It would have been really easy to go ahead and make a pizza, but I was already planning on a soup for dinner. I’ve been doing a soup dinner once a week lately, and find that it’s a really good way to get a lot of vegetables into my diet. I was really just looking for something delicious to dip into it. So here is my uber simple recipe for vegan foccaccia. Serve it with soup or pasta, or even bake it up for guests as an appetizer. HSH Foccaccia

1/4 bag off HSH pizza dough (or make your own or just buy Trader Joes’)

2 sprigs of fresh Rosemary

2 cloves of garlic, thinly sliced

olive oil

sea salt

1. Separate the dough into two pieces and roughly form it into 1 inch thick round disks. If it looks like shit, just call it foccaccia rustica. Be careful not to push the dough down, just stretch it. I just found out that they key to good dough is apparently not to flatten it into nothing.

2. Sprinkle one clove’s worth of garlic slices and one sprig of rosemary on each one.

3. Indulge with a spray of olive oil, but keep it short because this is supposed to be a healthy side dish.

4. Sprinkle with a pinch of sea salt. I use this incredibly fancy french blend in a grater with a bunch of herbs. I bought it at this weird gift shop underneath the llouve and I feel very very important when I use it.

I’m crazy about pancakes for breakfast, and I like to play on a classic recipe by adding new ingredients into the mix. Last week, I added fresh blueberries and a few chocolate chips, and they were delicious. They were, in fact, so delicious and sweet that I went without maple syrup or earth balance on top of them. I’ve made a couple of adjustments to my old pancake recipe, so I’m reprinting it here. Feel free to experiment on your own with different add-ins. I’m thinking about pureed banana next time.Blueberry Chocolate Chip Pancakes

5/8 c. whole wheat pastry flour

1 tsp. vegan sugar

1 tsp. baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

1/2 TBSP egg replaces

2 TBSP water

3/4 c. unsweetened almond milk

cinnamon

1 TBSP chocolate chips

1/4 c. blueberries, tossed in flour to coat

1. Mix all of the dry ingredients together and then add the almond milk and water.

2. Stir in the chocolate chips and fold in the blueberries.

3. Heat a pan over medium and pour the batter out into your desired pancake size. The batter is thin, so you may have to use a spoon to evenly distribute the chocolate chips and blueberries, but it will rise while it’s cooking.

4. Cook for about a minute, or until golden brown, and then flip.

Sprouted Broccoli and Gnocchi

(serves 2)

2 cups sprouted broccoli

fresh ground black pepper

3 cloves garlic

pinch of salt (optional and I left it out)

packaged frozen gnocchi

1. Fill a large saucepan with water and bring it to a boil. Trim down your broccoli sprouts and dump them into the water. Let them boil for about five minutes.

2. While the broccoli is cooking, chop the garlic and add it to a frying pan over medium-high heat with 2 tablespoons of the broccoli water. Add the gnocchi to the water.

3. Transfer the broccoli to the frying pan and cook it over medium heat, stirring frequently and adding broccoli water as needed.

4. After 5 minutes, the gnocchi should float to the top of it’s pan and the broccoli should look sauteed-ish. Using a slotted spoon, pull out the gnocchi and toss it into the frying pan. Mix well and season with fresh ground black pepper and a pinch of salt. Yum.

9 am

Since I downed the cashew drink as soon as I woke up, 9 am was time for breakfast. I’m actually getting used to the green drink, and I can even taste the subtle differences between the different blends. The morning juice has lemon in it, which nicely compliments the hot water with lemon that I have at the beginning of every day.

11:00 am

I’ve decided that the seasonal juice is really awesome. I’ve also decided that while the cleanse gives me a lot of physical energy, I wish that it did more for me in the mental energy department. I have a lot of work to get through this week, and I really do need to be on my game. Maybe it’s the lack of caffeine?

1:00 pm

I decided on another quarter avocado for lunch today, because I was absolutely craving avocado. It was delicious and it got me thinking that when I finally get back on bread, I’m going to experiment with using avocado instead of earth balance. It’s all healthy fat, so it’s got to be better for me than empty calories, amirite?

3:30 pm

I realized that I completely forgot my third juice of the day, and I was a little late in drinking it. But it was a good sign that I forgot my juice, because it meant I was caught up in work. I actually do that a lot these days.

4:30

I also moved up the drinking of my lemonade, mostly because it tastes gross and I wanted to get it over with. Cayenne in lemonade? Not a good idea. Lavender or mint in lemonade? Awesomesauce.

6:30 pm

My last green juice of the fast. OK, I have an extra one in my fridge from yesterday, and I plan on drinking it tomorrow, but it’s still just a little sad to see one baby juice, forsaken by his juice friends.

*Thursday Morning Update*

I did my post cleanse weigh in and I can happily report that I lost 4.7 pounds total over the three day cleanse. Most of it was probably water, because I estimated that my calories deficit without working out was 1,200 a day on the fast.

8am

I woke up and weighed myself first thing. In my first day I lost 2.5 pounds, which I’m guessing was mostly water weight.  My green juice tasted much better the second time around, but my stomach was a little upset from not having enough food in it.

10am

I had juice #2 in a meeting. I tried to start my program earlier in the day because I planed to work out, which meant I would need to add in the pre and post-workout juice as well. My stomach was definitely a little off.

11am

I decided to drink 1/3rd of the post-workout juice, since it’s made out of almond milk. The one thing I don’t like about this cleanse is that it stacks your calories towards the end of the day, which is the exact opposite of how my body wants things to work. I continued to feel just a little foggy, much like I was on morning 1.

12pm

At this point, I broke down and busted out my emergency avocado (which is allowed on the cleanse, as well as lettuce, lemon juice, and vegetable broth). I had a quarter of it and it not only helped my stomach, but about an hour later I started to feel completely clear-headed.

2pm

The avocado filled me to such an extent that I didn’t even start my next green juice until about 2 oclock. By that point, my head had started to clear and I felt a huge burst of energy. It was a little weird, but I actually found myself wanting to leave work and go work out, which is usually something I dread.

4pm

Cayenne-lemonade time. This is by far the weirdest juice, and I can’t get past the little cayenne flakes that are floating around in it. My burst of physical energy started to subside, but my mental energy and ability to focus and concentrate was higher than it has been on the entire cleanse, which was a bonus. I got in a nice burst of productivity and got some serious work done.  I looked in the mirror, and I think that my skin might be getting a little oily, which is a perfectly natural side effect of a cleanse, as your body starts to release all the crap it’s been holding on to. At least I’m not getting weird BO, at least I hope I’m not. Someone would tell me, right?

6pm

I was winding down for the day, so I broke out the pre-workout drink. This meant skipping my third green juice of the day, but I’ve decided to save it for Thursday morning.  They call the workout juice  pre-shred and it consists of carrots, beets, celery, apple, and pear. I HATE raw carrots. I really have tried to like them in the past, but it’s never worked out for me. I get a nice hint of pear with this juice, but I can’t get over the carrot-y grossness. I’ve noticed that if I like a juice, it takes me longer to get through it. The pre-workout drink was finished in about 3 minutes, if that’s any indication of how quickly I wanted to get the experience over with.

Working Out

After work, I hit the 24 hour fitness for a little gym sess. That’s bro for session. While lifting weights, I noticed that my muscles were a little weaker than usual, so I lifted less weight than I usually do. This could be the juice or it could be that I am woefully out of shape. It makes me long for my gymnastics days when my body was a well-oiled machine. I’d love to go back, but I’m a little spooked after the tailbone injury that kept me in constant discomfort for almost a year. Maybe trapeze class? There’s a net to fall into there, so it’s probably much less dangerous. Anyway, in my current state I doubt that I would even be able to hold myself on the bar for any prolonged period of time. Oh how far I have fallen from the day that I actually climbed a rope to the top of the gym. After weights, I did a quick abs session which went the same as it always does. Then I ran on the elliptical. Again, I took it kind of easy but I did push myself to finish half an hour.

Post-Workout

In the car on the way home I enjoyed my almond post-workout drink. I already drank a third of it in the morning, so it wasn’t anything new. It’s a blend of almonds, water, cinnamon, and vanilla. I think there’s a little agave action up in there as well. I downed it pretty fast and followed with a full bottle of water to rehydrate.

8:30

I was torn on whether I even wanted the last drink of the day, a cashew vanilla drink that’s actually really creamy. I decided to have half of it, saving the other half for breakfast on Wednesday. I’m going to try to stave off the mid-morning fuzziness and stomach pains by stacking that high-calorie drink earlier in the day. Towards the end of the night, I started to really crave and look forward to solid food. It’s a good think I didn’t order that 4th day after all.

Wednesday Morning Update

I woke up this morning to weigh myself first thing and I’m down another point and a half, for a total of 4 pounds lost since starting the fast. Goal pants not only successfully button, but there is nothing spilling out over them. Other than that, I don’t see much difference in my face or the rest of my body.

Let me preface this by saying that Ritual Cleanse is not cheap. However, going to the farmers market and then spending my entire Sunday juicing would not have been cheap either, especially since I don’t own a juicer. I found a 20% off coupon which made $80 a day seem more reasonable, and I put in my order. I woke up at 6am on Monday morning to pick up my juice bag at a gym in Brentwood. You can have it delivered, but the company is in Irvine and their local delivery option comes between midnight and 6am, and I had no way to let them into my building except to wake up between midnight and 6am, and that just wasn’t going to happen. My 20 juices (6 per day and one set of the pre/post workout drinks) came in a stylish green cooler bag which was incredibly heavy.

9am

I brought my bag home and put my juices in the fridge. The instructions indicated that I should drink one juice every 2 hours, so I held out until 9AM to start. This was the hardest part because I like to have breakfast as soon as I wake up, and I tend to get an upset stomach if I don’t. The first juice of the day is a green juice with spinach, kale, romaine, celery, cucumber, green apple, and lemon. It’s like drinking a salad and was not a great introduction to the cleanse. The lemon was a nice kick, though. I managed to drink it, mostly by chugging, on my drive in to work. It settled my stomach’s demand for something to be put into it and I was off and cleansing!

11am

I brought my second juice to a meeting, and there is something really cool about carrying the bottle. It’s very interesting looking and they are all numbered 1-6. My second juice was a seasonal orange, blackberry, apple juice that is a pleasant pink color. It was a little tart for my tastes. At this point I had started to feel a little light headed, but the drink helped with that problem.  I was very surprised that I didn’t feel hungry. This juice I sipped, and I wasn’t done with it until 11:30.

1pm

At this point in the day, I had peed about 7 times. In addition to the juice, you’re supposed to drink a lot of water, and I’m shooting for a gallon every day. However, I’ve noticed that my senses of taste and smell are heightened, and I’ve developed a distaste for the filtered water we have at work. So, I walked down to Mrs. Winston’s and grabbed a liter of pellegrino. The bubbles tasted downright decadent. It was probably 1:30 before I started my next juice, and 2:15 when  finally finished it. Juice #3 is exactly like juice#1, except with ginger instead of lemon. I’ll admit that it was starting to go down easier.

4pm

Because it was taking me so long to drink the juices, it took me until 4 to be ready for my lemonade. It’s a blend of filtered water, lemon, cayenne pepper, and agave that reminds me of the master cleanse formula. It was ok, even though a lot of reviewers said that they loved it. The cayenne was a little weird in my lemonade, I’m not going to lie. At this point I was still feeling a little light-headed and just not very focused, but those are common side effects of fasting and it wasn’t that bad. I was able to get some work done at least.

6:00 pm

Juice #4 is another green juice, which I grabbed as I was finishing up work for the day. I still didn’t feel hungry, but this juice went down faster and easier than the first 2. Mostly I was feeling really proud of myself for sticking to the cleanse, and I could already feel my jeans loosening.

9:00 pm

The cleanse instructions encourage you to steam, so I just had to use one of my Christmas Burke Williams day passes. I went with a friend from work who is a very important member (she gets her own members-only dressing room!), and we steamed and soaked for about an hour. I also did half an hour in the hot tub while she got a massage. By the end of the night, I was starting to feel a little dizzy, despite drinking lots of water at the spa. It could have been the steam, but it also could have been the fact that I was late with juice #6. The final juice of the day has about three times as many calories as the others, and it’s a blend of cashews, water, vanilla, cinnamon, and nutmeg. They even leave chunks of cashew in it to make it creamier and the whole thing feels very substantial. Compared to the rest of my day, it felt like I had just finished a 6-course dinner and that I was too stuffed to move. I zoned out with some tv for a few hours and went to sleep around 11.

Sleep

Many reviewers promised that I would get an amazing night’s sleep on the cleanse. However, I woke up two or three times just to pee. Those episodes aside, it was an extremely restful night of sleep.

The Results

I woke up this morning and I was down two and a half pounds. Most of it was probably water weight that my body had been carrying due to the crap I’ve been eating since I got sick, but I feel incredibly light and energized. Two more days to go.

Fast-forward to 2012. My job means so much to me, and it feels great to be able to excel at something and be recognized and rewarded for it. I work with a talented group of people and I run my own team of project managers. The pace is addictive and the work is mentally stimulating. I consider myself successful and I know what I want out of my life, but it comes with a price. In other words, I don’t have any time to waste. This is why I’m becoming increasingly frustrated with two things: men and the stigma of being a vegetarian.

That’s right, I don’t even advertise myself as being a vegan. When I control for factors like intelligence, geographic desirability, and not having some vague job in “sales”, I’m working with a very small percent of the male population. Adding a big scarlet V to my name just seems like too much to ask for. I was even summarily dismissed by a guy because he “love(s) bacon so much that he could never date a vegan.” So I tell them I’m a vegetarian, because hey, I eat honey, I go to restaurants without asking too many questions,the occasional dessert isn’t a cardinal sin, and the Paris exception counts. You would think this would make things easier on me. It doesn’t.

There’s probably no hope for me, but I figured that I could at least write something to offer a little advice to people who might be searching for tips. Here are eight simple rules for dating a vegan.

1. I don’t want a lecture

Yes, I am aware that humans have evolved as omnivores, I know that we have canine teeth. I shop at Whole Foods on a weekly basis, and I am all too aware that it is more expensive. Yes, I am aware that vegans have to pay attention to their B-12 levels. Did you know that that’s the only nutrient not present in a plant based diet? Did you know that our teeth are much smaller and less sharp than those of natural predators, making us unsuited for tearing apart flesh?  Did you know that the meat and dairy industries are heavily subsidized by the government? Oh, you didn’t know those things? Maybe it’s because a first date is the absolute WRONG time for a science lecture and I’m not looking to give you one. I want to wittily banter back and forth and talk about the declining quality of How I Met Your Mother and hear your charming awkward high-school stories.

2. I don’t want to argue

The only thing worse than a holier-than-thou lecture is when someone takes personal offense at the things I choose to put into my body.  If you’re getting all fired up that a girl you barely know doesn’t like to eat things with faces, then you Sir have control issues. There’s no need to raise your voice about it, there’s no need to try to engage me in a defense of veganism by taunting me or talking about all the baby animals you love to eat. You sound ignorant, so just stop talking.

3. Meat is gross

If you have just asked me a question about my diet, and I have responded that I don’t eat meat, then the very last thing I want to do is hear about you putting away half a pound of bacon last weekend. Now I not only have a mental image of you shoveling massive amounts of fatty fried animal flesh into your body, but I also can’t stop picture it churning around in your stomach before eventually causing an intestinal blockage. I don’t eat meat because I can’t get over the imagery associated with it: factory farms, little chickens with their beaks cut off, pigs living in their own feces, blood and guts on the slaughterhouse floor, and that disturbing video of pink “chicken meal” being pumped into McDonald’s chicken nuggets. It ruins the mood for me the same way that me talking about how girls do indeed poop would ruin the mood for you.

4. Don’t justify your diet to me

These people don’t annoy me as much as the others. You know why? It’s because I can tell that they feel guilty about all the crappy food that they put into their bodies, and they want to justify themselves by talking about all the greek yogurt they eat or how they only eat Salmon sometimes or how they would never touch veal. You’ve made a lot of healthy changes to your diet lately? That’s good for you and you should be proud of it, but you shouldn’t seek my validation of it. I can see right through it. The best thing to do when dating someone who embraces a different lifestyle is to just pretend that that difference doesn’t exist. It’s different when I talk about it with my friends or colleagues. You, sir, are a stranger and this is one of the most personal aspects of my life.

5. No, I can’t just “get a salad”

This one is just plain rude, and I see it on the internet all the time. A guy wants to take a girl out on a date, but he wants to go to some expensive steakhouse, so he asks a question on yahoo answers. There are always a chorus of people telling him to just go where he wants to go and that she can just “get a salad”. Well guess what, I can’t just get a salad. Want to know why? It’s because most salads have chicken or eggs or other unsavory things in them or the dressing is made out of mayonnaise. Sometimes all I can do in those types of places is get a bowl of lettuce, maybe with some raw carrots or cucumbers on top and then ask for no dressing and a side of oil and vinegar. Not vinaigrette, vinegar. Now, if I am going out with my friends and they ask me if I want to go to a place like that, and I say yes, I am owning that choice and I will figure out something to eat. However, the early stages of a relationship are all about being polite and putting your best foot forward. I know that a guy is never going to treat me as well as he does on our first couple of dates, and I know that it’s all downhill from that point on.

I know this is a rant and I know that I come off as a completely self-entitled bitch, but I’m just incredibly frustrated with what I’ve been going through lately. My real opinions are somewhat more tempered than what I’ve represented in this post, but I just had to get it all out there. So thanks for reading.

This recipe is my attempt to recreate a tofu scramble that we were served at The Gentle Gourmet, a vegan B&B in Paris. We visited about a month ago, and I finally think that I have out amazing host’s recipe down.The real trick is that it’s more of a hash than a regular tofu scramble. I use firm tofu that isn’t packed in water (you can get it blocks at either Whole Foods or Trader Joe’s). I’ve figured out that this is the way to go as far as tofu is concerned, because you just have to give it a quick squeeze to release any excess moisture, instead of having to press out the liquid for 15 minutes.

Le Scamble de Tofu

1 c. potatoes, diced

4 oz. of tofu cut into 1/4″ cubes and dredged in cornstarch

1/4 bell pepper, cut into slivers

4 medium-sized mushrooms, sliced

1/2 c. frozen spinach (that’s 1/2 c. while it’s still frozen).

2 tsp olive oil

1 tsp fresh ground black pepper

1/4 tsp. dried minced garlic

1 tsp.  sea salt

1/4 tsp. dried thyme

1. Dice potatoes, cut peppers, and slice mushrooms. Then, take the frozen spinach and defrost under warm running water.

2. Add  2 tsp oil and garlic to a skillet, heat over high heat, tilting the pan to coat. Add the potatoes and cook for 4 minutes, stirring frequently. Add the thyme and black pepper.

3. Coat the tofu in cornstarch and add to the pan, along with the mushrooms. Cook for another 4-5 minutes, until the mushrooms begin to sweat and the tofu starts to brown.

4. Add the peppers and cook an additional 2 minutes, then add the spinach and cook until most of the liquid has evaporated (about 3 minutes).

5. Season with sea salt to taste and serve.

As a complete tangent, I was just looking up nutritional information online. Applebees has discontinued the chimicheesecake ( a responsible choice IMHO). However, this bullshit site has a user-submitted recipe that they claim comes in at 140 calories. I was so infuriated that I created an account to respond. I mean, come on, a tortilla has 120 all by itself.

Anyway, I made a vegan version that is much lighter, but still not something I would reccomend for the faint of heart. We had it on New Years Eve and paired it with When Harry Met Sally (which was actually a brilliant combination). Apple Chimicheesecake Redux

4 individual squares of puff pastry, thawed

1 1/2 apple cut into 1/2″ pieces

1/2 an apple, shredded

2 TBSP  unsweetened applejuice

2 tsp. cornstarch

2  tsp. brown sugar

1 tsp. white sugar

pinch cinnamon

1 tub of follow your heart vegan cream cheese

1/2 tsp. vanilla

2 TBSP pastry flour

1 TBSP powdered sugar

1. In a saucepan, cook the applejuice and cornstarch over medium heat until dissolved. Add the cubed apples and cook until it becomes thick and syrupy. Remove from the heat, transfer to a metal bowl, and cool in the fridge or freezer.

2. Grate the remaining apple and cream it with the cream cheese, cinnamon, both sugars, and vanilla.

3. Spray a muffin tin with non-stick spray (spray very quickly to avoid using too much) and cut the puff pastry squares in half diagonally. Press them into the muffin tins, folding two sides of the triangle together to form a cup.

4. Stir in the cooled apple mixture and add the flour to thicken.

5. spoon the mixture into the puff pastry and bake at 375 for 20 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted comes out mostly clean (it will be a little wet, but shouldn’t have any chunks sticking to it).

6. Serve with any combination of: vegan whipped cream, ice cream, sorbet, caramel sauce, cinnamon, or powdered sugar.

For these particular chip-filled little darlings, I veganized a reduced-fat recipe by substituting egg replacer for the egg whites (yes, the original recipe uses egg-whites) and using earth balance instead of butter. Helpful hint: melting the butter before using it allows you to use less. It’s some kind of miracle of science or physics that allows you to cut the fat in the recipe, which is a good thing because you will want to eat twice as many of these cookies. They are seriously that good. Reduced-Fat Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies

1/2 c. white sugar

1/2 c. brown sugar

1/4 c. melted butter

egg replacer powder for one egg (pre-mixed)

1 tsp. vanilla extract

1 c. flour (I used whole wheat pastry flour)

1/2 tsp. baking soda

1/8 tsp. salt

1/2 c. dairy-free chocolate chips

1. pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees. While is is heating, mix the flour, baking soda, and salt in a large bowl. In a seperate bowl, beat together the sugars, butter, and egg replacer until light and creamy.

2. Add the vanilla to the sugar mixture. Slowly stir in the flour, adding 1/4 of it at a time and mixing well after each addition. Stir in the chocolate chips.

3. Drop rounded spoonfuls onto a parchment-paper lined cookie sheet, leaving 1″ between cookies. Bake at 350 for 8-10 minutes and cool for 5 before removing from the tray. Let the cookies cool completely in a single layer before transferring them to a storage container.