Category Archives: Food

Amy’s Breakfast wrap

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I haven’t been feeling well the past few days.  I know it’s because I’m not eating well. I’ll admit, I take the lazy way out in the morning.  I don’t make breakfast at home, because more often than not, I’m already running out the door late.  I usually stop at the grocery store and get a bagel and just toast it when I get to work.  Not the most healthy of morning starts.

Tired of feeling like crap, I decided I needed to find a vegetarian breakfast that I could just pop in the microwave at work.  I found Amy’s Breakfast Wrap/Burrito.  Follow the link and find out more about this company and their products:   http://www.amys.com/products/product-detail/burritos-and-wraps/000048

The instructions say to put it on high for a minute, then turn it over and put it in for 35-45 seconds.  Well, it was frozen solid, so that wasn’t going to work.  I put it in for about 4 minutes in total on one side, and then just 30 seconds on the other.  It came out hot all the way through and thankfully, none of the ends of the tortilla were the consistency of cardboard.  I was afraid I may have heated it too long, but I didn’t.

This tasted heavenly.  The tofu made in such a way that it substituted the egg very well.  I enjoyed it thoroughly and have a great alternative for that bagel.

Amy's breakfast scramble

 

I give this a definite 4 tuna cans!

This stuff rocks!

NEW Morningstar pizza – Baja Black Bean Review

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I am always wary of microwave pizza.  That “crisper” rarely works well, at least for me, and many times I wind up turning it from a potentially tasty treat, to something I can make a shoe out of. But, I decided to give this a try.

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I wasn’t sure about black beans and corn on a pizza, but it was either this one or the one with the garbanzo beans (Mediterranean Chickpea).  I love garbanzo beans, but on a pizza seemed more odd than the black bean combo.

So, here goes.  On the tray, for 3:45 minutes in the office microwave.

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Looks like this when it’s out.

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And now for the best part.  Tasting it!

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It’s actually quite delicious!  A little spicy, so it’s got a bit of a kick to it. And guess what? It’s crispy!!!  I really really loved this.  Now I want to try the other one.   The price comparable to other single serving pizza’s on the market.

Here is some of the nutrition information.

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I highly recommend this.  It’s vegetarian, tastes good and the price won’t kill you so you can buy a couple and have them for lunch at work, or dinner at home.

I’ll give this a resounding 4 tuna cans!

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A few new things to try from Trader Joes’

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On Friday October 18th, a new  Trader Joe’s near my home.  I was so excited that I rushed after work to not only get my free reusable bag, but to look around at all the goodies I’m always hearing about!  When I got there it was insanity!!!  I guess I wasn’t the only one who’d been waiting for Trader Joe’s.  

I couldn’t take the crowd, but I did manage to get a couple of things that I wanted to try.  First being this:

Trader Joe's Spicy Chai Latte Mix

Now, I LOVE Chai tea, so this just sang to me.  I tried it that very night.  What impressed me most was, many times you buy these mixes and they say to use water or milk.  If you use water it usually tastes horrible, but this didn’t!  It tasted amazing just with water alone.  I can only imagine what it tastes like with soy milk!

This deserves:

4 tuna cans – This stuff rocks!

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The next thing I tried is Trader Joe’s Roasted Seaweed Snack.

Trader Joe's Roasted Seaweed Snack

Crunchy, a little salty, a little fishy and you can eat the entire package and only take in 60 calories!  I’m thinking about making a mock tuna salad spread with this.  Some experimenting is definitely in order.

I give this:

3 tuna cans – You have my attention.
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So far, Trader Joe’s hasn’t disappointed me.  Sadly, it’s still incredibly crowded to go into. I’ll have to wait a few weeks until the novelty has died down a bit, so that I can go in and fully and calmly investigate things.

 

Honey and Plantain cheesecake.

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There are times when I have very little in my fridge, very little.  Friday, was one of those times.  I had a few things and went online to see what I could make with some cream cheese and eggs.

I found a recipe for honey cheesecake.  So, I decided I’d go with that, but I’d add something extra.  I had a ripe plantain and wondered if I could incorporate that somehow.  I didn’t have any graham crackers or any vanilla wafers, so I had to improvise.  I had Count Chocula cereal.  Yes, you read right.  Having nothing to lose, I went at it.

In the end, I wound up with a pretty damn good cheesecake.  It’s not overly sweet, which makes the ingredients of honey and plantain to stand out more.

Here it is:

Honey and Plantain cheesecake

Filling:

2 8oz packages of cream cheese
1 large ripe plantain (very important, make sure you use a ripe plantain, not a green plantain)
4 eggs
2/3 cup of honey
1 tsp vanilla
1 dash cinnamon (optional)
1 dash pumplin spice (Optional)

Crust:

1 cup Count Chocula cereal
1/4 cup butter

Pre-heat oven to 350.

For the crust, mix the Count Chocula and the butter. (trust me.)
This will give you enough to make a thin coating at the bottom of the pan.
For more, use 1 1/2 cups of cereal and 1/3 cup of butter, which will allow you to bring the
crust up the sides a bit.

To make the filling, boil the plantain for about 20-30 minutes on medium heat, until soft.
Mix room temperature cream cheese with plantain, eggs honey, vanilla.

Pour the mix into your tin and then place your tin in a water bath, which is just a large pan, filled with water.
Place into the oven for 1 and 15-30 minutes.  Depending on your oven, until firm.
When done, take it out of the oven, and allow it to cool for a few minutes, and then place in the refigerator
for at least 3-4 hours before you take the cheesecake out of the tin.  Then place it back into the fridge and allow it
to further cool overnight.

As I said at the beginning, this is not an overly sweet dessert.  The honey and the ripe plantain, along with the cereal crust allowed the natural sweetness to come through.

When you serve, add a drizzel of honey or even chocolate.  I also like spreading a bit of raw honey over the top.

Enjoy!

Don’t mind the kitty legs in the background. My assistant liked the spotlight.

 

Easy Quiche

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One of my favorite things to eat and make is quiche.  I have a very easy recipe that I’ve been using for several years.  I found it in an old recipe book.  Over the years I’ve adapted it so that I can make something easy and I can use any number of different fillings.

To begin with, you need your ingredients.

Okay, don’t mind the large black kitty. He’s my assistant.

It’s not easy cooking with 5 cats running around.

I always try to by cage-free.

Add a dozen eggs in a bowl and beat as though you were making a very large omelet. For a very hungry giant.

After you beat the eggs, you add a half-pint of heavy whipping cream. Make sure it’s heavy and don’t add more than the half-pint. Then you add your spices.

These are dill seeds. Or are they fennel seeds? No, sorry that’s dill. I suppose you’d say that’s a good dash. I add a little more fennel, because I like fennel, but you can play with it. You really can add any of your favorite spices. It’s all about experimenting. I also added just a shake of white pepper and oregano. I didn’t add salt, simply because I’m not a big salt eater, and with everything else I added, it’s flavorful enough for me.

I buy the small blocks of spinach from the freezer section. I’ve also used the packages, which is easier because you can add them directly from the package, instead of having to thaw it out and squeeze the water out.

This is the block of spinach after I squeezed the water out. It doesn’t look like much, but it’s plenty, believe me.

Mushrooms. Not too thick cut, but not too thin either.

I put the spinach in first, then add the mushrooms and lastly the cheese on top.  I would say I add about a little more than half a cup of shredded cheese to each quiche. But again, it’s up to you how much cheese you like.

I add the egg mixture with a ladle. I add one ladle at a time to each shell, so that they each get the same amount. The ingredients will yield two quiches. Pre-heat your oven to 400 degrees, and then bake for 35-40 minutes. With my oven, 35 minutes is perfect. The quiche comes out moist, not too dry. It should not be too dry if you plan on re-heating in the microwave. And don’t worry about the pie shell being yucky if you re-heat in the microwave. I do it all the time, and it comes out fine. Just be careful and nuke the suckers in 10-15 second intervals.

And here you have the finished product. That’s how you want it to look, a nice light golden color. I love this because as I’ve said before, you can add anything. I’ve made this with tomatoes in the past, I’ve also made them with asparagus. You can add meat if you like as well. Experiment and add things you like. This is a breakfast, lunch and dinner meal and it is very satisfying. This keeps well, covered in the fridge for about a week.

Of course, one of the best things is how inexpensive this is for a mean that, at least for one, can feed you for a week for less than $10.00

I hope you make this and enjoy it!

This is my recipe, but I’m still giving it 4 tuna cans!  It’s awesome!

So Delicious Dairy Free

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As many of you know, I am a vegetarian.  I do eat eggs and dairy products.  But, yet again, in an effort to live cruelty free, I am always looking for alternatives.  For a time I was drinking soy milk only, but I stopped after reading some articles linking soy products to cancer.  I still eat soy, but not as much as I used to.  I’ve been buying Rice Milk, which I like if I’m having say, milk and cookies.  But for cereal I like to use So Delicious Dairy Free.  like the taste, but for me, it’s too rich to drink alone. I hadn’t tried the ice-cream, but yesterday I decided to give it a go in the hopes of this being another product I can buy to replace dairy ice-cream.

Here’s what I tried:

Since I bought this at the supermarket, they didn’t have the varied selection a place like Whole Foods may, so really my choices were limited to Vanilla Bean, Cookie dough, and Chocolate.  Of course, I chose chocolate.  You can’t go wrong with chocolate…usually.  I was pleasantly pleased with this.  It was actually much creamier than I thought it would be.  Originally I thought it might be the consistency of say a sorbet or something similar, which I really don’t like, but it wasn’t!  It didn’t have as chocolaty a flavor as I would have liked, but it was still very good, and it had a hint of coconut taste, which was expected.  This product is soy free and dairy free, and they have a couple of flavors that are gluten free as well as no sugar added flavors.  There are also some Almond milk varieties, which I’ll have to look for as well.

All in all, I was quite happy and I give this 4 tuna cans – This stuff rocks!

 

Morningstar Farms “Veggie Hot dogs”

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I’m always looking for different meat substitutes, whether meatless burgers, cold-cuts or hot dogs and sausages.  Finding a really good tasting hot dog type product has been the hardest.  I have tried some good chorizo and sausage type products, but hot dogs, not so much.

This past week I saw a new product from Morningstar Farms which was a hot dog.  I was sooooo excited because I used to love eating hot dogs. I finally made them yesterday and they were deeply disappointing.  So many times people describe food like this as tasting like cardboard.  I wish!  Hell, I’d love to say they tasted awful, but that would imply they actually had flavor.  Really, they tasted like nothing.  The most flavor in my meal was the bun and the mustard.

I will NOT be buying these again. This gets a litter box rating of 4!  Blah!

Gardein Mandarin Chicken – Review

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One word, AWESOME!

I decided to get a few things at Target this past Saturday afternoon, and in the middle of finding the perfect stockings for my two new furry additions to the family, I realized I needed something for dinner. I love shopping at Target, because ever since they added the grocery section I find many wonderful meatless options either in frozen foods or on the shelves next to some of the dry foods. Thankfully, Target has begun offering some Gardein choices in their vegetarian section. I was reaching for the meatless burgers when I noticed the Mandarin Chicken package!

Of course, I couldn’t just serve this alone. I’d need some sort of side, so I opted for a steam-in-bag broccoli, and added some some boil-in-bag brown rice at home, (can you tell I’m all for convenience?) My entire meal took less than 15 minutes to make. I did however have to improvise a little when it came to the sauce for the Mandarin Chicken. The pouch exploded in my microwave, and I only had about 2 tablespoons of sauce, watered down sauce, left. I add a little honey and some red pepper flakes and mixed it into the chicken as it was in the pan.

It was delicious! This package is enough for several meals if you are cooking just for yourself. I not only had enough for dinner, but I had plenty left for lunch today and dinner later as well. So for less than $6.00, between the Gardein and the broccoli, I managed 3 very tasty and convenient meals. I won’t count the rice, because I already had that.

I love Gardein. There are many meatless offerings I haven’t had, simply because not all markets sell all of their products. I suspect they just sell the most popular. I won’t complain very much though, since I’m happy to be able to find anything from them. If you want something delicious, quick and not too pricey, especially if you are feeding several people, this is the way to go.

Gardein Mandarin Chicken easily gets 4 tuna cans from me!

Freschetta by the slice – review

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I bought one of these yesterday at the market. I had planned on having it for lunch, until one of my office neighbors offered to share her lunch with me. I’ll take homemade pasta with sauce over microwave pizza any day, so this was left for today.

As frozen microwave pizza’s go, this actually tasted quite good. I had hoped to find the one with veggies, but other than this cheese slice, the only other one in that section of the freezer had chicken on it.

It was cheesy, and spicy and had the right amount of sauce. Of course the crust wasn’t crispy, even with the special tray included, but I didn’t expect it to be. I have yet to taste any microwave pizza that has crispy crust. This is why I always make mine in the toaster oven, but we don’t have one here at work so I had to make do. The price was incredibly reasonable at $1.99. Really, you can’t go wrong with that.

Regardless of the lack of crispy crust, I’d recommend this for an inexpensive lunch that will satisfy the taste buds. It was filling and I will certainly be trying it again. Next time I will hopefully find the veggie one.

I give this a rating of 3 tuna cans. It really was quite good.

Sophie’s Kitchen – Vegan Seafood

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Yes, you read that right, vegan seafood! AAAHHHH!!!!

I’ve been a vegetarian for a little over 3 years now. It hasn’t been easy, as I’ve lived my life loving a good rare piece of meat. I became a vegetarian for ethical reasons, after only being able to see 5 seconds of a video about factory farming. The image of a sick cow trying to get up only to be dragged by a forklift will haunt me for the rest of my life. After seeing that, I no longer wanted to be part of that world. And if you eat meat, you are part of that world.

But, I digress. Since that time I haven’t been able to satisfy my love of seafood. There are quite a few companies that make some amazing tasting fake meat products. But seafood isn’t an easy thing to fake. Imagine my surprise when one day I walked into Whole Foods and found http://www.sophieskitchen.com (I tried to add the link another way but it wasn’t working. So far, I’ve had the “fish” filets and Prawns. The prawns were very tasty, but the filets are to die for! Tomorrow I’m trying the shrimp. I’m hoping they are as good as the other two products. They also have calamari, but I’ll skip those since I was never crazy about real calamari. Ick.

Even if you aren’t a vegan or vegetarian, you might want to go and have a try. Replacing even just one or two meals a week with meatless products will make a huge difference to keeping some of these animals from being needlessly killed.

I’m giving this amazing product 4 tuna cans!