mission impossible: no eating out for 2 weeks

I've been seriously craving to get back to blogging for a while. It's been tugging at the back of my mind every time I put a meal together or order a great meal at a restaurant. So finally here I am, diving right back into it. 

Coinciding with my return to blogging is a diet of sorts, so there won't be a whole lot of sinful treats to be seen here for quite a while.  And I'm sure my pocketbook will thank me for not eating out once or twice a day anymore. I'm on lockdown!  I'm imposing a 2 week freeze from eating out.  Hopefully I'll manage to skip visits to my favourite restaurants for longer than that, but I'll re-evaluate once I get to the two-week mark.

This is gonna be painful because it's patio season in Yaletown, which means slushy drinks and tapas are everywhere  I seriously had the best gin infused peach lemonade last Friday on a rooftop patio lounge.  Somehow I'll go 2 weeks without going back for more, which may or may not involve me trying to recreate that lip-smacking good, lucious peach lemonade in my own kitchen.

Anyhoo, today is a sunny Monday that deserves a bright and cheerful bento box lunch for my 3-year-old girl to take to daycare.

A half sesame-seed bagel with tofutti cream cheese, fresh organic strawberries, rice crackers, chickpea & celery medley, hummus dip and matchstick carrots and yellow bell pepper slices. 

And mine is pretty similar:  For breakfast, I've got the other half of baby girl's bagel & strawberries, and for lunch, a Caramel Nut Brownie Luna bar and a herb salad with chickpeas, carrots & yellow bell peppers.

Sophie's Cosmic Cafe

Usually breakfast is my least favourite meal of the day when it comes to dining out.  My usual fare of hasbrowns and dry toast gets pretty boring after so many years.  A lot of places offer a side of fruit, but it's usually melons and grapes that have been marinating in lemon juice and water and pretty devoid of taste.

So this morning when Mr. Carnivore and I went out for breakfast, I picked the place: Sophie's Cosmic Cafe.  When we first arrived, there was a bit of a line-up spilling out into the sidewalk and Mr. Carnivore grumbled a bit, but we only had to wait a few minutes before being seated.

As you enter, you're greeted by hundreds (maybe even thousands) of knick-knacks and figurines which are affixed to every nook and cranny. My favourite is the pair of glittery silver high-heel boots near the front counter.

Sophies Cosmic Cafe has a really great selection of vegetarian options on the menu, including a Mexican tofu scramble, served with salsa, tortilla chips, 2 flour tortillas and black beans.  And the portions are ridiculously huge.  I barely ate half before my pants were begging to be loosened.  Mr Carnivore had (non-veg) French Toast with berries and was sufficiently stuffed as well.  He'd be happy to go to Sophies again, and that makes me happy :)

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!

Thanksgiving recap

I just realized that I never posted pics from Thanksgiving dinner.  Since the USA Thanksgiving is coming up, it seems like a good time to share a couple of my favourite dishes from our huge family dinner.  One of my cousins made an egg-less pumpkin pie that was probably the best pumpkin pie I've ever had.

And my baked yams with Dandies may look a bit strange but tasted great too.

For all mu US friends, I hope you have a delicious Thanksgiving next week!

Watermelon bunnies & Cucumber bears

I love cutting fruit and veggies into little shapes for P's lunch.  This one has fun watermelon bunnies and  cucumber bear heads.  There's also some Kashi puffs, rice crackers, soy yogurt and brown rice pasta with a chopped up veggie dog.

Another lunchbox that came home empty!  I'm sure one of these days I'll strike out and P won't like what's in her lunch, but I'm really excited that she's eating all this good stuff.

I've got Dandies for my Yams...

It's Thanksgiving this weekend here in Canada.  There's always so much hype around the US Thanksgiving, is it wrong of me to feel underwhelmed with ours?  I was talking to some co-workers yesterday about how, when I was growing up, I hated everything that was served on our Thanksgiving menu.

My mom always made a molded green jello ring mixed with cottage cheese. I forget what it's called - I want to say ambrosia salad but I don't think that's right.  In any case, it's revolting.  My cousin makes a yam dish baked with marshmallows on top, and of course there's the turkey and ham.  Blehhh.  I used to fill up on dinner rolls and corn.  Not really much of a feast, to say the least.  Weekday meals were far more interesting.

Being vegan since the age of 14, I looked forward to the family gathering more than the food that was served, but I really do wish I could do both.

This year my cousin (the yam and marshmallow girl) has invited us over to celebrate Thanksgiving at her place.  I'm determined to make it my best Thanksgiving meal ever.  So I've got Dandies for my yams, and I'm making a huge baked vegetable medley for everyone too.  There will be lots of vegan goodies, so stay tuned for photos of the feast!

Fun new VEG song with catchy verses

I received an email from Cyrus Pirasteh, Founder of OhWhyOhWhy.Org asking me to check out their new song/music video promoting the veg*an movement.

I wasn't really sure what to expect, and I was pleasantly surprised to discover that the song has a funky reggae-feel to it, and I really enjoyed watching the video with Preciosa.She was excited to see all of the animals in the video and when it was over she asked to see it again.

So here's the video for you to check out for yourself. It's performed by Greg Cipes and Jah Sun.



For more info about the organization behind the tunes, go to http://www.ohwhyohwhy.org

I also found the song on iTunes for $1.29.  For that price, how can you not buy it?