Vegan soft tacos

The BEST vegan dinner - easy, nutritious and DELICIOUS!

Okay, I know that sounds a little over the top, but this is my go to recipe. It's so yummy you can serve it to vegans and non vegans a like. It takes 10 minutes to make and it's good for you.

What's not to love?

I start by making a quick fresh salsa

3 to 4 tomatoes chopped
1/2 onion finely chopped
handful of fresh cilantro finely chopped
a few squeezes of a fresh lime
1/2 jalapeno finely chopped (if you like the spice, if not eliminate this ingredient)
salt to taste


You will need;

soft corn tortillas
1 can pinto beans
vegan shredded cheese (I like Daiya)
vegan chorizo
cabbage and lettuce finely shredded mixed together
avocado sliced

I like to make them on a cast iron griddle, but if you don't have one, a heavy bottomed fry pan will do.
Put a little olive oil on the pan to stop the tortillas from sticking.

I get 4 tortillas at one time on my griddle. Heat on one side without browning, takes a minute or two.
Turn them over and immediately, sprinkle some cheese on each one. When it starts to melt add some drained warmed pinto beans on each tortilla and some warmed chorizo. Don't add too much, you don't need to. Put a few pieces of avocado on each tortilla. Serve immediately.

Serve with shredded cabbage/lettuce mix, fresh salsa and your favorite hot sauce.

Vegan Fresh Cream of Tomato Soup and Grilled Cheese Sandwich

Just because your vegan, doesn't mean you can't indulge in this quintessential American lunch.

Once in a while I get a craving for tomato soup and a grilled cheese sandwich. I also needed to use up some of my tomatoes from the garden. We've had a great crop this year and I don't want to waste any. So I keep coming up with recipes to use my tomatoes and this is my Tomato soup recipe.

For the grilled cheese, butter two pieces of vegan bread with vegan butter add vegan cheese in the middle. I like Daiya Cheddar it melts well and tastes great. Any unused I keep in the freezer, because it does tend to go off rather quickly, once opened.
Grill on one side until browned, then flip sandwich over and grill on the other side. Yum!

Tomato soup Ingredients
1 medium onion chopped
2 large celery stalks chopped
1/8 of medium cabbage chopped
2 medium carrots chopped
2 tablespoons olive oil
Vegetable stock atleast several cuos, you may need more.
5 fresh tomatoes peeled and chopped (To peel fresh tomatoes, cut a small cross in the skin of each tomato, place them in a bowl and pour boiling water to cover. Leave for a minute or two, drain the water off and skin should peel off easily)

Saute all the above ingedients over medium heat for a few minutes then add some vegetable broth, put lid on pan and turn on low. Cook until vegetables are soft. Check often to prevent burning adding more vegetable stock as needed.

When vegetables are very soft, add

1/4 tsp powdered white pepper
1/4 tsp onion powder
1/4 tsp garlic powder
salt to taste
1 Tablespoon oregano (crush with your hand before adding to the pot)

Blend altogether until smooth.

Add one can of tomato sauce (I like Trader Joe's organic tomato sauce)

Blend again until silky smooth, adjust spices and add more broth if needed.

Serve with a dollop of vegan cream cheese.

This is the cheddar cheese I like to use.

Freya Ridings - Too Much Sky (original acoustic)

This is my brother's friends daughter. She is so good, I just had to share.

Monsanto at it again

This is a continuing battle that the big companies like Monsanto are hoping we'll get so tired and discouraged we'll give up on.

Last week, the Grocery Manufacturers Association (GMA) dumped in $5 million against the Yes on 522 ballot initiative in Washington state. That means the GMA, who represents companies like Pepsi, Coke, Kraft, Kellogg's, Starbucks and General Mills, is now the lead funder in an effort to silence GMO labeling in America, with a total of $7.2 million. But the real story behind the continued efforts to kill GMO labeling in the U.S. is even more alarming.

Already Monsanto has dumped in $4.8 million and DuPont has pledged $3.4 million to bring the opposition war chest to a total of $17.1 million against the citizen-led ballot initiative Yes on 522 to label genetically engineered foods.


Hawaii has it's own battle.
For the past several months an important battle has been heating up on the paradise islands regarding pesticides and experimental GMOs that could impact our collective future.

“Right to Know” legislation - Bill 2491 - that puts public health ahead of biotech profits by limiting Restricted Use Pesticides (RUPs). It prohibits open air testing of experimental pesticides and experimental GMO’s while publicly disclosing pesticide use on the islands.

Unfortunately biotech companies like Monsanto, Syngenta and DuPont are triyng to force a delay on the vote to try to stop Bill 2491 and another important bill (Bill 113) from becoming law in Hawaii.

Earlier this summer more than 32,000 Food Democracy Now! members stood with residents of Hawaii to protect this island Paradise and its residents from the indiscriminate poisoning of their communities.

We can all do our part. 
Contact your congressman and tell them we have a right to know when we are eating GMO's.

We need to keep the pressure on.

Delicious Vegan Plum Cookie Bars

We had a dear friend coming to stay overnight and I wanted a quick easy dessert. I had home made plum jam (we had a bumper crop of plums this year) and cookie ingredients so I came up with this. If you would rather use another type of jam, I would think apricot or seedless raspberry would be good. Something with a little tartness to it. 

Our friend really liked them and we did too.

I used palm sugar which is low on the glycemic index, oats, pecans and almond meal making it high in protein and I used gluten free flour because I don't do well eating gluten.

Another plus being it takes less than 10 minutes to prepare.

1 cup gluten free flour
1/2 cup packed palm sugar ( can use brown sugar if you wish)
1/2 cup finely chopped pecans
1/4 cup almond meal
3/4 cup quick cooking rolled oats
1/2 cup vegan butter softened
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/8 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 tablespoon maple syrup

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Grease one 8 by 8 square pan.

Combine flour, sugar, baking soda, salt, rolled oats, chopped pecans, almond meal. Rub in the vegan butter, using your hands or a pastry blender to form a crumbly mixture. Mix oil, vanilla and maple syrup, pour and mix well into the crumble.

Press 2 cups of mixture into the bottom of the pan and spread the jam on top. Leave a half inch space around the edge to give the jam room to spread. Sprinkle the rest of the mixture on top, pressing it lightly into the jam.
Bake for approx 35 minutes until lightly browned. Allow to cool and cut into squares.  

spread the jam evenly over the crumble

Press the rest of the crumble lightly on top of the jam

Bake until lightly browned