Chow Vegan

Good Eat • No Meat

Amy’s Rice Macaroni With Daiya Cheeze

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Amy's Rice Macaroni with Daiya Cheeze

I’ve been so busy lately, I haven’t had the time to cook much of anything. To stave off starvation, I turn to my time-crunch savior, Amy’s. On a recent Whole Foods trip, I had bought Amy’s new gluten-free, dairy-free rice macaroni with Daiya cheeze for just such a time. And it was on sale for $3.49.

Heating it up couldn’t be any easier, it takes just 5 minutes in the microwave and comes out as a nice, hot tray of creamy, cheesy goodness. I’m no mac-n-cheese connoisseur but Amy’s is pretty tasty. The smell is wonderfully cheesy, the texture and look is spot on.

Amy's Rice Macaroni with Daiya Cheeze

Although my eyes did bug out when I glanced at the side of the package and saw the amount of sodium, 740 mg. Is mac-n-cheese normally so salty? It’s fairly high in fat and calories too. It’s a whopping 22 grams of fat and 520 calories! That’s like a whole meal for me right there in that one tray.

At least it’s filling and I wasn’t hungry for the rest of the day (good for the super busy). But as tasty as it was, I’m reserving it as an occasional treat only.

Dreamy Nut Bars

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Dreamy Nut Bar

I’ve been interested in raw food for awhile now, but I haven’t really gotten around to trying any raw recipes. Then I saw the most awesome chocolate covered raw treats on dreaminitvegan.blogspot.com.

There’s no baking involved, so it’s totally my speed (seeing as I’m no baker by any stretch of the imagination). There’s only 4 ingredients – medjool dates, raw almonds, shredded coconut and vanilla, plus melted chocolate for covering, if you like that sort of thing.

And it taste kinda like an Almond Joy. Oh man, I couldn’t get a hold of the ingredients fast enough.

Dreamy Nut Bar

Super easy to make, just toss into a food processor and hit the button. Instead of a round shape called for in the recipe, I shaped mine into bars. You know, like the candy bar, complete with a couple of almonds on top.

I only had half a chocolate bar to melt, so I just drizzled it over the top, but it’s still good and more than enough. It’s sweet even without the chocolate. I’ll definitely be making these again and again.

Update: I’m happy to report that the nut bars (without the chocolate) freeze well. I stuck a couple of test bars in a tupperware lined with wax paper into the freezer. Basically what I had in the fridge, got popped into the freezer.

Just take out and eat, it doesn’t freeze solid. It’s just a little colder than the refrigerated ones.

Evol Burritos

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Evol Burritos

Remember Brendan Synnott from Survivor: Tocantins? It was the season that aired early last year. At the time, I had no idea he co-founded Bear Naked Granola which was later sold. He then went on to co-startup evol burritos.

After Brendan got booted off the show, he offered up free evol burritos to Survivor viewers. After all this time, I finally received a coupon for said burrito.

In their lineup of eleven, there’s two that are vegan. The first one I tried was the Tofu and Spinach Sauté – tofu sautéed with spinach, potatoes, black beans and tomato salsa in a whole wheat tortilla. It had a southwestern kind of flavor.

Inside, there was one big chunk of tofu and one big chunk of potato, mixed in with everything. I don’t know if that was just the one I got or if they’re all like that. Maybe it was because they’re handmade. But it was well-seasoned and the taste was good.

Evol Burritos

The other vegan option is the Veggie Fajita – sautéed peppers and onions, rice, black beans and salsa in a whole wheat tortilla (pictured above). It’s more colorful but not as flavorful as the tofu and spinach one. It just taste like peppers, rice and beans. It seems like it needs something.

For me, the real question is how does the evol burritos stack up against my favorite Amy’s burritos? There’s no contest between evol’s Veggie Fajita versus Amy’s Non-Dairy Bean and Rice. Amy’s kicks butt. Sorry Brendan.

But on the bright side, it’s a draw between the Tofu and Spinach Sauté versus Amy’s Indian Spinach Tofu wrap. They both have tofu and spinach in a whole wheat tortilla but each has a totally different taste and flavor. I could go for either one.