Date Walnut Vinaigrette Salad Dressing (Oil Free)

Date Walnut Vinaigrette PinThis oil-free Date Walnut Vinaigrette Salad Dressing recipe is rich and delicious! Most vinaigrettes have oil, but since we’re oil-free plant-based eaters, we used walnuts as the (truly) healthy fat. The dates give it a little sweetness and the balsamic gives it a little tanginess.

Many of the phytonutrients in dark leafy greens and other vegetables are fat soluble, which means you need some healthy fats in your digestive tract at the same time as the veggies to allow your body to extract the most nutrients.

A lot of people still think oil is a healthy fat, but it comes with a lot of extra baggage and lacks all the fiber and many of the beneficial nutrients that come in the whole-food form. Oil is essentially a refined fat that may have some healthy ingredients, but it’s packaged along with several unhealthy ones. It’s far healthier to get your healthy fats from whole foods like nuts, seeds and avocados instead of processed foods like oil.

Date Walnut Vinaigrette

Using 3/4 cup of water in this recipe yields a pretty creamy salad dressing. You can make it even thicker by cutting back to 1/2 cup water, or you can thin it out by using a full cup. It really depends on your own personal preferences.

You can put this delicious Date Walnut Vinaigrette dressing on most of your favorite salads, including our Easy Garden Salad, Spinach Salad or Hearty Side Salad.

If you make this recipe, please let us know your thoughts in the comments below. And please share with your friends to help spread the word about healthy plant based eating.

 

Vegan Muesli

Vegan Muesli PinThis Vegan Muesli breakfast is filling and delicious. It makes enough for 8 servings so you can make it ahead of time and enjoy it for several breakfast meals.

We used whole rolled oats as the base, but you can use instant oats, rye flakes or your favorite breakfast grain. We also used coconut flakes, raisins and craisins for sweetness, and walnuts and sunflower seeds for a little extra protein and healthy fats. But you can use your favorite dried fruits and nuts. Anything will work.

Unsweetened Cashew Milk is creamy and delicious without many calories. The brand we use only has 25 calories per cup with 45% of your day’s calcium needs (50% more calcium than dairy milk).

Berries are a nutritious part of any breakfast. They’re loaded with vitamins and antioxidants. Plus, they’re very sweet so you may not need additional sweetener. If berries aren’t your thing, sliced bananas or Healthy Cooked Apples also taste great on this Vegan Muesli.

If you make this recipe, please let us know your thoughts in the comments below. And please share with your friends to help spread the word about healthy plant based eating.

Carrot Pineapple Salad

Carrot Pineapple Salad PinThis Carrot Pineapple Salad is straight from Amelia’s mom’s kitchen. Amelia loved this recipe as a kid and now I love it, too!

Not only is it full of vibrant colors, it’s deliciously sweet thanks to the pineapple and raisins. In fact, it’s so sweet, you could eat it as dessert. Good luck not eating multiple helpings of it!

Thanks to the walnuts, raisins and pineapple, it does pack quite a few calories at 176 per 3/4 cup. But it also has 168% of your RDV of Vitamin A.

We paired it with our unbelievably delicious Vegan BLT & Avocado Sandwich. The sweetness in the Carrot Pineapple Salad was the perfect compliment to the salty, savory tofu bacon.

If you make this recipe, please let us know your thoughts in the comments below. And please share with your friends to help spread the word about healthy plant based eating.

Vegan Wellington

Vegan WellingtonIt was the first snow of the season here in Denver and the roads were treacherous, but we were determined to get to Whole Foods during rush hour. Amelia read that a plant-based chef, Kelley Williamson at PlantBasedKitchen-Recipes.com, was teaching a holiday cooking class and the main dish was Vegan Wellington.

This being our first vegan Thanksgiving, Amelia wanted to make us a special occasion meal, and the description Kelley wrote fit the bill so we trekked through the snow and only arrived 5 minutes late. It was totally worth it!

This delicious Vegan Wellington recipe is made with eggplant and other veggies in lieu of beef. It’s packed with flavor and plates nicely with your other Holiday Dishes.

Vegan Wellington is a labor of love and took us the better part of a day to make it, but the result was worth the effort. It made our Thanksgiving dinner simply amazing.

This recipe makes 2 Vegan Wellington loaves so you’ll have plenty of servings. Since there was only two of us, we froze one of the loaves to eat in a few weeks. Or you can cut the quantities in half to make one loaf.

Mom’s Famous Pie Crust will make this an extra special treat, but you can also buy frozen vegan pie dough at the store if you can find it. We couldn’t find any. The guy at Whole Foods said they were out.

You’ll need the Flax Egg recipe here. This recipe calls for two flax eggs.

You can make the mushroom mixture ahead of time to save time on the main cooking day. You can also make the Vegan Wellington loaves the day before and refrigerate them overnight so they’re ready for your holiday and you don’t have to spend the whole day cooking. Just pull them out of the refrigerator an hour early and put them in the oven 30 minutes or so before meal time and the loaves will come out piping hot and ready to eat.

If you make this recipe, please let us know your thoughts in the comments below. And please share with your friends to help spread the word about healthy plant based eating.