Welp, I’ve fallen in love with Colorado.

As if I needed another place to become obsessed with.

Who woulda thunk I’d jive so hard with the midwest? Until now, I always pictured tumbleweeds just flowing through the streets and kids in overalls.

But Colorado is kewl, man! So many beautiful mountains and plenty of nature things and good places to grub and excellent people watching. The homeless population rivals Seattle, making me feel ever so at home. I just loved everything about it. The main purpose of the trip was to see our favie band at Red Rocks. I thought I would be underwhelmed by the venue because it’s like “the” place to see a show, but nopity nope nope. It was amazing. You’re just watching a radical show surrounded by these giant…red…rocks… It sounds lamer than it is, I promise. We did a couple of hikes too and they about killed me. Apparently elevation sickness is a thing and there is less oxygen in CO. That would explain my incessant wheezing. The other purpose of our trip was to scope out neighborhoods your girl and her man are MOVING there next summer WOOOO. We are so stoked. We had a list of neighborhoods to explore. Ask me how many we got to, just ASK! You’d be right, we saw not a one and instead just ate our way through the state.

There are so many vegan restaurants I am absolutely going to go bankrupt in this state.

Time: 30 minutes (prep + cooking) | Serves: 2-3

Ingredients:

• 1 can of chickpeas, rinsed + drained
• 1/2 a red onion, diced
• 1 jalapeno, diced
• 1/2 an english cucumber, sliced thin + quartered
• 1 orange, segmented
• 1 cup of strawberries, quartered
• Juice of 1 lime
• 2 tbsp. of cilantro, diced
• 1 tbsp. of agave
• S+P, to taste

How to:

• Preheat oven to 400 degrees
• Arrange chickpeas on a lined baking sheet + sprinkle with S+P
• Roast for 25-30 minutes, tossing once
• Meanwhile, combine onion + jalapeno + cucumber + orange + strawberries + lime juice + agave + cilantro in a bowl
• Add chickpeas + S+P, toss well
• Serve chilled
• Sit on couch with bowl of chickpea + fruit salad between your legs + eat all of the contents of said bowl while bingeing Handmaid’s Tale so you can talk to me about all of your feelings