Best. Pizza. Ever!!

Okay, I’ve made pizza a few times since going vegan, but I believe that this particular one is my crowning glory.  All veggie toppings (red peppers, broccoli, and onions), a crust made with whole wheat flour and a hefty amount of vital wheat gluten, some leftover spaghetti sauce, and—wait for it—no cheese!  Or even a cheese alternative!  I sprinkled a few tablespoons of nutritional yeast over the whole thing, added an assortment of spices, and it was really, really good!  I honestly believe it was one of the best pizzas I ever made.  And it looks pretty, too.  ☺

Not much left over--and the cupcake stayed there just long enough for the picture!

Saturday was the vegan/vegetarian meet-up at the Whetstone Park of Roses.  We had such a good time, and the food was awesome.  We met a bunch of cool people, and we added some Facebook friends because of it.  I also signed us up for another meet-up group that does hiking meet-ups in the area, thanks to a lady we met at the picnic; we really can use some regular exercise again.  The weather was terrible—huge thunderstorm started the second we got out of the car, and it rained pretty much the whole time we were at the park—but that didn’t stop us from having a good time.  And everybody liked my cupcakes!  There were only 4 tiny ones left by the end of the picnic.  That alone says a lot!  Sean and I also got to reacquaint ourselves with the animal activist who got us started down this particular path.  I saw her at the food table shortly after she arrived, and we ended up talking for the next couple of hours about how she changed our lives.  Thanks again, Eriyah!

We have been so incredibly lazy all day Sunday.  We slept in, at when we felt like it, tried to focus mainly on Vita Mix concoctions, and just generally took it easy.  It’s been fun, but I’m hoping to do something a little more active tomorrow.  I told Sean that I really want to get up early and take a nice long walk before it gets too hot.  Then I have a facial scheduled at the Origins shop at Macy’s at noon.  I know he has a photo shoot that needs to happen tomorrow if it’s going to happen at all, and I’m still trying to decide if I’m coming along or not.

First up on the theatrical scene...

Followed by Shakespeare and a vegan picnic!

Even though it’s vacation week, we’re still going to be busy.  I have two plays to review this week (back to Newark to see Weathervane’s production of The Secret Garden on Thursday, and then Rosebriar’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream on Friday down in Groveport), and I still want—nay, demand!—to see Harry Potter, probably on Tuesday or Wednesday.  So, in a nutshell, Sean is probably going to kill me for booking our social calendar so full when he’s trying to relax…  Oh, well.  It’s not like we usually have lives or anything any other time. 

Must. See. This. Movie!!!!

Ah... Vegan comfort food!

I have been so incredibly lazy today.  I did spend about half an hour cleaning up the kitchen (kind of…), and I started a load of laundry (at 5:00), but other than that I haven’t really done much of anything today except up my post number on PPK’s forums.  Shameful…

In an effort to redeem myself, I decided to make a nice dinner for Sean and me, since the kidlets are with their dad this week.  I really wanted mashed potatoes, and I knew I had a few left that needed to be used pretty soon before they started sprouting.  I made them with some soy milk, Earth Balance margarine, and about a clove or so of minced garlic.  I made the basic broiled tofu recipe from Veganomicon.  Then I steamed some broccoli and cauliflower.  I put fresh garlic pepper over everything and sprinkled some crushed red pepper over the tofu.  Simple flavors, easy preparation, and delicious to boot.  And lots of leftovers!  All those things make me happy.  ☺

Creamy and delicious!

Sean put himself in charge of dessert.  He really wanted to try the whole Vita Mix ice cream thing again.  This time, we left the lid on.  *grin*  Yay no more broken tampers!  He was going to make strawberry, but we didn’t have quite enough strawberries for what the recipe called for.  So he added some peaches and a frozen banana to get the fruit weight up to where it needed to be.  Then he added some coconut extract.  I think that almond would have been nice, too.  He used what was left of the vanilla soymilk we made yesterday.  Despite running the blender just a bit too long (it shut itself off—yay overheating!), it ended up perfect as soft-serve ice cream.  The coconut extract was a little stronger than I would have liked—maybe we should scale it back a little bit next time.  But it was creamy and light without being overly sugary sweet.

I have decided that in the name of keeping myself sane, I’m going to start making a monthly meal plan.  I’ve had to throw away so much stuff that I bought and never used because I either forgot about it or changed my mind, and it’s just sickening to me.  I’m still going to try to incorporate at least one or two new recipes a week since we’re embarking on this vegan journey, though.  After all, when you eat the same stuff for 36 years, a drastic change like going vegan means you have to experiment to find what you like and what you don’t.  Without some wiggle room for experimentation, this new lifestyle could get really boring really fast.  And it requires more than just veganizing old recipes.  Doing this is going to make grocery shopping a lot easier, too, which will hopefully save us some money in the long run.

I’m not expecting myself to turn into June Cleaver overnight, but I am hoping that I’ll have made a decent dent in my new stay-at-home-mom persona by the end of the year.  So now I’m armed with a master shopping list, a 30-day meal planning calendar, and a dream…  Wish me luck!

No salt, little bit of melted "butter", hot out of the oven--just the way I like 'em.

Sean was begging for pretzels today.  I have one of the Top Secret Recipes books by Todd Wilbur that has a recipe for Auntie Anne’s pretzels.  I’ve made them several times before, but I think I got them almost perfect this time.  Yay!  They’re best when they’re fresh out of the oven, but they’re still pretty good if you put them in a Ziploc bag and eat them within the next day or so.

I’ve taken a few days off from blogging because for some reason, I have been inexplicably exhausted since about Thursday.  It’s kind of annoying, really—I have stuff to do!  Namely, baking and cooking more new vegan recipes.  And I have a brand-new brunch cookbook that I haven’t really even sampled yet.  So stop being tired and dumb, body!  I have plans!

For him

For her

It has been quite the movie week here, though, even with my being so tired recently.  We took the kidlets to gender-appropriate movies on Friday night:  Transformers:  Revenge of the Fallen for Daniel and Ice Age:  Dawn of the Dinosaurs for Sylvia.  I’m not sure how it’s happened, but I haven’t seen the new Harry Potter movie yet.  What’s up with that?!?!  Though I was talking to the kids’ swim instructor yesterday, and she told me about a few things that are in the movie that never happened in the books.  *sigh*  I hate it when they do stuff like that…

For the grownups

On the vegan front, Sean and I went to see Food, Inc., last night.  Very informative.  The production value of this film is definitely better than Earthlings, but I’m afraid that I wasn’t quite as moved to action with this one.  I am convinced, though, that I’m going to try to do as much cooking and preparing of my own food as I possibly can and try to stay away from overly-processed stuff.  I can almost hear the arguments starting that “cooking is processing,” and all that.  But I think even the argumentative ones know the difference between making your own tomato sauce from scratch using fresh ingredients and opening a jar of Prego.  There really is a difference.

Once again, I’m feeling that sense of tiredness sweeping over me.  At least I’ve had an easier time waking up in the morning than I usually did.  Maybe this is just my body’s way of telling me that I really do need some rest, despite all the “stuff” I feel I need to accomplish.  Besides, the puppies are sleeping, and they just look too darned cute not to join them.  ☺

Awesome tofu scramble for a lazy Sunday brunch.

Yet another big cooking day today.  I’m starting to feel like I’m living in my kitchen lately.  At least the blender kind of took a break today—just one juice drink this morning for breakfast, and then it was eerily silent for the rest of the afternoon.

We all slept late this morning, so breakfast was more like brunch.  I found an awesome tofu scramble recipe a few weeks ago, and that was what I used to make the concoction pictured above for the adults.  The kids wanted cereal, so everyone was happy.

On Saturday, Sean found a picture of vegan cheezy fries somewhere and insisted that he wanted to make them for himself.  I was sent out on a quest to track down The Ultimate Uncheese Cookbook by Jo Stepaniak since apparently the “cheeze” recipes in there are awesome.  I have to admit, the one we tried tonight turned out pretty good:

Yummmmm....

It was particularly awesome over the fries:

Double yummmm....

After dinner, we took the kids and the dogs for a nice long walk—exactly what all of us needed after such a filling dinner.

I watched “The Meatrix” animated series of shorts tonight.  Very informative without being too in-your-face, and keeping a sense of humor.  I think that’s part of the problem that most vegans run into in daily life:  too many crazies out there who give us all a bad name.  I’ve been at this for about a month now, and even though it’s starting to get easier, I still don’t know if I actually feel vegan yet.  Of course, I can’t even explain exactly what that means or how a vegan should feel on a day-to-day basis, but still, I keep thinking that there’s supposed to be something else, something life-altering that hasn’t happened yet.  Maybe it will eventually, or maybe it won’t.  For right now, though, I can find comfort in the knowledge that I’m doing my part to try to stop the suffering of those who cannot speak for themselves.  I may not be sneaking into livestock auction houses or slaughterhouses or puppy mills with a video camera to expose the wrongdoing that’s going on there; but I can stop adding to the consumption that creates the supposed need for factory farms and mass-market killing.

I am glad that I made the switch, and I’m glad that Sean made the switch with me.  Even the kids have gotten involved, and they’re interested in the new things I’m making for dinner every night instead of the ongoing cycle of mac and cheese or spaghetti.  I’m still floored that they liked the Indian food I made on Saturday.  That reaction just opened a whole new realm of possibilities for dining experiences at home.  I think tomorrow’s dinner might be something involving sweet potatoes and some naan bread perhaps?

"You have just dined, and however scrupulously the slaughterhouse is concealed in the graceful distance of miles, there is complicity." --Ralph Waldo Emerson

Wow.  Just… wow.

In a nutshell:  Humans really suck.

And now for the long form:

I’m really glad that I had already made the decision to become vegan before I saw this movie.  I don’t think I could have continued eating meat after watching it.  It never ceases to amaze me how incredibly selfish the human race is.  It’s all about what we want, what we “need”, what’s the hot new thing that we simply must have—no matter who or what may be exploited in the process.

Here are a few vignettes that made me cry:

–Some garbage men in Mexico throwing a still-living, struggling stray dog into the back of a garbage truck and then compacting it.  (Sean asked me if I was okay after that one.  I wasn’t, but I also wasn’t going to quit that early into the movie.)
–A mother seal nuzzling her slaughtered, skinned calf after watching a hunter kill it.  (I remember watching that on PBS when I was a kid, and I still cried just as hard nearly 30 years later.)
–Cows purchased from poor Indian farmers (who were promised that the cows would live out their days on farms) crowded into trucks, starved, beaten, and eventually slaughtered for their hides to make leather.
–Wild animals—including foxes, wolves, sables, and raccoons—housed in tiny cages, starved, receiving anal electrocution that may or may not kill them on the first try, and eventually skinned, some of them while they were still alive and blinking.  (FYI:  There are no government regulations regarding the humane killing of animals destined to be fur coats.)
–Dolphins herded into tiny harbors in Japanese coastal towns to be injured, beaten, and eventually killed for meat that is labeled as “whale meat”.  And the whale hunting is a whole different story…

Any doubts I might have had about our decision to become vegan are pretty much gone now.  Though the movie does start to get a bit preachy at the end, it’s still very effective and moving.  However diligent I had thought I was in the last few weeks since the big switch in lifestyle, I intend to be that much more diligent from this point on.

Suddenly, the $77 I spent tonight on organic, non-GMO, vegan-friendly foods doesn’t seem like that big a sacrifice.

The movie is Earthlings.  Buy it here.  Rent it here.  Check it out from your local library.  Just watch it.  Even if you continue eating meat after watching, if you at least feel bad about doing it, you’re a better person.

This is sooooo good when it's warm and fresh!

My kitchen has been invaded by ants this week.  I find this most distressing.  All the time I’ve lived in this house, I have seen an occasional straggling insect.  This invasion goes way beyond that, though.  This week, I have found a tiny battalion working its way to the dogs’ food dishes.  I looked around for humane methods of convincing the little buggers that they should look elsewhere for food.  Chili powder, curry, and vinegar haven’t worked.  Combinations of all three haven’t worked.  The last time I tried the chili powder trick, I found them walking through it to get to the food dishes.  I have cleaned the dogs’ bowls, mopped the floor, emptied the trash daily and swept the kitchen floor every night hoping the stem the tide.  So far, I haven’t seen any more today.  Let’s hope that maybe they found someplace better to go.  I will admit that I squashed a few while trying to sweep them up, and I’m pretty sure a few were drowned in vinegar.  I will also admit that I felt absolutely no remorse over the casualties.  This is why I will most likely never be a member of PETA.  ☺

I had a couple of overripe bananas sitting around the kitchen, so I decided to make some banana bread.  In the interest of trying to be a tad healthier (and possibly drop the 5 or so pounds I’ve gained since becoming vegan—ick!!), I made some changes.  I used 1 ¼ cups of whole wheat flour, ½ cup of unbleached all purpose flour, applesauce instead of oil, only ½ cup of sugar (I figured it would be sweet enough with the applesauce and the really ripe bananas) and I added about ½ cup of chopped walnuts.  I shortened the baking time to just under an hour—about 50 minutes or so—because the bread was starting to look overcooked.  As it turns out, the bottom was still a little underbaked, but it’s edible and not too sweet.  The whole wheat flour made it kind of dense and it didn’t rise very much, but it’s really tasty and doesn’t taste as desserty as some of the other sweet breads I’ve made recently.

After reading Skinny Bitch (and skimming Sean’s copy of Skinny Bastard), I have been trying to cut down on my caffeine intake.  It sucks.  Not that I’m usually too crazy with it—I got myself down to 1, maybe 2 cups of coffee a day, and I don’t drink soda at all anymore—but I really should be drinking more water.  I drank a full glass of water with the banana that I ate for breakfast (trying out the suggestion of eating a piece of fruit for breakfast, wait a little while, and eat another piece of fruit if still hungry), but I still wanted something else.  So I made a cup of chai tea with Silk creamer and a packet of Truvia.  Truvia is a tricky substance for me in beverages:  one packet isn’t enough, and two packets are too much.  I hate having half-packets lying around, so I’m thinking I may just try to deal with my tea being less sweet.  Either way, I greatly enjoyed my chai with a slice of fresh banana bread.  You didn’t really think I wasn’t going to taste it the second it came out of the oven, did you?  *grin*

Tonight is Weight Watchers, and I’m not looking forward to seeing the scale.  I have been hovering in the same 5-pound range for months, and now I’ve completely overhauled my eating habits and gained a few pounds.  Ick…  I know it’s just a matter of finding the right balance, and I have been eating so much bread lately that I’m surprised that I haven’t gained more.  It’s still been kind of frustrating not getting to my goal weight yet, but I’m still working at it, still trying, and still keeping that goal in mind.  I really need to remember that just because it’s vegan doesn’t automatically mean that it’s healthy and low-calorie.  It’s still all about calories in versus calories burned, and unfortunately baking cupcakes doesn’t burn enough calories to justify eating three of them in a day.  I should probably start my running regimen again.  I’m turning into a lump…

Enough pouting!  At least I’ve been keeping up with my kitchen (granted, it’s mainly so deter the ants, but still—an accomplishment is an accomplishment!), and I’m thinking I should probably get the kids out of the house for a while today.  Maybe we’ll go to the Y and they can swim while I run laps.  It’s a perfect day for it, really.  Exercise time, everybody!  ☺

I bribe my children.  I admit it.  Sometimes, it’s something material.  Today, it was for pure fame and notoriety.

I wanted for them to get out of the house for a while today.  We took them to the grocery store first—granted, hardly the most fun trip for a kid—and then we went for a walk at Battelle Darby Creek.  I had them bring their cameras along and told them that whoever took the best picture would have it posted with my blog entry today.  Daniel won!  Those are his size-10 feet that you see there.  I hope his feet stop growing soon—or at least that he grows into them more.  As it is, he’s starting to look like he’s wearing clown shoes.  ☺

Sylvie was a little less than enthusiastic about the walk (and the picture-taking, as it turns out), and she was breathing so hard by the time we got to the top of the steps on the trail that she could barely talk.  I’m thinking that maybe daily trips out there and a few times up and down the stairs might toughen her up a bit.

Not too much new on the food front today.  I did make broiled tofu for the first time using this recipe.  Super easy, and pretty tasty, too.  I don’t think I used the full amount of oil, though.  I just used some that was leftover after Sean made sweet potato fries for the kids and added some Bragg’s aminos to it.  After I turned the slices a few times, I added different spices to each set of 4:  garlic pepper, Mrs. Dash onion and herb, and a spicy one.  I think the spicy came out the best.  I served them on sandwiches with hummus, spinach, and some green pepper strips.  Definitely a keeper!

Surprise of all surprises:  my children are coming to like veggie “hot dogs”.  Daniel had one for a quick snack yesterday and ate two more for dinner tonight.  And this was after he made fun of the tofu at the store earlier today.  Little does he know that he had it for dinner tonight!  *evil cackle*  I’m on a quest to make these children like healthy food if it’s the last thing I do!

I think tomorrow is going to be something with pinto beans.  Actually, I know it’s going to be something with pinto beans since there’s a pound of beans soaking in the fridge as we speak.  I had one recipe in mind, but I totally forgot to pick up fake beef bouillon at the store tonight, and I think I’m out of even the veggie stuff.  Hmm…  A different recipe may be in order.  I was planning to make bread tomorrow, but we’ll see how that goes.  I found a great whole wheat bread tonight at Whole Foods—it’s light and fluffy, sliced super-thin, fairly inexpensive, no artificial crap (I could actually read the entire label without having to consult a dictionary!), and from a local bakery.  With all of that going for it, it makes me wonder if I really want to continue on my bread-making quest…  I really would like to make my own, though.  It makes the house smell wonderful when it’s baking.

Since it was raining off and on this evening, we thought that taking the kids to the Gallery Hop downtown would be more fun than sitting in the park getting wet while waiting for fireworks to start.  They always have fun, and tonight wasn’t very crowded for the first time in ages.  Of course, the line outside Jeni’s Ice Cream was still huge even with the rain, so we skipped it.  Sad, too—I had really been looking forward to trying some of their vegan sorbet selections…  Oh, well.  Maybe next time.  ☺

For dinner, we went to Z Pizza.  They were really helpful during the ordering process, letting us know that the soy cheese they use isn’t vegan (it has casein in it—more sadness), and that there’s sugar in the pizza crust.  We got the California pizza sans cheese for the adults and a half-pepperoni, half-cheese for the kids.  What we didn’t tell the kids is that we had them use soy cheese instead of the regular.  They never even noticed the difference.  Not quite as good as all-out vegan, but it’s a step in the right direction.  And we did get to see some fireworks from the car when we were driving home.  Not too shabby a night, really.

I made a couple of new recipes today.  For lunch, I made black bean burritos with chopped onions, salsa, fresh spinach, some rice “cheese”, and green pepper strips on whole grain tortillas.  For a snack that will hopefully last the week, I made the vegan chocolate chip cookies from Skinny Bitch in the Kitch.  Sean and the kids liked them, and they’re okay, I guess, but I think I’m going to try some other recipes, too.  They were just a little crispier than I like them, even after playing with baking times and things.  Of course, the recipe called for 1¼ cup of refined coconut oil, and I didn’t have any; I used Earth Balance sticks instead.  I wonder if that could account for the overly-crispy results?  I might try it again with the coconut oil at a later date.  Sean got creative and made a chocolate-peanut butter quinoa pudding using the recipe I found here as a jumping-off point.  I haven’t tried a full serving of it yet, but what I got from the spoon was pretty tasty.

I think what I’m learning during this transition is that—well, I have a lot to learn.  There are so many things to consider that I had never really given any thought to in the past.  Just like the sugar thing tonight.  It never would have crossed my mind to be the slightest bit concerned about sugar just a few weeks ago, except from a health standpoint.  Now that I know more about the ethical ramifications that go along with sugar (namely, the use of charred animal bones to process sugar to its gleaming white state), it’s harder for me to ignore.  I feel like I’ve spent the last three weeks completely obsessed with the food that I eat, buy, and prepare, and maybe that’s not such a bad thing.  Maybe I’ve needed to pay a little more attention to what I’m putting in my body.  Maybe it’s a good thing that I’m focusing nearly as much attention on nourishment as on taste.

I will say this, though:  I am so grateful that Sean is doing this with me.  I don’t think I could stick with it if I had to go it alone!