I'm moving!!!!

I love blogging all my vegan recipes, but I have gotten accustomed to using wordpress for blogging purposes thanks to evilgeeks.com, so will be moving my vegan blogging there as well. The new website: http://crunchyvegan.wordpress.com/

Hazelnut Vegan Chicken Pesto Pasta

The recipe from tonight was used almost identically from Meettheshannons, my favorite vegan food blog. I used TJs chickenless strips for my fake chicken. http://www.meettheshannons.net/2012/03/hazelnut-pesto-with-vegan-chicken.html

buffalo chicken pizza and another mexican pizza

I made this extremely unhealthy pizza once before, and made it again for pizza night this last week, it was a huge hit as always! Basically I mixed together my favorite ranch dressing recipe (all vegan naturally-http://kblog.lunchboxbunch.com/2009/04/vegan-ranch-dressing-and-dip.html) and spread this over the bottom of the rolled out pizza dough. Then I cooked 1 package of TJs chickenless strips in some olive oil, and then soaked it in 1/2 a container of vegan buffalo hot sauce. This was then spread out over the pizza and it was cooke at 450 for 15 minutes. Hot but delish!

I also remade a previous mexican pizza recipe for pizza night- rinse one can black beans with 2 cans diced tomatoes. Spread over a pizza dough. Top with daiya pepperjack cheese. Cover with roasted corn and vegan beef crumbles (fried up in a little olive oil first). Bake at 425 for 20 minutes.

tofu and kale breakfast scramble

This was my attempt to make enough breakfast to last me a week, but sadly I did not eat it for breakfast, it became dinner. Super easy to make though: just mix together 1 package crumbled firm tofu, 1 bag kale, two chopped red bell peppers, 1 can rinsed black beans, and 8 small chopped white potatoes. I boiled the potatoes first, then fried all together in some sesame oil. I also mixed in a little paprika and onion powder. It went well with a little daiya pepperjack cheese on top. Can also be served as tacos if you want.

drunken "eggy" noodles

This was a new combination of recipes: For this one I fried up a package of TJs vegan chicken, one package chopped green onions, 2 red bell peppers, 2 TBsp garlic, and one chopped bok choy in a small amount of vegetable oil. Once the mixture seemed to be well cooked I added a sauce. The sauce was a whisked together combo of 1/2 cup soy sauce, 1/4 cup lime juice, and 1 tsp basil. This was timed to add the noodles as well to fry with the veggies in the sauce for a couple minutes. I also cooked a package of vegan rice noodles while working on the fried veggies. This was all placed in a large bowl and the "eggy sauce" was then added. The eggy sauce was a puree of 1 package silken tofu, 1 tsp tumeric, 1 tsp salt, and 1 TBsp sesame oil. Pretty tasty! Those are TJs sesame sticks on top!

The "All By Myself" Marathon

Well folks, I ran my 7th marathon ever today, it's been three years since my last marathon and this one was different from any other marathon I have ever run before. How so? I ran it alone, and it was unofficial...no race chip, no water stations, no running bibs, and sadly no medal. So why did I do this? I guess it was a test. When I arrived in California 4 months ago I found a culture of running shared amongst my co-workers, which was great. And several of them were training for a marathon so I hopped on the bandwagon and started training along with them. Sadly the marathon they were training for is this up coming weekend, and being a new kid on the block working weekends I couldn't really request the time off to join them. But training was fun. My days off did not overlap well with the others, so I was surprised that I stuck with the training and peeked at 22 miles a couple weeks ago, again all by myself. So this week I really had no reason to try to run the full 26.2. However, several of the actual marathoners asked me if I would run it on my own. I said no, and then naturally started thinking about it more, and decided this morning to give it a go. I mapped out a route the night before, brought my water bottle strapped to by back, and took off at 9:15am. It started out as an easy jog around some San Jose neighborhoods so that I would end up on the Los Gatos Creek Trail after already logging 5 miles, and that part went fine. I continued along the trail for the length of it, not having any issues, aside from almost faceplanting while I tripped as I was looking at Great Blue Heron around mile 11, things went fine. And then the usual marathon wall was struck around mile 15. I was definitely feeling it in my hips at that point. But I struggled along. I did walk a bit from then til the end, basically whenever I stopped at a water fountain to refill my water bottle I would walk about 0.2 miles until my stomach stopped sloshing from the water and would pick it up again. I had a near bathroom crisis around mile 19, which has happened before to me during marathons, though normally relieved via the desperate search for a porta-potty and hoping to find one with some toilet paper remaining. Well thank the gods I had good karma and shortly after my GI tract started getting all willy-nilly I saw a Campbell public restroom along the trail, and by gosh it had toilet paper. Five minutes later I hit the trail again, feeling a couple pounds lighter and seeming to have found a second wind. For a good 3-4 miles I felt great again, helped along by some great tunes and thinking I didn't have the far to make it. The true testament to my jedi mind strength came at mile 24- I got to the end of the Los Gatos Creek Trail by my house again and could easily turn left to head home in 0.5 miles, but I forced my willpower to keep me moving straight and add another 2 mile loop before returning home and finishing the miles I had intended. Those last two miles, like many marathons before, were brutal. My hips hurt. My feet hurt. And I had no one to cheer me on this time. But I continued on and finished. I did it. 26.3 actually. And super proud of it. Of course, I then climbed the stairs to my apartment and collapsed, and was too tired to push the dog away from me as he indulged in licking all salty goodness that had accumulated on my face off. I was thinking about what to call this "race" and thought the "All By MYself" Marathon summed it up, though when I thought of that phrase I pictured the opening scene of Bridget Jones' Diary as she drinks a bottle of wine and sings that song embracing her spinster-hood status. I then thought it would be worthwhile drinking my own bottle of wine when I got home, but gladly my dumb blonde brain had enough cells remaining in it to realize wine+26.3 miles= instantaneous vomiting. No PRs here, but I will say the phrase that came to mind again and again was "That'll do pig, that'll do."

taco night!!!

Had a really fun taco night with friends, making lots of recipes for one night: 1. My classic mandarin chicken tacos- using gardein mandarin orange chicken. I've posted the recipe before, this version was served with black beans as well as a mango salsa where I substituted avocados for the cucumbers. 2. My lime-cashew-cilantro tofu tacos, recipe identical to the one posted on this blog before. 3. My chickpea tacos- recipe identical to the one posted here before. 4. A new one! I used one package brussel sprouts and one package small yellow potatoes, diced. These two were fried in some olive oil, then served in a taco shell with black beans as well as a sauce made of 1/4 cup vegan sour cream, 1 avocado, and 1 TBsp lime juice. It was a great night!!!

Mexican Pizza!!!

God I love pizza. And black beans. And tomatoes. And avocados are probably my favorite thing in the world....so naturally this was a great pizza. As will be the recipes from taco night to follow. Tacos and pizza, I could live on those two staples as there are so many creatuve ways to make recipes from it all. So this pizza: Basically I had a whole wheat pizza dough rolled out. I rinsed 1 can black beans and 1 can diced tomatoes then mixed them together and spread them all over the pizza. Then I topped this with vegan cheese, then sliced red and green peppers, red onion, and mushrooms. This was all baked at 450 for 15 minutes, and topped with delicious avocados when done.

Vegan Drunken Noodles!!!

Loved this recipe! TJ's carries fresh vegan rice noodles- I used two packages for the recipe. I brought a large pot of water to a boil and added the rice noodles until cooked. In the meantime I mixed together 1/3 cup soy sauce with 2 TBsp brown sugar. In a large skillet I fried some diced extra firm tofu in a little peanut oil. Once starting to brown, I added 1 small chopped red onion to the skillet. Lastly I added all the ingredients together: 3 garlic cloves, 2 cups broccoli florets, 1 cup basil leaves, the cooked noodles, and the sauce I made up earlier. Once cooked through I removed this to a bowl, added 2 cups fresh bean sprouts, and topped with a crunchy Asian snack (TJ's had a vegan sesame stick topping that I used here).

African Groundnut Stew

Another oldie but a goodie. In a large pot mix 1 chopped yellow onion with 1 TBsp olive oil until browned, then stir in 2 TBsp garlic, 2 tsp ginger, 1 TBsp brown sugar, 1 tsp cinnamon, and 1 tsp cumin. Once blended in add 2 cups chopped butternut squash and 4 chopped sweet potatoes to the pot. Stir to coat with all the spices. Then add 2 cups of water, or enough to bring to just over the level of veggies. Bring to a boil. While heating, in a bowl whisk together 1/2 cup peanut butter with 1/2 cup water until very thin mixture. Turn the heat in the pot down to low after it was brought to a boil and add in the peanut butter mixture, as well as one can of drained kidney beans. Let simmer for at least 30 minutes, then add 1 cup peanuts and stir in. Serve over rice, or with flat bread (I love the TJ's middle eastern flatbread).