Taste of Chicago 2007 – Vegan Options

We took a Metra train into the city and hopped on a free trolley to Grant Park for the Taste of Chicago today. It was fun and I will definitely go back next year. Vegan options weren’t plentiful but we enjoyed most of the ones that were available.

Tickets are sold at the cost of 11 tickets for $7. However, earlier in the week, we picked up discounted tickets at Dominick’s. They sold 11 tickets for $5.50, with a limit of 44 tickets that could be purchased. We saved $6 on our tickets.

You are allowed to bring your own bottled water so I brought a few bottles with us. I’m not going to waste my tickets on overpriced beverages. I do have to give mad props to the City of Chicago for providing recycling bins at Taste. I was happy I didn’t have to lug my empty bottles back home to put in my recycle bin.

I plotted out our route ahead of time so I knew the locations of the booths we wanted to visit. We started off at Pars Cove Persian Cuisine’s booth for a taste portion of their Hummus Shirazi. It is “fresh herb-tomato-cucumber salad over a bed of hummus”. It was served with a tiny pita wedge and cost 3 tickets. It was yummy!

Booth:

Taste of Hummus Shirazi – hand modeling exclusively provided by Rob

Next we headed over to Zam Zam which had a fantastic falafel sandwich. It was 8 tickets and well worth it. Definitely a must-try if you like falafel sandwiches. This booth was right near the Fox Chicago stage where the band Woogie was playing. We sat at a bench off to the side in the shade and ate our sandwiches listening to Woogie’s cover of “When You Were Young” by the Killers.

Booth:

Falafel Sandwich:

We stopped for a few minutes to check out Buckingham Fountain:

Then we were off to the A Natural Harvest’s booth. I inquired about what was vegan and they told me the tamales minus cheese and the tofu cutlets were vegan. We decided to each get two tamales (we each got one spicy and one mild) and one order of tofu cutlets to split. The total was 21 tickets. The tamales were tasty but pricey for what you got. The tofu cutlets were good but what a rip-off. An extremely stingy portion and I suggest you avoid it. If there was even 1/4 of a block of tofu for what I got, I’d be shocked. I also read their napkins while I was eating. It specified what was vegan. It said their corn on the cob with soy butter was vegan but their employee didn’t mention that. I never assume soy butter is vegan as some brands have dairy products in them. Overall, I’m not impressed with A Natural Harvest and won’t be going to their booth if they are there next year. Save your tickets for something else.

Booth:

Don’t bother getting the tofu cutlets. They are even smaller than they look in the picture. This was a full order, not a taste portion:

Tamales. Darn it, you can see the cheese at this booth in my picture of the tamales. Boo! A non-vegan food showing on my blog.

The last booth we went to was Arya Bhavan, which is right behind A Natural Harvest’s booth. I inquired about what was vegan. They even checked with the older woman who was cooking and everything is vegan except the bread which has milk in it. We got a taste of a Samosa, which I loved in spite of the fact it had peas in it! I think that says a lot for how tasty it was. We also tried the Bhel which is “puffed rice, sev and puri mixed with diced potatoes, onions, cilantro, garlic, and hot and sweet chutney sauces.” It was delicious! The bhel and the taste Samosa were only 11 tickets. I thought that was a good deal.

Booth:

Samosa and Bhel:

We had a great day. Yummy food and beautiful weather!!! We took the free trolley back (the trolleys were crowded and we had to stand) to Union Station for our train ride home.

Hope you have a wonderful day

My Garden Plot – Part 2

Hi all! I have some updated garden pictures that I took this past weekend. I’ll start out first with my latest purchase….a mini tiller. Even long-time gardeners at the community garden have said this is the worst year ever for weeds. The mini-tiller has been a huge help. It’s compact but powerful and only weighs about 45 lbs. The handle folds down so it easily fits in my car.

Mini Tiller:

Another Mini Tiller Pic:

Our community garden plot is 20′ x 20′. Here is one shot of our plot. You can see how big the tomato plants are now. The open space in front is where I will be transplanting some plants this weekend.

Here’s another angle of my garden plot. You can see fellow gardeners working on their plot in the background.

And here are some individual plant pics. I’ve already picked a few zucchinis!

Tomatoes:

Yellow Ball Squash:

Zucchini:

The Pickling Cukes are just starting:

The Eggplant plants are getting bigger:

I’ll have updated pics of my patio garden next time. I’ll be back to blogging about food soon as well. I’ve been on a Thai cooking kick lately so expect some posts on Thai food in the next few weeks. Hope you have a wonderful day.

My Garden Plot

I finally have a chance to talk about my community garden plot. I’m enjoying it but I’m behind in weeding due to my sinus infection. We had a few days of rain when I was sick so the weeds were out of control in just three days. We’ve been playing catch-up ever since.

My tomato plants have tomatoes! Yipppeeee! These are the largest tomatoes so far:

One of my cherry tomato plants:

Eggplant:

I have 20 squash and cucumber plants. Here’s one of my squash plants:

The carrots are starting to poke through the ground. I planted 4 types of carrots.

I’ll be taking new pics of my garden this weekend. Here’s one from last month (May) when the weeds were under control. You can see my 14 tomato plants, habanero peppers plants , eggplant plants, and brussel sprouts plants. In between the tomato plants is where I’ve planted chives as well as several varieties of carrots and radishes. To the right (not pictured) is where I have my squash plants. I also will be transplanting my lettuce, spinach, and swiss chard there soon. I’ll have more garden pics soon, including pictures from my patio garden as well.

Part of my garden plot:

Hope you have a wonderful day. I’ve been reading your blogs but I haven’t had time to comment. Hope all is well

You Will Find True Love on Flag Day

Ok, I have to admit that the title of this post has nothing to due with my actual post….I’m just an obsessive Simpsons fan and today is Flag Day in the US. Happy Flag Day everyone

I went to a rummage sale that supported a local animal shelter and found some great stuff. I only spent $5 and found a Minor Threat t-shirt, a blue camo t-shirt, an unopened package of Museum Gel,
Complete Book of Home Canning (Ann Serrane), Kathy Cooks (a vegetarian cookbook), and a vinyl lined tote bag that can folded up and zipped into a small square.  The tote bag has some company logo on it but I don’t mind. I’m going to use it when I go to book sales and the farm market.

In case you haven’t heard of Museum Gel, it’s a clear gooey gel that you can use to attach ceramics, glass, etc… to a shelf. It holds the item in place. I love this stuff and in the past, I have even bought it at….. do I dare say it …. full retail price!

Thrifty Finds (tote bag folded up):

Thrifty Finds (tote bag unfolded):

I found a great book at Half Price Books when they had their 20% off sale over Memorial Day weekend.  It’s called Thai Vegetarian Cooking (Vatcharin Bhumichitr).

From this cookbook, I made Sweet and Sour Vegetables. I added tofu to the recipe as well. It was delicious and I made it extra spicy using several Thai Chiles.  I also used fresh pineapple. Caputo’s had a sale on organic pineapples. They were under $2 each. What a deal! I used half of the pineapple in this dish and we ate the other half as a snack. For the veggies, I used onions, carrots, and cucumbers because that’s what I had on hand. I served it over basmati rice.

I’ll be doing a post on my community garden plot this weekend. Keep an eye out for it. I’ve been reading your blogs this week even if I haven’t had a chance to comment. I’ll be commenting this weekend.

Hope you have a wonderful day!!!

Yard Sale Find! Federal Glass Snack Set

Eagle-eye readers may recognize this snack set pattern. I do own another set of four in this pattern (they were a gift from my godmother). I went to a huge yard sale recently and spotted another set of four (one set = 1 plate + 1 cup). I didn’t have the willpower to pass this deal up. I only paid $2.50…..for all four sets. Now I own eight sets total. Yipppeee! My original four are packed away so I will put these four to good use now.

At this same sale, I also found some cookbooks and small planters which I can use for hardening plants. Speaking of plants, our community garden plot is doing well and I will have pics of our garden soon.

Thank you all so much for the get well wishes. I am feeling a lot better!!! I’m anxious to get back to baking, cooking, crafty projects, and thrifty shopping. I’ve been reading your blogs even if I haven’t been commenting. I’ll be visiting blogs and back to regular blogging next week.

Hope you have a wonderful weekend