Woman in Real Life

Outside my window it already looks like it's the middle of winter - snow on the ground and no evidence of sunshine. But I can't complain - I hear they're getting hammered with snow in Buffalo today. It's a bit early for hibernation still, but you'll find me staying inside whenever possible nevertheless. Staying inside and eating. But hopefully not excessively.

We have pasta at least once a week in our house. I think my husband had it almost every day growing up in an Italian family. I am good with having pasta regularly, especially if we alter the sauce a bit. One time we might add chickpeas, another time a handful of red lentils. This week I spotted Gardein vegan "meatballs" in the freezer section at the health food store. I'm a Gardein fan so I really wanted to give them a try. The Gardein meatballs are a bit larger in size than any vegan meatballs I've tried before. They are firm and dense and I enjoyed the texture. I spotted some fennel seeds in the mix. Because I chose to cook the meatballs in my sauce, the whole sauce was infused with the taste of the fennel and other spices from the meatballs. I'm not going to say it was my favourite flavour - I'd probably cook the vegan meatballs separately next time.

Happy Wednesday! For those of you who seem to be stuck in a snow globe, not to worry, someone will break us out soon...I hope. In the meantime, cuddle in tonight and put the fireplace on (for the last time?). Enjoy a hot cocoa, read a great book and bid winter farewell in style. Or just have a good cry. Whichever.

I have so many hopes for spring and the renewed energy it brings. I'd like to go through my wardrobe and discard a bunch of clothes. I'd like to get rid of the magazines piled in my bedroom and have the upstairs carpet professionally cleaned. I'd like to freshen up the interior of my filthy car. The list goes on and on. For now, I'm focusing my limited energies on one area - the kitchen. I am trying to get it back to "clean" every evening (no small feat) and I am experimenting with new, healthy recipes and meal ideas.

It's sunny today! Temperatures are still below zero and there is supposed to be another winter storm on Thursday, but I'll take the sunshine while I can get it.

This What I Ate Wednesday I'm taking a look at what I ate yesterday. It was the day after the Family Day long weekend and there were few groceries to be found in our house. I wasn't sure what I could even pack in the kids' school lunches so I got up (relatively) early and made fresh banana chocolate chip muffins. We always have ingredients for those (except I was short half a banana). I also gave them veggie hot dogs, orange slices and snacks. This is a long way of saying that my breakfast ended up being banana muffins with half of an orange left over after I prepared the kids' lunches.

It seems to me that there are those people who like vegan dairy substitutes and those who don't. My husband doesn't like them, for example, but I do. My favourite product is Daiya's vegan mozzarella shreds. So, I was pretty excited to discover that Daiya has some new products on the market.

First up, I sampled Daiya's cream cheese style spread. I haven't had a morning bagel with cream cheese for years. This product is indeed smooth and creamy as the label says. It spreads beautifully. It's also free of soy. I really don't know how they do it. It tastes pretty good too. You have to keep an open mind if you're going to try it, though. It's not going to taste like the dairy-based cream cheese you're used to.