Preparing for Farm Sanctuary Hoe Down

Yay! My b/f, two other friends and I are going to the Farm Sanctuary for the hoe down. We're going to go there early to set up camp. My two other friends are omnivores and my b/f has converted to vegetarian. He is going to slowly transition to a vegan. We've made food and other needs for the trip. I've tried making lemongrass essential oil but it smells sweet so I don't know if I made it correctly.

Since there will be no showers for the campers, I made my own body wipes/baby wipes. Here's the recipe.

Vegan Baby/Body Wipes



2 Cup Warm Water
2 Tbsp Tea Tree Oil Castile Soup [You might want to use something less foamy]
2 Tbsp Aloe Vera Gel
1 Tsp Baking Soda or 3/4 Tsp Vinegar
Few Drops of Fragrance or Essential Oil

30 sheets of Basic Bounty [Not sure if regular bounty will absorb more so just experiment]

• Mix all the ingredients in the order listed in a plastic ziploc bag or a tupperware except for the paper towels.
• Swish the liquid ingredients around.
• Put the paper towels in the liquid and make sure all the paper absorbs the liquid. Check to see if the middle is still dried or not.

Herbal Properties

Tea tree oil - It is claimed to be good for acne, blackheads and repelling mosquitoes. It fight against certain bacteria and fungi.
Aloe Vera Gel - It is claimed to moisturize and sooth skin.
Baking Soda - It cleans, deodorizes, relieve itches and sooths the skin
Apple Cider Vinegar - It's also very similar to tea tree oil. It's good against rashes, sores, insect bites, acne, poison ivy and poison oak.

Sources:
Tea Tree Oil Uses
Wikipedia - Aloe Vera
Lamas Beauty
Amazine

Hot Chili Recipe from Vegan with a Vengeance


I used TVP instead. I had my TVP stored in my cupboard for more than half a year but my main reason is because I'm too lazy to make seitan. I realized I didn't have beans so I had to rollerblade to the grocery store to get some BEEEAAANN. I haven't rollerbladed in years, so I was the crazy girl wobbling down the sidewalk trying to kill people. The hot chili will be heated up in the camp fire on a nice hot summery day so we can sweat like crazy as we get bitten by mosquito. Isn't that a the life.


Kick Ass Carrot Cupcake from Recipezaar

It's called the Eggless Vegan Carrot Cake Cupcake. We made it early this week but my b/f forgot the sugar so we ate it as is but it tasted great without the sugar too because of the spices. I think it would taste great as a savory cupcake. Hahahah. It was actually more like a muffin.

Day with lots of green and lots of orange

Green Tea Noodle with Spinach Cilantro Pesto and Artichokes


Tomorrow I have jury duty. It's my first experience and I didn't know that I would be there long enough to eat lunch so I have the option of bringing or buying my lunch. I know the neighborhood is not vegan friendly at all so I am bringing my own. I just bought some fresh spinach and cilantro so I wanted to use it while it's fresh. I was skimming through Veganomicon and found the perfect recipe, Spinach Linguine with Basil Cilantro Pesto and Artichoke. Instead of using the basil and spinach linguine, I used the spinach and green tea noodles. I also used some frozen artichoke instead and grab a handful of chopped spinach.

BBQ TVP Wrap
My boy friend and I also made some delicious BBQ TVP wraps. My boyfriend is unknown to the world of TVP so we made some today the BBQ Pomegranate Tofu recipe from Vegan with a Vengeance. We obviously didn't tofu. We followed the recipe pretty through and thought except we used onions instead of shallots and we used a bit more than the recipe suggested. We didn't reconstitute the TVP instead we let it simmer in the delicious BBQ sauce so it can absorb even more flavor. We added the TVP after all the ingredients were added and combined to make the BBQ sauce and we threw in a cup of huge TVP chunks and we cooked it for about 15 minutes. Then we let it gently simmer with the lid on for about 20 minutes so that we don't lose even more moister. Just check it occasionally to see if it is sticking or burning. Then we uncovered it and we cooked it for about 5 more minutes. We served it on a tortilla wrap with some cucumbers and tomatoes. Nothing special but the TVP tasted great! Too bad we didn't take any photos.

Long while

It's been a long while since I've posted. I'm very sorry but I've been so caught up with school and once summer hit, I continued to take summer classes but now I have more time. I haven't really been baking or cooking as much. I have been relying mostly on my dad and eating junk food. :X Not the best in the world but when time is limited I guess that all I can do.


Now the new peen tong in the Asian market is being supplied by xun wua, mandarin = xin hua (新華) The new peen tong is now called Brown sugar rather than Brown Candy in the Weekend getaway the ingredients used in this peen tong is just sugar cane and water. The sugar is not processed or purified, hence the brown color. It's around $.080 $1.00 per 400g so it's a pretty decent price if you are a frugal vegan like me. It comes with a hefty price. It's a long slab so it's pretty hard to grind it up. This is what I do:

• Get two sheet of napkins and sandwich the peen tong between the napkin. I used one sheet of paper towel and folded it in half and sandwiched the slab of sugar. Figure A and Figure B.
  
• Then I hammered every inch of the sugar slab creating many tiny pieces of sugar around the size of 1 - 1 1/2 cm. Figure C.
  
• Then I dropped it in my blender and blended it until it was powdery. Because the sugar has a bit of water, I suggest blending one slab at a time or else the heat from the machine can cause the sugar to melt together. Just dump the sugar you blended into a jar or a bag and blend again. You can store it in the refrigerator since it is a bit moisty. The finished product is in Figure D.