It's my birthday

I'm not a big celebrator of birthdays — mine, I mean. But I've definitely enjoyed this year's festivities, starting Sunday night with a family dinner at my son and d-i-l's house. My d-i-l made the most delicious lentil burgers and roasted potatoes. She found the red lentil burger recipe here, and they were excellent —crispy on the outside and light on the inside. She didn't make the yogurt sauce from the recipe, but subbed a vegan curried mustard sauce instead.

The burgers were supposed to be broiled but because the oven was in use, she cooked them in a pan with oil. For dessert we had fabulous cookies.

My son made a curried mustard sauce to top the burgers.

Today, my actual birthday, I went out to lunch with Bethany, and we went to Café Flora, an upscale restaurant with vegetarian, vegan, and gluten-free menu choices. I didn't take my camera, so I can only tell you I had a fragrant and wonderful root vegetable soup, a side of roasted potatoes, and bread with excellent olive oil. There was dessert, too, but I was too full to eat more than a yummy mouthful of nectarine upside-down cake and vanilla ice cream. I'm hoping to recreate a soup similar to the one we had, and post a recipe, soon.

Not only is the food delicious at Café Flora, the atrium where we ate is the place I would most like to live. While Bethany was off secretly arranging for the waitress to bring a candle to the table, I was lost in thought, picturing where I'd put the bed, the sofa and the studio! If only.

I'd be remiss if I didn't also mention the friendly, enthusiastic and extremely knowledgeable waitstaff. They are unfailingly helpful and kind.

Of course, my birthday wouldn't be complete without a dinner out with my husband. After much debate, we decided to go to Bamboo Garden Vegetarian Restaurant to indulge in my favorite hot pot — tofu skin (yuba) and mixed vegetables in Szechwan sauce.

Because I couldn't decide which yuba dish to order (and it was my birthday) we also ordered Golden Petals on Jade Platter (marinated, crispy-fried soy bean wrappers over stir-fried baby bok choy).

Back at home, my husband gave me a copy of Jonathan Franzen's new book, "Freedom," for a gift.

Going back to Sunday night again, after the family dinner we gave our middle son a ride back to his new apartment, and while we were there he brought out a collection of Polaroid photos that had been in my father's condo, and which my son came into possession of, after my father passed away two years ago. They were all photos of our family taken when our kids (and we) were very young. The above photo of my husband and me with our oldest son was taken when we were visiting my parents — so many years ago.

Breakfast ruts | lentil burgers | Goodwill finds

From elementary school through college, I never ate breakfast. I just couldn't handle anything in my stomach early in the morning. My appetite was fine — even hearty — the rest of the day, but NOT in the morning. Maybe it was the anxiety of school that affected my eating habits, but whatever the reason, breakfast didn't exist as a meal for me.

At some point I learned that "breakfast is the most important meal of the day" and took it to heart, and I've been eating breakfast ever since. BUT, breakfast tends to be my least creative meal of the day. I'm always in one breakfast rut or another. I'll go for long stretches eating only homemade granola, or only oatmeal, or only one kind of cold cereal. (That would be Nature's Path Organic Flax Plus Multibran Cereal (whew), to which I'm sadly addicted.) Well, when I recently had my back molar removed, I couldn't eat the usual crunchy flakes, and I fell into a new rut. Every morning I've been scarfing down bananas, blueberries and yogurt. You'd think I could at least change up the fruit, but nope, that's the nature of ruts — they stay the same.

I WILL change the fruit. I'll try. But at least I have changed the yogurt. Sometimes it's Whole Soy plain, but right now it's So Delicious Coconut milk yogurt in vanilla or plain. The first taste was weird, but now I love it. So I guess I'll be in a coconut milk yogurt rut for a while.

Two-year-old Miss E spent the night with us, and in spite of my own personal rut, I always like to have something special for her breakfast. She usually wants pancakes but I wanted to try the French toast recipe from 30-Minute Vegan, and I'm glad I did. It was fantastic. I made it with thick slices of wholegrain bread, and served it topped with blueberries and pure maple syrup. Of course, I also had yogurt with bananas and blueberries. :D

My son makes all sorts of things for breakfast (though not always at what one would consider the normal breakfast hour), and one day I was lucky enough to stumble upon some delicious tofu scramble with tomatoes, sweet potatoes, onions and kale.

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Dinner on a hot night

It was 96˚ as dinner was about to be prepared last night, but I'm not complaining. I've been wishing for temperatures like this to counteract the long months of dreary dampness. I'm not used to living sun-free for such long periods of time, and I love having the sunshine and heat. There wasn't much humidity so I didn't find the heat oppressive. That said, I also didn't want to slave over a hot stove for a long time or heat up the kitchen with the oven. What I wanted was lentil burgers, and since there was a lot of leftover quinoa in the refrigerator, I made lentil-quinoa burgers. Lentils cook really fast and the quinoa was already cooked. With the addition of chopped onion, carrots, fresh basil, paprika, chipotle powder, granulated onion, dry breadcrumbs and hickory-smoked salt, the burgers were easily thrown together and cooked on a cast iron pan. I ate mine in a sandwich with a little mustard, hot sauce and tons of salad greens on top.

The burgers were served with lightly steamed dinosaur kale and peppers. And salad.

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Latest Goodwill finds

If you've been reading this blog for a while you know I love thrift store shopping. I don't go that often (maybe every few weeks) but I usually find something I want (e.g. mandoline, bundt pan, popcorn popper, skirt). On our last trip to Goodwill my husband found an oak coffee table. We're living in a furnished rented house with a huge living room and not a lot of furniture, and we've been wanting a coffee table. For $14.99, we now have one. It's not the gorgeous round one I recently saw at Crate and Barrel, but it will do for a year. I also found a 3/4 sleeve black stretchy cotton Gap top which I love.