Store-bought natural peanut butter? RIP-OFF. Make your own, boss!

In recent years, of course, I got into eating natural, no-crazy-sugar-or-other-bullshit-added peanut butter.

But have you seen straight up peanut butter in the store?! Freaking $6, $7, $8 – who has that kind of cash for luxury peanut butter?! I don’t live near a Grocery Outlet anymore, so I’ve paid crap prices for peanut butter a few times. Luckily I don’t go through peanut butter that quickly.

My baller friend Ashley, one of my high school besties, posted about making her own peanut butter over at her blog.

ZOMG I HAD TO DO THIS.

Vegan ice cream!

The day arrived on Saturday afternoon at the New Moon Farm Goatalympics in Monroe.

I saw it in person: Seattle Cookie Counter.

A sight for longing, hungry eyes.

It was tough to choose a flavor. I wanted all of them. Ice cream was just about my favoritest thing as an omnivore and I hadn’t had anything quite like creamy ice cream in ages. Sorbet, yes, and some So Delicious ice cream sandwiches, but a place where I had more than one choice of dreamy ice cream on a hot day was such a delight.

I picked coffee chip ice cream snuggled between two snickerdoodles.

Insert into face.

It was so wonderful! The ice cream was cold, but creamy enough that I didn’t have to jam my teeth through it and give myself an ice cream headache. The cookies were sufficiently chewy but held together. It was delightful. What a wonderful combination!

Perfect start to my visit with my boyfriend to the Goatalympics. Let me tell you, the goats were not impressed with the contests. They required, er, coaxing.

Anyway, go see Seattle Cookie Counter if you’re in town!

Support vegan ice cream in Seattle!

Gee golly has it been a long time since I’ve posted here. I have tons of posts in the queue, but work and life have been crazy. You know how that goes.

Now even though I have plant-based adventures to share with you, this piece is time sensitive and I should have posted it sooner!

Last week I found out about Seattle Cookie Counter – a vegan ice cream sandwich project that will travel throughout Seattle in a VW bus selling ice cream sandwiches to the masses.

It’s raising money on Kickstarter until 11:59 p.m. tomorrow and you should pitch in! It only requires a $1 minimum donation.

Now I didn’t really have enough dough to donate as much as I wanted until today and fortunately, it has already surpassed its minimum goal of $18,000. Hooray! This is now a reality!

But I think local, vegan small businesses are peachy keen and wanted to pitch in, anyway. And cash in on an awesome little reward for donating.

Plus their video on their Kickstarter page made me drool. I lurrrve sorbets and stuff, but their ice cream looks like the rich, creamy stuff I have honestly missed since going plant-based. Now I want it in my tummy!

Here’s what they promise if they exceed their goal:

-A permanent curb space in the U-District
-Wholesale sammies at small, local businesses
-A private ice cream sammie party for all the backers

Support them now.

Portland!

After some tough weeks at work for the both of us, my boyfriend and I went to Portland for the weekend.

My main experience with Portland is my mom taking my brother and me to the Clackamas Mall (quite outside of Portland) for sales tax-free back-to-school shopping. Of course I’ve been to Portland proper, the metropolitan neighbor to the south, but I hadn’t explored it on my own.

Seattle is an easy city in which to be vegan, but in Portland they totally cater to you. I had a waiter volunteer to check on the veganness of a salad, went to places with special vegan menus and you can just say “make it vegan, please” and they know what to do (too many people don’t know what that means, so I always have to specify no mayo/sour cream/cheese/aioli, etc.). Portland is particularly vegan-savvy.

Now eating out with the man friend means seeking out omni restaurants that have something I can eat. Homeboy doesn’t quite get that it’s possible to have a meal without meat.

But it was so easy!

Oh and we drank lots of craft beer. So happy beer is vegan.

Fantastic rice bowl from Laughing Planet. Brown rice, green beans, broccoli, tofu, carrots and red cabbage, topped with peanut sauce. I added sriracha.

Boyfriend enjoying the chips and salsa and his burrito at Laughing Planet. He raved about his braised beef burrito.

Quinoa cashew burger at Deschutes Brewery and Pub. Boyfriend and I are Deschutes conoisseurs. Quinoa and cashew patty was dry by itself, but together with all the sandwich fixins and sauce it was so, so good. Salad dressed with Mirror Pond vinaigrette.

Austin scramble made vegan at Byways Cafe. Boyfriend and I loved this place. They replace eggs with tofu for any scramble. And the toast, of all things, was divine, sourced from Fleur de Lis in Portland.

Yes we went to Powell’s. I set out to buy a new vegan cookbook. I wanted to try something from an author I don’t have like Brian L. Patton’s The Sexy Vegan or Angela Liddon’s new Oh She Glows. But I had to get the modern day vegan Bible, Veganomicon by Isa and Terry. Because by now I should own the vegan Bible.

Scrambled tofu with olive oil and parsley at Bijou Cafe. I seriously thought these were eggs when I tried them. Pretty tasty. This was the only vegan option on the menu.

Regular vegan burrito from Las Gorditas. They had a meat, vegetarian and vegan menu. Much appreciated! The burrito was a little bland, but huge and filling.

Boyfriend waiting for the train home wearing my shades.

Now I’m kind of lightening up post-vacation with Happy Herbivore Light and Lean. But this skinny mac and cheese is no joke.

Not pictured: a grilled PB and J from the famous Bunk Sandwiches. Yeah I’m gonna make those at home now.

Recommended brewery: Pints.

Maybe next time I’ll go to Portland with girlfriends who will eat at the vegan joints with me.

What vegans eat

I always love vegan food porn where I can peep what other people eat, like what Bianca at Vegan Crunk does now and then.

So I’ll offer up my own food porn. Captured by my crappy cell phone camera. Sexxxxxi.

I’ve had so much fun with my new cast iron skillet. My first dish was Isa’s Ohama yakisoba. My new love in life is udon noodles. So chewy and satisfying.

I’m still trying to stay on the breakfast train, with varied results. I’m not the most consistent. But I tested out the Isa Does it chickpea scramble for something new. Thumbs up!

My parents helped me celebrate my first vegan birthday with a delicious cake from Bearded Ladies in Olympia. Funfetti with blackberry frosting. Sweet, but not too cloying. Dense yet moist. Such a perfect cake.

For my birthday with my family I asked to go to Darby’s Cafe in downtown Olympia so that I would have hippie stuff to eat and the rest of my family could have an omni dinner. I love this place! This is the Spice World burger with a blackened vegan patty, avocado, jalapeno, Daiya and other veggies. Complete with a heap of shoestring fries.

I typically forsake three-course meals for something that all goes together in a bowl or on a plate. But this one, courtesy of Happy Herbivore Light and Lean, was so easy! Lemony asparagus, mashed potatoes (which I topped with barbecue sauce) and meatloaf bites covered in marinara.

Kale and tofu rice bowl with curry peanut sauce from Isa Does It. I could have straight drank up this sauce.

Got to use my new toy I got for my birthday! Blasted Isa’s cheddary broccoli soup from Isa Does It.

Cheddary! With Happy Herbivore Light and Lean drop biscuits.

I spent a few days in Darrington for work, near the site of the Oso landslide that killed dozens. Clif bars and veggie burgers got old, so I stopped by the Mount Vernon Safeway to grab veggies and hummus to eat in the car during the final hour of my trip home.

Boyfriend and I discovered Razzi’s Pizzeria in the Greenwood neighborhood of Seattle, which is omni but has separate menus for those who are vegan and gluten-free. I got a calzone with Daiya mozzarella, pesto and sundried tomatoes. It was actually good! New place for the man and I to go and both be fulfilled.

I’ve been pinching pennies here and there with baked potatoes. I like to top mine with salsa, hot sauce, homemade vegan sour cream and plenty of nooch. Scallions if I have fresh ones handy.

Easy peasy

… lemon squeezy.

I really did squeeze a lemon for this one.

I almost always make recipes that will last me at least a couple days – if it lasts me a week, even better. I love cooking, but ain’t nobody got time for that every day.

A recent super-de-dooper easy recipe that I went through for about a week came from Budget Bytes with Beth’s oven roasted Greek stuffed pitas.

Budget Bytes is an omni website, but it has vegetarian and vegan tabs and many of the non-vegan recipes are easily vegefied – like this one.

I nixed the chicken and made the Happy Herbivore feta to go with it. Chickpeas would also have been a great add if I’d thought of it.

After I used up all my pitas, this filling was great on a salad.

Speaking of salad, it makes an excellent side next to the pita.

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