Quick Mexi Veggie Dish

Didn't follow a special recipe for this one, just used things I already had in my cupboards. I cooked up some brown rice. While that was cooking, I heated up a frozen mix of red/green peppers and onions as well as a Spicy Black Bean Burger. Love, love LOVE the spicy black bean burgers. They are my favorite of the Morningstar brand. Tossed it all in a dish with some organic salsa on top for a little kick and voila! A quick and easy one-person veggie meal. :)

I really don't like cooking for myself. I much prefer to make meals that others will enjoy with me. But I'm trying to be better about it and get more creative for my solo meals so I'll have more entries to post here, LOL.

Wild Rice Casserole

I made this yummy dish last night for me and my boyfriend. I swiped it from veggieboards.com. It was originally posted by
Vggiegirl, so many kudos to her for sharing this recipe!

I used brown rice instead of wild rice, because it's what I had on hand. And, I used scrumptious baby portabellas and canned cream of mushroom soup--though I will most definitely try the vegan recipe for the soup the next time around.

The sauce thickened a lot upon setting for a few, but this was a great stick-to-your-ribs type of recipe. Really wish I would've found this earlier this winter... might be a bit heavy during the summer months, especially with the 90 minutes that it has to cook in the oven. But definitely two thumbs up! This one's a keeper! :)

Making Easter a little more veggie

In my family, Easter has always been a holiday focused on meat, namely ham and kielbasa. But over the years, the number of vegetarians in the family has grown--first my aunt, then myself, and now my 15-year-old cousin who is following in our veg*n footsteps. Because of this, the meatless food options at family gatherings has improved, but it's still not guaranteed, depending on who's serving dinner.

This year, Easter was hosted by my aunt and an uncle who is a
big meater andhunter to boot.  This is the same uncle who
often tried to trickme into eating venison when I was younger.
I learned not to trust him when it came to food.  So it was
a no-brainer that I needed to bring a veggie dish to this
holiday dinner.

I knew my veggie aunt was making potato pierogis and
sauerkraut would be available, too.  But there was no
talk of vegetables by anyone else. :(  So I picked up
my new copy of Vegan with a Vengence, thoughfully given
to me by my sister for my birthday, and thumbed the
pages for a simple yet hearty veggie dish to pass.

My eyes rested on "Roasted Brussel Sprouts with Toasted
Garlic."  Mmm. Sounded good to me!  I also liked that there
were only four ingredients involved: the sprouts, olive oil,
garlic and sea salt. And, the book said it served 6, which
meant if I doubled the recipe, I'd easily have enough food
for everyone.

My experience with brussel sprouts in the past has been
pretty uneventful.  While I don't dislike them, they're not
one of my favorite veggies either.  Maybe that's because I've
only eaten frozen sprouts which were steamed?  I was
definitely up to the challenge of finding a more interesting
way of cooking sprouts, and this vegan recipe seemed perfect.

I made a few modifications to the recipe though: I used the
minced garlic in a jar instead of fresh garlic and opted for
fine sea salt rather than coarse, simply because it's what I
had on hand.

The recipe was uber easy to make.  Definitely a plus for
those who may not like to spend all their time in the kitchen.
The most time-consuming aspect was washing/cutting the
sprouts.

Best of all, it got rave reviews from everyone at the dinner
table...even my boyfriend, who doesn't like brussel sprouts.
He took a little nibble and said it was better than other sprouts
he's tasted.  I liked the fresh taste of the sprouts.  Definitely
a step up from frozen bags. However, I personally would like to
experiment with the recipe using different spices.  Definitely a
"keeper" tho and one to play with!

Hot and Spicy Shake N Bake Tofu

Double post today, because I feel so bad about not posting in such a long time. Tonight, I made myself this tasty dish--Shake N Bake Tofu over Brown Rice. Now, I kinda cheated cuz I didn't actually bake it... I fried it. But, next time I most definitely WILL bake it. This is the second time I've tried Shake N Bake with tofu, and it tastes great, but when frying it, I find that some of the crunchy flavoring tends to fall off quite easily. :-/

Anyhoo, for this recipe, I simply marinated some tofu slices in Italian dressing... then I coated the slices with Shake N Bake Hot and Spicy. Fried those up in a little bit of Olive Oil. While doing that, I fried up some day-old brown rice, and a frozen mix of peppers and onions. Combined it all together and... YUM! I really enjoyed this. I don't like my food too spicy, and this was just right in my book. :)

Tofu Pot Pie

Apologies for the lack of updates. But I'm going to jump right in and post my dinner for yesterday--Tofu Pot Pie! Didn't have a special recipe for this... just modified the Impossibly Easy Chicken Pot Pie recipe over at bettycrocker.com. First, I used the Heart Smart Bisquick instead of regular. And, I substituted Ener-G's Egg Replacer for the real egg. Then, for the pot pie recipe, I substitute cubed tofu for the chicken, 98% fat-free cream of celery condensed soup in place of the cream of chicken soup, and I used a frozen vegetable mix which had kidney beans and chick peas in it. :) I baked as directed and mmmmmmm... yummy pot pie! I've used this recipe before, but alway just omitted the chicken instead of trying to substitute it. I must say, I was pleased with the Tofu Pot Pie version!

This post is delayed. I actually made this dish on Thursday, but haven't posted it until now. Mainly because it's nothing spectacular and I was in no hurry to post it. :-/ It's basically just several different leftovers joined together, so they wouldn't waste away in my fridge. I used some leftover cooked barley and a few leftover uncooked veggie dogs and fried them up with some frozen peppers and onions... seasoned with lemon pepper and fresh thyme. Not my best dinner, but it filled my belly and I didn't waste food. :)

Veggie BLT

Fast and easy was the name of the game last night. Just didn't really feel like cooking. Plus, I felt like something 'light' after all the good birthday food I've been eating the past week. I had some Rosemary Olive Oil bread left over from Monday's Barley 'Risotto' with Mushrooms dinner, so I decided to use the bread for a veggie BLT sandwich. :)

Yummy rosemary olive oil bread; Smart Beat nonfat mayo; roma tomato; spring mix greens; and Lightlife's Smart Bacon.

It was my first time trying the veggie bacon... it was pretty good. Kinda dry and hard after being cooked, but maybe I cooked it too long. Overall, a yummy light dinner!