Food from Home

Lately posts have been mostly food I've eaten around town but I have been making things recently too:

This is basically socca. I saw something in a book about "chickpea fries" that got me interested but I refuse to fry things. Instead, I made socca and cut it into strips. I tweaked Caitlin's first, basic socca recipe (though she has other flavors too!) a little bit (1 1/2 TB olive oil, no pumpkin, shallots, garlic or olives) and added some spices (cumin, chopped fresh parsley, black pepper, coriander, garlic powder.) They kind of tasted like falafel bread, which was okay, but I wanted them crispier and the spices are still a little off.

These are SpaBettie's apricot truffles, without the dark chocolate coating. They were delicious enough on their own. I love the texture that fig seeds give. They were a little sweet; if I make them again, I'd swap the agave for lemon juice, probably.

This is a snack plate with carrot sticks, zucchini, black pepper water crackers, and berbere spiced red-lentil hummus, from Susan at Fat Free Vegan. I like the dip a lot, but I hadn't had berbere spices before and expected it to be a bit hotter. It's tweakable to taste, though, obviously. That was actually the most fun part of making the recipe - spooning a little paprika in, mixing in cinnamon, etc. When I make my own food I rarely think to season it at all, but spices are so fun to work with. It also made me happy that I'd had a bag of red lentils in the pantry for months now and it just so happened that I had the exact amount that Susan's recipe called for! I love using up every last bit of something, especially with the move impending.
Standard, non-recipe eats:

Raw salad (corn, tomato, spinach, zucchini, parsley) topped with blurry cooked quinoa.
more quinoa + salad:

mixed greens, beets, carrot, parsley, corn, raw sunflower seeds, tomatoes, quinoa - I added balsamic vinegar and black pepper after the photo.
I told you I have a banana-buying problem! I was buying them all last month, and then not eating them. Hence, I have about 5 frozen bananas in the freezer that needed to be used up. This is my new favorite smoothie:

Spinach, frozen banana, frozen cranberries (also finally finished the last of a bag), goji berries, orange juice, and water. So creamy and cooling.
It's good to be back in the kitchen and using things up. Do you have any favorite "other bloggers recipes" or do you prefer to make yr own? Do you cook from cookbooks more often than from online recipes?

Smorgasburg

Today G and I went out to Smorgasburg, a food bazaar / flea market on the Williamsburg waterfront. I've talked about it a little before in this post but I guess my feelings have lightened up a bit since then. It was still pretty decidedly non-vegan, but it appears there are rotating vendors. It might have been an off day or maybe my blinders were on, trying to cope with / avoid the crowds.
G picked up a sandwich from Cemita's, with cheese but no meat. Looks like they really packed it in:

I found a falafel stand and a stand that was sort of just a side of veggies that both looked pretty good but I opted for something a little heartier and more unusual, from Uttapam & Co.

An uttapam (gluten free sourdough pancake) with grilled, locally made (Barry's) tempeh, summer squash, and an apple-cilantro chutney. Don't worry, there were greens consumed with other meals.
We also shared a ginger-apple "soda" from Brooklyn Soda Works, which is just carbonated fruit juice. It was really delicious and cooling.

You can see from the photo what a gorgeous day it was out. They re-did the waterfront area only within the last couple of years and I hadn't visited yet. We walked around, enjoying the breeze and sunshine. Since you seemed to enjoy yesterday's Brooklyn photos, here are a couple more:

                                    Williamsburg Bridge, Brooklyn Bridge in the background.

 

                                                      Weird creepy graffiti house.
The end. My brother is leaving tomorrow so I might go hang out with him tonight. It was a pretty good day. Hope you all had a pleasant one as well.

Out and About

I also like to say that title with a Canadian accent.
Anyway, my brother is back in town from LA for the week and my sister is home for the month as well, AND my parents have the daughter of a family friend (from Bath!) staying with them while she works as an intern with an architecture firm here in the city so the house is full again and my mother is brimming with ways to entertain us all and keep my mind busy, ha.
One day my parents and I went for a walk along the promenade and through the park just underneath the Brooklyn Bridge to show Marina, the daughter, the architecture of downtown Brooklyn and some views of the city:

G is helping my mind stay busy too. We went to see Sebadoh at Bowery Ballroom and they were just as kickin' as at the Cat's Cradle show.

Before the show, we went to High Heat, a newish burger/pizza/bar in the West Village that G had gotten a groupon-ish deal for. There looks to be one vegan pizza and one vegan burger on the menu, but their fries are also a big draw - you can pick for them to be tossed in one of four different flavorings.

G showing off the patty - made with shiitake, lentils, black beans, tofu, and sweet potato in a roasted garlic-tomato sauce. The toppings were pretty basic - until we realized there was a toppings bar with pickles, pickled onions, jalapenos, etc. So that was cool. The burger was a little bland but the toppings helped and it was nice that they at least had a vegan option that was more than a frozen veggie patty or something that tried too hard to be meaty.

I got my fries tossed with garlic and oil. They were really well made, but let's just say it's a good thing Jason Loewenstein was able to control himself and not make out with me all night.

More Brooklyn entertainment: my family and Marina went to a Cyclones game out in Coney Island. The Cyclones (named for the famed Coney Island amusment park rollercoaster) are a Mets farm team, so it was cool to see the young kids who will hopefully play for the Mets some day (and maybe then we can win?)

                                            (The amusement park from the train window)

(Famous Nathan's. We went here after the game and I just tried to breathe through my mouth and not look at anything.)

The Cyclones' ballpark. Since it's so much smaller than a major league park, all the seats are awesome - and cheap!
Since I've been running around after work, I've been relying on picking up food rather than making my own:

From the Whole Foods salad bar - steamed collard greens, corn, black beans, bell pepper, sweet potato.

 From Paradis - lentils, new potatoes, steamed kale, tomatoes in a dijon vinaigrette.

From Whole Foods prepared foods - vegetable wrap, supposedly with hummus, but I didn't taste any. Wasn't bad, though. Fresh enough.
I think that's enough for tonight. I hope you all are enjoying yr weekend.

Summer Salad

Thanks for yr comments on the last post, guys. I will try to respond to them all.
Threw a bunch of pretty much everything into a salad for dinner tonight. It was crunchy and fresh.

Spinach, roasted eggplant,chopped zucchini, carrot, cherry tomatoes, raw corn, tofu. With balsamic vinegar and black pepper.
More summer produce, nectarine:

Slow Attempts at Rebuilding

Hahah, hey, guys. What's up? Oh, me?
Briefly, I lost my shit. Bipolar disorder is a force to be reckoned with. Let's just get that out there.
I did stop eating for a while, I've only just gotten back into preparing food for myself, and it's only today that I haven't had a couple drinks just to get myself out the door. In a fit of mania, I bought myself a ticket to Raleigh, North Carolina, a state in which  I know precisely three people. (I later had a panic attack, cancelled the trip, and then re-scheduled it about 8 hours later.)
I didn't take any food photos down there (beer photos I do have) but it involved a "Tempeh Tantrum," - marinated tempeh, vegan pesto, vegan bacon, avocado, and lettuce on sourdough at The Remedy Diner with my friend Tedd, before we began a night of incredible drinking. Another night, there was also a cookout at Tedd's friends' place in Durham. I didn't eat anything (though they were so incredibly generous to the awkward unknown girl in the corner) as most of it was not vegan and I was more interested in the whiskey and dogs (!) but there was a corn/tomato salad that someone had made entirely from local farmers market produce. It is big down there, I hear.
I brought along some energy bars that I ate for breakfasts most days.
I also brought this bag of crudites (cauliflower, broccoli, bell pepper, carrots) to eat on the train ride down:
 

My cousin lives in Chapel Hill, so I spent a day and a half with her. She took me to Top of the Hill, where they brew their own beer! It's a burger/beer place (with a beautiful view!) so it was pretty basic but there was an edamame burger (really good!) with sweet potato fries and two Ram's Heads beers, thank you very much. After that, she dropped me off at Cat's Cradle for one of my main reasons for going down there - to see Sebadoh!! Oh, man. Guys. I can't stop listening to Sebadoh. It was a fantastic show, and I'm gonna see them here in NY again next week. This is only ONE of their INCREDIBLE songs, but seeing as there's a cat in the video, y'all vegans might dig it. (Shen, this is nothing like United States of Whatever. Sorry.)

 

Anyway, so yadda yadda, vacation pics, whatever. I am back in New York and I know a lot of you lust after the vegan food opportunities here and being born and bred here, I never thought I could leave the city. But the South is beautiful, there is nature and space and cheap housing and kind people and none of the weird personal hang-ups that are here and quiet and local food movements and even food trucks and fragrant breezes and goats and backyards. So. We'll see what happens on that front. Advice/recommendations on moving to the Unknown are welcome.
ENOUGH RAMBLES. I am eating again and for anybody else who suffers from mental disorders (especially depression) I can't stress how important it is to give fresh, raw vegetables to yr body. It is totally hard to force yrself to put effort into anything, but please, please do it.
Here is my "Keep on Livin'" grocery run from today: an orange (grocery store), nectarine, corn, two little eggplants, and two zucchinis from the farmer's market. 

Also some treats. Of course. Vanilla So Delicious ice cream, a big bottle of Chardonnay, Emmy's raw macaroons (Coconut-Vanilla flavor), and Go Raw pumpkin seed cookies. I like this photo because you can see my angel statue in the background. She makes me not cry all the time.
Tonight's raw dinner:

 Raw kale, raw kraut, raw corn, tomatoes. Probably inspired by this meal from Paradis the other day:

Raw corn, tomato and onion salad alongside sweet potatoes and chopped kale.
Previous night's dinner:

Raw kale, raw kraut, tomatoes, tempeh. In a sriracha-tahini dressing.
Previously, randomly, seaweed salad into which I mixed sesame seeds and red pepper flakes. Never thought I liked seaweed salad, but I guess I do. This was followed by miso soup.

That's all for now. Hopefully more will come. I am moving in mid-September with an old friend so hopefully we will cook and have fun together.
Wow! Lots of personal shit, and I don't even know you all but I think it's important to be honest. I hope all you guys are well! Especially the pregnant ones of you! I missed you guys. Thanks for being there (wherever you are.)

Hiatus

Oh, hey, so I stopped caring about food for now. On hiatus. Keep eating yr various delicious vegan foods. See you when I see you.