Those of you who read this blog regularly know that I love to play in the kitchen. I do my best to cook with whole foods – always vegan – but that I don’t shy away from a little help from convenience foods. When I’m giving talks at vegetarian festivals or during cooking classes I will, at some point, say, “I live in the real world. I cook at home and convenience foods have a place in my cooking and diet to help me along the way.”
About a year ago Dave and I stumbled upon a brand of jarred produce, MM Local Foods. I believe we were at NOOCH Vegan Market in Denver where we spied spicy tomato juice and pickles that were destined to become Bloody Marys. MM Local preserves Colorado and Pacific Northwest produce and we are slightly obsessed. To the point that whenever we see a jar in a grocery store we grab it and figure out what to do with it later, like on our last trip to Breckenridge where we picked up a jar of tomatoes for a quick and delicious pasta dinner.
I’m known to tweet out my MM Local creations and because of that I was recently asked to try their new, seasonal item, Holiday Beets, along with the Paonia Pears. Of course I said yes. And of course I also asked them to host a giveaway so that you can try MM Local produce, too (details and enter below!).
I received the beets and pears and combined them with the several jars of MM Local favorites already in my cupboard: pearl onions, dill pickles, and peaches.
We had a lot of fun adding MM Local Foods to our Thanksgiving dinner!
We started our morning in the kitchen with a Bloody Mary. Because Bloody Mary.
We added a vegan Worcestershire sauce to a tomato juice and added carrot, celery, and MM Local pearl onions and pickles. If you are a Bloody Mary fan, check out the MM Local Bloody Mary Maven 3– and 6-Gift Packs.
One of my new favorite things is to caramelize onions. I set up my Saladmaster MP5 in the morning and let 4 cups of onion sweat and sweeten throughout the morning. They first popped up on this simple salad of frisée lettuce, topped with MM Local holiday beets,
served during the first course with these delightful tomato, double cream chive (vegan) cheese and MM Local Paonia pears.
Then it was time for the main feast.
This meal came together so quickly:
- In the pressure cooker: potatoes, parsnips, onion, and garlic layered on the bottom. Celebration Roast over the veggies. About 3/4 cup vegetable broth. Cook at high pressure for 8 minutes, allow for a natural release. (Mash the root veggies in the cooking broth + a splash of almond milk with a wire masher.)
- While the root veggies and roast were cooking up in the pressure cooker we added about two cups of chopped shiitake mushrooms to the electric pot with the remaining caramelized onions before adding prepared vegan mushroom gravy. We also made a quick stuffing, as well as sautéed green beans in garlic and tossed with almonds.
- The special touch? I chopped up for MM Local preserved produce for a simple relish for the roast: peaches, pears, holiday beets and pearl onion.
Ready for the grand finale? I was at NOOCH last weekend for a cooking demo and spied a box of vegan Jel (lo) on the shelf. And then I saw vegan marshmallows. Consumed, I decided I just had to make some kind of silly, old-school dessert. I started with this:
and it resulted in this:
Let’s go with a “pie”?
Vegan Marshmallow Jello Salad “Pie”
Ingredients (Serves 6 to 8)
- 1 package strawberry Bakol Jel
- 1/4 cup chopped pecans
- 1/4 cup vegan marshmallows
- 1/4 cup dried cranberries
- 1/4 cup chopped MM Local simply peaches
- Whipped soy cream
Instructions
Prepare vegan jello according to directions. Pour into a glass pie plate.
Chill for 15 minutes
Mix the pecans, marshmallows, cranberries and peaches and let sit at room temperature while the jello is chilling.
Remove jello from the refrigerator after 15 minutes and “drop” the fixings into the jello. Lightly press down into the jel.
Return to the refrigerator and chill for another 90 minutes – 2 hours.
Place a serving plate over the pie plate. Flip pie plate over. Add soy whipped cream and serve.
So there you have it. An incredibly delicious, fun, and speedy holiday feast, with help from MM Local Foods.
You can order any number of the jars of goodness we used directly from the MM Local online store. And you can enter to win this Foodie 6-Pack!
Entering is easy. Check it out below!
This post is sponsored by MM Local; the point of view is my own.
38 thoughts on “Holiday Help from MM Local (Giveaway!)”
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Hi JL! Thanks for the opportunity. The products all look yummy. The one that intrigues me most is the Live Spicy Mustard Sauce! Have you tried that one?
I haven’t but I want to, Shelah!
Those whole plums look amazing! I would love to try them.
Hey! I saw the pumpkin in Whole Foods yesterday and almost grabbed a jar. I’d love to try it, and (of course) the peaches!
The Beetnik 6 pack!!!! I ❤️ ️beets.
Beets and the Rosemary Pears look yummy!
Would love the ripe pear sauce and live kim chi spicy kale. Great to know companies care about the products they produce. Great local ingredients. Thanks
I was having trouble deciding on a product….until I saw the PLUMS! Oh it has been SUCH a long time since I had plums like that!
That is a nice giveaway. The Foodie 6-Pack looks amazing!
Thanks for introducing us to new products JL – these look great.
So many choices! I’d pick the bread and butter pickles, simply kraut and simply pears to try first.
Zucchini Pickles! They sound awesome!
I love your beets!! 🙂
I would love to try the ripe peaches!
Your Thanksgiving dinner looks delicious! Thanks to you I use my pressure cooker all the time now. Great giveaway!
Oh, I’m so glad to hear you’re pressure cooking, Jannifer!
I forgot to comment on the product. I would really love to try the hot pickled chiles!
Thank you for introducing me to these fabulous products. I am especially interested in trying the kimchi!!
I’ve wanted to try this product line since moving to Colorado almost 2 years ago – this would be a perfect chance… it all looks so good every time I see it!
So many of their products would be fun to try! I’d start with Zucchini pickles, Kimchee (because I hear I should eat this and never have), Pickled Chilis (mild)… oh so many things to pick from!
I love pickled and spicy things. This gift pack sounds awesome. So do the zucchini pickles, yum! Thanks for the giveaway!
I’d love to try the Rye Style Kraut!
RAFFLECOPTER: CAROLSUE
I am dying to try the kimchi! I have been trying to make my own but love to try different varieties whenever I can!
The red cabbage live kraut looks delicious!
I totally want to try the spicy Kale Kim Chi. I have heard a lot about kim chi but haven’t gotten the chance to try it yet!
The products look great! Hope I win 🙂
The Zucchini Pickles look really yummy, as does everything.
Ooh, so many wonderful looking products! The Pear Sauce looks delicious, but so do the pears with rosemary! And the spicy mustard sauce. Yum! I don’t think my Whole Foods has these, but I’m going to look for them just in case.
I’d really like to try the Live Kim Chi-Spicy Kale.
The peaches, pears and beets all look like they’d most definitely be hella delicious.
These look fantastic! Would love to try them!
All of them look yummy, I would like to try the paonia pears first.
It is reallllllllllly hard to choose but the Live Thanksgiving 4-pack looks yummy
THOSE PEARLED ONIONS!
Cucumber pickles look amazing!!
All of these products look delicious! My mom would love the bloody mary pack!
I’d try the pear sauce.
I love me some pickled green beans! It all looks mm mmm good. 🙂