What Is Left To Eat? -- a Food Journal by Laura Bracken

I won't refer to these as WFPB (whole food plant based) because I am using a (gluten-free) flour mix and chocolate chips. Anyway, once in a while I want dessert.  I also like sweet muffins because they are a good "travel" food for when I'm going to be out of the house all day. Ingredients 1 mashed banana 2 shredded zucchini 1 tsp vanilla 2 chia eggs (2 T chia seeds & 6 T water, let sit for 5 mins) 1/3 to ½ maple syrup 2 cups Bob's Red Mill Pancake & Waffle mix  1/3 cup oats ½ cup chocolate chips (or carob chips, or dried cranberries, etc) ½ to 3/4 cup chopped walnuts I mix all the wet ingredients (the first five) first, then add the flour and mix, then the oats and mix, then the chips and nuts and fold/mix. There is some coconut sugar in the flour mix so you can cut back on the maple syrup if you don't like your muffins too sweet. I put the mix into these cupcake liners in a muffin tin and back at 350 for about 30 minutes. ...

I owe this recipe to my son and his wife.  They were here recently and made a fantastic spaghetti dinner for us for New Year's Eve.  I took what I learned from watching them prepare that meal and made a few tweaks.  Hope you like! Ingredients: 1 eggplant 1 onion, chopped 2 zucchini, large chops 2 cloves garlic, minced 1 jar no-oil and no-sugar marinara sauce (DeLallo makes one) or you can make your own sauce from tomato paste, water, and spices. Potatoes, peeled and quartered (or cooked rice) Mushroom powder (optional) I start by making fork holes in the eggplant and roasting it in the (toaster) oven on 400 for 40-60 minutes, turning it once in while. Then I get the potatoes started.  I have two instant pots, the 8 quart and the 5 quart.  For steamed potatoes or rice, I usually use the smaller pot.  Put 1 cup of water in it, some salt, a steamer basker, then quartered potatoes (I like mine peeled... and I usually use Russett, but I don't ...

My version was pretty close to the original ... just a few tweaks and minor alterations. 16 oz. dry bow tie pasta (feel free to try gluten free) Veggie broth ½ medium red onion, sliced 1 large carrot, peeled and sliced 2-3 cups broccoli florets, cut into large chunks 1 red bell pepper, chopped 1 crookneck (yellow) squash, chopped 1 zucchini, chopped 3 - 4 cloves garlic cloves, smashed or minced 1 pint grape or cherry tomatoes, halved 2 teaspoons dried Italian seasoning Juice of a lemon 1/3 cup chopped fresh parsley Fake parmesan cheese (optional) I got all the veggies cut up and into a large bowl (keep the halved tomatoes in a separate bowl) with the smashed garlic and the seasoning at the ready. When company showed up, I sauteed the veggies in a little veggie broth on high heat (with the garlic and seasoning) in a very large pan until al dente.  Very short cooking time.   Don't overcook... you don't want mushie veggies. I added the tomatoes to the...

I've had a lot of good meals and tried a lot of new recipes since I last posted... but in my typical all or nothing perfectionist mentality, I didn't post anything here because I didn't want my posts to be half-assed. Apparently I can get over that because my next two posts will definitely not be full-assed.  I'd rather have a place I can refer to when I'm looking for a recipe that I tried, even if it doesn't have a great photo or whatnot... than not be able to remember what recipe I used for a really good meal. So, with that out of the way, the other day I followed a recipe called "The Best Vegan Chili".  Here's the link to the original recipe. I'm also going to post the ingredient list because I have this fear about other people's blogs being taken down and then the hyperlink will go nowhere and the recipe will be lost to me forever.  Also because I made a few minor alterations.  For example, the original recipe called for olive oil...