What's been going on

First off I need to tell you that I am a stay at home mom, trying to start a small at home business and raising two kids (three if you count the husband).  The last couple of days have been hectic as I have been working with a kids store in our area that I was hoping would carry my product.  And they now do, yyiiipppeeee.  I hand make personalize baby/child bracelets, teething necklaces and custom bracelets.   Here is the website,  http://www.bornbeads.com/.  As of today, you can now purchase teething necklaces and ready made bracelets for that last minute Christmas gift at Over the Rainbow here in Calgary.  Okay enough of my excitment, here is what I have for today.

Since this week has turned out to be so busy, I haven't really stuck to the menu I set out on Monday.  The last couple of nights have been slapped together meals, unfortunately one quite bad one last night.  Hopefully will be back on track tonight.  Here is what the daughter and I had yesterday for lunch:


We had edamome, marinated tofu with rice, yes that is white rice.  I had it in the fridge and didn't want to waste it.  We usually eat white rice at dinner (my husband in asian, he hates brown rice) but when it's the daughter and I, I usually make brown and enough to store in the fridge for the week.  I slathered the miso gravy on my dish and soon the daughter was screeching she wanted what mommy had too.  She ate it all up, have I mentioned the gravy is "TO DIE FOR".

For lunch today, we had some pasta noodles with a Vodka Tomato sauce, I added some hemp seeds to the sauce, they don't have a strong flavour so it blended in nicely.  The daughter kept looking at the little seeds but also kept on eating.  For tonight I am planning a pizza night, the son has drum lessons and by the time we eat dinner it's quite late and pizza is fast. 

Also the PCRM Physicians Committe for Responsible Medicine is launching their 21 day kick start program on January 1, 2010.  http://support.pcrm.org/site/PageServer?pagename=21day_vegan_kickstart.  There are meal plans, celebrity tips, community forum, daily messages to keep you motivated.  I signed up for this the last time around and it was very helpful and informative.

A few of my meals...

My version of the Dragon Rice Bowl from "Refresh" by Ruth Tal, that sauce on it is a Miso Gravy and I can tell you that it was super yummy.  There is rice under the veggies, seared tofu, seared zucchini and grilled tomatos.  The recipe called for cilantro, but I am not a fan, so I used green onions.  Here is a picture from the recipe book, well maybe not quite the same, but you get the idea.

For today I plan to make the Spicy Tofu in Coconut Cream.  Although the hubby is a bit hung over today (department Christmas party), not sure if the cream will go over well.  Might have to make him some udon soup instead.  Hmmm, will look up a recipe for that.

I bought some hemp seeds this past grocery shopping trip and am going to be looking up some recipes to use them in.  I saw in one of Dreena Burton's cookbooks that she raved about the benefits of hemp seed, I did some searching on her site for some suggestions and this is what I found,  http://trueslant.com/dreenaburton/2009/08/17/super-foods-hemp-seeds/.  I also signed up with Manitoba Harvest, that is the brand of hemp seeds I bought and they have quite a few recipes on their website http://www.manitobaharvest.com/.  Again another attempt to get some good nutrients into the picky son.  I am going to start with muffins, see what happens, wish me luck

That is all I have for today, have a great one!

Should be cleaning...

Well I should be cleaning, the floor is a mess, the little girl is napping and I have about 1 1/2 hours to myself.  But here I am on the computer writing my blog, sigh!  I thought I would write today on some frustrations I have been having with this journey.

1. One of my big frustrations is the lack of vegetarian options that are reasonably priced.  Sure I can shop at Planet Organic (my favourite store by the way) but my grocery budget would be blown to bits.  So I try carefully to pick and choose what I eat organically and vegetarian.  Now I am contemplating going Vegan, but will need to find alternatives to cheese (I love cheese), milk (I have tried Soy milk with the picky son, he hated it) and a few other random dairy products.  So do I buy two separate products?  that would break my grocery budget again.  This I am working through at the moment.
2. My second frustration is a lack of vegetarian options in restaurants.  Sure we can go to specific vegetarian restaurants in Calgary, few and far between by the way, but there are none near us.  So we go to a few fast food restaurants, some sit down restaurants and no options.  Sure I can have a salad, but do I want to pay $15 for a salad at a sit down restaurant when I can make one at home for about $3.  My favourite fast food place is Taco del Mar, as they have a vegetarian burrito, which is huge and very good, but other then that any other fast food place (McDonald's, we have kids) I just order french fries.  I did a quick google search this morning and found 6 vegetarian restaurants in Calgary, 6, for a population of 1 million people.  That is sad!
3. My third is my cravings for some meat dishes.  At the moment it's fish, we ordered chinese food this past weekend and had a few dishes with scallops and shrimp in them.  I was very hungry, ate quickly and then felt a terrible guilt afterwards.  I had a slip, not sure if this happens to everyone converting, but guilty none the less.
4. My fourth is cooking at night for the family, with my husband and son still eating meat and having a picky eater it has making dinners quite a challenge.  I am fine during the day, the daughter and I have vegetarian for lunch, she loves everything and breakfasts are usually waffles, cereal, toast, etc.  I am trying to make dishes that I can make my veggie choice seperate without causing me to have alot of extra work and then my poor husband has been eating a lot more veggie stuff then I think he likes.  Still finding a balance there.

So any ideas from anyone for guidance, suggestions or motivation, please send along.

Have a great day out there.

Cookbooks, love them

Well Christmas is almost upon us and I have been thinking about what I am going to do for Christmas dinner. I will have a turkey and all the trimmings for the family but for myself I haven't quite decided on that.

One thing to know about me is I LOVE COOKBOOKS! All kinds, I actually just yesterday took about 25 that I never used to Value Village and promptly went to Chapters to look for a few new vegetarian ones. I was in there for over an hour, just in the vegetarian section alone. There are so many to choose from, here are the ones that have been helpful to me so far. I do love my "1000 Vegetarian Recipes", I find the recipes easy to make, most have a good number of ingredients (not too many that it's overwhelming) and everything has turned out fantastic. My second favourite is Vegetarian Times "Vegetarian Beginner's Guide", it was very helpful in helping me stock my pantry, and good and quick recipe ideas.

I bought two new books and am super excited to try them out, the first one is "The Vegetarian Family Cookbook" by Nava Atlas. I love her cookbooks, I have taken a few out from the library and always find them easy to read, easy to make and delicious recipes. It has a great section on snacks, I think I mentioned how this family loves snacking, lunchbox ideas, easy breakfast ideas and great looking soups and entrees. I also liked the fact that she gave vegan options for the recipes.

The second one was "Refresh" by Ruth Tal, this cookbook is gorgeous, I am also a sucker for beautiful cookbooks, great pictures, the end product looks for yummy. I picked this cookbook as it has a section on rice bowls, noodle bowls and juicing. This is a vegan cookbook from a restaurant in Toronto called Fresh, from what I have read so far, she started out as a juice bar that had some food to three restaurants around Toronto. The first thing I am trying is the Buddha Rice Bowl, some of the ingredients are marinated tofu cubes, thai peanut sauce, cucumber, tomato and of course rice, yuuummmmmyyyyy.  This book also has a section on dressings, sauces and marinades, I am hoping to make big batches of sauces and marinades and freeze them for later use.

Here is what is on the menu for this week:

• Buddha Rice Bowl
• Seitan and broccoli stirfry
• Pizza night (I always throw one in each week for those lazy days you don't feel like cooking and we all have them) 
• Spicy tofu in coconut cream

Here are the links to the websites for the cookbooks I have mentioned above:

http://www.vegetariantimes.com/product/11  (Vegetarian Times "Vegetarian Beginner's Guide)

http://vegbookshop.com/  ("The Vegetarian Family Cookbook)

http://www.freshrestaurants.ca/  ("Refresh")

I found this great looking rice bowl, fits in your hand and dishwasher and microwave safe.  http://flavourdesign.com/product.php?ProdNo=202