Christmas Gift

I made my friend cupcakes for Christmas. I made him Chocolate Mint from VCTOTW, Caramel-Apple-Spice Cupcakes and Jelly Donut Cupcakes both from Veganomicon. I also made him some tea cupcakes. I saw the recipe in a Paula Dean magazine but as we all know, she loves her butter. Therefore, I took some of her recipe and applied it to Golden Vanilla Cupcakes from VCTOTW. I came up with this recipe. I have not decided on a name yet. I have been calling them Jared’s Cupcakes.



Jared’s Cupcakes
1 cup soy milk
2 bags of black tea
1 teaspoon lemon juice
1/3 cup canola oil
¾ cup granulated sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla
¼-lemon extract
Pinch of lemon zest (optional)
1 ¼ cups all purpose flour
2 tablespoons cornstarch
¾ teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt

Heat the soy milk for a 1 to 1 ½ minutes. Allow the tea bags to seep for around five minutes. When removing tea bags squeeze out all the tea goodness with you fingers (do not burn yourself). Add the lemon juice to the tea milk, mix and set aside. Preheat oven to 350 degrees and get your muffin tin ready. Pour your tea milk, oil, sugar, vanilla, lemon extract and lemon zest into a large bowl and stir. Add the flour, cornstarch, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Stir until just a few lumps remain. Fill muffin tins about ¾ of the way and bake for 20 to 22 minutes.

Glaze
3 tablespoons soy milk
1 bag of black tea
½ teaspoon lemon juice
Powdered sugar

Heat up soy milk in the microwave. Allow tea bag to seep for a few minutes. Once again, try to squeeze the tea goodness out with you fingers (watch out it is hot). Add the lemon juice and a cup of powdered sugar and mix. Keep adding sugar and stirring until you get the consistency you desire.

Veganomicon Recipe #5

On Thursday, I had Vegetarian Potluck at work. I made smlove pie. It was delicious. My Mom loved the leftover candied pecans.

Kumla Revisited

I did some test drive baking this weekend for Christmas. I can’t post any pictures or recipes because it would wreck some bodies Christmas gift. I have always been bad at keeping secrets so I will distract myself by writing about my office Christmas party. Applesauce and a baked potatoes; that’s all I have to write about because that was all there was for me to eat. On yet another subject here is the Kumla recipe from several entries ago.

Kumla
5 cups grated raw potatoes
3 T. melted “butter”
3 tsp. salt
1 tsp. baking powder
3 to 4 cups flour
2 tsp. sugar
“Ham” Broth

Put raw potatoes through a meat grinder. Mix with butter, salt, baking powder, and sugar. Add 3 to 4 cups of flour or enough to handle well. Make into balls which are the size
of a baseball. Cook in broth, boil for at least 30 minutes.

My mom uses a spring loaded ice cream scoop to make the balls. They are supposed to float when they are done.

Chocolate Mint Cupcakes

I made these for the first time in May and took them to a potluck at work. Ever since then Chelsea has been harassing me to make them again. Since it was her birthday, I made them special for her.

Kumla

Kumla is hands down my favorite food in the entire world. It is a Norwegian dish of potato dumpling boiled in ham broth. My mom was able to adapt the broth to make ham seitan from La Dolce Vegan. I cannot find the cookbook with the kumla in it so I will need to post it later but here is my Mom’s recipe for ham broth.

8 cups water
¾-cup tamari
3 tsp liquid smoke
2 tbsp Braggs

Mix in a stockpot and bring to a boil.

The leftover are great the next day chopped up and fried.

Dessert?

Today I made Banana Walnut Bars from Garden of Eden. The only reason I chose to make this is because I felt like baking and I had all of the ingredients. I did need to change the walnuts to pecans. This was listed under the dessert section but it is really more of a breakfast item. It tastes great; I loved the cinnamon sugar on top.

Thanksgiving Books

I am sorry to say I have nothing to post food wise. I do however have a few thanksgiving book recommendations. The first is T’was the Night Before Thanksgiving by Dav Pilkey. This is a story about a group of students who take a fieldtrip to a turkey farm. The all fall in love with the turkeys and save them from becoming a thanksgiving meal. The second book is A Turkey For Thanksgiving by Eve Bunting. This is a book about Mr. Moose searching for a turkey for thanksgiving. However, the turkey was the guest of honor not the meal.

Star Fruit

I was grocery shopping the other day and I thought I would try something new, a star fruit. I was really exited. Since I never had one before I was not sure how to pick a ripe one. Today I decided to try it. I was surprised that it crunched like an apple. Is it supposed to be like that? I thought the taste was okay but I did not like the texture. I was sitting here and I could smell the star fruit and it reminded me of something from childhood. Then it just hit me it smells like pumpkins when you carve them.

Veganomicon Recipe # 4

I love brownies. I have only made them once since becoming a vegan and I did not like them. Therefore, with great hope I made the Blueberry Brownies form Veganomicon. I had some problems though I ran out of vanilla and had to run and get more. Blueberries are out of season so I left them out. I took them to work because I felt guilty for not sharing my cookies (did not have enough). Everybody who tried the brownies liked them unless they were lying to me.

Sorry about the picture, brownies are really boring to photograph.

Mexican Lasagna

I needed to use up the left over cheese sauce from the tater tot hot dish so I made Mexican Lasagna. It was really a mix of a recipe from peta2 and the bean ball recipe.

Instead of the fake ground beef in the peta2 recipe, I made the bean balls. I replaced the kidney beans with black beans and replaced the oregano and thyme with a teaspoon of taco seasoning. I made them according to directions but after they had browned, I broke them up, add about ¾ of a jar of salsa, and cooked for a few more minutes. Then I assembled the lasagna and baked it according to the peta2 recipe. It turned out very good.

Oatmeal Cookies

I made some oatmeal chocolate chip cookies from The Garden of Vegan. They were nice and chewy. Plus, using a banana instead of an egg gives it a nice taste. I took some to work and I have gotten requests for the recipe.

Not Your Grandma’s Hot Dish

Today I veganized my Grandma’s Tater Tots Hot Dish (she is from Minnesota, which is why it is a hot dish, not a casserole). With her recipe, you mix browed ground beef with cream of mushroom soup and a can of vegetables. Then you put a layer of tater tots on top.

In my version, I used fake ground beef and cheese sauce. I left out the can vegetables because I think their gross. Then I put a layer of tater tots on top and baked it for 25 minutes in a 450-degree oven. It smelled good but it did not taste good. I have not used fake ground beef since February and I think I have lost the taste for it. I think next time I might use mashed up beans instead of the fake ground beef.

Veganomicon Recipe #3

Today I made Spaghetti and Beanballs. They were fantastic! I loved them. I always hate trying new recipes because, I am never sure if everything is turning out right. Most of the balls fell apart when I was frying them. All the broken up pieces in the sauce were delicious.

Sorry for the bad picture.

Leaf Burning Day

Today is leaf burning day, my allergies are bothering me. It feels like someone has punched me in the face. I feel bad, on my first day of VeganMoFo I have failed. All I did was sit around, eat leftovers and avoid the outdoors. I did feel like a hot drink however, so I made Not For The Faint Of Heart Hot Chocolate from La Dolce Vegan! I would have never put cayenne pepper into hot chocolate. I liked it though it leaves a nice little tingle on my tongue.

On another topic, I think that Isa and Terry are marketing Veganomicon all wrong. They should be marketing as a cat bed. I know my cat loves it.

Veganomicon Recipe #2

Today I made Chewy Chocolate-Raspberry Cookies from Veganomicon. While mixing them I was not sure if I was doing it right, because the dough was dry. They were very easy to make. I was done with clean up before they even came out of the oven. My Mom thought they tasted like brownies. I liked them a lot.

Zeke go a bath today. Look how unhappy he is.




This is my Mom’s dog, Shelby. Look at her demon eyes.

Veganomicon Recipe #1

I knew the first time I saw the Chickpea Cutlets they were going to be the first recipe I would make from Veganomicon. I will admit this was the first time using vital wheat gluten; I wasn’t sure what to expect. These were delicious and easy to make. I have a feeling they will enter my regular rotation. I made roasted sweet potatoes for the side.

Halloween Lunch Tales

Today, I had a Halloween Program at work. I made chocolate and vanilla cupcakes from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World.

My little ducky army.

The best part of the day was when I got Veganomicon in the mail I cannot wait to try some of the recipes

October Vegetarian Potluck

Today at work, I had Vegetarian Potluck. We had ten people attend this month. I think that is good considering where we live. I made unbeef stew. It was time consuming. I would never put that much effort into cooking something for myself, but I would make it for other people.

Chelsea’s First Tofu

My mom made Tofu Pumpkin Pie. I’m not a big fan of pumpkin pie but I liked this.

Here is Chelsea a.k.a. Gangster of Love cutting into her vegan rice crispy treats. She looked like she was going to murder it with that knife.

Finally, look at my pretty centerpiece.

Homeschooler's Afternoon

Today I had a Homeschooling program at work. The older kids and I made non-bake cookies. First, we made Kiwi Coconut Snackballs. They came together well (is well the right word to use or is it good). Then we made Mama Mayhem’s Perfectly Easy No- Bake Cookies from La Dolce Vegan! While making these I spilled vanilla everywhere and poured coca down the front of my shirt. They tasted great despite all the problems. Most of the kids liked making them and, all the kids loved eating them. This is what was leftover.

Saturday Dog Sitting

My Mom was out of town today so I spent the day at her house watching her dog, Shelby. I spent the day in the kitchen.

For breakfast, I made Pumpkin Scones by Jolinda Hackett. I made these for the first time last week for a potluck at work. The recipe called for three teaspoons of ginger, which I did not like. This time I replaced the ginger with one teaspoon cinnamon, one teaspoon nutmeg and one teaspoon ground cloves. I brushed the top with soymilk and sprinkled cinnamon and sugar on the top. They turned out huge. I will make them this way from now on. They were addictive I won’t even go into how many I ate.


We had just gotten the Vegan Italiano Cookbook by Donna Klein in at work. I decided to make Linguini with Broccoli and Garlic with a side of Rosemary Bread (I’m not sure if this is the actual title, I left the book on the counter at my Mom’s house).The linguini turned out just like a recipe I tried from The Teen's Vegetarian Cookbook by Judy Krizmanic. Krizmanic’s version was a lot easier to make. The rosemary bread was okay I don't think I will ever make it again.




And for dessert, Raspberry Chocolate Chip Blondes from the book Vegan With A Vengeance. The only soy yogurt that is available in my town is strawberry and peach. I tried it with the strawberry, you couldn’t taste the diffrence in the final product.