Vegan meal planning: day 3 January 5, 2012

It’s day three in the meal plan book and things are going good. Tonight we finally tried the black bean and butternut squash chili – its so good!! As you can see above, i ate most of it before i remembered to snap a picture. Here’s the recipe, we modified it to make it more child friendly and had the babies taste test it and they liked it too.

Black bean and butternut squash chili*

Ingredients:
1 chopped onion
3 cloves garlic
1 medium butternut squash
2 (15 oz) cans black beans, drained
1 (28 oz) can crushed tomatoes
3/4 cup water or veg broth
1 tsp cumin
1 tbsp paprika
Black pepper to taste

Directions

1. In a large stockpot, sauté the onion and garlic in oil until soft.
2. Reduce heat and add the remaining ingredients.
3. Cover and simmer for 25 minutes. Uncover and summer for another 5 minutes. (I’m going to note here that it took a bit longer than 25 minutes for our squash to be cooked).

* adapted from the daily vegan planner

Vegan meal planning: day 1 January 3, 2012

Today was the first day that my husband and I would be using the vegan meal plan book that he’d gotten me. It’s always easy to eat vegan on the first day. But, with the meal plans given in the book, it’s way more food than I normally eat in a day.

Breakfast was a bagel with peanut butter and a banana. And, no, I didn’t give up my coffee.

Lunch was a veggie burger on whole wheat bread with lettuce, sprouts, mustard, ketchup, and a slice of fake cheeze. And a cup of vegetarian baked beans.

Dinner, pictured above, should’ve been pasta and sauce with a giant salad. I didn’t want straight up pasta so I made a thick pasta soup. I combined sliced red onion, chopped carrots, celery, some leftover mini pasta stars, and chick peas. I then added some tomato sauce, and lots of spices. It turned out pretty good. Our salad was romaine hearts, cucumber, orange, sunflower seeds, sprouts and a strawberry vinegarette. The drink is a (hot) black cherry tea, it is cold tonight! Oh, for dessert I had a small cup of applesauce that was an apple/pineapple/passion fruit blend, it was really good.

But yeah, the meal plan book had a snack of raw veggies an hummus planned out and my husband and I never ate them. Maybe as a snack during baby-less tv time?