Day I'm tired of counting...it's Wednesday.

Yesterday ended on a high note, vegan-wise. The chili (you can find the recipe here) was really tasty. Jeremy added more of the spices than the recipe called for, due to the fact that we'd heard it was bland. I topped mine with some nutritional yeast (which is inactive yeast flakes that have a nutty/cheesy/salty taste to them and are actually quite nutritious) which tasted good. We also cut up an avocado and shared that to top our chili. Overall, I'd say the recipe was really good, but I'd add more quinoa next time to increase the body of the chili.Also, the prep time that is called for in the recipe (10 minutes) is only applicable to Iron Chefs. I cannot chop that many vegetables in that much time. It probably took me 30 minutes of chopping to get everything ready, and then I had my super helpful sous chef opening cans, rinsing beans, and measuring spices on the side. So - allow yourself a bit more time, and make the quinoa ahead of time as well.

(While I'm at it...here are the black bean quinoa burgers we made the other night).

THENNNNNNN after dinner we watched Pitch Perfect which arrived on Blu Ray from amazon yesterday (I loved it so I bought it for keeps). Have you seen that movie? If you haven't, please do so immediately. It's actually hilarious, and the songs are awesome. AND, for my fellow wahoos, the Hullabahoos are in the movie! I actually shushed Jeremy really aggressively at the point that they said "From the University of Virginia, the Hullabahoos!" and he may have gotten mad for a few minutes...haha. During Pitch Perfect, we enjoyed our vegan Red Velvet cupcakes from Sprinkles...they were SO GOOD! Honestly, they may have  been better than traditional Sprinkles Red Velvet cupcakes. They use coconut oil (which you can taste) and a tofu based frosting (can't taste that) and the cake is super moist. Yum! I'll definitely be buying those in the future.

Last night before bed I decided to give chamomile tea a shot at relaxing me and making me sleep well, and it actually did help I think. I felt relaxed before bed and slept relatively better than I have been sleeping generally. So that's a win.

This morning I was not feeling like juicing (also didn't have any cucumbers left) so I had a piece of my sprouted grain bread with Trader Joe's salted crunchy peanut butter for breakfast (their natural PB is better than Whole Foods, IMO). The lovely people from Kong brought  lunch for us today and I ordered a sandwich with roasted red peppers, hummus, arugula, tomatoes, and cucumbers. It was delish! I think the amount of oil in the bread really helped, but it was a welcome break from my spinach salad doldrums.

Speaking of which, Molly Laufer shared this blog with me as another resource for vegan recipes, as well as sending me an email full of her favorite vegan recipes that I could make! How awesome is that? Thanks again Smolls! :)

So, lessons learned so far:

• Being vegan requires a lot of forethought 
• Being vegan is a lot easier with support from your friends :) 

 As of now, I still say that I'm "trying" veganism instead of self-identifying as vegan. I'm not sure I'll ever truly be vegan...but probably more likely Vegan with Benefits as Sarah says. 

A special HELLO to Molly and Annie Vaughn who are likely reading this together around 3 am ;-)