Vegan Alfredo

We made this the other night as per the recipe food on this site. We decided we would adjust it more to our tastes.

I found the original too peppery, Hubby said it was not garlic enough, (I agreed.) JT insisted it needed Parsley. :)

so here is our preferred version.

2T olive oil
4 cloves garlic smashed and minced
2 1/4C almond milk
3-3 1/2C chopped Cauiliflower
3/4t salt
1t peper, oregano, basil
juice of half a lemon. (or 1T lemon juice)
1/4 C and 2T nutritional yeast.
Pinch or 2 of parsley

In med pot, heat oil, and garlic until garlic is turning brown.
add in Almond milk and let com to a boil
Turn down heat. add cauliflower, salt, pepper, oregano, and basil. cook until cauliflower is soft. (8-10 mins)
let cool until safe enough to put in your blender.
blend cauliflower mix with lemon and nutritional yeast until creamy.

stir in parsley.

add over your favourite noodle, or noodle type substitute.

We easily fed 6 with this recipe. But 3 of the 6 are under 10. :) so it is probably a 4 adult meal.

faux red lobster buiscuts. veganized!

so, with my oldest having stomach issues currently. I am looking to perfect a faux red lobster biscuit recipe... dairy free.
ahhh
 so. here is my current work in progress. We shall see how much tweaking is needed!!
we tried it, it is pretty good, but we will be adding more nutritional yeast next time.

2C all-purpose flour
1 T baking powder
1 T granulated sugar
1 T garlic powder
¾ t kosher salt
½C coconut oil (or butter substitute)
1/4C coconut oil (or butter substitute) 
1C Almond milk
1/4C nutritional yeast
½t  dried parsley

Preheat oven to 450°F.  Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. 

In a large mixing bowl combine flour, baking powder, sugar, garlic and ½ tsp salt.  Whisk until well combined.  Add melted coconut oil and milk and whisk just until flour is all wet, do not over mix.  Add Nutritional yeast and fold in with a spoon.

Drop heaping spoonfuls onto baking sheet.  Bake for 10-12 minutes, until biscuits are golden brown.

Meanwhile melt remaining ½ stick (¼ cup) of coconut oil in small mixing bowl.  Microwave for 5 seconds or until it is melted.  Add ¼ teaspoon salt and parsley.  Stir with pastry brush. 

grab those biscuits out of the oven and give the a brush.

Enjoy!!!

Vegetarian/Vegan Mexican bake with Quinoa.

My Son was recently at a youth program. I made a dish to help with the feeding of all the pre-teen monsters. The recipe was apparently a hit, and after testing the leftovers when he got home, I have now made it again, and again! it was adapted from this recipe. I didn't add as much spice as the original called for and as usual played around with the measurements a bit. :) here is my version.

• 2 1/4C veggie broth
• 1C uncooked Quinoa
• 15 oz can black beans
• 1 1/2 C frozen corn kernels
• 16 oz can diced tomatoes
• 1/2C chopped red peper
• 1/2C chopped green pepper
• 1/2 med onion
• 2 cloves Garlic
• 1T chili powder
• 1/2t salt
• 1t ground black pepper
• 1t ground Cumin
• 1t oregano
• 1C shredded cheese (optional)

So, I like easy..

throw everything into a crock pot minus the cheese.

turn on high for 2.5 to 3 hours. If you want to set it longer set it on low. I have cooked this for up to 6 hours, and then reheated it the next day and it is just as good!! 

I like to leave the cheese to the side so those who want can add it.

Love cooking once and eating twice.. ( or 3 or 4 times) 

'I will add a photo if I remember to take one next time. :)

crock pot mushroom barley soup

This is a quickie for the lovely Ms. Melly!!
Based on the recipe found here.

I am completely trying to fall back in love with my crock pot.  Here is the Mushroom barley soup I made a full crock of today. Love that I can start it and have it ready when I am. Tonight is a busy one with C.J. and J.T. off to their scouting groups. above web site is filled with vegan crock pot recipies. I am so happy to have found it. The whole cooking one meal for Todd and the kids and then something for me with enough for all the kids to try, is getting a bit exhausting to think about. Most often then not I end up losing out and eating something that maybe I would rather not. So, I'm trying to make mine the main meal and then a little bit of something for Todd. Mostly since chances are the kids will eat what I make for me anyways. so, enjoy, and stick around. I will eventually keep this up a bit more.  ;)

MM MM Mushroom Barley soup in a crock.

• 10 ounces mushrooms ,
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 carrots, 
• 1/4 Med onion 
• 2 stalks celery,
• 1/2 cup barley
• 5 cups veggie stock. (I use home made. YUMM!)
• 1 teaspoon thyme (or 2 sprigs fresh thyme)
• salt and pepper to taste

So I like quick and easy for supper. So toss all this in a crock pot. set on low for 6-8 hours. A great filling meal ready when you are. (inexpensive too!!!)

I should add, this came out pretty thick and a bit starchy for me this first go round. so, I would also highly recommend properly soaking and rinsing your barley before hand if you think a head. I made this on a whim today. And upping the stock or adding water. I added about 8 oz of water when I was about ready to serve and let it get good and hot again! 

so, for some bizarre reason my 3 boys do not like sweet potatoes. we have tried giving them to them baked, mashed, fried like fries and chips mixed with other stuff. no go, they ran if you mentioned them. Weird right?!? At our local farmers market we buy these huge sweet potatoes One would easily feed the 6 of us. so really besides refrigerating the left over, which is a lot, what do I do with all this sweet potatoe. so, today I decided that there must be a sweet potato muffin or bread I can make. So surfing I went. I found several pages that all had muffins and bread loaded with tons of sugar, not at all what I was looking for. then, I foundit. the answer to my get the kids to eat sweet potatoes with out loading it with sugar prayers. Sweet potato biscuits. the original recipe is at the Ontario sweet potato  Web site. I, Of course, can't resist changing things up a bit, so here is my version...

Ok... and again with the no Photos.. so sorry. will post them when iPhoto loves me again.

Sweet Potato Biscuits

1 C all-purpose flour 1/2C Whole wheat flour 1 T baking powder ½ t. salt 3 T. coconut oil 1 C cooked and mashed sweet potatoes (i didn't peel mine, but do what  works for you) ¼ t. ground cinnamon 1/8 t. ground nutmeg ¼ C Almond  milk In a lg mixing bowl, sift together flour, baking powder and salt.  drizzle the room temp oil into the dry mix. using the back of a fork mix into flour mixture until it's crumbly looking. you could use a pastry knife as well. this worked just fine though. add in sweet potatoes and spices. blend well.  Add milk all at once and stir with fork until mixture comes together. ** note I found this a very wet mixture** Roll out on generously floured surface to ½ inch thickness.  Cut with biscuit cutter or the open end of a drinking glass, which is my usual method.  Arrange on ungreased baking sheet Bake at 450 degrees Fahrenheit for 12 minutes or until golden and puffed up place on cooling rack. theses little suckers are HOT!! So the kids went crazy for these. they even helped make them J.T. was in charge of the biscuit cutting! so, I will be making these again in the future! I don't mind them eating lots if the nutrition value is there! I think the only thing I would change is next time put the potato's through the ricer so they mix easier.

Pizza bread

YUM. I got this out of a cook book on my shelf that I have had forever. It is called "school Days Lunches"  by Jean Pare. It is from her company's coming series. Great book. Even though we homeschool I live to have easy to make projects for the kids that turn into portable lunches and snacks. Cause homeschooling is not about staying home!! This is a great recipie since it is easy to make vegan. (I generally make a vegan version) I will present it here as I make it and put the extras that I don't use in brackets.
Please pardon I have no photo's on here.. iPhoto is being a royal pain in my ass and I will get those up wen I figure out what the issue is!!!


1T coconut OR olive oil.
1C chopped onion
2 garlic cloves (org. calls for 1. we LOVE garlic...)
2t Paprika (I often skip this if I don't have it)
1/2t Pepper
(3/4C chopped Pepperoni slices)
1/2 C all purpouse flour
1C whole wheat flour
(really any combination of flour will do. Just need to make sure you have 1 1/2 Cups in there... i tend to try to use more whole wheat)
2t baking powder
1/4t salt
4 egg replacers (or 4 eggs)
3/4 C nutritional Yeast  (or 3/4C parmesan Cheese)
1/2C tomato sauce
1/3 C coconut oil in liquid state (OR hard margrine or butter melted)
3/4t dried Oregano (OR if you super lucky and have some fresh, I would totally do that. so 1T chopped)

You also need; a frying pan, a small mixing bowl, a LG mixing bowl, and either a 22cm (9") greased round pan or a greased muffin tin.

Ok I know that list looks long, but I promise these are super easy and you can substitute the extra's you don't like.

As a side note to the Oregano, I I happen to not have enough I just wing it with what ever spices smell good that day.

so, your going to take that first bit of coconut (or what ever cooking oil you are using) and heat it in your fry pan.
in the pan add your onion and cook until softened. then add in the Garlic, Paprika if your using it and pepper. Just heat it until it smells yummy (about 2 mins)
if you are using the pepperoni. add it now and cook until browned.  then transfer to your smaller bowl to cool. if not, then transfer and cool.

Hey! this is a great time to make a tea while everything is cooling. Or do something really exciting like throw in a load of laundry... Yeah, I'll stick with the tea too...

Preheat your oven to 375.

Put the flour, baking powder, and salt in the Lg bowl and make a well in the centre. add your cooled mixture from your small bowl into your well in the lg bowl, and then add in the last 5 ingredients.

I find this mixture very wet. so if your used to making bread be ready for it. I also find it mixes better when you flour your counter top and give it a quick knead. although the book says just to stir until moist. I found stirring left it not well mixed.

This is also a great time to add your extra pizza toppings you may like. I loved a few handfuls of mushrooms and black olives (rinsed and drained!) Just add until it looks good in the dough. go crazy!!

Now you can either dump it into your round pan or put it into your muffin tins. I fill my muffin tins about 2/3 of the way. This way they are a great size for small hands and make cute sandwiches if you chose to stuff them.
toss them in the oven and let them bake for about 20 mins. the tops turn a pretty golden colour and your should be able to stick a toothpick or fork through the middle and have it come out nice and clean. I've found the muffins took as long as the round. keep half an eye on them as all oven are different. and some have hot spots.

This recipe freezes awesome (if they last that long).
Hope you enjoy them.

Guess it's been a while... and cookie update!

Well I keep meaning to do this, but time is getting away from me. I just realized I am closing in on 5 months to go in this pregnancy. Wow. Every time I think of it I think of the million things that I need to get done. LOL. House work catch up is a killer. 2 1/2 months of being too ill to move really did a number on the house!!
Anyways. I figured out the cookie recipe. It's pretty good. (in fact the kids are sitting on the couch with the bucket downing them now.. so I"m pretty sure that means they are a winner.)

CJ's real food cookies.

1C Butter Melted
3/4 C honey
3/4 C Unsweetened applesauce
2 Lg eggs
1 1/2t Vanilla
2 3/4 C Whole wheat Flour
1/2 t salt
3 C Steel cut/rough cut oats
2 cups Bitter sweet chocolate chips.

Pre-Heat oven to 350 F

Combine butter, Honey, Apple sauce and Vanilla. In a small bowl. (In all honestly, I just put it all together in the pan I melted the butter in, After I take it off the heat) Beat eggs well and mix with the butter mixture.
In a Med size bowl combine Flour, salt and oats.  All butter and eggs mixture to flour mixture. Mix well. Add chocochips and mix well again.


Put on baking sheet in tablespoon sized portions. these are not going to get bigger. So keep that in mind. You are going to want to kind of flatten them a bit so then cook even. So no big balls of dough on your tray. Bake for approx. 12 mins. (remember this depends on your oven so watch them the first few times) they should go a light to med golden brown. (again, this depends on your preference)

These would also be great with a hand full or so of dried Cranberries added, a Teaspoon of cinnamon. Or really anything else your heart desires. it is a wet enough dough that adding stuff isn't an issue. If you are thinking of adding a lot of something that will dry it up a bit omit 1/4 cup of the flour and just add it in as you think necessary after the extra ingredient. You may want to wait and add the chocochips after you add the extras and make a decision on the flour though.

So this is mine and Cj's second try through this. The first one we had 1t of Baking soda in them. and they rose quite a bit. So If you like a softer more cake-ish cookie, I would add the baking soda in to the flour mix.
Ok well thanks for joining us on our baking experiment! Glad we didn't have any huge disasters.. this time!! LOL

ahh. well..

We are one week in on our Real food challenge. It hasn't been that hard, But let me tell you! Today I'm craving Brusetta like a crazy person! So I'm having it. From a box, totally Not real food, but, I figure it's that or eat randomly all day. The lesser of two evils is giving in when you need to. Other than that we are doing great! I am noticing a difference in energy and the amount I want to eat. It is awesome seeing CJ make responsible food choices all on his own. He is not being forced in any way and when he asks if he can have something that doesn't qualify, I tell him it is not what he is supposed to be eating but it's his choice. 9 times out of 10, he is making a different choice. He is only 8, so I think it's huge that he is doing that. Now to work on his attitude! LOL. 

Todd is, Of course, being a doll and reading labels for me and being careful what he buys. We are are very aware of the fact that living on a budget means we also have to eat what we have in the house weather it follows the guidelines or not, but we are trying to do it so there is very little that doesn't work in any given meal and Bringing into the house only what applies. This is definitely going to be an easy to keep up lifestyle to keep up past the 30 day mark. So far we have only had 2 meals that had anything in it that wasn't within the guildlines. (that's including my Brussetta today.) We know that this isn't a huge stretch for us. It is definitely helping us to be much more aware of what exactly is in EVERYTHING we buy. Which is a great thing.

I have some recipes that I have been using to make our snack food that I will put up. we did the crackers right off of the 100 day real food website, but I wan't pleased with how they baked. They tasted great. and it was probably operators error. We decided next time to roll them out thin and cut them with a play-doh cutter. Sounds weird I know, but I'll take photos and show you. It was Todd's Idea and actually makes perfect sense. (Not that you don't always babe!!)
Yesterday Cj and I did some experimental baking. We Have come up with a "Real Food" cookie recipe. The only questionable item in there is Semi-Sweet Cocochips. It's not quite perfected yet. It came out really good, but more Cake-ish in a way. I like a good chewy, cookie. so I think tomorrow we may head to the bulk food store to re-load on some missing ingredients and give it another go. I'm pretty sure I know what changes need to be made to adjust it. When I get it right I will post it.

Our new Food experience

Well, let me be honest. It's not entirely new. We have been working sloowwllyy towards a more healthy eating lifestyle for a while now. But now I'm doing a Thirty day "real food" Challenge with a group of ladies I met online. (and a few I know IRL). We are all doing our best to follow the rules found HERE On this great website full of amazing information. (Really, go check it out... I'll wait...) My oldest, who is 8,  has volunteered to do it with me. Todd says he is glad he works at Starbucks and can get his fix at work. LOL. I'm sure not going to force him to stick to the rules around all that yummy temptation! So the trick is to find things to satisfy my pregnancy sweet tooth and still stay within the basic guidelines.. Toast with honey did it today, but I'm not holding my breathe on that one! Thankfully we have an awesome chocolate vendor at our local farmers market who sells fair trade chocolate made ethically right from the cocoa pods. There is no added sugar so that will take care of my chocolate cravings!! So anyways, I have looking for a great snack to have on hand so I didn't switch to auto-pilot and grab and handful of pre-packaged crackers for a quick snack fix and I think, after looking at a zillion Granola recipes I made one that I really like. I just sort of took the things I liked the most out of a bunch of recipes I liked (and I can't remember them all.. sorry) and mashed them together. So here is my version.

Granola

3 1/2 C rough cut oats

Enough water to cover oats in a bowl

2 T vinegar (I used cider 'cause that's what was easiest to grab)

appx. 1 cup each of

Almond slivers

Dried cranberries

Peanuts

unsweetened coconut shreds

sunflower seeds

(I think if I could have found pumpkin seeds I would have thrown those in too. But they weren't at the bulk store I went to this last trip.)

2T flax seed. (next time I would soak these first, but they were a last min addition)

2 t Cinnamon (plus the bit that "spilled" while I was scooping)

1 1/2 t ground Ginger

1/2 t nutmeg

1/2 cup honey

6T butter

2 1/2 t Vanilla Extract

OK so first on the soaking.

I have been informed, and it makes good sense, that because Seeds are meant to reproduce the plant they are not really all that meant to be eaten. and if you do eat them, They are build to be passed through your system. They have a layer built on the outside that stops them from being broken down by the human system. So, all thought we know that there are oodles of awesomeness inside seeds (and nuts) for our bodies, Lets be honest, If you can't absorb them, it's kind of a waste (Ahem). So In order to break down this barrier we need to soak the seeds and nuts to kind of confuse the seeds into saying "Hey! Lets grow a plant!"And that they signals the seed to begin to germinate. At that point our bodies can break down all that great stuff that makes your body strong.

Ok enough yapping.. On with the granola.

First the night before I put the Oats in a bowl and filled it to cover with room temp water. I then added 2 T of vinegar. I Think the exact instructions for soaking I read said 1T to 2C water.. I'm a winging it kinda girl though so I didn't remember exactly. This really only have to soak for 6 hours. I'm lazy, so overnight it is.

the next day I drained the oats, I just left them in a strainer lined in coffee filter for a while while I made breakfast and cleaned up... and I'm pretty sure half way through breakfast to.

Mix in with the oats all your dried ingredients. So al the way down to the nutmeg on that list up there.

Take a smal pan and melt together the butter and honey. then add the vanilla extract.

Dump the honey/butter mix into the oat mix. Mix well.

in a Lightly Greased baking sheet spread a layer of the granola mixture approx. 1.5cm thick. Pop into a pre-heated 250 degree oven. Now heres where is gets tricky..

If you want it kind of a chew granola bar texture. you only need it in there until the top is really firm but you can still push into it if you really try. This is how my kids seem to like it the best. this will take about 30-40 mins. If you want it crunchy granola you will need to keep it in the oven for about 60 mins. These times are not exact. (in case you haven't noticed, cooking for me never is!) And I strongly suggest you don't stray to far. They will burn fast once they start to go. (Ask me how I know....) if they hit a med brown colour pull them out otherwise you will end up throwing them all out too.. Keep in mind that it will cook for a few mins after you take it out of the oven.

I hope you like them. Really you can add anything you want to them. I'm sure mine will vary a lot to keep us from getting to bored. If I come up with any spectacular one's I'll update here!!