VegFoodFest 2014: Part 3 - Sunday

For my third day in Toronto, I needed to get myself some breakfast since VegFoodFest started a little later. We went to Fresh Restaurant for a lovely breakfast of vegan pancakes, tofu scramble, tempeh bacon and a side of onion rings. Their almond milk latte is also amazing! I also loved the funky paint colors and chandeliers, it made for a fun atmosphere. 

Once at the Harbourfront where the festival is held, I attended Big Bald Mike's first ever public speaking event.

Chocolate-Glazed Mini Donuts (vegan)

This year, my sister bought me this donut maker from Babycakes for Christmas. I was SO excited to try it! Since we decided to do a cleanse for the month of January, it remained unopened for the month, sadly collecting dust. On the first weekend of Febuary, I took that baby out and got right into it! I tried the donut recipe from Chloe Coscarelli's cookbook, Chloe's Kitchen (my Christmas present to myself) but I replaced the nutmeg with cinnamon. When I was mixing the dry and wet ingredients together, I found the batter to be a little bit thick. After adding about 1/4 cup of extra soymilk, the batter was much better but still quite thick. Even with that, I found the donuts turned out a little dense, so I will try adding 1/2 cup soymilk to the liquids next time. Overall, the donut-making was great; super easy and quick. The donut-iron (is that what I'm supposed to call it?) took about 5 minutes per batch, and using the ziplock-bag method for piping the dough made the whole process so much easier!

January cleanse: extension week recap

The last little stretch is done! WOW! What an accomplishement for me. Feeling incredibly proud, inspired, and happy! Here's how it went:

Monday night I did some awesome yoga at my local Goodlife Fitness. I felt so great afterwards, it was a really good class! My sister had brought along two of her friends, who were very hesitant to trying yoga. Obviously, they came out of the class loving it! It was so nice to see this positive influence and the happy chatting afterwards (insert warm fuzzy feelings here). And then my sister and I went home and munched on guacamole and roasted red pepper hummus with Gluten-Free crackers, yum! It's actually really embarassing how much hummus we go through... Good thing we buy it at Costco!

So apparently I'm a runner now.... WHAT? I've never been a runner, a jogger, or even a big walker. Cardio has never been my thing. During this cleanse, I found that I have SO much more energy, and I need to do something more than bicep curls and squats to get it out. Since getting bad whiplash this summer, my back and shoulder area have been tense so I didn't want to work out too hard. Cardio it is. I've been doing pretty good, slowly working my way up to longer periods (watching longer Ted Talks videos!). My biggest issue before was the sluggishness (probably just unconscious laziness) and my lack of endurance. Now it's not an issue at all!