Quinoa, the breakfast of champions... or just clever folk.

Eat this. 

I love quinoa. Pronounce it like this: "keen-wah". I buy it in a 4-lb package at Costco for like ten bucks. Recently, in an effort to really improve my fitness and to shed some vanity pounds, I started eating it for breakfast. It is the PERFECT BREAKFAST FOOD! Here are some fun facts about quinoa.

1 cup of cooked quinoa has...

222 calories
4 grams of fat
29 grams of carbohydrates (very complex ones!)
5 grams of fiber
8 grams of protein!
15% of your RDV of iron (!)

~ not very well known in North America
~ HUGE staple in South America
~ it is referred to as "mother grain" but is not a true grain... it's a seed of the Goosefoot plant
~ beets, spinach, and swiss chard are all relatives of quinoa
~ there are almost 120 species of it!


Quinoa is high in protein, iron AND calcium, contains several B vitamins and vitamin E.  Its protein is considered to be a complete protein due to it having an almost perfect balance of all 8 essential amino acids that are needed for tissue development.

Quinoa can be cooked in whatever liquid you want and flavored any way you want! It is a great filler-upper and I love to eat it before and/or after workouts for energy. Fiber, protein and carbs all in one. Here's how I make it for breakfast... I make a big batch and keep it in the fridge.

NOTE: You should always rinse quinoa before cooking it!

1. Rinse two cups of quinoa in a strainer until the water runs clear. 
2. Put the quinoa into a large saucepan with four cups of almond, soy, or rice milk -- I used almond milk which is devoid of protein, so if you want MORE protein, use soy milk -- it has 6g per 8 oz.
3. Add in 2-3 packets of Stevia sweetener. 
4. Bring the mixture to a boil over high heat, then lower the heat, COVER, and simmer for about 15 minutes until the spiral "tail" of the quinoa emerges from the seed. It will be frothy-- most liquid should be absorbed. 
5. Let the quinoa cool a little and serve warm or cold (I prefer warm!) with a sprinkle of brown sugar and/or cinnamon, or enjoy it plain! You can even add in raisins, dates, almonds, walnuts... the list goes on! It's as big or small of a meal as you want it to be.

RECIPE! Banana Split Cake

Oh. My. Goodness... were the words that croaked off of my tongue when I finished the inaugural piece of this fabulous baked sensation. I can't believe cake can be this good! Why wasn't my wedding cake this moist and delicious? I don't think I've ever had cake THIS GOOD. And it's vegan. This cake is even better than my super-moist pumpkin spice cake for the holidays... which is, incidentally, also free of animal products.

So if you're a non-veggie who honestly thinks you NEEEEEEEEED eggs, and NEEEEEEEEED milk and other dairy products to have delicious cake or other baked goods, I'm going to be frank. YOU. ARE. WRONG!!! This is the 21st century. You can make good food without the involuntary assistance of animals.

The cake... in all its vegan glory.

BANANA SPLIT CAKE (featured in The 100 Best Vegan Baking Recipes as "Banana Split Cupcakes", page 98)

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/3 cup oil (I used Peanut oil)
1/2 cup plus 2 tbs soy yogurt (I used pureed silken tofu... measured to 6 oz. in a measuring cup... if you absolutely must... use 6 oz. plain Stonyfield organic yogurt.)
3/4 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla
1 8-oz can crushed pineapple, drained
1/2 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips (be careful here. your average chocolate chip has "milk fat" as one of its primary ingredients. I used Ghirardelli semi-sweet, they are vegan)
1/4 cup maraschino cherries, drained and chopped
1 1/2 bananas, in 1/4-inch slices


Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 and lightly grease an 8x8 pan.

In a large bowl, combine flour, baking powder and salt. In a medium bowl, mix together oil, yogurt/tofu, sugar and vanilla until well-combined. Add wet ingredients to dry ingredients and mix until just incorporated. Gently fold in pineapple, chocolate chips, and chopped maraschino cherries. Add banana slices and mix carefully.

Spoon the batter into the pan and bake for 35-45 minutes, or until the top is lightly browned and a toothpick comes out clean. Serve warm!!

Note: you can spoon the mixture into a muffin pan lined with 12 cupcake liners (preferably paper).


Store at room temperature.

Five Things You Didn't Know You Needed On Your Wedding Registry!

I just got married to Benja-man about two months ago. And I Googled this topic myself because I wasn't really sure what to put on it!! So my hope for this article is that some bride-to-be will find it and it will help!

Five Things You Didn't Know You Needed On Your Wedding Registry!

In no particular order...

1. RICE COOKER! This little beauty has made my life so much easier. I still have to look up the directions every time I want to cook something, but that's just me :-) Perfect rice EVERY TIME! This is one similar to the one I received-- from Target. It even comes with a vegetable steam rack! Click HERE to see it.

2. Magnetic Knife Rack  -- really useful, very simple bar that screws very easily into the wall. You can stick anything metal onto it... check it out HERE!

3. Electric Skillet -- GREAT for larger crowds or when you want to double a recipe. You can use it as a warmer for parties, too! It is especially nice when I am having to chop/prep and cook all at once--this thing sits right next to my "chopping grounds" and I can throw things in as soon as I'm done! No more walking across the kitchen to the stove with a handful of garlic! FIND IT at Target.

4. A Big, Comprehensive Cookbook. You'll learn things about cooking you never knew every time you open it! Plus, if you've got a certain ingredient on hand in the fridge you need to use, simply look it up in one of these babies and you should get some ideas on how to use it in no time! My "big" cookbook is How to Cook Everything: Vegetarian by Mark Bittman.

5. A Bread Machine! You can save a lot of money and make a lot of REALLY GOOD bread with an inexpensive bread machine! There is a delay timer so you can make your bread at night and let it bake while you sleep... so you wake up to the delicious fragrance of fresh bread wafting through your home!
Click HERE to see the bread machine that now calls The Breadbox its home.

These are some of my very favorite wedding and shower gifts. Actually, I got the bread machine for Christmas, but whatevs. I use them all regularly! Great gifts are ones that you come back to over and over again, ones that help you save time and money--and these all fit the bill!

[Product Feature] ROKU -- Little Box of Amazingness

So we got this new TV, right? It is such a huge step up from our giant boob tube it's not even funny. We love it.

Every week, we watch several TV shows. Thing is, we never catch them when they're on TV. We don't like to plan our lives around TV, and we hate all the commercials, so we have been watching them on Hulu.com whenever we feel like it, and we love it!! But once we got this new TV, we were thinking about how we could make it possible to watch our shows on our new TV. Ben's parents (still feels weird to say my "in-laws") received an AppleTV device from Stephanie, Ben's sister, for Christmas this year. So we looked that up on our beloved Amazon.com to see if it was compatible with Hulu... but it wasn't! After a little research and a visit to Hulu.com itself, we discovered ROKU... starting at $59, the ROKU streams over your highspeed wireless internet onto your TV. No hooking up to your computer required. We subscribed to Hulu Plus for $8 per month so we can watch all episodes, past and current, of our favorite shows like The Office, Modern Family, The Biggest Loser, and Glee on the HuluPlus channel on ROKU! Before, we'd sit on the couch with one of our MacBooks, brand-new TV in the background and watch our shows on the tiny MacBook screen. ANNOYING!

The Little Box of Amazingness itself.

With ROKU, you can simply go to the Hulu Plus channel, go to your queue, and select the episode you want to watch, and it plays in HD on your big screen! O-M-G! After doing it the MacBook way for over a year, this was a welcome change!!

Hulu Plus wasn't the only channel that rocked my socks on ROKU -- they also have Pandora (FREE), Amazon on Demand (which allows you to choose from several hundred FREE movies or rent them right from the screen), several other free movie channels, Facebook Photos (where you can watch facebook pictures on the big screen) and my favorite.... THE GYMBOX!!!!

Okay, this has turned into another feature all of a sudden, but it all goes back to ROKU, the Little Box of Amazingness. (Did I mention it only took 10 minutes to set up and it was SO EASY!!?)

Now, The Gymbox. It's a fitness channel. You subscribe online for $10 per month, or $99 per year, and you get to do HUNDREDS of group-fitness-class-at-the-gym style workouts!!! You can choose from

• cardio dance
• core strength
• pilates
• yoga
• treadmill
• kickboxing
• stretching
• strength training
• SPINNING 
• step
• extreme cardio intervals

That is 11 different types of workouts with REAL trainers that upload NEW workouts EVERY week. For $10 a month!?! I actually bought a Spinning bike (for a sweet $300 on Amazon, check it out HERE!) with some leftover bonus money so I could spin in my living room!

This is an absolutely GENIUS invention. My husband and I did a Step class together in our living room! (He was really good at it, too, better than me! Must be is dancing skills kicking in!) All of the past workouts are archived so you can scroll through and select others you haven't done before. The trainers are great, and there are "beginner" classes which are a little more basic, but also shorter. At 30 minutes, the beginner classes are perfect for mornings before work. The longer advanced classes, at 40 minutes to an hour (usually an hour) are perfect for weekends or weekday mornings when I have more time. 

Click HERE to go there now!

And at $10 per month, it is WAY cheaper than a gym membership and you don't even have to leave your house. That's the best part-- Ben and I have often asked each other this after a morning workout in the living room: "Would we even work out if we didn't work out at home like this?" The answer would be NO! Because the exact amount of time I need to get in a good sweat session in the morning is the exact amount of time I would WASTE driving to the gym. No thanks!

You can even bring your ROKU with you wherever you go. Ours was a deluxe model that came with cables to hook up to any TV with an a/v port (so where your DVD player gets plugged in). We use the HDMI cable, but if you're going on a trip, you might not have access to an HDTV.

Anyway, I love it. Ben loves it. Best money I ever spent!

Savvy Spending... How to Get the Most BANG For Your Buck!

Costs can stack up a lot faster if you only shop retail!

Savvy spending. That doesn't mean we DON'T spend. It means when we do spend, we spend very wisely and try to get a lot of bang for our buck. This week-and-a-half, we have spent quite a bit of money...more so than usual. I got a bonus recently and it's been veeeery nice to not have to pay $650 in rent every month for a dinky, dark, downtown apartment. So we decided to make some upgrades to our technology in the house, and we did that first by purchasing a refurbished 42" flat screen LCD HDTV! We ordered it, it arrived, and we installed it last weekend.

What's a refurb? Factory refurbished items can be a number of things. First, it could be that the item was indeed defective and was sent back to the factory to be repaired and inspected. It could have been a store display, or a store return for any reason (TV too small, recipient did not like, etc.) and once the original box has been opened, retailers are not allowed to resell the TV as new. If the item is not sold as-is, oftentimes they are sent back to the manufacturer to become a certified refurbished item. Then they can be sold online (usually) for hundreds of dollars less than the brand-new price--AND it's been double-inspected. We like that.

You can get refurbished phones, cameras, food processors, refrigerators...heck, we just bought a refurbished hedge trimmer and saved $20!! It feels great to be able to get exactly what you need (and sometimes what you don't need!) for a lot less money than "normal" people pay :-) It feels like you're part of a secret club!

Shop online! The UPS and FedEx guys know us. We have stuff delivered to our house ALL the time from our online shopping ventures. We order vitamins, hedge trimmers, kitchen cabinets (yep), furniture, cat food, cat litter... you name it, I can find it online WITH a coupon code for at least 10% off! I absolutely love online shopping. You can buy with so much confidence due to all of the customer reviews (or lack thereof) on a product and know you're getting a great product before you just buy it in the store because it looks nice... and then it breaks two days after you get it, or just doesn't work. I did this for our wedding registry as well. If the reviews were bad, it was not on my list!

Some of my favorite sites to find great deals are:

www.amazon.com -- everything from fitness equipment, movies, books, appliances, electronics... they don't have much by way of linens or clothing, but that's not a bad thing. Great customer service, so easy to use, and if you use your .edu email address you can get a YEAR of free two-day shipping with Amazon Prime! Yay!!!

www.vitacost.com -- great variety of vitamins and supplements and their "store" brand is great. We also buy shampoo, body wash, etc. on here because they have a great variety of cruelty-free and organic products. We even buy food on it! Ben likes this European cereal, called Muesli, that Vitacost sells for $1.50 less per package than Publix!

www.shopping.google.com -- kind of a metacrawler for online stores. I go here to check and make sure I can't find the same product somewhere else for less money. It even includes eBay, and includes shipping into the total cost!

eBay and Half.com -- great for books. I read the reviews and check prices on Amazon.com first, then cross-check these sites to see if I can find it cheaper.

Overstock.com -- great place to get great deals!! We bought our stainless steel kitchen sink and faucet for hundreds less than Home Depot and Lowe's prices. We also have purchased and office chair. They do have a few coupons as well, and shipping is always $2.95 no matter what! 

www.retailmenot.com -- if you're on a site buying something and you see a field to enter a coupon code, but you don't have one--don't despair! Simply Google the site name plus the words "coupon code" or "promo code" and retailmenot.com will, 9 times out of 10, come up first. I did this for our kitchen cabinets on www.CabinetGiant.com and save an extra 20% (!!!).


What I love most about online shopping is that most of the time, you don't have to pay tax!! Plus, you save TIME, hassles, uncertainty, GAS, and pains in the arse from having to fit whatever it is you are buying, especially if it's large, into the car and out again, to bring into your house. Have it delivered right to your door!

The Internet is a GREAT tool for busy people. And now, you don't even need a computer! With the Amazon iPhone app, buying a hedgetrimmer on your lunch break at work is an absolute cinch! Paying off your credit card bill (in full, every month, of course!) is a snap with Bank of America's iPhone app, too.

FOOD! African Beans + Potatoes

African beans and potatoes

Another feature from The Tropical Vegan Kitchen, tonight's dinner was a special genre request from my hubby for AFRICAN food...

Meat-free, egg-free and dairy-free, African Beans and Potatoes paired with a pile of baby spinach leaves + a piece of fresh homemade bread made for one well rounded plant-based meal. In the main dish alone, there is plenty (18 grams!) of protein, 11 grams of fiber, 52 grams carbs, and approximately 9 grams of total fat per delicious serving. I absolutely love meals like this--so full of flavor and character (YES, food has character!) without an ounce of cholesterol or less-than-appetizing animal-derived ingredients. Ben and I call this kind of food "damn good vegan food" and this is pretty much all we eat at home. We've even considered opening a restaurant! Even my mom has hopped onto the vegan train and is feeding my dad vegan versions of the foods he loves! Every time Ben's parents come over for dinner, we love to bless them with a vegan dining experience that tantalizes their taste buds and teaches them, little by little, that vegan food is NOT gross or bland or boring. And so far, I'm succeeding!

So without further ado, here is the recipe for tonight's dinner!

Ingredients:
2 tablespoons peanut oil
1 large red onion, thinly sliced
2 stalks celery, chopped (I HATE celery so I left this out)
2 large cloves garlic, finely chopped (I used three... and I peeled them with my E-Z Rol!!)
2 cups low-sodium vegetable broth
1 pound round red or white potatoes, peeled and coarsely chopped (the recipe suggests swapping out for sweet potatoes... which I gladly did!)
1/2 tsp salt
1 15-oz can chickpeas, rinsed and drained
1 cup rinsed, drained pinto beans
2 tbs tomato paste
1/2 tsp crushed red pepper flakes
1/4 cup chopped peanuts or pumpkin seeds (I used peanuts)
Hot pepper sauce (optional... but we sprinkled Tabasco!! yum!)

Directions:
In a medium deep-sided skillet with a lid, heat the oil over medium heat. Add the onion and cook, stirring often, until lightly browned, 7-10 minutes, adding the [celery and] garlic the last few minutes of cooking. Add the broth, potatoes, and salt, bring to a boil over high heat. Reduce the heat to medium and simmer briskly, partially covered, until the potatoes are tender, approximately 10 minutes. Stir in the chickpeas, pinto beans, tomato paste and red pepper flakes; simmer, uncovered, stirring often from the bottom to prevent sticking, until the mixture is thickened, about 8 minutes. Serve warm, garnished with the peanuts and sprinkle with hot pepper sauce (if using).

ENJOY!

Magical Grapefruit Seed Extract

Magical liquid!!

I love this stuff. It is a natural antibiotic and antioxidant that is packed with bioflavonoids and other anti-inflammatory, anti-carcinogenic properties! It does not work like other antibiotics by killing bacteria and making it resistant after prolonged use. Instead, grapefruit seed extract (GSE) alkalizes the environment inside the gut to make life unliveable for bad bacteria. You can Google it for a longer list of uses, but I'll just mention the main ways I have used grapefruit seed extract.

• To ward off yeast infections! -- To be frank, this has got to be the best use so far! Ever since I've been on birth control, I find that I am more susceptible to yeast overgrowth "down there". I didn't want to use any OTC shove-it-up-there product or use any prescription medication, so I just did some research on natural remedies and kept reading about grapefruit seed extract. So I got some, and started diluting about 15 drops in a glass of water (put the water in last), three times a day... and in about 2-3 days... no more itchiness or other unfavorable symptoms of yeast overgrowth. And as long as I drink a glass with 15 drops several times a week, I am safe from yeast infections and haven't had one since I've been using this stuff consistently. 

• To remove stains! -- A drop directly onto the site of a stain (I used it on blood!) with a little bit of water, and the stain was gone! You can also add several drops to your laundry to boost the cleaning power.

• To improve oral hygiene!! -- You can dilute 5 drops in a mouthful of water, and use it for mouthwash. Be careful not to use more than 5 drops or so or your tongue will be a little bit numb... it goes away, but it feels weird!!

• To moisturize and prevent breakouts! -- I put a few drops on my fingers when they are still wet from washing my face, and rub the GSE all over my face.

• To clean my kitchen! -- I mix 1.5 cups water, 1.5 cups white vinegar, and 30 drops of GSE into a spray bottle and my kitchen is bacteria and grime-free in no time!!

• To soothe sore throats! -- My husband Ben had a sore throat this weekend and, knowing its good reputation, I recommended that he gargle some GSE... he did, and the sore throat went away immediately. 

• A natural preservative! -- I put a few drops of this stuff into cosmetics with shorter shelf lives-- like my eye cream from 100% Pure (click name to visit site)  --  because it acts as a natural preservative for those kinds of products.

For just $13.50 for a 4 oz. bottle that lasts forEVER.... you get so many uses for so little money!
Click HERE to purchase!

Tonight's Dinner: Aloo-Lobhia (Black-Eyed Peas & Potatoes)

My husband and I looooove Indian food. We have tried quite a few restaurants here in town, and after my first attempts at creating my own Indian cuisine at home, I had pretty much given up hope that I'd ever be able to duplicate those delicious flavors on my own... until tonight!

Aloo-Lobhia on my stove!

Using a recipe found in The Indian Vegan Kitchen (click title to buy!) tonight's dinner was absolutely mouthwatering. We both agreed it tasted better than everything we had eaten the last time we visited our favorite Indian restaurant. With my newfound skillz, The Breadbox might just become our new favorite restaurant... here's the recipe!

1 - 1/2 tablespoons canola oil
1/2 tsp cumin seeds
3/4 onion, finely chopped
1 tsp ginger, peeled and grated
1 cup tomatoes, chopped (I used one can of diced, rinsed and drained)
1/2 tsp turmeric
1- 1/2 tsp ground coriander
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
1 tbs almond butter (I used unsweetened natural peanut butter!)
1 - 1/2 cups frozen or boiled black-eyed peas, drained and rinsed, or one 16 oz can (I used boiled from dry)
1 cup potatoes, peeled and cut into 1-inch pieces (I used a can of potatoes I found in my pantry)
3/4 tsp salt, or to taste
2 cups water
1/2 tsp garam masala
1 tsp lemon juice (i used 2 tsp fresh squeezed!)
1/2 cup chopped cilantro

1. Heat oil in medium skillet on medium high heat. Add cumin seeds and cook for a few seconds until darker brown. Add onion and fry 2 to 3 minutes until golden brown. Add ginger and tomatoes. Cover and cook for about 2 minutes. Using a potato masher or the back of a spoon, mash the tomatoes until well blended.

2. Add turmeric, coriander, cayenne pepper, and almond (peanut!) butter. Stir for a few seconds. Add the black-eyed peas and potatoes and stir to coat with the onion masala. Add salt and water. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to a low boil and simmer for about 10 minutes. Using the back of a spoon, mash a few potato pieces against the pan.

3. Add garam masala and lemon juice.

4. Transfer to a serving bowl and garnish with chopped cilantro.
Serve with rice or naan. (I served with hot basmati rice from my rice cooker -- love that thing!)


We loved it. And we can't wait to eat the leftovers for lunch tomorrow!

Product Feature: E-Z-Rol Garlic Peeler

Photo courtesy of Amazon.com

How this little sucker peels garlic so fast and so perfectly, I'll never know... but you won't ever find me in the kitchen peeling garlic with my fingers or by "cracking" it with a knife again, that is for sure! All you have to do is place the "clothed" clove inside the garlic peeler, and roll it back and forth on a flat surface, applying a bit of pressure ... you'll hear a crackling sound. Stop! Shake out your naked garlic and get to choppin'!! I absolutely LOVE this little gadget. Buy it HERE!

Weekend of Unexpected Blessings

Even though Ben and I have only been married for 6 weeks, we are soaking up whatever we can by way of marital help -- before we even "need" it! So this weekend, we attended Discovery Church Southwest Campus-sponsored event "Laugh Your Way to a Better Marriage". It was a DVD seminar that looked at the inner workings of men's and women's brains, sexual issues, etc. We were the youngest married couple there and felt  lots of support from the rest of the couples. I took quite a few notes and both of us felt like we really got several nuggets out of the weekend--and we definitely laughed a lot!!

Saturday night we had invited our likewise recently married friends Kisha and Alex over for dinner and games. Kisha is a real fashionista and has been accepted to a design school up there. They will be leaving for NYC at the end of the month :( so we wanted to see them at least one more time before they leave... I pulled out one of my favorite cookbooks -- Donna Klein's The Tropical Vegan Kitchen (<-- click to buy!) which has a ton of Thai, Indian, Caribbean, African dishes. One of my favorites, although I've tweaked it a bit with the addition of ginger, cilantro, and green peas -- is Thai curried sweet potatoes! I also made a lovely side of Thai-style basil rice...

Part of the fun of entertaining, for me, is the presentation. I love to present "restaurant style" meals. Alex and Kisha were sooo flattering, I didn't know what to do with myself. Right down to our "incredibly comfortable" vintage flatware, we were showered in praise over our lovingly prepared vegan cuisine. It felt great! I love sharing food with people, especially healthy, wholesome food that literally makes your tastebuds dance.

I also love table setting. Saturday evening definitely took on a Thai theme, so my simple table decor reflected that.

Dipper, Hubby, and our friends Alex & Kisha

I've also recently taken to beer drinking. Not chronic, but occasional. I love flavored beers, like honey wheat or lime-spiked Corona light... very good stuff!

As an after dinner treat, I served my famous "black bean brownies" -- this recipe is too simple not to share...


Black Bean Brownies

1 box of fudge brownie mix (I used Target brand-- I always look for one with no animal ingredients, and the fudge brownie variety general do not contain them).
1 15.5 oz can of black beans

(Preheat oven to 350 degrees, lightly grease a 13x9 pan with spray)

1. Empty the can and rinse the beans, then put rinsed beans back into the can, and fill it with water until the beans are covered.

2. Puree the beans and water.

3. Mix the brownie mix and pureed beans together until well blended.

4. Pour the mixture evenly into prepared pan.

5. Bake for approximately 23-25 minutes! Use a toothpick in the center to test if brownies are done.

Voila! They are lovely, moist, and packed with extra fiber and protein!!


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to be continued....