I mentioned before that for the entire month of August, Jonathan & I are challenging ourselves to eat 100% vegan. It’s been one week since we’ve started, & I’m enjoying it very much. I’ve been experimenting more with recipes & ingredients, & have been keeping my mind as open as possible to new foods. Surprisingly, it’s been quite easy to incorporate dairy-free meals into our food routine. Granted, I have cheated a bit with some pre-made baked goods (there’s butter or powdered eggs in everything, it seems). Otherwise, I haven’t had a craving for cheese or ice cream once.

This week, I’m going to try vegan pizza for the first time, which uses vegan cheese. & before this month’s end, I hope to eat at a vegan restaurant. These are both things I never would have been so willing to try, but I’m suddenly excited about it.

All I hope to gain from this 31 day challenge is a new appreciation for different meals & less of a dependency on dairy products. If more comes from it than that — say, being 100% vegan from here on out — I’m open to that, too.

(Oh, & a lot of you asked if I would be sharing my vegan meals here. The answer to that is OF COURSE! How could I not?)

Today’s recipe is one of the first baked vegan dishes I’ve ever made. It’s also the best fucking cornbread I’ve ever had. It’s so moist & dense & sweet that it’s as though you’re eating cake, which is why I like to call it Vegan Cornbread Cake.

Before this recipe, I used to eat my cornbread with butter & honey. But this cornbread is so delicious that you can eat it straight from the oven, no butter needed. I’d also like to add that every time I make this, Jonathan is adamant that if he could leave me & marry this cornbread he would. & I wouldn’t blame him. Seriously… it’s that good. & this picture doesn’t do it justice.

1 cup sorghum or maple syrup
1¼ cups soy milk (or soy/rice blend)
¼ cup safflower oil
1½ cups cornmeal
½ cup whole wheat pastry flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon fine sea salt

Preheat the oven to 400 °F / 204 °C.

Oil a 9″ x 9″ (or similar size) baking dish or 12-cup muffin tin.

Combine the sorghum, soy milk, & oil in a medium bowl & mix well. In another bowl, stir together cornmeal, flour, baking soda, & salt. Add the dry mixture to the wet mixture, & mix just until well combined.

Pour the batter into the prepared pan & bake for 25 – 30 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center of the cornbread or a muffin comes out clean. The cornbread will be a nice golden brown & insanely delicious. Enjoy!

(This recipe was found in the book The Kind Diet.)

[notes]

• The prep time for this recipe takes less than 5 minutes, so you’ll be enjoying scrumptious cornbread in no time. It also leaves your kitchen smelling divine.
• Sorghum is a type of molasses, but I’ve only used maple syrup to make this recipe. If you don’t have maple syrup or sorghum, don’t substitute it for molasses. It’s not the same.
• Keep in mind: the batter will be very, very watery & you’ll think that you did something wrong. But don’t worry, it’ll start to rise & thicken beautifully just as soon as the heat hits it. I promise.
• Don’t overwork the batter. Doing so will cause the bread to be tough & heavy. Stir it just enough so that the ingredients are blended completely. Also, don’t let the batter sit too long. The baking soda will lose its effectiveness if so.
• We usually eat the cornbread with collard greens, soup, or chili. But it could easily be a dessert, a midnight snack, or a morning nibble with your coffee. Whichever you prefer.

(If you make this recipe, I’d love to know how it turns out. & I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.)

1.) Enjoying Sofie Aiko’s happy face & crooked teeth on her 4th birthday (7/25). She had just finished a scrumptious birthday dinner of rice & green beans. It was so good that it stayed with her (on her face) for the rest of the evening.

2.) Watching cucumbers grow in our garden…

3.) … & our tomatoes starting to show their true-leaves.

4.) Stacks & stacks of old magazines, given to me by my mom & sister. I plan on shredding them to smithereens & creating abstract, typography art from them, as per suggestions from family & friends. I might even decide to sell a few.

5.) Playing Big Two with Jonathan. This was a card game that we bonded over when we first started dating. I’m not the best strategist, so Jonathan usually wins most of the time. I don’t mind losing, just as long as I can watch him shuffle & deal. The way he shuffles & deals the cards turns me on. (He used to be a professional card dealer.)

6.) Inheriting (or holding onto) my great-great-uncle Luther’s pipes. Perhaps even pretending to smoke them. I find pipes so fascinating.

not shown:

loving my curly-headed self; discovering new music (which will be the death of me & my bank account); helping my sister & mom prepare for their move to Portland, Oregon; connecting with new bloggers & readers from all over the world; relishing in yummy vegan food, & not missing cheese once; preparing for my very first college class (Introduction to DSLR Cameras); watching interesting movies (Mary & Max, Chloe, An Education, The Book of Eli, Volver); beating PvZ for the fifth time.

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Q: what have you been up to?

shirt – Nasty Gal; shorts – Jonathan’s old skinny jeans; shoes – Asos.com

Having a shaved head — while combating the miseducation of natural hair — has been quite the adventure.

Most days, I’m still in disbelief that I’ve actually done it. Most days, I feel beautiful, empowered, free. Most days, I feel more feminine than I ever have before.

But then there are days where it seems like everyone is staring at my head; where I feel like I stick out like a sore thumb; where I feel boyish & awkward; where everything I put on exaggerates the discomforting thoughts that I look a bit masculine.

I know it’s ridiculous. I know what people have told me incessantly (“Your face is far too feminine for anyone to ever think you look like a boy.”). But trying to make this clear to my brain, which is heavily entrenched in the age old misconception that hair = femininity, is not easy.

I wasn’t prepared for all of this inner battling with my ego. I didn’t think that I would have to talk myself into feeling feminine everyday. I especially didn’t think that I would feel so terribly foreign in my own skin.

To combat the yucky thoughts, I’ve made it a habit to repeat this mantra over & over until I can’t stand it:

I am not my hair. I am not my hair.

I am not my hair. I am not my hair.

I am not my hair. I am not my hair.

Then I peruse through Le Coil’s & Kwesi Abbensetts’ archives. After which, like clockwork, I am back to my optimistic, sunshiney self.

Which goes to show you: Sometimes all you need is a bit of inspiration to give you enough courage to keep going.

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Oh, & a BIG hello to all my new readers! Thank you so much for your readership, but especially for your support & love for Apricot Tea. I can’t wait to get to know all of you. Say hello to me on Twitter. We’ll be friends. :]

There are many, many reasons I am in love with Jonathan. One of them is that he has opened my mind & heart to new things, especially when it comes to food. Before him, I’d never tried hummus or pad Thai or Vietnamese food. My meals were limited to peanut butter & jelly sandwiches & Hot Pockets. Thanks to him, he’s completely expanded my meal horizons by introducing yummy & healthy dishes to me. The yummiest to date is this quinoa recipe that we make far too often.

Quinoa is a whole-grain that is loaded with protein & fiber. Think of it like rice, but much heartier. The texture of quinoa (if steamed properly) is slightly crunchy & the taste is bland enough that you can add all kinds of ingredients to personalize it to your taste.

This is the only recipe I’ve ever tried for quinoa, & I’m pretty dead set on it. I think you’re going to love it.

2 teaspoons grated lime zest
2 tablespoons fresh lime juice
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
1 tablespoon oil
1 teaspoon sugar (we use agave)
1 cup quinoa
1 (14- to 15-ounce) can black beans, rinsed and drained
2 medium tomatoes, diced
1-2 green onion, chopped
1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro

Wash quinoa in 2 changes of cold water. Put quinoa in a pot with 1½ – 2 cups of water; bring to boil. Then turn the fire down low to a simmer & cover to steam. Cook for 20 minutes (or until it’s reached its desired softness).

Meanwhile, whisk together lime zest & juice, butter, oil, & sugar in a large bowl.

Add dressing to quinoa & toss until dressing is absorbed. Stir in black beans, tomatoes, green onion, & cilantro. Mix well.

Salt to taste & enjoy!

(This recipe was simplified from Epicurious.)

[notes]

• This recipe takes about 30 minutes to make. You can also cook quinoa in a rice maker, which will no doubt cut the time in half.
• We usually eat this dish with tortilla chips & guacamole (or a diced avacado). But it would easily go well with a nice side salad.
• Quinoa comes in a three gorgeous colors — white, red, & black — & they all taste differently. Play around with the different colors & flavors of the quinoa. White & red combined is my favorite.
• Note from Jonathan: If you want to get lucky, make this for your wife and do the dishes afterward. ;)

(If you make this recipe, I’d love to know how it turns out. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.)