A bit overdue...

I haven't posted in a while because I have nothing to post! Food has been sort of blah, and I'm working mostly nights so I don't get a lot of time to cook-- I just throw something together for lunch with leftovers to take to dinner. Boring!

The picture above is of something I created while in this state (the lunch/dinner state) and although it didn't turn out how I wanted it, I like the idea. Clearly, it's stuffed jumbo shells. Not so clearly, it's inspired by Dreena Burton's pesto stuffed shells-- however, although this looks amazingly and wonderfully delicious, I don't think I could possibly eat that for a normal lunch and not die afterwards. That's the type of food you eat at a party (because food at parties is fat-free and calorie-free by default), but I wanted something quiet. Simple. Easy.

This version has my pesto, tofu and mashed black beans to compensate for my lack of tofu. I will tweak this and use either no beans or white beans if they must be used. It also turned out bland. At any rate, expect a good version of this sometime soon, if I ever get around to using the other half of the box of shells!

The other note-worthy meal I made recently was something I actually managed to cook for Phil and I. I must confess, we've been eating out a lot lately. I've been running a lot in my free time, and he works so much he doesn't have much free time, so we've been lazy as of late. I'm hoping to change that and get back to cooking, especially since money is so tight (we're all feeling it, right?) This was just some marinated tofu (I used one of the marinades from Vegan Vittles) that I baked, and served with a sauce I made by thickening the leftover marinade with cornstarch. The couscous was cooked in vegetable broth and mixed in with sauteed oyster mushrooms, red onions and crispy broccoli. Nothing notable in the salad-- just a salad! We eat a lot of them in this house!

In some final news, check out this ridiculous article in Philadelphia's Citypaper, entitled, Veganomics: Guess whose diet is affected most by high gas prices.

What? Are you living in a cave, Boyce Upholt? Everyone's food comes on trucks, dude, including meat, diary, eggs, etc. The deciding factor is less vegan or omnivore, it's local or imported-from-Mexico.

I'm curious to see anyone elses thoguhts on this article. I didn't think it was necessarily 'talkin trash' about veganism-- it just seems sort of, well, pointless and stupid.

Undercover in the morning!

Around 7 this morning, I woke up sort of startled because Phil wasn't next to me (he stayed out late last night with friends). So I got out of bed, walked to the stairs and saw a light on downstairs. I peered down the stairs, and there he was fast asleep on the couch with an empty container of hummus in front of him on the coffee table. I woke him up and got him to bed, the got myself back to bed for a few more hours (I meant to wake up at 8, but it became 9:30).

When I woke up, I saw that there was a half-eaten piece of bread, still bearing hummus, lying on the floor by the couch. I suddenly had an image of an intoxicated Phil struggling to eat before passing out, and the passing-out winning. Well, the bread was covered by ants, which I threw away, but the carpet was still all hummus-y and the ants were having a ball. I followed them across our couch (on the ground, of course), then all the way across the living room to the... front door? No, they weren't going under the door. They ducked beneath our bookcase next to the door and dissapeared.

I pondered this, while taking pictures because I'm weird:

That's fake leather, if you were curious.

Anyways, I lost interest and went out to water the plants, but some movement by the door caught my eye. I found their entrance! They were crawling through a crack in our stoop, which must somehow lead to a place nehind the bookcase? I don't know, weird.


The moral of the story is: ants are good at cleaning up. Once I was done being a camera creep they and the spilled hummus were gone (I was GOING to clean it up, but I wanted to give them some time to scram. I felt bad vacuuming those unsuspecting suckers up!)

Might as well face it, I'm addicted to...

I don't know, they were there, they were cold, and so I just ate one. And then I couldn't stop! One became 5! 5 became 15! And so on, so forth. Part of me thought, 'Tsk, tsk! You already had your snack today!' Then my sense took hold and I realized that a diet that limits me from fruit (even thought grapes are basically candy, whatevs) is silly. So I won't feel guilty.

But I will say that I wish I wasn't on a diet so I could cook interesting things. I'm reluctant to post weird diet crap like:

Okay, this was actually pretty good. The other night, Phil came home late and made a midnight snack. It was an awesome pasta. It took me back to the good old days (2 weeks ago) when I ate delicious stuff like that every day! Every meal! I asked for a bite and he gave me a (small) bowl and I ate it even though I was suffering from massive stomach pain from that stupid movie popcorn on Saturday night. Which is finally gone, btw, but it was hell for three whole days. It was like I had a length of chain moving slowly throug my intestines.

Anyways, I tried to recreate Phil's pasta, but E-diets friendly, and naturally it didn't work at all. It was good, just not Phil-good. The basic idea behind the pasta dishes I've been cooking is to replace some of the pasta with something else-- in this case it was green beans, which I boiled with the noodles (half the time) and then treat as noodles. It's a good alternative since starch is something I gravitate towards.



On a different note, today after work I did some grocery shopping. Something you'd think I would do more often as I work at Whole Foods, but I actually live closer to another one and I don't like to drive to work, so I usually walk to the one near my house to shop. I drove today, shopped, and while I was in line the Odwalla guy gave me this Odwalla and a coupon to get it free!

First of all, lt me start by saying that I don't drink juice. I mean, I don't buy juice, because I don't like drinking sugar. It makes me thirsty, which defeats the point of drinking. I do, however, like drinking R.W. Knudsen Family Spritzers (see left) because they're 100% juice and that's awesome.

I mention this because cane juice is the second ingredient is this tasty Odwalla drink, and though it was an awesome free drink, I wouldn't buy it again. I just don't get the point. But some people really like juice, and if that's you, give this a try.

I have, however, had the Odwalla smoothies for a snack, and they're yummy.

Sorry this is a lame post. Hopefully I'll lose my 7 lbs and can go back to creating interesting food.

PS. I had too many labels so I'm shortening them, drastically.

Music ?

Can popcorn stomach aches last 3 days?

That's the question of the day, and I wish I had a definitive answer. Something funny is going on in my tummy, and I wish it could leave me in peace! Maybe I should try pepto bismol. Is it even vegan? I've never had it. I'll have to look into that.

Anyways, lunch yesterday was the above pictured 'pita pizza', a meal that tasted better than it looked.

Dinner was this Boca burger with pretzels and hummus. Yum! I've eaten more processed veggie burgers in the last week than I did last year, without a doubt.

My mom pointed out a while ago that even though this blog is called "Music and Veganism" I rarely mention the music in my life. I'm going to try to from now on, since it i the focus of my life and what I want to be doing. For now, if you are interested, my myspace page is www.myspace.com/charlottelittlehales , and for anyone in the Philly area that is reading this, I'm playing next Tuesday (7/15) at the North Star Bar!

See you later-- lunch is cooking up and I've got a chick-flick a-waitin.

Food Allergy?

I wrote out a huge post yesterday and the internet died, causing me (among other things) to lose it. I'm not in the mood to rewrite my lentil-soup recipe, but I'll post some pictures.

Anyways, the gist of it was that I doubt I have a food allergy, so goodbye elimination diet! It was fun. I felt healthy, and skinny, but I want bread again. I was going to sort of do it for another two weeks, but.. eh. Actually, tonight we're having chili and I'm making corn chips from scratch, so technically I'm probably still sticking to it. But I want tempeh in it. And afterwards, I want to go to the turkish store across the street and buy some allergen-ridden Turkish sweet. So I will.

Here are some pictures of food from the last few days. Tomorrow or maybe later, I'll post a recipe for the asparagus pesto pasta (quinoa macaroni) we had last night. Inspired by Michael Chiarello, in case you were wondering.

Food:







Roasted Brussels sprouts and potatoes. Um.. yum? I do this whenever I get the chance. I love roasted Brussels sprouts!










My attempt as a brown lentil dal. Phil liked this but I was not a fan. Next time I'll use a recipe.












Phil makes amazing lentil soup, but this was mine. Mine = bland. But it wasn't bad, just... bland. The thing that made it special is that it had red lentils and brow lentils in it. Which anyone can do.








A kind of Mediterranean take on that quinoa-lentil thing, with sauteed zucchinis and red lentils instead of brown. I had a lot of fun with lentils, as you can see.







And some sneaky oatmeal cookies that didn't make a picture.. yum.

A New Idea

This idea might not last very long, but I though it might be fun to try to theme my cooking adventures. As much as I enjoy reading the other vegan blogs out there, I'd like to do something that sets me apart, and I'm really not. So I thought I would try to tackle cuisine not normally associated with vegetarians or vegans. Those that come to mind immediately are French, Irish/British, Cuban... just to name a few. I should be able to name more, which is more proof that I need to expand my global-culinary-knowledge.

In the future I'd like to check out books from the library and veganize recipes, but this week I'm using the internet, and I chose Irish cuisine.

Now, looking at the options sort of makes me feel nauseous. I haven't eaten a "meat and potatoes" diet ever in my life, and I don't really want to. But I'm going to anyways. And somehow I'm going to find a way to still incorporate whole grains and a lot of vegetables (I like potatoes, but we aren't lovers or anything).

Here's the menu for this week:

Bangers and Mash (I'm told this is the British name, but the dish still exists in Ireland)
Dublin Coddle
Pea and Ham Soup
Boiled Bacon and Cabbage
Parsnip and Apple Soup

Blech. That sounds disgusting. Wish me luck! Oh, and Phil gets to make two meals of his choice this week, so hopefully we'll get a break at some point. I'll post the recipes and pictures as I go.

Oh, I almost forgot. This is part of the promise I made myself that I mentioned in the last entry, which is: I'm not buying any more vegan cookbooks. Gifts are fine, but for the time being I'd like to use what I've got and learn from other people. Sort of like the mentality behind 101 Cookbooks, ya know? Okay, that's all!