Vegan MoFo Day 9: Snacks'n'soup!

Today we had a pretty mellow (for us) day in downtown Santa Cruz. In the morning, we got coffee and then went to the Washington Street Park. In the afternoon (post-naptime) we went up to Westlake Park. Yup, that's about our lives these days.

We ate a lot of good stuff along the way, so here it is!



What it is: crabapple!
My thoughts: So I looked it up on wikipedia. Crabapples are wild apples. They are really yummy. Tart, but also very fruity. Like, more fruity than your average apple. They are the perfect size for a little nibble on the go.
Emperor's reaction: He ate about half of this one, then got distracted by the granola bar.



What it is: Pumpkin Spice Flax Plus granola bar and coffee with a splash of soymilk from Peet's
My thoughts: These granola bars are actually pretty good. Kinda chewy, kinda sticky. A little sweet for my tastes. I thought they would be spicier, too, considering that they have the word SPICE in their name. Still, not bad.
Emperor's reaction: oh, he is all over these things. I wasn't sure he'd be able to chew them that well (though his mouth is full of teeth, oy) but he is and he adores them. He ate about half of this bar, then half of another one later in the day.



What it is: Korean spinach from New Leaf and (not pictured) tempeh noodle salad from the same.
My thoughts: Such a yummy, yummy lunch. I am going to steal this pairing and make the same thing at home next week. The spinach is good, a bit vinegary and a bit sesame-y and a bit spicy. The noodles have tempeh, sesame seeds, carrots, and a sort of sesame oil-soy sauce-vinegar coating.
Emperor's reaction: He ate a TON of the spinach. And get this... he forked it into his own mouth. I showed him how to stab the fork into the spinach, and he proceeded to do it without any help from me. He would not give me the fork back to eat my share of the lunch, actually.

He also ate eight bites of tempeh. The tempeh pieces in this are very small, but still... he's a tempeh monster!



What it is: Mystery Vegetable Soup and homemade whole wheat toast with EB & onion powder
My thoughts: So this soup is basically every vegetable I had kicking around except eggplant (I only like those little round eggplants in soup, big eggplant is weird), in a bit of powdered vegetable broth that I kicked up a bit with some random add-ins (miso, nooch, fresh thyme and sage and lemon verbena, probably some other things). So it's a little carrot, peas, red potatoes, celery, a sweet onion. Oh, and I diced up the leftover seitan cutlets from last night and threw those in too. The end result is really quite delicious and, oh my, this was easy.

Homemade bread is so good. When I told J we had plenty left today, he was like "let's eat it for dinner!" I admit that I put together this soup just so we'd have an excuse to make a butt ton of toast too.
Emperor's reaction: He ate a bite or two of bread and that's it. He had an incident a little before this where he burnt his hand on our woodstove and while he's okay, he was out of sorts for a while afterwards and I think eating was just about the last thing on his mind.

Bonus VIDEO! Oooh la la!

Here is the Emperor drinking water. He's a pro, or at least he thinks he is.