Archives for vegan

Adult Mac and Cheeze

November 9, 2016 by Zucchini Runner in Food, Main Dish, Main Dish | 2 Comments

Yep, you read that title correct! If you are like me, you loooooooved mac n’ cheese as a kid. I couldn’t get enough of that stuff. I also looooooved eating that bright yellow goodness with a hot dog. YEP. I haven’t been plant-based my whole life folks.

img_0410_sized

So when we stumbled on a vegan mac n’ cheeze recipe for kids about a year ago, we modified it (a lot) to make it more substantial, and adult-like. We added onion, green peas, broccoli and yes, even vegan sausage. This recipe isn’t as quick as throwing a box of noodles in boiling water and then plopping in butter, milk and a neon cheese packet — but it is SO much better for you and it’s still a filling comfort food. Who doesn’t need a little of that from time to time, right?

Ingredients
1 c. cooked butternut squash
1/2 c. raw macadamia nuts*
2 TBSP. nutritional yeast
1 c. water
squeeze of lemon juice
few dashes of Real salt, maybe some ground black pepper too
6 c. dry macaroni noodles (or other similar noodle on hand)
10 oz. package of frozen, organic broccoli
1 c. frozen, organic peas
1 small to medium brown onion, chopped
1 Field Roast vegan Italian sausage, chopped
9″x12″ baking dish

Preheat oven to 375°F

  1. Peel, cut in half, scrape out the seeds and chop the butternut squash; or if you are lucky you can find it this way in the grocery store. Place the chopped pieces on a baking sheet, with a little water and bake at 375°F for 20 minutes, or until fork tender.
  2. In a blender, add the mac nuts, nutritional yeast, water, lemon juice and salt. Set aside while you wait for the butternut squash to cook.
  3. In a large stock pot, add water and 6 c. of noodles. (Follow package instructions for exact preparation.) We use gluten-free noodles typically; this time around I used garbanzo bean fusilli!
  4. In a steamer basket, place broccoli, peas and chopped onion. Place steamer basket over your pot of water and place lid on and steam until the onions start to become transparent and the greens are BRIGHT green.
  5. Cut up the vegan sausage link and set aside.
  6. By now the butternut squash is probably done, so you can add it to the blender, which contains the other cheeze sauce ingredients. Blend on low for about 10 seconds, then crank it up to high and process until you get a thick and creamy, cheezy sauce. Be sure to taste test it at this point and see if you want to add any more salt or other seasonings. Make it yours!
  7. Once the noodles are done, drain and place in the 9″x12″ baking dish.
  8. Add the steamed veggies, cheeze sauce and noodles as well.
  9. Stir well in the baking dish to combine.
  10. Cover with foil and bake for 10-15 minutes at 350°F. Serve immediately.

This dish will serve 6-8 as a side dish, or you can just do what we do and save it for leftovers for a couple days.

Below is a slideshow with more preparation instructions.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

(*Nutsinbulk.com is a GREAT place to get mac nuts FRESH and avoid the rancid grocery store variety. Fresh mac nuts are life changing. You can also use cashews if you like those too.)

Did you enjoy mac and cheese as a kid, or am I alone in this?

Thrive Bars by GoMacro | Review & Giveaway

October 5, 2016 by Zucchini Runner in Giveaway, Review | 11 Comments

First, I want to give a special thanks to Mr. Zucchini Runner for taking over my blog duties last week, and sharing his recipe for baked french fries! We truly are a team, and he definitely is my favorite person on the planet. (Sorry family.) Now, onto this ancient seeds superfood nut bar… that’s USDA organic, non-gmo, vegan, gluten-free and AMAZING. These are some of the key words I look for when shopping for any packaged food, and I’m super impressed these Thrive bars have them all in one tiny little snack-a-licious package. Some of you may remember the GoMacro bar review I did back in June of 2015, and may wonder how these differ. Well, I’m glad you asked!

img_9661_mod

These smaller bars are the perfect snack to grab and go, and not ruin your upcoming meal. Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely still love the peanut butter chocolate chip GoMacro bar, but I do call it my “healthy candy bar”. Weighing in at 290 calories and 11g of protein, it’s basically a meal replacement bar. The Thrive bars are smaller and about 100 calories less and contain half the amount of protein. This made it very easy for me to grab one as a snack, to tide me over until the next meal.

Thrive bars come in six flavors so you are sure to find one flavor you love. For me, it was hands down caramel coconut. But you might be a fan of ginger lemon, almond apricot, chocolate peanut butter chip, blueberry lavender or chocolate, nuts and sea salt!

Just like the larger MacroBars, all the ingredients listed are recognizable as FOOD, as a bonus in the Thrive bars they are also visible with each bite! If my iPhone was better at getting a macro photograph, I would have posted it — but since it’s not this little card insert will have to do. 😀

img_9662_mod

For the label readers out there, here is a sample ingredient list for the ginger lemon bar:
Organic Cashews, Organic Brown Rice Syrup, Organic Ancient Seed Blend (Organic Sprouted Flax, Organic Puffed Quinoa, Organic Hemp Hearts), Organic Crystallized Ginger (Organic Ginger, Organic Cane Sugar), Organic Pumpkin Seeds, Organic Apple Fiber, Organic Dried Brown Rice Syrup, Organic Lemon Juice Powder, Organic Sunflower Oil, Organic Natural Lemon Flavor

Once again, GoMacro has produced a yummy, healthy PACKAGED snack; which is not easy to do in my opinion.

img_9651_mod

These three flavors were my least favorite…

img_9659_mod

These three were my favorite, with caramel coconut as the clear winner!

Below you can what I mean about the poor macro shot… one day I will get a DSLR… one day. For now, the trusty iPhone will have to do… since you can CLEARLY see the pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, puffed quinoa and cashews.

img_9656_mod

If you want to purchase Thrive for your next big adventure, or just the upcoming work week, GoMacro will give you 30% off! Just use code Thrive30 at checkout, on any Thrive product at GoMacro’s online store. If you are a rebel and just want to pay full price, Thrive bars are also available for purchase at your local Whole Foods Market.

GIVEAWAY DETAILS

It’s been a while since I’ve done a review and giveaway on the blog, so I’m pretty stoked one of my lucky readers/followers will have the opportunity to win a box of 12 assorted bars! Just follow the entry requirements below, and you will be entered to win.

  1. Follow GoMacro on at least ONE of the following social media channels:
    Twitter: https://twitter.com/gomacro/
    Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/gomacro
    Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/gomacro/
    Instagram: https://instagram.com/gomacro/
  2. Follow Zucchini Runner on Instagram.
  3. Comment on this blog post with the flavor you MOST want to try!
  4. BONUS: Comment on the Instagram post related to this giveaway, by tagging two of your friends. This will get you an additional “name in the drawing hat” so to speak. 🙂

The winner will be chosen and announced this Friday, October 7th, so don’t hesitate, enter ASAP!

img_9653_mod

More about GoMacro

GoMacro is a family-run natural food company with roots in organic farming and they are dedicated to making the best tasting food with the highest quality ingredients. Everything they make is 100% vegan, USDA certified organic, certified non-GMO, Gluten-Free, and made from mostly raw ingredients! They truly believe that everything put in our bodies should have a beneficial impact.

← Older posts
Newer posts →