Southernish-Style Vegan Thanksgiving

We had Thanksgiving on Saturday this year, and it doubled as Christmas with Jen's mom. I figured I'd put the menu on here, because it was a darn good meal. I, as per usual, didn't take any photos of anything I made. But you can be sure that it looked completely professional and gourmet. Yeah.

The main dish, I guess, was the VegNews Mac 'n' Cheese. It turned out as expected. That's a pretty solid recipe. If you haven't tried it yet, I suggest it.

I also made Southern Fried Cauliflower and a bit of Southern Fried Seitan. I use this recipe, which is just written for seitan. When making it with cauliflower, I roast the cauliflower at 400 degrees for about 15-20 minutes and let them cool off before proceeding with the rest of the recipe as written.

Some vegan blue cheese dressing to dip the deep-fried goodness into. And some Franks Red Hot sauce.

Collard greens 'n' rice.

I also made these baked sweet potatoes that I like. I've never written the recipe down, but basically it's cubed sweet potatoes baked with margarine and pretty much equal parts chili powder and cinnamon (but maybe a bit more cinnamon). And then put marshmallows on top during the last ten minutes or so. But I forgot the marshmallows at home, so it wasn't nearly as good as it usually is. Oh well.

For dessert, I made pumpkin soy cream. For second-dessert, I made the VegNews/Chloe Coscarelli creme brulee.

It should be said that my sister-in-law helped with a bunch of prep work and I would have had to start a few hours earlier if I didn't have her help. She also gave me one of her two kitchen torches, so I'm thinking creme brulee might be a more regular thing at our house (which means once or twice a year, probably). Ooh, or torch-roasted marshmallows for kitchen-s'mores (which is just s'mores without the campfire).

Strumming Liam

Here's a long video of Liam playing the guitar. The second song is a version of Twinkle, Twinkle as sung by his ECFE teacher (who plays guitar in class). You can hear that version here. 

So yeah, the kid likes guitar. Also, we're pretty up-front with our children about death.

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For those of you in the Twin Cities metro, the Riverview Theatre is showing Vegucated this coming Monday at 7pm. I haven't seen it, but it looks interesting. Anyway, more info is here.

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Speaking of the Riverview Theatre, Liam went to his first movie back in September. He, Anna and I went to the new Winnie the Pooh flick. It was fun and he did pretty great.

Here they are before the show:

And in their seats waiting for it to start:

Halloween Photos

Some Halloweenish photos.

Carving a pumpkin with auntie Jessica.

Carving pumpkins with Lisa and Dan.

Halloween night. The squirrels added their own little touch to the pumpkins.

The neighborhood gang.

I forgot to "Boo!"

For the past four years, I've written a Halloween post in which my children dine on the flesh of innocents. This year, I apparently took a break. I'm sure the innocents will thank me later.

At any rate, you can read the previous years by clicking on this here hyper-text.

Speaking of holidays, Nathalie VanBalen, author of "Garlic Onion Beet Spinach Mango Carrot Grapefruit Juice" has a new coloring zine out called "Happy Thanksliving." Here's a sample page from her blog:

You should order it now so it will arrive in time for your kids to color it for Thanksgiving.

And speaking of "Garlic Onion Beet Spinach Mango Carrot Grapefruit Juice," VanBalen often puts free coloring sheets on her blog, often of the characters from the book. I printed out the two she made for Halloween this year and the kids colored them. Here are a couple that Anna did.

Thora:

Yellow Spotted Snails: 

Both of these are unfinished. Pretty much everything of Anna's is unfinished unless every single speck of white on the paper has been colored in. 

And here's Liam's Thora: 

So yeah. Good times. 

And a happy belated Halloween to all. 

VegKins Halloween Party!

OK, so I forgot my camera. I didn't get any photos of our Second Annual VegKins Halloween Party, but my friend (and fellow VegKins coordinator) Celeste did. So go check out the photos over at her blog, Growing up Veg. It was a blast.

You know what? I've never actually explained what VegKins is on this blog. I should really do that some day. 

Cat on the Playground

Anna told us about her school day yesterday. The highlight of the day, apparently, was the cat who was hanging around the playground. He was there in the morning and for after-lunch recess.

Anna said that a bunch of kids were circling around and chasing the cat because they wanted to pet him (she said she thought he was a "him"). She chased the kids who were chasing the cat, imploring them to leave him alone.

I asked if they were trying to hurt the cat. She said no.

"So you just wanted them to leave the cat alone because you thought he might be scared?"

"Yes," she said. "He just wants to live his life."

- - -

I wonder sometimes whether or not Anna will choose to be an animal advocate when she grows up. It seems that she's already dabbling in advocating for animals, and I'd be lying if I said that didn't make me happy. But there's a part of me that worries that she might end up caring too much.

I know, I know. That sounds callous.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that if she cares sooooo much and wants sooooo much to help animals and get others to see how they can also help animals ... well, she's in for a life of disappointment after disappointment ... punctuated by a few instances of joy and hope for the future of humanity.

I've managed to keep my distance. I advocate on behalf of animals in my own way, sure. But I rarely feel as much as many of the advocates I know. There are days when this concerns me and there are days when I see this as a blessing (bestowed upon me by genetics and environment).

Don't get me wrong, I'm all for advocating loudly and proudly on behalf of other-than-human animals. I guess I just cringe a bit at the prospect of Anna being sad all the time because her peers don't give two figs about the animals she cares so much about.

Anyway, we'll see how it pans out. One day at a time, right?

MoFo 2011

Wow. I've been pretty much nonexistent in the blogging world as of late. But I have a good excuse! I've been writing an essay that will appear in an animal rights anthology, due out next summer. That's all I'll say about it for now, but you can be absolutely certain that you'll hear much more about it in the near future.

Anyway, I thought I'd post today about Vegan MoFo (that's Vegan Month of Food, in case you didn't know). I love Vegan MoFo. This year there are 658 blogs participating, all planning to blog about vegan food five days a week for a whole month. If they were all successful, that would be 69,090 blog posts about vegan food in a single month (not counting the vegan blogs not participating in MoFo).

How fucking cool is that?

My friend Celeste is doing the MoFo this year. She just posted a recipe for a veganized juicy lucy. Do you know what that is? It's a burger with cheese inside of it. I don't remember if I ever had one of these in my pre-vegan days, but damn, I want a vegan one. In my belly. Like right now.

Celeste is also doing a bunch of giveaways this month, so be sure to check out her blog. She currently has two giveaways going:

1. $25 gift certificate to Vegan Essentials. (giveaway ends Oct. 8th)

2. 9 Eli's Earth Bars (candy bars) and the cookbook, Vegan Lunch. (two winners, ends Oct. 12th)

It seems like this year is the MoFo Year of the Giveaway. Or maybe it's always been that way and I'm just paying more attention this year.

Anyway, Vegan Heartland is doing a giveaway too. Enter over there to win the cookbook, Vegan Slow Cooker. (And yes, me linking to that blog earns me an extra entry into the contest. I'm shameless and I don't care.)

One more giveaway: Chicago Soy Dairy is giving away a year's supply of Dandies Marshmallows (12 bags ... though I don't know in what crazy marshmallow-deprived universe a mere 12 bags equals a year's supply).

So yeah, get your blog-reading butt over to those blogs and enter.

And then peruse the 658 blogs participating in Vegan MoFo by following this link that I will title awesomeness: AWESOMENESS.

Flabbergasted

I was talking to Anna (and Liam too, since he was in the car, though I don't know how much of the conversation he grasped) about adopting animals instead of buying them. We've had this discussion before, but I like to revisit concepts now and again, especially when new contexts for the conversation arise.

So anyway, Anna was saying that we would never buy a cat because her mom's allergic to them. I replied that we would never buy a cat, period. We would adopt.

I explained that we would adopt because there are animals who need adoption. I explained that there are places where people take lost or unwanted dogs and cats, and those places are only so big and that they feel that they have to kill them to make room for more (all while breeding continues unabated). I was sure to say that it doesn't have to be this way, and that there are places where people don't kill the animals they are sheltering. In fact, tomorrow we're going to drop off some clothes and stuff the Animal Ark Thrift Store where they use all proceeds to fund Animal Ark, a no-kill shelter.

Then Anna said, "But people who aren't vegan would buy a dog instead of adopting."

I said not necessarily. I said a lot of people who aren't vegan still really care about cats and dogs and they don't want them to be hurt and killed.

"What?" she said, incredulous.

"Yeah," I said, "a lot of people love cats and dogs, but eat cows and pigs."

She was utterly flabbergasted.

I know the feeling.

The School Year That Was

Anna's last day of school was on Tuesday. She's both happy and sad for it to be over. As she said, "I'm happy because I get to spend more time with you, but sad because I won't get to see my friends all the time."

It makes me happy and sad, too.

The year was awesome, by the way. Anna learned a ton, and she made friends.

Some things of note, as far as the vegan stuff goes:

We talked to her teacher (let's call her "T") at the beginning of the year about Anna being vegan. T immediately understood everything we said, and there was never any confusion about it from then on. We gave T a list (incomplete, but a list nonetheless) of snacks that are vegan, since she does the shopping for snacks for the class. As far as I know, the class always had vegan snacks, or if they didn't, there was always a vegan option for Anna.

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Kids have birthdays, of course, and they bring in non-vegan things. For the first few months, I just let Anna go treat-less. She would come home and say that so-and-so had a birthday and they brought such-and-such, but it wasn't vegan so she just had a snack. She never complained and never seemed sad about it. Except once. She said she wished she could have one of the cookies. I asked her if it was vegan. She said no. I asked if she wanted to eat things that aren't vegan. She said no. I asked if she wanted to eat the cookie. She said no, but that she wanted a cookie like that, but vegan.

So I bought a package of Candy Cane Jo-Jo's from Trader Joe's and sent them to school with her. From then on, whenever a kid brought in a non-vegan treat, T would give Anna a Jo-Jo. She loved it, and from the sounds of it, the kids were often jealous that she got a special treat.

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Anna's teacher told us at the beginning of the school year that she has, in years past, kept a cockroach in an aquarium in the classroom. When she told us this, I mentioned that Anna may say something about the cockroach not wanting to be in a cage. I didn't ask her to not have the cockroach in class, mostly because I'm the kind of person who generally avoids conflict. But lucky us, after thinking about how Anna might feel about the cockroach, T decided to not have one this year. Yay! We feel pretty luck to have a teacher who respects, understands and even encourages our daughters empathy.

I know that some classes do a caterpillar in a jar in the spring. I don't think T usually does that in her class, which makes me happy. I don't like the idea of confining animals for the education of our kids. It might teach them something about life science, but the untaught lesson is that it's OK for us to confine and control the living conditions of our fellow beings.

And besides, who wants to see caterpillars and chrysalises in a jar in a classroom when you can see them outside?

It's a Montessori school, which means that pre-K and Kindergartners are in the same classroom. So Anna will have this same teacher next year. Woot!

UPDATE: Upon further thought, I realized that the white thing in the above photo isn't actually a chrysalis. But they were all over the place and each had a caterpillar in them. So what are they? Google is failing me. If anyone knows, let me know.

Anna's on Vegansaurus

Vegansaurus is a blog, for those of you who don't know, about vegan dinosaurs. Except actually it's just about vegan stuff.

Anyway, they're doing a series called Happy Veggie Kids and Anna is featured today.

Check it out.

And read all of the Happy Veggie Kids posts here.

And to those of you coming over from Vegansaurus, hi! Welcome to my sort-of weekly updated blog. Feel free to have a look around. A few of my favorite posts here are:

My Daughter the Monkey Eater (on pretending to eat animals)

We're All Made of Meat (on explaining what meat is to Anna)

Happy Feet (a review of the movie)

This is Not a Post About Milo & Otis (on Anna trying to understand others who aren't vegan)

The Life I Did Save (about a squirrel I brought into a rehabilitation center)

Anna's First Correction of "It"