Growing things

I’ve devoted the past week to home renovation. This involves simple spring organization like cleaning out my closet as well as a lot of other projects that have been waiting for the right season. For one, I plastered and painted our bathroom which was quite an arduous task. Luckily, I was able to offset the toxic paint fumes and dust with a bit of time outdoors creating a balcony garden.

I’ll be the first to admit that I am not at all gifted when it comes to growing things. The only plant that I’ve been able to keep alive thus far is a single stalk of lucky bamboo that has now traveled with me from my past four residences to my current place. On the other hand, I’m a firm believer that you can be good at pretty much anything if you practice, so I’m trying again and going all out with a very small vegetable and herb garden and a few succulents.

If all goes as planned, soon I will have heirloom tomatoes, strawberries and cayenne peppers grown fresh to add to dishes. I’m even more excited for the herbs as the basil was so fragrant, it took a great deal of willpower to not just eat it right then.

I came into possession of some recycled pots of various sizes and filled them with some succulents and small cacti. There are some really strange looking succulents, like the lithop, that are just so cool. I honestly don’t even know what some of the plants I got were, but they look awesome. Also, some of the pots were extremely small so the tiny cacti worked out perfectly. I’m also particularly fond of an adorable little cacti with a name something like Red-headed Irish that has a few little clovers on the bottom.

Just a few hours spent planting and we now have our own garden oasis. Here’s to hoping everything survives. I can’t wait for the time when we have some real space to plant things.

I’ve also discovered the joy of baking mini-cheesecakes. I have been putting off trying these because of a lack of options for vegan graham crackers to use in the crust. I finally settled on some to try and went with a basic cheesecake recipe. I topped it off with an attempt at a vegan lemon jello. Unfortunately, even though it tasted amazing, the jello didn’t solidify and it was really more of a lemon sauce.

Since the mini-cheesecakes are obviously much smaller than regular cheesecakes, I ended up only using half the recipe with another half left over to be made. I got a little experimental and made a spiced molassas cheesecakes which were yummy but didn’t quite cut it for my standards. In any case, I will definitely be making more mini-cheesecakes as they are the perfect size for a little treat. They can be fancied up for special occasions or just eaten as a sweet little finger food. I predict mini-cheesecakes are gonna be the next cupcake.

Comments
7 Responses to “Growing things”
  1. Brittany says:

    i just made some mini cheesecakes last night! i topped them with the leftover raspberry goo and chocolate ganache from the mousse cake i made for the birthday party. they turned out pretty damn good, but i over baked them a little.

  2. Laura says:

    Mini cheesecakes are the way foreward! I made some for the last daring bakers, yum!

  3. halfeaten says:

    Love your blog 🙂 Very sweet. That’s so exciting to grow new things, I’ve been wanting to start a little garden, but I never find the chance.

    I was wondering if you’ve heard of the Worldwide Vegan Bake Sale that’s taking place in LA? Well, a fellow veg and I are the ones coordinating it. It’s getting me all giddy everytime I talk about it. If you’d like to join our little bake sale, let me know!

    I just started following you on Twitter . You can find out what I’m considering baking for the sale there and any other additional info :0)

  4. Foodeater says:

    Cacti are awesome and practically foolproof. I love plants that are virtually impossible to kill!

  5. Vegyogini says:

    The only plant I’ve managed to keep alive is my trusty aloe. 🙂

    Which graham crackers did you choose?

    • miss alix says:

      I got an aloe as well! Hopefully it lives 🙂
      I went with the Amaranth graham crackers. I actually really liked them.

  6. Melisser says:

    I love making mini cheesecakes too!

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