Birthday Dinner for Mr. VE&T!

Well, I'm a little behind - we've been busy with birthday celebrations! (and the rest of life too) Yesterday was Mr. Vegan Eats & Treat's big day and we had a nice day - especially in the nomz department!

The day started with a surprise loaf of vegan Challah Bread. This recipe is from Quick and Easy Vegan Celebrations, and we love it SO MUCH. It's moist, a tiny bit sweet, chewy and amazing. Mr. VE&T loves this stuff so much, but he forgot all about it, so I got to surprise him with a fresh loaf! We each had two pieces - one with some homemade apricot jam from a friend and one with Chocolate Hazelnut Chocoreale. Mmmmmm. Such a special treat.

Our day also included as many strawberries as we could possibly want - a bday gift from our friends Jane and JP who just happen to grow organic strawberries on their farm. Friends in high places, I'm tellin' ya!

For dinner, after days of deliberation and uncertainty, Mr. VE&T decided that he wanted the Seitan BBQ Ribz from Vegan Diner/Fat Free Vegan. He wanted a double batch, but I don't think either of us really just how many ribz that was gonna be in the end. CRAZY. So, now we've got a freezer full of ribz available for at least a couple more weeknight dinners. Ha. As always, they were chewy and delicious. I remember seeing this recipe around the interwebz for so long before I ever made them, and I'm so glad I finally did. They are delicious!

You can't just have a big blob of seitan for dinner (okay, well, maybe you can. But not for a birthday dinner!) - so we decided to make some green bean & potato salad to go with the ribz. This potato salad is an old recipe from Mediterranean Vegan Kitchen and it's my all-time favorite potato salad. It's vinegar and oil and salt and pepper and shallots with some new potatoes and green beans. Oh man, it is just incredible. And no mayo - which is a plus for me. I've never been into those mayo-covered potato salads.

We had more strawberries for dessert... and then tomorrow night we'll have a little family gathering with cake and ice cream - photos will be forthcoming!