Backlog Photos Of Foods I Ate.

When my husband cooks for me, he almost always makes me pasta. This is a simple spaghetti with marinara (we buy Gina Rispoli, Newman's, or Mezzetta) and Trader Joe's meatless meatballs. Very hearty and filling.

Homemade sandwich on whole grain with Tofurky italian deli, Chao cheese, avocado, red onion, lettuce, tomato and Vegenaise!

Awesome sandwich.

Had my sandwich with a cup of Annie's tomato soup. This is so good if you don't have time to make your own soup.

Last Thursday was my birthday and I made my own cake! Chocolate with penuche frosting. I got the frosting recipe from a vintage Betty Crocker cookbook. It's a brown sugar frosting that is sooooo good.

My dad bought me a birthday pizza from Domino's. Thanks Dad!

For my birthday weekend, my husband and I spent time in Santa Barbara. We ate at the following restaurants:

British fish n chip shop. The chips are so good.

While my husband ate fish n chips, I had chips n baked beans.

At The Natural Cafe there are some good vegan options.

Like this sandwich. It's called the "Local's Favorite". Ask for no mayo and get a side of tahini sauce. Such a good little spot to grab lunch.

On our last night we hit up Galanga for amazing Thai food.

Spicy Mint Noodles with tofu. Make sure to order without fish sauce and egg.

Delicious veggie red curry. No fish sauce.

My plate. I was so full afterwards. Can't wait to go back to SB!

Puy Lentil Coconut Dahl & Banana Cake.

Beautiful dahl recipe from The Happy Pear cookbook. I'm so in love with their food! I had to substitute a few things because I didn't have them. I used a garnet yam instead of butternut and kabocha squash. I know the squash would have been amazing. Didn't have pak choi so I used baby spinach.

I had some with a bit of white rice. Very very good. The coconut milk is what makes this dish. It is very similar to Thai Masaman curry. Just gorgeous flavors.

Vegan banana cake. Nothing healthy about this! It'll be good with a cup o' tea.

Super Healthy Kale Salad and Mushroom Masala Curry.

Made a delicious kale salad tonight with tahini dill-chive dressing. Scrumptious! It has kale, arugula, carrots, red onion, red bell pepper, toasted walnuts and dried cranberries!

First I massage my kale with a tiny bit of olive oil, salt and lemon juice. This will make the kale leaves tender. Then I added all the other veg and tossed with the following dressing. I let it chill for about 15-20 minutes. The flavors are amazing and the kale leaves softened just enough.

Tahini dressing:
1/3 cup tahini
1/2 lemon, juiced
2-3 tablespoons water
1 clove garlic, minced
2 tsp maple syrup
1 tsp dried dill
pinch of cayenne
fresh chopped chives
salt and pepper
Whisk all ingredients until smooth. Add more water if too thick.

Great curry with mushrooms and peas. I love curries. They really are the very best kind of comfort food. I had an idea today that L.A. needs a veggie friendly curry house. Wouldn't that be wonderful? And not just indian curries, but curries from all over.

Chickpea Ketchup Curry and Homemade Roti.

Chickpea ketchup curry from River Cottage Veg cookbook. Easy and satisfying.

Homemade roti! Here's a good recipe using whole wheat flour. I used white flour for mine.

Michelada, Quesadilla, Chopped Salad, Curry and Vegan Snacks.

Yesterday was a nice hot Saturday and cocktails were in order. Here is a vegan Michelada which is 1 can of beer, 1 small can of tomato juice, squeeze of lime, salt, chili powder, a few drops of soy sauce (or vegan worcestershire) and Tabasco. So refreshing!

Breakfast quesadilla this morning made with Daiya cheese.

This is a vintage copy of The Watkins salad book published in 1946 that I inherited from my late mother-in-law. I made one of the french dressing variations in it and made a yummy chopped salad.

Rainbow salad.

The dressing was so easy to make too. I added capers and chili sauce to mine.

This salad was very good.

Also made a quick chickpea and potato curry with glorious basmati rice. I made the rice lebanese style with lots of olive oil! This is key.

Ran across these accidentally vegan snacks at the store. The ice pops are really light and fresh and the Sahale Valdosta pecans are so good. I can probably make them myself but I liked the convenience. They have cranberries, black pepper and orange zest. Tasty!

Spinach, Tofu and Potato Curry

I followed the "Chard and New Potato Curry" recipe in the River Cottage Veg cookbook. I substituted spinach and used regular russets and added a bit of cubed tofu. And also instead of yogurt I substituted almond milk. I kept all the spices: garlic, ginger, garam masala, mustard seeds, turmeric etc the same. Delicious!

Simmering away.

This curry goes well with rice, couscous, quinoa or chapati.

Flatbread sandwich, White bean ketchup curry and Mushroom rice.

My inspirations today are from my two current favorite cookbooks: Mary McCartney's FOOD and Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's River Cottage Veg. The above sandwich I had at lunch is Mary's "hummus, avocado and chili jam sandwich" on a whole wheat flatbread instead of toasted whole grain. Very messy and very delicious.

Dinner was the ketchup curry from Hugh's book. He uses chickpeas but I was all out so I subbed white beans. It was a super easy 10 minute recipe that uses ketchup instead of tomatoes. Loved it. On the side, more flatbread and one-pot mushroom rice from Mary's book.

Japanese, Thai and Korean deliciousness.

These lovely morsels of curried perfection are called "curry croquettes" which are made up of mashed vegetables, breaded and fried. We got these at the japanese market called Mitsuwa in their prepared foods section. They were so good, I could have eaten more!

My version of thai style noodles vegan style flavored with ginger and mushroom soy sauce. Add to it, lots of tofu and vegetables, fried garlic, chili oil and sriracha sauce. So comforting and so good.

A spicy and sour kimchi I got at Whole Foods that happened to be vegan. I can't remember the brand right now. It was great.

Day Off Food.

Got the day off today to babysit my pooch Buster. Buster hasn't been so well lately as he was diagnosed with a hemangiosarcoma lump on his rear area. Vet says he's a good candidate for surgery as the cancer has not spread to any organs yet. He is scheduled for surgery on Thursday. I'm very worried for him as the lump is ulcerated and has been bleeding for days. The worst was on Sunday night and since then my husband and I have been babysitting him in turns. Today I got to spend time with him as well as cooking some good comfort foods. My good friend Cami stopped by to visit Our Buster. While she was here, we cooked!


Comforting curry! I followed a chana masala recipe and added mushrooms and peas. We had corn salad and rice as well as tamarind/ginger/chili chutney and a pickle relish.


For dinner I made this yummy sandwich.


Our Buster.

Pav Bhaji.

I'm currently reading a food memoir called "Monsoon Diary" and reading about all the delicious indian foods made me crave this dish big time. I've always used this recipe every time I make pav bhaji. I substitute dairy free Earth Balance margarine for the butter. This always turns out mouthwateringly delicious.

Soy BBQ Curry

Dang, I can't believe I made this. If you are a West LA local and a veggie who loves indian food, you probably know about Samosa House in Culver City. They make really good veggie indian food that I have had the pleasure to enjoy only a few times. My favorite dish of theirs is what they call "Soy BBQ" which is a curry full of soy chunks swimming in a dark red sweet and spicy bbq/curry sauce. After having it a few times, I was determined to make it. Only thing was I had no real idea what flavors I was tasting. It is sweet with slight curry flavors and a hint of spicy kick. Today I experimented and I think I came pretty darn close. Keep in mind these measurements are very loose as I was adding a little bit of this, a little bit of that as it simmered. You do what suits your palette.

Vegan Mouse Soy BBQ Curry

2 TB canola oil
1/2 a large onion, sliced
3 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 cup chopped eggplant (optional)
1/2 tsp cumin
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp allspice
2 tsp garam masala
2 tsp hot curry powder
1-14oz can diced tomatoes with juice
1-6oz can tomato paste
2-3 TB tamarind chutney
2-3 TB BBQ sauce (I used hickory bbq sauce)
2 tsp sugar
1 tsp salt
2 cups water or more
1 cup chickpeas, drained and rinsed
1 cup tvp chunks (use more if you are not using chickpeas or eggplant)
1 TB olive oil


Heat canola oil in a pot and saute onions and garlic until soft and fragrant. Add the eggplant and cook until semi tender. Add the spices, tomatoes, tomato paste, chutney, bbq sauce, sugar, salt and water. Stir to break up the tomato paste and bring to a boil.

Add chickpeas and tvp chunks. Stir to make sure tvp chunks are submerged in the sauce so they will expand and soften. Then lower heat to low, cover with lid and let simmer. Every 10 minutes or so, stir. If you need to add more water, go ahead and do so. The tvp chunks should always be submerged in sauce. Also the sauce should be medium consistency and not too thick.

Continue to simmer covered for an hour and adjust spices and salt as you go. At the end, drizzle about a tablespoon of olive oil and stir.

Indian craving.

Went out with my girlfriends last night and had some delicious vegan indian at Electric Karma in L.A. It really got me in the mood for it again so I made this potato, spinach and chickpea curry today. AND I made homemade roti for the first time. It was dead easy. Recipe here. For condiment, I had some jarred tamarind chutney that I thinned out with lemon juice and added ginger and cilantro. This food was very satisfying.

Indian food craving.

When I crave Indian, I must have it! I went all weekend craving a good curry and even though I had a lentil dahl at a non-indian restaurant on Saturday, it didn't cut it. Came home and made my favorite: channa masala. I usually add peas to mine so I don't think that part is authentic. But the taste was amazingly authentic. I ate it with rice, mini chapati and tamarind chutney to complete my indian feast. Recipe here.

Good stuff to eat.

Sorry, been so lazy with the blogging lately! I've had several meals that I forgot to blog about and here's one of them. It's fried tofu with a tamarind/hoisin glaze. That's coleslaw on top.


Kidney bean curry when I was craving indian food.


Deeelicious flaky and tender biscuits! They are great on their own and perfect with margarine and jam. Me+tea+biscuits=happiness.

I got this recipe from bazu over at the ppk forums. Here it is veganized:

Recipe James McNair's Buttermilk biscuits:


1/2 c. solid vegetable shortening (I used Earth Balance stick)

2 c. all-purpose flour

2 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. baking soda

1/2 tsp. salt
3/4 c. soymilk whisked together with 1 tsp. vinegar

Position rack in middle, preheat oven to 400
spray baking sheet with oil or line with parchment, set aside
in a bowl or food processor, combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt. cut in the shortening with your fingertips or a pastry blender until the mixture resembles coarse bread crumbs. (I used a fork) Add soymilk/vinegar and stir just until the mixture sticks together.

Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead lightly and quickly, about 30 seconds. using a lightly floured rolling pin, roll out about 1/2 inch thick. using a floured 2 1/2 inch round biscuit cutter, cut out circles. Place onto the prepped baking sheet.

Bake until lightly browned, 10-12 minutes. Serve piping hot.

I got about 10 biscuits out of this, plus a bunch of loose ends that I'm saving in the freezer to use as dumplings.