Hey gang! We liked making the first video so much, we made a second. In this post, we review Green’t Dubbel Dark Ale. It’s freaking delicious.
Don’t forget to check if what you’re drinking is vegan at Barnivore!
From Brent and Christie, peace out, my vegans.
I swung by my sister’s house this evening and the vegan options were limited to baby carrots, so I swung by the local store for something quick to have for dinner. Now, I could have bought some fresh veggies to cook or make a salad, but instead, I went with Gardein Sliders from the frozen section.
As you can see from the box, it’s 150 calories per slider and 9g of protein. No cholesterol, y’all! I heated the sliders according to the instructions and they came out perfectly heated with no sogginess.
I was really hungry and lazy so I topped the burgers with some ketchup and mustard. I didn’t put too much on the actual patty because I don’t like condiments oozing out of my burger; I’ll usually dip my burgers into ketchup or mustard. The sliders definitely needed some spice. I checked out the other items in my sister’s fridge and found this awesome organic horseradish mustard that was not only vegan but the perfect addition to the sliders.
Gardein sliders get an A from me for being a delicious and quick and easy vegan treat. Plus, I look super sexy biting into them!
‘Til next time! –Melissa
We decided it would be a good idea to do some videos to spice up the site. So, here’s the quick and dirty for Green’s Tripel Blonde Ale!
As discussed in the video, Barnivore is a great resource to check if what you’re drinking is vegan.
From Brent and Christie, peace out, my vegans.
I got these guys on impulse because they’ve got my dog whistle on them: gluten-free, vegan, organic. I can’t ignore those words. Five Star Foodies artichoke burgers are made primarily from rice, cashews and artichoke and have a great flavor all by themselves.
They keep indefinitely (barring the recommendation on the label) in the freezer and for weeks in the refrigerator. They cook quickly and easily and go well with fries or a tofu scramble. They cost me about $1.75 per burger and 4 come in a bag for a total of $7. Each burger contains 16 grams of fat, more sugar than fiber and 330 milligrams of sodium so those of you who are watching your weight or your salt might want to steer free of these babies in favor of something home-made. All in all it was one of the better gluten-free veggie burgers I’ve ever had. The texture was nice: they melted in my mouth without falling apart during cooking. Still, these haven’t converted me; I’ll probably stick to home-made burgers and trying new ones.
We served them up with a tofu scramble as though they were a breakfast sausage. This is probably not what these burgers were intended for but it allowed us to really taste the burger and not the bun and condiments. If you get to try them, let us know what you think!
This is Brent and Christie, signing off!
I would say that this is a classic lazy vegan post but it does require some effort, like opening a package and slaving over a hot stove for 5 minutes. I wanted a tasty dinner with minimal effort, so I decided to finally try the Tofurky Chorizo Style product that has been sitting in my fridge. It was perfect because I already had tortillas and only had to stop at the store for some pepperjack Daiya.
The product definitely looks meaty and once you open the pack, you can smell all the scrumptious spices. “That smells SPICY!” said my niece as it cooked.
I heated up the ‘chorizo’ in a mini frying pan for 5 minutes.
I served them on tortillas with some Daiya pepperjeck and a side of tomatoes. The product smelled spicy and it is tasty, but it could use more embellishment. I plan to add some garlic and/or onion powder and to serve it with hot sauce or fresh salsa. But it is good as-is and met my needs this evening.
I love Tofurky products! –Melissa
Here at Turning Veganese, Brent, Melissa and I can agree that cheese is the hardest habit to kick when transitioning from a carnist to vegan lifestyle. We’ve made 3 previous posts about cheeses we’ve tried and whether or not we liked them, were useful, thought the ingredients and nutritional profile were an improvement and if we thought they were a good value. We’ve managed to track down a few more vegan cheeses and wanted to share them with you.
Better than Ricotta by Tofutti was stunningly similar to ricotta. The ingredients include soy but it’s free of nuts, dairy and gluten so it’s suitable for people with those sensitivities. It’s pretty high in calories, equal to that of regular cheeses so I’ll probably stick with home-made tofu ricotta which is also considerably cheaper compared to the $5.49 or about 30 cents per ounce.
Better than Sour Cream, also by Tofutti is another product that we liked the flavor but found the nutrition lacking and the ingredients highly processed. It also contains soy but is free of nuts and gluten making it suitable for some common food allergies but not others. Making you own at home is probably more budget friendly but this makes a great taco topping in a pinch. Making your own will be a better bet in terms of nutrition and price. It’s priced at $3.49 for 12 ounces.
We Can’t Say it’s Sour Cream by Wayfare Foods had a great calorie profile at 35 calories per ounce and is free from soy, gluten or nuts (except for coconut). The taste and texture were a little confusing. It tasted kind of like sour cream but more like Tofutti’s Better than Cream cheese. The texture was also more like cream cheese than sour cream, even after we mixed the top layer of liquid into the bulk of the product. It cost us $3.99 for 16 ounces making it a better value than Tofutti but I suspect that a lot of people wouldn’t be convinced by the flavor and texture to really enjoy it.
Free & Easy Cheese Sauce mix is more of a flavoring than a cheese substitute but can help make things that are supposed to be cheesy taste like something approaching white cheddar. The ingredients are pretty processed but mostly inoffensive and are suitable for someone with nut, soy or wheat allergies. The container says there are 12 servings in the can but I don’t think you need as much as they say to get the flavor they’re advertising. You can add this to sauces, nut or lentil pate, soy-curl “chicken” salad and anything else that you’d want to have a cheesy kick. With this product, a little goes a long way so it’s a pretty good deal at $6.95 for a 130 gram container.
Nacheez This particular cheese was low in calories (20 per ounce) and the ingredients were relatively unprocessed and inoffensive, though it does contain nuts. It’s a great source of B vitamins, iron and Vitamin C. The flavor is pretty good, though we had to add cayenne to make the ‘spicy’ version spicy enough for our taste. It microwaved well in its glass container turning into a molten pot of awesomesauce that’s great for dip at a party or pouring over your favorite taco recipe. It was a little pricey at $6.99 or 82 cents per ounce.
Mozzarisella is something I’ve been excited about because I’ve been seeing rave reviews. It comes packaged like Teese and has a softer texture. The ingredients are not particularly objectionable but the cheese has no particular nutritional value. When we actually got to tasting it, I found it had an oddly chemical flavor and Brent’s remark was that it was “like sucking on a garden hose”. We might have gotten a bad batch but I don’t think I’ll be buying it again. Even at a sale price of $7.95 ($2 less than retail) it wasn’t worth it for 7 ounces.
Parmela has a standout list of ingredients and a nutritional profile and flavor to match. I think the packaging is a great addition because it’ll look nice on your table at a fancy party when you’re serving pasta but I think it’s a little pricey at $3.99 or $1.60 per ounce. I’ll probably stick to Parma by Eat in the Raw. Parma also contains nuts so neither is suitable for those with nut allergies.
Vegan Queso by Food for Lovers does not contain nuts like Nacheez but does contain gluten so this is suitable for people with nut allergies but not for those who are sensitive to gluten. It’s very close in flavor, ingredients and nutrition to Nacheez and is similarly great for use as a dip or a topping for enchiladas or your favorite TexMex cuisine. A little cayenne and a microwave is all it needs! It’s sold at $5.99 or 50 cents per ounce which is a better deal as long as you’re not sensitive to gluten.
So we’ve shown you some more of the cheeses we’ve managed to get our hands on and hope you’ll get to try and decide for yourself. Also let us know your favorites and if we haven’t tried them, we’ll give it a spin.
This is Brent and Christie, signing off!
I was browsing at ‘rhymes with Schmole Broods’ today and came across SaviSeeds by Vega. There were small packages, perfect for tasting, so I grabbed the Oh Natural and Cocoa Kissed pouches. I ended up staying late at work and was highly caffeinated, very much needing a snack as I waited to meet up with my sister for dinner. So I grabbed the Oh Natural bag and decided there was no better time than right then to try them out.
I have never heard of sacha inchi seeds before. They mostly remind me of peanuts, but the more I ate, the more I found them to be a giant, hearty seed — which is exactly what they are. The Oh Natural version is seasoned only with sea salt. These seeds were delicious and easily tied me over.
These guys are gluten-free and have 6 grams of Omega-3 (according to the package, they are the richest plant-based source of Omega-3) and 9 grams of protein per serving. AMAZING!
Here is a photo of the sacha inchi. Totally rad, right? I think I have found my perfect on-the-go snack! –Melissa
I grew up eating processed meats. I would happily eat hot dogs or bologna for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Gross, I know, but my Mom was a food chemist at a meat company and bringing home the product was a benefit of the job. She also analyzed vegan hot dogs and sausages, but would never bring that weird stuff home. She recently mentioned how annoying it was to test vegan “meats” because there was no cholesterol. I could sort of explain why, but she’s the chemist and my layperson translation doesn’t quite make sense to even me right now.
I have been really hesitant to try vegan hot dogs. I’m sure part of it is the annoyance that my mother displayed whenever she had to analyze them. Other than that, I guess I’ve been worried that they won’t taste like the real thing. I decided to take a chance when I saw Field Roast frankfurters at the store.
I’ll admit that I was attracted to Field Roast based solely on the packaging. The hot dogs are individually cased so you get a link of sausages; none of this smushing 8 or 10 links into one space. They also have a variety of interesting flavors like Mexican Chipotle and Smoked Apple Sage. The Frankfurter style look like hot dogs, they smell like hot dogs, they’re easy to cook, and they taste like hot dogs… mostly. They’re spiced really well with a good smoky flavor but a bit too salty for my taste. I wouldn’t say that they taste vegan so much as that they taste like a fancier brand of hot dog (a classy hot dog, if there is such a thing). They have a very solid texture, not chewy or grainy or crumbly.They go really well with ketchup. I tried them with mustard as well, but I found that the saltiness didn’t mix well with the mustard.They are not gluten-free, but they are soy-free.
You can prepare the sausages by boiling or grilling or browning: I opted to brown them since the instructions for boiling called for them to remain in their casing and I wasn’t comfortable boiling the product in its plasticky casing.
Hey, check these guys out! I cut up a handful of these tomatoes from the garden and mixed them with some onion to go with my hot dogs.
The verdict: these frankfurters are good. Not quite wicked good, but good. They’re definitely a great substitute if you find yourself craving a hot dog. I do want to try the other products that Field Roast has to offer, but I came to a conclusion after this meal: I don’t miss hot dogs!
Stay tuned… I have a whole package of this stuff and I am planning to use the rest of it to recreate a couple of my favorite hot dog dishes! –Melissa
A vegan friend was discussing vegan cooking gadgets with us on her visit from elsewhere and suggested we try out the TofuXpress. We decided to give it a spin, and I will sing its praises for years to come. The TofuXpress is freaking sicknasty bodacious.
As the resident tofu presser in our household, I have struggled with the perfect way to make the texture of tofu meatier. I tried conventional pressing methods (tofu on paper towels, pressed down and weighted by a plate on top), and not so conventional methods (freeze, thaw, freeze, thaw). The former was certainly the most effective, but it necessitated a lot of waste. The TofuXpress makes it easy for me to make a nicely textured tofu that I can marinate.
So, for this simple recipe, you can use the paper towel method, or in my case, use a TofuXpress.
Take your block of tofu, drop it into the Xpress, use the heavy spring for pressing. Before putting it in the fridge, dump some of the already pressed liquid down your sink drain for optimal drainage. Stick it in the fridge, and go do something fun for an hour. I chose to dance to some Earth, Wind, and Fire records.
Pull the tofu out of the fridge, drain the liquid, remove the press. Now, to marinate, there’s a handy lid that attaches to the base of the Xpress that also acts as a seal for marinating.
Go ahead and prepare your marinade. For this experiment, I used a combination of soy sauce, teriyaki sauce, Sriracha and Bragg’s Liquid Aminos. The soy sauce and liquid aminos are there to help thin out the mix as tofu is not quite porous enough to soak in the teriyaki and Sriracha, which is where the awesome flavor is at. Dump your marinade into the Xpress with the tofu, let it soak for a half hour. After that time is up, flip the tofu, put the lid back on and let it soak another half hour.
The final step is to press out excess marinade for a last half hour period. I know that this has taken up 2.5 hours already, but I promise it’s worth it. Drop the excess marinade into a dish, save it for later, or use it to dip. You can slice up the tofu and eat it as is, or pan sear it for science.
If you want to save time, do the following :
This will save a lot of waiting time, and your tofu will be freaking amazing after that nice long marinade session.
In short, the TofuXpress made it super easy for us to make firmer tofu, and enabled us to experiment with marinades. It saves us from wasting paper towels, and doesn’t take up a counter top. It’s dishwasher safe, and all of its parts store inside of itself. The TofuXpress has been a boon to us. Let us know if you have one, your marinade recipes, or feel free to ask us about it.
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I was talking to a friend who’s a vegetarian (Hi, Yamini!) when she asked if I had heard of PB2. I had not. So she gave me some to try. How awesome is that?
PB2 is a powdered peanut butter product. Say what? Yep. Powdered peanut butter.
PB2 has three ingredients: roasted peanuts, sugar, and salt. It’s basically traditional peanut butter — without fat or oil. Per their web site, this is how the product compares to traditional peanut butter:
AMAZING, right?! Making the peanut butter is easy. Simply mix 2 tbsp of the powder with 1 tbsp of PB2. Adjust as needed if you want something more runny or more thick.
I’ll admit that I wasn’t completely blown away by PB2, but if I hadn’t known that it started out as a powder, I would have been fooled. My six-year-old niece tried some, and she loved it! I do wonder why sugar was added; not a huge deal, though.
I prefer traditional peanut butter, but the nutrition facts speak for themselves. I sometimes go several days in a row when I eat peanut butter and toast for breakfast. The lower fat and calorie content, along with 5g of protein per serving, makes PB2 a GREAT option. In addition, having peanut butter in powder form makes it easy to mix into smoothies or when baking and cooking. I definitely intend to use PB2 next time I make kare kare.
Learn more about PB2 at their official web site! Let us know what you think if you try it, and I hope you do. –Melissa
Turning Veganese 