Sunday taco lunch.

On the left, Refried beans and on the right, chipotle lentils. I just cooked some brown lentils up, drained them and then cooked them with onions, peppers, chipotle taco seasoning and tomato paste. Yummy!

All dressed taco topped with lettuce, fresh tomatoes, Daiya cheddar, fresh salsa, Tofutti sour cream and Cholula hot sauce. 

Native Foods & Lentil Soup.

We went to lunch yesterday at Native Foods in Westwood. So sad that the Culver location is closed. Santa Monica too. Why??? It happened so fast and so mysteriously.

This is the BBQ chicken salad. So yummy! For dessert a chocolate cupcake.

Fries and blueberry hibiscus tea.

Today's cooking: Ina Garten's lentil sausage soup. I didn't have leeks so I left them out. Used Tofurky Andouille sausages. Mmmm!

Served with a healthy portion of mashed potatoes.

Lunch for me and lots of leftovers for the work week lunches.

St. Patty's Day deliciousness.

This year I made The Happy Pear's lentil and root veg stew again along with the kale colcannon mash. Very delicious and super healthy! For dessert I made a healthy banana, blueberry, peanut butter, cocoa, cashew milk smoothie.

Bowie Pie & Crack Cookies (with recipes).

Last weekend was glorious. It was David Bowie's birthday weekend. We celebrated by listening to his albums, watched Ziggy Stardust the film and on Sunday January 10th, the new album BLACKSTAR was delivered to my doorstep. Little did I know the same night I was listening to this beautifully dark and complex album, David Bowie would die. I woke up the next morning with no knowledge as I was offline all night and had gone straight to bed. My husband came to me while I was getting ready for work: "Did you hear about Bowie?" I was confused: "No, what about him?" "He died. Last night." I was in disbelief. I stopped putting on my makeup and ran to my room to grab my phone to confirm it for myself. Sure enough, it was true. I looked at my husband with tears streaming down my face. "Oh my god."

"In our madness we burnt one hundred days. Time takes time to pass. And I still hold some ashes to me. An Occasional Dream..."

It was a very emotional week for me. One of our brightest stars is gone. It feels like an end of an era. I'm a big music fan and I am an artist/musician myself so it was a lot to accept. These artists give us so much to hope for, to believe in. Their deaths are more profound somehow. My husband said: "That's life." I know this but how very sad and tragic. Here we were celebrating his life, excited about his new music, his new direction. In the next second, we were mourning his death. He's gone forever. I think of all my other idols. They too will be gone one day. It's just that we are never ready for them to go.

So this weekend, I'm thinking of David and playing his music and spending time with myself. David's favorite dish is Shepherd's Pie so I thought it would be a good dish to make today. And I needed to have some sugar too so I baked some cookies which are called "Crack Cookies". I got the idea from my friend Hope who gave me the recipe that I adapted to make it vegan. They are basically chocolate chip cookies with added oats, coconut and shaved chocolate. What's not to love?

On to the food.

"Bowie Pie". A lentil, vegetable pie with tomato base and a fluffy and crisp mashed potato topping.

Bowie Lentil Pie

1 cup brown lentils
3 TB olive oil
1 large onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 carrots, sliced
1 green pepper, sliced (or you can sub celery)
1 container of cremini mushrooms, sliced
1 can stewed tomatoes
1/2 to 3/4 cup veggie broth
splash of white wine
3 TB tomato paste
1 TB HP Sauce
Salt and pepper to taste
1-2 tsp dried herbs (I used a poultry herb blend)
2 TB tamari or Braggs
For Mashed potato:
7-8 peeled potatoes boiled until tender
1/2 cup soymilk
2 TB margarine

Preheat oven at 350F.

Cook lentils in a pot of water until tender. Drain and set aside. Boil potatoes for the mash. Heat olive oil in a different pot and saute onions, garlic, carrot, pepper, celery until semi-tender. Add mushrooms and saute for a while to sweat them out. Add the cooked lentils, stewed tomatoes, 1/2 cup broth, wine, tomato paste, HP sauce, salt, pepper, herbs and tamari. Cook on medium to allow all vegetables to cook through and reduce liquid a bit. If it dries out, add a little more broth. Total simmer time should be around 10-15 minutes or so. Longer is fine. Keep it on simmer. Mash the potatoes with soymilk and margarine. Season with salt.
Prepare a baking dish sprayed with oil. Pour the lentil filling into the dish and top with the mashed potatoes. Use a fork to drag lines across the top of the potatoes. This will make the topping crisp up in the oven. Bake for 1 hour at 350F.

Turntable is in full force today.

I adapted my friend Hope's "Crack" cookie recipe by using the "Toll House" recipe from last week as a guide and making little tweaks. They came out really good! They are slightly crispy on the outside and chewy on the inside with yummy things inside!

"Crack" Cookies, Vegan Style

In a small bowl stir together:
2 cups flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
2 cups quick oatmeal

In a larger bowl cream together:
1/2 cup margarine (Earth Balance), softened
1/2 cup shortening, softened
1 cup granulated sugar
1 cup brown sugar, packed
1 tsp vanilla

Then add 1/2 cup of unsweetened apple sauce and stir.

Add in the flour mixture little by little and stir as you go to incorporate all ingredients.
Add 12 oz. chocolate chips
Add 1 cup shredded coconut
Add 1/4 of a bar of grated chocolate (I used 70% dark). Grate the chocolate right into the bowl. (EDIT: USE A FULL BAR OF CHOCOLATE! IT WILL TASTE BETTER!)
Stir together all ingredients and drop by the Tablespoon onto parchment papered cookie sheets. Bake for 10-12 minutes at 375 F or until golden brown. Remove cookie sheet from oven and slap it down on the counter. This will flatten cookie a bit. Let stand for a few minutes and then transfer to cooling rack.

Lentil Stew & Mash.

Lovely lovely lentil stew. This happens to be Ina Garten's lentil and sausage soup, veganized and instead of sausages I used cut up pieces of Field Roast. It's a really good recipe. You must try it. I was originally going to accompany it with colcannon but I realized while boiling up the potatoes that my kale had gone bad. So I ended up throwing some spinach in the mashed potato along with the soymilk, margarine and green onions. Delicious!

Lentil Stew.

Made Moroccan lentil stew last night and it was delicious as usual. I love lentils!

Dinner ruined! Plus backup dinner and chocolate pudding freezer pops.

So I got home from work today and spent a good amount of time making the above dinner. I revamped the coconut lentil dahl and made patties and roasted cauliflower. It would have been so good. Unfortunately when I took them out of the oven, I realized a light bulb in the oven had exploded and there was glass on the food. There were shards of glass mixed in with the cauliflower. I was horrified! Had to throw it all out! At least I got some pics. I will recreate this dinner again one day.

Smokehouse chickpeas from Salad Samurai. Easy to make when dinner gets ruined!

Backup dinner was this salad with smokehouse chickpeas with homemade thousand island (vegenaise, ketchup, pickle relish). It was very good.

The other day I made vegan chocolate pudding and decided I wanted them to be freezer pops instead. Super easy to do. Just pour them into plastic cups, stick a popsicle stick or in my case skewers with some foil to cover and freeze overnight.

Super tasty too!

Coconut Lentil Dahl & A Sandwich.

The Happy Pear's recipe for Puy Lentil Dahl with coconut and veggies. I changed up my veggies from the original recipe based on what I had in my fridge. It's really good with rice.

A sandwich for dinner. Tofurky italian deli, vegan cheese, avocado, lettuce, tomato and olive salad.

Irish Lentil & Root Veg Stew and Kale Colcannon Mash.

Happy St. Paddy's day all! I saw a video on youtube yesterday of The Happy Pear, who are twin brothers who cook and also own a veggie cafe and grocer. They are so fun to watch. I loved the simplicity of the recipe and the fact that it is a vegan recipe made it all the better. Whipped it up tonight and really enjoyed it. The flavors are really good and it's definitely a comforting dish. It's also super healthy and full of delicious ingredients!

Here's the video!

Lentil Sausage Soup & Bisquick Biscuits!

I was watching The Barefoot Contessa during lunch break at work the other day and Ina was making a couple of soup recipes, one of which was this lentil and sausage soup. I've never used french green lentils before so this was a first. I substituted Tofurky Kielbasa for the meat version. It is so hearty and beautifully seasoned with cumin, thyme, onions, garlic, leeks, carrots and celery.

And to go with it, biscuits made from the Bisquick mix. I used the biscuit recipe from the side of the box and substituted almond milk for the cow's milk.

So delicious!!!

Recipe here.

Moroccan Lentil Stew & Bisquick Apple Cake

I love lentils, especially in a warm and comforting stew like this Moroccan lentil stew with eggplant and a variety of vegetables flavored with spices: cumin, curry powder, ras el hanout and cayenne.

I got this recipe from sexy Vegan Mama.

Masoor Dal & Vanilla Tapioca Pudding!

I made a pot of red lentil dal today from The Flavors of India cookbook. I love all the wonderful flavors in this: cumin, mustard seed, ginger, turmeric and chile. I had a bowl for lunch with a hot buttered flour tortilla.

And check this out! I made tapioca pudding! I used to love tapioca pudding so much as a little girl and my mom used to buy those little packs of Swiss Miss puddings. Then I upgraded to Kozy Shack haha. I thought I would never taste tapioca again after going vegan but I found a super simple recipe here. I can't believe how easy it is. I served it with a generous topping of soy whip! It's so creamy and just like I remember.

Lentil Tacos and Lentil Chilaquiles Casserole.

I made a really good lentil taco filling the other night to which I added chopped veggie sausage and textured vegetable protein. Came out delicious. Here's a good lentil taco recipe.

I had so much lentil filling leftover that I decided to make this chilaquiles casserole. I added scrambled tofu to the filling as well.

Yummy!

Moujadara and Broiled Vegetables

A very good meal to have on weeknights. While the moujadara (lentils and rice) was cooking on the stove, the vegetables went into the broiler and in about 20 minutes, dinner was served.

Moroccan Lentil Stew and Homemade Harissa

I love to throw stuff in a pot and call it dinner. This is what happened tonight after a long day at work. I've made this before using this recipe, but this time I took some liberties and used red instead of brown lentils, and added other veggies like corn and zucchini. On top there is a blob of North African style chili paste, also known as "harissa". I love to eat this stew on top of rice. Lentils and rice. You can't go wrong.


I must have been anticipating a Moroccan/North African flavor because I made the harissa over the weekend. I used New Mexico and Japones dried chilies, LOTS of garlic, mint, coriander, caraway, cumin and olive oil. It is SO FREAKING GOOD.

A Mediterranean Sunday Lunch.

I was feeling ambitious today and made this beautiful array of foods for my lunch, including dessert. Wish I had a friend over to share it with!


I used my "Olive and The Caper" Greek cookbook to make this luscious eggplant stewed with red wine and basil. It originally called for shallots but I used onions instead. This was so flavorful and you know that anything cooked with red wine is going to be good.


I had a tiny cauliflower that I knew would be a perfect accompaniment to my stew. I roasted it in the oven with olive oil, salt and pepper for about 20 minutes to get this beautiful golden charred look.


And from my trusty "Tables of Lebanon" cookbook, I made moujadara (lentils and rice with caramelized onions). I needed some protein to round out the meal so this was a good way to get both a grain and a protein.


My bowl.


And dessert was a basic lemon white cake. So soft and tender!

VeganMoFo: Lazy Weeknight Dinners.

My husband got me a pizza for dinner tonight. It was great because I really didn't feel like cooking tonight. Mushroom, onions, no cheese please. I added some homemade pesto that I had hanging out in my freezer. Was yummy.


This was last night's lazy dinner. Leftover lentil-chickpea fritters, lebanese rice pilaf and sauteed kale with balsamic dressing.