Vegan and Gluten free Banana Bread

So, I've had the week from hell, all to do with taking my computer in because it was running slow. The tech department decided it needed a new hard drive, but once they had replaced it, the computer wouldn't work at all. I won't bore you with the details, but I had to go back three times. Eventually, they decided it would be so expensive to repair I should buy a new one, which I did because I was trying to run my online business soaptheearth from my iPhone and it was very stressful. This is all to explain why I missed posting last week and why I chose the recipe I did. I needed something comforting, easy and delicious.
I have tried many banana bread recipes and most come out lacking in one way or another. So, I have been trying to come up with a recipe I'm happy with. After many trials and tribulations I think I've done it. Sometimes the simpler the better.

Let me know what you think.

2 cups gluten free flour
11/2 tsp baking soda
11/2 tsp baking powder
1 tablespoon xanthun gum
1/4 tsp salt
1 cup sugar ( I like palm)
2 "eggs" substitute I use EnerG and I whip the mixture before adding to the rest of the ingredients
1/2 cup coconut or almond milk
1/2 cup safflower or sunflower oil
2 tsp vanilla extract
1/4 cup maple syrup
1 cup of walnuts or pecans, chopped

Mash the bananas, I use a potato masher, set to one side

Place all the dry ingredients in a bowl and mix to blend.

Place all liquid ingredients in a separate bowl and mix to blend. Whip the egg substitute when your ready to add everything together

Add the dry and wet ingredients together including the egg substitute, mix in the mashed bananas and nuts and place in a greased loaf pan.

Cook at 350 degrees for approx. 40 minutes, or until an inserted knife comes out clean.

I love to put a slice in the toaster and spread a little butter on the warm slice. Nice change from toast and Oh SO good with a cup of Coffee or Coffee alternative.

Vegan and Glutenfree Mac & Cheese

Like a lot of people I get cravings for the comfort foods in life, especially once the weather starts to get cooler and evenings get darker, earlier. It may be something in my genetic makeup, or at least a nostalgia for my childhood, growing up in Northern England.

Either way I'm craving warm, high carb comfort food, which brings us to this weeks recipe.
Vegan Mac & Cheese.

I have tried quite a few recipes for vegan mac and cheese and they leave me flat. I like the idea of the sweet potato mac and cheese, but it doesn't have anything to do with the original dish and seems a little dry.

I like the recipes with the cheese sauce made from cashews, but I wanted to try something different, especially as I like to add more protein, so I played with some recipes and came up with a hybrid.

I also realized that although it did turn out creamy and delicious, I think most non vegans wouldn't really consider it mac & cheese in the sense of the infamous Kraft variety. Therefore I think our vegan mac and cheese should be called Mac & Cheesefredo.

It seems like a cross between mac & cheese and an alfredo sauce.
Don't get me wrong I'm not trying to downplay how yummy it is, however I think it describes the dish more accurately.

It was an interesting experiment, serving it to my husband. When I told him it was mac & cheese, he looked sceptical. When I added, to clarify, it was more a cross between mac & cheese and alfredo, he dug right in.
To explain, my husband does eat 90% vegan and enjoys it, but he was a true meat and potatoes man when I met him and a junk food aficionado. Therefore, once in a while he gets a little nervous when I serve a new dish. When it comes to food, he doesn't like a lot of change or surprises. With that in mind I think he's truly a trooper and my biggest supporter.

So, I wanted to share this dish with you. It's creamy, comforting and has lots of protein and fiber. It's also incredibly easy to make, with very little prep time, if you don't count how long the potato takes to cook. Just cook that earlier in the day and you're all set for a quick and easy dinner.

Check it out for yourself and let me know what you think. I served it with a crisp green salad with a balsamic vinegar dressing. It really hit the spot.

Serves 6

Put one medium sweet potato in the oven to bake. While it's baking start on the rest of the dish.

Corn pasta penne, cook enough for six people, using the diections on th packet. I like to use the corn pasta for this recipe as the texture is good with the sauce.

While your pasta is cooking add the following ingredients in a blender.

1 cup unsweetened soy or rice milk
1/2 cup nutriotional yeast
1/2 vegetable oil
3 tablespoons tamari (glutenfree)
2 tsp garlic powder
3 tsp paprika
1/2 tsp onion powder
1/4 tsp ground white pepper
3 tsp grey poupon
2 tsp horseradish
1 package of block tofu, I used firm silken

Blend until well mixed, once the potato is cooked, peel and add the flesh and blend.

Mix the sauce with the cooked, drained pasta. Mix in a 1/4 cup grated vegan cheese ( I like daiya cheddar) Sprinkle a little more cheese on top and bake at 350f for approx 15 to 20 mins or until pasta looks slightly browned on top.

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