This was a recipe in the making for about a week.  Every time Loren asked what was for dinner I always threw a “peanut butter jelly tortilla” in with the other options but he never bit.  The night I added “french toast-adilla” into play, he bit.  To make this crazy awesome dish, smear peanut butter all over one side of a whole wheat tortilla.  Add your favorite jelly to one half as well as sliced bananas.  Fold the tortilla over so that the peanut butter is on top and bottom and use it to seal the edges together.

Prepare an egg wash with 2 eggs and a dash of soy milk.  Pour the egg wash over the sealed quesadilla, moving it around so the entire thing is covered in the wash.  Place the quesadilla in a medium sized skillet (sprayed with some olive oil) on medium heat.  Flip just like you would with French Toast.  At one point, we positioned the half moon section of the quesadilla directly against the pan (as shown) and poured some of the leftover egg wash on top of the quesadilla so it created a thick egg outside to it.

Once it’s cooked to your satisfaction, cut into 4ths and sprinkle some cinnamon on top.

I surprised Loren with a nice breakfast this morning to start his day with a bang! Inside a whole wheat tortilla lies spicy scrambled eggs, spinach and Veggie Shreds cheese.

To make spicy scrambled eggs, crack two eggs into a small bowl with a little soy milk and whisk until mixed.  Next drop in 2-3 T of hot salsa and stir. Pour into a small skillet (that’s been sprayed with olive oil) and then add some Morningstar Farms Italian sausage crumbles and a dash of freshly ground black pepper and sea salt.  Every one has their own scrambled eggs method…I like to keep mine moving with a rubber spatula.  Once the scramble is completed, I put down a bed of spinach on top of the tortilla, then then eggs, then the Veggie Shreds.

Another good non meat to use, is to cook a black bean burger and then break it up into pieces and use that instead of cooking ’sausage’ in your eggs.  You get the same amount of spice and meat.  If you’re vegan you can use crumbled tofu instead of the eggs.  Put it in a skillet with some olive oil, salsa and veggie shreds cheese and cook (moving frequently).

Delicious!

Pasta at its best! As my beach trip quickly approaches, I’ve been letting the food run out in the house and only buying things that Loren will eat while I’m away (so my house is seriously lacking in my fruits and veggies). This dinner started with some salted boiling water for the noodles and then started building itself as I ventured through my cabinets and fridge.

Bring 3 T extra virgin olive oil, minced garlic (1 large clove) and chunks of red onion (about 1 cup) to medium heat in a large skillet. Keep this moving so you don’t burn the garlic (very important in making sauce…if the oil is too hot and the garlic turns brown, you’ve burnt it).  After you’ve cooked this for about 4 minutes (you’ll smell the onions and garlic) add the broccoli (I used a bag of fresh broccoli).  Let this cook for about 5 minutes (you may need to pour some more oil on top of the broccoli so they cook down a little) but while it’s cooking,  add 2 cups of halved grape tomatoes, 1 cup of raw sun dried tomatoes (not in water or oil…just dried in the sun) and 1 cup of tomato sauce.  Once the tomatoes have heated through, they will begin popping (or breaking)….you can speed up this process by squishing them with a fork into the skillet.  I then added some Morningstar Farm veggie Italian Sausage crumbles, some fresh rosemary from my garden and turned the heat down to low and covered (stirring occasionally).  Once the veggie sausage heats through, your sauce is done.  I poured the sauce over my cooked noodles, mixed and added some freshly grated parmigiano reggiano cheese.  Once plated I topped it off with some fresh basil leaves.

This is one of my newest favorite pasta dishes! It goes very well with some Cabernet.

Raw vegan sushi is too pretty not to post for the 292,038,727th time.  I made it with some of the usual ingredients: cucumber, broccoli shreds, avocado and carrot.

When I’m eating raw I often find myself missing one of my favorite meals: the sandwich. My raw vegan lettuce wraps do a great job putting an end to my sandwich hunger!

I made a lettuce wrap station on the table featuring shredded carrots, shredded broccoli, raw sun dried tomatoes, basil leaves (from the garden), avocado, green pepper slices, red onion, diced tomatoes, Tofurkey sliced in strips, raw asparagus and a variety of condiments: yellow mustard, grape seed oil Vegenaise, spicy brown mustard and Sriracha. We used romaine lettuce for the wrap (much like the raw-co).

I could put away like 6 of these bad boys.

Using left over raw ‘refried beans’ as well as the leftover vegetables that were prepared for raw-co night, I made myself a taco salad! When we make raw-cos, we use romaine lettuce and then wrap vegetables and ‘beans’ inside them.  I cut up the leftover romaine for the base and then added all of the leftover vegetables (carrots, broccoli shreds, grape tomatoes, red onion and green pepper) and then added an avocado half and a scoop of ‘beans’.  I used some organic, raw tomatillo salsa for dressing.

It was extremely filling and I only got through 2/3 of it. Loren had to come to my aid to finish it up.

I made this sandwich for Loren the other morning and had to take a bite.  It’s delicious and super filling–this is definitely a no side item sandwich!

First step, prepare your bread.  I put vegan butter on one side of both pieces of bread (just like a grilled cheese) and placed them on top of each other with the butter sides touching.  Then on the side of the top piece of bread that’s looking up at me (its un-buttered), I spread a thin layer of Vegenaise just to give the sandwich a little more flavor (I use the grape seed oil Vegenaise).

Next step, start your tempeh! Tempeh needs to cook in some liquid in the skillet for about 5 minutes before you place it on your sandwich.  I sliced a chunk off my tempeh bar and then sliced that bit thinly in half (so the two thin pieces would fit the bread perfectly).  I turned a small sized skillet on to medium heat, poured some soy sauce (about 2 T)  into it and then placed the tempeh on top, moving it around a little to ensure that it was covered and let it ride.  I flipped the temeph a couple of times to ensure that it warmed all the way through.  The tempeh will soak up the liquid in the pan.  Once it was finished, I started constructing the sandwich!

I put one slice of veggie cheese on top of the Vegenaise layer, then the tempeh on top of that, another piece of veggie cheese and finally, the last piece of bread (butter side out).  I’m assuming everyone has made a grilled cheese before so you all know that the butter sides of the bread go down on the pan. I used the same pan as I cooked the tempeh in; because the tempeh soaked up the soy sauce, I didn’t have to worry about cleaning it first.  Any reminisce left on the pan will add a little more flavor into the bread.  Cook the sandwich, flipping from time to time (still on medium heat) until its reached your desired deliciousness. (hehe)

You can fancy up the sandwich by adding onion, tomatoes, spinach, etc.  I was in a simple mood that day otherwise I would have! Maybe next time….

HMoC!! My new favorite thing in the world is Avocado Gazpacho! It’s like eating guacamole with a spoon! This recipe is 100% raw and 200% delicious.

To start this trip to delicious city, you will need to cut up 1 zucchini and 2 small yellow squash in about 3/4 inch circles. Slice 1 ring of onion about the same thickness (and then into fourths) and 1/2 a red bell pepper into chunks.  Put these ingredients into the bowl of your food processor and pulse so its choppy but not too small or in a paste.  These veggies will be filler in your gazpacho.  Transfer this mixture to a medium size bowl.

Cut the corn off of 2 cobs and add to the vegetable mixture in the bowl.

Put 1 avocado in the bowl of the food processor along with 1 medium size tomato (already pre-chopped) and pulse this so its chunky (but watch out! the avocado will turn to guac if pulsed too much). Add this mixture to the veggie bowl and add the juice of 1 lime and a pinch of sea salt.

Next, put 2 avocados in the food processor along with 1/2 of a small jalapeno (seeded), 1 clove of garlic and the juice of 1 lemon.  Turn the food processor to ‘On’ (instead of pulse) and let these ingredients turn into a paste (or sauce).  Pour this  sauce into the gazpacho bowl along with some some water and whisk together.  The amount of water is up to you…I added it twice making sure that each time I did it wasn’t too much.  I left it kinda of thick but you can add more water if you’d like it more soupy.

Once plated, I topped my gazpacho with some raw sunflower seeds and red pepper flakes. This recipe will serve 3-4 depending on how much you like it. I had 2 helpings and so did Loren and we had some left over.  Its kept in the fridge since last night so I may snack on it today (hehe). Loren ate his as gazpacho and with chips (like guac).  It tastes like fancy guacamole; every bite you take you can taste the corn, the spice of the jalapeno, the zucchini and squash.

Delicious!

*update: im eating the leftover gazpacho now for lunch and its even better after it sits overnight! i know most gazpachos you let sit but I was weary because this one had so much avocado in it and it oxidizes quickly.

Hello friends!

We just wanted to let you know that we haven’t forgotten about the blog–quite the opposite! We’re working hard on putting together a cook book that you can buy either online or have a hard cover shipped to your house! We are also updating the site and adding features like a “send this recipe to a friend” button, a contact button and some other little tricks.

We had a friend recently tell us that the bottom of the page featuring the About Me is cut off. In case other people were wondering why that is the way it is, its because it’s actually just a preview of the About Me page.  In order to see the whole page, click the About link at the top of any page.

If at any point and time you want to contact us before we put up the Contact button, simply comment on a post and we can chat through there OR follow us on twitter (@cararusso) and we can DM each other if you’d like to keep it private!

Thank you for being patient with us as we update the site. We want y’all to have a good time and make sure you’re getting as much information as possible at all times.

xoxoxo

-Rustin and friends

p.s. become a fan of carol rustin on facebook! 

Here at the Rustin house, we take exercise very seriously. I switch up my exercise routine between going to the gym and running, doing the elliptical and/or the bike, walking/running around the neighborhood, doing crunches at night (courtesy of my Bender Ball *see below*) and doing Yoga using either Wii Fit on the Wii or Let’s Yoga on the Nintendo DS (both great work out games!!!).

Last week we had an out of town visitor staying with us and he wanted to see the sights of Atlanta.  Thursday we went to Stone Mountain to hike up to the top and do all of the other little games/sights inside Stone Mountain Park.  I had a BLAST climbing the mountain! It’s a mile to the top and at first you’re just using rocks as stepping stones but then it turns into a steep flat slope for the last 1/3 (?) mile.  There are handrails at one point to help you with the steepness of the mountain.  I’m tempted to go back and try to run up to the top (hah!).  I would go here weekly for exercise but its $8 to park and I don’t want to spend $8 a week to park. Maybe I can find a buddy and we can each pay $4…any takers? (hehe)

**I do not recommend buying a Bender Ball. While the ball is easy to use and makes doing crunches more effective, the company rips you off.  Your account will constantly be charged $20 a month and they keep sending you DVDs without permission and taking more money out of your account for them.  I contacted them THREE times to get them to stop charging me.  Finally my bank handled it for me because they wouldn’t stop.