29 Days of Giving

Today, I am sitting snuggled up on my couch with my favorite blanket wrapped around me. Tuesdays are usually my short day of work, so I've gotten in the habit of taking a yoga class once a week to clear my head and find some balance. Unfortunately, there will be no yoga today - and no work for that matter - because I am sick. Really sick. Yesterday, when I started feeling bad, I described the pain to one of the adorable kids I babysit as  "a fire-breathing dragon breathing fire on my throat". So, I've decided to give myself a much-needed day off to recover, leaving me with some time to catch up on here, for which I am so thankful.

Recently, I finished reading a book that has completely changed my world. It's called 29 Gifts, and it's a book by Cami Walker.  My mom gave me this book as a Christmas gift, and I am so happy she did, because it has opened me up to a completely new world - the world of conscious giving. 29 Gifts is a book about Walker who, after suffering for several years with heart-wrenching MS, was given a prescription from a friend and spiritual adviser to give away 29 gifts in 29 days. These gifts did not have to be grand, sweeping purchases, but rather simple acts of kindness - a smile to a stranger, a thank-you card to a friend, a donation to a person in need. After being hesitant about the idea, Walker decided to give the 29 day challenge a try - and it completely turned her world around. After only two weeks of doing the challenge, she was able to walk again without the assistance of a cane, as well as begin working again. She was so inspired by the life-saving effect of the challenge that she wrote 29 Gifts and founded the website www.29gifts.org, as a way of making the challenge an international effort.

I've been so inspired myself that I decided to begin my own 29 days of giving yesterday. Today is my second day, and after considering a plethora of ideas for gifts, I've finally decided on one.

Steve and his mom dancing at the wedding.

Steve's mom has been an integral part of my journey as a vegan, especially in the past year as Steve began his own vegan journey. In addition to always being so accommodating when Steve and I come home for visits, Steve's mom is always on the lookout for new ways to incorporate vegan cooking into her own life. When we decided to host a vegan Thanksgiving dinner, Steve's mom was more than happy to veganize one of Steve's favorite dishes - sweet potato casserole - and bring it to our Brooklyn home. I am already so fortunate to have my own mom who is unconditionally supportive of every effort in my life, but to also have the support of Steve's mom and family has been really amazing.  I am so thankful for all of Steve's mom's kindness - the cookbooks, the meals, the encouraging words on my blog, and the love behind it all.

Below is a recipe Steve's mom adapted from my Halloween stew a few months ago. She has been making this stew for the past few months, and at her recent Hanukkah party, she served this stew as part of a dinner for thirty non-vegan guests. I absolutely love the recipe - it's great for people with sodium sensitivity, and it incorporates beans, an awesome plant protein source.

I hope you enjoy her recipe as much as I do! If you're interested in beginning your own 29 Day Giving Challenge, visit www.29gifts.org. 

Vegan Bean Stew 

(A Recipe by Steve's Mom)  

Ingredients:  

1 - 15 oz. can organic kidney beans (drained in a colander and rinsed)
1 - 15 oz. can organic garbanzo beans (drained in a colander and rinsed)
5 - 6 cloves of garlic (smashed and diced)
3/4 large sweet onion (chopped)
6 small organic red bliss or organic fingerling potatoes (quartered)
1/2 bag of organic baby carrots (cut in half)
2 stalks of organic celery (diced)
8 baby portabello mushrooms (quartered)
1 yellow organic squash (sliced and quartered)
1/2 bag (8 oz.) frozen peas
32 oz. organic low sodium vegetable broth (I used Pacific)
2 Tbsp. Earth Balance margarine
1/3 cup unbleached flour
  
Directions: 
Heat Earth Balance margarine in a stockpot.  Saute garlic and onion. Add kidney beans, garbanzo beans, potatoes, carrots, celery, and mushrooms.  Cover with vegetable broth.  Keep remaining broth for later. Cook for 45 minutes. Add peas and squash.  Cook for an additional 10 - 15 minutes. Add flour to remaining vegetable broth and stir.  Slowly add to stew to thicken and stir carefully.  Go slowly, do not over thicken. Can be served with garlic bread or a whole grain vegan bread.

Reasons to Smile

Who can't smile at a cute little goat peeking at you from behind a shed?

1. Two weeks without coffee! I've been trying to transition from coffee to tea (to lower my caffeine intake), and I can honestly say that the chai tea with rice milk I'm currently sipping is well worth it.

2. Daiya Cheese. If you've never had this crazy awesome vegan cheese before, you need to order it online right now! I used it all during the holidays, and it was a dream come true for this vegan.

3. Speaking of the holidays - remembering Christmastime. My mom just gets better and better each year about welcoming my vegan lifestyle into our family home. This past Christmas, she had a handmade menu posted in the dining room with our holiday food selection, which included vegan meatballs (topped with Daiya!), portabello mushroom fillets with horseradish sauce, and a variety of vegan holiday cookies. Yum!

4. Vegan Treats, for making Steve and I this gorgeous wedding cake.

5. The Vegan Noodle Kugel Steve made for my Step-mom and Dad's Hanukkah party. (Recipe by Colleen Patrick Goudreau, The Vegan Table)

6. PETA's "Map of Accomplishments" for 2009. Seeing how much has been accomplished for the animals suffering needlessly is amazing to behold.

7. Giving a cow a much-needed scratch on his forehead.

8. One of Steve's friends recently reading Skinny Bastard, and his decision to take a vegan pledge because of the effect it had on him.

9. Alicia Silverstone and her wonderful book, The Kind Diet. This book has opened my eyes to an even larger world of vegan food - who knew that miso soup could be magical?

10. Tempeh Reubens. With vegan potato salad. 

(I wish I could eat this picture!)

What are your reasons to smile today?

Six Minutes

Ok, people - as I wrote in my previous post, I'm trying to step it up a notch in my blogging by writing about the videos, articles, books, and people who inspire me to remain vegan this year.  Well, I've found something today that has inspired me to continue on my journey, and I feel compelled to share it with you.

I stumbled upon this video this morning after a friend on Facebook posted its website to her profile. It is an undercover investigation of what goes on at a Hatfield Quality Meat supplier - "Country View Family Farms," in Fannettsburg, Pennsylvania. The footage is documented by an undercover representative of Mercy for Animals, an organization dedicated to defending the rights of animals and exposing factory farming's cruelty. The footage you will see is not a unique occurrence - unfortunately, the practices documented in this video occur every day in nearly every factory farm that exists today. These practices are so commonplace that the humans who work at these "farms" have become completely deadened to the pain they witness day in and day out.

I ask you to watch this video, even though I know it may be very difficult. I especially implore you to watch it if you still eat meat and animal by-products, but are curious about leaving that lifestyle behind.  I just finished watching it myself, while tears streamed down my face. It was unbelievably hard to continue viewing it, but I knew I needed to.

I believe that just because we have power as human beings, that in no way should allow us to abuse that power. The pigs shown in this video are representative of all the intelligent, loving, and emotional animals who spend their lives suffering endlessly on factory farms.  I also believe that we have become a society of indirect cruelty - we know deep down as a culture that something is deeply wrong with the way animals are made into food, but a lot of us are too afraid or unconcerned to face that reality. I am asking you to face it today.

Maybe you'll read what I've written here, and after thinking about it, decide not to watch the video today. Please consider watching it anyway. Because the circumstances for these poor animals will not change unless individuals like you actively choose not to be a part of it. I decided a few years ago that I no longer wanted to be a part of any of it, and it has been a long and incredible journey that has led me to go vegan - a decision that has been the best I've ever made in my entire life.

If I haven't yet convinced you, I'll pose this question: if these animals can endure a lifetime of immense abuse and suffering, can't we endure a mere six minutes of a video that documents it?

The Cove

First of all, Happy New Year people! 2009 was an interesting and lovely year to say the least, but I am so ready to embark on the crazy adventure that 2010 will prove to be. I hope all of you are rested, full from lots of holiday food, and ready to enter a new year with this Brooklyn vegan blogger.

After a year of unintentionally putting it off (I think because deep down we knew we would have to really be ready for it), the husband and I finally prepared ourselves for an at-home viewing of "The Cove",  a 2008 documentary thriller about a team of activists who executed a plan to uncover the horrific secret world of dolphin slaughter in Japan. A description of the film from the Sundance Film Festival website reads:

"Flipper was one of the most beloved television characters of all time. But ironically, the fascination with dolphins that he caused created a tragic epidemic that has threatened their existence and become a multibillion dollar industry. The largest supplier of dolphins in the world is located in the picturesque town of Taijii, Japan. But the town has a dark, horrifying secret that it doesn't want the rest of the world to know. There are guards patrolling the cove, where the dolphin capturing takes place, who prevent any photography. The only way to stop the evil acts of this company and the town that protects it is to expose them... and that's exactly what the brave group of activists in The Cove intend to do. Along the way, they uncover what may be the largest health crisis facing our planet— the poisoning of our seas... Part environmental documentary, part horror film, part spy thriller, The Cove is as suspenseful as it is enlightening. The final result is a heart-wrenching, but inspirational, story that shows the true power of film in the hands of people who aren't afraid to risk everything for a vital cause." 

I knew what I would be getting into with this film: much like the PETA's "Meet Your Meat" videos and the documentary "Earthlings", I would bear witness to shocking footage documenting some of the cruelest abuse towards animals. After spending several years taking in those kind of films and videos, I've become a video-watching warrior of sorts. But for some reason, building myself up to watch "The Cove" was another thing entirely. Maybe it was because dolphins have been one of my favorite animals since I was a little girl. Maybe it was because it used to be a dream of mine to swim with them. Whatever the reasons, I pushed them all aside and decided to give it a go.

What I didn't realize was that while the footage ultimately documented by the filmmakers was indeed difficult to watch, the entire film itself was not - it was quite exciting, surprisingly enough. "The Cove" was the first documentary I've seen that seemed more like a thriller/caper than an actual documentary. If there have been other documentaries like this to have emerged before, I have not seen them. Louie Psihoyos (the director), Mark Monroe (the screenwriter), and the rest of the "Cove" team did such a wonderful job of causing the moviegoer to forget at times that we were watching real life in front of us, all while reeling us in (no pun intended) with moments of arresting footage showing the beauty and intelligence of these magestic creatures.

What was not as surprising, but definitely as moving, was how similar dolphins are to any of the land animals that Americans eat everyday. Much like chickens, dolphins are highly social creatures who love to live in groups (called "pods") of up to a dozen individuals at a time. Much like pigs, dolphins are highly intelligent animals (possibly exceeding the intelligence of humans!), with intricate ways of solving problems. And much like cows, dolphins develop long-term bonds filled with friendship and acts of kindness, and if separated from their loved ones, they will exhibit depressive or grief-stricken emotions. What is the one major trait that all of these animals share? They all exhibit unbearable frustration, anger, sadness, and even depression when forced into a life of captivity.

 

"It's this anthropomorphic 'we have something to teach them or to control them' - and perhaps we ought to be looking at what they can give to us. " 

 - quote from "The Cove"

The best part about the film was watching the humbling, no-nonsense mindset of Richard O'Barry. Watching this man in action is truly inspirational. Once the trainer to the dolphins on "Flipper", O'Barry has since devoted (and I mean devoted) his life to saving and freeing dolphins in captivity. In the film, O'Barry states that " you are either an activist, or a non-activist" - and that one day he realized he wanted to be an activist. It's amazing to me to witness the will of a man working to right as many wrongs as he can in his lifetime - he heads into this covert operation with the tenacity, persistence, and guts of a person who has truly been awakened to their life's calling. Bottom line - Richard O'Barry has superhero status in my book, and I only hope that in my lifetime, I can do my own small part to be more like Richard O'Barry.

This year, I've decided to try to write more about movies, projects, people, and articles that inspire me to stay strong as a vegan. "The Cove" has been a perfect place to start. Over the holidays, my family watched "Food, Inc", and that got a substantial conversation going between my sister, brother, husband, and myself about how our food is made. I hope that more and more people will watch "The Cove" and have that same kind of conversation.

I have moments from time to time when I read or think about the cruelty that exists in this world, and I scream inside my head "I didn't sign up for this!".  It's a helpless, raw feeling that is hard to beat sometimes. But by watching films like "The Cove", or by pouring into my next new book - Alicia Silverstone's The Kind Diet -  I feel like I can be a part of the solution, rather than the problem. My hope for the world this year is that more people will consider taking steps toward veganism, because it is one of the simplest and most powerful things you can do to take a stance against the abusive practice of factory farming. The power we have as individuals is mighty, and although we've often been taught otherwise, we really do have the freedom to choose foods that not only nourish our bodies, but also nourish the world around us. We have the freedom to re-create the "food pyramid" - we have the freedom and the power to be activists simply by abstaining from products connected to animal abuse and opening our world up to everything else that exists. Because that everything else is something that has the ability to help save our world from being destroyed beyond compare - and we could desperately use some saving. 

"Our problem with realizing the full implications of animal sentience may not be the difficulty of 'liberating' animals, but of liberating ourselves from centuries of conditioned thinking. Only then can we see animals for who they are and award them the respect and compassion they deserve."

- Joyce D'Silva, ambassador, Compassion in World Farming