Vegan Beezie's Foodcart!

What the feezie?! Vegan Beezie's getting her euntrapaneur on with a food cart?! Yup yup:) Finally took the leap and made it happen.  After years of fantasizing about my own guerrilla food venture I finally did it, and guess what?  I did it all on the back of my bike! see...

Pretty cool, I know!  And guess what is even cooler?  The venture was a success even with a few setbacks:)  Let me take you through the story of what became my first official day of glory.

So it all began a couple of weeks ago when I finally decided on a product, vegan taquitos. I then started shopping around for items needed for my cart (bike trailer, tables, serving supplies etc...)  Besides the serving supplies my whole cart set up is made up of upcycled items, even the elegent cardboard menu sign.  Then after obsessing over possible spots for my first set-up I decided on a location on Stanford campus near the sarorities.   A risky move? yes, but where the freak else am I going to to set up a guerrilla vegan food cart operation in San Mateo County?  If you gots any ideas i'm all ears.

So I set a date that I would make myself get out there and I did just that.  I spent about 4 hours preparing about 60 taquitos and loading my trailer then I hit the streets.  Just so happened I picked the coldest night of the year!  Ughhhh, what can you do? As my friend Elyse puts it "You got what you got".  So I blasted my Reggae and hit the road.  It took about an hour to get there and guess what?! I went on finals week aka "dead week" where free food is provided in dorms round the clock.  Ughhhh!  I almost turned my sad ass around to mope my way home but I sucked it up and set up my cart in the midst of stanford ghost town.  Then guess what happened? I had customers within seconds:)  The stanford students were warm and welcoming and I can't wait to go back and feed them.  I packed up around 11:30 with 1 taquito left and biked my freezing buns home.  Next time I think I might make some home made chili and jalapeno cornbread... yum!

A special thanks to Arne for the awesome photos.  I met Arne on campus and was nice enough to give me a photo shoot and email me the pics.

What's in the future for Vegan Beezie you ask.  Well... I will be back at Stanford when Spring Semester begins with my bike cart.  I also have plans to sell tamales at the bars in downtown Palo Alto and do special orders for them as well as cupcakes.  I will try to do most of this on the back of my bike but we'll see as things blossom what my humble bike trailer can handle.

Stalk me on my twitter at #beezieskitchen.

Potato Filled with Broccoli and Cashew Velveeta

Damn it!  I need a real camera, this blackberry bullshit is just not cutting it...hint hint ;) anyone gots a camera laying around collecting dust they could lend me? 

Anyways... when your in a funk whats better to eat than broccoli and cheese?  I usually make my cheese sauce with nutritional yeast, earth balance, soy milk and flour but because I am TRYING not to eat wheat and soy... notice I emphasize TRYING.  Not eating wheat and soy on a vegan diet is effin hard!  But overall I have been eating a hell of a lot better so this might be something I try to stick with... we will see.  Both cheese sauces are REALLY good but I think the cashew one is a little easier.  They can also be very versatile, last night when I came home and had a mad case of the munchies I made some quesadillas with the leftover cashew Velveeta and though they were sloppy they were also delish. 

So at this point I am feeling pretty cocky about my ability to veganize (yes that is a word) pretty much anything, so give me some ideas, what is your favorite dish you would like to see veganized?  I want to get some crazy delicious dishes on my blog and then start promoting it a little more.  Let's see what kind of crazy ideas you gots!

Baked Potato Filled with Broccoli and Cashew Velveeta

2 large potatoes baked
1 head of broccoli chopped and steamed
1 cup of cashews
1/2 cup nutritional yeast
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
juice of 1 lemon
water
salt and pepper to taste

1.  Place cashews, nutritional yeast, garlic powder and lemon in a blender and fill with water until the cashews are just covered and blend until a creamy cheese sauce is formed.  Taste and add salt and pepper to your liking.  Open potato and salt generously, add a tablespoon or two of cheese straight to the potato then top with broccoli and add a couple more tablespoons of cheese.

Sweet Potato and Black Bean Chili with Jalapeno Cornbread

I grew up on Denison's Chili Beans in a flour tortilla with cottage cheese... yup yup and I loved every last bit of it.  Cottage cheese?! you ask, well yes but I can't explain why and I will to this day defend it as nastolgic delicious food that I will never eat again along with fried bologna sandwiches.  We all know that canned chili just does not stand up to the real thing, even if it is covered in cottage cheese.

I am always trying to think of ways to add extra nutrients and whole foods to my recipes so I decided to add sweet potatoes and zuchinni to this version of chili.  I was a little nervous about the sweet potatoes but I really enjoyed the sweetness they added, my lover was not a fan but what does he know about food he is one of those freaks that just forgets to eat... who the fuck does that!?  For the cornbread I used a packaged mix and instead of the honey I used agave and instead of the eggs I used flaxseed (1 tablespoon of flax meal with 3 tablespoons of water heated until an eggy consistency forms).  For jalapeno cornbread just add a couple of chopped jalapenos to the the batter and leave in some of the seeds if you like it on the spicier side.  I liked the jalapenos but I have found better more vegan friendly recipes for cornbread on vegweb.

Sweet Potato and Black Bean Chili


1 tablespoon oil

1 large onion chopped
1 green bell pepper chopped
4 cloves garlic minced
2 jalapenos chopped
2 zuchini's chopped
1 Giant sweet potatoe or 2 regular sized sweet potatoes peeled and cut into 1/2 inch peices
1 12 oz can of chopped tomatoes
2 12 oz can of black beans (I only had one can of black so I had to use a second can of pinto)
1 teaspoon chili powder or more if you like it spicy
3 teaspoons cumin
salt and pepper to taste
optional toppings: avocado, green onions, cilantro, cashew cheese, vegan cheese, tortilla chips

1.  Heat oil on medium in a large pot and add onion and bell pepper, cook 3-5 minutes until tender.  Then add the garlic and jalapenos and continue to cook for 1-2 minutes until the garlic becomes very fragrant.  Add the rest of the ingredients, bring to a boil then lower to a simmer. Cook for  45 minutes to 2 hours, the longer you simmer the better it will taste.  Salt and pepper to taste and add any toppings of your choice and it's ready to go.  If it seems too dry just add a little water or vegetable stock.

Mine is topped with avocado, cilantro and leftover cashew cheese from my eggplant parmesan as you can see...

And once you are finished consuming this delicious recipe you can sing "Beans Beans the magical fruit the more you eat the more you... " Yes I just went there, I just can't help it. I will never grow out of my obsession with fart and poop jokes, just typing the word poop makes me smile:) Happy eating!