Tao of Tea at the Chinese Gardens

The Portland Classical Chinese Gardens are a peaceful sanctuary located in the heart of Chinatown, Downtown Portland. The juxtaposition of the tranquil cherry blossoms and the large skyscrapers makes for a surreal  and gorgeous experience.


Admission is $8.50, but during the first week and a half of January 2010, admission was FREE!
From their website:

10 Days of Free Admission

On September 14, 2010 Lan Su Chinese Garden turns ten. To commemorate this exciting milestone and honor our special relationship with our sister city Suzhou, we’re hosting a yearlong celebration--and everyone is invited. We are kicking off the celebration with 10 free days of admission from January 2-11. Come see the Garden on us.

Some girlfriends and I made plans to come check it out.

(This picture reminds me very much of this from a few months ago:

Almost the same group of ladies, but instead of the unexpected warmth of the Oregon Coast, we had the January chill of Oregon winter)

Anyway, we met at the tea house, which is ran by the Tao of Tea, a peaceful zen-like teahouse and shop in Portland. We all ordered little cups of tea and shared some snacks.

 
Steamed Buns with green spinachy type stuff inside. Major Yums.














“Eight Treasures” tea. Sweet and simple.










“Horsebeans” aka fried fava beans. Crispy and salty and delicious.








Green Tea Pumpkin Seeds. The Spicy Vegan was right when she said they tasted like marshmallows. Sweet and curious,they were a yummy little treat.




Dried mangos with coconut and goji berries









 





Daikon Salad. I don’t think I like daikon yet. Maybe I just didn’t like the way this was prepared? I should look into recipes.



And..

Steamed Dumplings. I don’t remember what the filling was in here (mushrooms maybe?) but they were presented beautifully and everyone enjoyed them.





After lunch, we walked around snapping pictures, hugging trees, getting our Chinese fortune read with fortune sticks, and coloring cherry blossoms to hang on a display.

(We were the only adults.)

It was a gorgeous and peaceful day and a super fun way to spend some really good giggly fun time with girlfriends.

Book Giveaway!

If you’ve been reading this blog for awhile, you probably have heard me talk about Gail Eisnitz and her book Slaughterhouse.
To read my review of it, click here.
It’s an incredibly powerful and moving expose on factory farms in the United States. Though it was written about ten years ago, unfortunately the conditions are still just as horrifying now. Eiznitz,Chief Investigor for the Humane Farming Association (HFA), spent countless hours communicating with USDA employees, speaking with slaughterhouse workers, and listening to families who have lost loved ones due to the shoddiness of the American Agri-business.
I’m not gonna lie; it’s a hard read. It’s emotional and draining and explicit. But it’s also incredibly informative, well-researched, and touching.
I was so touched, in fact, that I wrote to Gail and asked her if she’d be interested in donating a book or two for my blog.
She said yes.
If you’re not interested in reading this book, I don’t blame you. But if you do want to find out more, this book isn't just for vegetarians or animal rights activists. It's for anyone that cares about people, about animals, about being informed, about corporate greed, about health, and about compassion.
~~~~
To enter, please leave a comment below stating either:
1. Why you want to read the book; or
2. What you hope to get out of the book; or
3. Why you’re nervous about reading the book.
**The contest will last until Noon on January 13th.

Top 10 of 09

My top 10 favorite things of 2009 (in downright random order)

1. Twitter—2009 is the year Twitter exploded everywhere, leaving people dazed and covered in tweets. I love it.

2. Vegan Community—2009 is my first full year of being a committed vegan. And what a year it has been. I’ve met loads of awesome vegans, in Portland and throughout the world. I love having a network of people whose lifestyle and beliefs lead to conversations that seamlessly jump between  quinoa recipes, global warming, cute little piggies, and cancer prevention.

3. Vancouver, BC—March. My trip with Rob in March was so much freakin fun. We rented bikes, drank fancy drinks, ate fancy food, stayed at the fancy Metropolitan, ate veggie dogs from street vendors and shopped.

4. Christmas—December. Four days sped by as I was enveloped in the cozy embrace that is home and family. Revitalizing.

5. Turkey—October. Shelley and I explored half of this vast continent, learning the Turkish language, eating Turkish pizzas, hobnobbing with Turkish ship captains, and generally generating a giant love affair with everything Turkish. This country is so ancient and beautiful and magical.I will go back.

6. Champagne Cocktails—What do you get when you mix champagne with cocktails? A sophisticated party in your mouth. For a home-recipe and a partial list of places in Portland that serve these wondrous concoctions, click here. In case you didn’t know, Champagne cocktails and the Epicurious Vegan are bffs.

7. Vita Mix—April. This little soul-expensive blender has changed my life. Smoothies, soups, nut cheese, creams, breads, smoothies, and smoothies. My life in 2009 is infinitely better because of my Vita Mix (though not my bank account).

8. Writing—2009 is the year of Yelp reviews, blog posts, company newsletters, culture mob articles, examiner articles, demand studio articles, and loads of lengthy emails.

9. Modified Style—May. 2009 marked the first year of Modified Style, the rockin benefit fashion show that Andrea and I put on. It was a smashing success; we raised funds and awareness of The Farm Sanctuary, Sisters of the Road, and Junior Achievement. Modified Style also inspired people to get creative! Now that we have a committee for Modified Style ‘10, it’s going to be even bigger and better.

10. Food!—my very favorite. I cooked a lot and ate a lot in 2009. From food carts to vegan supper club to vegan corn dogs to Back to Eden, I definitely ate way more than my fair share of vegan treats this year.

What was your favorite moment or trip of 2009?

Poor (Wo)Man’s Pasta

 

So the other day, I was S-T-A-R-V-I-N-G and had very little food in my house to eat. Rob was hungry too, so I wanted to make something really filling.

Say hello to my little friend: Poor (Wo)Man’s Pasta!

 

I made a quick cheese sauce (Earth Balance, flour, nutritional yeast, water, mustard, miso, salt and garlic) while boiling the pasta. Once the cheese sauce thickened, I threw in some of Nate’s Meatballs (from the Grocery Outlet—one of my favorite places in the WOOORLD!) to warm up. Once the pasta was cooked, I drained it, threw in a can of black beans (protein! fiber! genius!) and some garden spinach before tossing it in with the cheese sauce.

It was incredibly filling, pretty easy, and surprisingly tasty. I would have thrown whatever I had in there, but this combination actually worked out quite well.

Raw ‘Un’ Baking

2 weeks ago, I headed up to the Back to Eden kitchen to do a little un-baking for the storefront.

 

This is what I made:

(I’m going to start with the worst picture, so your enjoyment can go up as you read down:)

Cranberry-Pistachio Nessie Bars

   (uncut)

I fell in love with Lara Bars a while back, and was amazing at their simple ingredients. Then I was amazing at how much I was spending on them.

Solution: Make my own version! Introducing: Nessie Bars. This kind was in honor of Christmas—the bright red and juicy cranberries mixed with the salty and crunchy green pistachios made these bars gorgeous. Garrett sold them as squares down at the storefront, and I wish I would have taken a picture—they were so festive!

These bars are vegan (duh), raw, soy-free, gluten-free, and would have been sugar-free if the cranberries weren’t sugar-sweetened.

Next up:

Chocolate Chip Cookies!

These kind of look like rice cakes or something, but don’t judge based on the pictures! They’re so good!

The text I got from Garrett the day they hit the storefront for the first time:

A woman came in today and bought one of your raw cookies. She ate it in the store. She then bought the rest of them! No, really. She said, ‘I’ll take them all.’

Um, can I get a holla?

These cookies are vegan (duh), raw, sugar-free, soy-free, and would be gluten-free if oats aren’t rolled in wheat (Why on earth would people do that? I just found that out).

And finally…. Brownie Bites!

These babies are chocolate-y walnut-y little morsels all rolled up in coconut. I love em! I added some chocolate extract to them, but I don’t think I would again because they tasted kind of alcohol-y. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, I guess.

My brownie bites are vegan (duh), raw, sugar-free, soy-free, and gluten-free.

I love baking in Back to Eden’s kitchen—it’s so shiny and clean and has all the ingredients I could ever want to play with. :)