Taco soup!

When I visit Sunshine at school, I stay in a hotel room with a kitchenette. There, I can prep food for her to store in the freezer. Her favorites are veggie noodle soup, taco soup, and chicken/black bean enchiladas (not vegetarian). This isn't the most appetizing photo, but it's my little prep kitchen during a recent visit. Taco soup recipe below. It's a winner!

I have been making variations of this taco soup for years. My kids devour it. Honestly, I've never seen anybody turn it down.

Ingredients:

1 can corn, drained
2 cans diced or crushed tomatoes (whatever you prefer)
4 cans beans (black beans, pinto, or tri-bean blend: drained and rinsed)
1/4 cup taco seasoning (store bought or make your own)
1 T dehydrated onion
2 cans of water

Put all ingredients in Instant Pot, high pressure for 4 minutes. Manual release. Top with cheese and/or sour cream and tortilla chips. Also freezes well, and is GREAT as leftovers.

Stove top alternative: place all ingredients in a soup pot and simmer on the stove top until flavors meld and onions are rehydrated.

On the 11th day...

And on the 11th day, the three year old has a breakdown realizing that there is no turkey & cheese in the house.  "But I need turkey and cheese not made out of animals!"  Sweet girl.

To the rescue....

Daddio heated the hot dogs stove-top in a skillet.  They had the right flavor and a very similar texture to a hot dog...without all of the hot dogness of a hot dog.  You know what I mean. ;)

These will become a refrigerator staple now that I know Punky will eat them when all else fails.  Whew!  Crisis averted!

Raspberry Peach Smoothies

YUM!  We love smoothies.  The girls think they're getting a treat and I know they're getting good nutrition.  Okay, let me rephrase.  We all love the deliciousness, but the only one I'm still fooling is Punky.  They're growing up! <sniff, sniff> ;)

Last week on our Costco trip, I picked up a flat of organic peaches.  They weren't quite ripe, so we placed them in a large paper sack for a day (just leave sack on the counter).  Fast forward, the next day they were fragrant, juicy, and ready to devour.  But, for some reason, by the very next day, they needed to be used ASAP!  Into a smoothie was the best way for us to use up this fruit.  I decided to pair it with some raspberries that were also aging in the fridge, and a banana, of course!  I think every smoothie has to have a banana for creaminess and flavor.

The girls loved these smoothies so much that I made them again the next day!

Peach-Raspberry-Banana Smoothies

Peach-Raspberry-Banana Smoothies
Recipe (4 good size smoothies)

4 peaches, pitted and roughly chopped
2 bananas
1 pint raspberries
1 c coconut milk yogurt (we used vanilla)
1/2-1 cup almond milk
ice
*flax seed
*brown rice protein powder

*optional

Place all ingredients in a blender and process until smooth.  Add almond milk (or other dairy free milk) as needed.

Simple and delicious!

Did I mention that we're a homeschooling family?  Nope?  Now ya know!  :)  Since today is Labor Day, the kids woke up trying to convince me that we should take a school break.  It didn't take much convincing, honestly.  We had a long day yesterday (our A/C broke and the outdoor temp was 105) so I figured a day off would be nice.  We've been working on fun projects instead of school work.  I have a to-do list a mile long, and was really in the zone, so I forgot what time it was.  At 12:57, Belle asked if we could have lunch.  Oops!  :)

I decided to keep working and let Sunshine & Belle figure out what we'd have for lunch.  They settled on tomato & avocado sandwiches, chips and apple slices.  So simple and satisfying!

Belle set forth cutting a deliciously ripe avocado into chunks.  We happened to have a beautiful tomato already cut (leftover from yesterday's salad).  Sunshine spread soy-free Vegenaise on the soft bread.  They put all of the ingredients together and made a yummy sandwich!

Tomato & Avocado Sandwich
(Yes, I know that looks like bacon in the picture but I promise it's a tomato!)

Belle was reading labels while choosing her chips, she's getting really good at figuring out what's vegan and what's not (we're still finding food in our pantry that we didn't clear out the first time through).  It's nice that she's able to identify the hidden non-vegan ingredients.  Great learning experience!