My Plant-Based Family

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Dirty Mashed Potatoes

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Nothing says comfort food quite like Mashed Potatoes and Gravy.

 

There was  only a tiny bit of mashed potatoes left after the four of us ate. I wanted to stuff my face with the rest of them but I resisted.

These Mashed Potatoes are really easy to make. I’ll give estimates on amounts but it will really depend on your preference and the size of your family.

dirty mashed potatoes

Dirty Mashed Potatoes

Ingredients

  • potatoes (I used four small-medium sized, see the ambiguity here)
  • cauliflower (1/4 of a head, or 1 1/2 cups of florets)
  • water
  • salt
  • garlic powder or fresh garlic
  • onion powder
  • black pepper
  • unsweetened plant milk (I used Almond milk)

Do

  1.  Bring water to boil.
  2. Wash and cut potatoes in to smaller pieces. I left the skin on but you do not have to. Add them to the boiling water.
  3. Wash and cut cauliflower into florets. Add them to the boiling water.
  4.  Once the potatoes and cauliflower are both soft, carefully drain the water. Return the potatoes and cauliflower to the pan or place in a large bowl.
  5. Mash the potatoes and cauliflower with a potato masher. Add milk to get the a creamer consistency. Try 1/4 cup at a time.
  6. Add salt, pepper, garlic and onion powders and mix well.

Serve

I served this with brown gravy, a Lentil Loaf and steamed spinach. The mashed potatoes were perfect, savory and delicious. I think I could have eaten the whole pot by myself. I didn’t taste the cauliflower at all but my husband mentioned that they smelled like cauliflower. These would also be good with broccoli, although that would be noticeable. 

I just mentioned that I served brown gravy. You can find that recipe here at the Happy Herbivore. I love Lindsey’s blog, and her cookbooks. I use them all the time. I halved this recipe for us and we had plenty leftover. The gravy was delicious! My husband topped his Lentil Loaf with it and he isn’t a big fan of nutritional yeast.

I hope to try this Lentil Loaf again soon. I couldn’t find a recipe that used the ingredients I wanted to cook with so I made up my own. It needs some tweaking still but I think if will be a winner. 

These are also great with Portobello Steaks! Be sure to use my Mushroom Marinade!

Muffins, Yes Please!

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I did a little baking yesterday. I’m not quite ready to share the recipe because I’d like to duplicate it first. But I will share the pictures and hopefully the recipe next week.

These Cherry Muffins were fresh from the oven. See how the cherry goo is still oozing out. This is one of those times where oozing goo is a good thing, trust me. I also made some with fresh blueberries.

I was actually trying to make more of a cupcake than a muffin but oh well. These were still yummy. I always feel like I need to offer a disclaimer when I bring muffins to friends. My muffins are really good, they have flavor BUT they do not taste like muffins/cake that is made from butter, milk, white sugar and white flour. Once you eliminate those options from your diet these are great! My non-plant-based friends have liked my muffins as well but I’m sure they are thinking that something is missing. (Something is missing, all of the over-processed junk that is bad for you!)

We also revisited the Stir Fry, you may remember that we had a bad experience  and took a stir fry sabbatical.  This one was good, although not a masterpiece.

I used noodles because we are avoiding rice and rice products due to an allergy. This is the leftover portion, there were actually a lot more veggies but we scooped those up first thing.

We also snacked on Jalapeno Hummus and organic tortilla chips after dinner because sometime we feel a little bit piggy. But seriously if organic tortilla chips, hummus made without added fats (oil and tahini), whole wheat muffins made with real fruit and without added fat is the worse thing we eat I’m not to worried. 

Later today I hope to make Banana Bread. I made a really good banana bread. I’ve made it hundreds of times, even though it is whole wheat everyone loves it. 

Have you made the switch to a plant-based diet? What is holding you back? Join me and countless others as we regain control of our health. 

Gratituesday: Friends

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Do you have great friends, I mean really great friends? I do! I am so blessed to have some wonderful women in my life. They love me and I love them. We would do just about anything for each other.

If I have a need I can make a call or send and email and have support. These friends have babysat my children, brought me food (and coffee), and been a listening ear and even helped me clean my house. If I need a friend I can call them and tell them I’m coming over to talk and they are welcoming (even late at night). Most importantly I know they pray for me.

All my friends may not be that close. We all have families and are at different places in our availability. I know other women who I hope to be this close to one day but we haven’t been able to nurture our friendship yet. There are close to a dozen of us. I can tell you that this is rare. Most of the time you will have a hard time finding 12 women who genuinely love each other. How does this happen?

I’m not sure. I don’t think there is a magic formula. I can tell you that we all love Jesus! We all started out meeting for Bible study on Tuesday mornings. Some of my friends are at a different place in their lives now and can’t attend. I do believe it is possible to have the same dynamic outside of the church, but here’s the thing.

It takes selflessness.

You don’t find that a lot of places. Selflessness is uncommon. Are we all completely selfless all of the time, no, but we go out of our way to be there for each other.

I can’t imagine my life without my friends! What are you thankful for today?

Join us for Gratituesday at Heavenly Homemakers!

Meal Plan Monday

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Today I am posting much later than normal. We had a family “situation” to deal with this morning. Additionally I usually have the meal plan worked out on the weekend and even as I type I’m not sure what we are having when.

First some reflection (I’m stalling while I think up a Meal Plan), boy am I glad my Unprocessed Challenge is over. Today is a day for some processed food. Did you survive the Unprocessed Challenge? I did not finish strong.

On Saturday we celebrated my 3 year old’s birthday by hosting a brunch and having a few families over to celebrate with. I will not mention all of the animal products that were cooked in my kitchen. I was blown away by how much I spent for one meal (there were a ton of leftovers too), almost $90. That is a week of groceries with some eating out.  I’m so glad I don’t normally buy animal products! I am also thankful that we were able to send our friends home with leftovers so I didn’t have to waste it. 😉

Also, I finally took my new food processor out of the box. Can you guess what I made? Oh yes, Chocolate Mousse and Guacamole! Then I made Jalapeno Hummus! What is your favorite thing to use your food processor for? I need some ideas. I hope to use it more this week.

On to the Meal Plan.

For breakfast we will be eating toast with nut butter and fruit (my favorite), oatmeal, cereal, and pancakes.

Lunches will be leftovers, baked potatoes, grain and bean bowls, and sandwiches.

Snacks are sometimes just like lunch. Yes, I eat all the time! I’m sure I will have some of the hummus I made last night with fresh cut veggies. I’m gonna try my hand at granola bar making. I haven’t made them since we when to a Plant-based diet. If they turn out I’ll brag about it soon.

Dinner

Monday: Stir Fried veggies with noodles and (hopefully) an awesome sauce. If this doesn’t turn out well we will have nachos.

Tuesday: Lentil loaf, mashed potatoes, and broccoli or salad

Wednesday: Bean Burritos 

Thursday: Couscous and Veggies

Friday: Baked sweet potatoes for the kids and take out for the parents, woo hoo!

I also plan to do some baking this week. If you follow me on Facebook you’ll sneak peak pictures.

Progress Report: Unprocessed Challenge

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This week I’ve been only eating unprocessed food. I’ve enjoyed some really good food but I’ve also let a bad attitude get in the way a few times.

I miss my toast. I decided not to eat bread at all, even my sprouted grain bread, because I was eating it way too often. It would find its way into breakfast, lunch, snack and dessert some days.

Eating processed food was really more of a habit than hunger. When I’d give my son a handful of animal crackers I’d normally eat a few too but not this week.

A few things that helped…

  • Having food already cooked and ready to eat.
  • Cutting fresh fruit and veggies for easy snacking.
  • Hummus!
  • Supportive husband and friends, and public accountability.
  • Cooking delicious food so you don’t feel deprived.

So what have I been eating this week…

If you remember on the weekend I cooked black beans and quinoa. I heated them up together in a bowl and added chili powder, garlic powder, salt, pepper, cumin, and onion powder. I laid them on a bed of greens, added salsa and mashed up half and avocado. A few squirts of lime juice and it was delicious! It reminded me of a salad from Chipotle. When I mention eating a bean and grain bowl this is what it is like sans greens. I love it with tortilla chips but not this week, roasted corn would be amazing in this.

Yesterday I cooked Minestrone Soup, one of my husbands favorites. I changed teh recipe a bit but we didn’t miss any thing I left out. I competely forgot about the green beans, too bad a have some in the freezer ready to go. I left out the noodles and veggie broth since they are both processed. The soup simmered for hours and tasted great. There was hardly enough left for my husband to take to work. Maybe if I wouldn’t “quality” check so often there would have been more. 😉

Fresh veggies and Jalapeno Hummus! Easy, delicious, unprocessed!

Smoothies! Who doesn’t love smoothies? We have been eating these for our after dinner snack/dessert. My husbands favorite this week was made with frozen bananas, frozen cherries, and a little almond milk. I like frozen banana, a few frozen cherries, a little peanut butter, a little cocoa powder and almond milk. You can make them with whatever you have, for a tropical flavor add frozen mango and/or pineapple.

Earlier this week I ate leftover Enchilada Soup. This time I made it with millet instead of rice. It was tasty.

There are really a lot of options when it comes to eating unprocessed. Some recipes can be slightly adjusted to become unprocessed. A few other things to consider are…

The Best Chili Ever
The Happy Potato
Avocado Chocolate Mousse, if made with date paste it becomes unprocessed
Stir Fry

How have you been doing? Is it difficult for you to stick with it? Do you have any tips or recipes for the rest of us? Leave a comment below and encourage someone else with your journey.

Did you know that My Plant Based Family is on Facebook? To hear more about what’s going on in my kitchen check it out.

Jalapeno Hummus

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Cilantro Jalapeno Hummus has been a game changer for us after adopting a plant-based diet. Let me explain…

This Cilantro Jalapeno Hummus is a quick and easy plant-based recipe! This oil-free hummus is the ultimate dip for veggies.

My husband used to be anti-hummus. If I bought hummus he would laugh, and I’m not talking about a chuckle, a full on belly laugh. This is the same kind of laugh he would have had 6 months ago if I would have told him we were going to stop eating animals. Do you get it now? He though it was udderly ridiculous, just like so many other things that are now common place for us.  

Cilantro Jalapeno Hummus

After we changed our diet it was hard to find a good plant-based meal when eating out. I took him to Pita Jungle and introduced him to Jalapeno Hummus. That is the day he stopped laughing at hummus. 

Cilantro Jalapeno Hummus

We ate Pita Jungle’s hummus on many date nights, we would call in a to go order while running errands, and we even bought a huge Costco vat of Jalapeno Hummus. There are two problems with eating store/restaurant bought hummus. It is more costly than you can make at home and it is not as healthy as you eat at home. 

I finally decided to stop the insanity, and all of the extra calories and fat from oil-YUCK, and make it myself. 

Cilantro Jalapeño Hummus

Yield: 2 cups

Cilantro Jalapeno Hummus

Cilantro Jalapeno Hummus

This Cilantro Jalapeno Hummus is a quick and easy plant-based recipe! This oil-free hummus is the ultimate dip for veggies.

Prep Time 5 minutes
Total Time 5 minutes

Ingredients

  • 1 15.5 oz can chickpeas, drained but save liquid
  • Juice from 1 lime (lemon can be used)
  • a few cloves of garlic (more or less to your preference)
  • 2 jalapeno peppers (remove seeds first for a less spicy hummus)
  • a handful of cilantro (optional)

Instructions

  1. Dump drained chickpeas, lime juice, garlic, jalapenos and cilantro into a blender or food processor.
  2. Add just enough liquid to allow everything to process smoothly.
  3. Taste test, add extra peppers or spices until the flavor is just right.
  4. Chill for a few hours before serving.

Notes

This recipe is perfect for dipping veggies, chips, crackers, or adding to your favorite salads, sandwiches or bowls.

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© Holly Yzquierdo

Serve with fresh veggies, pita bread, tortilla chips, in a wrap or as a salad dressing.

I didn’t love this right after I made it, but my husband did. I put it in the fridge and tried it the next day and it was amazing. AMAZING! 

I’ll be making this again this week. It is unprocessed and delicious and I can’t imagine a better way to snack on raw veggies. 
If you like this you’ll LOVE my other delicious, oil-free, plant-based dips!