VeganMoFo - Tamales from the Potluck

For the potluck I made a batch of tamales. The corn husks came all the way from California with my Mom, when she visited two years ago. Nice to know they store well, isn't it? I made 3/4ths of the batch with refried beans and black beans spiced up with garlic, onion, chili powder and a pinch of smoked paprika. The rest I mixed Field Roast Chipotle Sausage with a bit of the leftover bean mix.

The plain ones were delish. Creamy insides, smooth taste and perfect smothered in guacamole. The Field Roast ones were a bit too spicy for my taste and then they upset my stomach. For whatever reason those products always do that, so its not surprising.

I gave all the spicy ones away to KMK, BP and VHZ at the end of the potluck to take home with them. I still have over a dozen small sized bean ones in my fridge. Sometime next week, its tamale night!

Potluck Pictures - round four 'the big finale'

The fabulous potluck sleepover extravaganza was wrapped up by playing board games in our jammies till 2pm, eating ice cream and pie for lunch and snacking on lunch leftover veggies and dips.

VHZ and KMK made a great team for Scrabble. Which we played with modified rules, if you could spell a VegWebber's name, you got a double word score!



The winning team though, was Camilus and Baypuppy. Look at them, so studious!

Pictionary was awesome, and we ate dessert... I mean lunch, during it too!
I tried to get out of having to draw Ronald McDonald as it was morally against veganism, but it was such an easy win.
My lunch was pumpkin pie, Mocha Almond Fudge & Snickerdoodle ice cream by So Delicous covered in Soya Too Whip we made the day before. mmmm This bowl was either BP's or Angel's which had pumpkin pie, Chocolate Brownie Almond ice cream, Soya Too Whip, Smuckers Marshmallow Topping and chocolate sauce.
Our lunch feast is a bit of slim pickings overall, but we still had leftovers!
We did finish the games with a round of Simpson's Clue. It was Marge in the Simpson's House with the necklace by the way!


Just look at that fiesty BP!

We did see KMK off after the fun with a bag full of food, prizes and cigar boxes. Empty mind you! My hubby wont part with the contents but I am willing to part with the boxes easily. After that everyone packed up and we took our last field trip to Barns & Noble and the local kitchy store The Christmas Tree Shop. It was a huge amount of fun and I was so happy people came over and had a great time. Thanks for coming everyone!

Potluck Pictures - round three "the morning after"

We all slept in until about 8:30am after our potluck pajama party. In the morning we sat around kind of groggy and our bellies still not quite up to eating MORE food. But we persevered for vegans everywhere and headed to the kitchen. Behold our accomplishments!


This is the Nutritionist Soy Milk Maker I got over a year (or two) ago through my local Freecycle group. This was its first batch ever made by me though. Let me just say, I wish I had the instruction booklet! It is not a good batch. I will try again and add oats or rice to the soy beans in the brewing process and sugar afterward!

Next is our lovely tofu for the Tofu McVegans I promised VHZ. They were made with two blocks of The Bridge tofu, which is a local Connecticut company! One cup of Apple Cider Vinegar, half a cup of oil and a tablespoon of Black Salt Powder finished them off. I let it soak for about thirty minutes before baking over an hour at 350. I flipped them several times to get them all golden and crispy. Luckily this was done the day before so that they just needed a quick reheat.

No vegan fast food breakfast would be complete without hash browns and bacon, so VHZ and Cam made some! Yay.

This was my breakfast sandwich, complete with Tofutti cheese slice, LightLife bologna, Smart Bacon, Tofu and hash browns wedged between a Stop & Shop Multigrain Light english muffin. Delish!

Here is Cam enjoying his, which I think he buttered the muffin and added two different meats and cheeses! How indulgent we vegans get in a pack.


There are more potluck pictures to come, so stay tuned.

Potluck Pictures - round two

For those of you not in the know, we had a VegWeb potluck at my house this past weekend! Four steadfast friends trekked in as far away as Albany to come visit, eat and have a great time. My not tiny sized kitchen felt very small with five adults working in it. Here are more pictures!

KissMeKate and VegHeadZealia watch on as dinner preparations start.

Baypuppy and Camilus putting Mac & Cheeze in the oven. mmmm bread crumb topping!

We decided then to have a fancy schmancy dinner party type of dinner since it was just us. I love bringing out the good china for fun things!


KMK folded the napkins! So awesome.

Sitting around the table, ready to dig in!
The food! Going clockwise from the top is: sauted Kale, teriyaki meatballs, lentil bake, mac & cheese and my own bacon spaghetti. Everything was so delish and it is such a treat to be around people cooking great vegan food.
This is what was left once we did as much damage as we could. Luckily leftovers did fit in my fridge and people got to take portions home!

First though, we had a field trip to my local Trader Joe's before we started on cooking dinner. We picked up everything from dried Dragonfruit to trail mix to frozen asperagus to toothpaste! What a fun trip. We also hit the local Stop & Shop grocery store for smoothie makings but once in the store we got distracted and only bought sundae toppings like Smuckers Marshmallow Sauce!

After we ate that feast pictured above, we sat in the den and played Scattegories. It is funny how everyone got different foods but when we had to think up people or places there were duplicates. We also voted that Hulk Hogan is NOT considered a hero. This party was a pajama party with everyone staying overnight for two days of fun and food so we all got in our jammies and stayed up till 2am goofing off and laughing hysterically.

Sunday morning fun will have to wait till next post though!

Potluck Pictures - first batch

Just a few minor notes and changes to this post to update it some. Saturday morning I got up, cleaned my house within an inch of its life except the outside edges of the stairs apparently. (Long story!) All in preparation for a potluck! Yay!

I made a double batch of Cheezy Quackers with garlic, salt & pepper. These are always so good!
Look at that lovely dough.

Luckily I now have the counter space to roll these addictive crackers out onto.


Little leaves all cut out and awaiting the oven.

My new cookie cutter set. Probably will only be used for crackers though. Cookies are too much like work to cut out. hahah!


The final bowl full. Seriously, this is all a double batch, three large pans worth, made. We demolished these pretty quick. I suggest making a triple batch if you like them as much as I do.

The lunch spread! Left to right: Condiment container with marinated mushrooms, kalmata olives, salsa, guacamole and chickpea dip. Tortilla chips are in the bowl below it with Olive Tapenade right beside it. A quartet of hummus stands strong with the quackers. Veggies ranging from bell peppers, snow peas, green beans, radishes, carrots and celery block the vegan ranch, creamy Sheese, sliced Teese and Cheddar w/ Chives Sheese from escaping the garlic bread and pitas.

A hungry Baypuppy digs into the hummus. nom nom nom

Camilus did some dishes!
And we had a vegan cheese test of meltability. Teese on garlic bread, firm Sheese in a whole wheat pita and soft Sheese in the tiny pita spaceship shape. I did not eat any of these hot from the oven but I must say, the creamy Sheese probably is my favorite to dip things into. The firm kind was strangly resistant to any mingling with other foods. It exuded oils but would not spread or blend. The Teese was of course, excellent.


I think Cam thought the same way about my cheese favorites because here he is eating the tiny pita stuffed with creamy Sheese and looking delieriously happy!

Day 2 - but we ate leftovers!

Oh me oh my! We had leftovers tonight. Things that by now are not super photogenic. Luckily I have older photos from September.

First up is the previously mentioned seared smoked tofu atop a bed of grains with lemon pepper broccoli. Very good and simple to make.


Next up I made myself breakfast burritos. I pan fried up some onion, shredded potato, bell pepper, faux sausage crumbles and salsa verde. These were great but the best part was that I put them in the freezer to eat at a later date and they turned out so wonderful. Easy to heat up in the microwave on the way out the door or as a brunch snack on the weekday. Since it was not a lot of work I hope to do this more often for an excellent train ride handheld breakfast.


mmmm salsa verde!

VeganMoFo Day 1

To make up for my long silence I present to you my lunches, times four! In September I bought a Laptop Lunchbox to bring my own healthy lunch with me to work.

My first lunch was full of V'Con's Chickpea Cutlets, rice pilaf, veggies, apple slices, salad dressing in the tiny container and a bag of dark chocolate covered blueberries. Was good!

My second lunch was my own take on a BLT with Lightlife's Smart Bacon standing in for poor dead pig. And honestly, who doesn't put Avocado on their BLTs? This was a dip-tastic lunch with ketchup in the kitty and elephant containers to plunge the tater tots into. A container of grapes rounded it all out nicely.
Next I made my very own Cornish pastry from the Vegan Lunch Box cookbook. These were so very very good! The pie crust was easy to make, the filling was delish and it traveled very well. No wonder hand held stuffed pasties have been around for centuries!
And finally I have a picture of a lovely bunch of broccoli! Ok it is really leftovers from my excellent dinner of Smoked Tofu with Lemon Pepper Broccoli over Mixed Grains

Let me know that store bought plantain chips do NOT hold a candle to homemade fresh ones. Now if only I could make these myself all thin and crisplike.

I hope to keep posting all month. I am throwing a potluck at my home this weekend for several VegWeb friends. Expect lots of yummy food posts from that as soon as I catch up on all my September backlog, which consists of 3 more food photos. Doh!