Weekend Recap, aka Why you haven't heard from me in a while

Well, we had a wonderful weekend with our visiting friends, with lots of laughs and good food. We took Carlos to a local fish hatchery, which he totally loved, and hiking, and to the river... it was too windy to swim but he still had fun. I was very bad and managed to take only one picture all weekend, but at least it's a cute one.


Food recap time - the Pasta Fagiole recipe I made on Friday night was very good. Here's the recipe:

Pasta Fagiole

3 tablespoons olive oil
1 medium onion, chopped
4 cloves garlic, chopped
1 jalapeno pepper, minced
1 (14.5 ounce) can stewed tomatoes
2 (15.5 ounce) cans great northern beans, rinsed and drained
6 cups vegetable broth
8 ounces orzo or other pasta (this time I used rotini)
salt and pepper to taste

Heat olive oil in large pan over medium heat. Add onion, garlic, and jalapeno and cook 4-5 minutes, or until onion is soft. Puree tomatoes in blender and add to pot, along with broth and beans. Bring to a boil over high heat. Add pasta, return to boil, reduce heat, and simmer 8-10 minutes.

Easy and delicious! I wish I knew where the recipe came from so I could give credit, but it's one of those scraps of paper that a friend copied the recipe down on that has been in my recipe binder for so long, who knows where it originated.

And we had my favorite summer salad:

Strawberry Salad with Poppy Seed Dressing
(veganized from an old Cooking Light recipe)

3 tablespoons sugar
3 tablespoons Vegan mayo
2 tablespoons soymilk
1 tablespoon poppyseeds
1 tablespooon white wine vinegar
your choice of lettuce
sliced strawberries
1/4-1/3 cup slivered almonds, toasted

Whisk together first five ingredients and pour over lettuce, strawberries, and almonds.

I regret to say that I found the 'Sexy Lowfat Cupcakes' in Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World to be significantly less satisfying than the other recipes I've made so far (which have all been killer). They were edible, but not anywhere near as special as others I've made. Part of the problem was my inability to make them as pretty as they were supposed to be.

Here's what I was aiming for (photo from the book):


And here's where I ended up:


Hmm. Not quite what I was going for. When I tried putting the raspberries on top, they all just slid off the sides. Grr.

We had vegan cinnamon rolls again, and our guests were duly impressed. Man, those things are good. And on Sunday night I made pad thai, which was quite tasty as usual. I wish I had been better about taking pictures of all the food I cooked, but I wasn't. Sorry.