Lemon-Chickpea Stir-Fry

I really have been cooking lately, I just haven’t been taking pictures half the time, and when I do take pictures I don’t post. I’ve also been pretty lazy though, it was my birthday so even one night my boyfriend cooked for me, which is something he hasn’t done since we moved in together (2 years ago!) Anyway, I decided to make something involving chickpeas, but I didn’t want anything even slightly resembling tomato or soy sauce for once, so I went with lemon juice. I should admit though, my boyfriend did end up adding soy sauce to his, but I think that was mostly because I used white rice rather than brown and he isnt much of a fan of white rice.

Lemon-chickpea stir-fry

1 Can chickpeas rinsed well
1 Cup frozen spinach
1 Cup mixed vegetables of your choice
½ Onion diced
¼ Cup diced green peppers
2-3 Cloves garlic
3 tablespoons lemon juice
Salt to taste
A little oil

1. Heat some oil in a large skillet
2. Add the chickpeas and onions and cook until chikpeans start to brown
3. Add spinach, vegetables, and garlic cook until vegetables are to your liking
4. Add lemon juice and taste
5. Add salt if needed
6. Serve on rice, yum
7. Enjoy!

Personal Pizza

One of my favorite meals to cook is pizza! I have always loved pizza, but I don’t love how greasy they are sometimes. So I make a very delicious, rather nutritious meal instead. I didn’t have many ingredients for pizza toppings this time, but usually I use a lot more. My favorite topping for this is broccoli, its really perfect! Unfortunately I ran out, I eat a lot of broccoli… You can put any toppings you like on here, be creative! I also add crushed red peppers to mine, but not his so its not in the recipe.

2 tortillas (I really like spinach wraps)
2 cups of cheese (You can certainly use less, I really like cheese…)
About 4 tablespoons of tomato sauce (You can use more, I don’t like a lot of sauce)
Toppings
¼ cup spinach
¼ cup diced onions
¼ cup chopped mushrooms
¼ cup grated potato
¼ cup diced green peppers
½ cup broccoli
2 cloves garlic minced
Little oil

1. Sauté onions in a little oil for a few minutes
2. Add mushrooms, green peppers, potato, broccoli, and garlic
3. Cook at medium for about 10 minutes
4. Place tortilla out on shallow pan, usually only fits one per pan.
5. Spread around tomato sauce in the center of the tortilla but leave ½- 1 inch around the edges
6. Put ¾-1 cup of cheese on each “pizza” also avoiding that outer edge
7. Sprinkle the toppings on top of the cheese (Its hot, I use my spatula to do it)
8. Bake in the oven at 350 for 10 minutes or so, the cheese melts in 5 but I cook it an extra 5 minutes for crispier crust.)
9. Enjoy!

Veggie "corn dogs"

Last night I made one of my boyfriends favorites, corn dogs. I try to avoid using the fryer too often, so this is a bake method. I really wish I had mini muffin pans for this to make corn dog bites, because they would be so much cuter. They are still pretty neat if all you have is regular muffin pans like me though! You can use any corn bread recipe you like really, or even those boxes of corn bread mix work quite well too.





Veggie corn dogs

1 cup flour
1 cup cornmeal
1/3 cup sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 egg
1/4 cup vegetable/canola oil
1 cup milk
3-4 Vegetarian hot dogs

1. Mix flour, cornmeal, sugar, baking powder and salt
2. Stir in the egg, oil and milk, it will remain a little lumpy, thats ok
3. Cut up hot dogs into about 1 inch rounds, stick an end into the muffin pan and cut so that it is just a little shorter then the top of the pan.
4. Slice each round in half, unless your using mini muffins then leave it
5. Pour the batter into the greased pans to about half full
6. Add hot dogs around the center of the muffin pan, if your using mini muffins just put one in the center, if your using regular pans you will need to put 3-4 pieces in there.
7. Spoon any remaining batter over the hot dogs, just dont go over 3/4 full. Also, its ok if you dont have enough to go over the hot dogs.
8. Bake at 400 for 20 minutes
9. Let cool for about 10 minutes before removing them, and enjoy!

Sometimes, I'm lazy...

...but it tastes so good.

Ok, I know I haven't been posting as much as I had said I would. I've been struggling with the question, do I admit that I'm super lazy sometimes, and eat super simple, highly processed foods? To be honest, I am a college student, sometimes I just dont have the time or energy to think of a good meal, so I cheat. I'm pretty sure I'm not alone on this though, so I figured I would go ahead and admit it, and even share some of my not-so-health conscious meals with you guys.

For starters, my very favorite jarred pasta sauce is Vodka Sauce my Newman's Own. Usually I wouldn't list a brand name, especially since I usually buy generic because its generally all made in the same factory anyway, and I'm a college student, enough said. However, I will always make an exception with Newman's Own, because they are a GREAT company, they donate their profits after taxes to multiple charities. They have given $250 million to charities already! And on top of that their Vodka Sauce and Sockarooni rock my socks, it is the only brand I will buy, I haven't tried anything I haven't liked yet. The other night we had a jar of Vodka Sauce over whole wheat penne noodles with some bread.

Another quick and easy meal I make every once in a while is a veggie burger topped with cheese, tomato, lettuce, and pickles served on the big slices of Texas garlic toast. It has so much flavor, my mouth waters just thinking about it. Be warned though, it is messy!

I would not recommend eating like this on a regular basis, but occasionally, who could say no?

Fast and Easy Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies

I can not claim these wonderful cookies; I got this recipe off Vegweb.com. They are called Happy Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies, and they were my first ever attempt at vegan cookies. I wanted to bring a dessert to the vegan potluck I went to on Sunday so I made these. I thought they are a little oily, but everyone raved about them, so maybe it was just me.

Vegan chocolate chip cookies

2 cups unbleached flour

2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp.salt (optional)

Vegan chocolate - put in as many as you like I love chocolate so I used around ¾ cup!

3/4 cup sugar (original recipe is 1 cup but the chocolate chips are sweet enough)

1/2 cup canola or vegetable oil (I used a little less, you could also substitute margarine)

1 teaspoon vanilla (optional)
Cinnamon to taste (optional) I used about 1 tbs

1/4 cup water


1. Mix together flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon and chocolate chips.
2. In a separate bowl mix the oil, sugar and vanilla.
3. Add the water to the wet mixture
4. Pour the wet mixture into they dry mixture and mix into its all moist, you don’t want to mix too much though
5. Bake at 350 for 4 minutes then rotate the pans and cook for another 4 minutes or so
6. The cookies will be soft, but trust me, give them 5-10 minutes and they will harden up. Oven times do vary though, so watch them.
7. I know they are light colored, don’t do what I did and try to broil them to brown them, it is not cute, and broilers will burn in a minute.

Tofu Noodle Stir-fry

Ok, so this meal is more of creation in designed to use the very minimal ingredients I had before I could go grocery shopping. I will admit, it is not pretty, but it was really tasty, and could easily be made more aesthetically pleasing with different vegetables, but I was out. I don’t know how universal this recipe will be, because I don’t know how available shredded white tofu is in your area, but I buy mine at the local Asian market. Use any vegetables you have on hand, if I had carrots I would have chosen that over peas. I should admit now too, I don’t actually measure how much spice and oil I put into something, I taste as I go, so most of this isn’t exact.

Tofu noodle stir fry

1 8 oz package of shredded white tofu
1 Can of peas
¼ Onion, diced
¼ Cup mushrooms
2 Tbs sesame oil
3 Tbs (low sodium) Soy sauce (Again, add slowly, taste as you go)
1 Tbs tahini (optional)
Salt as needed (really shouldn’t be)
Additional oil as needed


1 Sauté onions and mushrooms in a little oil until tender
2 Drain the can of peas and add them to the onions and continue to lightly sauté at medium heat
3 Boil shredded white tofu in water for about 3 minutes
4 Drain tofu and it to the vegetable mixture
5 Add sesame oil, soy sauce, and tahini to taste
6 Cook for about 5 more minutes and enjoy!

Vegetarian Chili

Without TVP ...................................... With TVP

Last night we had a filling vegetarian chili. This is a super easy version of “homemade chili.” The recipe is completely vegan as well, unless you like sprinkling some cheese on top while it is cooling in your bowl as we did. We also enjoyed eating this with a few slices of buttered bread, but that was only because we were out of crackers.

Vegetarian Chili

1 can pinto beans drained
1 can red beans drained
1 can southwestern corn drained (regular corn works too, just adds a little extra)
1 can diced tomatoes (really any can of tomatoes should work ok)
1 can tomato sauce (For less tomato flavor don’t drain the beans or corn and leave this out)
1/2 onion diced
1 green pepper diced
About 2 medium carrots diced
3 cloves of garlic (or to suit your tastes)
2 tbs chili powder
1 tbs ground cumin
1 tbs paprika (optional)
¼ cup sliced mushrooms (optional)
¾ cup of TVP (optional)
Salt as needed
Olive oil as needed

1. Sauté your onions, garlic, and carrots until they start to get soft in a little olive oil.
2. Add green peppers, mushrooms and chili powder and sauté for about 5 more minutes.
3. Add the can of diced tomatoes, and your beans, tomato sauce, corn, and the remainder of your seasonings.
4. Cook on medium heat, covered, for about 20 minutes.
5. Stir in TVP and cook for an additional 10 minutes to soak up the flavors.
6. Enjoy!