VeganMoFo

Our winner is Megan, who says, “A dab does the job on my Ezekiel bread!”

When I first made the transition from vegetarian to vegan, I did so with enthusiasm and excitement. I was already eating soy yogurt and drinking non-dairy milk, I had learned about vegan baking…and then I tried an not-to-be-named margarine that happened to be vegan, and I kind of halted, because it was not good. Now, i’m no Paula Deen with a stick of butter in every dish, but I like a little pat of it on my toast, in my oatmeal, with potatoes…it is definitely my fat of choice. For the first time, I was concerned that I was really giving something up.

Thankfully, I quickly learned about Earth Balance margarine! I believe my initial reaction to trying it was something like, ‘ohthankgod’. I had a delicious, buttery spread to carry me forward into my new lifestyle. And their line is always expanding! Not only do they have the buttery spreads and sticks, but they now have vegan mayo, soymilk, and nut butters. And of course, everyone has at least seen the pictures of everyone enjoying the new coconut spread at Vida Vegan Con, which is delicious on anything you would normally put butter on (try it on cornbread).

Today, Earth Balance is offering one lucky winner a bamboo cutting board and a year’s supply of Earth Balance (12 free product coupons)! Just comment here, telling me your favorite food/recipe to use Earth Balance with, be it a baked good or just on bread. This one is open to US and Canada, a winner will be randomly chosen tonight at 11 pm CST.

Here are our winners! Thank you to everyone for the pictures, whether you pulled them off of the internet, they are yours, or your foster pets. I spent a good chunk of my night/morning laughing and gushing. As usual, i’m glad I use a random number generator to pick people because if I had to pick the best picture, I would be here all day deciding!

Stacey wins Rabbit Food for sharing her diabetic cats, Pekoe and Larry with us.
Amanda wins Caribbean Vegan with this baby hedgehog in a coffee cup.

I will email you shortly!

I don’t know about you, but I am a cookbook hoarder collector. Which is funny, because i’m not much for meal planning or recipe following. So for me, cookbooks are a thing to read and look at, and since there are so many vegan cookbooks out these days, I kind of have high standards. I will pretty much never buy a book without photos (except zines/DIY books), and I prefer that they have a special angle to them. Like, I know how to make a bean burrito already.

Which is why i’m so glad that today we are giving away two beautiful books that are sure to be a great addition to anyone’s collection!

First up, we have Vegan Caribbean by Taymer Mason (giveaway courtesy of The Experiment). This book is full of beautiful photographs, authentic Caribbean cuisine (Taymer is from Barbados), and I can guarantee you will learn about new flavors and dishes with this book. Here are samples of some of the recipes that await you: Curried Potato Salad, West Indian Pumpkin Fritters, and something really exciting, Holiday Ham!

The second book is Rabbit Food by Beth A. Barnett. This book is spiral bound, full of neat info like how to make your own grocery bag and some food history, and a ton of adorable illustrations. Beth used to put out the book all by herself, but has recently passed production onto Sasquatch Publishing (who are sponsoring the giveaway), this brand spankin’ new edition has new recipes and updated resources, but is just as cute as before! Beth has up lots of pictures and some sample recipes here, you really need to check out the pictures to see how much effort she put into it. Also, check out her etsy shop for more handmade paper items.

Since these books are from separate publishers, Vegan Caribbean is US only, while Rabbit Food is open to US and Canada. To win, please state which book you would like, and then link me to picture of a cute animal, because I am running out of creative questions to ask you guys and I like cute animals. I will pick a winner tomorrow morning around 9 am CST.

Winners!
Kelly, “Artichoke hearts, garlic, pesto, green olives, kalamata olives, mozzarella Daiya, sundried tomatoes, Upton’s Italian seitan, roasted red peppers, green peppers, and basil.”
Amy, “Sundried tomatoes, gardein chickn scallopini, olives, red onions and fresh basil with a roasted garlic sauce. Now I’m hungry…”
Ellen, “Kalamata olives, bella mushrooms, sundried tomatoes, and mozzarella Daiya cheese! YUM!”
Megan, “Artichoke, onions, mushrooms, and kalamata olives. So good!”

I use a random number generator to choose winners for fairness, but I think olives are gross, so after drawing four olivey pizzas I decided to hand-pick the last answer. Onions and garlic, heck yeah!

Shannon, “My dream pizza is one I just started making recently. I make 2 french bread rolls. After they are done and cooled off, I cut them in half and into fours. I use them as my crust. I top them with sauteed mushrooms, garlic, onions, and kale. I put a thin layer of Daiya on top, after I sauced them. Then I add my veggies, followed by another layer of Daiya. After I pop them out of the oven I sprinkle some vegan paremsan cheese on top along with a little basil and oregano. Sometimes if I add a little Sriracha to give a kick!”

You’ll be emailed in the morn!

There are a few touchy subjects among vegans that everyone has strong, differing opinions on. One of the big ones is which brand of vegan cheese you prefer, if any. Every brand has its fans, and the same brands have people who think it’s completely gross. But who cares, we now have more vegan cheese options than you can shake a stick at!

Daiya had the vegan world a-buzzing before it was even released. Shredded cheese? That melts? That isn’t soy? And if you’re a fan or not, you can’t deny that Daiya has really pushed vegan cheese out into the mainsteam. I have seen it Kroger grocery stores, a place where I have never seen anything but those non-vegan veggie shreds. It’s in Amy’s products, Gardein, Tofurkey is making frozen pizzas with it…and restaurants are using it! Getting a vegan pizza where you don’t overpay for them to take off the cheese is an exciting thing, especially if you don’t live in a big city where vegan foods are easier to find.

(Vegan pizza with Daiya from Pi Pizzeria in St. Louis)

My personal favorite way to use Daiya is pepperjack flavor + tortilla = instant quesadilla!

Today, we are giving away three free product coupons to five lucky winners, meaning you can get a bag of each flavor if you want! Since I now have pizza on the brain, just comment here with your dream vegan pizza combination to enter! This giveaway is open to US and Canada only. The winners will be chosen tonight at 11 pm CST.

Here are our winners:

Em, “Plain with blueberries and walnuts sprinkled with chia seeds. MMM.”
Lauren, “Oh man, I just tried this for the first time yesterday, and I LOVE it. The peach flavor is pretty much perfect, but I’m interested in trying blueberry next.”
Linda, “I’ve never tried it! Love vanilla non-dairy yogurt with fruit on top. How interesting about the cultures in other non-dairy yogurts.”
Aimee, “Would love to make a peach Amande popsicle.”
Kristen, “I just discovered Amande yogurt last month. In fact, it’s the yogurt I used in my Iron Chef Challenge recipe! My absolute fave to eat by itself is cherry. It is better than ANY yogurt I’ve ever had. Coconut is my favorite in a smoothie and with granola. And I bake with plain. The Hubster likes the raspberry best. Can you tell we love this stuff??? :)”

You will be contacted shortly!

(image courtesy of onemileonemeal.com)

Vegans can’t live without their yogurt! And these days we don’t have to. There are so many options out there, but Amande is really unique. First of all, they’re the first brand of almond milk yogurt, and that’s got to count for something. Secondly, all of their yogurts are sweetened naturally with fruit juice, not sugar. And to top it all off (literally?), Amande’s probiotics are grown in a non-dairy medium. I won’t get all yogurty on you, but some of the non-dairy yogurts start their cultures off in dairy. How awesome is it to know that dairy isn’t necessary at all, even in yogurt?

Let’s get down to the most important part, the taste! Amande comes in 6 different flavors, and as I’ve tried them all I can tell you that the coconut is the best (cherry and strawberry are tied for second). You can also get plain and vanilla in a 24 ounce tub, which is awesome to bake with. Unless you’ve been living under a vegan rock, you probably know that you can replace the eggs in most recipe with yogurt: 1/4 cup yogurt = one egg. Easy peasy!

They all have a custardy consistency, and seem more like a dessert than a breakfast item. I’ve even used it in place of ice cream, eaten with pie (Ginger Peach Pandowdy from Vegan Pie in the Sky):

As a bonus, did you know that the cultures in yogurt are good for your skin? Yogurt is a much easier and tastier way to help keep the pimples at bay than creams full of nasty chemicals.

Tonight we’re giving away 2 free product coupons and 4 discount coupons to 5 (count ‘em FIVE) lucky winners! To enter the contest, just visit the Amande site, pick a flavor and tell us your favorite way to eat it. Is it with granola? In a smoothie? Straight out of the carton? Winners will be chosen Monday afternoon! US only please, and don’t forget to enter a valid email address so that we can contact you. Good luck!

Our winner is Melinda, she says her favorite way to eat vegan sausauge is, “A bun and mustard. That’s it. Why mess with perfection?”

Vegan sausages may souns like an oxymoron to some, but I can’t think of a single (gluten eating) vegan who isn’t nuts about vegan sausages.  They’re fun to make, they’re fun to eat, they’re fun to just buy when you’re in a hurry for some ready-made protein.  And while I love making my own sausage flavors up on the fly, I can’t deny that Field Roast sausages have a unique texture that I will probably never be able to achieve at home.  The greatest thing about them though, is that they convinced one of my friends that he could live without pork products.  His fridge has more mock meat in it than mine!  Their new frankfurters are a big hit around here, so much so that I paid for a cooler to have a few packages shipped from Cosmo’s so my husband would stop crying.

Field Roast also makes deli slices, loaves, a meatloaf, a holiday celebration roast, and this holiday season they will have a new product for us!  I don’t see this on their site so this might be the world premiere of their Hazelnut Cranberry Roast En Croute!  Jazz hands!

The kind folks at Field Roast have a special package today for one very lucky winner, three free sausage coupons and a t-shirt!  Simply comment here and tell me your favorite dish to add sausagey goodness to!  (No one will judge you for saying ‘straight out of the package’.)  A winner will be chosen tonight at midnight, CST.  US only!

Our winner is Cara, who says that in the shower she sings:  “Bonnie Raitt’s “I Can’t Make You Love Me” haha. Why am I embarrassed to admit that?”  Email us your address if you see this, Cara!

We all know that finding vegan food can be hard, but you know what’s harder? Nice vegan soap! A lot of the artisan soap I can buy at the health food store has stuff like goats milk, beeswax, honey, etc. It can be really frustrating when you want to support your local businesses but they don’t offer any vegan products. As with many things I say, thank Al Gore for the internet.

Tracy from Strawberry Hedgehog contacted us and asked if we would like to give away some of her products – boy, would we!  I have personally never tried her products, but since I read Vegan Beauty Review, I know that Sunny loves them.  A lot.  She reviews a lot of products and is constantly changing up her favorites, so if she has been in love with one brand of soap for several years, trust that this is some good stuff!

Today, we are offering one lucky winner a jar of organic whipped body creme and the best selling soap set.  If you are of the manly persuasion, please note that the body creme is unscented and the scents in the soap set aren’t girly, so this isn’t just a giveaway for women.

To enter, simply comment here and tell us what your favorite song to sing in the shower is (don’t act like you don’t!).  A winner will be chosen at 11 pm CST tonight, US residents only.