Happy (Belated) Holiday/Christmas!

     Happy belated Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa  Christmakah, etc    veggie eaters, food lovers, and all around sexy crews!~

     Christmas ever started with a complete lack of sleep and a meek attempt at dehydrating tomatoes...which took over 12 hours!! But first...my oven got tickled hardcore this time around. I had a Christmas/Holiday party to share with a lovely group of buddies and we played a sort-of Yankee Swap/Secret Santa type of deal. I made up funky money banana bread~ chocolate chips, cinnamon, ginger, cranberries, raisins  walnut, pecans, coconut~ everything was whole wheat, organic, and I slipped in vitamin B12 drops, vitamin C drops, etc... I got a bit too excited. 

Funky Monkey Bread, before and after~ photo taken by VeganBeats

     The next day was the day before Christmas Eve, and I had a lot of dehydrating and baking to do. But I got pretty awful and heartbreaking news...so I lazed up. I had planned on baking four cakes, dehydrating tomatoes, and making a peppermint brittle. These buggers owned my oven...for about half a day!

Oven-dried tomatoes...before the 12 hour marathon~ photo taken by VeganBeats

     Christmas eve rolled up and thanks to tomatoes, cake baking happened all day Christmas eve. I spent this Christmas eve with the ever talented and wonderful Scotty Soul...where the plan was chill, make dinner, exchange gifts, listening to silly Holiday tunes, and watching far too many Christmas movies...
     I didn't get a picture of the yummy dinner we made but I'll gloat a bit. We stocked up on two massive bags of veggies and spices and made a big and beautiful pot of veggie soup.
     Menu~ Scotty Soul's favorite...Soup and toast!

     The recipe is a bit all over the place, but here's a gist:
What We Used:

1. 1 med-large onion, chopped
2. 2 medium sweet potatoes chopped
3. 1 pint of cherry tomatoes, or 0.66 Kg of tomatoes chopped
4. 1 large carrot, chopped
5. 2 small head of baby napa cabbage, chopped
6. 4 leaves of dinosaur kale, chopped
7. 3 leaves of chard, chopped
8. bag of enoke mushrooms, chopped
9. 1/2 medium zucchini, chopped into half moons
10. 1-2 T olive oil
11. 1 T garlic minced
12. 1-3 T black pepper
13. 1 t salt
14. 1 T Chinese pepper
15. 1 T mixed herbs

What we Did:

1. heat a medium/large pot to medium high heat, add the oil
2. When the oil is hot, add the onions and sweet potatoes~ set to low heat and watch
3. After you can smell the sweetness, add the chopped tomatoes *Let this Stew and boil down to make a broth of sorts*
4. Add carrots and garlic.
5. After 10 minutes, add everything else and let boil down to desired thickness!

~Toast optional~

Scotty Soul and dins~ photo taken by VeganBeats

     Scotty Soul gave me such amazing and perfect things...that soon enough I'll get to use ALL THE TIME~ Right now I've got a SICK electric blanket that keeps me super super snugly  And I got some perfume that makes me feel like a sassy lady (hell yea), and as soon as I update to an Iphone5...food will start looking sexier. But the thing I'm beyond tickled for has been chilling at Incheon International...soon...soon~
     Christmas day was a joll at Kia and Sean's!!!! I made an intense and drunky cake for the occasion! So..what is this complexity?

My Christmas cake!! photo taken by VeganBeats

     Ginger rum cranberries, blueberries, and raisins in a dark chocolate cinnamon cake with a green tea, ginger, and rum butter-cream frosting! Rich is flavor and alcohol~ whasa!
     Enough squiggling, let's see what Kia and Sean stabbed and stretched my stomach with! Get a napkin...

scalloped potatoes~ photo taken by VeganBeats

spinach and artichoke dip~ photo taken by VeganBeats

tomato, shitake mushroom, cashew cheese pizza~ photo taken by VeganBeats

stuffed mushrooms~ photo taken by VeganBeats

lentil loaf~ photo taken by VeganBeats~

     There was also olive tempanade, baguettes, babaganoush, jello (agar) shots, alcohol...lots of alcohol, and  a stupid delicious salad chalk full of pomegranate (!!!), apples (!!!!), lettuce (AHHHH!!!!!!), pecans (!!!), and a tofu based dressing. I had bowls of this....bowls....stomach stretching greens gamble~

Grasshopper pie~ photo taken by VeganBeats~

peppermint fudge~ photo taken by VeganBeats~

Grasshopper pudding cups~ photo taken by VeganBeats~

chai cake~ photo taken by VeganBeats

     I drank loads, laughed a lot, ate too much, smiled, and was full of immeasurable amounts of love...

I think I need a tissue break...

Happy Late Holidays!!

New Years is around the bend!!!!

Scotty Soul's Surprise

     October has been more than busy, stressful, emotional, and brilliant. It started off with the death of a brilliant man, upsetting family realizations, emotional roller-coasting, a draining wallet, and rounded off with birthday celebrations, party preperations, smiles, laughter, growth, an anniversary, new family members, Halloween jams, and November began with a SURPRISE!
     This is a silly side-note and apologies to my girl, but Hamlet and I celebrated two years together on October 26th! She has brought so much joy and love into my life! The nights I've ended snuggling up to her are immeasurabley blissful!

baby~ photo taken by VeganBeats~

     Anyways, Scotty Soul had his birthday on October 29th and since Halloween is on the 31st, it's been a bit neglected. For his actual birthday I made him a super veggie friendly but NOT vegan birthday dinner paired with a massive yummy salad~

up close, and not that pretty~ photo taken by VeganBeats

     When I was a little thrasher, my nanna used to make baked macaroni and my entire family and I would literally melt in it's scent. She would make a creamy roux, rich buttery smells and whole wheat flower, with soft cheeses, and baked with a crunchy ritz cracker and butter topping. Not healthy, but very comforting, and delicious. Scotty Soul isn't vegan, and I wanted to make something homey, comforting, and special...

     The non-vegan dish was a baked three cheese macaroni. The cheeses were feta, extra sharp cheddar (VT!), and pepper jack. The veggies I threw in were broccoli, spinach, kale, caramelized onions and bell peppers, and the topping was blended tortilla chips (less salt overall chyea)~ 

Scotty Soul's plate~ photo taken by VeganBeats

     The salad I made was chalk full of greens and all sorts of textured roughage. Iceburg lettuce, romaine, green and red leaf lettuce, spinach, kale, onions, broccoli chunks, celery, cucumber, and bamboo shoots! The dressing I made was my "friends with salad" dressing.
      One of the gifts I made for him was a custom deck~ Got a board, sanded it down (thanks to my neighborhood grocer for finding sandpaper for me~) and spent all night painting finishing touches while ruining four cakes...ugh

his deck~ photo taken by VeganBeats~

again~ photo taken by VeganBeats~

     But...BUT this past weekend a community that has nothing but love for Scotty Soul joined up at Braii Republic for a Surprise party! I still managed to ruin a couple cakes but eventually made two that I aimed to make! The first one was Jake the Dog from Adventure time WATCH THIS SHOW!!!

Jake the cake~ photo taken by VeganBeats~

     ...and the second was one of his childhood "dream" cakes!~ (Thanks to the goddess and stunning Carrie for helping me out =^ㅊ^=)..

dream pool cake~ photo taken by VeganBeats

     The Jake cake was a dark chocolate cake with white chocolate and cranberries with a coconut butter cream frosting with cocoa essence. The dream cake (the swimming pool cake) was a dark chocolate, cranberry, white chocolate, and peanut butter swirl cake with a dark chocolate and coconut butter cream frosting with raspberry and strawberry essence. The "pool" part was organic strawberry jam.
     The cakes themselves were vegan but the frostings weren't due to actual butter used (baked birthday dinner leftover ingredients) and the peppero sticks~
   

Oven playing~

     I have an oven! I can now play baker whenever I want, roast things, and hell~ I can dehydrate things!! It's been maybe a week and I've already roasted some zukes, made some cookies, and baked a few cakes for my buddy Brian~

the cake~ (photo taken by VeganBeats)

     The cake was a mash up of nearly everything, chocolate chips, mangoes, cashews, peanuts, coconut, almonds, and cranberries! The frosting was a coco-peanut butter butter cream. I made a bunch more cakes that only differed in that they were coconut-oat chocolate chocolate chip with a peanut butter coconut butter cream frosting.
    I also made some dark chocolate protein bars...!!

very VERY rich~ (photo taken by VeganBeats)

     It was raw dark cocoa, almond butter, peanut butter, cashews, cranberries, and coconut! I think I may have threw in a load of flax too...

Maybe I'll finally learn how to bake up a dense studded-bread~

Itchin in the Kitch~

     My cooking has been suffering a LOT lately. Suffering by just not happening. (How often do I whine about this) but I did some playing and created some pretty flavor packed stuff!~
     I'm a little exhausted and lacking words at the moment...so here's some pictures!

tumeric rosemary and black pepper almonds (photo taken by VeganBeats)

     When I go food shopping, I've been buying nuts, which really isn't necessary. They're expensive and pretty easy to make at home. So I went for it and made some AWESOME spiced and flavor jacked almonds! These are tumeric, rosemary, and black pepper "French-fried" almonds...yum!!
     Just to make something pretty I whipped up a chocolate strawberry cake~

chocolate strawberry cake (photo taken by veganBeats)

     Can you see the strawberries peeking out?!~ To make it extra pretty and a bit more complex, I made a raw coconut cream and chocolate hazelnut "frosting."

pretty! (photo taken by veganBeats)

     This was rich, lovely, full of fruit, and besides the natural fats pumping from coconut, it's essentially fat free. The only additional fats in here were whipped flax seeds!!

     More to come, more playing to get on~

Christmas Eve and peppermint pudding pie

     My dad, mom, and brother were all about the secret V, they didn't tell anyone that I was wandering in this time zone so my godparents hadn't a clue that I was hiding in the basement while they prepped for church going.
     Every Christmas eve, since I can't recall (even in the slightest degree) my godparents have shared holiday celebrations with my immediate family and myself. Last year was the first one I didn't attend. The evening usually plays out in this order...they arrive, we all kick it, nom or whatever, open presents, people eat desert, then we play games until no one an keep an eye open. I don't care how dweeby I sound, but video games and goofing around is something I love, I fully embrace video game culture and ribbing one another over some 3D interactive game show. Why watch jeopardy when you can be doing it yourself right?
     My dad and I were chatting when the doorbell rang and all army style I crawled like a lynx to my basement...they all got gussied up and went to church and when they came back I strolled down the stairs. More hugs, lots of love and...ahh the embracing squeezes...I may be bruising these ribs of mine but it is hella worth it. It felt like I never left, we all eased into our routine but with a cheeky rosiness now, so much positivity!

O_o# (photo taken by VeganBeats)

pressies pressies pressies!!! (photo taken by VeganBeats)

     While opening presents, Alex and I went to the kitchen to create a rich dessert together. I want all kitchen play to be in my hands (does that sound slightly demanding) and my brother was kind enough to let me play baker. He being a full-fledge mint-man and a self-reserved choco-holic, we created a super peppermint chocolate cream pie. It wasn't vegan but it was nearly from scratch...in terms of Attleboro.

ready, set, finish (photo taken by VeganBeats)

     While my brother made the chocolate pudding and crushed peppermint, I made the whip cream. It was fresh and as local as you can get in this tiny town but..I won't even bother defending myself on this. I added peppermint powder (freshly powderized!) and confectionary sugar to the cream and went a whipping. The smell of mint entered our nostrils and even though I'm not a mint girl...it smelt yummy!

photo taken by VeganBeats

     Luckily I picked up some fresh mint from a local store and with all these peppermint candies littering our home, Alex let me decorate and what came to be was a heavily loaded cream pie with chocolate dusted on it's snowy peaks. 

photo taken by VeganBeats)

whoa (photo taken by VeganBeats)

photo taken by VeganBeats

     We got rave responses and Alex seemed thoroughly content with the minty-ness. A vegan version is on the checklist!

US day 1: getting gas and baking cookies...

     My brother owns a camaro, a stupidly sexy and aesthetically teasing vehicle that...I want. I am not a fan of Transformers but that car was featured and it's damned sexy so a while back when my brother sent me pics of his "new car" my heart grew hot with excitement for him and this new part of his life, and with envy. Anyways...the day began with a trip to fuel up this car of his and it turned into a chain of visits and more surprising!
     First we drove to our old high-school and met up with old teachers, familiar faces, and old classmates. This was so much fun because...as much as high-school may be behind me, there's this slight hankering to trek the hallways and rock that uniform.
     After this we drove off to the oldest friends we've got. This family is our second family, there are three children (adults) that we grew up with and of course their parents that hold a big part of our hearts. I haven't seen Nichole since I left for Korea and seeing her was beyond wonderful! She's getting married in a year and though brief, we caught up and everything felt like not an hour has passed. I can't WAIT to be a part of her wedding!

89 cent slushies...bring on the corny syrup (photo taken by VeganBeats)

photo taken by VeganBeats

     I'm still snap happy and have been clicking pics left and right...sorting through all of them is a bit overwhelming but..how much love do I got eh?!

smilin bro (photo taken by VeganBeats)

text (photo taken by VeganBeats)

drive (photo taken by VeganBeats)

photo taken by VeganBeats

warning (photo taken by VeganBeats)

highway skies (photo taken by VeganBeats)

     Next we went to my old workplace, Newbury Comics. Seriously the best place I've ever "worked" for. Granted I never brought home money (I kept using my paycheck to rack up cd's and albums) but I had a blast. All day all of us would kick it, listen to music, goof around, just have a rockin' good time. Man...Newbury~
     Turns out everyone I worked with got relocated to a different store, so we drove the forty minutes there to see all of the original staff! I saw the guys that hired me, the people I used to squiggle with...
Such a busy and fun first day....and it keeps getting better!
     We closed the evening with the rest of that family friends crew we got. I surprised them by tucking away into my jacket and just chilled. Again, the love and the beats not missing have been sugar coating this trip.

     In the theme of sugar I got home late and decided to take full advantage of my parent's oven...within hours I had "conceived" hundred(s) of sweet delicious things.

coconut chocolate chip almond walnut cookies (photo taken by VeganBeats)

orange cinnamon gazed shortbread sugar cookies (photo taken by VeganBeats)

walnut apricot choco-coconutty bar (photo taken by VeganBeats)

no recipe...VeganBeating kitchen play (photo taken by VeganBeats)

vegan tollhouse (photo taken by VeganBeats)

What have I been doing without an oven? Seoul~ help me out, gimme a big oven not this silly toaster oven jazz...you aren't fooling anyone.

There will be a post dedicated to Binger...that glorious pig of mine that brings me so much joy and child-like giddiness!!

I am a guinea pig...a heart with limbs.

Sorae Villiage Christmas Market

     Last weekend I met up with some wonderful friends (I'm loving this trend) and we trucked it over to the Christmas market that was happening in Sorae villiage. Sorae villiage is the French district in Seoul and is honestly a strip loaded with cafes, bakeries, French cuisine, and is thoroughly dusted with the French language. It's super cute, I recommend just checking the area out!
     The market was quaint, there were lots of tables and foodie items all over the place. Sadly there wasn't much on the Vegan front (Aliensdayout, let's collaborate)! They had everything from wine (^^*), breads, cakes, bindaeddeok (빈대떡), crepes, hot chocolate...ahhh I'll just lay the porn on you~

starry wine (photo taken by VeganBeats)

more vino!!! (photo taken by VeganBeats)

빈대떡 (photo taken by VeganBeats)

     The hot chocolate was made with dark chocolate chips and...butter. ugh~ 

hot chocolate (photo taken by VeganBeats)

all sorts of tinned items (photo taken by VeganBeats)

     There was a table LOADED with beautifully dressed pastries and warm crusty breads but...vegan lacks and wallet demanding...my eyes can gorge though right? (I mean, what's porn for!)

look at all that bakey jazz! (photo taken by VeganBeats)

photo taken by VeganBeats

Christmas logs! (photo taken by VeganBeats)

cheesy breads (photo taken by VeganBeats)

decadent (photo taken by VeganBeats)

lemon tarts (photo taken by VeganBeats)

"so good" and the model's gorgeous too! (photo taken by VeganBeats)

Christmas decoration! (photo taken by VeganBeats)

olive oil (photo taken by VeganBeats)

not vegan )O: (photo taken by VeganBeats)

     It was mighty cold so we wandered into a small cafe where we sipped on hot coffees and Mipa gifted us with some BEAUTIFUL treats from her bakeshop. Check it out~ buy buy buy!!!

ginger coconut muffins and Boozy Christmas Fruitcake (photo taken by VeganBeats)

hand-dripped coffee..ughhhh (photo taken by VeganBeats)

cute! (photo taken by VeganBeats)

It's around the bend...and these treats wrap it kindly~

photo taken by VeganBeats

Christmas is LESS THAN a week AWAY!!!

Make sure to get some DELICIOUS vegan treats from aliensbakeshop.com If you get some now, you may have time to order another batch of noms (because you may just eat it all prior to gift wrapping!!