I love winning contests.

My husband and I won a Halloween costume contest for our Racoons in Garbage Can getup. Our prize? Free cupcakes from Divine Cupcake.  If you are in Eugene and have not been to Divine Cupcake yet, shame on you.  Every cupcake is vegan and they have a wide offering of gluten free options.  The cupcakes you see below are all vegan and GF, though you would never know it. They taste just as moist and sugary and delicious as a laycupcake.

Thanksgiving

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

 

I hope your Thanksgiving was wonderful, I sure enjoyed mine. I spent it with some friends, so I didn't prepare a full Thanksgiving meal.  I should also note that I was reluctant to experiment because there's a lot of pressure to make delicious dishes on Thanksgiving.  I therefore found recipes and only modified them slightly.  Below are the dishes I prepared, links to the recipe, and modifications.  

Roasted Green Beans with Onions and Walnuts

via here

Indian Dahl and Rice

via here

 

modifications: substitute oil or earth balance for butter.

Mushroom Gravy

 

 

 

via here

modifications: I used less oil, used vegetable stock in place of water, added more nutritional yeast, less soy-sauce (I used tamari). Replace flour with gluten-free flour all purpose flour.  I also rehydrated some dried mushrooms, chopped them and added them to the gravy, I then used the leftover mushroom-water in place of regular water.

Ginger Pumpkin Pie

via here

This turned out better then my last pumpkin pie, my last PP didn't have enough sugar. This was plenty sweet and had a great kick to it.

modifications: use EnerG egg replacer in place of eggs, replace half and half with a non-dairy creamer (if using soy, try to use organic), used a regular crust and added a hint of sugar and cinnamon to the dough. 

And here's my plate filled with all sorts of vegan and GF offerings.

Vegan and GF Pumpkin Pie

Pumpkin Pie from scratch-scratch: no cans, pumpkin filling from a real pumpkin.


Crust:
1 1/2 c. Gluten Free Flour (Bob' Red Mill)
1/2 tsp. salt
4 tsp. earth balance
4 tsp. vegetable shortening
5 tbs. ice water


Filling
1 Pumpkin pie pumpkin
1 1/3c. soy creamer
1/2 c. sugar
1 egg equivalent
1 1/4 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. ginger
1/4 tsp. cloves
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
1 c. hot water

Process
Cut pumpkin in half, scoop out seeds and strings, and placed pumpkin halves face down on baking sheet.  Cover with tin foil, and bake at 350 for 1.5 hours

Remove from oven, and cool.  Scoop out insides.  Mix 1 1/3 c. of pumpkin insides and the rest of the ingredients.  Pour into pie crust, and bake at 375 for 55-65 minutes.

For the crust:
Mix salt and flour in a bowl, add in butter/ shortening in slices.  Continue to mix until the mixture resembles coarse meal. Lightly stir in the water, 1 tbs. at a time, until the dough mixes into a ball.  Roll out the dough into a circle 1/8" thick.  Add to pie dish. 

question of the day

One thought about a raw diet: Many people think it is an "extreme" way of eating. But answer me this, how is a diet consisting of nature's bounty in its purest most nutritious form; a diet that is arguably the best diet for the planet, more extreme than a diet that is based on slaughtering animals, ingesting hormones, and food created in a factory?

Raw day 7

I officially made it through Raw Week 2010. I feel really good, my waist is trimmer (4 pounds trimmer), I don't get 3pm sleepy's, and my face is looking clearer . I think I will try and keep it up, maybe for a month, but to be honest, Thai food is sounding really delicious.

breakfast: nada
lunch: Avocado, mustard, and sauerkraut sandwich on my freshly dehydrated bread
dinner: large salad with garlic tahini dressing
dessert: chocolate brownie bites (raw blondie recipe with cocoa powder)
snacked: raw blondies

Raw day 6

breakfast: skipped
lunch: large Taco Salad, and an orange
dinner: zucchinni pasta in a cashew lemon cream sauce
snack: beet, carrot, and "extras" juice, raw blondies

A raw diet obviously uses a lot of produce, and as such will generate a lot of discarded parts i.e. the tops to zucchini, the greens of a carrot, the peel and inside of a lemon, the stems of chard. I have been saving these 'extras' in a container in my fridge so I could throw them in to my next juice. Waste not want not!
After I drank my juice, I mixed the pulp with ground flax, whole flax, and chia to make crackers

dehydrate overnight.
Recipe

Pasta in a Lemon Cream Sauce
Ingredients
2 zucchini
1 c. of hemp sour cream (left over from taco salad)
1/2 c. cashews (soaked)
juice of 1 lemon
1/4 c. basil
sea salt and fresh pepper
water (add slowly until you reach desired consistency)

make pasta from zucchini, blend all other ingredients in blender. Mix and serve.

Raw day 5

This may be the longest I have ever been 100% raw. I feel great and it really hasn't been much of a challenge. In the evening of day 3 I started to get a bad headache (detoxing). I didn't want to take Advil, so I tried to sleep it off, but around 4 am I couldn't sleep it was pounding so hard, so I gave in and medicated. The next morning I woke up feeling great and haven't felt poorly ever since.

Food Diary
breakfast: A tall glass of "nature's gatorade" aka coconut water.
fun fact: Coconut water is packed with electrolytes.

be sure to save the meat!

lunch: Taco Salad, comprised of Raw Taco Meat, Hemp Sour Cream, avocado, cabbage, tomato, and bell pepper. With a side of Corn Chips
dinner: Salad with Raw Garlic Tahini dressing
dessert: Chocolate Coconut Mousse (from my local market)

Recipes
Hemp Sour Cream, recipe found here, the video gives a great tutorial and demonstrates how to open a coconut
Taco 'Meat'
Ingredients
1.5 c. Walnuts, soaked in water for 1-4 hours and drained
2 tbsp. Cumin
1 tsp. Chili Powder
2 garlic cloves
juice of 1 Lime
sea salt

Corn Chips
2 c. corn
pinch of cayenne
sea salt

blend together in food processor. press flat onto teflex dehydrator sheet or use wax paper, and dehydrate overnight for about 10-12 hours, or until crunchy.