vegan snacks

When I was a teenager, jalapeño poppers were one of my favorite appetizers. There's just something about a jalapeño pepper stuffed with a creamy filling and wrapped in a crunchy breaded crust. Recently, I was reminded of my beloved snack and decided to make a vegan version.

When I looked around the internet, all of the vegan recipes were open-faced stuffed jalapeños, without the breaded coating that I remember. While those stuffed jalapeños do look pretty, they just weren't quite what I was looking for. So I set out to make my own. And I soon realized why all those recipes were made without the coating: it's not easy to get jalapeños perfectly coated! However, after weeks of trial and error, I've finally come up with a method that creates the perfect crunchy coating.

You've planned your entire Thanksgiving feast. But now you're in need of the perfect appetizer for you and your family to snack on while Thanksgiving dinner's being prepared. Don't worry!

In years past, we've snacked on my delicious spinach & artichoke dip. This year, I'm adding a new menu item to the holiday appetizer list: vegan cranberry and cashew goat cheese crostini! (This recipe is also a great option for holiday parties.)

Crostini (an Italian word meaning "little toasts") share some traits with their better-known antipasto cousin, bruschetta. Both are finger foods made from toasted bread slices with various toppings. However, bruschetta traditionally uses larger slices of bread (from a loaf of Italian bread, for example). Crostini are made with smaller bread slices, typically from baguettes. Crostini are also toasted in the oven on a baking tray, while bruschetta is usually grilled over a fire.

A few weeks ago, I woke up with three words in my head: cookie butter frosting. I'm not saying that God herself tasked me with making a vegan recipe for cake frosting for you. But I'm also not saying that she didn't.

For those of you who don't know, I used to sell cupcakes many years ago. So veganizing my cupcake recipes has been on my to-do list for a while. But cookie butter frosting wasn't ever on my radar. I've seen some recipes for traditional (non-vegan) cookie butter frosting, but so far I haven't seen any vegan ones!

Back in October 2019, Disney World announced new plant-based offerings all throughout its parks and resorts. I couldn't wait to try them, so I saved up my coins and headed to Disney earlier this year (pre-COVID). Together with a friend, we sampled vegan eats and treats throughout all four parks. Over three days of dining, we each kept our food spending under $70! Here's a list of what we ate, and what I thought about it.

I cut costs by bringing my own water flasks to the parks to avoid buying bottled water throughout the day. It does add weight to your bags, especially in the morning when the flasks are full, so you'll have to decide if that's worth the savings. I also brought breakfast foods to eat in the hotel before heading to the parks. At Disney World, I shared almost every dish with my travel partner, so we got to sample twice as many foods!