Vegetarian Travel: Orlando Florida day 1

In February I went on a little vacation with my dear friend to Florida and I wanted to document the eating options I had as a vegetarian while traveling with non-vegetarians. It is important to be flexible when you are the only vegetarian in a group of diners as well as have your dietary restrictions respected and understood.  This might mean that an all you can eat seafood restaurant may be out of the question or you can ask the restaurant staff  if there are appetizers or starters which are vegetarian or can be made vegetarian.  The following are the meals I had while in Orlando:

Day 1

Dinner was at a Colombian restaurant called Oh Que Bueno with only a few vegetarian options.  I ended up ordering 3 side dishes.

 

Passion Fruit iced drink-no alcohol

  Ensalada:  This salad was huge and for 3 bucks it was a
 good deal but was only iceberg lettuce so it was nutritionally vacant but had
 plenty of fiber and the dressing was a tasty chimichurri sauce.

Arepitas (corn cakes) and Beans: The server assured me that the beans  and corn cakes
 were free of lard, chicken stock, and were completely
vegetarian friendly.  The beans were very tasty.... the corn cakes were not.
Unfortunately the corn cakes where as hard as a hockey puck and had no flavor.


   

Quick Vegan Creamy Pasta and Vegetables

I adapted this recipe from a great cookbook called Vegan yum yum written by the blogger of veganyumyum.com. The original recipe is called Super Quick Tomato Basil Cream Pasta and is excellent.  Since it is winter and basil is not in season I decided to add fresh mixed vegetables to create a quick and tasty meal.  The cashews give the tomato sauce a creamy taste and I added a vegan vegetable bouillon cube. From start to finish this meal took less than 30 minutes.

Ingredients

2 tbs tomato paste
3/4 cup raw cashews
16oz can plum tomatoes
1 tbs olive oil
1 tbs fresh pressed garlic
1 vegan vegetable bouillon cube
1/2 box linguine
3 cup each of broccoli florets
2 carrots chopped
1 red pepper chopped
2 cups green beans
2 medium shallots

Wash vegetables, sauté shallot in olive oil, add vegetables to
pot

Cook until tender

Add cashews, tomato products, garlic, bouillon cube in a blender
then add the sauce to a pot

Cook pasta and add to sauce. Reserve 1cup of pasta water to thin
sauce if necessary

Add vegetables and enjoy

Happy New Year!!- Kale Confetti Salad

Celebrate 2012 with a raw kale salad.

The salad in this picture is served with a sesame noodle salad.

Ingredients


1 bunch Lacinto kale chiffonade
1 cup shredded carrots
2 cups shredded red cabbage
1/4 cup red onion sliced
1/4 cup hemp seeds
1/2 cup Seasoned rice wine vinegar
1/4 cup hemp seeds
1/4 cup olive oil
3 tablespoons nutritional yeast
fresh ginger, sea salt to taste

-mix all  ingredients and enjoy

The Green Fork

This is my first post!!!


Cooking and being a vegetarian is a big part of my life and since I love to cook, bake and create new recipes I wanted to keep track of all things food related in this blog.  One of my favorite past times is going to different supermarkets and farmers markets and searching for ingredients.  Often my meals are an adventure since I am extremely picky and want the freshest and best looking produce  which requires going to several stores before finding everything I want.  I named this blog The Green Fork because all the cool names were already taken but I do like the color green and I also like to use forks when I eat so it works.

Broccoli from my garden