Tofu Finally

I have wanted to make my own tofu for such a long time. I like tofu, even when it's almost completely plain. I do prefer it on the spicy side, though. Today, because my mother went to Trader Joe's yesterday, I took out some tofu and stir fried it with vegetables!

It was very last minute so I cannot pull the recipe off of the top of my head. I know it had chili powder, soy sauce, garlic and salt and pepper. But this is was a really nice break from the veggie burger I was going to have with plain broccoli.

As I'm writing this I'm actually wondering if this should even be posted because until the first week of September, I won't actually be away at University. I made this stir fry in the kitchen of my house. It has little to nothing to do with cooking and maintaining a vegetarian diet in college. Well I feel conflicted..

It's getting posted. Take that!

Also, I am going to put a picture of the tofu that I used. I cannot call it my favorite because its' one of the..two types i've had. and I honestly cannot tell the difference. It's from Trader Joe's.

As a matter of fact, all the food I buy is from TJ's. But to save you that never ending list, here are all the other foods that went into my stir fry 

And then you get half way through uploading photos and realize that you do not have a photo of the broccoli.. Well crap. 

University and Food Part # 2; LUNA Bars and Why I Can't Live Without Them 1/2

Good Morning! And Happy Christmas. I am feeling particularly holiday-esque today and as a result, am writing this to Faith Hill's "Where Are You Christmas?" 

This is part two. Snack and Snacks Alone. It's catchy. It really should be called LUNA Bars and why I Can't live without them. 

My favorite thing to eat that is not a food item, but rather a bunch of food items that have been combined.  Meet The Chocolate Peppermint Stick LUNA Bar. 

This is little guy has gotten me through so many things. I get up and go to the gym at 7am everyday and I usually do not have the motivation to walk all the way to the dining commons and then back to the gym. I can recall about 45 occasions when I've eaten a LUNA bar in bed, half awake, and then gained an extra twenty minutes of lying around and doing nothing. In keeping with the holiday spirit that has inhabited my body I wanted to write about these for the past week. 

For anyone who doesn't eat LUNA bars on a regular basis; do not mistake this for a "light" snack. 

 

At 180 calories per bar, it really isn't something to eat as a pre-dinner snack. I usually bar this with chocolate almond milk or a banana or something. It's not quite enough to be part of a meal. But, in my opinion, it isn't small enough to be a little snack. 

It tastes like a combination of a brownie, peppermint stick ice cream and all my childhood memories, all packed into a tiny bar.  8grams of protein is also an incentive for any vegetarian (because yes they are vegetarian), to eat this little guy. Among LUNA's other "Original," recipes are Blueberry Bliss

Blueberry Bliss
Caramel Nut BrownieCarrot CakeChocolate ChunkChocolate Dipped CoconutChocolate RaspberryIced Oatmeal RaisinLemonZestNutz Over ChocolatePeanut Butter CookiePeanut Honey PretzelS’moresToasted Nuts ‘n CranberryVanilla AlmondWhite Chocolate Macadamia

Note that the one's that I've crossed off and/or pictured, are the ones that I've tried. Lemon Zest was the original favorite that I'd had. At the time, it was the only type I'd ever tried. It is a really good flavor and a close second to Chocolate Peppermint Stick, but I am sticking to my favorite. Lemon Zest is not so much sour as it tastes like lemon cheese cake, or something similar.  The White Chocolate Macadamia requires a really love with white chocolate, but is still good. It is REALLY sweet and somewhat creamy.  I love anything with oatmeal so Iced Oatmeal Raisin was really tasty for me. It was a bit like the Quaker Oatmeal Bars, but less crunchy and most moist 

 The small number of bars that I've tried is due the fact that I simply buy what they sell on my campus. Chocolate Dipped Coconut is super sweet and I love coconut  but I have only ever seen in it stores once. My roommate is partial to the Nutz Over Chocolate recipe and buys it by the box. 

As soon as I try the other recipes (Smores first, and then Carrot Cake}, I will make a LUNA Bar's part two review. 

Bars and snacks are really somethings that I call lifesavers because being a health nut, being in college and trying to maintain an almost vegan life style means that I can't run around eating potato chips and drinking the soda that is provided at social gathering I go to. I always make sure to have some type of bar, LUNA more often than not, in my back pack or bag just to make sure that I'm not stuck facing awful food choices. 

I've managed to turn a few girls in my hall onto LUNA bars and now they can't get enough.

I plan to do a post on LUNA's Protein Bars (which I'm addicted too) and LUNA's fiber bars (which I haven't tried). I'm also going to cover CLIF, which owns LUNA, but has their own bars (protein and original recipe) And for something new, I am going to cover MARK bars. Which I won in a contest and according to the ingredients, are natural and well. KIND Bars and Uber Bars will probably come last because I don't have as much of an obsession with those as I do with CLIF and LUNA. 

Peanut Butter Vegetarian

Hello Lovelies

I’ve decided that because I am a peanut butter addict and my url is peanutbuttervegetarian.blogspot.com, it would only be appropriate that I make a post about peanut butter.

There is not any way to fully encompass the wonderful qualities, powers and impact that peanut butter has provided me but I am going to try my best.

First things first: types and kinds. Most people think that it’s creamy or chunky. What a sad world it would be if that were the case. My peanut butter of choice falls into the chunky category.  ~Trader Joe's Crunchy Unsalted Peanut Butter from Unblanched Peanuts~ is the full title on the label of the peanut butter that I eat straight from the jar, on sammiches, in smoothies and with bananas or apples. My backup, when I am not near Trader Joe’s would have to be Teddie Brand, Old Fashioned Super Chunky Unsalted All Natural Peanut Butter. 

That 190 calories per 2 tablespoons gets me every time though 

I'll break it down from here. 

Trader Joe's  makes a wide array of natural foods, peanut butter included. My house is about a ten minute drive from the store. My University does not  have one within 20 miles. So over my last break from school I bought four jars and am already down to one. I have lack of self control sometimes

Here are the types I've taken note of 

~Trader Joe's Crunchy Unsalted Peanut Butter from Unblanched Peanuts~ 

~Trader Joe's Crunchy Salted Peanut Butter from Unblanched Peanuts~ 

~Trader Joe's Creamy Unsalted Peanut Butter from Unblanched Peanuts~ 

~Trader Joe's Creamy Salted Peanut Butter from Unblanched Peanuts~ 

~Trader Joe's Valencia Creamy Salted Peanut Butter made with Sea Salt ~ 

I use the ~Trader Joe's Crunchy Unsalted Peanut Butter from Unblanched Peanuts~  for everyday consumption and the ~Trader Joe's Creamy Unsalted Peanut Butter from Unblanched Peanuts~  for baking and for smoothies 

I haven't tried the other types 

I know that Trader Joe's  makes other "butters," such as almond butter, cookie butter, apple butter, cashew butter and the likes but I am partial to their peanut butter.

I am realizing now that I will need to create another post solely on peanut products

Teddie is a brilliant brand and I don't want to undermine them. But they come second because I happened upon them by mistake and also have a really large brand loyalty issue

Teddie Types:

Teddie Old Fashioned Super Chunky Unsalted All Natural Peanut Butter. 

Teddie Old Fashioned Super Chunky All Natural Peanut Butter. 

Teddie Old Fashioned Smooth Super Chunky All Natural Peanut Butter. 

Teddie Old Fashioned Smooth  Unsalted All Natural Peanut Butter. 

Teddie Old Fashioned Smooth  All Natural Peanut Butter with Flax Seed(vegan)

Teddie Old Fashioned Chunky All Natural Peanut Butter with Flax Seed (vegan )

Teddie All Natural Chunky Peanut Butter 

Teddie Organic All Natural Chunky Peanut Butter 

Teddie Organic  All Natural Creamy Peanut Butter 

Pretty Similar to the nutrition label that TJ has 

Teddie makes two types of peanut butter that are homogenized but I don't really know enough about them to include them. 

So what's obvious is that Teddie has more variety but I mean, what can you do? 

Both are really good and both serve my habit really well.

I am all about being natural and try to buy from Trader Joe's as much as possible but my roommate likes Skippy, Jiffy and Other brands which are loaded with sugar and salt. 

And no, this isn't me trying to harp on my roommates eating habits

She says that I am actually convincing her to try to eat more healthily and came home with this the other day, accompanied by a rather tragic story of how she had to sit through dinner and watch apple crisp, lemon bars and ice cream all be eaten by her friends while not allowing herself to have any.

I'll have to make a post about everything in moderation. Included lemon bars. 

Anyway, this is what she brought to my attention

This is by Peanut Butter & Co. It looks like some chocolaty sugar bomb doesn't it? 

Made from cane juice, cocoa, vanilla, non soy lecithin, butter and palm fruit oil.

A round of applause to this company for making something that looks like a mess of junk food but really isn't.

Unfortunately it doesn't taste very good, to me. It smells like one of those Reese's Peanut butter cups but doesn't really take like one.  Not like peanut butter and not like chocolate. I think that could possibly be attributed to the fact that it is "mixed with dark chocolate," and dark chocolate can have a pretty bland taste depending on it's ingredients. 

My roommate eats spoonfuls though so I can give her a pat on the back for choosing this one. And what really got me was that it has 10 calories less per tablespoon than both TJ's and Teddies. 170 calories have probably never seemed so nice to someone who is used to peanut butter than is "made with a honey swirl," but doesn't have honey listed in the ingredients. 

The thing about peanut butter than led me to addiction was it's longevity. I can eat a spoonful of peanut butter and long after it's been swallowed, still smell it on my hands. 

This is the saddest thing I've ever had to conclude. 

I'm sure there will be more peanut butter related posts in the future. I really want to post about this recipe for peanut butter cookies that I've seen but I need to take photos of them, and probably actually bake them. I made a batch a few weeks ago and needless to say, the half that weren't eaten while still in their dough phase, are quickly dwindling in numbers. 

Anyone else a favorite type or brand? Does anyone think I'm out of my mind? 

University and Food Part #1

I've dedicated multiple boxes in my room to store of foods and fruits.

Everything except the fresh fruit are things I've purchased for Trader Joe's or the natural section of Stop&Shop

My Breakfast Foods: Kashi Go Lean Cereal, Trader Joes' Puffed Wheat Cereal, Trader Joe's Toasted Oatmeal Flakes,

Trader Joes Oatmeal

Tasty Lunch/Dinner Things: Nature's Promise Kidney Beans, Trader Joe's Black beans, Trader Joe's Latin style black bean soup, Trader Joe's Unsalted, Crunchy Peanut butter, Nature's Promise Whole Wheat Bread,

Yummy Snack Foods: KIND bars, Luna Bars, Luna Protein Bars, Clif Bars, Uber Bars, Kashi Bars, Trader Joe's Unsalted, Crunchy Peanut butter, Honey Fruit Leather, Dried Apricots, Dried Cranberries, Raisins, Apple Sauce, Almonds, Sunflower Seeds, Peanuts,

My Favorite Drinks: Dasani Water, Raspberry Lime Seltzer Water, Trader Joe's Chocolate and Vanilla Almond Milk, Green Tea, Coffee

Sweets and Things: Unreal Unjunked Chocolate, ,Yummy Earth Gummy Worms, Go Organic Hard Candy

Now all of these things aside I still eat usually at least one meal per day in the Dining Hall at my University

I'll start photographing and blogging about the meals that I have there

This is from a months ago after  I'd done my After Christmas Break Shopping 

Pictured Here Are \/ \/ \/ \/

- Nature's Promise

     - Organic Honey Graham Bears

     - All Natural Kettle Corn

- Pear

- Trader Joe's Peanut Butter

- Licorice

- Oatmeal 

- Pear

-- Bread

Chocolate Chip Muffin Top (Cookies)

Because I am in college have a have little access to a stove, save the times when I go home for breaks, I will post maybe bi-weekly recipe or recipe reviews. 



These are some of the best Muffin Tops and only Muffin Tops I've ever had
But they were actually written as a chocolate chip cookie recipe
So this means that one of two things have happened
Either my definition of a cookie was way too narrow
Or I messed up the recipe and created a squishy cookie 

This recipe comes from Lindsay S. Nixon, author of The Healthy Herbivore Blog. 

I left out the chocolate chips that she included because I couldn't find any vegan brand :(

Here is what they should look like 

Here is how my version came out (I made them once with chocolate chips for my mom. She likes chocolate)

The only thing that I can think of to explain the shape would be that I made the cookies too small and used really big chocolate chips and that is why they look so strange. 

And I have a friend who told me that the apple sauce in the cookies could have made them so squishy. 

Another tip that I have would be to use Almond milk as the "Non-Dairy Milk" ingredient that the recipe calls for. 

They also have a similar taste to Nixon's Cranberry Orange Muffins.

They both have the same ingredients minus the orange juice, bananas and cranberries that the muffins call for.

When baking them I usually end up storing them with the cookies and they sort of "flavor blend." 

I can't complain though. This is one of the simplest recipes I've tried in my exploration of Clean and Mostly Vegan Baking. The thing that made these appeal to me was their lack of foreign ingredients. For people new to healthy baking ground flax, chia seeds, medool dates and tofu can be intimidating. These cookies are flour, apple sauce, non dairy milk, vanilla and no mention of black beans!
Nixon also has a black bean brownie recipe
Baking with black beans scares me  

And For Only 61 Calories, it's a yummy squishy cookie

A College Vegetarian with Vegan Tendencies Introduction

Welcome Readers
To A College Vegetarian With Vegan Tendencies

In recent, and by recent I mean within the last two years, I've adopted a completely vegetarian life style. 

I am just finishing my second semester of University 

I am also a self proclaimed "health nut," as my roommate has suggested.

I try to live as organically as possible and keep my carbon footprint to a minimal size. 

As of February 2013, I've switched to an vegan diet with an exception for eggs. 
I won't call myself a vegan because I do consume eggs and use products that could have animal byproduct in them. 

This blog is for recipes, rants and ridicule. It is for shopping, supermarkets and saving money. It is for every day aspects of a vegetarian life that I never expected to encounter when I made a switch to an all natural life style.

I consume nothing that contains Meat, High Fructose Corn Syrup, White flour, rice, pasta, chips, bread or sweets. Bleached flour, rice, chips bread, pasta or sweets. Nothing that says "Enriched," "Bleached," or "Modified." Dairy. Gelatin. Soda, Pop, Soda Pop or any other form of "fizzy drink." The only beverages I take in are Water, Tea and Coffee. I won't eat white sugar because it is bleached. 

My favorite food is Peanut Butter. All Natural and organic. Chunky. I keep at least four jars in my dorm at all times. 

If I can’t recognize or pronounce one of the ingredients in a food, I try not to eat it. 
I am also addicted to exercise.
Running, Biking, Lifting Weights, Dancing.
Addicted and proud

I hope some of you will enjoy my posts 
Truthfully, Katherine