Happy Mother's Day! May 8th

I hope everyone is enjoying the day with their mom! But first in other news, I've passed both my real estate exams on the first try and will start working this week! :) So I'm going to be a lot busier now, but will try to squeeze in blogging when I can!

My mom and I went to brunch today, rather than dinner (which we normally do). We decided to go to Omonia Cafe, which I'd been to once before and liked. One of the reasons I like it is because it's such a good value! For $12.95 you get...

Choice of 2 beverages, one alcoholic and non-alcoholic (I got an apple juice and a screwdriver), entree of your choice (I got the strapatsada again)...

and an amazing dessert! This time I tried the "amygdalou" (which is an almond creme cake), while my mom got the strawberry shortcake (which I got last time).

Yesterday while running errands I stumbled upon the best pizza place yet in Astoria! It's called Dino's and it's at 30th & Broadway. Next time we'll definitely be ordering from them!

And of course, even though I'm not a "real" mother yet, I am a "kitty mother" lol, so this day DOES have some special meaning to me!

Peanut may look cute, but he can be a handful... like when he "blackmails" me. How, you ask? Let me explain...

I may have brought this up before, but sometimes when Peanut wants my attention and I'm busy doing something else, he'll deliberately "threaten" to bite my computer wires! He's actually done it before too and he knows it makes me really mad!

But generally he's a good boy. He's very quiet and most of the time he just goes about his business, like...

Playing on the back of the toilet seat (chasing his tail mostly)...

Playing in paper bags...

And of course, cat napping!

He can get grumpy if I disturb him! lol

But I did force him to take a "mommy and me" picture today! :)

Happy Mother's Day!

Face Lift! January 12th

Not me, of course, the blog! lol How do you like it? I was thinking about lightening it up for a while now. Anyways, this is about all I have time for these days. We started packing today and we're finalizing things with the apartment. We are moving to Astoria (in Queens, where I was born actually). They are still in the process of renovating the apartment... if I showed you the pictures now, you'd have a heart attack! lol But I was promised yesterday by the head contractor that it will be beautiful when it's finished (which will hopefully be in 10 days).

In the meantime though, Peanut has been enjoying having the boxes around! He likes to wedge himself in between the stack of them!

I'll be posting more pictures of him in the boxes soon though! He's having a blast!! Peanut is very much a paper puss! :) He loves paper bags, boxes, crumples, etc. We just have to pray that he doesn't chew the boxes to shreds before the move!

Hopefully I'll be posting some eats soon too. I have to admit though, I'm a vegan who cannot give up her cheese. It's rather sad, actually. But I haven't had much appetite lately with all the stress, so beggars can't be choosers! I must eat what I can, when I can. I did stop by Wild Ginger today since I was downtown for a doctor appointment anyway. That place always makes me realize how SUPERIOR vegan food is to all the rest! It's so good and good for you. I am truly spoiled here in NY with veggie restaurants! :)

New & Tasty Eats! November 17th

I want to start off with my review of the other MorningStar Farms entree (you can see the review of my first one here). Now I am usually a HUGE fan of MorningStar Farms, but their entrees have been disappointing. :(

I normally like pretty much any vegetarian lasagna, but this one had an awful taste and texture. It just didn't taste much like lasagna. So it's only 270 calories. I'd rather they put another 100 calories in it and have it be edible! The ONLY thing I liked in it were the "sausage" crumbles. And that's because I really love their veggie sausage (as you can see here). Unfortunately though, there was hardly ANY sausage in it! Not good.

Luckily I had a great meal at Tue Thai Food. I have gotten food delivered from them, but never visited their restaurant in the village (on Greenwich Ave. & 8th st.).

Look at this amazing lunch! And for just under $10 too! I got their pad se ew with tofu for my entree, and the lunch special comes with an appetizer of your choice (I chose spring rolls, of course!), a side salad and beverage of your choice (I got a coke, which you can just make out in the picture in that cute little jar).

For breakfast this past weekend I made Trader Joe's BIG cinnamon buns.

Mom and I enjoyed these. There is little that Trader Joe's makes that I DON'T like. lol

This week I had a great lunch delivered from Suzie's, one of my favorite chinese restaurants.

I got a vegetarian egg roll and their sizzling tofu in black bean sauce (this is an exclusive dish of their's and is really tasty).

And yesterday I went to the doctor's downtown... long story, but my doctor is downtown in Chinatown because it's one of the only places that accepts my health insurance! lol She's great though, so I don't mind going.

Anyways, after my appointment I stopped in an adorable bakery in Soho. I must have been by this place before, but it looked new to me! It's called Little Cupcake Bakeshop and it's on Prince St. It's funny, I had really been craving a cupcake too!

I got their golden vanilla one, which had chocolate buttercream frosting. I am not kidding when I say this was AMAZING. I seriously don't know what they even put in it to taste so good, and truthfully, I don't care!!

As for my Peanuts, he was having quite a time when I got a package that had some of those white foam packing bits.

And he spent some time watching the figure skating with me this past weekend.

Ok, that's all until Thanksgiving! Enjoy this fall weather while it lasts!!

Peanuts & other tasty eats! August 31st

I've been snapping photos of Peanut over the last few weeks... you know, one of the joys of watching your cat grow from the time he's a tiny kitten, is getting to bond with him and watch their personality develop. And Peanut has SUCH a personality!!

Sitting pretty on my vanity stool. :)

Sleepytime...

Sitting pretty.

Messing around in Mom's drawer.

Peanut LOVES coupons or any crumpled paper really... he has his eye on the coupons in these photos.

And here are some of my eats over the past week...

A proper dinner for a change... Boca chik'n nuggets, Alexia oven fries with sea salt, and a Birds Eyes mini ear of corn.

I had a meeting downtown last week which ran late, and by the time I got out I was starving so I headed to Peep for a late lunch. I got the usual...

Spring rolls...

and their saffron fried rice with tofu.

Pizza from Rivoli's in the West Village (there are two apparently... one is on 7th Ave. & 11th St. and the other is on Hudson St... we order from the one closer to us now on 7th... both are amazing though!).

And while it's not health food by any means, I've been crazy about these lately!

Nestle drumsticks... so good! :)

I got a job working for a NYC magazine, but we aren't paid a salary... we only make money on sales commissions, so that's eating up a lot of my time now. I will try to update when I can!

Lots of Good Stuff & Peanuts too! :) July 14th

Lots to catch up on! So let's get started....

I found a great new place around the corner from me with great food. Well, actually it's not *new*, but last week was the first time I ever went! It's Good Stuff Diner (on West 14th St. off 6th Ave.). And they aren't kidding, they really do have "good stuff!" lol

They had such an extensive menu and everything looked so good, it was hard to choose! But I opted for something healthy and unhealthy... For the "healthy" I got a "high-c" smoothie minus the bananas (which was basically strawberries, pineapple, orange juice, and frozen yogurt) and for the "unhealthy" I got mozzarella sticks. And you know what? I don't care! These were FANTASTIC! Not at all greasy and really delicious! And the smoothie was good too! I'll definitely be back again soon!

On Sunday I had a great brunch with Melissa (Missy Maintains) and Maggie (Say Yes to Salad) at one of my favorite places, Sacred Chow.

We all got the same thing, the tofu scramble (except different variations! lol). I got mine with fruit and home fries. I also made the dreadful mistake of ordering orange juice. And I know you must be wondering, what could be dreadful about that? How about an $8 price tag! Simply because I didn't specify "small" (I didn't know they had sizes). Still, $8 for ANY size orange juice is ridiculous. It was good though, although I'll never make that mistake again!

Still, I had a great time and I was glad we were able to squeeze the brunch before Maggie's wedding! (Btw, I'll hopefully be doing a guest post on vegetarian weddings for Maggie's blog when she's on her honeymoon, so look out for that!)

Yesterday I went to one of my old favorites, Wild Ginger. Sadly they have gotten more snooty like Blossom (read that story here!), but I don't feel like getting into it now! It was SO dark and rainy out the day I went that the pictures came out awful. So luckily I had saved some pics I took on a sunnier day of the same food that I got! lol

Spring rolls

Steamed veggie dumplings

Pineapple fried rice

And now, on to Peanut! :) Here's what he's been up to...

He LOVES boxes, and spends a great deal of time in this one!

Helping Mom go through recipes... he LOVES paper-- especially crumpled paper! I always say we should have named him Crumples! (So that's his middle name in case you are wondering!)

His usual laundry basket shenanigans! (He has such a round little belly, and we feed him a 1/2 cup food daily as the vet recommended! He's just a bit chubby. :)

And finally...

A Mommy and Me picture! :)

In other news, I went to the brand new Chelsea Trader Joe's today!! It just opened on Monday at the corner of West 21st St. & 6th Ave.! And all I can say is this... why oh why didn't you open sooner?!?! I've lived right down the block from them for nearly 2 years and just now they opened! Oh well, all I can say is go! And please DON'T tell your friends! lol I don't want it to turn into the circus that is the Trader Joe's in Union Square! lol It really is gorgeous and spacious and well run... I'll be shopping here from now on!

Veggie Tacos & More! May 21st

Well the good news is that I've discovered a way to make insanely good veggie tacos! And Katharina from Katharina's Food Adventures is coming to NY this week, so we'll finally get a chance to meet! :) The bad news is that I haven't heard a single thing from Blossom, after sending them a very detailed (and polite!) e-mail about how rudely I was treated at last Sunday's brunch (see the post below). And, it's been a rough week being that it's now been 2 whole years since I lost my cat, Cloudy to stomach cancer (he died May 19, 2008 at only 11 1/2 years old). I'll admit, since adopting Peanut last year, it has been easier. Not that you can ever "replace" your pet, but there is no sense in grieving forever and missing out on loving another animal the same way you did for the one you lost!

Speaking of Peanut, he "helped" me with my Red Mango frozen yogurt the other day. He loves to play with the round, plastic lid that they give you to cover it with!

Oh, and I get the medium original with granola & strawberries! :)

He actually picks it up in his mouth and carts it off! I have to watch him though because I don't want him cutting his mouth on the plastic! lol

Here are more eats from this week (in random order!):

Another terrific find was Amy's vegetable pot pie! I got the original, non-vegan version (it is vegetarian though, as are all of Amy's products).

I really liked this... it reminds me of the pot pies I used to eat as a kid, only this one comes with tofu instead of chicken or turkey (and it's a great way to eat your tofu... so good!).

A slice of Whole Food's strawberry shortcake... yum!

And Whole Food's vegan chocolate chip scone...

Re-heated pineapple fried rice from Wild Ginger (still just as good!).

On to the veggie tacos!! Ok, so I started off by getting Garden of Eatin's yellow corn taco kit. Then I got some of Boca's ground "meat" crumbles (these are unbelievably fantastic by the way!), and some Organic Valley mild shredded cheddar cheese! You just follow the preparation instructions on the taco kit as you would, but substitute the meat for a veggie substitute!

I haven't had tacos in years, mainly because I didn't think I could make a good vegetarian alternative... well think again! These tasted like the real thing and were totally meatless! :) And I split everything in half so I could get 2 dinners out of it... plus it makes wayyy too much for one person!

And for dessert tonight I had a Rice Dream vanilla mudpie!

I had never tried one of these, but it was really good... although nothing compares to Trader Joe's sublime ice cream sandwiches!

How about you guys... any new or interesting veggie finds?