Today we’re posting another entry for our Not Just a Phase series, started a couple weeks back and explained in a little too much detail here. Our friend, Natalie, took the time to pass on her story of feline intervention. …sorry. I couldn’t help it.

Yep, it was all pretty much a gag reflex—a gut reaction, if you will, rather than some big spiritual awakening or epiphany resulting from consultation with Buddhist monks, a chance encounter with Donovan, or even an afternoon spent smoking cloves and sitting in a dark room in Poughkeepsie with “Meat is Murder” on a loop. It was just that, once the realization that I was actually EATING ANIMALS fired through the synapses of my brain and started going all crazy up in there, I couldn’t go back. I could never again gnaw on someone else’s leg.

Natalie Bowman, Grossed out vegan & maker of the world’s best vegan bunny cake (pictured below)
And, because I think vegan sweets ARE the answer to all the world’s problems, here’s a favorite link of mine.

You’ve likely already seen Shepard Fairey‘s new mural in Keith Haring’s old spot at Houston and Bowery, but we wanted to post a shot of this one along the Gowanus here in Brooklyn, a hop skip and a jump from our office. Street art proppa. Here’s a video on the Manhattan mural and various other arty, political-y topics.

I know, right? You’re all like, “Pssh. Where you beeeeeeeen?” I have no good answer for you, reader. Actually, that’s not true. I have many good answers for you, but none excuse us from our Webbly duties. Here they are nonetheless:

Two things: First, yes we did, yet again, fail to let you know about this week’s musical selection yesterday. What can we say. We were enamored with the sheer perfection of the day.

Hello, dear reader. On this weekend-eve, as we approach the edge of summer and the future of a thousand fond, warm (maybe too warm in New York) memories, we want to kick off a new feature that we hope will become somewhat of a regular one.

Yes, yes, I know. Usually on Fridays we pretend to be all “in the know,” as the kids in the know say, telling you various Webby or New-Yorky things of interest…or, more often than not, we just want to get the hells out of the office, so we exercise the 5th. But lend us your electronic ear for a moment. We want to try this out.

So, we’re attempting here to examine a piece that looks back at the stories of who we are and why. More specifically, we want to chronicle the choices we’ve made in our lives as they pertain to animals and vegetarianism and/or veganism. But in a fun, personal way. See, for many of us, the choice to stop eating animals is one that—whether we knew it or not at the time—began to sketch out the fine lines our lives have followed. It steered us in a direction that, often, led to who we now are as adults. It set a compass, so to speak, for choices to come—be them moral or health- or environmentally-minded.

With all of that in mind, we’re kicking off what we’re calling Not Just a Phase, where we ask friends, family, co-workers, and clients who happen to have chosen at whatever points in their lives to go vegetarian or vegan to tell us their stories. Though it’s such a choice that affects so very much in the world, it’s also one that’s extremely intimate and intense. As many authors have written in the past, what we choose to eat is a wildly personal thing. And so, it follows that making such a significant choice often has an intriguing, affective story attached to it. A few weeks ago, we asked many people we know to be so kind as to tell us those stories. We’ve received a number of really moving stories already and hope to be able share many more in the future. For the time being, here’s our friend Marisa’s story.

The story goes, I refused to eat anything other than fruit and vegetable baby food, so even though my pediatrician said I was growing just fine, my mother started feeding me a concoction called a “milkie” that was frozen yogurt, whole milk, chocolate syrup and…a raw egg. Every day. I eventually succumbed to eating meat, but I remember that growing up—I always sort of hated food.

Fast forward to fifth grade where my best friend, Saba Syed, convinced me that eating pig meat was dirty. Then seventh grade where my friend, whose mom was a hippie, convinced me that “red” meat was bad for you. I had about two more years of a chicken-based diet when I went to visit my sister in Atlanta. A weekend’s worth of southern fried chicken did me in. We ate at a Jamaican restaurant to mix things up, and I ordered my first ever veggie burger and OHMYGOD it changed my life. Then and there, I vowed never to eat meat again. I was 13 years old. At 15, I began a 6-year excursion into veganism, and while I’ve wandered back there now and again, I’ve never been strict about it since I graduated from college. But I haven’t eaten meat in eighteen years! Told you it wasn’t a phase! But the best part is I love food and cooking now that I know I don’t have to eat dead bodies.

Marisa, Lawyer

Marisa contributes to this veg recipe blog from time to time and wanted to share it.

Above, Marisa way back when with a new pal at Farm Sanctuary in upstate NY.

If you’d like to share your story, we’d love to hear it. Make it as simple or as complicated, as heart-rending or as trivial as you want. But do please make it succinct. I mean, it’s a blog, right? Visit our company’s contact page or click here to send us an email if you’d like to share. Be sure to tell us your name, what you do (whatever that may mean to you), and give us any link you may have to your site or anything else you want. Send associated images you’d like too. We love photos. We’ll be posting these in the order we receive them whenever possible, likely every Friday or so.

And have a great weekend!

We usually focus on images or artists we consider beautiful on these Journal days. Today, we look at an idea.

Kindness of Ravens: Honorable Ms. Romero, we here at KoR would like to thank you for taking the time to talk with us here. And by here, I mean the vacant imaginary space populated by only ones and zeros that is our blog. Welcome. Or, I should say, 0101011101100101011011000110001101101111011011010110010100101110.

Terry Hope Romero: That’s a pear tree, a sofa and a lemur Matrix-style right? No? Well let’s get to it then!

KoR: Indeed! So, how did you get wrapped up in the crazy, cutthroat world of vegan cookbook authorship? I’m guessing it has some roots, at least, in the Post Punk Kitchen?


THR: Yes it’s true, I did start sailing the high, bloodthirsty seas of VCA (vegan cookbook authorship) back the golden age of the PPK show. The show ushered on Isa’s first book, Vegan with a Vengeance (2005), where I make a few appearances (AKA – the sushi slut or goings on about Spanish potato tortillas and spanikopita). Soon after, we joined forces again to bring on a 1000-year reign of vegan cupcake domination and, after two years of tireless eldrich exploration into the non-Euclidean depths, we unearthed mighty Veganomicon (2007) from it’s long and dreadful slumber. The rest is history. Lovecraftian vegan history, at that.

THR: Maybe it was the name with “punk” in it that led to the logic of having an indie band playing in one’s living room—helping with chopping sweet potatoes or eating leftovers. I don’t remember exactly what triggered it but we had a pretty good run with the concept and it made us feel really cool—hanging out with bands while wearing a kitchen aprons. That seemed motivation enough.

KoR: Makes sense. So, as far as we can tell, there are what, four complete PPK episodes? Is there any secret footage from any half-completed shows?

THR: Did you just read my mind, ‘cause that’s scary and you could probably ace that ESP test that Bill Murray makes that guy take in the beginning of Ghostbusters. There is a lost 5th episode that never got edited due to all kinds of crazy life stuff. It’s several years old by now. From what I remember, we’re both wearing black and we’re cranky and making pie maybe? But how is this different from every other day, you may ask? Someday it’ll grow up and become a real video or end up on VH5000 years from now.

KoR: Bill Murray was so mean to that kid. But PPK sort of evolved eventually into a blog/recipe bank/forum/Web site of the same name, right? Is that pretty much defunct now?

THR:The PPK is all that, but the show is kinda on permanent hiatus. Isa and I live on different coasts now, but really what’s 1000x more difficult than filming a show with zero budget is editing the whole thing together to make that certain special something happen. And the fact that web based programming is the way to go (not our original public access format at a whopping 28 minute average). I would love to do a few teeny 3-minute reunion shorts someday.

KoR: I think you’d get a lot of support for that. So, after co-writing the very superb Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World (2006), Veganomicon (our fave all-purpose cookbook, 2007), and Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar (2009) with Isa, you’ve now got Viva Vegan! (2010), your first solo venture and, if we’re not mistaken, the only vegan cookbook for Latin food EVER! What made you want to do a vegan cookbook dedicated to Latin American cuisine?

THR: When I think about food, it’s usually how I would pull this or that cuisine into my alternate vegan kitchen world. Latin American food often gets top billing. Plus there is so much of it and sometimes it seems that our fellow veggies and vegans are only eating the tip of the burrito iceberg. My parents are from Venezuela and I grew up with not just that food but my dad’s constant experimenting in other regional Latin cuisines. So, while working on VV, I would call and pester him about arroz con gandules along with arepa techniques. VV will have you playing with dough just like a kindergartener, minus the handmade ashtrays but plus tamales and pupusas and tortillas. That’s a whole world of cooking fun vegans need to embrace.

KoR: Yeah, we’ve used the cookbook a few times now and have to say, it’s really great. One of the things we love about it is how your recipes are filled with easy-to-access cross-references that point to in-depth information you can check out at your leisure. Things like your thoughts on different peppers and their various culinary uses or how to prepare staple foods like beans and rice…really helpful sections that address more the gestalt of Latin American cuisine. Was that insanely tedious to do? Or maybe you had an intern you could pile heaps of admin-related abuse on?

THR: Oh, to have an intern! The nuts and bolts of VV! are all me. It probably was tedious and, for my own sanity’s sake, I don’t recall the details, but after three cookbooks, writing about beans or tofu or cast iron skillets becomes second nature. I like writing about food and can pump out quite a bit when I’m in that zen, vegetable-like writing state. At the time of writing VV! (and Vegan Cookies and the other books) I also had a full time day job as a graphic designer, which basically would put me in the situation of coming home at 6PM after shopping, cranking out a dish, working up a recipe, and writing it all down before midnight. Since then, I’ve been, as they say in this economy, “downsized”, so I’m taking more time to dedicate myself to vegan cookery. And increasingly wearing no pants: It’s quite easy when there’s no need to leave the house every day first thing in the morning.

THR: Millions of years of constant heat, pressure, and strong green tea will transform the germ of an idea into a diamond-hard cookbook. Or 16-24 months, depending on all kinds of factors. While working on VV! I moved, couch-surfed for a month, and renovated an apartment, which in total left me kitchenless and not cooking for over four months. With the best-intended projects, advanced planning is great but the bulk of the work happens when that deadline looms ever closer.

KoR: Amen to that. Viva Vegan! totally changed how we cook beans. We’ve been pro-can for years—primarily out of gas-related fears and annoyance with prep time—but, I have to say, you really cleared a lot of that up for us. No pun intended.

THR: That’s a whole lot of information to work with! Dried beans are so freakin’ cheap and good for everyone, they should be a requirement in every home economics cooking class. And they’re not impossible to work into preparing during the weekday. My favorite thing to do is put them to soak (sort them the night before for debris and put in a bowl if you don’t want to be bothered in the morning) before leaving for work. Eight or whatever hours later, come home, boil and simmer while you’re playing X-box or blogging or reading or whatever, and a big pot of beans will be ready for the week’s recipes before you pass out.

KoR: Yeah that’s totally a great culinary trick of the trade. So, as a cookbook writer, do you get entirely SICK of testing recipes? Especially genre-specific ones? I can only imagine that, after sending the final copy of VV! off to the publisher, you celebrated with Chinese take-out or something.

THR: Too true. It helps that I had a legion of amazing testers to tread through these recipes. But by now I’m actually getting a little nostalgic for the days when I’d open the freezer and a tamale would fall out and bop me on the head. As far as eating, I’ve been on a huge Indian kick lately…for like the past 20 years, so I guess that doesn’t count.

KoR: Alright, everyone always asks cookbook writers what their favorite recipe in the book is, so screw that. What’s the CRAZIEST recipe in the book, either in terms of preparation or of terms of the taste party that ensues in your mouth upon eating?

Yuca with Cuban Mojo Sauce
serves 4 as a side or more as an appetizerThis Cuban style of serving yuca (a tropical tuber veg found in most any Latin market and many supermarkets too) is the ultimate comfort food, similar to a super starchy white potato with the enhancement of sweet, nutty nuances and a flakey yet creamy texture. A richly seasoned garlicky oil sauce makes it irresistible. Serve as an appetizer on a platter or arrange individual servings as a side with any Caribbean or tropical entree.

Tip: Yuca is large tropical tuber with a dark brown, woody and somewhat fibrous skin. It’s also known as cassava or manioc. Often the skin is waxed and it’s always removed prior to cooking. In well-stocked Latin markets you can also find frozen, pre-peeled and sliced yuca, perfectly convenient if you don’t feel like wrangling with roots. Follow the package direction for boiling and make the sauce as directed.
• 2 lb yuca (one really big fat yuca root)Mojo Sauce:
• 1/2 cup olive oil
• 6 large cloves garlic, finely minced
• 1 small yellow onion, peeled, cut in half and thinly sliced
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
• 1/4 cup freshly squeezed lime juice
• freshly ground black pepper to taste

Trim ends of yuca and and use a sharp “Y” shaped vegetable peeler to remove the waxed outside skin. With a heavy sharp chef’s knife split the root into two or three equal pieces horizontally, then cut each piece in half lengthwise. You should have 4-6 large semi-circular chunks of yuca. Slice each chunk into two or three more pieces. Place in a large pot and pour in enough cold water to cover yuca by at least 3 inches. Bring to a boil over high heat, partially cover the pot and cook for 25-30 minutes or until yuca is very tender. Fully cooked yuca is ready when its white flesh has a semi-translucent appearance on the edges and it also flakes easily when pierced with a fork.

While yuca is boiling prepare the mojo sauce. In a large saucepan combine olive oil, minced garlic and onion and bring to a gentle simmer over medium heat, then turn heat down to low. Simmer for 12-14 minutes or until garlic and onions are very soft and just starting to turn golden. Remove from heat and stir in salt and ground cumin…resist the urge to drink the luscious scented garlicky cumin oil. Set aside for 2 minutes to cool slightly. Gently whisk in lime juice and add a few twists of freshly ground pepper.

To serve drain hot yuca from pot. Occasionally cooked yuca may have a thick rubbery skin on the outside edges of the root: this peels of easily so just remove and discard. Arrange yuca in a mound on serving platter and drizzle with garlic sauce and pile onions on top of yuca. Serve immediately.

You know how we all have a friend who is, like, nut-bustingly good at something? Like your friend who bakes cupcakes that make angels cry? Or your pal who just ‘whips up’ a dress for their own wedding that looks like it came right off the runway? Jerks, right? No, I kid. But, really, you do all know someone who is unbelievably creative AND productive.

And—no surprise to us at this point—their selection is pretty impeccable. From hand-selected vintage clothing to genuine 1970’s mood rings to a wide array of animal-themed pillows and bizarrely awesome doll-head-planters, the vast and colorful range of items that makes up the store’s inventory creates an oddly cohesive, appealing disposition, no doubt owing to Michelle and Julia’s discerning taste. Check them out when you get a chance (16th Street at Prospect Park West, right next to the 15th St-Prospect Park F stop).

Pictured left, Michelle being guarded by a weird bald dude on a unicorn. Below: Doll head and (in the background) cat-doll head planters by Plant on the Brain; 70s mood rings; men’s and women’s clothing; hand-made pillows by co-owner, Julia; two slightly shifty-looking rabbit pillows.

I know, I know, I know. You came here looking for music recommendations or a nice recipe or maybe really bad pictures of me eating veggie dogs and now you’re about to shut the browser window because you don’t want to watch this kind of stuff. But I plead with you, do.

Photo: Two cows enjoying some R+R post-rescue at Farm Sanctuary. Find out more here.

Video footage courtesy of Mercy for Animals.

Apologies, dear readers, for the gargantuan whirring hole in the time-space-internet continuum that was our blog yesterday. We would like to blame larger, less provincial issues for being kept from our cyberspacial duties, but, in fact, we were merely maximizing our R and also R with our friends, Kristen + Rimas, down in Austin. That and—despite the late hour of our arrival and our world-weary bones—we could not keep ourselves from the five and a half hours of nail-biting, tear-jerking, heart-breaking pre-recorded television that were the twilight times of Lost. Seriously, ya’ll. If you never got into Lost, stop what you’re doing right now and Netflix that shit. Then let’s talk in 84.7 hours. Or we can make it an even 108…