Healthy Choice Cafe Steamers: Asian Potstickers

I stumbled upon these Healthy Choice Cafe Steamers and decided to try it out.

The "steamer" is a little steam basket that holds the potstickers, veggies, and rice above the sauce while the dish is microwaved. Then you mix the food with the sauce when done. It worked pretty well in my work microwave, but I could see the potential to overheat the potstickers.

I was disappointed that the rice was not brown rice - I rarely eat white rice and much prefer brown. The sauce was similar to a thick, gooey Americanized sweet & sour sauce. I added both soy sauce and sriracha to this dish.

Overall, this dish was not great, but not terrible. It was about $2.50 at Super Target, which is not a bad price, though I could get an Amy's frozen burrito for less than that and they would have a little better nutrition than this dish. However, if I just really need something quick and convenient and am in a different city or town, at least there is this option out there.

Ricera: Strawberry Rice Yogurt

This is a new product, at least new to me. I found it at Whole Foods and decided to try it out. It wasn't that bad, though I must say that the So Delicious soy yogurts are still my favorite vegan yogurt. It's nice to have yet another alternative to soy, though.

Amy's Kitchen Non-Dairy Beans and Rice Burrito with Chips and Salsa

Just a simple beans and rice burrito with hot salsa and tortilla chips. Nothing too special. From Amy's Kitchen.

Baja Sol Express - Veggie Burrito Sol Bowl

I love Baja Sol because it has actual vegetables for veggie burritos and the hot salsa is fresh and HOT. They also have actual diced jalapenos rather than just pickled ones. While the burrito bowl is not the most photo-friendly food, it is quite tasty. This bowl features rice, black beans, vegetables (zucchini, red bell pepper, onion, yellow squash), lettuce, pico de gallo, guacamole, HOT salsa, fresh jalapenos and hot sauce. I also usually take a few lime wedges to add some zing.

Christmas 2007

Happy New Year!

To celebrate, let's look at some of the last big meals I had during Christmas 2007:


First off, a more traditional meal with a Tofurky, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, peas, stuffing, gravy, and dumplings:



This was my second Tofurky ever, and it was actually good. The dumplings that came with the Tofurky Feast did not work out for me, but it was fun to try them. I made the mashed potatoes (skin-on) and I made the extra stuffing, which was REALLY easy. I simply melted a lot of Earth Balance with veggie stock on the stovetop, and poured the hot mixture over the crispy bread chunks. The gravy was from the tofurky feast as well.

Next, a picture of some veggie sushi from another Christmas meal I went to:



The sushi consisted of avocado, carrot and cucumber wrapped with nori and sushi rice. A giant bowl of pickled ginger and the not pictured wasabi rounded off the appetizer. I cannot take any credit whatsoever for making the sushi, it came courtesy of Super Target.

There was also homemade bruschetta and the main star: pesto lasagna roll ups with a "meaty" sauce. Unfortunately, it was all eaten very quickly before I had a chance to take any pictures because it was SO GOOD. I promise that sometime VERY soon I will recreate the recipe and take many photos.

There was also an excellent vegan chocolate mousse, but no pictures.

More food from 2007 to come!

Bento Birthday Box

This is a dinner from Midori's Floating World Cafe, a Japanese restaurant in Minneapolis. This is from their special all vegan menu, which is available only at the restaurant and only if you ask. If you click the picture, it should bring you to Flickr where I labeled the picture.

clockwise, starting with the rice:
tempura veggies
veggie sushi rolls
soba noodles and wakame
fruit
pickled ginger and pickled veg in center

I also had some agedashi tofu, a special vegan version (dashi = fish broth, and the agedashi tofu is usually served with bonito (fish) flakes. At Midori's they serve it with a shitake broth, and nori strips.)

Peppers and Onions with Rice

Simple, satisfying dish. I just felt like eating a lot of vegetables. And bell peppers were on sale, so I decided on peppers and onions.

I used about half an onion, somewhere around 70g I would say. I cut up 4 bell peppers: 2 Orange/Yellow, 1 Red, 1 Green.

Sautéed them together with a couple cloves of minced garlic and served over rice. Really good.

I might post a big long how-to on slicing the bell peppers, but that is a lot of work and I still have to upload a lot of photos.