Knead to Cook

Food & fitness obsessed girl.

Matcha Lemon Muffins. Vegan.

by Filed Under: Brunch, Easter, Holiday Baking Ideas, Muffins, Snacks, Vegan

While surfing for dinner inspiration, I came across this recipe and was ready to dive in. I of course put my own spin on it and used what I had on hand. These came out so beautifully, I mean look at that color! They taste great, super moist… quite lovely with a cup of tea.

Ingredients:

2 cups of all purpose flour
2 tablespoons of matcha powder (I prefer Encha)
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 good pinch of salt (1/4 tsp)
1/3 cup of sugar
1 tsp of vanilla extract
1 container of Culina Bourbon Vanilla yogurt (or 2/3 cup of whatever yogurt you have on hand)
1 cup nut based milk
Juice of one whole lemon
Zest of 1 lemon

Method:
Preheat your oven to 375 degrees. Spray or line your muffin tin. This recipe made 11 muffins for me.

Into a bowl or stand mixer, add you dry ingredients. Blend well. Then add the remaining wet ingredients. Blend well but be mindful not to over-mix. Add to your muffin tins, 3/4 of the way filled. Bake for 18 minutes or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.

Allow to cool and enjoy!

~ox

— Knead to Cook

Mexican Instant Pot Black Lentils. Vegan.

by Filed Under: Evolution Power Yoga 40 Days, Gluten Free, Lentils, Mexican, Pressure Cooker, Side dish, Vegan, Vegan proteins, Wheat Free

Since I received a preview copy of my friend’s first book, Fiber Fueled, I’ve become very conscious of eating way more fiber in each meal. Lentils are, of course, the king of the fiber world so I thought it was fitting to share my lunch today considering tomorrow is the epic Taco Tuesday with Cinco De Mayo on the same day! These lentils can easily be a replacement for you taco “meat” or a lovely addition to your taco bar.

These lentils are super easy to make in your instant pot and store beautifully in your fridge all week. I love to add leftover lentils to my salads or tofu scramble. Okay so let’s get started!

Ingredients:

1 cup of Beluga black lentils (green or brown would work)
1.75 cups of water
Pinch of salt
1 tbl of ground cumin
1 tbl of smoked paprika
2 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp of chili powder
Lime juice from one lime

Method:

Add all of your ingredients to your Instant Pot insert and swirl around to mix. Set the manual timer for 6 minutes allowing it to release pressure naturally. Once its done, stir and adjust your seasoning per your taste and add your citrus juice. I added additional salt.

Endless ways of using these lentils. I added to Romaine boats and made tacos that way. You can use as a protein for your salad. Add these to nachos.

Hope you love these as much as I do!
~ox

— Knead to Cook

Chickpea Mushroom Quinoa Skillet Dinner.

by Filed Under: Brunch, Gluten Free, Pantry, Side dish, Vegan, Vegan proteins, Wheat Free

This is simply the fastest dinner you can make especially if you have leftover quinoa on hand. Start to finish you’re done and plating in about 12 minutes. Plus, right now, using pantry ingredients is key!

This recipe is very flexible, add more or less spices if you like. Hot sauce would be a lovely addition, but hey – when isn’t it? Serve it up in bowls with some crusty bread and tuck in!

Ingredients:
1 tbl olive oil
2-3 cups of mushrooms (use what you have on hand), rough chopped
1 small yellow onion, diced
5 cloves of garlic, minced
1 tbl of smoked paprika
1 tsp onion powder
1 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp oregano
Salt and pepper
1 – 14 oz can of chickpeas, drained and rinsed
2 cups of cooked quinoa
1 cup of frozen spinach or kale
2 tbl liquid aminos or soy sauce
1 handful or more of roasted cashew nuts

Method:

First prepare your quinoa according to package instructions. I cook mine in my Instant Pot 1 cup quinoa to 1 cup water, cover and cook for 1 minute. Natural release. Set that aside.

Into a skillet add your oil of choice. Once hot, add onions and mushrooms and cook for 6-8 minutes. Add garlic and stir often to avoid burning. Add your spices, stirring often again. After cooking for about 11-12 minutes, add your chickpeas, quinoa and greens of choice. Stir well to combine and then add your liquid aminos. Stir and taste. Adjust spices as needed. Right before serving, add your cashews – mix in and serve piping hot. Enjoy!


— Knead to Cook

Vegan Tuna Salad.

by Filed Under: Brunch, Snacks, Vegan, Vegan proteins, Wheat Free

Last weekend I stumbled upon this vegan tuna in a package. I was intrigued. When I ate meat, I would occasionally crave tuna sandwiches – it was rare as I was never a seafood fan but it was a quirky craving. I picked up the packet and then funny enough I must’ve ordered one (it was different flavor) from Thrive market as well. So today I wanted to share my go-to recipe for how I used to make tuna but now am enjoying using this awesome vegan product instead.

As a side note, I found this on Thrive Market however a local grocery store also had it. I also found it on Amazon here. *This is an affiliate link that provides a small commission.

Ingredients:

1 packet of this vegan tuna
1 tbl vegan mayo
1 tbl Dijon mustard
1/2 avocado, mashed
1 stalk of celery, finely chopped
1/4 cup of red onion, finely chopped
2 tbl of pickled jalapenos
4 mini dill pickles or 1 medium, finely chopped
2 tsp smoked paprika
Freshly cracked pepper

Method:

Into a bowl, add your mayo, mustard and avocado. Mash and combine well. Then add your remaining ingredients and mash and blend well. Adjust seasoning as you desire. I did top with red chili flakes but we like spicy!



Serve this on my salad or on a crusty roll that’s been toasted. Enjoy!

— Knead to Cook

Mixed berry buckle. Vegan.

by Filed Under: Breakfast, Brunch, Cakes, Easter, Vegan, Vegan proteins

The buckle cake is a fun one to make, super easy and you can use fresh or frozen fruit you have on hand. I used a mixed frozen berry mixture I had leftover from Costco. Black and blue berries and strawberries. It’s a good spring or summer dessert and tastes heavenly with whipped cream or vanilla ice cream. The term buckle comes from the cake buckling around the fruit as it cooks for a bit of trivia. 🙂

This recipe was inspired by The Full Helping which can be found here.

Ingredients for the Streusel Topping:
1/2 cup oat flour or all purpose flour
1/2 cup of brown or coconut sugar
1/4 tsp salt
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
3 tbl of vegan butter, cut in cubes and must be cold

Method:

Into a bowl, add flour through cinnamon. Whisk to combine. Then add your cubed, cold butter and cut in with a pastry cutter or pinching with your fingers quickly. You want to avoid melting the butter. Set that aside in your fridge while you work on the cake batter.

Ingredients for cake/buckle:
3/4 cup of non dairy milk
2 tsp of apple cider vinegar or lemon juice
1/3 cup of neutral oil – canola, refined coconut oil etc.
1 tbl vanilla extract
1.5 cups of all purpose flour
3/4 cup of brown or coconut sugar
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
Zest from one lemon
3 cups of fresh or frozen fruit (if using frozen, run under hot water then allow to drain for 5 minutes) – I only used 2 cups and it needed 3!
Plus 2 tbl flour to toss the fruit in

Method:
Preheat your oven to 375 degrees and spray a 8×8 pan with some oil. Set aside.

Into a measuring cup, add your non-dairy milk with vinegar or acid of choice. Whisk and allow to sit for a minute to “curdle”. Then add oil and vanilla. Whisk and set aside. Into your stand mixer, paddle attached, add your flour through zest. Blend. Then add your milk/oil mixture slowly and blend to just combine. Take your fully drained frozen or fresh fruit (no draining needed if fresh), toss with a bit of flour to coat. This helps the fruit to suspend in the cake and not sink to the bottom.

Pour your cake batter into your prepared pan. Then with a spoon- add your fruit to the top of the cake. Take your streusel topping from the fridge and spread evenly over the top of the fruit. Bake for 40-45 minutes. Remove and let cool before serving.

Enjoy!

— Knead to Cook

Vegan Skillet Sausage Peppers and Roasted Potatoes

by Filed Under: Breakfast, Brunch, Gluten Free, Italian-inspired, Vegan, Vegan proteins, Wheat Free

It’s definitely comfort food time. Once a week I seem to gravitate to making this skillet for dinner. My dad, who lives with us, is not vegan although eats vegan 95% of the time, loves this dish so I indulge. Then the leftovers are repurposed with some Just Egg sheets for an sausage & egg sandwich for breakfast or lunch. It’s also great toss with pasta. Versatility is key. Plus when cleaning out your fridge, its a great way to use up onions and peppers you have on hand.

Let’s get to it!

Ingredients:

1 package of Beyond Meat sausage (I prefer the spicy)
1 to 2 yellow onions roughly chopped
4-6 cloves of garlic, chopped
2-3 bell peppers, any colors
1 tablespoons of fennel seeds
3-4 Yukon potatoes, cubed
Olive oil

Method:

First, I begin by roasting my potatoes in a 350 degree oven on a baking sheet. I simply put my potatoes on a baking sheet and spray with olive oil. Toss around and bake until golden brown for about 35-45 minutes – tossing occasionally.


After the potatoes have cooked, remove and set aside. Let the oven on.

Into a cast iron skillet, add your onion and peppers and sauce until cooked down and the onions start to brown. Add your chopped garlic and cook for 2 minutes, stirring often. Then add you fennel seeds. Cook for another minute or so. Add your sausage, cut however you prefer. Cook until golden over low/medium heat. This normally takes 10-12 minutes, stirring often.


Once cooked through add your potatoes into your skillet and stir well. Place the skillet into your oven for 10 minutes.



Serve immediately & enjoy!



— Knead to Cook

Empty nesters and a bathroom and bedroom renovation on a budget.

by Filed Under: Life.

Our oldest has remained at her apartment nearby to her university during Covid 19. She is working on campus and staying throughout the summer after her internship had been cancelled due to the stay in place orders. Our youngest graduates in a few weeks and had an opportunity to move into a lovely home nearby. This allowed her to build credit through utilities also experiencing living life on her own aka no one to cook and clean up after her. With just 5 days under her belt, we’ve seen so many incredible changes in her. Cleaning! She’s learning to be responsible for cleaning up after herself which honestly, I never thought would happen 😉 I seriously thought she would be on hoarders in her future. Kid you not! LOL. Apparently moving out has changed her 180 degrees and we couldn’t be prouder!

When she moved out we decided to change her room over to our Peloton & fitness room. By simply moving what we had and rearranging, touching up paint and having the rug cleaned… we’ve turned her room into a dreamy Pelo studio.

The wall color is Sherwin Williams Mindful Gray. Bookcase is old Ikea along with the baskets. Clock is available here.

Various yoga mats are in the corner and I anticipate buying a basket for them once the quarantine is over.

The bathroom. Well it was in rough condition to say the least. It had to be painted, it had been many years, scrubbed, bleached and disinfected (insert eye roll). Not wanting to spend a lot of money right now with the uncertainty of life… my goals:

1. Scrub everything.
2. Repaint both parts of the bathroom.
3. Paint the wood cabinets.
4. Replace the hardware.
5. Clean the faucets and see if they needed to be replaced – they were perfect!
6. Add an etagere for storage.
7. Buy new towels.
8. New accessories.
9. New shower curtain and hooks.

I didn’t take before pics to protect the guilty. Sunday we started and finally finished today, Friday.

Wall color is Storm Cloud by Sherwin Williams.
Trim color and cabinet paint color is pure white.
Etagere is here.
Apothecary jars are here.
Towels are here.
Bath mat is here.
Shower curtain is here.
Towel rack (which we have the matching toilet paper holder as well) is here.
Toilet paper holder is here.
Drawer knobs are here.
Door pulls are here.

Overall the renovations/updates came in around $350-$375 (with almost half of that for the carpeting cleaning and sanitizing).

I’ve been on a mission to lighten & create a minimalist space. We are so happy with way everything has turned out. Adjusting to empty nesting has been weird at times but overall quite lovely. The biggest positive is watching your children thrive on their own. For that we are grateful. If I’ve missed anything you’re interested in, please don’t hesitate to let me know.

~ox

— Knead to Cook

One bowl vegan whole wheat banana bread.

by Filed Under: Breads, Brunch, Quick Bread, Snacks, Vegan

I have an abundance of bananas in my house since quarantining. They are our go-to’s and we’ve been hoarding while others hoard toilet paper. So my weekly treats always have some bananas in them. Today, I morphed this recipe into a vegan and to work what I had on hand. It came out perfectly so I wanted to share. Would be lovely with some chocolate chips and/or chopped nuts. Because my husband is allergic to chocolate I omitted it.

Ingredients:

3 tbl flax meal
5 tbl of water
2 large, overripe bananas, peeled and mashed
1/3 cup of melted coconut oil (I used refined)
1/4 cup of maple syrup
1/4 cup of coconut sugar
1/4 cup of nut based milk
1 tsp baking soda
1 tbl of vanilla extract
1/2 tsp of salt
1 tsp of ground cinnamon
1 3/4 cup of whole wheat flour
Optional: 1/3 cup of nuts or chocolate chips

Method:

Preheat your oven to 325 degrees. Spray your loaf pan with oil and set aside.

Into you stand mixer, add your flax and water. Mix to combine and allow to thicken for about 5 minutes. Then proceed to add the remaining ingredients in order from wet to dry. Blend until just combined. If adding mix-in’s … blend by hand. Pour your batter into your prepared pan and bake for 55 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Remove and allow to cool for 30 minutes before slicing.

Sending all my love, ~ox

— Knead to Cook

Easy Crusty Vegan Herbed Bread.

by Filed Under: Breads, Breakfast, Brunch, Vegan

I’ve been on a bread making kick lately. Let’s face it… I have plenty of time recovering from knee surgery and with the COVID isolation. Honestly, homemade bread is super easy and tastes incredible but it was the one thing I thought I never had time to do before. The fact is it takes just a few minutes to create but a few hours of resting where you can do a ton of other things without worrying about it.

You can bake bread in a loaf pan or on a pizza stone but I opted to bake my bread in a Dutch oven to yield a perfectly crusty loaf. Honestly, this recipe is quite fail-proof. I hope you give this one a try! Tonight we’ll pair this up with some marinara and vegan meatballs. A simple plate of good olive oil and balsamic for dipping… basically heaven.

Ingredients:

3.75 to 4 cups of organic all purpose flour
1.5 cups of 100-105 degree water (you must gauge the temp to ensure you don’t kill the yeast)
2 tbl of instant yeast
1.5 tsp of sea salt
2 tbl dried oregano or 2 tbl of Italian seasonings
1 tsp of garlic powder or you can chop up fresh garlic and add that instead

Method:

Into your stand mixer, with the dough hook attached, add your flour (start with 3.75 cups), warm water, yeast, salt and spices. Stir to combine for about 2 minutes.

In the meantime, oil a large bowl and set aside. Once the dough is blended, should be slightly sticky but easy to handle. If the dough is super sticky add the additional flour and mix. Turn the dough out and place into your prepared oiled bowl. Cover with a towel and place in a warm spot in your kitchen. Allow the dough to rise for 1.5 to 2 hours. It will double in size.

In the meantime, preheat your oven to 450 degrees with your Dutch oven inside.

Once the dough has risen, turn it out on a floured surface and turn the dough onto itself basically like pulling the edges up and pushing into the center. Repeat until you have a lovely smooth ball of dough.

Carefully remove your Dutch oven. Again, carefully place the seam side of the dough ball into your pot and cover. Bake for 40 minutes. Remove and take the bread out and allow to cool properly. It should be crusty and sound hollow when tapped.

Slice and enjoy once you can safely handle it.


~ox

— Knead to Cook

Hearty Lentil Stew. Vegan. GF.

by Filed Under: Gluten Free, Lentils, Soups, Stews, Vegan, Vegan proteins, Wheat Free

Right now, I’m finding using up pantry essentials for our dinners quite cathartic. I feel like I’m hoarding my fresh veggies for my salads and focusing on beans and lentils with quinoa or rice as our main meal. Plus saving money where we can, during this unsure time, is necessary.

I’ve been off from work recovering from yet another knee surgery. My husband is still going into work daily. Both of our daughters are still doing classes online and working outside of the home as well. In fact our oldest remained at school in her apartment to remain at work. Such a weird time. I’m hoping you are getting into the kitchen to whip up some good comfort food even if you aren’t a cooking fan. This dish is very easy and forgiving. A great place to start 🙂 I served it with some fresh homemade dinner rolls which everyone loved.

Ingredients:

Olive oil to coat your pan
1 yellow or red onion, diced
3 large carrots, chopped
1 stalk of celery, chopped (keep the leaves and add them as well)
6 cloves of garlic, minced
1 large potato, I used a purple sweet potato but a white potato will work as well*
2.5 cups of green lentils, washed and drained
1 tsp of dried oregano
1-2 tsp of smoked paprika
1 tsp of smoked or regular salt
A few cracks of fresh pepper
1 tsp of liquid smoke
8 cups of vegetable broth
2 tbl of tomato paste
1 tbl of apple cider vinegar
1 cup of frozen kale

Method:

Into a large stock pot, add a drizzle of olive oil to the bottom of the pan over medium heat. Add your onions, carrots and celery to cook for 6-8 minutes stirring often. Add your garlic and cook for 1-2 minutes. Then add your potato, lentils, seasonings, smoke, broth and paste. Stir to combine. Bring to a boil and then reduce to a low simmer and cover your pot. Cook until the lentils are softened throughout. Prior to serving add your acv and frozen kale. Stir to combine. Taste and add additional s&p as desired.

*When choosing your potato the sweet version will add a slight sweetness to the dish. The purple potato also makes the stew dark. A white or Yukon will not add sweetness and will keep the stew more red/tomato colored.

I hope you enjoy this dish. It’s better the day after as the flavors will develop more. We served over basmati rice along with some fresh dinner rolls.

Sending you all of my love~

— Knead to Cook