Fresh Meals for an Active Day

It's already May, and we love that it's warmer outside with beautiful colorful flowers. Spring and especially summer always makes us feel so refreshed and eager to be active outside and also to eat healthy. We love fresh light healthy meals on a warmer sunny day. Here's some recent nutritious fresh meals that we have enjoyed!

Super-powered berry breakfast:
Soaked barley flakes with soy milk, raw flaxmeal, and antioxidant-rich sundried white mullberries and freeze-dried pomegranates. And, a creamy berry smoothie with frozen blueberries, bananas, and more soy milk.

Tart, fruity, and nutritious to rejuvenate us for the day!
Mullberries are very nutritious, full of antioxidants, iron and vitamin C. They taste like flowery dates, with hints of coconut and raisins.

Pomegranates are also nature's superfood, with high levels of vitamin C, potassium, and antioxidants.

What unique berry have you tried, and how do you incorporate more antioxidant-rich fruit in your diet?

Salsa Tofu Scramble:
With black beans, onion, bell pepper, tomatoes, and spices. When served with tortilla chips, steamed broccoli, and fresh tomato wedges, and eaten on the patio in the warm Oregon spring weather, this meal makes for a nice fiesta dinner!

Tofu is a great meat-alternative, filled with healthy soy protein, isoflavones, calcium, and iron.

Broccoli is one of the most nutritious vegetables, high in vitamin C, vitamin K, vitamin A, fiber, folate, and other nutrients. Like other cruciferous vegetables, it is powerful in flavonoids, especially anti-cancer phytonutrient sulforaphane and phytonutrient lutein.

What's your favorite dish to eat broccoli and tofu? What's a unique recipe you use that has soy/tofu?


Whole Grain Millet Bowl:
This tasty and nutritious meal was easy to make - cooked millet mixed with olives, tomatoes, chives, and extra virgin olive oil.

As a gluten-free whole grain, millet has a great nutty, buttery flavor with a texture between rice and couscous. It is a great way to incorporate more fiber and heart-healthy whole grains in one's diet, and is a good source of magnesium, phosphorus, manganese, and other nutrients.

Olives (and olive oil) is a great way to consume more healthy mono-unsaturated fats and polyphenols.

Which gluten-free grains do you enjoy, and how do you prepare them? What's your favorite brand of olive oil with the best flavor? We love trying different extra virgin olive oils to detect the various aromatic flavors.


Yay for May flowers and fresh eats!
P.S. For delectable eats, Ricki Heller has written Sweet Freedom, a cookbook of delicious vegan desserts. Check out her giveaway post for more information - you can have a chance to win a free copy of her new cookbook!

Whirlwind of Seasonal Eats Part 2

Since the warm weather didn't last, we also enjoyed hearty comfort foods:

Calazones stuffed with mushrooms, kale, onions, bell peppers, garlic, and balsamic sauce. - We got this idea from Dreena's Moraccan Vegetable Phyllo Rolls. We made calazone dough, sauted veggies, then stuffed the dough with the veggie mixture and baked in the oven. Then we served the calazones with balsamic sauce, which was SO good. The leftover sauce we ended up using later in the week over sauted greens and tempeh.

Tempeh Sausage and Hashbrowns - We got this recipe from iamglutenfree.blogspot.com (adapted from the Vegan Chef blog). A great idea but WAY too salty. Should cut down Braggs to like 1/4 cup or less instead of 1/2 cup. It would be good to make different variations - serve with mushroom gravy, tomato sauce, or mustard sauce; add balsamic; add different spices like curry powder or italian seasoning.

Tandoori Tofu with rice and broccoli - We got a tandoori spice packet from the store (these spice packets are great!), and added it to plain yogurt. Served the sauce over rice, tofu, and broccoli and it was a spicy authentic Indian meal!


Miso Soup with tofu and cabbage - We used Vegan Planet's miso soup, and it made tons - leftovers for the week! Great easy soup, nice on a cool day to sip on healthy miso broth.

and Baba Ganoush Pizza - For the pizza, we used Vegan Planet's baba ganoush recipe minus the fresh mint leaves, spread on homemade pizza crust and topped it with bell pepper, tomatoes, and onion. DELICIOUS! Another easy pizza would to use hummus instead - both make the pizza creamy, and are great substitutes for cheese.


Looking foward to more spring! And Happy Easter! We wish you a great blessed day. - LK

Re-energize!

Everyone experiences days when they feel lazy or weary, when their lives are too hectic and stressful, and/or when they can't seem to be happy and think optimistically. How do you overcome this? We personally feel that the following have brought us better joy:

1. A wholesome vegan diet and
2. Faith in God

Despite weariness and stress, we are more assured and energized each day. God gives us eternal strength and hope. And, being vegan gives us inner peace, knowing that we are doing the right thing and eating fresh, nutritious plant foods that are good for our bodies, good for the animals, and good for the earth. Nourishing our bodies and souls the right way is so energizing and uplifting!

Some vegan food we've recently made has put smiles on our faces :) We've enjoyed using our Vitamix to blend smoothies and soups!

We are officially on the "green smoothie" bandwagon. We enjoyed our first Kale Berry Banana smoothie this weekend, and it was a great way to start the day. Our smoothie we based off of the Green Smoothie Blog's recipe. We blended together some red kale leaves, bananas, hemp protein powder, and frozen marionberries for a delicious, creamy breakfast smoothie! As if we hadn't had enough Kale, we've also been enjoying raw kale salads, with some garlic, olive oil, and lemon dressing or sundried tomatoes.


With our handy pressure cooker, we easily cooked up some red potatoes and whipped up Creamy Potato Broccoli Soup, adapted slightly from Veganomicon!


We also tried a refreshing citrus fruit - the pummelo! This fruit is a big citrus fruit, with a greenish-yellow skin and a pink flesh. Similar to a grapefruit with a hint of lemon, yet mild and sweet in flavor.


A few weeks ago we enjoyed a trip to New Season's Market in Lake Oswego, OR. These markets are like Whole Foods. The employees are the nicest people - they really care about customer service. Shopping at New Seasons is so much fun!

Trying new products always boosts our mood, and at New Seasons we got to purchase a lot of great eats.
(Note, some of the products in the photo above we've already reviewed)
Dr. McDougal's Lentil Couscous Soup Mixes, low in sodium, yet very flavorful and filling!
Terra Sweet Potato and Carrot Chips, although fried, are a nice variation to the usual chip.
Suzie's Puffed Kamut Cake - so good, with a nice "popcorn" bite and flavor, all whole grain.
Dagoba 'Single Origin' Milagros Dark Chocolate bar - with notes of banana and fruit.
Panda Licorice - the best licorice bar with a great molasses-licorice flavor, soft and chewy!
Laura's Wholesome Junk Food Gingerbread Bites - good because healthier ingredients (such as dates); but too much sugar/sweetness, and expensive.
Woodstock Farms Mango Applesauce - natural and flavorful!


What are some ways you all find energy and happiness each day? The coming of Spring is another thing to find happiness about!
-LK

Catch Up!

Instead of the raw dessert post we promised, we'll wait till the weekend since we plan on making a tasty raw treat with our new ultra exciting member of the household - a Vitamix!

Until then, here are some photos and quick rants on our most recent foods.






A Farmer's Market feast! Our last time at the farmer's market for the year, and we'll miss it so much until mid April when it starts up again. Curly kale, broccoli, Danish squash, pumpkin, eggplant, garlic, bell pepper, banana pepper, corn, red onion, and yellow onion.

Savory Millet Breakfast - with tofu, Braggs, nutritional yeast, basil, and garlic powder







Orange/Yellow Watermelon - tastes just as sweet, juicy, and delicious as red watermelon!


Crisp Juicy Red Grapes!




Thick sprouted wheat pasta with sauted kale, garlic, onion, tomatoes, and eggplant (farmer's market produce!)



Wonderful salad with local salad greens, tomatoes, bell pepper, and lemon pepper tofu.



Now that the farmer's market is over, we signed up to be apart of the Community Supported Agriculture, and we get produce every week from "Growing Wild Farm". Carrots, spicy radishes, lots of bell peppers, tomatoes, cucumber, turnip greens, fresh bay leaves, and (not pictured) wonderful mixed salad greens.


Indian Sweet Potato Stew - Sweet potatoes, cabbage, pecans, onion, bell peppers in a spiced Indian sauce served with chewy red rice. Got the recipe from online somewhere. Great hearty warm dish for a chilly day.



We've been enjoying the outdoors whenever we are blessed with a clear sunny day - such beautiful scenic drives, farmland, and trees. The leaves are changing colors! - LK

The B's - Bowls, Blueberries, Bread, and BUSYINESS

Long work days (9-10 on average, but this week will be ~13 hours) limit our cooking creativity and cooking time... Our cookbooks, like Veganomicon and Soy of Cooking books are starting to collect dust! Hopefully work will get better and we'll have more time to try some of those good looking recipes! While we are cherishing each minute of relaxation and free time we do have, we've been only cooking quick meals or planning ahead. What kinds of nutritious meals do you all prepare during BUSY times?

Our recent favorite meal has been rice BOWLS - they're versatile and chock full of good veggies. Simple, yet elegant. We've been loving red rice with it! The first rice bowl this week was with edamames, carrots, scallions, mushrooms, bell pepper, garlic, and Bragg's. The next day we enjoyed the rice bowl with an addition of orange sesame dressing, crunchy water chestnuts, and a gold nugget squash (creamy, like a cross between a summer squash and an acorn squash). Just mix all the veggies and goodies you want with rice in a bowl and dig in with a big spoon! :)


More "bowls" ahead, only this is a sweet treat - Coconut Bliss Vanilla Bean ice cream with fresh local peaches and cranberry orange granola!


For breakfast, we soaked extra thick oats overnight with hazelnut nut butter and some milk. Then we added frozen banana slices and fresh local blueberries and heated it for a heart-warming healthy breakfast! The BLUEBERRIES here are to die for; we've been buying 1/2 flats for really cheap and freezing them to stock up for the winter.


It's really convenient and cheaper to bake homemade BREAD/rolls and freeze them for the week. We made wheat rye garlic rolls (some wheat flour, rye flour, garlic, and herbs), which olive oil always goes well with. (By the way, we've been chugging our current olive oil - from Italy! It is to die for.)
Other baked goods we made this weekend were guava jam biscuits and ginger spice biscuits. Our grocery store had all natural, no sugar-added guava jam -it tastes so tropical and delicious on bread, we might as well put some jam in the bread!

We recently enjoyed Fat Free Vegan Kitchen's paprika potatoes with local red potatoes. We added more tomato paste, omitted the saffron, and cut down the oregano. We, of course, drizzled olive oil and nutritional yeast on it. It was good served warm with steamed broccoli, as well as eaten chilled like a potato salad. Thanks Susan!

Lastly, here is a pic of our grocery finds, including the guava jam, red rice, and gold nugget squash. There are two new chocolates we've discovered - mango chili and cacao nibs with nutmeg. They're both sweeter than we like (we like extra dark chocolate), but the nutmeg one reminds us of eggnog spice, and the mango chili has subtle notes of tropical coconut sweetness with some heat.
Hope that your lives aren't as busy as ours....we need your encouragement and energy to get through this upcoming week! We're thankful for Farmer's Markets and a vegan's favorite B's - Blueberries, easy meal Bowls, and Bread.

Best wishes, LK

Mid September Eats

It's already September, and even though we've been cooking up some great eats, we've been very bad bloggers. It's in part because we are still trying to settle in as well as keep up with 8-10 hour work days! We've just been too exhausted. But this weekend we've managed to squeeze in time to blog about our exciting September eats!

Rice Bowls - with baked tofu, yellow bell pepper, broccoli, red onion, sunflower seeds, red rice, and an orange sesame dressing. It was delicious and we love having rice bowls quite frequently.



We made spinach hummus and added red onion and cucumber in a flatbread to make a "panini-style" sandwich. Would be good with agave-mustard dressing!





Using Bob's Red Mill Millet Grits, we made Homemade Millet Cornbread. It was a spontaneous creation, so it may need some work (like reduce the sweetness), but it turned out delicious.

Homemade Millet Cornbread
1/4 cup flax
3/4 cup hemp milk
3/4 cup oat flour (or other flour)
1 cup cooked millet grits
1 cup cornmeal
1 Tb baking powder
1 tsp salt
1/4 cup agave
1/4-1/3 cup chopped red bell pepper

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Mix flax and some milk and let sit. Combine the remaining ingredients in a large bowl, except for the bell pepper, then add the flax mixture. Stir until combined, add bell peppers and stir until just blended, then bake in a round pie pan or make muffins in a muffin pan. Bake for 15-20 minutes, until golden.


Purple cauliflower - roasted with olive oil, garlic, and nutrional yeast!



Had a Bell Pepper with Tofu and Walnuts recipe in our recipe book, and we are so glad we finally made it. The filling you could make into a casserole with broccoli and more tofu and mushrooms. We changed the recipe slightly - for the filling we used Bob's Red Mill Grains and Nuts Hot Cereal (instead of rice), added crumbled tofu, chopped mushrooms, onion, Braggs, curry powder, black pepper, garlic, oregano, and celery seed. Served with nutritional yeast.



One of our favorite cuisines is Thai - and this Thai Coconut Stir Fry was so elegant and full of flavor. Another recipe in our recipe stash, and we don't know where we got it from, but we will definetely make this again.

The dish had coconut milk, garlic, snap peas, mushrooms, bell pepper, bok choy, crushed red pepper, lime and lemon zest and juice, onion, some spinach, and soy sauce. We served with long grain brown rice. Love that it was saucy to serve over the rice. Next time we'll try it with broccoli and chinese cabbage!


Finally after many months, we made pizza again! Homemade pizza crust, with local fresh tomatoes, eggplant, bell pepper, onion, and basil, and with lots of garlic and olive oil. This pizza crust is a keeper - soft but chewy, just great flavor and texture.
LK's Homemade Pizza Crust

1 1/2 cup warm water
1 tsp sugar
1 pack dry active yeast
1 Tb olive oil
3/4 tsp salt
2 cup whole wheat flour
1 1/2 cup hard white wheat flour
1 tsp basil
1/2 tsp oregano
fresh rosemary leaves, chopped

Add all ingredients according to your bread machine's directions. Set on dough cycle. When done with dough cycle, flattened into a pizza crust. Place stone in oven to preheat, then add crust to stone and bake at 500 degrees F for only 5 min. Can freeze crusts for easy pizza dinners for the week. To finish the pizza, add toppings, then bake at 425 degrees F for 8-15 min.


Finally, this morning we enjoyed warm tasty Carrot Trail Mix Muffins. We adapted this recipe quite a lot, so here is our version.
LK's Carrot Trail Mix Muffins

1 1/2 Tb ground flaxseed
1/3 cup pineapple juice
1 cup whole wheat pastry flour
1/4 cup wheat germ
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 1/2 tsp cinnamon
pinch of salt
1/4 cup date pieces
2 Tb sunflower seeds
1/2 cup + 1 Tb pineapple, crushed
1 Tb safflower oil
3 Tb agave
1/2 tsp coconut extract (or just vanilla)
1/8 tsp vanilla extract
3/4 cup carrots, finely grated

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Combine pineapple juice and flax in a small bowl and set aside. Combine all dry ingredients in a large bowl and wet ingredients in another bowl. Stir in flax mixture to wet ingredients, then add wet ingredients to dry ingredients. Bake in a mini muffin pan for 15-20 minutes (check for doneness and golden color). Sprinkle cinnamon on top. Makes 12 mini muffins.


We especially like the pineapple as a sweetener. Sunflower seeds added a nice crunch, but we may try walnuts next time. Other ideas: apple butter and currant muffins and pumpkin pineapple muffins.


We are praying for all you Texans who may be affected by Hurricane Ike. We hope you are all safe and well.

God bless, LK

...Quickies...

This post will be short, as we are pressed for time! We have so much to do before we leave tomorrow for Houston to attend a MercyMe concert with our dad, and then go to Oregon (Sunday to Wednesday) for job interviews at Betty Lou's! (Pray for us!). So quick rantings about our recent baking and cooking... (not necessarily quick to make)

We finally made the raw cinnamon rolls that everyone's been enjoying - and they were fabulous! Decadent, spiced, and nutty! We enjoy homemade cinnamon rolls, but those can take long to make, and even though these were no exception, they were well worth it.

We made an orange-cranberry variation, adding orange juice instead of water, adding orange zest in filling, and adding dried cranberries instead of raisins. Awesome orange frosting (almond butter, orange juice, and orange zest)! Very tasty, healthy, and filling. (Tip - drink lots of milk or water with it!) Made lots and froze them. Other variation ideas: maple date/fig with maple frosting; lemon blueberry; vanilla spice; chocolate.


We revisted an old recipe favorite - Thai Tofu Saute. Good flavors and better the next day! Awesome with broccolli, onion, bell peppers, but would be good with snap peas and cabbage. The sauce was really good and made lots. Yum! Served with quinoa.



More veggies... raw that is! We made raw zucchini spaghetti with raw marinara sauce. Marinara sauce included local fresh tomatoes, sun-dried tomatoes, garlic, onions, herbs, bell pepper, mushrooms, and spinach, all pureed (semi-chunky). Shredded a huge local zucchini - so good! It was a refreshing meal, but more like salsa and nothing like a good plate of spaghetti with veggie spaghetti sauce.


... will be back after our travels! LK

Mmm Creamy Delights

Don't you just love the feel of creamy-smooth foods in your mouth? How about soft-fluffy? And sweet-fudgey? And creamy-cooling?


Veganomicon's Pasta Della California was the perfect fresh summer meal, with lots of creamy-smooth avocado. Spiral wheat pasta with chopped broccoli, LOTS of garlic, lime zest and lime juice, spinach... and LOTS of creamy-smooth avocado to hit the spot! Will definetely make again!


Our soft-fluffy delight: Sweet Potato Yeast Bread. Instead of using canned pumpkin for Celine's Pumpkin Yeast Bread, we bought some canned sweet potato puree, added ingredients in our bread machine, and 3 hours later, enjoyed the best bread ever. Seriously! So soft and fluffy with a lovely sweet-potato flavor!

To use up the rest of the sweet potato puree, we made some sweet potato brownies (found recipe online). We underbaked them so much, that they turned out to be sweet potato fudge, but all the more decadent! Sweet and fudgey! We froze them so they would be fudgey yet somewhat firm. You can taste the sweet potato flavor, and it is quite rich. Always good to try new recipes and concoctions, though we think we'll stick to our fudge recipe and just make variations from that.


And we also made creamy ice cream - Strawberry Vanilla! A creamy-cooling treat.

Cheers, LK Sisters