Lovely Puerto Rico

 I just got back from a wonderful trip to Puerto Rico to celebrate my sister's birthday...it was amazing and, of course, sweltering!  I loved it!  I cannot stand cold weather and snow, so I had the time of my life just baking.  I also ate some very good food.  I have the Happy Cow app on my iPhone, so I did some searches for some good places to eat!  The following is a photo diary of some of my culinary experiences while staying in San Juan, PR.  If you might be traveling to Puerto Rico in the future or are thinking of finding a place to vacation, check out the choices at Happy Cow.

The first thing I did was go to the grocery store, the Super Maxx.  NO JOKE this was the freezer section.  I decided that since there was an enourmous selection of vegan foods at the grocery (in addition to countless ethnic and local foods), I want to move to Puerto Rico.  That and, did I mention it's HOT?

We ate at a wonderful restaurant call the Cafe Berlin in Old San Juan.  I had the vegetarian "steak" with vegetables and it was so filling and delicious.  They had a LOT of vegan/veg choices on the menu, and if we had been there for longer, I would have tried to make it to the brunch.  Also, a little old man serenaded me with his guitar.  Bonus points.

At the Super Maxx, I bought a can of vegan "skallops".  I was curious, so I thought that I would take them home.  Well, they never made it home because one night we were so tired that we ate at the hotel restaurant.  I did not want to eat hummus again (yes, you can have too much of a good thing), so I went out on a limb and brought the waiter the can of "skallops" and asked him if he could do something with it.  This is what I got.  It was amazing.  Thank you Hosteria Del Mar!

For my sister's birthday, we ate at a lovely eatery called The Garden.  I had the curried tofu with jasmine rice.  It was so good, I am so glad that there are so many places that I can eat at in Puerto Rico.  Almost too many...I am seriously going to have to hit the gym hard this week.

Sidenote: There are some places that you should never eat.  This is one of them.  If you see a string of roadside "cafe's" that have their food sitting out and basically look shady, go to Subway of Burger King.  Your stomach will thank you.

Read Your Labels!

I am a busy mom and a full-time teacher...I love to cook and do it regularly, but it absolutely thrills me when I find a product that is yummy and makes me proud to serve it to my family.  That's why I read labels!  It's like a treasure hunt at the grocery store, and I typically find what I am looking for.  For example, recently I started craving cinnamon rolls.  Made a batch from scratch...took forever.  I felt good about it but I cannot do that frequently, I just do not have time.  So I kept thinking that there MUST be something at the grocery store...I was right!  After reading the labels for several different brands of easy bake cinnamon rolls, I found that the store brand was exactly what I was looking for.  You see, many of the everyday products that people eat are, in fact, vegan and they do not even realize it.  Potato chips, oreos, pastas, you name it.  So I read a LOT of labels, and it does take time.  But that's OK, because finding those products that are quick and easy but good for my ethics saves me time in the long run.  I love it when I can whip up a hot and wholesome meal...after working all day, picking up the kids from swim training, and squeaking home around 5:30 pm.  Just be careful, when you are reading those labels, there are a few key words you want to avoid that a lot of people do not usually recognize: sugar, rennet, lard, sodium, bha, caffeine, caramel, carrageenan, calcium disodium, lactic acid, maltol dextrin, modified food starch, mono-and diglycercides, monosodium glutamate(msg), nitrites, polysorbate, propyl gallate, red dye 40, saccharin, aspartame, & GUMS-arabic,cellulose,xanthan gums.

Ice Cream Dreams

Every once in a while I come across some new product at the grocery store that I didn't even know existed...this is one of my new favorites!  Yours Truly cones are remarkable, they taste delicious and they are reasonably priced.  When I was a kid, I was a big fan of drumsticks, and these are even better.  Instead of nuts, it has cookie crumbles on top of hard chocolate on top of soy ice cream on top of a cone.  There is even solid chocolate in the tip of the cone.  My kids love, love, love these, and I can get them to do just about any chore around the house if I bribe...errr...REWARD them with a Yours Truly cone.  These are not at most grocery stores yet, but it is worth taking a look in your store's organic section or taking a trip to a whole foods type store.  I mean, I love a pint of soy or rice milk ice cream, but this is just a different experience altogether...yumm...

While we were on vacation, I wanted to cook with my aunt and make a big meal for the whole family.  I know you're like, "Who wants to cook on vacation!?!".  Well, usually I don't, but I wanted to make a good impression on my family members that I had not seen in a while.  I got to go to the Navy Commissary, where I hadn't been in a while.  Decades, actually.  I decided to do a nice Italian Casserole, easy and cheap to feed a bunch of people.
Italian Casserole (Vacation Bum Slacker Style)
1. Sautee lots of vegetables...whatever you can find (squash, zucchini, muchrooms, peppers, etc.)
2. OPTIONAL: Heat up a bag of Gardein beefless tips, just sautee in a little oil and set aside.
2. Boil a box of pasta and drain.  Put in a LARGE bowl.
3. Add a jar of pasta sauce (check the label, make sure there is no cheese in it) and a large can of crushed tomatoes to the pasta.
4.  Add the sauteed veggies and beefless tips.  You can also add crumbled veggie burgers if you cannot find Gardein.  How many?  I don't know, like, 4 maybe?  Keep crushing and adding till it looks right.  Just make sure to COOK those veggie burgers first!
5. Add some fresh herbs like basil and oregano if you have them.  Crush two cloves of garlic into the bowl as well.
6. Stir well, put in a casserole dish.  Shred vegan cheese on top!  Bake in oven at 350 degrees for about 45 minutes.  
7. Go relax and have a glass of vacation juice (translation: whatever you want, especially if it's nice and boozy) while you're waiting. This is the most important step.
8.  Let cool and serve with bread if you like bread.  Belissimo!
 

Time Flies!

I cannot believe it, but this month marks our FIVE year anniversary as vegans!  I guess five years in kid years is a long time...my two don't remember being omnivores.  My youngest was breast fed for a year, and when we went vegan he was only two, so this lifestyle is pretty embedded in him.  It's certainly not always easy, and we do miss out on what the "Joneses" are doing every once in a while (although we have never been too concerned with what the Joneses are doing...they don't look like they are having any fun and they are always a little grouchy), but it's just such a part of now that I cannot imagine living any other way!  Everyone benefits!  Let's put this into perspective with a handy-dandy statistic (from Vegan Heights):

Water saved in one year by being vegan - 1,400,000 gallons

Water saved by 4 people being vegan for 5 years - 280,000,000 gallons

Mediterranean in Virginia Beach

Vegan Moussaka

 We recently when on a vacation to Virginia Beach, VA.  Nothing complicated, but my aunt and uncle live there, so it was nice to visit them and have some fun, too!  We played disc golf at Munden Point Park, went to Croatan beach (where I got on a surf board for the first time in 10 years!), saw the state aquarium, and made/ate some great food!  One of the best things about going away for a vacation is eating food that you do not normally eat!  We are so busy that we quickly get into a rut with meals...spaghetti, enchiladas, mac and "cheese", stir-fry, vegan meatloaf...they are all pretty easy, and good for a typical week night.  When I am on vacation, though (as you know if you have been following this blog for a while!) I want to send my taste buds on vacation as well!  So one restaurant that we tried was Baladi Mediterranean Cafe.  It is pretty close to where all the action happend in VA Beach...the boardwalk, the beach, the carnival, etc.  I checked the website before hand (thanks again Happy Cow!) and was very pleased to see lots of green "V's" on the menu, indicating that a dish was vegan.  EVERYTHING (yes, I am serious!) on the starter menu was vegan, and they also had some nice entrees and wraps as well.  I tried the vegan moussaka...they brought me a huge plate of it and my first thought was that I would never be able to finish it all...well, it was gone in no time because it was THAT good.  I also had some really great baklava (vegans, when was the last time you had that!?!?), made with agave nectar instead of honey.  Oh, and some Turkish delight!  Overall, the atmosphere was great, the staff was so polite, and the chef personally came out to see how we liked our meal.  Do NOT go by Virginia Beach without going to Baladi!

Vegan Baklava with a Turkish Delight!

A Blueberry Muffin Obsession

This is not the first (or the second, even) time I have posted about blueberry muffins.  I don't know what it is about a delicious, warm blueberry muffin that makes any morning so much better!  So I have posted recipes for muffins before (search breakfast), but I do not usually have time to make muffins from scratch.  Surprise!  Most of the time I have not given much thought to the muffin mixes at the store until now.  Duncan Hines has a Blueberry Streusel muffin mix that is amazing.  Not only do they use real ingredients with nothing artificial, but they also include a can of REAL, wild blueberries.  Fast, simple, but you will need to make sure you have a box of egg replacer handy.  If you try this mix, please let me know what you think, my kids gave it two thumbs up!

A Meal Away From Home

So here in the USA, it is summer (yeah!), which of course to many means summer vacation.  We typically go to the beach and avoid busy places like theme parks so that we can spend at least a few days being relaxed...not stressed out!  Because we are not staying at resorts, we often end up looking for places to eat out.  I love cooking, and it is very economical to cook during your vacation, but on vacation I do not want to be cooking all the time.  Enter HappyCow.net.  You can use this website to search for veg friendly and all-veg restaurants all over the world.  We typically find at least a few good places to eat whenever we use Happy Cow.  For example, let's say you are in...New Zealand.  Love New Zealand, used to live there, it should be on your bucket list!  Now that I am vegan, I need to find a place to eat because I am starving!  It is so easy to click on the map on Happy Cow, narrow down the search to cities, and I now see that there are 47 veg-friendly restaurants in Auckland!  Woah!  While the website is very user-friendly, the mobile app is even better, check it out.  Oh, and make sure you download the app BEFORE you are starving,it's better that way ;-)

A Home Run Dinner!

Many people are familiar with the famous White Castle...a burger joint famous in the northeast for it's pint-sized, greasy burgers, also called sliders.  In my home town, we have a similar burger joint called the Snow White Grill.  It's burgers are about 3/4 of the size of a regular burger, but full of flavor.  I do not often miss things I used to eat before going veg, but I do occasionally miss those burgers.  They were just right, and I admit it, while I try to cook healthy most of the time, I LOVE a greasy burger.  Don't know why, I just do.  So whenever I miss something that I used to eat, my first thought is...I can totally veganize that.  So I did.
You can get slider-sized buns at the grocery store sometimes, OR you can use square rolls like the kind grandma used to serve for dinner.  Either way, you need something like a mini hamburger bun.  For the burger itself, I actually minced and sauteed onions (about one onion) and mixed them with GimmeLean vegan sausage.  It looks like sausage in a tube, but it makes a better, more flavorful burger than the "ground beef" style that I usually use for meatloaf.  Shape about a palmful of that mixture into a square-shaped patty.  Slice another onions into rings and also some mushrooms and throw into a large pan with some vegetable oil...sautee for about 5 minutes, shove to the side of the pan, and use the same pan to fry your patties.  You should have about a centimeter of standing oil in the bottom of your pan (for the "greasy spoon" experience).  Flip your patty after a few minutes and then put a slice of vegan American cheese on top.  Cover that with some mushrooms and onions and cook till the cheese is melty.  Put your buns on the counter (no, don't sit on the counter!), and put on patty on each bun.  Make as many as you are going to eat, although leftover taste AWESOME heated in the microwave the next day.  Before you put the top on, place it face down (the flat side that hugs the patty) in the oil you were just cooking in for about 10 seconds.  Greasy.  That step is optional.  Put the top on the burger and serve with fries.  This will taste so good, like something your doctor would tell you not to eat, but because of the fact that it's vegan and you are cooking with vegetable oil instead of animal fat, you can indulge and still rest easy.

This Not-So-Little Piggy

So if you have been following my blog for a while, you remember that back in August of 2010, my husband bought me an adorable teeny pot-bellied pig.  We call him Ollie.  At almost 2 years old, Ollie is now as tall as a Labrador and WAY heavier.  Well over 100 pounds.  Now, I think he is just the most handsome pig in the world, but most of our friends and family are shocked at how big he has gotten.  He even has some nice tusks, to boot!  I meet people all the time who want a pig when they find out that I have one, they see videos on YouTube of a sweet little football-sized piggy doing tricks.  It is a myth that even the famed "teacup" pigs stay really small...a mini potbelly can get up to 200 pounds!  And SO, this is the problem with fad pets.  Fad pets are pets that suddenly become popular and everyone "has to have one".  The problem is that many folks will acquire a fad pet and not think about how much work it is to take care of one.  For example, even our yard has to be pig-proof.  Ollie will tear up trash if it is left around.  He needs to be fed and watered regularly.  He needs a pool of water and a warm, dry bed.  He even has his own pig house, and comes inside often during the cold months.  These reasons contribute to why so many fad pets end up in sanctuaries or abandoned.  People just do not educate themselves.  If you have the time and the patience, a mini potbelly is a great pet.  If you like your yard hole-free, your furniture upright, and your time to yourself, it is not a good choice.  Of course, you can say that about most pets.  If you are not willing to love them unconditionally, perhaps you should reconsider owning a pet.  If the demand goes away, the population of these animals will naturally go down over time because humans will stop intentionally breeding them to sell as pets.