Chicago Marathon Val

Hi everyone! I hope you had a wonderful long, holiday weekend! I’m so impressed with the bloggers out there who continued to post frequently over the weekend…. aside from my Double Giveaway post (which ends tomorrow!), I pretty much took the weekend off.  I missed the blogworld, but it was lovely to relax and not worry about technology!

I know you are probably overloaded with Turkey (or Tofurkey) Day recaps, so I’ll keep my weekend recap brief!

Thursday morning, I was itching to run the local Turkey Trot with a couple friends, but figured that I could save the $35 and just run a 5k on my own.  Well… that didn’t quite happen, but I still had a good workout!

I twisted Mike’s arm and finally convinced him to go for a short run with me, but it was SO windy that we didn’t run very far before starting to walk.  Mike headed back after a mile or so, and I ended up walking for about an hour and 20 minutes, which I thought was acceptable considering the majority of Americans consider it a travesty to work out on Thanksgiving!

After my run, despite being chilled to the bone from the frigid temps, I cooled myself off further by making a green smoothie with an interesting twist:

[Grrr.... pretend there is a pretty purple smoothie picture here, my computer ate it!]

Mike’s parents were out of spinach, so along with some soymilk, a banana, and some frozen blueberries, I used romaine lettuce!

It actually turned out spectacularly…. in fact, I was a bit irked that it was so tasty since I ended up having to share it with the whole family

Soon after it was time to get started preparing the feast! Here’s me, my FIL (who was trying to coerce me into helping to stuff the turkey carcass) and Yaya

Mike and I and his cousins

Oddly enough, I wasn’t the least bit nervous for my first vegan Thanksgiving.  Aside from the expected harrassing lighthearted teasing from the relatives about my dietary choices, it went off without a hitch!

I nibbled on some of my Garlicky Sun-dried Tomato and Cranberry Pecan dips (tastes just like a Larabar!) dips while everyone else munched on crackers:

Here’s my (first) plate! The second plate was basically just a heaping pile of green bean casserole and some scalloped potatoes. My cheesey scalloped potatoes are pretty rockin if I say so myself, but they aren’t as good when they aren’t made fresh, which I learned the hard way.  Still good though!

Here’s my Vegan Green Bean Casserole recipe:

* Drain green beans – I loathe frozen green beans and was too time-crunched to make fresh, so I used 6 cans of french cut green beans – let sit in the collander (if using canned) while making the sauce

*Slice 4 c. mushrooms in 2 T. EVOO; it would be great to caramelize some onions at this stage, too

* Saute the mushrooms for a few minutes until tender

* Mix 1/3 c. nutritional yeast and 2 T. cornstarch into 2 quarts of vegan mushroom soup (the only vegan brand I’ve found is Imagine, which you can find at Whole Foods)

* Add mushroom soup mixture to the mushrooms you were sauteeing, let simmer over low heat. Dissolve one cube of vegetable bouillion into a tiny amount of hot water; mix this in, as well

* Season with 3 tsp. salt and 1 tsp. pepper, or to taste

* Once the sauce is sufficiently thick (feel free to add more cornstarch if you like), take off the heat and stir into your green beans in a large mixing bowl

* Add one can of French’s onions (these aren’t healthy by any stretch of the imagination, but are vegan!)

* Pour the green bean mixture into a 13×9″ pan.  Top with another can of French’s onions

* Bake at 350 degrees for 35-35 minutes.  Let cool on your counter top for 20-30 minutes so that it will thicken up and the flavors will meld together

YUMMM!!!!! These were a hit.  Definitely a keeper of a recipe! And so easy!

You’ve seen these before….. veganized cheesey scalloped potatoes:

And another new recipe: Vegan Pumpkin Cheesecake!

* I normally like to make my own crust, but again in the interest of saving time, I bought a vegan whole wheat crust from Whole Foods which worked out well

* The filling was so simple: blend 1 can pumpkin puree with 16 oz. vegan cream cheese, 1 c. sucanat, 3 T. cornstarch, and 2 tsp. pumpkin pie space

* Bake at 250 for 45 minutes, then chill before serving

I really liked this, but a lot of people commented that it tasted more like pumpkin pie (not a bad thing!) than cheesecake, so when I make this again I will probably double the amount of cream cheese I use.

I didn’t have very many leftovers from Thursday’s Thanksigiving, but what I did have leftover I brought with me to Thanksgiving #2: my side of the family met at my grandparents’ retirement home.

We haven’t had a “full” family Thanksgiving in years since all of my cousins and I have been getting married, etc., so it was nice to have the whole family together again! I definitely recommend having a Thursday T-day with one family, and Friday T-day with your other family, if you are married and in the same situation where you feel torn between both families!

Here’s the whole gang:

The rest of the weekend involved Christmas shopping, seeing The Blind Side – sooooo good!!! a must-see!!! – relaxing, and catching up with friends and family.

I didn’t take a lot of pictures over the weekend, but I thought you would enjoy the site of Mike biting into a vomit-flavored Jelly Belly:

Sorry guys, I know that it’s not kosher to post the words “vomit flavored” on a foodie blog, but it was highly entertaining.  My sister bought Mike this package for his late birthday present:

It was a riot watching him, my mom, and dad try out the flavors.  The only wacky flavor I tried was Baby Wipes, which truly tasted like the deodorant-type scent of a (clean) baby wipe… so bizarre!  This is definitely a good way to liven up your Christmas party this year

What was the highlight of your Thanksgiving? The food? The shopping deals? It’s always hard going back to work after a long holiday, but I have a feeling the next few weeks will fly by! I’m excited to make a ton of new vegan baked goods for Christmas….. the first recipe post will be going up tomorrow, and I will also announce the two giveaway winners! Stay tuned!

Recipes and fun and shopping, oh my!

This entry was posted on Monday, November 30th, 2009 at 8:19 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.