Holiday Meals: Breakfast and Lunch
Having family over for the holidays can be one of those wonderful and also challenging experiences. A house full of loved ones should be a fun and happy time, but it can be crowded and stressful, especially feeding all of those people. We don’t have a plan to make your house bigger, but if you’re wondering what to feed your omnivorous loved ones, we’ve got some answers.
Photo by Snarky Vegan Julia Moran Martz
Take some of the stress off by planning delicious vegan meals in advance. Knowing what you’re making, shopping before hand and doing preparation steps ahead of time can all make your holiday meals go over smoothly and calmly. For great time-saving tips even for more complicated recipes check out Snarky Vegan’s Vegan MoFo series EZ Comfort Food for Tired Wenches. Here are some suggestions from Allison’s award-winning “VeganizeIt!” column from VegNews Magazine:
Photo by Heather Blackmon of Better with Veggies
If you’re having family staying with you for the holidays chances are you’ll want to plan more than just dinners. But a meal planned doesn’t have to be a big, sit-down affair. For a sweet and simple breakfast treat try warm and buttery scones. Our bloggers have created several versions for you to try: Pumpkin Cranberry, Orange Chocolate Chip, and the latest Better with Veggies version Currant-Raisin Orange, which are all spin-offs of Allison’s original Orange Currant recipe. Scones make great casual breakfast fare as they can be kept warm or re-heated for everyone to eat in their own time.
Photo by Snarky Vegan Julia Moran Martz
For a fancy sit-down breakfast or brunch nothing beats a golden-brown Frittata complete with seasonal veggies and topped with your favorite shredded vegan cheese. For extra decadence and tastebud delight, serve slices of Frittata with a fruit salad and strips of Smoky Fried Tofu Bacon on the side (or crumbled and baked in). YUM!
Amidst all the holiday eating, lunch can be a satisfyingly simple and healthy affair. Turn a plain-jane soup and salad combo into light lunch extraordinaire with French Onion Soup (available in the September/October edition of VegNews), Clam-Free Chowder, or Cream of Broccoli Soup and a very green kale salad.
Of course, we’ve got you covered in the sweets department. Let us do the baking, and make dessert one less thing for you to worry about.
Gourmet cookies in seasonal flavors and trays of decadent vegan fudge make perfect holiday snacks and desserts. They’re also great as gifts for friends near or far. Check out the Holiday Gifts and Gifts By Price sections of our website for seasonal gift ideas to fit any budget.
Come back next week for a super exciting chocolate announcement on Monday, and then holiday dinner suggestions and even a new recipe or two later in the week…
Providing the “How” in Living Vegan
You may have noticed that we stay mostly on the positive side of veganism around here. You don’t hear much from us about the torture and abuse of farm animals or the horrors of the dairy, leather and fur industries. 
We’re not, however, trying to gloss-over or ignore these issues. We care very deeply about animal welfare and a compassionate lifestyle, which is why we put most of our time and energy into providing the “how” to being vegan.
There are many amazing resources out there providing the “why” of vegan living from VegNews and Mercy for Animals, to PETA, The Humane Society of the United States and Farm Animal Sanctuaries around the country. They give you the reasons and facts behind veganism, from ending factory farming to the health benefits of animal-free eating. Then, when you’ve decided that you want to live an animal-free lifestyle but don’t feel like baking, or think that veganism means complete deprivation from all the foods you love, that’s where we come in. 
We’re here to offer you solutions, the answers to all your cravings from vegan toffee and gourmet cookies to veganized comfort food recipes. We’re also a great gift-giving resource for vegans and non-vegans alike. Families and friends of vegan enjoy giving delicious, high-quality desserts to their plant-eating loved ones and vegans themselves give Allison’s Gourmet treats when they want delectable, compassionate and fair-trade gifts that even a carnivore will love.
We love providing vegan lifestyle answers to everyday dilemmas, and, although we’re all about the food, we’re happy to be able to connect our customers to other vegan choices too, like donating and volunteering at animal shelters, purchasing animal-friendly attire, and reading the latest vegan books and blogs. We’re here to help. Have a vegan lifestyle question? Looking for vegan inspiration in some area of your life? Ask your questions here and we’ll see if we can dig up the answers.
Salted Is the New Sweet
Kelly’s salted Margarita Biscotti recipe from last week’s Friday with Friends got me thinking about how much I love the salty/sweet flavor combination not just in gourmet cookies, but in vegan chocolates and confections too. I’ve always loved to contrast salty and sweet tastes; on late nights in college I would go back and forth, eating candy, then chips, then candy… But I was still skeptical when Allison first suggested that we try tests of salted caramels and brittle. I thought “I love salty, and I love sweet, but both at once?!” 
If you haven’t yet tried the salted confection phenomenon, maybe you’re thinking the same thing. Let me assure you, then, that these aren’t some super-salty, sickly sweet aberration. Just the right balance of salt added to a sweet confection enhances all the flavors therein, making salted chocolate caramels taste more chocolate-y as well as sweeter and saltier. But tasting is believing, and with hand-crafted vegan confections of the highest quality as ours are, you’re in for a real treat.
In the past year or so Allison has developed several salted confections and there are more in the works. 
Available right now are her unbelievably delicious salted chocolate and vanilla caramels as well as you-won’t-believe-’em-until-you-try-’em salted lavender caramels and salted chocolate brittle (my personal pick for best Father’s Day gift idea). Salted confections make wonderful treats for those with salty palates like mine or for people who love to try new things.
What are your favorite unorthodox flavor combinations?
Fun with Snow Days!
We can usually expect a few inches of snow once or twice a year here in our small foothill community in Northern California. It’s just enough to make it feel like winter, but little enough that many people in this area do not have 4-wheel-drive cars. This year, however, it has already snowed three times and last weekend it snowed over a foot! Now I know we’re not the only ones getting hit with more severe winter than usual this year, and if you’re reading this in the Midwest a foot of snow may not seem like a lot, but around here at least it’s enough to shut down the town. 
Most people were out of power and stuck at home all weekend long and school was canceled for most of last week. While being trapped at home can be a drag, especially if you have work deadlines or screaming kids with cabin fever I like to see it as an opportunity.
Snow days can be really fun and delicious, especially if you have some treats on hand. I know for a lot of people, no power means no heat, so curl up under a blanket (or by the fireplace or wood stove if you have one), light some candles for their warm glow, and indulge in a cup of hot cocoa and some scrumptious gourmet cookies. We spent our snowed-in weekend playing Monopoly for the first time in years and going sledding in our back yard. Then we made one of Allison’s amazing Veganize It! recipes: Shepherd’s Pie. Yum! (Stay tuned for photos coming on Monday).
How Do You Eat Cookies?
My dad sometimes jokes with me that I don’t make toast, I make warm bread, which is funny because it’s actually true. The dry crunch of dark toast is about as far from the sensuous experience I want in my breakfast as you could get. And I feel the same way about gourmet cookies. I want a soft and chewy cookie that’s perfectly flavored and easy to eat. 
Yep, I’m a chewy cookie girl, and luckily for me, so is Allison, so her cookies are always perfectly soft and delicious.
One of the things I love most about cookies (besides their taste) is their versatility. They’re a go-anywhere, eat anytime, kind of sweet snack. And, there are so many ways to eat them! How do you eat your cookies? Personally, I’m a dipper. I love to dip my cookies in non-dairy milk, Living Harvest’s Tempt Hemp Milk is my favorite one right now. Or, if it’s chilly outside, or maybe the cookies have been out for a few days, warm tea to dip them in is the best! 
But, I also like soggy cereal, so all you crunchy cereal people must have other ways to eat your gourmet cookies. Do you warm them up? Eat them with non-dairy ice cream? Eat them in non-dairy ice cream? Leave them sitting out for a few days until they get crunchy enough for you? Just kidding, but seriously, if chewy cookies aren’t your thing, try some crunchy peanut brittle and leave the cookies for me. 
