Fettuccine Alfedo

This is another dish which uses Morning Star Farms Chick'n strips. Cass even said it hit the spot for creamy noodles, he used to love Alfredo and this is a great substitute.

You'll need just a couple of ingredients:
1 package of Fettuccine noodles
1 1/2 C Soy Milk (I use plain)
1 can of whole kernel corn
1 TBSP onion powder
1 TSP salt
1 package of Morning Star Chicken Strips
Pepper to taste
Food Processor or Blender
Pot for cooking noodles

Cook your noodles to your liking on the stove.

Meanwhile, place your soy milk, corn, onion powder and salt into the food processor. Make sure this is totally blended. Once the noodles are drained pour the mixture from the food processor into the pan and mix with the noodles. Add pepper to taste.

Thank you captain for the pepper.

At this point spread the package of chick'n onto a microwave safe plate and cook for 1-1.5 minutes. Once these are put into bowls top with chick'n (and honestly I snuck some Daiya mozzarella shreds into mine and they melted in there and oh my gosh, it was amazing.)

And if the other pictures didn't sell you, here is our 2 year old.
Eating with his hands because he can't seem to eat fast enough with a fork.

Nerdy Birdy Chick'n Bytes

I decided to share this delicious recipe that uses Morning Star Farms Chick'n Strips. Can be found in the PETA College Cookbook under Nerdy Birdy Chick'n Bytes, which I just called "Taco Chick'n" because it's easier to remember. This is super easy, and super messy.

Gather together:
1 packet of taco seasoning
1 TBSP of Vegenaise
1 Package of Chick'n Strips
Salsa
A medium sized mixing bowl
A plastic baggie

First off mix your taco seasoning and your vegenaise together until they are well mixed, then place this mixture into the plastic baggie. I thawed my chick'n a little before using which I recommend.

Place your chick'n into the baggie with this mixture and shake around so that everything gets well coated.
Place your coated chick'n on a plate and microwave for about 1-2 minutes.
Enjoy this dish by dipping in salsa.

This would also be great in a taco salad, layered dip or burrito. 

Vertical Diner

Saturday evening after my Dolls and Gents: Benefits and Events meeting we decided we were super hungry. Not too far away from Kafeneio where we were having our meeting is this fabulous vegan restaurant, Vertical Diner. I have been to this diner a handful of times and had a wonderful experience every time  I'd never actually been there on a weekend evening though, it was packed. Typically when I go there is like my table and maybe one or two other tables being used. But this time just about EVERY table was occupied. Oh, and there was live music too, which was a nice touch!

It was our little family and Cass's sister who has been vegetarian for about 4 days and his brother who is no where near vegetarian or vegan. But he was a good sport and ordered food and the only thing he really had to say about it was "it was good, but the texture is different" 

We all ordered different things which made the evening very interesting. Especially since 3 of the items were things I had never tried and I got the opportunity to try them all. 

When you eat at Vertical I recommend you start with Spicy Fries, I of course ordered half regular fries because the spicy ones are WAY TOO hot for the baby. They come with fry sauce and ranch, and I always order a side of cheese sauce too. 

Going around the table counter clockwise lets talk about what everyone picked for dinner:

The American Diner: Choice of hand cut fries, mashed potatoes or hashbrowns smothered with gravy topped with fried chicken (this was ordered with hashbrowns)

Kids Banana Pancake: Pretty self explanatory

Breaded Chicken Ranch Sandwich (buffalo style): Served with lettuce, tomato, onion and ranch dressing on 7-grain, French bread or tortilla wrap (this was ordered with French Bread)

La Mesa: Hashbrowns, black beans and rice, tofu scramble, grilled peppers and onions, cheese, salsa, sour cream and guacamole (unfortunately there wasn't any guac on mine...but it was still really good)

Philly Pizza Steak: Choice of Boca Burger, Cali Burger, grilled portabella mushrooms, sausage, tempeh or chicken with grilled onions and pepper, topped with cheese and red tomato sauce on 7-grain or French bread. (This was ordered with the chicken and the French Bread)

Anything off the burgers and sandwich menu comes with a side of carrot sticks, tortilla chips or the option to upgrade to fries, mashed potatoes or chili for only $3 more. 

We paid about $30 for Cass, myself and the baby to eat, which makes this a pretty average priced place to eat; it's not super cheap but not any more than standard restaurants. 

If you're looking for a vegan meal with that classic diner feel, Vertical is the place to go. 

And I leave you with this spilled water on our table that looks like an elephant.

SLC Vegan Drinks 4 Year Anniversary

It's not often that we get to go out and do grown up things, but we want to start making our attendance at Vegan Drinks a regular thing. This event happens on the first Friday of every month at Metro Bar. It's potluck style and 20% of drink (they have a bunch of specialty vegan cocktails  beer and wine available) sales go to The Ching Farm Animal Sanctuary.

We arrived at the bar a little early and we were lucky because they let us in so we didn't have to freeze outside.The location of The Metro is amazing. It's right off the Old Greek Town Trax stop (like literally across the street) which makes this super easy for those of us who don't own cars.

We had many different delicious food during the pot luck portion of the night including:

• Black Bean Chili
• Raw Lettuce Wraps
• Gluten Free Peanut Butter Rice Krispie Treats
• Fudge
• Zucchini Chocolate Chip Cookies
• Mango Salsa
• Refried Beans
• Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies and
• Some delicious type of BBQ, may have been Seiten. 

SLUG Mag was present taking pictures which was pretty awesome.

I don't really do dessert very often but I had to try a bite of everything. I unfortunately wasn't able to finish all my desserts but every bite I had was amazing!

There was also an opportunity to purchase raffle tickets at the door, everyone got one ticket for free, additional tickets $1 each or twelve tickets for $10. Some of the prizes up for grabs were crocheted hats, City Cakes & Cafe gift certificates, El Azteca gift certificates, Good Times Tattoo gift certificates and many other amazing items. It's awesome to go to an event and see all the people who care about and support the vegan community. 

And on an end note: Whoever brought the Dr. Who sticky notes to label their items.....10 points. 

The cookies seemed bigger on the inside.

Today's Lunch: Taco Bell

I know what you're all thinking, Taco Bell has vegan food?! This can't be true. But guess what?! It is.

Benefits of Taco Bell:

• it's cheap
• almost everywhere
• it's typically quick 
• their beans are lard free
• their tortillas do not contain lard either
• most items can be made vegan by asking for no dairy and no meat

My typical (and suggested) order from Taco Bell is:

7-Layer Burrito

• No Cheese
• No Sour Cream
• Add Potatoes (they usually charge you extra for this but it's WELL worth it)

It's awesome.

A List of Taco Bells Ingredients can be found here:

Taco Bell: Ingredient Statement

An Alien and Some Guy on Dissection

By: Cassidy Ward

An Alien and Some Guy on Veganism

 By: Cassidy Ward

Frisch: Compassionate Eatery

Tonight for dinner we made a journey to Salt Lake right after work, our destination to be Frisch, a local restaurant which was opened in Spring of 2012. This eatery has been a place that Cass has been dying to try after hearing about it on Geekshow Podcast. Luckily they are open until seven pm on Wednesdays and we had time to make it downtown after work. 

The menu is pretty small so it wasn't too hard to make a decision on what we wanted, I was stuck between the nachos and the mac and cheeze, and luckily Cass wanted nachos which made the decision that much easier. 
For starters I had an iced hybiscus tea, and we had an appetizer plate of veggies, pita bread and white bean chili dip. It was particularly good with the pita chips, the seasoning adds just the right.........zingyness?

Our main meals came next: nachos with rice, vegan cheese sauce and spicy soy chick'n for Cass, $8.50 including a dollar fifty upgrade for the chick'n.  Spicy mac & cheeze for me (Spicy because of the aforementioned spicy chick'n, no additional cost)
and a kids mac and cheeze for Brody (which by the way was awesome, I love when vegan restaurants have kids menus, I like it even more when they are $4 and come with a side). Dude literally devoured his miniature mac & cheese.

Of course we couldn't get the boy to stop eating long enough to get a proper picture.

We also had Cass's sister, Whitney and his Mom with us (who are both non-vegan but enjoyed the trip as much as we did) they both had wraps which they really liked. My mother had The Obligatory Veggie Wrap, hummus and assorted veggies and my sister had The "Fancy Boy" Spicy Chick'n and veggies with vegan chipotle mayo. 

I had to stop eating about halfway through my dinner because I spied a Dillo (Kylie has always said it just as it's spelled [Dill-o] but the waitress said it as if with a spanish accent [Dee-yo] now I don't know what the hell to call 'em, I'm just going to mumble until I see a vegan twinkie in front of me) on a table across the room and sensed that there must be dessert options...which prompted me to order a delicious marble cake with a custard center and great frosting. It's true, it was great.

"tis better to take home food and have cake, than to not have any cake at all"

Overall this was a wonderful experience and we will definitely be going back. Yup.