Blue Rice Balls

I made these squid, octopus, elephant rice balls today to add to my bento freezer stash. I started off coloring them with pureed blueberries but I did not like the color so I added some blue food coloring. I really like the cute shape and size of these onigiri. They are twice the size of the bear, heart, and star balls and they still fit in my bento boxes! The mold makes an indent for the eyes, mouth, or ears depending on the shape, so instead of nori I used vegan caviar to fill in the gaps for the detailing.

Broccoli Bento

Thank Goodness it's the weekend! Even if I will be working on my thesis all weekend. On the top tier of the bento I packed broccoli stir fry, with a pea and a carrot bear rice ball. The middle tier has blueberries, chocolate chips, and two blueberry bear rice balls.

Saffron Cherry Rice Balls

I was running low on cute rice balls for my lunches so I whipped up a couple of batches that turned out very nicely. On top I have yellow hears, stars, and bears. I didn't dye or pureeing anything I simply threw in saffron with the rice. Super easy and very yellow. The pinkish rice below was made with pureed cherries. I did not use very many and I strained out the pulp to make sure the rice would not have any detectable flavor. I can't wait to eat them :P

Under the Sea Bento

I had a lot of fun with this lunch. The squid section is made of okra, soy cheese, and rice. The goldfish is soy cheese with nori detaining, and is resting on a mung bean ocean with asparagus seaweed and carrot starfish.

Vegan Chicken Nugget Bento

I keep waking up thinking Wednesdays are Saturdays, and then am crushed to realize there are 3 days until the weekend. So to get through the day I made a super tasty bento. The left tier has mung bean noodles, celery, and carrot in a spicy teriyaki sauce. The right tier has faux chicken nuggets, carrot sticks, cucumber and locally made larrupin (a sweetish style sweet mustard) dill sauce for dipping.

Tortilla Bento

Todays bento is heavily tortilla based. The top tier has 2 strawberries, and a flower tortilla wrap with hummus, purple cabbage, and chili oil. The bottom tier has soy tereso bean dip with corn chips.

Bagel Dog Bento

In the left dish I packed ants on a log, baby carrots, and edamame. The middle dish has carrot slices, a homemade veggie bagel dog, macadamia nuts, craisins with a carrot face, catchup and mustard with nori faces. The lid has a mix of nuts.

Bento Supplies

I just got these adorable bento supplies to add to my collection. The firs package is a bunny, bear, and flower sandwich or cookie cutter. I really like that the tops of the cutters have detailing that can be pressed into bread or dough. The cutters come in two pieces each. So they can be used to cut the outline of the shape, stamp the full image on food, or both. The second package is a sandwich cutter that makes 2 cats, a bear, and a heart. I like how deep the cutter is and how surprisingly sharp it is for plastic. The last item I got is a pair of large rice molds. They are big so they are perfect for making filled onigiri, but they are slightly to tall to fit in my bentos.

Valentine Bento

I made this bento last last Friday for Valentine's Day. The top ties is made up of broccoli cashew stir fry with a carrot and a beet heart shaped rice ball. The bottom tier has a blueberry heart rice ball, carrot sticks, celery, edemame, hummus, and pine nuts. The lid has candies peanuts, and pistachios.

Monokuro Boo Pasta Bento

Today's bento is vegan cheesy pasta with mushroom furikake on the top tier. The lower tier has dried peach, craisins, date, macadamia nuts, a prune, edamame, and carrot flowers. The lid is filled with pistachios.

Mamegoma Sushi Bento

Todays bento is homemade sushi on the top tier, with dried fruit, carrot, edamame, quinoa, pickled ginger, and soy sauce for dipping on the bottom tier. I recently figured out that the lid can holds a thin layer of food if the chop sticks are removed. Since today's lunch is made up of all finger foods I get a bonus handful of pistachio nuts. Score!

Petit Happy Mushroom Bento

This breakfast themed bento contains a vegan sausage and tofu scramble breakfast burrito, half an orange, 2 home made chocolate chip cookies, romaine lettuce and baby carrots. I am happy to finally post a picture of my new Petit Happy mushroom bento. It is so cute, and I love the color.

Miracle Fruit Platter

I went to a lunch last week where I finally got to show off my newly acquired panda orange skills. I brought miracle fruit tablets along with sliced lime, lemon, granny smith apple, grape fruit, out of season strawberries, and of course a panda orange. It took a lot of restraint not to panda all the citrus fruits :P

Valentine's Day

I hope everyone had a nice Valentines Day. I had a really fun day. It was my last chocolate feature, so I can get back to my normal posts. My parents bought me a box of Sjaak's Chocolates, and a new camera! It is so nice not trying to use my broken camera anymore! And to top it all off I got to make a decadent vegan plater for a Valentine's party I went to. I brought whole wheat crackers, slices of vegan herb feta, vegan yellow and black lumpfish caviar, vegan cream cheese, garnished with cucumber and carrot flowers. It was so good!

Sweet Earth Organic Chocolates

Happy valentines day! Today is the last installment of vegan confections. I hope you can use this list when purchasing a gift for a loved one, whether they be herbivore or carnivore alike. Todays company is Sweet Earth Organic Chocolates. Sweet Earth has a lot of vegan options, but their web site is challenging to navigate. There is no vegan section, which is very frustrating. The link at the bottom of the page goes to the results of typing the word "vegan" into the search bar. So not everything is vegan, and every chocolates description needs to be scrutinized before purchase. I included Sweet Earth today because I really like the chocolate molds the company uses. They already have some cute dark chocolate easter rabbits for sale. I'm a sucker for the bunnies.

Sweet Earth Organic Chocolates

http://sweetearthchocolates.com/search.itml?icQuery=vegan

Chocolate Inspirations

Only one day left for the 14 day count down of vegan treats! Todays candies come from Chocolate Inspirations. Ironically this company does not carry vegan chocolate. However they do carry vegan cinnamon sugared pecans, cinnamon toast toffee, coconut brittle, coffee toffee, and English toffee. I love the simple gold packaging, it's decadent and works for any occasion.

Chocolate Inspirations Vegan Selection:

http://www.chocolateinspirations.com/store/index.php?cPath=52

Oliver Kita: Fine Confections

Oliver Kita offers a, organic, fair trade, vegan line of chocolates. These gorgeous chocolates are pricey but is it rewarding to know the money goes to support sustainable pesticide free agricultural practices, equal opportunity and fair wages to farmers, and not the use of child labor. Mmmmm, now that tastes sweet!

Oliver Kita Organic, Fair Trade, Vegan Collection:

http://www.oliverkita.com/search?q=vegan

Sweet Botanicals

Sweet Botanicals is a UK candy company that only uses pure plant extracts to flavor and color their products. The candies come in a wide range of flavors and beautiful colors, but what I love most about Sweet Botanicals are the antique molds used to shape the candies.

Sweet Botanicals Website:

http://www.sweetbotanicals.com/

Online US Retailer, Natural Candy Store:

http://www.naturalcandystore.com/category/vegan-hard-candy/a

Booja Booja

Booja Booja is a UK company that offers organic vegan truffles. These are super delicious and come in a unique wooden container. My aunt bought me the hazelnut and banana boxes for Christmas years ago and I can still remember how amazed I was that they were dairy free.

Booja Booja Website:

http://www.boojabooja.com

US Online Retailer, Vegan Essentials:

http://store.nexternal.com/shared/StoreFront/default.asp?CS=vegane&StoreType=BtoC&Count1=999401271&Count2=916541695&ProductID=1917&Target=products.asp

Life by Chocolate

Life by Chocolate offers a wide selection of well labeled vegan organic chocolates. They have assorted boxes of unique flavors, as well as cherry cordials, handmade chocolate bars, fruit flavored truffles, and tea flavored truffles. Mmmm...

Life by Chocolate Vegan Selection:

http://www.lifebychocolates.com/gourmet-chocolates.html/cPath/94

Barkeater Chocolates

Barkeater Chocolates is not an extremely vegan friendly. There is not much of a vegan selection and the chocolate ingredients are not well labeled. However they offers 4 vegan truffles under their soy collection. The truffle flavors are chai, almond, vanilla, and toddy. Yum!

Barkeater Chocolates Soy Collection:

http://www.barkeaterchocolates.com/catalog/i51.html

Allison's Gourmet

Allison's Gourmet is the mother load when it comes to vegan treats. Everything on the site is vegan, from the baked goods to the confections! The company offers: assortments, gift baskets, and monthly clubs. The selection is amazing, and perfect for any occasion. My aunt got me spiced peanut brittle for Christmas and it was delicious! Definitely checkout this company and help support an all vegan venture.

Allison's Gourmet Website:

http://www.allisonsgourmet.com/

Loukoumi

Chocolate is not the only candy that makes an excellent gift. Next holiday try handing out Rose Turkish Delight made in New Zealand by Loukoumi. None of Loukoumi's products contain gelatin! Their all vegan traditional flavors include: rose, orange, lemon, berry, mint, hazelnut, almond and mixed assortments. Some of their gourmet flavors contain honey, so if it has honey in the title don't buy it. The gourmet pomegranate and liquorice flavors are bee free and critter friendly.

Loukoumi Website:

http://www.loukoumi.co.nz/

US Online Retailer, Natural Candy Store:

http://www.naturalcandystore.com/category/vegan-turkish-delight

Harbor Candy Shop

Harbor Candy Shop sells well labeled vegan truffles, marzipan, and chocolate covered nuts and fruit. For any holiday you can purchase a delicious assortment strait from Harbor Candy (pictured below) or you can support PETA by ordering their chocolate gift box specially made by Harbor Candy (pictured above). What is really special about this company is that they have vegan milk chocolate made out of rice milk. Dark chocolate is good, but it is nice to have a sweeter milder option while still abstaining from the cruelty of the dairy industry.

Harbor Candy Shop vegan section:

http://www.harborcandy.com/shop/candy/viewCat_P.asp?pageName=shop&idCategory=16

PETA Gift Catalog:

http://www.petacatalog.com/catalog/Gifts-21-1.html

Rose City Chocolatier

Humboldt County had another earthquake today. The quake had a magnitude of 5.9 and hit 35 miles from Petrolia, CA. It was much smaller then the 1/9/2010 quake but still scary to have another so soon. On a sweeter note I would like to continue with my vegan valentine finds. Today is dedicated to Rose City Chocolatier. They are not all vegan, but have a great selection and clearly label what is vegan. If the selection and adorable seasonal packaging is not enough, Rose City offers several vegan chocolate of the month packages. Imagine vegan chocolates showing up at your door every month, it seems to good to be true.

Rose City Chocolatier Website:

http://www.rosecitychocolates.com/

Sweet & Sara Vegan Marshmallows

I never cared for marshmallow products growing up, now that most brands are forbidden to me (due to gelatin which is animal collagen) I get overly excited anytime a new vegan product comes out. Sweet & Sara are a tried and true brand. They offer strawberry, cinnamon pecan, and toasted coconut marshmallows, as well as mini marshmellows for coco, smores, rocky road bark, and cute valentines day confections like the one pictured above. The creator and owner Sara has been vegan for over 18 years, and the site has a section explaining why some people don't want to eat gelatin. Plus, the mascot is a white bunny designed after the owners childhood pet Skipper. Super cute! These treats are carried throughout the country in natural food stores or can be ordered online.

Sweet & Sara Website:

http://sweetandsara.com/index.php

Ococoa Chocolates

These chocolates look amazing! With these decedent beauties on the market there is no excuse for giving loved ones cruel and unhealthy animal based gifts. All Ococoa Chocolates are vegan except for one chocolate. The company will custom make any box to be vegan, just let them know to remove all the sunflower honey cups in the comments box on the checkout page.

Ococoa Website:

http://www.ococoa.com/index.html

Sjaak's Chocolates

Since it is almost Valentines day and Easter is right around the corner, I thought I would post for the next 14 days on the myriad of vegan treats available. Today is Sjaak's Chocolates. I included pictures of a Valentines gift box, and a chocolate heart filled with 5 European styles chocolates. These treats are near and dear to me because their store is withing walking distance from my apartment. How great is that? Their chocolates are all organic, but sadly not all are vegan. They do however do a great job labeling everything that is vegan, so you always know what you are getting.

Sjaak's Vegan Options:

http://sjaaks.com/categories/show/Vegan+Chocolates