granola power!

I haven't made granola in a really long time and so I made a batch tonight. Mine almost always has nuts, seeds and cinnamon. Here is my basic recipe for granola but the cool thing about granola is you can pretty much add any dried fruits, nuts, seeds, chocolate/carob chips and spices/extracts. Of course, you can put only nuts or only seeds or only dried fruits but you may need to add additional oats. This isn't an exact science so play around with it until you find a technique/recipe you like!

2 tbsp Earth Balance (buttery stick)
4 tbsp Pure Maple Syrup
2 tbsp Agave Nectar
1 1/4 cup Oats
1/4 cup chopped nuts (whatever you like/have on hand)
1-2 tbsp seeds (whatever you like/have on hand)
cinnamon to taste (or whatever spice/extract floats your boat)
pinch of sea salt

* Preheat oven to 300 degrees
* In a small pan, melt on low heat the Earth Balance, Pure Maple Syrup and Agave Nectar.
* In a medium glass bowl combine the oats, nuts, seeds, spice(s) and the sea salt.
* Pour melted mixture on top of oat mixture and mix until everything is wet.
* Pour sticky mixture on a baking sheet covered with parchment paper.
* Bake for about 30-45 minutes (really depends on yr oven) until most of the wetness is gone. STIR MIXTURE SEVERAL TIMES DURING BAKING!!!
* Remove parchment paper with granola on it from the baking sheet onto counter top or cutting board and if using, stir in any dried fruits at this point. Let the granola dry completely. This cooling will actually be what makes the hot still moist granola turn magically into the crunchy stuff you are use to.
* If it lasts long (which it won't) store the completely cooled granola in a tight fitting Tupperware container.

~Nut Ideas- pecans, walnuts, almonds, cashews, macadamias, peanuts, peanut or other nut butter (please note, if you are going to use a nut butter, melt it in with the margarine/syrup/agave).
~Seed Ideas- sesame, sunflower, ground flax.
~Dried Fruit Ideas- cranberries, cherries, blueberries, strawberries, raisins, apples, apricots, banana chips, coconut flakes, dates.
~Miscellaneous Ideas- chocolate chips or carob chips (I would wait for the mixture to be 100% cooled down before adding these though)
~Spice Ideas- cinnamon, freshly ground nutmeg, cardamon.
~Extract Ideas- vanilla, almond, coconut.

Combo Ideas-
- walnuts, dried apples, cinnamon, fresh nutmeg.
- almonds, dried cranberries, vanilla extract.
- peanuts, peanut butter, chocolate chips.
- cashews, macadamias, dried banana chips, coconut flakes, cardamon.

My batch tonight had pecans, sunflower seeds, ground flax seeds, cinnamon, fresh nutmeg.

the ultimate comfort food: biscuits and gravy

Wednesday, at 2 am (so, Thursday morning) Jared's shoulder popped out of socket in his sleep. This is a recurring thing from a football injury in high school, that happens about every year and a half to two years . . . so, we are not strangers to ER trips at all times of the day or night. As you can imagine, this is a very painful thing for Jared and we try to talk about all sorts of things (food and music are the usual suspects) to keep his mind off of the pain and to make time go by for both of us. So, we talked about what he would like to eat when we got out of there and of course after we got to go to bed. As his personal short order cook, biscuits and gravy was requested. We finally got home about 7, fell asleep about 8 and slept til 2 in the afternoon. So, we had breakfast for lunch and biscuits and gravy is what Jared and I had.
I got the biscuit recipe from Love Like A Vegan's blog and they turned out great, not as pretty though. I'm not sure why but I didn't end up having to use as much soy milk as the recipe called for. The gravy was my version of years and years of me paying attention to how my Grammie made her breakfast gravy (hers either had bacon or sausage bits & grease). I first browned 4 heaping tbsp of unbleached all purpose flour in a frying pan under medium heat for only a few minutes (watch closely!). I took the browned (not scorched/burnt) flour out and added a touch of canola oil to fry up 3 frozen veggie sausage links, along with a glug of maple syrup. After those browned, I mashed them in the pan until they were very crumbly. I took out the sausage crumbles and added 4 tbsp of Earth Balance (buttery sticks) to the pan. I made a roux with the Earth Balance and browned flour, added sea salt and fresh ground black pepper. Once the roux cooked for a few minutes, I slowly added soy milk until the gravy came together at a thickness we liked . . . we like our gravy on the thick side. If you like a thinner gravy, add more soy milk. I then stirred in the sausage crumbles. I can't even tell you how much this was right on to how my Grammie's gravy taste. We were kind of amazed actually.

Molasses Cinnamon Rolls

No need for an intervention, I swear I have a legitimate reason for making all these sinfully delicious yeast based baked goods lately. The next 2 weeks we will be having visitors. Last I heard, this coming weekend, our friends Star and Lepley are coming up for a bike race and also to help our friend Hank move up here. Star is also a vegan. Her and I have already been discussing what goodies we want to make. I'm hoping to nab her sugar cookie recipe.
THEN, the weekend after this, my dad and step mom, Delia, are coming up. WOO WHOOO!
SO, you see, I had to test out these cinnamon rolls. Right? Yep.
For these treats, I made my crazy bread dough except I put in approximately 2 tbsp of molasses with the slurry and palm oil instead of olive oil. Once the dough had risen once, I rolled out the dough to probably around a half inch thickness, brushed a little bit of melted Earth Balance and sprinkled a sugar/cinnamon mixture on the rolled out dough. I then rolled the dough up into a log and cut the log into 12 spirals. I placed the spirals in a pan (with cooking spray) and let them rise again. They were baked at 350 degrees for what seemed like forever (it was probably around 20-30 minutes) and then poured an icing I made with a couple of tbsp powdered sugar, a splash of soy milk and more cinnamon.
Right out of the oven without icing:

Plated with icing (notice it isn't drenched in icing):

a weekend tribute to summer time

As summer is slowly coming to an end, this weekend's meals were comprised of summery goodness. Jared and I went to Marietta, GA to explore the town and visit Harry's Farmers Market. Despite being vegan, I still watch a few shows on Food Network, including Good Eats. I bring this up only because when Alton Brown (host of Good Eats) goes to a grocery store, it usually is this place. So while it is nerdy, I wanted to go check it out. It is actually a really great store. They had organic heirloom tomatoes on sale so we picked up a red one with green and black highlights and a yellow one. Last night, Jared's brilliant idea was to make spaghetti with some of my homemade tomato sauce (which I usually always have in the freezer) with the raw heirloom tomatoes on top. This was so good. I have never had better tomatoes in my whole life and with the spaghetti, homemade sauce and vegan Parmesan sprinkles it was heavenly. I also made some of my crazy bread to help mop up the sauce.

Tonight I made a meal my Grammie would be proud of. I roasted red, yukon and purple potatoes with olive oil, several cloves of garlic, sea salt and fresh thyme. The green beans were boiled to death (the southern way!) with sea salt and black pepper. I also sliced some plain ol' red tomatoes with a homemade balsamic vinaigrette. I originally was going to have corn on the cob but the corn wasn't good enough on it's own, so I cut the corn off the cob and put into corn bread. The corn bread recipe I made was from The Damn Tasty Vegan Baking Guide. This was an amazing corn bread recipe, especially if you like a sweeter cornbread like we do. The good thing was the corn bread doubled as our dessert. You must get this book . . . it's awesome!

Veggieland

Jared and I were going to try this all vegetarian but VERY vegan friendly place on my birthday but it was closed on Sundays, so yesterday we finally made it out to Veggieland. Like a lot of restaurants around here, Veggieland is in a strip mall. The menu was vast, ranging from veggie burgers with loads of toppings, salads and hot dishes. PLUS, at least 5 vegan desserts! Despite being in the richy rich part of Atlanta (Buckhead area) the prices were incredibly reasonable.
Jared decided upon the daily special of Potatoes and Veggie Curry with Brown Rice. It was very tasty and was only $5.95.

For me, there were too many choices and I panicked. I got the chili hot dog that came with sweet potato fries and coleslaw. It was good but not great. This is something I could have made at home. I will say the coleslaw was awesome and made with vegan mayo! The sweet potato fries were a bit under cooked. Luckily, this whole plate of food was only $4.95, so at least I didn't feel ripped off.

What we will go back for was the vegan desserts! Jared and I shared the strawberry cake. It was a two layer yellow cake with vanilla icing and strawberries in the middle and a strawberry glaze on top. It was so good that I talked two other customers into getting a slice. The cake was the priciest menu item coming in at $3.95 but I love that a restaurant has vegan desserts and well worth the price to encourage them to continue making lovely vegan treats.

All and all, we will go back to Veggieland. I will take my time with my menu choice and pick something I couldn't make at home way better. Jared was very pleased with his dish and we both are in love with the dessert!
Veggieland
211 Pharr Rd Ne # B
Atlanta, GA 30305
(404) 231-3111