Tag Archives: Vegan MOFO

Yesterday was crazy, and exhausting. I just couldn’t wake up in the morning, and was so tired I was nauseas, so my lunch was cherry ice cream. Eep. Then Wolfie wouldn’t go down for a nap, so I figured might as well take a nap with him. 3 HOURS LATER I woke up! Wolfie stayed down for another 20 min. It was not expected at all. I had to dash out the door to get a vegan pizza slice and a cupcake because we were off to a birthday party. So by the time I got home I didn’t have the brain power to think. We just had some jarred tomato sauce, spaghetti and frozen “meatballs” from Aldi’s. I didn’t even think about blogging since I didn’t eat any food from the CSA, though looking back I could of made a fun post of CSA must have products. I guess next time right?

ANYWAYS…… what did I eat? Well I did take a LIIIIIITTLE bit of leftover stew from last week and made a burrito wrap with white rice and soy chorizo from Trader Joe’s it was much tastier than I was expecting. I do have to say you guys will most likely see tons and tons of wraps on the blog, because it is the main way I reuse leftovers. And if I can’t use the leftovers fast enough, they get wrapped up and frozen.

Naturally a great way to use up produce is pickling. That way it can stay in the fridge for awhile until you are ready to use them. I always pickle hot peppers from the CSA. It is pretty quick and easy, and is great because I hate buying ONE jalapeño at the super market for fifty cents. These pickled snap peas are being tucked into Jon’s lunch tomorrow. Our CSA had such a great year for peas BECAUSE of all the rain, so much that I think they have a pick what you can on the board. So I might of went a little nuts.

Next to the peas is salsa verde I made last week. I try not to make it since it involves roasting tomatillos, but I just couldn’t help myself this year. It was really rewarding to use poblano peppers from the farm as well. I haven’t decided but I am sure I will be making a wrap for Jon tomorrow as well.

The big dinner was an African peanut stew with eggplant, okra, tomatoes, and the stir-fry greens. The dish is from Chad and is called Daraba. I used this recipe and I wasn’t too impressed. The recipe was super simple, but I think that was it’s downfall. I think there were a few steps I could of added that would of given a lot more flavor. And I would of liked to add more spices to it as well. But it used up a lot of vegetables so that was at least good.

I’ve been itching to bake but it hasn’t happened yet. I am a little nervous, but I guess soon I should bite the bullet. Though I am not sure if I will be baking with any of the produce. So we will see what tomorrow brings.


Jon and I were lucky and had a child free morning. Jon’s Mother saw we were very grouchy yesterday morning, and pretty much talked about how Wolfie has been waking up at least once every night since May. It isn’t a big deal, usually he comes in our room, I then follow him back to his room, and he lays down. Sometimes they are bad dreams, and one night recently he slept in our bed because he was so scared. But it was mostly nice to wake up and not scramble to get food in a cranky toddler. 

Because of this I made myself an acai bowl without the fear of having to share. I topped it was peanut butter protein granola from Trader Joe’s, blackberries, and some ground cherries. It was yummy and very rewarding.

Then Jon wanted to eat some waffles, so I figured why not. Sadly, they were not vegan. Wegman’s was having a sale on waffle mixes and I picked them up, not even thinking they wouldn’t be vegan. Sure enough- buttermilk powder, in both. I noticed after buying and opening, and honestly they were on sale so I am not crying a river. So I might be offering them to my in-laws to use. But I did make a special waffle for myself, using Fit Quick Waffle mix. The mix is REALLY old, so I don’t know if it just getting old or if I needed to cook it in the waffle maker for another minute or two but it was okay. But I topped it with more blackberries, some chocolate peanut butter sauce, and some blueberry syrup.

For lunch both Wolfie and Jon had wraps using old stew. The stew was a moroccan white bean, zucchini, and carrot stew from Appetite for Reduction that used old produce from our CSA. There isn’t much of it left, but I am thinking probably a “burrito” wrap again.

Well, one pro-tip to plan your produce is to use the vegetables that will go bad first. Usually things like fruits are the first to go, so I always try to use ripest tomatoes first. But I find that okra doesn’t always last after a week. So I wanted to use it up since I already have leftover from last week. I made the recipe from Tahini and Turmeric, caramelized okra in a pomegranate molasses sauce. It was awesome, Jon took a bite and said “This is actually good.” A first for okra lol

Sadly it didn’t really photograph well. I don’t think I used enough okra, as the stems probably made it weight more than what I was actually using. It was pretty simple to make, it just took a REALLY long time, like an hour. I will totally be making it again.

We served it with white rice from the rice cooker, and my in-laws gifted us some corn, so that is added thing to use up XD But a quick trick to making perfect corn really quickly is microwaving it! Just toss the corn with husks and all and cook for 3-5 minutes. It depends on how many ears are in, and how good your microwave is. I am sold on the process.

Looks like tomorrow we will have to go grocery shopping. Not looking forward to that, but we already made a pretty big dent in the produce.

How do you like to make okra?


Things at the farm has been a little disappointing. In June there was some heavy flooding, about a years worth of rain in a span of a few weeks. Many crops suffered and it now finally showing. A bit of a bummer, but it is probably a little good. Our power went out for two days, so we ate at my in-laws for those two nights. Before that we cooked for them the previous two nights, using their produce. So we went almost the whole week without cooking with any of the produce. Yikes!

I got used a good bit, but I ended up with much more than I would of hoped for. That’s okay since i got less than what I was expecting from the farm! lol I had a hard time “filling a bag” from the mix and match table that I ended up grabbing some more okra, something I am not super fond of. I will say I am excited about the ground cherries, I already ate some in an acai bowl with some blackberries. I also cheated a little with my share and took my in-law’s share of tomatillos. Not 100% sure what I am going to use them for though.

What’s Leftover

  • 2 garlic scapes
  • 1/2 cucumber
  • 2 green bell peppers
  • 1 kohlrabi
  • 1 small head of cabbage
  • 10 oz okra
  • 2 1/2 lb beets (half golden, half red)
  • 6 1/2 oz carrots
  • 1 bunch of scallions

New Produce

So what am I cooking today? Not much. I had a smoothie and a bagel, which both did not use any vegetables from our farm. The closest I got was making an acai bowl topped with ground cherries and blackberries. Jon and Gavin ate a few blackberries as well. We will be eating at my in-laws tonight, who are making eggplant “meatballs” and some pasta so that sounds pretty good. I also have some chocolate cherry sorbet in the ice cream maker for dessert.

What would you make with my haul?


You might of seen my original post introducing the theme of my Vegan MOFO posts, but you might have tons of questions. So I am making a quick little FAQ page while I wait to pick up my CSA share tomorrow morning.

What is a CSA?

I wrote a lot about CSAs on my CSA Beginners Guide, which I would recommend checking out. But a quick answer is that you pay a lump sum of money, and each week for a set amount of time you get a box of the produce. I break down different ways farms do this on the page if you are curious.

So what does your CSA look like?

My CSA is one farm. They do boxed shares for pick up in Toms River and Holmdel, but I pick up their summer share at their farm in Chesterfield. It starts after Memorial Day, and then runs for 26 weeks. I pay $660, which averages out to $25.50 each week. Sometimes the farm offers an option to buy more produce, and has products from other farms to buy. They also offer a winter share, that we never participated in.

When we pick up the share there is a board that lists all the food we can take that is already picked. Usually

I want to join a CSA, where should I look?

You’ll probably have to do some digging, but the best place to start is asking friends if they are part of a CSA and if they are happy with it. But googling “CSAs near me” might not get much. But there are two helpful directories that I’ve found. Bounty from the Box has lots of information about each farm listed, though they have limited listings. Local Harvest has a more extensive database with Events, Farmer Markets, and CSAs. Even better is that they list what type of CSA it is, if they have pick up locations, etc.

How do you find recipes for your produce?

Pinterest and Google do a lot of heavy lifting. Sometimes the best thing to do is simply type in some of the ingredients you are trying to use and see what comes up. It also helps to have a large collection of cookbooks, but sometimes simple vegetable “bible” books help you get comfortable with the produce. I really like Vegetable Love as it breaks down chapter vegetable by vegetable. Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone has instructions for cooking lots of vegetable as well. Neither are 100% vegan though.

What do you do with vegetables you don’t like?

Think about what type of dishes you’ve tried with said vegetable. For example I am not a huge eggplant fan, so I sat and thought about what I’ve eaten with it, breaded and fried, lots of tomato based dishes, very Italian stuff. So I might search for Asian inspired dishes. If it is a texture you don’t like, look for dishes where you puree the stuff, like soups or sauces.

Any other recipe tips?

Pin any recipes you think are interesting, even if you can’t make it this year. Maybe you don’t have enough of that vegetable, or maybe you don’t have all the vegetables that week. It’s all good. Save it because then you can revisit it next week, or next year.

Also don’t knock non-vegan recipes. You can easily modify the recipe by using vegan alternatives. Use vegan yogurt, use a cashew cream, or tofu instead of meat. You get it.

Any other questions about owning a CSA?

For now, I’ll see you tomorrow with a list of the produce for the week.


It’s that time of the year! VEGAN MOFO! I have been participating for the past 4 years, and been doing a lot of themes revolving around American Cakes and Sweets. I kind-of wanted to stick to that theme but it is hot, and our central air is still broken. I do not want to be doing any baking. So I thought I would do something that is kind-of hard to capture in one post, but is often asked- What the heck do you do with all that produce?!

My husband and I have been part of a CSA since we got married (and we got married there.) We pay Fernbrook Farms a set amount of money for a year worth of produce (or rather 26 weeks.) We pick up food each week, mixed between things we choose, things we pick in the fields, and additional foods we can pay for. When I explain our situation to friends and family I often hear similar comments, what do you do with all that food? Lots of people have tried doing a CSA and couldn’t keep up with the produce, or have taken a share once for someone and felt overwhelmed by the amount of food.

So each Saturday I will share what I got that week from my CSA and what I still had leftover from previous weeks. Then each day I will blog what I ate with the produce from the CSA. Maybe it is leftovers, maybe it something I feed my son, or give my husband. I will try and show the many ways we eat it up to give an accurate view of what being part of CSA would mean.

Hopefully I will be able to keep up, and I am excited to check out all the Vegan MOFO posts this year!


My goodness. I think this is the most popular cake I’ve made in a very long time. I’ve been asked three different times for the recipe, and I even debated posting this recipe BEFORE vegan mofo. Clearly I didn’t. Mostly because I never got my act together getting photos. I’ve made it for three different birthdays, making it perfect todays prompt- Birthday Bash. So what flavors should you expect with a Hummingbird Cake? Some floral notes? A super sweet syrup? What makes it “humming bird”? Well, it is actually pineapple and banana flavored cake with a cream cheese frosting.

As for the history of the cake- well that’s where things get messy. There are LOTS of theories, which is pretty common with any type of recipe. The most popular answer is that the cake originated in Jamaica. It is named a “doctor bird cake” because it is a common name for a Jamaican hummingbird.

Then there is the idea that this cake is naturally Southern in origin (er… Southern USA that is.) Any cake historian (is that a real job?) will agree that this cake was widely popularized by Southern Living in 1978. The recipe was submitted by Mrs. L.H. Wiggins of Greensboro, North Carolina. But here’s the thing- there might not be a L.H. Wiggins of Greensboro. Heck, even Southern Living is admitting this. It seems that there are many variations of this cake before 1978 where tropical fruit appear in a spiced cake in a tube pan. The idea of serving this styled cake in three layers with cream cheese frosting might of been a first.

American Cakes subscribes to the theory that Jamaican Airlines came up with the cake. Supposedly the airlines came up with a press packet that included a recipe for this cake. Why hummingbird? Well, their logo is of a hummingbird! Duh!

Whatever the history is, this cake is a classic in the South. It is Southern Living’s most requested recipe, and man is it delicious. This was a pretty easy cake to veganize, just sub the eggs for some aquafaba and that’s it. It took a little time to figure out the portions of the cream cheese frosting. The recipe below is JUST enough for 3 layers. If you want to make more, that’s fine. It is also worth noting that if you are making this vegan cake and aren’t vegan yourself, you can avoid by “fake” vegan food by buying mainstream accidentally vegan cream cheese frosting in a can.

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When I first tackled on my American Cakes challenge last year, I was overwhelmed with excitement. Ideas where flying through my head on what to try, and I was excited to learn more about American classics. I quickly started to learn more about our history than just cakes. Sure there were a few pies in the book, including a shoo fly pie, but I was learning about green tomato pies and vinegar pies. I am hoping to make these this year, but it got me thinking, what other desserts are very American? And that’s when I swallowed my fears and looked up a recipe for Ambrosia Salad.

Let’s be clear- this is hardly a salad. At the very least, not a salad by any modern sense. The word salad was used more loosely in the past than it is today. So loose that it was often used for various aspics using vegetables. Heck, even the term Jello Salad comes up as type of dessert on Wikipedia. So I will swallow my pride, and delve into this piece of American cuisine, and besides, I remember these desserts always tasting better than it looked.

Unlike a Jello Salad, Ambrosia has no gelatin, but it kind-of gets clumped together. The origins of this dessert seems much more classy. The original recipe from 1867 was pretty simple- grate fresh coconut and toss with some sugar. Layer the coconut with orange segments and serve in dessert dishes. The name came from Greek mythology, as ambrosia was food for the gods, and they would grow weak without it. The dish would most likely be served during the winter, and I could see this simple dish tasting refreshing and sweet after having no fresh fruit for so long.

But times change, and so did fruit production. The United States started to increase it’s production of citruses, making them cheaper. Canned fruit became much more common and cheaper for people, so using canned fruit became more common place, and naturally, pineapple started to make an appearance. Some recipes asked for whipped cream, booze, or just tossed with heavy cream. And by the 1900s, various different fruit started to get mixed it, ranging from strawberries to bananas to cherries.

This was around the time when ambrosia started to become a Christmas thing. Let it be known, not all American make ambrosia for the holiday season. I never even heard of this until now, so don’t ask your American friend if they got their marshmallows for their yule tide salad. This is mostly a tradition in the South, and by 1930s, it became common knowledge that this is a Southern tradition.

As time went by tropical fruit became less special. As mentioned earlier, canned fruit became more common place and cheaper. So it didn’t take long before we added more sweets to the dish- marshmallows. The earliest recipes called for marshmallow fluff to be added, before marshmallows became commercially available. But once machines were invented to mass produce marshmallows, it didn’t take long to add them to recipe in late 20s to 30s.

Today, the dish has a million variations. Heck there is a recipe in How It All Vegan that uses tofu, orange juice, and a whole basket full of fruit. Some people stick to it’s very traditional fruit salad roots, and some people make a molded dish with it. There are recipes for a baked salad, and some recipes use mayo. The dish has gotten quite a bad rep, coming up in the ranks with fruitcake. So many chefs are trying to reinvent ambrosia. Some are simple enough, using fresh fruit again, some involve a very loose interpretation of soup, and one person it means “fresh grapefruit and navel oranges, chopped celery, avocado, and cucumber flavored with fresh basil and jalapeno and tossed in a buttermilk-lime dressing with two tablespoons of shredded coconut.” Too much of a stretch to me.

So what the heck am I making? It seems the common thread with this dish are usually tied to these ingredients- whipped cream, marshmallows, pineapple, coconut, and oranges. So that’s what I did. I ditched the shredded coconut and used coconut milk as the whipped cream. Sadly, I can figure out HOW to get coconut creme to whip up. No clue what I am doing wrong. BUT that is okay, having a sweetened coconut coating is still yummy. I also ditched the canned fruit and used fresh. It’ll cost you more, but totally worth it.

Now, if you can’t find mini marshmallows, leave them out. But I figured if Alton Brown includes marshmallows, then dang it, they stay in. Luckily I only us HALF a bag of marshmallows, so that won’t be TOO expensive. The downfall is that this salad doesn’t last too long. The coconut milk will slowly soften the marshmallows, making it yummy, but wait too long, it’ll make it mushy. So I suggest making this the morning of, perhaps for a potluck or family get together. I honestly think it won’t last long, but if you have leftover, gobble it all up the next day.

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This week is budget week, and this is indeed a budget cake. Most of the ingredients are cheap ingredients that most people have in their pantry. The only “expensive” ingredient is the vegan butter that you put on the top, and the vegan milk of choice. But I used some homemade oatmilk, making it only cost pennies.

What I find really interesting about this recipe is how information changes from the American Cakes book when I start googling things. The book described this as a coffee cake, to much confusion to the international audience. No- there is no coffee flavor to this cake. Rather this is a cake you would have with your afternoon coffee, much like a teacake is for when you have tea. Most American coffee cakes are usually unfrosted, and have crumb topping. This cake has a crisp sugar topping instead of the crumb, which I haven’t really seen before. But some quick googling shows that most people describe this as a breakfast food. It might seem far fetched but makes sense, it is quick to make and by today’s standard of donuts and danishes, it isn’t so bad.

All the recipes that came up have an interesting marbling effect. Well, this is because the photos in the book doesn’t quite portray this, so I didn’t understand the recipe. I kept the slices of butter near the top and very thin. Most people I think put bigger chunks and dunk them deep into the batter. So I will give directions for my way of making this cake, but you can easily dip the butter further down the batter.

Many people say it is a variation of a Swedish Flop Cake, which seems like a stretch. There are many people describing the cake as having an Amish background. This seems really plausible. A recipe from American Cakes that I’ve been dying to try is the Moravian Sugar Cake, which seems to have similar buttery dimples in it.

So why is it a Cinnamon Flop? As Anne Byrn puts it

Could this coffee cake be named because the cook forgot the eggs and thought it would be a flop? Or was “flop” a corruption of the word “flap”, and could this have been an early breakfast recipe like flapjacks (pancakes) except without eggs? Webster’s dictionary says the first use of the word “flop” in America was 1728, a year after the Amish arrived.

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It’s November 25, 1783, and the last of the British troops leave New York City. Washing crosses the Harlem River and settles in Manhattan. This the Evacuation Day, the bookend to the Revolutionary War. I could describe it, but I swear my brain can’t process information regarding wars. Washington strutted his horse down Broadway and ate at Fraunces Tavern, supposedly eating this cake. Today the Tavern still stands, and is a historical landmark. If you ever visit New York City, it would be a interesting visit as it looks like the place is steeped in history and isn’t your normal tourist place (at least in NYC.) It even has a restaurant still open, but it is very much NOT vegan.

This cake is the first one for me to hit some roadblocks. Mostly because I wasn’t really thinking. I thought okay, replace the eggs, sub the butter, BAM DONE! I didn’t notice that there wasn’t any baking soda or powder. The cake would normally rise because it uses a creaming method that we see in pound cake- using sugar, butter, and eggs. Every vegan pound cake I’ve found uses baking soda or powder. I ended up with a cake that’s texture felt under baked.

So it was back to the drawing board. I tweaked the recipe, added baking powder or soda (I can’t remember now) and it still didn’t work. Yikes. I was getting really discouraged, although the flavor was really good. I was just trying to figure out how to balance the baking soda and oil with the existing recipe.

But then I made my Martha Washington Great Cake. The creaming method works with aquafaba! Amazing! I was over the moon from the news. I went back into the kitchen and pretty much just copied the cake from the book using the aquafaba, and wham bam! Done! No sweat what-so-ever! Crazy. But to add insult to injury, I re-read the description of the recipe, apparently an oil based recipe using baking soda has been floating around for years. In fact, you can try it right here, just sub the eggs.

So what makes this carrot cake (MY carrot cake) worth your time? Well, it is VERY different from most carrots cakes we eat today. Most modern carrot have a grated carrot in the mix, and almost always has cream cheese frosting. A style that is very American in it’s own right, and a recipe like this appears later in the book. But this cake uses boiled carrots that pureed, and folded into the batter. This gives the cake a beautiful color and flavor. Plus, Natalie Brown from Buzzfeed apparently fucking loves this cake.

I hope you take a chance on this cake as it is really yummy. Boiling and mashing 4 carrots take very little time, and it doesn’t need to be a perfect puree. And I specify Earth Balance butter since I am unsure how well this creaming method stands up to different styles.

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Soda and cake is a match made in heaven. Perhaps you were on a diet, and used it in a recipe with diet soda to cut down on calories from sugar? Maybe you were in college and only had soda instead of eggs on hand? Or we vegans know from PETA– you can use a can of soda in your cake instead of eggs. Now, YouTube is filled with “vegan cake mix hacks” videos but this drink is fairly old.

Nope- before cola and cake meant a drunk college girl is trying to make a cake with her new vegan phase it was known for two words. Church and the South. Yes, any respectable Southern woman would make a coke cake for their cake walks and Sunday socials (or whatever people make cakes for church functions.) Perhaps it is because Coca Cola is called Southern Champagne, or that the company is a heavy part of Atlanta’s identity.

Now you don’t have to use Coca Cola. You can use Pepsi, or perhaps any other cola out there. There are many “boutique” brands that make colas, at least in the United States. I strong recommend two things before buying. 1) Buy what you know you will drink. If you aren’t much of a soda fan, look around for a place you can buy one bottle. Doesn’t do you any good if you don’t want to drink the remaining 5 bottles that come in a six pack. 2) Avoid sugar-free versions. I made mine with diet store brand cola, and you could taste a hint of aspertaine in the cake. I am sure you would be able to taste the stevia in Zevia brand cola. But hey, go ahead and try it out. Why not?!

What are some fancy pants brands out there? Well, I always find that store-brands work just fine. But some organic and vegan options are Blue Sky, Jones, Maine Root, Boylan and Fentimens. And remember go nuts! Play around with sodas you find. Wanna try it with Birch Beer? Sounds good to me. Maybe Spruce? Or Sarsaparilla?! Maybe with that Chai Cola!? I don’t know, I don’t have time to make and EAT all this cake. But they all sound yummy to me.

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