Vegetarian Eggrolls

I've always wanted to make eggrolls at home and after a trip to the supermarket I picked up a pack of eggroll wrappers. Upon inspection when I got home I realized that they contained egg so it wasn't vegan, but I still made  them for my family. I was told they came out tasty. I wasn't feeling very adventurous about the filling so I filled it with refried beans, carrots, cabbage, ground "beef" and a few of them had cheese. I seasoned them with soe nutritional yeast, flax, salt pepper, paprika, garlic and a little basil. Then I fried them up in a pan of oil and that was it. 

The egg rolls that I bought were from Nasoya. Next time I'm going to make some vegan ones from scratch so that I can enjoy them!

Hearty Vegan Chili

I've never been particularly fond of chili and had never made it before but for some reason felt like making it. Originally it was supposed to be a 3 bean chili but it turned out to be 2. Seriously this chili came out so delicious I can't help but keep eating it repeatedly, as soon as this batch is done I'm making another one. When I made it I honestly didn't bother to measure because I like to just add how much I feel but I did try to make a recipe with a guideline at least. So this chili was like a 2 step process but still not that difficult at all. 

Step one and Ingredients: Bag of red kidney beans or any beans of your liking 

Soak your beans in a bowl filled water overnight. Next day boil the beans in a pot of water until tender. I only used half a bag of beans and that was plenty, then I froze the other half. Now since I was using one canned bean that was already cooked (black beans) I only worried about cooking the other ones.

Step two and Ingredients: Carrots, Potatoes, Celery, Corn, Tomato/es

Use as many potatoes and carrots you'd like (I used more carrots than potatoes).I put my potatoes and carrots to boil in a pot till tender and cut them up into bite size pieces (later on I cut them smaller for the chili).  Boiling the beans, potatoes and carrots before will just cut down on the amount of time that you have to leave the chili cooking. 

When you have those things boiling you are going to cut up your celery, tomatoes and corn (I used canned corn).

Step three and Ingredients: Beans, adobo seasoning, chili powder, garlic, onion, tomato sauce, paprika, tumeric, sazon, sofrito, lemon juice, oil

Taking a big pot because this makes a lot I started to add the seasonings. I coated the bottom of the pan with a thin layer of oil (your choice which one) and turned the stove on low. 

Then I added in about 1 table spoon of chili powder, 1/2 packet of sazon seasoning, 1 tablespoon of tumeric, 1 tablespoon of paprika, 1/2 of an onion (cut it up as small as you like or leave it big like I did)3 cans of tomato sauce, 3 tablespoons of lemon juice, 1 1/2 tablespoons of garlic (We grind our whole garlic cloves), Your cooked beans and about 3-4 tablespoons of sofrito.

When I precook beans I always store them with the water that they were boiled with so I only had to use a little water if needed but this liquid was enough. 

Now to make sofrito which is a seasoning you will need these ingredients:

 1/2 red bell pepper roughly chopped

 1/2 green bell pepper roughly chopped

 1/2-3/4 cup fresh cilantro (depends on your taste) 

1/2-3/4 cup recao (culantro)  

2-3 garlic cloves

 1/2 onion roughly chopped

We make big batches so you can double the recipe or halve it. Store it in the fridge or freeze it to keep for a couple of months. You can make sofrito with using both peppers or rather use one or the other. Red pepper cilantro is nice to cook with beans.

Step 4 and Ingredients: Corn, Potatoes, Carrots, Tofu

Throw in the precooked and cut potatoes and carrots into the pot. Taking some extra firm silken tofu I crumbled it into the mixture as well ( you can decide how much you want to put in). Throw in the corn you either cut up or got from the can. Also I threw in a large tomato to thicken the chili up a bit and give it a stronger flavor.

Stir everything in and cover the pot. Make sure to keep it on low heat so that it simmers slowly. Also make sure to check on it as it thickens because you don't want it to burn. So once you see that it starts getting a little thicker check on it more often than if it was watery still. 

Let that cook for about 1 hour and 30 minutes (or until its to the consistency that you want), then turn the heat off. The sauce should taste like seasoned beans, I could definitely pick up the sofrito flavors. If you made a big batch you could save some of it and freeze it and you already have beans cooked to serve with rice if you please. 

Step 5

So taking some cheddar cheese (Daiya) depending on how much you make pour however much cheese you want in it but not too much because we don't want it cheesy. I mixed in the cheese only after serving individual bowls and for each one I put in about less than 1 tablespoon into them. Also I sprinkled in some nutritional yeast about 1-2 tablespoons and added about 3-4 tablespoons of flaxseed.

Next I took some sour cream (Tofutti) and again mixed it in individually about 1 teaspoon per bowl. If you are mixing it into the pot you wont need more than about 1- 1 1/2 tablespoons. After adding sour cream the chili instantly thickens and all the flavors come out.

I sliced up some avocado and placed it atop my chili. 

The rich flavors in this dish is astounding, you can taste almost everything and it works wonderfully. This is definitely a keeper in my book and I am going to keep making it through the winter. Everyone loved it all carnivores and all. This is such a hearty meal in itself and so fulfilling! 

 Hope you enjoy it!

Old Fashioned Vegan Pumpkin Pie

I wanted to put up this recipe despite thanksgiving passing, because it was my first vegan thanksgiving. I had to find a way to alter the recipes I loved and always used to fit my new lifestyle and I'm actually really happy with my success. More on the other recipes soon!
This is the pumpkin pie recipe that I have used countless times and will always use, for me there is no other pumpkin pie recipe to try. Here are the original ingredients and measurements with its adjusted ones.


For a 9 inch pie:


2 Eggs  (You can use an egg substitute but since I didn't have I used 2 tblsp of Coconut cream)
1 canned pumpkin
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt 
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ginger
1/4 cloves 
1 2/3 cup evaporated milk or cream   (substitute with Non-dairy milk like soy,almond or rice)


Makes: 2 9 inch pans   Bake time: 45-50 mins or until knife comes out clean


I have made this recipe without cloves also and the taste is still very good. I used coconut cream because it's great at adhering things together when baking. So based on the amount of eggs I substitute it for tablespoons of coconut cream. I made my own crust with it that was very simple but store bought one's are just as good.

Vegan BLT Lunch

I have been a bit MIA this past week and it's due in part to feeling under the weather. The other part is that for some reason or other everything I cooked last week ended in a massive fail. Nothing was coming out right so this week I've been hesitant to try anything extravagant. I started it off with a sandwich that I found myself craving for breakfast.
I loved regular Blt sandwiches and for whatever reason they came to mind and I wanted to give it a try. It's a simple easy sandwich and I had it again yesterday for lunch because it was so good. All you need is; bread, "bacon", lettuce, tomato, "mayo" and french fries.


I used two strips of vegan bacon and in a pan with a small amount of oil cooked it until it was crispy, I also added a bit of salt in the oil to give it that salty bacon taste.
Then using some bread I lightly toasted it and spread a thin film of vegan mayonnaise on one side, adding the bacon atop it.
I cut up some lettuce and slices of tomato and seasoned them with salt, pepper, olive oil and lemon. I put the lettuce and tomato on the other side of the bread and closed to eat.
I also cooked some fries as a side and  put some ketchup and barbecue on the side.

Apple Cinnamon Oat Muffins

Late last night I got into the mood of baking but tried to figure out what to make. I really wanted to try my hand at making chocolate chip cookies but having never made cookies from scratch I told myself to leave it for another day. Instead I decided on muffins since I already made cupcakes and a sponge cake. The idea of blueberry muffins and something with oats appealed to me so I got started. 

Apple Cinnamon Oat Muffins Ingredients


2 cups whole wheat flour (unbleached white is fine too)
2 cups oats
3/4 cup sugar (white or brown will do)
1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce (I subbed it for a banana)
1/2 cup canola oil
1 1/2 cups soy milk
3 apples, peeled and diced into small pieces 

Bake at 350 for 20-30 minutes

The only alterations I made to the ingredients were eliminating the salt (because I had no more at home) and I did 1 cup Soy milk and 1/2 cup water. Next time I will use the salt a little more cinnamon, applesauce and instead of soy milk use almond milk, I think the almond flavor would work nicely. I ended up with a lot of batter enough to make two dozen muffins. It came out slightly sweet not overpowering and although my sister enjoyed them I personally wish they had a little more cinnamon ( I love the taste of it). It was surprisingly easy and I will make them again in the future with the changes I stated.

I made my blueberry muffins first and while they came out like muffins I wasn't too happy with the end result. I had the oven set too high so the outsides slightly burned and then it hardly had any flavor. I used canned blueberries because I didn't have fresh ones (I think this affected it greatly) and I had to skip on salt because I was out of that also. They have a slight sweet taste but not really strong so those are still sitting in the fridge. 

 Sad flat little muffins :(

Vegan:Breakfast

So this morning I decided to try and make Pancakes. I don't eat pancakes often being more of an oatmeal or cream of wheat fan but occassionally I have one. I made some about two weeks ago using buckwheat flour and the consistency was about the same. Only thing was that I used water instead of milk and too much cinnamon last time, they were very sweet (although my sister disagreed). Any way the recipe's pretty simple all you need is:


1 cup of flour
3 tbsp sugar
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 tbsp oil or butter
1 egg replacer (like bananas) or nothing at all I've skipped using it
1 cup non dairy milk (I think almond milk would be a nice choice but I have used water or soy milk)


I mixed all the dry ingredients together and then mixed in the wet ingredients until there were no lumps. 

You can add other things in it like chocolate chips, bananas or cinnamon (which I used). I let it cook on low-medium heat and then served it with some syrup. 

I accompanied my pancakes with a bottle of water and a fruit smoothie consisting of 3 apples, a handful of strawberries and some vanilla soy milk. 

Everything was quick to make which is ideal and it tasted good as well.

Vegan: Savory Pasta Bake

This dish started off as a couple of tomatoes and trying to figure out what to do with them. I decided I wanted to make a fresh tomato sauce so I started with that.

I have only seen one person ever make fresh tomato sauce but never really done it myself. Taking a nonstick pot I poured in my tomatoes with a tiny bit of peanut oil, then I let it simmer for a couple of minutes. After it started getting soft I put in about 3 tablespoons of tomato paste (The amount depends on how many tomatoes you are using). Stirring in the paste I started to break up the tomatoes and then season them. I put in garlic,basil, Oregano, paprika, sazon (its a seasoning mix) and pepper. Since I made this at night I stored it in a container in the fridge for later usage. 


Knowing that I had tomato sauce already made I wanted to make some kind of pasta but I wasn't sure what kind. I'm not that big a fan of pasta but I figured I would make something that had several components. I settled on Pasta Bake since I had "cheese" and "ground beef".
Boiling the pasta in one pot (I used rotini) I cooked the meat in a different pan. I pretty much use similar seasonings for most of what I cook so I seasoned it the same as the tomato sauce, minus the sazon and basil. I did add instead some salt, nutritional yeast, flax seed and spinach.

After draining the pasta and putting it on a baking dish I poured in the meat then the sauce on top.

Then I mixed it all together, added some Daiya Mozarella cheese and covered it to bake.

Since Vegan cheese takes a little longer to melt than regular cheese I left it covered with aluminum foil in the oven for about 15 minutes or so. 

I mixed it all together and served in a bowl.

Serve it with a side salad or some garlic bread and enjoy. It was really savory and definitely hit the spot. I will definitely be making this again in the future.

Sponge Cake

I've had this strawberry preserve sitting in my fridge for some time and I wanted to use it with a cake. I decided to make a sponge cake even though I have never made one before. In the end it came out too thin because I didn't make enough batter for my baking pan but it still came out fine. I put strawberry preserve as a topping and then sprinkled crushed walnuts on top. I tried to make some vanilla frosting but it did not work out at all, so maybe next time. 

It sort of looks like pizza in the pictures

Peanut Noodles

I haven't made these in so long, but since I have had a craving for Asian food I wanted to make it again. It's pretty simple to make all you need are; carrots,broccoli,peanut butter, soy sauce, cilantro, garlic, pepper, paprika and noodles (I used whole grain spaghetti, linguine will work fine).


Step one: Bring a pot of water to a boil to cook your pasta. I used a double boiler to cook my noodles on the bottom and then steam my vegetables on the top. 


Step two: Taking a small bowl mix up your peanut butter and soy sauce so that the peanut butter isn't as thick (you can use some water to thin it out as well if you don't want to use too much soy sauce).


Step three: Mix in all of your seasonings to the soy and peanut butter mixture.


Step four: Taking a pan or pot (nonstick, or if not then lightly oil it to prevent sticking) and pour in your spaghetti (of course they should have already been boiled and cooked previously).


Step five: Pour in your mixture onto the spaghetti, mixing it together for a couple of minutes. 


Step 6: After I've stirred the spaghetti for a couple of minutes insuring that it absorbs the flavors I then throw in the vegetables I steamed (cutting them smaller before I put them in). Stir everything for another couple of minutes and then determine when its done. 

I ran out of soy sauce so my noodles came out more thick than I had wanted but it still tasted good

Serve by itself or with some rice if you'd like and you will have a fulfilling meal. I have made it in the past with other ingredients like onions, lettuce and the like. You can pretty much put in whatever you'd like. It's such a simple meal but tastes good and fills you up. I added some grounded up flax in mine and nutritional yeast but that is completely optional.


Try this out and enjoy!

Eggplant Stacks

I wasn't sure what to make but then spying some eggplants figured I would make something with those. Normally I like to make eggplant Parmesan and I fry the eggplant, this time I decided to bake them. I again wanted something that wasn't very heavy or too difficult to prepare. 


Cutting up the eggplant in wheels I coated them like I would if I made fried chicken. Only difference is I didn't use egg or milk, instead I used plain soy milk to soak them in. I ground up plain cornflakes with the seasonings of my choice; paprika,basil,salt, pepper,onion powder,nutritional yeast, flax-seed. I mixed up all the dry ingredients in the blender to get them mixed and get the cornflakes smaller. One by one I dipped and coated and then spread them onto a pan to put in the oven. 
While that cooked I cooked the filling for my stacks;ground soy crumbles. Lightly greasing a pan I added some salt pepper,onion,garlic and paprika with the soy crumbles. Then as that started to cook I washed some fresh baby spinach and threw it in with the crumbles to soften. When the spinach was soft I took the pan off the stove and checked on my eggplants. 
After taking out my eggplants I got a plate and started building as much as I would eat. I put one eggplant wheel down and topped it with the "meat" then took a tiny amount of "mozzarella" cheese and sprinkled it on top. To give it a little moisture I poured a little bit of tomato sauce on top (spaghetti sauce will do) and then covered with another eggplant wheel.

Since the cheese wasn't melted I would have to put it in the microwave for a couple of seconds. Next time I will just assemble the stack and let it cook together in the oven.

And so that was my lunch, topped off with an apple and some water on the side

This is a good option for Lunch or Dinner, you can pair it with whatever you wish and its good for you.

Vegan Diet:It's a wrap

I had been craving wraps for some time after having a really delicious one last month. It was a hummus,bell pepper,avocado and cheddar cheese hummus. It was such a simple wrap and tasted so good that I needed to recreate something like it. 
Unfortunately I had no avocado when I made it the first time and then the second time there was no avocado left. I made this for dinner because I wanted something fulfilling that wasn't heavy.

                                    I used a whole grain tortilla, some white bean hummus, daiya 
                                 mozarella cheese, ground flaxseed,nutritional yeast and a tomato. I seasoned
                                         the tomato with a little bit of lime juice, salt and pepper.

I served it with a side of unsalted corn tortilla chips.

I guarantee if you tried this out you would love it. I made one for my sister only using real cheese on hers. Its such a simple meal but it tastes so good that its worth it. My sister even said "Its so good and I don't even know why." Its a healthy simple meal that works well for lunch or dinner.

Vegan Diet: Dessert

Ever since giving up dairy I haven't really been able to have any dessert. The most I've had has been teddy grahams with chocolate soy milk. I missed chocolate and cakes, so I finally bought what I needed to bake. This was my first time ever baking from scratch and surprisingly it was very simple. Rather than make a whole cake I decided to just make cupcakes, I made some plain and others chocolate chips. The chocolate chip ones were my favorite. The batter was moist, a little bit chewy but not raw. My only complaint would be that it was a little too sweet for me so next time I'll use less sugar. 

                                               They came out so nice and golden

I had my cupcake with a side of chocolate soy milk just to get a little more chocolate in :)

The ingredients were as follows; Baking soda, Flour, salt, sugar, soy milk, vanilla extract, vinegar, oil.

Instead of using oil I subbed it in for some vegan butter. Also because I ran out of vinegar I used lime juice instead and it wasn't noticeable

Vegan Diet: Lunch

I have been craving lasagna for weeks now and when I attempted it twice they ended up being massive fails. I was off my cooking game then but I'm happy to say i'm back. It tasted sooo good just like regular lasagna. I've made vegetarian lasagna before but never vegan so this was my first time. I used some soy crumbles,spinach and mozarella "cheese". The only thing is that the sauce was a little too sweet for my liking but it still tasted awesome. With the seasoning playing a big role.

                                     I only made two layers so it was pretty thin but still satisfying,
                                              I didn't want to make a lot and have it go to waste.
                                            I had this with two slices of avocado also on the side.

While that was cooking I decided to have my fruit intake for the day and decided to make a smoothie. I sliced up a banana, 3 slices of pineapple, a handful of frozen strawberries and some vanilla soy milk. I don't usually care for smoothies when I make them because I can never get a good consistency. This time it came out pretty good, it was a good mix. 

After serving myself a cupful there was still some left over