Overnight Oats

I got the idea of Overnight Oatmeal from Vegan MOFO - Vegan Month of Food. All across the blogosphere, vegans are joining together throughout the month of October to share lots of great vegan foods and recipes. Check out www.veganmofo.com for info, as well as a daily summary of some of the best foods and fun being shared! I'm trying to post five times per week during this month. So we'll see how it goes!
Overnight Oats are eaten cold, in the morning, after being prepared the night before and stewing all night long in the fridge. Here are the ingredients I used for my first bowl:


1/2 c rolled oats
2/3 c soy milk
1/4 tsp vanilla extract
2 Tbsp ground flax seed
1 small banana, mashed up

I just combined all those ingredients in a bowl, stirred it up, and popped it in the fridge, uncovered.
In the morning, I mixed it up again and took a bite.

MMMmmm! The banana flavor really sets into the oats. It's not like my hot morning oats, where some bites have banana in them and some don't. And it's nice and sweet and creamy, as well as nutty from the flax seed, and just a little bit crunchy. No cooking required! Actually, I think the idea is that it resembles oatmeal mixed with cold yogurt and fruit. The flax seeds create a gooey-binding texture with the soy milk, like yogurt.
I had planned to put maple syrup on in the morning, but the sweetness was so perfect that I didn't want to touch it. I added just a small spoonful of peanut butter, but that's it.
I've got lots of ideas for variations, which could be added at night or in the morning I suppose: various kinds of nuts (walnuts, almonds, sunflower seeds), chia seeds (which work like flax seeds to make that yogurty texture), pumpkin puree, molasses, maple syrup, agave, other fruits....

Sometime I've also gotta try Baked Oatmeal, which my sister Bethany has gotten me excited about. Now that the weather is getting colder, hot oats in the morning is sounding very enticing!

Baked Brussels Sprouts and More

Hmm, how best to use this propitious pile of veggies I found in the fridge?
After spending 15 minutes online looking for a recipe, I gave up and turned to my own imagination.

Of course, these diminutive brassica were the main source of my imagination. They are just, ahem, "sprouting" out of the ground this time of the year, and I've heard that they gain a nice sweetness after the first frost! Sounds like I know what I'm talking about, but I've honestly never cooked Brussels Sprouts before. When I set them on the counter, I had this flashback of calling them "murdered cabbage patch kids" as a child. Yeah, real nice, I know.
Anyway, I did get two ingredient ideas online: dijon mustard and balsamic vinegar. Once I decided that my cooking method would be baking, I was ready to go. First, I mixed up in a bowl the following ingredients: garlic, leeks, olive oil, soy sauce, salt, pepper, and Grey Poupon (but of course).

This looked pretty good, but I wanted a little extra flavor, so I chose 1/4 cup of dried cranberries, 1/4 cup of almonds, and chopped them up.

That looked better. Next I mixed it all up...

Then I carried on with the very satisfying task of chopping up all the vegetables: 2 small yellow bell peppers, two carrots, six mushrooms, and about 6 brussels sprouts (cut just in half).

I greased a baking sheet with olive oil, put the veggies on it, then smeared the spices mix all over them.

Is there anything wrong with me calling this eye candy?
I covered the baking sheet with tin foil, which I'd rather avoid because it seems pretty wasteful, but I don't have any other ideas on how to bake vegetables without drying them out. Also, I think the tin foil covering reduces the baking time quite a bit. I let all of this bake for 20 minutes at 375 degrees F, and they came out perfect.
While the baking was going on, I decided to add another layer to the meal: quinoa.

This only takes about 10 minutes to cook. How do you know when it's done? When the little grains open up a bit and reveal their inner white sprouts.

Yup, about like that. But I think with a few more minutes, they'd open up even more and not be quite as chewy as I had them! Oops!

Brussels sprouts and friends, fresh out of the oven and still steaming! This batch of veggies definitely baked a lot faster than some other ones I've done (Scarlet Roasted Vegetables - 40 minutes; and another vegetable mix I did with Parsley, Sage, Rosemary & Thyme - 45 minutes). And I'm glad twenty minutes was enough, because I was huuungry after being out in today's BEAUTIFUL weather walking the dogs all over the place!

Honestly, this patch of vegetables tasted great, just plated up fresh from the oven. The Brussels Sprouts were just right, a perfect texture balance of chewy and crunchy.

But just like in a great clothing outfit, a masterful layering of different elements produces a subtle but superior taste.

Did I just call myself a master? Ha!
Well, all the different components did come together nicely. But really, how can you go wrong with any baked vegetables combined with almost any collection of spices? A couple spoonfuls of quinoa and a few drizzles of balsamic vinegar, mixed together with the baked vegetables, and I had myself a warm and scrumptious meal.

Black Beans & Rice & Everything Nice

Ok, I promise not to blog about black beans again so soon! But honestly, after blogging about Sweet Potato & Black Bean Burritos yesterday, I was craving good old fashioned REGULAR black beans.

I arrived at my parents' yesterday to stay and do some dog-sitting for them. This afternoon I found this can of beans in their stash. For spur of the moment black bean cravings, canned beans definitely work better than dry beans! Even though they don't keep onions on hand (my dad hates them), there were leeks and garlic, and that's all I needed to decide on my lunch menu. I chopped up two big garlic cloves and about 1/4 cup of leeks, and sauteed them in olive oil for about 5 minutes, stirring frequently.

While the aroma was wafting through the air, I thought about the title of this blog, Beans & Rice & Everything Nice, which I took from Bethany and David! I decided I'd like to have an additional component in with the beans and rice, you know, to make them extra nice! There were a few lonely mushrooms in the fridge, so I chopped them up, and added them to the frying pan. Then I dumped in the whole can of beans. Sometimes I rinse them off, to lower the sodium content, but I like the taste when the beans cook in their own sauce.

 I immediately added about 1/4 cup of hot water and stirred it all up. I keep the burner up to high so that the water/sauce boils. I let this simmer for awhile, probably upwards of eight minutes, using a spatula to stir and scrape the bottom of the pan every once in awhile. Beans are technically soft enough to eat right out of the can. But I think these eight-ish minutes of boiling softens them up even more and allows the garlic and onion (or leek) flavor to really coalesce with the beans.

Even though I usually use onions, not leeks, the reeds of green really brighten up the dish!
While I got the beans going, I also cooked some rice. Cheater style. Instant brown rice, from a box. Took only 5 minutes of cooking and 5 minutes of steaming. A craving, a box, and a can. As easy as CBC.

So how do you know when the beans are done? Don't worry about timing eight minutes. Just stir and scrape every once in awhile, and when you notice the sauce starting to bubble down and stick and dry to the pan - they're done!

 Scoop them out on top of some rice (or Scrambed Tofu).

 Mix it all together (if you so desire), and chow down!

Beans and rice are very nice.
But so is dessert in the middle of the afternoon!

Oh yeah, chocolate peanut butter soy ice cream with strawberries!