The Heartbeat at My Feet: A Furry, Four-Legged Love Story

It's Valentine's Day, might as well write a mushy ass post... 

Whether you know me in real life, from the ppk or just from the blogosphere, it's no secret that I love my little vegan dog more than anything or anyone in this world. Every day is an adventure with her and the unconditional love she gives is like no love another person can give. Here is our story....

Almost 2 years ago I was volunteering at a no-kill shelter and a girl I worked with found this adorable little Chihuahua mutt with a sick ass underbite roaming around a park in Quincy. She brought the dog home and was never able to find her parents so she kept her. Then it came time for her to leave for college and she obviously couldn't bring the dog with her and unfortunately(for her, not for me) she couldn't leave the dog at home with her family because she didn't get along that great with the other dog in the house. I heard her story and immediately offered to either adopt her or if the boyfriend I had (and was living with) at the time wouldn't let me, I could bring her to the shelter with no fear of her being put down. The girl brought the dog to the office so I could meet her. It was love at first sight, she had to be mine. I sent a picture of her to Jeremy and asked if we could keep her. Based on the few shitty picture texts I sent him, he said yes immediately. The thing was, we were living with his dad and already had 2 other dogs. We decided to tell him a little white lie, that we were temporarily short term fostering her until the shelter had room for her. The very next day we took her to get a name tag, food and toys, as soon as his dad saw it he knew we had no intentions of giving her up. Luckily for us, he was cool with it. She became our daughter that day and even though we aren't together anymore (we are still best friends) she is still our daughter and we both love her as unconditionally as she loves us. We have no idea exactly what mutt blend she is, except for the obvious Chihuahua in her or how old she is but it doesn't matter. The love and joy she has brought to both of us actually has me tearing up a little right now. (I know right, I actually have emotions?!) Even though she doesn't see him everyday anymore (I got custody in the split), as soon as I say, "Where's Daddy?" or "go get Daddy" her ears perk up, she starts wagging her tail and runs to the door to wait for him.

She is such an amazing little creature... She gives hugs on command, stands up and walks for treats, gives kisses even when you don't ask for them, sleeps in the crook of my arm under the covers every night with me and eats her vegetables with a wagging tail. In fact, I have never met a dog that loves vegetables, especially green ones more than her! Kale, brussel sprouts, sweet potatoes, beets and dried pineapple rings are her favorite things. I feed her Natural Balance Vegan Formula supplemented with VegeDog products and make batches of homemade wet food for her with rice, beans, steamed and/or pureed veggies. Half of the time she eats better than I do!

She is even learning Spanish! One of my best friend's, Jorge, is her "tio" (Spanish for uncle) and just as she knows "daddy" when I say "Donde esta tio?" she gets so excited! Seeing her reaction when her tio or dad walk into my apartment is priceless every single time. If it's been too long since she has seen either of them she will even let out a few little cries of happiness. It melts my icy black heart.

In the spirit of the "holiday" I hate the most, I decided to give my little baby some Vday love and make her pink pupcakes! But, before I get to the recipe, check out a few of the thousands (literally) of photos I have of her...

Hiding in a tree

Mother Daughter love

Gizmo and Gramps

Going for a ride!

Gizmo and Daddy

Gizmo and my nephew. I swear we did not coordinate their outfits!

Happy Easter

Tired rainy day

Gizmo loves her car seat!

Her favorite pitbull

We did the MSPCA walk

Gizmo and her Daddy

One morning I woke up to her laying like this on my arm. 

Okay now that I have relived some amazing memories going through these photos and killed you with the adorableness that is Gizmo, let's move onto the pupcakes shall we?

Pink Vegan Beet Pupcakes

2 cups oat flour

1/2 cup nutritional yeast

1 tsp salt

1/2 tsp baking pwder

1 tsp baking soda

1/2 cup of canned sliced beets with the beet water

1/2 cup veggie broth

Pink food dye. I didnt measure, but not a lot. 

3 tblspns oil. I use olive. 

• Preheat to 350 and lightly spray mini muffin pan with cooking spray
• 
  
• Puree the beets with the liquid, then mix with veg broth oil. 
• 
  
• Mix wet and dry ingredients with whisk until combined. 
•  
• Pour 1 tblspn of batter into mini muffin reservoirs. Bake about 10-12 minutes until toothpick comes out dry. 

Makes about 36 mini muffins.  

This recipe is something I randomly came up with tonight. Gizmo loved them as is but I think next time I will play around with them a little more by leaving out the food dye, adding parsley and carob chips. Or maybe making a carob frosting? Who knows! The possibilities are endless!

Carob Muffins for Gizmo

If you know me in any way, you probably know that I love Gizmo more than I love most people. If you met her you would understand why. She was a stray so I can only guess as to what mix of breeds she is, how old she is or what her life before me was like before me but what I do know is that is an amazing dog with the greatest personality and a crazzzzzzy underbite. Seriously, her underbite cracks me up every time.Sometimes it is just half of her teeth, sometimes its the whole bottom row. Either way, both are magnificent!

Gizmo came into my life last spring and has had me talking in cheezy baby voices, buying dog clothes and making homemade dog food ever since! She is a spoiled little brat but she is also the best thing that has ever happened to me. A girl I used to work with found her roaming around a park and couldn't find her parents. She asked everyone at and around the park if they knew the dog, nobody did. She also checked the pounds, no micro-chip and nobody looking for her. The girl decided to hold on to the little mystery dog until she could hopefully find her parents. Time passed and the girl was getting ready to move to college, a place she obviously couldn't take an animal, and the dog already living in her parents house didn't like Gizmo so much so she couldn't stay there. Gizmo was headed for the pound. I was volunteering at a no-kill shelter at the time and when I heard the story I immediately told the girl that if I couldn't keep the dog than we could talk to the people at the shelter to see if they could make room for her.

As soon as I met Gizmo I fell in love, but I was trying not to get too excited about taking her because at the time I was still with Jeremy, we lived with his dad and 2 other dogs. I thought they would both say no. I told Jeremy all about Gizmo and what her fate looked like if we didn't adopt her, he is just as much a sucker for an animal, especially a dog, in need as I am so sight unseen he agreed to let me take her home. While Gizmo the mogwai is technically a male, the name is really fitting for our little girl. She looks like a cross between Yoda and a Mogwai and even though she is always wearing pink and purple clothing, people constantly mistake her for a boy. She isn't the most feminine creature. Weighing in at just over 7 lbs she is full of energy, the best cuddler and plays with the family hounds and my brothers pit bull as is she were the same size as them.

Because she is so precious to me I am very careful about what I feed her. She only gets the best and beause she is vegan so I have to make sure she is getting everything she needs nutritionally. Her favorite treats are dehydrated sweet potatoes and pineapple but I also like to make her, and my other dogs, homemade treats. On a recent trip to Whole Foods I found some Vegan Carob Powder and since it is a common ingredient for dog treats I figured I would pick some up. I finally got around to using it and decided to make Carob Muffins from It's A Vegan Dogs Life.

The recipe is really easy to follow but I was a little nervous I had screwed something up when the dough was super sticky. Then I remembered I was baking for dogs, even if I did screw something up, odds are they were still going to eat and love them. It made 24 mini muffins but there are also variations for biscuits, cookies and bagels. They puffed up a lot so even though they are mini muffins, they are still pretty big for Gizmo so I have been splitting them in half for her, but she has been gobbling them up!


Carob Muffins

Carob can burn easily, so check these more often than you normally would.

2 1/3 cups flour

1/3 cup carob powder

1/3 cup wheat germ or additional flour

¼ cup nutritional yeast

½ tsp. baking soda

1 Tbsp. ground flax

1 Tbsp. hulled hemp seed (optional)

1 ¼ cups water

2 Tbsp. natural applesauce

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spray mini muffin pans with non-stick spray.

In a large bowl, combine flour, carob powder, wheat germ, nutritional yeast, flax, hemp
seed and baking soda.

Add applesauce and water, mixing well.

Scoop batter into the muffin pans and bake for 20 minutes. Remove and let cool completely before serving.

Store in the fridge.

Makes approximately two dozen mini muffins.

Variations
Biscuits- Reduce water by ½ cup and eliminate baking soda. Knead into a stiff dough,
adding ¼ cup of flour at a time until it can be rolled out without sticking to the rolling pin
(add a bit of water if it gets too dry). Roll out onto a floured surface to ¼ inch thickness.
Cut with cookie cutters or knife and bake on a greased cookie sheet until crispy.
Cookies- Add ¼ cup of flour at a time until dough is firm enough to form into balls. Place
dough balls on a greased cookie sheet and press flat with your hand or a fork. Bake until
crispy.
Bagels- Make the same as the cookies except do not press them flat. Dip your finger in
water and poke a hole in the middle of the dough ball. Flatten slightly to form a bagel
shape. Bake until crispy.

Grasshopper and Gizmo meets Santa

Grasshopper is definitely the vegan restaurant I visit the most when I am in the Boston area. The portions are huge, the prices are decent, the food is always cooked to perfection and service is QUICK! The atmosphere is a little lacking and I'm always really cold when I am in there but it's a small price to pay. A lot of people I talk to either love it or could care less about it, but me, I obviously love it. Now that I think about it, I can't think of a vegan restaurant I've been to that I haven't loved. I am starting to think I am really easy to please, I always thought I was difficult. Moving on...

I recently purchased some CoupMe coupons for Grasshopper which gets your $15 worth of food for $1. Seriously? Even if you don't love the restaurant, that is a deal! I bought 5 of them, they can only be used for dine-in and it is 1 per visit, but hey, $15 is $15.

Since Jeremy and I were heading into Boston the week before last, we decided to stop over on our way home. We were both starving due to excessive drinking the night before and this is definitely the place to go for some delicious Asian comfort food. It's comfort food, to me at least.

My eyes were definitely bigger than my stomach because we ended up ordering so much food. Jeremy of course finished his entire plate, plus everything I couldn't from my soup or appetizer. I took my leftover entree home though.We definitely had ourselves a feast.

We started out with the House Special Assorted Appetizer plate. That could have been a meal in itself, it had Vermicelli Rolls, Fried Wontons, Fried Dumplings, Fried Bean Cakes and Fried Spring Rolls. It was a lot of fried, but that's just what I want when I have a hangover. Everything was great, with the exception of the Bean Cake. I didn't really know what to make of it. It looked like a muffin but was really dry and didn't have much flavor.

Next was the Wonton Soup. I could have probably guzzled a gallon of the broth. It had plenty of wontons, carrots and potatoes in it. I'm not sure what they were filled with but they tasted good.

Jeremy got the Eggplant & Tofu Surprise which was really good. It reminded me of a dish we usually get at our local Thai restaurant. There were tons of eggplant, tofu, peppers and baby asparagus. The portion was so huge, I can't believe he ate the entire thing. Including his side of rice. And the rest of the appetizer and soup I couldn't finish. He is a garbage disposal.

Last but definitely not least was my entree. The dish that most people know Grasshopper for. The No Name. It is a bunch of little chunks of battered gluten fried and tossed with sweet and sour sauce, steamed veggies and sprinkled with sesame seeds. It is the perfect balance of crispiness and chewiness and is SO filling. I barely made a dent in it but I definitely took it home. It didn't last the night though, I ate the rest of the No Name when we got home a few hours later and Jeremy ate the rice.

Before our trip to Grasshopper we did stop of at the MSPCA Angell to have Gizmo's picture taken with Santa.