Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies
Yum! From: http://youtube.com/user/everydaydish
Archive for April, 2008
Vegan Pizza
Pizza! I personally would have added some tomato sauce … but it looks good anyway! Just letting you know, the song in the background is a bit odd …
EDIT NOTE: I forgot to mention, I did not make this video… I found it on You Tube. I believe from: http://youtube.com/watch?v=KwMGgAjxkNA
Vegan Crepes
If you love crepes, give this a try! Comes from: http://www.youtube.com/user/everydaydish
Vegan Donuts
Yum! Homemade vegan donuts! Comes from: http://www.youtube.com/user/veginity
Tofu Scramble
Classic Vegan Recipe! Check it out! Comes from: http://www.youtube.com/user/everydaydish …
A Letter to the Editor…
I’ve teamed up with both Defenders of Wildlife and the Compassion Over Killing groups and thus I’ve been doing a bit of letter writing, so I figured I could post them here along with their response (if there is any). I could also forward Defenders of Wildlife news to you guys (although if you want, it would be easier to subscribe trough email to their free newsletter). So, anyway … I read this article online called “Do chickens have feelings too?” (you can read it here: http://www.macalester.edu/weekly/022103/opinion1.html) and the following is the response I wrote:
“Hello, I read your article titled “Do chickens have feelings too?” and had a few comments to make. I recently wrote a short essay on the emotions of animals called “Do animals have feelings?” which , if you are interested, you may find at http://harmless4life.wordpress.com/2008/04/02/do-animals-have-feelings/. To sum up the essay we can hardly prove human emotions/souls absolutely, however there is reason to believe animals posses the emotional capabilities around or even above human beings. Other than observations of animals like dogs (who display extreme loyalty), elephants (who have been known to show recondition and grief in relation to other elephants) and primates (which are virtually a step away from humans), scientific evidence to support the theory exists. There is a part of the brain called the amydala which is believed to be involved in emotional responses. Birds have amydalas (http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6SYT-4FMBHTT-2&_user=10&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=981561cbbdd19f0e95d33a6f74392f24).
Chickens specifically are even kept as pets and have enough cognitive ability to be trained just as dogs are ( see http://www.upc-online.org/thinking/index.html or more specifically http://www.upc-online.org/thinking/71707buffalo.html).
Whether or not you believe in animal emotions, it is proven that they experience pain. The treatment they receive in factory farms, whether emotionally distressing or not, causes them extreme physical pain.
I am fairly certain that it would still be considered cruel to physically abuse a human being who is mentally handicapped or even severely brain damaged if they could still feel pain.
“Chickens are near copies of digital pets in the way of intelligence and feelings, but humans do not protect the rights of machines,” I am not certain how living beings that experience pain and probably emotions are the same as machines.
I cannot speak for PETA or other animal rights groups methods, but do not judge the cause on who believes in it. For example, while people love to mention that Hitler was a vegetarian, keep in mind, so was Gandhi.
Consider the civil rights movement and women’s suffrage when thinking of animal rights. Is it not better to give a being too many rights than to give them to few?
- Monica”
Do you think that was ok? I do my best to not sound like a crazed radical as people offten seem to come off as when talking about this kind of issue. I hope the web URLs weren’t tacky … I’m a tad critical of the things I write (*cough**cough* - as you can tell) … comments are appreciated …
Adopt an Animal (without the hassle)
Have you ever wanted to help out an animal in need but didn’t have the time or resources or didn’t want the mess? Well now is your chance! There are two main places to “adopt” online. For farm animals, checkout Farm Sanctuary. For wild animals (which you couldn’t responsibly adopt anyway since they aren’t “pets”) check out Defenders of Wildlife. These make great gifts for both the animals and the receiver. The Defenders of Wildlife adoptions even come with stuffed animals!
How the concept works is you pay a certain amount of money to be used on either a specific animal (as in Farm Sanctuary) or towards the good of the species as a whole (Defenders of Wildlife). Animals “available” include cows, chickens, pigs, rabbits, ducks, goats and sheep on Farm Sanctuary and anywhere from wolves to penguins to hummingbirds on Defenders of Wildlife.
To findout more info go to https://secure.defenders.org/site/Ecommerce?store_id=5381&VIEW_HOMEPAGE=true&FOLDER=0&TYPE=&NAME=&s_src=WJY08WDADOPT&s_subsrc=WJY08WDADOPT_web&JServSessionIdr005=26sy6haj12.app26a for Defenders of Wildlife’s Adoption Center or http://www.farmsanctuary.org/get_involved/aafa/ for Farm Sanctuary’s.
Other options for “Adoption” can be found below:
To Adopt Virtually:
To Sponsor a Individual Animal:
Vegan BBQ Part 1
This was the closest image I could get. I couldn’t take any pictures last night. I had this great vegan BBQ last night and I’m gonna go to a relative’s house and do the whole thing all over with different food, so I figures you guys might want in on it…
Last night I had:
Vegi-Kabobs (well they where suppose to be, but I forgot the kabobs *cough*cough*)
Roasted Ginger Carrots
Corn on the cob
Lentils
Roasted Pineapple
The main part was the kabobs, which consisted of squash, zucchini, potatoes, miny mushrooms and I threw in a little asparagus since I couldn’t cook them the normal way (I was going to add tofu, but I figured that was enough) … wrapped in tinfoil and cooked in cooking spray (which you have to be careful with if you’re vegan, because they aren’t all vegan - another alternative is vegetable oil and pre-melted margarine if you want to grill veggies the same way I did) garlic salt and rosemary (I was a bit short handed on spices, you can add whatever you want). The next part wasn’t even on the grill. I pre-soaked the lentils for an hour or two (very important if you have dried beans) in twice the amount of water as beans. When they where done soaking I rinsed them and strained the water they had been sitting in (according to a vegan podcast I listen to , also very important) and cooked them in water with a little vegetable oil. At the end (according to the same podcast you aren’t supposed to add salt or other things like citrus juice … etc till the end) I added garlic salt (you can add whatever you want … I was just experimenting). The corn was the freezer kind and my meat eating hosts cooked that in some boiling water (minus butter thankfully), so saved me the trouble. The carrots where wrapped in tinfoil and cooked in cooking spray and ginger and came out soft and not overly sweet, just how I like ‘em. An other way to cook them (which I think I’ll try today) is with cumin in olive oil to make more of a spicy carrot. It doesn’t come out super spicy and they are still soft. The recipe is actually from Rome!
The pineapple turned out kind of lame, but, after trying the uncooked pineapple, is just because we got a bad pineapple. Some pieces turned out great, while others didn’t taste right. On a whole, the concept is sound. I cooked them in entirely their own juices, I just wrapped them in tinfoil.
My meat eating hosts (I feel the need to make the distinction since I am speaking of eating there) had steak(dead cow as I’d rather refer to it), potatoes and corn and some had a little of my carrots and pineapple. Over all, I like my BBQ better.
Later today I will be doing a repeatperformance with slightly different food, so keep a lookout for Vegan BBQ Part 2. What I’m thinking of trying are Original Vegan Boca Burgers on my accidentall vegan sour dough bread with the traditional lettuce, tomato (minus the cheese) and some avocado (perhaps more). Then some of those Roman style carrots, maybe some more roasted veggies and whatever other “side-dishes” (*cough**cough*) the meat eaters are cooking. I’m not totally sure yet. I think they are having hot dogs (mystery meat sticks) and beef-burgers though I’m not sure. There might be fries … just because it isn’t ALL I eat doesn’t mean I can’t like fries … hmmm … I think I might try that caramelized banana I saw on TV … a little random I know, but while we’ve got a fire going …
A Review: Jocalate Bars (from Larabars)
I was purusing the health food isle at my local HEB (I live in San Antonio) and I came across the very same bar I had seen on Vegan Essentials just that afternoon! The two flavors I tried where Chocolate and Chocolate Coffee. Here is the info for them (I got it from Vegan Essentials’ site)
Ingredients: - Organic dates, organic almonds, organic walnuts, organic cocoa, organic cacao nibs, organic cashewsChocolate Coffee flavor - Organic dates, organic hazelnuts, organic walnuts, organic cocoa, organic cacao nibs, organic coffee
Chocolate Mint flavor - Organic dates, organic almonds, organic cocoa, organic cacao nibs, organic peppermint flavor, organic vanilla flavor
Orange Mint flavor - Organic dates, organic almonds, organic cocoa, organic cacao nibs, organic orange flavor
Nutritional information:
Serving size – 1 bar (48g)
Servings per package – 1
Calories per serving – 190 (180 for Mint flavor)
Total fat – 9g / 1g saturated for Chocolate and Orange flavors, 8g / 1g saturated for Mint flavor, 11g / 1g saturated for Coffee flavor
Sodium – 0mg
Total carbohydrate – 25g (5g fiber, 19g sugars), 26g (6g fiber, 19g sugars) for Mint only
Protein – 4g, 5g for Orange flavor only
ORGANIC * NO ADDED SUGAR * 90% RAW * NON- GMO * GLUTEN FREE DAIRY FREE * SOY FREE * VEGAN * KOSHER
Well, as some of the other reviews on Vegan Essentials said, this isn’t exactly a chocolate bar in the traditional sense. It’s more of a chocolate flavored food bar. Also, while it says “No added sugar” (which is usually a good thing) that leaved the bar slightly bitter and definitely not as sweet as you’d expect from a chocolate bar. However I did like them, especially the Coffee flavored, but just know that they aren’t exactly what you’d expect.
As far as I know, most or all of Larabars are vegetarian if not vegan. I have yet to try the others, but I have heard they are good …
Sponsor a Child
I was watching TV today and I saw this commercial, so I thought I’d post it here. The link is http://www.planusa.org/sponsorachild/?tp=VE1HUj0xLHRpZD0yMzc2NzQs. It’s a dollar a day to help out a child in need. I encourage you to check it out or post links to similar programs in a comment. I figured just because we care about animals doesn’t mean we don’t care about people! The main website is www.planusa.org.
harmless4life
