Maggianos

A couple of weekends ago, the in-laws were in town and we went to a lovely Italian restaurant in Austin called Maggianos http://www.maggianos.com/en/Pages/Home.aspx in South Austin.  I spent a few months in Italy when I was in college so I have a warm place in my heart for REAL Italian food (not cheese soaked pasta dishes you get here) so I was excited to be be there.  Awesome place.  But not at all vegan-friendly.  As a good vegan does, we bombarded the cashier with vegan questions and began to order...the cashier, a 20-something-plays-videogames-and-drinks-chocolate-milk-and-wears-the-same-shirt-for-days-on-end kinda guy says challengingly, "the Pizza's NOT vegan."  Incredulous, I say, "Really? It has milk?"  "No", he replies, "It has YEAST!"  I shake my head and say "It's OK" and he just stands there, not entering my order into the register and looks at me (ready for a fight)..."It is a living ORGANISM".  I just have to laugh, and retort "I am not here to argue, I am just trying to feed my family".

I really don't mind being challenged like that...but it is funny that a person who clearly is not vegan and in fact clearly was anti-vegan would seemingly worry about the well-being of single celled organisms.  If we had to worry about critters as small as yeast, gosh, I couldn't sip water from a glass that wasn't recently sterilized for fear I might ingest a bacterium!

Good food though...what was vegan!  LOVED and I mean LOVED and will FANTASIZE about the marinated olives, zucchini and eggplant in the refrigerated section...drooooollll....we had some decent pizza that the kiddos loved and the husband loved his pasta dish.  All in all a very nice visit!

Veganism, Parenting, and Health

When I first became a vegan twelve years ago, I noticed how I immediately started feeling better. I had more energy, and little nagging issues went away. For instance, I used to get acid reflux in a bad way. When we lived in Salado, we lived right across the street from a gourmet pizza place, which I loved, but the acid reflux was absolutely the worst when we went there. They used a variety of cheeses on the pizza, and it was quite a tasty pizza. Except sometime in the middle of eating it, I would bend over clutching my chest. Ouch. Eventually, I made the connection between the pizza and my acid reflux, but it did not go away entirely. I wound get it every once in a while. After I became a vegan, it occurred to me that I got acid reflux when I had cheese-heavy dishes. Since I have been a vegan, I have not had one case of acid reflux. Another minor issue that I had was a wart growth on one of my fingers. I would cut it away, and it would aways come back. When I became a vegan, it just went away entirely. A big plus to being a vegan was I just stopped getting colds. I was never sick until about 2012 when we started sending our son to daycare. Since then, I have gotten many colds, and I'm sure I've had the flu. Today, we kept our son out of school because he was coughing uncontrollably. After a visit to the doctor, he's feeling better this evening, but I'm feeling a cold come on for me now. The bottom line is that veganism will do wonders for your health, but it won't protect you from children.

So Animals Have Emotion? Surprised?

I saw this interesting article about a giraffe showing emotion in a zoo. The story is touching in its own way, but that an animal shows emotion and attachments shouldn't be a surprise. It should be proof to people to stop locking animals up. http://www.timesrecordnews.com/news/2014/mar/22/giraffe-licks-dying-zoo-worker/

Should You Vaccinate?

This is not necessarily a vegan issue, but I thought I would share this since so many vegan parents are choosing not to vaccinate their children. I had an interesting conversation about vaccines with my daughter's doctor today. If you haven't heard, a young child recently died of whooping cough in Austin. For the life of me, I cannot understand why people choose not to protect their children from very dangerous diseases. I can understand a debate about whether the ingredients in the vaccines are safe, but that has not been the focus. It seems that you are either for or against vaccines. The doctor did mention that manufacturers are removing some of the questionable ingredients from vaccines, such as thiomersal, so that is a positive. Just a coincidence, but on the way home, I ran across this article about vaccines in the Texas Observer: http://www.texasobserver.org/worth-shot/. I highly recommend it. And on top of that, my wife sent me this article about how children who are not vaccinated are threatening the lives of vulnerable children: http://www.ottawacitizen.com/health/Anti+vaccination+parents+risking+toddler+life+mother+says/9642041/story.html. Please consider all of the information closely before choosing not to vaccinate.

Vegan at IKEA

I needed to go to IKEA in Round Rock for a small bookshelf, and I noticed that the cafe there had tomato-vegetable soup labeled vegan. It was pretty good, too. About a year ago, we went and had to wait forever before the kitchen staff determined that their lentil soup was vegan. That soup was awesome by the way, but it is nice to see them labeling it now.

Oil-Free Crispy Potatoes

I just wanted to share a recipe that worked out beautifully for me. We are trying to use only whole foods in the house, and that includes eliminating oil. Of course, that has made cooking tofu and potatoes much more difficult. This recipe for crispy potatoes works like a charm. There is no oil, just whole wheat flour. I also added cumin, salt, and pepper to the flour mixture. There really is no reason to be cooking potatoes in oil. Very weird, but I am super pleased this works. Here is the recipe: http://www.fifteenspatulas.com/fat-free-crispy-potatoes/. Oh, and I left the potato skins on.

New Whole Foods in North Austin!

The new Whole Foods in the Domain is simply awesome, but I am still hyperventilating from all of those people. The parking garage and lot were full. Streets in the Domain and a very large dirt field were filled with overflow parking. Insane. I can't wait until it calms down.