Vegetarian Recipes 3x

No, I’m not a vegetarian but I’m not a big meat eater either.  Any meals that I personally cook will not involve meat, as evidenced in this post.

Tempeh, seitan and nut loaf?  I’ve eaten all three of these things this weekend and guess what?  Vegetarian meals are awesome!  But first let’s catch up a little, shall we?

Oats of the chocolate variety may be my favorite, which is so so weird considering I’ve never really been that into chocolate.

My picture taking is really distracted by the chia pet Joey’s growing by our window.

It really freaks me out that I’ve consumed chia seeds.  I wonder if they’re sprouting like this in my stomach?…

Snow has inconveniently come on the day before the first day of classes.  I can only imagine how fun commuting will be.

I will brave the snow for Sunday breakfast with my family, however.

Joey is most definitely not a vegetarian.

My nephew is so funny to watch.  He and Joey are like two peas in a pod.  But as entertaining as Joey was, this empty box seemed to be even better.

I’ll remember to bring it when we babysit this weekend.

When we got back home I was ready to bake.  Snow always makes me want to stay indoors, bake and drink hot tea.

I had 2 bananas I needed to use up fast (why do I keep ending up with extra bananas at the end of the week??) so I obviously tried Ashley’s Vegan Chocolate Banana Bread.  It was really hard to decide between her chocolate or cinnamon versions so I asked for Joey’s opinion and then did the opposite. <— Nice right?

Ashley got into the benefits of grinding your own flax seeds and I was really proud of myself because I already do so and I store it in the fridge.

I’ve had some trouble with vegan baking because everything comes out flat but that was NOT the case with this bread.

I poured half the… dough? batter? into the pan, added a handful of organic chocolate chips to the remaining batter then poured that into the other half of the pan.  The recipe calls for walnuts but I’m not a huge fan of those and considering I was using them in the nut loaf I felt that was quite enough for one day.

Joey and I shared a piece as a post-yoga snack and it was delicious.  Didn’t I say something about not liking chocolate earlier?…

Anyways it’s moist and not overly sweet plus there’s nothing better than biting into a melty chocolate chip.  Yummmmm.

And because I think every Edible Perspective recipe is a gem, we also made Chris’s breaded tempeh last night.  Try it.  Really.

I wanted the leftovers but I did the mature thing and let Joey have them.  He topped the pieces with marinara and parmesan.  I was pretty jealous.

But I had a tasty bbq seitan sandwich to eat.

I had some recipe requests.  You can find it here.  However, I would probably make a much thinner log than I did and reduce the cooking time by 30 minutes.  Oh, and don’t let that side-note scare you.  Joey and I didn’t experience that side effect…

For my sandwich, I cut 3 slices of seitan, tossed with bbq sauce and popped in the micro for a minute then threw it between an English muffin with some pickles.

With some leftover wrinkly roasted veggies.  Does that description sound appealing or what?

Take that, Joey!

Beanie and I decided the roads were clear enough to make it to the free yoga class and I’m glad we went.  I’d been in a bad mood all day (I blame school staring back up again) and I felt much better after sweating flowing it out.

Plus I had nut loaf to come home to!

I used Angela’s Ultimate Vegan Lentil Walnut Loaf recipe.  Finished product pictures to come tomorrow along with a tasty and easy cauliflower recipe.

I think nut loaf gets a bad rap.  In fact, my mom was just telling me a story about my first Thanksgiving and how we went to a friend of my dad’s house and my mom was appalled that they had nut loaf instead of turkey.  She then had to stop at another friend’s house on the way home to get her turkey fix.

And honestly, after making this, I complained a lot.  It was quite the process and I’m guessing Joey didn’t enjoy cleaning all the dishes I dirtied but upon tasting the finished product I suddenly forgot the bad rap because it was that good.  I’ll take this over real meatloaf, or turkey for that matter, any day!

Happy Monday!