Sending postcards....

I have been unable to post recently. And the reason was not a lack of time or inclination. But instead an acute sense of failure. The support offered after my last post was so welcome and I really took to heart what was said. So when it came time - after one week - to check my results I felt I'd let not only myself down but those kind enough to offer encouragement.

The truth was: I lost no weight.

None at all.

I could not believe it. All the stories on the web, in the podcasts, in the book...everywhere...tell of people who lose 10lbs, 15lbs or more in their first ETL week. OK, I was not aiming that high, but *something* would have been nice.

So, I felt stuck. I could not bear to admit this failure, but it was the elephant in the blogroom. Sitting right on my keyboard in fact! I could scarcely post about other topics without first addressing this. And so I was unable to write anything.

Luckily sense prevailed and I took heart from the advice of a wonderful friend who encouraged me to stick with it, rather than throw up my hands and grab a dinnerplate-sized chocolate-chip cookie. (Thank you, Colleen!) It's been 15 days since I started the ETL program and, following my initial disappointment, I'll admit I have not been 100% faithful to Dr Fuhrman. I have enjoyed larger servings of rice - for instance - than are recommended and I even went out for a beer with My Beloved last weekend. But, in general terms, I have stuck with it about 80%.

And so I am wildly happy to report that today I discovered I have lost 4.5lbs. I have eaten copious amounts of leafy greens, fruits and vegetables, cut back on my coffee intake, eliminated 98% of the processed sweet treats I used to bake (look back at previous posts and you'll see them all!) and generally felt satisfied, clean, balanced and rarely hungry.

I do believe this is going to work!


Coincidentally, I had a check up with my doctor last week who scheduled a routine lipid panel. I haven't mentioned 'The V-Word' to her (I sense she will not share my enthusiasm for this lifestyle) and so I was interested to know what my scores would be. I got them today so here goes:

My total cholesterol is below the norm at 171mg/dL (<200 = 'desirable'), triglycerides are at 53mg/dL (<150 is 'normal'), LDL is down 3 points to 117mg/dL (where 100-129 mg/dL is considered 'Near optimal/above optimal') and HDL is at 48 which is moderate. I guess this last stat could be improved and so I foresee more oatmeal in my future!

I am not being self-congratulatory here as I have a loooooong way to go before I restore my health completely. Thirty-plus years of the standard western diet tend to wreak a degree of havoc that's not quickly overcome.

But these results seemed like an excellent opportunity to bear witness - in specific, scientific, medical terms - to the benefits of our vegan diet. Whilst the ETL program is so new to me as to not influence the above results, I do however attribute this overall success to veganism.

Completely and totally.

So I am once again on my way to becoming the strong, energetic, healthy vegan I **so** want to be. This journey is wildly interesting and I feel I am on an adventure. So I'll be more diligent in the future about sending 'postcards' along the way....

:)

Stay vegan, friends!

I'm not a junkitarian, but still....

I am learning a lot by following Dr. Fuhrman's Eat to Live plan. There's tons of nutritional advice of course, but I'm also learning about how my other diet compares. I'm beginning to realise that although I cooked pretty much everything from scratch and am definitely not a junkitarian, I was still eating a remarkable amount of processed foods, without even really noticing.

I see now how much bread I usually eat. How much pasta. The vegan cheese in quesadillas and grilled paninis, white flour in the cakes and cookies I bake and write about here. The Gimme Lean sausages and white bread french toast on weekend mornings. And I am quite shocked. In an earlier post Sara was kind in pointing out that the biggest change has already been made - moving from omni to vegan - and that giving up a few processed foods would be easy in comparison. And for the most part she's right, of course. But I do miss the breads - especially the artisanal loaves we usually get from this tiny little independent place where they bake the bread in a wood-fired beehive oven and fetch the loaves out on long wooden spades - and the few convenience foods I used to enjoy.

And I guess the difference here is motivation. When I turned my back on animal products I did so because I could not bear to be a part of the suffering, to support the unconscionable cruelty that pervades the animal exploitation industries.

It was completely for the animals.

Eliminating processed foods from my diet is for me and - although I am motivated to improve my own health and drop the weight - the compulsion is just not as strong.

The ETL food is great - a huge variety of beautiful, colorful fresh fruit and vegetables, some brown rice and a little bread (1 slice in 5 days) and I am enjoying what I do eat. The broccoli and red pepper soup is a standout - I could have eaten the whole panful! And the stew from last night (Day 4) actually had me going back to the stove just to recheck and make absolutely sure nothing was left.

It's just that I am missing what I do not eat. And I am also feeling a bit lost without the comfort of our routine. Fridays, for instance, My Beloved and I frequently go for a pizza (cheese-free for me) and a movie. That will not happen tonight and I am totally clueless as to how to make a Friday evening special without using food. Everything I think of revolves around going out for a meal or winding down from the week over a pint or two in our local brew-pub.

I wonder how many of you can empathise and what you found would help?

Stay Vegan, Friends!

Happy St. Patrick's Day to You!

And may the luck of the Irish be with you today!

No, I'm not Irish but heck, I'm not letting that stop me from making some chocolate-stout cupcakes with whiskey frosting.

The recipe is from VCTOTW and the frosting is just basic vegan buttercream with a healthy dose of whiskey instead of soymilk......The pix are courtesy of my friend and coworker who was terribly excited at the prospect of stout and whiskey at 08:30 in the morning!



And here's another she took having eaten a cupcake!



And how do they taste? I haven't the foggiest! For the first time, I have abstained from sampling my own creations - even to the point that I recruited My Beloved to taste test the frosting last night for the right level of whiskey-ness (yeah, he has a tough life, I know!).

However, today is Day Two of Week One and breakfast is oatmeal with walnuts and raisins, oranges (2) and an apple. And I am strangely content with that!

Oh, and for today's WTF Moment, I bring you Corned Beef and Cabbage Cupcakes. Yep, these sure were worth taking a life for.....sheesh!

Anyways, Happy St. Pat's Day to all those celebrating and - even amidst the corned cow platters - stay vegan, friends!

Such a chunky little vegan...

For those of you who know me only through Cackleberry, let me confess something: I am a chunky little vegan.

With the emphasis on the first of those adjectives!!!

I take full responsibility for this situation and know that umpteen years of eating omnivorously - and greedily - are bound to have taken a toll that 18 months of veganism cannot wipe away. However, as realistic as I am, I cannot fail to be disappointed in my almost non-existant weight loss. So, last weekend I bought Dr Joel Fuhrman's Eat to Live, a book recommended on the latest podcast of Vegetarian Food for Thought. And read it. Well, part of it anyhow (the weekend was kinda packed with stuff to do....) and I have decided to follow his 6-week eating plan and see what happens.

I guess I'm posting about this because I would love to know if anyone out there has also followed this plan and with what results. I was nervous initially because I have already changed my eating habits radically and I knew My Beloved's patience is not 'unlimited'. However, when we discovered that Dr Fuhrman's plan is not too different from the way we eat now, he brightened considerably. The main difference I see in the good doctor's approach is the unlimited quantities of nutrient-dense foods, especially in the form of fruits and most vegetables. And the things I will be limiting or omitting altogether are refined carbs such as pasta, white bread, white rice and white flour. Oh, and alcohol too. :(

Anyways, given that pasta is not generally considered indispensible to one's diet, I am hopeful that I may see some positive results. And I cannot say that I am to be underfed: today is Day One of Week One and it is lunchtime. I have already enjoyed the following:

Breakfast: strawberries, blood orange and a ruby grapefruit

Lunch: whole wheat pita stuffed with My beloved's own black bean dip, salad greens and sprouts, with a huge salad alongside (spring greens, cucumber, yellow peppers, green peppers, red peppers, red onion, kalamata olives and fresh peas) and an apple.

Dinner tonight is salad (as above) with an entree of steamed swiss chard and zucchini, cooked in a tomato, mushroom and onion sauce. I think blueberries are to follow.

I am very impressed at Dr Furhman's common sense attitude and, although he's not vegan, he really emphasises whole plant-based foods and copious amounts thereof. And unlike any other diet I've ever been on, the food looks good on the plate and I especially love the fact that each part has only one 'listed ingredient' - itself. A grapefruit is a grapefruit, a red pepper a red pepper. Gone are the days of purchasing 'food-like substances' with a list of additives longer than my arm; gone are the 'meal replacements' that never actually replaced so much as a snack in my view.

However, gone too are the cookies, biscuits, cakes, scones, breads, tofutti ice cream etc etc. But it can be only for the best and I am excited. For the first time in ages, I am truly excited to see what this new system will bring.

Let me know if you have a story to share....I'd love some encouragement!

Stay Vegan, Friends!

Don't eat blue cake...

Cakes.

Hmm....

Layer cakes, cheesecakes, bundt cakes, coffee cakes, and - let's not overlook cupcakes! Chocolate, lemon, vanilla, blueberry, coffee, key lime, elaborate with frosting, elegantly simple with a modest dusting of powdered sugar. Yep, I loved them all!

So when I first became vegan I was sure that they'd be forever off my plate. No more. A sweet memory only, filled as they are with chickens' eggs and cows' milk. But then I discovered the myriad vegan cookbooks out there with all of their simple cruelty-free substitutions and I quickly came to cherish a few particular favourites.

And during the last year and a half or so, I think I've become a pretty good baker. Good enough to please my family, friends and coworkers anyhow, so generally I am happy with my progress. But the one thing I have never mastered is formal icing. Piping shells, roses, lettering...that kind of thing.

So when a chance remark to a coworker revealed that one of the big box arts/crafts chains offers Wilton cake decorating classes I took the plunge and signed up for Course I. How hard can it be I thought, to learn smooth frosting, piping dots, leaves, stars and the like? And surely I have an advantage in that I already make cakes all the time and have a few things down pat. One thing did concern me: the stipulation that we use all Wilton supplies - some of which are not vegan - and follow prescribed recipes, which of course include butter. However, I remembered that a great blogger, Vegan_Noodle, also completed this course, so I emailed her for advice. Vegan_Noodle set me straight on substitutions - use the VCTOTW buttercream recipe and omit the meringue powder entirely - and I set off happily to the class.

In Week One I discovered that we are expected to bring a full cake to each class. Each week. It should be ready 'torted' and frosted all over. Man, this is more work than I had expected. The class is on Tuesday evenings so it makes for a pretty long day. Oh well..... In preparation for Week Two I made a basic yellow cake - just two layers because there seemed no point in making something extravagant - and followed the directive to frost it with pale blue buttercream.

Now, just to preserve my self-respect/ego, let us - before we go any further - review some of my past works:



















And just for kicks, here's a couple of arty close-ups:





And what about a slice of Humphrey Hound's carrot and beet birthday cake:



So bearing all of the above in mind what, I ask you, what is this heap o'crap????



I despair.

Stay vegan, friends, and don't eat blue cake! :(

Recipe: The 'Toothsome Tuscan Treat'

The weekend would not be the weekend without a trip out with the boys to run in the woods. And being that one of the boys is a beagle, and therefore ruled by his nose, and the other is a wannabeagle, and therefore ruled by his big brother's nose, it is vitally important to take plenty of irresistable treats, to ensure good recall.

And so, yesterday, we used up all of the remaining pup treats thus:

The SurfDog

The Thinker

The Recall

The Reward

Thanks!

So it was time to devise another canine cookie....so may I now present: the 'Toothsome Tuscan* Treat'

You will need:

2 cups whole wheat pastry flour
2 tsp baking powder
2 tbsp canola oil
1/4 cup nutritional yeast (ooohh, cheesiness!)
1/4 cup sun-dried tomatoes (salty, yummy and weird-looking)
1/2 cup cooked pasta (excellent way to use up leftovers)
3/4 cup water

1. Preheat your oven to 325 and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
2. Boil a kettle and pour approx. 3/4 cup water over the sun-dried tomatoes to rehydrate. This will take about 10 minutes (the rehydrating...not the pouring).
3. In a large bowl, combine the wholewheat pastry flour, baking powder, nutritional yeast and the canola oil.
4. Finely dice the cooked pasta. I used penne which diced into cute little rings, amusing me no end. I am easily amused, it seems. Add amusing pasta shapes to the flour mix.
5. When safe to do so, retrieve the now plump sun-dried tomatoes from the water reserving the soaking liquid and dice finely.
6. Add both the tomato bits and the 3/4 cup soaking liquid to the mix and stir well to combine. You may need to knead it a little to incorporate all of the pasta and tomatoes.
7. Turn out onto the baking sheet and roll the dough until it's about 1/2 inch thick. Bake for 30 minutes, cut into shapes and then bake a further 30 minutes.
8. After this second set of 30 minutes, turn off the oven but leave the cookies inside to get fully crunchy.




Yum!

Stay Vegan, Friends!
*If you're wondering 'Why Tuscan?', the truth is that I'm not sure. The pasta suggests Italian, and I like the alliterative qualities of 'tuscan' and 'toothsome'.....s'all!

New Award: The Drool of Desire!

A couple of posts ago, I promised a new recipe using the mystery ingredient: pears!

And here it is:



Ginger and Cinnamon-Scented Pear and Almond Cookies with Sunflower Seeds.

For these truly yummy treatlets, you will need:

1 cup diced fresh pear
2 cups whole wheat pastry flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp powdered ginger
1 tsp cinnamon
pinch of salt
1/4 cup sunflower seeds
3/4 cup water
2 tbsp almond butter

1. Preheat your oven to 325 degrees.
2. In a large bowl, mix together the flour, salt, cinnamon, baking powder and ginger. Then add in the diced pear and sunflower seeds.
3. In a measuring jug, stir together the almond butter and the water, until the almond butter is thin and runny. You can use warm water for this, to make it a little easier if you like.
4. Add the liquid to the dry ingredients and mix to combine.
5. Turn the dough out onto a baking sheet covered with baking parchment and press down to flatten out with your hands. Then roll it out until it's about one-half inch think.
6. Bake for 25-30 minutes, remove from oven, cut into small pieces or use a cookie cutter to create shapes. Separate out a bit so that all sides of the cookies are able to dry out completely.
9 Return tray to the oven to bake for a further 25-30 minutes. At the end of the cooking time, turn the oven off, but leave the cookies in to dry out and go really crunchy.

A close-up:





Why, I hear you cry...why are they bone shaped???

Ahh....excellent question! Because they are intended for the canines in your life. These particular cookies have gained the official 'Paw of Approval' - from Sir Humphrey Hound - and the 'Drool of Desire' - from Darwin the Beagle.

Praise indeed!!

Try them out on your pups and let me know how it goes!

Oh, and stay vegan, friends!

PS: In the interests of scientific inquiry, I nibbled on one of these myself and have to report that they are really rather good. Not overly sweet - due to the absence of sugar as you will have spotted - but the almond butter and the fresh pear do lend the cookies a slight hint of sweetness which is almost enough!

Life's occasional rewards

Sometimes you get confirmation that you're on the right track in the most unusual ways. Take yesterday, for example.....My Beloved and I were in our favourite brunchtime hang-out in NoHo - The Green Bean (no website, alas) - seated at a small two-top towards the back of the restaurant. Now for folks who don't know The Green Bean, it's a pretty cozy kind of place. Not exactly elbow-to-elbow, but 'friendly', if you catch my drift.

So, I had ordered their roasted pear and pecan salad (hold the goats' cheese that normally comes with it) and had settled back with some coffee and begun to people-watch. It's a really intriguing kind of place in that it attracts a great diversity of customers - college students, locals, 'valley folk' (stereotypically munchy-crunchy, Birkenstocks-in-winter, hand-knitted hats and beaded beards), alternatives of every kind, and strictly professional types peering at their Blackberrys or laptops. The couple seated next to us were older, hardy New England types, bundled up in The North Face, Polartek, and leather outerwear. They drew my attention mainly because they were large folks in a small space and were incredibly clumsy: water glasses were constantly on the verge of overturning, forks dropped effortlessly to the floor, condiments squirted randomly across the table....everything was a disaster, happening right beside us, in slow motion.

Amidst this carnival, our food arrived and I was presented with a gorgeous-looking plate of baby spring greens, candied pecans, a roasted pear, fanned delicately across the plate, the whole thing drizzled finely with a balsamic vinaigrette. There was also a side of fresh, creamy avocado. The colours, textures and the smells were just a picture! As I savoured the image before tucking in, the plates arrived for the 'couple next door' and instantly my stomach just heaved. He had ordered a beef burger and it arrived slathered in cheese, with fat pooling around the bun. It was gross in the extreme.

Then he cut into it.

The smell was just nauseating. It was blood and death and putrifying. That's the only way I can honestly describe it. A slight panic set in as I realised that it was going to be really difficult to eat with that stench emanating from the next table and I did not want to spoil our brunch.

And then the miracle happened.

The dead bovine on a bun was underdone.

So. He. Sent. It. Back.

I looked at My Beloved and he looked at me, and we tucked in to our brunch with abandon.

I wondered how long this reprieve could possibly last. The guy grumbled. He ate from his wife's plate. He muttered, dropped a coffee spoon or two, was given some chips and salsa to 'tide him over', he muttered some more. And still his beef burger did not reappear.

A full 20 minutes later, My Beloved and I had finished. For me, the last candied pecan had disappeared in a tummywards direction; the final morsel of toast and jam had been devoured, for him. We sat back, satisfied, and drained the last dregs of our coffee contentedly.

Then our waitperson reappeared. She was bearing two things - our check and our neighbour's cremated cow.

It was time to leave.

But the wonderous way in which life doles out occasional rewards was not lost on me.

Steer clear of the steer and stay vegan, friends!

Taking a trepidant whiff.....

I have the most exciting news! They don't smell...not at all....I am amazed and delighted!

Oh, erm, let me backtrack....

I understand from the numerous blogs, podcasts and nutritional handbooks out there that it's important for a well-balanced vegan diet to include a multi-vitamin. Yes, I prefer to eat widely to ensure I get as broad a range of nutrients directly from 'the source' as possible, but as a wise woman once said 'it's a good insurance policy'.

However, many of the multis out there are not vegan and so when I found one a few months ago that was, I scooped it up and brought it home. Where it sat in pride of place on the kitchen shelf alongside the dogs' treat jar.

And gathered dust.

Quite a lot of dust, in fact.

And I was frequently more tempted to reach for a dog cookie than for one of those vitamins. Because after a dose or two, I simply couldn't stand to take any more.

Because of The Smell.

I think - but don't quote me on this - that it's the fault of the B-vitamins. Which specifically or why I do not know, but I find it absolutely noxious. My stomach clenches, my throat constricts and I cannot - to save my life - get that damn stinky horse-pill down my throat.

So when, a week or so ago, I received an email from Cosmos Vegan Shoppe - those fine folks down in Atlanta, GA - advertising their line of Tiny Tablets Multivitamin By Deva one word leapt out at me: TINY! Perhaps, I hoped, these would be ones I could take!?! So I ordered some and crossed my fingers.

Yesterday, the box arrived from Cosmo's and in it, from within the biodegradable packaging, I unearthed this:



With slightly trembling hands, I fumbled the cap and took a trepidant whiff.....

Nothing!

Zip. Zilch. Nichts.

No smell.

Finally - FINALLY - a multi-vitamin which stands some chance of escaping the bottle on a daily basis! I feel better already!

Eat well and stay vegan, friends!

PS - the writing on the label is wicked small, but here's a full nutritional listing courtesy of Cosmo's:

Vitamin A (Acetate) 2500 IU
Vitamin C (Ascorbic Acid) 60 MG
Vitamin D2 400 IU
Vitamin E (D-Alpha Tocopherol Acetate) 30 IU
Vitamin B1 (Thiamine Mononitrate) 1.5 MG
Vitamin B2 (Riboflavin) 1.7 MG
Vitamin B3 (Niacinimide, Niacin) 20 MG
Vitamin B6 (Pyridoxine Hcl) 2 MG
Folic Acid 400 MCG
Vitamin B12 6 MCG
Biotin 30 MCG
Vitamin B5 (D-Calcium Pantothenate) 10 MG
Calcium (Calcium Phosphate, Carbonate) 20 MG
Iodine (Kelp) 75 MCG
Magnesium (Oxide) 8 MG
Zinc (Oxide) 2.25 MG
Selenium 35 MCG
Copper(Gluconate) 100 MCG
Manganese(Sulphate) 1 MG
Chromium 30 MCG
Molybdenum 19 MCG
Boron (Citrate) 50 MCG
Choline (Bitartrate) 3 MG
Inositol (Nicotinate) 3 MG

Review: Little Things are Big

Sometimes it's the small things in life which make the difference. Courtesy on the road from a fellow motorist equally late to work, a warm smile from the tollbooth collector on a freezing winter night, or a random act of general kindness when least expected.

So that's one reason why I have come to love Maria-Rose's blog Little Things are Big. I stumbled across it accidentally and was drawn immediately to pictures of her beautiful little girl, Miss Bumblebee, and to Maria-Rose's wonderfully gentle writing style. By the time I learned she's also a vegan...well, I was hopeless addicted!

Maria-Rose is one of those unique folks who sees the good in the everyday, the beauty in the routine. Being somewhat of a pessemist myself, it is uplifting to read her posts - especially those of her undercover exploits as the Kindness Bandit. And it doesn't hurt that she's owned by the cutest bassett hound around!

So if you - like me - find yourself occasionally in need of a quick emotional pick-me-up, head on over to check out Little Things are Big. Because sometimes the 'little things' are all that count.....

Stay Vegan, Friends!