Vegan Mac and Cheese

I am so behind on my blog. Isn't that what every blogger says? I have had about 5 million blog post ideas in the last month and the only thing I have done is tweet about stuff on Twitter.

Without further ado I bring you, my attempt at the Vegan Mac and Cheez from Oh She Glows! Her website and recipe here.

First off, the ingredients list. Her recipe calls for garlic and onion powder. We used the real thing (what we used in parenthesis) but I think ultimately powder will work better to blend into the cheese sauce. Since I like chunky salsa, pasta sauces, etc I didn't mind the texture at all (as a matter of fact we added mushrooms) but I think a more uniform flavor would also come out of using the powder as well.
We also used olive oil to saute the mushrooms onions and garlic, and left out the Earth Balance. I think it would add to the creamier, buttery flavor but we don't use butter in this house so I have changed that to straight up oil for sauteing.

Ingredients:
    •    1.5 cup unsweetened, unflavoured almond milk (or more as needed to thin out)
    •    12 tbsp nutritional yeast (LOVE this stuff!)
    •    olive oil
    •    2 tbsp all purpose flour (or other flour)
    •    4 tsp Dijon mustard
    •    1/2 tsp garlic powder (or 4 cloves)
    •    1/2 tsp onion powder (or one onion)
    •    salt & freshly ground black pepper, to taste

Directions:

1. In a skillet or pot, heat oil, onion, garlic.
2. In a medium sized bowl, whisk together the flour and milk until all clumps are gone. Add dijon mustard.
3. Add mushrooms and saute until softened. 
4. Add milk & flour mixture and nutritional yeast to pot and whisk well. Reduce heat to low-medium.
5. Add salt and pepper  (and your garlic/onion powder if that is what you are using using) to taste and whisk frequently until the sauce thickens, about 5 minutes. If it’s still too thin you can add more flour to achieve the thickness you desire.

We are really pleased with the way it turned out: creamy texture, that lovely cheesy quality of the nutritional yeast, and we were still carbing it up with the pasta shells but nutritional yeast has lots of protein (9 grams in 3 rounded tablespoons) so I feel awesome about that!

Next time I'm going to roast some shiitakes (tastes like bacon!) and use that instead of the sauteed mushrooms. Vegan bacon mac and cheese!

And voila, the finished product:

My First Spokane Overnight

In two and a half years of traveling for my work I have never ended up in Spokane. J always said it was a pretty awesome overnight, and especially so in spring when the river is high. What are the odds, then, that we ended up on a Spokane overnight together...in spring?!
We arrived early enough to catch brunch at Madeleine's, a french cafe type place (though not the chain of cafes known as Le Madeleine). After a surprisingly healthy brunch and mimosas we walked a little around Spokane, checked out the pedestrian bridge over the river, and decided it was a great day for a nap.
As it turned out, while we were asleep it rained. We couldn't have had better timing. We set back out for happy hour at the Clinkerdagger before meeting with the rest of our crew for dinner.
That's it in a nutshell, really I just want to share the gorgeous spring pictures!

Along the river.

Blossoms

Blossoms galore!

A view upstream.

At the pedestrian bridge. The water was captivating: so strong.

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We walked a little further down river, fallowing these gondolas (can you see them through the trees?) that drop down near the falls.

At the same viewpoint as the picture taken above, if you just look downstream, there is a gorgeous view of this bridge within the falls.

Another view of the city.

From one of the funky little shops.

Happy hour!

The clinkerdagger had statues outside. Hilarity ensued.

A simple study in line: butterfly sculpture in the park.

Perfect capture of spring.

Slow Roasted Salmon with Fennel, Citrus, and Chiles (Bon Appetit)

Hello! This recipe is straight out of Bon Appetit. I thought it was wonderful and fresh. We are ready for summer.

Ingredients:
1 medium fennel bulb, thinly sliced
1 blood or navel orange, very thinly sliced, seeds removed
1 Meyer or regular lemon, very thinly sliced, seeds removed
1 red Fresno chili or jalapeno, with seeds, thinly sliced
4 sprigs dill, plus more for serving
Salt
Pepper
1 2-lb skinless salmon fillet, preferably center cut
3/4 cup olive oil

Note: Since this serves 6 we decided to half the recipe. We stuck with the same citrus and fennel ingredients and still used a whole jalapeno though we removed half the seeds for our 1 lb of salmon.

The bright and beautiful base for our salmon.

Directions:
Preheat oven to 275. Toss fennel, orange slices, lemon slices, chile, and 4 dill sprigs in a shallow 3 qt baking dish; season with salt and pepper. Season salmon with kosher salt and place on top of fennel mixture. Pour oil over.
Roast until salmon is just cooked through (the tip of a knife will slide through easily and flesh will be slightly opaque), 30-40 minutes for medium rare.
Trasnfer salmon to a platter, breaking in to large pieces as you go. Spoon fennel mixture and oil from baking dish over; discard dill sprigs. Season with salt and pepper and top with fresh dill sprigs.

We found some fabulous fresh caught salmon for our dish.

The final product.

Glenwod Springs via Amtrak

J and I finally took a trip that we had been talking about for a while. Instead of heading to Scottsdale for Spring Training this year we decided to book a shorter, less expensive Colorado stay-cation: we headed to Glenwood Springs on the Amtrak to enjoy vapor caves, hot springs, a historic hotel, great beer, and a great meal.


We departed Denver on the Amtrak and made our way through Winter Park and over to Glenwood Springs. We were a little late but not terribly. The Amtrak station is on the south side of the Colorado River. The hot springs, vapor caves, and our hotel were a super short walk to the north side. We checked in to our Hotel Colorado and immediately headed to the vapor caves at Yampah Spa. In the caves the temps can reach 112 degrees Fahrenheit. There is a whole ceremony to vapor caving it...you throw on a swim suit, wrap in a towel, and head down the cool hall to a small, unassuming staircase. By the time you've walked to the bottom you are already in 90+ degrees of steam and hot air. At the point you hang up your towel and chill in this area for a while, or one can venture farther back where the temperatures rise. There is a little relief in a cold water faucet where you can quickly rinse or fill a tub to take with you as you sit in a semi private cave. The general rule is that you leave at least every 15 minutes and go upstairs to drink some water. We made it over an hour, coming in and out.


After the vapor caves we were decently hungry, and we decided to start with a brew at the Glenwood Canyon Brew Pub back on the south side of the river. Good, solid beer. We headed one building down to The Pullman for dinner. I would have loved to try everything on this menu! We had an appetizer that was a Salmon Melt Crostini: smoked salmon on small, crusty bread bites with tomato and preserved lemon (we left the fontina off). After that the main course was eggplant cannelloni filled with mushroom risotto and coriander tomato sauce. Perfect!

We walked our way back to the hot springs to end our evening there. There was a therapy pool that was heated via the hot springs to about 104 degrees. The larger pool was in the 90s. We couldn't spend a whole lot of time in the therapy pool all at once. We would switch back and forth, moving as carefully but quickly as we could in the cold evening.




The next day we did morning at the Daily Bread. Gigantic portions, super reasonable prices, and wonderful food. Very accommodating. They had a rosemary sourdough bread, homemade jam, and substituted without question. J's coffee was never close to empty and everyone was so sweet.


After that we checked out, spent some time finding some snack for the train ride back, and then went and waited. Homeward bound!

Side story: The Australians. When you go to the dining car for lunch on the Amtrak you are paired off in groups of 4. So J and I sat across from an Australian couple. The best part of the conversation was when Vegemite was brought up and I asked if there was anything that was an American staple that Australians despised.  Turns out: root beer. So hypothetically, I asked, if I am traveling in Australia and ask for a root beer..."They'll know what you're on about," our friend responded. :P  Who knew?!

Here are some pictures below. Of course the pictures from the vapor cave and the hot springs were on J's waterproof GoPro so I will need to obtain a picture and maybe some footage!

Union Station, off we go!

Heading into the foothills (this is just west of Denver)

This train has an observation car which has windows above as well as larger views along the side. Here is J enjoying his way through a gorge!

At one point the train proceeds through Moffitt Tunnel. It spits out right in Winter Park! I didn't even have time to react and grab a picture until we were past a lot of the slopes.

Our snack...a French baguette with strawberry limoncello jam (with a bit of black pepper)...fabulous!

Making out way closer!

Glenwood Springs! I took this from the pedestrian overpass. That is our train.

The Glenwood Hot Springs!

Hotel Colorado. This is where we stayed...

...lots of Teddy Roosevelt history, and we all know how much J loves Teddy.

A sunroom-type hallway at the Hotel Colorado.

We first headed next door to the Glenwood Canyon Brewing Company where, apparently, the beer I ordered only came in keg-size. Needless to say we did not have any alcoholic beverages by the time we headed to The Pullman. The food there: fantastic.

I have to have at least two pics of Teddy and J.

On our way Denver-bound...heading through Glenwood Canyon.

Glenwood Canyon.

Another view from the observation car.

Glenwood.

Heading back over the high country.

Six Years! Denver Restaurant 2014! And Love.

Happy March, I know! But I am just now working on all the pictures I took in February. I am sure I took hundreds, but I narrowed them down to about 60, and I will only have published maybe 20 in these last two posts, so I think I'm doing okay!

February in Denver is always fun. Well, not really. Now it's just cold with no cozy holidays and more snow and more ice. But I guess there is Valentine's Day, though we aren't huge celebrators (though this year we did go out for Belgian fries and pizza with my mom, not to be particularly Valentine's-y, that was just the night we were all around and needing something to do and a place to eat. :P) I digress, J and I always celebrate at the end of February - commemorating when we met - and it happens to coincide beautifully with Denver Restaurant Week.

J and I have had a stretch of nine days off that we are currently working our way through. It looked something like this:

Day 1: Visit friends and their cute, new baby in Loveland.
Day 2: Denver Restaurant Week (just J and I) with reservations at Row 14 downtown and then a walk over to the Chapultepec to hear some jazz before heading home. The "Pec" as it is known is rich in history. Lots of greats have played there, and Ella Fitzgerald used to park her car outside and just listen. Really neat to have just been there, and listen.
Day 3: Dinner with our friends Caren, Kevin, and Caren's mom.
Day 4: Denver Restaurant Week Part 2 withe Kelsie and Josh (and lots of cheese) with reservations at La Fondue. The cheese course was my favorite...it was a white wine, Brie, Fontina, Montery Jack, garlic, fresh cream, basil, pistachio creation that was just freaking perfect.
Day 5: J and Josh watched the final Shocker's basketball win while Kelsie, my mom, and I went to Balistreri for lunch and enjoyed Italian food and lots and lots of great wine.
Day 6: Today! More on that later since we are getting in to March with that info and I'm still trying to catch up on February! :P

Happy Valentine's Day!

Downtown Denver. It's always a little glamorous walking around downtown in heels with all of the lights.

Row 14, celebratory drink(s)

Afterwards some fabulous, and definitely historic, jazz.

This was taken from our booth. Seriously a very intimate way to take in some jazz.

Happy six years! :D

At fondue...we are full of nutella, dark chocolate, and ridiculous sweets.

Here's to another fantastic year!

February Overnights of Extreme Awesomeness

In February I was on reserve, which means that J ended up with some decent trips with his seniority. One trip in particular was purposely bid. The overnights were DCA (Reagan National) and SAN (San Diego).

We both finally ended up on the trip (after much work trying to move my reserve block) but it all sorted itself out and off we went!

Our first overnight was relatively short (only 13 hours) but we had some work to pack in to it. We landed, made our way to the hotel, and immediately changed and made our way to the metro station. We had a date with Teddy Roosevelt at the Old Ebbitt Grill in D.C. At the Old Ebbitt the mounted animal trophies above the bar are none other than Teddy's. There is not a man my husband loves more. :P While there we met up with our great friends, Shannon and Jud. We need to make another trip out there to visit and hike Teddy Roosevelt Island Park.

DCA!

Right next door to the Old Ebbitt? The Treasury.

J...to Teddy!

The Ebbitt is known for its oysters so J had to try a half dozen (we split them with our friends).

Teddy's trophies can be seen above the bar.

From DCA it was a short flight to ATL and a long flight to SAN. We had a blast with the passengers though and the day went by quickly. It helped that we had an amazing crew. It was J, myself, and Oliver. I had never flown with Oliver before but had met his girlfriend, Steph (also a flight attendant) several times. It was great that he ended up our trip with us...I always enjoy a super low-key crew!

So back to the story. We land in SAN where we have 19 hours. Our plan was to hang out with our friends Kelsey and Alex, two amazing people. Seriously amazing. Their honeymoon was 200 days long and included Costa Rica, Belgium, Namibia, Vietnam, Thailand, animal rescue, and dengue fever. They were newly returned.

Our first course of action was to take a nap, which I am going to take some time to ramble on about because it is blissful. Windows open, breeze blowing in through gauzy drapes, the sounds of the traffic and the boats outside. Palm trees. Ah.

We were woken up before our alarm to a text from an old friend (and our MDW crashpad "dad") Blaine! We were supposed to be meeting Kelsey and Alex in 30 minutes but wanted to see Blaine too. We ran to a local bar and through one back, catching up at a million miles an hour, which is when we all just decided he should come along with us.

Soon after Kelsey and Alex arrived and we were whisked off to Pacific Beach, just north of where we stay near the Gaslamp and Little Italy. Tapas and sangria was for dinner and a beautiful sunset was dessert. It was lovely. Lots of sleep that night and then three legs back home in the morning.

We are now on the last few days of a nine day stretch off. There has been lots going on, and I will write another short post with some information on that soon. :)

Paella was ordered to supplement our tapas.

Beachy fun.

Surfers at sunset.

Namaste.

View from our room the next morning. :)