Peanut Luna Cashew Coffee

Considering how much I love peanut sauce, I seriously wonder why it has taken me so long to make it homemade. Well, I finally did.



I used a recipe swell vegan gave me, but of course I didn't have all the ingredients and kicked myself a little for still making peanut sauce without them. But I could tell from what I made that the recipe is worth it, so I'm going to Whole Foods in a few minutes to stock up so I can have the real thing for dinner. Yay!

Right now in lifecycle nutrition we're doing group presentations, and I won a prize for answering one of the presenter's quiz questions. The prize was my favorite Luna bar (Blueberry Yogurt - it's one of the Luna Sunrise ones), and it didn't take me long to figure out what to do with it.

And thus I present: Luna Oatmeal!



For this I only used half of the bar. I broke the half into little cubes with the help of my knife and just stirred it into my oatmeal. This is such a great little idea of mine, in my own humble opinion, because you can enhance the flavor of your oatmeal by adding (half of) any Luna or Clif bar of your choice. For oatmeal this week I have been preparing quick oats in water, mashing in sliced banana pieces after cooking, stirring in some ground flaxseed, and eating it all up with some fresh ground unsalted peanut butter! I'm in love with Whole Foods' grind-it-yourself right now, and because I've gotten so used to almond butter, going back to peanut butter for a few days has been especially refreshing and fun because it has distinct, strong flavor when it's fresh ground!

And cinnamon coffee cake muffins, inspired by my childhood love for coffee cake.



They'd serve it at day care all the time, so just the smell of it is a comfort food in my book. I used a recipe from Adventures in (Vegan) Cooking and reduced the sugar by half with no ill effects. In fact, they were amazing! The recipe for the streusel topping makes a ton, and I only made half of that, too. If you're a coffee cake lover, I'd say make 'em muffin style. (They cook so much quicker.)

And for good measure, Dreena's Homestyle Chocolate Chip Cookies with cashews!



I make this recipe all the time, and this is the first time I used whole grain spelt. They still taste great - I didn't even notice a difference and I usually use "refined" spelt. A friend who tasted them told me the added cashews make for a great salty/sweet combo (there is no salt on the cashews, but there is sea salt in the recipe). Mmm!

Welcome Back to the Real World

Sadly, my Disney World vacation is over, and it has been for quite a few weeks now. So I definitely have a lot of updates since then...

I've been really, really into espresso recently. 90% of that would be the decaf kind. I ordered this awesome espresso blend online...



I found out about in on the coffeegeek forums, which reported that Decaf Black Cat from Intelligentsia Tea & Coffee is supposed to be the best-tasting decaf blend on the online market.

They didn't lie. It kicks butt. Lately I had been thinking my espresso machine was pretty crappy (a Starbucks Barista), but after intensive research on coffeegeek and some other nerdy coffee forums, I have improved my latte techniques a hundred fold. This is definitely a money saver, because otherwise I'm a coffee shop junkie!

Some latte art from the best local coffeehouse in town (I really want to learn to do latte art but it requires a lot of technique and practice, and soymilk is a little more difficult to work with than dairy milk when doing latte art):



I have been making some pretty good drinks, but...



...I definitely made a mistake on this cup. See those bigger, dishwasher-type soap bubbles? Those shouldn't be there. What we're looking for are really dense micro-bubbles. That is ze perfect foam.

I have a new vegan friend here in town too! She makes kick-butt vegan cupcakes once a week and brings one (and sometimes two) for me. :) Here are the cupcake and me at work with the vegan Cookies 'n' Cream Cupcake (from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World). It's nice to finally have a vegan friend I can talk to in person. Yay.





And I decided I'm going to be posting more regularly, but more shorter posts rather than thorough, lengthy ones. Then it won't feel like I'm gone so long every time. To wrap up, here's a picture of one of my favorite dinners from this weekend:



Steamed broccoli. Half a toasted vegan multigrain bagel from work (the culinary majors actually made them, and I was lucky because a lot of the stuff they make isn't vegan) with a little bit of Earth Balance. An awesome Chickpea Cutlet with maple-dijon sauce (1 teaspoon maple syrup, a packet of mustard, and a squirt of dijon mustard all heated up in the microwave - so good!).

Disney World Part IV

Just tuning in? Here are links to the earlier portions of my four-part series about eating vegan in Disney World: Part I, Part II, and Part III. It's totally possible, and if you're lucky, you may ending up having some of the best meals of your life.

We had lunch at the Sci-Fi Dine-In Theater at Disney's Hollywood Studios on day six of our Disney World trip. This restaurant is one I visited numerous times in my childhood and of which I have very fond memories. The hosts lead you to your table on rollerskates and sit you in an actual car. Each car has a tabletop that you eat on, and all the cars face a giant old-fashioned projector movie screen playing 50's-style commercials and little video clips. It's so fun!!



They actually had a tofu item on the menu - Seared Marinated Tofu with Mango Glaze and Steamed White Rice. This is actually the first meal I research and planned out for our trip, so I was a little disappointed when I did my vegan "double-check" with the waitress and found out the mango glaze had honey in it. So I just got the seared marinated tofu without the glaze, and the tofu wasn't bad at all - these chefs knew how to work with tofu! I was pleased with the taste and texture of the tofu, but I wasn't blown away. And that was good enough for me, at this point. I am surprised, though, that they included honey in the only vegetarian entree on the menu. It was cheeseless, so what's the point of adding honey? To discriminate against the crazy vegans? Also, I prefer brown rice over white rice... But I've learned on this trip that I need plenty of grains and carbohydrates at each meal because I have no idea what I'll be served at the next one. After all, carbs are the human body's preferred source of fuel. :) My body certain lets me know how angry it is with me when I don't get those grains!

We had a duplicate dinner today and went back to Wolfgang Puck Express. All four family members had a very positive experience here on our first day of the vacation, unlike at Wolfgang Puck Cafe (see part III for the ugly details). The chef who had made the astounding, knock-my-socks-off wrap a few days ago wasn't working tonight, so I attempted to recreate my lunch by descibing what I'd had before to the cashier. What I got was really good but not as good as what Tom, the first chef, had made. He had just done something really special with the roasted vegetables. Again, I had a wrap in a flour tortilla with roasted vegetables: eggplant, mushrooms, yellow bell peppers, and zucchini. Though they forgot the sun-dried tomatoes I asked for, I didn't have much to complain about. At least I didn't starve tonight! I even got a big juicy orange for dessert.



Day Seven

Just for the info, I hate waterparks. But I didn't want to be a party pooper on my family, so I sucked it up and didn't even mention my hatred for walking around a crowded, wet theme park packed with screaming little kids and half-naked people and icky sand (which I also hate) when the family decided to spend the day at Blizzard Beach, a Disney-affiliated waterpark. We had lunch at Lottawatta Lodge. For a few minutes, I was scared I would have to go starving, but they ended up having vegan Boca Burgers in the back even though they weren't listed on the menu. Yum! I love the Boca. The only problem is that one patty doesn't fill me up - I would have lasted better through the day with two! :) I got a side of apple slices instead of French fries and a fruit cup for dessert. Fruuuuuity. Later I got a package of baby carrots for a snack.



Dinner reservations had been made at Boma - Flavors of Africa, a restaurant inside Animal Kingdom Lodge, one of the newer Disney resorts. My vegan dining guide described it as a family buffet with the "ambience of an African marketplace." Kitty, the woman who made the guide I followed, is a vegan and recommended this place as the best place to eat for vegans on Disney property. She also wrote that it is her favorite restaurant, period.

First, the waitress sent the chef over to talk to me about vegan options. He walked me through the buffet line and told me what was in each dish that I could have, and I let him know that I also do not eat honey. After the "tour," the chef said he'd prepare me my own plate of goodies and deliver it to our table. Talk about special treatment! Kitty mentioned in the guide that the chefs may hook you up with extra goodies if you let your server know you're vegan or if you have dietary restrictions/allergies. My first plate from the buffet line had a spoonful of roasted vegetables (including one of my favorites, sweet potatoes), a heap of spring mix greens, three falafel balls, a pineapple chunk, a splotch of Black Olive Hummus, a pita wedge, and some lavosh flatbread crackers.



The lavosh, hummus, and falafel were my favorites, and I went back to try more from the hummus bar (yes, Boma has a hummus bar!). This time I tried White Bean Hummus, more Black Olive Hummus, and more of the addicting lavosh, in my opinion a far superior complement to hummus than pitas.





While I was working on this, the chef brought out my specialty plate, which turned out to be tofu cutlets atop a bed of sauteed vegetables. I was very excited to see the tofu! It ended up having a good flavor but it hadn't been pressed/drained much -- the dish had been prepared pretty quickly, after all - but the outer texture of cutlet was really yummy because it was "crusty" and lightly browned. (Brown Derby tofu is still my favorite tofu from this trip.) The chef chose some really delicious vegetables for my plate, too: baby broccoli, snap peas, some yellow yummy things I couldn't identify in the dark lighting, plus some edamame.



I wanted more from the buffet after that, so I got more falafel balls and White Bean Hummus, plus Sun-Dried Tomato Hummus and more lavosh. I had so much fruit today that I skipped the usual fruit bowl dessert I got at almost every other restaurant on the trip. I was quite full from this super-charged-with-protein (and fat) meal! There was a bar with some very elaborate-looking non-vegan desserts, though. I loved this restaurant so much, and I would jet back over to Florida in a heartbeat to eat there again. Each family member had gotten to pick one sit-down restaurant for the trip, and this was mine. I'll let you know that my family thoroughly enjoyed their meals as well and told me I had made a great choice in suggesting this restaurant! I could eat veggies, hummus, lavosh, and falafel all day, dude.

Day Eight

We had lunch at The ESPN Zone along the pier at Disney's Boardwalk Resort. My meal consisted of a Grilled Vegetable Sandwich and a cucumber salad. The sammie was multi-grain bread packed with tomatoes, greens, red pepper hummus, and chilled grilled vegetables (a huge marinated mushroom, red onions, and zucchini).



The bread was thin and cold and gross. It could have been toasted at least! But the vegetables made up quite a thick layer and they had a really great flavor because they'd been marinated, plus the giant mushroom took on a "meaty" taste. So overall I really liked the sandwich. What sucked was the waiter - he was slow and extremely inattentive. It made me the most angry when he did not offer me any type of dessert - not even a measly fruit bowl. The problem with this was that, as a part of the Disney Dining Plan, my parents had already paid for all of our meals - and a beverage, entree, and dessert were supposed to be included for each family member. So I didn't like the fact that my parents were being ripped off when they had already paid for something, and it was getting kind of old watching my family members have cheesecake and apple pie after every one of our meals, while I only got fruit. I love fruit, but vegans like to indulge too! We definitely tipped the waiter according to the service he gave us and then since I hadn't gotten dessert and everyone else had, we found me some more Chocolate Tofutti "ice cream" at Beaches & Cream Soda Shop just down the pier at the Beach Club Resort. I admit I was being a pain in the butt about the dessert thing, but I felt left out! I also like to think that we used part of the tip money our waiter would have gotten on my Tofutti. Haha, take that, jerk.



Dinner was a quickie - my parents and I left my sister at the hotel room (she just really wanted to watch TV) and we ate at Earl of Sandwich in Downtown Disney. We got to talk to the manager, and we found out her daughter is vegan. So immediately the commonality made the manager warm up to us and she made up a special sandwich just for me - nothing on the menu was vegan. She made a Lettuce/Tomato/Cucumber/Spinach/Bell Pepper/Pineapple Sandwich with cranberry spread and some of Ken's Balsamic Vinaigrette on the side. It was a pretty darn good sandwich - I never would've thought about lining a sandwich with a thick slice of pineapple but I liked it. The bread is made fresh in house with only three ingredients - flour, yeast, and water - and it was soooo good! They also toast the bread for you, yum. I had fruit for dessert.



Day Nine

My last day at Disney. We had a sit-down restaurant at our resort at Olivia's Cafe before my sister and I had to catch our planes. We'd had dinner there before and my parents and I had loved it. This time around, though, it didn't turn out so hot - the only yummy part of my meal was a giant marinated mushroom.



Yes, that brown thing is a mushroom. I freaked out when the waitress set it down, because it looked like meat. There were some mushy, warm tomatoes on the side and some stir-fried vegetables that were just okay. White rice was supposed to come with my plate, but it never got delivered and I didn't bother asking about it. I did get incredibly hungry later though - veggies and olive oil only tide you over for so long.

Overall, I had some fabulous food at Disney! Though the trip also had its down, I was really, really sad to leave. I didn't want to go back to my school routine. It's hard being so many states away from your parents... And Florida is warm and perfect, and I didn't want to go back to the cold and to tormenting myself over chemistry and all the other blah blah academic stuff. But after vacation, we always have to go back to the real world. Mostly what I didn't want to go back to was responsibility. Going back to Disney World definitely reminds me of when I was little - when life was carefree and I had no obligations. Sigh... I can't believe almost a month has gone by since my vacation ended! I hope you enjoyed my four Disney posts, and pretty soon I'll be letting you in on what I've been up to since then!

The Magic Continues: Disney World, Part III

Our fourth day at Disney World was spent at Epcot Center, and one of the first things we did there was the park's new Finding Nemo ride. It was a cute, slow-paced ride probably best suited for younger kids, but there was more fun after the ride was over: There was a building full of aquariums situated at the ride's drop-off point, so we toured through to look at all different kinds of sea life. We got to see some rescued manatees that were being rehabilitated before they would be reintroduced to their natural habitats - one of them had had his tail mutilated by a boat propeller. What really got me was how much those guys weighed. One of them was 900-something pounds, and the other was close to 1,100! And all they were eating was lettuce. Manatees are herbivores for the most part, so I'm just wondering how exactly their bodies work... This website says they eat 32 to 108 pounds of sea plants a day!

I appreciated that the manatees were being secluded for a good cause, but I'm not sure how I felt about the other fish and sea animals being caged up for the public to oogle at. There wasn't a lot of information displayed about where the fish came from - and the tanks were fairly large, but I couldn't help but think how boring life must be in an aquarium when the fishies could be exploring an entire ocean. I felt especially bad for the dolphins - they are my favorite animals and it looked like their swimming space was pretty limited. I'm not sure where the dolphins came from - I didn't go to the other floor to see the area where they can visit the surface of the water - but I hope they have a more rewarding life in the future.





The World Showcase portion of Epcot was where my mom, dad, sister, and I went once we had worked up an appetite. We headed to Tangierine [sic] Cafe in Morocco for a Mediterranean-themed lunch. I ordered the Vegetable Plate, but I was disappointed that the Moroccan bread and all the pita bread and other carb-y items at Tangierine were not vegan (the cafe does have an ingredient book available to assist diners with special allergies, intolerances, or special diets). I requested for the bread and honey-laden lentil salad to be left off my plate, which ended up consisting of couscous, a black & green olive salad, a parsley tabbouleh salad, and hummus. Are you seeing the same problem I did? Yep, I had nothing to dip the hummus in!!! The problem was solved, however, with my mother's help. She ordered a falafel sandwich without the yogurt-y sauce and gave me half of her falafel balls to dip into my hummus. She's such a good mommy, so kind to her wonderful daughter (me, haha!). It was her first experience with falafel, and she really liked it! I also thought the falafel was very good and the hummus was pretty decent, but not the best I've had. I had yummy Moroccan mint tea for my beverage, but sadly this restaurant didn't have any vegan-friendly desserts. Overall, this was a pretty good and satisfying lunch for me, though my poor mommy said she got hungry later.

I've also been searching Disney World and Downtown Disney for coffee shops that serve soymilk. The first was in Downtown Disney, at the cafe inside Virgin Megastore, and the second was here in Epcot, near the United Kingdom portion of World Showcase. Sadly, the decaf soy latte I ordered was completely gag-worthy - the espresso was so acidic and awful, but I drink fortified soymilk to meet my nutritional needs every day so I was glad to be able to find some outside the convenience of my resort room's fridge.

I was glad when the time came for our dinner reservation because I was getting extremely sick of walking around Epcot - we had already done everything we wanted to do. We went back to United Kingdom section of the park to Rose & Crown Pub. The nicest woman ever ended up being our waitress, and I was extremely amused that everyone working at the pub had a British accent, including their nice and cheery chef. She came out to tell me my options, and there ended up being a vegan entree already on the menu: Vegetable Curry. It sounded amazing, so I went with that rather than requesting for her to create something especially for me, which she did offer to do. (Aww!)



The Vegetable Curry came with Indian bread, a scoop of sticky & sweet quinoa, and vegetables in a coconut curry sauce. Wow! was I absolutely in love with their quinoa - I've never had it prepared this way and can say it's the best I've ever had. It didn't have the slightest hint of bitterness, either. Yum! I also thoroughly enjoyed the Indian bread, which I downed in about 2.37 bites. Okay, so that's an exaggeration, but it disappeared before I even realized it. :) The curry part was also delicious, but I liked the bread and grain elements of my meal the very most. I highly, highly recommend this restaurant if you go to Disney World. We sat outside on the patio, right along this giant lake in the middle of Epcot. We finished eating at around 6 pm, so it was still beautiful and bright outside, with just the slightest breeze.

Dessert was a fresh fruit bowl with cantaloupe, honeydew melon, and grapes.

                Day Five

Today we planned to go to the classic Disney park, Magic Kingdom - that's the one with Cinderella's giant white castle. My favorite ride at Magic Kingdom is Buzz Lightyear's Astro Blaster. You get in a little space car and ride along a little track speckled with aiming targets. This is actually an interactive ride, because the cars are equipped with big laser guns, which is what you use to hit said targets. Each person even has their own digital scoreboard inside the car, so you can rack up some points and show off/laugh at your family members when you get a higher score than they do! I've always been competitive with video games and even school academic contests, be it a classroom Jeopardy game or a spelling bee, which explains my love for this ride. I ended up getting an okay score and beat everyone in my family - except for my mom! This came as a total surprise, because she is technologically challenged and is awful at video games. But I'll just count this little instance as a freak accident. I am still queen of the Buzz Lightyear ride. (I'm not actually that good at it, haha, but I say I'm the queen if I want!)



I was really looking forward to lunch - I had it all planned out to go to the Tomorrowland Terrace Noodle Station because I knew they had not one, but two tofu entrees. Warning for any future Disney visitors: The Vegetable Noodle Bowl contains whey in it's soup/noodle consumme base... So I got the Teriyaki Tofu with Steamed White Rice and Vegetables. The rice in my entree was vegan according to the ingredients, but it tasted really chicken-y. In an awful, awful way. I've never had ramen noodles, but if I could possibly imagine what a "chicken flavored" ramen noodle package tasted like, I would imagine this rice. Hopefully, I freaked myself out for nothing. The teriyaki sauce was light and sparse - I could barely taste it and what I could taste was bland, nothing special. The "chef" at this quick service station obviously do not know what to do with tofu. It was just there. In little steamed hunky chunks. Shudder. That tofu is why tofu gets a bad rap. I had grapes for dessert and an organic iced peach green tea that tasted like cardboard. Then again, I didn't add sweetener, but I'm not much of a tea girl. I just don't know what to do with it!



Something very, very special awaited me at the Ice Cream Parlor on Main Street at Magic Kingdom. Er - I should more properly say, "somethings." I got a double scoop of Chocolate Tofutti "ice cream"! I love this brand and flavor so much! It was 88 degrees in Orlando that day, so soy ice cream was the perfect treat. Even my dad thought the Tofutti was yummy and I quote: "much creamier than regular ice cream." Goodness, Magic Kingdom really has a lot to offer for vegans. There was not-so-tasty tofu option I chose for lunch, but their other restaurants offer vegan burgers, vegetable wraps, vegan chili, and hummus sandwiches! The Main Street Bakery next door supposedly carries Divvies allergy-friendly/vegan cookies, but I wanted ice cream more so we didn't go to the bakery.



I was really excited about tonight's dinner reservations in particular, out of all the other dinner plans we had made, for Wolfgang Puck Cafe in Downtown Disney. It's pretty upscale, and we'd already had a great experience at the express version of Wolfgang just a few days earlier. I was expecting a lot after my meal there hand-crafted by the chef. Sadly, this restaurant was the first in our Disney experience that did not deliver the goods. Literally. The chef did not have many innovative ideas to begin with - this really surprised me because I think good chefs are supposed to be creative, especially if they work in a restaurant of this caliber. They should also be accomodating if they are working on Disney resort property. I was led to believe by the staff that their spring rolls were vegan after one modification (the slaw) and the chef had proposed to make me a side of sauteed zucchini, squash, and eggplant with lemon and garlic. The dish seemed simple but I thought he would be able to make it something special, like the Wolfgang Puck Express chef did with my roasted vegetable wrap.



As you can see, the sauteed vegetables were presented beautifully. I also expected them to at least taste good. This chef, however, delivered vegetables that would make people not want to eat vegetables. They were oily, slightly cold, and nothing special at all. I was really put off because I had been eating so well all week at the other sit-down restaurants. This dish's presentation reminded me of the movie Ratatouille, so then that reminded me of the food critic's motto: "If I don't love it, I don't swallow." I'm normally a complete veggie lover, but I gave the sad guys on my plate a chance and didn't like it, so I didn't eat much of it at all.

The staff also delivered me the order of spring rolls incorrectly - they had the un-vegan slaw - so our waitress returned them and then the same ones were sent back again! The waitress expertly snatched it up, rolled her eyes at the kitchen staff, and finally got me what I wanted. Almost. I took one bite of the first roll and immediately sensed something was wrong. The spring roll wrapper was very flaky, and had an almost-familiar taste that I hadn't tasted in a long, long time. I had to get the chef to ask what the roll wrappers were made of, and it turns out my vegan-radar was correct: the rolls had been sealed with a very small amount of egg wash (the chef had "forgotten," oops). EW! It made me really upset that so much food ended up being wasted, and all the mix-ups could have fed other people... And I knew animals had suffered for the food that had been put on those plates.

Basically with all the attention and waitstaff and chefs flying around to check up on me, it got really dramatic and tears were involved. I really don't like a lot of attention, and I hated feeling picky; I felt like I had ruined my family's meal with all the fuss. By this point, my parents and sister had finished eating and I hadn't eaten anything substantial so far. I figured I had to eat something, but I wanted to be safe so I asked for a completely plain and dry green salad. The manager wouldn't let up about giving me some dressing. Seriously, I don't know why. So I was like, whatever, just give me some oil and vinegar on the side. And for some reason and somehow he badgered me into agreeing to some vinaigrette that he said was "safe." (I didn't believe him, though, at this point...) I just specified for the whatever dressing to be on the side. And what did I get? A romaine salad slathered with dressing. It was a vinaigrette, and I took a few bites because I had felt wasteful enough already, but seriously! A dry salad was all I had asked for, and they couldn't even give me that! I gave up, finally. So I left hungry and disappointed, except for my dessert of strawberries and raspberries.



Thank goodness for that, but it wasn't quite enough for dinner. The experience was just really upsetting and I kept fixating on it for the next few days. Again, I don't like creating a fuss, but I feel like the chefs at Disney are obligated to know how to deal with dietary restrictions if they advertise that they can do so. Oh! Annnd the chef also told me that I could eat the appetizer bread, but I asked again before I ate it and found out there was honey in it! (Same was the case in Wolfgang Puck Express, which was what warranted my double-checking.)

Ahhh. So that sucked a lot. But it was the first horrible experience I had, and all I could think was that I was glad I had eaten most of my double scoop of Tofutti earlier that day. But I like to take very good care of myself nutritionally speaking, and I don't like to go hungry. I like to set the example, especially as a nutrition major, that the vegan diet is nutritionally adequate. I don't think it's okay to only eat fruit and vegetables. So I made sure to fill my body up with lovely calcium, vitamins D & B12, and protein with a glass of soymilk back in our room at the resort. Normally I'd eat more, but I was honestly so emotionally worked up after Wolfgang that it was all I could manage before going right to sleep...

More happy days are coming, I promise! The rest of my days at Disney are coming soon to a post near you! A Ruby Red Vegan post, that is. Sorry for the downer at the end of this one! Smile, smiley, smile. All better!