Smarty Vs. Farty: Treats

I'm a junk food addict.

That's one of the reasons I started this blog. Upon realizing that junk food was making me sick (and fat), I wanted to find healthy alternatives for my cravings.

Remember my PMS-induced choco-holocaust from a couple weeks ago?

Yeah, so much for healthy substitutes. No matter the ingredients, a cookie is still a cookie. A veg is still a veg.

To curb my sweet tooth, I've been trying a number of different tactics to keep myself from another choco-holocaust. First? Eat something sweet every single day.

So using this blog as an excuse, I've been buying up the cookies like cookie monster gone old school. Here's what I found.


1. Pamela's
These cookies are NOT vegan. I tried them anyway, for all my gluten-free girls out there. Because I'm lactose intolerant, they most definitely made me sick. BUT they are some of the best gluten-free cookies out there. The Chocolate Chunk ones were my faves. Peanut Butter, not so much. A little too chewy and not sweet enough.








2. Enjoy Life


Enjoy Life cookies are gluten-free and vegan. For me, they are the perfect choice when you want a soft cookie. They are not as sweet as Pamela's, as they are fruit-sweetened. But they don't make you sick either.










3. Smart Treats


I buy these whenever I'm in Boston. They have a sandy texture, but they kick ass in sweetness and taste. They also crunch real good. A great side with coffee. Even my Boston-non-Vegan-BFF, who's a notorious junk food eater, loves them.



4. Cookies... For Me?


These are indigenous to the Pennsylvania area, and well worth the cost. Hands down, the best brownies I've had, ever. This lady's stuff is not always vegan, but if you are having a severe brownie attack, it's worth it.







5. Frankly Natural



Frankly Natural makes the best vegan, gluten-free junk food I've had ever. They take the cake, literally.




















Ever see the movie "Chocolat"? It's about a lady who starts a chocolaterie (or however you spell it) in this tiny little French town full of Catholics and anorexics. At the end, the starving mayor tries to destroy her shop. He ends up eating her entire front display case.

As much as I preach, I do believe that all rules deserve to be broken. Everything in moderation. Or else, we'd go mad.

I Want It

We all know how I hate to spend money.

I'd love to support every brilliant vegan chef out there (What up, PPK!) and buy a whole catalog of cookbooks. But right now, I can't afford it. I can't even afford the ingredients!

My teaching job ended a few weeks ago. None of the local temp agencies have been able to find me work. After ten years of waitress and bartending experience, I can't score a restaurant job.

It's rough out there, folks.

BUT TODAY, I found a cookbook that I MUST BUY.

The Complete Vegan Kitchen is one of the most brilliant, creative, mind-blowing cookbooks I've ever seen in my life. Seriously.

I sat down at the University of Penn. bookstore this afternoon and read the whole thing, cover to cover, like it was a gripping murder mystery. Every page I turned, there was a new dish or new combination of foods I'd never heard of.

This chick, Jannequin Bennett, has one hell of an imagination. She veganizes rare recipes from all over the globe, while putting her own spin on vegan classics. There's a recipe for Eggplant Rollatini that uses polenta, instead of riccotta cheese. There's a Broccoli-Almond veggie burger. There's recipes from Algeria, Portugal, and Indonesia.

There's a recipe for Tofu Boursin cheese.

If that doesn't convince you that this cookbook is one of a freakin' kind, then I don't know what.

And you know what? I don't even care. 'Cos I'm buyin' this bitch. ASAP.

Go, Going, Gone

My skin is crawling.

My face is boiling.

My stomach is all knotted up like twisty doughnut.

I'm hunched over a computer, trying to get work done. I could be in the Mac Lab at school. I could be my parents' kitchen at five am. It doesn't matter. If anyone talks to me, I'll scream.
http://www.kf6nvr.net

How old am I? Any age. This is how I've been my entire life. At 19, my doctor prescribed me with Xanax and told me that I had anxiety disorder. I took two pills and sold the rest to my druggie friends at college.

I didn't think it was a problem.

I've always thought of myself as a typical east coast chick. High-strung. Uptight. Angela from The Office, basically. I like being stressed out. I like the drama of it. I like the shouts, the tears, the sweat. I like not knowing what will happen next.

Until it started affecting my gut.

Over the past few months, I've realized that stress causes 99.99% of my IBS. Stress makes my stomach clench. Stress makes me eat too fast. Stress makes me eat too much.

I didn't come into this on my own. My IBS-BFF has been telling me for years: "Pay attention to your stress." And I ignored her, fascinated with learning about vegetables and healthy food.

All the IBS books I read said the same thing. I ignored them.

Finally, about two months ago, I started keeping a food diary. What did I find? Every time I had a bout of IBS, it was on a really stressful day.

In Making Sense of IBS, Brian E. Lacy, Ph.D, MD explains why our emotions affect our guts so intensely. There are nerves down there. In the stomach. These nerves receive messages from the brain, telling our stomach when to digest food. So if your head is all effed up with stress and anxiety, chances are that our stomach isn't going to be able to work properly.

Most IBS books focus on food. Dr. Lacy talks more about stress. He offers some new tricks for that I'd never heard before. Here's the run-down of what worked for me:

1. Exercise before eating.
Duh, right? You all know you have to exercise. But Dr. Lacy points out the importance of working up an appetite. If you work yourself into hunger, it will be easier for you to digest foods.

2. Don't eat unless you're really really hungry.
Again, work yourself up to maximum digestion. If you feel hungry, try other ways of satiating yourself. Drink water. Me? I get the elevensies so bad. To combat them, I drink either coconut water or soy milk. Then I can hold off until 1 or 2 for lunch, when my digestion is at peak.

3. Focus on eating while eating.
Chew your food like ten, twenty times. Don't do anything else while eating. Don't read. Don't play on the computer. Sit and look out a window.

4. After eating, sit.
Don't do anything for a half hour after you eat. It's okay to read, listen to music, or watch TV. But don't get up and go on with your day immediately. Don't drink anything either. Espresso, wine and lemon water have been known to help digestion. Sometimes, when I feel like I can handle it, I'll use them. Most of the time, it's best to let the food work its own way down.

www.eregimens.com

So these little tricks are fine, but how do they help quell stress?

They don't.

The biggest bitch about stress is that it happens without you knowing it. It's when you get so caught up in life that you're on autopilot. You lose your job. Someone close to you dies. You go and go and go. From one tragedy to the next.

It's so easy to walk out the door without your head on. But remember, when you leave your head at home, you leave your stomach too.

Polenta Pizza Crusts

Recipe courtesy of the brilliant Susan V. at Fat Free Vegan!


Super easy to make...









Delicious Plain...







... And sturdy enough to make a slammin' personal pie!