Teese Mozzarella Sticks

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Chicago Soy Dairy came out with vegan breaded mozzarella sticks using their vegan cheese called Teese. Teese is probably my favorite vegan cheese, so I was psyched to try these out. I work at a mostly vegan restaurant and my boss was able to get samples of the cheese sticks from a distributor for me to try.

I tried one of them by themselves and the rest I dipped into our homemade marinara sauce with a bit of Sriracha in it as well. My general consensus on them was: meh. They're not bad, but they're not something I imagine myself craving. The most disappointing part of them was the "cheese." It tasted like nothing. The breading on them was really good, but it didn't make up for the blah middle.

It's fried, so, yeah, if a plate of these were put in front of me, I'll eat them with gusto. I just wouldn't go out of my way for them.

Nature's Path Ancient Grains Granola with Almonds

Nature's Path sent me their new Ancient Grains Granola, which was a collaboration with Kirkland Signature. I was confused about this, but what I've read around the Internets is that this was done so that the product would be more widely available and that Nature's Path was still independently owned, so whatever, good for them.

They sent me the Costco-sized box of the cereal (it was 2 separate bags in one large box) in the mail in a huge box that was supposed to look like an old suitcase/wooden box. I thought maybe there was a good reason for the huge size

My cute niecepup Tilda to show size comparison.

but no...

There were some papers on top of that blank space (recipes and info on the cereal), but really it was just a bunch of hay-type filler. I just thought it was a ginormous waste, it seemed like something that would've been the idea of a Kirkland rep. But it's their money, I suppose?

Anyways, on to the cereal...

The grains involved are spelt, kamut, quinoa, amaranth and oats. The almonds are a tasty inclusion for those of without an allergy to them (like my poor sister). The flavor is good and I enjoyed it with soymilk or my yogurt. It was also nice not to have to deal with an annoying vanilla flavor. With 5 grams of protein and 9 grams of sugar per serving, it's a pretty healthy choice as far as granolas go and I would definitely eat it again.

Have y'all had it?

GoodBelly (Plus!)

I've been finding myself in poor health this last month or so, with various ailments coming and going. I've always considered myself to be "healthy as a horse" (wtf kind of phrase is that??) and have never been to the hospital, just urgent care for a 4 wheeler accident and the normal chicken pox crap. Oh, and I have back problems, but, really, I rarely get sick.

So for one ailment or another, I decided I wanted to take some probiotics. I haven't been eating a lot of (vegan) yogurt, so a supplement seemed necessary. I got some vegetarian cap Acidophilus, but decided to also buy some GoodBelly Plus, which is found with yogurts and the like in the fridge at your local grocer (though if they don't even carry soy yogurt at your local grocer, you're probably shit outta luck). I've tried GoodBelly before and I really enjoy their packaging and interesting flavors. This time I picked the Pomegranate Blackberry (looking online I realize I now have tried them all but the Strawberry). The "Plus" is the added vitamins and minerals, which includes 100% of both your B12 and Vit C. Flavorwise, I don't think this one was my favorite. The two flavors with berries kinda taste the same to me. I think the Mango may be my favorite. I wish they were less sweet, but you can't complain they taste gross. They're fruity and drinkable.

My favorite part about this product is the container. I think it's very Europeanesque. And, really, how can you resist a container that is smiling at you???

These little guys are about $1 a piece, so as a multi-vitamin with probiotics (20 billion "at time of manufacture"...so perhaps some are dead by consumption?), it's not that pricey, but I think I would prefer a pill for everyday.

I would like to try some of their other products, such as GoodBelly Splash and their family sized quarts. The quart sized have about 21 grms of sugar per serving, so a little more than I'd like in my juice, but not as much as I get when I'm guzzling the sweet nectar of the gods.

Just an FYI, this wasn't free. I did this product review of my own volition and money.

Nature's Path Gluten Free Cereals

Vanilla to the max!

I was given two samples of Nature's Path's new gluten free cereals. I have an on and off love affair with breakfast cereals. I'll eat it everyday for weeks and then I'll get sick of it and not eat it for at least a few weeks, if not months. I have been dabbling with eating less gluten and so this offer of free gluten free cereal excited me.

My first taste of both was a dry run, if you will. It was in my car when I picked up my salmonella-poisoned sister from Urgent Care and she thought she should eat something, so we opened them both up. Kim's opinion: Gross. My first, initial, opinion: Meh. But they grew on me! The Whole O's practically have no sweetness to them (actual nutrition facts: 4gm sugar per 2/3 cup...is that much?) and the taste is...off. But the more I ate them, the more I wanted to pop the little spheres in my piehole.

The Crunchy Vanilla Sunrise was a bit better initially. Again, it grew on me. I think I've mentioned before that I am suspicious of vanilla flavor in cereals. It usually comes off as too vanilla-y to me. I ate some of this with plain soymilk and thought it was good but that the vanilla flavor could be kicked down a notch...so I took the flavorless Whole O's and added them to the mix and it was good! It just evened out the vanillaness a bit. I've enjoyed bowls of the merry mix now, it makes a lovely snack or breakfast!

Thank you to Nature's Path for the free boxes of cereal! Thank you for making gluten free products for my celiac friends and for those trying to eat less of gluten!

Pizza Time!

Pizza!

Hey, y'all! I'm back with a review of Tofurkey's new pizzas. I got a coupon for a free one and so I picked up the Italian Sausage & Fire Roasted Veggie. People rave about Daiya cheese, but I'm one of those nonravers. I don't hate it, but I don't see how it's better than Teese or Follow Your Heart. I also think they should do thicker shreds because, normally, it has such a weird thin look when I see it on pizzas. I'm not sure if that makes sense, but perhaps you've seen what I'm talking about...

Anyways, the pizza was good. Not great. Not something I would spend $9, usually. I can see myself splurging on this in certain situations. It does have a lot of toppings and I think it's a bit bigger than your average small frozen pizza (But my memory could be wrong).

I dislike pizzas where the toppings and sauce go to the edge of the pie, which Tofurkey has done. It's a bit of a pet peeve of mine. I used to work at Hot Lips Pizza and the owner insisted on doing that. Personally, I like having a place to grip where my hands won't get messy. I also like pizza bones, you know, the crust, nice and plain. If I didn't want pizza bones I would order it Sicilian style or something!

Final Thoughts: Good in a pinch, but my homemade pizzas (made with the fantastic dough from Hot Lips here in Portland) kinda kick their ass...But when have you thought otherwise about a frozen pizza? I do love using Tofurkey's sausages on my pie, so they're still getting my money! :o)

Vega Shake & Go Smoothie

I was given a free sample of Vega's new line of Shake & Go Smoothie. Or should I say, "smoothie"? I'm just not able to call something a smoothie if it's not a frozen treat where ice or frozen fruit is involved. Shake, yes, smoothie, nah. Out of the 4 flavors (Bodacious Berry, Tropical Tango, Choc-o-lot, Vanilla Almondilla), I chose Tropical Tango. The 300gr pouches of the product retails at $23.95 and are available online.

Forewarning: I have never had a protein/supplement powder that I have actually liked and used continually.

It took me awhile to finally try the product. I love the idea that I can just shake it up with some water and go, especially when I haven't felt like cooking in the a.m. as of late, but these types of products don't get me excited. I don't have a lot of luck with them tasting great and something needs to taste great (or my life has to depend on it) for me to continue using something. I tried this product twice and I couldn't get over the texture. The flavor wasn't bad, it was totally doable, but there was a bit of grittiness to the smoothie. Perhaps I didn't shake it enough? What I did learn was that it gets really gross looking if you let it sit around for awhile, this is because it consists of xanthan gum.

I did give the Tropical Tango to a friend who was really interested in trying it. She had this to say:

It is great in yogurt with a banana, but it is not great w/ soy/rice/almond milk b/c it is too sweet. I haven't tried it w/ water but the sour quality of plain yogurt seems to cut down on some of the 'starburst-sweet' quality. I like it, the bag style is convenient, and I keep it in my lunch sack and when my blood sugar starts to drop at work I mix a little into a container of yogurt and it stabilizes the blood sugar much better than using just yogurt alone, actually almost as well as a high protein animal source like cheese. I would recommend it for anyone with blood sugar issues who needs pick me ups through out the day and doesn't want to use protein bars (I think this would be healthier and cheaper). anyway, thanks for the sample, it is great to have at work!

I think it's a great idea to put it in some yogurt, much better than plain water. Have you tried it? What do you think?

Thanks to the Vega people for the sample! I appreciate you guys making healthy vegan products!

French Meadow Woman's Bread Review

I was given a coupon for one free French Meadow product. I have had a couple of their products in the past. If you're looking for good soft, fluffy bread for sandwiches, such as your childhood favorite, the peanut butter and jelly, you will want to look elsewhere. For dense, healthy-tasting bread, French Meadow's your best friend. Previously, i had tried their Hemp Bread and their Hemp Bagels. Neither was horrible tasting, but they're definitely not for the faint of heart. Dense, y'all!

I was at Whole Foods when I remembered I had their coupon. The selection at this Whole Foods was actually not that great. I looked in both the fridge and the freezer and they seemed to only have 4 varieties, 2 of which had just come in that day. I guess 4 isn't a bad number, I was just hoping to have a pick of pretty much everything French Meadow sells. Anyways, I chose the Woman's Bread, since Men's Bread seemed silly to get (since I'm a woman and all) and the other options were of the hemp variety.

So, the Woman's Bread...I toasted slices for breakfast and snack times and smeared with jam or Earth Balance. This bread isn't very sweet, even with it's inclusion of cranberries (actually, now that I think about it, cranberries are only sweet once you add sugar to them and I'm pretty sure these were straight up cranberries, with no sugar added.) and then it's also not savory enough for me to want to put veggies on it, like cucumber or tomato slices on it. This bread was formulated when the owner of the bakery didn't want to take hormone replacement therapy after a hysterectomy and decided to get phytoestrogen from soy isoflavones. This is what I don't like about the bread: soy that I don't want. I already think I eat plenty of soy as it is. I've actually been trying to eat less of it by switching to a different kind of nondairy milk. I feel like this bread is for nonvegetarian women whose diets don't tend to include much tofu and tempeh.

As I've said previously, this isn't sandwich bread. I think it's an all right bread, but I doubt I'll ever buy it. I'm still going to stick with Dave's Killer Bread, which is made locally and is perfect for sandwiches and toast alike. Oh, and cheaper.

Helen's Kitchen, Part One

A few months back I noticed Helen's Kitchen products in the freezer of a grocery store I was at and I was intrigued. So I was happy when I heard that they (or a PR person) wanted to send me coupons to try out a couple products. I picked up GardenSteak TofuSteaks and the entree Thai Red Curry. Not all of their products are vegan, so keep that in my mind when purchasing.

The first item I tried was the Thai Red Curry. It's a small entree so, thankfully, I was not completely famished and this filled me up just right. It's all organic, gluten free, gmo free and has 13 grams of protein in it. The red curry sauce was the perfect amount of spice for me (I'm just a bit on the wussy side of spicy). The TofuSteak chunks are extra extra firm and have a nice slight chicken-y flavor (the TofuSteaks come in both regular and "chicken"). The peas and butternut squash in this are tasty as well. I actually really enjoyed this meal, but, honestly, I'm unsure if I'd buy this if choosing a frozen meal. It's mainly because if I'm going to get Thai food, I'm going to head over and pick some awesome to-go at Pad Thai Kitchen. When eating frozen, I tend to go for nonAsian dishes. Just my preference, I guess.

Have any of you tried their stuff? I look forward to trying the TofuSteaks! I love love love firm tofu!

More Teese, please!

This weekend I had a great birthday celebration vacation with some friends in preparation of my big 30th birthday on Wednesday. It's nuts that I've lived in Portland for over 5 years now, but what it's even more nuts is that I no longer will be in my 20s!! It's not that I don't like getting older, I'm totally fine with it. It's that I don't feel like I thought I would at this age. I still haven't had, what I would consider, a real adult relationship. I haven't had someone I called my "boyfriend" since I was 18. I have definitely matured a bit, but I would say I feel more like I'm 25. And I definitely look less than 25. Well, at least when you don't see the darkish circles under my eyes... :o)

But you're not here to read about my circles, or my feelings, right? Right! So back to food. After I received the 2 small (but still a lot) tubes of Teese a couple months ago, I received an email saying they (Chicago Soy Dairy) were sending me a tube of their new formulated Mozzarella style Teese. It's supposed to be less liquidy after it melts and to be more stretchy. I did notice my first tube of Mozzarella had been a bit liquidy after it was melted, so I looked forward to testing this new one out.

The time to test came when we decided on making pizzas for Saturday dinner. None of my friends that came to the weekend are vegan and I had deemed this an all vegan weekend because there's nothing better than being able to eat *anything* (which is why I love vegan potlucks so much!) and not have to ask if something's vegan, etc. Some friends made the pizza dough and pizza sauce and for toppings we had: fresh asparagus, sauteed onions, mushrooms, zucchini, Tofurkey Italian Sausages, shredded Mozza Teese, fresh tomatoes, kalamata olives (I didn't partake of the pizza with those awful things on it). Of course, there was optional hot sauces and nooch. Johnny made 5 pies total and did an assortment of pies. My favorite was asparagus, sausage, zucchini, onions and Teese. It was so good!!! I wouldn't consider the Teese stretchy exactly, but I enjoyed it on my pie, it held the ingredients on to the crust. One friend didn't even think about it til afterwards that the cheese wasn't the real stuff. Two of my friends thought it tasted good uncooked, though I disagree. I wouldn't waste eating it raw when I could eat on a pizza!

Unfortunately, I forgot to take close up shots of the pizza, but shoot on over to Jess Sconed and check hers out!

Johnny & Amanda- makers of pizza pie!

Thanks to Chicago Soy Dairy for the awesome samples!!!

New Blog & A Review

I've been ignoring this blog a bit, somewhat due to that I now have another blog. I had been discussing with a friend that I frequent coffee shops with about how I was thinking of starting a fashion blog. So many times I'm looking online at online shopping, fashion blogs, etc and I think "what the eff??" and I feel the need to show someone else what crazy thing I have seen. So I've been posting links on my Twitter, but I don't get much feedback from that and you can only fit so much in 140 characters and I feel annoying if I post several posts in a row. While I was discussing this with my friend I got the fun idea that we could co-host a blog together. I have a friend that does a blog with a penpal of his. It's like they're talking back and forth to each other, a conversation in photographs and art that they've done. But this way I could also interact with whoever else was interested. So 'anchor and crow' was born...So far I'm the only that has posted, but I hope soon (nudge, nudge) Miss Crow will post something.

This, my dear readers, is a delicious vegan frozen dinner. I've been really diggin' fried plantains as of late (Mostly from a great dining experience at the food cart Fuego de Lotus). Description of product:

Plantains with roasted sweet potato, black beans and kale. Spicy ancho sauce with pumpkin seed garnish over Kashi seven whole grain polenta, plus amaranth.

I tried amaranth for the first time a few months ago. It kinda looks like a smaller version of quinoa. Mine ended up pretty gloppy, but I think it's supposed to actually stay separate. I don't love love love it, but it's not gross. It's eatable and knowing that it's very good for me persuades me to continue eating it.

I was surprised by how much I liked this. If stars were given, I would probably give 4 out of 5.

If it's on sale, I'll definitely buy it again for those desperate times when I don't have any food prepared and don't feel like making any.

Teese Experiment #2

As I mentioned a week or two ago, I received 2 types of Chicago Soy Dairy's Teese to play around with. This past week I did something with my Mozzarella style. I had some cremini mushrooms to use up and also had some Gimme Lean sausage on hand, so I decided upon Baked Stuffed Mushrooms with Sausage & Mozzarella. I didn't follow it exactly. I didn't have green onions and I didn't use any faux Parmesan (even though I had some...I think I just forgot to put it in). I didn't have Italian Seasoning, but had the separate ingredients and I may have added thyme. What I love about this recipe is that it allows you to input how many servings (which for this recipe equates to how many mushrooms you have) and then it changes the recipe for you so there's no thinking "hmm, what is 2/3 of 1.5 teaspoons?" They do all the work for you!) Also, I added some s & p.

I didn't love this recipe, but I did like the mozzarella Teese! I noticed that the more I used, the better it tasted! If I used this recipe again next time I would use less sausage and add some bread crumbs. Oh, and more mozza Teese!

Yesterday, I made another dish with the mozzarella Teese. I had no recipe this time and just used up the veggies that were going bad in my fridge with some marinating tofu also needed usin' up. The tofu had been marinating in tamari, water, sage, rosemary and nooch. I sauteed some leek, garlic, red bell pepper and the tofu in olive oil and after it was done cooking I grated some of the mozza into it and stirred it up. I put a piece of Good Seed bread in the toaster oven with a couple slices of the mozza, then plated it up, piling the tofu/veggie mix on top. I enjoyed this quite a bit! Next time I would add more mozza and perhaps some kind of gravy. Yum!

I definitely think this is the best mozzarella vegan cheese I've had so far! I look forward to making a panini sandwich with it with some pesto and summer-fresh tomato!

Eggplant Burger

Eggplant Burger with a side of my mom's favorite, lima beans!

So I finally got to the other eggplant product by the folks at Dominex! Woot! Finally!

Well, so there's the Eggplant Burger. I put it on a slightly toasted whole wheat bun with some vegenaise, ketchup, yellow mustard, lettuce and a piece of Tofutti "American" cheese. I didn't realize that this was going to be a like a Boca patty, as in, meaty soy product. For some reason I didn't get that idea from reading the box, but I didn't read it very carefully and I just glanced at the ingredients and didn't really think of it. I thought it was going to be, like, 98% eggplant....which I thought sounded kinda weird. So when I was cooking it on the skillet in a little oil, I was, like, oh, it's just a fake meat patty with some eggplant thrown into the mix.

Flavorwise, not impressed. It tastes a bit off and it's definitely not as good as Boca, which is one of my favorites. The texture is fine and since my nose has been stuffy and my memory is bad, I don't have anything to say about the smell.

Yeah, this burger did nothing for me except give me some nutrition.

The lima beans are frozen from Grocery Outlet, I think they were Green Giant but I can't find any proof online about that. I believe they were 99 cents. You take them out of the box and put them in the microwave for 5-6 minutes and walah! Ready to eat limas! Semi-dry tasting, just as I remember from my youth!

Green Chili Cheese Grits

*Cilantro for looks only

I am one of the many bloggers that are participating in the Teese vegan cheese challenge. I was able to choose which of the flavors I wanted (we picked a back up flavor, they ended up giving us both, which so awesome!) and then were asked to make something that really hadn't been done before.

The flavors I got were Mozzarella and Nacho Sauce. First up: Nacho!

I thought and thought, trying to come up with something I hadn't seen yet. And based on the google search for recipes, this isn't something that's come up lot. Perhaps it's because there's only a small population of people out there who actually like grits.

I normally only see cheddar cheese in Cheese Grits, but I thought the Nacho would give a nice mexi flavor. This is the recipe I ended up with:

3 cups water

3/4 cups quick cooking grits (I used white)

2 garlic cloves, put through a garlic press (roasted garlic would probs be alot better)

salt

2 green chilies from a can, chopped small

2-3 T nooch

fresh ground pepper

1/2 t red pepper flakes

Teese nacho cheese sauce (a 1/4 of the small tube...maybe 1/4 cup?)

I boiled the water, the lower heat to simmer and put in the grits, salt and garlic. Whisk, leave uncovered and stir occasionally for about 5-7 minutes. Stir in the rest of the ingredients and top with hot sauce if desired.

Personally, this isn't my favorite. I think I would prefer it with a non-nacho cheese, but I am going to try it again tomorrow because I believe time will make the flavor better. It's not bad, but it's just not something I'm excited about. Perhaps it could also use some baking? The cheese has an odd smell to it, like an artificial smell, that I found a bit disconcerting. But it didn't taste weird. I would like to try it as a melted queso sauce and will perhaps try other things with my leftovers of it. Do you have any suggestions?? Also, suggestions for the mozzarella?? I'm thinking of stuffing mushrooms with it..

Update, next day: I just ate a delicious breakfast burrito that consisted of the chili cheese grits, avocado, sauteed Gimme Lean sausage, green pepper and onion. So yum!! Also, the grits do taste better with a little aging (doesn't that look misspelled?)!

Butter Pee-can

I came across Soy Dream's new flavor, Butter Pecan, at Fred Meyer's tonight and I was feeling old (have you ever heard a 5 year old ask for some Butter Pecan ice cream? I didn't think so...), so I bought some. My sister, our housemate Helena and I usually watch the new episode of Greek on Tuesday nights together, so I thought ice cream (I mean, non dairy frozen dessert*) would be a nice accompaniment. Helena was missing, but Kim and I dug into the pint of Butter Pecan. We thought it was good, especially when you had a lot of pecan pieces, but it wasn't great. I don't think it's something I would buy again unless it was very on sale. It's just that with the greatness of Trader Joe's/Double Rainbow Soy Very Cherry Chip, you feel ripped off when something else you bought just doesn't make you as swoony. It makes me wish they had more flavors at Trader Joe's. The problem with the Butter Pecan was the soybeany aftertaste and the ice cream didn't have the luscious creaminess that Double Rainbow's has. 

I give this 3 out of 5 stars.

* Did you know that in America, your product has to be at least 10% milk fat for it to be legally called "ice cream"? Stupid. To me, that's like saying you can't call a vegan sausage a sausage because it doesn't have real meat in it. I've encountered people who have gotten up in arms about the ice cream thing (I'm talking to you, commenter dude, on Grant Butler's vegan blog!). I sorta get it because you want ice cream to mean literally iced cream...but no. Actually, I don't get it. As long as it's labeled correctly, with either "non dairy" or "vegan" before the words "ice cream", why does it matter? Those words describe what it is, or trying to be. "Frozen dessert" could be anything; push pops, fudge pops, creamsicles....Ok, rant over...

Eggplant Product Review

So a few months ago, I received some coupons to try out Dominex products. They have several products, but don't expect something without eggplants, their logo says Dominex "The Eggplant People." I'm not a huge fan of this vegetable, to me it's like cats or celery, if they disappeared from Earth, I wouldn't be upset. Ok, actually, I know quite a few cats now that I like and would be sad if they disappeared and celery is a vegetable I actually dislike, so I wouldn't say it's in the same category as eggplant, which I neither like nor dislike...So really, ignore that whole sentence...It's all to say, that currently none of my favorite things involve eggplant. But see...now that I'm thinking about it, I do enjoy some baba ghannouj, the stuffed mini eggplants from Ya Halla's are so good, and breaded eggplant is yum. Though the last doesn't count, because have you ever had something breaded and fried that you didn't love? 

Which brings me to the first product I've tried: The Eggplant Cutlets. Aka breaded eggplant. The way I cooked them was on the stovetop and in the oven. The stovetop ended up being the preferred method. The oven ones took longer than instructed. Which is probably just the fault of the oven, but I'm not sure what the deal was and why it took so dang long. The above picture shows them (stovetop cooked) with a Cluckphrey "chicken" patty (I will blog about those soon) and whole wheat pasta with tomato sauce and nutritional yeast. They tasted good, they tasted like you think they'll taste. I added some salt on top of mine. Because I dislike making breaded eggplant myself, I would possibly buy these. If they were on sale. My friend Jess quite liked them.

I still have yet to try the Vegan Burgers that are in my freezer. I never have buns for burger-shaped foods and have this mental block where I don't like using pieces of loaf bread for burgers. Also, it doesn't seem like the type of burger that you should eat breadless. So...eventually, my dears, I will get to trying those out.

Higher Taste are makers of yum.

Last fall me and the GetSconed chick were gifted with a large amount of goods from Higher Taste, a local company that is known for it's buzzitos and hippie-healthy (for real, they put a shit-ton of shredded carrots on them and use hearty whole wheat buns) sandwiches. 

Included was the buzzitos, hummus, their deli salads, and one of their sandwiches, the Spicy TLC. The deli salads are served in various grocery store deli's and not available in the self-service area like the buzzitos and sandwiches.  

Jess took the hummus and let me have all the deli salads. Unfortunately, I got all these goodies at a time where I was unable to get to everything before their expiration date. I don't remember what was going on, but for some reason I ended up having to throw some of the stuff out. But I did try at least a bite of it when I first got it. My favorite deli salad was the Vegetarian Chicken Salad. The only thing I didn't like about the (vegan) mayo based salad was the celery. I'm a hater of celery. It has to be very finely chopped or cooked to death for me to be ok with it. They use chunks of very firm tofu as the "chicken." I enjoyed the curry goodness of the Curried Rice salad. I'm a sucker for those curry rice salads that have a nice sweet kick that comes from the addition of raisins. The Spicy Yaki Soba is just that, spicy. But as a person who's a bit of a wuss when it comes to spice, it wasn't too hot. Also, it's labeled vegan, but technically not since it's got honey in it. I'm a honey-eatin' vegan, so I didn't mind. Then there was the German Potato Salad. I thought it was...ok. Nothing to write home about. I would eat it happily if served it, but I wouldn't go out of my way for it. 

The salads are sold at the following places:

1. Both Food Front locations (NW Thurman & SW Capitol Highway)

2. Zupan's (W Burnside, SW Macadam, SE Belmont) However, at Zupans they list them as "Zupan's insert name of salad here  Salad"

3. Fred Meyer's Hawthorne 

4. Ross Island Deli

5. First Alternative Co-op in Corvallis

6. The Kiva in Eugene

I don't have anything bad to say about any of the buzzitos I had. The standout was the new Ya-hoo BBQ. The yummy BBQ sauce, the soycurls....yum! If you still haven't had soycurls, you need to get to it! Like tofu, they aren't flavored so they soak up whatever flavor you give them and they have a delightfully shredded chicken texture. (If you know me at all, you know that I love going to Taqueria Los Gorditos and order a burrito, torta, taco, whathaveyou with soycurls. They do an awesome job with the soy curls...and everything. but i digress...) The thai and teriyaki ones are sorta strange b/c it's like eating a thai or teriyaki dish wrapped in a tortilla...b/c that's what it is. Good, just weird.

My favorite sandwich is still either The Golden Slice, a fried piece of tofu with the usual shredded carrots, vegenaise, whole wheat bun, or the Bhima Power Burger, a hearty sandwich consisting of a tempeh burger with the same extras. 

You can go check out Jess's review here. Do you have a favorite Higher Taste product?

More Waffles...and some sausage

This morning I was perplexed at what I would eat for breakfast. I was out of my English muffins that I normally eat, toasted with peanut butter and jelly. Then I remembered that I had bought these new waffles, Nature's Path's Flax Plus with Figs. I think they were on sale, I definitely bought them spur of the moment style. The inclusion of figs just sounded so delicious. 

I haven't been in much of a waffle mood so I had forgotten about them. So when I remembered them this morning, I decided to give them a go. I also had Gardenburger's faux sausage patties in the freezer. I had gotten them a long time ago and hadn't been mad impressed with the two I had eaten so I hadn't finished the box. I really miss Morningstar brand sausages. Those are the best faux sausages! Unfortunately, they have egg in them so I had to stop buying them. I think I heard they are working on making more of their products vegan, so I look forward to see if that is one of things they are changing. 

Anyways, I put two of the waffles in the toaster oven and then heated two of the sausage patties on the stove top. I topped the waffles with a little bit of maple syrup and had some ketchup and Chalula mixed up to dip the sausage in. I really liked the waffles! It was a lot like the other waffles I get from them, but with the addition of tasty fig bits. Frozen waffles are one of my main convenience foods. I do have a waffle maker but I used it only once, a couple weeks ago. My sister is the one that actually used it, I watched. It's a Hello Kitty one that I got from her a couple years ago (it was a presentfor her brother-in-law and he didn't want it, "too girly"). The waffles were tough to get out and....yeah, work....frozen waffles are cheap. Granted, they don't come in cute Hello Kitty shapes....

And the sausages. Well, they came out better than I remember! Not sure if I'll buy them again, but good to know they don't suck as much as I thought.