Reads, Recent Kitchen Experiments, & Build-Your-Own-Wrap

WARNING!  This is going to be a lengthy post!  And most likely one to jump around a lot, too!

First I want to share with you a new-to-me-vegan-cheese that I found at Wegman's this past weekend on my mini haul!  It's from Parmela Creamery and it's an aged nut cheese that is on the sharper side and made with cashew milk.

I used these shreds in the recipe/meal idea below, too!  The verdict is still out on this one.  I liked it but I have had others that were more tasty.  It doesn't melt as good as some of the other ones I have worked with but it does have it's perks, too!  The aroma is much like an artisan aged cheese.  Tonight I tried it in a wrap (which I will get to a little bit later in this post) and I really enjoyed it in a wrap situation.  There were a couple of other flavors for sale but I wanted to try this one first.

The other night I was trying to throw together a bowl of sorts and it ended up turning in to something completely different.  Let me explain.  

THIS photo is of the bowl mixture which was pretty tasty in its own right but it made me left wanting.  I will go on to show you what I did with it shortly, but first, the ingredients for this include: 1 C Multi-color Couscous, About a pound of roasted veggies I found at Trader Joe's a while back that I heated up and put into a blender on pulse, and then I made a simple creamy sauce made of Cashews, Almond Milk, Sea Salt, Garlic, Onion Flakes, Dill, Nutritional Yeast, and a splash of Balsamic.  Everything was eye-balled so sorry I don't have the exact measurements.

So here is what I ended up doing with the mixture.  It was holding together pretty good on its own so I made them into little balls and pressed them down into a muffin pan.  As you can see I used the plant-based shreds on top of all of them.  On half of those I squirted some Sriracha on top.  Both were tasty.  I think I liked the ones with Sriracha on top better.  I then made another Vegan Ranch type sauce for dipping. 

Here's a close-up of the dressing/dip/sauce.  Because I was out of cashews I decided to use Sunflower Seeds for this one.  Below is that recipe...

1 C Sunflower Seeds
About 1 C Almond Milk
2 t Lemon Juice
2 Cloves Garlic
2 t Dill

1 t Smoked Paprika

1 t Black Sea Salt
2 t Dijon Mustard

2 t Onion Flakes

Here's a closer look of the little Couscous Bites I made.  I have to say for me just throwing something together I was pretty proud of these lil guys!  The roasted veggies in the frozen package I got at TJ's was made up of Eggplant, Red Peppers, Onions, and had a bit of Balsamic for flavor in them, too!

In other news...
I had to break down and buy my lunch the other day and didn't want to go too far from the office so I stopped in at Total Evolution.  I opted for the Build-Your-Own-Wrap.  I decided to go with Sprouts, Avocado, Shredded Carrots, Hummus, Tomatoes, and they make their own Vegan BBQ Marinated Chickpeas.  They also make their own Vegan Cilantro Ranch Dressing so I went with that, too!

I have a lot of things I will be thumbing thru over the next couple of days including the following...

Raw Healthy & Delicious Recipes from Norbu (Australia)
Maranda Pleasant's Mantra Yoga & Health
Raw Food Lifestyle - back issues from March/April & May/June 2014
Rawmazing Easy Raw Food by Susan Powers

I've also recently found a website for those with Dyslexia.  They have resources for children but they also have a section for adults so I decided to subscribe to their newsletter and got my first issue today.  I will continue to locate resources for adults and try and report back here.

What do you think about the experiments in the kitchen?  Or about the little Build-Your-Own I found in my small town?  Or about the currently reading list?  I will be featuring more mini hauls over the next week or so!  A few other things I'm wondering about are...what do you think about the changes to my site so far?  The FurKid Section/Tab?  The Into description and photo in the upper right hand corner of my nav bar?  And what do you think about the links section?  There are over 100 links there, now!  YAY!  I can't wait to visit and comment more frequently on both old and new friends sites!  Please let me know if I don't have your link listed and I will add it ASAP!  CHEERS!!!

Golden Kiwi Fruit & Dyslexia Awareness Month

This is a hurry-up-and-post-POST because I'm so far behind on everything and I didn't want to forget it.  I'm supposed to be posting every day during Vegan MoFo!  YIKES!!!  I'm hoping to do multiple posts today to make up for it!  As for this mini-post, I wanted to let you know that I located Golden Kiwi Fruit about a week ago!  They are smaller than regular Kiwi Fruit.  The texture is a bit different, too!  Why do I make a special effort to write Kiwi Fruit instead of just Kiwi?  Because years ago I had a friend who was originally from New Zealand and it irked her when people called the fruit Kiwi's because many New Zealanders call the people of New Zealand Kiwis.  They find it to be an endearing term and it's viewed as a symbol of pride.  Therefore, out of respect I always try to remember to say Kiwi Fruit when referring to these little gems.  Many of you know how I LOVE finding produce that is rare in my area or new-to-me.

In other news - October is Dyslexia Awareness Month.  Since mentioning I was Dyslexic in the past month or two here on my blog I have received a couple of notes from people which I appreciate and have been thinking about blogging more about it while trying to obtain more ways to help adults dealing with Dyslexia.

What I'm...

Here's something you might not know about me - I'm Dyslexic.  When I was growing up they didn't really say it much or know much about it so to make me/my parents feel better I think they said I was "borderline Dyslexic".  I think it was when I was in 2nd grade that they started saying this so almost my whole life and I still have problems to this day but I (mostly) know how to deal with it.  For me it was reading comprehension, transposing numbers, and completely shutting down during test taking.  I just had to learn in different ways than most people would.  I still have to do things differently in my adult life to retain information.

Because of this I tend to shy away from reading books - cover to cover.  I tend to enjoy collections of poetry, magazine, online sources, and recipe books instead.  That's where Issuu has come in handy as of late.  I'm trying to start up a nice collection of magazines again and have been searching their site for Vegan and Raw Vegan ePublications.  I've found MANY.  And from other countries, too!  Between that and my backlog of eBooks from sites I have frequented lately I need to start committing to some reading time.  What I'm currently thumbing thru is "5 Easy But Life-Changing Ways To Stop Stressing About Food" by Elise Museles of Kale and Chocolate.  It's not so much that I have been stressing about food lately but I have been rather bored yet rushed at the same time.  I haven't been cooking at home and have been trying to go back to simple foods like salads and veggie bowls.

As many of you know I have an eclectic mish mash of musical tastes.  I can switch from Broadway Tunes to Rap in seconds!  From Bluegrass to Reggae in a matter of minutes!  I'd like to think it's just because I like all sorts of music but sometimes I wonder if it's because I need to work my music like I work my brain...keep it interesting and active...and all over the place.  This week I have been listening to some Classic Rock and 80s for the most part but I feel a change coming VERY soon!

I really haven't been watching anything on Hulu+ or Netflix lately.  I have been more into YouTube.  I have been looking for funny and uplifting channels while still having a point to them.  I've also been looking at the Woodstock Fruit Festival videos I have been able to find.  I have wanted to go to it since the first year but haven't been able to so I figure 'why not check out everyone else's videos'.

An activity I have been getting into lately is finding decorated rocks just about EVERYWHERE!  I know during fair week the Queens Court was doing them on the fairgrounds for people to find but then on Labor Day I found one at our local Perkins Restaurant and it was from the #RockOutErie group.  Less than a day later I found another one for #WarrenRocks and #WarrenPARocks.  I found more of them with #RockOutWarren today, too!  Because I work at a group of radio stations I figured it would be cool to do some for our 92 Gold station so I started the hashtag #92GoldRocks...and we are starting to make some and place them around town.

The one above is one I found while I was on lunch.  A co-worker found a 'watermelon', too!  I figured it was something to do, eh!?  I think I needed a distraction from things happening in real life.  Then again - don't we all?  What have you been up to lately!?