I begin most days when I open my eyes at 6:47am and say to myself, "I'm going to get up in 13 minutes, work out, eat a healthy breakfast and lunch, and not eat pasta again for dinner." 13 minutes later I am snoozing super hard, I add extra almond butter to my oatmeal, eat leftovers for lunch, and definitely eat pasta for dinner. This has been especially true for the past few weeks, so here's a picture of not an exception. This is pasta with pesto sauce and breaded tofu with no vegetables. Sue me.


I know I said I've fallen hard into a pasta rut, and I have. But this picture was taken like 5 weeks ago, and it is an amazing stir-fry with basil and gnocchi. They sell packaged gnocchi at my bodega and I always forget about it, but it takes like 2 seconds to cook and also rulz. New tattoo! Team Gnocchi! Wait, too many letters and too few knuckles!


I know what you're thinking... "this isn't pasta either." But you're WRONG. This is orzo, which IS pasta!! This is the Tempeh Orzilla from Isa Does It, and also from her blog a million years ago, when I first made this and fell super deep in love with it. So deep we text late at night. It is SO good. It's a stellar combination of tempeh, spinach and sundried tomato. I added some cherry tomatoes on top for a nice pop of flavor, and sprinkled vegan parmesan-- fairy dust, if you will, made from almonds, nooch and lemon zest.


Alright, this is straight up not pasta. But it is also from like 4 weeks ago so maybe pre-pasta rut. This is the Lemony Cannellini beans from Chloe's Vegan Italian Kitchen, over mashed potatoes with some added broccoli. There's some amazing broth made from white wine, nooch and almond milk to soak up with some bread (more carbs!) or with the potatoes. This dish is literally perfect. I know I call every bean my favorite at one point or another but cannellini beans are totally my favorite. Swear.


I left my dark and stuffy apartment one time and bought this breakfast sandwich during lunchtime at Toadstyle. I also got fried broccoli. I wanted fried cauliflower but Alex doesn't like cauliflower. Worst, amirite? So instead of your typical tofu/daiya/tofurkey breakfast sandwich, this one has polenta as the "eggy" part, homemade hollandaise, tomato and avocado. It was nicely unique!


Remember that time I was making #irresponsiblepurchases at Haymakers? I bought all this stuff: Terri ranch dressing, Califia farms Almond creamer, Sriracha Just Mayo, Barry's Adzuki bean fresh tempeh, 2 of my fave So Delicious plain unsweetened yogurts, No Evil Foods Seitan, an espresso chocolate Ponycake (gift for Alex <3), Meow Meow Tweet grapefruit deodorant, daiya alfredo mac and cheese, Earth Balance Mac, Miyoko's winter truffle, and the Vegan Egg.


Since I'm sure you want to know my feelings on all of these products, keep reading. The Terri ranch is single-handedly responsible for any salads I ate during my pasta rut. My fave dressing so far! The Califia farms creamer is pretty much a staple for me, still haven't tried the Just Mayo (it doesn't go on pasta..), and the yogurts are long gone, because they are so good. I LOVED the tempeh, so yeah, go Barry! I made a Buffalo tempeh salad (!) with some Terri Ranch and loved it so much. I made an amazing Ropa Vieja from the No Evil Foods Seitan, which is easily shredded. Super good and will definitely buy again. I am a shamefully big fan of all of these mac and cheeses in a box. I grew up in the 90s in the McWorld era, so if you don't understand me you're too young to get me, or you're my mom and you are like, yup, exactly that. You already know about my feelings on the Vegan Egg, and this is my favorite flavor of Miyoko's cheese second only to the Fresh Loire Valley in a Fig Leaf. This deodorant smells good but it just doesn't work. Wish it didn't cost $14, but shame on me for even spending $14 on deodorant. I have been applying it 3 times a day in order to smell good. I recommend it for you if you don't do anything that makes you sweat, sit in air-conditioned places for the whole day, don't walk around or get mad. I sweat when I get mad, so sometimes I put this on more than 3 times a day.


I made this for a brunch party my parents had! It is the "Lazy Morning Frittata" from Thug Kitchen Party Grub and it was delicious the day-of, but the leftovers didn't reheat very well. It is super pretty and kind of perfect for a brunch party. Plus my mom let me use some of her stash of Polish Pottery and it made it look even better.

So I have been so into making oatmeal in the morning lately. I hadn't really ever made it from scratch before, and only ever ate those Quakers instant oatmeal packets, which after reading the ingredients really didn't interest me anymore. So all this time I have been like, RIP oatmeal, when I could have been making amazing homemade oatmeal every day. What I do is: bring 1 cup almond milk and 1 cup water to boil in a saucepan, stir in oats (old fashioned rolled) and reduce to simmer, stir every few. When it looks almost the consistency that I am into, I stir in like 2 tablespoons of almond butter and 2 tablespoons maple syrup. It makes 2 servings so I just pack the other serving in a container for the next morning. Once it's in my bowl I top it with extra almond butter, chocolate covered chia seeds, and some frozen berry that is in my freezer, this one is raspberry. Sometimes I do another swirl of maple syrup too.


Pasta! This is the Pasta Pomodoro from Chloe's Vegan Italian Kitchen with a dollop of pesto on top, because more pesto. Hard to go wrong here. You don't need help understanding why I am in love with pasta, tomatoes and basil.



Be back soon with hopefully less pasta, more makeup/beautystuffs, and hot with news.
<3,
KZ

I didn't have any chilled coconut milk to make the icing out of so I just made regular, standard, cinnamon roll icing. started off by doing a drizzle. Then I got real with myself and just dunked the doughnut in the icing like a normal person.

Overall, a decent breakfast doughnut. It's not like I'd swear off Dunwell or anything. I mean, these doughnuts will help you out when in morning doughnut need. Basically what I'm saying, is they're okay. A tough sell to someone who is a yeasted, fried, sugary doughnut fan. Alex wouldn't touch them. But they're small, so I ate two. The end.

Lemon Zinger Loaf

1/4 package silken tofu
1/2 cup coconut sugar
1/4 cup maple syrup
1/2 cup coconut oil
1 cup lemon zinger tea, steeped and cooled
juice of 1/2 a lemon
1 cup all purpose unbleached flour
1 cup white whole wheate flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground ginger

2 tablespoons white chia seeds
1/4 cup sliced almonds

Preheat oven to 350ºF and spray a 9x5" loaf pan with some oil.
Puree the silken tofu in either a blender or food processor and transfer it into a large mixing bowl, making sure you scrape out as much as possible, not leaving much left in the blender. Add the coconut sugar, maple syrup, coconut oil, lemon zinger, lemon juice and whisk together until combined. Sift in the flours, baking soda, baking powder, salt and ginger. Whisk again until combined and pour batter into your prepared loaf pan. Smooth out the top and sprinkle with almonds and chia seeds. Bake for 35 minutes, or until a cake tester or toothpick comes out clean when you insert it into the middle of the loaf with no batter residue. Let cool before taking loaf out of the pan.

Alex got the chickn and waffles. He gets it every time. This doesn't help me in my mission to try everything. However, these chickn and waffles are pretty great.

I drizzled them with maple syrup and sprinkled with turbinado sugar before the oven. Maybe next time I will do that after the oven.


Pumpkin Chip Scones:

1 cup pumpkin, from a can is fine
2 tablespoons almond milk
1/2 cup sugar
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon baking powder
1/3 cup coconut oil, cold
1/2 cup mini chips

*If you ever bake with coconut oil, you know that when it's cold, it's like rock hard, and hard to get exactly how much you need out of the jar. I like to measure it warm, pour it into small tupperware, then chill it until hard. Then dump it out and you have exactly how much you need.

Preheat oven to 350ºF.
Sift together flour, sugar, salt, and baking powder.
Cut the coconut oil into cubes or just small pieces. Add it to the flour mixture and stir in with your hands, breaking up the pieces of coconut oil even smaller, until you have pebbly sized lumps throughout your flour.
Mix together the pumpkin and almond milk, then add it to the flour along with the mini chips. Stir with your hands, only until the dough it holding together. You won't get all the flour mixed in, but that's okay. You aren't making batter, just dough.
Dump out the dough onto a clean counter and carefully press the dough into a disk-sized shape, about 1/2" thick. You can go thicker if you have enough dough, just the thicker, the fewer scones you will end up with. Slice into wedges, slices, circles, whatever shape scone you want to eat.
Using a spatula, carefully transfer the shaped scones to a lined baking tray. Bake for 18 minutes or until firm to the touch, not too firm, just not mushy anymore. Let cool 5 minutes before serving. Store remaining scones in a paper bag.

 These knives look kind of violent. They are just for the french toast. I swear, we are a no-knife family.


 Breakfast-glory. Sundays are for doing it right, and by that I mean piling your plate ridiculously high with delicious and responsible breakfast foods.