Quinoa Pesto-Asparagus -Tomato Salad

I've come up with this idea when my sister had a pesto noodle salad in Amsterdam. As good as my idea was I chose a rather bad day to make the salad — I had too little pine nuts, used too little garlic and the tomatoes tasted like nothing.



But I'll definitely make this again! This time with the perfect pesto and sundried tomatoes! This is exactly the flavor it was lacking.

Tofu Tortellini with Spinach, Broccoli & Zucchini and Nutmeg Sauce

Another perfect example for my I-don't-really-know-what-I'm-cooking-here-until-when-it's-done / random-throwing-together-of-appealing-ingredients-found cooking.



I cooked up a recent purchase: multi-colored tortellini with a tofu filling. They were nice, but the filling was a little bland.

Then I checked the freezer and settled on a cup of spinach and six broccoli florets although the brussels sprouts were quite appealing, too. Then I cut half a zucchini and put it all into a pot. Seasoned it with nutmeg, onion & garlic powder (can you tell I was being lazy? =p), salt and pepper and decided that I needed a sauce to go with it. So I quickly remembered the cream cheese in my fridge and veganized a quick unfancy version of the sauce I usually used to eat my tortellinis with.
One Tbsp. of cream cheese mixed with a little less than 1/4 cup soy milk. Seasoned with lots of nutmeg and oregano, some salt and pepper et voilá!

I have some blueberries in my fridge slowly starting their way torwards death so I'm thinking Oat Squares (Veggie Girl raved about them), scones (I've wanted to make them ever since la mistress mexicana Jennifer gave me the recipe) or good old-fashioned muffins like Alice made a few days ago! Mhh, so many things to choose from.

This blog world is just too full of inspirational people with amazing skills!
Not that it's a bad thing, ha ha! It just makes it so damn hard to decide =p

Wise words, Ice Cream & Snacks

When I went to the Karneval der Kulturen on sunday I spotted a man in the crowd wearing a black t-shirt that quoted Mahatma Gandhi.

"I abhor vivisection with my whole soul. I detest the unpardonable slaughter of innocent life in the name of science and humanity so-called, and all the scientific discoveries stained with innocent blood I count as of no consequence."

That convinced me, once again, that I'm doubtlessly practicing the right lifestyle.

That said, my boyfriend's getting more and more used to it. Yesterday his friend told him about a place here in Berlin where you can get vegan Döner and he was like "I instantly thought of you! We should go there!" Yep, he knows how to make me smile!
Of course we're still arguing every now and then. He still insists that you can not and were not meant to live without meat (riiiight...). He's become more open to the points I make though.
And since I don't feel like I have enough arguments I figured it's way about time to buy The China Study(and while I'm at it I think I'll get Eat to Live, too). Too bad it's not available in German, because everytime I try to make a statement to someone even now I don't know how to translate it into German so it'll make as much as an impact as it would in English. Know what I mean?

Onto the food, I had a yummy rye bread roll this morning with soy cream cheese (finally I found one, shouldn't use it for baking though because it's rather salty), basil, arugula, tomato and cucumber.



Yesterday I had half a bread roll with cream cheese and a tomato and bell pepper to go with it.



My mom bought these ice cream waffle "bowls" a few days ago and I considered them to contain egg or butter or something, but they're completely vegan =D
You can see Tofutti's Mango & Passionfruit and Chocolate ice cream(you were right Ruby, it's delicious) with crunchy amaranth cereal on top.



I realize that this is rather a snack post, but I've cooked up this dish again because it's just too yummy so that's why there's nothing new.
Hopefully tonight =)

Another quick Tortilla dinner & chinese inspired Veggie Rice Stir-Fry

More groceries! I'm really in the mood for grocery shopping at the moment it seems..

The crunchy amaranth cereal is fantastic in yogurts and the dried mango strips... well, I ate them all yesterday and felt sick because it were too many but they were seriously too good to stop =p



Also, I finally bought Hoisin sauce as you can see in the first picture! After I got back from Amsterdam I ate at this chinese place in Kreuzberg twice. They have all kinds of dishes, sushi, vegetarian dishes and even burgers that can be ordered vegan with tofu instead of fish.

I chose their veggie rice which was so good that I got the same thing twice. The sauce was delicious!! And they topped the whole thing off with pine nuts... yumm!!!

So I recreated the dish with much more veggies of course. I failed to get soy sprouts, but this was a fantastic light and very satisfying dinner nonthless.



I used a handful of baby asparagus and broccoli, 1/4 yellow and red bell pepper, 1/4 cup scallions, 1/2 carrot and pine nuts. I used to be not too fond of pine nuts and their flavor for a very long time and when I tried them this time the taste kind of reminded me of the fake ham flavor potato chips used to have... odd =p



Then on another day I had wanted to make a nice and finally more complete than usual mexican dinner à la me(meaning it's usually just inspired and I always end up making up my own variation to my liking anyway)tonight... with rice, guacamole and whatnot. But plans for tonight changed & I was left with very little time so I just cooked up a quick garlic-onion-black-and-white-bean-peperoni-tomato something and used roasted baby asparagus in it and as "the sprinkle" of my salad. Along with the new balsamico-basil dressing I bought (all the way to the left).

I used to roast it with some olive oil, but now I just wash it and put it right into the oven for about 20 minutes and it turns out perfectly.

Tortillas to the rescue!

Yesterday I did some shopping and stocked up on things to have on hand when I don't feel like cooking or don't have much time. Meaning jarred stuff like a regular tomato basil sauce, baked beans in tomato sauce, spicy peperoni tomato sauce, sweet corn, lentils etc.
And after a long long time without it I got soy yogurt again: blueberry and raspberry vanilla, mhhh!

And you can not believe how I beamed with joy when I looked into the stores freezer and saw TOFUTTI ICE CREAM! I literally could've danced! Ha ha, I felt like grabbing the person standing next to me "They have vegan ice cream!!! WOOOHOOO!" just to have someone to share my joy with, even if they don't give a damn =p Finally I can have ice cream again and it's the perfect timing as it's getting pretty hot here. I've been wearing skirts the last three days and I'm usually someone who's always cold so that really says something ;)

Anyway, I settled on mango and passionfruit (will have to get chocolate and strawberry too when there's free space in the freezer again). It's delicious!!! I had actually planned to ask my boyfriend tonight if he'd like some mango ice cream and serve it to him with fresh mango and pomgrenate to see what he'd say (without telling him that it was vegan ice cream of course), but you can obviously tell that it's not dairy ice cream. So sadly no fooling today!

But I'll have this fruity treat for sure and I'll just shove a spoon with a big mango chunk in his mouth and see if he'll be able to get over himself and and ask for his own portion. Oh the evil plan, ha ha!

So anyway, after grocery shopping and cleaning out my cupboards I was happy about the fact that I still had tortillas and could use my new purchases.
Sadly I can't seem to find whole wheat tortillas anywhere which really bothers me. But these worked just aswell for a quick dinner. The lamb's lettucce I had meant to use had gone bad already so the tortilla was rather plain, but still filling and satisfying.

Baked beans mixed with a spicy peperoni sauce, seasoned with oregano & pepper, followed by fresh bell pepper strips, tomatoes and sweet corn.



The addition to my boyfriend's was a thin layer of the spicy sundried tomato-walnut paste under the beans and on top and whole peperoni inside. His was the hot version, mine the "better safe than sorry" mild version =p



My boyfriend told me he had a phase where he bought cans of baked beans and ate them plain all the time, all day long. Ha ha, so I'll definitely buy these more often!

Tonight I'll make pretty much the same, but take more time for the preparation. I have to use my avocado so guacamole will be made and I'll pimp the bean-peperoni sauce a little with fresh herbs and onions and garlic. And maybe unfreeze some rice and add more veggies (I'm thinking grilled... yummm, I love that pan!).

Adopting!

For a while now I have been thinking about adopting a dog.

Reasons for why I haven't so far were that I was still at a school where it would've been impossible to bring a dog.
I would never get a dog if I wasn't 100% sure that I would be able to take care of it 24/7 or have a very reliable person I could trust would take good care of him/her in case I needed to go somewhere where I wouldn't be able to bring a dog. Too little time is the reason why most people give their dogs to shelters.

I love cats, too. And I have wanted one since forever as they do not need constant care the way dogs do which would've freed me from worrying about what to do with it when I was out of the house for a few hours, say at school.
But when I still lived with my parents I couldn't have one because my sister and dad are allergic. When I moved out I lived with my girlfriend, also allergic. And now I'm with Hendrik who is allergic, too. I think the universe doesn't want me to have a cat, tsss!

Anyway, the reason why I bring this up is that I'm doing an internship at the moment and I could bring a dog to work. After the internship I'll finish my studies at my school that - you guessed it - allows you to bring your dog. It was so adorable, last summer there were at least four dogs running around outside!

That said I don't have to worry about where to find a reliable person anymore either. My best girlfriend has a dog herself and was like "I would watch your dog all the time, no problem!" and my boyfriend who is crazy about dogs would probably want to keep him or her =p

So now I've been browsing the website from the Berlin shelter and have found a few dogs. And I totally fell for this little fella!

His name is Kalle, he's a 4-year old dachshund mix and has epilepsy. The shelter provides lifelong free care and medicine because of that. Now I'm wondering what it's like if a dog has epilepsy. But god, look at him! How could you not just want to wrap him up in your arms and provide him a loving new home?


This one is Jenny, also a 4-year old. She was found.


And that's Jessy, five years old. Also given away because her owners had too little time.


So I am planning to visit the animal shelter very soon. Of course it would be great to have a puppy, raise it and see it grow up. But when there are so many dogs in shelters who really need a home I believe it's the only way to go!
Imagine being an orphan, not getting adopted because you're "too old" and "not cute" anymore... Okay, it's a different thing if adopting a child is not an option for you because you want your "own flesh and blood". But why a new puppy? You may see it grow up, but the own flesh and blood saying won't work here.
So you might aswell rescue a little soul waiting to get all the attention, care and love it needs and love it like it was your own!

Well, I'll keep you updated on this =)

Grilled Veggie Bagels, Sundried Tomato Zucchini Mix & Linguine with Pesto

Half the fun is getting there... even if it means you have to sit between bikes!



Amsterdam was so much fun! I went with my best friend, the one I made all the PB birthday treats for. He gets along perfectly well with my sister so we explored the city together and enjoyed lovely hours at Cafés & Bars and the Vondelpark of course, where I also spent my birthday lying in the sun!



Ha ha, loved it!



The parrots were there, too! I woke up, looked out of the window and was like "See, the parrots came to greet you!" "Huh, PARROTS???" Ha ha =p



I also experienced Queensday for the first time. Lovely, great weather, great music! Like a small Loveparade ;)



I did not eat out a lot though, because I had to watch my money. I got this Avocado & Tomato Bagel the first day we got there which was 4.40 or something and very tasty!





I spent lots of money at Albert Heijn, basically living on the typical soft toast-like bread that I spread with a tomato pasta sauce, ready-to-eat salad mixes and fresh tomatoes. Oh, and not to forget the tasty ontbijtkoek!

I was more than happy to come home and find a wrapped Veganomicon upon my birthday gifts =D
I was looking at the recipes and pictures going "Ohhh, I craved something like that all week!" at basically each and everything that contained veggies =p

So as much as I missed preparing my own meals I now miss my sister a whole lot and would happily go a week without vegetables again if it meant I could see her again.
Oh well, I'll see her in two months hopefully!



So after my craving for veggies and the rediscovered love for healthy bagels I finally used my grill pan I got at IKEA and it works so well, I can say I'm in love!

The grilled veggies: eet smakelig!!!



I marinated a sliced zucchini, asparagus, scallions, a can white beans, a jar roasted bell pepper and fresh mushrooms (for le boyfriend) in a Tbsp. olive oil, 3 or 4 cloves of minced garlic and lots of rosemary (fresh aswell as dried) and thyme.

With an everything bagel.



My whole-wheat sunflower seed bagel.





Het waar lekker!

Then I made this a few days ago. I don't know what I should call this. Stir-Fry? Side dish? Anyway, it was good ;)



Long grain white rice, wild rice and some special red rice which I can't remember the name of.
I used 1 zucchini, 1/2 cup asparagus and 1 cup sundried tomatoes cut into small pieces. I mixed the vegetables with 2 Tbsp. tomato paste and 3 heaping Tbsp. of a spicy sundried tomato-walnut paste I had bought, along with black olives marinated in garlic on top. This was pretty spicy! I liked the taste, but my stomach isn't used to even the slightest heat so I didn't feel too well after eating it. I gave the rest to my parents and they both liked it very much, it being spicy in particular! Seeing people happily eating my food and complimenting me always makes me wish I had my own vegan Café/Bistro =) Someday... he he!

After buying fresh basil again I finished off the whole plant in one sitting because I craved pesto. I bought whole wheat linguine because I was really in the mood for pasta.
As for the preparation... I had VwaV, HiaV and a vegetarian cookbook lying open looking at the recipes and in the end didn't follow one.



I used 3 1/2 cups basil, 2 cloves of garlic, 2 Tbsp. pine nuts and 3 Tbsp. grated almonds (estimated, I just tipped them into my blender from the bag) and about 1/3 cup water and a little salt.

Then I mixed under some zucchini sautéed in garlic and topped it off with fresh tomatoes!



This was exactly what I had needed! Pesto never fails to make my day when it's homemade. So much better than the jarred stuff!
The boyfriend ate it too. And you know what? He didn't say anything about the noodles. He HATES (better yet fears for a to me unknown reason) anything whole-wheat like so many people do. Just another proof that What the eye does not see, the heart does not grieve over. Hope the translater gave me the right saying here =p

It's good to be back! Hope everyone's doing good!