Mole soup

Mole soup.

I promised you mole soup and here it is.

It was earthy, rich and redolent of chocolate. Not in a sweet way, of course, but in a deep satisfying kind of way.

Oh, yeah, and it had espresso in it.

Yup, espresso.

I know, I am more interested at this point too!

No formal recipe here because I think this soup should be altered to your particular taste.

I will tell you the ingredients (a dish for 1):

- 1/4 cup of canned kidney beans, rinsed and drained
- 1/4 cup of black beans, rinsed and drained 
- 1/4 of a yellow onion, chopped
- 1 cup of chopped tomatoes with some of the juice
- 1 clove of garlic, minced


Oh, wait I should stop here and show you the star of the show:

- little less than 1/2 a cup of the mole paste
- 2 cups of chicken broth
- 1/2 a teaspoon of instant espresso

Put that all into a soup pot and let it get all friendly and comfortable (ie. let it simmer for a good 30 minutes). 

Ladle into your favorite bowl, top with some sour cream and cilantro and enjoy!

Greens in the morning

Brown rice with broccoli rabe, carrot and Miso Mayo with a topping of Udo's oil.

Lol, if you saw the post with just the picture - yeah, that was my big pre-caffeine mistake of the day:-)

And what you see in the first picture was not my breakfast. It was, in fact, the dogs treat.

They have been eating grass again so I figured they would enjoy some greens. They went crazy over this. And, yes, they ate all of the greens and came back into the kitchen trying to sniff out more.

My dogs are strange.

This was my breakfast:

Breakfast bowl with brown rice, black beans, carrots, broccoli rabe.

 I started with the rainbow carrots.

The carrots went into the steamer along with two stalks of broccoli rabe (chopped). 

When the vegetables were tender, I took the pan off the heat and assembled the dogs treat. 

I grabbed my leftover brown rice from the fridge and put a tsp of the rice on the dish, some broccoli rabe, a piece of carrot, a dollop of Miso Mayo and drizzled all with some Udo's oil.

A heavenly dog treat.

Then I went on with assembling my breakfast. I emptied the steamer pot of all but about 1 Tbsp of the steaming liquid. 

I tossed in 1/2 cup of brown rice into the pot along with the carrots and broccoli rabe. 

Then came the spices. A pinch of cumin, cayenne pepper, 1Tbsp of salsa and a pinch of salt. 

At this point I still wanted to boost the flavor so I chopped up one scallion and that went into the pot along with 1/2 cup of cooked black beans (rinsed).


I was liking the way this was coming together but I wanted to boost the protein a bit so I lightly beat one whole egg and stirred that into the pan.

I topped the bowl with more salsa and a bit of avocado.

The pot cooked on medium heat until the egg was cooked through. 

I have a lot of greens in my fridge. My game plan is to try to incorporate greens into every meal I eat this week.

Wish me luck!

My favorite breakfast bowl (vegan)

I wish hotels would include this breakfast bowl on the room service menu.

 

Vegan breakfast bowl with vegan ranch dressing.

This bowl is also one of my favorite ways of including a vegan meal into my weekly diet.

The best thing about this bowl is the vegan ranch dressing that gets drizzled over black beans. 

When you make this dressing you will be licking the bowl and using your fingers to get up every last drop.

Yes, it is that good.

But back to the bowl:

Start with a layer of chopped romaine lettuce.

A layer of brown rice and a layer of black beans.

And here comes the star of the show:

See there? Off to the left? That is a jar of vegan ranch dressing.

And because it's Friday I won't make you wait till the end of the page for the recipe. (I slightly modified a recipe I found here.)

Vegan Ranch Dressing


Ingredients:

1/2 cup of Vegenaise

1/4 tsp. of onion powder


1/4 tsp. of garlic powder


1/4 tsp. of black pepper


1 tsp. of flat leaf parley, chopped fine


1/4 cup of unsweetened soymilk

Instructions:

Whisk all the ingredients together until smooth. Use immediately or store in the refrigerator. 

Enjoy!

And once again back to the bowl:

A healthy drizzle of the vegan ranch dressing.

Lastly, I top the bowl with some diced avocado and some salsa.

But, of course I can't let the bowl sit like that.

All mixed up and ready to eat!

What I like most about this bowl (other than the dressing) is the fact that in one bowl I get a nice hit of protein from the black beans, some healthy carbs from the rice, a dose of greens AND some healthy fats from the avocado.

A perfect way to start the day IMO.

Even if you are not a fan of a black bean/rice/salad bowl for breakfast, you should make the vegan ranch dressing as soon as possible. 

If you are a ranch dressing lover like me, you will have a very hard time not chugging this dressing straight from the bowl.

And be sure to use fresh, flat leaf parsley because I think that one ingredient was the key to dressing.

Happy Friday everyone!

Vegetable fajitas on the run

The work continues. They were doing painting and inspections, etc. so I was in the way even just sitting at my desk. 

I popped the dogs in the car and headed out to do errands. 

When 11am rolled around I was getting hungry since I ate breakfast so early.

I decided to head to a local taqueria.

It is a cute little place but during lunch time it can get really crowded as the workers from the many office building in the area flock in to get their burrito/taco fix.

 

I ordered the vegetarian fajitas.

It came with a really huge whole wheat tortilla but it turned out way to messy to try to eat taco style with a tortilla that big. I ended up just eating the veggies straight out of the takeout container.

The failed taco attempt.

It also came with tortilla chips but I skipped those. I did give each of the dogs a tortilla chip.

Connor is not much of a gentleman when it comes to taking treats - he is a grabber.

Abby, on the other hand, is very gentle.

Here she is gently holding onto her chip while she patiently waits for me to take the picture.

I should have ordered one of the smaller plates - I only managed to finish about 1/3 of the portion and I will probably end up having to toss the rest((((
 
I am hoping that this is the last day of the work for the inside of my apartment. And I am REALLY hoping that they did put insulation around the pipes - as they said they would - otherwise I will have the joy of hearing my neighbors every time they run the faucet, use the shower or flush the toilet (Ewww).

 

Lettuce tacos

The day was busy, lots of walking with the dogs and I did stop in to visit a friend.

It turns out, even if the dogs don't want to go out in the rain - it still needs to be done.

After a trip to the store I cooked up this. 

green leaf lettuce and scallions, cherry tomatoes and avocado.

Black beans.

Browned strips of beef with cherry tomatoes.

With avocado and green onions.