Happy Halloween!!!

A quick post without food tonight, I just wanted to wish you all a very Happy Halloween with lots of tricks and treats!!! We usually don't send Halloween cards to anyone but my son always receives cards from these special relatives and his best friend.

This BOO came from his grandpa!

This cutie was from his best friend, Aksel!

Another Boo came from Auntie Donna!

Red Ninja, Nathan and Evil Jester, Jacob went trick-or-treating!

BOO!!!

Sushi Night!

Just photos, no talking tonight (not much, actually)!!! I got home around 6 pm, I mixed rice vinegar with cooked Calrose rice that my husband prepared for me and ran upstairs to check my email. Then I started rolling my sushi dinner and served my family with imitation crab rolls at 6:30 pm. Ten minutes later, I served myself with these super yummy Tempeh/carrot rolls, dipped in wasabi and soy sauce, YUM!!!

Tempeh/Carrot Rolls

Spicy Seaweed Salad Rolls

Avocado Rolls

I used leftover sushi rice from Friday night to make avocado rolls for lunch last Monday, Mmmmm!!!

That's all for tonight folks!

Easy Veggie dinners

It's VERY windy tonight and the power was out a couple of times. Since I've already uploaded all our dinner photos, I should publish this post as quick as I can before my computer goes down again. Enjoy, everyone!!!

Monday, October 26

Veggie And Herb Chowder

Inspired by Vegetable and herb chowder from Simply Life Blog . It was so filling and comforting. Of course, I have to say it was really delicious. The whole family loved it so much!

Remark: I used Rigatoni pasta, veggie broth, rice milk and green beans. Other than that, I followed every thing as per the recipe.

Sunday, October 25

Veggie And Herb Pizza (Pita)

Inspired by Zaatar Pizza from The Vegan Mouse Blog . I spread olive oil mixed with Italian herb over pita bread, put sun dried tomatoes, roasted bell peppers, diced onion, chopped tomatoes, diced zucchini and sprinkled black sesame seeds. Bake at 350 degree F for 8-10 minutes. It was incredibly tasty, YUM!

Saturday, October 24

I had a portabello mushroom Burger at Hennessy's in Manhattan Beach. It was really good but I didn't bring my camera so there is no photo for this dinner!

Monday, October 19

Easy Veggie Tofu

I've cooked this dish all the time. It's so quick and easy, I can serve my family in no time. I just use whatever kind of veggie I have in the fridge. I posted this dish before here .

Not much talking today, I'll try to be back to show you more of our dinners very soon!!!

Have a lovely week!!!

Vegan Eats!

I've been dying to share with you my Vegan Eats in the past week or so. Just wanted to make sure you all know that I AM still enjoying vegan diets, hehe:)...



I was distracted by my naughty camera. All of a sudden, my camera didn't seem to work so well, sometime the pics came out too bright, sometime too blurry, but sometime perfectly clear...like this one below:

Carrot Ginger Soup

Inspired by The Life Blog . It was perfect time to enjoy this tasty soup when the weather was so cold with heavy rain last week. Creamy, spicy and delicious, Mmm.

Veggie & Tofu Drunken Noodle

We had company last Monday night, so we ordered Take-Out from Bamboo Thai Bistro. I had this spicy and delicious drunken noodle, I made sure there were no fish sauce or oyster sauce in my food.

Insalata di Farro

Most of the time, I bring lunch to eat at work but one Saturday I treated myself by ordering this oh so good "Insalata di Farro" from Pasta Pomodoro Restaurant. There are farro with grilled asparagus and zucchini, marinated red onions, and olives. I enjoyed it so much with warm bread. YUM!



Oh! and I did NOTforget to tell them not to put pecorino cheese in my food.

No Seaweed Veggie Sushi Rolls

Forgot to post this photo from one Friday night that I was determined to try making veggie sushi rolls without seaweed (especially for Rose ).

Homemade Almond Milk

I've been making my own almond milk since I started drinking green smoothies. I use the recipe from CLEAN . The recipe called for 1 cup of nuts (I use raw almonds), soaked for 3 hours in purified water (I usually soak it overnight in the fridge because I tend to forget all the time), 1 tsp vanilla extract, 2 tsp agave syrup and 3 cups purified water. Blend for about 3 minutes and strain through cheesecloth. This recipe makes about 4 cups of almond milk and store in the fridge ; lasts for 2 days.

You can find more "homemade almond milk" with slightly different recipes and step by step great pictures from The Voracious Vegan and Gluten Free Gidget and if you'd like to make some yummy muffins from the leftover almond pulps (which I did), please go to Almond Pulp Recipe from Gluten Free Gidget . They are truly amazing!!!

Homegrown Cherry Tomato Smoothie

hehe...I'm so proud to show off the last batch of my cherry tomatoes from my little garden. Whenever I run out of kale, I just made cherry tomato smoothie picked freshly right from the garden.

I still have a LOT more pics to show and tell about my vegan eats but I have to go to bed now. I've been up so late almost every night reading my favorite blogs. It has been truly fascinating to read about different ways of living by my new friends in the blog world.

Have a wonderful weekend!!!

Lentil Salad And Veggie Sushi

I'm having such a hard time deciding what I wanted to share with you today!!! My hero, Nathan stepped in and said "Mom, you should post about Lentil Salad because it's VEGAN and I LOVE it"!!! Oh, yeah! He is absolutely right and I have to say "the whole family loved it".


The story of this crunchy and yummy salad came from Nathan's Pre-Algebra class. He has to find a recipe that has at least 10 ingredients with at least 5 fractions for his project. He picked this recipe from CLEAN BOOK without thinking what the ingredients are and if he would like it or not????



So I made this Lentil Salad for our dinner last night. Below is the photo of the salad after I mixed all the ingredients. Does it look amazing??? I still can't believe that my family ate raw salad (they usually don't), I didn't even have leftovers for my lunch today!


This salad is super easy to make. The most important part is the salad dressing which contains olive oil, cumin, turmeric, freshly grated ginger, crushed garlic, lime juice, and sea salt. Put all the ingredients together in a glass jar with lid and shake vigorously. The recipe called for dried green lentils which you have to cook them until they are tender, zucchini, cucumber, carrots, pineapple (all diced), chopped cilantro and scallions. I used shredded carrots as I like to be easy and omitted the pineapple because I didn't have it. Then, I mixed the lentils, all the vegetables and the dressing together.



And....Voila! The delicious Lentil Salad...served on top of the greens!!!




I'm soooooo sad:( ....... to tell you that I burnt my pumpkin seeds last night. I had to throw them all away but I won't give up, I'll try to roast them again very soon. I just need to set a timer next time!!!!


We usually go out to dinner on Saturdays because it's my day to work and I don't feel like cooking. Last Saturday night, we went to Open Sesame Mediterranean Grill in Manhattan Beach. I had these tasty Falafel patties served with hummus, fattoush, tomato, lettuce, wild cucumber pickles, tahini sauce and pita. I noticed that the menu indicates which dishes are for Vegetarian or Vegan or Raw. There are so many Vegan choices that I would like to go back and try. Can't wait!!!

Veggie Sushi

I'd like to keep you posted about my Sushi experiment every Friday night, lol:). I hope you don't think I'm weird to come up with the above pics. YES, I had Veggie Sushi Bowl for dinner last Friday night!!!! I first started with the idea of making Sushi rice, I wet my hands with water, take about 2 tablespoons of the rice in one hand and mold into a rectangular cylinder shape. Put a tiny bit of wasabi on top and cover with a piece of avocado. Later, I got lazy so I put all the veggies on top of a bowl of sushi rice. Does it sound easy to you??? Hope you'll give this a try, ha ha!!!

Vegan Food Experiment!

I've decided to experiment with vegan food in October, not only to support VeganMofo's awesome event but also for my own self. I learned from Vegetarian Starter Kit that vegans eat no meat, fish, poultry, eggs, or dairy products and vegan diets are the most healthful of all. That sounds so wonderful, doesn't it? I want to live a healthy life...so I am so excited to find out if I would feel healthier after one whole month of vegan diets!



Last Friday, I made veggie sushi rolls for dinner again. I had pan fried tofu, avocado, cucumber, carrots and black sesame seeds. The rolls were a little bit loose but they were so delicious as always.

I used up all my seaweed. I thought I would try to make veggie roll with out it. So Rose will know that it's possible to make veggie sushi without seaweed because she doesn't like its smell.

So I spread the sushi rice on the bamboo mat, put tofu, cucumber, carrots and avocado on top of the rice and then....I rolled.....and...rolled..... and when I tried to cut it.....

It was falling apart = I failed:(

Pan Fried Tofu with Teriyaki Glaze

This was our dinner for Monday night. It has been our all time favorite menu since I discovered the idea from The Vegan Mouse and Vegan Dad , I just keep changing the sauce and vegetable depending on what I have in the fridge. Highly recommended!

Kanom Jean and Namya Curry

Namya is an authentic Thai curry for Thai noodle which is called "Kanom Jean". The ingredients consist of Galingale, Garlic, Dried Chili, Salt, Onion, Lemon Grass, Sugar, and Spice. Growing up in the southern part of Thailand, I had a fond memory of eating "Kanom Jean" and Namya curry with a big plate of fresh green vegetables any time of the day, YUM!

The recipe called for 100 g.(3.5 oz)of Namya curry paste, 3 cups of coconut milk and 200 g. (7 oz)of fish or canned tuna... Oops! What should I do? I'm on a vegan diet! Do you see the above pic? YES, a cup of yummy chickpeas saved my hunger:) I smashed them while pretending they were fish and mixed them up with the curry paste and coconut milk. Super easy and Mmmm...Mmmm... really good!!!

I packed my Kanom Jean and Namya Curry with green beans and corns to eat for lunch at work, so delicious and satisfying:). The pic below showed how it looked when I mixed them up. YUM!

I'd like to share with you a couple of pics from Thailand when I was visiting my hometown in the south. I really enjoyed eating Kanom Jean and Curry. I ate them for breakfast, lunch and dinner. YES, I did:)

They always serve Kanom Jean with varieties of curry. From the left, without coconut milk; quite spicy, the second one was with coconut milk (the one I made), the next one was super spicy with pumpkin chunks (no coconut milk) and last one called "Nam Prik" which was sweet and not spicy at all (for children).

They served a gigantic platter of fresh and pickled veggies to eat along with the Kanom Jean and curry. (Please ignore the date on the pics, I messed up my camera, I had the right date but wrong year). Anyone can tell. Right??? Haha...:)

Most of the time, we ordered mixed curries depending on how we like it. I like mine with Namya and Nam Prik together. Really really goooood!!!

I've really really enjoyed experimenting with vegan food , so far so good!!! And looking forward to trying something new next week. Any suggestions for vegan easy cooking would be so much appreciated. :)

Have a fantastic weekend everyone!!!!

For the love of Pumpkins!

Oh My! I don't know why I've been so crazy for pumpkins. I've wanted to blog about them for the longest time and I've been dreaming about this wonderful veggie a lot lately. I just dreamed last night that I was going to name my new post "For the love of Pumpkins". Hope you'll like it:)

I LOVE this pumpkin drawing so much, it's on the front cover of a vegetarian cookbook I bought in Thailand. This book inspired me to eat more pumpkins and to tell others about how great they are. We can eat almost every part of this veggie including the seeds and skin because they are full of fiber, potassium, vitamins , minerals and Beta Carotene! I found helpful info about pumpkins from NutritionExpert'sBlog. So check it out if you're interested:).

I also found so many yummy recipes for pumpkins as listed below:


- Great recipes from past years from Vegan Dad Blog.

- Pumpkin Pecan Pancakes from The Ordinary Vegetarian Blog

- Falling for Pumpkin from Bitter Sweet Blog

- Pumpkin Yumkins from Newlyweds Blog

- Pumpkin Oatmeal Cookies from The Vegan Mouse

- Toasted Pumpkin Seeds from Mitten Machen

- Autumn Spice Pumpkin Cookies from The Voracious Vegan

- Pumpkin Recipes from Simply Recipes

- Pumpkin Soup from Newlyweds Blog

- Pumpkin Spice Cupcakes from Maine Food & Lifestyle

- No Ordinary Pumpkin Soup from Roses r Red

Good Morning Pumpkin Smoothie

I made this delicious pumpkin smoothie this morning (no green monster, I ran out of kale!). I got this great idea from my sister Noi and my son, Nathan keeps telling me to make it . I just need only a few ingredients for this super easy smoothie:



1 cup pumpkin puree =I used my leftovers puree from my pumpkin pie

1 1/2cups almond milk or soy milk

1 Tbsp agave syrup

1/2 cup ice

Blend together until smooth. I sprinkled ground cinnamon and nutmeg on top, Mmmmmm!!!

Pumpkin Butter I found this pumpkin butter at Trader Joe's. I spread it over sourdough bread = speechless!!! It becomes my favorite snack now:)...YUM!

Thai Red Curry with Tofu, Broccoli and PUMPKINS
I made this spicy and dee-li-cious pumpkin red curry last week. I was dying to make it after I read the comment from Mary at Mitten Machen Blog to try it in curry sometime. I'm so glad I did it. It was so tasty and I can't wait to make it again!

Mixed Vegetables Stir-Fry (with Pumpkins)

During our sight-seeing tour in the north of Thailand, we stopped at a restaurant for lunch. They served very tasty Thai food, I often noticed that they used a lot of pumpkins in different dishes such as stir-fry, curry and some desserts. This was the only picture I got.


Pumpkin Custard

A couple weeks ago, I had a nice reunion dinner with my relatives at my house. My cousin brought this oh sooo good pumpkin custard. It is a typical Thai dessert that I seldom find in the U.S. So I was so happy to get to have the leftovers, lucky me = YUM!!!

Next time, I'll share with you some more Thai dishes with pumpkins as I ran out of time for today.

I'll keep rocking along with VeganMoFo. YAY!!!

VeganMoFo 2009!!!

Starting TODAY... for the entire month of October, vegan bloggers from all over the world will be writing about vegan food as much as they can to tell people how delicious vegan food is and it's so worth it to talk about!!!

I didn't sign up to participate in this awesomeness but I thought I would like to experiment eating and cooking vegan food in October to see how much I like it!

And...of course, I'll try to blog as much as I can:)
Oh! So exciting!!!!

More about MoFo go to here

Green Smoothie Day 4

This morning, I was so happy that I had all the ingredients the recipe called for. I loved it MORE with the fresh taste of the coconut water. I was feeling so energetic at work!...YAY!

This baby makes my green smoothie tastes...Mmmmmm GOOD!!!

Quinoa Salad with Black Beans and Mango

I made this Quinoa Salad with Black Beans and Mango from home to share with friends at work. I found the recipe from The Vegan Mouse's Blog . I used a cup of celery diced instead of scallions and extra virgin olive oil instead of grapeseed oil. I didn't have red bell pepper so I skipped it.

To be honest with you... this was my first time trying Quinoa and I thought I liked it but the taste of this salad was kinda brand to me, I had to season it with more salt & pepper. However, I was so glad that everyone at work enjoyed it very much. I heard someone said "The flavor was so fresh and bright"!...YUM!!!

Pasta Dinner

Tonight, we had pasta with mushroom and garlic sauce (Barilla brand), cooked with lots of love by Easy Veggie Dad,... so tasty! I put a LOT of sweet basil (from my garden) in my plate after I took the above pic.

I'm so grateful that easy and yummy meal like this one doesn't need any meat in it!!