Vegan Mushroom Cracker Crust Frittata (Welcome to My Lair: Fundraising, Quilt Frenzies And Plant People)

Some of the tastiest food I've made comes from this little Missouri Bed and Breakfast cookbook I nabbed when I was a road warrior. This frittata is unique but simple and oh-so-very yummy! Two pans of work is all it takes. One, to saute the "crust" ingredients: a bit of olive oil, a package of mushrooms sliced, a chopped onion, couple shakes of your favorite herbs, then crumble in some crackers and press into the pie plate.

So your first layer--your sauteed mushrooms and onions with crumbled crackers spread into your pie dish for the crust.

Next, toss in whatever you have in the fridge into a lightly oiled pan--could use the same one the mushrooms were in. In my case, I made a sort of hash from a yellow pepper, one onion chopped, one potato diced and half a head of cabbage sliced thin. Saute until all are soft--beginning with the potato, ending with the cabbage. I grabbed some fresh herbs from the garden and tossed in whatever I felt like. The addition of those herbs took the flavor of this to a whole new level.

What dish called "frittata" would be complete without cheese--vegan cheese, that is. Next comes the godsend: Daiya cheese! I added two layers of this in my creation. One layer of cheese spread over the crust, another layer spread over the top when I baked it. Yum! Bake at 350 for about 25 minutes.

And then there was this. . . my lair in its "frenzied" planning, cutting, tossing and re-cutting stage.

Since I'm a newbie to this quilt stuff, I really just went "with the flow" on my second one. This would be donated to my garden club for its silent auction I coordinate. . . which was two days away. TWO!

I thrive in chaos and in time crunches. But it's really best to avoid me at these moments or you may find my demeanor a bit, oh, I don't know. . . MAD!  

Then comes the final okay from the QC (quilt critique) department. It must be road tested, walked and shedded upon for it to really meet its final approval. Then, we go to the next phase, sewing the pieces together. (By the way, this is just a design I sort of fell into after deciding that it really doesn't matter one iota what sort of "blocks" you create as long as I am happy with it--that's what counts.) Therefore, do not fear the quilt blocks. 

After several mini-meltdowns. . . completion. (I love the colors in this quilt! Happy colors--called it the: Hello Daisy! Not Your Grandma's Quilt.)

Pretty, oh-so-pretty.

My first quilt--with the backing showing on my border trim, also known as the "binding". I am under this thing every night! I love it!

My people interaction cup runneth over. I am now in mandatory, self-prescribed seclusion. Yesterday was my garden club's yearly fundraiser--its second. Never mind that it was 95 degrees with a heat index of 105 and humidity levels so high that even stepping outside for a brief break left me soaked from head to toe in my own body gland fluids.

So how did this come to be--(the auction, not the body gland sweat issue)? I brought this idea to them when, last year, everyone was whining over the "lack of funds" for this and that fix and repair. I'm like, So hold a silent auction--so easy, so much money to be made. Thankfully, a dear friend of mine--also in the garden club--spoke up "Yes, hold this auction". We were dubbed officials for this new fundraiser. More along the line of this took place: "Okay Ms. Smarty pants, we dub you silent auction coordinator." I'll admit, coordinating a silent auction is not for the faint of heart. Lots of "testing" of you takes place. Oh, we were tested alright, but after the 120 plus bid sheets were laid, and we stepped back to take a deep breath and look at how wonderful the auction tables looked after our little committee had worked three days non-stop to set it all up--we all beamed with pride.

I don't like meetings for just that reason. At almost fifty, I am unable to keep my mouth shut when a very clear answer to problems (usually financial in nature) surface. And don't they always surface? So that's when I find myself in these mad-scramble situations like I faced last week.

You simply must "give back" and I try to live by the "to whom much is given, much is expected" creed. My personal exception to this is with regard to family members because they can get on your last nerve. More so than say total strangers or acquaintances. (I think this acceptance or intolerance might link back to why mothers of some species eat their young, yet live fairly harmonious lives within the confines of their social groups.)

I wouldn't say I've been given the lottery in my life, but I do feel I have god-given talents that make me the perfect victim for these sort of event planning/fundraising milestones. All in all--we had a very successful day. Made lots of money, everyone was polite (well, there are always those folks who, having possibly never attended a silent auction before--think it's okay to place a one dollar bid on something we clearly have listed as a "minimum bid of like twenty dollars"). Ah, people. They are such work sometimes.  

So now it's back to the drawing board. I want to quilt some more. I love it! Time flies so I know it is something I truly love doing. And it is sort of like painting. With my second quilt I ended up going in a direction I had not even remotely planned. But that's what I loved about the "journey"--and quilting is all about the journey. My quilt found a new home with, thankfully, my auction chair friend for her going-into-fifth-grade daughter who just loved it--that made the whole process TOTALLY worth it! It melted my heart to tell the truth.

Quilting is a really nice break from my knitting and. . . well, gardening has totally taken a back seat for now. Ewww. Heat. Bugs. Heat. Bugs. Then downpours of rain. More humidity. My vegetables all look great however. So I am expecting some serious veggie popping to happen any day now. Fingers stay crossed for this.

I am in my third week of my "beginning sewing class" in which a darling little jewel of an apron will be completed. As we take baby steps to get to this however, last week's class consisted of stitching up this hideous pillow case with embroidery around the edges. I screwed mine up so bad, my seams were so crooked. The instructor gave me several "looks" during my aggressive sewing. I chalk my lack of attention-to-detail for the silly waste-of-time as a release from my quilting frustration. So I guess I won't be getting Sewing Class Student of The Month, but I will be coming home more relaxed after Samurai sewing.

I hope my directions scattered below the frittata photos suffice (in case anyone's interested in trying the recipe out). The dish was really, really good. And I had it for lunch the next day--totally yummy. Does it fit into my Eat to Live plan? But of course! It has cabbage in it!