Making my own almond milk and a rice n' bean loaf

(source)

I finally decided to go ahead and make my own almond milk! I've been buying unsweetened almond milk for ages and since I always have large bags of raw almonds on hand, I thought I'd try my hand at it.  So this isn't really a recipe, as I just tried to gather as much info as I could from various sources online and in books,to see what a good ratio would be. Here's what I came up with:

Unsweetened Almond Milk:

1 cup raw almonds, soaked overnight

4 cups filtered water

pinch of salt

Vitamix (or other powerful blender)

Sieve

Bowl

Put the almonds and 1 cup of water into your Vitamix (or other powerful blender). Blend on highspeed for several seconds until the almonds are mostly pulverized. Add the rest of the water and the salt. Blend again for another 10-20 seconds. Put your sieve over your bowl, and pour the milk into it slowly. Stir with a spoon, to help the liquid come out more quickly. Keep this up until all the milk has been poured and you just have almond pulp in the sieve. I only did this process once, but you could do it twice if you really want to. It should keep in the fridge for a few days.

Mine was just a little gritty still, but I don't mind it. I only use it in oatmeal, in smoothies, and with granola. Some people use cheesecloth. I might try that next time, since I have some. You can also add dates or some other sweetener, if you prefer sweeter almond milk. And here's a recipe that uses some of that leftover almond pulp!

Rice N' Bean Loaf:

-makes 1 large loaf

2 cups cooked brown rice

1 can navy beans, mashed up

3 stalks celery, diced

1 cup shredded carrots

1/4 cup nutritional yeast

1/4 cup almond pulp (from the almond milk,or you can use juice pulp if you prefer)

1 small tomato, diced

1/4 cup oats

1 TB flaxseed meal (ground flax seed)

1 TB vegan worcestershire sauce

1 tsp onion powder

1/2 tsp garlic powder

1 tsp dried oregano or basil

salt to taste

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Mix all ingredients together in a bowl.  Put parchment paper into a loaf pan and spoon the mixture into it, pressing it into all the corners. Smooth the top and bake for 30-40 minutes. Remove it from the oven and let it rest for another 10 minutes. I served it with a red tomato sauce on top. Some sort of mushroom gravy might be nice, as an alternative.

Don't forget to follow my Facebook page and you can also find me on Twitter!

Coming up: A book review of Robert Cheeke's Vegan Bodybuilding, perhaps a recipe for raw cream cheese, stewed tomatoes/okra, and more talk about Vitamin B12 and D.

Eat smart,

T.

Time to catch up....again.

Can't believe it's been so long since I posted last.  Well, here I am. Back to work....and we took our short trip to Atlanta too.  HAPPY WORLD VEGETARIAN DAY!!

Today's post is just a bunch of stuff I've been eating, tofu from Averie's blog, and some samples from TastyBite.

I recently made Ani Phyo's Ginger Almond Pate from Ani's Raw Food Kitchen. Delicious!  You can use it on anything:

The Pate:

The Pate in raw nori rolls:

The Pate in a raw wrap:

It makes a ton and you'll have lots of leftovers to use for several days.

Then I made my whole wheat calzones with Teese. So good! I love you, Chicago Soy Dairy :)

And I also made a Veggie Quesadilla with Teese:

Recipe:


Saute chopped veggies in a little water until mostly cooked (I like them a little crunchy)
-peppers, celery, onion, carrots, anything else you like
Flavor with cumin seeds, chili powder, oregano, salt & pepper. Set aside.
Spray a skillet with oil and put one sprouted grain tortilla in it.  Add the vegetables on top and sprinkle with Teese (I used mozzarella).  Top with other tortilla.
Press, but don't squish the filling out.  
Here's the tough part. When browned, flip. Hahahah......mine kind of fell apart at this point.  Maybe I should have put it in the toaster oven instead.
Anyway, brown the other side. Let cheese melt.  Put on plate and slice into quarters.

I got some awesome stuff from TastyBite.  They make lots of "convenience" foods that take very little time. Great for tired, working people! I don't usually rely on this kind of thing. But it sure comes in handy sometimes when I'm just too tired to cook anything and I'm out of leftovers (grains, veggies, etc.). The packages come with 2 servings. But to tell you the truth, it's really one serving if you eat it alone.  If you want to eat it with rice or potatoes, I suppose it would be 2 servings.

So far, I've tried the Kerala Vegetables, Good Korma Simmer Sauce, and the Mushroom Takatak.  All are very good. (they've got several vegan packages...all labeled!) I found them slightly oily (and you can see it in the pictures), but not overly so, especially if you combine it with a potato or something. They have lots of flavor. When I made the simmer sauce, I think I added too many vegetables! I probably could've used another packet of the sauce, but it was still a good flavor. The Mushroom Takatak I ate by itself (it already had potatoes in it).  The scary thing was....I put it in the microwave like it said and 40 seconds later it started popping and it sounded like things were exploding in there....so I took  it out...it was hot enough.  Weird! But tasty :)

I made more Eggplant Caponata atop sprouted grain bread with swiss chard:

I don't often use tofu.  But I found this cool stuff at Whole Foods, when I shopped there last month:

So I decided to try Averie's Sesame Ginger Maple Tofu. It was really tasty! My husband said it tasted like french toast. He's right....I could totally eat it for breakfast :) Thanks, Averie.

I was thinking maybe I should do one recipe per week (or every 2 weeks) from another blog. Is that a good idea? Gives more presence to those blogs, too.  And I have so many in my Google Reader that are starred for recipes, haha.  Too many. I should start making some of those things.  So maybe this is the first of my "Blogger Recipes" series!

Upcoming posts: Recipe for Millet with Roasted Vegetable Sauce and My Trip to Atlanta!

I still have a few weeks before my NYC trip, so you can still add your restaurant suggestions to that post!

Eat smart,
T.

Another Raw Pie: Chocolate Mousse/Strawberry

Don't forget to enter my very first giveaway here!!

I recently bought another raw "cook" book: "Raw Food Made Easy" by Jennifer Cornbleet.  It's published by Book Publishing Co. in Tennessee.  I already had this particular book, but the publishing company offered to send me any books I wanted to review here.  I will be reviewing the books they sent me sometime over the next month (Vitamin D:The Sunshine Vitamin and Sweet Utopia).  But since I already had this book, I thought I'd give a quick review.  

First of all, this book doesn't require much more than a blender and/or food processor, which is great, because I can't afford a dehydrator.  I like how she gives you a list (in the beginning of the book) of basic "kitchen staples" and equipment you'll need.  She also explains how to soak nuts and seeds, which is a big part of the raw food diet.  Now there's only a very small section of pictures in the middle of the book.  I always like my cookbooks with tons of color pictures, so that would be my only negative comment.  Yesterday, I tried my first recipe: Chocolate Tart with Strawberries.  Wow!  It's so good. It basically combines two of her other recipes in the book, her Almond Crust, and her Chocolate Mousse.  This is the first time I've made chocolate mousse out of avocados and it was even kid-tested last night with much success! Overall, this looks like a great book and I'm looking forward to trying more recipes. I only wish it had more pictures.

Update: You can find this chocolate mousse recipe on Jennifer Cornbleet's own website.

Other giveaways:

I just entered to win 5 FREE product coupons from Turtle Mountain, but I need YOUR help. Go to HeatherEatsAlmondButter & comment to win. Be sure to mention that I sent you. (that way we BOTH win)

A Life Factory bottle giveaway at the HealthyVoyager. (these bottles are cool!)

So....

Eat smart,

T.

Dave's Birthday

Today is our friend, Dave's birthday.....Happy Birthday Dave!! (oh, and Happy Birthday, Beethoven too!)

I'd been drooling over one of the recipes in Hannah Kaminsky's My Sweet Vegan cookbook for a while now.  So this was a great opportunity to try it and everyone loved it! It was the Decadent Almond Cake. I'll definitely make this again...I only made a few changes to the recipe. I used almond milk instead of soy and I used whole wheat flour in place of the all purpose and soy flours.  I also replaced half of the oil with unsweetened applesauce (I probably could've replaced it all!).  I only used 12 oz of chocolate for the ganache, and as it turned out, there was way more ganache than I needed!  I wonder if it'll freeze well.....otherwise I'll have to eat it....hehehe......ohhh, maybe I can dip the Louisiana strawberries in it for a dessert!!

And it was definitely a great ganache recipe....I'll use it whenever I make a cake again....any cake! Wonder what would happen if I added a little coffee to the recipe...hmmmm.....

So thanks Dave, for giving me the opportunity to make this cake, and thanks Hannah Kaminsky, for this amazing recipe :) (check out her blog: BitterSweet)

Eat smart,
T.

A Vegan Roll

Wow! I have to tell you, this is one of the most amazing dishes ever! It's really high on my list to make again and again. This is the 2nd time I've made it and I'm getting better at it.

Today for lunch we had the "Carpe

Diem Carrot Almond Pate Nori Rolls" from Vegan Fusion World Cuisine. I'm not going to post the recipe, just some of the ingredients that I used. The ginger, fresh dill, and lemon juice in

the almond pate give it such a zing! The flavors are really creative.

The vegetables I used in the rolls (you can pretty

much use any you want) were: carrots,

cucumbers, sprouts, and avocado. The key is rolling them up really tightly, otherwise stuff will

just fall out after you cut them. And use a sharp knife to cut them.

And so there you have it! The amazing vegan rolls of the day! You HAVE to try them.

See you for dinner :)

Eat smart,

T.