May 31st

Last day! I can’t believe the month is over already. I haven’t even tried a quarter of the recipes I want to! I’ve pretty much decided that I’m going to continue eating this way for as long as it feels natural and healthy to me. I might not be quite as strict – if pasta has a little egg in it, so be it. I’ll eat it up anyway. But no eggs in baking now that I know how to cook without them. I want to steer clear of meat and dairy though, meat for my little (and big) animal friends, and dairy for my asthma and the animals. I would encourage anybody who is remotely interested in this to try eating one vegan meal a week. Not even a full day, just one meal. You’ll find it’s not all that hard to do and your body will love it! I think the world would be a much healthier and gentler place if we relied on animal products less. And the environment would benefit so much – our air would become cleaner and CO2 emissions would decrease drastically. That’s the type of world I would like to live in, and I’ll do my part to make my little piece of it better.

Hopefully you’ve all had fun reading this blog and found it interesting or inspiring or just can’t resist those delicious Coconut-Lemon Cupcakes or Triple Berry Pie. Thanks so much for following my journey! So I’m signing off now, but not before introducing you to some of my little animal friends that we saw on the way to the cottage today. There were so many, but these were the ones I was able to take pictures of. I missed the picture of two young calves playing and head-butting each other, which was just too precious. And I missed all the birds we saw flying overhead. And all the butterflies – there were hundreds of them, yellow ones, flying around in sunbeams. And so many more! It’s worth a drive or bike ride out to the country to see them all.

But aren’t these guys so cute? The little baby calves with their mothers and the beautiful horses with their mothers are just so gorgeous and loving. All of them were so alert, and some, like the llama, goat and horse, posed for us too! And maybe I’ll throw in a picture of Cocoa, because you can never get enough of him, he’s just so cute. And he’s the reason for this month in the first place, so a big thank you to Cocoa!

Love.Melly

May 30th

How delicious was that couscous with snow peas and golden raisins and vegetable broth that my mom made? So good that I ate it for lunch AND dinner again today! We changed it up a bit for dinner though – we made a stir-fry of peppers and yellow beans and had that on top of the couscous instead of on rice and it was also very yummy. I’ll have to get that recipe from my mom so I can make it again and again. I did also eat a delicious pesto-cucumber sandwich again today. They are so good! If you already like cream cheese and cucumber sandwiches, try this instead. You’ll love it so much more – it’s so much more flavourful and it’s just as simple to make.

I can’t believe how the time has flown by! There’s only one more day left of the month that I’ve committed to, but I don’t think I’ll be able to stop eating this way. It was a very natural progression before the month started and I just don’t see myself going back. I’ll have to have a little experiment with it – eating some dairy or meat or eggs again to see how it makes me feel. But nothing beats the lightness you feel after a large meal. It doesn’t completely drain you and send you into a turkey coma. Plus my skin is better and I’ve lost weight and I digest better, AND I’m not hurting any animals. I don’t think it gets better than that!

May 29th

Tonight is my final family dinner for this incredible month of veganism (don’t worry, it won’t be my last!) and to celebrate I made a rustic triple berry pie. Maybe I should tell you about dinner first, but who doesn’t want to start with dessert? I adapted a recipe from a Rachael Ray magazine and turned it vegan and delicious. The pie was such a huge hit – the entire thing went, which never happens with pies at my grandma’s on Sunday dinners. I guess there’s just something magical about home-cooked berry pies, with that sweet scent wafting out through the open windows on the breeze, welcoming everyone in to dinner...Or we were all hungry. One or the other.

Triple Berry Pie
3 containers blackberries (about 3 ½ cups)
1 cup sugar
¼ cup quick-cooking tapioca
The juice of 1 lemon
2 cups quartered strawberries
1 container blueberries (about 1 ¼ cups)
1 ½ cups flour
¼ tsp salt
8 tbsp vegan shortening, plus 2 tbsp cut into small cubes
¼ cup ice water (more as needed)

In a large bowl, combine 1 cup blackberries, ¼ cup sugar, ¼ cup tapioca, and lemon juice. Mash using a pastry cutter. Stir in remaining blackberries, blueberries, strawberries and ¾ cup sugar. Let stand for 20 minutes.

Preheat oven to 400. In a large bowl whisk together flour and salt. Add 8 tbsp vegan shortening and cut in with a pastry cutter till crumbly. Drizzle ice water over flour mixture and stir until dough stays together but isn’t wet. Add more water if needed, a teaspoon at a time, until you reach desired consistency.

Transfer dough to a lightly floured surface and roll out to about 13 inches round. Place the dough over the pie plate and press dough gently into dish edge to eliminate air pockets.

Pour berry mixture and juices into the pie shell. Dot the top with remaining 2 tbsp vegan shortening. Gently fold and pleat the overhanging dough over the berries – no fancy fluting here. Sprinkle the dough with a little bit of sugar if you like. Place the pie plate over a baking sheet (to catch any bubbling juices) and place in the over. Bake for about an hour (I found 52 minutes was perfect) and let cool. Serve with soy ice cream!

Now that you know what we had for dinner, maybe you’re thinking, well, why do I even want to know what she ate for dinner? What could possibly compare? Well, the answer is: my mom’s delicious Mediterranean-inspired salads and roasted potatoes. Her dinner was incredible – and I’m so thankful she made a vegan version of her chicken couscous salad for me. Thank you Mom! She made me the couscous salad with veggie broth and used agave syrup instead of honey in the carrot-coriander slaw – she even used agave in the non-vegan dish! And her roasted garlic and rosemary potatoes were without a doubt the most delicious potatoes I’ve ever eaten. She’s becoming quite the vegan chef! Tonight’s dinner was so good. I think as we get more and more comfortable cooking like this, our dinners just get better and better.

May 28th

Today was the Great Glebe Garage Sale day. It’s a huge neighbourhood garage sale that goes on for block after block and thousands of people go to score great deals. Dom and I go every year, usually with a general idea of what we’re looking for so we don’t come back with loads of purchases that maybe seemed ridiculously cool at the time and now we look at and wonder what we could possibly have been thinking. On today’s list: gardening stuff like pots and edging, LP’s for Dom and any cool art books for me. We only found one out of the three, so maybe not the most successful year for us, but Dom got some cool Reggae records from a Jamaican guy for 25 cents. It’s always better to re-use someone else’s stuff than to buy it new. Keeping stuff out of landfills feels good. We spent about 4 hours at the sale, strolling up and down and across and back the streets, dodging bikes and cars and people and dogs and by the end we were both so hungry. We were very close to The Table and after our great experience there the other day, we decided to go back. Even more awesome food this time! Everyone MUST try this restaurant. I had a fantastic tofu stew in a yummy gravy. Usually I’m not a huge fan of tofu but this dish made me reconsider. With some steamed local asparagus and another slice of the tomato-olive tart, it was perfect. But then we added to that perfection by getting a gigantic piece of raspberry-chocolate cake. It was so moist and delicious. I’m so happy we found a place where I can eat desserts out since almost all restaurant desserts have eggs or cream cheese or milk in them. This was only my second time eating dessert out this month, the first being the first time we came to eat at The Table. Thank goodness we found this place!

After such a huge lupper (that’s right, lupper) we weren’t very hungry come our usual dinner time. We ended up making a chunky almond-basil pesto to spread on flax seed bread for tiny pesto-cucumber sandwiches. They are the new cream cheese-cucumber sandwiches. They would be perfect for a tea party! We each only ate half and we’ll keep the rest for lunch tomorrow.

May 27th

Tonight Dom made me dinner based on his go-to dish. It was sooooo good and spicy. I love the addition of the artichoke instead of the chicken. Since it’s his dish, I thought I’d let him tell you all about it and what it’s been like eating more vegan than usual this month. Here’s Dom’s guest post:

First, I’d like to say that I’m very happy for Melly and her decision to explore a vegan diet. I know her reasons whether they be moral, physiological, philosophical, or even emotional and I respect them, even if personally I don’t always agree with them. I have tried to be as supportive as I possibly can whether that means a little more research before going out to eat or modifying a home cooked meal, the result is usually eating a little greener, and usually a little healthier than I would have normally. Thankfully, the vegan food I have eaten has for the most part been delicious, especially when Mel prepares it. On this night however I was to cook which meant I had to modify a particularly favorite dish of ours. This has been a staple of Mel’s May: substituting ingredients in a dish in order to veganise it. At times this can be a little tricky, but for the most part it isn’t that difficult and allows for some creativity and new flavor experiences. The dish I made is derived from a dish my sister used to order in a restaurant, and she introduced me to her version of it. It’s a simple bowtie pasta with chicken and snow peas. There are no, and has never been any measured recipe for this dish and my sister and I make it differently, and honestly it is different every time I make it.

Dom’s Spicy Bowtie:
Ingredients: Extra virgin olive oil, sun-dried tomato pesto, garlic, various sweet peppers, various hot peppers, bowtie pasta, artichoke hearts (canned), snow-peas, zucchini.

Tonight I simply mixed about 2 tablespoons of olive oil with three tablespoons of pesto. I used a sundried tomato pesto which doesn’t contain any cheese or dairy. Sometimes I use a 1:1 ratio with the oil and pesto. I put in a healthy amount of minced garlic, I think three cloves. I added a liberal dose of cut up peppers, green, red, and my favorite orange. I also put in two different hot peppers; some people (myself included) prefer this dish when very spicy, just add what you have a tolerance for. When I don’t have hot peppers I just substitute a hot pepper sauce, but it’s never quite as good.

To this sauce I add the freshly cooked pasta, (always cooking more than I need because the left-overs are even better than the first time around). Usually I would now add the chicken but tonight I used artichoke hearts which actually turned out to be quite a revelation and the perfect example of discovering new flavors. Finally I put in the uncooked snow-peas to the hot mixture. This meal is both quick and easy to prepare and makes a great lunch the next day. Finally, it should be noted that this meal goes great with a fruity white wine or if you are feeling especially happy, two white wines. It’s been our experience that you don’t have to worry about dessert with this meal because you end up eating too much of it.

May 26th

So it may sound like all I do is go out to restaurants, which is not always the case, but it happens to be the truth this week. But today’s restaurant is one I am so excited about and really want to share with everyone. We went to The Table in the Hintonburg area. It’s officially a vegetarian restaurant, but really it’s so much more than that: everything is as fresh, organic and local as possible; almost all the dishes are both vegan and gluten free; there is a wide variety of food that changes everyday and also seasonally; all the ingredients are written on cards and each dish is labelled if it’s vegan or gluten free or both; and it has become my new favourite restaurant! Everyone should try this place, whether you’re vegetarian or not. The food is just sooooo good. It’s buffet-style; you fill up your plate and pay by the weight. Dom and I decided to get different things on our plates so we could pick off each other’s and try a little bit of everything. My favourites were the potato-onion fritter with onion chutney and a tomato-olive tart. Mmmm I can’t get enough of either of those. Dom’s favourites were stir-fried broccoli and ratatouille. But the best part – and this is incredibly special – they had dessert! And not just one cardboardy cookie, they had honest to goodness scrumpcious vegan cakes and pies and cookies! (Bonus: most were gluten-free too!) I had an amazing pumpkin pie that was sweetened with maple syrup and Dom had a maple-walnut tart. Both vegan, both gluten-free, both delicious! And everything was pretty inexpensive too, especially for the amount of food we got. We paid about $13 each including dessert, and we came out of there too full to move. I think I was just so happy to have so many options that I filled my plate with everything. I guess it depends mostly on how heavy it is, so fill up your plates with lighter salads and less of the tarts and bean loaves if you’re watching your wallet.
Just to let you all know, the picture of the pumpkin pie isn’t mine – I didn’t have my camera with me when we happened upon The Table. The picture also probably isn’t of a vegan one. But I’m really looking forward to making some yummy vegan pumpkin pie this Thanksgiving!

Ps. Sometimes, a girl needs to relive college days and just eat ramen noodles and vegetable dumplings. Just saying.

May 25th

I’ve found that vegan food can be found at almost every restaurant we’ve visited this month. Even if they’re not whole meals, with just a little creativity and some persuasion, a vegan meal can be had! Usually restaurant sides are vegan, including dishes like mashed/boiled/fried/roasted potatoes (without butter and sour cream), steamed vegetables and some appetizers like vegetable spring rolls or salsa. But eye-rolling (out of annoyance) or questioning (out of interest) from wait staff while piecing together my own dinner has not deterred me from going out. Tonight I met up with some girlfriends after work and we decided to go to Ahora, a Mexican restaurant in the market. I was lucky tonight and didn’t have to put together my own plate by ordering sides – there was a “Vegan Burrito” right on the menu! How helpful, when vegan is right there in the name. Black beans, lettuce, onions…all sorts of stuff crammed in the tortilla. I rounded that out with a nice big salad and some guacamole and corn chips. The guacamole was good – I love making my own, but this one was pretty yummy and the salad was great too, but actually I didn’t enjoy the burrito as much as I thought I would. So maybe I should have pieced together my dinner, with guac and salsa and more salad? Oh well, I’ll know for next time. The girls loved their burritos though, so don’t let my review keep you away. The atmosphere is fun, and if you can get a booth under the window it’s even better. You order and pay at the counter and they bring your food out to you, so it’s super fast – perfect when you’re veryvery hungry!

May 24th

Since I’ve eaten leftovers all day today, I thought I would take the time to tell you a bit more about some different products and foods I’ve come to love. First off, people have been asking me if it’s more expensive to eat vegan. My answer is, about the same, especially if you already eat organic foods when possible. So I’ll tell you about one expensive-ish product and another ridiculously inexpensive food to cancel it out.

The largest expenses on a regular grocery bill are usually any type of meat and cheese. If you take those out, you’re left with a much lower grocery bill. Fill that up with organic vegetables instead and your bill is still less than the original. Earth Balance butter is about the same as margarine if you can find it at a grocery store instead of a health food store. Specialty items like Vegenaise or organic miso can get more expensive, but you can balance that out with my new favourite: dried beans. Maybe you already have loads of dried beans, maybe you’ve never used them before. Before January I had never even considered buying dried beans…why would I wait an entire day to soak them when they’re available in a can, ready to eat? But it’s soooo inexpensive, especially if you can buy them in bulk. You pay much less for a huge bag of dried beans than for one can of the same. Maybe you’re paying extra for all that extra sodium? Don’t get me wrong – canned beans are so convenient, especially when you don’t have time to soak them. Most beans have to soak for 8 hours and then cook for 1 hour before they’re ready, so unless you plan your meal, you won’t be eating dinner before 3:00 am. But if you do have time, buy lots and lots of dried beans! I always keep at least two types on hand: lentils and chickpeas (lentils are the exception to the soaking rule and they can cook from dry in about 40 minutes). I also have adzuki and cannellini beans on hand right now. Each type tastes different but each is delicious. That’s adzuki and lentils in the picture.

Another product I have started using is Vegenaise. There are lots of vegan mayos available, but the best brand is Vegenaise by Earth Island. It’s the only brand found in the refrigerated section of the health food store and had surprisingly very pronounce-able ingredients. It has the same texture and a similar taste to regular mayo, but I kind of like the taste of it better. And anything that mayonnaise does, veganaise can do better. Like:

Curry Mayo Dip for sweet potato fries: Add curry powder to Vegenaise. Eat.

Or...

Garlic Mayo for zucchini or burgers: add minced garlic to Vegenaise. Eat.

Or...

Spinach-Artichoke Dip with pita chips
IMix 1 cup Vegenaise, equal parts quartered artichoke hearts and spinach, pepper, and some vegan parmesan. Mash everything together and heat in the oven and it tastes just like the stuff you get at restaurants.

I’m loving Vegenaise and I would continue to use it instead of mayo even if I wasn’t vegan, just because it’s so much healthier.

May 23rd

For dinner tonight my mom was making a stir-fry and instead of cooking the beef and adding it back to the vegetables, she kept them separate for me. I love eating stir-fries. Any vegetables we have on hand just go right in. Tonight’s combo was cauliflower, broccoli, red and green peppers, carrots and bean sprouts. I added a sprinkle of sesame seeds for an extra shot of calcium and ate mine over brown rice (I’m getting quite good at cooking brown rice now – I’ve even finished an entire bag of it since March!) How easy and delicious is stir-fry? My favourite is to make fried rice with leftovers the next day. I keep the veggies separate and cook the rice in the pan till it gets crispy, add my veggies back in to heat through and it’s so easy and nutritious. I love when rice crisps up and coats the pan – it reminds me of a dish called bibimbap that I order whenever we eat Korean (without the egg of course!)

May 22nd

Today I did some cooking for the rest of the week. I love to have my big cooking day on the weekend so that I can just heat up dishes during the week when I get back from work or from the garden and I’m too exhausted to cook. Last night I soaked some dried cannellini beans for a White Bean Casserole. I cooked them in half water, half vegetable broth, with a bay leaf of course. When they were done I strained them for the bottom of the casserole. I fried up some garlic and onions with thyme and tarragon, then I fried some cremini mushrooms with the same spices and mixed the vegetables into the beans. I spread these out in a glass casserole dish. As a topping I made my own breadcrumbs using a couple slices of whole grain bread from a local bakery, which I pulsed a couple times in the processor. I added the same amount of panko breadcrumbs, some thyme, tarragon and rosemary and ¼ cup vegan butter, melted. I put the crumb topping onto the beans and let it cook for 25 minutes in a 350 oven, and then my dinners for the week were done! The smell of the spices as it was cooking and especially as the onion was frying with them was amazing. I don’t know how to describe it, but make sure you try that particular spice combo out. I’ll just add a giant arugula salad to make my meal complete.

We had a barbecue tonight at my Grams’ for dinner. Veggie dogs for me! My go-to choice of condiment combination right now is mustard and relish. I used to hate relish and love ketchup, but now it’s the opposite. I just can’t get enough of it on my veggie dogs. Ketchup, on the other hand…it just doesn’t go with veggie dogs. I don’t know why; I just don’t like it together. My grandma had made a potato salad that was made with mayo and eggs, but she made some home-made French fries for me. I love my grandma’s home-made fries – they taste sooo good and I have no idea how she gets them so crispy on the outside but soft on the inside. It never works that way for me. It probably has something to do with oil temperature, but could just as easily have something to do with her magic cooking abilities. No recipe there: potatoes, oil, done. Mmm…

May 21st

Cottage day today! I’m so thankful that I live in Canada and that we have some amazing places available to us that we can escape to and really experience nature (including all its mosquito-bugginess) whether it’s a cottage in the country or visiting one of our many national or provincial parks. Just being surrounded by its awesome beauty really makes me feel that connection all the more deeply and I’m just so glad that I’m doing this small act to help greenify my little corner of the world. There’s so much more I can do, and I’m working at it all the time, but for now being vegan is the kindest I can be to the environment.

Dom and I continued with our “long weekend=pancake” theme today by making banana-nut-chocolate chip pancakes. The banana is great for binding the mixture together instead of eggs. You could probably use any recipe you have for pancakes and replace the egg with mashed banana, and the milk with non-dairy milk and you’d have yummy vegan pancakes. Just make sure you use baking soda and/or baking powder. They are a vegan baker’s best friends. Oh, and if your original recipe calls for sour/buttermilk, you can add vinegar to non-dairy milks and it will do the same trick. Try out the banana pancakes next time you make them. As long as you love banana, you’ll love them.

Today on the way to the cottage we stopped at a tiny little town for groceries and found our usual grocery store closed down! We had to stop at the only other store that sells groceries, and they have a very tiny section. We were kind of worried we wouldn’t be able to find anything there for me, but our experience there makes me believe you can find vegan food anywhere – not lots, but enough to choose from to make a complete meal. We picked up some hummus and pita, some corn, cucumber and arugula, some pistachios and a can of vegetarian beans. Along with some olive oil and balsamic vinegar mixture as a salad dressing, we were set for a great easy meal at the cottage while enjoying the sun and the calmness of the lake. Knowing you can make kinder choices anywhere is very comforting. Maybe they’ll get some veggie dogs there soon?

May 20th

Is there anything better than home-made pancakes on a beautiful sunny morning on a long weekend? Possibly, but if there is, then I don’t want to know about it. Dom and I made the cornmeal-lemon-blueberry pancakes from Veganomicon. We didn’t have blueberries so we left them out of the recipe but the pancakes were still very yummy and we topped them with fresh raspberries instead. I love the addition of the lemon zest in the recipe – it makes them taste so fresh. I recommend using lemon zest with every pancake batter from now on! Dom’s little 10-month-old nephew loved these pancakes too – he was eating up all the little pieces on his plate. After breakfast we all took a nice long walk and visited the horses in one of the neighbouring fields. They always come up to greet you at the fence. They’re so beautiful. I love seeing these huge, peaceful animals happily chomping away on grass. I feel so relaxed and happy sharing in their herbivore-ness. We got back from the walk just before the rain hit, but now that we’ve at least had some sun, the gloominess of the past 2 weeks is forgotten. And those little bits of sun today have really helped my little sprouts that I planted last week…take a look at them now! Those little bits of green are going to be broccoli! How amazing is nature?

May 19th

I love long weekends. Especially the May 2-4 weekend! It’s always the perfect weekend to spend in the garden, even if it’s raining. To mark the beginning of the long weekend, Dom and I went for a long walk outside when the rain stopped for a bit. After all the fresh air, it was time to make a nice spring dish that was equal parts delicious, vegan and comforting. We decided on pasta and peanut butter cups. Dom and I used to make this pasta dish from Canadian Living before with chicken and chicken stock and goat’s cheese. Instead we changed it around and it tasted just as good. Obviously vegetable stock is an easy substitution and I can do without the goat’s cheese. (Probably the only thing I really miss). Instead of the chicken we got creative and added artichoke hearts. I love artichokes – I first tried them in Italy and eating them reminds me of my time there. I tend to stick to the jarred artichoke hearts packed in water. I haven’t made the leap and tried cooking my own yet - it looks a little complicated, but it’s on my list of things to try!



Sundried Tomato-Artichoke Pasta
1 cup jarred artichoke hearts, drained
1 tbsp olive oil
1 small red onion
½ cup thinly sliced, drained, oil-packed sundried tomatoes
2 cloves garlic, minced
1-1/3 cup vegetable broth
½ cup white wine
2 tbsp earth Balance butter
12 oz wheat wheat spaghettini
5 cups arugula (The original recipe calls for spinach, but if you’ve read my previous post, you already know where I stand with that green stuff. Plus I much prefer the peppery flavour of the arugula, but feel free to try it with whichever green you love)

Boil water for pasta. Cook until al dente. Meanwhile, heat a skillet with oil. Cook onion over medium heat till cooked, about 5 minutes. Stir in sundried tomatoes, artichokes and garlic; cook for 1 minute. Stir in vegetable broth and wine; bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 5 minutes. Stir in butter. Add the drained pasta to the sauce and stir to coat. Toss and partially wilt in the arugula. Serve warm.

I really enjoyed the addition of the artichokes. Dom and I made a huge batch so we could have leftovers, but it didn’t even last 30 minutes! As everyone came in and saw it sitting on the stove, the pasta disappeared quickly. Then we brought out dessert and it was a huge hit. I’ve made these chocolate peanut butter cups from The Kind Diet many times before – they are one of the easiest desserts I’ve ever made. I once brought them to a girly sleepover party and they were gobbled up so quickly – and I never even told them they were vegan! So delicious. I actually like them more than Reese’s peanut butter cups, I think because it’s less sweet and the chocolate has such a yummy mellow flavour (I always use a mixture of half vegan chocolate chips, half carob chips.) Here’s the link to the recipe from thekindlife.com:

http://www.thekindlife.com/user/recipe/chocolate-peanut-butter-cups

Everyone should try these. I even made them once with Speculoos spread direct from a trip to Belgium instead of peanut butter. Not sure if it’s vegan but they still tasted sooo great. I bet they'd taste great with hazelnut or almond butter too. I also make mine in mini muffin tins instead of the regular sized one like the recipe suggests. Instead of 12 big ones, it makes about 24-36 bite sized cups.

May 18th

Since I've been eating leftovers - glorious curry leftovers - I thought I would take this time to introduce you to some of my favourite vegan products that I'd never tried before I seriously started thinking about going vegan. Maybe you're familiar with some or all of them, maybe you've never heard of any of them, but if the next time you go to the store and need margarine and come out with Earth Balance Buttery Spread instead, then I've done my job! Earth Balance is a really easy and great substitution - you use it just like you would dairy butter. And it tastes amazing...so very yummy. My favourite is to eat it on toast or baguette with baked beans. I really recommend trying this one out at least once. You can find it in health food stores or the health food section of larger grocery stores. Even if you're not even remotely considering going vegan, it's so much kinder, so feel free to use it anyway. I guarantee you'll love it.

The next product I was introduced to is brown rice syrup. This is a natural sweetener, like maple syrup, but made from brown rice which is cooked down with some kind of enzyme that breaks the rice down and you're left with the sweetness. I've mentioned this before - it's good drizzled on ice cream and pancakes and oatmeal. It looks like caramel or honey and has the same consistency, but it has a much milder flavour. The flavour of it is hard to describe - some vegans call it caramel-y but I don't really think it is since it's so much less sweet. That being said, it has a much deeper flavour than white sugar and kind of keeps the sweet taste alive in your mouth soooo much longer. It took me awhile to get to really appreciate it, I guess because I was expecting something exactly like the artificial caramel spread you can buy in grocery stores. It's nothing like that though and I appreciate it so much more now that I'm less bombarded with sugary sweets. I haven't gone strictly vegan and taken out all sugars yet, but even no longer eating gummy worms and fuzzy peach candies has made my tongue appreciate gentle natural sweetness. If you ever see it in the store and need some honey or a different topping for your morning pancakes or summer sundae, please give it a try. It might take you awhile to like it or you might love it instantly, but it's so worth using as it's a much healthier option than sugar. Try it in tea - I hear it's yummy, though I only drink herbal teas that don't need sweetening. But on soy ice cream? mmm...

Finally for today I wanted to tell you all about my newfound love affair with kale. I think before this month I'd eaten kale maybe once or twice, but I'd never really thought about my leafy greens. Turns out they're soooo packed with nutrients and goodness and light (as in literal light, like sunlight...you're eating sunlight from all that photosynthesis! the darker the green colour, the better) that it's very important for vegans to try to eat leafy greens at least once a day, although I really think this should apply to everyone's diet. Everyone could stand to eat a little more sunshine. Sunniness aside, kale was the leafy green that called to me over collards or bok choy or spinach (spinach and me, we're not friends...I still haven't gotten over the rotten spinach salad I ate years ago...ugh). I love that you can cook it with sauces or plain; you can wilt it into soups or pastas; or you can turn it into a chip (check out my kale chips recipe from May 1st) and any way you cook it it tastes delicious. My favourite is still the garlicky sundried tomato kale saute, but if you put any type of kale in front of me (except for rotten - I've learned that lesson) you can be sure I'll gobble it up.

So these are my fave products for the day. Maybe try one or all of them out. I have lots more though, so don't worry if you haven't found the one that piques your interest. I'll be writing about some more of them soon!

May 17th

I don’t even remember what I ate for breakfast or lunch today – all that is overshadowed by my delicious dinner. It was amazing! Honestly, I’d be very sad if no one tried this... it’s so good. For anyone out there who has ever thought to themselves “I’d love to be vegan, except I don’t think I could live without Swiss Chalet dipping sauce” which, as unlikely as it sounds is still possible, then this is the dish for you. I don’t know how it happened; maybe it was the combination of spices, maybe it was a fluke never to be replicated or maybe it was magic like the infamous green pepper from years ago that tasted exactly like Fruit Loops (my cousins know what I’m talking about) but whatever it was, it honestly tasted just like the Chalet sauce. So what exactly is this magical dish, you ask? It’s a curry! I made it inspired by a recipe that I’d read once but I changed to veganize and deliciousize it. I figured using coconut milk instead of cream would be a good substitution since coconut milk is used a lot in thai curries. Also, I didn’t really measure anything so I’m guessing with the amounts of spices and stuff. Feel free not to follow it exactly.

Melly’s Coconut Curry:
About 2 cups soaked and cooked chickpeas (or use canned if you like)
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp cumin seeds
½ medium onion, sliced
2 garlic cloves, minced
2 tsp curry powder
2 tsp turmeric
½ tsp cinnamon
Sprinkle of ground cloves
1 can organic diced tomatoes
Salt and pepper
¾ can of coconut milk (my guess is ¾ cup?)
Chopped kale

Heat the olive oil in a skillet. Add the cumin seeds and toast for about a minute. Add the onion and cook until just transparent, about 5 minutes. Add the garlic; cook for 30 seconds. Add the curry, turmeric, cinnamon and cloves. Quickly mix with the onion and garlic until they are coated with the spice mixture. Pour in the can of diced tomatoes, including the juices. Add the chickpeas. Season with salt and pepper and bring to a boil. When it starts to boil, lower the heat and simmer for about 20 minutes. After the 20 minutes, make sure the tomato is just barely bubbling and add the coconut milk. Mix everything together. Wilt in the kale and let cook for another 5 minutes. Serve on brown or basmati rice with a pita. (I couldn’t find any vegan naan and didn’t have the time to make any, but pita was great.) I had mine with brown rice, pita, cucumber and asparagus.

This recipe actually made quite a lot – too much for one person. I have enough to last me about a week, but I’ll be able to bring it to work for lunches and have it for dinner tomorrow. But next time I would probably halve it and keep the extra canned tomatoes for spaghetti sauce and the extra coconut milk for some delicious dessert.
This turned out amazing – I think it was one of the best meals I’ve ever made. Ever. It’s very rich because of the coconut milk – I wouldn’t make this all the time, but don’t let that deter you! It’s the same as eating a cheesy dish in the richness department. Just kinder.

May 16th

April 8th was Cocoa's 2nd birthday and to celebrate, I made him some homemade treats. Vegan dog treats! Why should I be the only one to partake in the deliciousness that is vegan cooking? Now, I'm not entirely sure about a dog with a strictly vegan diet, although while I was researching for this month I came across some people who do have their dogs on it, but I don't know too much about it, nor do I think I would put a doggie on it unless it was advised by the vet. Actually, the reason we decided to make vegan dog treats was because we didn't want him eating eggs or milk or sugar or getting any unnecessary cholesterol, even though it was his birthday and he was entitled to a treat! So we adapted some of the original home-made dog treat recipes we already had and came up with this:

Cocoa's Peanut Butter Surprise:
1/4 cup natural peanut butter
1 tbsp vegetable oil
1 cup water (or more as needed)
2-1/4 cup whole wheat flour
1 cup oatmeal

Preheat the oven to 375. Mix all ingredients together. Add more water if the dough is too dry or more flour if it's too wet. Roll out the dough to 1/4 inch thickness, cut with a cookie cutter. Place on a baking sheet and bake for 25-35 minutes. They should turn a little brown. It may seem like a long time, but you want the dough to really dry out to preserve them. Keep them in the fridge.
Feel free to halve the recipe as they made quite a lot - probably about 40 palm sized but thin treats.


Cocoa loved his birthday surprise! Whenever he got one he'd bring them to his favourite "treat-eating spot" in the living room, then lick them until they reached room temperature, then gobble them up super quickly. I cut his treats into squirrel and bone shapes. I said it was to make them easier for him to break apart and hold with all those curvy edges, but really, they just looked so cute that way! You can try making your own shapes with a knife - I didn't have a bone-shaped cookie cutter so I cut those out with a knife, not that Cocoa knew the difference. My cousin Dean and I even split one to taste them when they came out of the oven. They were a little dry and had a faint peanut buttery flavour, but they weren't terrible either! Mmm dog treats...if you have a dog and feel like making them a different treat than usual, try making these for them. If they already love peanut butter I'm sure they'll love them. Happy Birthday again Cocoa!

May 15th

So it's been a full 2 weeks of vegan deliciousness and I thought I should let you know about some of the changes with me:

1. First off, I've had really bad asthma for awhile now and I had read that not eating dairy could help ease asthma symptoms, so I had actually stopped eating dairy about 2 months before I started this journey. I've found that although I still have occasional asthma attacks, they're nowhere near as bad as they used to be and I can mostly breathe through them before using my inhaler. I've read lots of people's stories who say that it gets better with time and I'm really hoping to make more improvements on the breathing front. Fingers crossed!

2. This may sound gross, but I'm not as phelgmy as before. I used to wake up and cough and spit for about an hour, but I don't do that anymore. Even my grandma noticed this in the mornings when I go visit her. I wake up with clear passages! Along the same lines, I rarely have to blow my nose anymore, when it used to be an hourly occurance due to blocked nasal passages.

3. I usually suffer from severe pollen allergies in the spring and while people around me are suffering, I'm just not. Sure, I sneeze occasionally and my eyes get itchy but nothing like I used to experience. This may not be entirely caused by my new diet, but a lot of newly vegan people notice a decrease in their allergies.

4. I digest better. Very important.

5. When I feel full after overeating at a restaurant or family dinner for example, I still feel super full but not heavy. This may sound strange but I don't know how else to describe it... it's just a lightness.

6. I've always been plagued with bad skin; I had afwul blackheads on my nose and now they've disappeared! No matter how well I washed and moisturized my skin before, they never went away and now, even though I haven't been taking the best care of my skin in the last few weeks, those pesky blackheads are just gone. I'm very excited about this.

For people suffering from asthma or allergies or even bad skin, maybe a vegan diet is worth a try? I love finding natural remedies to any type of illness and this makes me very happy. I much prefer just plain eating to relying on medication. Hopefully I'll kick the inhaler soon!

As for today's food, I'm very excited to say that for breakfast today I tried tempeh for the first time. I had never heard about tempeh until I started researching the vegan diet, but my understanding is that it is fermented soybeans. It may sound a little gross, but was actually super yummy. Dom loved it too and has claimed the leftovers for himself. We tried the smoky maple bacon flavoured one, and the marinade actually had very healthy ingredients. It was a great alternative to bacon and I'll definitely be buying this again. I'm also very excited that this morning was the first morning that I felt I needed to eat greens. I've read that vegans should eat greens every day, but preferably with every meal and today was the first day that I opened the fridge at breakfast and the kale was the most attractive food in it. Yum. Finished it off with cinnamon oatmeal and it was really more of a brunch.

Dinner tonight was scrumpcious - we had a stir-fry and it was the bestest stir-fry we've ever eaten! We cleaned out the fridge, made a big pot of rice and added some corn and asparagus. We used a carrot, an onion, a green and red pepper, zucchini, broccoli, garlic, peanuts and sesame seeds along with a splash of hot pepper sesame oil, but you can really use whatever you have on hand or whatever needs to get used up before spoiling.

Dom and Melly's Sizzling Stir-fry:

1/4 large onion cut into big pieces

1 carrot, thinly sliced

1 stalk of broccoli, florets and peeled, chopped stalk separated

1/4 red pepper, thinly sliced

1/4 green pepper, thinly sliced

2 cloves garlic, thinly sliced

1/3 zucchini, sliced

1/4 cup peanuts, chopped

Sesame seeds

Heat a splash of sesame oil in a frying pan. When hot, add the onion and stir fry for about 2 minutes. Add the carrot and broccoli stalks and fry for another 2 minutes. Add the 2 peppers and stir fry for another 2 minutes. Add the broccoli and garlic and a splash of hot pepper sesame oil and fry until everything is just cooked. Add the zucchini and peanuts and seeds and stir everything together. When the zucchini is heated through, turn off the heat. Serve over brown rice. Sprinkle with more nuts or sesame seeds if you like.

If you're looking for a different flavour for your stir-fries, I recommend you use the sesame oil. It smells amazing when it's cooking and I like that you don't need to add any other sugar- or salt-laden flavourings. We made enough for me to bring to lunch tomorrow but it was so good we ended up eating it all. Just looking at the picture again is making me crave more. Yum.

May 14th

Today Dom and I were babysitting his niece and nephew and his niece had a lunchtime birthday party to attend in Dunrobin. For those of you who don't know or haven't heard of Dunrobin, it's a veryveryvery tiny town with not much around. After exploring the area, we decided to have our own lunch at the Heart and Soul Cafe (honestly, one of the only places to eat we could find, except for the pizzeria where the birthday party was being held.) It's a very quaint cafe with all home-cooked food and seems to be very popular as there was only one table left when we got in. They recommend reservations on weekends, but I guess we got lucky! Although they had no purely vegan dishes on their menu, after explaining to the waitress that I was vegan, she allowed me to mix and match the side dishes to create my own meal. I was so happy and thankful that she allowed me to do this - not only was she so accomodating, but was actually very interested in my new diet and lifestyle change. We talked about it for a bit before I decided on a whole wheat bagel, grilled tomato, avocado and homefries. It ended up being very yummy - I love the homecooked taste of the meal.And after all the driving around today, Dom and I decided to treat ourselves to scrumpcious oatmeal cookies. I made the oatmeal-walnut-dried plum cookies from the Kind Diet, but left out the plum and added pecans along with the walnuts. They turned out sooooo yummy - we can't stop munching on them! Along with sugar (the recipe calls for maple sugar but it's very expensive and hard to find so we use organic evaporated cane juice) it's also sweetened with pure maple syrup which gives it such a lovely flavour. These are definitely one of my new favourite cookies!

May 13th

More gardening today! Today I prepared my indoor planters and the warm-weather crops for the outdoor garden. I'm very lucky to have a small little vegetable garden in my backyard that I can fill with compact vegetables, herbs and even strawberry plants, but I am doubly and triply lucky that both my grandmother and boyfriend each plant a vegetable garden of their own. This year we delegated our crops depending on the size of the garden patch and we'll share in the bounty: carrots, broccoli, dwarf peas, herbs and lettuces for me; cucumbers, potatoes, and tomatoes at my grandma's; and everything else you could imagine at Dom's including butternut squash, zucchini, yellow and green beans, eggplant, spinach and we're even trying corn for the first time. If you have the oppourtunity to grow something this summer and don't usually, I encourage you to try it. It feels so good and rewarding and it doesn't have to be a big vegetable patch either. A small window container of an easy-to-grow herb like chives or basil is just as rewarding. Although I've only just planted the seeds, I'm so excited to try our veggies!

Continuing with the "gardening=green" theme, I used the leftover pesto from yesterday in a whole wheat pasta for lunch today. No real recipe here, just poured the leftovers over hot cooked pasta. Very easy and scrumpcious. I think it makes a much better meal of convenience than the frozen burrito. Just as soon as all my basil starts growing I'll be able to use it to make fresh pesto anytime and it'll be my new meal of convenience. Grow little veggies, grow!

May 12th

I love gardening. Flower gardening, vegetable gardening, indoor gardening, garden-viewing...I just find it so rewarding. One of the most beautiful gardens I've seen is the Butchart Gardens in Victoria. It's so beautiful and inspiring and we had such an amazing time strolling through the grounds and on the many paths, surrounded by beautiful green growth. We went in the spring although I'd love to visit in every season to see all the seasonal plants. Having spent most of the day outside in my own garden (a little less fantastic than Butchart), preparing the earth for spring planting and weeding the flower garden, I felt like I needed to eat something green. Literally green, not eco-conscious green, although thanks to the lack of livestock it is that too! I ended up making a quick pesto spread for a sandwich, and threw on anything green-coloured we had in the fridge.

Quick Pesto Spread:

approximately 30 basil leaves

1 tbsp toasted pine nuts

1 tbsp olive oil

juice of 1/2 lemon

1-2 garlic cloves

1/2 tbsp tahini (for the spread-like consistency)

coarse sea salt

Add ingredients to food processor and whiz until it reaches a consistency you like. Taste and add anything that might be missing.

I used half this pesto as a spread on my baguette sandwiches, and topped it with cucumber slices, avocado and sprouts. Try whatever combination you like!

Melly's Green Sandwiches:

4 Slices whole grain bread

Pesto spread

12 Cucumber slices

1/2 an avocado, sliced

Sprouts (broccoli or alfalfa)

May 11th

I’d really like to share the vegan cookbooks I own with you, in case anyone is ever interested in trying some new recipes out. I started off with “The Kind Diet” by Alicia Silverstone (yes, the girl from Clueless – who knew, right?) and it’s the book that completely changed my life. I browsed through it once in a bookstore and every time we went back in I’d always be drawn to it and skim through it. The first recipe I saw in it in the store was Peanut Butter Pie, and I figured if vegans could eat peanut butter pie, then I could definitely commit to that lifestyle. After months of contemplating the purchase, I finally went ahead and bought it and I think it might be one of the best purchases I’ve ever made. I re-read it all the time. It’s written in a very friendly style and has lots of great information, although the “nasty foods” section can be hard to get through because it’s so heartbreaking and anger-inducing. It’s also split into 3 different paths: “flirting”, “vegan” and “superhero” (the latter based on a macrobiotic diet) with tips and recipes for each. I think I’ve made three quarters of the recipes from it and have loved them all. And that peanut butter pie? I made it for dessert for my family once and no one even guessed that there was tofu in it!

The next book I bought was “Veganomicon”. I’ve mentioned this one before – it’s kind of like the textbook of vegan recipes. Everything is in here, veganized. The recipes aren’t always as healthy as the ones from the Kind Diet and a lot of the sweet ones use white sugar, but they’re very fun and great for entertaining. The biggest thing I’ve learned from this cookbook is that when you make a marinade, say for tofu or something, you can use the marinade after because there aren’t any meat guts in it! How simple and genius. Marinated curry tofu = curry sauce for stir fry the next day. Maybe this seems obvious to you, but to me it was eye-opening!

Finally, in preparation for May, Dom got me “The Complete Guide to Vegan Food Substitutions” and reading through this has helped me figure out how to veganize my favourite recipes from before. It’s split into sections like egg, dairy, meat, sugar, etc. and has convenient little charts for substituting whatever you need with something plant-based. Especially since the way you would substitute eggs in cookies is different from the way you’d substitute it in a cake, or in scrambled eggs or quiche. Very helpful. It also has many recipes in it, and it’s what I based my vegan French toast on.

I also have the internet at my fingertips for any recipes that are missing. And I regularly use the cookbook my parents got me, “Quinoa 365” for cooking all sorts of quinoa dishes. It’s not all vegan but contains lots of vegetarian recipes and armed with my substitution charts, cooking vegan from it is simple. Check them out next time you see them at the store or library and see if you don’t find a winning recipe.

So now that I’ve told you all about my fave recipe books, I bet you’re wondering what I made for myself from them today. The answer is…nothing. Our stove died a couple days ago and we’re getting a new one tomorrow (yay!) but it has meant convenience food and leftovers for the past couple days. Thankfully I found Amy’s brand of frozen burritos in the frozen section of the grocery store. I’m not sure if all of Amy’s items are vegan, but when you read the ingredients, it says vegan right away, which is incredibly helpful. I had a black bean and veggie burrito for dinner tonight. It smelled yummy, very oniony, and tasted pretty good. I’m not a huge fan of microwaving dinners, but it definitely came in handy. Obviously Cocoa liked the smell of it too! (Don't worry - he didn't eat it)

May 10th

When we were in Italy last year, we were introduced to the wonder that is the blood orange. I had heard of them but I’d never actually eaten one. While we were there, Dom would order a cappuccino every morning and since I don’t drink coffee, I started ordering orange juice. The first time it arrived at the table, I was surprised to find that it was a beautiful redish-pinkish colour, freshly squeezed and so sweet. Nothing like the yellowy cartons of OJ I’m used to here. So this morning Dom made me his ode to Italian breakfasts…freshly squeezed blood orange juice.

Dom’s Freshly Squeezed Blood Orange Juice:
8 blood oranges

And that’s it! I guess you could use a juicer to make it, but really, where’s the fun in that? He did everything by hand, the juicing, the straining, and it was wonderful! So naturally sweet that you don’t need to add sugar and it’s so healthy that it feels like a punch to the immune system! We even kept the pulp to use later in a smoothie. Try it with blood oranges or regular oranges or grapefruits or a mixture of any citrus fruits. Your immune system will thank you.

May 9th

Is there anything more delicious than dessert for breakfast? It just kind of starts the day off right. This morning Dom and I didn't exactly have dessert for breakfast, but it was good enough to be eaten for dessert! We made brownie waffles with chopped almonds, topped with berries and maple syrup. So delciously chocolately but not sickeningly sweet. Dom set the table this morning - didn't he do a fantastic job? It looks so beautiful! The recipe came from the book Veganomicon, which is kind of like the textbook of vegan recipes. Anything you can possibly imagine is in here, veganized. Not always the healthiest, but always delicious and always healthier than the animal versions of it. (I'll be posting about the vegan cookbooks I own soon, incase anyone is interested.) We ate outside, soaking in the beautiful sunshine that has been eluding us for the past 2 weeks. We could even hear the donkey and goats from the neighbouring farm. So very peaceful. I know it may seem like I eat crazy-decadent breakfasts every day, what with waffles and french toast and all that syrup, but I'm really just as happy with fruit smoothies or oatmeal or toast, especially toast and mustard. Sounds gross, but my Grams taught me the mustard-on-toast trick and it's so very yummy.

It was so beautiful today that we just needed to spend the day outside. We went to the Canadian Tulip Festival in Ottawa and walked around the Rideau Canal. The festival just started this past weekend and runs for 2 more weekends so not all the tulips are out yet but it's just so enjoyable that we usually head back a couple more times throughout the festival's run. The festival is one of my favourites in Ottawa: it celebrates both nature and culture and is pretty groovy - just watch those psychedelic commericals for it on television! They even had a solar-powered food truck that sells some vegan food like soups, salads and cookies. It's called Stone Soup Foodworks so keep an eye out for it in Ottawa. Even their non-vegan food is pretty healthy and all organic and seasonal. I didn't get to try it because I wasn't hungry when we were there, but I'd like to. Here's the festival's website incase you're thinking of checking out any of the festivities:

http://www.tulipfestival.ca/

Tonight's food was mostly a mixture of leftovers: pizza, asparagus, potatoes and carrots, pasta salad, black bean burgers. Whatever we had in the fridge so it didn't get wasted. Nothing terribly exciting, nothing you haven't heard before...except for the kale! I'm really excited about this kale! We used what was left of the bunch of kale and sauteed it with garlic and sundried tomato and the sunflower oil that the tomato is preserved in and it was soooo good. For a thrown together dish, it tasted amazing! Forget about the kale chips; if you're going to eat kale and have never tried it before, prepare it like this!

Melly's Sundried Tomatoey Garlicky Kale:

1 bunch kale, chopped, tough stems discarded (hopefully composted!)

Sundried tomato, cut into strips, however much you like

2-3 cloves of garlic, finely sliced

1-2 tbsp Sunflower oil from the jar of sundried tomato, or whichever oil you prefer.

Heat the oil in a frying pan over medium heat. Add the kale and cook for 3 minutes. Add the garlic and tomato. Cook until kale is tender, about 5-7 more minutes. Serve hot!

The oil lends such wonderful flavour to the kale and the garlic gets all sweet and fried. I could eat that garlic like candy it's so good. Looking forward to dessert tonight: leftover waffles from breakfast!

ps. Extra points for the person who noticed the bowl of pasta salad in the picture...if you saw Tubby Custard written around the edge, you win! I think the Teletubbies might like vegan food...they were so in tune with nature after all!