So, when I hear the “I don’t feel so well” or “I have a really sore throat” I shelve my dinner ideas for another day and make a hearty soup with bread. Nothing feels as good to me than a nice hot bowl of soup. It soothes my head and my makes my stomach happy too.

One soup I like and make frequently (even when we are perfectly healthy) is vegetable barley soup. To me it is the vegan version of chicken noodle soup. Soothes you when you’re not feeling well, like a warm blanket or a big hug. Simply put – comfort food.

Barley Soup

From Meatless Cooking by Jean Paré. Part of the Company’s Coming series.

Makes 8 cups. ~6 servings.

6 cups water

2 tbsp instant vegetable stock mix

1/3 cup pearl or pot barley

1-14oz canned diced tomatoes with juice

11/2 cup chopped onion

2/3 cup chopped celery

1 cup grated carrot

1 cup grated potato

1/2 cup grated turnip

1 tbsp tamari sauce

1 tsp salt

1/4 tsp pepper

1/2 tsp agave

Chopped parsley or chives, for garnish if you like.

Combine first 13 ingredients in a large stock pot or Dutch oven. Stir. Heat to boiling. Cover and boil slowly for about 1 hour, stirring occasionally. Garnish if you like and serve.

Barley Soup

This goes great with a nice crusty bread or biscuits, like these from Happy Vegan Face gluten-free buttermilk biscuits, recipe here. And you will notice she also has a wonderful gravy recipe that you could make and have biscuits and gravy plus this soup. Talk about comfort food. Wow!

Vegan Gluten-free Buttermilk Biscuits

I felt supercharged yesterday, so I tried the “gluten-be-gone” homestyle chocolate chip cookie recipe from this post by Dreena Burton’s a contributor to True/Slant. She is also author of three of my favorite vegan cookbooks, The Everyday Vegan, Vive le Vegan!: Simple, Delectable Recipes for the Everyday Vegan Family, and Eat, Drink & Be Vegan: Everyday Vegan Recipes Worth Celebrating. And she her blog is eat drink & be vegan.

"Gluten-Be-Gone" Homestyle Chocolate Chip Cookies

So I made these cookies. The recipe called for amaranth flour. I only had amaranth grain and my trusty coffee grinder. The little grinder did its best, but it wasn’t as fine as I would have liked. But I made the cookies anyway. They taste great! Very much like a chocolate chip cookie, but look a little funny. Not as mouth watering as Dreena’s cookies, but like I said very chocolate chip cookie like – Yummy! Next time I will use amaranth flour!

More picts:

Enjoy cooking and the food you create!

Have fun with your animal friends!

The first thing I tried from this book was the Strawberry Kream Cheezecake. I had some strawberries I needed to use up and the only thing that I needed to purchase was lecithin powder. But, Ani gives you the option of increasing the coconut oil and decreasing the amount of water to achieve the same results. The only problem I had was waiting long enough to let the filling firm up! As you can see from the picture, we couldn’t wait to try the cheezecake and so the filling was not as set as it could have been. The next day the filling was set and looked fabulous. We unfortunately ate it up before I could get another picture.

The cookies I made were very easy to make and fun to make! The fun part of raw preparation is that you don’t have too worry or stress about burning or over cooking. And these cookies can be stored in the fridge or freezer, so you can take one out and eat it as a nice cold treat on those days you could “fry an egg” on the pavement, not that you would want to.

The Halva Chai Thumbprint cookies are one of my favorites. They are comfort food for me in that they remind me of special times with my Grandma – baking cookies and then sitting at the table having tea, talking with friends and nibbling on cookies.

These cookies are very tasty and filling! The jam filling is raw too. Very easy to make berries, dates and agave.

Next, I made Almond-Goji Cacao Chip cookies. These cookies were again very easy to make and the TG’s loved them! They really like the goji berries and the cacao chips which added a nice crunch to the cookie.

Lastly, I made the Oatmeal Raisin cookies. I am an oatmeal person, love whole grains, so these cookies are also one of my faves. I would like to point out that these cookies can be shaped into fancy cookies using cookie cutters. I need to purchase some more cute cookie cutters so I can make shapes other than a circle and a heart. Another fun fact when making these cookies is that if you mess up the shaping you can start over and the cookie is still great! So making these cookies are great to make with your children.

Enjoy cooking and the food you create!  Have some fun with your animal friends!