A simple homemade potato-carrot soup in a thermos for lunch today. In the lunch box I packed homemade crispy croutons and a tiny container of Bac-Os (yes, indeed, they are vegan!) to sprinkle on top of the soup before eating. For fresh fruit and dessert, green grapes and a Chocolate Chip Bake-At-Home Oatmeal Energy Bar.Verdict: Did bacony Bac-Os make every bite better? "They gave me Bac-O Burps," shmoo reported. "Oh, bad?" "No! It was g-o-o-d good. I had Bac-O Breath!" Every last bacony bite was gone. 4 stars.
P.S. Another noon release tomorrow. See you Thursday!
Did you know you can get little cookie cutters (animals, hearts, stars, letters, etc.) at craft stores and make crouton shapes?! We just started doing this and it's so much fun to have animal croutons in your soup - we've also discovered the joy of animal-shaped beets, jicama, carrots...
ReplyDeleteAnother noon release day? But they just had one on Friday!!??
ReplyDeleteThe lunch looks yummy. My daugher is loving green grapes right now. However, she's not keen on peas and carrots right now (favourites only a few days ago). Funny how they switch preferences every week or so. :-)
Ooh, I love fun shapes. I should get some of those too.
ReplyDeleteJennifershmoo, what do you think of those energy bars you've been making? Are they soft or hard after cooling?
They stay soft and chewy. I dunno, the company contacted me and sent me the mix to try, so that was really fun (woo, free stuff!). But it's something I would never buy myself; if I wanted to bake bars I would make some from scratch, and I don't like the whole flaxseeds in them. They were good for what they were, and we had no trouble finishing them off!
ReplyDeleteWhat brand are the Bac-Os, they look delic for the soup....!
ReplyDeleteEeeew to the bacO breath, yuck, but he's funny and cute!
ReplyDeleteThe lunch looks great and I'm with yellow-belly-hippy lady about all those noon releases, whoa!
I know! I think kids today get a lot more noon releases than I did.
ReplyDeleteI thought it was funny that Bac-O breath was a plus in his book. LOL!
>>What brand are the Bac-Os
Betty Crocker (follow the link in the post and read all about them).
i got horrible bacos burps the other day too! i had them on my baked tater. poor shmoo - baco burps are GROSS!! :D glad he liked them though - lol
ReplyDeleteI was so amused when I found out that Bac-Os, along with many store brand "bacon bits", are vegan. No wonder they're so cheap! XD
ReplyDeletePotato-carrot soup looks FANTASTIC. Now I'm hungry!
Yes, Bacos are vegan, but just as important to consider is that they have artificial food coloring and they soy used is genetically modified. I stay away from them, because the food coloring and how it affects children and who knows about genetically modified food??? Yikes. "Bac-un bits" from Frontier are 100% natural and organic, non-GMO, and taste much better than Bacos. They are available through the Frontier Natural Products coop site, natural foods stores, etc. I have a couple pound bags of them (you can get jars of them, too) because we go through a lot of Bac-uns...
ReplyDeleteThat looks like such a yummy lunch, I love soup with potato in it!
ReplyDeleteSoup with potato is delicious!
ReplyDeleteSome another recipe potato soup
Haha Bac-oBurps :)
ReplyDeleteRockets
I'm random, but I hear if you combine certain foods like beans and rice, you can get a complete protein. WE don't know everything shmoo eats, and since Jennifer seems to work so hard, it seems that she would take care of the protein thing
ReplyDelete+++I can't tell you how often that happens. Chicken in some form or another is used in WAY more food products than I ever knew before going vegetarian.++++
ReplyDeleteYes, I was alarmed to find out that Doritos salsa verde flavor chips have chicken (I forget whether it was fat or broth or powdered flavoring). Chicken in tortilla chips? Glad I didn't indulge often before finding out!
I've used Bac-Os when cooking beans, and they're curiously good on peanut butter sandwiches. It's one of those things that doesn't sound like it would be good but it is.
>>Is little shmoo taking the WASL? I know he's just in 1st grade, but I heard some schools are having kids take it.
ReplyDeleteIt is testing week here. The higher grades are taking the WASL, but his class is taking the ITBS (Iowa Test of Basic Skills) instead.
>>At my school we have early release (1:20 pm) every Monday to save money--is that what shmoos school does?
I think so; it's basically every other Wednesday here. Most of the school districts I know of are having early release one day a week to save money.
this is fantastic. after only one term of packing a school lunchbox I have been getting very lazy. Also, my little boy is starting to ask for stuff like ham. We're on school holidays here, but when school starts again in a few weeks and I have looked carefully through your archives I will be ready to go.
ReplyDeleteYum, potato soup!
ReplyDeleteI'm not a vegan, but your lunches sure make it a tempting choice!
ReplyDeleteGelatin is the other animal product that seems to sneak into way too many foods where its not expected.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Jennifer, for pointing out (in one post or another a while back) that some fruit "gels" products are, in fact, vegan. Since gelatin is in so many non-Jello-like foods, I just assumed all those products contained it and never even checked the label. I've missed those products -- especially when I'm sick and have that "mom gave me Jello to feel better" yearning -- and it was good to find that I can actually have some without special trips.
As a comment to the chicken-in-everything discussion, BBQ Baked Lays have chicken fat in them! I've written the company because it's just so ridiculous....even fried BBQ lays don't have chicken fat. Of course, I just got a canned letter in return and a lousy coupon to buy more of their chips!
ReplyDeleteOn another note, I'm having these weird Bac-O cravings, and it's all your fault! =) Lunch looks great as always, keep it up!!
Jennifershmoo, I just found your blog today through a friend of a friend's blog. I'm so impressed that you are living and eating the vegan way in Kennewick, WA! I grew up an hour away on the Oregon side of the river, and we did all our major shopping in the TriCities. When we moved there in 1987, tofu was my favorite food. We went to the grocery store to search for said tofu, and they had never heard of it.
ReplyDeleteI imagine things have changed over the years.
Cheers! Abby in Berkeley, CA
"Echo said...
ReplyDeleteLabryis: Doritos??? "
Yeah, not something I bought often, fortunately. It was for a party and one of the guests happened to glance at the label. Tortilla chips I didn't think to check unless they had a title suggestive of meat ingredients like "chili" or "Pizza" or something. I also didn't know about bbq baked lays. I thought we'd made progress when they started using vegetable oil instead of lard but now they're using it as flavoring.
I think if enough customers write it does work. Look how fast they started getting trans fats out of chips when it started getting publicized!
I have to go back to reading every single label, even if I can't imagine meat in it. What's next, chicken flavor in our applesauce?