Eating Like A Queen

How was everyone’s weekend? I’m sad that it’s almost over, but it was a weekend of many great eats! My poor hubby was stuck working all weekend, so I busied myself with eating out, tackling house projects and continuing helping my sister get settled into a new house which is a seemingly never ending project for them – they need moving lessons from Averie! :-) Saturday I finally made it back to The Green Boheme for lunch with my mom and what a perfect day to do so.

They had a special going on to try locally made raw vegan dog treats, take in a little wine tasting and have a nice meal for $25. I didn’t bring my pup, but we got to take cute little snack bags of the dog treats home for our dogs. The lunch included with this package was brilliant.

Zucchini-almond falafel, topped with marinara and cashew parm on a bed of sprouts and kale, served with sundried tomato-zucchini pesto and veggie crackers. The pesto had a wonderful spice to it, like nothing I’ve tried before but I will be trying to recreate soon. The crackers were good, but the darker ones were a bit chewy. After cleaning that, dessert arrived.

Score! 3 different flavors of raw ice cream, a raw chocolate crunch heart and a sweet banana flax cookie. All the flavors were amazing, but my absolute favorite was the chocolate, it was sinfully rich and creamy – would absolutely never know it was dairy free.

This was the perfect amount of fuel to move on to my sister’s house and tackle a list of chores with her including setting up shelves in her garage and organizing it in 95 degree weather, yard work and setting up a computer for my 3-year-old nephew and installing kiddie games, then showing him how to play. I think he’s already better with a computer than his parents. :-P With me as an aunt, he won’t have a choice! When we finished laboring away on her house, I went with her to Trader Joe’s to stock up her new kitchen and hopefully inspire her to use it more. ;-)

When I got home, I unpacked the raw vegan dog treats to try on my pup.

They smelled good enough for me to eat and probably were. The two chunks are soft, soft flax/nut chews that smelled heavily like onion. That made me nervous after my dog’s reaction to garlic. But she absolutely loved them, scarfed them down and begged for more. The only one she wouldn’t eat was the kale chip and just chewed it up all over the floor. On the flip side, my mom’s dog liked the kale chips and the dark nut chunks, but not the light chunks. Eh, between the two of them, no treats were wasted. :-)

Today was even more exciting. I was going to run yesterday, but the wind was horribly strong (I know, I’m a wuss) making a mess of our garden and howling down our street, so I worked in the gym instead. The weather this morning was perfect for a 3-mile run and catching up on my own yard work after (whew!). Then I met up with my mom again and we headed to Nevada City, a beautiful little town in the foothills that’s about an hour drive north from me and a beautiful drive on winding two-lane hilly roads lined with little wineries, ranches and produce stands. It’s a great little trip to escape the heat and get a change of scenery with tons of unique shops, amazing restaurants and just great scenery and today was perfect weather for the trip.

Today we headed for another living food cafe, The Fix.

This cafe is located in an eclectic old  building it shares with a neat clothing/jewelry shop with hand made clothing a bit out of my price range. What’s interesting about this cafe is it’s a raw vegetarian cafe offering raw goat cheese and other cheeses as well as vegan nut cheeses.

Because the weather was so nice, we opted to eat on the crazy cute patio.

Being quite hungry after an active morning, both my mom and I ordered appetizers before our lunches to really try the place. ;-)

My mom got the raw bruschetta and the nut, grain dehydrator bread was wonderful with a seasoned nutty flavor what was sweet, moist and chewy compared to traditional bread. It was also more satisfying to eat.

I got the raw dolmas.

They were messy to eat, but super yummy topped with seasoned olive oil and pine nuts and stuffed with a mixture of seasoned tomatoes, onions and avocado.

Our main entrees were amazing too, my mom got the portobello burger.

The bun was an impressive grain-filled dehydrator bread with a chopped mushroom patty topped with raw cheese for her, fresh tomoto and red onions with cashew mayo and sundried tomato ketchup.

I went with the Hawaiian pizza.

Before going vegan, it was my favorite pizza flavor and the raw vegan version did not disappoint! Crispy dehydrator crust, fresh tomato sauce, pineapple, macadamia nuts and marinated eggplant strips.  Yum! Served with a beautiful sesame topped salad.

After doing a little more shopping, we moved on in search of nearby Bitney Springs for famous water. In no way do I consider myself a connoisseur of fine water, but I first tasted water from this spring at a raw class and had to admit, it had a flavor that was smoother actually more refreshing than the regular filtered water I drink all the time. Knowing we’d be in the area, I decided to check it out. Only my car GPS didn’t think the road actually existed, so switching between phone GPS, we made it.

After my mom filled all the containers she brought, I reloaded my water bottle to give the water a try.

It was crystal clear, ice cold and super refreshing. There were quite a few cars stopping by to fill up containers and a cute family there listening to granddad give them the history of the place while filling up and drinking bottles. I haven’t drank water from a spring like this since I was a kid and we used to stop at one in the Half Moon Bay area regularly, seems strange that people would just drink from a pipe in the ground spewing water, but it truly was great water and I have a huge glass bottle of it in my fridge now that won’t last long!