Sunday, January 30, 2011

Este Pizzeria

   As I said last post I would be going to Este Pizzeria to celebrate Vegan Pizza Day. I didn't know what exactly to expect from Este since I've never been and haven't heard many reviews from it. All I knew exactly is I lived close by one of the locations and they offered vegan pizza's. As I walked in this place I love it the atmosphere is so modern and just screams fun!
   My dad and I ordered the White Vegan Pizza. The description for it was a pizza with olive oil, vegan cheese(they use diaya), garlic, oregano, tomatoes, and red onions plus we added spinach. We first ordered it to stay, but after having to wait for so long I decided to ask for it to go. That and with the music in the background and other people talking I couldn't understand what my dad was talking to me about.


    The pizza smelled delicious! I was a little hesitant to try it since I hadn't had the mozzarella version of diaya. My dad didn't seem to mind the fake cheese. I was rather shocked by this, but my dad isn't really picky. Although his second slice he put on some actual cheese. As for me I wasn't a fan of it. The taste was fine, but it had this silky texture that I didn't like. By the end of the pizza I couldn't take it and had to take it off.
The crust of the pizza is good it's thin, but it isn't that crispy thin that I really like. It had a nice fluffy texture to it though. 
The topping of the pizza I think there needed to be more, I didn't taste any garlic and had only one bite of the red onions.

Even though I didn't really like the pizza I still want to go back to Este and try one of their vegetarian pizzas and garlic knots. I still think i'll be going to Whole Foods for my pizzas. If your vegan and in Salt Lake that likes daiya I think you should come here. I can't speak for their vegetarian pizzas yet so you'll have to decide for yourself on that decision. Este also delivers as well, but I believe it's only the downtown location.


2021 Windsor St.
801-485-3699
and
156 East 200 South
801-363-2366
(winter hours to April)
Mon-Thur
11:30am-9pm
Fri-Sat
11:30am-10pm
Sun
4 pm- 9pm
(Summer hours)
Mon-Thur
11:30 pm - 10 pm
Fri-Sat
11:30 am- Midnight
Sun
4pm-9pm

Saturday, January 29, 2011

Happy Vegan Pizza Day!

HAPPY VEGAN PIZZA DAY EVERYONE! Sorry was that a little to loud for you?
I hope everyone is celebrating this fantastic day. 

Now I didn't used to like pizza at all. I always felt like an outsider when we had pizza parties at school and everyone was excited about them except me. I didn't like pizza because of the tomato sauce I was not a cooked tomato type of girl. Oddly enough now my taste have changed and I am growing to like tomato sauces sometimes even crave it. I still prefer to have a pizza with a hummus or pesto based sauce though and loaded with veggies and very little cheese if any at all. I guess you could say i'm more of a non-traditional pizza lover.

So for vegan pizza day my dad and I will be going to Este Pizzeria. I'll blog about it tomorrow most likely. So now go enjoy some pizza I know I will because I've been craving some!

Monday, January 24, 2011

Homemade Coconut Butter!

      I've never tried coconut butter before and I do love dried coconut. So I wanted to give it a try, but when I went to the store to find out the jar cost around 10 bucks I just had to say no(for now) and wait for another time to buy it. Lucky me though I was looking at the blog Heather Eats Almond Butter or HEAB for short. I saw that she made some homemade coconut butter and since I had dried coconut flakes that have been sitting in the cupboard for to long. I thought I should make them into coconut butter since I hadn't used them in anything else.
  Making coconut butter is a lot easier then I thought it would be. All you do is keep blending it up in a food processor until it gets silky almost.

(after blending a while)

(getting there)

(blending a little more)

(looks good to me)

Well it did look good and smooth, but when I transfered it into a jar it was still a bit chunky. I think I could have blended it more. Texture wise I kind of like it though. It wasn't that sweet or to coconutty for me. I think maybe the coconut I used was to old. I'm not sure I think I need to test out the store bought kind first. 

I did add some raw honey(I know honey isn't vegan, but I love it so I use it here and there) to make it more sweet. I think that helped a little but, but it did seem to make it more chunkier. It did solidify after a while like it should which is a good thing though! 

In conclusion i'm going to buy the store stuff eventually and see if it taste at all the same to what I made.

Sunday, January 23, 2011

Single Dad Cookie

   Over at Chocolate Covered Katie's blog she makes all sorts of yummy single serving things like cookies and cupcakes! She calls them single lady cupcakes/cookies.
    Well i've been dying to make one and since my dad loves cookies so much I decided to surprise him when he got home from work...well I called him to tell him about them because I was to excited. So it wasn't as much of a surprise. 
The cookie turned out great! so here you go a single lady cookie turned into a single dad cookie. :)

Single Dad Cookie
serves: one of course or two if you want to share.

4 tsp spelt flour(any flour will do, i'm sure)
1/16th tsp baking soda
1/16th tsp salt
2 tsp olive oil
1 tsp vanilla almond milk(I used unsweetened)
handful of dried blueberries
handful of chopped almonds
2 tsp 100% pure maple syrup or maybe maple sugar

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Combine dry then add in wet ingredients or the other way around however you want. Then mix well with a fork. Pour the batter onto a oiled, buttered, or parchment papered baking sheet. Cook for about 8 minutes or until done.

(look at how the dried blueberries are exactly like each on one end and one perfectly in the middle)

   This cookie was sweet, but not overly sweet which is my favorite thing if I make a cookie. I was glad because I wasn't to sure about how much maple syrup to do and was afraid it would either be not sweet enough or to sweet.


In fact this cookie was so good I doubled the recipe and made another larger one for dessert after dinner. That time I added 2 tsp flax meal for a nice nuttier taste and I only did 3 tsp olive oil. It turned out great great as well. I have even been asked to make this cookie again, but make a whole batch of them goes to show how good they are...or maybe how much my dad likes sweet things...or both.

Tuesday, January 18, 2011

The Complete Book of 400 Soups.

    My aunt gave my dad and I a soup cookbook called The Complete Book of 400 Soups(pictured below). None of the soups are vegan, but a lot of them are vegetarian. They are easily veganized though. Even without vegan soups I still would recommend this book, because of all the great ideas for soups it has. Well onto my boring story of what soup I made.
   My dad wanted to make a recipe from one of the cookbooks we have. I wanted to do something easy and not to hard so I grabbed the soup book since I hadn't made anything from it yet. I bookmarked a few recipes that seemed yummy, easy, not to many ingredients, and some what fast. I wanted to make red pepper sweet potato soup if I remember right, but I didn't write down the ingredients for it and went straight to the grocery store. Well when I arrived there I forgot exactly what I needed for the soup I wanted to make. My dad remembered a broccoli almond soup that he wanted. We had most of the ingredients for it besides the broccoli and almond milk to replace the cream. When we got home I double looked at the recipe and changed a few things of it like using olive oil instead of butter. I then made the changes, measured ingredients  and then put my dad to work making it because I had other stuff to do. He toasted almonds did whatever else the recipe called for.

Well the soup was taste great even though my picture isn't! I could easily make this again, but I should probably slurp up the rest that I threw in the freezer first! 

Do you ever freeze soups and then reheat it? Does it still taste as good as when you first made it?

Thursday, January 13, 2011

Purple Cabbage and Apple Gingery Sautee! What a Mouth Full!

      My dad and I one weekend were being sluggish and sat on the couch watching the food network. We came across the show Ten Dollar Dinner. I really wasn't interested in watching it, but when the host Melissa d'Arabian mentioned a sauteed cabbage dish with apples, my dad wanted to watch. So I put down the remote about to change the channel and let him watch as I sat there waiting for it to be over. Well after watching it the dish did look pretty good not to mention easy! So I went and made my own version.

        
My version swapped everything the recipe called for except the cabbage. So if you want the recipe I got the idea from it's here, but here's my recipe. I didn't write down all the measurements, but it should be fine if it's not exact just use your own taste.

Purple Cabbage and Apple Gingery Sautee
Ingredients
1/2 head of purple cabbage or one small cabbage
1/2 to 3/4 one large honey crisp
Enough olive oil to cover most of the pan(or earth balance)
Fresh Ginger(or powdered ginger) I can't remember how much I used so just do this to your taste
Pinch of salt
splash of apple cider vinegar, optional(I didn't use this since my dad can't have vinegar)
enough Pear Juice to deglaze the pan(the recipe called for red wine)

Core and slice the apple into wedges, but not to thin. 

Cut the cabbage into strips.

Heat a large sautee pan. After it's been heated add the olive oil. Make sure the heats at medium heat then add the cabbage, ginger, apple, and salt. Let sit until the cabbage wilts around 20 minutes. Stir the cabbage and apples every now and then. When ready deglaze the pan with pear juice or red wine and the splash of  apple cider vinegar. Now serve!


I know the pictures I took probably don't do it justice(I have bad lighting in my kitchen at night), but it was still good. I really liked the warmth of the apples, and the subtle kick of ginger. I would make this again next time i'll  write down the exact amounts I used though.

Monday, January 10, 2011

Cakewalk Vegan Bakery and Grocery.


Now if you aren't familiar with Cakewalk Vegan Baker and Grocery in Salt Lake City, Utah. I'll give you a little information about it. Cakewalk is the first all vegan bakery in Utah. They have two locations one in Woodcross and one in Salt Lake. The owner of the bakery Kelly Collobella started Cakewalk in hopes of paying the vet bills for German Shepard. Cakewalk is also where the dillos a vegan twinkie began(I have yet to try one of these yet, shame on me!). If you want you can get them at Vegan Essentials, Food Fight Grocery, and Sidecar for Pigs Peace. To read more about Cakewalk/Kelly Collobella here's a few articles on it here and here. Plus two blog post from Utah Eats Cupcakes and Vegan Salt.

I've been to cake walk a few times before, but that was before I started this blog or forgot my camera. Well anyways over the time of me not blogging and all the holiday crazy-ness my dad and I was able to go to cakewalk three time...I think, but I only took picture of my eats twice. I love love love love love love love cakewalk(is that enough loves?)! I like it's; green walls, I like it's shelves filled with vegan dog food, vegan candy bars, vegan rice milk chocolate bars, and other vegan treats, It's some what little fridge full of vegan cheeses, it's always yummy treats in the display case, the nice people that work there and that are patient when I don't know what to order, it's soft serve ice cream, and most of all it's coffee! Yes I said I like the coffee most of all. It is literally the best coffee I have ever had! Okay enough of my non-stop love for this place you just want to see what I got huh? 

This is a plain vanilla and a carrot cake. I got the carrot cake while my dad got the vanilla. Since my dad has the bladder disease that I am from now on going to call the ICC disease he can't have any chocolate or soy for that matter, but the soy in these cupcakes haven't bothered him yet...I don't think. Okay i'm getting off track here. The vanilla cupcake is a nice cupcake where the frosting is sweet, but not overly sweet. My dad says and I quote "this is the best cupcake I have ever had". This makes me feel great since he goes and tells everyone about this is the word cupcake is even brought up. I bet he'd never think that a vegan cupcake would be the best he'd ever had. :) yay!



The carrot cake has raisins, walnuts, and well carrots of course topped with creme cheese frosting! If you like carrot cake with a bunch of add ins I would get this. I personally didn't like it because I like my carrot cake simple, but don't get me wrong it was not terrible!

This is my favorite of all things I have ever tried. I am not over exaggerating when I say I would have not died happy without trying this(okay i'm exaggerating a little). This here is the nog soft serve, they had this for the holidays. It is the perfect blend of spices and taste exactly like egg nog. My dad even liked this(I barely got enough strength to give him a bite). Even though it was cold as hell outside i'm glad I got to try it. If they have this next year then I'll ask for it by the buckets.

Another holiday treat gingerbread cookie! yummy yummy! Sorry I ate almost half of the cookie before I took the picture I just could not wait! This cookie is fantastic if you like gingerbread. I think it could have had more ginger, but then again I was on a super gingery kick at the time of trying this. If you are ever able to get this cookie It's recommended dipping it into the nog soft serve and eating it. Mmmmmm just thinking about this makes me want the holidays to come back!

The last treat I have to share with you is the candy cane cupcake. My dad got this so he got a vanilla based cupcake, but it was also available in chocolate. I was lucky enough to get a two small bites of this cupcake. The cake part is exactly like the vanilla light and fluffy. The frosting had a nice not overly powering taste of peppermint. I wish I had gone back one more time to get this cupcake.

If you ever find yourself stumbling into Utah you must go to cakewalk and get yourself some treats. Oh and coffee!



Cakewalk Bakery and Grocery


Salt Lake Store
434 S 900 E Salt Lake City, UT 84102
(Located next to Raincheck Payday Loans in front of Office Max)
Phone#
Hours:Tues-Fri: 12PM-8PM, Sat: 11AM-9PM
info@cakewalkbakingcompany.com

Woods Cross Store
566 W 1350 S Woods Cross, UT 84010
Phone: 801-860-5473
Hours: Friday and Saturday 2-8 p.m. , Sunday 2-5 p.m.
Web site: http://cakewalkbakingcompany.com/

Twitter:  @cakewalkvegan

Wednesday, January 5, 2011

Sorry for my Absence

    Wow! Can you believe it, it's now 2011! Here's to hoping it will be a great year!


Sorry for my absence I can explain. First my computer decided it didn't want to work for me so I had to go get it fixed. That took about a week to finally get it back. So that makes up for a big part of me not blogging. Then at the end of mofo I really didn't have any food experiences worth blogging about. I could probably go on with other reasons why I haven't been blogging. I thought I should update at least and tell you in a short paragraph about what's been happening. I hope soon that I will be able to start blogging, because I have some wonderful things to tell about. Like maybe a certain wonderful vegan bakery/small grocery called Cakewalk and whatever other pictures of food I made and maybe a recipe or two(I can't remember).


My computer still is a little weird though and I have to download stuff back onto it and whenever I try to upload the pictures on from my camera it won't let me(Grrrrrrrr!). I plan on trying to fix this soon....so I should be back to blogging soon(maybe? hopefully? should be?).


Well that's about it I hope everyone has had a great holiday and a happy new year!