Happy Halloween!

Casey the Brindle Dinosaur!

Prepare for take-off!

Casey’s Backpack came in

Now we’re ready for some serious camping!

Casey with her new saddlebags

Super Foggy Day

Art projects are in the making, many of them for the Holiday Season coming up so sadly cannot post pictures of them.

I was surprised with how foggy today was so I thought I’d share.

Super Foggy Day

You can usually see much further out. It’s nice though, whenever it was this foggy in Florida it was muggy and uncomfortable. With this you just can’t see much further than a block. I wish I had a chance to get a picture of this tree that was a bit taller than a house, because you couldn’t see the top of it.

On the camping front we recently got in two sleeping pads, the kind that are filled with a foam so you can compress them, but they auto-inflate.

And I ordered this yesterday in anticipation of Casey going camping with us at some point:

Casey's Backpack

First it’ll probably be at a camp site, and eventually we’ll find some back country place we can take her with us.

I’ll post pictures of her wearing it once we get it in.

Fall is Here!

So it has been getting chilly here and it is officially fall. The leaves are changing and falling everywhere and it’s fantastic.

View from a bus stop

So naturally we go and get some Pho and Paul drinks out of a coconut to remind us of warmer tropical times we are pleased to not be a part of.

Paul drinking out of a coconut

Best Biscuits & Gravy EVER

The gravy for this is pretty much entirely stolen from Issa Moskowitz’s book Vegan with a Vengence, and is by far the best gravy I have ever had (veg or not).

Gravy cooking

Ingredients

Gravy:

.25 cups flour

2.5 cups water

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 medium onion, chopped

2 teaspoons mustard seeds

3 cloves garlic, minced

1 16-ounce can of chickpeas, drained

2 pinches of ground cumin2 pinches of paprika

pinch of rosemary, thyme, oregano, and coriander

2 tablespoons soy sauce

.25 cup nutritional yeast

about 1 cup of finely chopped Nummy Seitan (see previous recipe)

Biscuits:

1.333 cups unbleached white flour

.333 cup nutritional yeast flakes

1 teaspoon dried herbs

5 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

5 tablespoons margarine

2 tablespoons raw apple cider vinegar

1 cup soy milk

Directions:

Preheat oven to 450°.

Mix the flour, nutritional yeast flakes, herbs, baking powder and salt in a medium bowl. Cut the margarine into the flour mixture until mixture is crumbly.

Measure the 2 tablespoons of apple cider vinegar into the bottom of a one cup measure. Top the cup off with soy or rice milk. Stir gently and let sit for a minute to curdle.

Add the “buttermilk” to the flour mixture and stir into a ball of dough.

On a lightly floured surface, roll the dough out to about 1 inch thick. We just balled up the biscuits like you would with cookies, but the recipe suggests that you should cut biscuits with a sharp cutter and place on lightly oiled cookie sheet.

Bake approximately 10-12 minutes in a 450° degree oven.

Biscuits out of the oven

While the biscuits are baking, prepare the gravy

First, mix the flour with the water until its pretty much all dissolved.

Use the oil to fry up the onions and mustard seeds for a few minutes until slightly browned, add the garlic and saute a bit more

Smash the chickpeas until they are pretty well broken up, and throw them, the chopped up seitan, the herbs, and the soy sauce in the pot.

Lower the heat a bit and pour the flour/water into the pan. Stir until a thick gravy forms.

Put the biscuits on a plate and pour the gravy over them. Enjoy!

~fin

Nummy Seitan

INGREDIENTS

Dough:

1.5 cups of Wheat Gluten

.5 cups of Chickpea Flour

.25 cups of Nutritional Yeast

2 cups “Chicken-Style” broth of just plain old veggie broth

Broth

2 cups of water

1 cup of broth

1/2 an onion, diced

2 cloves of garlic, finely grated

Directions:

Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees F

Combine the dough ingredients into a dough, and knead vigirously for 5 or so minutes, it should be kind of elasticy. Knead it into a log-shape, and put it in a lightly oiled bread pan. Pour the broth into the bread pan until the dough is covered. Put a sheet of aluminum foil over the bread pan, and throw it in the oven for an hour. After an hour, take it out, and very carefully using a spatula or two, flip it over, put the aluminum foil back over it, and throw it in the oven for another hour, and its done.

Unlike stuff like Tofu, this has very much flavor on its own, and can be served much more like a meat. Cut slices of it and serve as Seitan with Mashed Potatoes and Veggies, cut it and and throw it into stir fries, or us it as to make gravy for biscuits and gravy (see next recipe)