Perfect Roast Potatoes and Other Stuff.

I was in the mood for roast veggies last night so I rushed home from work and made the following: roast potatoes, roast carrots and Tofurky sausages and gravy. I wanted to make perfect roast potatoes so I consulted Jamie Oliver's book The Ministry Of Food. I borrowed a UK copy from my neighbor but if you go on amazon I think the US title is Food Revolution. So anyway, Jamie says to parboil the veg in water for 5-7 minutes and then let the spuds steam in the colander for 2 minutes after they are drained. Then you shake up the colander to bash the spuds a bit so the edges get kind of fluffy which makes them get all nice and crisp in the oven. Then you prepare a baking pan with a few glugs of olive oil, smashed garlic and fresh rosemary. Toss the spuds in the flavored oil, spread in the pan and roast at 425 F for about an hour. I took mine out after 40 minutes because I was in a rush and they were very well cooked and crisp. If I had left them the full hour, they would have been more perfect and crispier I suppose. But even at 40 minutes, they were delicious!!!! I will make roast potatoes this way from now on (and roast for the full hour).

I love you roast potatoes. My husband and I ate a lot and had the rest for lunch today.

Roast carrots, plain and simple.

Also a Tofurky sausage and canned peas. The gravy is my Thanksgiving orange herb gravy. The best.

Condiments are always a part of my dinner table.

Sunday Roast!

Craved a Sunday veggie roast today so I made the perfect roast potatoes, heirloom rainbow carrots, brussels sprouts and cauliflower. And to go on top of all that, Bryanna Clark Grogan's vegan brown gravy. SO GOOD!

So tasty!

For dinner yesterday I made the Spicy Chickpeas and Carrots from the River Cottage Veg cookbook. It has great flavors: cumin, garlic, orange zest, orange juice and smoked paprika.

For supper tonight we had a bunch of lovely things to nibble on. Salad, tomato bruschetta, white bean hummus, agave roasted cherry tomatoes (that I made yesterday) with fresh seeded baguette slices.

Arugula, cranberries, grilled zucchini, grilled mushrooms tossed in a light italian dressing.

Tomato bruschetta which is simply fresh cherry tomatoes, garlic, olive oil and basil, salt and pepper.

Popped open the Moroccan Olive Salad that I bought yesterday from World Market. This stuff is good! Green olives bathed in olive oil, tomato sauce and spices.

All served on seeded baguette slices. I love eating like this so much.

So tasty!

Raw Vegan Wraps.

Healthy wraps for lunch today made with collard greens and zucchini slices as wrappers and two different nut spreads and an assortment of fresh veggies. The spread on the left is the black pepper cashew cheeze (cashews, lemon juice, miso, water, black pepper) from Ani Phyo's raw book. I added yellow miso for some saltiness. The one on the right is the Sun-dried tomato pâté from "You Won't Believe It's Vegan". I didn't have enough sun-dried tomatoes so it's not as red in color but it's got good stuff in it: almonds, sunflower seeds, walnuts, olive oil, parsley, garlic, lemon juice and black olives.

Saturday Taco Lunch, Stir-Fry and Carrot-Nut Muffins.

Had a delicious lunch with my mom and her best friend yesterday. Mom helped make this delicious spread of food. Tacos with sauteed tofu, veggie ground, fresh salsa and guacamole and potato salad. The tomato salad was fresh from Gelson's.

Stir fry using Tofurky sausages flavored with vegetarian stir fry sauce (kinda like oyster sauce) and sweet chili sauce.

Ok, so this was my attempt at making a raw vegan carrot cake with carrots, dates and nuts. All I can say is...FAIL.

So I transformed it into a cooked carrot cake. I just dumped 1 cup of carrot/nut mixture into kittee's vanilla cake recipe (halfing the cake recipe). I saved the rest of the raw cake mixture in the freezer for future use.

Kichadi Soup, Carrot Raisin Salad, Ginger-Date Cake

Enjoying my new Ayurvedic cookbook. In front is kichadi soup. Kichadi is a simple stew of basmati rice and split mung dal which is the core of Ayurvedic nutritional healing. This is a watered down version, cooked very plainly to make a soup. I didn't have split mung dal so I used masoor dal (red lentils) which turned yellow in the soup. The only ingredients in this soup are sunflower oil, basmati rice, lentils, cumin and mustard seeds, sea salt, ground cumin and water. I added minced ginger root, green hot chili peppers and coriander leaves (cilantro) as a topping. The dish in back is also from the cookbook and it's a simple carrot salad with raisins.


I was dying for sweet but didn't want to indulge in something sugar laden so I made this vegan date cake and used extra dates and also date syrup to sweeten. I added lots of grated fresh ginger root for some spiciness. It turned out so moist, almost like gingerbread (without the molasses) and lightly sweet. It's perfect with tea.
Recipe is here. In place of sugar, I added about 9 more dates and used about 1/2 cup date syrup and maybe a tablespoon of grated ginger. I also added a touch more spelt flour to make up for the extra liquid. I'm sure if you up the date syrup, it would be sweeter. Oh, and sub soymilk for the milk of course!

A Moroccan Lunch.

I made two beautiful Moroccan salads for myself today to enjoy on my backyard patio. The one in front is called 'zalouk' which is a cooked eggplant salad with onions, garlic, tomatoes and green peppers flavored with cumin and paprika. The one in back is called 'khizou harra' which is a cooked carrot salad that is flavored with cumin, paprika, lemon, olive oil and cilantro. The zalouk recipe is from 'Olive Trees and Honey' cookbook (one of my absolute favorites!).


Such vibrant color! This carrot salad recipe is from a book called "Food of Morocco".


Served with warm whole wheat bread and a little bit of cauliflower bean dip that I made last week. Gotta have some protein!

Beans on Toast, Steamed Chard and Carrots

I was so tired today after work that I didn't want to do anything fancy for dinner. We heated up some Heinz Beans, steamed some swiss chard and carrots and called it dinner. Simple but very satisfying.

Moroccan Carrot-Orange Salad

My cousin Oraphan (of Easy Veggie blog) came to my dad's b-day party on Saturday and made this beautiful salad. I loved it so much. Hers was flavored with orange, lemon juice, olive oil, sugar, cinnamon, raisins and pine nuts! I re-created it this morning and didn't remember the exact proportions of ingredients but I was able to add little by little until it tasted just right. The bright citrus notes of the lemon and orange contrasted beautifully with the sweet carrot and spicy cinnamon. I added agave syrup to mine instead of sugar and toasted almonds instead of pine nuts. This salad is very refreshing and perfect for a mild spring day like today.

Edited to add recipe.

This is approximately what I did to make this salad:

3-4 carrots, grated
1 orange, peel and pith removed, cut into chunks
juice of 1/2 a lemon
1 TB olive oil
1 TB agave syrup (you may use less to cut down on sweetness)
pinch of salt
1/4 tsp of ground cinnamon
1/4 cup raisins
1/4 cup sliced almonds

Mix all ingredients together and chill.