Veganism in the Media

Sports Writers Should Stick to Covering Sports

The University of New Brunswick's The Brunswickan publication left me shaking my head a little last week. I was sitting in a local coffee shop with my Pennsylvanian friend, who was examining the spoils of our recent trip to the library. Sipping on some organic coconut water and leafing through "The Bruns" (as it's known in these parts), I hadn't counted on finding fodder for a blog post on the term veganism's being misinterpreted or misrepresented in the media, but there it was in the form of an article called "Weighing in on being vegetarian: pros and cons". In fact, its very opening paragraph contained the typical "veganism is a diet" assumption:

Vegetarian, Vegan, Ovo-lacto, Semi-Veg, all these terms are used to describe varying levels of commitment to a similar cause; the removal (to some degree) of animals or animal by-products from the diet.

Of course, veganism is not just a diet, but involves abstaining from the exploitation of animals over and above merely refraining from consuming their flesh, milk and eggs (or other secretions). And it's not one of "varying levels of commitment to a similar cause" to be lumped in with the occasional or customary consumption of animals.

Personal Choices as Personal Bubbles

The sports writer goes on to make a wrongheaded statement concerning ethics, proclaiming that "[a]nimal rights or animal cruelty is in a bit of a grey area depending on personal belief and the source of a person’s animal by-products". In conflating considerations of the treatment and the use of animals and injecting this consideration with relativism, the writer is basically asserting that the concept of "rights" is subject to each individual's personal interpretation. His statement also seems to presume that the violation of one's rights can become a non-issue depending on how one has been treated. It's no surprise to read such misunderstanding wrapped around the notion of rights given how adamantly so-called animal advocates like Jonathan Safran Foer insist that there are some who raise animals for slaughter who should be regarded as heroes for the manner in which they enslave and kill other sentient creatures.

On Health and Experts

The piece's writer then jumps to a discussion of the nutritional pros and cons of being vegetarian or vegan and of not eating animals or their products. He quotes a dietitian who lumps vegetarians and vegans in together, saying that vegetarians tend to weigh less, have "lower cholesterol, lower incidents of heart disease and lower blood pressure levels" and benefits to their kidneys in consuming non-animal sources of protein. She then dismisses the consumption of animal flesh as being a significant factor in terms of obesity and brings up the supposed prevalence of iron and B12 deficiency in her vegetarian clients. The writer of the piece reemphasizes this, stating:

This is a common theme for many vegetarians or vegans; removing meat from the diet adds certain challenges to insuring that the body receives enough protein, iron and B12.

He then paraphrases his token expert as calling B12 "the real challenge" and as stating that "[t]he only source of B12 that humans can naturally absorb is found in [animal-derived products]". This makes it sound as if humans have difficulty absorbing B12 in supplement form or in fortified foods, although he paraphrases the dietitian he interviewed as in fact recommending a B12 vitamin supplement, albeit as also expressing that there are "absorption issues in fortified foods". However, the UK's Vegan Society's Vegan Society -- in a statement on vegans and B12 endorsed by over a dozen internationally renowned medical experts -- asserts that "[v]egans using adequate amounts of fortified foods or B12 supplements are much less likely to suffer from B12 deficiency than the typical meat eater".

Reasons and Justifications and Learning to Look Beyond Ourselves

The sports writer's conclusion, based on his misunderstanding and dismissal of animal rights issues and on what are either incorrect or incorrectly interpreted statements of the dietitian quoted in his article, is that "deciding to become a vegetarian or vegan to simply 'improve your health' is not a justified reason". I sort of agree with this statement in the sense that going vegan to purportedly improve one's health doesn't seem to make much sense, particularly since (going back to the first paragraph of this post) veganism involves eschewing the exploitation of animals beyond those whose flesh or secretions one chooses (not) to eat. Personal health reasons would never, in and of themselves, really compel one to not ride a horse, visit the circus or to not wear a leather belt or wool sweater, would they?

What the writer is actually getting at, though, has nothing to do with this. His conclusion is that if the reason you cite for going vegan is that you'll be healthier, that not eating animal products will not necessarily lead to this. I agree with his final sentence that animal products in moderation can be a healthy part of a diet. However, just because something can does not mean that it should. Additionally, as demonstrated in Dr. T. Colin Campbell's The China Study, most omnivores in the West don't consume animal products in moderation and instead do so in a manner which leads directly to increased incidence of completely preventable diseases and that even slight increases in the consumption of various animal products can lead to a direct increase in the incidence of those preventable diseases.

Regardless of this, going vegan and not exploiting animals wherever and whenever possible -- including those we raise for human consumption -- should not be dismissed because not exploiting them may not lead to amazing personal benefits in terms of health and wellness. Going vegan should be weighed in terms of the rights and interests of the non-humans whose lives we affect when we opt to remove ourselves from the cycle of exploitation. Going vegan isn't about you or me -- it's about them.

Visit Animal Rights: The Abolitionist Approach to learn more.

Seitan!

With a house guest for the holidays, I've been doing a lot more cooking. One of the things I decided to tackle was something I haven't done in many years; I made up my mind to whip up a loaf of seitan. I used an old favourite recipe, Jo Stepaniak's "Roasted Breast of Seitan Turkey" from Vegan Vittles. You can find it on page three of this document or find adaptations of it on various online blogs. Vegan Vittles is a great little book, however. I've used it for years and have used it often and recommend it to anyone interested in playing around with seitan or mock cheese recipes.

I first assembled the gluten flour, soy sauce, onion and garlic powder (and water) to make my dough. A little bit of kneading was all it took to come up with a nice gluten loaf in a bowl. It's important to knead it thoroughly to ensure that all of the flour gets moistened and that you don't end up with knots of hard dough from dry lumps.

I then assembled the ingredients for my marinade: olive oil, toasted sesame oil, thyme, 3 garlic cloves (instead of the two called for in the original recipe), poultry seasoning (I had no plain sage on hand and there's plenty of it in poultry seasoning) and pepper. I usually use extra virgin olive oil, but last-minute holiday shopping left me grabbing what I could at the local market when I ran out.

I mixed together the marinade's ingredients and proceeded to rub it well over the gluten loaf, which I then placed in the smaller bowl in which I'd mixed the marinade. I covered it and stuck it in the fridge overnight, occasionally pulling it out to rub the marinade in the bottom of the bowl over it again, enjoying the scent of the yummy toasted sesame oil whenever I did so.

The next day, I preheated my oven to 350F and prepared my cooking / basting liquid. I then placed the loaf and what hadn't been absorbed of the marinade into a rectangular casserole dish, poured half the basting liquid over it and popped it into the oven for an hour and 10-15 minutes, occasionally taking it out (say, every 10-15 minutes) to baste it with the liquid in the pan and adding a bit more as what was in the pan got absorbed or reduced.

When it was done, I took it out to cool it, continuing to baste it every once in a while. Once it was cool enough to handle, I sliced it into strips for later use in sandwiches and stir-fry. It turned out fairly well, albeit less "turkey"-like than the recipe's title would suggest thanks to the extra dark mushroom flavoured soy sauce I'd had on hand and used. I wasn't looking to mimic this or that taste, however, but was just looking for some cheap tasty protein to use.

This did the trick!

Hot Noodle Soup on Xmas Day

My non-vegan guest is a huge fan of chicken noodle soup, whether his mother's or from a can. While he was squeezing in a nap after our simple veggie burger lunch, I made the following no-fail easy noodle soup, adapted from one in Dorothy R. Bates' TVP Cookbook. This stuff always reminds me of the lazy Sunday lunches when I was a kid, when Mom would pop open a can of Campbell's soup or pouch of Lipton's and serve it up with grilled cheese sandwiches.

Noodle Soup

What you need:

1 medium to large onion (red or yellow), diced
2 Tbs extra virgin olive oil
6 cups water
1 cup TVP granules
2 cups noodles of your choice, broken
1 vegetable bouillon cube
salt (if any) to taste
1 Tbs dried parsley
1/3 cup good quality nutritional yeast (I prefer Red Star)

Whatcha do:

Heat olive oil in a medium-sized pan and add diced onion. Cook until onion has softened and just started to brown.

Add the water, noodles, TVP and break the bouillon cube into it. Stir well and bring to a quick boil, then reduce heat to a simmer. Simmer until noodles are on the verge of being perfect (around 10-15 minutes or maybe less depending on size of noodles you're using). Mix in parsley and when noodles are perfect, stir in the nutritional yeast until it's dissolved.

Ladle into hot bowls and top with a pinch of dried or fresh parsley for garnish. Serves 4-6.

The Latest from The Sexy Vegan

He's writing a cookbook, it seems, and I very much look forward to seeing what he slaps together. You can find out more (and check out archived videos) at his website: The Sexy Vegan.

What Vegans Eat

I'd thought about devoting a post to some of the holiday treats being shared by vegan food bloggers online, but figured that I'd use December's "what vegans eat" post to nose around for things I'd like to try to make over the next few weeks while I entertain a house guest from Pennsylvania. There'll be no elaborate multi-course meals and no extravagant baking of sweets over and above what most would consider modest for the holidays, but the quest for eclectic noms is on nonetheless. I plan to test out a variety of new recipes, as well as to explore quick-fix meal options such as sandwiches and wraps, salads and one-pot dishes. So here are a few of the things recently (and not-so-recently) posted by vegan bloggers that have caught my eye:

I will be making seitan at some point over the holidays. There -- I said it! There's no backing out of it now. Aside from the odd gluten burger from an old Seventh-Day Adventist cookbook I picked up at a garage sale many years ago, I have not made anything even vaguely resembling seitan in well over 4-5 years, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed that I can make a half-decent batch of it that can be put to good use. The recipe for Hearty Beefless Stew on the Vegan Good Things blog sounds good, as well -- a bit of a change from my usual (and favourite!) Farmhouse Stew by Joanne Stepaniak. What I'd really like to try again, however, is to make some decent vegan Philly Cheese Steak sandwiches. I'd made some back in September using the PC Blue Menu Meatless Strips they sell at the Real Atlantic Superstore in my city; they're made by Gardein and are great, but are also pretty expensive considering that you can easily make 4-5 times the amount of homemade seitan for the close to the same price.

Claire's Samosa-style Twice-baked Potatoes at Chez Cayenne are definitely on my "to do" list. She had them with a curried lentil soup, but I'd be tempted to just serve these up with greens of some sort of a salad (although the soup itself looks really good and I may just be compelled to try it out separately -- lentils are just so awesome).Since they're so quick to prepare and an easy way to clear out a crowded refrigerator crisper (and since my guest enjoys them), Asian-themed stir fries tend to get thrown together at least once or twice a week when we're visiting with each other. He's a noodle-lover, so this recipe for Lo Mein from miss v's vegan cookbook will most certainly be on the menu at some point soon.

Another thing I'd sworn to myself I'd try to make this time around is cornbread. During one of my previous visits to Pennsylvania, we'd picked up some cornbread at Whole Foods and during another, a box of mix to make some. I haven't made cornbread from scratch in several years. It's not something I generally seek out, but it seems to be a favourite of my guest's, so I'll try my hand at baking some, using a recipe like this one posted by trktos at the rants & recipes blog. It should go really well with the three-bean chili I'll invariably end up improvising some morning when I hop out of bed early (although after checking out so many new blogs these past few days, I think that I've found a chili recipe that may become my new indulgence -- Slow Cooker Smoky Pumpkin Chili from the Cooking for a Vegan Lover blog.

I may try out these pasties by Vegan Dad who is back after a brief blogging hiatus. I was hoping to find a pot pie recipe, but these may do the trick. I love filled things! In fact, I may even try my hand at making this pita bread recipe from Bankrupt Vegan to fill with falafel using this recipe from Vegan Epicurean posted back in August or to make some seitan gyros.
I'm looking forward to a couple of weeks of vacation and to starting off at least a few frosty mornings sharing some mugs of hot cocoa with my house guest. Lee at The Vegan Version recommends using So Delicious Unsweetened Coconut Milk in cocoa, which sounds delicious!

Seriously, who needs cookbooks with all of these amazing vegan food bloggers plugging away? The food photos were taken from the blogs referenced, by the way. Visit them and visit them often!

Hope

"If you want to build a ship, don't herd people together to collect wood and don't assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea."

- Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Vegans Gabbing it up Online

Social Networking

I spend a fair amount of time "talking" to other vegans. In the non-virtual world, at least in my immediate circle of friends, family and acquaintances, I don't get to indulge in this at all. I've met a few vegans, sure, but could I pick up the phone to call one up to head out for a soy latté to maybe bounce a couple of blog post ideas around, or to bemoan an upcoming staff lunch at the local gourmet burger joint? Not so much. I can sometimes bend my sweetie's ear, but although he's a decent sounding board when it comes to things having to do with group dynamics or trying to hone in on a point about which I want to write, his eyes glaze over noticeably after what he calls "too much AR talk".

But I do get to communicate with other vegans on Facebook, on Twitter, in various discussion forums, by email and even by Skype. I do this daily. Sometimes we discuss educational projects in which we're involved, while sometimes we discuss news stories about animal rights issues. More often than not, we end up talking about simple details of our lives and of our respective interactions with the non-vegans around us. Vegan parents find themselves weighed down with more than the average parent's share of unwanted advice from family, friends and strangers alike and commiserate with each other. Holidays like like this past Thanksgiving invariably lead to an exchange of stories concerning family dinners. Basically, a lot of the communication that goes on is just the same sort of gabbing in which anyone would indulge, except that it generally -- or at least very often -- involves discussing veganism or animal use.

24/7 Advocacy: A Moral Imperative?

Recently, I've noticed some folks on social networking sites expressing a fair amount of indignation and irritation with some of their fellow vegans. Take Twitter, for instance: A couple of "tweeters" who'd been following me started up about what a complete waste of time it is for vegan activists to "follow" and communicate with other vegans on Twitter, and that these activists' time would be better spent offline engaging in face-to-face advocacy by talking to non-vegans. Some of the tweets I've seen along these lines have been overtly reproachful.

There is an assumption being made that vegans talking to each other online about animal rights issues and regular old life stuff don't, in fact, engage at all in offline activism. Of course, there's absolutely no evidence to back up this claim. It's a false dichotomy, ignoring the fact that it's possible to engage in both activities--or to (gasp!) do other things altogether having nothing whatsoever to do with animal rights. Some of us actually spend some of our free time volunteering for causes that even have nothing directly to do with animal rights. Heck, some of us even spend much of our free time doing things like knitting or napping.

Yeah, that's right -- napping.

And the thing is that even if we do engage in other activities, that still wouldn't preclude initiating or participating in face-to-face advocacy at some other point during the day or over the course of a week. And ultimately, is it really another advocate's business in the first place if I spend a few minutes or even a few hours a day on the internet rather than doing 'X'?

Where and When and Who's Watching, Anyway?

A few months ago, Dan Cudahy wrote a great little essay called "On Advocacy Media Preferences" in which he examined the question of whether one forum of advocacy, online or otherwise, is more effective. His conclusion?

Of books, magazine articles, scholarly journals, blogs, forums, emails, street stalls, leaflets, event tables, speeches, presentations, casual discussion, and whatever other forms of communication might be effective, it seems to me that what is communicated and how it is communicated is far more important than where or through what media a message is communicated.

I agree with him wholeheartedly on this. One point he makes which I'd like to explore further, however, concerns what he describes as the need to target a non-vegan audience. Some advocates have too narrow an interpretation of how we can educate and the truth is that there are many ways to engage non-vegans directly, as well as many ways to engage them indirectly.

According to a blurb on Wikipedia about lurking, I'm not so sure that vegans talking to each other online aren't, in fact, doing a fair amount of indirect outreach. Lurking on the internet happens when someone registers for a discussion forum, for instance, where members exchange information with each other, but this individual -- known as a "lurker" -- doesn't jump in and ask or answer questions, but instead spends a lot of time just reading and soaking in whatever information is offered up. Research shows that "lurkers make up over 90% of online groups". So when vegans are indulging in the purported waste of time known as talking to each other about veganism (aka preaching to the choir), this means that there's a really good chance that many others are reading the anecdotes being shared and the tips being traded.

I follow around 260 "people" on Twitter, for instance. There is no way that I do -- or could -- tweet back and forth with all 260 every single day. Most of those Twitter accounts belong to real folks (mostly vegan) who spend their time gabbing with others. They end up in my Twitter time-line and I read what they have to say; if I think that I have something interesting with which to chime in, I will. Otherwise, I just lurk and learn, particularly about how other vegans handle being vegan in what is an overwhelmingly non-vegan world. I assume that for each person following me on Twitter that there are probably many who don't jump in to discussions I try to start up, but who read the exchanges that ensue.

Those Pesky Forums

Before Facebook and Twitter, there were -- and there still are! -- online discussion forums. While some of them have been set up as communities to facilitate vegans' exchanging information and supporting each other, some of them are more inclusive and lead to debate between vegans and non-vegans, welfarists and abolitionists, and so on. Many advocates avoid engaging in online debating in such venues because it can seem pointless to rehash the same arguments over and over again. It can be exhausting. Yet, what I wrote above concerning lurkers applies just as much to old school public forums as it does to sites like Facebook and Twitter. As sociologist Roger Yates wrote in his short piece "Vegan Education on Public Forums":

it is important to remember that many people seem to read these exchanges without actually taking part in them. It is for them that contributing to public internet debates is important.

And he's right. Furthermore, a lot of these public discussion forums (particularly the ones targeting vegans or people interested in learning about veganism) provide a venue for vegans to support and encourage each other or to engage in earnest dialogue when and where differences may occur and this takes me back to the beginning of this post.

That vegans gab together isn't a lost opportunity for advocacy; others are watching, weighing our words and learning from them. Vegans gabbing together provides something more, though, and it would be unfortunate to ignore or to downplay that when vegans talk to each other online -- when we offer each other tips on the day-to-day aspects of living in a non-vegan world -- we're also helping each other to be happier vegans and helping each other to stay vegan. We're helping to build some sense of community for ourselves so some of us can feel a little less isolated or lost. In the end, it makes us better agents and advocates and that, surely, is no "waste of time".

Follow me on Twitter or visit the My Face Is on Fire Facebook page.

A High Five Is Completely off the Table

More from Vincent Guihan:

What Vegans Eat, The US Holiday Way

I've been so busy with work, school-related red tape and meeting new abolitionists over at the Abolitionist Approach Forum over the past few weeks that I haven't been doing much of my usual nosing around online to check out the projects in which others have been engaging. Sometimes it's good to step back and disengage from things a little. Last night, however, I did spend some time wowing at the prolific posting that's been going on by some noteworthy vegan food bloggers this past month.
It would be a bit bizarre to write about vegan food blogging this month without acknowledging the numerous posts that have written to share variations on traditional Thanksgiving fare just in time for the US holiday. One that really caught my eye was shared on Facebook a short while ago by cookbook author Robin Robertson. Her Almost One-Dish Thanksgiving Dinner (aka Thanksgiving Pie and pictured above) sounds as if it would be absolutely delicious served up with a side of oven-roasted vegetables and some cranberry sauce. Angel Flinn and her pals over at Gentle World also shared some Thanksgiving meal ideas recently, offering up a "Vegan Menu for a Gentle Thanksgiving". It includes recipes for Thanksgiving Stuffing, Holiday Stuffed Butternut Squash, Herb Roasted Vegetables, Holiday Mushroom Gravy, Holiday Candied Yams and Pumpkin Pie.

Oregonian writer Grant Butler also shared some animal-free versions of traditional Thanksgiving recipes (or recipes that remind him of meals shared with his family while growing up in the US South) in an article this past Monday. In it you'll find Green Beans w/Mushrooms, Acorn Squash w/Pecan-Cherry Stuffing, Roasted Cauliflower and Classic Macaroni and Cheeze. Butler describes bringing sides to a family meal as a sort of vegan advocacy through food. I'm also a big fan of bringing good vegan chow to potlucks and shared meals to let everyone see how delicious vegan food can be.
Leinana at Vegan Good Things shared a number of recipes -- all ridiculously delicious-sounding -- in a Thanksgiving-themed post over the weekend -- Porcini & Pecan Pâté, Celery Root Soup w/Granny Smith Apple & Chive Oil, Butternut Squash & Macaroni Casserole (pictured above), Brussels Sprouts, Pumpkin Cheesecake and Oven Roasted Banana Rum Cheesecake w/Spiced Pecan Crust & Maple Rum Sauce.

You should also check out an article with general Thanksgiving tips Houston food writer Joel Luks shared with me on Twitter earlier today. In his article, Luks talks about how easy it is to substitute typically animal-based ingredients like cream, butter, broths or cheese to win people over with the most decadent of recipes. You also need to try the recipe for Pumpkin Spice Cupcakes w/Cream Cheese Frosting he shared.
For more ideas geared towards dessert, try the Frosted Pumpkin Cookies (pictured above) or Maple Walnut Roasted Apples from Meg's Cooking Addiction. Or for a theme-appropriate beverage, you can try the Pumpkin Nog recipe by Alyson at Manifest: Vegan.

So there you have it! Go forth and spread good noms!

Veganism in a Nutshell

I Read It on the Internet

There's No Such Thing As a Vegan, Revisited

"Hey, I'm snarky and I'm going to rip the world's vegans a new one in one fell swoop with my cleverness. Um.... Well, how about with my bad logic and shoddy writing skills, then?

Dave might like to read this piece dealing with the same tired "there's no such thing as a vegan because whatever you eat requires killing" excuse used by those who choose to exploit non-human animals to somehow attempt to justify their deliberate use of non-human animals. And he should ask them about accountability and complicity in animal slaughter, instead of wasting his readers' time by mocking those who actually do their best to live lives that reflect taking the rights and interests of non-human animals seriously.

Here's the "cold hard truth", Dave: You have the choice to live your life so that each and every day, you avoid using animals as things by refusing to consume animal products and to participate in animal exploitation as earnestly and thoroughly as you can. Small animals may be killed during agriculture, but how on earth do you think it follows that, bearing this in mind, we should all throw our arms up into the air and say "Gee, well I guess that I'd better go back to deliberately using animal products in every single aspect of my life, then." You're right to have written "we all make choices in our lives but once you make that choice be honest and accountable about it".

Veganism is about accountability in our choices. Where's the accountability in yours?

For further reading on veganism and agriculture, please check out Dan Cudahy's excellent essay "On the Environmental Disaster of Animal Agriculture" on his Unpopular Vegan Essays blog.

Meeting Halfway for Good Eats

During two separate trips to Pennsylvania this past year, I found myself developing some pretty strong emotional ties to a little place in Reading called Good Eatz Green Cafe. Initially started as a gluten-free bakery, Good Eatz eventually rolled out a cafe to accommodate various food allergies and preferences. I first heard of it after a few internet searches to find someplace near my host's family's home where we could sneak out for a bite and where I could find some vegan fare. No, it's not a vegan restaurant, but it was within an hour's drive of where I was staying, had the most intricately labeled menu I'd ever seen in a non-vegan restaurant and had a sort of laid-back "mom 'n' pop" vibe that left my friend and I feeling comfortable from our very first visit.

Some of my favourite picks from the menu were the Harvest Salad (roasted butternut squash and grilled asparagus on mixed greens, tossed with a cranberry white balsamic vinaigrette with dried cranberries, spiced walnuts and carrots), the Sautéed Vegetable Wrap (containing broccoli, butternut squash, sun-dried tomatoes, onions, peppers, grilled asparagus and hummus) and the Vegan Grilled Reuben. The Marinated Tofu "Burger" was OK, as was the Vegetable Burger, but if I get to visit again, I'll likely go back to that scrumptious Harvest Salad or try out one of the numerous other vegan options they have on their menu (the Vegan Shepherd's Pie and Vegan Veggie Lasagna were tempting). Their wraps and sandwiches are all served with a fresh date, some pieces of orange, a pickle and one of the 2-3 salads of the day (either fruit, pasta, potato or rice based and so the waitress told me, always with at least one vegan option).

The servings were generous and the service was great. The prices were reasonable, too. A few of the times we went, someone was setting up to do an open mic sort of thing and the crowd was always a balanced mix of college students and older ordinary looking folks. We always managed to find a table in the small place that offered us privacy, which was really nice. I've lost track of how many times we ate there -- four or five? I'd been looking forward to four or five more and do hope to return someday.

I hadn't felt comfortable blogging about it up until now, because the truth is that the place does sell animal products, which is usually greeted with a sigh and a shrug by those of us who are stuck in towns or cities with no vegan restaurant options. The place also perpetuates the whole "organic is better" myth, unfortunately, when it comes to the animal products it serves. One waitress informed me during a visit, however, that the vegan portion of the menu at Good Eatz has been increasing quickly and significantly since they've opened and that the demand for vegan fare is obviously there and growing. Fingers crossed that this place of which I've grown nostalgic for other reasons does at some point end up with a completely vegan menu. In the interim, if you're ever in Reading, PA and in need of a place to eat, check them out and talk to them about wiping the animal products off their menu.

Some Musings on Hosting

This past September, I had a house-guest for longer than I've ever had a house-guest. I think that he stayed just a bit shy of a month. I whipped out my cookbooks weeks in advance, I sifted through my favourite vegan food blogs and made notes of some old favourite dishes that I've lapsed in making for some reason or another over the years. Having cooked for said guest before, I had few worries that I'd have any difficulty accommodating his taste preferences; having stayed with me before, he was willing to appreciate that the meals I'd be making would be free of animal products.

Coming from a meat and potatoes upbringing in an area he referred to as "dairy country", my guest admitted to me that starches and animal products had made up most of his diet for years, with the starches including such things as white rolls, noodles and pretzels (i.e. as opposed to things like the sprouted whole grain wraps, brown rice and rye crackers I ordinarily keep in my own kitchen). Soy was something dark that came in a bottle that you sprinkled on Chinese food in his home. Raw produce was generally limited to things to put on sandwiches with cheese and deli meat. Sound familiar?

So? What did this whole foods loving vegan decide to do? On top of trying to prove to him (what I'd already, unbeknownst to me, proven to him before) that vegan food can be absolutely delicious, I decided that I would try to prove to him that changing his diet over and above that would leave him feeling more fit and lively. I would fill him up with whole grains and legumes; I would expose him to a multitude of fruits and vegetables. I would change his life! (Okay, not really, but you get the picture...)

I used whole wheat flour and flax seed in the peanut butter cookies I baked. I made three-bean chili and argued the merits of whole grain rolls and crackers during our grocery store trips. I made soups with chickpeas and whole grain noodles, blending vegetables together to thicken the broth. I snuck raw greens into fruit smoothies. And to appeal to his omni side, I stocked my freezer with Gardein "chicken" breasts, soy burgers and Tofutti Cuties and I froze and thawed blocks of tofu to marinate for stir fry.

And my guest? He got a stomach ache and a spectacular range of gastro-intestinal issues to boot.

I'd thought I was doing this wonderful thing, Instead, I ended up turning someone's dietary habits completely inside out and going down a path I generally avoid myself by using meat subs to give some of my dishes a sense of familiarity that I'd hoped he'd find appealing. He told me at one point that he ended up eating more fruits and vegetables in a single day spent with me that he'd ordinarily consume in over a month. He was like an an alien who'd landed on a planet with completely foreign foodstuff, even though all he'd done was cross the Canada/US border. In my haste to do too much at once, I'd inadvertently done more harm than good. I'd pushed too hard, too fast and ended up with a house-guest who, halfway through his visit, didn't feel all that great.

My good intentions hadn't been well thought out, mostly because I don't eat a low-fiber diet that revolves around simple carbohydrates, meat and dairy. As he pointed out to me himself, I'd spent years adapting to eating a high percentage of fruits and vegetables in my diet. I'd spent years integrating various high fiber grains and legumes into it, as well. And he was right. As for soy? Soy is actually something that I've generally phased out of my diet, myself, over the past couple of years because I try to avoid processed foods and because it sometimes irritates my own stomach if I have too much of it. So I exposed someone who was unused to eating it at all (except in the bits that show up in processed foods, or in soya sauce) by preparing it in every other meal? Oy.

It got me wondering if some of the new vegans who make a sudden switch and sometimes complain of digestive issues end up trying too hard to substitute animal products with processed soy products, or maybe go health food store crazy by suddenly discovering that there is edible plant life other than iceberg lettuce. It got me wondering if maybe some of them end up making some of the mistakes I ended up making with my guest.

So we started having basmati rice with the curries I made. Stir-fry became a vegetable-only dish over regular noodles. We bought his and hers rolls for sandwiches. He tried (and liked) almond milk in his morning coffee. We munched on nuts -- almonds, pistachios and so on. And we ate out a bit more, mostly to take some of the edge off my feeling I'd failed as a cook and hostess. There's a huge difference between fixing the odd meal once in a while for friends and asking someone to suddenly change everything he or she eats for a sustained period. By this I am not referring to the omission of animal products, but instead I'm referring to adding all at once an overwhelming number of foods someone is not accustomed to eating in the first place (particularly when those foods contain a lot more, uh, fiber than the person is used to eating).

But the next time I'll know better. I've learned my lesson and sent heartfelt apologies to my house-guest; I should have introduced him to fewer things and done so more gradually. It wasn't switching out the animal products that was an issue, but it was feeding him too many things all at once to which his system wasn't accustomed. Fingers crossed that he decides to incorporate more fruits and vegetables and whole foods into his diet moving forward and for his own well-being. Fingers crossed, as well, that I did enough repair work and pleased his palate enough to not have permanently scared him off this vegan's kitchen --it's definitely not a mistake I'll repeat. Writers are often told to know their readers and it seems that cooks need to keep this in mind, too!

Crossing Fingers and Staying Hopeful

A little over four years ago, my life changed pretty drastically in one of those ways where you find yourself suddenly unable to breathe. A lot. I had left a steady tech-writing job at the beginning of the year to go back to school full-time to finally finish off the BA in philosophy I'd left dangling for so long, when life did that thing it does and I found myself suddenly living alone, unemployed and living off dwindling savings. With one elective left and with winter coming, I walked away from school to find work -- any work -- to be able to catch up on bills, fill my heating oil tank and find my feet. I had no money left and everything I could scrounge up went into food and meds for my feline family.

The job that I finally nabbed ended up being the first job from which I've ever been fired, mostly because I really (really, really) hated the job in the worst way. But at the time, I did what I felt I had to do to look after myself and to look after the five cats left in my care after their other human skipped out on them. Sometimes you have to suck it up and do something that you don't want to do and resign yourself to it being a temporary place while you're sussing things out and planning for a better place. There's no shame in it.

And you know what? Almost every single day of the fall and early winter I worked there, I got to stand outside and look at this at the end of my shifts. And even today, I can't help but feel that that it made things a whole lot more bearable at a time when I could have really used "more bearable".You can tap into happiness wherever you are if you look for it. It can be found in the most unlikely and simplest of things. Here I am four years later, not remembering the crap job I had and hated, but remembering lingering outside my office to watch the sun set every day -- and looking forward to it every single day. Not bad for "bearable".