Author: PatagoniaLlami

by Kathy Patalsky · updated: Mar 14, 2020 · published: Aug 9, 2011 · About 5 minutes to read this article. Leave a Comment

Yesterday, while strolling through DC’s Eastern Market, I spotted some beautiful peanut butter chocolate crispy bars at a coffee shop. They weren’t vegan. But the craving stuck with me. So I veganized the classic confection and enjoyed my own homemade peanut butter bliss. Try these easy vegan Peanut Butter Chocolate Crispy Bars…

This weekend was a hot one. Humid, upper ninety degree weather mixed with random thunderstorms and sudden gushing downpours. Most of the time it feels like you are strolling around in a steam shower. Swimming is a better word. Thick heavy air, wet and soggy. It’s enough to make even the most enthusiastic outdoorsy person retreat with a grumpy huff to a nice air conditioned building. Ah, August in DC. Not my favorite month in our nations capital.

But summer is also a time for exploration. Vacation. Even in your own backyard. My husband and I are always thinking of weekend ‘adventures’ to have here in DC to fight our “we miss NYC” fatigue. I love DC, don’t get me wrong, but the energy level can certainly be less vibrant than New York – which can be nice at times as well.

Yesterday, for our adventure, we took the Metro out to Eastern Market. I have been meaning to go for the past .. 5 years or so .. and so finally it happened. Eastern Market, completed in 1873, was designed by a German-born immigrant named Adolf Cluss. In 2007 it was victim of a horrible fire – but in the past few years has gotten back on its feet quite well. This public market carries goods of all sorts in various indoor and outdoor venues.

Market. You step off the Metro and walk a few blocks to the central market area. The US Capitol building right in view. It was hot, sticky, the crammed vendors looked not so cheerful to be sitting out in almost triple digit heat. But still, plenty of DC-ers scurried around the market buying art, produce, bohemian-style clothing, sparkly handmade jewelery, some clever crafts and some furniture. Compared the the outdoor and indoor markets in NYC (Essex, Eataly, Union Square Farmer’s Market, Brooklyn Markets), I was pretty underwhelmed. However, I was glad we went – and I did manage to pick up some gorgeous summer tomatoes, peaches and peppers..

As we were leaving, I managed to get stung by something – on my foot. Or maybe it was a painful heat blister, not sure. But it hurt! So we wandered into a little espresso cafe and picked up two soy iced lattes. I didn’t realize how overheated I was until I gulped down that chilled icy coffee.

Out of the corner of my eye I spotted a display of confections. Brownies, cookies and then these gorgeous peanut butter chocolate rice bars wrapped in shiny cellophane. Not vegan. So I went home and made some veganized bars of my own. Perfect cool “icebox dessert bar” for a warm summer day.

This recipe is quite easy. You can whip these bars up in under twenty minutes and not even have to turn on the oven. You can soften the vegan butter and peanut butter in the microwave and melt the chocolate on your stove top with a double broiler. Then chill for at least an hour – I put my bars in the freezer to speed things along. And serve!

Recipe Notes: My initial concept for this recipe included melting in 2 cups of vegan marshmallows instead of the maple syrup. This would make a “stickier” bar. But actually the flavor of these bars were fabulous. I would imagine that adding a tad more vegan butter would make them stick together better. Or another way to solidify them is to put a chocolate layer on both the bottom and the top – creating a choco pb bar sandwich. But either way (well solidified or not), they were yu-mmy…

And also, I used “puffed” cereal which made my bars more tender rather than “crispy” – if you want a crispier/crunchier bar, use crispy rice rather than thick puffed grains.

Easy Peanut Butter Bars


makes about 16 2″ bars

3 cups puffed rice cereal (use crispy rice cereal for crispier bars)


2 cups puffed kamut cereal


¾ cup maple syrup, grade B


1 cup vegan butter, softened


1 teaspoon vanilla extract


1 cup creamy peanut butter, softened

1 cup vegan dark chocolate chips


1 teaspoon veg oil


¼ teaspoon sea salt

Directions:

1. Combine the maple syrup, peanut butter, vanilla and softened butter in a large mixing bowl. You want to have a thin liquid mixture.

2. Melt the chocolate chips – with the oil and sea salt – on your stovetop – or very carefully in your microwave.

3. Add your rice and kamut crisps to your butter/maple mixture. Fold until all the crisps are coated.

4. Pour your crisps into a wax-paper lined dish. Flatten with a spoon.

5. Drizzle the melted chocolate over top. Note: You can also double the chocolate amount and do a top and bottom later of chocolate. Or you can even fold the chocolate right into the crispies to create true peanut butter chocolate crispy bars.

6. Chill in the freezer until hardened. Store in the fridge.

Before you start thinking I’m crazy – “This chick tried to pass off tofu as eggs last week, and now this?!” – allow me to explain myself and this vegan caprese salad recipe.

Caprese salad is one of my favorite dishes. It’s supposed to be an appetizer, but I would happily eat caprese and only caprese for my dinner. It’s such a genius combination of ingredients – juicy tomatoes, fresh and fragrant basil, salty mozzarella, and there should always be a drizzle of good olive oil for good measure. For the lactose intolerant or vegans among us, though, there’s another way to enjoy this classic appetizer.

I’d never heard of caprese, let alone tried it until we lived in New York in the summer of 2011. On our first night in the city, we ended up at the famous and notorious Cipriani’s Downtown for dinner. One of the appetizers was – you guessed it – caprese salad.

Before tasting it, I had to secretly ask one of the other dinner attendees what, exactly, it was.  Keep in mind, this was in my skeptical, anti-awesome-food days. But I tried it so it wouldn’t seem like I belonged at the kid’s table. I look back at this as one of the defining moments of my journey with food. At the time, I wasn’t at all interested in chunks of cold cheese mixed with tomatoes and leaves. Pass me a slice of pizza or a grilled cheese, please.

Trying not to turn up my nose in premature disgust, I went in for my first bite. And in that moment, I totally understood.

These flavors were meant to go together. Each bite combines silky, crunchy, and juicy with aromatic sweet and salty flavors. When it’s done right, with quality ingredients, caprese salad makes you feel like you’ve sat down to dinner with an Italian family who has picked the tomatoes from their garden, brought the basil from a neighbor, and picked up the cheese from their favorite farmer that morning. The dish is freshness and simplicity defined.

Nowadays, I steer clear of dairy as much as possible. While I’ve never been diagnosed as lactose intolerant, I’ve realized that my body doesn’t like the way dairy affects it. Clark thought of this alternative while we were somewhere between the Badlands and Devil’s Tower, and at first I was thinking “No. Way.” But then I thought about it for a minute… tofu has a similar texture to mozzarella and it can be seasoned in a million different ways. Worth a shot, right?

You’ll have to take my word for it when I say you can hardly tell the difference between the tofu and mozzarella. Put any skepticism aside and try this for yourself.  I won’t be making this every day, or even every week, because this kind of dish is a special treat for me. But it’s nice to know that I have a way to make “caprese” at home, without all of that dairy messing with my system.

Some people like to add a drizzle balsamic vinegar for good measure, and I think that’s a good touch, too. As for me, I like to grind some fresh black pepper and sea salt over top of everything. When tomatoes and basil are as fresh and abundant as they are right now, I think simplicity is the way to go.

If you made this vegan caprese salad recipe let us know how you get on on Instagram.

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Home » Mains » Vegan Pizza Margherita

Last updated on January 27, 2021 By Crazy Vegan 43 Comments

Published: Jun 26, 2017 · Modified: Jan 3, 2019 by Gloria – The Greedy Vegan · This post may contain affiliate links · 19 Comments

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Kohlrabi And Potato Bake With Basil Sauce

Kohlrabi And Potato Bake With Basil Sauce is a very healthy and delicious way of incorporating this beautiful vegetable into your diet. Since I moved to Ireland I hadn’t noticed it being sold in any of the big shops across Dublin, therefore, I was even more delighted to find them on sale in one of the Asian markets. So far I used to believe that this vegetable was only consumed in Germanic countries, consequently, I was surprised to learn that it’s also popular in North India and Bangladesh.

The word kohlrabi is German for “cabbage turnip” (kohl as in coleslaw, and rübe for turnip) though kohlrabi is not a root vegetable at all. It’s a brassica—like cabbage, broccoli, and cauliflower—and those cute bulbous shapes grow above ground, not below.

If you can’t find kohlrabi or just like a good bake as much as I do, you might want to check out this Vegan Shepherd Pie Recipe, too.

How to use Kohlrabi

Kohlrabi tastes somewhat like a broccoli stem, although a bit more palatable and often softer, it can even take the consistency of an apple at times. While the roots/stems are often used in salads in a similar way as carrots or broccoli, the leaves are typically interchanged for kale or spinach. You can consume Kohlrabi raw, cooked or baked, whichever you fancy most, my favourite recipe is definitely this Kohlrabi And Potato Bake With Basil Sauce.

Some countries even use kohlrabi as food for their livestock, as it is packed with beneficial nutrients and grows relatively easily in certain climates.

Health Benefits Of Kohlrabi

Kohlrabi is full of nutrients and minerals like copper, potassium, manganese, iron and calcium, as well as vitamins, such as vitamin C, B-complex vitamins, vitamin A and vitamin K.

Along with that, kohlrabi is high in dietary fibre and antioxidant compounds which aid digestive health and weight loss.

It is low in calories and the fibre makes us feel full, so even if the volume of food consumed isn’t that great, we resist the urge to snack between meals or overeat.

Your turn

What about you, have you ever had kohlrabi before and how do you like to prepare them? I’m looking forward to finding out in the comments. 🙂

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Enjoy 🙂

How festive is this 8 layer tortilla pie?  Made with layers of corn tortillas, black beans, onions, corn and cheese.  The bean and corn mixture is cooked in a vegan beer for added flavor.  For a complete listing of vegetarian/vegan-friendly beer, please visit my favorite resource:  www.barnivore.com  (No affiliation to TheVegLife, they are just awesome for what they do 🙂 )  You could also use vegetable broth here.

I get asked alot for vegetarian variations of the recipes I post and really, this could be vegan with just a simple substitute of the cheddar cheese.  I usually try to make my recipes vegan because those substitutions are more of a challenge.

Top with a dollop of sour cream (or vegan sour cream) and a little salsa.  Serve warm.  We made ours in these single serve 4″ springform pans (found on Amazon.com) and used a cookie cutter to trim the tortillas, but you could also do this in any traditional pan and slice into wedges.

Happy {simple} Cinco de Mayo 🙂

This would be great with a layer of refried beans and maybe even some diced tomatos.  It’s such a versatile concept, add your favorites.  Just be sure not to add too much moisture or the tortillas won’t crisp up.

October 5, 2016 by Rachel Carr Leave a Comment

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