Sorry, Columbus. But I blew this popsicle stand!

Hi all,

I've recently moved to the beautiful city of Indianapolis and as such, am no longer your go-to for vegan living in Columbus, OH. That being said, I'm still sharing awesome recipes and tips, so feel free to head on over to "The Indy Vegan" and check us out.

Stay classy, c-busers!

<3 p="">

I made quesadillas and all I have to show for it is a blurry iPhone photo

Make no mistake about it, I am not the master chef that Tracy is. I can follow a recipe. Kind of. But cooking off the top of my head, in any type of freestyle situation, is way beyond me.

But Tracy challenged me to make a quesadilla instead of going to the outside world and picking up some junk food.

So that's exactly what I did.

I know it's still junk food, but it was MY junk food.

There's no recipe per se. A recipe for a quesadilla, even for a pure, clueless amateur like myself, is over the top. Just kidding. I needed a recipe:

-Put a teaspoon of butter in a medium-heat pan and let it melt. Swirl it around.
-lay down your flour tortilla and get your Daiya cheese on it immediately.
-(optional)chop up some prepared Gardein and put it on top of the cheese
-cover the pan and let the cheese melt
-Put the top tortilla on and flip the quesadilla
-Don't leave the 2nd side on too long.
-BAM! Eat that stuff.


I do have a few tips for the complete novice though.

1) a little bit of butter in the pan goes a long way. Don't soak it though because then your finished product ends up greasy. If you like that sort of thing, go for it though.

2) Once your pan heats up, flour tortillas burn fast. Especially after you flip to the 2nd side and there's not as much butter in the pan. Peel it up with a spatula quickly and make sure it doesn't burn. I burned one pretty bad and it still tasted good.

3) Gardein breaded chicken and Daiya's Pepperjack style cheese are the bomb. So make your quesadilla with those things and you can't go wrong. Tracy's cilantro-lime sour cream doesn't hurt either.

4) Apply the hot sauce of your choice if you like that sort of thing. I sure do.

Finally I'm Fresh

If you're a vegan and you're into naturalish products, you're constantly tempted to slip up and try something more, how shall we say it, mainstream?

It could be a soap, a shaving cream, a tampon with a plastic applicator instead of a paper one. There is a diffent temptation for each of us.

For me it's deodorant.

I've been searching a long time for a deodorant that A) works. And b) won't give me leukemia. With those two parameters, it's hard to find the perfect choice.

After almost giving up on the natural deodorant search and settling with some strongly scented commercial stuff like Axe, I sniffed around the co-op (literally) - pulling off cap after cap in hopes of finding something non-feminine and effective.

And then I did.

It was love at first sniff. I found Zion Health's Adama Minerals citrus blossom ClayDry deodorant.

My new particular flavor showcases what a sucker I am for citrus - orange blossom. It is an all gender acceptable, light orange aroma grounded in the earthy smells of clay. A touch of hippy, a touch of high class. Just like I it.

Stop by the Clintonville Community Market and try some out. Well, not right in the store. But buy some and try it out.

Loaded Baked Potatoes for 1

Potato of doom!

Twice-baked potatoes are a thing of beauty. It's like a combination of the 2nd and 3rd best way to eat a potato (the first being french fries IMHO). You get the crispy outside of baked potato coupled with the velvety texture of mashed potatoes. I don't know if I would necessarily call these true twice-baked potatoes, so I'll just call them "loaded" - as in "loaded with toppings and deliciousness".

Cheater Chick'n & Cheeze Empanadas: Pockanadas?

The golden, crispy exterior

I hate to call these empanadas. I feel like I'm doing a huge disservice to that which is a true empanada. So, we'll say these are somewhere between a super fancy hot pocket and an empanada. Fancy Pockanada? No? I'll work on it. But I definitely see Hot Pocket stealing that from me. THEN who will have the last laugh?

That being said, these are insanely delicious. Inside, the Daiya cheese and cream sauce melt together to make a phenomenally decadent center. The gardein chicken is strong enough to handle all the cooking, so it retains it's flaky, chicken-like consistency. A little jalapeno makes for a touch of heat. A handful of spinach to make you feel good about it. And the puff pastry outside... well, find me someone who hates puff pastry. We'll talk.

The Wynn creates a vegan oasis in the desert

Tofu and Eggplant

It's an old cliche - a billionaire creates an epic hotel, hires some of the world's finest chefs, goes vegan and then makes all the world famous chefs create vegan menus.

Well, it's not a cliche at all, but it should be.

Tracy and I sat down together to see if there were any good reasons to get out of town for the weekend. The idea of Vegas came up. It was probably a joke at first, but the idea became a real possibility when we remembered some old vegan news clippings that fell through our google news filters about an eccentric rich guy, Steve Wynn, who was doing something crazy: veganizing his restaurants. ( read about his veganism )

Cornbread, Ain't Nothin' Wrong with That

Chris Rock has forever ruined cornbread for me. I can't even begin to utter the words without immediately thinking: "Ain't nothin' wrong with that!!"And if you have no idea what I'm talking about, you should listen to this while you bake this AMAZING, incredibly perfect cornbread: