Isa's Genius "Mac and Shews"

I was craving something casserole-y and thought of doing a mac a cheese. Serendipitously, an unrelated visit to the ppk blog resulted in a drool-worthy shot of "Mac and Shews" in my face, and dinner plans were made! I love the star ingredient, saurkraut, but often struggle with getting through an entire jar of it.

This recipe is good hot or cold, but I don't know that I would put it in the same category as "mac and cheese." With some tweaking I think you could get more creaminess and less tang, but I love this recipe as is, and for what it is.
I paired the Mac and Shews with a Caesar salad, using my now world-famous dressing and toasting some croutons. The dressing is never measured and always thrown together. This particular incarnation included Vegenaise, dijon mustard, capers in brine, raw garlic, olive oil, nooch, pepper, and lemon juice.

It was a nice, tangy meal. Followed up with chocolate pudding. Two thumbs up!

Recent Food Hauls

Well, Doc and I are in our new house and we love it. We've been busy getting settled, entertaining visitors, and fixing things! In the coming months I'm sure I will be posting many "before and after" photos of our progress.

Switching topics: I wanted to share my recent delicious food hauls.

We now live very close to Dovetail bakery (among many other wonderful vegan [and non] establishments), which means I can expect to put on a few pounds. Just under three weeks ago, after our LOOOONG day of moving, I stopped by Dovetail to pick up some breakfast goodies. I am in love with their assortment of scones. The people at Dovetail are so nice. I even got two free chocolate chip cookies!

cinnamon pecan scones

sticky buns with pecans

cinnamon buns

chocolate chip and black and white cookies

I'm loving the connectedness of this town. Our Realtor set us up with a great painting company, the hands-on owner of which told us about the farmer's markets that his wife coordinates, including one at their home, a couple of blocks away from us. After stopping by last weekend, Doc and I signed up for Late Bloomer Metro Market's CSA-like deal and last night we were delivered this:

two dozen Tokyo Rose, Gala, and Sansa apples

seven Stark Crimson pears

a bunch of purple and golden fingerling potatoes

three ears of corn

four beets

a head of cabbage, large cucumber, and large yellow onion

two zucchinis and two yellow squash
(I'm not a huge zucchini or yellow squash fan, but I have big plans for making zucchini bread, especially now that the weather has turned cooler.)

aromatherapy tea in a cute little beaker

All organic or transitional for $29!

The boys checking out the new digs.

Field Roast: A Go-To Package of Goodness

I recently discovered Field Roast products at my Whole Foods, which left me wondering why I didn't pick them up sooner. I am IN LOVE with their Smoked Apple Sage Sausage. IN LOVE. My favorite way to eat it is super simple, too. It's become my go to meal on a weeknight where I want something quick and delicious.

First, I lightly pan fry the sliced sausage until it's crispy. I set the sausage aside on a plate. In the same pan, I quickly steam a bunch of kale. I toss the kale with lemon juice, salt, pepper, and a little Earth Balance. I put the kale in a serving dish, top it with the sausage, and squeeze a little more lemon juice on top. So simple and so, so good.

I recently tried the Celebration Roast, which was also very good. For this meal, I sliced and lightly pan fried the roast. I plated it with some creamy mashed potatoes with fresh parsley and garlic, and steamed kale (topped with s, p, Earth Balance, and lemon juice). It was VERY good. Next time I'll think about making a gravy to go on top, but it really didn't need it.

My local WF carries the Celebration Roast, Smoked Apple Sage Sausage, Mexican Chipotle Sausage, Italian Sausage, and some deli cuts. I've only tried the first two. I guess I should remedy that!

Paper Victory! I love it!

A while ago I was perusing the wares sold by vegan sellers on Etsy.com . I came across a great shop called MonkeysAlwaysLook. The artist, Allison, sells a variety of succulents in interesting, mostly vintage containers, and even makes garden markers by hand stamping vintage silver spoons. While there, I saw that Allison also has another Etsy shop, Paper Victory.

(Photo from MonkeysAlwaysLook)

I absolutely love the graphic quality of her cards (on recycled paper) and the fact that there are so many gorgeous/adorable/interesting animals to choose from! I've ordered several items from Paper Victory, adoring all of them. This time around, I placed a custom order for three dozen goldfish cards with "Thank You" printed in the caption. With her immaculate attention to detail and awesome customer service, Allison went beyond what we discussed, alternating the goldfish graphics and the font on the cards. My photos don't do the images justice.

You know what else I love? Supporting fellow vegans for their services and/or products. I know that the money I spend will be used in a way that mirrors my own morals, instead of potentially perpetuating animal cruelty.

Thanks, Allison! I think these cards will encourage me to send my "Thank Yous" out in a timely fashion!

PS- With Valentine's Day coming up, how cute is this?

A Candle Review

Anyone who knows me probably knows how big of a fanatic I am when it comes to good smelling things. Naturally, I love candles. I shouldn't say that. I don't love just any old candles. Recently, I've been doing a bit of research and decided for the most part, I'm going to lay off the parafin stuff. My all time favorite candles are from a local Philadelphia company called Duross and Langel, which you may have heard about here. They make awesome personal care and home products, most of which are vegan. (I have a soap addiction too...)

Today, however, I'd like to talk about a company that I've very recently heard about, thanks to Molly over at It's a Vegan Dog's Life. Her post, aptly named "Soy Candles by Phebes", included info on how to receive a free candle when you order three from this vegan and eco-friendly company. Needless to say, I was pretty excited. I decided to order "Coconut Lime Verbena," "Sunday Morning," "Cranberry Cobbler," and "Christmas Tree." Mike from Soy Candles by Phebes emailed me right away and said that he'd throw in a surprise candle. How awesome! This one was another holiday scent, "Twinkle."

When the package arrived (and boy, did it arrive soon after I placed the order!), I took a big whiff of each candle. Scrumptious!

Right now I have the Coconut Lime Verbena burning and it's a lovely, mild scent. I wouldn't say the entire apartment is awash in the fragrance, but it's doing a great job of filling the living room with the tropical aroma, which is actually quite perfect as DocDufresne and I sit down to watch the last season of Lost on DVD.

Life is good when you have a candle alight and a partner plus two warm pups to cuddle up with.

YARN!

I just had to take a break from the grant I'm working on for Cares4Pets to create a quick post about the awesome yarn I just received from Heidi of Quo Vadis Handspun. She sells both her own handspun yarns and commercially spun yarns, naturally dying them all herself using plant material. Most of the yarns are organic too.

If you're a knitter like me, I'm sure you'll appreciate this shop. Compared to other stores I've been too, Heidi's prices are very reasonable. (In total, including shipping from BC, Canada, I spent $124.25 for 14 skeins.) You also get the lovely colors that only come from hand-dyed yarn. With yarns made from soy, organic cotton, and other natural (non-animal) fibers, (or at least recycled acrylics, etc.) it's also great to know that you're not supporting the creation of a patroleum-based product.

Hayao Miyazaki fans will get a kick out of the yarn names in this great Etsy shop.

In my excitement, I accidentally left out a yarn from the photo, so I'm uploading one of Heidi's.

PS- Shhh this yarn is for a secret "Vegan Thanksgiving" project. New post when project is finished in November.

Too lazy to prepare pasta?

A meal doesn't come much easier than throwing pasta in boiling water and topping it off with tomato sauce. Trader Joe's has done a great job of wrapping up the epitome of laziness into a convenient frozen package. I am somewhat ashamed to admit that I gave this product a try, but I'm also glad that I did.

Here's my review of TJ's Penne Arrabbiata.

The package.


Here's the frozen form of the penne. This bowl contains about one third of the package. I love saucy pasta and this dish doesn't disappoint. The ratio of sauce to pasta is perfect in my opinion! The fact that the sauce is frozen into little disks, separate from the pasta, makes the whole dish taste freshly prepared.


Here's the final photo after the pasta's been zapped for a couple of minutes. I topped it with Vegan grated topping, but it certainly is flavorful enough without it. There's a great fresh parsley taste along with the spiciness of the pepper in the sauce.

I really recommend this product if you ever are too lazy to boil some pasta. Aside from the convenience though, it's a great, flavorful dish that I would probably keep on hand even if I wasn't occasionally pressed for time.

Etsy, where have you been all my life?

As DocDufresne can attest, lately I've had two obsessions. One is the forum on Post Punk Kitchen. The second is Etsy, which I actually learned about on PPK.

Etsy is "your place to buy and sell all things handmade." If you appreciate art and homemade crafts like me, you could easily wind up spending hours each day exploring this innovative site. Eventually when I've settled somewhere and can have my art room, equipped with lovely things like a kiln, paper cutting tools, and every color acrylic possible, I'll open my own Etsy shop. For now I'm content buying gifts (some for me) and ordering custom projects like my uber secret recipe project that JoanTheMad is helping me with, and a t-shirt project that WhiskeyDogPrintShop is working on, featuring my ubiquitous mascot, the one and only Anderson Dufresne. I can't wait!

Etsy is such a gem. This website provides you with the ability to purchase one-of-a-kind art directly from the (sometimes "starving") artists, supporting their craft at reasonable prices.

You can find a gift for anyone on Etsy, from cookies to pottery, handmade clothing to paintings.

So far I have purchased a cute piggy planter from FruiteFlyPie,

flannel menstrual pads from strangeandviolent (vegan seller),

chocolate chip cookies, maple candied walnuts, and coconut almond truffles from SweetFritsy, (vegan seller),


designed t-shirts (on thrift store shirts: awesome!) from WhiskeyDogPrintShop,

and jewelry (a birthday gift) from LillyQueen.

Seriously. Go check it out!