Field Roast Vegan Mini Corn Dogs & Odwalla Vegan Shakes

I normally don't care for fake meats because I never liked the taste of real meat growing up.  Going vegetarian was overly easy for me because of that.  However, with all of the new vegan products coming out these days I'm not opposed to trying them at least once.  You never know unless you try, right?  There are very few vegan meats I would buy often.  I could probably count them on 1 hand, actually.  But then there is what I would consider 'convenience and social' storebought vegan foods.  By that I mean, if I am going to a BBQ or camping I might buy them just to have them to be more social.  I think this is one of those items.  Field Roast Mini Corn Dogs.  They were one of the more tasty products I have found but I would put it on that 'convenience and social' list of things.  I wouldn't eat this product every week but I'm glad it's an option.

2 other items I have tried for the first time recently have been these two Odwalla Vegan Shakes.  They are made with Almond Milk and are clearly marked VEGAN.

The first one is the Mocha Latte.  It was ok.  I didn't love it so much that I have to buy it over and over again but I was grateful I was able to find it locally and chug it down last week.  I really thought I would ADORE it but it was just 'ok'.

I'm not loving the press photos of these shakes because they look a lot lighter in color than they actually are when you hold them in your hand.  The photo is a bit misleading, I think.

Oddly, the other one I grabbed was this Snickerdoodle one and I thought I would try it and not love it but I ended up liking it way better than the Mocha Latte one. 

In other news - I'm having a hard time getting into Christmas Shopping and the Christmas Season this year.  One of these days I will elaborate on that more but not now.

This past weekend we attended our last craft/vendor show as Wildtree Reps.  We were involved with the product for 9 years and thought after MANY corporate changes this past year we would call it quits.  It was nice while it lasted and we still LOVE the product line but with everything else going on such as our full-time work, lots of volunteering, my niece and other family happenings, we thought the time has come to move on.

Mac & Chao and Thrown Together Wrap After The Fact

I just got back from Walmart and couldn't wait to jump into this!  YUP!  I found it LOCALLY at MY Walmart!  I thought I would have to wait at least 2 more years before seeing this in my area...if at all!  This is certainly a TREAT and not something I would buy every time I went to the store because it was still very pricey at over $5.  YIKES!  I have a few things to share with you on it.  First and foremost is that I noticed a hint of 'hot' when I first bit into it.  Not much but just enough to make me re-read the ingredients AGAIN.  To my surprise one of the last ingredients was HOT SAUCE!  It really was the icing on the cake here, folks!  It MADE the overall experience what it was!  The other thing I want to share is that it suggested 5 minutes in the microwave (that is if you didn't bake it in the oven) and to follow up the original 5 minutes with another 2 minutes.  I found out just how important that extra 2 minutes was!  After the first 5 minutes I thought...oh crap...this is going to suck...it was still all stuck together in a huge block and I didn't think it was going to melt properly.  So...I continued on with the additional 2 minutes and it made all the difference in the world for it melting into a magical half mac-and-cheese and half Alfredo type sauce!  WOWZA!  YUM!  I also have to add that this was my first pasta in about 6 weeks!  I'm pretty proud of myself but I couldn't resist this vegan temptation!

At the risk of sounding 'late for the party'...I have really been getting into cauliflower rice lately.  I know that Cauliflower Rice isn't anything new but I never got into it much when it first became trendy.  And really the only reasons that I am getting into it now is that there are naturally vegan frozen options that are already 'riced' that are much cheaper than a head of cauliflower (here in my area).

Yesterday I started writing about 'said rice' and then forgot to follow thru with the rest of the 'rice story'.  Furthermore, I didn't take a photo of this wrap that I did...VERY SORRY!  But...it was darn tasty so I figured it was still worth a mention.  I had 1 Sun Dried Tomato Wraps that I had to hurry up and use but I didn't really want to get to involved with cooking a meal.  So I decided to warm up some of the Cauliflower Rice that had some herbs already mixed in and put it in the wraps along with some melted Parmela Nut Cheese that I told you about yesterday.  I then topped it with a very little bit of Trader Joe's Vegan Mayo Spread (to finish off the jar) and a bit of Salsa.  Oddly, this combo was YUMMERS!

I was able to find another new-to-me vegan product at my local Walmart today that I thought I would save for another post.  Plus, I still have items from my Wegman's Adventure from last weekend.  So I do have LOTS to blog about in the coming weeks!  Oh yeah...and...I still have to figure out which dishes I might want to do for Thanksgiving Day over any my parents house!