~Betty Day 14 @ the Zenith

~Day 14 Betty

Two weeks today and going strong! We had an amazing lunch at an interesting vegetarian cafe in Pittsburgh’s South Side. Franc and I had lunch at the Zenith (at the corner of 26Th and Sara St) and saying we enjoyed ourselves is an understatement. This place is super fabulous!!! For starters it’s an art gallery slash antique store with a cafe that has a vegan/vegetarian menu. HELLO! The atmosphere is an eclectic mix of art, antiques and oodles of trinkets. The dining room is in the back but it blends right into the surroundings it’s really nice – in a shabby chic sort of way. They have an extensive tea menu and we chose a peach ginger mango green tea which we really liked. The menu is small but I was told they change it often; I think weekly. My lunch began with a beautiful side salad almost too pretty to eat.

Lovely salad from the Zenith

 I ordered roasted garlic Linguine, it was light fluffy linguine with artichokes, mushrooms and roasted garlic. The pasta was not at all oily it actually barely tasted as if it had a sauce on it but it was very flavorful from the roasted garlic. I LOVED it!

Roasted garlic linguine

 Franc started off with a black bean, tomato, and garlic soup which he said was very filling and hearty. He then had the Ethiopian gingered vegetable wrap and it was HUGE, and filled with chickpeas, potatoes, carrots, green beans and ginger. He really liked it and couldn’t even finish this giant sandwich! To finish off our lunch we shared a piece of vegan chocolate chip Bundt cake. I had been eyeing this cake up since we sat at our table just hoping it was vegan friendly. This cake was to die for. It was thick, rich, moist and had chocolate chips inside and out. We ate every last crumb of its chocolaty goodness J It was so good I even took home a piece for my mom (Hope you liked it mom) so she could taste how good vegan chocolate cake can be. I aspire to make one this good – if only the waiter would have given me the recipe! Believe me, I asked.

Scrumptious vegan chocolate chip cake

We’re off to visit family and do a little traveling this weekend and we’re curious how we’re going to get by eating vegan out of town and around non-vegans. We’ve got a plan to take a few things and wing the rest. Should be interesting!

    TGIF,
     Betty

~Betty Day 13 Zucchini Stew

~Betty Day 13

Its sooooo Cold here today so I decided to make some homemade vegetable soup. I’ve made my soup recipe for years and I always called it Zucchini stew because I started making it in the summer time when I would have so many zucchini and this I one of the recipes that I’d use them in, but really its just veggie soup J

In a large pot use olive oil and sauté:

 Half of a large onion,

2 carrots,

 2 stalks of celery,

 About three cloves of garlic (more or less),

 Two small or one large zucchini chopped into bite sized pieces (little half circles),

Two potatoes (in bite size pieces),

 Allow these to soften a bit in the olive oil and then

Add two cans of red pack tomato sauce and one can of water,

Add a big handful of fresh green beans trimmed and cut in half,

2 tablespoons of Italian seasoning

Salt and pepper to taste

And I like to add ½ tablespoon of crushed red pepper flakes for kick (optional)

Also at some point add a dash of sugar to cut down the acidity

I also like to throw in some fresh basil if I have it

Zucchini Stew and Homemade bread

Let this simmer until the vegetables soften and enjoy, now this is a no fail recipe you can add any vegetables that you have left around your house and make it different every time.

 This recipe makes A LOT of soup but it freezes beautifully so make it once and eat it all month. Serve with some homemade crusty bread J

                                                                     

                                                                 Trying to stay warm,

                                                                        Betty