vegansaurus!
12/19/2012
![It’s nearly time for winter break (!!!), which means it is “only posting stuff that makes me happy,” which translates to “good food and cuddly animals.” In that vein, here is Michael Procopio’s beet and orange salad, to fight the Seasonal Affective Disorder and celebrate the winter solstice that will (eventually) bring the sunshine back to us.
Get the recipe at Bay Area Bites! Though I remain ambivalent about beets, this salad is gorgeous. You might add some pomegranate seeds for extra-fancy winter produce points, should you be so inclined. Or serve it atop a bed of kale for a vegan superfood knockout.
[Photo by Michael Procopio via Bay Area Bites]](http://24.media.tumblr.com/374c41e21230491bfb276b0d9fc3461f/tumblr_mf8pouI5Ft1qzq14lo1_500.png)
It’s nearly time for winter break (!!!), which means it is “only posting stuff that makes me happy,” which translates to “good food and cuddly animals.” In that vein, here is Michael Procopio’s beet and orange salad, to fight the Seasonal Affective Disorder and celebrate the winter solstice that will (eventually) bring the sunshine back to us.
Get the recipe at Bay Area Bites! Though I remain ambivalent about beets, this salad is gorgeous. You might add some pomegranate seeds for extra-fancy winter produce points, should you be so inclined. Or serve it atop a bed of kale for a vegan superfood knockout.
[Photo by Michael Procopio via Bay Area Bites]
∞ posted at 11:30 by seriousmeaveness 
11/29/2012
Proposition 37 failed, but we can still figure out what’s going on with our produce. Mike Kahn made this three-minute video about Price Lookup Codes (PLUs)—the digits on the stickers on your grocery-store produce—to teach us how to read them and use them to learn how a food was grown.
Bay Area Bites also has some more information on how to identify genetically modified and engineered foods.
My favorite organic food? Pepple’s Donuts, duh.
[Photo via donut king Josh Levine’s Instagram, which you should follow because DONUTS]
∞ posted at 09:00 by seriousmeaveness
11/20/2012
Oh yeah, it’s Stephanie Hua’s friend Jen’s Auntie Louise’s cranberry jalapeño relish, and you need to have it on your table this week. It’s the perfect Thanksgiving fusion dish! And it’s totally gorgeous, which is half the reason we eat cranberries, right? They’re always so pretty.
∞ posted at 07:30 by seriousmeaveness
11/15/2012
![Roasted pumpkin seeds three ways with our pal Jerry James Stone!
You guys aren’t afraid of roasting pumpkin seeds, right? My ma roasts hers plain to feed to her chinchilla, but we humans aren’t usually thrilled by such unembellished snacks. JJS has got three spice mixes for your pepitas: salted, maple and sea salt, and coffee and chili (ooh).
And a video, in case you’re better at watching than reading:
[Can’t see the video? Watch it on Vegansaurus.com!]
Every part of the pumpkin! Because nobody puts pumpkin guts in their vegetable scraps stock!](http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mdfvjxkEIN1qzq14lo1_500.jpg)
Roasted pumpkin seeds three ways with our pal Jerry James Stone!
You guys aren’t afraid of roasting pumpkin seeds, right? My ma roasts hers plain to feed to her chinchilla, but we humans aren’t usually thrilled by such unembellished snacks. JJS has got three spice mixes for your pepitas: salted, maple and sea salt, and coffee and chili (ooh).
And a video, in case you’re better at watching than reading:
[Can’t see the video? Watch it on Vegansaurus.com!]
Every part of the pumpkin! Because nobody puts pumpkin guts in their vegetable scraps stock!
∞ posted at 06:30 by seriousmeaveness
11/01/2012
Bay Area Bites has a super-sweet recipe for pickled jalapeños, which are vegan by default and also one of the world’s greatest foods. Not just sour, not just salty, but vegetal and SPICY, it is truly wonderful.
Don’t want to bother with canning? You can do this in the fridge! Refrigerator-pickled produce is a simple and easy way of preserving food you have no intention of letting sit around longer than a week, because it is too delicious to wait for.
∞ posted at 11:30 by seriousmeaveness
09/28/2012
Jerry James Stone presents: How to cut and store an avocado! »
It seems like a total duh, right? But avocados are beautiful, we love Jerry James Stone, and over the past couple weeks I’ve seen like three avocado halves in the fridge at my office turning brown and shriveling because whoever is using them doesn’t know how to store them properly. This must be stopped!
Thankfully, JJS has the answer:
[Can’t see the video? Watch it on Vegansaurus.com!]
Genius, right? Produce! Eat it, love it, care for it.
[Photo by femme run via Flickr]
(Source: blogs.kqed.org)
∞ posted at 08:42 by seriousmeaveness
09/12/2012
Drink this now: a spicy margarita with jalapeño and cilantro, from our pal Jerry James Stone!
The recipe is at Bay Area Bites, along with this video!
You know, sometimes I think Vegansaurus should have a cooking show, though the only one of us who writes her own recipes is Jenny. Maybe I could just make her drinks (such as this tremendous spicy margarita!) while she magics up some Heaven Dogs. Actually, that seems kind of genius, right?
∞ posted at 14:00 by seriousmeaveness
07/25/2012
Artichoke chips! From the people who brought you the lavender-mint mojito!
Jerry James Stone at Bay Area Bites calls it “a vegetarian version of the internet’s bacon meme,” which surprises me, because I have never heard of it and I read a fair amount of vegan food blogs. Tempeh bacon? Duh. Eggplant bacon? Made it, loved it. But artichoke chips? In everything, on everything, let’s eat crispy fried artichokes all the time? I could get behind it!
If you’ve never made them, check out this recipe (with helpful video). If you have, why didn’t you tell us about artichoke chips? They seem brilliant!
∞ posted at 13:34 by seriousmeaveness
07/16/2012
![Let’s drink with Bay Area Bites! This is Jerry James Stone’s strawberry-mint mojito, made with blonde ale, and it looks gorgeous. Mixing beer with liquor seems like delicious danger, which we are totally into. Taking a little risk is good for the constitution.
We’ve got the local strawberries, home-grown mint, and rum; you bring the ale and we’ll have cocktails on the patio, yes please!
[photo by Jerry James Stone for Bay Area Bites]](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m6zbr2vJdb1qzq14lo1_500.jpg)
Let’s drink with Bay Area Bites! This is Jerry James Stone’s strawberry-mint mojito, made with blonde ale, and it looks gorgeous. Mixing beer with liquor seems like delicious danger, which we are totally into. Taking a little risk is good for the constitution.
We’ve got the local strawberries, home-grown mint, and rum; you bring the ale and we’ll have cocktails on the patio, yes please!
[photo by Jerry James Stone for Bay Area Bites]
∞ posted at 08:29 by seriousmeaveness
06/20/2012
It’s summer, let’s preserve some produce! »
You guys know how I’m all enamored of DIY and bartering with your neighbors and making your neighborhood your actual community? I know, I’m so on trend right now! The latest cookbook to cater to our 21st century homesteading obsessions is Marisa McClellan’s Food in Jars: Preserving in Small Batches Year-Round, and I want it SO BAD.
Bay Area Bites has an interview with McClellan that features her recipes for apricot jam and pickled okra, as well as dates when she’ll be signing books and holding canning classes in the Bay Area. She sounds appealingly pragmatic, and I really wish I could attend one of these events. Maybe you can? I’m totally making refrigerator pickles this weekend. They don’t sound any more complicated that cold-brewed coffee, which I drink constantly now that it’s warm in the suburbs. And with all the extra storage room (closets! garages! attics!) there’s no reason not to put up a bunch of delicious summer produce for savoring during the leaner months. Not that it’s ever lean in California, but we do have growing seasons.
What do you think? Are you creating your own Little Apartment on the Prairie? Or is all this for us deluded, un(der)employed suckers? Who even has the time to make jam out of everything except people who don’t have jobs? I have some time for it, but that’s because the only other thing I do is work, and I don’t have kids or fun to take up my time. Just a new kitchen project every weekend. And canning seems practical! Think of all the homespun sack-garments I’ll be able to trade for my strawberry jam and spicy bread-and-butter pickles!
[photo by Jessica via Flickr]
∞ posted at 07:56 by seriousmeaveness
