pickles and hemp

here's the pickles from Monday's post that are just a wee bit delicious!



and a couple of snacks from yesterday, a tasty live pumpkin seed bar from Go Raw



my go to fav...apples and homemade almond butter, just like a lil kid ;)  yes, that was too much AB



Monday's dinner- Rustic Pasta and Sicilian Collards from The Kind Diet.  We ended up adjusting the pasta recipe quite a bit, maybe I was distracted by a show on tattoos on the History Channel while I was making dinner, who knows? ;)  Now I have my next tattoo back on the brain...brown rice pasta, olives with lots of celery and purple cabbage goodness.



have a mentioned before how much I love collards? 



we did do the 'superhero' swap of pumpkin seeds for the pine nuts



green smoothie:
some of that homemade almond mylk, a banana, 3 Tbsp of hemp seeds, 2 dates, lots of spinach and a generous amount of cinnamon.  I really enjoy cinnamon in smoothies! 



a protein boost and good oils from whole food hemp





last night's big salad of romaine, dandelion greens, broccoli, red pepper, carrot, red onion, celery, sunflower and hempseeds.



dressed with Averie's tahini slaw dressing, get the recipe here.  You won't be disappointed!



topped mine with tomato and half an avocado, hubby will not eat these fruits :(



We were recently talking about rice n beans and decided that I don't ever make them, so I found this recipe for dirty rice and that was the rest of my dinner.



Dave dressed his up pretty, corn chips, dirty rice, cheese, kidneys, and lots of chipotle hot sauce.



Anybody else buy that ginormous bag of organic tortillas at Costco?? 

From what I hear Oprah is going to have a good episode today with Michael Pollan,  Alicia Silverstone, and Chipotle (our kitchen away from home ;) !

Alicia talks about the taping here!  Now to remember to turn the tv on at 4....

vanilla almond mylk

So I've made the vow to stop buying premade almond milk for daily use.  Not that I don't love it ;), but I knew that we could make it here more economically, less packaging, and it's live.
This first time I used the Vanilla Mylk recipe from Ani Phyo's Ani's Raw Food Kitchen

ingredients




after the VitaMix action



a half cup of almonds and dates made all this milk.  I found the sweet milk bottle on clearance at the food co-op.


So far I've had a glass plain, made pancakes, made hubby's hot cocoa, and been the base for fruit/green smoothies.  Speaking of hot chocolate, I don't know if anyone loves it as much as my hubby does in the winter, but I couldn't have him drinking all that high sugary mix every day constantly, so I make him his own mix, and keep in a mason jar, modifying a Dr. Weil recipe that came in an email a long time ago which I can't seem to find online now...

Dr. Weil's recipe calls for:
1 cup milk
2 t.cocoa powder
1 t. sugar
pinch of vanilla powder






I modify ours to make the ratio of cocoa powder higher than double the sugar (for sugar I use a mix of turbinado and org. powdered)  I also go heavy on the vanilla powder to add to the sweetness since I'm removing sugar.  You could also use agave as your sweetner, but I like to have this in a powder form that he can just mix in easily.  We use hot water or almond milk as the base. 
Vanilla powder is not cheap, but it does last a long while.



Dinner last night was the end of veggies and greens left from the week. 
baby bok choy, kale, romaine, red pepper, carrot, celery, broccoli, sunflower and hemp seeds, raisins, a sprinkle of dulse flakes, tossed in dressing. 



to mine I added a Sunshine burger with a blob of Vegenaise, and a sliced Bubbie's pickle.  These pickles taste sooooo great and naturally fermented!  yum.  I got inspired to pick these up after reading this blog post, ( be forwarned you will be totally inspired by this gal, she's like a superhero!!)  I had walked by them how many hundreds of times in WF not knowing what I was missing!



Breakfast this morning was leftover Banana Pancakes (with blueberries added) and a big pile of mango.  As Averie was talking about recently this is another good way to use up those whole super ripe bananas chilling in your freezer.  Also, go check out her gluten free pancake recipe here that's destined to be our breakfast this weekend, looks so yummy! 



Have a great rainy day Monday everyone!  I'm thinking it may be a good day to get some more painting done...will it ever end? ;)  and finish our laundry after having the machines unhooked for 2 weeks!
Thanks for reading.

Red Pepper Deli

Friday I went for a little drive to Costco and thought I'd head over to the Red Pepper Deli in Northville.  I've been wanting to check it out for a while and since I could combine it with a trip to a couple stores it didn't seem like an unnecessary drive.  I first heard about the deli at VegFest last year.  Oh my, I just checked VegMichigan's website and Rory Freedman of Skinny Bitch fame is going to be at this year's VegFest along with John Salley again!!!  Ok, back to Red Pepper.  I ordered the Veggie Roll, because I love collard wraps, a lot =)

It was zucchini, red pepper, cucumber, carrot, romaine, and cashew cheese rolled in a big collard leaf.  It was great, the nut cheese was real yummy and had a nice tang to it. 





I also enjoyed my first juice ever (you know besides the citrus kind).  I got the Liver Tonic#2, which was dandelion greens, carrot, apple and lemon.  It was soooo good.  It was my little apology to my liver for taking a few Tylenol this last period.  I may have to drag out the beast that is our Champion Juicer.  We bought it about 6 years ago used and have yet to use it. 



I would definitely go back to Red Pepper on occasion since it's not in my town, it reminded my a bit of the Go Raw Cafes in Vegas which I miss (see there are good things about living in Las Vegas ;)  with the vibrant colors and pythos plants. 

Here's me and my juice pulled over while I dug out a gps to find my way back from a wrong turn on the way home ;)  I always seem to take the wrong turn first!



Dinner last night was the Polenta Casserole with Seitan from The Kind Diet.  I had picked up seitan that's made in Michigan from WF.





it was tasty, the package is a pound, so I put half in the freezer for future sandwiches maybe. 



I'm still on a cauliflower kick and the recipe has it mixed in with the corn meal. 



getting assembled with frozen asparagus and corn.



baked.



and dinner is served.



overall it was good, the seitan I dug, the casserole was too lightly seasoned for me, the leftovers I'll have to spice up some.

I've been making greens smoothies with protein recently, I like the taste of the protein powder sometimes.

This is one that my Mom drinks, I got the last serving to use and then I get to go shopping for the refill (which I love, if anyone ever wants me to do their grocery shopping, I'm game ;)





It went into a smoothie of almond milk, blueberries, banana and spinach.



This is a protein powder we've had for a while that I got to mix into my oats, an ispiration from Heather of HEAB. 



It went into a smoothie of spinach, kale, water, a banana, and obviously blueberries ;)



a leftover lunch of the White Bean Pesto Bowl from Get It Ripe.



Have cashews soaking for hopefully a successful dessert creation tonight, still full from Chipotle for lunch that may just be our dinner!  Two meals from Chipotle in three days, check ;)

tea and tv.

Happy Wednesday to all!  Hope it's a good one so far =)

Dinner last night was BBQ baked tofu with mushrooms and bell peppers from Get It Ripe.  We ate it with brown rice (remember that big ol bag from Costco??).  I liked that the sauce is sweetened with blackstrap molasses and was a bit spicy.  I think I was craving some raw foods, but it was good and satisfying none the less ;)



The cookies turned out wonderful, I made Monica's Thumbprint Cookies from The Kind Life site.  Super quick to make!  They taste a bit like shortbreads to me, yum.  I've eaten quite a few in the past 24 hours ;)  so in to the freezer went a bunch of them today, ha!



We had a bottle of conserve from a sweet gift basket from this holiday waiting to be used, perfect, I love apricot.  Apricot baby food was a common snack of mine in high school!





Another big bowl of oats from The Kind Diet for this morning's breakfast, then it was off with Mom to take in a load of recycling, but first made a little batch of pesto for tonight's dinner.







Lunch was goood, leftover Sesame Kale Soba with raw cauliflower and broccoli topped with lightly warmed raw cheese sauce that I made here. 



Cleaning bok choy



seriously, how cute are these guys???



we first tried bok choy this summer from the farmer's market.  I really enjoy how crisp and refreshing it is, seems so full of water.

I am in love with tonight's dinner, Pesto White Bean Bowls also from Get It Ripe, very fresh and clean.



close up layers of quinoa, bok choy, pestoed beans, drizzle of dressing.



We got our delivery of chia and hemp seeds yesterday from The Raw Food World.  Excited to try them, hopefully some successful recipe ideas to come soon, until next time =) =)



They also sent a few free samples with our order, love that!