Lazy Vegan Miso Soup

There’s nothing quite like sitting down at a nice Thai or Japanese restaurant and sipping on a warm bowl of miso soup. It’s equally nice to enjoy this dish from the comforts of your own home, especially on a rainy or sick day when you want nothing more than to be curled up in sweatpants with a movie or a good book. Unfortunately, miso can often be misleadingly made with a soup base called dashi, which is a mixture of water, dried seaweed and fish flakes.

The good news is that this simple and delicious comfort food can be recreated as a vegan soup with very little effort. Typically,  pair the soup with a nice, fresh Asian salad or vegan lettuce wraps.

When you’re feeling the blues or needing a little pick-me-up, just go to your fridge and use whatever vegetables and protein products you have on hand to fuel your miso.

Ingredients:

• 1 pkg. Silken tofu, or whatever tofu you have on hand. Silken makes the miso more closely resemble the restaurant-style dish
• 2 large carrots, thinly sliced
• ¾ c. green onions, chopped
• 6 medium-large white mushrooms, sliced
• 2 TB miso paste. South River organic sweet white miso paste is one that can last for decades in your refrigerator.
• 2 large vegan bouillon cubes or 2 TB Better Than Bouillon paste. Follow instructions on container.
• 1 dash sea salt
• 4 – 6 c. water

First, slice your vegetables. Feel free to use whatever vegetables you like. Celery works well, as does seaweed, or any variety of mushroom.

Drain your tofu and cut into tiny cubes.

Fill a large pot with water and bring to a boil. Once your water is boiling, dissolve the miso paste in the water. Stir.

Add your vegetable broth or vegan bouillon. Stir.

Add carrots and/or other vegetables (not your green onions or mushrooms) and let all the ingredients reach a full boil again. This will soften your vegetables. Once your miso is to this point, bring to a simmer.

Just a couple of minutes before serving, add the green onions. sea salt, and mushrooms.

Then add the tofu.

Let ingredients cook for 2 -3 minutes to allow the flavors to mix together, and serve!

Makes 4 – 6 bowls.

Article excerpted from www.organicbugblog.com

Reasons a Vegan Diet Can Cause Weight Gain

Many people choose a vegan lifestyle for ethical, health, or environmental reasons. But if you’re solely going meat-, dairy-, and egg-free because you think it will help you drop pounds, you may end up gaining rather than losing weight. Remember that just because a food is vegan doesn’t mean it’s healthier or lower in calories. Keep these points in mind to avoid plumping up on your vegan diet.

• Chowing on vegan junk: French fries, tortilla chips, and Swedish Fish are all free of animal products, but they’re also high in fat, sugar, and calories. Just because some junk food is vegan doesn’t mean it’s healthier.
• Loading up on bread and pasta: Many people don’t know how to cook vegan meals, so when you head to a dinner party or out to a restaurant, get ready to eat some dinner rolls and spaghetti! There’s nothing wrong with eating bread or pasta, it’s just that they’re high in calories. A dinner roll will run you over 200 calories, and although one cup of cooked pasta is a little over 200 calories, plates tend to be two or three times larger than an appropriate serving size. If bread and pasta are staples in your vegan diet, it’s no wonder your pants are fitting a little snug.
• But that cupcake is vegan!: Made with butter, milk, and eggs, most cookies and cakes are off-limits. But missing out can be a little depressing. When you stumble upon a vegan carrot cupcake with Tofutti cream cheese frosting, you indulge. Go ahead and enjoy vegan treats once in a while, but eat your sweets in moderation. Like junk food, animal-free foods do not equal calorie-free treats.
• Nuts for protein: Snacking on handfuls of nuts, smearing peanut butter on your banana, and wondering why the scale numbers are increasing? Yes, nuts are a great source of protein for vegans, but they’re also high in calories — a two-tablespoon serving of peanut butter will run you 210 calories! Do check out these protein-rich, low-calorie vegan meals.
• Overdoing it on the dairy-free products: It’s amazing how much Daiya cheese and Soy Delicious nondairy frozen desserts taste just like the real thing. It can be really exciting to discover these foods after living without them for so long, but a vegan can’t live on dairy-free ice cream alone.

Article excerpted from www.fitsugar.com

What Are Vegan Desserts?

Vegan foods cannot contain any type of animal product. Poultry, fish, and meat are the most obvious items that must be eliminated from this type of diet. Eggs, honey, and dairy products cannot be eaten by vegans either, and create a bigger problem when finding acceptable vegan desserts.

For any baked good to be considered vegan, it can not be made with eggs, milk, cream, or butter. Acceptable egg substitutes are soft tofu, applesauce, mashed banana, or cornstarch. Milk can be replaced with soy milk, nut milk, rice milk, or even water. For buttermilk, a mixture of soy milk and vinegar can be used as a substitution. Vegan margarine is available in some supermarkets and health food stores.

Placing several substitutions in a regular recipe can be tricky. Using a vegan recipe for baked goods is the best option for making satisfying vegan desserts. Vegan recipes can be found for cookies, cakes, pies, and brownies.

Fruit crisps and cobblers are among the easiest vegan desserts to make. For a quick and easy crisp, simply pour oatmeal prepared with soy milk or water over fruit. Blueberries, sliced apples, and peaches are great options. Fruit salads combined with vegan marshmallows and nuts are a simple dessert choice as well.

Nut products, such as peanut butter, are important to a vegan diet because of their protein content, which vegans may have trouble getting elsewhere. Desserts containing nuts such as chocolate peanut butter pie, or macaroons made with coconut and dates, can be healthful as well as delicious. Cookies are particularly easy to work nuts into, from peanut butter cookies to chocolate chip cookies loaded with extras such as pecans and almonds.

For those who prefer prepackaged dessert products, the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) has put together a list of vegan baking mixes. Included on the list are Betty Crocker Bisquick baking mixes, Aunt Jemima Coffee Cake Mix, and Hodgson Mill Whole Wheat Gingerbread Mix. Several flavors of Duncan Hines® Creamy Home-Style Frosting made the list, as well as Pillsbury® Treat Toppers in chocolate or vanilla. Many Jello-O instant puddings are also considered vegan by PETA. Vegan baking products on PETA’s list include Crisco® Original Cooking Spray and All-Vegetable Shortening, Keebler® Ready Crust Graham Cracker Pie Crusts, and Blue Bonnet® Light Margarine.

By working creatively with dairy substitutes, nearly any traditional dessert can be made into a vegan dish. When purchasing packaged mixes, consumers should always double check the label to make sure that the contents adhere to vegan standards. Many products that aren’t labeled as vegan, still meet the appropriate requirements and can be used as delicious vegan desserts.

Article excerpted from www.wisegeek.com

Vegans are by no means stuck eating boring foods, you can still enjoy delicious desserts. Besides, you can get many vegan desserts recipe on the dessert. Start to make your vegan desserts today!

Survey reveals that vegan stereotypes are false

A new survey of over 2,000 vegans worldwide, called Vegan From the Inside, offers the truth about people who live on plant-based diets. The respondents of the survey were required to have been on an animal-free diet for at least three months.

Survey author Janice Stanger, PhD, notes that “On balance, the rewards of a vegan diet far outweigh the challenges that respondents describe. A totally plant-based diet is an ideal that is easier than some might believe.”

Likewise, Dr. Pam Popper, Executive Director of the Wellness Forum, says, “Finally, some documentation showing what those of us who have been teaching people to adopt a plant-based diet for years have known all along. The diet is easy, people love it, they get great results, and they generally stick with it.”

The survey results debunk common claims about animal-free diets, including fallacies such as vegans are “pale, weak and unhealthy” or that a “vegan diet has too many carbs.” Other debunked myths are that a “vegan diet is boring” and “all about deprivation.”

In fact, the survey results actually found that most participants “enjoy cooking more” and have felt “fulfilled results of their eating choices.” Additional common misconceptions claim that a “plant-based diet requires significant discipline and is difficult to maintain” and “vegans can’t enjoy eating out.” Particularly in response to the latter argument, some respondents added that, as veganism is becoming more mainstream, eating while out is easier.

One respondent even remarked, “Going vegan was the best thing I ever did!”

Finally, a positive light shed on the positive change of going animal-free!

Article excerpted from www.thisdishisvegetarian.com