Nana's Pumpkin Spice Cake (vegan style)

This weekend was unseasonably warm here in North Carolina.

Just when I thought the cold weather was here to stay we had a bright and sunny Sunday which involved lots of playing outside.

Before we played we had to make a stop at Costco after church.

Somehow I don't know how...this ended up in our cart:

Yes I now have the mother of all blenders and I am more excited than Andrew in this picture.

The first thing we made you ask?  A green lemonade...which was delicious and refreshing for a warm Sunday.

I also made this which is perfect for Thanksgiving or any of the other 364 days of the year.

Nana's Pumpkin Spice Cake

1 2/3 C sifted all purpose unbleached flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp cloves
1 C light brown suger (firmly packed)
1/3 C shortening (softened)
1 C canned pumpkin
1/2 chopped nuts (I used leftover almonds from my almond milk that I made here)
1 egg (regular or flax)

Put all of your ingredients into one bowl and mix until incorporated (you just can't get any easier then this).

At first it will look like this:

Put the batter into a greased 9x9 pan and bake at 350 degrees for 40-45 minutes.

It will come out looking like this:

Now I did add a quick icing (powdered sugar, Earth Balance, vanilla, and a splash of almond milk).

This cake is so moist and full of spice.

It would have been delicious on it's own (making it more a quick bread), but with the icing you take it to a whole new level of love.

Show someone you love them and whip this up.

Do you have a dessert from a relative that you love and is easy?

I hope you all are having a wonderful Monday only 3 more days till Thanksgiving....YEAH!

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Peach Bread

In my kitchen was this

What is this you ask?

Well it is the left over "juice" from a jar of peaches I canned here.

I thought it would be a great shame to just pour this out when SURELY it could have a purpose

The purpose came to me as I gazed on 3 peaches from my CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) that we had not yet consumed.

I thought surely I could make banana bread with peaches and then was born:

Peach Bread

Ingredients

1 1/2 C unbleached all purpose flour
3/4 C sugar
2 peaches pureed
1 peach diced
1/4 tsp baking soda
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 shake nutmeg
1 flax egg (1 Tbsp ground flax meal, 3 Tbsp water)
1/4 C oil

I mix my flax egg first (so it can thicken) and then I combine all the other ingredients (the least amount of dishes to do afterwards the better).

Add the flax egg and mix it to incorporate

Pour into a greased loaf pan

Bake for 50 minutes at 375 degrees and out pops this

While it was still warm I brushed the top with some of the reserve "juice" to give the bread a sheen.

The bread is very mild in flavor, but super moist.

My kids have especially liked this bread sliced and toasted followed up with a smear of jelly (their current favorite is Crofter's Four Fruit)

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Trip and Treat

It's not even October and I am handing out a treat.

I know, I am super generous like that.

For the boys being at the beach not only meant they got to play in the sand and surf they were able to share their favorite games on the iPad with their grandparents.

The backyard has a wonderful natural area where the kids could run and play all sorts of pretend games.

Ocean City (Maryland) has a boardwalk full of street performers, rides, games, and food you should not eat (DEFINITELY not veg friendly).

We saw a variety of street performers.

There was one guy who made spray paint art in 15 minutes flat

and a guy who made religious symbols in the sand (VERY impressive)

We were lucky to find The Lazy Lizard.

A restaurant situated directly on the water, you could taxi your boat over to it should you choose.

The Lizard had a delicious black bean burger as well as a playground for the kids...now that is a way to pass the time when you are waiting for your food.

The one last highlight of the trip that I want to share with you is Birch's Farm stand.

Birch's was about 2 minutes from our house and offered some of the most delicious and fresh produce (the farm is directly behind the stand).

Local farmer's markets, or stands like this one, are a great way to make your vacation dollars go further and provide you with a much healthier alternative to the grocery store.

Now as promised a recipe!!

While we were away our garden continue to grow.  Like Jack and the Beanstalk we came home to find this

A 12" zucchini.

Holy Smokes just image the fish stories you could make up with this one.

I decided to talk this big monster and the leftover zucchini from last week's CSA and make zucchini bread and some puree (I freeze the puree and use it in muffins when the kids request them).

Zucchini Bread


2 C whole wheat flour
1 C unbleached all purpose flour
3 flax eggs
1/2 C cooking oil
1/2 C unsweetened applesauce
1 Tbsp white vinegar
2 C sugar
2 C grated zucchini
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
3/4 C raisins (which are optional...however are a must for my kids)

The zucchini can be grated by hand or in a food processor.  For me I am old school so I pull out my hand grater and get to work, all the while praying I don't scrape a knuckle.

Combine your sugar, oil, applesauce, and vinegar.

Whip together your flax eggs (3 Tbsp ground flax meal and 9 Tbsp water)

Add to mixture along with zucchini

Add the remaining ingredients to the bowl and combine

I prefer mini loaves so I divided the batter into 8 mini loaves

Place in 325 degree oven and wait patiently

40 minutes later you get this (well 8 of these)

 This is by far the most moist bread I have ever made.

Give this a try and let me know how it turns out!!!!

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What I Ate/Baked

Yesterday was a day that I wanted to bake. 

Why? 

Because my kids demanded donuts for breakfast. 

Now don't be judgemental yet. 

I didn't run over to Krispy Kreme and buy them a dozen of their fried concoctions. 

Instead I made my own, in the mini version because lets face it everything is cuter in mini version.

These little cuties are super easy to make and elicit comments such as "Your are the best mom in the world!"  Really?  Wow maybe I should working on a speech or something, surely there is an Academy Award like event that rewards moms for being the best.

First to bake donuts you need a pan or this handy dandy small kitchen appliance

For about $20 this little gem can be yours (I purchased this one at Target).

The ingredients and directions are simple:

1 C unbleached all purpose flour
1/2 C sugar
1 tbsp baking powder
1 egg
1/2 C almond milk (vanilla)
4 tbsp vegetable oil

for those wanting to veganize sub out the egg for a flax egg or silken tofu
for the flax egg mix 1 tbsp flax meal and 3 tbsp water mix and allow to thicken
for silken tofu use t tbsp and whip smooth

You will need to grease both sides of the donut maker and plug it in to warm it up.

Combine all ingredients into a large bowl and whip together until smooth (I prefer to do this by hand, but you could use a hand mixer).

Pour a scant less then a tablespoon into each of the donut forms and follow the cooking instructions of your donut maker (for me it is to close the top and wait for the light to go off...signaling donuts should be cooked to perfection).

As if a light fluffy donut isn't enough to whet your whistle how about adding a little topping. 

On hand at my house was:

Which in turn made my cute minis look like this:

These aren't as pretty as they could have been, but I was fighting with my 2 year old because she was scarfing them down and didn't want to take time for pictures of food.

Yes I firmly believe shoveling them in by the handful is required when you have something chocolate.

What I Ate Wednesday

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Hidden Inspiration

Yesterday my children we craving something sweet, and I am ashamed to say I only had chocolate chips on hand (yeah I know they are delicious, but not quite what the kiddos wanted).

So mulling things over in my head and trying to figure out what I wanted to make my husband says "Hey peanut butter banana cookies."  I thought maybe he was having a stroke, but no he was just reading the side of the banana bag.

Sidebar:  For purposes of saving money when I can I LOVE to purchase the big bags of "ripe" bananas from the produce section.  As luck would have it Lowes had organic bananas for $0.39 a lb (for $2.00 I got two of these large bags, one of which is currently in my freezer).

This is the side of the bag:

In case you can't read it here are the ingredients:

1 1/2 C all purpose unbleached flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 small banana (1/2 C)
1/3 C firmly packed brown sugar
1/4 C Earth Balance (softened)
1/4 C Organic smooth peanut butter (you can use crunchy...but I didn't have any handy)
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla

* for egg substitutes you can use a flax egg (directions here) or you can also take a tablespoon of silken tofu, whipped by hand.

Add all of the ingredients to a bowl

Mix these together, you can use a hand mixer if you like, I prefer a potato masher.

Once combined form into 1 inch balls by hand and place on baking sheet (covered in parchment paper or greased with cooking spray)

Take a fork and dips the tines in granulated sugar and make a lattice pattern on top of each cookie to flatten them out

Bake for 10 minutes at 375 degrees

These are not overly peanut buttery cookies.  I may have to play with the ratio of peanut butter in the future and possibly throw in some of those chocolate chips that I always have around.
For now though this is tasty and healthy little snack for anyone ages 1-100 (can't give peanut butter to children under 1).

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