Happy Thanksliving!

We are late to the party as usual... :)  We had our Thanksgiving dinner on Saturday instead of Thursday so we could have some extended family and friends join us.  It was so nice to have a house full of people relaxing and celebrating!  Over the last month we have had a multitude of changes in our lives, I recently went back to work and we are currently in the process of moving (Staying local just moving about 5 minutes from where we were), but going back to work means my daughter had to go to enroll in preschool which is a big change for her and add all the fun and jitters of a new job for me and stress of moving... Ugh!  It was so nice to set all of that aside for one day and just relax and hang out, even if I did have to go sifting through unpacked boxes for my potato masher and the kids had to eat picnic style in the living room because we don't have furniture in that room yet... it was all good!

So on to the feast!

 
I made a homemade seitan roast similar to this one from the PPK  and silly girl that I am I was worried it wouldn't turn out and we would be left with nothing to eat so we picked up a store bought Tofurkey roast,
for a back up, as it turns out I worried for nothing the roast I made was delish and even pleased the palates of our non veg friends.  The Tofurky roast was bland and over chewy in comparison to the delish homemade one... lesson learned!



I was lazy with the gravy and just went with the store bought Tofurkey brand gravy which was so good over my garlic mashed potatoes, stuffing and the roast.  Big fluffy dinner rolls were perfect for dipping the the yummy yummy gravy.

I did roasted veggies to go with the roast which were brussel sprouts, cauliflower and carrots they were tossed with bunches of minced garlic, seasonings and olive oil and then roasted until soft, about an hour. 

My special occasion green beans are always included at holiday meals and were so easy to make vegan, simply sub the butter for Earth Balance.  Take about a pound of fresh green beans, you put 1/2 a stick earth balance into a large heavy skillet and once melted and bubbly throw in a 1/2 cup shaved almonds and 1/2 cup pepitas (shelled pumpkin seeds) toast those for about 5 minutes and then toss in your beans combine them really well so the earth balance is well distributed and let cook for around 5 more minutes or until the beans are as soft or as crisp as you like them, add salt to taste.

Candied yams are a Thanksgiving staple and were crazy easy to make vegan, just sub the marshmallows for vegan Dandies brand marshmallows and you're done!

My sons' birth father was in town and this was the first time in about 5 years that he has gotten to spend Thanksgiving with his sons so it was important to us to put off our feast until he could join us.  He is DEFINITELY not vegan, though when he is here he does try to be supportive of his sons' choices.   He made us a delish tart homemade cranberry sauce and whipped up a vegan cornbread stuffing with tempeh in place of his usual choice of sausage. 




For dessert I made my traditional chocolate pudding pie,  I've been making this pie every year for Thanksgiving since I was like 14.  For years I have made this pie using an Oreo cookie crust, Jello chocolate pudding mix and Cool whip on top.  But this like just about everything else is so easy to veganize.  I couldn't find a cookie crust at the healthfood store I was shopping at so I just decided to  go with a traditional pie crust and found some that were vegan in the freezer case.  I used organic chocolate pudding mix, and mixed with Silk's organic soy milk, topped with Soyatoo stick it in the freezer for 2 hours or so and then... revel in the amazing simpleness that is my favorite pie :)
 



I also made this crazy simple pumpkin pie from The Lunch Box Bunch that disappeared quickly and a raw vegan cheesecake , we were not in love with the cheesecake.  I used almonds instead of walnuts for the crust as my little dude is allergic to walnuts and it was just too nutty for us.  The texture of this cheesecake was spot on, it just didn't have enough of that "cheesecakey tang" so I want to try to work with it some more.  We are not raw by any means so I think pairing this filling with a vegan graham cracker crust and maybe doubling the lemon juice in the filling and we will get that "tang" we were missing.  






It was a great evening, we all ate way too much, enjoyed some drinks, card games, the company of friends and family and the spirit of being thankful for all that we have.  I am thankful for my beautiful children, for my furry babies, for my amazing husband, for the best friend a girl could wish for, for my wonderful new friends to make new memories with, our new home and that I was able to find a job easily and quickly to ensure we will not struggle financially to keep this roof over my family's heads. I am also thankful that my family is vegan, that we opened our eyes and our hearts to the millions of animals that suffer daily for our choices and that I have learned that I can put on a spread like this... made with love without causing harm to anyone.

Wishing you all the the warmest wishes this holiday season.

Mc Mama's Vegan Breakfast Sammies!

Time to share my favorite yummy breakfast sammies!!  


Making these for my husband helped him kick his Mcdonalds breakfast mcmuffin addiction.  This is the typical artery clogging breakfast he would have from McDonalds several times a week:  http://www.mcdonalds.com/us/en/food/full_menu/breakfast/sausage_mcMuffin_egg.html  These sammies require some prep work, so I usually make them in batches that last about a week so that everything is in the fridge and ready to go.  Once it's all prepped and marinated it's so easy to whip them up!

Step One: Making the egg substitute.

You need:

• 1 block of extra firm tofu.  Frozen, thawed and then pressed or squeezed until all the water is out. 
• Apple cider vinegar (about a cup)
• Nutritional yeast (about a cup)
• Dijon mustard (about 3-4 tablespoons)
• Tumeric (about a tablespoon)
• and about 1 teaspoon each garlic powder, onion powder, sea salt and pepper

In a resealable container mix apple cider vinegar, yeast and mustard.  Play around with the measurements until you have something that resembles mayo in texture and consistency.  Add the other spices and mix well.



Slice the tofu into about 1/4-1/2 slabs and dip in mixture to coat them really well and then line them up in the container cover and refrigerate overnight.



Step Two:  Making the "bacon"
I use the recipe from Vegan with a Vengeance for fakin' bac'n.  I don't always have what I need on hand so I just go with what I have. This time around I didn't have tomato paste so I just skipped it and I was out of fresh garlic so I just put in a dash of garlic salt instead.



You will need:

• 3 tablespoons braggs, or tamari, or soy sauce
• 1/3 cup apple cider
• 1 teaspoon tomato paste
• 1/4 teaspoon liquid smoke
• 1 8 oz package tempeh
• 2 cloves of crushed garlic
• 2 tablespoons peanut or vegetable oil

Slice the tempeh into thin strips.  Mix all the remaining ingredients in a resealable container and add tempeh.  Cover and let marinate at least an hour or two overnight is best.



The tofu and the tempeh will keep for about 5-6 days in the fridge.


Step 3:  Cooking and assembly

You need a few more ingredients for the final product:

• English muffins or sourdough bread
• Veganaise
• Tomato slices
• Avocado slices
• Soy cheese slice (I was out of cheese today so mine are sans cheese)
• Olive oil for cooking

Heat some olive oil in a large skillet and then brown your tofu slabs and bac'n until they are nice and crispy on both sides (about 3-5 mins per side).


While they are cooking slice your veggies, and spread a thin layer of mayo on your bread of choice.

After the tofu and bac'n are done remove from pan and set aside, I like to brown the bread in the oil and if you assemble the sammie and try to do it then you will have a mess on your hands when you try to flip it :)  So I learned to brown the two sides of the bread BEFORE assembly, I guess you could toast them in a toaster but doing it this way you get a kind of deli grilled sammie feel.

Ok so bread toasted, start stacking it on

 
and the last step is: TO DIG IN AND ENJOY!!

Simple Dinners: Enchilada Casserole

Time is never on my side... as evidenced by the fact that is has been way too long since my last blog post.  Lately I need meals to come together quickly and taste good because I don't have time for dinner meltdowns over who doesn't want to eat what.  My oldest son for some reason absolutely hates enchiladas, any enchiladas I have made in the past have resulted in one of those dreaded dinner table meltdowns.  Not because the enchiladas are bad... (I know you were thinking it!) because everyone else in the house gobbles them up with relish.  He just has an aversion to enchiladas, which really sucks for him because the rest of us love them.  So last night I was craving enchiladas but really didn't want to go to the time and trouble of rolling them all up, plus I still have very vivid memories of my hands in flames from the last time I made some.  I made green chili chick'n enchiladas with jalapenos in the sauce and OMG my hands BURNED for two days after wrapping all those up.  So I wanted all the yum of enchiladas without the work... typical huh lol.  Then the answer came to me:
"Enchilada Casserole!" YES!! Enchilada Casserole!  It came together very quickly with about 10 minutes in prep time, there was very little clean up involved, NO ROLLING of enchiladas and best of all my oldest surprised the heck out of me and wolfed it down and asked for more!

So here you are Vegan Enchilada Casserole:

Ingredients:

1. 1 can vegan refried beans (Amy's has a good one)
2. 1 can black beans
3. 1 can or the frozen equiv corn
4. 1 can (the 15 oz one not the huge one) enchilada sauce
5. 1 can diced tomatoes
6. 1 package vegan tortillas/wraps whole grain/spinach... whatever you have will work.  The spinach wraps would add some pretty color.  You need about 12 if you use the smaller ones or 8 if you use the larger 10" ones
7. 1 package pepperjack Daiya
8. Olive oil for bottom of pan

Instructions:

1. Heat oven to 350
2. Heat up your refried beans (they are easier to spread around when warm) and corn in separate bowls in the microwave or pans on the stove
3. Put enough olive oil in the bottom of a 13x9 casserole pan to coat
4. Pour about 1/2 of your enchilada sauce into the pan
5. In a large bowl mix (or the pot you warmed the corn up in if it's big enough) mix the remaining sauce, drained black beans, drained tomatoes, and corn together.
6. Slice your tortillas/wraps in half (a pizza cutter works great for this) so you have a flat edge and then lay down a single layer to cover the bottom of your pan.  You can slice a few into quarters if you need to to cover the corners
7. Layer 1/2 of the refried beans onto the tortillas you just laid down
8. Do another layer of tortillas
9. Cover this later with 1/2 of the black beans/sauce mixture
10. Add a good handful of your Daiya over the layer (About 1/3 of the bag)
11. Add another layer of tortillas
12. Cover with remaining refried beans
13. Add another layer of tortillas
14. Cover with remaining black bean/sauce mixture
15. Add another 1/3 of the Daiya to this layer
16. Cover with a final layer of tortillas and then add the rest of the Daiya to the top
17. Bake for 30 minutes and let it cool for about 10 minutes before slicing it up (the layers stay together better if you let it sit for a few minutes before cutting into it.

 You can top this with black olives, avocado slices, vegan sour cream and a sprig of cilantro for plating. 

Mason Jar Salads with DIY Annie's Organics Roasted Garlic Vinaigrette

So hubby is on a BIG salad kick lately, like he's been eating BUSHELS of salad!  We make them up days in advance in mason jars. They stay crisp and fresh for about a week this way and they are quick and easy for him to grab one from the fridge in his mad dash out the door in the mornings.  We use lots of fresh organic veggies from our weekly produce box (we use Full Circle) and make super tasty healthy salads, the only drawback has been the dressing was getting pretty expensive.  He likes Annie's Organics Roasted Garlic Vinaigrette which runs about $5 a bottle and we've been going through about 2 a week.  So I decided to make my own today when making his salads.  The recipe is down at the bottom of this post :)

The salads have the following:
2 radishes
1 beet
1 carrot
1/2 a HUGE cucumber (if yours are smaller use a whole one)
2-3 cups of greens
and some thing crunchy on top (I rotate different kinds of nuts or seeds)

I set up all my fixins assembly line style and get to chopping.  You want to put all the "hard" veggies in the bottom of the jars, I usually stack radishes first, then beets, then carrots. 

Once you have all those chopped pour your dressing in until you have enough to barely cover them.  They will kind of pickle in the dressing while they wait for you to eat them over the week, trust me this is a good thing... it's sooo good! Also those are the veggies that won't get all soggy if they sit in dressing for days, you def don't want your dressing to touch your greens.

After you have your dressing in dice your cukes and put those in, then hand tear your greens and shove em it (don't be afraid to mash them in there, they will bounce back I promise!).  If you want to add things like chopped tomatoes, maybe some beans, quinoa or some avocado you have treated with lemon juice put those in BEFORE you put in the greens.  If you want to use grape or cherry tomatoes add those on TOP of the greens and then top with nuts and seeds. 

Then just screw on your tops and store in the fridge.  We have eaten these as many as 6 days after prepping them and they were still crisp and tasty. 

If you've never worked with beets before, don't be alarmed by the bloody hand look you will soon be sporting... and I HIGHLY suggest not wearing your favorite white t-shirt when prepping these unless you are wearing an apron... just take my word for it :)

Five beautiful healthy organic salads to nourish my hungry hubby all week.

The dressing!!

Try to use organic ingredients if possible.

Roasted Garlic Vinaigrette:

2 big ass heads of garlic, roasted for about 30 minutes
1 cup evoo
1/2 cup vinegar (I used plain white)
1/2 cup water
4tbsp lemon juice
1tsp sea salt
2 tsp fresh ground pepper
1 tbsp parsley
2 tbsp agave
1/4 tsp xanthan gum *I debated putting this in,  but I had it on hand so I did.  It is a thickener and binder and I wanted this dressing to be as close to the original my husband loves.


Once your garlic is roasted squeeze them out of the skins into your blender and then add all the other ingredients and blend. 

This made me 3 cups of dressing which was enough to dress all those salads pretty heavily and fill up the empty Annie's bottle to put back in the fridge.  Now get on with your happy salad eating self!

Tofu Scramble for Miniature Vegans aka a Tofu Scramble Your Kids Will Actually Eat

Ahhh tofu scramble... nothing screams breakfast more to me these days than a delish tofu scramble served with breakfast potatoes and a slice of toast.  However, my kids and I have VERY different ideas about what is delish... see to me this:


is a FABULOUS tofu scramble, but to my kids it is reason to run away from the table screaming.  "Ahhhh mom... what are all those bits!?"  "What are the yellow ones?"  "What are the red ones!?"  "Tomatoes, mom you know I hate tomatoes unless it's ketchup!"  "Mom you know avocado makes me barf!"  "Spinach!  Mom WHO eats spinach for breakfast!"


Sigh... so I decided to make a tofu scramble just for them with no "bits" of anything, no "barfy" stuff lol, no spinach... just a tofu scramble that in my opinion is scarily close to real scrambled eggs. 

It was super easy to throw together, only a handful of ingredients and the kids ate it all for breakfast this morning and asked for more!

Tofu Scramble Your Kids Will Eat 

• 1 Block of extra firm tofu
• 1/2 tsp tumeric 
• 1/2 tsp BLACK salt black salt is the key in making these actually taste like eggs!  It is sulfury and tastes like egg yolks!  I buy it in the bulk section of my local health food store. 
• 1tsp onion powder because the kids like the taste of food cooked in onions but not the oniony bits!
• 1 tsp ground mustard
• 1 tbsp nutritional yeast
• Some fresh cracked black pepper to taste  If your kids get wigged out by the little black bits from pepper in their food you can try white pepper which adds the same flavors but is sneaky invisible! 
  
• 2 tbsp almond milk, added in at the end I'm sure any non dairy milk will work, I just had almond on hand today

So I want to tell you first; DON'T freak out about pressing your tofu for this dish!  Somethings like tofu steaks and patties etc... yes you need to press out the water to cut it and maintain the tofu's shape, but with a scramble you are mashing the hell out of it anyway so it really doesn't matter.  The trick is to cook off the water!  So open your tofu, drain and hand squeeze what water you can out of it.  Then crumble it into your pan.  You want to heat it over a med high heat and you will start to see the water coming out of the tofu like in the photo below.

Once you start to see the water releasing you want to keep cooking it, stirring occasionally until all the water cooks off (about 3-5 minutes).  Then it should look like this:

Add the rest of your ingredients and cook for about 5 more minutes.  

It all looked a little dry to me so I added a splash of almond milk and stirred that around and cooked for like a minute or two more.  The result was this:

 A tofu scramble my kids actually ate!  And tell me that does not look just like scrambled eggs!? 

Plated with some breakfast potatoes, fruit and toast I was very pleased with what we put in their bellies this morning!

Family fun at Silverwood or as I have come to call it SilverWON'T

We took the kids to Silverwood last week and while we did have a really great time for the two days we spent there there was one thorn in my side about the trip... and that was the lack of vegan food and the lack of information about vegan options in the park.  That and coming from a girl who grew up in California with access to Disneyland, Magic Mountain, Universal Studios, Knott's Berry Farm, Six Flags, WaterWorld, Raging Waters and more I have HIGH expectations when it comes to theme parks and Silverwood ALWAYS seems to fall short for me, it just seems like a slightly more upscale version of your State Fair and when compared to the cost of parks that offer so much more than they do I find them HIGHLY over priced.  However... it is the ONLY game in town here so folks line up with their money in hand to get in and spend the day.  My kids are young enough that they don't really remember how awesome the theme parks in California are so they absolutely LOVE Silverwood and I try my best to enjoy it vicariously through their eyes. There is the amusement park side with a couple roller coasters, a small area with 5 or 6 tame rides for the littlest kiddos, a log ride, super fun river raft ride (which is always our favorite!), bumper cars and bumper boats, a couple of your typical spin-you-around-until-you-want-to-vomit type rides, carnival games, a train tour and carousel. And then on the other side of the park is a waterpark with some really great watersides, two wave pools, an awesome lazy river and super cool kids play area/climbing structure with big and little kid slides.  Honestly if it wasn't for the waterpark part of Silverwood I would not even want to go, the waterpark is the best thing it has going for it.  We spent HOURS floating the lazy river, and there is a swim up bar (yippee!) so you can get yourself a fruity adult beverage to float around with :)  Just make sure you figure out a way to bring some money in your swim suit (hello boobies!)  Note to mamas:  The waves in the wave pools can get CRAZY, I stayed towards the "shore" with my 3 year old and my 7 year old ended up going out a bit too far, got caught up in the sideways waves they were making at the time and had to have a lifeguard jump in after him all while I was stuck in the shallows with the little one.  I felt like such a horrible mom in that moment, what do you do??? Leave the little one alone and go in after him?  Well in the 10 seconds it took me to work it through in my mind the lifeguard jumped in and pulled him out and he was fine, no worse for wear just a little embarrassed.  He can swim but those waves were just too much for him, so I told him he always has to wear a vest in the wave pool no matter what.  I would recommend the same for any kids going into those wave pools that are not exceptionally strong swimmers, in fact I think it should be a policy of the park.  As big and strong as they make those waves, it is just way too easy for kids to get stuck in them.  Just my little FYI so you don't experience that same moment of terror I had.  Aside from that moment of drama we really enjoyed ourselves, my 3 year old Bella decided she was a mermaid and never wanted to leave the water.  She swam and played in the water so much both days that when we finally forced her out she was falling asleep within minutes :)

Anyway about the food... I wanted to plan ahead and know what was vegan to eat from the stands and restaurants within the park so I wrote to management a week before we were going and asked what they had to offer vegans to eat in the park.  The response I got back was so lacking in information or help it really kind of pissed me off.  This is the was the email conversation I had with the park staff:

Hello, my family is planning a visit to Silverwood and I would like to find out if any of the restaurants offer vegan dining options? Please let me know what, if any, vegan items are served in your park. A vegan item is one that is free of any animal flesh or animal derived ingredients such as eggs and dairy products (milk, cheese, cream etc).

Also are wagons allowed in the park?

Thank you in advance for your help.

Ash Menacho
Silverwood Theme Park 

Ash,

 

We do have salads and some menu items that would work with your vegan diet. It will take some work on you part and we would recommend you speak with an employee before ordering so you can make sure that what you are getting will work for you. The other option is to just pack your own food and eat is out in the grassy area next to our parking lot. We do have a few table out there as well as plenty of room for a blanket picnic.

So it took them almost a week to get back to me and I started to wonder if they would ever write back so I called and spoke to someone who said they had "No idea what might be vegan in the park" and suggested we bring in our own food.  If you have food allergies or other dietary restrictions you can pack food into the park if you leave it in the fridge within the first aid center, you just have to go back there to get it when you want to eat.  Be advised you can NOT take a cooler into the park.  You can take your food in in ANYTHING but a cooler (we learned the hard way).  


When we got into the park I stopped to look at the menus at a couple of the places and there was NOTHING suitable, even the salads they mentioned in the email (which btw I didn't receive until the first day we were already at the park... lot of good that did us :/) were covered in meat and cheese.  As a mom with 3 kids I did not appreciate knowing that if I wanted to eat from the places in the park I would have to stop at each place and try to figure out if there was anything vegan there and if not then haul my hungry kids to the next place in an endless cycle of trying to find something to eat... it just seemed like it would turn into such a nightmare for us and totally take away from the fun and relaxation we were trying to enjoy on our trip. 

So we decided to take our own and I spent the better part of the day before we left preparing the food for our trip.  We decided to take our own food for every meal and snacks, rather than take any chances on not being able to find something to eat there.  My love of packing and list making and organization kicked in and I decided to just make the best of it and have fun making sure everyone had enough yummy fun food for 2 days.

I started off with a rough draft of the meal planning

Breakfast for Gabe Day 1 - Cereal in Ziploc "bowl," spoon, poptart and banana.

Once I had the meals planned I got to packing.  Each person had a Ziploc for each meal for the day and one for snacks.

Those then when into big grocery bags for each meal each day.

 And each bag was labeled to let me know what meal it was.
This is Breakfast for Day 2

A days worth of meals.  The ones that were getting left in the fridges in the park had our last name on them as well.

Lunches for the kids consisted of homemade Uncrustables, chips, cookies and pudding.

Grownups had Tofurkey, Daiya, and lettuce sandwiches with vegan mayo.
Hint:  Put your mayo in between slices of Tofurkey or cheese (not right on the bread)
to keep your sandwich bread from getting all nasty and soggy. 
I packed these sandwiches for lunches both days and the ones for day two
were just as yummy and fresh as the ones from the prior day.

Snacks were Primal vegan jerky, vegan fruit snacks, fruits and vegan "Pocky Sticks."













Pocky Sticks are a treat that my kids used to love but are not are not vegan, so I make my own with breadsticks and chocolate peanut butter.  The kids LOVE these.

Please ignore my messy counters I was prepping
all this food at once in a big hurry :)

For dinner each night we had salad jars.  I chopped red onions and radishes and put those on the bottom, then covered them with dressing (those got really nicely pickled in the dressing), next came carrots the quinoa and then greens, tomatoes and some garbanzos.  There might not look like there is much in those jars but you really shove and pack it in there and there is 3 heads/bunches of greens divided between he two jars.





Each night for dinner I went up to the counter at the BBQ place and asked for the paper "boats" and then I plated the salads.  Each jar held enough for me to make 4 salads this size out of.

Amy's vegan chili, corn, quinoa and garbanzo
beans made up our "tacos"

Dinner the first night was sandwiches and salads and on the second night we had "cold walking tacos" which I made from tortilla chips placed into the paper boats and then covered with cold chili, tomatoes, corn, quinoa and beans.  I packed some hot sauce packets we had laying around from Taco Bell for Mike and I to spice ours up.  They were really good, easy and filling but I totally forgot to take a pic of them all plated up :(

The breakfast cereal was eaten out of Ziploc "bowls."  I simply packed a portion of cereal in a baggie with a plastic spoon and when it was time to eat poured in a little soy or chocolate coconut milk.  The kids all did really well eating cereal like this, I was worried it would end up in a big mess but even my 3 year old was able to eat it without making a mess.  We even ate these in the car on the way down the first morning and not a drop was spilled.

Campfire Cuddles!

That's my daredevil hubs in the backcar of the coaster.

Me and my munchkins <3 :)

This one may have had a bit TOO much fun hehe

All in all we had a great trip, I just really REALLY wish that the park would make available a list of items that people with dietary restrictions can look at and decide what if anything they can eat in the park.  I have since written to them requesting they do just that as of yet no response to that email.

Goodbye Silverwood!