Vegan MoFo Day 10: Compulsive Recipe Tagging!

I subscribe to a large array of vegan blogs via Google Reader, and whenever I see a recipe that looks good and whose ingredients and prep instructions are sufficiently non-intimidating, I tag the entry for later use.  At this point, I must have at least a recipe-book's worth of recipes tagged.  The crazy thing is I can count on one hand, with fingers to spare, the recipes I've actually followed through on.  I clearly am more enamored with the idea of making all these great dishes than with putting the time and energy into actually making them.  However, I keep telling myself I WILL, at some point, get my kitchen groove on.

But meanwhile, I confess, I peruse the blogs and get a vicarious thrill from the vegan food pr0n.  I am especially partial to the cupcakes, brownies, and the raw desserts.  In that respect, it's probably for the best that my follow-through is so poor.  If I made and ate every beautiful vegan dessert that catches my eye and earns my "recipe" tag, I'd surely gain at least ten pounds! 

Anyone else out there in vegan blogland who is more of a food spectator?

Catch-Up: Alyza, Forks Over Knives, Vegan MoFo

I am almost two months late posting about this, but the producers of the Rising Star movie ended their Alyza Challenge early because the results were so overwhelming:  Alyza will be a vegan!

The fam and I attended the Forks Over Knives screening that was held at the Albany Vegetarian Network's Expo on October 2.  The film is very powerful and I hope it is widely seen when it is in general release, starting March 11, 2011.  Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn and Ann Crile Esselstyn, featured in the film, were speakers at the Expo and also were present at the screening.  I would have liked to have stayed for the Q & A at the end, but there are limits to a seven-year-old's patience, so we really had to book out of there once the film ended.

Finally, I've signed up to participate in Vegan MoFo 2010.

What Is VeganMoFo?

It’s that time of year again! Time to wear down your stove and your keyboard. Time to mow people down with your shopping cart. Time to answer the age old question: do lemon and chocolate taste good together? It’s time for VeganMoFo, the Vegan Month Of Food.

VeganMoFo was originally created on the Post Punk Kitchen, as an homage to NaNoWriMo. Because we do want to write novels, but sometimes cooking gets in the way. So why not combine them!

The idea is to write as much as you can all month, about vegan food. The blog entries can be about anything food related – your love of tongs, your top secret tofu pressing techniques, the first time your mom cooked vegan for you, vegan options in Timbuktu – you get the idea, right? If not, browse around on some of our round-ups and you’ll catch on fast!

There aren’t strict guidelines for how often to write, but the idea is to shoot for every weekday, or about 20 times in the month. If you’d like inspiration or would just like to whine about how hard it is, check out the MoFo forum on the PPK message boards.

As the world catches on that vegan food really is the best choice for animals (suck it, humane meat!), the planet (bite me, melting ice caps!) and people (piss off, heart disease!) let’s show them what vegan eating is all about.

To take part, simply sign up with our convenient form right here!

Happy MoFoing!

I've been very lax/lazy about posting entries here, so I am planning to use Vegan MoFo as an inspiration to boost my frequency. I'll aim for at LEAST one post/weekday--weekends, too, if I'm really feeling inspired.

By coincidence, my husband is planning a host of food experiments, inspired by having read Caldwell Esselstyn's Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease.

Mainly, he is interested in cutting way back on fats.... Olive oil went right down the drain yesterday.  Personally, I've not been big on adding oils to what I eat anyway, though I haven't been too worried about whole foods that contain fats:  i.e., nuts, olives, and avocadoes.  My big exception is coconut oil, which I use for a very targeted purpose:  fueling my runs.  I include it in my pre-run smoothies and in my sports drinks, gels, and direct fuel bites.  According to Brendan Brazier, coconut oil, though a saturated fat, metabolizes quite differently from other fats--namely, the liver immediately uses it for energy during exercise.

Also, I know Ginny Messina came out with quite a different take on olive oil recently--I will have to show this to the hubs and see what he thinks.

Vegan Hood TV: I LOVE this YouTube Show!

I found out about this YouTube program from an entry at the Animal Rights and AntiOppression blog.  I just love this!  Some vegan guys in Brooklyn with an awesome DIY "vegan" show highlighting inexpensive, healthy vegan eating.  I am definitely going to follow this program's subseqent episodes.

Averie's Vega Shake-and-Go Give-away

Because I love Brendan Brazier so much, I can't resist posting an entry about this give-away at the Love Veggies and Yoga blog.  I already love Brazier's Thrive recipes and would love to try these instant smoothies.  Thanks for doing this, Averie.  :)

Hezbollah Tofu!

This site came to my attention thanks to a post at the "veganpeople" LiveJournal community.

The famed Anthony Bourdain has a hate-on for vegetarians and vegans. I've never seen his show Without Reservations, but he's shown up as a judge on Top Chef, which I do watch. This quote of hate comes from his book Kitchen Confidential:

Vegetarians, and their Hezbollah-like splinter faction, the vegans, are a persistent irritant to any chef worth a damn. To me, life without veal stock, pork fat, sausage, organ meat, demi-glace, or even stinky cheese is a life not worth living. Vegetarians are the enemy of everything good and decent in the human spirit, and an affront to all I stand for, the pure enjoyment of food.

The "Hezbollah Tofu" blog quotes this nastiness in its first entry and offers the following message to Bourdain:

So we aren't just going to "enjoy" food, we're going to enjoy vastly improved, veganized versions of your masturbatory, blood-oozing recipes. And then we're going to compile them, sell them in zine form, and donate the proceeds to vegan outreach organizations and farm sanctuaries--in your name. Anthony, I have to say, I'm really looking forward to the great work we're going to do together for veganism.

This is an open call to vegan cooks of all stripes: professional chefs and bakers, cookbook authors, food bloggers, amateur cooks, and--perhaps most importantly--ordinary, everyday people who just want to live their lives and eat their dinners without unnecessary heckling from the heroin-addled peanut gallery.

I have to say I adore this idea. I've come across Bourdain's quote o' nastiness before and found it equal parts baffling and irritating. I can hardly wait to see what people come up with.