Aldi has pre marinated tofu this week. Lemon pepper and teriyaki. I made the lemon pepper for lunch this week, but forgot to take a picture. Here’s the teriyaki I made for dinner tonight. I pan fried it as crispy as possible, and made a homemade teriyaki sauce too. Once it was finished cooking I added some of the sauce and tossed the roasted broccoli in it too for good measure. Tasted good, but next time I will dust it in cornstarch before cooking for extra crispy goodness.
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I think I’m going to try using more of the homemade teriyaki sauce in this Impossible Burger recipe this week.
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Ooooo!!
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Made a batch of Chickpea Salad for sandwiches. I read several recipes and then just used the ingredients and flavors I liked best from all of them. I had it for lunch in a whole wheat roll with micro greens. It was pretty good, though I felt like the capers were lost in it. Had a little more on crackers and liked it a lot better that way.
Ingredients:
2 cans of chickpeas (drained)
2 T vegan mayo
1 T dijon mustard
3 T tahini
3 T lemon juice
Drizzle of olive oil
Dash of garlic powder
2 T fresh chopped parsley
2 T capers
3 green onions, thinly sliced
Salt and pepper to taste
Drain and rinse the chickpeas, then place in a food processor with mayo, mustard, tahini, lemon juice, olive oil and garlic powder. Lightly pulse, but don’t purée it. Once you have a consistency you like, stir in the parsley, capers and green onions, then salt and pepper to taste.
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It looks / sounds like houmus but on steroids. I think I need to try this
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It’s supposed to be a veggie answer to chick salad, so any flavors you might have liked in that, would work well in this. But yeah, as I liked it better on crackers, it is kinda like a jacked version of hummus.
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Ooo! I’ve been meaning to try this! Do you have a vegan mayo you like? The ones I looked at weren’t much healthier in terms of cholesterol content. I found one that was low, but it wasn’t great.
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Do you think it was the extra saltiness or dryness of the crackers that helped it? I’ve made chickpea salad a few times and I remember really liking it on crackers at first but it being better on bread the next day after the flavors had a chance to meld. Your recipe looks yummy, I might have to give it a try.
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There should be 0 cholesterol in any vegan ingredient. If the number is higher than zero, it’s not vegan since cholesterol only comes from animals.
We use Veganaise from Follow Your Heart brand and Trader Joe’s also has a good vegan mayo spread.
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Hmmm. Good point lol. I was on the phone with Mr. Road while he was at the food store so my info was second hand. I’m not sure what he was looking at. But it might have been the saturated fat too. Though it does seem lower. 
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Cholesterol is a bit more nuanced than that, saturated fats & other nutrients play a big part. Our bodies create it, since we are also animal.
Here’s an article from the vegan society that offers some good info.
*except their recommendation to use rapeseed/canola. Do not agree, that seed is very inflammatory. Choose something more natural, avocado oil for cooking or olive (not for cooking). Or leave it out entirely, it’s actually very easy to cook with water instead of oil!
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Saturated fats have been more impactful than cholesterol in lowering my numbers, I think. Though it’s hard to tell because I cut down so much on both!
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Yes, absolutely. I’m very impressed with how much you shifted your numbers.
I’m due for some tests to see where I’m at. The biggest change for me was cutting out wine. We are already following a mostly Mediterranean diet so I should be very healthy but my thyroid is still off and the dr recommends terrible drugs I really would prefer to avoid.
I am 1.5 years into menopause now & hope my chronic low iron will start to creep up. When that happens I’ll be able to cut out red meat entirely. We mostly just have occasional eggs, dairy, chicken and fish now. I could honestly drop the dairy and not substitute it with any fake mylk things, I don’t care for that stuff. But with kids in the house we still buy lots of products they like & it’s just there as tempting quick-grab foods.
Did you read about the plastic of packaging leaching into foods? Even fruit & veg in celo or bags. Ugh, you can’t escape it even if you’re doing mostly whole foods. Covid changed being able to bring your own jar to bulk places too. I hope things shift back sooner than later. It shouldn’t be such a struggle to make healthy choices.
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It’s REALLY hard with kids in the house. Temptations are everywhere!!
And cutting out wine is huge! I definitely kept my occasional weekend beer (or two) in the mix.
I love using avocado and hummus to replace the creaminess of dairy. For the most part I’m ok just leaving it off/out.
Ugh. I really tried to reduce plastic packaging but it’s so hard to avoid!
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We’ve been cooking beans in a pressure cooker, fyi. Perfect texture in about half an hour for chickpeas. Removing the skins is pretty easy & it makes for the smoothest, creamiest hummus. It freezes perfectly, costs pennies, & I control the amount & type of oil as well as using fresh local garlic, herbs, & fresh citrus. It’s a bit of upfront effort but not actually that much! & I freeze it in small mason jars with the lid off until solid, so NO PLASTIC!
I just took the last 2 containers of white bean spread & roasted beet bean dip out of the freezer so there’s a healthy snack for me to grab. Sprinkle on some hemp seeds & have with chopped veg, it’s actual heart & cholesterol healthy rather than the opposite. I love that pressure cooker!
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Nice! I need to be better about using my pressure cooker.
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Ooo I never considered freezing hummus, that’s a good idea. I need to learn more about how to freeze stuff, what containers can be used, and actually do it. Currently we always have to eat everything once it’s made but making ahead of time and freezing would be a time saver and lead to eating less packaged foods. We used to eat way more healthy before vegan became more mainstream and there were prepackaged foods everywhere. Right now our freezer is filled with frozen pizzas, burgers, fried rice, tofu, brown rice, blueberries, and thin mints 
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Well, it’s mostly Rob. That thing scares me a bit. Love the results though! He can whip up a delicious curry in half an hour, it’s truly amazing!
Jenn, I freeze in straight sided mason jars with about an inch of space left for expansion, lid goes on when frozed solid. I tend to big batch cooking, feeding 5 is so much work.
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Same. I also find that when I do freeze things they just sit in the freezer forever…
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I’ve only started to like mayo, in certain things, in the last couple years. I grew up hating it. Blue Apron recipes convinced me to give it a try, mainly by making things like quick aiolis and other sauces, and I learned to like the ‘olive oil’ mayos in these kind of recipes enough to keep it in the house. So I went in search of a vegan version at Harvest Market the other day, and there were 3 versions of Follow Your Heart Vegenaise. I started with the original to just give it a try. When I run out, I’ll try the other two (grapeseed oil and avocado oil), and report back.
I think it was the crunch. And the fact that it didn’t squish out all over the place, when taking a bite of the cracker. I’ll try on a roll again today and see if it’s better now that the flavors married a bit more.
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