Cosmo's Vegan Shoppe Ice Cream Social

How awesome is it that Atlanta's one and only vegan store, Cosmo's Vegan Shoppe, is having an ice cream social saturday night to celebrate their first year on Highland Ave anniversary.
They are the coolest.
We'll be there, will you? Hope so. You should be.



<3
Lori

Flying Saucer Snack Attack

Like a broken record, I am still swamped. Besides conquering chemistry, a huge struggle for me has been bringing brain sustaining food with me to school on the days I am there for over 8 hours, that doesn't bore me. I like sandwiches and all but I certainly couldn't eat one everyday like Jared does, so I have been racking my brain as to what I could make that will ward off hunger and keep my taste buds happy. Part of the problem is that I forget to pack my lunch/snacks the night before and food in the morning just isn't very appetizing to me. Another issue is that what I do manage to pack isn't anything I am in the mood for later on. By the time I'm on campus and hungry, it's too late. So, besides boring sandwiches, I have been bringing apples, carrot sticks and sometimes chips or pretzels. For someone who enjoys food, this is not cutting it. I seriously don't know how parents pack a lunch for their kids everyday (or just about everyday)!!!

Anyways, my friend Ashley (Vegan Invasion), made an awesome cheese ball for the ICE pre-party a couple of Friday's ago that I have been thinking about ever since. It is seriously as good, if not better, than the original cheese ball it is based on . . . You know, the incredibly dense cream cheese and cheddar ball covered in nuts? I didn't have one set recipe but made this version from several recipes I found online. My version was simply Tofutti cream cheese, shredded vegan cheddar block (Galaxy Nutritional Foods), Earth Balance, nutritional yeast, vegan Worcestershire sauce, Bragg's Liquid Aminos, granulated garlic, cayenne pepper, liquid smoke (the key ingredient!), dried chives and a finely chopped green onion mixed until fluffy and smooth with an electric hand mixer. I had trouble forming it into a ball, so it became a spread with a top layer of roasted chopped almonds. I'm not sure how long it will last once Jared gets home, but my plan is to pack this up for lunch this week with some crackers, in addition to my carrot sticks and apple. Thanks for the idea Ashley!



p.s.- I LOVE this picture of my nephew, Gabriel, because he looks how my brain feels every night before I go to sleep.

Pasta Primavera

This week has been one of my hardest weeks in recent memory . . . and it's not even over yet! So far this week, I've had 2 tests, a quiz, 2 chemistry lab experiments with write ups and several homework assignments all in a matter of 3 days, not counting all the studying time this past weekend. I had my 1st college exam in about 6 years AND it was a chemistry test. Ugh! I walked out feeling good about it, like I may have gotten an A, but alas, I ended up with a mid/high B. With my homework assignments, I'm not too far off from an A, but I can't say I'm not a little disappointed and discouraged, especially considering how much I KNOW I studied. Maybe I just needed to warm my brain up with this test???
Anyway, today was probably the 1st time I've cooked in a few weeks (well, thoughtful/not as fast cooking, anyway). This dish kinda reminds me of Pasta Primavera, minus the peas since I'm not a huge fan. All I did was blanch small-diced zucchini, yellow squash and broccoli florets in salted water. I cooked some thin spaghetti and just added my homemade nutritional yeast/garlic dressing over it and tossed in the crisp veggies. The heat from the spaghetti and veggies warmed up the dressing perfectly. It turned out really great compared to the veggie burger, tater tot or cereal meals I have been having. If I make this again, hopefully I'll have some fresh herbs to perk it up a bit.

Now I'm gonna do some much needed laundry and more chemistry crap (sorry to be a baby about this class but you have no idea what I'm dealing with in my classes as far as professor "teaching" styles and obnoxious/disruptive classmates.)

Tootsie Pop

This past Saturday, Jared went to the Indie Craft Experience at Centennial Park while I stayed home and studied for chemistry. He said it was a good thing I didn't go because it was super-duper hot and there were way too many cute things that I would have wanted to buy. Being the sweetheart Jared is, he brought me back a very cute owl made by Love Yu (sorry I couldn't find a working website). I have named him Tootsie Pop because he reminded me of a modern version of Mr. Owl from the kitschy 70's Tootsie Pop commercial. He has off centered eyes, which makes him even more adorable to me, plus the colors are one of my favorite color combos: brown, blue and orange. He was a nice surprise to get after a stressful day of isotopes, unit-factor conversions and atomic structure. Now I just have to play defense with Sweetpea because she is fascinated with Tootsie Pop and wants him to be one of her babies to play with.

i am spent

I'm sure you can tell from the lack of posting/commenting, school has taken over my life. I am pretty much at school or doing something for school from 8 in the morning until I go to sleep around 11 every night. It's madness how much work I have, especially for my chemistry class and lab. I seriously don't remember college being this rough . . . but I have been out for about 6 years. Plus, summer session is only about 8 weeks, so it is like whirlwind and flash taking 3 classes in that short amount of time. Not the best way to start college, but I only have 6 more weeks!
Jared and I are seriously on opposite schedules, so I barely get to hang out with him these days. Sucks a lot! Nearly as horrible is that my eating habits have gone down the drain. My head has been so into books that I have been not eating all that much. I have a hard time breaking away from studying and feel a bit guilty when I know I could be doing extra work . . . so, forget cooking and baking for fun. It's basically survival eating, which is not fun at all.
I was feeling bad for not making anything special for Jared, so last night during a brief break, I made an open-faced style apple turnover bake with all the apples we've had a round for a while and a frozen puff pastry I have been wanting to get out the house. It was just okay. Not my best creation, but it didn't stop us from eating it. If we had a little soy ice cream on top, it would have been so much better (as so many things are!)