Month: May 2011

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Judy Moody Giveaway

So excited about this giveaway. MomsLA is hosting a group of parents and kids to see the movie Judy Moody next week in Hollywood. I’m giving away 2 sets of tickets. One that includes 3 tickets and one that includes 2. To enter just leave a comment by 5 p.m. Friday with how many tickets you need. I’ll notify the winner Friday night.

You must live in Los Angeles and be able to provide your own transportation to and from the event, which is –
Wednesday, June 8
4:00 PM “Mega-cool” Cookie Party
4:30 PM Screening, winners will be notified with the location (in Hollywood).

Here is a synopsis of the movie:

When her best-laid plans for a summer full of fun go comically awry, an imaginative young girl creates her own vacation adventures in Judy Moody and the NOT Bummer Summer. Based on the beloved, bestselling book series by Megan McDonald, Judy Moody and the NOT Bummer Summer is an irresistible and delightfully funny treat for adventure-loving kids and adults.

This summer, third grader Judy Moody is planning the most super-duper, double-rare summer vacation ever with best friends Rocky and Amy. Except that it turns out Rocky is going to circus camp to learn to tame lions, and Amy is headed off to Borneo with her mom to save a lost tribe while Judy stays home with her pesky little brother Stink and second-best friend Frank Pearl.

Just when she thinks things are as rotten as they can be, her parents announce that they will be going to California and Judy will have to stay behind with her Aunt Opal, who she’s never even met! It looks like Judy’s best summer ever has just become her way worst summer ever.

But feisty, fearless and ever-funny Judy Moody never gives up! With help from some unexpected sources, she’s headed for a summer full of surprises in this charming and spirited family film. Get ready, get set, get MOODY!

MomsLA was compensated to run this post. 

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Vegan Gluten-Free Peanut Butter Oatmeal Cookies With No Refined Sugar

The headache finally went away. I’ve been doing the Whole Foods 28-day Challenge and the second week is going much better. The challenge requires participants to go 4 weeks without meat, dairy, oil, or refined sugar. I had a headache for the first 4 days as I detoxed from sugar and salt, but since then, I’ve been feeling pretty good.

It’s kind of incredible how good I feel, actually. I usually follow up everything I eat with a little something sweet. Whether it’s a piece of chocolate or a cookie or some candy. So for the last week and a half I’ve been reaching for fruit or nothing at all. I’ve even stopped sugaring my coffee. I’m not having sugar cravings at all. (Disclosure: I did cheat for an hour when I went to a blogger tasting at a local natural bakery. But I was working!)

And oddly, I’m not thinking about food as much. But that doesn’t mean I’ve stopped baking gluten-free treats. I love to bake, so I tried to come up with something that would work for the challenge.

I combined a couple of recipes I found online and then made it gluten-free as well. These cookies are not designed to mimic a sugary, gluten filled treat as many of my other recipes are. These are different; dense and filling and not terribly sweet. But like I said they are filling and they will help curb that sweet tooth if you’re not eating refined sugar.

Vegan Gluten-Free Peanut Butter Oatmeal Cookies

1/3 cup natural peanut buttermaple batter
2 ripe bananas, mashed
1 tsp vanilla
2 tbsp unsweetened soy milk
2 tbsp maple syrup or raw honey
2 ½ cups quick cooking gluten-free oatmeal (Bob’s Red Mill makes it)
1/4 cup gluten free flour (King Arthur Gluten-Free Multipurpose flour or see below*)
¼ teaspoon cinnamon
¼ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon xantham gum
¼ to ½ cup dried cherries or other dried fruitoatmeal batter

Preheat oven to 350º. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and set aside.

Combine oatmeal, flour, cinnamon, salt, and xantham gum. Set aside. With a wooden spoon, mix the mashed banana, vanilla, soy milk, and maple syrup. Add the flour mixture and stir until combined. Mix in the cherries.

Using two spoons or a small ice cream scoop, drop cookies onto a cookie sheet. Avoid using hands because the mix will be very sticky.

Bake for 12 to 15 minutes.

*Basic Gluten-Free Flour Mix with Brown Rice Flour
6 cups brown rice flour
2 cups potato starch
1 cup tapioca flour
Store leftover flour in an airtight container.

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Kung Fu Panda 2

Friends were giving me a hard time lately about being a killjoy when it comes to my kids. I have two rough and tumble boys, but just because they are male doesn’t mean I subscribe to the ridiculously patronizing saying “boys will be boys.”

What does that even mean? What kind of boys are we talking about? When people say that, I think they mean “brutes will be brutes.” I want my boys to be peace loving young men who solve problems with words. I want them to tell their friends that they love them. Not hit them with sticks.

So it might come as a surprise that I would take my kids to go see a screening of Kung Fu Panda 2. A few years ago after we saw the first movie my younger son acted out all the kung fu moves on his older brother.

They had been seeing the signs for Kung Fu Panda 2 all over town and were dying to see it. We were invited to a screening at DreamWorks with a tour of the studio to follow. We could not pass that up.

Okay, there is a lot of fighting and also shooting of things in this movie, but at its core, it’s a sweet movie. And I love the animation especially the hand drawn sequences that explain Po’s back story. Po is now the infamous Dragon Warrior fighting villains with the Furious Five, his hard-to-win-over companions from the first movie. When Po must fight a band of wolves he starts to have flashbacks that make him wonder where he really came from. There are a few funny and touching scenes where Po, a Panda, starts to realize he was adopted by his goose father.

Kung Fu Panda 2 is definitely darker than its predecessor, but the animation is  beautifully done. It might be too scary for younger kids especially the scenes where the Po loses his birth parents and the fight scene at the end.

But the movie as a whole is fun for kids and their parents. It’s funny and the action packed. My boys loved it.

I keep trying to get my boys to resolve their conflicts with words and in the end that’s what Po tries to do. It doesn’t work and he has to fight it out, but at least there is an attempt at conflict resolution. If boys will be boys, this might be a good movie for them.

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Big Sunday Lemonade Stand

When I told my 5-year-old we were going to have a lemonade stand he was quick to volunteer to help. “Are we raising money to buy Legos?” he asked.

We’d been giving my two boys chores to do around house so they could earn money. Every couple of months, they would pool their banks together to buy Legos.

Nope, I told him. It’s for charity. A few weeks ago I volunteered for LA River Day through Latina Bloggers Connect and Pine Sol. It was such a great time, but too long of a day for my kids to participate. So I searched for a volunteer project for us to do as a family; one that the kids would enjoy, but would teach them the importance of helping other people.

Of course, by the time I got around to signing up most of the projects for Big Sunday, May 5 and 6, were full. Big Sunday is an annual event where people all over Los Angeles spend the weekend doing projects to help schools, libraries, parks, and non profits. We decided to put up a lemonade stand and donate the money to Shane’s Inspiration.

lemonade benefit stand in LA

Shane’s Inspiration builds handicap accessible playgrounds including Aidan’s Place at the Westwood Recreation Center. When we first moved to Los Angeles we lived in an apartment near the Rec Center and it was often the highlight of my day to walk my toddler and newborn baby there. My kids agreed that it would be a great organization to raise money for. I had hoped to have the lemonade stand at Aidan’s Place, but the park required a permit that it was too late and too expensive to get, so we put up the stand at my house.

lemonade

We had picked up a lemonade stand kit from Big Sunday earlier in the week, which included signs, Minute Maid lemonade, and tshirts. My two boys and I walked around the neighborhood that Sunday taping up signs and talking to neighbors asking them to stop by. Meanwhile, my husband went to the store and got provisions for the friends we invited over in the hopes that it would turn into a party.

And it did. It was such a great day. My friend Marissa and her family had volunteered to do the stand with us. Other friends showed up as well as some neighbors. We raised more than $100, which I think is pretty good for a lemonade stand.

kids lemonade stand

The most rewarding part of the day was watching the kids. There was no talk of buying Legos. They walked up the street with signs and were eager to serve when we had customers. They really wanted to get people to the lemonade stand so they could raise more money for Shane’s Inspiration.
And what an inspiration it was for all of us.
Pine Sol was the Big Sunday Big Clean Sponsor and also sponsored this post. I am being compensated for writing the post, but not for putting up the lemonade stand. That was all the volunteers and the family.

Thank you to Pine Sol for inspiring my recent volunteerism! “Pine-Sol is proud to put its scents to work and celebrate volunteerism and community development through its sponsorship of Big Sunday.” Please “like” Pine Sol Latino on Facebook.

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Gluten-Free Strawberry Cake

I am pretty food obsessed, which is probably why I’ve gained weight recently. My last food obsession was with this strawberry cake recipe from the food blog “In Erika’s Kitchen.” It looked so delightful I kept thinking about how I needed to make a gluten-free version for my family.

But I’m trying not to bake just for the sake of baking until I drop those pesky 8 pounds (I tried this recipe before I started my vegan diet). The last time I just baked a cake for the hell of it my husband and I ate an entire gluten-free lemon pound cake in a day.

So I waited until there was an occasion and thank you, Jesus, there was. This Easter I was finally able to make the cake and it turned out delightful. Light and moist. It has a streusel topping so it’s more like a coffee cake, but no one was complaining.

The strawberries are perfect right now so it’s a good time to try this out. This cake has oat flour. If you don’t like oats or can’t find gluten free oat flour, you can use all gluten-free flour.

This is Erika’s recipe that I modified to be gluten-free. Visit In Erika’s Kitchen to see the original.

Ingredientssliced strawberries
2 eggs
1/2 cup canola oil
1 cup sugar
2 cups fresh strawberries, sliced
2 cups gluten-free flour (King Arthur Gluten-Free Multipurpose flour or see below*)
¾ cup gluten-free oat flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
2 teaspoons xantham gumstrawberry cake batter
1/3 cup dark or light brown sugar, firmly packed
1/2 tsp cinnamon
½ teaspoon salt
5 Tbsp unsalted butter (or vegan butter)

Instructions
Preheat the oven to 350º. Spray 9-inch round cake pan with canola oil spray. Using an electric mixer or stand mixer, beat the eggs, oil and granulated sugar together until the mixture is thick and pale, about 1 minute. Add the strawberries and beat at low speed about 30 seconds, just enough to break up the berries a bit.

In a small bowl, combine the gluten-free flour, oat flour, baking powder, baking soda, and xantham gum.

Add 2 cups of flour mixture to the bowl and mix briefly, just until everything is combined. Smooth the batter into cake pan.

Make the crumble: Mix together the remaining 3/4 cup flour, brown sugar, and cinnamon in a small bowl. Cut the butter into small pieces and add them to the flour mixture. Using your hands, rub the butter into the flour mixture until it has the texture and feel of wet sand. Sprinkle the crumble generously over the batter in the pan. Bake the strawberry cake about 35 minutes or until a tester or toothpick comes out clean. Cool the cake in the pan about 10 minutes.

I served the cake in the pan, but if you don’t mind crumbles then you can flip it over on a serving dish. To do that, take a knife and run it along the sides of the cake. Then place a plate on top of the cake pan. Turn it over and quickly turn it back over onto a serving dish. It’s very crumbly and moist so best not put on a cooling rack. Serve at room temperature.

*Basic Gluten-Free Flour Mix with Brown Rice Flour
6 cups brown rice flour
2 cups potato starch
1 cup tapioca flour

Store leftover flour in an airtight container

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Whole Foods 28 Day Challenge; Why Did I Think This Was a Good Idea?

I’ve completed 4 days of the Whole Foods 28 Day Challenge and I’ve had a headache for 4 days. I’m no doctor, but I think the two things might be related.

This lifestyle change (I’m not supposed to call it a diet) hasn’t been easy. For an entire month I can’t have meat, dairy, refined sugar, or oil.

I’ve been eating mostly oatmeal, bread, nut butters, salad, and avocado, which worries me because other than the salad, the food is high carb, high calorie. Even so I’ve lost 3 pounds. I’m sure it’s water weight from not eating any processed food, but hey, I can button my pants again.

I’m not doing the challenge to lose weight. Rather, I’m really trying to get my sugar addiction under control. Not long ago, during one of pre-marathon training sessions, a running coach said that he eats something high in sugar and salt after long runs. I interpreted his off the cuff comment to mean that I needed to eat a lot of salt and sugar while training for the marathon.

So now that I’m on this new plan, I’m not concentrating on baking cookies and cakes to fuel my next run, instead I’ve been cooking more healthy meals. I made brown rice pasta (pictured above) with red onion, garlic, spinach, and mushrooms. There’s no oil in the “lifestyle change” so I sauteed the vegetables in vegetable broth. It was so good. I really wanted to put fresh parmesan, but I controlled myself and was thrilled that it tasted so good. I’m hoping I can make more good recipes.

Hopefully my headache will be gone by tomorrow and I can really embrace this lifestyle change.

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KCRW's Global Street Food

I keep waiting for Blogger to recover the post I wrote last week about KCRW’s Global Street food event, but I don’t think it’s going to happen. Since the post appears to be gone forever, here’s the video we did for MomsLA.

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LA River Day

If you drive by the LA River, hopefully you’ll notice something different. It’s much cleaner. A group of hundreds of volunteers gathered with trash bags and plastic gloves and cleaned up the river as part of LA River Day on April 30.

I was there thanks to Latina Bloggers Connect and Pine Sol. We helped clean up the river and talked to the mayor, who is nearing the end of his second term, about his environmental legacy. We also got to see a concert with Ozomatli!! And meet the fabulous young women of Girls Today Women Tomorrow.

The day was so inspiring I decided to get my kids involved in my next volunteering adventure. This Sunday is Big Sunday where people all over Los Angeles will get together to do community service in their neighborhoods. My boys, husband, friends, and I will be hosting a lemonade stand to raise money for Shane’s Inspiration, which creates inclusive playgrounds to bring kids of all abilities together.

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LA Food Blogger Bake Sale

If you love fabulous and interesting baked goods, you must try to catch one of the Food Blogger Bake Sales going on around town this weekend. Proceeds will benefit Share our Strength, an organization dedicated to ending childhood hunger.

Gaby, from What’s Gaby Cooking is hosting an LA bake sale this Saturday, May 14 from 11:30 am to 2 pm at BLD Restaurant. It will feature baked goods from an amazing collection of food bloggers including one of MomsLA’s own, Daydreamer Desserts. I had the pleasure of tasting some of her gourmet macaroons and if she makes them this weekend I may have to buy them all.

I’ll be donating gluten-free cookies, brownies, and vegan mocha cupcakes and, I must admit, I’m a little intimidated. I sometimes write about food, but these people are some of the best food bloggers in town.

If the West Side isn’t convenient for you, check out the bake sale Veronica, of Muy Bueno Cookbook, is hosting in Valencia. Her sale runs from 3 pm to 7 pm on Saturday, May 14 at Westfield Valencia Town Shopping Center (Sisely’s and TGIF entrance).