Curried Penne

After months of inactivity on the Blog I decided to share a new recipe with you. I stumbled upon this recipe while going through old issues of Vegetarian Times looking for some inspiration.

I’m tired of pasta and tomato-based sauces. Surely something else exists for pasta. I’m a fan of Indian cuisine and found this combination of pasta and Indian spices to be interesting.

This one was found in VT’s January 2007 issue, page 42. I’m posting the recipe as it was printed and I will then offer some changes which I will be making the next time I attempt this recipe. The original recipe was not suitable for vegans, so that has been corrected.

Curried Penne (Serves 4)

8 oz. whole-wheat penne pasta

3 Tbs. slivered almonds

1 Tbs. canola oil

1/2 onion, finely chopped (1/4 cup)

1/2 tsp. whole cumin seeds

1 small tomato, diced (about 1/2 cup)

1 1/2  tsp. mild curry powder

pinch cayenne

1 cup frozen peas, rinsed under hot water

1 cup low-fat buttermilk

2 Tbs. chopped cilantro

Directions:

1. Cook pasta according to package directions. Meanwhile, heat large skillet over medium heat. Add almonds, and toast 2 to 3 minutes, or until lightly browned, stirring frequently. Transfer to a small bowl.

2. Heat oil in skillet over medium-high heat. Add onion, and cook 2 minutes or until softened. Stir in cumin seeds, and cook 1 minute more, or until fragrant.

3. Add tomato, curry powder and cayenne. Cook 1 minute, or until liquid has evaporated. Add peas, and cook 1 minute more. Remove from heat, and stir in buttermilk.

4. Drain pasta, and transfer to large serving bowl. Toss with buttermilk sauce, top with cilantro and almonds, and serve.

Nutrition Per Serving: 348 calories, 13G Protein, 8.5G Total Fat (1G Sat Fat), 56G Carbs, 4 MG Chol, 433 MG Sodium, 9G Fiber, 8G Sugars

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And now for little changes that make this a new “rushed for dinner” quicky. This comes together very quickly once you have your ingredients ready to go, so definitely start the pasta before anything else.

Changes:

*Any pasta could be used, though the more corners it has, the more the sauce will cling to your pasta.

*Raw cashews (a pantry staple) can be used in place of the almonds. just chop them a bit before heating.

*A large tomato or two small tomatoes would be tasty, I hardly noticed the 1/2 cup that the recipe called for. Maybe a can of drained diced would work too?

*The cayenne can be left out entirely or used VERY sparingly as it almost overwhelmed the rest of the dishes flavor.

*Substitute 1 cup of soy milk and 1 tsp. white vinegar for the buttermilk (you could even leave out the vinegar as I’m not sure how much of a flavor difference that made in my dish).

If this sounds interesting to you, chance are you will really like the end result. It’s Indian pasta for cryin’ out loud, how can that be a bad thing, I ask? Let me know if you try this and what you think of it. Bon appetite.

Christmas Parties = Fending For Self

Yesterday I attended a holiday pot luck held in my office.

I have since learned to sign up to bring a vegan entree as I had to special order a subway 6-inch that would accommodate my empty belly.

I brought lemon drop cookies, at least the ones that didn’t burn, because I wanted my co-workers to taste delicous sweet goodness…as I’ve said, I’ve learned.

I think people might be turned off to anything considered different and not “normal”. The ones that did try the cookies very much enjoyed them. Should I have just been happy with that fact? Well I was, don’t get me wrong, but I wanted more people to actually try them.

My plate consisted of a subway 6-inch, salt & vinegar chips, green olives & a tossed salad. It was delicious, but I felt like an outsider having to “order” a special sandwich…next time I’ll just bring a damn entree for all to enjoy.

Merry Christmas!

What does a woman have to do to lose some weight?

I’m starting to get seriously depressed with my inability to lose weight?!?

I understand, or at least I think I do, that I eat too much food. I have a very sedentary desk job but manage to exercise usually 6 days out of the 7 day week. I never go over 2000 calories a day, but it’s usually between 1600 & 1800 calories. I’ve converted my desk at work to a standing work station so I’m not on my ass all day.

My exercising is nothing wicked strenous, but it’s consistant. I’ve started slowly incorporating jogging into my exercise routine. The last time I went out I was able to jog for 9 mintues & 25 seconds of my 32 minute walk/jog around the local cemetery. Not a straight 9+ minutes, but a combined 9+ mintues. Still better than when I started. Do I need to walk an hour a day to see results?

Still not losing weight…

My husband and I went vegan, oh, probably 2-3 months ago now….and nothing has changed. You would think eating veggies and fruits would help a person lose some weight, right? That’s what I thought.

Genetics play a part, I’m sure, but I can’t pawn it all off on genetics. That wouldn’t be very nice of me (love you Mom) and would definately show me being in denial (what can I say, I love food).

I’ve thought about one of those “programs” (ie. Jenny Craig, Weight Watchers, Nutri-System…nevermind, not Nutri-System because their food looks aweful in the commercials) but I can’t bring myself to (again) pay someone to give me pre-packaged foods (I did Jenny Craig’s program over 10 years ago); also, I’m sure none of the programs offer a full vegan menu. I feel like I could probably work out a ”home” program like this on my own though it would take lots of planning and time I fear. I lack both patience and time. 

Has anyone out there had success doing losing weight on there own, being a vegan or a meat eater (makes no difference to me)? I would LOVE, LOVE, LOVE to hear from you and to hear what worked and how long it too you to notice real results. Was it more than just cardio and food; did you use weights or journal daily?

I am 5 feet tall and weigh 146 lbs. I want to lose 25 pounds and I want to shrink my rather large lower half (to put is mildly). Oh yeah and I want to do this NOW!

Any ideas?…and please be nice.    

Show me what ya got!

Creating A Backyard Oasis

Dave and I are putting up a picket fence for the front portion of our backyard to finally have a completely fenced in backyard. 5 years ago we talked about doing this and we’re just now getting around to it…why the delay? Excellent question…

We’ve spent a bit of time discussing our wishes for the perfect finished yard. I’m just not sure if we can get there.

I’m wondering why we decided to own a house really. There so much that goes into it. Maybe if I knew we would be here in 10 years I would see it differently, but I already know our goal is to MOVE to the other side of the country. We need to give our house curb appeal and make someone else fall in love with it…just like we did when we saw it for the first time…what the hell were we thinking?

I will post pictures of the back yard when it’s done…

7 Minutes 12 Seconds

7:12

This is the total amount of time I ran this morning during my lap around the cemetery. Whoohoo!

In looking back over the past few weeks this is more than a full minute over what I could do last Friday evening.

Even though I start the walk saying I’m not going to try to beat my last time…I can’t help but to really want to beat it. I’m competitive and this is the case even if I’m competing against myself. I will keep pushing myself.

I’m averaging 55 seconds of jogging during each burst. It used to be less than 30 seconds when I started this so I know somethings going on inside of me. I think today the one thing that kept me from running longer were my legs. My breathing was under control and I could have kept going but my legs started getting tired. They are still working on running longer.

I even think my face was not so red today.

Have a great weekend everyone!!!

Whole Foods

I was at the local Whole Foods today with Dave as we decided to stock up on some new staples while we were in the big city.

We ended up eating in their cafe which was jam packed with people at 12:30pm (great minds must think alike). We ended up each having falafel burgers with a side of the most delectable french fries I’ve had in about a year (sadly they’re not a staple any longer) and they offered to substitute the tzadziki sauce which is not vegan with a more acceptable Veganaise.

This was the first time we’d tried the veganaise and it is far superior to the Nasoya brand that we bought when we first decided to nix the dairy products. More on that later…

Well I got home from the Whole Foods and started surfing the Internet and reading blogs that I follow to see one blog posting about a giveaway for $40 in Whole Foods gift certificates…Love It!

Go to the following blog http://www.feedmeimcranky.com/ and answer the question she is asking about healthy living and she will enter you in this drawing. It’s on Friday July 10th, so hurry!

Toys and Husbands

My husband is driving me nuts right now with a new toy he purchased at the local Goodwill store.

He is into electronics and “circuit bending” so he hit the jackpot when found a kids toy that even in it’s original state is quite annoying…probably why it was at the Goodwill in the first place.

This “toy” is now repeating the same phrases and in different tones as I type…I’m hearing cows too.

Happy vacation!

Let them eat cake…

I decided to try baking, vegan-style, by making a batch of Chocolate Cupcakes with Fake Cheesecake topping. What the hell was I thinking?

Some might say I failed miserably. I think it’s debatable.

The chocolate cupcake was good enough, pretty chocolaty, not too spongy, not too gooey moist. They were the best looking cupcakes I’ve ever made rising higher than anticipated. Worthy of a bake shop I think…(heads getting bigger as I type)…

However the cheesecake filling was, how do I say…like soup?

It was still delicious in flavor but I needed to use a spoon to drizzle it over my cupcake when it should have been able to be spread into my cupcake after removing the cupcake top to make a lid of sorts.

Don’t get me wrong, these were/are very delicious cupcakes. Dave and I will have no trouble at all finishing them over the course of our vacation.

I’ve just learned a lesson.

Baked products are very picky things.

If a recipe calls for butter softened that doesn’t mean the same thing as Smart Balance softened (i.e. don’t let it sit out too long to soften because it will never again look, or act, the way it did before you softened it).

I tried putting my cheesecake topping mixture into the fridge to thicken it…didn’t work.

I tried putting it into the freezer to thicken it…didn’t work.

I added more confectioners sugar to try to thicken it…didn’t work, but now it tastes better, as if that was possible.

So I’ve resigned myself to just enjoying the flavor of the cheesecake topping and using this as a stepping stone for the next time I attempt baking. I think I much prefer cooking as I can easily modify to my liking and not based on the science of it all.

Live and learn.

Jogging Update

I’ve kept at it and my body is playing nicely.

To date I’ve only been out jogging 7 times. In between days that I jog I usually either rest, use machines indoors such as the treadmill or the elliptical or I just walk outside (no jogging). A girls gotta rest her weary legs sometimes.

When I go out to jog I only go to the cemetery (a 4 minute walk from my house) with my husband in tow. He now carries his watch that has a timer function so he can time our stretches of jogging. I am curious how I am progressing so this helps me see concretely that my body is becoming conditioned.  I can feel it too.

We’re usually out of the house for a total of 33-37 minutes. That includes our warm up (4 minutes to the cemetery) and cool down (4 minutes walk home). My bursts of jogging are increasing in frequency and I think a bit in duration. It obviously depends on the day and how my body feels. Some days are better than others.

When Dave first started timing our jogging segments my time totaled 5 mintues 8 seconds. Now I’m up to jogging a total of 6 minutes 35 seconds. This might not sound like a lot to some people, but before I started doing this walk/jog thing on (6/17/09) I was only a walker. I’d never jogged before in my life. Trust me, I have the butt to prove it!

So I’m really psyched that I am not getting so out of breath as I was when I first started this and my legs aren’t getting as tired as they were in the beginning. My face still gets wicked RED. I think I’m going to start jogging without a hat and see if that helps my head stay cool.  

I will keep posting on my progress….Happy belated 4th everyone!!

Cajun Crusted Tempeh

I found this great recipe in a Robin Robertson cookbook called Vegan Planet. If you like to cook I highly recommend this cookbook as there are over 400 recipes in it and each that I’ve tried have been delicious. Here you go.

Place in a shallow bowl equal amounts of: (perhaps 1tsp each)

Paprika, dried thyme, garlic powder, onion powder & brown sugar.

Add 1/2 of the previous amounts of: (perhaps 1/2 tsp each)

salt & cayenne

Poach a brick of tempeh (cut into sticks) in simmering water for 10 mintues. Remove and pat dry. Brush oil onto tempeh sticks and dredge in the spice mixture. (Fingers will be messy during the entire process.) Use fingers to help coat tempeh with spices.

Heat 1-2 Tbs. canola oil in large skillet (Med-high heat). Place tempeh in the heated skillet and fry for 5 mintues then flip and fry amother 5 mintues. Towards the end your pan will get really hot and the tempeh might start smoking…

Done.