a garden update, the seeds are sprouting!

ok, so I found another use for coconut kefir...pancake topper drowner!  It's so good.



this was great with NaturallyNutty Vanilla Almond Butter and coco kefir!



I made extra pancakes (the recipe is Orange-Poppy Seed Pancakes from the Garden of Vegan
and added lots of blueberries for a couple of my bfasts this week.



a yummy dinner lately Tortellini Salad with Fresh Spinach from the current co-op Advantage flyer (scroll down for the recipe).  It calls for cheese tortellini, but why do that when you can have these? 



I will forever remember the first time I had butternut squash ravioli, I was in love at first bite.  Did it help that I was on a date with my hubby in our early relationship days (It was love at first bite with him too ;))???  sure =) but the ravioli was housemade and really delicious. 

Here's all the goodies before I added the spinach.  I subbed rehydrated sun-dried tomatoes and red bell pepper for the fresh tomatoes. 





A savory late night snack...I don't know it just sounded good ;)  An avocado, tomato, Averie inspired dressing with miso added, and Salad Sprinkles. 




we always have to be eating our kale here!  Sesame Kale Soba from Get It Ripe.  (organic Soba/Udon are on sale at Whole Foods right now)



I just realized I didn't put any green curly kale in the garden this year, oh well!  All you fellow kale eaters worshippers will love this:  A girlfriend of mine has a new nephew and his name is...Kale!, why didn't I think of that...well, for starters we don't have any kids, haha ;) I so love it!

I finally broke down and bought lotion...I found this at Target.  I am not familiar with the company but they seem to be a good one and the ingredients looked ok to me.  I searched for this on the skin deep database, they had a different lotion from the two I bought and it was listed by a user not the database folks, it scored a 4...not great, but the ingredients that were not liked I didn't find in either of my lotions....at this point I'm very happy with both of them.  Not sure why I bought two, I guess I just couldn't decide!





It seems like so many little companys are just becoming parts of the big money monster ones, this one may be the same I just don't know it yet!  A friend of mine posted about this recently on her blog here.  If you have a favorite handmade lotion from the farmer's market or the like and it's relatively local I'd love to hear about it!! 

I took a few garden update pictures last week =)

Here's a couple of tomatoes coming up! (didn't mark which I planted where so they're either Black Krim or Cherokee Purples with some cottonwood added for extra fuzziness).


cucumbers



lacinto kale



lots of cilantro!



spinach (last year I realized where the little thin leaves come from in the baby spinach from the grocery;)  They are the cotyledon or the seed leaves).



leeks and carrots behind them



the starts from Frog Holler in their new home! (tomatoes and red peppers)



an aerial view, haha!  Our garden is little(4'x8') and I break the rules and pack a lot of plants into it.  The frame was already built when we bought our house and was previously a dog sandbox/pool.  It was perfect and lined with sand for our garden, each year we add more compost and this year a fence too to keep the vagabond cats from pooping in it, yes it happened and yes it stressed me out ;)  The old zucchini seeds, romaine/butter lettuce, and basil have also sprouted.  Dave's one request of green beans went in last week, hoping they'll sprout soon as well!  I think I have a love affair with the garden, I must look at it a few times a day and talk to it a bit =)

Must get moving, I'm getting sleeping and have lots to do...

thought for the day from Lululemon's manifesto "the pursuit of happiness is the source of all unhappiness"

A2 farmer's market + Pilar's with Mom

Mom and I hit up the Ann Arbor Farmer's Market last week for the first time together this year.  I couldn't resist and picked up a few veggie starts from Frog Holler!  My red pepper seeds have yet to sprout (they were involved in a little mishap between Maggie and an outside animal...) so I choose some Italian red sweet peppers called Super Shepard and a few different varieties of heirloom tomatoes, an orange Valencia, Moskvich, and some Red Zebras. 



I also bought this super cool salad dressing vessel.  This is definitely a pretty and functional way to mix up our 'stirred together dressings'.  I love it. 





The artist is Denise of Blue Heron Pottery.



We also then found our way to Pilar's storefront (with the help of Mom's super fancy phone) for lunch.



Mom enjoying lunch =)



We shared the vegan tamale meal with horchata.



I brought some goodies home for dinner too.  This is the vegan spinach and kalamata tamale, so good!  Sylvia sources many of her ingredients from local organic farmers, the spinach in this tamale is from Tantre Farm, which is another of our favorite local farms.



I've been on a kefir kick here and a great use for it is to make shakes, this was fresh pineapple, banana, one date (the last one...), original So Delicious coconut kefir, vanilla powder, and Naturally Nutty almond butter.  Way better than a dairy milk shake if you ask me! 





We had company for dinner last week and I made the Carrot Bisque from Vegan with a Vengeance and a salad based on the Apple Walnut Poppyseed one from The Raw Food Revolution Diet. 





along with some Motown Multigrain bread from Avalon bakery in Detroit.  The depot town bakery's oven is being rebuilt right now and in the meantime the co-op is stocking Avalon's bread.  We dipped it in our soup and gave it two thumbs up! 



look at all the seeds =)



I think we've been eating all of Kroger's stock of organic strawberries ;)





and the usual green fare:



lots of massaged kale





I've gotten a little behind on blogging, we've been away from home or outside so much that it's been hard to sit at the computer ;)  I did get caught up on Grey's Anatomy yesterday though and it was so intense!  I'm glad no one had spoiled it for me before I saw it. 
We're having the most gorgeous weather here!  Tyrah's crazy hair season can begin because we also took the top off the Jeep this weekend, haha, it gets nuts! 
Does everyone have their gardens all in?  What a great growing week it's going to be.

Forks over Knives.

I'm so very very excited for this film to come out, I understand it will be sometime this summer!  Gene Baur had told us about it during his talk at U of M.  Here's the trailer if you haven't seen it already. 



Happy healthy Friday to you all! 

WCC earth day festival

Back a few weeks ago now I went to the Ann Arbor Earth Day festival.  It's now held indoors at WCC(Washtenaw Community College), it was rainy and cold this year, so that was kinda nice.  I do like it to be outdoors better though at the farmer's market, my favorite year we went with one of my SIL, it was cold and rainy then too ;) , we were introduced to kale chips and sunflower sprouts.  We bought kale, brought it home and made our own delicious chips (in the oven).  This was about six years ago now, it's taken me a while to find myself back to that lovely kale...now it's a staple in our diet and grows like crazy in our garden =) 

This year I enjoyed lunch from Pilar's.  I had the tamale meal which is a lot of food, and I did eat it all ;)  She makes a vegan tempeh tamale that filled with tempeh, green olives, capers, and potatoes. 





Here's my meal: the tamale, casamiento, slaw, and plantains.



vegan tamale filling



and maybe the best part horchata!  I know this has sugar, which I don't consume a lot of, but this is a wonderful treat to me.  I did chat with Sylvia about the ingredients (so many horchatas have cow's milk/cream in them), but she makes hers vegan and creamy just from the toasted rice. 



you know where this cup is now....our composter =)



She also makes hibiscous tea, which Mom and I have had before and is yummy.  I do much prefer horchata however.....mmmm it's so good



responsible waste!  (all my lunch products went into the compost, well, and my belly ;)



the Leslie Science and Nature Center was there with some of their rehabbed injured birds of prey.  They had this gorgeous bald eagle and a barred owl that was so amazing.  I just love birds of prey and really enjoy seeing them out in the wild. 



Other highlights of the fest for me were chatting and learning about Ann Arbor's Co-Housing, which I find really interesting and wonderful.  Not for us right now, but maybe someday...and talking with bgreen today, looking through their cork flooring and learning that they have a store front on Industrial.  This week I went to the store shopping for some remodelling materials.  If you're in the market for green finishing supplies (or biodegradeable plates, cups, laundry soap, etc.) I definitely recommend checking them out.  I also learned that there is an electric scooter made in Ann Arbor!  who knew?  We've tossed around the idea of doing one car one scooter, which right now would work for us.  We still own two autos that are kicking though, so we're very happy with that now, but maybe someday I'll be driving my scooter to our co-housing condo. 

D'lish tonight on the Travel Channel

Just a quick post now as I've got a laundry list of things to try to get to today.  My most favorite restaurant that I've been to is going to be on the Travel Channel show Bizarre Foods tonight!  Here in MI it's on at 10pm.  It'll be interesting to see how they figure it's bizarre, but super cool that this awesome vegan joint is going to be on tv.  So for those of you who have tvs I think you should check it out =)  The restaurant is D'lish in Sedona, AZ.   Link to the show's site.

Hugo Naturals swag

Also in my visit to WF this week I met Hugo of Hugo Naturals.  I didn't know he was going to be there, but thought it was cool that he was at one of our Michigan stores.  He was very kind and well informed, we chatted about the products of course, Monsanto, the food industry, etc.  What a cool happenstance!  I did not have my camera on me, otherwise I totally would have asked for a photo. 



He hooked me up with some lip balm, a lavendar sanitizing hand spray ( I do like to keep a natural hand sanitizer of some sort for festivals or the like when we'll most likely be using port-o-potties, this one is surprisingly moisturizing too ), and a delicious rose soap.  How generous!





Mom, you're going to go gaga when you smell this soap!



I found that I loved Hugo Naturals hand/body lotion in Las Vegas, they carried it at the new big WF on the strip.  I was interested in it first because it's cruelty free and at the same time made with ingredients that I recognize.  When I buy lotion this is what I get, the Oatmeal and Shea butter.  I then started using their Vanilla and Sweet Orange shampoo and conditioner which I loved too, I have since as you know become a no-pooing gal.  HN also gets the WF premium body care designation.  By talking with Hugo you can understand his sincere concern with the health of our planet and you can read more about that here.  Another cool thing for anyone who has gluten sensitivity is the products are gluten free. 

I sampled the baby oil too, and must have smelled my skin about 50 times on the way home, yum.  I did not know they had a baby line (I think baby products are great for adults too:) I think the line would be awesome for anyone with a babe or babe on the way.

Here's some recent eats around this joint.
Big chia oat kefir breakfasts



wraps



Gena's Raw Curried Cashew Spread, which is awesome!  I've eaten it spread in the wraps and with red pepper and zucchini dippers.



salads



with stirred-up dressing



more salads and wraps





Indian-Spiced Sweet Potato Soup with brown rice.  I used red kale instead of spinach and left out the chickpeas.  This was yummy, warming, and spicy.



I lost the recipe when it slid down between the countertop and the wall ;) 



I found it with a quick search online at Delicious Living, the link is above.  I love this magazine and also Taste for Life. 

Averie's Vegan Chocolate Snowballs that I made for my Mom on Mother's Day.  I did go quite a bit lighter on the sweetener and used part raw agave, and did a half cup total of the coco powder which I used half cocoa and half raw cacao.  I also used the coconut oil and chias.  Mom has reported that they are all gone now and were delish =)  I agree. 



Mom had ordered some raw cacao from Mrs. Bassett and ordered me a bag too!  Thanks Momma xoxo



A raw dinner away from home with lots of green power!



A little Ziggy for this warm sunshiney day!