Hey friends! It’s time for another iteration of ‘Recent Vegan Eats.’ This time, it’s a Recent Vegan Eats: Quarantine Edition. If you’re new around here, I use the ‘Recent Vegan Eats’ mini-series to share some meals and snacks I’ve eaten in recent weeks. I also use these posts as an opportunity to reviews of any new vegan products I’ve tried.
As with all posts in this series, this post is not meant to depict an ideal or healthful diet. In fact, it’s worth noting that this isn’t everything I’ve eaten lately; it’s simply what I’ve happened to photograph with my phone. I simply do these posts to provide entertainment and perhaps some new meal and snack inspirations for fellow vegans and/or my part-time or veg-curious friends.
Okay! Onward to the eats: like much of the world, I’ve been self-isolating in my home for the past 3 weeks, leaving only for walks and a single trip to the grocery store. Usually, I grocery shop at least once per week (as I’m admittedly a produce fanatic), so this has changed how and what I eat. But seeing as being quarantined is currently the norm for many, I feel these meals and snacks are still worth sharing.
Homemade vegan ‘Cosmic’ brownies
I was feeling nostalgic, in the mood for chocolate, and apparently inspired by Little Debbie, so I made some vegan walnut brownies with vegan chocolate frosting and put a bunch of vegan sprinkles on top.
Delicious. I love the crunch sprinkles add.
Banana muffin + fruit snack plate
Behold my snack plate: a warmed homemade banana muffin (recipe here) with a smudge of sunflower seed butter, a small sliced apple, and a small sliced orange.
For a couple days in a row, I enjoyed this combo as a mid-morning snack. I’m out of muffins now, but this was a delightful morning perk while they lasted.
Peanut butter toast with quick jam
After weeks and weeks of being on an oatmeal-for-breakfast kick, I’ve circled back to my beloved toast-for-breakfast routine. I typically do 2 pieces of toast with peanut or other nut butter, and sliced bananas. But upon running low on bananas, I shifted directions and started making quick jam (using chia seeds and frozen fruit, you can find directions here) to put on top of my toast.
This has been a treat. There is something about warm blueberries on top of melty peanut butter on toast. I highly recommend this if you have frozen fruit on hand.
Butter lettuce
I love butter lettuce. Along with romaine, butter is a top lettuce for me. After getting some butter lettuce when I went grocery shopping, I enjoyed a couple butter lettuce salads in all their tender, crisp glory. With good balsamic, of course.
My love for butter lettuce got me curious about other people’s favorite lettuces, so I polled my Instagram and Facebook friends and got a lot of passionate responses. It really made me excited to see how passionate people are about their favorite greens. What is your favorite lettuce? Let me know.
Pantry peanut butter cookies
I whipped these up on a “low on groceries” day and they turned out pretty delicious, so I shared the recipe on my Instagram feed. I’ll share it here, as well.
Combine: 1 cup peanut butter, 1/2 – 3/4 cup sweetener of choice (sugar, puréed dates, etc), 1/4 cup flour, 1/3 cup apple sauce or canned pumpkin (or sub non dairy milk, but they will be a little more crumbly) and a pinch of salt.
Mix ingredients. Add more apple sauce or nondairy milk if dry until a dough forms. Roll into balls. Stamp cross marks across balls with the back of a fork. Sprinkle with more sugar. Bake at 350°F for ~8 minutes.
Black Bean and Potato Instant Pot Soup
Recipe coming very soon! It’s saved in my drafts already and I’ll publish it early next week.
Side note: cooking beans from dried changed me. The texture is something special (much more al denté than canned beans).
Soup over rice + cauliflower rice
I ate this soup several nights in a row. On the third night, I stretched it out by serving it over cauliflower and wild rice and pairing it with a salad.
Joe’s Os with almond milk
Yum! If you’ve been following me for any amount of time, you probably know how much I love eating cereal after dinner. Well, before I got more groceries this week, I’d been out of cereal and almond milk for about a week. Reuniting with my post-dinner cereal and almond milk ritual was great. So great, I’ve been eating two cups most nights after dinner instead of just one.
Also, my hot take: Joe’s O’s are better than Cheerios (they are lighter, crunchier, and taste a bit less toasty). And at $1.99 for a large family-sized box…well, you can’t really beat that. Feel free to agree or disagree with me on this.
Vegan Lasagna
Lasagna is a special food; there is something so comforting to me about those wide noodles, and I love pretty much anything covered in a tomato-based sauce. This lasagna was made using Hummusapien’s Best Vegan Lasagna Recipe, and it is quite delicious!
The recipe makes homemade vegan ricotta using tofu and hummus, which I have to say, is pretty innovative and yields pleasing, realistic ricotta results. I have made ricotta with nuts before, but I have always found it to be a bit too dense, so I much preferred Hummusapien’s tofu and hummus version. If you’re looking for a hearty yet healthy vegan lasagna recipe, I highly recommend this one!
This version had more veggies and nutritional yeast packed in, and was topped with some Violife vegan parmesan is on top. Delicious.
Served with a quick salad of greens, sliced tomatoes, carrots, nutritional yeast and homemade balsamic.
Nugo Dark Chocolate Pretzel Bars
I may or may not have eaten a 12-pack case of these that I ordered online over the past couple of weeks. And I may or may not have just ordered another.
These are just too good. Nugo makes my favorite vegan protein bars and I have tried a lot of bars. They are better than many actual candy bars in my opinion. My favorites are the Salted Chocolate Pretzel and the Chocolate Mint. Yum.
A random veggie plate
When groceries are low and you’re craving some veg: clean out the pantry! For this lunch, I steamed a Japanese sweet potato (my favorite), and microwaved some frozen green beans and Brussels sprouts, which I topped with coconut aminos, Trader Joe’s 21 Seasoning Salut, and salt and pepper. I also randomly added some canned stewed tomatoes to the side.
I added a heaping spoonful of raw almond butter to the potato post-picture for added physical and tastebud satisfaction.
I’m also pretty sure I ate a Nugo after this plate to round out the lunch, which was a bit low in protein and fat.
Tofu chocolate pudding:
On an evening when I was very low on groceries and looking for a sweet treat, I found a package of shelf-stable tofu in my pantry and excitedly made pudding with it.
You can find a recipe for chocolate tofu pudding here, but basically it’s just tofu, cocoa powder, and sweetener whirled to perfect puddingy bliss in a food processor or blender. Yum.
Trader Joe’s Black Bean and Corn Enchiladas
How many times have I professed my love for these delicious enchiladas? Probably too many time to count. Anyways, I still adore these and think they are probably one of the greatest frozen meal options I’ve ever tried.
I bought several packages while at Trader Joe’s and have been enjoying them as quick and different lunch or dinner option.
Marinated Tempeh with Salad, Avocado, and Peanuts
For the tempeh, I cut the block into strips, and made a marinade by mixing liquid aminos, coconut aminos, a splash of syrup, some ground ginger & a squirt of sriracha and allowed the flavors to mingle for a couple hours.
Then, I baked the strips of tempeh at 450 for 20 min, and ate it on top of the Trader Joe’s Crispy Noodle and Peanut Salad Kit, which comes with a delightful cilantro peanut sauce and crushed peanuts. I also added some cauliflower rice and wild rice for some extra carbs and avocado for some extra fat. Yum
Clean-out-the-fridge salad
Gosh, I love fresh vegetables. Mixed with some microwaved Trader Joe’s frozen green beans and Brussels sprouts to stretch the fresh stuff.
Curious about how frozen and canned food compares to fresh? Check out this recent post on the topic.
Yeast-free homemade bread
I’m out of yeast but wanted to make bread, so I tried to make a homemade yeast-free bread. It turned out okay; it wasn’t great but had potential. I am going to work on this concept and try to improve it a bit.
Girl scout cookies
I enjoyed some S’mores, Thin Mints, and Lemonades for a hot minute (ie, before I rapidly ate them all). Wow this photo really makes me wish I had more.
Cauliflower gnocchi
With marinara and nutrition yeast. Yum. Trader Joe’s, I love you.
Stir fry with tofu
I steamed some cabbage, frozen broccoli, carrots and snow peas, and made some marinated baked tofu (recipe similar to what I used for tempeh), and paired these with some soba noodles, crushed peanuts, and a Teriyaki sauce.
Mixed all together, it was a different and satisfying meal. Sorry the photo is overexposed and kind of aesthetically unpleasing. But hey, it’s real life and sometimes I’m not in the mood to have a photo shoot with my dish before I eat it.
Good! Snacks Vegan Protein Bars
I ordered a variety box of Good! Snacks vegan protein bars to try. Verdict: I really like some of them, and other flavors I’m just lukewarm about. My favorites are the Chocolate Mint, Chocolate Peanut Butter, and the Lemon.
These bars have a unique fluffy interior (kind of like the whipped part of a Three Musketeers) with little crunchy bits, surrounded by a candy coating.
Panda Licorice
These forever remind me of my childhood. If you haven’t had Panda licorice, I encourage you to give it a try, even if you (like me) don’t really care for commercial licorice candies. They have bright fruity notes with a deep molasses flavor undertone. Scrumptious.
I think I’m going to end the post here, seeing as it’s getting pretty long. I should mention I also ate 4 boxes of Trader Joe’s Dark Chocolate Covered Almond with Sea Salt and Turbinado sugar that went unpictured, since usually I just grab a handful of those here and there throughout the day. Anyways, those are delicious and I can’t recommend them enough.
What are you eating these days? Let me know in the comments down below, and/or Instagram, Twitter, or YouTube.
Have a nice weekend! And listen to public health experts, please. Millie sends you a hug.
If you liked ‘Recent Vegan Eats: Quarantine Edition’ you may also like:
- Late Winter Recent Vegan Eats
- Recent Vegan Eats – late January and early February
- What I ate on my birthday (vegan)
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