Most recently, I whipped up the Buffalo Chickpea Mac & Cheese from Vegan Bowl Attack, which was a welcome variation on plain old regular mac. I loved this and cherished the leftovers for a week.

I might go as far as to say that the Pesto Mac from Chloe's Vegan Italian Kitchen is my favorite mac. That's a pretty heavy endorsement, because I'm basically a professional mac and cheese eater and cooker. I've made this about 17 times and kind of want to go make it right now.



I've been known to seek out mac where mac is to be had, and surely it is in Brooklyn, NYC. Pretty much every Shop Up I attended, mac was consumed. The most reliable vendor for a sturdy mac, I feel, is Freakin' Vegans. Plus, they have empanadas, and which is better-- mac & cheese with empanadas, or mac & cheese without any empanadas? I think I've answered for everyone already.


Once the Mac Daddy Bowl debuted on Champs' menu, it became physically impossible for me to ever order anything but that whenever I went (extremely often). Try as I might, rehearsed saying "Drunken Cowgirl" aloud beforehand, whispered, "Soltero Bowl" under my breath as others ordered, nothing but "I'll have the Mac Daddy Bowl" would ever leave my lips when it was time to order. I just learned not to fight the urge after a while. I mean, who's strong enough to fight an urge like that?


This is another time I made pesto mac. It's the best. It just is.

Another reason 2015 turnt down for no one, was that I discovered scallion pancakes. I know that vegan pan-asian restaurants exist all over the country, but they opened one that delivers to my work, so I have a new default love for them, and scallion pancakes are one thing, and that thing, is dope AF.
I say dope a lot for someone who doesn't smoke. If you find yourself at a vegan asian place, don't skip the scallion pancake!


I ate a lot of crepes this year, exclusively from Little Choc Apothecary, who makes great crepes. I have tried the pizza crepe, the mushroom crepe, the breakfast crepe, the apple crepe and the seitan crepe. Oh, and alex aways gets one with banana and nutella with pecans, so I get to have a bite of that each time too :)


I think tea is fun and interesting, and as I've said earlier, I get sick of coffee easily. This place specializes in tea! So it's fun to try out a little teapot full of a new kind of tea you've never heard of. When they bring it out they give you a little hourglass timer box so you know how long it steeped for. Then you can play with it the whole rest of the time you sit there.


I baked some breads to bring home with me for Xmas, including the Cinnamon swirl bread from Vegan Sandwiches Save The Day. This bread is great and it's not too sweet the way some cinnamon swirl breads can be. Isn't freshly baked bread the best?


It's even better when it's been freshly baked -- by you :)



I cooked a beautiful meal for my family on Thanksgiving, everything vegan! My dad did cook a turkey and put it on the table with my beautiful spread of food but that's okay. He ate the rest of the food and seemed happy about it. Alex and I were the only ones who ate any of the Field Roast Celebration Roast I made, but it made for crafty leftover-sandwiches -- more to follow on that.


I made some roasted garlic mashed potatoes, cashew-creamed onions, cranberry sauce with pomegranates, and baked stuffing! We did some mashed butternut squash, which needs very little in the way of preparation, and peas that we heated in the microwave. It was delicious and I was really happy with everything! I was also happy to sit down to a nice meal with my close family and not have a super hectic time cooking and traveling.


A special vegan announcement: There's new stuff on the menu at Champs!!!! Tots are on the menu!!


Also, there's something called the "Mac Daddy Bowl" which was basically created with me in mind.


I also got married in 2015. And we looked real cute that day...


This is where we eat. We have an apartment that's too small to fit a dining room table, so we just eat at our coffee table while we watch shows or movies together. It's definitely a different vibe than setting a nice table for a fancy dinner, but having a casual place to eat together is nice too, plus I know things will change one day when we move or have kids and we won't have our little table and our shows together anymore. It's kind of time that we know we're going to miss someday.


I have had a large stack of books to read for a really long time. I have started reading all these books, some I've read over half-way through, some I just read the first chapter of. A couple of them, I didn't really like the beginning of, but still feel funny about not finishing. For me, I think of a book as an endeavor that I must see through, and won't feel right until I do. So as you can see from this large stack of books, I feel very off-kilter from having half-read so many! My goal is to finish all of these books in a timely fashion instead of buying new ones to read first like I did all year.


I know that last year I talked about wanting to eat more salads, and man did I do right by that resolution. I ate salads exclusively for a whole month! It was easy with the help of Salad Samurai. I never got around to making the Bento Box Niçoise salad from the book until a few weeks ago. Maybe I was holding out for purple potatoes. Well I finally found some! And damn-- this salad was amazing. I mean, there isn't much left to be desired. You've got your potatoes, your veggies, your avocado, your greens, lemony dressing and coconut bacon crunchies for the top (or everywhere). The coconut bacon filled a gap in my cold heart and helped me love again.


I finally tried the rainbow cookies by Sweet Maresa's this year! They are perfect in every way and I can't say anything appropriate to how good they are in this language so I will just stop.



Okay so this is my plate from Wigilia this year. I made those pierogies with the help of my mom, dad, and Alex helped pinch them this year too! My golabki is covered in a creamy cumin tomato sauce I made, and above that is my pumpkin-cranberry risotto, that was totally gone by the end of the night! My aunt Karen makes delicious potato pancakes, which I ate 4 of, and my cousin Sarah made this delicious Kale, pomegranate and quinoa salad that we begged her to make ever since the last time she brought it. Spoiled, right??


Alex and I are so similar and cute that we bought each other the same record for Christmas. So cute and barfworthy.


Yeah, I shredded a little bass in 2015... What of it??


My craftiest moment of the year is when I made these thanksgiving leftover sandwiches. I had the perfect storm of leftovers, and purchased nothing that wasn't already in the fridge to make it! It has (ahem), celebration roast slices, garlic mashed potatoes, caramelized onions, chao cheese, and cilantro pesto on pumpernickel bread! I pressed it in my panini press (spoiled), and voila, the best sandwich I ever made was eaten.


My final spoilage of 2015, was my mom finding the most perfect device to fit to our very specific measurements that would hold our dish drain, and support the weight of a multitude of cast-iron pots and pans, and look cute. She scored for seriously. It looks so great and I could finally take the heavy pots and pans out from under the sink cabinet in which the floor of it caved in due to the heaviness of the pots. Kindly don't repeat that to my super.


Today marks my fifth anniversary of veganhood! It seems like forever since I went vegan, but some of my friends have been vegan for 15 or 20 years! They make me look like a newbie vegan. Speaking of newbie vegans, Alex decided to go vegan today! Yay for him! I am so excited to have yet another huge part of my life to share with him. I recognize how lucky (and spoiled) it makes me to have a vegan husband, living together in NYC, and eating at Champs once a week, Chloe's for lunch on weekends, seeing shows all the time, I'll stop, I can see it's bothering you.

Happy New Year to all the vegans of the universe! I'd never be the same without all of you.
<3
KZ

Anyway, this was delicious and the sauce was tofu-based rather than cashew based for a change, so I'm into that too. The shiitake bacon was a nice crunch, but really it just tasted burned to me. I still loved this, and it took 2 seconds to make. Plus look how pretty it looks :)


My fried Amey, from Vegan Eats and Treats, has blogged a few times about how much she loves this dish from Appetite For Reduction which is the Chipotle Chili with Brussels Sprouts and Sweet Potato. It sounds like an odd combo for chili, but it was so totally great and I'd definitely make it again. I had to make cornbread because, like how can you eat chili without it???


One night I made the Pomegranate BBQ Tofu from Vegan with a Vengeance 10th Anniversary and it was so great! I even poured some of the sauce over the baked potato I made. This tofu is baked first, then smothered in the sauce. I really love baked tofu. It sort of changes everything about tofu and makes it really succulent (?) and amazing. I feel like succulent is just a plant... Am I wrong about that?

This dish was the biggest winner for me. The Pesto Mac and Cheese from Chloe's Vegan Italian Kitchen is just so great. The mac on it's own is a little bland, but when mixed with the pesto, it's like the most perfect combo you ever tasted. Also, I've learned that it's worth lugging out the food processor to make pesto instead of just using your vitamix which is already out on the counter. The food processor gets it the right texture and consistency. The vitamix just pulverizes it and makes like a pesto sauce, as smooth as your smoothie. But I love a good textured pesto with little bits of garlic and walnut in it. It's definitely worth the clean up, and trust me, I hate cleaning the food processor.


We went back to our hometown for a day to see David Bazan play a "living room show", something we've always wanted to see. This host had his own freestanding library/recording studio next to his house, so David just played there. Alex and I were trying to count the times we have seen him play, and it's probably something like 10 times. It was amazing and I'm so happy we got to see him in our hometown.


After the show we went out to dinner with my parents. Alex and I got the veggie burger, which has been good in the past, but really not so great anymore. It's dry and pretty flavorless, and I took a picture so you guys can see how to properly handle a sub-par veggie burger:

 That night we didn't feel like cooking, but we didn't feel like getting takeout, and we had some pesto on hand and some pasta to put it on. So yeah, we can't always be extravagant. Don't even pretend like you don't do this sometimes.


After a pasta-heavy week I decided to make some salads for the few days ahead. I made the Pomegranate Holiday Tabouli from Salad Samurai and the Brussels Sprout Salad with Grilled Miso Apples, also from Salad Samurai. The brussels sprouts salad was great, I never thought to use sprouts as a salad green, but they were great! The apples give it enough attitude to be a salad I'd make again. The pomegranate tabouli was just eh. It had lentils, and not enough dressing. I think it would benefit from avocado or baked tofu, and maybe then it could stand alone. If I'd only made the tabouli, I'd have been hangry by the time I finished.


Both salads had toasted walnuts in it, which definitely improved each salad. Toasted walnuts are special. They are softer, nuttier, toastier... Just better. Just nod so that I know you know.


I haven't made chana masala since probably 2011, when this dish debuted on Isa's blog. Lucky for everyone, it was published in Isa Does It, and now we can make it on the reg. The house smelled so spicy and nice for days after I made this. There's nothing like a spicy curry on a cold and rainy day.


Now, the main event, I decided to finally get a Vegan Cuts Beauty Box subscription! Two factors led to the inevitable decision to sign up for this box, besides me just wanting one: I started having problems with my skin, and I started realizing most of my bath/body/skin care products aren't even vegan. It's really shitty of me to have been vegan so long without paying attention to the products I buy for body/skin/beauty care, and I don't see (now) how it's any different from products I'd buy to eat. I'd hear about some product being vegan and just look for that kind but I always struggled to figure out on my own whether a product either has ingredients in it derived from animals, or has been tested on animals. I also have struggled to find vegan products that work (I'm talking to you, Tom's of Maine deodorant). Luckily, for me, I'm vegan in 2015 and the nice people of the vegan community and interwebs have already done the legwork of compiling a list of vegan companies who make and sell vegan beauty products. I am trying to replace all of my skin/beauty/body care items with vegan ones, but as you know, vegan products can be expensive. I found some affordable brands, and some not so affordable, but at least I know where to find them. The beauty box is great because it includes trial sizes of these products from companies you probably have never even heard of. This way you get to try out a product before committing to spending the $54 on it, or not. I am super psyched to try all these products and support vegan businesses trying to make a living the ethical way.


Each box contains between 4 and 7 items to sample and a handy card to tell what's what.

 My first item was this Indian Hemp & Haitian Vetiver Body Lotion by Nubian Heritage. It smells so good! I am always in need of lotion, so I am glad to find a good-smelling vegan one.


This is a calming botanical facial steam pack by Bohemian Beauty Co, which you pour into a bowl that you then cover with boiling water, and inhale the steam that comes off from the bowl, inhaling the scents and relaxing. It has a lot of common "zen flowers" in the packet, like chamomile and lavender. I'd never thought of using a product like this, but I will definitely give it a try.



Next is Moisturizing Hair Milk with Shea Butter by Shea Radiance. From reading the description of it, it seems to function like a detangler. No woman with long hair could say that they'd not benefit from some detangling spray, though I don't like to generalize. I'll just say that I will totally use up this product and put it to the test with my tangles. Especially in scarf season.


I never really thought of nail polish as being vegan or not. Well, it turns out I have about 25 bottles of non-vegan nail polish and if you want to take some of it off my hands I have the colors of the rainbow and beyond. I have one vegan color now! This is "Galaxy" by Mineral Fusion. It's hard to tell from this picture I guess, but it's a sparkly dark blue. I will put it on my toes in the near future.

Last but not least is Black Tea Liquid Eyeliner from 100% Pure. This is a full-sized product that would otherwise be very expensive to just "test out" seeing that it costs more than the entirety of this month's box. I tried to use it this morning, but realized that liquid eyeliner requires a steady hand, and it got kind of all over my lashes and so I just used my trusty crayon liner because I know how to do that. I will practice and learn the art of the liquid-liner. Swear.
Today my parents and in-laws came for the day and came to the shop-up with us and it was great! My parents especially liked Monks Meats sliders, the winner of the spread we put before them. I ate about 5 macarons so far, and I accidentally ended up with 12 more, so yeah. Not a bad Saturday.

 I have been loving the Thug Kitchen cookbook that I got for Christmas! The food is exactly the kind of food I want to be eating all the time: healthy, satisfying, full of whole ingredients, still awesome. This one is the Spring Veggie Bowl with grilled bok choy and asparagus with tofu and rice noodles. The sauce is a red curry paste base with things like soy sauce and agave and brown sugar thrown into the mix. It was so perfect and awesome and I want to eat it again, and again and again....
So Silk came out with these yogurts, and I really have never been a take-a-yogurt-to-work kind of person, and I never really liked portioned flavored yogurts vegan or otherwise, so I am not sure what made me give these a try. It must have been the word "plant-based", or to people who like to get real, "vegan." Anyway, this vanilla flavor was so amazing and it tasted like pudding or something dessert-like. I bought this flavor, peach/mango, and blueberry. I liked them in that order, vanilla being the best.


 Oh, and a third thing occurred to me: There is a keurig machine upstairs at work that I have never used. I occasionally bring my own coffee from home but way more frequently stop and buy some on the way, or several other times throughout the day. I could be saving all of those dollars by bringing my k-cups and creamer (which does not separate in iced coffee) to work, and having it all day long for the cheap price of about $1.09 per giant iced coffee! I brought lots of coffee supplies for me and my (also dairy-free) coffee-drinking coworker but he won't drink any of my coffee. Maybe I have cooties or he's too proud. More for me?



Alex used to be so obsessed with the Terminator that he dressed up like him for halloween in 1993. We have been lugging a VCR around from town to town for all these years and finally popped a VHS in for some throwback movie nostalgia. Everyone knows Terminator 2 is the best Terminator.



In addition to Iced Coffee Season, it's also Margarita Season. There's a place down the block from me that has killer margaritas. They aren't cheap, but they have frozen passionfruit margaritas and you can't exactly pass one of those up. On Mondays and Tuesdays they only cost $6. I had one this past Wednesday and Thursday, so I'm definitely looking forward to Monday and Tuesday of this week.



Today I woke up and began the very best Saturday ever. I did a crazy Jeanette Jenkins workout for 2 hours, and then ate a cookie. Okay I ate a few cookies. Then I got a chance to try out some new vegan beauty products I hadn't worked into my schedule yet and relax a little before Alex woke up. I am an early riser, he is absolutely not. After we got up, we went to Champs, because it's Saturday, and beat the line! We didn't have to wait at all! Although we probably missed the rush rather than beat it, since we didn't get there until 2pm.
I got an Iced coffee, obviously, and a Drunken Cowgirl, an old favorite that I decided to revisit. I realized I love this dish because I don't need to add anything to it. For a while I was doing the Soltero bowl and adding guac, but that is $3 extra, and the bowl costs $13 already, so why not order the Drunken Cowgirl, that has ALL of the bases covered and pay only $12? Goddamn I am so smart lately. It must be my new Vans. They are thinking shoes.


 My flavors are the good ones, ie the raspberry pistachio and apple pie, while Alex got vanilla sprinkle and cinnamon sugar (not pictured).





Speaking of Double LPs, here is my most recent Double LP purchase, Neko Case's latest, but still 2 years old, The Worse Things Get... Totally amazing artwork/Totally amazing record. I cannot wait to see her next month at Northside!!!




The album cover is painted by Frances, the singer, songwriter, and rhythm guitarist. It is fruit in a dish but sometimes it looks like a big pile of melting ice cream scoops to me and I like it. It makes me want ice cream. Vegan, of course. She also includes a great handwritten lyric sheet that I have read many times over by now.

 So as not to end on a non-vegan-food note, I picked up this candy bar that I found at Haymaker's that is like a Milky Way. One time my sister and I searched high and low at a Whole Foods for it but couldn't find it. We were stocking up on vegan snacks to bring to a wedding that we didn't anticipate having food at. I love my sister and am so happy I have her to be awesome and vegan and cool alongside me.