Content
I lovingly call these the easy chocolate chip cookies. They are great-tasting, quick, vegan cookies from the Post Punk Kitchen. I do have another (more difficult and time-consuming) recipe that I slightly prefer but if you need chocolate chip cookies in a hurry, I highly recommend these. I’ve made them twice before; once with my [...]
I am in love with fake chicken nuggets and fake chicken strips. Whenever I’m near a Yard House I beg to go there so I can order their Gardein Chicken Tenders doused in their amazing honey mustard sauce. It tastes like heaven. The frozen Gardein Seven Grain Crispy Tenders are a big favorite of mine [...]
For dinner tonight, I made a vegetarian version of this recipe for a taco casserole. It’s like a Mexican lasagna! The layers are Morningstar Farms Grillers Meal Starter Crumbles mixed with fire roasted tomatoes, green chiles, and spices, then vegetarian refried beans, then reduced fat shredded Mexican cheese, followed by spinach tortilla strips. After the [...]
My parents came to visit for Mother’s Day weekend and to see our new house. I got the chance to cook a few meals for them in my luxurious new kitchen including this new-to-me recipe for vegetable enchiladas. I used this recipe from Recipe Girl which is adapted from a Martha Stewart recipe. The enchiladas [...]
It’s a falafel party! Robbie and I love this baked falafel recipe from Kalyn’s Kitchen. It’s got protein from the chickpeas and, because it’s baked not fried, it’s not oily. Here are most of the falafel ingredients in the food processor. I used about a can and a half of chickpeas (rinsed) instead of dry [...]
Tonight’s dinner was an old South Beach Diet favorite (bikini season is coming blah blah blah). It’s baked tofu with soy sauce and green onion from Kalyn’s Kitchen. I don’t have sesame oil so I skip that part and it’s still delicious. We had asparagus doused in olive oil, salt, and pepper baked in the [...]
We put the beers in the fridge Sunday night and Robbie cracked one open Monday night. They’re REALLY carbonated and not as hoppy as Robbie would like but the taste is pretty good! There was sediment at the bottom so he poured it slow and didn’t get a full glass. Overall, it was fun to [...]
We had a pizza party last night! I made my usual whole wheat crust and topped with our favorite toppings: spinach, artichoke hearts, garlic, tomato, and basil (from my window sill basil plant – I felt fancy about that). The big difference this time was homemade vegan mozzarella cheese! I tried this new vegan mozzarella recipe I [...]
The time to bottle the beer has come and gone. We didn’t have any helpers this time and we were trying to keep the room dark for the beer’s sake so the photo quality really suffered. This is what the beer looked like after fermenting for two weeks. First we had to sanitize everything including [...]
Mad Men returns on Sunday! I’ll be enjoying a Skinny White Russian as I watch the two hour premiere. It’s another easy to make adult beverage. Start with a rocks glass with some ice in it. Pour in a shot or 2 of vodka, a shot of coffee liqueur, then top it off with unsweetened soy [...]
For dinner last night I made tortilla soup for the first time. I used a recipe from The Vegan Slow Cooker by Kathy Hester to start and made some of my own changes and additions. Ingredients olive oil vegetable oil (my addition) 1 medium-size yellow onion, minced 2-3 tsp minced garlic 1 box of Pomo Chopped [...]
On Saturday we completed step one of our first batch of homebrew. We are using a one gallon kit made by Brooklyn Brew Shop to brew their Everyday IPA. (Robbie exclusively and very selectively drinks IPA.) Our friends Conner & Tessa came over and helped out. Our puppy Sookie was here too to supervise/interfere/cute it [...]
Who doesn’t love a strawberry daiquiri? I allow myself one frou-frou drink per vacation and I almost always choose a strawberry daiquiri. The problem with ordering one out at a bar or making one at home with a store-bought mix is the insane amount of sugar. I used a single serving version of this recipe [...]
Mad Men is back in two weeks! I’m preparing by enjoying a new cocktail from the Mad Men Cocktail Guide. The vodka gimlet is a simple drink – vodka and lime juice with some lime wedges and ice cubes. It’s tangy and tasty and there’s no added sugar! I made it with my favorite vodka, [...]
The craft room is (pretty much) ready! It’s a small room and the lighting is wonky so I really struggled to get photos that do it justice. Here it is! This is the view from the doorway. My quilting table is against the left wall with my cabinet full of supplies and yarn behind it. [...]
We’ve been taking Sookie to puppy kindergarten classes at 7:30 on Thursdays which means dinnertime is all crazy for seven weeks. I made sloppy lentils in the slow cooker last week and that worked out really well. I wanted to try something new for the slow cooker this week so I made buttery chick’n from [...]
Our new puppy has been keeping me really busy. I’ve been doing a fair amount of cooking at the new house but sticking to old favorites I know I can make quickly. Last night I branched out and made potato leek soup for the first time. I used this recipe from the Vegetarian Times. It [...]
Robgeleen.com turned 1 year old on February 5! I have to say it feels like a lot more than a year. There were 116 total blog posts and 47 legitimate comments, as well as 90 trillion Brazilian bot comments I’ve chosen to keep to myself. I’m proud to say I successfully completed Reddit’s 52 Weeks of Baking [...]
This is my quesadilla version of Cooking Light’s tempeh fajitas. The marinade and fajita style onions and peppers are delicious but Robbie didn’t like how the fajita always fell apart on him. I’m an admitted cheese addict and I like to throw in some spinach wherever I can so I prefer the quesadilla way too. [...]
This is something I used to make when I was a single lady because it’s fast, easy, and makes enough to eat a few times. I also happen to think it tastes amazing and, if you get a low sugar BBQ sauce and don’t get crazy with the bread and (optional) cheese topping, it’s not [...]
We’ve been so busy with packing for our big move to our very first house! We’re renting, not buying, but it’s still a big deal because neither of us have lived in any house other than our parents’. Knowing we’d be hungry and covered in dust and other dormant apartment nastiness from packing, I made [...]
For dinner tonight I made a very tasty Asian dish from Vegan Junk Food:225 Sinful Snacks that are Good for the Soul, a book by Lane Gold that I got for free for my Kindle app. You can see a copy of the recipe here. I made the following changes: skipped the noodles and cut [...]
I’ve been a vegetarian for over a decade now but back when I used to eat chicken I LOVED the bourbon chicken from the mall food court. I did some searching for a recipe for that sauce and found several on different sites that were pretty much the same. Since there appeared to be a [...]
I did it! I baked my way through the whole year. The final challenge for Reddit’s 52 Weeks of Baking is peppermint. I couldn’t come up with a truly baked food that involves peppermint, or even one that would be improved by the addition of peppermint, so I went the sorta cheater route and made [...]
I’ve been making these cute little crocheted snowflakes as Christmas ornaments. They work up really quickly and I think they’re so sweet and quaint and homey. I used this pattern from Red Heart that I found on Ravelry.com. Here’s one hanging on our already dying Christmas tree. I used some white Vanna’s Choice 4 weight [...]
Cross stitch is a supposedly fun thing I’ll (probably) never do again. I really like the look of it but I hate threading the needle so to avoid doing that so often I kept trying to use really long pieces of thread which got tangled and knotted and caused me great sadness. I was also [...]
The challenge for Week 51 of Reddit’s 52 Weeks of Baking Challenge was to bake a traditional Christmas dessert from another country. I chose this Bavarian apple torte. I’m not sure how authentic it is but this recipe, and similar variations, are quite popular online so I went for it. I followed the recipe except [...]
Week 50 of Reddit’s 52 Weeks of Baking Challenge is plating. Only two challenges left! I made a chocolate cake with chocolate ganache for my mom’s birthday. I used the reliably delicious recipe for basic chocolate cupcakes and the chocolate ganache used for lots of things from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World. I had [...]
Book: Chloe’s Kitchen: 125 Easy, Delicious Recipes for Making the Food You Love the Vegan Way Author: Chloe Coscarelli Rating: 4 out of 5 stars I recently checked out Chloe Coscarelli’s new book Chloe’s Kitchen: 125 Easy, Delicious Recipes for Making the Food You Love the Vegan Way from my public library. I’m a fan of [...]
We flew into Denver on a Friday and were welcomed by beautiful, cold weather. We stayed in Uptown/Downtown Denver at the Warwick Denver Hotel. The parking and breakfast situations there were horrifically priced but other than that it’s a great hotel. Really good and central location, clean, warm, quiet, and we both noticed the elevators [...]
Week 49 of Reddit’s 52 Weeks of Baking Challenge is fudge. I made this vegan chocolate cashew fudge from The Joy of Vegan Baking. It’s delicious and very similar to “real” fudge. It’s rich, sweet, creamy and has that smooth “mouthfeel” just like butter and evaporated milk fudge. It makes a lot! So much fudge. [...]
My first stuffed animal is complete! Hot damn, did I struggle with sewing this little guy together and hiding all the yarn ends. This was my first time crocheting anything that wasn’t a hat or some variation of a square – scarf, purse, granny square blanket, what have you. He’s a little derpy but he’s [...]
Week 48 of Reddit’s 52 Weeks of Baking is pulled/poured sugar. I had never heard of this before so I looked into it. It requires equipment I don’t own like a candy thermometer and kitchen gloves. I don’t particularly want to own those things but I didn’t want to skip the week either so I [...]
People tend to be curious about what vegetarians eat for Thanksgiving so here’s a quick rundown of what we had at Thanksgiving Part 1 at my parents’ house. That’s right, there was a Thanksgiving Part 2. We are very committed to this holiday but there was wine at Part 2 in SoFlo and thus I [...]
These take some time to make but they’re really popular and tasty appetizers. I make them a few days before, freeze them, and bring them to Thanksgiving every year. The phyllo dough is finicky but if you keep it covered while you work it’s not so bad. Makes about 36 spinach phyllo triangles. Ingredients 1/2 [...]
Week 47′s 52 Weeks of Baking Challenge is sweet potatoes. My mom makes the best sweet potato casserole! I already made a vegan sweet potato casserole earlier this year for the gluten-free challenge. It really doesn’t compare to the Southern version my mom makes for Thanksgiving every year so I cheated a little by submitting [...]
This week’s 52 Weeks of Baking Challenge is Asian desserts. I am lucky to be a member of the Gator Nation (“Go cure cancer!”) and as such I frequently enjoyed the extremely delicious and inexpensive Krishna Lunch offered every weekday at the Plaza of the Americas on the University of Florida campus. My favorite dessert the [...]
Bobbie Hinman’s cookbook The Vegetarian Gourmet’s Easy International Recipes is the first really great vegetarian cookbook I ever owned. I’ve made her recipe for sweet and pungent tofu many times since getting the book in college. I made it last night after a long hiatus. It’s still delicious. My favorite part of making it is [...]
During our fantastic trip to Colorado this past week, we took a tour to Rocky Mountain National Park. We went with a company called the Colorado Sightseer and were guided by a knowledgeable Colorado native named Tom. Tom picked us up at our hotel in Denver and drove us through Boulder and into the town of [...]
Week 45 of Reddit’s 52 Weeks of Baking is chocolate. I’ve made a lot of chocolatey things this year but I’m always happy to make another. I baked these mocha chip muffins from the Post Punk Kitchen website. The taste is great. They remind me of the beloved chocolate chocolate chip muffins my friend and [...]
I believe in giving Thanksgiving its due. It’s a fine holiday in its own right and deserves to flourish gloriously through the bulk of November without worrying about how it compares to the Elvis Presley of holidays coming up next month. I’ll admit that Christmas decorating is the most fun but I always save it [...]
After hearing great things about Epcot’s Food & Wine Festival, we decided to go this year. Every fall, Epcot holds a festival in the World Showcase area with booths offering small plates, beer, wine, and mixed drinks from different countries. We went in mid-October with our friends “Contessa” and had so much fun that we [...]
Happy Halloween! Week 44′s challenge of Reddit’s 52 Weeks of Baking is Halloween. I bought these adorable Halloween cookie cutters on sale last year and have been wanting to try them out. The best thing for cookie cutters is, of course, sugar cookies. I used this recipe from VeganBaking.net. This was the only vegan recipe I [...]
The challenge for Week 43 (can you believe there are only 9 weeks left in 2012?!) of Reddit’s 52 Weeks of Baking is candy. Ever since I made those awesome cashew turtles with salty agave nectar “caramel”, I’ve been really into the combination of chocolate and salt. I was searching for vegan chocolate bark recipes [...]
Week 42 of Reddit’s 52 Weeks of Baking challenge was coatings. Chocolate coated anything is generally a safe bet so that led me to this recipe for Chef Chloe’s chocolate chip cookie dough truffles. These truffles are ridiculously decadent. They’re good but the dough is so sweet that it’s almost like a frosting. I suspect the threshold [...]
I made this little scarf for my friend’s birthday on Friday. I thought it would make sense for an October birthday but her birthday has come and gone and it’s still in the high 80s around these parts. I hope she’ll get a chance to wear it, you know, ever. I followed this pattern from Ravelry. I bought [...]
Week 41 of Reddit’s 52 Weeks of Baking Challenge is pumpkin. I made a fall favorite from Veganomicon. It’s pumpkin crumb cake with cashew streusel and I love it very much. I made this last fall as well and I’ve been craving it ever since. I’m so glad it’s pumpkin season again! A kind Internet [...]
Week 40′s challenge is pie. I debated whether or not cheesecake is pie and decided that yes it is. I figure a pie is any baked good with a crust and filling therefore cheesecake counts. I found this recipe in a book called Vegan Pie in the Sky, so that’s Exhibit A. This is the second vegan [...]
I finally finished making the second, smaller, embroidered name quilted pillow for our younger niece. I tried to scale down the instructions to accommodate this smaller pillow form that I already had. It didn’t go so well at first. I had to make a lot of adjustments as I went along to get everything to fit together properly. [...]
