Monthly Archives: October 2015

Kittens, final classes, vegfest, oh my!

Posted by Banana Curl Vegan Girl in Gluten Free, Personal/about me, Pizza, Sammy, Vegfest and tagged with , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Hi! I’ve been slacking a bit with my posts, but with good reason!

First, I adopted a kitten!

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He’s the best. He was already named when we got him. His name is Sam (his litter mates were all named after Lord of the Rings characters), but we like to call him Sammy. He’s so playful and cuddly but also a little skittish.

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(oh, and as you can see I am rocking a new colorful hair style!!) I’ve been spending a lot of time with him, bonding and such. He was really scared at first and was skeptical of sleeping in my bed, but now he likes to cuddle with me in it, especially in the mornings. He’s keeping me on a better sleep-wake routine which is awesome. He is 13 weeks old, and we got him when he was 12 weeks. He really loves people too, lots of people have met him so far, and he isn’t afraid or timid of any of us.

Next up on my big news, I finished all the work for my degree! As part of one of my classes, I made a new website too and got business cards! You can check it out at veg-edu-ables.com! I’m hoping to start mentoring people who want to be vegan near me, and doing other things like cooking classes, food demos, providing food for different organizations, helping with people’s writing (which can be for anything, vegan or otherwise, but most of my writing has something to do with veganism, so that’s why it’s there too!), and more! I finished all my work for my Bachelor of Science degree on October 18, 2015! I will have that paper in my hand some time after December 31st! (My college has 8 week terms, where you take 2 classes each term for a total of 4 classes per semester). I’m so happy to be done early and have some time to really start working on some of my awesome projects!

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This calls for some celebration!

Part of that celebration was going to the Boston Vegfest! I went there today with my mom…my mom was really excited because she’s lactose intolerant and could have cheese and chocolates and all kinds of stuff! She’s never actually been somewhere that she can have so much stuff at! I got a lot of cool stuff, some for my birthday coming up this Thursday the 29th…

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I couldn’t decide what stickers to get at Herbivore so I got a ton…also some pins from Compassion Co.

I also got this gluten free magic bar from FoMu:

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I also got a vegan bacon chocolate bar from Rescue Chocolate, a t-shirt with a cow on it that says “Create Kindness” from Herbivore, some (vegan of course) sour cream and chive cashews, some Pulsin protein bars (it’s really hard to find good gluten free AND vegan protein bars), and tons of free samples. My mom was especially excited that So Delicious was giving away free full size mocha ice cream pops, her fave! (I was surprisingly not very hungry and so I didn’t eat that much stuff until I had a vegan hot dog that came in a gluten free wrap and had a delicious kale salad, coconut bacon, and chipotle mayo on it!! yum!) It was a really great day and my mom actually loved it, which I was a little worried she wouldn’t like it as much as she did! 🙂

I came home and made some pizza with Schar’s gluten free crust which makes pizza so much easier for me. It was a buffalo chicken ranch pizza.

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I made it by spreading the buffalo sauce on the crust, putting a mix of Follow Your Heart (hand-shredded) mozzarella and cheddar on top, cooking up Beyond Meat vegan chicken strips and then cutting them into pieces and putting them on top…then I baked the pizza. When it was done I drizzled this amazing vegan ranch dressing I found at my local grocery store!

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It’s so good, it has a coconut milk base. I love it! And they have other varieties that are both gluten free and vegan that I want to try too! 🙂

So yeah, it’s a really easy pizza to make. I also made a similar one not too long ago with bbq sauce…

Anyways, that’s the update, hope you’re having as much fun as I am lately!!

To-fu Young Recipe

Posted by Banana Curl Vegan Girl in Asian Foods, Fried food, Gluten Free, Nut free, Original Recipes, Veganized Recipes and tagged with , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Oh man, I messed up this time on Vegan MoFo towards the end. Just wasn’t feeling it as much. I think I would have preferred a theme I had chosen and developed a bit more.

But, onward and upwards, so the saying goes?

I have a new recipe to share. Also, I’m very tired from not sleeping well and having run a 5k race today.

The other day I remembered egg fu young, and was like, “why haven’t I made this vegan yet?” so…I did.

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To-fu Young with gravy recipe

Gravy ingredients:

  • 1 cup vegetable broth
  • 2 tbsp Bragg’s liquid aminos
  • 1 tbsp mirin
  • 1 tbsp cornstarch dissolved in 3 tbsp water
  • 1 tsp sesame oil

To-fu Young Ingredients:

  • 1 large onion, chopped
  • 1/4 cup water chestnuts
  • 1/2 cup bean sprouts
  • 1/2 cup shredded celery
  • 1/2 cup chopped mushrooms
  • 1 tbsp sesame oil (optional if allergic, use another oil or no oil at all)
  • 1 package firm tofu
  • 1/2 tsp Indian black salt (the kind that smells like eggs)
  • 1 tsp turmeric
  • 1/4 tsp black pepper
  • dash white pepper
  • 1/3 cup chickpea flour
  • 1/2 tbsp egg replacer powder (I use Ener-g)
  • 3 tbsp water
  • Peanut oil (or canola if you’re allergic to nuts) for frying

Directions for gravy:

  1. Mix all ingredients except cornstarch and water in a small saucepan over medium heat.
  2. Heat until bubbling.
  3. Add cornstarch and water mix while whisking constantly.
  4. Continue to whisk until the gravy thickens.
  5. Serve on top of To-fu Young when ready

Directions for To-fu Young

  1. Cook all veggies all together with the sesame oil in a large frying pan over medium heat until soft and the mushrooms have become darker.
  2. Turn off heat.
  3. Break the tofu block in half. Crumble one half into small pieces into the pan with the vegetables are in. Stir well.
  4. Place the rest of the ingredients in a food processor and blend well until it becomes a thick liquid batter.
  5. Fold into the vegetables and tofu, stirring well.
  6. To fry them up, I used an electric fryer that we use for making potato latkes because I thought it would work better than doing it in a frying pan. You can definitely do it in a frying pan though if you have one that doesn’t stick too much with this sort of stuff (I don’t).
  7. Heat the oil (you want about a half inch of oil or more) until some of the batter begins to sizzle when flicked in.
  8. Place large spoonfuls of the batter into the oil. Cook on one side and then flip when the side is browned. If not ready yet keep frying it on the side until it becomes crispy and brown. I would have tried to be more mindful of time, but it can vary so much depending on your equipment and your ability to keep the temperature of the oil stable.
  9. When both sides are sufficiently browned and crispy, place on a paper towel on a plate to soak up some of the oil and cool.
  10. Serve with rice and the brown gravy.IMG_5449