Thanksgiving

This Thanksgiving was a lot of fun. Wednesday started busy; full of cooking, cleaning, and laundry-doing. In the evening, I picked up my father from the airport.

I slept in on Thursday morning until 10:15, then went for a run through the woods. We played board games in the afternoon and and cooked a big dinner.

Friday morning was working early. I have nothing to complain about though, as we opened at our usual 5:30, not 3:00 like some other businesses. I went with a friend to Hard Times for vegan muffins, and then to Fast and Furless, where I got some vegan almond joy bars. We also checked out a new coffee shop in out great city, listened to some live music, and drank lattes. In the evening I went with some other friends to the short little River Dazzel parade on Main street. After the parade, my brother, father, and I went to our favorite Bricks Pizza for dinner.

Saturday I dropped off my dad, went to the mall for fifty minutes of shopping, then sped over to St. Paul for some Luce with my aunt and uncle. It is almost my cousins second birthday, so we went to a party for him afterwords. Then home again! It's been a very busy few days.

Now, to give you what you're here for:

Lil' Bro and Ma Ready to Eat!

The Vegan Plate

Most of the food we had was vegan, the only thing they made was some kind of beef roast. We had pretty standard Thanksgiving fair; green bean casserole, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, corn, stuffing, gravy (mushroom, from VCON), and Field Roast Celebration Roast. Dessert was a perfect pumpkin cheesecake.

Like many children before me, I used to despise cranberry sauce. One Thanksgiving, a few years back, I felt compelled to make my own, for whatever reason. So I searched the Internet, found one that sounded delightful, made it, and its been my favorite part of the Thanksgiving meal ever since!

I haven't a clue where I found it, so I can't give you a link, but I will post the recipe, because it's one of those you must try.

My Favorite Cranberry Sauce EVER

Ingredients:

1 -1/2 cups sugar

1 orange

1/2 teaspoon grated ginger

4 cups cranberries

1/2 cup toasted pecans

Directions:

1. Pour the sugar into a medium pot. Grate the orange peel, and juice the orange. Add to the pot with the sugar. Add the ginger.

2. Simmer the sugar-orange mixture over medium heat to dissolve the the sugar, stirring constantly.

3. Add the cranberries and continue to cook until the pop; about five minutes.

4. Stir in the pecans and chill the sauce.

5. Eat it with everything.

I hope you all had as good of a Thanksgiving as I did, enjoy your Sunday!

The Weekend

I've been very busy the past few days, starting Friday with a rather eventful day at work.

The morning at work was very busy, but overall went smoothly. By the time we hit noon, the boss told us it had been the busiest morning ever. Around 12:30 I was working the register in the middle of lunch rush, when a woman at work starts yelling at her boyfriend, who also works there. I went back to work the sandwich line, when I noticed a girl who was scheduled until three, was gone. I asked where she was and I got the answer "she not here". After a little eves dropping, and several more hours of work, I learned she had been fired for stealing tips.

After a rather long and stressful day at work, I went home, baked a cake, and ran.

Chocolate Chip Cake Topped with Pumpkin Dandies Spice Cake Topped with Poured Fondant

This cake was a lot cuter inside and looked somewhat like a brown and orange version of this cake. Unfortunately, I didn't get a picture because it was for a potluck. It was very moist and people seemed to like it.

The potluck it was for was Compassionate Action for Animals Annual Turkey Free Thanksgiving. I volunteered most of the day Saturday, but I still got to eat, and see some friends and family there.

Right after the potluck, I zipped over to St. Paul to pick up JT for dinner and the opera. It was my very first opera! We got a deal on really good seats, and the opera, Cassanova's Homecoming, was funny and very entertaining. It was better (and quite a bit more sexual) than what I expected.

After the opera, I came home to homemade lefsa that my mother had spent the day making. My favorite holiday food! Perfect as usual.

The next morning, I woke up to the sound of the washing machine. I went downstairs, ate breakfast, and baked sweet potato blondies for that evenings potluck. My mom came home from a two-hour run. She walked over by the garage door, and said "did you take your dog out, the floors wet!" I went and look at where she was standing and told her I didn't think that was from the dog. She opened the garage door, and it was raining. On the inside of the garage. She ran upstairs, and into our flooded laundry room. The carpet around the laundry room, and in my brothers room was soaking wet.

My mom got my neighbor (who had the same thing happen three times, we live in identical town homes) and he came over and started giving her phone numbers and telling her what she needed to do. Four hours later, our carpets were ripped apart and our house filled with fans.

I still wanted to go to the potluck because my mom had some things that were needed. I drove there, helped with set up and directing people where to go, and then had another nice big dinner with my friends.

Hazelnut Chocolate Dreamies

These really do deserve there own post. The cookies are buttery, crunchy, and not to sweet. The ganache is dark and complex - with frangelico and espresso to complement the dark chocolate.

I made these on Saturday for my friends, and we ate them all by yesterday. They were perfect with our late night tea, and just as good for breakfast with coffee.

If you haven't picked up your copy of Vegan Cookies yet, you are really missing out. Especially with the holidays coming up, you're going to want to be able to whip out cookies to prove to your friends and relatives that being vegan doesn't mean you're sad and deprived.

Local Food and More Vegan Cookies.

Baldur Farms Bread and Timber Trail Preserves

Wisconsin ain't no Vermont when it comes to local foods, but I have noticed we are always making strides in the right direction.

Maureen rocks. She and her husband run Baldur Farms. They grow their own grains, and then Maureen makes dark hearty whole grain breads in her wood fire oven. Once a week they get delivered to the co-op in brown paper bags, the loaves aren't cheap, but they are worth every penny. Each week, she makes just one kind of bread, some times they have honey, but more often than not, they're vegan. This week's bread was a soft, moist, and lightly sweet beer bread. For containing no sugar, and being 100% whole grain, all of these characteristics are quite remarkable.

These breads are good for any meal of the day. For breakfast, I like to have a slice or two with jam or nut butter (though, I think the nut butter might be a bit too much for this bread as it's already filling enough). A slice with a bowl of split pea soup is also delightful. It's really good with more carbs too, especially if your running a marathon in the morning.

As I said, my favorite topping is jam, and my new favorite jam is Timber Trails Ground Cherry Preserves. I was a little leery at first, as ground cherries strike me as being a little too tomato-y, but upon reading the ingredients of oranges and orange peel, I had to try it. It really tastes nothing like ground cherries and everything like orange marmalade, and oh how I love it for that reason.

And Now For Something Completely Different....

Je t'aime. Or should I say, ti amo.

After I came home from long day at work (I am just complaining, really, I don't work that much), I submitted some college apps, went for a run, and then made cookies. These are the Minonos from Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar. They are thick, bread-y, and just slightly sweet. I used a pretty dark chocolate for the filling, and they went over quite nicely. I should have made them a little bit smaller, as I only got 11 sandwiches instead of the 16 the recipe says it should make. My brother thought the orange zest was nasty, but my mother and I both liked it.

After all of that, I went out for happy hour sushi with my friends. After dinner (it was 10 o'clock at this point), we wanted to hang more, so we drove around trying to find someplace. We ended up settling on Olive Garden (the only place that was open), where we drank coffee and ate Minonos. Really, the point of this little story is that Minonos are great dipped in a black cup of decaf at 11pm. Our waitress probably disagreed.

And oh I might just post a bit more later today or tomorrow. I am making hazelnut chocolate dreamies today, and I get the feeling they are going to deserve a post of their own.

Fruity Oat Bars

These bars a hearty and healthy tasting (in a good way). They are a little bit chewy and a lot yummy. I used quinoa flakes to replace the wheat germ because I was out. Perfect for a quick breakfast or snack. I froze about half of the batch, because I am not sure we will eat them all before they go bad.