amy eats vegetables

Crescent rolls aren’t so good for you, but they are vegan and delish. Great to serve with a quick meal: Dr. Praeger’s veggie burger over arugula with daiya and tempeh bacon.

well, it’s official: i’ve made it past my 30 days of being vegan without even noticing! i guess that means i’m sticking with it…

i wish i had some cool reflective thoughts for this past month, but it went by so fast and seemed super easy!

this past week i read alicia silverstone’s the kind diet, which really help to affirm me in the choices i was already making, and gave me some great tips on making healthier choices as i continue with my vegan lifestyle.

it’s really exciting to get other people to enjoy vegan food as well. i hosted a potluck baby shower this weekend and i brought peanut butter brown rice crispy treats (recipe from the kind diet), spicy orange soba noodles (recipe from susan feniger), and herbed cream cheese and cucumber tea sandwiches (recipe from c’est la vegan) and they were all a huge hit! the sandwiches were the only dish that was totally gone by the end of the party, and despite trays of cupcakes and cookies, my boyfriend just kept eating my crispy treats!

it was a long and fun day, but my boyfriend treated me to a relaxing dinner at m cafe de chaya, a great macrobiotic restuarant where i can enjoy vegan goodness and he can get sushi! a picture post with my meal is coming up, but we failed to take a pic of the yummy pumpkin pie we got for dessert. my boyfriend said afterward that it was “really good” and that was coming from a “pumpkin pie connoisseur.” he also had a realization that he might even like vegan desserts better than regular dessert!

So, I’ve had two amazing dining out experiences that I have to share this week! Unfortunately, both places were visited after a long day of work where I was super hungry, so I dove right into my food before I could get any pictures! Rest assured, I WILL be back to both of these places!

1) Tony’s Darts Away- Burbank, CA

This is not a vegan restaurant, it’s a bar that happens to have amazing vegan food!

I guess this place used to be pretty divey ‘til Tony came in and re-vamped it. The atmosphere is great! They have games you can play, so boyfriend and I played Connect Four while we waited! Also, the bar is very eco-friendly and has no bottles! Everything, even wine and rootbeer, comes from a keg and all the drinks are from California.

Now, let’s get to the food! I had an amazing vegan apple sage sausage topped with house-made hot sauce, vegan aioli, daiya cheddar, and apple slaw! It was so good! I’m pretty sure they use Field Roast vegan sausage, who I think has a really cool philosophy on grain meats (check out their website).

My boyfriend is doing meat-free Mondays, so he got a salad (good- he loved the dressing) and sweet potato fries with a vegan maple almond glaze. INSANELY GOOD. It tasted like candy… We will definitely be coming here again. We actually almost went again in the same week!

2) Pure Luck

I’ve been wanting to try this place for a long time since it is constantly recommended on one of my favorite blogs, quarrygirl, and it did not disappoint! The best part of experience was watching my five omnivorous dining companions enjoy a totally vegan meal!

I got their Caesar salad rolls: romaine, red onions, avocado, and perfectly cooked tofu wrapped in a flour tortilla with their homemade vegan Caesar dressing. Really yummy! Their agave lemonade was great too. My boyfriend got their “pulled pork” sandwich. They use jackfruit as a replacement for pulled pork and carnitas, and it was bizarrely good! Next time, I will definitely get something with jackfruit because it was so delicious! At my request, he also got potato pals, aka fried gnocchi, aka YUM. They’re so good with the special sauce, though I’m pretty sure it’s veganaise and bbq sauce…

Afterwards, we went to scoops, right across the street, where they always have 3 vegan options. We got oreo cream cheese and it was pretty good. Luna and Larry’s Coconut Bliss has ruined me from enjoying other vegan ice creams because theirs is SO GOOD, but scoops wasn’t too bad…

Well, there you have it! Tomorrow I will be finally taking a cooking class from SporkFoods and I am super excited!

i love basil and i grow my own on the porch, but when i was buying other herbs at the hollywood farmers market, i got a free bunch. naturally, i decided to make vegan pesto with my surplus basil.

although pine nuts are traditionally used, i prefer walnuts. i like the taste better, and they are so good for you! antioxidants, protein, fiber, magnesium, phosphorus, and omega 3 fatty acids!

you’ll need a food processor or a blender. i prefer the texture in the food processor, but sometimes “chunky pesto” as i call blender-style, can be good.

separate the leaves of a good bunch of basil (3 cups-ish), add 3 or 4 peeled whole garlic cloves and chop in the processor. add 6 tbs of walnuts and chop some more. then add 6 tbs of olive oil and chop one last time. that’s it. so easy!

you can add vegan parmesan or nutritional yeast, but i like it as is.

i like to toss it with spinach penne, because with a vegetable pasta, you’re getting slightly more nutrients that the average pasta. good stuff.

last night, i served this with heirloom tomato slices and gardein crispy “chicken” tenders and it was so so yummy!

Homemade vegan pesto with spinach penne, heirloom tomato, and gardein crispy “chicken” tenders. So so delish!

I stayed on track pretty well friday and saturday, but the main events were two big cooking adventures.

1) VEGAN CUPCAKES

My boyfriend held a poker night on Friday, so I decided to wow his buddies with some amazing vegan cupcakes from Chef Chloe Coscarelli. She recently won a Cupcake Wars challenge on the Food Network, and I believe is possibly the first vegan to win on any food network show. I made her Chocolate Strawberry Shortcake Cupcakes.

I was worried the cupcakes were going to be a disaster, because the frosting was… If you saw the picture of a clumpy hot mess I posted on Friday, that was the frosting. It was so hot out (even with the A/C on) that my coconut oil melted too much and I couldn’t get the frosting to the right consistency. Luckily the cupcakes were nice and moist on their own and the strawberries and powdered sugar were just enough extra. And, yes, they were a big hit!

2) CORN FRITTERS

For Saturday night’s dinner, I tackled a recipe from Spork Foods: corn fritters with chipotle “cream” sauce over arugula.  They were so delicious and flavorful (I loved using lots of spices) and weren’t too hard to make either. The actual frying of the fritters was a little challenging at first, but I got the hang of it.

My boyfriend loved it too and I was so proud of him for eating a whole vegan meal!

Spork foods recipe! Corn fritters with chipotle “cream” sauce over arugula

Last night’s dinner. Boyfriend and I love to have quinoa with green beans sautéed in garlic and olive oil. Then, we choose our own protein: black beans are my go to.

No pictures today, as everything i ate was either leftovers, snacks, or a mish-mash of things, but trust me it was all yummy and vegan…

I had a delicious dinner with my dear friend Mandy tonight of whatever we could find in her house, though it probably would have looked crazy if we took pictures of it. Here’s what we ate:
- roasted red pepper hummus
- baba ganoush
- mini pitas
- pickled turnips
- avocado
- watermelon
- grapefruit
- grain salad from Whole Foods
- sweet potato fries with fig spread melted for dipping

Everything was delicious (well, except for the Whole Foods salad) and it was so nice to share a yummy vegan meal with a great friend, who, by the way, is not vegan and is eating for two (baby boy due in November)!

As nice as it is to eat with other vegetarians/vegans, it means a lot when your friends will eat to accommodate you and be open to enjoying vegan goodness. I am very grateful that my veggie-hating boyfriend will eat vegan pizza, but I have a long way to go to get him on board with eating vegan meals. I’m not trying to “convert” him, but I like opening up his picky palate to healthy and delicious foods. I am thinking about trying one of Chef Chloe Coscarelli’s Cupcake Wars winning recipes for his poker night tomorrow. I think they’ll be a hit!

Vegan pizza from Lenzini’s in North Hollywood. Basil from the garden, lovingly garnished by my sweet boyfriend.