Another Yummy Combination

(Note: I wish I had a professional food photographer to take pictures of these recipes! They always make dishes look so yummy. Anyway, you'll have to take my word for it.) 

Another recent recipe my family and I enjoyed was a vegan version of sloppy joes with a side of heirloom tomatoes topped with a vegan cashew queso made by none other than my ever talented, cheese-making husband, Brian. The sloppy joe recipe comes from one of my favorite vegan cookbooks, Veganomicon. In the cookbook, it's actually called "Snobby Joes." Don't let the fact that it's not made of fatty, second-rate meat scare you away. This is not your school lunch sloppy joe. It tastes way better! With lentils, tomato sauce, onions, peppers and an assortment of other spices and flavors, this dish is one of our favorites to eat in the summer time. In the meal above, we were actually having leftovers so I put the Snobby Joe mix over brown rice to make it a gluten free meal. (Normally we put the mix on a whole wheat bun or a piece of Ezekial toast). Anyway, the mix is so delish that even CJ chows down on it.

As I've mentioned before, tomato season is one of my favorite times of the year. The last several weeks we've gone grocery shopping, they have had the most unbelievable heirloom tomatoes! You know, the ones that come in all kinds of crazy shapes and colors? OMG, I can't believe how wonderful they taste right now. They are too good to resist so for this particular meal, we sliced them up and topped them with Brian's cashew queso from Post Punk Kitchen (http://www.theppk.com/2011/11/cashew-queso/). The combination was fantastic! We also used the leftover queso and mixed it with a rice dish I made later in the week. We've tried several of these cashew-based cheeses and so far, this was the best one. (Check out other fabulous vegan recipes from Post Punk Kitchen! They have a fabulous list of meals to choose from).

Sometimes it can be intimidating to try new recipes that are so different from your norm when you are trying to incorporate more veggie dishes in you life. Just by picking up a good cookbook like Veganomicon or checking out the many blogs devoted to vegan cooking, you only need to choose one simple dish to try and work it in to your meal routine. Before you know it you'll be getting crazy and making vegan mozzarella to serve alongside your pasta with heirloom tomatoes and basil!