DJones BranchingOut

Vegan Restaurant or Donut Shop… Tough Decisions

Today’s foray into new food was setting up to be one of extremes- it was looking like either vegan fast food or a donut shop. The restaurant wasn’t where I thought it was. Oops. However, the donut shop on the walk up the hill to find it was looking mighty good! But, I turned the corner and there it was, right where The Girl pointed it out to me a couple of years ago. Her friend works at “The Loving Hut,” the largest family of vegan restaurants worldwide, and a meatless Lent makes this the perfect time to finally try this restaurant.

You know It’s a good joint when there are two Buddhist monks sitting in a booth near you, and the satellite choice is tuned to jazz combo music. Yea!

I ordered way too much for lunch so I could share with whoever shows an interest, IF I decide to share…

Fresh Summer Rolls– lots of basil, carrots and jicama for crunchiness and protein of soy ham and tofu. Very good.

Ginger Tofu from The Loving Hut — Ginger Tofu

Ginger Tofu– whoops… remembered that I don’t care for ginger. Fortunately, it wasn’t overloaded with ginger. It was just plain good, a gingery-teriyaki-ish sauce on tofu cubes that might have been fried. They were good, however they were prepared.

Healthy Fried Rice– it’s darn near impossible to make a good fried rice with brown rice, even The Boy would like this. I don’t like meat in my fried rice but love the scrambled bits of egg. I didn’t miss my egg as the fried bits of chopped tofu were really delicious.

more of the menu options at The Loving Hut- non-GMO, organic tofu used... — more of the menu options at The Loving Hut- non-GMO, organic tofu used…

The guys working were really helpful with suggestions for what to order next time (oh yes, there WILL be a next time). Lucky Lemongrass soy fillet with veggies, the wonton soup, Crispy Chow Mein noodle bowl filled with sautéed veggies and soy, Drunken Noodle stir fry, and a couple of taco options all came highly recommended.

And jazz music. Did I mention that? Piano bar jazz on their background music playlist.

The Loving Hut is neither fast food, nor junky, and all around delicious- I will be coming back here soon.

What Would a Haunch of the Devil’s Ass Taste Like? Giles Coren Has an Idea…

After running the gamut of errands, house work, and emotions, I plopped myself down and thoroughly enjoyed Giles Coren in “The Million Dollar Critic.” If you have access to BBCA Network, and are looking for something other than the usual sitcoms and Reality TV (LOL… I can hardly mention that poorly-named genre with a straight face), you might appreciate this show.

I enjoyed Giles Coren and comedian Sue Perkins in “The Supersizers…” The series, in which for one week they wear period costumes, live in close to or completely authentic settings, and eat the foods from different eras throughout history, was full of great banter and crammed in a lot of interesting facts. I caught “The Supersizers…” on American TV several years after it originally ran in the UK, from 2007-09, and I was happy to see Giles Coren on a new foodie show for North American audiences.

A lot of self deprecating humor in “The Million Dollar Critic” helps to balance the fact that he really is a highly regarded critic with much riding on his reviews. When dining with Eva Avila, the season four Canadian Idol winner, he shares “People imagine that having dinner with a restaurant critic is going to be informative, thrilling, and sexy. But in fact, as I’m demonstrating to Eva, it is as boring as having dinner with any other tedious, self obsessed middle-aged man who loves the sound of his own voice,” and then proceeds to embarrass himself with the cutlery.

Best lines included:

“An amuse bouche is something that restaurants that think they’re fancy give you because they’ve seen it on the TV… just the sort of thing that makes you wish you’ve gone for a burger instead.”

On trying seal meat- “This tastes like death. Like a small haunch of the Devil’s ass.”

On observing the chefs and owners of a popular restaurant- “Chefs should never be drunker than I am. That’s just showing off.”

There are about 120 other great lines, go watch this show. Great television viewing here, folks, it doesn’t get any better that this.

March Read: Abby Picks Historical Fiction…. “The Mistaken Wife” or “Hild”

It is time to choose a new Book of the Month! Today, Abby the Labby gets to pick, and she’s quite excited… because we are bribing her with a treat to keep her sitting down and posing for this photo. What’s it gonna be? She knows I don’t want another edjoo-ma-cative read after January’s “The Happiness Project” and February’s “Nikon D3300 for Dummies.” She also knows that I am fond of historical fiction, and have picked up two recently.

“Hild,” is book number one by Nicola Griffith, who, through much research created a novel about what 7th century Britain would be like for the woman who would be later known as Saint Hilda. This book came highly recommended by staff at a favorite small bookstore. Book number two is “The Mistaken Wife,” third in a series including “The Blackstone Key” and “The Counterfeit Guest,” all by Rose Melikan.

Abby during the discernment process:

Sure looks like she is leaning toward "Hild," and check out all the wine we won at the school's raffle! We've NEVER won anything like that, WOO HOO!!! — Sure looks like she is leaning toward “Hild,” and check out all the wine we won at the school’s raffle! We’ve NEVER won anything like that, WOO HOO!!

Is Abby choosing "Hild?" Is she in a 7th century Britain mood? Hmmm... — Is Abby choosing “Hild?” Is she in a 7th century Britain mood? Hmmm…

So what is Abby going to choose for me? It’s…

IT’S “THE MISTAKEN WIFE!” But, how do we know which one Abby chose? It came down to which book she drooled on, honestly. Remember, we had treats for her, and she was quite aware of it. Maybe she also knew that I already read Melikan’s first two stories about Mary Finch, reluctant heiress and even more reluctant spy during the close of the 1700’s. Either book presented a win-win situation for me- I’m a sucker for well researched historical fiction, And Harry Potter. If you ever feel like discussing the minutiae of that universe, I’m your Potterverse Pal.

March Project: A 5K and The Only Two Reasons Why I Run

#1. I want to have seconds on taco night, and to be able to drink wine every night.
#2. My gramma and her husband taught me two keys to a healthy, long life: Moderation and Be Active.

Gramma is 98 this year, by the way. She also taught me to drink the good wine, and enjoy Happy Hour- not just on Fridays. My grandmother and her husband did things that I have sworn to do as I grow older: they are the poster children for caloric restriction and eating with moderation (everything they want, but in moderation), and they had always been active. Always. Dancing, walking, aerobics, swimming, traveling. ANYTHING.

Don't ANYONE show this picture to Betty Gene! I mean it, mom and Amie, DON'T! — Don’t ANYONE show this picture to Betty Gene! I mean it, mom and Amie, DON’T!

At 96 she was still driving, cooking for her husband, taking care of her home, and for anyone visiting. A couple of years ago I was visiting my gramma and honestly, there was nothing that she had lined up for me to help do for her. She made me salmon for dinner and the most I could do was clear the table and help put things away.

I started running recently and have gone from hating this form of exercise to… well, not hating it. I’m logging two miles about every other day and at the end of March I’m signed up to run a 5K. Whew. A big goal for me. This month I am adding on some hills and lengthening the run to three miles. But honestly? I run because my gramma taught me that I need to move it or lose it. And I will!

Don’t ANYBODY show these photos to Betty Gene, she will KILL me, do you hear me, mom?

Headline: “Old Dog Learns New Trick, Teens Unimpressed”

Check me out, I learned how to use Excel today. I haven’t used a spread sheet since I was a high school teacher, and that was on an Apple II e- yes, I am officially a dinosaur. There have been many, many times recently that I would have benefited from having this skill and it was curiosity that finally drove me to it. I wanted to know how many calories were in one of my Chocolate Chip Cookies.

Sticking to about 1200 calories/day? You're looking at more than a complete meal if you have that milk, too. — Sticking to about 1200 calories/day? You’re looking at more than a complete meal, over 500 calories, if you have that milk, too.

Fortunately for me, I converted my go-to recipes to grams instead of cups- try it, you can whack out a batch of sweets in no time flat when you aren’t fighting to cram shortening into a one cup measure. All I do now is place my mixing bowl on my handy-dandy digital scale, dump an ingredient into my work bowl and zero out the weight with each new ingredient.

All it took was double checking calories per gram of ingredients on a couple of web sites and voilà! When it came to finding all the calories per gram of ingredient, Google was great, so were company websites, like Nestle. All the info you didn’t want to know about home made cookies, now in one convenient spot.

To all my friends who have been eating these cookies over the years, don’t look…. Sorry.

Chocolate Chip Cookies
# of Cookies	144

Total Cal	13789
Total Cal/cookie	95.75

ingredient	cal/gram	# of grams	total	cal/cookie
flour	4	675	2700	18.75
white sugar	4	620	2480	17.222
brown sugar	4	445	1780	12.3611
shortening	9	330	2970	20.625
butter	7	110	770	5.3472
chips	5	545	2725	18.923
egg (per)	72	4	288	2
vanilla (T)	38	2	76	0.5277

not all ingredients are listed…