California Dreaming

Photo taken by my friend Anne Ylvisaker on her iPhone- unfortunately I left my camera at home on our walk today!

Every time I visit California, I realize this is where I belong. The air is so fresh, the sun is (almost) always shining, there are great places to get vegan food, and you can hear the ocean from everywhere. I always feel so rejuvenated, especially since I've been stuck in the Midwest for so long. After college, you can definitely count on me heading to the west coast. Just look at how beautiful it is here, how can you resist?! 

Also by Anne!

Because I'm pretty busy starting my internship with the natural history museum, I'll just leave you with a quick and easy lunch recipe that I made for my mom and I while I was home. It's from my favorite cookbook I mentioned before, Big Vegan. These wraps were super tasty and incredibly healthy!

Easy Veggie Tahini Wraps 

serves 2

1 1/2 cups broccoli florets
2 cups chopped kale
3 tbsp tahini paste
2 tbsp fresh lemon juice
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 cup halved cherry tomatoes
2 large spinach tortillas


1. Steam the broccoli and kale so that they become tender and bright green. Drain them and pat dry.
2. In a medium bowl, stir together the tahini, lemon juice and salt until smooth. Mix in the broccoli, kale and tomato halves. Warm up the tortillas in a toaster oven or microwave and fill them with the veggies. Wrap up and enjoy!

I think these are about to become a lunch staple for me.

I love listening to this song by the ocean. Excuse me while I go dream about dolphins and waves...

Toasted Veggie Sandwich and Disaster

Disaster has struck my dorm. Our oven and stove are broken. Now instead of baking lovely treats for everyone, I'm going to actually have to do my homework this weekend. Maybe it's a sign that I need to adjust my priorities. Hopefully it will be fixed soon though, because I have a long "to-bake" list for you guys. Meanwhile....

I discovered the fact that the stove was broken midway through preparing to make a grilled veggie sandwich. I was about to completely give up after waiting 10 minutes for the pan to heat up and just go with boring old peanut butter and jelly, but then I had an idea. I could toast/roast the veggies instead. The result was still delicious.



Basically I drizzled sliced eggplant and tomato with olive oil and sprinkled them with oregano and rosemary and baked them at 400° in the toaster oven for about 15 minutes (until the eggplant was soft). I toasted two slices of bread (I used plain old wheat, but I wish I had some better bread like ciabatta so it didn't get so soggy) and then spread a layer of spinach and artichoke hummus, topped it with fresh basil and finally added the veggies. Perfect for a quick and healthy dinner before I ran off to serve pizza for 5 hours!



Haven't you ever noticed that the best sandwiches are always the messiest to eat? It's a fact.