Reading, Reading, Reading and Vegan Mac and Cashew Cheese variations

Image courtesy of Ron Bird at freedigitalphotos.net

Hey! What's up everyone? How's everyone handling the changing seasons?? I can't be the only one who wishes we had summer weather all year round, right? Someone once said to me that we need to have the cold weather so that we can better appreciate the hot weather. The problem with that is that I don't complain about the heat. Because of that I can't say that that way of thinking works for me. But if it works for you, go with it.

Well, for the past however long it's been, I've been reading. And working on some writing. And learning computer coding through Khan Academy. As of a few weeks ago, I found an app that helps me track my 30 fitness challenges. I'm currently doing a 30 day plank and a 30 day push-up challenge. Today I held a forearm plank for 1 min and 50 seconds without needing a break or collapsing because my muscles tired out. Don't know about you but I consider that to be a small win. Unfortunately, I'm kinda struggling with the push-up challenge. I was supposed to complete the challenge doing traditional push-ups but after a few days I found myself having difficulty getting past 5. So I started resting my knees against the ground and continuing the challenge that way. I would much prefer to continue doing "regular" push-ups but I guess I have to start somewhere. I just hope that one day I'll see a bit more muscle on my twig-like arms.

One thing I've been meaning to post about is my Vegan Mac and Cheese variations. I use Lindsay Rey's recipe from Vegan Yumminess as a starting ground and I alter some things as I see fit. For example, the recipe calls for 1/4 cup of coconut milk. I've used unsweetened cashew milk, almond milk (sweetened and unsweetened), soy milk, unsweetened coconut milk from a carton and fairly recently I bought Goya's canned coconut milk which is much thicker. Out of all of those, I really like the taste of using canned coconut milk. Fair warning: it does have a tiny hint of coconut after taste even after being blended with other foods but it comes out really creamy and delicious. Other variations include mixing the dish with broccoli florets, adding chia seeds, spices to give it a kick, sautéed mushrooms and my own version of Vegan Hamburger Mac and Cheese.

To make the Vegan Hamburger Mac and Cheese, first make the mac and cashew cheese like you normally would. I bought some Boca crumbles, tomatoes, tomato sauce, garlic and onion (powder works just as well). I mixed half the package of boca crumbles in with some tomato sauce (I didn't measure how much, I just eye-balled it), a couple of small tomatoes—diced, 1 chopped pearl onion and a couple of garlic cloves. Once that had heated up, I stirred it into the mac and cheese.

Started eating it before I realized that I wanted to document it for later. It doesn't look so appealing but it tasted great.

Unfortunately, I got the sauce ratio of the cashew cheese and the tomato sauce wrong because there was WAY more of the sauces than there was macaroni or crumbles. I also doubled the mac and cheese recipe so I may have read something wrong. 

Either way, my parents absolutely loved it and it was all gone in less than 24 hours. Next time I'll change how much sauce I'm making and experiment with different spices to make the crumbles more flavorful. For Thanksgiving I want bake it in the oven and add something crunchy on top. I imagine this can be made with gluten-free noodles but I don't know too much about gluten-free pasta. If you want to try gluten-free veggie crumbles, try the Gardein brand.

On a different note, I've surpassed my Goodreads challenge to read 50 books this year. To date, I have read 58 books and I don't plan on stopping. The number could be higher if I continued to add all the comic books I read but I opted to leave some out to make the challenge harder for myself. By the way... if you ever want to know what I'm currently reading, check out the Goodreads widget on the left. You can also find me on Goodreads. I've been asked, "How do you read so quickly?" or "How do you find the time to read?" and the short answer to that is 1. I read multiple books at once and 2. I take a book with me almost everywhere. The longer answer, as well as some tips, will come in another post later.

And that's how I've been. Nothing entirely interesting. I'm trying my hardest not to complain about my circumstances. I've been actively avoiding Facebook all summer long. I won't divulge my reasons right now. (I have been casually checking the CBLV Blogger Facebook page, though.) However, I have been poking around on Twitter and scrolling through Instagram more often. But given the rising tension with the upcoming presidential election, I've been cutting back on how often I check Twitter, too. I don't know about you but I have a threshold with how many times I can hear a particular candidate's name and of the list of people I cannot stand, let's just say they're up there with Professor Dolores Umbridge. 

This is where my signing off catch phrase would be but I haven't found one yet so... see ya!