Hello, hello lovely people! I see that we all love our grilled veggies, but more importantly the friends that we have made through blogging. Some times I wish that the distances weren’t so long because I would love to have the chance to meet all of the friends I’ve made through this. I definitely think the commonalities go way beyond food, and there’s just something more.

My usual bowl of oats with random things piled on… sounds good! Here I threw in frozen banana slices, the last of the fig tartlet “filling”, pumpkin seed butter, homemade sunflower seed butter, and cinnamon. The sunflower seed butter tasted really good, especially since I added honey when making it. However, next time I need to mix it with oil. I’ve found that with nuts and seeds that don’t have as much fat in them naturally need that extra “oomph” from additional oil. For instance, when I make macadamia nut butter, macadamias have enough oils in them to have a semi-gooey consistency when made into a nut butter. Next time!

When I first tried this I thought “hmm… this kind of tastes like sausage.” Then I had my roommate try it and she mentioned that it reminded her of beef jerky. Who knows! This hummus recipe definitely has a flavor reminiscent of something.

“What Do I Remind You Of” Hummus

1 can of chickpeas, drained

a bit of water

1 dried chipotle pepper, broken into pieces

a few splashes of hickory smoke

1-2 tsp curry powder

2 tbl olive oil

salt and pepper to taste

1. Pour the chickpeas into the food processor, and start processing them with a little water so they get broken up.

2. Add the rest of the ingredients–except for the olive oil, salt, and pepper–and mix. Then add the olive oil and mix. Add salt and pepper to your liking and mix again.

I love collard greens! They look like the leaves from the cabbages for the cabbage patch dolls. This time when I was making my wraps I thought of what it would be like to steam them; kind of like dim sum–little packets of deliciousness! Did you know that ”collard greens provide us with this cholesterol-lowering benefit whether they are raw or cooked. However, a recent study has shown that the cholesterol-lowering ability of raw collard greens improves significantly when they are steamed.” A sign that I should make them kind of like dim sum. “One cup of boiled collard greens has about 119% of the daily value of vitamin A, 58% of vitamin C, and 880% of vitamin K. Vitamin A is an important nutrient for the eyes, vitamin C is essential for healthy skin, and vitamin K is necessary for the blood to clot. You can read more here: collard greens benefits.

It was funny how some of us weren’t that nervous at first, but as soon as we were nestled on to a step our fears set in. We had many countdowns, many words of encouragement, and lots of laughs!

It was really helpful following through that day because of the help of my friends, and feeling comforted by the thought that it was going to be okay. There was a point where I just had to stop thinking, stop looking around, down, and just do it! Have you guys faced some sort-of fear recently?