Sprout It Out

What a wonderful turn in the weather! It's days like these that suck me into staying in this town, it's just so damn gorgeous. And I am now completely addicted to sun-lit brisk runs down the empty docks, if I could do that every day, I'd stay forever. The overwhelming serenity of running through such pristine beauty is just incredible. But the fact of the matter is that in a very short while those docks will be packed full of tourists and more likely than not, the weather will be back to its rainy normalcy. Le sigh. Oh well, I'm taking what I can while I can and loving it up.

 

Our apartment, unfortunately, gets no direct sunlight. It's pretty horrible. Well, we do get a random beam refracted off of the lucky bastards' windows on the hill, but it's only like at 2pm every 9th Thursday. So basically NO sunlight. Hence not a lotta plants thriving up in our place. Except sprouts! They don't technically need sunlight. You could put them in some sun after the first several days, but it's not necessary.

I purchased this handy-dandy-as-fuck sprout tower a few birthdays ago for K. (So she could grow me some sprouts! Aren't I such a darling wife?) Recently I've taken it over and have been sprouting like a madwoman.

It's a pretty neat little set up. Each layer has a drainage spout so you pour the water in the top, it trickles through all the layers and then you discard the water at the bottom. Do that twice or so a day and in a few days you get to EAT THEM. That's my favorite part! In fact, I keep meaning to take a picture of them all packed in there and ready to be devoured...but I usually am too excited and devour half of them before I get the chance. So this is what you get instead.

Broccoli sprouts, day four

Bean Seed Mix, day two

I usually do a tray each of clover, broccoli, and a mix of adzuki, lentil, mung bean, and radish seeds. I keep meaning to stagger them so that I don't run out, but I love having the variety at the same time, so that never really works. In fact I need to finish off my last batch and start some trays today!

How do I eat them? Atop errything, that's how!

With edemame hummus and thin corn cakes (organic, from Australia, and delish!)

With Amy's Gluten Free, Vegan Mac N Cheese (and obligatory hot sauce)

In a giant bowl o' chopped veggies

With tomato soup

Atop a zucchini, leek, pesto pizza (with creepy looking but tasty tasting faux cheese)

Inside quick 'n easy hummus / avocado tacos

Everything's better with organic pico de gallo chips. Truth.

Sprout spring rolls? YES! (This is what I made to eat after B's today. Scrumptious!)

Make sure you wash your sprouts WELL before eating as they can contain bacteria that will not treat you right. I feel like they're the chicken of the plant world, I'm always super paranoid and wash the holy living shit out of mine.

That being said, sprouts are super good for you. Chock-a-block full o' protein, nutrients and deliciousness. Seriously, they're just plain goodness. Don't take my word for it, here are a few links with more sprout-tastic information!

http://sproutpeople.org/

http://www.doctoryourself.com/sprouting.html 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sprouting

So go get sprouting! It's a fairly low maintenance process and at the end of it you get to eat the product. Who wouldn't want to eat shit that they grew? Fuckle, I wish I could grow everything I ate! That would pretty much rule. Ahh, someday I shall farm, I fucking hope.

Below is our brunchness at B's Bistro today. I love that place, even if the only thing on the menu for me is French press coffee. Today there was a young child's birthday party going on and it was so adorable! And they've put drawing supplies on the tables. Love, love, love. K got to eat like a queen: lemon blueberry pancakes AND a lemon blueberry cupcake. Looked delish, I'm pretty sure it was!  

Happy sunshine-riffic, super Saturday! Enjoy the day, wherever it may take you!

 

Thankfullofvegetables

I'll start this off by saying I am very thankful, I have a wonderful life with my incredible wife. I am so lucky, my thanks will never end. But I just don't care about the Thanksgiving holiday. Even when I ate meat and wheat-tastic bread stuffs (I will always miss you, Stove Top) I wasn't big on the whole shebang. This year being gluten free, vegan and avoiding potatoes (talk about NO options!), I wasn't exactly counting down the days for the meat / wheat / spud fest. My stomach seems to like less and less food and I have had a really negative attitude about food in general lately. I really just wanted to not do anything, stay home, watch netflix and eat hummus and baby carrots like every other day and pretend Thanksgiving didn't exist. Luckily for me, K is truly incredible and made the day so superb! I was home sick (thanks db stomach!) on Monday and she convinced me to search for gf, vegan recipes for the holiday. I found some GREAT recipes and we got the goods to make everything. Then comes Thanksgiving morning and I did NOT want to cook. Again, lucky me, K came to my rescue and got my whiny ass back in the kitchen and got the grub made. And holy hell, it was SO good. So, so, so good. And the blog I found, Gluten Free Goddess has renewed my interest in food in general, giant thanks there! I am super excited to try more of her wonderful recipes.

The icing on top is that we brought all the dishes to our friend's house for a multi-family Thanksgiving feast and there were several people in the same boat I'm in. It felt great to be able to fill their plates with food they could eat. It's such a lonely, hungry holiday when you're the vegan/vegetarian/allergic to whatever person staring at a table full of assorted meats, bread, cheeses, and the only vegetables are probably swimming in more meat, cheese and bread. Being able to help others avoid that fate really made my Thanksgiving grinch heart grow several sizes! And the dishes all got rave reviews from the meat eaters as well. Win, win, win!

We made a few changes to the recipes but kept it as close as possible. I somehow never picked up molasses so we just used more maple syrup and some random corn syrup we had in the cupboard. I'd have rather not used the corn syrup but whatev's, it is what it is. And what it was, was DELICIOUS! I used butternut squash in place of the sweet potato and it worked great. The veggie loaf was great, just have to figure out some new name for it that sounds more appealing and befitting of its tastiness. The showstopper was the pumpkin pie with pepita pecan brittle. Oh. My. Goodness. Delicious. Back in the day, when I had my pick of pies pumpkin was rarely on my radar, pecan generally won out. Pumpkin was always so bland and boring. This recipe has made me a believer in the power of pumpkin! It almost got axed from the menu, the recipe was daunting and as mentioned above, I was not super stoked about cooking. Sweet, endlessly patient wife of mine is to thank for it getting made, without her encouragement and help it surely would not have. And it was actually a lot easier than I expected. The pecan coconut crust is very macaroon like and I want to make just it again but in cookie form. Maybe later during this lovely long weekend we get! Here are some shots of vegetable bounty and the links to the recipes. Enjoy!

Pumpkin Polenta Recipe with Tomatillo-Avocado Salsa Fresca Recipe

http://glutenfreegoddess.blogspot.com/2010/10/pumpkin-polenta-recipe-with-tomatillo.html

Green-Cabbage and Red-Apple Slaw with Brussels Sprouts  

http://www.marthastewart.com/314563/green-cabbage-and-red-apple-slaw-with-br?center=0&gallery=274421&slide=282029

Red Quinoa Recipe with Roasted Butternut Squash, Cranberries and Pecans

http://glutenfreegoddess.blogspot.com/2010/01/red-quinoa-with-butternet-squash.html

Easy Cider Roasted Vegetables Recipe

http://glutenfreegoddess.blogspot.com/2005/11/brown-rice-roasted-vegetables.html

Vegan Garden Loaf Recipe with Maple Apricot Glaze  

http://glutenfreegoddess.blogspot.com/2009/05/garden-loaf-with-maple-apricot-glaze.html#ixzz2Cid3yagP

Karina's Gluten-Free Pumpkin Pie with Praline and Coconut-Pecan Crust http://glutenfreegoddess.blogspot.com/2010/11/gluten-free-pumpkin-pie-with-praline.html

B Batteries Salad

We got our delicious box of veggie goodness yesterday. So I figured it was about time to use the beets from the prior box from two weeks ago. And I had a not-sure-how-old head of broccoli that was pleading to be used and basil from our new veg box. Enter B Batteries Salad, so named because I love alliterations and Demetri Martin is pretty rad as well. I don't have a specific beet salad recipe, I generally just make some sort of vinaigrette and hope it's delish. And generally, it is. This time, I measured and wrote down the process as I made it. So in hopes, it can be replicated...

And here is the rambling recipe:

B Batteries Salad

3-5 beets
1 head broccoli
10 basil leaves, chiffonaded

1/4c - 1/3c oil - I used safflower, but whatever floats your boat...
1/4c red wine vinegar
2T Dijon mustard
1T red miso paste
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/8c maple syrup
1/2t - 1t cracked black pepper
1/8t - 1/4t cayenne pepper
2T apple cider vinegar
1T lemon juice

Boil beets, I boiled mine whole and it took about 40 minutes on a low boil. While the beets are a boilin', everything else can be done.

Chop the broccoli into small florets with as little stem as possible. Or leave the stems on, no diff. I peeled the stalk of the broccoli and sliced it into rounds. Nice broccoli taste with a water chestnut like crunch. Plus the stalk is full of vitamins and damn it, I paid for those vitamins, I'm eating 'em! Broccoli florets and stalk rounds can then be parboiled for about two minutes or left raw. If you parboil them, be sure to shake as much as the excess water out of the florets as possible. I parboiled mine to better match the soft (slightly overcooked, shh) beets.

Combine oil and vinegar in mixing bowl, whisk in mustard and miso paste until emulsified. Add maple syrup, garlic, black pepper, cayenne pepper, apple cider vinegar and lemon juice and whisk until combined. Feel free to add the ingredients in small increments and taste test as you go. It is always a "little more of this, dash more of that, oh shit now I need to add that" kind of process for me. If you cut up the broccoli before making the vinaigrette you can use the broccoli florets for taste testing. Once you feel the vinaigrette is where you want it taste wise, mix in the chiffonaded basil and refrigerate.

Once the beets are done, after about 40 minutes, rinse them under cold water, peel the skin and remove any funky bits. Slice into thin quarter slices or dice. Combine beets, broccoli, broccoli rounds and vinaigrette in a large bowl. Or preferably a large food storage container with lid, since it's going in the fridge anyway. Mix until everything is nice and all up in each others' shit. Refrigerate and let the magic happen for however long you can wait or eat immediately. Top with more cracked pepper and cayenne pepper, if so desired.

Whew, alrighty! There ya be, my recipe! Take it, make it or leave it :) The dressing is a pretty generous amount and you could probably use only half or thee quarters and save the remainder for salad. Or use it all and sop it up with french bread....mmm...bread. Jeez I need to get on learning about baking some gluten free bread!

More Pics

Here are a few other things I've done in the last few weeks.

Everyone loves nekkid ladies right? Well they should.

Acrylics on canvas board.




Sharpie on shelf backing.


This is my beautiful home.




I been ah cookin'
Lentil Burgers made from leftover Mjeddrah


Sweet Potato chips. Delish but time consuming as fuck.


Sooooy Milk


And shmee...
I kinda gave myself a blondish streak or something.

Pictorial Post

I made soy milk today. Woo effing hoo! I bought a soy milk maker years ago when I was a full on vegan. And used it a bunch. But then moving, not being a vegan, etc, led to it staying in it's box. I'm certainly no vegan but I am tired of extraneous shit in my products. And supporting companies who are owned by companies who are owned by the devil. I'm still not sure of how good soy is for me. It seems you can find a watertight argument on either side. So in the future I do want to experiment with brown rice and almond milk. I was asked why I don't drink regular milk and my immediate answer was, well I'm not a baby cow. The end. The only reason I am even going to the trouble of making "milk" is because I love me some cereal and I want to start baking more. Not because I'm an infant bovine. So here are some pics from the process. Enjoy.

The goods.


Soaked soybeans. Took a damn hour to squeeze them out of their skins, but it makes it taste better.


While the machine was doing it's thing, I had time to have a nice lil snack of leftover moroccan-ish veggies and couscous. YUM.


Tada! Soymilk and Okara, the pulp. It's good in all kinds of stuff. Hopefully I use it.



And a good reason to stay inside and be kitchen crafty.

Veg-tastic Voyage

Last week I bought dried lentils and barley and thought I'd experiment with them. I found an easy seeming recipe for the lentils called Mjeddrah. It was pretty easy and simple. And I had just made my miso dressing so I was excited to try it with it. It was good and hearty and made a lot more than I needed. And since my fabulous roomie is on the meat end of the diet spectrum, she's no help to make it disappear. So the idea of lentil veggie burgers rolled around in my head for a while. Until finally today I looked up recipes. I basically followed this one, plus the video was fun to watch.

How I made them was, I toasted four pieces of cracked wheat bread in the oven. Ground them up in the food processor along with black pepper, granulated garlic, cayenne pepper and some shards of Parmesan cheese. Yes I cheated and didn't make it vegan. But I happened to have the cheese on hand from last nights pasta and figured I'd try it out. Then I added the left over mjeddrah to the food processor and a few squirts of Braggs and mixed it all up. Put a little bit of safflower oil in a pan and got it fairly hot and dropped gobs of the mixture into the pan. I let them cook for a long time and kept kind of pushing them farther down so they would get more browned. They don't get super firm as they are a pureed mixture, but as they were cooling they felt like they were getting firmer. I tried the little one and let the others cool and then froze them. I had a little mixture left over so I made little patties and then halfway through I broke them up and cooked them. So now I have veggie crumbles for salad or wraps.

Yesterday I made pasta for my awesome friend S. It was red kale, butter beans, sun dried tomatoes and a can of Italian tomatoes and probably 6 or 7 cloves of garlic and spices tossed with whole wheat linguine and shards of Parmesan cheese. Basically sauteed everything together, starting with the garlic and kale. I ended up smashing the beans once they had simmered a bit. I think it made a nicer thickness and got rid of the canned bean taste. It was pretty tasty. She liked it and when a different friend came over later she had some and she liked it as well. It's always nice to know that other people like my food. I have such weird tastes and usually lovey roommate looks at me a little weird when I create stuff. So ha! Normal people liked it! Yay!

My miso dressing. My fave sister in Seattle always makes me make her a huge batch of it when I visit. I don't follow a recipe, I made it up so it's all by sight and taste. But these are the ingredients if you want to try it out. In order of amount, btw.
Oil - I use safflower or Enova, whatever you like. A little flax seed oil is great.
Vinegar - Rice, red wine, or apple cider is good. Even balsamic but it'll change the over all taste.
Dijon Mustard - This is magic. One it tastes goood. Two, it acts as an emulsifier.
Maple Syrup
Miso - I've only used white. Usually three tablespoons or so.
Garlic - Usually two-four cloves, I use a garlic press. Best invention ever.
Black pepper
Cayenne pepper

So basically put it all together and whisk till the miso is dissolved. I haven't used my food processor to make this yet but that seems like a pretty handy way to get it all emulsified and the garlic chopped up.

The next culinary ideas I have rolling around are breads, soy milk and Moroccan stuffed peppers. The peppers are for this Sunday dinner. HDot and I have decided to have Sunday dinners with her lil G man. I'm pretty excited to have someone to cook for and to hang out with her more. And her little dude is seriously the cutest kid on earth.
The soy milk I've made before. I own a soy milk maker. I don't know if it still works, it's been shipped back and forth between here and Kansas a few times. But I bought soy beans, and damn they're hard to find!, and if it works I'll be making some. If not, I'll be buying cheesecloth and making some.
Breads. I want to know how to make bread and have it be good. My mother was born in her fathers bakery in France. He baked bread every day up until he died. One of my only memories of him are his big arthritic knuckles covered in flour kneading dough. It's in my genes somewhere, I just have to cultivate it.

Wet cats, Adrenaline, & Heath Food

Starting from right now going backwards. Mother effing Jack has magically become an outdoor cat today. And so far her favorite activity is to go out the little kitty door, stand in the rain until she is soaked and then come downstairs, whine and meow and run up to me (and my computer) and shake dry. It's awesome. Oh and while she's standing outside soaking up EVERY raindrop, she's standing in mud. Little kitty paw prints everywhere. They'd be cute if they didn't go across my bed!

I volunteered to help clean out the bar storage unit with the lovely S today. We both felt like not doing it when we got up however. So we went to breakfast out in le valley and then decided to go to a matinee. Drove back downtown to watch either The Crazies or Legion. Couldn't decide so we flipped a coin. The Crazies won. HOLY HELL! So good. I didn't realize how tense it made me until we left the theatre and I was shaking. I seriously flipped out and couldn't stop looking around and just feeling unsettled. Good job movie maker peeps! So then we decided why not be really lazy and make a full day of hookie and go see Legion. So we did. Decent movie, nice amount of blood right off the bat. A bit slow in parts, but perhaps that's because I felt like my heart hadn't calmed down from the prior movie. After our movie marathon S took me over to H Dot's house to have dindin. H and I decided to have dinner and have it be healthy organic stuff after watching Food Inc the other day.

Talk about a horror film! Having been a vegan I know a fair share about how bad feedlots and mega farms are, but can usually ignore it for the most part. For a while now I've been feeling a pull back to some kind of vegetarianism. This sealed the deal. I remember learning about all the bad shit animals go through. I remember how bad that food is for us. For our planet. I'm not saying people shouldn't eat meat. That is entirely up to the individual. But I know there's a better way. And genetically modified foods? We are fooling ourselves if we really think we can outsmart mother nature. Seriously, we can't bend nature to our will. We are not invincible. As much as we'd love to think we're unstoppable because we're at the top of the food chain, we're not. At the rate we're going, there won't BE a food chain to be on top of. We can only fuck with nature before we fuck ourselves. You know that whole thing about how we only have one Earth? Well it's true. We keep breeding down plant species until there are fewer and fewer varieties left. The strong ones! The big ones! The ones that will feed us forever! Until that day when the one last variety of tomato succumbs to some new mutated, pesticide resistant bug and then we've successfully sent the tomato into extinction. Go us!

One of the best things the movie got across is that we all make a difference. Watching the majority of the movie there is an overwhelming feeling of hopelessness. That we can't turn to the government because they're in fucking bed with Monsanto and whatnot. Which is a damn waking nightmare. But what we can do is choose. Every time we shop, choose organic, choose items that specifically say non GMO, grass fed, etc. It will make a difference. "They" will notice. Our money is our ballot and we can make "them" change with each and every cent we don't spend on CAFO downer beef and hormone laced milk. At least I fucking hope so. Hope is all we have.