Tuesday, May 29, 2007

100th Post! A Memorable Memorial Day

Memorial Day in Austin is a day of rain. It ALWAYS rains on Memorial Day here. At 6:00 a.m. the storms began and my power went off. By 10:00 a.m. we had 2 inches of rain. It has rained every day for the past six days, over 7 inches this month. My yard can’t hold any more water!







Memorial Day 1981 was one of our worst floods. 10 inches of rain fell in four hours. Shoal Creek, which runs from midtown to downtown and normally flows at 90 gallons per minute, peaked at 6 million gallons per minute. Needless to say it overflowed its banks. 500 cars were swept into the creek, 13 people died, and there was $36 million in property damages. One of the hardest hit was Whole Foods. It was just a small storefront and completely ruined. Mr. Mackey and friends were going to have to give up their dream, but the community rallied and private donations rebuilt the little hippy store with great produce we had come to love. The rest, as they say, is history.





The plan for this Memorial Day was to pick up Chase in the morning at his new apartment, assess what furnishings he needs, then shop at IKEA. And then while Chase put his new things together, I would fix a dinner to celebrate his new apartment and my 100th post.

Well, we couldn’t get out in the morning storms, so I ruined a cake while waiting for the rain to stop. (My sister had a hard time on her flight home.) The rain finally stopped at noon. First stop, Chase’s apartment. Here’s the view from his balcony.





He just loves his new place. He also loves his laundry room.



It’s his new pet rabbit, Smokey!




Shhh! The apartment manager doesn’t know. He’s just 8 weeks old and so sweet. Chase swears he researched excessively on how to properly care for him. He’s wanted a pet for so long, so I hope this one works out.



IKEA was a madhouse! We spent 3 hours there and got most of the things on our list. I was tired when I got home, but ready to cook. On the menu was VWAV BBQ Pomegranate Tofu and Coconut Rice, Veggie Chickpea Cobbler, broccoli, and cake, which didn’t happen. Chase proclaimed this one of the best meals I’ve ever made, so – YAY! The BBQ sauce for the tofu is really, really good. It was unlike any recipe I’d used before, so I was pleasantly surprised. I added some cumin seeds and mustard seeds to the rice and used lemon instead of lime. It was excellent.





The cobbler was also really delicious, which is a good thing because I made a huge pan of it. I sautéed all my veggies – sweet potatoes, carrots, onions, green beans, cauliflower, and corn – until softened, then added in a can of tomatoes, a big can of chickpeas, and a mix of spices I didn’t write down, but included cumin, coriander, and oregano.



While the veggies simmered I made a baking powder biscuit dough with sunflower seeds and nutritional yeast, rolled it out, and cut it into star shapes. The stars went on top and it baked for about 12 minutes.




We had extra biscuit dough. Luckily, I found my Man in the Moon cookie cutter and we made more biscuits.




Here’s my plate. I had to have a half piece of BBQ tofu.



So about the cake…. I wanted to make a strawberry ice cream cake roll. Let’s blame the humidity for the cake cracking instead of rolling. I saw the crack, but continued anyway, thinking maybe everything would just freeze back together. Nope. In a panic I scraped as much of the melting ice cream and fresh sliced strawberries into a store bought graham cracker crust. I couldn’t bear to throw a 15 x 11 inch cake into the trash, so I picked up pieces of the ice cream soaked cake and put them into a bowl. Quite a few strawberries were still stuck to it. It looked good in that bowl. I took a bite. I had bread – or rather, cake pudding – a vanilla ice cream soaked vanilla cake with strawberries! Oh boy, it was rich tasting and so deserving of a bowl instead of a trash bin.




I also had a half filled graham cracker crust. Plan B – stop at the store for more Tofutti and make Strawberry Ice Cream Pie. Of course it’s yummy. It’s got ice cream and fresh strawberries!




This is already a lengthy post, but I’ll take this opportunity to say how fun it is to be a part of the vegan blogger community. I enjoy immensely all the knowledge and recipes we exchange. I actually GET a lot more than I GIVE. I can’t imagine ever tiring of cooking or blogging. Some bloggers have reflected on their favorite posts when they reach a milestone. I looked back on mine and thought “Why did I post that? It looks like crap!” Even if my food didn’t turn out perfectly, my favorite posts are ones where Chase and friends were involved in the preparation of the dinner. Cooking and eating should be fun and enjoyed regularly with family and friends. That’s when food tastes the best.


By the way, here’s what today looks like…..





27 comments:

Anonymous said...

I love your blog!

Holly

Vicki's Vegan Vice said...

What a fun post! Happy Memorial Day, and Happy 100th post! I love Chase's view, and I bet the food tasted extra special, thanks for sharing how it all unfolded that day. :o)

Sheree' said...

I love your blog and feel like I am part of yours and Chases's life. Thank you. Your 100th post and your meal to celebrate with Chase is wonderful. The cobbler is fantastic. Thank you for the great idea. CAn you share your recipe for the bisquits. I want mine to come out as perfect as yours did. With your review of the BBQ tofu I will have to try it. Congratulations to you for your awesome blog and congrats to Chase for sharing his life too. You are a fantastic mom!

Sheree' said...

I forgot to say how cute Smokey is. I love fur kids!

Anonymous said...

congrats!!!! i love your blog and i apreciate all you show in here.

Mikaela said...

I love those moon and star biscuits. Love them! :)

Congratulations to you for #100, and to Chase in his new pad!

Anonymous said...

congrats on your 100th post! i like ikea, too. what a cute rabbit you have :) tofu and coconut rice look so great - nice presentation! desserts look great, too... what a beautiful Memorial Day you had!

bazu said...

Happy 100th post! You always have such consistently beautiful food and presentations.

I'm sorry for your bad weather... and how nice the picture from yesterday looked! I can't imagine Whole Foods ever having been a tiny store-front! And, I'm glad Chase's move went well and Smokey is one adorable baby bunny! Awwwww.

erica said...

Smokey!!!
I had a rabbit named Prego as a kid (we had spaghetti that day).

That ice cream pie looks good - I had a piece of raw hazelnut cake with sunflower seed frosting and fresh strawberries at Proper Eats yesterday. Not proper food combining, but it was pretty good, and I didn't have to make it. :D

Amey said...

Hoorah for 100 posts! Hoorah for Smokey!!

I love your blog so much... I have dreams of us all getting to actually meet each other one day!

Jacqueline Meldrum said...

Hip Hip Hoorah Congratulations on your 100th post!
I can sympathise on the rain, it has done nothing but rain all week here and all of my sandals are open toed! It sucks!

Judy said...

I love when I'm able to rescue a trash-bound dish and not only make it work, make it delicious. Love the pastry stars and moons too - so clever.

laura k said...

Wow, great save with that ice cream pie! It sounds like a lovely day for a celebration--it's so strange, though, that it always rains! I've been catching up on your blog and, as usual, love all that I see... I'll have to remember Texas caviar. Oh, and I hope Chase and Smokey get along great--he's one cute little guy!

Harmonia said...

Great pictures! The Bunny is adorable! The food looks wonderful! :) Long time, no see...swing by when you can!

HARMONIA

Kate said...

Congrats to Chase on the apartment. All the food looks awesome and the bunny is so cute!

Christina said...

Smokey is so cute!

There are only three vegan bloggers I know of in Austin: you, http://www.vegoutaustin.com/, and me, but there must be more, I mean it IS Austin. I'm working on getting some of the students of NE to work on blogs, but they haven't so far.

There's a huge email list for the NE/Casa community potluck, if you send me your email address, I'll make sure you're added to that list. We've just started doing potluck themes, the May potluck was held at my house, and the theme was Persian food, it was BEAUTIFUL! And it's always a nice mix experimental, extravagant and simple food, and greens/veggie dishes are always welcome.

Tomorrow, June 1st is the date of another (separate) vegan potluck and open music jam. I have the details for that, but I don't want to post it in an open forum like this.

urban vegan said...

Looks liek the rain didn't ruin your Memorial Day with all of that yumminess The tofu looks iller--I have to get my hands on pomegranate molasses and try it. And that ice cream pie looks so refreshing right now.

urban vegan said...

Forgot to mention how utterly adorable the bunny is. I'm sure Chase will be a great bunny papa.

MeloMeals said...

Great save with the cake! The pie looks so amazing... along with everything else.. I keep meaning to try that recipe... must find pomegratate molasses... hehe..

Congratulations on 100 posts! I love your blog and this lovely vegan blogging community we have here.. it is really special.

Vegan_Noodle said...

Congrats on your 100th post! The rain has been pretty constant here in Houston too, luckily it seems like we are getting a break now. That was a really interesting tidbit on the flood and whole foods! And of course, your food looks yummy as always!

david santos said...

Today it is the World-wide day of the child

Anonymous said...

Congrats on your 100th post! I love your blog--thanks for keeping it up!

Courtney

Emmy said...

Congrats on your 100th post :) Wow, you certainly have been getting a lot of rain. I hope it eases up soon. That was an interesting story about Whole Foods. That's great Chase is enjoying his new apartment. Smokey is so adorable!!! I think Ikea is always a madhouse. No matter when I go to Ikea, it's always jam packed. I love the biscuit stars you made. So cute :)

Jackie said...

Happy 100th post :)

Smokey is sooo cute, I am sure the landlord would even fall in love with him.

scottishvegan said...

Happy 100th post! I am glad you plan to always continue cooking and blogging because I will always love reading your blog! Everything always looks so healthy and colourful! I love little Smokey the rabbit…he’s sooooo cute! Your food is gorgeous as always…I love the little star and moon biscuits! And the ice cream cake/pudding looks amazingly yum!!

Johanna GGG said...

I love your star biscuits on the vegies - and the man in the moon to keep the stars company - reminds me of a song I sung as a kid - all looks delicious... 100 hundred wonderful posts like this is a great milestone - congrats!

Kati said...

Cute biscuits! Heavenly pie! Adorable rabbits! That's so neat that you've been going to Whole Foods since the beginning.