Joe Knows Chocolate!

Reminds me of Cadbury's fruit &nut bar!

I've mentioned before that in my before vegan days, I was a milk chocolate girl. I know it's not very sophisticated, but a plain old Hershey's bar always made my day. As a kid, I have fond memories of sharing Chunky bars with nuts and raisins with my grandma.  In my early twenties I discovered Cadbury fruit & nut bars, and it was love at first bite. When I first went vegan, I think I went quite some time without eating chocolate, because I just could not really enjoy dark chocolate. Over the years I've found a few dark chocolate bars that I really enjoy, but they can be kind of pricey. When I was at Vegan Haven, they had some vegan milk chocolates, but they were very expensive, okay for a treat every now and then, but not for everyday. Well,  leave it to Trader Joe's to swoop in and save the day! This dark chocolate bar has raisins and pecans(chunk that) and it is organic, and here's the best part- it's only $1.99! I don't know how they do it, but I'm so glad they do. The chocolate has a really creamy mouth feel, similar to milk. It has a deep chocolate flavor, without some of the bitterness that comes with some dark chocolates. I love this bar so much, and I had to pry it out of a non-vegan's Reese's peanut butter cup loving hands. If you miss lighter chocolate, and balk at some of the high prices, try this bar. This is going to be a regular item on my Trader Joe's grocery list.

Spicy sticky eggplant

I was surprised with Chinese food for dinner last night. It was taken out from a place called Snappy Dragon. This dish is the crispy eggplant in tangy hot glaze, with tofu. The menu says dishes with a star are prepared 3- star spicy. This was 5 star, as my love of spice is well known. This dish was unusual in that it was large slices of Italian eggplant in a tempura batter, and sauce. I've had similar dishes with the smaller Japanese eggplant, not breaded and fried. This version was good, but definitely heavier than what I would expect from an eggplant dish. It was nice and spicy, and the eggplant was cooked properly, so all in all it was a success.
Back to the job hunting grind for me today. I was really hoping to find a job with a dog walking company, there are so many in Seattle, but it seems as if everyone insists that you have a car. I'm pretty sad about that, because I can't imagine a better way to earn a living than hanging out with dogs all day!  Sigh.
Happy Thursday!