Vegan Pistachio Ice Cream

AKA: Green Monster Ice Cream!

This ice cream post is dedicated to all of my vegan and lactose intolerant friends and followers! Because it’s so darn hard to find good tasting ice cream that’s also dairy-free… And while I’ll load up on Lactaid to enjoy the occasional bowl of ice cream or froyo, it’s nice to have a meal where I don’t need to take a pill before I eat!

Typically, frozen desserts that are vegan or dairy-free are sorbets or granitas or other fruit-based treats. While I love a good sorbet, sometimes you want something soft and creamy like ice cream. And this pistachio sorbet is just that! Thanks to silken tofu, pureed pistachios, and avocado this ice cream is super creamy and flavorful (and a really awesome shade of green!). 😀

A note on buying pistachios: buy the pre-shelled pistachios if you can because shelling them yourself is a pain in the arse!

Click below for the recipe! Have a question? Feel free to ask in the comments. And thanks for reading! 🙂

Vegan Banana Chocolate Chip Cookies

To preface this post, I am not vegan. I do this in case it’s not obvious in some of my earlier posts about foods that are definitely NOT-vegan… But I do have several friends who are vegan, and I like to cook/bake for them when I can. (I do the same for my friends who are gluten-intolerant, so I promise that some gluten-free recipes will be coming too!)

I first made these cookies to hand out at my first regional Burn. I’d made about 500 cookies to gift over the weekend, and I wanted to make sure my vegan friends didn’t feel left out. After that, these cookies became my go-to vegan recipe because they are amazing, whether you are vegan or not! They are like little banana bread cookies: crunchy on the outside, soft and chewy on the inside, and loaded with chocolate chips!

It’s been over two years since I first made these cookies, based on a recipe from Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar. Since then, the recipe has evolved, as has my education on cooking and baking vegan. Personally, I sometimes gravitate towards vegan foods because I’m severely lactose intolerant, and vegan foods are frequently the only way I can ensure no tummy troubles later in the day…

A few important things to remember about this recipe:

• The more disgusting your bananas look, the tastier they are! I like to let my bananas turn mostly black, and then I stick them in the fridge until I’m ready to use them. It looks and feels gross, but the extra kick of banana flavor is totally worth it!
• Make sure you use quick-cooking oats or rolled oats and not instant/minute oatmeal.
• Vegan chocolate chips are getting easier to find. Personally, I use this variety from Enjoy Life, which I first found at Whole Foods. (They’re now also carried by my local Target!) I’ve tried a few other brands of vegan chocolate and carob chips, and these are my favorite!
• If you’re not concerned about making the cookies totally vegan, you can use white sugar and regular miniature chocolate chips. Vegan or not, they’re super-tasty!

Click below for the recipe! Have a question? Feel free to ask in the comments below! And thanks for reading! 🙂