Tofu Taco Tuesday & National Margarita Day!!!! Ole

So much fun today, this morning as I was siting in a less than thrilling meeting at work I got a text from my mom saying "Its National Margarita day, don't forget to celebrate" FANTASTIC!!! Later in the afternoon I got an email from PETA saying that it is Tofu taco Tuesday! Again I am excited to have 2 cool things to celebrate and even better than that I have enlisted my Mom and little sister to help me blog. I asked them to take pictures of there celebration of taco's and Margaritas.

So first up is my Mom, she gets an A+ for presentation and creativity. She made Turkey tacos with Veg-re fried beans and Orange Mango Margaritas. Nice work!

Beautiful! Thanks Mom :)


Ok now for my little sister, she made Margaritas out of 100% agave silver tequila!! and ahi fish tacos served in blue corn tortillas, topped with caramelized onions, tomato's, and lettus. she served all that goodness with a side of re fried beans and pineapples with brown rice. So creative and healthy!  Looks very good, here she is cooking!

Now for my celebration dinner, I made Tofu tacos with vegan re-fried beans and Spanish rice. with lots of amazing toppings. Plenty of pictures to follow but first, how to turn tofu into a taco worthy protein!

First take one package of extra firm tofu, press out as much water as you can and cut into cubes, heat about 1 tablespoon of olive oil into a pan and add the tofu (about medium heat)

after the tofu begins to fry a little and brown up, add 1/2 a package of taco seasoning. mix and cover for about 5 min.

and that's it, put it on a plate, fastest dinner ever! It took me longer to shop for all the ingredients! And now for the feast.

Here it is with all the fixing's!

Creation #1 - beans, rice, tofu, cheeze, lettuce, avocado salsa Verde (from Trader Joe's.... Amazing)

Creation #2 - Cheeze, Tofu, green onions, avocado, salsa.

So good, with a side of rice and beans!

This was such a fun project today, it was a blast to get some of my family involved and to celebrate so wacky holidays!!! I hope you got some ideas for your own fun taco celebrations, just spend some time and enjoy your food and your family, vegan or not!
CHEERS

Fuel for my Hike

Quite some time ago I remember ordering this yummy breakfast dish at a little cafe they called it the Cali Bagel. It was very strait forward and fresh, this was the perfect Saturday morning breakfast before my job at Hiking Yoga! Here is all you need!

Cali Bagel

1 everything bagel
Better than cream cheese (I used the french onion flavor by TOFUTTI)
1 tomato
1/2 avocado
Salt and Fresh Black Pepper

Now to build

Toast the bagel
put on the cream cheese
top with sliced tomato's and avocado
finish with S&P

I enjoyed this with a nice cup of tea and had plenty of energy for my hike. This one is super good even if you are not vegan, use whatever cream cheese and bagel you want (most bagels are naturally vegan) :)

Enjoy

My version of some Classics

As always I am blogging after the fact but these are 2 classic foods from my childhood that I just had to post. The first one is my own version of my moms old stand by, Chicken and Trees. It is an amazing casserole with lots of goodness inside but I had to find a way to veganize it so here it is, off the top of my head. (one day I will remember to write stuff down when I cook so I can remember the measurements)

Stacie's "Chicken" and Tree's

1 package of crescent rolls, most brands are vegan just check the back (i used the trader Joe's brand)
1 head of broccoli
1 container mushrooms
3 fake chicken cutlets, I love the Gardein products!!  http://www.gardein.com/products.php?t=frozen&p=5
1 cup vegan sour cream
1/2 a packet of french onion dip mix (check to make sure you got a vegan one)
1 cup Vegan Mayo - I love Vegenaise!!  http://www.followyourheart.com/product-family.php?id=14
1/2 cup of water
1/2 (or so)  bag of vegan shredded Cheddar. I like Daiya! http://www.daiyafoods.com/
1/4 cup of Panko (or bread crumbs)

• Turn the oven to 375
• Use a 9x 13x baking dish, spray with cooking spray, then make a crust with your crescent rolls, make sure you press it all together so there are no holes.
• in a bowl mix the mayo, sour cream, onion mix and water
• heat your chix in the micro than cut it up into small chunks
• cut broccoli and mushrooms to bite size chunks
• mix your chix, broccoli, mushrooms,and cheeze into the creamy mix, stir to combine
• dump the filling into your crescent roll crust
• sprinkle the top with your panco/bread crumbs and more cheeze if you wish :)
• salt and pepper to taste
• Bake covered for about 20 min
• then check and bake for about another 10-15 min, depending on how dark you like it, just basically it is done when it is all bubbly and gooey

Another food that I remember loving was Caesar salad, I love it but the dressing is usually made with egg and anchovy..... NO thanks so I found a great recipe for a vegan Caesar and let me tell you I think I have made a batch every day for the last week! So easy and tastes amazing!!!!

Eggless Caesar Salad Dressing  Lemon

• 1 tablespoon eggless Mayo
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 1/2 teaspoon Dijon Mustard
• 1/2 lemon, juiced
• 1/2 vegan Worcestershire sauce
• Pinch of salt
• 1/4 cup olive oil
• Pepper to taste

Dump it all into a bowl and whisk, it is that easy!!! I just used some romaine and croutons and an avocado that I needed to use up! SOOOO good!

So all together I am happy that I have found a way to enjoy 2 recipes that I consider classics from my mom, I hope the links for the products are helpful and I hope you all give these a try, at least the dressing, it was so good! I think my next project will be to recreate a old bar food stand by of mine, gooey and crispy mozzarella cheese sticks with marinara sauce. I will post that one for sure!

Breakfast!!!

Good Morning! I know I have not posted in a little while, don't worry I have still been cooking :) I have made some fun and delish things that I have just not photographed. I will try to work on that! I love breakfast but I reserve the more complicated ones for the weekend so and I was standing in front of my refrigerator this morning wondering what to make I saw some black beans I cooked the other night. I have recently decide to try to get dry beans out of the bulk bins and just make them myself, yes it takes a little more time, but it is much cheaper and I got to choose not to add salt! Getting back to my morning, I had a few potatoes leftover from the soup I made the other night and some frozen corn and frozen tofu (tofu freezes really well) so I decide to make some roasted potatoes and a tofu scramble!!! 

Stacie's Tofu Scramble

8 little red potatoes
1/2 a block of firm tofu (I like Trader Joes extra firm tofu)
1 cup black beans
1 cup corn (I used Trader Joes roasted frozen corn)
3 green onions
olive oil
turmeric
nutritional yeast
cumin
chili powder

ok now for the prep/cooking

cut up the taters and toss them with olive oil and S&P, spread them out on a cookie sheet and then put them into a preheated 400 degree oven

next put a drizzle of olive oil all over  the pan and toss in the tofu, break it up with your spoon and let it break down to scramble egg size pieces. then add your seasonings.

I did not measure I rarely do.... I just went around the pan a few times with the turmeric, that is really just for the yellow egg color, then a few sprinkles of nutritional yeast. and about a teaspoon of chili power and I really love the flavor of cumin so I put quite a bit!

Next add the black beans, corn and green onions. Just stir them in, add S&P to taste and just let it cook until heated thought.

this is not my best picture but you get the idea.
then put it all together and I put some hot sauce on top!!!

This was such a yummy breakfast! Try this one it is so easy and really good!
Stay tuned for my SuperBowl Snackies :)