Peanut Butter Ice Cream Pie w/ Oreo Pretzel Crust

The name pretty much says it all... A DELICIOUS creation by one of our members. Seriously, YUM.

Ingredients
For the crust:
2 cups Oreo crumbs (about 16 Oreos)
2 cups pretzel crumbs
1/2 cup vegan butter, melted

For the filling:
1 8oz container vegan cream cheese
1 cup peanut butter
1 1/4 cup powdered sugar
1 cup vegan vanilla ice cream
2 tbs vanilla extract

For the topping:
1/4 cup vegan chocolate chips, melted
Also try pretzel and Oreo crumbs

Instructions
1. Find a method of crushing Oreos and pretzels. If you have a food processor, great! We used a hammer and some creativity...
2. Mix Oreo crumbs, pretzel crumbs and melted butter and press into a pan (we used an 8x8 square pan). Bake at 350F for 15 minutes. Then refrigerate.
3. Mix cream cheese, peanut butter, powdered sugar, vanilla, and ice cream. Fill the cooled crust with this mixture.
4. Decorate the pie either before or after freezing, drizzling melted chocolate, sprinkling Oreo and pretzel crumbs on top... go wild!
5. Place pie (covered with plastic wrap or aluminum foil) in freezer for at least 2 hours. Keep (and store) in freezer. Serve with vegan ice cream!

Happy Badger, Epic Bake Sale, Amazing SASHA Trip

On October 3rd, Veg Club met for lunch at the Happy Badger in BG for delicious, veg-friendly food! The atmosphere of the Happy Badger is really unique; glass jars are used for drinks, and there are all sorts of little knick-knacks and interesting decorations (including a functional record-player/juke box). We found a stuffed badger too and we just had to take a picture! After lunch, we ended up roaming around downtown and shopping (a little too impulsively and excitedly...) at Ben Franklin's. It was a really fun afternoon. :)

On October 17th, Veg Club baked together at the Common Good in preparation for today's bake sale. It got a little messy and chaotic, and we had a couple baking mishaps but this just made it more fun! We made so much food: brownies, no bake cookies, chocolate chip cookies, sugar cookie sandwiches, puppy chow, Oreo cupcakes, and cookie dough pretzel bites/sandwiches (an invention by one of our members). The recipes we used (although we halved many of them) can be found here. On October 18th at the bake sale, we actually sold out of all of our items and ended early! Based on our tallies, we made $62! Great job and thank you to everyone who helped out and to everyone who stopped by to taste just how delicious vegan food is! :)
  
(Guest written:) After waking up on an early Sunday morning (October 20th) and trugging along the road for two hours, the Veg Club made it to it's destination to SASHA in Jackson, Michigan. After arriving, and signing a liability waver of course, our crew went to the pastures. Here we were left with the task of cleaning up after the horses, which we didn't mind! But the day could of turned for the worst when one the donkeys pushed it way past us and out of the pasture. Luckily, due to two great members, the donkey was retrieved and put back into the pasture. Thank goodness! So, we continued with our work. After about two hours, and making the pasture more green than brown (LOL), we decided it was time for a break. First came pictures that I (Ciara) had the honor of taking and it went really well. We had alot of fun and decided we wanted to take a tour of the farm before eating our lunch. This resulted in seeing our the animals that the farm had taken in to take care of, from goats, horses, mules, donkeys, cats, sheep, dogs, chickens, emus, birds, and cows! 

Speaking of cows, we had quite the experience with them. I, was butted by one and so was someone else but then we had one poor member be actually thrown to the ground from an unfriendly, injured cow. But she's okay and we were able to laugh about it! Although after seeing the cows so up close, I am a little bit intimidated by them! We had alot of fun with all the animals and then we ate our vegan lunch we had packed while petting Fearless who was a very friendly dog that was just roaming around. I managed to get a picture with him and one of the members. He was such a magestic dog! After eating our lunch, we helped the man running the farm with some walnuts that needed to be disposed of. By then it was close to three and we decided to head back to Bowling Green. But we were really thankful to be able to volunteer (and even hear about a possible internship!) and help all the animals. It was wuite the experience and we hope to be able to do it again soon! :)

Experimental Granola Bars

These granola bars were an experiment by one of our members. The beauty of granola bars is that there is no perfect recipe and it is open to creative modification... so go wild and have fun, using this as a simple guide.

Ingredients
1.5 cup oats
0.5 cup roasted pepitas
0.5 cup raisins
1 large overripe banana
2 tbs syrup
2 tbs oil
1 tsp salt
0.5 tbs vanilla
1 tbs cocoa powder
2 tbs cinnamon

Instructions
1. Preheat oven to 375 F. Toss oats in oil and salt and toast the mixture in the oven on a cookie sheet for 15-20 minutes.
2. Mash the banana in a bowl with a fork until nearly liquified. Add to the mixture syrup, vanilla, cinnamon, cocoa, raisins, and pepitas.
3. Add the finished oats to the bowl, mix, and pour into a small brownie pan, pressing the mixture down to pack it tightly.
4. Turn the oven down to 300 F and bake for 35-45 minutes. Cool for 10 minutes and then cut into bars. Sprinkle extra cinnamon etc. on top if desired. Store in a container in the fridge. Enjoy!