Lots today

I have quite a list of comments for today.  First, a couple of weeks ago I talked about grocery shopping and price comparisons.  I specifically talked about vital wheat gluten, at the time I thought Superstore was the cheapest, until I was at Safeway.  Well last week I was in Planet Organic (one of my favourite natural food stores) and found it for $8.69 a full $2.30 cheaper then Superstore.  It was a shock to me, as I always thought specialty food stores would be more expensive.  So word to the wise, even though they advertise cheap food prices, when it comes to the natural food section, please shop around, as they are not the cheapest. 


We experimented with the juicer this weekend.  We tried pear juice and it was a hit with everyone.  I do have a older not very well made juicer and it left behind ALOT of pulp, this is why I wanted a newer one.  The new juicer did a fabulous job of juicing all the fruit, out of 6 pears I had maybe half a pear in pulp.  Fantastic!  When I did the grocery shopping this weekend, I stocked up on oranges, apples and a pineapple.  We will do a bit of testing this week, I am hoping to get a leaf or two of spinach into one test.  Will have to be something green that we are juicing so the picky son won't notice.  Hehehehe. 


And finally to let you know about the "vegetarian" dinner I was served at my husband's company christmas party.  The first course was a salad with a side of potato based something which clearly had bacon in it, pass, but the salad was good.  The second course was a mushroom soup in a broth base, I have never had a mushroom soup in anything but a cream base.  This was very, very good and I am going to be doing some searching on the internet for a recipe today.  Then we had a sorbet to cleanse the palate.  Our main course was a baby carrot and two asparagus spears on top of mashed potatoes and then some sort of eggplant thingy in a pastry shell.  Absolutely no taste, no spice, no herbs, no flavour whatsoever.  It was very disappointing, I tried three bites to see if it got better, but no such luck!  I was hoping for a risotto, pasta, lasagna, something with flavour, sadly no.



Yesterday I was able to carve out a bit of time to do some cooking for the week.  I found two soup recipes in my "1000 Vegetarian Recipes" by Carol Gelles.  One was a Lentil Cauliflower Soup and then a Creamy French Lentil Soup, both sounded yummy.  When I cook, I sort of follow a recipe, so this time I did a combination of the two.  The combo soup turned out great and I was able to freeze two meals worth.  The second thing I tried to make was seitan, I got the recipe from http://www.theppk.com/recipes/dbrecipes/index.php?RecipeID=112.  It looked very easy, so away I went.  This was my first time making seitan and I had never tasted it before, so I am not sure how I did.  My version didn't quite look like the pictures I had seen, as for the flavour, it was good.  I fried a couple of pieces for dinner that night and had it with mushroom gravy, rice and carrots. 


So far this week I have planned:

• Roasted Vegetable Lasagna
• Pizza night
• Soup/Stew night with some good french bread (it's cold outside, good hearty soup)
• Seitan and mushroom Stroganoff

Again, not in any particular order.  Have a great day, stay warm and safe.

A few bits about getting all my vitamins

Good morning everyone, thank goodness it's Friday. Our 18 month old daughter is going through a phase of clingy, whininess and night waking, it's exhausting, so I need to make sure that I get proper nutrition. This was one of my concerns when turning vegetarian. Chatting with a friend while picking up our son yesterday, she mentioned that a good friend of hers was debating becoming a vegetarian but was always anemic. There are lots of ways I have learned to make sure you get your iron, especially for us women, while being a vegetarian.


The one thing I learned is that when you are eating a food with iron, always have it with something with Vitamin C, it increases the absorption. Spinach salad (tons of iron) with a citrus dressing, oatmeal with orange juice, etc. For me, I also take an extra iron supplement during a certain time of the month. Although I don't always keep up on my iron, I can always tell when I am lacking, when I have good sleep but still feel very tired and no energy, that is when I take some extra iron supplements.


Another vitamin I was concerned about was B12; I do take a B12 supplement, but have also discovered Nutritional Yeast. Full of B vitamins and a complete protein, I try to add this to one of my meals a day (it has a cheesy flavour).  I usually add it to my pasta, pizza, anything that would taste good with a cheese flavour.  


Here is a great looking broccoli and cheese soup that uses nutritional yeast, again from Vegetarian Times...

Of course, I am not an expert and you should read up on all the nutrients and where to get them yourself if considering becoming a vegetarian.  Also talk to your doctor or a nutritionist, hopefully I have offered some insight into what you need.  I always consult the vegetarian food pyramid for my daily food choices.