Island Portobello Mushroom Burgers with Baked Potato

This is the Island Portobello Mushroom Burger out of The Everyday Happy Herbivore Cookbook by Lindsay Nixon. It is found on pg.88. I can not say enough good things about this burger. This was the first time we had tried this recipe and I was beyond impressed. The part in the middle of the mushroom of the first picture is diced onions that I added when the mushrooms were cooking. They were very fast to prepare 15mins from start to finish. I put vegan mayo on the bun with lettuce and tomato, and served it with microwaved baked potato with vegan butter. The buns are 100% whole wheat and the label was read very carefully to make sure it didn't contain any animal products. If you like mushrooms at all, even if you eat meat I recommend you try these they are mind blowingly awesome! Vegans eat burgers too :). 

Snack: Homemade Guacamole and Tortillas

This snack wasn't my idea, at about 10am every morning Miss Kaylee gets it in her head she has to eat again. She is the biggest avocado fiend I have ever seen. She ate two or three cubes of it while I was preparing this dish. It is made with half an avocado (or a little less then half in this case), vegan mayo, garlic powder, onion powder and about half a plum tomato thinly chopped. I was not the creator of this recipe. I stole it from Mariah Hackett who stole it from someone else. Though my cheater version is different from hers, I need to give credit where credit is due. She uses real onion instead of the onion powder and I'm not sure but she may measure stuff. I just kind of throw it together to fit my taste buds. This is MUCH cheaper then buying pre-made guacamole and is much better for you since it doesn't have all the extra added whatever. Though avocados have some fat that occurs naturally it's the good for you fat.

Whole Wheat Bagel with Vegan Butter and Apple Slices.

Earth's Balance vegan buttery spread has helped in my not missing dairy. We use it on popcorn, in mashed potatoes and of course on bagels and toast. This was breakfast this morning Lenders 100% Whole Wheat Bagel with Earth's Balance buttery spread (I top mine with garlic salt, but I'm a little strange) and a gala apple sliced. Of course in the picture you see I had a glass of orange juice and my coffee. In my coffee is a french vanilla coconut milk creamer made by So Delicious. This is a very versatile breakfast we have a vegan cream cheese I could have used instead or with the buttery spread. Fruit spread, and/or peanut butter are also topping options for this yummy simple breakfast.

Whole Wheat Rotini, Quick Marinara, Beef Flavored TVP and a Side Salad

I'm sure the first question here is going to be what the heck is TVP. It is soy based product that makes a great meat/protein replacement in the vegan diet. It can be seasoned for tacos, beef replacement or sausage replacement. TVP or Textured Vegetable Protein is about the most versatile stuff I've worked with so far, it's right up there with tofu (we'll cover that I'm sure in another post). Notice here the salad is off to the side and not the primary part of the meal? The only pasta I buy is whole wheat, so what you see pictured here is whole wheat rotini with quick marinara sauce (Happy Herbivore Cookbook pg. 259), and beef flavored TVP (also found in Happy Herbivore Cookbook, pg. 140). It looks a little orange because it's topped with vegan parmesan which is a simple mixture of nutritional yeast and ground up walnuts which can be found in health food stores. The salad includes chopped romaine lettuce, cucumber, portobello mushroom and roma tomatoes. I generally buy an organic marinara sauce, which I did have in the house. I wanted to see how the marinara would be in a fixed up meal such as this. It was really good. I did find myself having to add salt, and I think next time I may add a few additional spices not in the recipe to fit my family's preferences. Overall though this meal combination was both filling and satisfying, the only thing that needed to be added was a piece of fruit for dessert!

Hawaiian Chickpea Teriyaki

This is a recipe out of The Happy Herbivore Cookbook by Lindsay Nixon it's located on page 127.

The glob you see on the top is pineapple mango salsa out of a jar. I wasn't really feeling all the work that would go into making it from scratch, but Lindsay does a great job in her book listing what you would need to make your own salsa.The recipe was very quick to throw together. The part that took the longest was the non-parboiled brown rice. The actual chickpea part of the recipe took a total of 15mins. It was very very flavorful and the salsa added that sweet little kick that it needed. I added some soy sauce to my bowl mainly to give the rice a little flavor. I think that maybe putting a little extra teriyaki sauce on before topping with the salsa would give it just the touch so I'd be able to leave off the soy sauce next time. I will definitely make this again. It was hearty, satisfying and very filling.

The reason for yet ANOTHER blog.

I get a lot of questions when I tell people I'm vegan. The most common question when I tell them I don't eat animal or animal bi-products is; "Well then, what do you eat?".  I have created this blog to answer that question. I cook a lot of the time out of right now only a few really great cookbooks. 

The plan

1. Cook something.

2. Take of picture of it ready to serve.

3. Write a review on what I thought about it. 

If you like food, and are wondering right now what we do eat. Stay tuned!