Example:

Anonymous friend confession: “I thought condominiums were places adults bought to have sex in. I didn’t know that they are just apartments you owned until I was 14.” (Drunken laughter ensues!)

When it came around to me I was almost too embarrassed to confess. I had some really silly ones that I had kept to myself for years but this is the name of the game.

 “I thought the phrase was “Worth your wild!” Not “worth your while.” Someone corrected me on this earlier this year. I am 27 years old.

“Until I was 13, I thought Charles Mason was a disowned member of The Beatles since writing and going crazy after Helter Skelter.” My mother corrected me, horrified but laughing.

 “Cold-slaw” Which to me still makes sense since it is a cold salad!

 “I thought Prince ripped off the song “When Doves Cry” from the Leonardo Dicaprio/Claire Danes version of Romeo and Juliet.” That movie gave me a lot of problems about love when it came to dating as a teenager and how I desperately wanted to meet my true love through a giant glowing fish tank. 

 Now for the food confession: I don’t know what nutritional yeast is. Well I didn’t know until I wrote this post.

All I knew about it previous to this was: the first time I bought it I thought that they mislabeled fish food, upon first trying it I knew I was hooked and it is insanely good on pretty much everything from pasta, my Ultimate Vegan Nacho Cheese, soups (this one in particular) and sprinkled on roasted potatoes.

 So wtf is nutritional yeast?

“Nutritional yeast is a deactivated yeast, often a strain of Saccharomyces cerevisiae, which is sold commercially as a food product,” says Wikipedia. Yeast is part of the Fungi Kingdom so no animals harmed!

Nutritional yeast is a complete protein which means it has all the essential amino acids that we humans must consume since we do not produce it ourselves. It is also sugar, gluten and dairy free. Some brands fortify nutritional yeast with B12, which is a vitamin most vegans are lacking. Read the label carefully to see if your local brand contains this vitamin (you will also notice your urine turning an insanely bright colour…too much information? Mark made the joke….”You might think ur-ine trouble….” How do I date this person?? P.S. we did not meet through a fish tank)

Thankfully going gluten free I did not have to give up one of my favourite pantry staple nor one my fav winter comfort foods: mac and cheese. Developing this recipe took some time as I posted on Instagram so long ago my first round of trials. At first I used my nacho cheese recipe minus the ancho chili and poured it onto some noodles but the sauce was way too rich plus an entire cup of cashews runs a little high with Christmas on its way. Scratch that idea.

I had heard of butternut squash mac and cheese before but squash is Mark’s least favourite vegetable and I have certainly had my fill of it already this season. Thanksgiving for us Canadian seemed so long ago. I knew I didn’t want a sweet mac and cheese like so many squash recipes are- it had to be savoury (added fresh rosemary and raw garlic) and cheesy flavoured thanks to the nutritional yeast.

Four rounds of mac and cheese later, I finally came up with this recipe. Am I sick of mac and cheese yet? Not even a little. I even had Mark’s very meat and potatoes friend test it out and he said he wouldn’t know it was squash based if I haven’t told him.

I poured it over some brown rice macaroni but it would taste good on some roasted vegetables too. Perhaps some wilted greens added to the noodle mix to make this a little more grown up and nutritionally dense.

I hope transitioning to gluten-free continues to go fairly smoothly with the exception of all the bakeries around my house smelling extra tempting. I am currently optimistic but ask me again when all the Christmas cookies start coming out…..

The post Rosemary Butternut Mac & Cheese {Vegan & Gluten Free} + WTF is Nutritional Yeast? appeared first on Sprouts & Chocolate.

We recently purchased one of those fancy cords that hooks up from your television to your computer so we have been watching a lot of the FIFA World Cup that we stream online to our TV. It has been fairly heated around the apartment after I decided to walk in wearing an England shirt and Mark, being Scottish and a Celtic fan, was less than impressed (Celtic verses Rangers is a serious heated battle). He said immediately upon seeing my shirt, “Don’t let my mother see you in that!”

Though I am not too crazy about sports in general but events like FIFA or the Olympics I can totally get into. I love the collective enthusiasm over a loved team or the mutual hatred over another. The best part of watching a sport event is the pub food. I am a glutinous beast when it comes to greasy pub style food; my first date with Mark was at a pub where we shared a pitcher of beer and chicken wings. Nachos are probably our most favourite pub dish; easy to share, spicy and you know someone loves you when they let you take the last chip with cheese melted on it. We use to get the jarred fluorescent orange nacho cheese in the chip aisle but after going vegan we no longer purchased it. However, I still really love the creamy spicy sauce but after reading the ingredients list I knew I had made the best choice in giving it up. I wanted to recreate the chip aisle in a healthful way. Say what?? Yeah you heard me, I wanted to have my nachos and eat them too.

Jarred salsa is pretty good, can work great in a pinch and so many varieties are available, why would anyone bother to make it? Homemade salsa is usually served raw while jarred salsa is cooked and fresh summer time tomatoes make my mouth water. Jarred is great when tomatoes aren’t in season and taste like Styrofoam but when the weather is hot, fresh tomatoes are the way to go. It turns out fresh homemade salsa is pretty quick and easy to the make with the assistance of a food processor. A quick chop, chop, chop, pulse, pulse, pulse and voilà salsa! Not as quick as opening a jar but it is worth the process (get it? Process…? Hahaha oh I just kill me.)

The guacamole is also a fairly simple recipe but instead of buying a ton of avocados I used a little trick from the Forks Over Knives Cookbook to yield more guacamole. Edamame! I was hesitant at first since I LOOOOVE an all-avocado and I have tried many recipes with substitutions but did not crave them again. The FOK style guac uses all edamame but I knew I needed some of that green buttery stuff to tingle my taste buds. I did a part avocado/part edamame with tasty results and kept the rest of the ingredients simple to let the avocado shine through. Remember to keep those pits! Placing the pits in the prepared guacamole help it from getting discoloured. 

Vegans will try to make nacho cheese out of anything: cauliflower, sunflower seeds, sesame seeds, milk with a roux, tofu and my favourite: cashews. Soaked cashews are a vegan’s creamy dairy free dream and I use them all the time. When I made my Ultimate Cheesy Kale Chips, I thought the sauce, before cooking it, tasted like nacho cheese. This recipe tastes better than any other plastic version of nacho cheese out there and it completely: vegan, oil free, sugar free, gluten free and almost raw. Yeah you heard me again, making the chip aisle healthful! Now I know cashews have a lot of fat in them but I will take the cashew nut fat over any other type of fat any day. Going turbo for a few minutes on your Vitamix makes the cheese warm, which is insanely delicious. Warning this cheese is addictive and tastes great on tacos, quesadillas and anything that needs a cheesy kick (on everything really).

Making chips without oil was a little trickier and they do have a slightly different texture than a store bought deep fried chip but they can hold the weight on a heavy dip of guacamole, which to me is a sign of a good chip. I used lime juice to help the salt stick to the corn tortilla and dusted them with a little more ancho chili powder since I am hooked to that smoky flavour. Plain salted with lime juice is good as well in case you don’t like spicy stuff.

With these recipes, crack some beers and turn on the game to cheer for your fav teams. England is sadly out now much to Mark’s delight but there is still plenty to cheer for like how it finally feels like summertime. Oh and don’t forget to pass the chips.

Quick Corn and Pepper Salsa

2014-06-27 10:10:23

Yields 2

Fresh, quick and full of spicy summertime flavours

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Prep Time

10 min

Total Time

10 min

Prep Time

10 min

Total Time

10 min

Ingredients

1. 2 Roma tomatoes, stemmed and cut into quarters
2. 1/3 cup roughly chopped red onion
3. 1 garlic clove, peeled
4. ¼ cup light packed cilantro leaves
5. ½ jalapeno pepper, diced
6. ½ red pepper, diced small
7. ¼ cup corn, fresh or frozen (thaw if using frozen corn)
8. 2 tablespoons fresh lime juice
9. ½ teaspoon kosher salt or fine grain sea salt

Instructions

1. In the bowl of the food processor, place the quartered tomatoes and pulse 3-4 one-second pulses until tomatoes are chunky. Transfer the tomatoes to a medium bowl.
2. In the now empty food processor bowl, add onion, garlic, cilantro and jalapeno and pulse 9-10 one-second pulses until minced but not pureed.
3. Transfer the mixture to the bowl with the tomatoes.
4. Add the rest of the ingredients to the bowl and stir the mixture together.
5. Serve with chips or on top of burrito bowls.

Notes

1. Don’t over process the tomatoes; it will cause them to release more liquid.
2. Fresh salsa is always more liquify than jarred since the jarred stuff is cooked.
3. This recipe is a medium spice level, omit the jalapeno completely if you want a mild salsa

By Jessica DeMarra

Sprouts & Chocolate http://www.sproutsandchocolate.com/

Protein Packed Guacamole

2014-06-27 10:18:10

Yields 2

Fresh, buttery guacamole with a protein punch

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Prep Time

10 min

Cook Time

4 min

Total Time

40 min

Prep Time

10 min

Cook Time

4 min

Total Time

40 min

Ingredients

1. ¼ cup lightly packed cilantro leaves
2. 1 small garlic clove, peeled
3. 2 tablespoons diced red onion
4. 2 teaspoons diced jalapeno
5. 1 cup frozen edamame, cooked according to the package instructions and drained
6. 2 tablespoons fresh lime juice
7. 2 large ripe avocados, halved and pitted
8. ½ teaspoon kosher or fine grain sea salt

Instructions

1. In the bowl of the food processor, pulse the cilantro, garlic, onion and jalapeno for 8-10 one-second pulses. Transfer the mixture to a medium sized bowl.
2. In the now empty food processor, add the edamame, lime juice, ½ of 1 avocado and salt and puree until completely smooth. Add the puree to the onion mixture and stir until combined.
3. Dice and scoop out the remaining 1½ avocado and gently fold it into the edamame puree.
4. Place the pits in the mixture, cover, refrigerate and let the guacamole rest for at least 30 minutes before serving.

Notes

1. Keep the pits of the avocado! Placing the pits back into the prepared guacamole helps it keep it green.
2. This recipe is a chunky guacamole but if you want it smoother, just place all the avocado into the food processor and puree.

By Jessica DeMarra

Sprouts & Chocolate http://www.sproutsandchocolate.com/

Ultimate Vegan Nacho Cheese

2014-06-27 10:23:29

Yields 2

Spicy, creamy and a million times better for you than any nacho cheese you have ever had.

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Prep Time

5 min

Prep Time

5 min

Ingredients

1. 1 cup raw cashews, soaked for 2-8 hours or quick soaked (bring water in a pot to a boil, add cashews, put tight fitting lid on the pot and take it off the heat. Let the cashews soak in the hot water for about 1 hour)
2. 1 red bell pepper, deseeded and roughly chopped
3. 3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
4. 3/4 cup nutritional yeast
5. 1 teaspoon salt
6. ½-3/4 teaspoon ancho chili powder
7. ¼ cup water

Instructions

1. Place all the ingredients in a high power blender and blend on high or turbo until completely smooth. Going turbo makes the cheese all warm too.

By Jessica DeMarra

Sprouts & Chocolate http://www.sproutsandchocolate.com/

Oil-Free Ancho-Lime Baked Corn Chips

2014-06-27 10:31:04

Could an oil-free chip be delicious? The answer is in the crunch.

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Prep Time

3 min

Cook Time

25 min

Total Time

28 min

Prep Time

3 min

Cook Time

25 min

Total Time

28 min

Ingredients

1. 8 small corn tortillas
2. 3 teaspoons fresh lime juice
3. ½ teaspoon fine grain sea salt
4. Pinch of ancho chili powder

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees and line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper.
2. Stack the tortillas on top of each other and cut into fours.
3. Place the pieces in a single layer divided between the two sheets.
4. Sprinkle the pieces with the lime juice, coating both sides. Sprinkle with salt and lightly dust one side with the ancho powder.
5. Bake for 15 minutes, flip the chips and cook for another 10 minutes until the edges are golden brown. These won’t keep very long since they aren’t fried so serve within the first day of being made.

Notes

1. Watch your chips after you flip them since burnt chips are never delicious.

By Jessica DeMarra

Sprouts & Chocolate http://www.sproutsandchocolate.com/

The post Vegan Pub Style Dips with Ancho-Lime Baked Corn Chips appeared first on Sprouts & Chocolate.