Roseburg Health Fair Sept. 26 '10

Roseburg Seventh-Day Adventist Church's Health Fair was a grand success. Many visitors came to check out the many booths featuring different areas of health information. We enjoyed our time there as well and had a nice turnout for the two cooking demonstrations we presented featuring delicious healthy food preparation. Brian showed the guests how to prepare his signature appetizer from his second book entitled The Maui Vegetarian Hana Hou, the Glazed Onion Stuffed with Curried Vegetables. Something you can make when you want to 'wow' your guests without having to slave in the kitchen. He also showed how to do a simple and delicious dessert, the Coconut Carob Pudding. Crystal explained a little about gluten intolerance and showed how we can prepare a healthful and filling meal that is also gluten free. She made Polenta with Wild Mushroom Creme Sauce. And also showed a very easy dessert, Strawberry Cheezecake.

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We always enjoy presenting our cooking demonstrations where we focus on showing folks how easy it is to prepare delicious vegan meals. Many thanks to our friends at the Roseburg Seventh Day Adventist Church for having us again to be a part of a good thing and all the hard work put on by the nice people there so that those in the community can know something of God's goodness by providing us with information on how we can all be healthier.

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Take care and Be Well!

Roseburg SDA Kitchen Crew serving up burgers.

Friendly folks here to help. Thanks to our good friend David!!

Crystal's cooking demo.

Sept. 2010: Upcoming Venues...

We are on the road again! Coming up next, we plan to be at the Olive East Seventh-Day Adventist Church on Sunday September 19 in Merced, California. We'll be having a cooking presentation at 5:30. The public is invited to attend.
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The following Sunday, one can find us back near our hometown at the Roseburg SDA Church. The Church will be having a Health Fair on Sunday September 26 from 1:00 to 5:00 pm. We'll conduct a cooking demonstration, and also have a booth there where folks can try out some samples of our food as well as purchase our books.
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Be in good health!

June 20 '10

Aloha!

We are finally home in Oregon after a month and a half on the road. 4 weeks were spent in Holbrook, Arizona where we conducted cooking classes, busily sending out cookbook orders to various locations, including Hawaii. Brian and I had an awesome (and busy) time at the Modern Manna Health and Healing Crusade. It was truly a success with over a thousand attendees at its peak listening to inspiring messages from speakers such as Danny Vierra, Dave Westbrook, Charlotte Gerson, and more! They have already sceduled next years' Crusade for July 17-19, 2011. If you've never attended one of these, make it a point to go!

For now, we have a couple more things on the schedule. We'll be conductings a cooking class for the NW Vegetarian Society in Portland on August 15, 2010. We're looking forward to seeing our friends that are part of this fantastic group of health-concious, eco-friendly, and compassionate people.

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Also on the schedule, you can find us at the Beaverton Seventh-Day Adventist Church the following day on August 16,2010. Lots of people come out to learn more about our style of vegan cooking and have a lot of fun in the meantime.

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On September 19, 2010, we'll be a part of the Roseburg Seventh-Day Adventist Health Fair, holding a booth where you can sample some of our goodies and have the opportunity to purchase our cookbooks. We'll also be conducting a couple of cooking demonstrations throughout the day. It is an all-day affair from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. and there will be lots of good information you can get for free! More details later.

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Until next time, A hui hou and have a happy, healthy life!

New Cookbooks are Here! May 2010

We are happy to say that our cookbooks have finally arrived, and they look great! We are currently in Arizona conducting cooking classes with various groups and will be in California at the Modern Manna Health Crusade on June 11-13. We'll be opening up this awesome health program with a cooking demonstration on Friday June 11 at 1:00 p.m. If you can make it there, stick around, for there will be some very engaging speakers all weekend to educate us all. Admittance is FREE, camping is FREE and meals are FREE. For more information: http://www.modernmanna.org/.

Vegetable Patty from The Maui Vegetarian Hana Hou

Check out our two new cookbooks online at http://www.themauivegetarian.com/, The Maui Vegetarian Hana Hou and Easy Gourmet for Gluten Free Vegans.

Have a happy and healthy day!

Breaded Eggplant from Easy Gourmet for Gluten Free Vegans

Update: More Cookbooks...03-24-10

We will be releasing two new cookbooks in The Maui Vegetarian line soon. You can expect to see them by the beginning of May 2010. We are also setting up a schedule to present cooking demonstrations, classes, and health lectures. If you are interested in our presentations featuring vegetarian recipes from our cookbooks, raw food preparation, information on health and healing, or your suggestions, please contact us through our web site at www.themauivegetarian.com. We hope many will be blessed by our books and presentations. Mahalo!

The Maui Vegetarian-Hana Hou- Brian's second book featuring more of his fantastic recipes. In Hawaii, the phrase "hana hou" is the equivalent of "encore" here in the States. And so he once again brings an array of deliciously creative dishes from diverse ethnicities to the table from appetizers like his Glazed Onion Stuffed with Curried Vegetables, to entrees such as the Rice Noodle Cake with Thai Sweet Sour Sauce, and all the way to desserts like his Banana Bread Napoleon and much more in between. Full of colorful photographs, Hana Hou will continue to inspire masterful culinary creations in your kitchen. $18.95

Easy Gourmet for Gluten-Free Vegans- Crystal's cookbook addresses the growing need for satisfying fare when gluten must be excluded from the vegan diet. She brings a collection of deliciously simple every-day recipes that can make every meal a gourmet meal as well as information on gluten-intolerance and Celiac disease. A gluten-free vegan herself, she brings her Asian/American and multi-cultural influence into the recipes presented, featuring lots of colorful photographs. $14.95

Gluten-Free Ravioli? More fun in the kitchen...Dec. 09 '09

Haven't been good about being timely in posting stuff up. I'm supposed to be working on a project for which I have two weeks to finish. Something is always coming up. Here's one of the things that keeps coming up. I neglect to admit that I just keep getting distracted and my project is stressing me out and I just can't focus when I'm under pressure, and....

So I went a little too overboard on amazon.com but couldn't help pass this up...a real, authentic ravioli maker! It wasn't that cheap, but it all worked out and I'm a happy camper 'cause when I got it in the mail today, I found it to be an Italian product (sick of buying things made in P.R.O.C) and well-constructed.

Well, I don't get too excited about gluten-free foods anymore because what I'm savoring in my mind is often disappointed by my tastebuds. If you recently had to go gluten-free, then you will surely understand. But I do get excited for challenges in the kitchen. Turned out that the end result exceeded my (non)expectations.

The above photo represents the finished product with our Garlic Cashew Creme Sauce, some Marinara we canned from Big Lick Farm's delicious organic and heirloom tomatoes, and fresh parsley. How do I get these pictures bigger? Here's one last try...

Hope that photo helps a bit. Anyway, Brian made a Mushroom and Spinach Duxelle for the filling. So after formulating a recipe for the dough, I rolled it out on my handy-dandy ravioli maker to be quite thin. A bit hard to work with because there's no elasticity as with wheat flour, so it does need to be handled gently so that it doesn't tear. Filled the pockets with the Duxelle and put the second layer over. Also tricky to try to seal it with the roller. I think I might have over-filled them, so I'll keep practicing to get it right.

The raviolis held up very well in the pot of boiling water. I really was expecting them to explode but they didn't. After initially dropping them in the water that was at a rolling boil, I turned down the heat a bit so that the bubbles weren't so violent in the pot, just a low rolling boil. Continued that for about 5 minutes and then gently lifted each one out with a spoon-type strainer. I still wasn't taking any chances at having an explosion happen.

My tastebuds are happy, but I'll keep experimenting and having fun with my ravioli maker. I'm thinking of making a Butternut squash filling on the next try. Also, I'll try replacing the white rice flour with brown rice flour to make it healthier. Hope you try it out too and have fun while you're at it!

Gluten-Free and Vegan Pasta Dough

2/3 cup tapioca flour
2/3 cup cornstarch
1/3 cup white rice flour
¼ cup potato starch
1 tsp. sea salt
1 tsp. xanthan gum
2 Tbsp. olive oil
1 cup water

Combine flours and starches, sea salt and xanthan gum. Add the olive oil and water, a little at a time. Mix with a spoon. You will want to have a pliable dough that is not sticky. If it is sticky, add white rice flour a little at a time, or if too dry add water a tablespoon at a time.

Lunch Today: Patties, Potatoes and Greens Oct. 02 '09

My heading didn't sound so appetizing did it? But for lunch in a hurry, it was really very good, so I thought I'd better share this one for you time-challenged people trying to get a healthy meal on the table. This was an under-30-minutes-meal... Sorry picture is not so good, I didn't know the camera was on low resolution.

Ingredients for the patty:

1 onion, quartered

1/2 cup walnuts

2 cups rolled oats (doesn't matter what kind)

1 tsp. sea salt

1 tsp. sage

1 Tbsp. soy sauce or tamari (wheat-free)

1 can garbanzo beans, drained

1/4 cup plain milk- almond milk or rice milk

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A food processor helps make prep pretty easy. So that's what I used to make the patties. Into the processor bowl went the onion. Pulse the machine and get that chopped up a bit smaller and then add walnuts, rolled oats, salt and sage. Process until it's all mixed together good. Add in the garbanzo beans and then soy sauce or tamari and milk. Process away until it's all blended up and gooey-looking, takes a minute or two.

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I like to use various sized ice cream scoopers to do the dirty work. Plus, me being me, I like all my patties uniform in size and shape. But go ahead and do what works for you and what you have available. (I can't help it I'm a kitchen gadget girl). Taking a medium-sized scooper for medium-sized patties, I scooped the mix into a nonstick pan that had a little olive oil in it over medium-high heat and flattened them down with the back of a shamoji-you know, the rice scooper that comes with the new rice cooker. It doesn't stick! Let it cook until golden brown and then turn over with a spatula and brown the other side.

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While my patties were cooking, I thought "Ooh, I need a starch." Brown rice takes too long to cook for last minute. I had some dehydrated potatoes, the kind for making scalloped potatoes. So I put them in a pot with water and cooked them, thinking I'd make mashed potatoes. That didn't happen because they wouldn't break down. I ended up putting them in a pan with olive oil, fresh rosemary, garlic, and salt and browning them off. Not bad.

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We had some kale and Swiss chard out in the yard. Those are always easy and tasty and you know their full of powerful stuff like Vitamins K, A and C, manganese and high in fiber. This translates into building good blood for a healthier you and keeping your colon clean. Rinse them good and chop or tear into bite-sized pieces. If the stem is large, I'd suggest removing the rib by folding the leaf in half and running a knife blade down alongside the rib. (Save the stems for juicing!) Then chop or tear. In a pan heat some pure sesame oil and saute a few cloves of sliced or chopped garlic. Once that has browned, add in the kale and saute lightly, turning with tongs. Don't overcook. Drizzle on some soy sauce or tamari at the last moment then remove from heat. Sprinkle on vitamin B-rich nutritional yeast and calcium-rich sesame seeds and you're done.

If I had just another minute more I would have added a sauce to go with my patties. My thought would have been to blend some pimientos or roasted red bell peppers with pepperoncini peppers, and mixing that into a bit of Vegenaise. I know this makes a great sandwich spread because Brian did it recently for an event we catered. That would have been good on those patties. Oh well, next time. Anyway, a fresh green salad rounded out this meal. Try this dressing we had on our salad today. Everybody in our family liked it a lot. Found it on this web site: http://www.foodmatters.tv/_webapp_265455/Golden_Elixir_Salad_Dressing_Recipe

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Happy cooking, happy eating, happy health!