cooking

I’m not sure whether or not this counts as a “craft” per se, but I’m going with it :).

My husband and I, after watching the documentary Forks Over Knives, have decided to cut all animal products from our diets. This has been a bit harder than I expected – until today. But more on that in a minute.

We took our sons to a farm last Friday, and because it’s so late in the season, all they had available for u-pick was blueberries, so we picked blueberries. It was a wonderful family experience, even if most of the bushes had already been picked pretty clean. We got at least 2 pints for a meager $1.11. I know, had we purchased those same berries in the store, it would have cost us at least $8. Fun family time + cheaper berries = big win!

The trick with so many blueberries, though, is that I don’t particularly like them, except in baked goods. I know they’re really healthy with all their antioxidants etc., but I’ve never enjoyed raw blueberries, so my mind was immediately trying to think of what we could use them for. The kids like the raw okay, but hubby (after a huge blueberry picking trip as a child where they literally ate nothing but blueberries and blueberry-inspired baked goods for several days) isn’t overly fond of them, either, so unless I cooked something with them, I knew a lot of them would go to waste. Even at a savings of almost $7, I couldn’t let that happen.

Since this was after we adopted the vegan lifestyle, however, I was at a loss as to how to make muffins (the standard blueberry fare :)) without milk or eggs. A simple Google search led me to this recipe, which was so easy I knew I had to try it. It’s made using ingredients commonly found in a standard kitchen; all I had to buy was the margarine (we’ve been butter people for years) and applesauce. These used about half of the berries we had, so I went over to another site and found a wonderful recipe for vegan waffles and added the rest of the berries to that for breakfast one morning (unfortunately, I don’t have a picture of the waffles, though). Yum!

Back to that comment about finally finding our way in this new lifestyle today. I found a documentary on Amazon (I love having a Prime membership!) yesterday morning – while I was nursing Baby E and wishing to be asleep, lol – from one of the guys who did Forks Over Knives called “Forks Over Knives presents The Engine 2 Kitchen Rescue with Rip Esselstyn” and watched it. It was really good; I highly recommend it. In it, he went to two families’ homes and taught them the basics of this lifestyle: they went shopping for a day’s worth of groceries, and then he taught them how to use those whole ingredients to make delicious meals. Believe me when I say the meals were amazing looking! Or better yet, go watch the film yourself :). We’ve committed to taking his 28-day challenge (starting today) and have had two of the meals from his site so far; both are some of the best food I’ve had in ages, especially since going vegan. Head on over to his site if you’re interested in more information on this plant-based, whole foods lifestyle :).

Until next time…