fabulous! Pictures do not do this sauce justice, believe me.



I'm sort of glad that the leftovers for this are all gone now, because that was a whole lot of fat and calories. But so worth it, ya'll.

Something else nice that happened this week was May 19th. Ken and I met on May 19th, 2001. Yeah, we celebrate lots of anniversaries because we are dorks. So we went out to dinner to celebrate eight years of knowing each other. <3



The vegan Classic Chocolate Cake is always the best part about eating at Cafe Sunflower. Coincidentally, we had this same cake made as our wedding cake in 2004! You can see Ken's piece of strawberry cake in the background, also a delicious cake selection.

I love you, sweets!







*Thank you, Watership Down for that vocabulary word for today.

alright, so maybe vegetables aren't your thing?

But I bet you like waffles! Peanut Butter Waffles from Vegan Brunch:



After this picture was taken, we smeared them with mixed berry jelly. Geez, so good. These were the fastest cooking waffles ever, too. For some reason they took half the time to cook that a regular waffle does. That's because they're super waffles.

Now, for some vegetables. Ha! See how I tricked you with waffles before?



This is a recipe from a cookbook called Vegan Italiano- Braised Romaine with Kidney Beans, which we had over some protein-packed quinoa. I've always wanted to try cooking romaine somehow, and this worked well. The romaine turned slightly sweet when braised. Ken and I both really liked this dish.

Hey, I baked some cookies last night, too. These are the White Diamond Cookies from La Dolce Vegan. The centers of these cookies turned out really gooey, which Ken loved. They are a peanut butter and cocoa cookie with white chocolate chips. Tasty!



As you can probably tell, I'm definitely enjoying our new camera, as well as our new schedule that allows me more kitchen time!

project vegetable is in effect.

I'm not a total junk food vegan. I mean, I do eat more vegetables than the typical SAD follower. But I do love to eat bread and sweets, that's for sure. Not to mention that I work all day surrounded by vegan sweets! In fact, I have gained nearly fifty pounds over the past four years. Because of this, I'm really trying to fill up on more vegetables as well as exercise a bit more. I get bored with salads all the time, but luckily I have a whole mess of cookbooks to fill me with vegetable inspiration.

I finally cracked open Vegan Soul Kitchen this week. VSK is filled with so many healthy options, it was hard to choose what to make first. We started with a modified version of Wilted Swiss Chard and Spinach with Lemon-Tahini Dressing. I say "modified" because I forgot to buy more tahini, so I subbed sunflower seed butter in it's place. I'm sure the sunflower seed butter brought in a completely different flavor than tahini would have, but we still enjoyed this simple way to eat greens. Scrumptious. We served it over quinoa along side a salad.



Another easy VSK dish we made this week is Crisp Green Beans with Roasted Shallots and Walnuts. This was quick, easy, and had tons of flavor thanks to the roasted shallots and tangy dijon vinaigrette.



Moe wanted in on the action. Get out of there! Bad kitty!



Of course we didn't eat just green beans for dinner. I made a batch of Orange Sesame Tofu from Eat, Drink & Be Vegan to go along with it.



The tofu dish was good, with a nice bright orange flavor. The sauce was way too watery, though. I'll definitely need to thicken that sauce more next time.

eating my way through a slew of new cookbooks

Before a few days ago, if someone would have suggested I make my own bagels, the concept would have confused me. That's like me trying to wittle a toothbrush out of a pine tree or something. Why bother, when vegan bagels are cheap and plentiful? Well, I'm here to tell you why. Because homemade bagels taste better than any other bread product in the whole world, that's why. I know this now. I've grown a lot since Monday.



The recipe for these lovely bagels can be found in the new Vegan Brunch by Isa Chandra Moskowitz. Don't let the idea of bagel-making scare you, either. They were insanely easy to make. I've been excited about this book since I first heard about it, because I'm all about some breakfast foods. As expected, the book looks awesome, so I'm sure I'll be cooking from it plenty.

Another new title I picked up this week is The Vegan Table by Colleen Patrick-Goudreau. This book is set up nicely, with seasonal menu ideas for entertaining. While we rarely entertain anyone besides our cats (and they would probably say we're not entertaining at all), I'm sure we will still get a chance to enjoy some recipes from TVT. Last night, we tried the Caramelized Tempeh Shwarmas.

Open shwarma on lavash bread:


A look at the caramelized tempeh:


All wrapped up. I need a lesson on lavash folding:


Overall, Ken and I were just lukewarm on these. I really like tempeh in general, so that wasn't the issue. I think the problem for me was the ingredient amounts were a bit off. The recipe was supposed to make four servings, but 8 oz of tempeh divided four ways would have been pretty scant. So rather than having one shwarma each then saving one each for lunch the next day, we ended up splitting up the tempeh between the two of us. Also, the sauce was delicious but the amount was so tiny, we barely had enough for the two shwarmas. We really wanted more sauce. The cucumber/tomato/onion/parsley combo made way too much, enough to stuff 6-8 shwarmas. I don't know if I'll bother with these again, but if I do, I will definitely triple the sauce amounts, half the veggie amounts and double the tempeh amounts. I know that this could totally be personal preference, so you should consider that, too.

Hey, have I mentioned that I'm one of the lucky testers of Terry Hope Romero's upcoming cookbook Vegan Latina? Of course I have. It's exciting! Here's a look at a yummy Cuban Style Black Bean Soup from Vegan Latina:

a belly full of Chicago.

Ken and I headed to Chicago with our friends Jill & Tony this past weekend, and it was a nice break from our usual routine. Ken and Tony had tickets to see a huge, two day show, which left Jill and I free to roam about the city. While we had great fun and noshed on lots of vegan foods, I'm sorry to say that I didn't get pictures of everything we ate. What kind of food blogger am I?! Geez! Also, we were kind of limited to a few restaurant choices that were near the venue. Luckily, there was plenty of vegan food on North Clark Street. Let's take a little food tour, shall we?

Vegan French Toast at Pick Me Up Cafe. Holy shit. Would you just look at that plate of bread? It's an entire loaf's worth of fried, sweetened, vegan goodness. Ken got this for breakfast one morning, but of course we shared.



That same morning, I had Tofu Benedict. This was a great dish, smothered with various veggies and some kind of tasty cheezy sauce.



We went to Pick Me Up Cafe a total of three times in two days, partially because it was awesome and mostly because it was on the same street as the venue. Jill and I went back on Saturday afternoon for salads and Teese Fries.





Speaking of Teese Fries, let me just mention how well Chicago Soy Dairy has to saturated that city with their vegan cheese and ice cream. Seriously, everywhere we turned it was milkshakes, pizza, hot dog toppings, etc. And most of these restaurants are not exclusively vegetarian, but they have more vegan options thanks to the CSD guys. It's really amazing and wonderful! Atlanta needs to get on the ball with more vegan options, for real.

Er, where was I? Saturday. We also took a trip on the El to a suburb (I think it's a suburb..) of Chicago to visit an all vegan store called Ethical Planet.



Ethical Planet is a really cute general store tucked into an equally cute part of town called Evanston. The owner, Fran, was super nice and down to earth. We picked up a few chocolate treats, and Jill bought a veg-themed children's book. I have promised myself to support vegan businesses when I travel (and any other time) as much as I possibly can, because it directly helps the vegan community. Since I'm a vegan business owner myself, I know that this is extremely important. If you're vegan, please do me a solid and support your local vegan businesses! Thanks!

Okay, more food. When Chicago comes up in conversation, one restaurant that almost every vegan mentions is Chicago Diner.



Full disclosure here: at this part of the evening, my stomach was kind of wrecked from walking 100 miles and eating Teese Fries, so I didn't eat much at Chicago Diner. Keep this in mind as you read my thoughts on this vegetarian joint.
First I'll mention the good stuff: the service we received at Chicago Diner was stellar, which was especially impressive considering how freakin' packed the place was when we were there. We arrived close to closing time, and everyone was super nice and attentive. They even gave us little cups filled with cake samples when we sat down. The cake sample was mighty delicious, too. All I ordered was a smoothie, which was perfectly fine. Ken ordered a vegan chicken parm dish, which looked really uninspired. He said it was "just okay", but he ate it anyway since has was starving from hanging out at his testosterone fest all afternoon. Tony liked his dinner pretty well, which was a sandwich of some sort. But really, I think the reason why people love Chicago Diner so much is because of the milkshakes. And for good reason! Of course they use Chicago Soy Dairy Temptation ice cream as a base, then you pick your flavor.
Ken and I shared the best strawberry shake I've ever put in my mouth:



It was a real thing of beauty. J & T got some crazy awesome peanut butter chocolate shake, which we had a sip of. It was... Hm. There are no words. Just damn good, I guess.

Okay! Sunday! After another breakfast at Pick Me Up and walking back to the venue with the boys, Jill and I headed to a baseball game at Wrigley Field.



If you know me in real life, then you know this is weird. I don't know anything about any sport, especially baseball. But I'm always up for a new experience, especially when it involves mass hysteria. Mass hysteria is the best way I can explain all the blue and red clothing, yelling, and public drunkenness that was found on N. Clark Street. Complete strangers kept wanting to high five us just for walking by! Chicago sure loves baseball. And since Jill loves baseball too, she treated me to a game. It was pretty cool. She explained baseball stuff to me, and I saw a grand slam. Woo? Woo!

Sunday night (and also on Friday night) we ate at a place called Handlebar. I had a very decent vegan buffalo chicken wrap there, but I took no photos because it was too dark for photos. We ended up at Handlebar twice because it was open later than the other places we knew about. They had several decent vegan options, too. It saved us twice when most other veg restaurants had stopped serving for the night.

Monday was departure day, but we managed to work in some touristy stuff on the way to the airport. We stopped by Grant Park and Millennium Park for some photo ops.







Our last stop before the airport was a restaurant called Earwax. Delicious name, eh? I don't know if any restaurant should be named after body secretions. But. I did really like this place, despite the damn disgusting name. Earwax's decor was awfully cool- it had a Coney Island freak show flair to it.





I had some chamomile tea, and a huge sandwich with avocado, cucumbers, sunflower sprouts and some kind of vegan tomato-mayo spread. It was a very fine sammich.





Ken's plate of food looked really nasty to me, but actually tasted great. He got a vegan sloppy joe with fries.



...and then we flew home, yadda yadda. After all the excessive eating over the weekend, I feel like I need to eat detox food for a whole month. Salads, salads, salads.

Here's one last Chicago photo of Ken and I. He's so cute :)