Posts Tagged With: Vegan

Being an adult is AWESOME!

Mainly because you get to eat soup for breakfast. I mean seriously, is there anything more delicious then soup? On cold winter mornings who wants a cold bowl of cereal? We don’t even eat that around here! Although Capt’n Crunch is amazing… mmmmm… But soup! So warm and hearty!

Breakfast!

Breakfast!

So friends, Soup it is for me! Let’s also discuss the fantasticalness that is Cauliflower. I’m pretty confident in saying, cauliflower is the best food in the world. You can do anything with it! Mash potatoes, breakfast fritters, wings, poppers, the list is endless with this beautiful vegetable.

Isn't it beautiful??

Isn’t it beautiful??

Alright, I’m willing to share…

Curried Cauliflower Soup-

2 Heads Cauliflower

1 onion

4 cloves garlic

1 Tablespoon curry powder

5 cups veggie broth

Lets remember, I don’t really measure, hate using a ton of ingredients, and love simplicity! So play around with it a little, but this is generally how I roll…

Chop onion and garlic and cook in whatever pot you are using (with a little oil if you do that kind of this (I do))

When it smells yummy and before it burns throw in the curry powder for a second, then add broth. I use-

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Chop one of the heads of cauliflower and add it in. Cook until its tender enough to throw everything in the Vita-Mix. Blend until smooth!

Pour back into the pot, chop the other cauliflower, throw it in, cook until tender.

And Eat! I use a little salt at the end… but I might have a salt problem. Sometimes we serve it over rice, sometimes we don’t, delicious either way.

Best part of the recipe? Make double (or triple) and leave it in the fridge for a quick and easy snack! Mmmmm Breakfast!

Life is better with Soup. Woah, Woah,  Life is better with Soup. I’m pretty sure that’s what Michael Franti meant….

Categories: Vegan Recipes | Tags: , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Halloween Fun!

Despite the fact that it may seem against everything I believe in, I love Halloween! I love the freedom to dress up, be creative, and to just have fun. The candy and ridiculous amounts of sweets and the scary stuff (I’m scared of everything) may be my least favorite parts, but as a family we throughly enjoy our Halloween traditions.

Even the bathroom is dangerous around here!

Even the bathroom is dangerous around here!

Today was Decorate and Super Craft Day! We made some tissue paper bats, painted some pumpkins, and visited the dollar store to get some cheap decorations.

Working together.

Working together.

 

Shirtless painting is really the only way to go!

Shirtless painting is really the only way to go!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sometimes super craft days can be overwhelming, tons of children all wanting to do things in their order and ridiculous messes to clean up. I find it easier to run my crafting time like a preschool. I set the schedule (sometimes allowing their input) and plan easier activities for them (today it was foam airplanes from the dollar store for them to play with outside) so I am able to set up for the next activity.

Outside fun to keep them busy while I set up painting time.

Outside fun to keep them busy while I set up painting time.

Another favorite part of Halloween is making food fun! Simple pesto pasta is always better when you call it Slime Pasta!

Slime!

Slime!

Pesto-

Handful of Basil

3 handfuls of Spinach (to make the awesome green)

1 1/2 cups Cashews (soak them in water for 10 minutes or so)

Garlic cloves (I use 4, I love garlic)

Cup or so of Nutritional Yeast

A couple tablespoons of Olive Oil

Salt-Pepper

Throw everything in the Vita-Mix (or blender) with just a little of the Cashew water and blend away! Remember to add some vegetables. While there is a ton of spinach in the pesto, pasta is a “filler food” for us and should always be supplemented with extra veggies.

Slime Monster!

Slime Monster!

There is a lot of green slime around here today!

There is a lot of green slime around here today!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Remember– Messes can wait until later! Have fun making special memories with your little people now!

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Categories: Parenting, Vegan Recipes | Tags: , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Vegan Mac and Cheese

Great for camping!

Bag of pasta (Fun shapes are better!)- cook that per package

Mix dry ingredients and put in sauce pan over medium heat-

3/4 cup nutritional yeast

1/2 cup flour

garlic salt

onion powder

maybe a little more salt and pepper

Slowly add wet ingredients-

A cup of water plus a cup of plain soy milk

3 tablespoons olive oil

Whisk this all together and try to make it smooth (never works well for me). Be patient and it will thicken up nicely! If you have any veggies add them in!

If not..

Hobo Style- Any leftover veggie ends (broccoli stalk) either yours or your friends, add it in! Cheese sauce makes everything better!

Mac and Cheese cooked van side!

Mac and Cheese cooked van side!

 

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Categories: Vegan Recipes | Tags: , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

More Vegan Camping Food Goodness

One of the biggest search terms coming to our blog is “vegan camping food”.  So in an effort to give the people what they want, here is a little of what we cook on the road!

First and foremost for us, we like to hit up as much fresh fruits and veggies we can. Giving a child an apple as a snack always feels better to me than handing them anything packaged. One of the kids’ current favorite is being handed a whole mango. They simply peel as the eat, or eat the peel as well. The mess is worth it on this one!

Greens!

Greens!

Cauliflower, sweet potatoes and garlic salt!

Cauliflower, sweet potatoes and garlic salt!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

With green veggies a little browning in oil, salt, and garlic usually does the trick for us. Cauliflower is a huge hit either browning with salt and pepper or cooking up some cauliflower fritters:

Boil cauliflower until tender enough to mash

add 1/2 cup of flour and 1 egg replacer per cauliflower head

salt and pepper to taste

form into patties and cook in oil until browned on both sides

Cauliflower Fritters...

Cauliflower Fritters…

 

With a smile!

With a smile!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

When fresh isn’t an option, how we supplement to keep it cheap. Pancakes, biscuits, banana bread, all these can be made vegan in a jiffy! Play around with them and get creative. Add a little extra sugar to your biscuit dough and fry it in oil for some yummy vegan camping donuts (with jelly on top?). Canned chili might not seem too amazing, but add some fresh avocado and suddenly you’ve upped the nutritional value and deliciousness of the meal. Pasta can be a kid favorite with some fresh vegetables, oil, and garlic salt. Even boxed rice can be spiced up with some canned black beans and kale. Basically when running low on veggies and fruit, supplementing with carbs wont be the end of the world and will help you stretch out the super nutritional stuff.

Chili made Fancy

Chili made Fancy

Noodles and Veggies!

Noodles and Veggies!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Foraging- A wonderful Lady I know Mrs. Lylal Ledner convinced me foraging was a wonderful idea one day as I followed her around her beautiful farm, The Simple Farm. There with her I felt safe tasting everything despite the fact that I had no idea what it was. Convincing as she was, out on my own in the real world I got scared! So alas, no foraging was done except blackberries and a wonderful surprise of roadside strawberries one day. Sorry Lylah, one day I hope I can get up the courage! The beautiful possibilities that lie out there in the world that we don’t even know about are a perfect option for non scaredy cat vegans!

While strawberries found by the roadside!

While strawberries found by the roadside!

Favorite packed products-

Justin’s nut butter! Have you tried it? Squeeze packs make every child (and adult!) into happy campers plus they have vegan peanut butter cups (just the dark chocolate ones), I may be in love!

Lara Bars. Just dates and nuts? Yes please! Tons of awesome flavors for kids to choose from without the added sugar for mom to stress about, everyone is happy!

The moral of my cooking has become “just roll with it” some of our best meals have come when I thought we were going to be hungry that night. Sometimes your grill doesn’t work and you have to cook on the ground on a tiny Jetboil, roll with it. Sometimes you don’t have the correct utensils and find yourself improvising like a pro. Creativity is always the key!

Sometimes...

Sometimes…

You just make things work!

You just make things work!

Categories: Our Homeless Summer | Tags: , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Random non 14er Talk

A quick fill in to keep you all up to date! (seriously I know you can’t live without my words!)

After finishing Redcloud I knew I would need a little break from big mountains (I’m still possibly maybe, kinda broken and not willing to risk real injury and count myself out of all the fun for the rest of the trip). We headed to Ouray and decided sleeping in the car instead of setting up all our camping stuff would be best.

Sneaky Lady!

Sneaky Lady!

 

We found a nice little cooking spot and I perfected my biscuits and gravy recipe. All the little people love kicking it by the creek, throwing rocks, building stuff, and generally being hoodlums. I love the ease in cleaning dishes! (don’t judge I have a lot to clean…)

Hoodlums and to shenanigans I'm sure.

Hoodlums and to shenanigans I’m sure.

 

Jealous? Just come by, I'll cook you up something yummy too.

Jealous? Just come by, I’ll cook you up something yummy too.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our awesome side of the road sleeping spot also brought some new friends!

New friends!

New friends!

 

The big 2 took a run up the Camp Bird road with Daddy (part of the Hardrock course) and enjoyed some fresh waterfall water and some awesome views. It was in small part a reconnaissance mission to see if this crazy Mom would be able to make the drive to the trail head for Mount Sneffels, a 14er that would be super fun! We began the drive and I made it to what looked like a crazy turn, huge drop off, and gnarly overhang… needless to say I freaked and backed out. Seth and the kids were awesome to take it on by foot, I’m thinking it might be a go… maybe…

They love exploring on foot!

They love exploring on foot!

While they ran, the little 3 and I hung out. Tay found his first snake in the wild! Apparently he even gets scared! He was the awesome little brother that he is and watched over the snake until Tajh came back so he could share in the awesomeness.

Kickin it Tenny style! "Mommy why can't I jump into the creek from here?!"

Kickin it Tenny style! “Mommy why can’t I jump into the creek from here?!”

Snake! Tay was "still shaking" for a while after the spotting.

Snake! Tay was “still shaking” for a while after the spotting.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After this big adventure we headed into Ouray to wander the streets and play in the Hot Springs. This was a big promise after our Redcloud summit for the kids and I have to say they were not disappointed! Both Tru and Tenny just finished ISR (youtube it) swim lessons and had a great time swimming, floating, and showing off!

After another night in the car, it’s Father’s day and Seth and the children are off exploring together while I do this silly blog thing!

I have to say, being homeless now for over a week now has been amazing. No plans, no obligations, just riding whichever way the wind takes us is pretty freeing! Not sure what tomorrow holds, but I can tell you it will probably be epic!

Do I look homeless or crazy? Maybe both?!

Do I look homeless or crazy? Maybe both?!

 

Categories: Our Homeless Summer | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Camping Food Vegan Style

Feeding 5 children is a lot of work. Feeding 5 children healthy food takes even more time. Feeding five vegan kids healthy camping food is near impossible. Making Littles wait for a meal can result in full-on mutiny. Tables will be turned, rivers of tears will flow, and, in effect, the world will come to an end.

Or they just look at you very sadly…

"Please Daddy, can you cook faster?"

“Please Daddy, can you cook faster?”

Being vegan in our house means actually eating healthy food. Not to say we don”t fry things or indulge at times, but for the most part it’s a lot of fruit (I mean way too much!) and everything green!

Homemade guacamole w/a spoon=Happy baby!

Homemade guacamole w/a spoon=Happy baby!

We always try and keep in minimal so when we camp I usually cook all meals on a small 2 burned camping stove. Being homeless for 2 1/2 months I just felt this was something I couldn’t handle and we needed to splurge. Luckily, Seth loves my cooking and happily agreed. Behold my new love:

YUM!

YUM!

So I’ll give you some of my camping food secrets. For me, it’s all about green veggies, olive oil, salt, and TONS of garlic! Pictured above it some asparagus I first cooked (which means charred) with some salt and oil, added a shockingly large amount of garlic on top, and cooked a little longer. Another favorite is camping kale:

Jealous?

Jealous?

Again, cook with salt and oil until crispy and delicious!

Its basically a kale lollipop!

Its basically a kale lollipop!

Tenny informing me she will be needing more.

Tenny informing me she will be needing more.

Cooking delicious camping food is awesome, except when everyone eats it before you get some…

No more for Mommy... :(

No more for Mommy… 😦

Our new toy came with a dutch oven as well. I’m pretty sure I have a lot more playing to do before we leave and a lot more delicious food to taste test! I believe the extra space this stove will take up in our giant white van will be well worth the amazing food we will be able to create! New cooking adventures to come!

Categories: Preparing for our journey | Tags: , , , , | Leave a comment

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