Uncle Eddies Vegan Cookies

An amazing ending to a wonderful day! Uncle Eddies Vegan Walnut Cookies with Chocolate Chips! More flavors available!!! :-)

Hmmm.. Pad Thai It Is!

       Hi everyone! Tonight I am making a Vegan Pad Thai, all thought up and a little help from other websites. I'll be posting it tonight around 8 or 9, stay tuned!

If you have any questions or concerns, please contact me at: thevganteen@gmail.com
I hope you all are excited!
-Ilana xo

Have You Been Vegan TOO Long?

This evening after I picked up my new phone (Galaxy S2, love it!), I looked at some of my messages on facebook. I had a new message from my cousin! Opening up the inbox, there was a link saying: CLICK NOW LANEY! Startled, I did. I had a lot of laughs this evening, and a lot of "Oh wow... I do all of these!!" moments. Click this link for a laugh or two - maybe all of us are TOO vegan! ;) 
http://www.buzzfeed.com/expresident/signs-youve-been-vegan-too-long

If you have any questions or concerns, please email me at: thevganteen@gmail.com
Share this to all of your friends for a world wide laugh!
-Ilana xo

VEGAN Doc Martens!

Vegan Doc Martens (Black)
Price: $130

Not only am I a chef by day, blogger by night, but I am a fashion MANIAC! I love looking at clothes, and buying them as well! A couple of months ago, I stumbled upon a shoe. Not any old shoe - but THE shoe.
THE VEGAN DOC MARTENS.

Vegan Doc Martens (Cherry Red)
Price: $130

These cute, fashionable shoes come in cherry brown, too!
I am TOTALLY buying these - and I hope all of you who are reading buy these, too!
Here's the link if you would like to purchase them:

http://www.dmusastore.com/p-3753-vegan-1460.aspx

Cherry Red:
http://www.dmusastore.com/p-3696-vegan-1460.aspx
 





If you have any questions, comments or concerns please contact me at: thevganteen@gmail.com
I hope you enjoyed this fashion entry!
-Ilana xo


( All credits to the pictures of the Doc Martens go to their website, http://www.docmartens.com )

Saucy Bow-Ties

I have had olive oil for the past bajillion years, and so it was time to switch it up! Why not make a pasta with sauce instead of olive oil? And that's exactly what I did.
Ingredients: 

• Any type of red sauce that you would put on pasta
• Tofu
• Mushrooms
• Garlic
• Onions
• Bow Tie Pasta
• Olive oil

First of all, put down a pot of water to cook the noodles in. After that pot is out, take out a frying pan and put it on a different stove panel. Put that on simmer.

While that heats up, take out mushrooms, garlic, onions,tofu and olive oil. I bought pre-cut mushrooms, but whatever you want to do is fine. Cut the onions up - not too big and not too small. Cut the garlic as little or as big as you want, same goes with the tofu! Put the tofu, mushrooms, onions and garlic all into the frying pan on the stove. 

Cover the tofu, mushrooms, garlic and onions all in olive oil and saute them for as long until the onions turn a bit golden around the sides. Put the heat around high.

Put the pasta in the boiling pot of water, and cook for about 5-7 minutes.

Keep an eye on the things you're sauteing, and make sure you stir the bow ties so they don't stick together and come into a clump of bow tie disaster! 

Once the sauteed goodness is done, set the heat on simmer. 

Take the pasta out, and drain it. Set that aside.

Heat up the sauce in a different pot, and cover with a lid. Heat that for about 6 minutes, on high heat. It will be ready when it starts steaming and bubbling

Once that is done, put everything in the sauce, mix, and serve with hot pads! 

If you have any questions or concerns, please email me at: thevganteen@gmail.com

Hope this fulfills your taste buds!
-Ilana xo

Chocolate Mousse

I love my older sister! One day she was in town, and we decided to cook something together. We went to whole foods, and she asked me if I had ever tried vegan cake. Thinking it would be horrible, I got it just for her amusement. It looked pretty good, I'm not going to lie. 

I got home, and after dinner I grabbed a fork and stuck it into the moist, beautiful cake. I took a bite and fell in LOVE! Some of the best vegan cake EVER. There was also carrot cake, and we bought that too! Both were just so good. I recommend this sweet treat for any person with a huge sweet tooth!

Yummy Garlic Bread!

Who DOES'NT want garlic bread as a side on their wonderful pasta?
Follow these steps for amazing garlic bread!
Ingredients:

• Bread
• Garlic
• Olive oil

Preheat the oven to 350.
First, I got some nice bread (whole grain is good too, I just used white bread - left over from the Vegan BLT!) and cut it up into small slivers.

Second, I chopped up a bunch of garlic (without the skin), and set it down.

Afterwards, I put some olive oil on a knife, and spread it around on the bread (repeating this process as necessary).

When that was all SPREAD and done, I put the garlic on top. By then, these suckers were ready to be put into the oven!

Leave the delicious garlic bread in the oven, checking on it until you see the garlic turning kind of a golden color (as show above in the picture)

Take out and serve, but careful, its hot!

If you have and questions or concerns, please contact me at: thevganteen@gmail.com
Enjoy!
-Ilana xo

Another Picture:

Vegetable Pasta

Whole foods – 7:30 at night. Determined to make a good, hearty vegan soup, until my father happily reminded me how LONG soup took to make. It was cold, my mom and dad were hungry, and I was running out of options. I quickly thought in my mind of what to make, and it hit me. What about a nice bow tie pasta? The pictures in my head said it was a good idea, and the way it turned out made me glad I thought of it!
Things you will need:
• Broccoli (a head or just frozen in a bag - whatever makes you comfortable)
• 1-2 carrots
• Mushrooms
• Onions
• Garlic
• Tofu (optional)
• Olive Oil
• Whole grain bow tie pasta (or just any type of bow tie – whatever you prefer!)

Looks good, right? Follow these instructions and ill tell you exactly how to make it! 

I started by turning the stove to simmer, putting a frying pan on the panel I chose. While that was heating, I cut thin slices of onion, and cut them up not too big, but not too small. Then, I grabbed some garlic, tore off all the skin and cut it into small pieces. 

After that, I got out my broccoli and cut it up just so there was a little bit of stem but a lot of the green 'bush'. While that sat for a second, I covered the bottom of a large pot with water to steam the broccoli in, setting the heat on simmer. It doesn't matter if you just put the water in or not, put the broccoli in first. Put a cover over the top, trapping the heat. 

As that's steaming, start a boiling pot of water to put the bow-ties in.

Return to your frying pan, putting a lot of olive oil in. Grab the mushrooms, onions and garlic and toss it all in the pan! Put extra olive oil on top of everything (if you want to add tofu, cut it up in small squares and toss that in too!).

Make sure you watch the broccoli, and leave it in for about 7-10 minutes. Stir it around a couple of times so it doesn't burn or stick to the bottom, add more water as necessary. Watch the mushrooms, too. You don't want those to burn! Leave that in until the onions are turning a little gold around the sides. 

Add the pasta when the water boils, and wait about 5-6 minutes for that to cook. Stir and watch everything properly! 

Once the pasta is done, drain it. Same goes with the broccoli! Make sure you don't over cook the broccoli, otherwise it will turn mushy and gross. 

Take little parts of the pasta out of the drainer, and put it in the pot putting just enough olive oil on, not so it pours down and coats the bottom but just enough to add flavor to the pasta. Repeat doing that, until all the pasta is gone (or however much pasta you want). Add in the mushrooms, garlic, broccoli and onions as you go.

Once everything is mixed, take out your carrot and rinse it. Peel the skin off of the carrot and put it in the trash so you can have the carrot raw. Shave the carrot onto the pasta, mix it in, and serve!

If you have any questions or concerns, please contact me at: thevganteen@gmail.com

I hope this meal is wonderful!
-Ilana xo

More pictures of this meal:

The Vegan BLT

       So, one day I was on Skype with one of my friends from school and I just got the biggest craving for a sandwich. So I got to thinking, what if I just created one myself? Making myself even more hungry, I started to think about what I would put on it.

Bread (any type, your choice!)
Nayonaise lightly (or heavily – I chose lightly) spread on the bread – This sounds SO weird, and it’s so funny to pronounce! My mom and I laugh whenever we use it.
One leaf of cabbage (Leaf? Part?)
One rectangle layer of tofu (firm)
Fakin Bacon!
Thin strips of tomato
Cabbage on top of the tomato
Then to top it off, the other bread piece with nayonaise!
For this whole recipe, you would need:

•  Coconut oil 
•  Olive oil
•  Vegetable oil
•  Tofu
•  A head of cabbage
•  Fakin Bacon
•  Nayonaise
•  Any type of bread
• Tomatoes (optional, even though this IS a BLT, it will taste just as fine without it!)

·        

        And let me tell you, that was one BAD ASS sandwich!

Here’s what I did:

       First, I put a frying pan on the stove and turned the heat to simmer. After I did that, I cut a loaf of bread into slices to put the tofu, cabbage and ‘bacon’ inside. Returning to the frying pan, I put just enough vegetable oil to cover the bottom of it.

       Second, I turned the block of tofu onto its side, and cut like one inch strips all the way down leaving me a thin sort of square/rectangular shape. I grabbed some napkins, and pressed down on the tofu getting as much moisture out as I could. Afterwards, I put the damp tofu into the vegetable oil turning the heat up to mid way.

       While that cooks, on a completely different frying pan, I put 1 tsp of coconut oil in along with the ‘bacon’. Now, I cook my bacon until it’s crispy. For the people who DON’T like crispy bacon, don’t turn your stove on high heat! For the people who DO like their bacon crispy, CRANK IT UP BABY! :)

       As that’s sizzling and the aroma of goodness is in the air, I slightly pick at the sides and under the tofu. I don’t flip the tofu or anything until I think that it’s golden brown. The object of the game IS to get the tofu a nice golden color. Basically, treat it like a pancake – just watch it a LOT more! It could end up sticking to the bottom of the frying pan, and we don’t want that!

       When the tofu and bacon is almost done, I take some cabbage and rinse it. Putting it to the side, I take my jar of nayonaise and spread it on whichever side of the bread I want. After that, I dry the cabbage off completely and put as much onto the bread as I want.

       I return to my tofu and bacon and put the heat on off. For being safe, I take the tofu out of the frying pan and put it onto a cutting board/plate/whatever you would be using – just so it won’t burn.

       Last but not least, I layer everything. First the bread with the nice white lather, then the cabbage, on top of the cabbage is the tofu, some fakin bacon covering that, some slices of tomato, some lettuce on top of that, and finally the other bread piece that covers up the dream sandwich!

       Serve with love, care, and bandages because if you’re serving people other than yourself they will do ANYTHING for this baby!

       With any questions or concerns, please contact me at: thevganteen@gmail.com

I hope this vegan meal is out of this world!

-Ilana xo

More pictures of this delectable meal: