Cupcakes!

I made cupcakes today!

They're strawberry cupcakes, with either strawberry (pink) or caramel (brown) icing. I ended up putting the kiwi slices on top because, well, to be honest the caramel-iced cupcakes really didn't look too appetizing!

The best part is, they're 100% vegan! I was especially surprised that the caramel icing was vegan, but by-golly, it is! The strawberry cake-mix and strawberry icing are both Duncan Hines, and both are vegan. Very cool. Plus, instead of vegetable oil, I used a mashed banana. Extra delicious.

I'm feeling spicy...

Spicy food, that is!

I was having a hankering for some Mexican food today, so I decided to whip up some veggie fajitas for dinner. I used a recipe from this book as my base, and did kind of a 'use what you have' approach to come up with my own version. (I tend to do this with just about every recipe I use, because 99% of the time I don't have all of the right ingredients!)

So, here's what's on the menu tonight:

Fajitas

Tofu (pressed and cubed)

onion, green pepper, corn, squash, zucchini

Spices: garlic powder, chili powder, cumin

Saute the tofu, pressed and cubed, in oil with all of the spices until it is coated and starts to brown. Add in all the veggies and saute til they're done!

Serve in flour tortillas with diced tomato, avocado, sour cream (vegan, for me!), and salsa, and a can of refried beans on the side.

I know, its kind of cheating to use a can of refried beans, but I'm just really happy to finally have a can opener, people! Anyway, this is going to be good. I'm just waiting for Teddy to get home from work so we can dig in!

A Delicious Fall Treat!

I've been meaning to make some sort of pumpkin-spice cake or cookies for a few weeks now, and I finally got around to it today. It is absolutely heavenly, easy to make, and better yet, its vegan!

I didn't take step-by-step pictures because, well, I mostly made it up as I went along. So here's basically what I did.

Ingredients:

1 box of Spice Cake mix (if you're going for a vegan cake, just check the ingredients on the box. The one I used was Duncan Hines Moist-Deluxe)

1 can of pumpkin (instead of oil)

Ener-G egg replacer (equivalent of however many eggs your box of cake mix requires)

1 cup of chocolate chips (*optional; make sure they're vegan - I used Ghiradeli)

Directions:

Follow the directions on the box of cake mix, substituting Energ-G egg replacer for eggs and 1 can pumpkin (or applesauce, if you prefer it) for oil.

I stirred in 1 cup of chocolate chips for good measure (because isn't everything better with a little chocolate?).

Use baking times on the box - mine baked for about 30 minutes.

Let it cool completely before putting on icing.

The icing:

Ingredients:

1 block of silken tofu

3-4 tbsp. lemon juice (to taste)

1/2 tsp. vanilla

1/2 cup sugar

a pinch of salt (to taste)

Blend all the ingredients together (using a hand mixer) until creamy. Spread over the cake once its cool.

Eat up!

Pizza, Pizza!

So, last night I was really hungry for pizza. I found an easy-sounding pizza-from-scratch recipe in my new Beth Bee cookbook that I really wanted to try, but alas, I was out of tofu. Boo. So today after work I picked up some tofu and a few odds and ends for my pizza.

Let me just start out by saying that I have never really been much of a cook. I can prepare like a champ, but i just never got into cooking. Ever since I went vegetarian last October, and even more so now that I'm Vegan, I've been really getting into my cooking (also out of necessity!). Luckily, it seems that I'm a pretty decent chef!

The whole pizza was completely made from scratch: dough, 'cheese', and sauce. Oh yeah.

The 'cheese' is actually Tofu Basil 'Ricotta', which is seriously AMAZING. I used fresh basil leaves from my garden. The sauce is sort of my own mixture of tomato paste, diced tomatoes (canned), and spices because I didn't have any real pizza sauce, and I like to make things difficult.

I picked these fresh from my garden, too! I sliced up a few for the topping.

I made two small pizzas (one with broccoli, one without). Here's one pre-baking.

And here they both are, ready to be eaten!

What's the final verdict?
Delicious!

What I Did Today...

1. Drank coffee with my mom and watched The Today Show all morning. Then I made us some Tofu Scramble for breakfast (awesome!), since my mom is trying to incorporate more veg. food in her diet (yay!!).

2. Went out to my gardens and did some DESPERATELY NEEDED weeding. We're talking a mound of pulled-weeds about 2 feet high....seriously. Oh yeah, and I took some pictures of two new residents in our pond....

Look, a honey bee!

3. Made Chickpea "Meat"balls, using the recipe from Invincible Summer. They taste AWESOME, but they're really not very ball-like.... they don't really stay together very well. But seriously, they taste GREAT.

4. Still on a cooking kick, I tried a recipe for Vegan Cheesecake I found on vegcooking.com..... I followed the directions exactly, and ended up with something more along the lines of Vegan Flan. Hmm. Its actually quite delicious, but definitely NOT cheesecake, in any way/shape/form. I really think the author of the recipe truly just accidentally typed 'cheesecake' instead of 'flan', because it looks, smells, and tastes exactly like it. So its back to the drawing board on the cheesecake thing. I did find another recipe (this one calls for Tofutti cream cheese instead of silken tofu, and no maple syrup, which is probably a good sign) so I guess I'll give that one a go in the near future.

5. Made a new banner for the shop and here in the blog. I think its my favorite one EVER.

6. Went to work for 4.5 hours....(ahem...waste of time!)

7. Came home, sang "Happy Birthday" to my dad (he was tired last night when he got home so he wanted to celebrate today instead), ate a piece of my flan-cake, and now, I think I shall go to bed.

Goodnight, friends!

What I Did Today...

1. Spent too much time "plugged in".... but doing useful (ok, sort-of) things, like earning points for the Peta2 street team, looking up recipes because I'm tired of eating the same old things, ordering some new books and a tshirt....

2. Obtained this Beatrix Potter box set. My mom found it in my sister's crawl space (where my mom stashed all of her childrens' books. She has scads of them, as she's a preschool teacher). Yay!

3. Made yummy pasta salad with chick peas, my new favorite food.

And now, I have to go to work for 4 whole hours. Bleh. Why can't I just be wildly successful and live off of my Etsy shop??? ;)

Happy Thursday to everyone, and PS - today is my dad's 49th birthday!

Happy Birthday Daddy!

Tote bags, snow boots, and macaroni and cheese!

Tote bags are back in the shop! These are even better than the last ones... they're embroidered! Right now I only have 2, but the listings in the shop are for customized ones - I hand-draw, and then hand-embroider each design, so every bag is completely unique and one-of-a-kind.

I just really liked how these looked, lined up beside our generator outside.

I saw a recipe somewhere recently for vegetable macaroni and cheese. Of course, I couldn't for the life of me remember in which magazine (or if it was indeed in a magazine!) the recipe was in, so I made up my own. It turned out quite delicious, indeed!

Mmm... fresh broccoli, red peppers, and portabella caps, with ricotta and cheddar...

.....leftover noodles from dinner the other night, and....

.....a box of Kraft Spiderman macaronis. :D

A little bit of this, and a little bit of that

Yesterday was pretty uneventful. Chris came over for breakfast yesterday morning;
and I fixed a pretty yummy meal:

Bakery-fresh bagels, scrambled eggs (I make delicious eggs!), vegetarian sausage links for me (real bacon for Chris), and hashbrowns...and Starfruit! Yum!

I had class in the afternoon, but Chris was off work yesterday so he came over again in the evening and we watched a fantastic movie, undoubtedly my new favorite!

For dinner, I made vegetarian stuffed peppers - they're stuffed with rice and ground 'beef' made by Morningstar Farms - love it. They turned out so deliciously!

This is me cooking - I didn't know Chris had my camera! I turned around to say something to him and snapped the photo.

Check out my new, bright-green skillet! It matches my birthday present...

Top with a little cheddar, and voila!

And now, I'm off to school for the whole day. Bleh. I can't wait for summer! ;)

I'm sure you'll hear more from me later... happy Tuesday!

Happy birthday to me...part deux!

Ok, I'm back from shopping with my mom. I got one treasure at the Goodwill, which I will show you as soon as I get some decent pictures of it; and she took me shopping at Target, where I got some really really wonderful goodies! But alas, I don't have pictures of them yet, either. But I will, and then I will show you. Until then, I'll leave you hanging.

But, I do have pictures of my cupcakes! I'm so proud of them! Just look!

All of the miniatures came from miss A.Bel, except for the mushrooms, which were a thrift store find the last time I visited Norfolk. The tiny deer and gnome cupcakes are my two favorites. I also really like the ballerina.....

And now, I'm off to have some vegetarian red beans & rice with "chicken" and some cupcakes...and then we're going to play Disney Scene It, which was one of my birthday presents. Oh! And then green cupcake stand above was a present to myself that I got at Target today. Hooray!

Some Yumminess to Share

Yes, "yumminess" is now a word. Because I say so.

I was starving when I got home from school today, and I really felt like pizza.... so, this is what I created!

Its a vegetarian "chicken" and mushroom pizza, with BBQ sauce - yum!

I used Morningstar Farms' "chicken tenders" meal starters (awesome!!!), 1 fresh white mushroom, and a sprinkle of mozzerella cheese.

I wish I could say I made the crust myself, but unfortunately I'm just getting into the whole cooking-thing, so its just a regular old Boboli's. But it was delish.

For the sauce, I just brushed a little bit of olive oil over the crust, and then brushed on a thin layer of bbq sauce. I don't really like a lot of sauce. Then I just put on my toppings, popped it in the oven for about 10 minutes, and voila! So good.

I've been meaning to take some pictures of my little window-ledge herb garden, but I keep forgetting! Unfortunately its already dark outside, as you can see from the picture, so I only got one decent picture out of all that I took. I got the Chia herb garden for Christmas. Its so cute! So far, so good, even though I think the window ledge is a bit drafty. But its virtally the only place in the whole house where my poor little baby plants can get some sunlight and not get demolished by cats/dogs/people/etc. So we're just biding our time until its Spring, and they can be properly planted outside in my garden.

Speaking of gardens, this came in the mail the other day...

Birds & Blooms Magazine!

For anyone who even remotely enjoys gardening, or likes birds and/or flowers, you must read this magazine!

My grandma has been a subscriber for years, apparently. Last Spring, when I decided I was going to dig a garden, Grandma started letting me borrow her B&B magazines. I literally went through about 5 years' worth over the course of the summer. And about two weeks ago, I got a copy in the mail, with a little card attached that said I was receiving a "gift subscription", paid for by my Grandma! I think she forgot she ordered that for me, as a Christmas gift! She never said anything about it at all! Or maybe its a slightly-early birthday present, since my birthday is this Sunday...hmm... I've only seen her once since I received the magazine (which is ridiculous because she lives next door to me; but we're both always on the go!), and I forgot to thank her, or to even tell her I got it! So I need to remember to do that. Because Birds & Blooms is wonderful. They are filled with the most beautiful pictures, and cute stories, and tips, and blueprints, and..... well, its just great.

**************************

In other news, I think I forgot to mention that Chris did get the job at the Hanover Evening Sun. Hooray!!!!! So far, he really likes it. Its only his second week there, but so far, so good. I'm really keeping my fingers crossed that this job works out really well for him. He's saying that he'd like to stay there for a few years, at least, which is A-OK with me since I have a few more years of school left.... so we'd be living close by to each other still! Its so nice having him around regularly now. I'm getting super-spoiled!!

In other-other news, I'm really excited for school tomorrow. Tomorrow is sort of a "Global Warming Day" across the nation. They're calling it Focus the Nation; and if you haven't heard about it yet, there's still time. Check out the website and see if there are any schools in your area that are participating. I know right now there are over 1700 schools across the nation (colleges and high schools) that are participating. Its the largest teach-in in the history of the US. Its an all-day symposium of lectures dealing with the global warming crisis, and all sorts of consequences that people normally don't think about, like the psychological effects on people, etc. I'm super-excited because, well, its my major. But I think its going to be really interesting too. Plus, I get extra credit for going for my Atmosphere class. Hehe.

So, yeah. Check it out. You might learn something. :)

I've been a bad, bad blogger....

Oh, dear! Its been entirely too long since I've last popped my little head in here to say hello! Please accept my apologies, and the following excuses:

1. I've been terribly bogged-down with school work. Every time I think to myself "Oh, just finish this assignment a bit early, and you'll be running ahead of schedule! Then you'll have plenty of free time to actually enjoy yourself and have a life!" I'm sadly brought crashing back down to Earth by yet. another. assignment. (But, in that same vein, I did actually just finish my last paper for this week - so far - and now have a few minutes of free time before getting back to studying for a quiz later today and a huge exam tomorrow!)
   
2. Any time that is not spent either physically at school or studying/doing homework, I am of course, at work. Really. Its getting to be ridiculous.
   
3. I really haven't had much to blog about, which is terribly depressing. Why? See the above 2 excuses.
   

So, how is it I'm home, and not doing any school work right now? Well. Its actually a funny story. I went to work at 6:30 this morning, as I have been doing every Monday and Wednesday since school started. Only apparently I was supposed to work at 6:30 PM today, not AM. Crap. So I turned around and came back home, which is actually quite lovely because now I'm fully awake (much earlier than I would have been if I knew I was supposed to work in the evening, since I don't have to be at school until 2:00 today), and I was able to churn out a paper that I've been putting off for at least a week in only about an hour. I seem to be more productive in the early morning hours...maybe my brain is more fresh in the morning. I don't know! Haha.

So what's new? Hmm...

I have some new residents in my garden:

Yes, that is an enormous monster-spider that has taken up residence in my birdhouse. I am so creeped out by this, words escape me.

And this, thank goodness, is a rubber snake that my grandma thought it would be funny to hide in my tomato plant. I actually thought it was real for a second...so I poked it. It didn't move. I took it out and threw it on the ground, and every day its back in that tomato plant. So I just leave it there now. :) I'm actually not scared of snakes, is the funny thing... but one time my sister hid one in a pile of leaves while we were cleaning out the shed, and it definitely scared me. So now they always try to do that to me...not fair!

Last week my mom made some delicious chicken parmesan, and I added some fresh basil from my garden to her sauce.... it was so delicious! Too bad the picture came out so blurry....

This is my new favorite nail polish color...its called Twist and Shout, and I just love it. I think other people think I'm crazy though. I had one customer at work say, "Oh, look, you're ready for Halloween early!"..... and she was serious. That kinda hurt my feelings. But I still love it! My manager astutely observed that it matched his Mt. Dew, too. *rolls eyes*

This is my new favorite outfit. I love Fall clothes so much! Layers, layers, layers and knee socks! I wore this yesterday (I've had each piece for a long time, but that's the first time I combined them like this), and I got so many compliments! My comm. professor told me I'm a stylish girl! Haha. That always makes me feel good.

I made a big sale last week - my biggest yet! Though, I admit, I'm sad to say goodbye to my deer plaques...

At least I know they're going to live with a very sweet girl in the UK! I've made her promise to send me pictures of them hanging in her apartment... what a strange feeling to know that something you created will hang on the wall in an apartment of a person you've never met, on a different continent. Amazing.

I signed up for a free trial of Netflix earlier this week (but yesterday I found out that my dad signed up too so I can cancel mine), and I've watched some interesting movies...

The Calcium Kid

Loved it. Absolutely hilarious mockumentary, starring my boyfriend, Orlando Bloom.

Alice

Really not sure what I think about this one..... very strange. Disturbing might be a better word. I liked the little skeleton-animals, but not a big fan of Alice's up-close mouth with crooked yellow baby-teeth, constantly whining "Pleeeeeease, sirrrrr" in the same irritating tone. Meh.

Blood Tea and Red String

I saw this at Miss Marjorie's recommendation. It was cool, but not at all what I was expecting. Actually, I have no idea what I was expecting, but whatever it was, I still felt surprised after it ended. Cute, slightly disturbing... see for yourselves. PS - there's a whinnying turtle with a tiny saddle. Too cute!

Oh, and I finally got around to watching An Inconvenient Truth. I loved it. Loved it! Besides the few points of regression and melodramatic life-lesson stories by Mr. Gore, I thought it was fabulous. Of course, I would think so because his graphs and data are precisely the things that my major studies are concerned with - in fact, I've already seen all of that data in my classes this semester, although none of my professors have even made mention of the documentary. I guess its because they don't want to say yay or nay to the controversial film.... but either way, I found it absolutely fascinating and well done. Anybody else like it, or not like it? Anybody care to share their opinion about it? This is what I'm studying in school, and I'd like to know first-hand what other people have to say about it!

Ok, I really must stop putting off studying for my Geology quiz and Problems of the Environment exam. At least those are 2 classes that I really enjoy! Hopefully I'll have some more free time again soon, and I'll see you again! :)