Bar Stocking, Potlucking, and Ice Cream Making

Before I head out of town for a long weekend, I though I would share what I've been up to in the kitchen....

Here are the tiramisu cupcakes I made for an "stock the bar" engagement party. The engagement actually happened in Italy, so I thought these were appropriate. They might be my favorite from VCTOTW, although it's so hard to choose just one!

On Saturday night we hosted a small potluck to show appreciation for everyone involved in our Go Vegan art car. For an appetizer I cut up some of Julie's sausages and simply sauteed them and served them with a mustard sauce. These were a big hit.

My main course contribution was Isa's broccoli quiche from her upcoming brunch book. Oh I love her so much for sharing this recipe before the book is available. I added some tempeh bacon and a healthy dose of nutritional yeast. I was so sad to see it go so fast at the potluck, so I made another one last night.

Here's my plate from the potluck.... homemade bread with avocado butter, pasta salad, pineapple slaw, fruit, quiche, and mac and cheese (with peace sign pasta!). I had another plate with lasagna and tamales as well!

For dessert, I tried to recreate something I saw at one of our favorite cafes here in Houston (Brasil), a mini cake with chocolate base layer, fresh fruit (strawberries and blueberries), and topped with chocolate mousse (from VCTOTW). The presentation needs some work, but the taste was right on.

I finally broke down and bought an ice cream maker, an attachment for my Kitchen Aid standmixer (anyone use that one?). The last time I made ice cream was in high school chemistry class!! This try turned out well except I learned a valuable lesson, big chunks of strawberries in your strawberry chocolate chip ice cream cause major brain freeze and tooth pain! I also need to figure out a storage system since my ice cream developed ice crystals; I'm assuming because I didn't have an airtight seal. But, nonetheless, with temperatures soaring here, this is just what I needed when I walked in the door after work.

Tomorrow we leave for a San Francisco to attend the soldout VegNews launch party and then onto Las Vegas for the remainder of the weekend. Who knows, maybe I'll come back a millionaire. At least I'll come back with a tummy full of Ronald's vegan donuts....

One Year of Blogging

I had so many good intentions of a big one year blogiversary post. But with my business travel to Calgary last week, a busy weekend of running around, and top of everything getting a cold for the first time this year, it just didn't happen. Suffice it to say that the last year of blogging has been a wonderful experience and I thank every one of you who visits the blog and takes the time to read my sometimes random monologues. I have gotten so much more out of blogging than I had ever imagined, and for that I am thankful. (**here's the part where I blow out my imaginary candle and wish for many more years of productive, entertaining blogging**)

Over the weekend, we celebrated Earth Day with our local vegan society (Society of PEACE) with an all vegan picnic in the park! Everyone brought their families and we had about 40 people turn out on a gorgeous spring day. The picnic was BYOP&S (plates and silverware) in order to be more Earth friendly :-) Here's my plate, filled with a veggie dog (provided by SOP), twinkie, enchiladas, prospect park potato salad (from Vcon, which I made), fruit salad, green curry w/potatoes and chickpeas, broccoli salad, cabbage salad, and macaroni salad. More food came after I got my plate, and I tried a few including a bean salad, lentils and rice, and local green salad. All very yum.

The afternoon was full of lots of eating, chatting about veganism in Houston, and watching the kids (and adults) run around and play. Here's John and I... me with my dessert plate that included carrot cake, fat free chocolate cake, and chocolate peanut butter cookies. Like my new Vegan shirt from Cosmo's?

Just to prove that I haven't solely been living off of potluck food, here's some food from my kitchen.... Dinner last week of cumin lime tofu (from ED&BV), sauteed french green beans, and a baked sweet potato. I loved the tofu, especially with the crunchy pumpkin seeds on top. This will definitely be made again.

And I was a lucky recipient of some sourdough starter from the amazing Bazu!! John is a huge fan of sourdough, so he was especially excited to see this arrive in it's little green package (with a cute origami figure) in the mail. I began by making some sourdough pancakes to familiarize myself with the whole process. These were light and fluffy with a nice hint of sour. See all those instructions by the plate?!? I love how baking is a science. The next challenge will be making the crusty San Francisco style sourdough bread. You have not heard the last about sourdough here. Thanks so much Bazu for the starter!!

And finally, while in Calgary last week I had some roasted beets and asked myself why I had never made any on my own. I took care of that last night. Just a simple salad with mixed greens, walnuts, shredded carrots, and a maple balsamic vinaigrette. The beets are topped with a bit of sea salt. And to imagine I hated beets as a child....

Hope everyone did a something kind for the planet today..... Happy Earth Day!

PPK: The Texas Gathering

That's right, a room full of vegans with lots of homemade vegan food, two adorable chihuahuas named Charlie and Betsy, the game Apples to Apples, and all in Texas! This past weekend I made the drive up to Austin to attend a ppk potluck, done up Texas style. I made cupcake toppers especially for the event (oh, and cupcakes too... lemon macadamia with lemon buttercream and chocolate with peanut butter filling and chocolate ganash), because every Texas event has to include our lone-star studded flag (and here is a fun factoid for yall, we are the only state allowed to fly the Texas flag at the same height as the US flag because we entered the nation by a treaty rather than annexation).

Look at all the food!! For more food porn, visit here.

Here is my plate, I think I sampled pretty much every dish that was there. Let's see if I can remember them all (from the top moving clockwise): lasagna, macaroni salad, tempeh salad (which I also made), fruit, pasta salad with tofu, enchiladas, and in the center some carrots with ranch dip. I ate my dessert plate so fast I didn't take a picture, but I had a toffee bar, a chocolate chip cookie, and a cupcake.
And since someone asked for the recipe on the ppk boards, I figured I would list it here too. All ingredient amounts are approximate since I usually just toss them in and taste test until it's right. There were a few tempeh virgins at the potluck, and I didn't hear any complaints!
Southern Tempeh Salad
Ingredients:
1 8 oz. package of tempeh
1/2 cup vegan mayo
1 T vegan sour cream (optional)
2 T chopped fresh dill
1 T fresh lemon juice
salt and pepper to taste
1/2 cup chopped celery
1/2 cup red graped, halved
1/2 cup walnuts, roughly chopped

1. Cut the tempeh into cubes and steam for approximately 10 to 12 minutes. Place tempeh in a bowl. Mash the tempeh with a fork so that no whole cubes remain.
2. Once the tempeh has cooled a bit, add mayo, sour cream , dill and lemon juice. Adjust amounts as necessary.
3. Add chopped celery, grapes, and walnuts and combine. Season with salt and pepper. 4. Chill and serve.

Here's the Texas Gathering crew! I had fun getting to know other ppkers/Texas vegans. Of course, we all kept forgetting everyone's actual names and called them instead by the ppk name. I almost made cupcake toppers with everyone's avatar... next time I guess. Hopefully at our next gathering, I won't be the only Houstonian!

And a trip to Austin in the spring wouldn't be complete without gratuitous bluebonnet pictures. I thought about posing one of my little cuppies with them (as pretty much every parent does with their child), but was afraid the sun might melt the buttercream. Can you spot the ladybug that instead posed for me in the picture?

A special thanks to the ppkers who organized and hosted this monumental event!

Vegan Sweets and Eats Potluck! <3 And an Online Door Prize!

So I'm going to start off this post the same way we started our Vegan Sweets and Eats Potluck.... you get to guess how many chocolate mint lentils (you can buy them online here) are in the jar! Yes, you have a slight disadvantage in that you only have this photo (and at an odd angle too), but give it your best shot! I have a door prize to give out to whoever is the closest, so just leave your guess in a comment and I'll announce the winner on V-day. Those of you who were at the party are not eligible :-)


This was Society of PEACE's First Annual (which hopefully means there will be a second annual) Vegan Eats and Sweets Valentine potluck, hosted by yours truly! It was such a fun event to plan, what to get for door prizes, what food to make, and decorating the house with different shades of red and pink carnations (a much under appreciated flower).

To start with, the food. Everything was delicious. So many people kept remarking how good the food was and how we need to do these potluck things more often. I couldn't agree more. They are the perfect way to socialize with other veg*ns and get new recipe ideas. Below are only some of the dishes that we enjoyed, including raw cashew dip with fruit, hummus with pita chips and veggies, sweet potato fried, dahl, chili, stuffed mushrooms, and sushi. Not pictured were spring rolls, green bean salad, and some other Indian lentil thing that I totally forgot the name of (even though I asked two or three times)! Even though there was a ton of food, it all disappeared so quickly. Guess it was just that good.

To satisfy the vegan sweet tooth (cuz you know I have one!) there were dried apricots, two kinds of chocolate cupcakes, and peanut butter bombs. Thank goodness I saved a few cupcakes, the last one will be devoured tonight by me!!

After everyone stuffed themselves silly, it was time for door prizes! We had some great stuff; Cherrybrook Kitchen brownie, cookie, and cake mixes, Endangered Species chocolates, a Vegalicious calendar, a copy of Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World, and the latest issue of Vegetarian Times.

Best of all, we had up for grabs some of the adorable artwork of Mrs. Cakespy! She did a custom mini-watercolor of a vegan cupcake baker, just for the occasion (you simply must enlarge it by clicking on the photo or the previous link to truly appreciate it's cuteness)! Lucky for you, she even has this design (and another cute vegan themed one) on her cafepress site in the form of a T-shirt and magnets. I picked up a couple of the magnets for door prizes as well.


And no one went home empty handed, Mrs. Cakespy was sweet enough to let me use the watercolor design on a Vegan Sweets recipe booklet that everyone got to submit their favorite sweet recipe to before it was printed. A cute and useful keepsake!


And there is another shot of the lentil jar for you to ponder over, enlarge, and count individual lentils (dang, I'm giving you ideas!). Get your guess in by 9pm CST on Feb 14!!

A Taste of Things to Come...

I have been desperately trying to catch up on everyone's blogs (I'll get there, promise!), but it has been so gorgeous outside today that I had to get out and enjoy it for a little while. I just got the book Striking at the Roots: A Practical Guide to Animal Activism and enjoyed relaxing on a blanket in the sun and reading about vegan outreach techniques, such as leafleting! Yesterday I was busy getting ready for our Vegan Sweets and Eats Potluck party. It was such a great time, I promise a post by tomorrow night. But here's a sneak peak.... what could be hiding inside my cupcake? (thanks mom for finding this for me!)

Why they're vegan chocolate mint lentils! And this information may be of some help to you later... radius = 7mm; height = 4.5 mm; cubic close packing structure (ok, not really, just wanted to use a mineralogy term to show how nerdy I am)

Now get away from your computer and enjoy what's left of the weekend!

Houston Vegan Potluck

That's right, you read the title correctly. A vegan potluck in Houston! When I first became vegan I thought I might be the only one in the city, but there are actually quite a few of us. The Houston vegan meetup group hosted a potluck last night at a gracious member's home. There was a wonderful variety of vegan food and it was a good time chatting with other Houston vegans. Here is a peak at plate #1:



The food includes (from the left): chickpea patty (which I brought, see below), Ethiopian food with injera bread, veggie sushi, mini-sandwich with hummus and deli "meat", three different kinds of tofu, and beans with veggies dogs. I gobbled up all the food and went for seconds, which included a Santa Fe green chile casserole and General Tao's tofu. Yum!! Here's plate #2:

And of course, who can resist vegan desserts. Here are the desserts I sampled, a vegan cheesecake, some kind of tart (must find out, it was delish), and chocolate cake. I was stuffed by the end of the night.

Here are the dishes I contributed, including Moroccan Chickpea Patties from Vive Le Vegan, served with Sesame Mustard Tahini Sauce. These were delicious and I thought the spices added a unique flavor, we will definitely be making them again. I also brought the Maple-Mustard-Glazed Potatoes and String Beans from VWAV that I've blogged about before. Love those, they are the perfect potluck food.

And of course I had to bring a dessert. I tried out Vivacious Vegan's recent post, the Best Vegan Brownies Ever. I have to say I must agree with the name! I used pecans instead of walnuts and topped them with some powdered sugar. They disappeared from the plate very quickly, a good thing because I'm trying (regardless of the dessert plate you saw) to cut back on sweets since this past week full of cupcakes.



The evening was a great experience. I can't wait for my next vegan potluck (which I think will be in September!), it is such a nice way to discover new types of food, share recipes, and meet new people.