Guess Who's Coming to Dinner?

Anyone who is a vegetarian has most certainly been asked many times, “Why are you a vegetarian?” This question usually arises at the worst time, when you all sit down to eat during a social occasion such as a dinner invitation, or a work-related or neighborhood potluck, and people notice that you have no meat on your plate. To go into the reasons why you are a vegetarian or vegan at this time is a mistake, because regardless of how carefully you word your answer, you cannot help but touch on the most sensitive, and esthetically unappealing of subjects. If you achieve an accurate answer to the question, the people seated at your table will be unable to eat. This can alienate more people than you can recruit to a vegetarian lifestyle. There is, however, a simple, esthetically appealing way to change the world, one or two people at a time.

One of the most effective approaches I’ve had to making the world vegan has been one of the simplest: at least once every month I invite carnivores to dinner. Sharing a meal with people is a wonderful way to open up a world of flavors. Even if you don’t like to cook, there are simple, easy to create healthy vegan/vegetarian meals that you can make. And, if you don’t want to cook, many health food stores have deli counters which sell many prepared food products. If you absolutely hate to cook, order take-out from a vegetarian restaurant and set the food up on your dishes at home on a nicely set table. Eating together is a spiritual experience, a communion. As Will Tuttle expresses, “When we eat, we are loved by the eternal and mysterious force that births all life, that makes present all who ever preceded us, that manifests itself ceaselessly as us and experiences life through us, with a love that thoroughly gives of itself to us, to we, who are this force.”

It is after people experience a meal that causes no suffering or death, a meal that is rich in flavors, varied in sauces, a meal that is just as easy to prepare as a carnivorous one, that they begin to open themselves to another possibility. Sharing a meal with people has a way of altering everyone subtly. John Robbins says, “Eating is essentially an act of communion with the living forces of nature.” Thich Nhat Hanh, the Buddhist monk, and author says, “Having the opportunity to sit with our family and friends and enjoy wonderful food is something precious, something not everyone has.” Because of the generous nature of people, they will usually try to return the invitation and invite you to their house for what may be their first attempt at vegetarian/vegan cooking, or to a vegetarian/vegan restaurant. With this invitation, they begin the journey to the next step, exploration and preparation of vegetarian food as a viable option. As it was so beautifully expressed, “ The hunger that lives in the human heart is part of the kinship that threads us all together. We are interdependent beings with a profound need both to give and to receive from each other. For what one of us is lacking, another has in abundance, whether that be a bowl of rice, a skill, a wisdom, a capacity for joy, a knowledge, or a courageous heart. Our urges and our gifts, our longings and our offerings, are all needed and are all indispensable.” (Robbins J., and Mortifee, A., In Search of Balance)

Sometimes the most powerful changes in our lives come from something extremely simple. There is time for all the literature and websites and documentaries later. Sharing a simple vegetarian meal with carnivores once a month may be a powerful seed for change.

A Very Happy Vegan (Pre-) Thanksgiving Day

Today, Thanksgiving Day, I won’t be cooking dinner. My husband is going to take me out to dinner at our favorite, local vegetarian restaurant (Secret Garden Restaurant, Ajijic, Jalisco, Mexico) where the meal will be lovingly prepared by our friends, the owners and employees of the restaurant. Yesterday, the day before Thanksgiving Day, I made a pre-Thanksgiving dinner for five. (Recipes Follow.) This meal took the same, and in some instances, less time to prepare than a meal with animal flesh or other animal products and it was as, or more, delicious. CNN presented a news feature today about a family whose members compete every year to get the biggest turkey for Thanksgiving. The winner was pictured sitting in the back of a truck with his arm around a 72-pound turkey, acting as if they were “best buds,” instead of executioner and prisoner. That turkey was, most certainly, slaughtered for today’s Thanksgiving meal. As school children, we make figures of turkeys out of brightly colored construction paper. As parents, we teach our children that Thanksgiving Day is a day of gratitude, of love and friendship, of communion and compassion. Exactly where is the point in our thinking, our logic, where this all breaks down and becomes insane? At what precise point, understanding that we have been steeped in suffering and death almost from birth, does the individual conspire in the cover up and downplay the suffering, the taking of a life, the needless slaughter? More importantly when are we going to be honest when we talk to our children about Thanksgiving turkey and tell them that the roasted flesh that sits at the head of most Thanksgiving tables, ready to be carved, was more than construction paper,-- it was a living, breathing being with a right to its own life? Most importantly, when we are remembered, generations from now, wouldn’t we prefer to be remembered as the compassionate ones who climbed out of the insanity and took a stand, each one of us, in our own way, to stop all the suffering rather than as the barbaric ones who ate the flesh of another being -- an innocent being that had been held prisoner, horribly and violently mistreated, and then finally died a miserably frightening and painful death, all at our hands? It doesn’t have to be a violent revolution. It can happen peacefully one person, one family at a time, by the choices we make when we purchase food. We can vote with our wallets, and with our hearts. All of Mom’s recipes, remembered lovingly, can be easily translated into vegan alternatives that are just as tasty and, most importantly, will contain life and love, instead of death. We must not be so afraid to stop eating suffering and death. In the words of Cardinal John Henry Newman, “Cruelty to animals is as if man did not love God. . . there is something so dreadful, so satanic, in tormenting those who have never harmed us, and who cannot defend themselves, who are utterly in our power.” Isn’t it time for us to not just say we are enlightened and compassionate, but rather to truly be so? Wouldn’t it be less hypocritical?
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Our Vegan (Pre)Thanksgiving Menu:
Carrot-Sweet Potato Soup (with Sour Creamy Cashew Sauce), Whole Wheat Kalamata Olive Bread, Mashed Potatoes with Mushroom Gravy, Vegan Roast with Mushroom Gravy, Steamed Zucchini and Red Bell Pepper julienne strips (with Sour Creamy Cashew Sauce), Dutch Apple Cake


Recipes Follow:

My favorite Carrot-Sweet Potato Soup
Make about 12 cups of vegetable stock, flavored/cooked with several slices (15-20) of peeled ginger (remove slices before using).
In a soup pot, heat: 3 TBSP olive oil
Add, sauté until juice is released: 2 small/medium onions, chopped
1 tsp. salt

Add, and cook until soft (if necessary, add a little vegetable stock):

4 cloves garlic
1 TBSP cumin seed, toasted and ground
2 tsp. coriander seed, toasted and ground
4 tsp, grated or finely minced fresh ginger root
1/8 tsp. cayenne pepper (less, if preferred)
(optional: 1/8 tsp. nutmeg)

Add, bring to boil, then simmer until carrots are very tender (20 – 30 minutes):

4 lbs. carrots (about 14 cups), peeled and thinly sliced
2 medium sweet potatoes, peeled and thinly sliced
2 tsp. salt
8 cups veg. soup stock
Using a processor, puree the mixture a few cups at a time, placing pureed mixture into a different pot.
Add: 1 cup orange juice
Some or all of the remaining stock to thin to desired consistency
Garnish with Sour Creamy Cashew Sauce, chopped cilantro, a few sunflower seeds.
Makes a big pot of soup. If serving 2 to 4 people – just cut recipe in half. Like many soups, this soup tastes even better reheated the next day. Or, make earlier in the day to let flavors merge.

Sour Creamy Cashew Sauce
Combine in processor or blender:
1 cup cashew butter (You can make this yourself by putting cashews in the processor until they turn into cashew butter. Be patient, it takes a few minutes in the processor for it to turn into butter. You will need more than 1 cup of whole cashews to make a cup of cashew butter.)
4 to 5 TBSP lemon juice
Salt
About 1 cup of water (add gradually)

If you make this sauce ahead and need to reheat it, only warm it. If it begins to clump – put it back in the processor to break up the clumps. (If necessary, add a little more hot water to create preferred consistency.)

Mashed Potatoes
12 potatoes ( I used Yukon Gold), peeled and sliced thinly (1/4-inch slices)
6 small or 4 large garlic cloves, minced finely
8 TBSP olive oil
1 cup plain soy or rice milk
Salt and pepper, to taste

Cook potatoes, covered in water until very tender. (Bring to boil, then simmer) (About 30 minutes)
Drain and return to pot. Add oil, garlic, salt and pepper to taste. Mash mixture. Add enough soy/rice milk to bring mixture to preferred consistency. Serve immediately.

Quick Mushroom Gravy
6 TBSP whole wheat pastry flour
4 TBSP soy sauce
2 TBSP olive oil
½ tsp garlic granules
1 cup sliced mushrooms (I use Crimini or Portobello mushrooms)
¼ tsp black pepper
Toast (and stir!) the flour in a saucepan until browned and fragrant. Remove from heat.
Combine soy sauce, oil, and garlic granules, add gradually to the flour while whisking (fork or whisk) until smooth.
Cook over medium heat , stirring constantly until mixture thickens and comes to boil. Add mushroom slices, and cook for 2 minutes, stirring constantly until mushrooms are heated through. Season to taste. Serve at once.


Vegetarian Roast -- Several are available, ready to heat, at the health food store, or, for ideas on this, go to http://www.peta.org/ look for “Celebrate a Vegetarian Thanksgiving,” and then “Faux Turkeys” section, also for thousands of recipes, do an internet search for “Seitan Roast,” Tofu Roast,” “Vegetarian Thanksgiving Roast,” or “Vegetarian Thanksgiving Alternatives.” Or do a search for Vegan blogsites. http://www.bryannaclarkgrogan.com/ has a recipe for a vegan roast in her Thanksgiving recipes.
Kalamata Olive Whole Wheat Bread – made in my bread machine, with ¾ cup Kalamata olives added
Dutch Apple Cake – made with Egg Replacer, which is available in health food stores and some enlightened grocers.

Animals

"We will see that, like us, animals are expressions of infinite, universal love-intelligence; that, like us, they yearn for satisfaction of their drives and desires, and avoid pain and suffering; that, like us, they are profoundly mysterious. If we've learned anything at all about animals, it is that in no way can we make them fit into the categories of our limited understanding. When we look at animals in nature it is possible to see competition, struggle, and violence, as many scientists are trained to do, and yet it is also possible to see cooperation and mutual aid, as Kropotkin and other scientists have discovered. Further, it is possible to see celebration, joy, humor, love, caring, and the wondrous interplay and expression of an absolutely infinite complexity of life forms. There is deep truth in the old saying that we see things not as they are but as we are." Will Tuttle, PhD, The World Peace Diet