I'm Quitting My Job

If I didn't love fighting cancer so much, I'd quit. Because I enjoy sitting around my apartment cooking all day just as much. I didn't have to be at work today so I did my favorite thing in the world. And wore my awesome "Vegan Cowgirl" t-shirt while doing it! (Thanks jennilicious!)

For breakfast I cooked 1/4 barley (100 calories) and added 1 TB peanut butter (100 calories), .5TB unsweened cocoa (10 calories) , and a splash of 8th continent light vanilla soy milk (20 calories). It was a tasty breakfast, although I sort of felt like a 5 year old. This might be a new weekend staple, probably with a mushy banana added to it.

Lunch was even more fun. I decided I had to have mashed cauliflower and it had to look just like mashed potatoes. So I steamed a head of cauliflower (I once read that cooking veggies in water destroys a lot of the good stuff in them, but steaming is ok) and simultaneously cooked 2 very tiny onions (40 calories) and 4 cloves of garlic (20 calories) in 1 TB of Earth Balance margarine (100 calories). When the cauliflower was done, I added it and 1/2 the onion/garlic to the blender with a splash of unsweetened soy milk (30 calories) and blended until it was nice and creamy. If you were looking at it (if I would buy new batteries or a new camera), you'd think it was mashed potatoes. I also threw in some salt and pepper. I added the rest of the onion/garlic mixture to them so there's be a few lumps.

I swear I couldn't tell it was cauliflower. And I love cauliflower...I generally roast it in some olive oil and add some red pepper flakes, or lately I've been putting it in my lentils with some curry. Sometimes I just eat it plain steamed. Anyway, this dish was amazing. For people who claim they don't like veggies, they've just never had them cooked the right way, and this is a great way to do it. I cannot wait to have leftovers for dinner. Yum!

Oh, and I also decided I needed a couscous dish to go with my mashed cauliflower. So I put in 1/3 cup whole wheat couscous with .25 cup golden raisins (because they didn't have sultanas when I needed them and these were a last minute replacement for another dish awhile ago), some hazelnuts (I wanted walnuts, but I was too lazy to reach farther into the cupboard to find them), and some now dried mint that was once fresh but I stashed into the freezer in it's regular package without protecting it in a fit of panic because I didn't want it to go bad when I used it in the dish I needed the sultanas for, and 1/3 cup hot water. I covered the bowl and 5 minutes later mixed it up and threw it in the fridge. Then I decided it might be too dry and it needed some liquid. For whatever reason I chose unsweeneted soy milk instead of something like olive oil that might have been a better choice. But it came out delicious- a good breakfast dish. Now I can't wait to keep using the mint...