Veganuary 2021: Breakfast Cookies

These are truly my favorite go to for breakfast. Pair them with your favorite beverage, mine is coffee, for an easy start to the day. I find the oatmeal in these is fairly filling and takes me through until lunch no problem.

The original recipe is from the cookbook “Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar.” Written by two vegan powerhouse chefs, Isa Chandra Moskowitz and Terry Hope Romero, this is a great addition to anyone’s kitchen vegan or not.

Here is my rendition of the breakfast cookie recipe. I’ve tweaked it a little to fit my taste and also to enlarge the final cookie count. Because, well, you just can’t have too many of these. (and did I mention they freeze well?)

Here is my version:

3 medium over ripe bananas (4 if small)
3-ish tablespoons of ground flax
1/3 cup non-dairy milk (whatever you like)
3/4 cup vegetable oil (I use a no taste olive oil)
3/4 brown rice syrup
1/3 cup date syrup
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 1/2 cups whole wheat pastry flour (I’ve used regular whole wheat flour sifted with good results)
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg (or more if you really like it)
1 tablespoon cinnamon (adjust for more or less)
3 cups of rolled oats
1 1/2 cups of raisins (choose your favorite, dried cranberries, chopped dried apricots , chopped dates…?)
1 1/2 cups roasted walnuts (again choose your favorite, pecans, almonds, macadamia…)

I like to get everything out, measure, and ready the mixer before beginning. This lets me know if I’m missing anything before I get started and then realize I need an ingredient I don’t have.
Mix bananas with flax, milk, and the oil until combined. Add rice and date syrups plus vanilla, mix again. Add flours, baking soda, salt, and spices. Mix until incorporated.

The oats, dried fruit, and nuts will need to be folded in by hand as this gets crazy thick. Just take your time. It will all fit I promise.

Drop by 1/4 cup scoop or large tablespoons onto a non stick Silpat or pan. (Feel free to make smaller cookies but you’ll need to adjust the cooking time to less so they don’t burn) Flatten slightly with a fork or the bottom of a glass. Place in a 350 degree oven for approximately 12-15 minutes. Use a toothpick to check your cookies. If it comes out clean you’re done!

These store in a covered container maybe a week…if you can stay away from them that long. I normally freeze half in hopes that we have cookies for a later date but that doesn’t always work. We end up eating them before the week is out.

Which only means I have to make more!!

Until next time,

Susan

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Veganuary 2021

Easy cooking from New Year’s Day!

Readying the meal

No one wants to spend hours over the stove. Especially on a holiday and especially New Year’s Day!

So let’s clean out the fridge and make a healthy vegan meal. My Selections included a bunch of vegetables that were left from a grocery run about a week ago. A huge box of spinach, some onions, a head of garlic, a few left over mushrooms in a big box, an already open jar of sauce, and a good sized container of cooked pasta from the day before.

Pulled it all out to the cutting board and chopped away. Laid it on a plate for easy access and readied a fry pan, my favorite Le Creuset, and the wok. (My wok is always on the stove and gets almost daily use) Chopped mushrooms go into the fry pan with a bit of garlic infused olive oil. I love mushrooms but the rest of my family finds them questionable…so they get cooked separately.

oily wok

A bit more oil into the wok and throw in the onion. Once those get sizzling add some garlic. I fresh chop mine but a dash of garlic powder works too. Let that get all nice and sautéed. Next throw in your pasta to get warm, add some of the sauce to your liking, and whiz it around until everything is nice and hot. Toss in the chopped spinach and stir until it wilts. You’re ready to plate!

finished pasta dish

And here it is! I added some vegan parmesan cheese, tossed the mushrooms on the top…it was delicious!

There are so many options to this meal and they all start with whatever you have laying around. Make it easy, make it all the things you like, and clean out the fridge!

Here’s the video of the meal and below I will leave the ingredients and amounts I used for this dish.

I hope you’ll try it!

What I used:

1/2 white sweet onion sliced
4 cloves of garlic minced
A large handful of spinach chopped
3-4 mushroom caps sliced
Leftover cooked pasta maybe 4 servings worth
Leftover red sauce (I had Rao’s marinara in the fridge)
Garlic infused olive oil (because I had it handy)
Topped it with some vegan parmesan cheese that I grated (I love Violife brand)

You can really use any vegetable you might have lying around…and we always seem to have some of those! Get out those wrinkly bell peppers or the bottom of the bag Brussel sprouts! They’ll be delicious!

And you got a glimpse in my Veganuary intro video of my baking/ prep area…yes it does really look like this!

cook prep area

I have everything at my fingertips and, even though it looks crowded, it’s really efficient. The mixer isn’t always there but fits into a cabinet with plenty of space to pull the blender forward or mix a batch of cookies.

What does your space look like? And what goodies do you make?

Until next time,

Susan

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The Virus Chronicles Part 2

The fog is clearing.

I truly believe that creating and the act of doing art saves your mind, body, and engages your soul. And that’s what I’ve been doing. Lots of it.

Glitterfest is actually going to happen (October 11 in Tustin, outside, socially distanced and masked up) Yay! So nice to have a deadline to work towards.

That may have been a big part of my angst during this mess. No deadlines…no priorities…big plans, little plans, everything cancelled so there was nothing to work towards. 🙁 So the days are better and returning to some sense of normalcy.

So in the light of creativity moving me forward I’d like to share a few things that have been inspiring me.

I’ve pretty much sewn myself an entire wardrobe (to go nowhere lol) and watching sewing videos has been educational and entertaining. Let me introduce to a couple of my favorite YouTubers.

Welcome to the Fold Line. These videos are put together by two gals and if you like fashion and sew for yourself you have to watch these trend episodes. They waltz through all the things for the upcoming season then match them to indie patterns. So much fun to see the things you can customize to your own fashion sense. Even if you don’t sew your own clothing it will give you ideas of what to look for when your shopping. Definitely worth a watch.

One more…

This is just one of many but Chase Jarvis does some fabulous interviews of creatives, thought leaders, and popular personalities. Great to listen to when you’re doing something else. Always something interesting.

I’ll be back with more …there are many!

Susan

Charming Trinkets

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The Virus Chronicles

Or stories from quarantine…or pandemic play by play…or tales from behind the mask…

It seems like I’ve disappeared. I really haven’t. I just have been hiding from some forms of life since February. I don’t think I’m the only one. Let me go back and fill you in on what’s been going on.

Back in January and February I was finishing up a business plan for a brick and mortar creative store. Almost ready to commit to commercial space I found out my parents were having some health issues….and there was a deadly pandemic on the horizon. My dad turned 90 in February and that was the marker for his health decline. Numerous hospital visits and my Mother, in trying to take care of him, fell and broke her hip. They both went into rehab but my Dad never came out. All of this went on 3000 miles away from where I live.

Stay at home orders were in place when my Dad passed away. There are more things going on around his passing that effected me emotionally but mixed with the virus threat it put me into retreat. We stayed home. We only visited with each other. We did all the quarantine things. Creativity took a hike.

All of the spring and summer shows cancelled. Not surprising. I felt like my creative brain was cancelled. Don’t get me wrong spending time with family was pretty wonderful. We had lots and lots of quality time to chat, connect, cook, and bond. We dove headlong into a bunch of home DIY projects …like 20 different projects all at the same time. (no they’re not all finished)

My creative retreat took me back into lots of sewing. I dug out patterns, made some of my own, and spent hours alone at the machine. I made myself almost an entirely new wardrobe…that I have no where to wear. But it was meditative and allowed me to take my mind off all the other things going on in the world.

That pretty much brings me up to date. This is my first public and/or social media post since February.

Surprisingly there are a couple artisan shows that are going to go as planned this fall. This news has plucked me out of my funk a bit although I feel a little off course. Grieving different aspects of life takes you off course. But I’m finding my way back through creativity…and looking forward to doing a few normal activities.

See you soon,
Susan

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Trying to keep it all together…

the real me as a clown
Clowning around.

With all the things going on in the world I try to keep my home life on an even keel. We keep routines, stick together as a family, and check on each other every day for things going on.

So when I decide to take on a big dream and disrupt the status quo things get interesting.

No details yet on what this project may be. I’ll fill you in at a later date. Let’s just say I’ve been dealing with a thick layer of fear around the whole thing and trying new ways to work through it…step into it…try to get by it. It’s a big thing so I’m in no hurry to get to it without due diligence but I’m finding fear to be a big stumbling block.

A few random things wandered into my field of vision to make me realize I wasn’t just procrastinating but stuck. The first was a line from a FB post…if your dreams don’t scare you, you aren’t dreaming big enough. Ummm okay! Think about that for a minute. If you’re comfortable, and possibly bored a bit, with your life maybe it’s time for a change. Made my brain start firing…

Secondly I saw a post from another self esteem guru that I love which reaffirmed that the universe was screaming at me…and I better listen! All the things I want to achieve are on the other side of that fear…

Here’s a little video I put together about fear…and, also, sticking your face in front of the camera is scary too! So I’m going to practice doing some more of these videos…stay tuned!

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