THIS is a sandwich!

I've talked about Marmalady before, the weekly gourmet lunch cart service that serves up fantastical lunches in our staff kitchen each week.  I absolutely adore Chef Salima's colossal sized sandwiches.  If you were to compare them with a regular sandwich, it's like that scene in Crocodile Dundee where he scoffs at the swtichblade and says "THIS is a a knife".

Well, THIS is a sandwich!

Celebrating Gordita's first birthday!

We recently celebrated Gordita's first birthday by throwing a little birthday bash.  I made a vegan luncheon for our family and close friends and Gordita had a great time being the focus of so much attention. 

I baked two cakes: a vanilla-banana cake of my own creation, with white vanilla frosting, and a chocolate cake from La Dolce Vegan called Wolffie's Cocoa Cake with Chocolate Fudgey Frosting - both cakes were very well received. 

I wanted to make a few dishes with a Caribbean twist, in honour of Gordita's Caribbean heritage, so I made maki (sushi) with avocado and fried plantain banana, a tropical fruit platter, and mango berry iced tea.  We also had latin music and reggae playing in the background.

Other treats included mock tuna maki, mock tuna roll-ups (I'm so in love with Happy Herbivore's recipe!), tofu stix with peanut sauce, almond  butter & strawberry jam rollups, Ian's Alpha tots, spring rolls, and a big platter of fresh organic veggies.

 Feliz cumpleaño Gordita!

Mock Tuna Casserole

I trust you all had a spooky Hallowe'en?  Ours was a little less spooky with this little butterfly fluttering around...

A few days ago Happy Herbivore posted a Mock Tuna Salad recipe and I just had to try it.  The last time I ate tuna was at least 16 years ago when my mom used to bake tuna casseroles for dinner.   Though I don't miss tuna at all, I do miss my mom so I made this dish with pleasant memories of cooking in the kitchen with her. 

I whipped up a batch of the mock tuna, and let me say that it is so tasty it barely made it out of the food processor! I tasted a spoonful which then became two spoonfuls, then three...

But I managed to save enough of it to add to a casserole dish full of cooked brown rice pasta and peas.  I combined the mock tuna with my favorite pasta cheez from Get Sconed's adapted version of New Farm Macacroni and Cheez.   I sprinkled some kelp granules and black pepper on top before baking it.

Oh my, this was extra delicious!  And since I loved the mock tuna so much, I later made it again and enjoyed it on some sprouted grain bread with romaine lettuce.  Equally scrumptious!