sept+oct vegnews

VeganNEWSBUZZPLANETTRAVELFOOD

Creole Corn Sticks • Smoky Mac & Cheese • Pear Cheesecake

Rich Landau and Kate Jacoby of

Philadelphia’s Vedge Restaurant, p.26

6CourseFantasy Feastp.46

Debut

Column:

Superfoods!

Annual Food IssueRestaurants vs. CookbooksEveryone Wins!

Vegan Eateries on Our Wish List

Mercy ForAnimals

at 15

8

A Day In The Lifewith Adam Sobel ofThe Cinnamon Snail

California Dreamin’

Bountiful Berkeley

$5.99 US $6.99 Canada

October 2014

style is timeless

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for all animals.We’re there

Join us in celebrating animals and confronting cruelty.

#1 in cruelty prevention—attacking the root causes of puppy mills, pet

overpopulation, animal fighting, factory farming and other problems

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conferences, educational materials, publications and standard setting

The HSUS receives top ratings from:

• Guidestar’s Philanthropedia: The HSUS is the #1 high-impact animal group

• Better Business Bureau’s Wise Giving Alliance: The HSUS meets all 20 standards

• Worth Magazine: The HSUS is a top 10 fiscally responsible charity

Issue #96 September+October 2014

p.26

VegNow Keeping you informed on all things veg

8 Publisher’s Note Exceptional Columnists15 VegNow > Food > Health > Environment & Animals > BuzzNow24 10 Questions Mercy For Animals’ Nathan Runkle on the organization’s first 15 years

VegInDepthA closer look at intriguing topics

26 Restaurants vs. Cookbooks Award-winning author Ellen Kanner explores the intersection of vegan restaurants and their cookbook-writing chefs34 A Day in the Life Adam Sobel: 24 hours with The Cinnamon Snail food truck guru40 After the Fall Climbing back on the veg wagon after a slip up shouldn’t be painfulp.15

4 VegNews Think. Eat. Thrive.™ September+October 2014

p.46

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VeganNEWSBUZZPLANETTRAVELFOOD

Creole Corn Sticks • Smoky Mac & Cheese • Pear Cheesecake

Rich Landau and Kate Jacoby of

Philadephia’s Vedge Restaurant, p.26

6CourseFantasy Feastp.46

Debut

Column:

Superfoods!

Annual Food IssueRestaurants vs. CookbooksEveryone Wins!

Vegan Eateries on Our Wish List

Mercy ForAnimals

at 15

8

A Day In The Lifewith Adam Sobel ofThe Cinnamon Snail

California Dreamin’

Bountiful Berkeley

$5.99 US $6.99 Canada

October 2014

p.52 p.54 p.58

p.24

p.44

p.56

On the cover

Rich Landau and Kate Jacoby, owners of Vedge Restaurant, photographed in Philadelphia on July 1, 2014Photo and styling: Jason Varney/Varney Photo

p.26

p.34

p.82

p.46

Real Food Daily’s Yin and Yang Salad with Peanut-Sesame Dressing.Six-course menu starts on p.46!

Annual Food Issue!

Chef Eric Tucker has co-authored both The Millennium Cookbook and The Artful Vegan.

VegLifeStyleHelping to enrich your veg life

Travel44 VegEscape BountifulBerkeley,California ThecitiesbytheBay,part2of2

Food46 Restaurants vs. Cookbooks: The Menu Asix-coursefantasyfeastcompiled fromthecookbooksinourcoverstory52 Global Vegan Friturasfantásticas54 Vegan Chef Favorites Pumpkinmac&cheese56 Superfoods (Debut column!) Spirulina-spicedpepitas58 My Sweet Vegan Roastedpearcheesecake60 5-Ingredient Meals Apple-stuffedsquash62 Restaurant Review LifeAliveUrbanOasis&OrganicCafé64 VegPicks Today’sbestnewveganproducts

Departments66 Plant-Based Dietitian Antinutrientantipathy68 Alternative Medicine (Debut column!) Acupunctureandvegans70 VegFamily Giftoflove

VegMedia72 Books78 Marketplace

Last Call82 Eight Cookbook Authors... ...Whoshouldopenrestaurantstoday!

p.58

p.54

p.44

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Up next...

In the Nov+Dec VegNews...

The 2014 Veggie Awards™ Ourannualpicksforthebestofthelast12months–plusourreadersurveyresults

Veganism at 70VegNews’exclusiveinterviewwithDonaldWatson,10yearslater

New Dessert Column!Chocolate-CoveredKatiedebutswithChocolateCandyCaneCupcakes

6VegNewsThink. Eat. Thrive.™September+October2014

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We’ll certainly include Hannah Kaminsky’s Roasted Pear Cheesecake on our fall menu!

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These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. These products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease.

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AJIN-6224VegNwsConsmrFmlyAdMECH.indd 1 6/6/14 11:24 AM


Publisher’sNote

From the desk of Joseph Connelly...

BREAKFAST, LUNCH, DINNER? SOUP, ENTRÉE, DESSERT? OUR ANNUAL Food Issue serves up three unique “daily specials,” starting with our cover story on vegan restaurants with cookbooks, a pairing we’ve never seen explored anywhere, and one we’re certain you’ll agree gives chocolate and peanut butter a tasty rival. Next is another tag-team first for VegNews: we’ve continued our Restaurants vs. Cookbooks story into our Food Feature, offering you a delectable, six-course menu harvested from a half-dozen of the featured restaurants’ cookbooks. And saving the best for last, as you should always do, we couldn’t be more thrilled (and blessed!) that both of these pieces come to you from the amazingly talented Ellen Kanner, award-winning author, Huffington Post’s Meatless Monday blogger, and recipient of our 2013 Book of the Year honor, the incredible Feeding the Hungry Ghost: Life, Faith, and What to Eat for Dinner, which you should go out and purchase right now if you enjoy food. Or reading. Or reading about food. You get the picture!

We also have some big happenings regarding columnists that we must share, acknowledge, and yes, tease you with just a wee little bit. In our previous Summer Spectacular issue we introduced two new columnists, Rich Lysloff (VegFamily) and David Hanley (5-Ingredient Meals). We welcome both gentlemen, who have taken on pre-existing columns that we’ve brought back by your popular demand. In this issue we debut 2-1/2 new columns you’re going to love. Beverly Lynn Bennett, our long-time Dairy-free Desserts author, is making the switch from sweet to savory with Vegan Chef Favorites. Do check out her amazing revamp of the classic mac & cheese, this one with pumpkin. Yes, pumpkin! Turn the page and meet super Julie Morris, who begins her brand-new Superfoods column in this issue. Spirulina and pepitas? We have them. Finally, Acupuncturist Heather Lounsbury also debuts in this issue, penning our new Alternative Medicine column. We are thrilled to welcome all to the VN family and certain you will eat up their columns.

And these are just the beginning. In our November+December edition, we’ll debut a new healthy dessert column by ultrapopular blogger Chocolate Covered Katie, while in January+February we’re bringing back our Veganize It! column, which is being taken over by prodigy cookbook author (and Cupcakes Wars champion) Chloe Coscarelli. Also on tap in the coming months are a new VegFitness columnist, along with new efforts on Veganic Gardening and VegCanada. Yes, there’s never been a more exciting time to be vegan and VegNews will continue to lead the way, one meal at a time. Happy autumn!

Enticing Combos & Exceptional Columnists


StaffPublisher and Editor-in-Chief Joseph Connelly

Associate Publisher Colleen HollandSenior Editor Marie Mika

Art Director Gregory J. Del DeoBusiness Manager Christy GriffinDesign Assistant Jacinda VirginEditorial Assistant Isabel Moniz

Photo Intern Min-Yee RaqTechnical Guru Paul “Sixth Form College” Russell

Advertising Sales Representative Jill AlexanderCopy Editor Anne Callery

Recipe Tester Jenny Bradley

DepartmentsVegan Chef Favorites Beverly Lynn Bennett

10 Questions Joseph Connelly5-Ingredient Meals David Hanley

Plant-Based Dietitian Julieanna Hever, RDMy Sweet Vegan Hannah Kaminsky

Alternative Medicine Heather LounsburyVegFamily Rich Lysloff

Superfoods Julie MorrisVegFitness John Pierre

VegWellness Christina PirelloGlobal Vegan Robin RobertsonMedia Lounge Joseph Connelly,

Carol Hee Barnett, Sharon Hook, Amy Leventhal, Marie Mika, Jacqueline Tong

September+October ContributorsMarc Diamond & Amy Leventhal, Ann Gentry,

Derek Goodwin, Mickey Hornick, Hannah Kaminsky, Ellen Kanner, Jo Kaucher, Rich Landau, Angel Ramos,

Nathan Runkle, Adam Sobel, Eric Tucker, Aaron Wehner, Melanie Wilson

VegNews Advisory BoardYouth & Teens Nathaniel Barnett

Food Ken BergeronMilk & Dairy Robert Cohen

Nutrition Brenda Davis, RD, Vesanto Melina, RDPoultry Karen Davis, PhD

Digital Photography Derek GoodwinHealth & Fitness Ruth Heidrich, PhD

Communications Jennie KerwoodMedical Michael Klaper, MD

Animal Agriculture Howard LymanAnimal Rights Jim Mason, JD

Activism Bryan Pease, JDTechnology Thomas Russell

Humane Education Rae Sikora, Zoe Weil

The Fine PrintVegNews accepts articles for publication. Publication of an article does not

necessarily reflect the official position of VegNews Media.

VegNews Media assumes no responsibility for unsolicited manuscripts and/or artwork, which become the property of VNM unless accompanied by a self-addressed, stamped envelope.

Subscriptions: Send orders to VegNews, PO Box 461390, Escondido, CA 92046-1390; email [email protected]; or contact 760-291-1546.

Single Issues of VegNews are available for $6 postpaid. Back Issues can be purchased based on availability.

Advertising: Contact our home office at 415-642-NEWS, fax a request to 415-642-6398, or send an email to [email protected]. Rates available upon request.

Newsstand & Bookstore Distribution: Curtis Circulation Company 730 River Road, New Milford, NJ 07646-3048, 201-634-7400

Questions: Email: [email protected]. Tel: 415-642-NEWS. Web: vegnews.com.

COPYRIGHT ©2014 by VegNews Media and the individual authors and artists. All trademarks are owned by VegNews Media.

VegNews Magazine is printed on 10% post-consumer recycled paper using soy-based inks.

“Dun-Well Donuts in Brooklyn.”

“Gracias Madre! Hey, a girl can dream, can’t she?”

“Cornbread Café, an awesome vegan diner here in Eugene, OR!”

Which veg restaurant would you like to see publish a cookbook?Beverly

“Hard Times Café in Minneapolis—delicious and inexpensive!”

Melanie

Paul

“Saravana Bhavan. This chain of veg restaurants is one of the few places to find one of my favorite South Indian dishes, bisi bele bhath.”

Adam

Amy

“Amitabul in Chicago: they consistently make incredibly healthy taste purely decadent!”

David

“All veg restaurants should put out lots of cookbooks!”Julieanna

Issue #96 September+October 2014

DETOX MADE DELICIOUS

NO Pills Or POwders

wEekLy mEetiNgs thaT work!

gEt waisted IS yOur new rEcIpe fOr WeIght LOss

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fiNd The 7 secrets Of succeSsful WeIght LOss At

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every SinglE wOMaN in the treasure cOast group loST wEight in the fIrst wEek

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WOMEN in get WAIStEd mADison loST almost 6 pounDS in jUST tWo wEeks!

4


1 Adam SobelA Day in the Life, p.34

Hometown: NYCCurrent abode: Red Bank, NJCollege: Too boring, and not yummyRestaurant you want to try: Khun Churn in Chiang Mai, ThailandFavorite veg cookbook: Vegan PlanetYour Halloween costume: I like to stay home and eat snacksFavorite Halloween candy: Original Peanut ChewsLast vacation destination: Mysore, IndiaVeg since: 2000Mac or PC: I browse the web on a Gameboy and use a Speak and Spell for everything else

2 Katherine SazdanoffRestaurant Review: Live Alive, p.62

Hometown: Born and raised in OhioCollege: Ohio State UniversityRestaurant you want to try: Millennium Favorite veg blog: Deliciously EllaYour Halloween costume: Sandy from GreaseLast vacation destination: Currently living in Puerto Rico, a vacation destinationVeg since: 2013Mac or PC: PC

3 Melanie WilsonAfter the Fall, p.40

Hometown: Wahiawa, HICurrent abode: Cass Lake, MN College: Nova Southeastern UniversityRestaurant you want to try: Gentle Gourmet Café, ParisFavorite veg cookbook: Juice for Life: Modern Food and Luscious JuiceYour Halloween costume: A giant bunny rabbitFavorite Halloween candy: Jolly Ranchers!Last vacation destination: Back home to Hawaii!Mac or PC: Mac at home, PC at work

4 Ellen KannerRestaurants vs. Cookbooks, p.26

Hometown/Current abode: MiamiCollege: Bennington CollegeRestaurant you want to try: VedgeFavorite veg cookbook: Afro-Vegan. Love itYour Halloween costume: Chili pepperFavorite Halloween candy: Vegan candy corn (I’m probably alone here) Last vacation destination: Boston (work and play) and New Orleans (entirely play)Veg since: I was 13Mac or PC: Mac, of course

1 3

4

2

CONTRIBUTORS/

Write to VegNews at [email protected]. Please include your name, city, state, and daytime phone number. Letters may be edited for content and clarity. vegnews.com VegNews 13

yoursay VN READERS SHARE WHAT’S ON THEIR MINDS

9Meet Amazing Women Who Run Sanctuaries!

SummerSpectacular!

Blackfish. Speciesism.

How Powerful Is Film?

Oakland, CA The Other City

by the Bay

Vegan Hiker Treks 2,600 Miles

for the Animals

Debut Column VegFamily

South Seas Sundae

with Pineapple and Caramel Sauces, p.62

VeganNEWSFOODPLANETTRAVELBUZZ

Summer Menu: Peru! • Easy Caprese • Vietnamese Spring Rolls 8

Enchanting

Weddings, p.36

$5.99 US $6.99 Canada

August 2014

FILM POWERI was thrilled to see the question of film’s power discussed in VegNews (“The Persuasive Power of Film?” July+August 2014). I am even more thrilled that the conjecture about whether my film, Speciesism, is persuasive has a definitive answer: the film’s impact on viewers has exceeded even my most optimistic expectations. I consistently hear from people who say that the film changed their lives and persuaded them to become vegan, and I hear even more often from animal advocates who say that it persuaded friends and family members when nothing else previously had. This is not a testament to my skill as a filmmaker, but a result of the film’s emphasis on the intellectual basis for animal rights. Facts and images pertaining to the mistreatment of animals have an immediate—and valuable—emotional impact. I hope that Speciesism and other documentaries exploring this topic are just the beginning. New films may become our ultimate tool for reaching the broader public with the ideas and arguments behind animal rights.

Mark Devries WASHINGTON, DC

Editor’s note: Mark Devries is the director of Speciesism.

Jed Gillen hit the nail smack-dab on the head for me. Two points struck a chord. First were Gillen’s observations on our cognitive dissonance. Most people will desperately cling to the familiar and the comfortable, and rationalizing can often get downright creative. Second was his analogy of watching child abuse videos to stay motivated. Years ago I came to the realization that if I

wanted to be a productive activist, I had to stop watching these videos. To be effective I have to remain positive and hopeful, and graphic videos can’t help me there.

Mary Chipman SAINT ANN, MO

WEDDING$: KNOT!As lovely as it is to see delightfully happy vegans getting hitched, standing up to family and societal pressures, and refusing to serve meat at their weddings to make some great aunt happy (“Vegan Weddings,” July+August 2014), the “I Do Dough” section left a bad taste in my mouth. Reporting that two of the couples spent more than $60k on their weddings is a huge turn off. Maybe next time around we could just leave out the price tags?

Marga Silvestre SAN JUAN, PR

Your long-overdue issue was abysmal. You had way too much focus on weddings. Many of us are single.

Christine Yvonne

GLUTEN ≠ WHEATWhen asked “What’s the deal with gluten?” (“Healthy Vegans,” July+August 2014), you stated, “Fortunately, it’s now mandated that labels contain warnings when gluten is present.” Unfortunately, this is not correct. Wheat, one of the top allergens, has to be labeled; gluten does not. The celiac community has been fighting many years for gluten labeling but has yet to be successful. Gluten is tricky and hides under hundreds of different names, so due diligence is still needed by the gluten-free community when reading labels.

Melissa Gray NORWALK, CT

OUR KIND OF LIBRARYCheck out our lending library at the first 100 percent vegan food trailer lot!

Unity Vegan Kitchen

WE ♥ THE BAY AREAOaklanders know that our city is hella #vegan friendly (“Oakland, California Dreamin’” July+August 2014), @VegNews is spreading the word in the August ‘14 edition.

@OaklandVeg

@VegNews Yay! My #SFGiants AT&T park is #1. They do have some good #vegan options.

@lenow94

OFF THE VEGAN PATHIt would be great if VegNews could every now and then post inspirational stories for those of us living in rural areas where there are no vegetarian restaurants and no big grocery stores. One can eat only so many meals of lentils and beans!

Heidi Huse

…AND WE’RE BACKSo glad I got my magazine this month! Yay! Thank you. Missed it!

Jennifer Collins-Chlebina

This isn’t really a letter, but a note of thanks for coming back to the newsstands. I wondered why I couldn’t find you; you were missed!

Andrea Zacharuk

Excited to see VegNews Magazine is back in print. Great comeback issue!

Elizabeth Mays

Had a very happy surprise in my mailbox today! So glad to see the mag back up and running!

Lauren Cleveland

Started reading @VegNews and am so happy it’s back! #vegan

@Lovely_KatieRae

@VegNews thank you for making our world a better place.

@loominarioom

vegnews.com VegNews 15

FOOD / HEALTH / ENVIRONMENT / ANIMALS / EVERYTHING VEGANvegNOWVeganSupermarketsImagine strolling the aisles of your favorite grocery store, lazily picking up anything that catches your eye and not bothering to read the list of ingredients: you know it’s vegan. Everything is vegan—hallelujah! From Taipei’s iVegan (Taiwan’s first all-vegan supermarket) to Berlin’s Veganz to Viva la Vegan in Rancho Cucamonga, CA (“the largest vegan grocery store on earth”), what seemed only 10 years ago a fantasy food shopping experience is now a growing global reality.

Vega

nz: V

egan

z


Seasoned Vegan, Harlem’s first full-service vegan restaurant, opened for business on May 3! Mother-and-son owner/executive chef team Brenda and Aaron Beener describe their food as “home-cooked with love and a soulful twist.” Menu items include yam-based “crawfish” and “barbecue riblets,” made from lotus root.

In an interesting take on the typical gender dynamics of food consumption, more men are willing to eat meat grown in a lab than women. Twenty percent of Americans overall (27 percent of men, 14 percent of women) are receptive to the bio-burger.

Plant-based food startup Hampton Creek has had big-name investors (Bill Gates, Vinod Khosla) on its team for quite some time. Now on board as consultants are Michael Slaby and Rayid Ghani of President Obama’s 2012 re-election team. To help sell Just Mayo, among other products, Slaby and Ghani are employing Facebook Targeted Sharing, an app they developed for the presidential campaign. In order to succeed at their present rapid rate of expansion, Hampton Creek CEO Josh Tetrick says the company needs to think more like a “movement.” Yes, we can!

People are often surprised—even vegans themselves—to learn that most wine is not vegan. Many vintners use animal-derived ingredients, such as egg whites, milk proteins, and isinglass (fish bladders) to filter their wines. The Food Standards Agency in the UK now mandates greater transparency on wine labels, requiring that “wines produced from the 2012 vintage onwards” must state if animal-derived ingredients are present in the wine in quantities greater than 0.25 milligrams per liter. Until such standards exist in the US, barnivore.com will offer guidance on more than 16,000 wines.

The cost to produce one Cultured Beef Burger, the world’s first lab-grown patty, weighing in at five ounces.

FOOD/now

$331,200Hampton Creek co-founders Josh Balk (l) and Josh Tetrick with Ka-shing Li.

The company secured $23 million from Mr. Li, Asia’s wealthiest person.

Seas

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1 box (11 oz.) Dr. Praeger’s Gluten Free California Veggie Burgers OR Dr. Praeger’s California Veggie Burgers2 tablespoons olive oil 1/2 medium onion, diced 2 stalks celery, diced 2 small carrots, diced 1 garlic clove, minced 14 ounces crushed tomatoes 1/4 cup red wine 1/2 cup water 1 teaspoon granulated sugar 1 teaspoon sweet paprika 1 teaspoon dried oregano 1/2 teaspoon chili pepper powder 1 teaspoon salt (to taste)

1. In a medium sized pot over medium heat, sauté the olive oil, onion, celery, carrots, and garlic until translucent.

2. Thaw burgers by microwaving for two minutes. Cut burgers into chunks and add to sautéed vegetables, breaking them up as you stir.

3. Pour in crushed tomatoes, wine, water, sugar, paprika, oregano, chili pepper powder and salt. Stir to incorporate and simmer for 30 minutes until it thickens.

4. Serve over your favorite gluten free pasta, rice, or seed.

Prep Time: 15 minutes Total Time: 45 minutes

Vegetarian Bolognese Sauce – Makes 8 servings –

1 box (11 oz.) Dr. Praeger’s Gluten Free California Veggie Burgers OR Dr. Praeger’s California Veggie Burgers2 tablespoons olive oil 1/2 medium onion, diced 2 stalks celery, diced 2 small carrots, diced 1 garlic clove, minced 14 ounces crushed tomatoes 1/4 cup red wine 1/2 cup water 1 teaspoon granulated sugar 1 teaspoon sweet paprika 1 teaspoon dried oregano 1/2 teaspoon chili pepper powder 1 teaspoon salt (to taste)

1. In a medium sized pot over medium heat, sauté the olive oil, onion, celery, carrots, and garlic until translucent.

2. Thaw burgers by microwaving for two minutes. Cut burgers into chunks and add to sautéed vegetables, breaking them up as you stir.

3. Pour in crushed tomatoes, wine, water, sugar, paprika, oregano, chili pepper powder and salt. Stir to incorporate and simmer for 30 minutes until it thickens.

4. Serve over your favorite gluten free pasta, rice, or seed.

Prep Time: 15 minutes Total Time: 45 minutes

Vegetarian Bolognese Sauce – Makes 8 servings –

Great on the bun.Great in recipes.

Developed for Dr. Praeger’s by CookingWithBooks.net

Great on the bun.Great on the bun.Great on the bun.

www.DrPraegers.com

HEALTH/now

According to a recent article published in the British Medical Journal, frequent consumption of red meat may contribute to a 20 percent increased risk of breast cancer.


The positive impact of companion animals on human mental and physical health has been widely discussed in the media. Powerful, personal testimonials abound: one autism

service dog transformed a boy so dramatically that he was able to limit his medication, and people previously unable or unwilling to speak or move have talked to and reached for therapeutic animals. In-depth studies on such human-animal interactions have been uncommon, however—until now. The National Institute of Child Health and Human Development is starting a major, long-term research program that “focus(es) on the interaction between humans and animals.” Mars (the candy and pet food company) has committed $2 million to the endeavor.

The percent by which a low-carb, vegan diet may reduce the risk of heart disease over the course of a decade.

Every parent knows that getting children to eat (and like!) their veggies can be a challenge. A recent study led by researchers at the University of Leeds suggests that introducing new vegetables “early and often”—that is, before the age of two—is an ideal approach to cultivate a taste for vegetables in a child’s developing palate. Parents: be persistent and offer a new vegetable five to ten times (before surrendering to having it thrown all over the wall)!

Pretty much the only time most vegans turn to a vending machine is out of desperation on a road trip, but they may happily go out of their way to get to this one. Modern Farmer reports that the Garvey Food Court in the Chicago Loop is home to the first Farmer’s Fridge vending machine—or “veggie machine,” as founder Luke Saunders prefers to call it. This is one green machine: the kiosk dispenses food in plastic jars that may be reused, and the electric bill is only about $10 a month. All items are marked down $1 after 6pm, and what’s left at the end of the day is donated to a homeless shelter. Sample items include the Antioxidant Salad, a Crunchy Thai Salad, and the North Napa Salad—all with fewer than 300 calories!


Chosen by National Geographic Traveler

as “One of the 100 best worldwide vacations to

enrich your life.”

[email protected] (US): 1-800-496-0989

Ph: 1-828-749-9537

Or join the conversation: Holistic Holiday at Sea

holisticholidayatsea.com/blog

Lorraine [email protected]

Toll-Free: 1-877-844-7977Ph: 1-305-443-0542

(option 1 for program informationoption 2 for travel agent)

All reservations for our holistic groupmust be made through Lorraine Travel

Join our 12th annual Holistic Holiday at Sea cruise for 7 nights on the beautiful, new MSC Divina, one of the most elegant & ecologically-friendly cruise liners on the seas. Bask in gracious Italian hospitality & service all while enjoying inspiring lectures &

vegan natural foods prepared by our own chefs. Departing from Miami, FL & sailing to lush Falmouth, Jamaica; Georgetown, Cayman

Islands; Cozumel, Mexico & sunny Great Stirrup Cay, Bahamas. Learn more about the classes, cuisine & itinerary at holisticholidayatsea.com.

Best-selling author of Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease; starred in the film Forks Over Knives; featured on CNN special “The Last Heart Attack”

Co-author of The China Study and author of Whole: Rethinking the Science of Nutrition; featured in the film Forks Over Knives

Food options for everyone -vegan, gluten-free,oil-free, and ship’s menu

Dancing, socials & singles eventsVegan pizza & ice cream partiesCancer support group & recovery panel

Award-winningenvironmentally-friendly ship

Swim, snorkel & kayak in thecrystal waters of the Caribbean

Daily yoga, meditation, Pilates,Qi Gong, Do-In, running, fitness& body building classes

Private consultations& treatments available

Continuing Education Credits(CMEs & CEUs) will be available

35 teachers135 lectures & workshops9 cooking classes, 4 intensives Physician, author, &

internationally-recognized speaker on nutrition; founded NutritionFacts.org; spoke at Congress, on Dr. Oz, & the Colbert Report

Founder of the Physicians Commitee for Responsible Medicine; author of Food for Life & Power Foods for the Brain; active health advocate

Chef & author of Unprocessed: How to Achieve Vibrant Health and Your Ideal Weight, inspiring public speaker & cooking instructor

Award-winning author of five bestselling books, including The Joy of Vegan Baking & The Vegan Table; speaker, chef, contributor to NPR

Join 1700 Like-Minded Vegans

ENVIRONMENT+ANIMALS/now


Good news and bad news for elephants. First the good:

Thanks to wildlife education efforts and a draconian penalty

for poachers (death), the number of Asiatic elephants in

China’s Yunnan Province has doubled in the past 20 years.

Paradoxically, elephants may be safer in China than in Africa—

where elephant poaching is rampant to sate Chinese demand

for ivory. Now the bad news: Yunnan’s forests are being

razed to accommodate rubber and other cash crops, creating

ecological dead zones and isolating small groups of elephants

on tiny oases of jungle, suffocated by roads and development.

Just as lab-grown “meat” may mean the emancipation of farmed animals, new scientific innovations may spell the end of vivisection as well. The journal Stem Cell Reports reveals the development of “a lab-grown epidermal equivalent from stem cells” that mimics human skin, and could replace animals in cosmetic and medicinal testing. Thank you, science!

China has recently “clarified” legislation outlawing consumption of endangered species. This strengthening of the law offers increased protection to 420 species, including pangolins, golden monkeys, and Asian black bears. Some Chinese believe that certain parts of endangered animals, such as shark fin or bear bile, either have medicinal properties or enhance social status. Those who knowingly eat such products now face prison sentences ranging from three to ten years.

25-40Percentage by which greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture would be cut if Europeans reduced their animal-product consumption by half, according to the recent UN report “Nitrogen on the Table.”

Exotic, charismatic megafauna such as bald eagles, lions, and orcas enjoy far more respect and sympathy than food animals, while appeals to reduce or eliminate meat consumption that

rely on compassion for farmed animals seem to have limited impact on those who view them as nothing more than food. Exposing the devastating impact of meat consumption on wildlife, however, may prove a more effective strategy. New research published in the journal Science shows the clear impact of the meat-industrial complex on elk, pumas, and sea otters, among others. Thus, the Center for Biological Diversity has launched a new campaign, Take Extinction Off Your Plate, with the simple pledge: “Eat Less Meat. Save More Wildlife.”

11 THINGS WE CAN’T WAIT TO SEE / READ / DObuzzNOW


Celebrate 15 years of winning victories for farmed animals at the Mercy For Animals 15th Anniversary Gala in Los Angeles. Tickets available at mfagala.com.

Hug a cow or pet a pig at a farmed animal sanctuary on World Vegetarian Day (October 1) and World Farmed Animals Day (October 2).

Millennium, San Francisco’s iconic, award-winning vegan restaurant, opened 20 years ago today.

Vegan Holiday Cooking from Candle Café: Celebratory Menus and Recipes from New York’s Premier Plant-Based Restaurants arrives on bookshelves.

Halloween Kale salad and superfood smoothies? Not today, my friends. Here at VegNews we will be handing out Airheads, Skittles, and Twizzlers—and stuffing our faces with as many Cocomels as humanly possible.

For more on Millennium and Candle Café,

see p.26.

Elephant Appreciation Day Elephants are known to use tools, collaborate, empathize, and appear to mourn their dead and possess self-awareness.

Eat your damn kale. Thug Kitchen: Eat Like You Give a F*ck drops today.

Dictionary Day What’s a word for compassionate, healthy, and environmentally friendly? Vegan!

“I said Royale with VEGAN cheese!” Kingsman: The Secret Service, starring new and proud vegan Samuel L. Jackson, opens in theaters.

Chloe’s Vegan Italian Kitchen: 150 Pizzas, Pastas, Pestos, Risottos, & Lots of Creamy Italian Classics is available today for your cookbook library. Lasagna Bolognese, anyone?

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Do-si-do on down to the 5th annual Texas Veggie Fair in Dallas’ Reverchon Park.

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Young animal activist leads the way for the next generation.

NATHAN RUNKLE

10Questions>

10QuestionsVN Publisher Joseph Connelly talks shop with today’s must-know names.

VegNews has long recognized Mercy For Animals’ founder Nathan Runkle for his tireless animal activism. In 2007 VN honored Runkle as one of our “25 Most Fascinating Vegetarians” while two years earlier we had named him one of the “Top 20 Activists Under 30 Years Old.” In 2009, at the ripe old age of 25, Runkle became the youngest person ever inducted into the US Animal Rights Hall of Fame. In addition, in 2011 Mercy For Animals became the first organization to receive the coveted Veggie Award™ for “Nonprofit of the Year” twice (only one other group has done so to date). It’s difficult to envision anyone achieving as much success this early in life and highly unlikely another individual will match his accomplishments anytime soon. For all of these reasons, we are pleased to share the story of this remarkable young man who has devoted his life to making the world a better place.

1 How did Mercy For Animals get started? I founded Mercy For Animals in a rural Ohio town in 1999 after a farmed animal

cruelty case compelled me to act. Our local high school had an agricultural class, taught by a pig farmer. One morning the teacher tried to kill a number of piglets on his farm to be used in a dissection project. When he arrived to the school with the piglets, one of them was still alive. A student in the class, who also did part-time work on the teacher’s farm, took the piglet by her hind legs and slammed her headfirst onto the ground. The piglet survived the assault but now suffered a fractured skull. Two students in the class grabbed the piglet, left the room, and took her to another teacher who quickly left the school and had the piglet euthanized. Animal cruelty charges were filed in the case—but were dismissed on the first day of trial because the act of slamming a piglet headfirst into the ground is considered a “standard agricultural practice” and therefore exempt from cruelty prosecution.

This case, and the lack of legal protection granted to farmed animals, illustrated to me that there needed to be an organization that would give a voice to farmed animals in Ohio. Mercy For Animals was born out of that need.

2 How old were you when this happened?I was 15.

3It’s easy to understand how and why such a traumatic experience would affect a 15-year-old. But what did you know

at the time about starting, and running, an organization?I was driven by a deep motivation and desire to help animals. I learned how to run an organization by rolling up my sleeves and just diving into the demanding—but deeply rewarding—work of fighting for social change. Over the past 15 years I’ve learned so much about government, food, farming, economics, politics, and human behavior and psychology by being on the front lines for animals. N

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4 And you have done an amazing job. You just mentioned 15 years. Mercy For Animals reached that modest yet

significant milestone this year. What plans are in the works to celebrate the anniversary?Thank you. To mark this milestone we are hosting a 15th Anniversary Gala on September 12 in Los Angeles. The event will be hosted by the incredible Jane Velez-Mitchell and will feature such MFA supporters as Kathy Freston, Natalie Maines, Moby, Russell Simmons, Sam Simon, and more. It will be a special opportunity to celebrate the many victories and successes we’ve achieved in preventing cruelty to farmed animals and promoting compassionate food choices and policies.

5 That looks to be a hot-ticket event! You mentioned successes. What are three of MFA’s greatest milestones to date?

Fortunately there have been many victories in each of our program areas over the years: undercover investigations, legal advocacy, corporate outreach, and consumer education. But, if I had to pick just three, they would be:

1. Securing the first-ever felony conviction for cruelty to factory-farmed birds. This conviction was the result of an MFA investigation at Butterball—the largest turkey producer in the United States.

2. Pressuring major corporations—including Costco, Kmart, Kraft, and Safeway—to ban some of the worst factory farming practices, including tail docking of cows, confining calves in veal crates, and cramming pigs in gestation crates.

3. Inspiring countless people to adopt a vegan diet. Through our outreach programs, we have educated many millions of people about the horrors of factory farming and about the powerful impact a plant-based diet can have. This work has spared millions upon millions of animals’ lives.

6 MFA has been at the forefront of undercover video investigations. Why are these so critical to the movement?

Undercover investigations are absolutely crucial to the success of the animal protection movement. They expose, for the world to see, the daily exploitation and violence animals endure on factory farms and in slaughterhouses. Nearly every piece of animal-friendly legislation, corporate policy change, cruelty prosecution, or public awareness campaign stems from the work of

an undercover investigator. Seeing is believing and when the American public sees the way animals are confined, mutilated, and violently killed on factory farms, they demand change and take action.

7 Another area where MFA excels is working with the media and celebrities. How important are these two groups? How

critical are they to promoting the message? The media and celebrities can be such powerful allies for animals. If an issue isn’t in the headlines, on the news, or in the public discussion, then progress cannot and will not occur. Cruelty to animals simply cannot stand the spotlight, which is why it’s so important for us to put it there. I think the media have finally awakened to factory farming and veganism as important issues facing our society. Celebrities are also championing the cause—bringing the issue further into mainstream consciousness. When the two work in tandem, wonderful things can happen.

8 In addition to your animal work, you have also been recognized by another oppressed segment of society. OUT

magazine recently named you one of eight “Notables on the Power List Radar.” Is there anything the LGBT community can learn from the animal rights community, and vice versa? Oppression is oppression and violence is violence, regardless of the form it takes. Growing up gay in a small farm town, I experienced a lot of prejudice, bullying, and violence. It really sensitized me to the feelings of others, including animals. In our society, farmed animals are completely at our mercy and so vulnerable to abuse. MFA has been conducting outreach with the LGBT community for more than a decade now. Both movements are connected in a core mission of creating a society that is more inclusive in its compassion and consideration, regardless of whether the other individual is “different” from you.

9 In 2002 VegNews put you on the cover of a one-time supplement we published, AR News, for the story “Young Activists

Making a Difference.” If we were to do a follow-up edition and asked you to be our guest editor, whom would you put on the cover? Ah, yes, I remember that as if it were yesterday. Time certainly flies. Thankfully there are so many young advocates who are true leaders in our movement today. I attribute much of that to the rise of social media and YouTube. Today, you can see footage of factory farms and learn about being vegan simply by logging online. Back in 2002, that wasn’t the case. The

flow of information was very limited and restricted. The internet has brought greater transparency and accountability and has leveled the playing field between nonprofit organizations and multibillion-dollar corporations. The dams have burst and the new generation has access to the truth, and with that we are seeing the number of young

vegetarians, vegans, and animal advocates skyrocket. For that reason, I’d advise you to have a photomontage of hundreds of young advocates, with the title “Generation Vegan.”

10 It sounds to me as if you don’t want to abdicate your title! Since we just discussed young activists, I must

mention that you recently reached the ripe old age of 30. You have now been doing this work exactly half your life. If you could write your 15-year-old self a letter of advice today, what would you say?Wow, good question. I think I’d encourage myself to celebrate the successes, take care of myself, embrace the challenges, and enjoy the journey. I’d stress the importance of surrounding myself with positive, thoughtful people who can enrich my life—both personally and as an advocate. I’d assure myself that the future is bright and that incredible changes will occur—when our movement unites and works together.

VegNews publisher Joseph Connelly first met Nathan Runkle in 2001 and is as proud of him as if he were his own son.

Fast Fact: Since 2002, MFA has conducted more than 30 undercover investigations.

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Romance versus reality.By Ellen Kanner

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I TASTED THE FOOD OF MILLENNIUM LONG before I had the chance to visit San Francisco’s groundbreaking vegan restaurant. I was newly vegan in 1998 and somehow The Millennium Cookbook found its way into my hands. Millennium chef Eric Tucker’s book was a world away from the ho-hum hummus of most vegan cookbooks at the time. The recipes—bitter greens with figs and curried almond dressing, spring rolls with sesame and lime, eggplant torte with ratatouille—were—are —so flavor-intense and plant-powerful that they drove me into the kitchen. His dishes coaxed me into trying ingredients that had once seemed too weird. Tucker turned me on to nutritional yeast, and let us say, hallelujah. I could tell the Millennium chef understood my soul and my stomach. That is the romance of a great restaurant cookbook.

Then there’s the reality. To work in a restaurant is to know constant unpleasant surprises. Vendors don’t deliver. Equipment breaks. Diners are demanding. Your line cook checks into rehab. A bad—and anonymous—Yelp review can shut you down.

And on top of that, you want to write a cookbook?

At Millennium, Tucker can knock out a rich, creamy (and creamless) risotto for 60 without breaking a sweat. Reducing the recipe for a home cook to serve six is another story. “Recipe testing,” he says, “is like pulling teeth.”

“Cookbooks are big, daunting projects,” agrees Ann Gentry of Real Food Daily and The Real Food Daily Cookbook.

And, adds Vedge chef and Vedge author Rich Landau, “There’s not any money in cookbooks.”

All true, especially the money part. But it hasn’t stopped Tucker, Gentry, or Landau. Each has written not one, but two, cookbooks.

Restaurants exist to feed people. That’s their business. Why publish a cookbook that, in effect, gives away your recipes?

Blame Mollie Katzen.Back in 1973, in a far away place called

Ithaca, NY, Katzen belonged to a funky new collective called Moosewood. You couldn’t say “vegan,” let alone serve it, but pioneering Moosewood was happily serving meatless

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TryingThisAtHomeHoping to recreate your favorite restaurant meal at home? “You can’t,” says Landau. “I can’t.” A restaurant has equipment you’ve never dreamed of, including a commercial range that makes yours look like a toaster oven. It also has a team of line chefs who can do in 45 minutes what will take you three days, plus access to “ingredients you can’t afford and a crew of people to clean up,” says Landau.

Making a restaurant recipe can be a challenge even in a well-stocked home kitchen. A chef’s culinary brilliance does not always translate into a talent for communicating how to prepare a recipe. And each recipe is subject to each home cook’s sensibility. “There are different interpretations of what medium heat is,” says Ten Speed’s Wehner.

“I have never followed a recipe in my life,” says Landau. “I’m happiest just cooking. ” So how to balance what he can create with what a home cook can accomplish? He and Jacoby reverse engineered. They hired an assistant to watch Landau in the kitchen. “She figured out what I was actually doing.”

“The big thing is the volume—getting a recipe’s 60 to 70 servings down to four to six,” says Gentry. “It’s not just the math—you have to break it down, balance the seasoning, simplify the steps.” Wehner agrees. “Even when the recipes are perfect, the recipes are hard. High-end recipes are much more complicated.” Case in point: The Millennium Cookbook. Even 15 years after its release, the book seems cutting-edge—and unlike a good many chef-driven cookbooks, the recipes work. However, they are not what you want to try when you stagger home from work starving and need to eat now.

“It reads like a friggin’ novel,” admits Tucker. “I’ve had people say they get out of bed at 6 in the morning to cook from my book and at 6 pm, they have dinner. That’s why I’ve got a batterie of prep cooks down here tearing it up.”

On the other hand, a home cook has advantages a professional chef doesn’t. You can make dinner when you want to make dinner, barefoot, with a glass of wine (Tucker’s own preferred home cooking method), and if your pastry turns to paste, no one’s going to fire you. Just eat the filling. It’ll be terrific.

meals. Guests liked them. They asked for the recipes. Katzen obliged with the whimsical, hand-lettered Moosewood Cookbook. It remains one of the bestselling meatless cookbooks of all time and has been inducted into the James Beard Foundation’s Cookbook Hall of Fame. Well, that’s a hard precedent for a vegan chef to beat. So far, no one has.

But many of them share Katzen’s natural generosity. In Landau’s case, that spirit of generosity is overlaid with guilt. “People asked us for recipes all the time. They’d say, “If I could cook like this, I’d be vegetarian.”

Imagining all the omnivores who’d go plant-based if only they had recipes like the restaurant’s madly popular shaved Brussels sprouts kept him up nights: “I couldn’t sleep.” Last year, he and wife Kate Jacoby came out with their second cookbook, Vedge. As its subtitle promises, it redefines vegetable cooking, offering produce-centric, doable

recipes with bright, bold flavors. It’s a win-win: Landau gets a good night’s sleep and Vedge fans get a cookbook that’s a dream come true.

Yeah, but is publishing a vegan cookbook good business? Ten Speed Press publisher Aaron Wehner thinks so. “It’s been a growth category for five-plus years.” Wehner’s been with Ten Speed for longer than that, since 1997, the year before the house published The Millennium Cookbook. He was championing vegan cookbooks back when the omnivorous world thought vegan was wacky. Wehner didn’t care. “We’re based in San Francisco—the same city that gave birth to Greens (the West Coast’s answer to Moosewood) and a lot of vegetable-forward cooking. We’re a little more ahead of certain trends—not just in cooking, but in overall lifestyle. For us, Millennium was just a great restaurant to a do a book with—and a great restaurant.”

“Back then, it was just a bunch of hippies,

Executive Chef Eric Tucker always brightens San Francisco’s Millennium Restaurant with his warm smile.


steamed vegetables, and your server’s going to have a name like Pineapple,” recalls Gentry, who opened the game-changing Real Food Daily in Santa Monica in 1993. “We put vegan on the map.”

But “vegan” was still unsayable when her cookbook came out in 1994, or at least unpublishable. Real Food Daily is subtitled Really Fresh, Really Good, Really Vegetarian. The Millennium Cookbook, published in 1998, was subtitled Extraordinary Vegetarian Cuisine, even though the recipes, like the restaurants, are plant-based. The publishing mindset had shifted so fast that by the time Tucker released the second Millennium cookbook in 2003, Ten Speed was able to use the “V” word and call the book what it is: The Artful Vegan.

The history of vegan cookbooks is brief, but in that short time, the field has exploded. An Amazon search yields a mere 24 titles available in 1993, compared to 504 in 2013. So who’s buying all these vegan restaurants’ cookbooks? Mostly women, according to a recent Bowker Market Research study. Women represent 69 percent of the market. People in their 30s and 40s are more likely to buy cookbooks (including vegan cookbooks) regardless of what they eat. “Nonvegan home cooks are looking for inspiration,” says Wehner.

They’ll find it. From innovations in the kitchen, like those from raw vegan visionary Matthew Kenney, to innovations in cookbooks, like Dirt Candy chef Amanda Cohen’s graphic novel/cookbook, “vegan food has transformed,” says Angel Ramos of Candle 79.

Ramos has had a hand in making it happen. He’s been with the New York landmark since Candle Café’s 1994 opening, starting as a runner—the guy who hustles your plate from the kitchen to your table. “But I really liked to cook, to make people happy with what they eat.” Ramos went to the manager and said, “Give me a chance.” He worked his way up and is now the executive chef and part of the reason vegan fare has moved beyond earnest, brown, and bland (two words: lentil loaf) to gingery Asian dumplings, Caribbean curries, and luscious vegan chocolate everything.

Ramos has done a study of his own, trying to determine the makeup of those who frequent

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InItForTheAnimals—Sublime“You want every restaurant—you want the whole world—to be vegan,” says Vedge’s Landau. But like most vegan chefs, he finds it’s better to sell people on the concept of amazing plant-based food and leave the serving of agenda off the plate.

“That’s something we never push on people,” says Tucker. Landau agrees. “There’s no one in a cow suit with a ‘Meat Is Murder’ sign. We believe in animal rights, we’ve got a sickening country, we have our mission—but we’re chefs first.”

“Everyone’s on their own food journey,” as Gentry puts it.

Sublime, in Fort Lauderdale, FL, is the exception that proves the rule. Locals’ favorite go-to spot and mecca for visiting vegan celebs from Alec Baldwin to Neal Barnard, Sublime offers a romantic, fine-dining ambiance and comfort vegan cuisine, all served with a dollop of activism.

It’s driven by owner Nanci Alexander. The former wife of billionaire Houston Rockets owner Leslie Alexander, Alexander (an ardent vegan) cares more about animals than she does big bucks and sports. In 1989 she founded the nonprofit Animal Rights Foundation of Florida (ARFF), which she still runs. She opened Sublime 10 years later.

Sublime isn’t the only vegan restaurant to support, of course. Candle Café owners Joy Pierson and Bart Potenza serve on the board of the nonprofit New York Coalition for Healthy School Foods, which advocates for plant-based education and meals for school children.

Alexander takes it even further, though, donating all—that’s 100 percent—of the profits from both the restaurant and The Sublime Restaurant Cookbook to animal welfare.

The restaurant has been home to a host of culinary talent over the years, including Tal Ronnen, vegan chef to the stars, owner of Los Angeles’ Crossroads Kitchen, and author of The Conscious Cook. Yet it is Alexander’s name that appears on the cover of The Sublime Restaurant Cookbook. A tireless activist and PETA supporter, she dedicates the book to “all the animals who are thought of as food, rather than the magnificent individual beings they are.”

the restaurant and buy the cookbooks. “I’d say 80 percent are not vegan. They just like the food.” That’s good, he says. But he’s always up for a challenge, like the first-timers who come to the café with their minds made up. “They’re so closed—they don’t want to try something different. They think it’s not going to taste good. Then they try it, and they say, ‘Oh, wow, it wasn’t what I suspected.’ That’s even better.”

Vegan restaurant cookbooks have in common a fair number of standard recipes: arugula salads, black bean soups, plant-based piccatas, tofu scrambles, and veggie burgers. They all tend to avoid processed vegan food. The veggie burgers and vegan cheese are made in-house. What makes each cookbook unique is the way it represents the restaurant’s own ethos, culinary sensibility, and personality. In the case of the Chicago Diner (“Meat-free since ’83”), it’s an everyman sensibility.

“We’re anti-establishment,” says manager/

owner Mickey Hornick with a bit of swagger.Hornick and Jo Kaucher, Chicago Diner’s

chef (and Hornick’s wife), opened the eatery “when Chicago wasn’t such a foodie town” because they were desperate for great food made with compassion.

“The original veggie burgers tasted like Styrofoam,” says Hornick.

The veggie burgers have improved and people’s appetite for vegan dining has grown. A lot. In the last few years, Hornick’s watched as plant-based restaurants pop up on every corner. “The food is gourmet, organic, and expensive—$150 for a 12-course vegan meal. We’re a diner. And charge $8.95.”

“A hundred dollars?” Kaucher laughs. “I can buy a lot of groceries with that.”

The couple’s we’re-all-in-this-together sensibility comes with The New Chicago Diner Cookbook. Kaucher shares author creds with food writer Kat Barry “and The Chicago Diner

Spouses and chefs/owners Rich Landau and Kate Jacoby of Philadelphia’s Vedge will open a second eatery, V Street, in October.


Crew.” The book, which came out in 2013 in honor of the diner’s 30th anniversary, is a more polished effort than their 2002 publication, The Chicago Diner Cookbook. It reflects just how foodie Chicago has become. But its signature sandwich, the Radical Ruben (actually $11), immortalized on the cover, still rules.

It’s kind of a thrill to see Chicago Diner and so many of the plant-based pioneers still in business, still cooking to our hearts’ content. Even the vegetarian forerunners are still at it. Greens founding chef, Deborah Madison, released the bestselling Vegetable Literacy last year. Mollie Katzen, who put Moosewood on the culinary map, released her own 2013 title, The Heart of the Plate. Vegan Cooking for the Holidays from Candle Café, the third book from Ramos and the rest of the Candle team (and another Ten Speed book), is just out now, while Millennium’s Tucker is working on book number three. These restaurants may be old guard but the chefs are far from old school.

“There’s no laurels to rest on,” says Tucker. “We’re totally passionate about food, about what we do. We don’t do greatest hits. There’s always something new to learn. It keeps me and our staff on our toes.”

In a way, so does writing cookbooks. Doing that teeth-pulling recipe testing “has made me a better teacher,” he says.

Self-taught Gentry agrees. When she began, there was little in the way of vegan resources. Her book and Tucker’s were really among the first wave of vegan cookbooks featuring recipes you’d actually want to eat. More than that, though, Gentry wanted The Real Food Daily Cookbook to give home cooks a confidence in the kitchen she got only after years of trial and error. “I was a terrible cook in the beginning.” Her first foray into making couscous “turned into a big bunch of mush,” she says, laughing.

She won’t let that happen to you, by providing not only recipes like tempeh burgers and tofu quiche, but also a list of kitchen basics, from a good chef’s knife to a well-stocked pantry. “People really use the cookbooks. They’ve come back to me and said, ‘I did this recipe.’ I love that,” she says. “There is a lot of joy in it.”

Joy is not a bad bottom line.

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Looking through new vegan restaurant cookbooks—from Vedge to Plum to Vegan Holiday Cooking from Candle Café—I get the same sense I felt the first time I flipped through The Millennium Cookbook, of chefs with a deep, compassionate understanding of my stomach and soul. Their styles and recipes differ, but along with Tucker, Gentry, and the Chicago Diner crew, the joy comes through in their dishes. It’s as though they hold out a spoon, eager for you to taste what they’ve created. It’s a romantic, oddly intimate collaboration between the chef and the home cook. It’s connection.

“We’re working ... all the time, wondering how to get our message to the world,” says Vedge’s Landau. “Now we get these people who become intimate with the restaurant through the book. We’re getting email from around the

world. It’s become global; it’s amazing. You have the restaurant and a companion piece. It’s like going to the concert, then getting the CD and the program—you have the experience and a souvenir to take home.”

Cookbooks give the restaurant chefs the opportunity to do what they do best: to serve, to feed you. If you can’t make it to Candle 79 for the pleasure of a bowl of Ramos’ velvety roasted squash soup, the soft-spoken chef wants you to have the next best thing. “With the cookbooks, you can show people how to make vegan food taste good.”

Ellen Kanner (ellen-ink.com) is an award-winning food writer, Huffington Post’s Meatless Monday blogger, and author of Feeding the Hungry Ghost: Life, Faith, and What to Eat for Dinner, VegNews’ 2013 Book of the Year.

TheCookbooks The Artful Vegan: Fresh Flavors from The Millennium Restaurant

Babycakes: Vegan, (Mostly) Gluten-Free, and (Mostly) Sugar-Free Recipes from New York’s Most Talked-About Bakery

Babycakes Covers the Classics: Gluten-Free Vegan Recipes from Donuts to Snickerdoodles

The Candle Café Cookbook: More than 150 Enlightened Recipes from New York’s Renowned Vegan Restaurant

Candle 79 Cookbook: Modern Vegan Classics from New York’s Premier Sustainable Restaurant

Fresh: New Vegetarian and Vegan Recipes from Fresh Restaurants

Horizons: New Vegan Cuisine

The Millennium Cookbook: Extraordinary Vegetarian Cuisine

The New Chicago Diner Cookbook: Meat-free Recipes from America’s Veggie Diner

Plum: Gratifying Vegan Dishes from Seattle’s Plum Bistro

The Real Food Daily Cookbook: Really Fresh, Really Good, Really Vegetarian

ReFresh: Contemporary Vegan Recipes from the Award-Winning Fresh Restaurants

Sticky Fingers’ Sweets: 100 Super-Secret Vegan Recipes

The Sublime Restaurant Cookbook

Vedge: 100 Plates Large and Small that Redefine Vegetable Cooking

The Vegan Divas Cookbook

Vegan Family Meals: Real Food for Everyone

Vegan Holiday Cooking from Candle Café

Executive Chef Angel Ramos shares his love of organic, local vegetables in the seasonal menus at New York City’s Candle 79.


DAYIN THE

Adam Sobel of the Cinnamon Snail Food Truck takes VegNews readers along on a typical day.

BY ADAM SOBEL

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LIFE


4:50AM

I wake up and start my day with a minute-long meditation about how much I love my wife. I like to fix my mind on all of her wonderful qualities. Joey (she’s my wifey) was really instrumental in my becoming vegan, and she has done so much to help develop the pastry recipes we use on our truck.

5:00AM

I whip up a quick batch of breakfast chia pudding with fresh berries, crushed cacao beans, goji berries, and cashew milk to have for breakfast with my man, Sean, during our commute on the truck. The chia seeds sprout in the nut milk, and make a nourishing breakfast that has a consistency sorta like tapioca pudding. Since we will probably be too busy to stop and eat during the day, it’s nice to start with a good, clean breakfast.

5:15AM

I commute over to our kitchen on my bike. It’s still dark out, and I roll up to the glow of the lights of our kitchen. Our bakers are just finishing up the last of the doughnuts. Sean and I finish stocking the pastries and make sure that our fridges are tightly secured. Latches prevent the fridge doors from opening when we hit potholes getting into midtown Manhattan. We learned to attach them to the fridges the hard way.

6:00AM

Sean and I kick it in heavy commuter traffic in a food truck, eating chia pudding, listening to loud music, and getting amped for the day. We have a subwoofer strapped to the bottom of the driver seat for extra joy.

8:00AM

We arrive in Manhattan and hopefully find parking. If not, we play a weird game of parking voodoo for up to an hour. Parking is first-come, first-served, which is why sometimes we end up on a different block than planned, and we have to get the word out about our new location on Twitter.

8:30AM

The pre-grilling of 100 pounds of seitan begins. We like to sear the seitan in olive oil first, which keeps the moisture locked inside and gives the outside a nice texture. That way, when it comes time to prepare a specific sandwich, the seitan just needs to be briefly grilled with the appropriate marinade. We put quarters in the parking meter and start setting up our ever-increasing line of sauces, dressings, and condiments.

Number four on Yelp’s first-ever “Top 100 Places to Eat in the US.” Number four on Buzzfeed’s “25 Most Popular Food Trucks of 2013.” Winner of the first-ever Silver Spatula Award for top food truck in New Jersey. Adam Sobel’s Cinnamon Snail is taking vegan cuisine—and food trucks in general—to new culinary heights. How does he do it? In a VegNews exclusive, Sobel reveals how he finds the time to develop a new Thai barbecue marinade, teach a yoga class from home, and cuddle with the dog—all in a typical day!


9:00AM

The window opens to a line of six to 12 hungry people. The aroma of Maple Pecan Waffles and Chipotle Seitan Breakfast Burritos fills the air. A few people come just for coffee and doughnuts. Some of those folks don’t even realize our truck is vegan, and those are the people I get extra excited and giddy about. Their coffee and doughnut today is the gateway to a vegan tomorrow, and sometimes I hear from them a year later, when they come back to tell us that we were instrumental in their choice to go vegan!

10:30AM

While cooking, I also deal with an emergency over the phone with our prep kitchen. Our 80-quart mixer just broke, and we need to get a repair person on it ASAP. This is a bit of a constant in food truck life: our world is always filled with things that break down.

11:30AM

I leave the truck early while our crew starts to rock the lunch rush. I bring a box of fresh doughnuts to our publisher for a meeting about our upcoming cookbook (due out next year) and wolf down Korean BBQ Seitan for lunch. Korean BBQ Seitan is one of my favorite dishes on the truck. We make our own fresh kimchi with daikon, napa cabbage, red radishes, watermelon radishes, and a homemade Korean chile paste with ginger.

1:15PM

I hustle over to Penn Station to take a train back to our kitchen in Jersey. As I ride, I go over catering quotes, event logistics, and plans for new seasonal doughnut varieties. I check on our truck’s Twitter and Facebook pages and share a link for an event we are doing later in the week.

2:45PM

Back in the kitchen, I down a freshly fired yerba mate for strength (drowsiness fighting hard to take hold of my soul). I work with Michelle, our kitchen manager, on plans for this year’s Thanksgiving catering. Thanksgiving is one of our biggest catering days of the year. We prepare meals for hundreds of families in New York City and New Jersey. It takes months of planning, refrigerated truck rental, extra staff for the week, and a sorta unbelievable amount of stress. Knowing that we help people have a cruelty-free holiday makes the whole endeavor worth it.

“This is a bit of a constant in food

truck life: our world is always

filled with things that break down.”


3:50pM

I’m working on a fiery and exciting new Thai barbecue marinade for a new menu item, making adjustments to the recipe, and typing down tweaks. It needs more lemongrass and a touch more Thai basil and chiles. The plan is to make Thai barbecue tempeh with smoked, chili-roasted peanuts; pickled Thai basil and red onions; arugula; and Sriracha mayo on grilled spelt bread.

5:15PM

The truck returns to the kitchen. I run around and act silly while Sean pretends to run me over with the truck. Our many maintenance superheroes arrive to save the day: our handyman fixes a plumbing leak, our mechanic changes the oil on the truck’s generator, and our stocker inventories what’s left and gets us stocked for the next day. Finally, our cleaner shows up to deep clean the truck and wash all the empty trays and containers (the cleaning takes about four hours every night).

5:40pM

I get home and hug my wife, Joey, and baby, Ozlem. I water the garden while snacking on Dr. Cow’s awesome cashew cheese and crisp slices of Pink Lady apples. We grow a lot in our front yard garden. We have Concord grapes on an arbor, a dozen raised beds of vegetables and culinary herbs, fruit and nut trees, about 40 blueberry bushes, and a wide variety of medicinal herbs. We tincture the herbs to use for medicine for our family.

6:00PM

Joey and I sweep and mop the house, and perhaps counterproductively, I roll around on the floor with my soft, soft, soft dog Mossy (a badly behaved and adorable Border Collie rescue). When we first got Mossy, she was really a mess, with major fear-aggression problems from trauma with her previous guardians. She has come a long way, but she’s still a bundle of trouble. I might get married to her. We are kinda in love.

6:30PM

I get in touch with our bakers about special orders they will be working on for the night and give them instructions for a new cherry-chocolate-cheesecake brownie I’ve been experimenting with. I’ll swing by in the morning to take photos to put on Instagram, because it’s going to be really mouthwatering food porn material.


7:00PM

I sit down on the mat with my wife to teach a free 90-minute yoga class that we instruct twice a week from our home (every Monday and Wednesday at 7pm). Even if we are away, we have a friend cover the class, so that it’s a reliable place where folks from our community can come and do yoga for free. I’m extra exhausted, but that makes the stretching and meditation even more wonderful-feeling.

8:30PM

We eat a yummy salad with spicy sesame tempeh and marinated sea veggies. I fire up a blender full of raw chocolate hempseed milk, make some popcorn with nutritional yeast, and spend some time with Frank, our friend who is helping us design and build our next food truck. Every inch of the new truck is being designed to maximize refrigeration space and to make it easier to move around inside. The Snail 2.0 is going to be the Rolls Royce of vegan food trucks.

8:45PM

Dog food is done cooking, and we feed the pups a yummy din din. Our dogs are vegan, and we prepare their food with rice, lentils, sweet potatoes, kale and broccoli stems, flax meal, wheat germ, and olive or coconut oil. We like to change up the legumes and veggies sometimes to keep their diet diverse.

9:00PM

We do dishes, shower, brush our teeth, and then I get to hang out with my wife and kids in a hammock. We sip warm matcha tea prepared with homemade almond milk, read stories , and discuss the details of wedding cakes we will be working on together Friday night. Joey pretty much does all our cakes, though she likes design input and planning help from me.Finally, I get in bed. Cuddling of the dog commences. We have a super-big futon mattress on the floor, which fits our whole family, including dogs and cats. It’s really snuggly.

1:30AM

Phone rings. There’s a problem with the thermostat on our doughnut fryer. I talk the bakers through resetting it. Sometimes it’s not so easy. Sometimes our mechanic has found a problem with our generator, and I have to go play with him under the truck all night trying to solve generator puzzles. There’s lots of fun stuff like that to deal with to bring vegan food to the streets, and it’s always, always worth it. I love what I do and am grateful for the opportunity to do this kind of work with my life, surrounded by people I love.


How much do you spend on parking meters in an average day?

Even paying the $3.50/hour meters in Midtown, we still get tickets for “vending from a metered location” almost daily, which vary from $65 to $115.

When and why did you go vegan?

I went vegan when my daughter, Idil, was born 12 years ago. I had been vegetarian for a while, but the day my wife labored at home, I had some revelations about the physical and spiritual significance of breastfeeding. I decided I could never come between any mother and child again. I went vegan and had a child all in one day, which have been the two best things I have done in my life.

When did you open the Snail?

Valentines Day, 2010.

What did you do before the Snail?

I worked in vegetarian and vegan restaurants for about 10 years before starting the Cinnamon Snail. I also produced and performed psytrance music, and threw illegal trance music parties in the Pine Barrens in southern New Jersey.

Where did the name Cinnamon Snail come from?

The heavens parted, and world-renowned cellist, Yo-Yo Ma, came down in a sapphire-encrusted tuxedo, and as he performed a gorgeous, laser-guided rap attack (with sweatsuit-clad synchronized back-up dancers), he told me to call our truck “The Cinnamon Snail” because that name would please him the most.

Adam Sobel is a self-taught chef who runs The Cinnamon Snail food truck, teaches cooking classes, instructs free yoga classes, and loves his bad, bad Border Collie Mossy.

“The Snail 2.0 is going to be

the Rolls Royce of vegan

food trucks.”

FIVE Things You Need to Know About Adam Sobel AND THE CINNAMON SNAIL


AfterFallthe

Meeting imperfection with compassion.By Melanie Wilson


AS COMPASSIONATE AS THE VEG WORLD can be, what with all our animal love and environmental awareness, there is a dark underside that rears its ugly head when a vegan slips up, falls off the wagon, or worse, intentionally leaves the fold. Of course it can be disheartening to learn that a person no longer fits the image you hold (especially if that person is you). You may worry about the damage it does to the vegan movement to receive such negative publicity. You may even express your disappointment by disparaging the person whose actions are viewed as misguided or downright wrong. I’m reluctant to admit that I’ve been on both sides of this predicament, and it’s tough from either perspective.

Back in the day, my pet peeve was when people who called themselves vegetarian intentionally ate some nonveg foods on a regular basis. I felt that people should not

misuse labels, because it made the whole plant-based lifestyle more difficult for those of us who fight misconceptions, having to explain ourselves over and over. On the other hand, people make mistakes. Should someone be denied the status of vegetarian just for making a misstep, even if they did it repeatedly? In my mind, it came down to intentions, and the issue was black and white. But who was I? The vegan police?

“It’s about progress, not perfection,” says Lindsay Nixon of happyherbivore.com and author of The Happy Herbivore Guide to Plant-Based Eating. For some, she says, a slip-up makes them feel so awful physically that it solidifies their commitment to a plant-based diet. “I’ll never do that again!” Often the food doesn’t taste as good as they remembered, and they realize they aren’t missing out after all.

Eating and living well is a work in progress. For some it’s a casual meandering toward healthful eating, while for others it’s a steady march on a strict path. Food choices are intertwined with ethics to differing degrees.

Though it is human nature to judge others by how we think we would behave in a given situation, none of us can really know another’s journey. So when a fellow vegan takes a different path, it shouldn’t be viewed as a blow to our way of life. Likewise, when we stumble ourselves, we need not give up.

We live in a world where temptations abound, where even the most diehard vegan can turn carnivorous. The reasons for taking a diet detour are many and complicated—physical, emotional, psychological—but they don’t really matter, because they are all fodder for endless debate. What it comes down to is that people do decide for one reason or another to eat things that in a different mindset they would turn down unconditionally.

It’s what happens next that really matters.If it happens to you, you can move on,

stay firm in your convictions, and accept that imperfection is part of life—or you can get

mired in a landslide of self-doubt. Can I still call myself vegetarian/vegan? How could I let this happen? Is it worth the effort? Am I a fraud? At the core of veganism is absolutism. Its very definition embodies an all-or-nothing mindset. So it isn’t surprising that many who slip up berate themselves. It’s important to remember what Happy Herbivore’s Nixon says.

“I was so ashamed I dropped all of my vegan friends,” says Margie (only first names are used to protect the confidentiality of those interviewed for this story), 37, who returned to omnivorous eating for 14 months in her late 20s after being vegan for four years. “I know it sounds ridiculous, but I just couldn’t face them until I stopped eating animal products again. That time just stretched on and on as I struggled, and we grew farther apart.” To add to the confusion, her nonveg friends and family welcomed her back wholeheartedly, encouraging her decision to return to omnivorous eating.

Cristi Fisher of settingthebone.com initially became a vegetarian because she innately

PinterestVeganIf you lack real-life support for your commitment to veganism, you might just find it on the web. It’s easy to lose yourself in Pinterest, an online community started in 2010. The social interaction on this site is mostly of a visual nature, not text-based, so it appeals to your sensory side. It’s absolutely addictive—not only because it’s useful on a practical level for collecting ideas but also for its sheer beauty. It’s a treat for the eyes, the imagination, and the heart—and it’s free! Feeling down? Look at baby animals. Feeling creative? Search DIY. Hungry? Find a delicious vegan recipe. Not only are there many vegan recipe boards ready made for you to follow—complete with mouthwatering photos—there are lots of vegan-related pins (quotes, humor, fashion, and more). One of my favorite vegan pinners is Vegan Housewives. The new keyword search suggests search terms so you can narrow your vegan search down to pins that fit in new and surprising ways. Choose from dozens of categories, follow your favorite pinners or boards, then create a few boards of your own. Before long you’ll have your own followers.

“At the core of veganism is absolutism. Its very definition embodies an all-or-nothing mindset. So it isn’t surprising that many who slip up berate themselves.”

Meeting imperfection with compassion.By Melanie Wilson


“I was on a road trip. There was only fast food around. I had a Whopper. That was it.”

“When home for Thanksgiving break I didn’t want to hurt Grandma’s feelings by not eating the turkey.”

“I read that eggs are actually considered to be good for you now, so bring on the omelettes!”

If you’ve been vegan for any length of time, you’ve heard such stories from former vegans and vegetarians: tales of unconversion, told apologetically and tinged with guilt, which focus on a pivotal, sometimes serendipitous moment in which months or years of plant-based eating are suddenly over—perhaps temporarily, perhaps for good.

And you probably remember the first time you heard such a story, as it likely occasioned challenging or unnerving introspection: is “vegan” merely a phase for me, too? How strong are my convictions? Are there circumstances under which I might consume meat?

This soul searching is not without merit, as both “vegan” and “vegetarian” are, indeed, transitory identities for most who adopt this way of life. There are far more former vegans and vegetarians than there are practicing: by some measures, roughly three times as many. This may be discouraging to hear, and almost nonsensical for many vegans, as veganism is so often experienced as a heady amalgam of core personal identity, religious fervor, and social movement activism—further entrenched as we cloister ourselves in ideologically like-minded social circles.

What explains this high rate of attrition? Research has found several common themes among former vegans/vegetarians:

Their food choices were not grounded in ethical beliefsEthical reasons for adopting veganism/vegetarianism are more prominent among current

“meat limiters” than former. That is: ethical reasons for excluding animal products from one’s diet—concern for the environment, animal rights, political and moral values—seem to be the most solid basis for long-term veganism. However, it is not uncommon for one to become vegan for health reasons, then gradually adopt an ethical framework as well, as one learns more about the lives of farmed animals and the environmental impact of factory farming. This process further entrenches veganism into one’s core identity, increasing the likelihood that one will stay committed.

There are far more former vegans than practicing vegans; VegNews’ Marie Mika explains why, and offers tips to stay on the veg wagon.

Staying On The Veg Wagon

knew that eating animals felt wrong. “I went back to eating animals because I felt lonely and disconnected from other people. No one in my life seemed to share my beliefs.” Fisher acknowledges that she missed the comfort food of her childhood. “Looking back I realize what I was really craving was a connection and sense of belonging. But instead of recognizing those feelings and dealing with them, I just told myself that I was ‘craving’ meat.”

It’s important to remember that each person’s experience is his or her own. As vegans, our compassion for the natural world and the beings that inhabit it must extend to other people and, perhaps most importantly, to ourselves, no matter how flawed we believe ourselves to be. Getting back on track after a diversion can be the hardest part of all. Nixon has the answer: “Just do it. Make the next meal a vegan one.” And do it quickly. The longer you wait, the harder it becomes.

No one wants to admit it, but for many people eating animal products produces feelings akin to addiction. For those who push past the initial feelings of unease and get further from a plant-based diet, the comfort from animal-derived food grows. It becomes more and more difficult to give up the meat and dairy until the consequences—guilt, disconnection from self, weight gain, or medical problems—become unbearable.

A lot of soul searching went into Margie’s decision to live vegan once more. “It wasn’t as easy to go vegan the second time, because I was no longer sure of myself.” Where once Margie had believed she’d be vegan for the rest her life, suddenly she saw herself as erratic, changeable. “I was afraid to make a commitment to myself, my friends, and my family and then fail again.” Not only was it a matter of pride, she didn’t want to let anyone down.

Josh, 29, initially gave up animal products in high school as a dare, and went back to eating meat for six months in college. For him, the strength to return to veganism came with the realization that he was the one who ultimately had to live with his lifestyle choices. “As much pressure as I felt from both sides to eat a certain way, I had to make the decision for myself alone. Otherwise I wouldn’t stick with it.” It can be difficult to separate what we want from the needs and desires of those around us. Forgiving yourself and accepting your humanness, then evaluating what you truly want, may be the key. For Fisher it was realizing that “being a

As Jonathan Safran Foer so powerfully describes in Eating Animals, food is deeply personal, cultural, and the focus of family holidays and celebrations.


Veganism/vegetarianism was not part of their identityFor enduring vegans/vegetarians, their diets are deep parts of their personal identity; if one

were to say “I am a _______ ,” vegan would probably be the first response that comes to mind. Additionally, ethical (particularly animal rights) vegans are more likely to strongly self-identify as such, both when they first adopted veganism and today. If “vegan” isn’t a meaningful part of one’s identity, it is easier to revert to meat consumption.

An abrupt initial transition to vegetarianism/veganismMany former vegans and vegetarians initially went “cold Tofurky,” so to speak. A gradual

transition to veganism/vegetarianism—a common pattern being to first stop consuming red meat, then chicken, then fish, and finally dairy/eggs—is easier and more stable in the long run.

Lack of social supportAs Jonathan Safran Foer so powerfully describes in Eating Animals, food is deeply personal,

cultural, and the focus of family holidays and celebrations. Adopting a vegan diet can isolate one from friends and family; it may also be challenging to learn new ways of cooking, or discover enough personally pleasing recipes to constitute an entirely new diet. Former vegetarians and vegans often find all this too difficult to overcome, and resume eating meat just to make family and social life easier.

Unattainable ethical and behavioral consistencyFor some, “vegan” is a psychological and behavioral game of moral one-upmanship (the

“vegan police”) or a quest for pristine ethical consistency: to never use animal products in any way, shape, or form. Yet, paradoxically, the more one learns about the near omnipresence of animal bodies in the products we use and consume (wine, gumballs, marshmallows), perfection seems ever more elusive—and some people give up entirely: “If I just can’t avoid animal products no matter what I do, why try at all?”

What can you do?There’s nothing a vegan likes more than creating a new vegan—or keeping an established

vegan in the fold. If you want to be an effective ambassador for veganism, or nurture someone along on what can be a challenging and difficult lifestyle change, here are some effective steps you can take:

• Share favorite recipes, blogs, and resources. Dairy products are the hardest to leave behind for those moving toward veganism; showing alternatives to dairy for cooking and baking should prove quite helpful to the beginning or wavering vegan.

• Invite new vegans over for a plant-based feast and introduce them to restaurants with vegan offerings.

• Suggest favorite or influential films and books, such as Forks Over Knives, Diet for a New America, or Meet Your Meat. See the VegNews July+August 2014 issue for a comprehensive list of “Movies, Documentaries, and Videos about Food, Animals, and the Environment”

• Bring or offer vegan fare at family gatherings. • Above all, be kind, patient, and try to remember how difficult it may have been for

you to finally give up foods that you had enjoyed since childhood, gave you emotional sustenance, or were treasured family recipes.

In Vegetarianism: Movement or Moment?, Donna Maurer quotes an activist who simply sums up his philosophy: “If you want to see a vegetarian world … be the nicest, kindest, friendliest person you can be.”

Be the change.

Senior editor Marie Mika dreams of creating a VegNews vegan restaurant bicycle tour of San Francisco.

part of a culture of compassion was far more important than remaining a part of a tradition of cruelty.”

When I fell off the vegan wagon, I fell hard, and like Margie I hid from the world. When I emerged from my self-imposed confinement and admitted to a friend what I’d done, I found myself welcomed back to the vegan fold with open arms. The camaraderie in the vegan community is strong, yet I had let my fear and sense of failure keep me away for far too long. Today, however, I don’t answer to anyone for my food history. The choices I’ve made are mine and mine alone. They are a part of me, for better or worse. What happens next is all that really matters.

Melanie Wilson, former editor of Vegetarian Baby and Child magazine, lives in northern Minnesota with her husband Paul and lifelong vegetarian children, Kalli, 17, and Mackie, 13.

BookItThe vegan eye candy on Pinterest may inspire you to stay on the plant-based path—but a book club will give you a bit more to chew on! Ever been to goodreads.com? I originally joined the site back in 2008 just to keep track of the books I’d read in my goal (as yet unachieved) to read 50 books a year. Slowly I connected with my friends just to see what they were reading and get book recommendations. This past year I joined a group for the first time, and it prompted me out of curiosity to search for other groups. I found lots of vegan groups I could join, but the one that jumped out at me was a vegan group with 10 members, closed to the public, which was the online complement to a real-life book club. They don’t read vegan titles. They read whatever fiction books the group agrees on, but they have vegan food at their meetings eight times a year. Sounds like my kind of book club! Why not start a group of your own?


VegEscape

Bountiful

Berkeley

This university town (city, actually) has far too many vegan options to profile in one article, many of which we’ve covered before. So this time, we’d like to focus mainly on some newer businesses you might not know about that deserve some love. The last few years have seen huge strides in mainstreaming a plant-based diet, including restaurants that now have their own vegan menu sections. And we’re told that those dishes tend to be the favorites among vegans and meat eaters alike. Progress—one plate at a time.

From the Free Speech Movement to cruelty-free living, the other city by the Bay has long been at the forefront of social justice—for humans and animals alike (part 2 of 2).By Amy Leventhal & Marc Diamond

CaptivatingCreoleThe Big Easy comes to the East Bay in the eclectic, super welcoming neighborhood spot on Alcatraz Avenue called Easy Creole. One of the co-owners considers it a personal challenge to turn his Creole creations into vegan-friendly fare, which make up nearly half the menu. The overarching goal? Create a place where everyone can sit down together and feel comfortable. Mission accomplished.

> 1761 Alcatraz Ave.; 510-858-5063; easycreole.com

NailedItYou can’t visit Berkeley without stopping by the Adventure Playground located in the Berkeley Marina, where kids seven and up can get their creativity on in the great outdoors. Fun, exciting, and challenging, this playground isn’t what you might expect. What other playground provides hammers, saws, paint, and extra points for picking up rusty nails? Think of it as a workshop that’s constantly being built and reinvented by the kids themselves. There’s a fun zip line, too, for those who want to take a break from building.

> Shorebird Park Nature Center, 160 University Ave.; 510-981-6720; ci.berkeley.ca.us/adventureplayground

Missed part 1?Check out ourJuly+August 2014 issue spotlightingOakland, CA.


Berkeley residents Amy Leventhal & Marc Diamond can most often be found listening to Richie Havens on vinyl, drinking raw cacao, or chilling with King Cotton, the neighborhood cat.

C’estlaVBerkeley is happy to welcome the Republic of V to town. This all-vegan store features “foods, treats, and treasures” with the most extensive vegan cheese and chocolate sections we’ve ever seen, not to mention smoked “salmon” and other hard-to-find items like vegan belts and bacon grease. This one-stop shop is a new staple on the local vegan scene.

> 1624 University Ave.; 510-280-5778; republicofvegan.com

CloseKnitHidden in a quaint little alleyway behind Jupiter, and right around the corner from Gather, you’ll find Cakes & Purls, a knitting shop-meets-cupcakery. You can always count on at least three to six vegan options, including peanut butter chocolate, banana split, and classic vanilla. The gluten-free offerings are also vegan. They source all of their amazing fruit at local farmers markets. Even better—you can special order vegan cakes and cupcakes for that special someone. Congrats to nearby Cinnaholic for their delicious, always vegan cinnamon buns and for knocking it out of the park on Shark Tank!

> 2115 Allston Way; 510-225-0929; cakesandpurls.com

CounterCultureThe always popular Source in San Francisco opened up a smaller outpost in Epicurous Garden in the heart of the Gourmet Ghetto. Source Mini has the best vegan burger we’ve ever tasted, as well as a killer Banh Mi sandwich, pizzas, salads, “dosadillas,” and their own vegan homage to the Twinkie, Sno Ball, and mmmmore.

> 1511 Shattuck Ave.; 510-849-0000; sourcemini.com

Head-SpinningQualityOpen for almost five years, Dave’s Record Shop, in the Left Bank neighborhood of West Berkeley, specializes in rare and sought-after rock, jazz, and soul vinyl for serious listeners and collectors. Just steps away from the famed Fantasy Studios where Joan Baez, David Bowie, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Green Day, and many other music legends recorded or mastered albums, Dave’s lets you listen before you buy. It’s a small shop (which we kind of love), but it has a big heart and a great selection.

> 2634 San Pablo Ave.; 510-666-0336

GetCenteredThe Ecology Center, incorporated on Earth Day in 1970, has been a pioneer for all things eco-minded ever since. They are the masterminds behind the ever-popular Berkeley Farmers Markets, Berkeley’s curbside recycling program, classes, workshops, climate change action groups, and more. Their home base, a store that stocks nearly 5,000 eco-friendly products, is a great place to find gifts, books, seeds, and information.

> 2530 San Pablo Ave.; 510-548-2220; ecologycenter.org

ReadytoBeBowledOver? Vegetarians and vegans, rejoice! Finally, there’s a Korean restaurant in town that takes a compassionate diet into consideration. The hardest choice you’ll make at Bowl’d Korean Rice Bar is whether to get the JapChae or Bi Bim Bap. Lots of things can be made vegan—just ask. Fermented banchan side dishes and barley tea complement every meal. They also have a sister restaurant, Spoon, right around the corner from the beloved Berkeley Bowl West—a locally owned supermarket/haven for both vegans and vegetarians.

> 1479 Solano Ave.; 510-526-6223; bowldsolano.com

> 933 Ashby Ave.; 510-704-9555; spoonashby.com

> 920 Heinz Ave.; 510-898-9555; berkeleybowl.com

TheRawDeal Stop by the 100 percent organic Berkeley Farmers Market on Center Street in downtown Berkeley on Saturdays and snack on a Raw Daddy’s Gourmet Cone while you stroll the stalls. Try the savory, spicy Thai or polenta mushroom in a flaxseed cone—a feast for the eyes as well as the taste buds. If you’re craving a sweet treat afterward, head down to the other end of the market and sample the amazing raw chocolates at Coracao Confections.

> Center Street between Milvia Street & MLK Jr. Way; 510-548-3333

> 510-984-4848; rawdaddyfoods.com

> 510-548-3333; coracaoconfections.com


This delectable menu combines recipes from our cover story’s featured restaurant cookbooks into a stellar six-course meal.

Compiled by Ellen Kanner

Oh, it’s so hard to be a food writer, having to assemble a menu of luscious, plant-based recipes from some of the most amazing vegan restaurants on earth. Here’s what went into the process: a fair amount of salivating.

Also a desire for each recipe to reflect the soul of the chef who created it. You can find black bean soup almost anywhere. Each of these dishes, from stylish appetizer to sumptuous dessert, has its own unique flavor.

The Menu

APPETIZER

Asian Romaine Spring Rolls with Sesame-Lime DressingThe Millennium Cookbook: Extraordinary Vegetarian Cuisine

SOUP

Roasted Squash Soup with Almond Cream and Spiced Pumpkin SeedsVegan Holiday Cooking from Candle Café

SALAD

Yin and Yang Salad with Peanut-Sesame DressingThe Real Food Daily Cookbook

ENTRÉE

Roasted Baby Turnips with Maitake “Champignons au Vin”Vedge: 100 Plates Large and Small that Redefine Vegetable Cooking

SIDE

Curried Red Yam FriesPlum: Gratifying Vegan Dishes from Seattle’s Plum Bistro

DESSERT

Cocoa Mousse CakeThe New Chicago Diner Cookbook

Let’s eat.

The Restaurants vs. Cookbooks

Fantasy Feast

FoodFeature


COURSE 1:APPETIZERASIAN ROMAINE SPRING ROLLS WITH SESAME-LIME DRESSINGReprinted with permission from The Millennium Cookbook by Eric Tucker (Ten Speed Press, 1998).

Chef Tucker: “This is always a favorite when it goes onto the menu. The dressing features the herbal trinity of many Southeast Asian cuisines: mint, cilantro, and basil.”

Makes 6 servings

1 large head romaine lettuce

1 papaya, peeled, seeded, and cut into thin slices

1 red bell pepper, seeded, deribbed, and cut into thin slices

Kernels cut from 1 ear fresh corn

1 small jicama, peeled and cut into thin buttons

6 kumquats, cut into thin slices

1 tablespoon finely shredded fresh mint leaves

1 tablespoon minced fresh cilantro

2 cups Sesame Lime Dressing

Saffron-Lotus Root Pickles

Sesame seeds for garnish

1. Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Prepare a large bowl of ice water. Separate 12 of the largest romaine leaves from the head. Trim off the thick parts of the romaine stems. Blanch the romaine leaves for 10 seconds in the boiling water, then drain. Immediately immerse in the ice water to stop the blanching. Drain and pat dry with paper towels. Set aside.

2. Shred the remaining lettuce to make 2 cups. In a medium bowl, combine the shredded lettuce, papaya, bell pepper, corn, jicama, kumquats, mint, and cilantro with cup dressing.

3. On a flat work surface, place 2 romaine leaves, overlapping the stem of one next to the leaf of the other. Place 1 cup filling on the bottom of the leaves. Fold over the sides of the leaves, then roll them from the bottom into a cylinder. Repeat with the remaining leaves.

4. To serve, cover the bottom of each plate with cup dressing. Cut the rolls in half crosswise on the diagonal. Place half a roll on each plate, with the other half standing up or leaning against it. Garnish with slices of lotus root pickles and sesame seeds.

SESAME-LIME DRESSINGMakes 6 servings

1 cup fresh lime juice

1 clove garlic, minced

2 teaspoons minced fresh ginger

2 tablespoons maple syrup

bunch cilantro, stemmed

bunch mint, stemmed

bunch Thai or Italian basil, stemmed

1 kaffir lime leaf (optional)

1 Thai bird’s eye chile, seeded or 1 serrano chile

cup plus 1 tablespoon sesame seeds, toasted

3 tablespoons light miso

1 cups water

1 teaspoon minced lime zest

In a blender, combine the lime juice, garlic, ginger, maple syrup, cilantro, mint, basil, kaffir lime leaf, chile, cup sesame seeds, miso, and water and blend until smooth. Transfer the dressing to a bowl or other container and add the 1 tablespoon sesame seeds and the lime zest. Store in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 1 week.

SAFFRON-LOTUS ROOT PICKLESChef Tucker: “For this quick pickle, we add a little turmeric to the brine to produce day-old golden lotus root pickles. We use these to garnish many of our Asian-inspired dishes. If you use the saffron they will complement Indian or Middle Eastern dishes.”

Makes 10 to 12 pickles

1 lotus root, cut into 10 -inch-thick slices

1 cup rice or white wine vinegar

1 cup water

1 tablespoon sea salt

2 whole cloves garlic

teaspoon saffron threads (optional)

1 teaspoon turmeric

2 whole cloves

teaspoon fennel seeds

In a medium saucepan, combine all the ingredients. Bring to a boil and boil for 15 minutes. Chill and serve, or store with the brine in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 2 weeks.

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COURSE 2: SOUPROASTED SQUASH SOUP WITH ALMOND CREAM AND SPICED PUMPKIN SEEDSReprinted with permission from Vegan Holiday Cooking from Candle Café by Joy Pierson, Angel Ramos, and Jorge Penada (Ten Speed Press, 2014).

Chefs Pierson, Ramos, and Penada: “This smooth and creamy soup, garnished with rich almond cream and toasted pumpkin seeds, makes an elegant starter for a Thanksgiving feast. We recommend making batches of this nourishing soup all season long and keeping it on hand (it freezes beautifully) for cozy dinners that will warm your heart and soul. Note that the almonds must be soaked overnight.”

Makes 8 to 10 servings

ALMOND CREAM 2 cups sliced almonds

3 tablespoons safflower oil

2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

1 teaspoons sea salt

cup water

1 tablespoon chopped fresh chives

ROASTED SQUASH SOUP 3 tablespoons olive oil

1 tablespoon vegan margarine

1 cup diced white onion

1 cup chopped apple

teaspoon ground cinnamon

teaspoon chipotle chile powder

teaspoon chopped fresh sage

teaspoon fresh rosemary

lemongrass stalk, split

1 teaspoons sea salt

3 pounds butternut squash, peeled, seeded, and cut into 1-inch pieces

8 cups vegetable stock

SPICED PUMPKIN SEEDS 1 cup pumpkin seeds, hulled

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 teaspoons fresh lemon juice

Pinch of ground cinnamon

Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

1. To make the cream, the day before serving, place the almonds in a bowl and add enough water to cover. Cover and let soak overnight in the refrigerator.

2. Drain the nuts and transfer to a blender. Add the oil, lemon juice, salt, and water and blend until smooth, about 5 minutes. Transfer to a bowl, stir in the chives, and set aside. The cream will keep, covered, in the refrigerator, for up to 2 days.

3. To make the soup, heat the oil and margarine in a large soup pot over medium heat. Add the onion, apple, cinnamon, chipotle powder, sage, rosemary, and lemongrass, and cook, stirring occasionally, for 5 minutes.

4. Add the squash to the pot and stir to coat, about 3 minutes. Add the stock, bring to a boil, decrease the heat, and simmer, covered, until the squash is tender, about 40 minutes. Remove the lemongrass stalk and let the soup cool.

5. Transfer soup to a blender and blend until smooth. Or blend the soup with an immersion blender until smooth. This will have to be done in batches. The soup can be made ahead of time up to this point. It will keep in the refrigerator for up to 3 days or frozen up to three months.

6. Preheat the oven to 300 degrees.

7. To prepare the pumpkin seeds, combine the seeds, oil, lemon juice, cinnamon, and salt and pepper to taste in a bowl and mix together. Transfer to a baking sheet and roast for 5 to 10 minutes, shaking the pan occasionally, until the seeds are lightly browned.

8. To serve, pour the warm soup into bowls. Add a dollop of almond cream and sprinkle with the roasted pumpkin seeds.

COURSE 3: SALADYIN AND YANG SALAD WITH PEANUT-SESAME DRESSINGReprinted with permission from The Real Food Daily Cookbook by Ann Gentry (Ten Speed Press, 2005).

Chef Gentry: “The name of this salad is an homage to the ancient Chinese philosophy that all things in the universe contain elements of both yin and yang. Within each is the seed of the other, and when yin and yang work in harmony, all is good in the world. All is good in this salad, too. The crunchiness of the vegetables is the perfect counterpoint to the rich and creamy peanut dressing.”

Makes 4 servings

4 cups shredded napa cabbage

3 cups shredded red cabbage

2 carrots, peeled and julienned

1 (2 -inch) piece daikon radish, peeled and julienned

10 green onions (white and green parts), julienned

1 cup Peanut-Sesame Dressing

4 cups -inch cubes chilled Gingered Tofu

2 tablespoons toasted sesame seeds

Toss the cabbages, carrots, radish, and green onion in a large bowl with enough dressing to coat. Mound the salad into 4 wide, shallow bowls or onto plates. Arrange tofu around the salad. Sprinkle with sesame seeds and serve.

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PEANUT-SESAME DRESSINGChef Gentry: “If you’d like a spicier dressing, just add more crushed red pepper flakes. This thickens up once it’s refrigerated, so you can either add a little water to thin it or leave it thick to use as a sauce on grains and other cooked dishes.”

cup creamy peanut butter

cup brown rice vinegar

cup maple syrup

3 tablespoons water

2 tablespoons tamari

1 tablespoon minced peeled fresh ginger

2 cloves garlic

1 teaspoons toasted sesame oil

teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes

1 cup lightly packed fresh cilantro leaves

Blend the peanut butter, vinegar, maple syrup, water, tamari, ginger, garlic, sesame oil, and crushed red pepper in a food processor until smooth and creamy. Add the cilantro and blend just until it’s finely chopped. The dressing will keep for 2 days, covered and refrigerated.

GINGERED TOFUChef Gentry: “This basic tofu recipe is versatile and easy to make. It’s important to drain the liquid from the tofu before marinating, so give yourself enough time to properly prepare. Once the tofu is baked, serve it as “steaks” or cut into any desired shape—triangles for dipping, rectangles for sandwiches and entrées, or bite-size squares for salads.”

2 (12-ounce) containers water-packed extra-firm tofu

cup tamari

cup brown rice vinegar

cup toasted sesame oil

1 tablespoon minced garlic

1 tablespoon minced peeled fresh ginger

1 tablespoon canola oil

1. Drain the tofu and save the containers. Cut into 1-inch-wide strips, and pat dry with paper towels. Cover a large baking sheet with more dry paper towels. Place the tofu in a single layer over the towels on the baking sheet and let drain for 2 hours, changing the paper towels after 1 hour.

2. Whisk the tamari, vinegar, sesame oil, garlic, and ginger in a bowl to blend. Pour half of the marinade into the reserved tofu containers. Return the tofu slices to the containers, and pour the remaining marinade over. Cover and refrigerate at least 4 hours and up to 1 day.

3. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Oil a heavy, rimmed baking sheet with the canola oil. Drain the tofu and place it on the prepared baking sheet. Bake for 10 minutes on each side, or until golden brown and heated through. Serve warm, cold, or at room temperature. The tofu will keep for 1 day, covered and refrigerated.

COURSE 4:ENTRÉEROASTED BABY TURNIPS WITH MAITAKE “CHAMPIGNONS AU VIN”Reprinted with permission from Vedge by Rich Landau and Kate Jacoby (The Experiment, 2013)

Chef Landau: “I could spend hours wandering the side streets of Paris, popping into cafés with their inviting little patios adorned with pots of flowers and ornate signage. Unfortunately, I could spend very few of those hours actually eating, so I am constantly drawn to reimagining animal-free versions of French classics. This is one of our favorite go-to dishes for special-occasion menus at Vedge. For the elegant results, this dish is relatively easy to prepare, and its herbed red wine and mushroom jus will whisk you

right off to that Parisian corner café. If you can’t find maitakes, oyster mushrooms will also work well. In the dish that we photographed, we took a standard turnip, cut it into a medallion, and roasted it just like the quartered or halved turnips in this recipe.”

Makes 4 servings

2 pounds maitake*, bottoms of stems removed, caps wiped clean

1 pound baby turnips, halved, or standard turnips, quartered

1 carrot, peeled and sliced into -inch rounds

1 cup diced onions

cup olive oil

2 tablespoons minced garlic

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

2 cups dry red wine

2 cups vegetable stock

1 tablespoon chopped fresh thyme

* Mushrooms also known as hen-of-the-woods.

1. Preheat oven to 450 degrees.

2. Break or cut the mushrooms into 3- to 4-inch chunks. Toss the mushroom chunks, turnips, carrots, onions, olive oil, garlic, salt, and pepper in a large bowl. Pour the mixture into a 13 x 9-inch casserole dish and bake for 10 minutes.

3. Pour the wine over the roasted vegetables, stir, then cover the dish with foil or a lid and bake for an additional 10 minutes.

4. Remove the foil and pour the vegetable stock over the vegetables. Return the dish to the oven, uncovered, for 10 more minutes. Add the thyme and stir gently, then serve.

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COURSE 5: SIDECURRIED RED YAM FRIESReprinted with permission from Plum by Makini Howell (Sasquatch, 2013)

Makes 4 servings

1 quart canola oil

2 medium red-skinned yams, unpeeled and cut into fries about 4 inches long by inch thick

1 tablespoon curry powder

2 teaspoons chopped fresh parsley, or 1 teaspoon chopped fresh dill or cilantro

1. Heat oil in a large, heavy-bottomed Dutch oven to 350 degrees as measured on an instant-read thermometer.2. Place the yams in a fry basket, lower it carefully into the hot oil, and cook until the fries rise to the top, 3 to 7 minutes depending on their thickness. If you don’t have a fry basket, gently lower the fries into the oil using a slotted spoon, being careful not to splatter the hot oil, then carefully remove with a slotted spoon.

3. Transfer fries to a tray or bowl lined with paper towels. Toss with curry powder (add according to taste) and parsley, dill, or cilantro, and serve immediately.

COURSE 6: DESSERTCOCOA MOUSSE CAKEReprinted with permission from The New Chicago Diner Cookbook by Jo Kaucher, Kat Barry, and the Chicago Diner Crew (Agate, 2013)

Chefs Kaucher and Barry: “Fluffy, moist chocolate cake layered between a rich, whipped chocolate mousse…this cake will send you to pure vegan bliss. It’s nearly impossible to stop yourself from polishing off a whole slice in seconds.”

Makes 1 8-inch cake

For the cocoa mousse:

2 cups dairy-free semisweet chocolate chips

1 cup soymilk

1 tablespoon brown rice syrup

6 ounces silken tofu, drained

For the cake:

2 cups whole wheat pastry flour or unbleached organic all-purpose flour

cup cocoa powder

teaspoon baking soda

teaspoon baking powder

teaspoon sea salt

1 cups brown rice syrup

1 cup water

cup + 1 tablespoon vegetable oil

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 teaspoon white vinegar

Fresh berries, mint sprigs, or orange zest, for topping (optional)

TO MAKE THE COCOA MOUSSE:

1. Place the chocolate chips in a double boiler over low heat and allow to melt, stirring constantly. If you don’t have a double boiler, you can place a small saucepan inside another saucepan with about 1 inch of simmering water in it. When using this method, be sure that you do not let the bottom of the upper saucepan touch the water (it will burn the chocolate), and that you do not let any water get into the upper saucepan (which would break the chocolate and cause it to separate).

2. In a blender, combine the soy milk, brown rice syrup, and tofu and purée the mixture. Add the melted chocolate chips to the blender and blend until smooth. Transfer to a bowl and chill in the refrigerator for 1 hour.

TO MAKE THE CAKE:1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees (325 degrees for convection ovens). Lightly grease the bottom and sides of an 8-inch cake pan.

2. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, sift together flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder, and salt on low speed until well combined.

3. In a medium mixing bowl, combine brown rice syrup, water, oil, vanilla, and vinegar.

4. Pour the wet ingredients into the bowl of the stand mixer. Mix well on low speed for 2 to 3 minutes, until fully combined and smooth. Be sure to scrape the sides of the bowl to make sure all the dry ingredients are thoroughly mixed. Pour the cake batter into the prepared cake pan.

5. Bake for 30 minutes or until a toothpike inserted into the center comes out clean. Remove from oven.

6. Let cake cool in pan on a wire rack for 30 minutes. Carefully invert pan onto a cake plate. (You may need to slide a knife along the edge of the pan before flipping.)

7. Once the cake is completely cool, frost it with the Cocoa Mousse. A warm cake will melt frosting, and if you don’t wait, your cake will be glazed rather than frosted. Top with fresh berries, mint sprigs, or orange zest, if using.

8. Serve immediately or store in an airtight container in the refrigerator for 5 to 7 days.

Ellen Kanner (ellen-ink.com) is an incredibly rare fourth-generation Floridian who lives la vida vegan in Miami and believes in close community, strong coffee, organic food, and red lipstick.

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DidSomeoneSayDessert?“Plant-based” went from earnest to awesome with two words: vegan cupcakes. Isa Chandra Moskowitz and Terry Hope Romero started in all in 2006 with Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World—which, along with their 2007 Veganomicon—still leads the pack in vegan cookbook sales. Since then, vegan bakeries have been taking over the world, too, led by a few devoted sweet freaks who’ve unlocked the mystery of plant-based baking.

So far, it’s a girls-only club: three smart, award-winning cookies whose decadent treats outshine their drowning-in-dairy competition. Two-time Cupcake Wars champ Doron Petersan rules the capital at her DC landmark, Sticky Fingers Bakery. In New York, Babycakes’ Erin McKenna, whose cupcakes were voted the city’s best by New York Magazine a few years back, dukes it out (compassionately) with Vegan Divas diva Fernanda Capobianco, whose baked donuts took Time Out’s Best of 2011 award.

Cupcake cuties Petersan and McKenna both have a deliciously naughty BFF vibe, while Capobianco has a cooler sensibility. She’s a vegan diva, after all, plus she’s married to pastry royalty and bakery owner Francois Payard (who is manifestly not vegan—call it crazy love).

In their bakeries, all may appear sweetness and light (especially sweetness), but vegan doughnuts and plant-based whoopiee pies don’t just happen by magic. These vegan pastry goddesses have suffered through many a substandard s’more before hitting on a winning combination. Their cookbook recipes are not without calories and not without effort, often involving lengthy preparation and special ingredients and equipment.

Ah, but it’s worth it for a totally mind-blowing brownie. As Petersan puts it, “Anyone who says they don’t have a sweet tooth is a total liar.”


Puerto Rico is home to white sandy beaches, the El Yunque National Forest—and a variety of crispy, fried snacks known as frituras.By Robin Robertson

IT DOESN’T TAKE LONG TO FIND GREAT VEGAN options in la comida Criolla, the Creole cuisine of Puerto Rico; this is due to the island’s rich mix of cultures, each with its own special tastes and cooking techniques. The original inhabitants of the Caribbean, the Taínos, provided the corn, local root vegetables, and tropical fruit. The Spanish added rice, wheat, and olive oil. But the larder of la Isla del Encanto (island of enchantment) still wasn’t complete until the African slave trade brought okra, taro, and deep frying. The result is the delicious cuisine known in Puerto Rico today.

Puerto Rican cooks draw on local produce. The pear-shaped chayote (also known as christophine) is a Puerto Rican favorite, as are the native root vegetables cassavai and yautia, breadfruit, malanga (a local sweet potato), plantains, taro, and yuca. Meals often begin with a soup or appetizer, such as empanadillas (crescent-shaped turnovers made with a variety of fillings) or baked and fried plantain slices, called tostones or patacones. Arepas, fried cornmeal patties found throughout South America, are also enjoyed in Puerto Rico.

If you guessed that the most popular appetizers or snacks in Puerto Rico are fried, you’d be correct. Crispy frituras, or fritters, can

be found in food stalls or kiosks all over the island, as well as in most restaurants. Although many of these tasty bites are often filled with meat or seafood, it’s easy to adapt them by using cooked beans, seitan, or tempeh.

Frituras range from alcapurrias, stuffed fritters made with taro root and green banana, yam fritters called buñuelos, and especially delicious treats called sorullitos, which are cornmeal sticks infused with cheese. They can be enjoyed alone as a snack, with a dipping sauce, or served alongside a soup or stew. Try them with your choice of dipping sauce: the classic pink sauce known as Salsa Golf or a sassy Puerto Rican mojo sauce.

CheeseInfusedCornSticks (Sorullitos De Maiz) Serves 4 to 6

2 cups water

1 teaspoon sea salt

teaspoon sugar

1 cups yellow cornmeal

1 cup shredded vegan cheddar cheese

Neutral oil, for frying

Salsa Golf or Mojo Sauce (recipes follow)

1. In a saucepan combine water, salt, and sugar and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low and stir in cornmeal. Cook, stirring constantly, until water is absorbed and dough pulls away from pot, about 4 minutes. Remove from heat and stir in shredded cheese. Mix to combine. Set aside to cool for about 20 minutes.

2. Once cool, use a spoon to place about 2 tablespoons of the mixture into the palm of your hand and form a log about 3 inches long. It should look like a short cigar. (If you have trouble with the dough sticking to your hands, you can rub some oil onto your hands, then proceed.) Repeat until all of the mixture is used up. You should have about 24 corn sticks.

3. In a pot or deep skillet over medium-high heat, heat about 1 inch of oil until hot. Fry the corn sticks in batches until golden brown and crisp, 3 to 4 minutes. Transfer to paper towels to drain. Serve hot with sauce.

GlobalVegan

Mojo is a versatile condiment made with olive oil and lots of garlic. The basic recipe consists of olive oil, garlic, paprika, and cumin, with the optional addition of citrus juice and fresh herbs such as parsley or cilantro. Mojo makes a great marinade or cooking sauce.

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SalsaGolf Makes about cup

cup vegan mayonnaise

cup ketchup

1 teaspoon lime juice

teaspoon Tabasco (optional)

Combine all ingredients in a small bowl and stir to mix well. Serve with sorullitos.

MojoSauce Makes about cup

4 cloves garlic, minced

cup fresh orange juice

cup fresh lime juice

cup olive oil

teaspoon dried oregano

teaspoon ground cumin

teaspoon paprika

teaspoon sea salt

teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

pinch of sugar

cup fresh parsley, cilantro, or mint leaves (or a combination) (optional)

Combine all ingredients in a blender or food processor and blend until smooth. Transfer to a small bowl to serve.

Robin Robertson (robinrobertson.com) likes to serve sorullitos as an accompaniment to a spicy chili. Robin’s latest book is Vegan Without Borders: Easy Everyday Recipes from Around the World.

Salsa Golf, known as pink sauce or ketchup-mayonnaise, was invented by Nobel Prize winner Luis Federico Leloir during the 1920s at an exclusive golf club in the seaside resort of Mar del Plata near Buenos Aires. Supposedly, Leloir, while dining at the club with friends, wanted a more interesting sauce than what was served with his shrimp cocktail. He asked for a tray of condiments and concocted several variations using mayonnaise, mustard, ketchup, and seasonings. After a few tries, Salsa Golf was born, so named by Leloir’s friends for the location of the event. The sauce became popular throughout South America and the Caribbean and is now available in supermarkets in the region. Here is a vegan version.

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WITHOUT A DOUBT, MAC ’N’ CHEESE IS ONE of the most beloved dishes of young and old alike. Whether you choose to prepare this classic and versatile comfort food from a boxed mix on the stove top, bake it with breadcrumbs, concoct it with a combination of several nondairy cheeses, or elevate it to gourmet status with a savory assortment of add-ins, the delicious possibilities are endless.

While vegan cheeses can be used to make a stellar batch of mac ’n’ cheese, doing so can be pricey. Lately, I’ve opted to take a more economical and natural approach via the vegetable patch for the flavor enhancing and tinting of my vegan cheesy sauce. In this recipe, roasted pumpkin, a generous blend of heady spices, and a few other ingredients are magically transformed into a thick and creamy sauce. When combined with cooked tempeh, kale, and pasta, this creates a hearty batch of vegan mac ’n’cheese that’s a definite favorite in my house!

SmokyPumpkinMacand CheesewithTempehandKaleMakes 6 to 8 servings

1 3 pound pumpkin, peeled, seeds removed, and cut into 1-inch cubes

1 cups nondairy milk of choice

cup nutritional yeast

1 tablespoons tapioca starch or flour

2 teaspoons Dijon or spicy brown mustard

1 teaspoon sea salt, plus extra

teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

1 teaspoon garlic powder

1 teaspoon onion powder

teaspoon chili powder

teaspoon smoked paprika

teaspoon chipotle chile powder or cayenne

teaspoon ground cumin

8 ounces tempeh, cut into -inch cubes

1 tablespoons tamari or soy sauce

12 ounces pasta of choice (elbow macaroni, shells, penne, or other)

1 cup fresh breadcrumbs

2 tablespoons olive oil, divided

1 large shallot, finely diced

10 ounces Italian kale, roughly chopped

VeganChefFavorites

Puréed, roasted pumpkin amps up both the flavor and orangey hue of this autumn-inspired mac-and-cheese medley. By Beverly Lynn Bennett

Pump UpYour Mac


1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees. On a parchment-lined cookie sheet, place pumpkin cubes in a single layer and season lightly with salt. Roast pumpkin for 30 to 40 minutes or until tender. Remove from oven and set aside to cool for 5 minutes. 2. Transfer half of the roasted pumpkin to a blender or food processor. Add nondairy milk, nutritional yeast, tapioca starch, mustard, salt, pepper, garlic, onion, chili powder, paprika, cayenne, and cumin and blend for 1 to 2 minutes or until smooth.

3. In a small bowl, stir together tempeh and tamari and set aside for 10 minutes.

4. In a large pot, cook pasta according to package directions. Reserve cup cooking water and drain pasta in a colander.

5. In a large cast iron or nonstick skillet over medium heat, combine breadcrumbs and tablespoon olive oil and cook, stirring often, for 5 minutes or until golden brown. Transfer breadcrumbs to a small bowl and set aside.

6. Return skillet to medium heat. Add tempeh and remaining 1 tablespoons olive oil. Cover and cook, stirring occasionally, for 10 minutes or until lightly browned. Add shallots and cook for 1 minute. Add kale and reserved cooking water. Cover and cook for 5 minutes or until kale is tender. Remove the skillet from the heat.

7. Meanwhile, reuse the large pot over medium heat and cook the pumpkin cheese sauce, whisking often, for 5 minutes or until thickened. Remove pot from the heat. Stir in the cooked pasta, followed by the remaining roasted pumpkin and tempeh-kale mixture. Sprinkle breadcrumbs over the top and serve.

Beverly Lynn Bennett (veganchef.com) is a vegan chef and author of several vegan cookbooks, including her latest, Chia: Using the Ancient Superfood.

Chef’s Tip:Short on time, but still craving a yummy batch of pumpkin mac ’n’ cheese? For a quick and easy version, replace the roasted pumpkin purée in the pumpkin cheese sauce with 1 cups canned pumpkin purée and also omit the cooked tempeh-kale mixture and breadcrumb topping.


Superfoods

Spirulina The world’s most ancient superfood. By Julie Morris

Working with the best of the best is a benefit that VegNews is thrilled to be able to share with our readers. When we decided to add a superfoods column, there was only one person we sought out—and we were thrilled when Julie Morris agreed. Author of the amazing Superfood Kitchen as well as Superfood Smoothies and the brand-new Superfood Juices, Morris knows her subject well and presents it with both delicious recipes and stunning photography. We welcome Julie to VegNews and know you will be as thrilled with her column as we are to have it grace our pages.

A BLUE-GREEN ALGAE, SPIRULINA MAY NOT sound like the sexiest ingredient you’ve ever acquired, but one look at its benefits and it’s easy to understand why this health-boosting food is the gold standard of edible greens.

As one of the very first life forms to appear on the planet, spirulina has a soft cellular structure that’s extremely easy for the body to digest. It may be primitive, but wow—is it powerful: gram for gram this superstar contains 3,900 percent more iron than spinach, 2,800 percent more beta carotene than carrots, 600 percent more protein than tofu, and 280 percent more antioxidant potency than blueberries. These impressive nutrients mean spirulina is absolutely invaluable for skin protection, immune function, cardiovascular health, and cellular function. Spirulina is also an incredible source of detoxifying chlorophyll (the green pigment in plants), a rare source of the blue antioxidant phytocyanin that’s key to liver and kidney health, and one of the only plant sources of digestible B-12, which is essential for neurological health and DNA synthesis. And of course, some people love spirulina just for its energizing effects!

As you may have guessed, a little spirulina goes a very, very long way to boost recipes—a daily serving is a miniscule 3 grams. Admittedly, its slightly sweet-salty ocean flavor is usually something that is better left in the background flavor wise, but with the right spices and seasonings, you’d never know it is there (save for the classic clue of its blue-green hue). For maximum nutrition, use spirulina in low-heat or raw applications, such as desserts, dips, smoothies, and snacks.

WhatAreSuperfoods?From cacao to cranberries to quinoa, “superfoods” are an excitingly diverse group, each offering its own unique alchemy of benefits: these are the most nutrient-dense, benefit-rich foods found in nature. Key to this foodie definition is the idea of “nutrient density,” which is the ratio of micronutrients—aka antioxidants, minerals, phytochemicals, and vitamins—per calorie of food. In other words, you’re getting the most nutritional bang for every caloric buck you “spend”—a smart way of eating that leads to more energy, balanced weight, and a healthy body.

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Chef’s Tip:Since spirulina grows in water, source is very important to ensure a clean product. Choosing Hawaiian spirulina is a safe bet for acquiring an excellent quality product.


SpirulinaSpicedPepitasSavory, smoky, and with a little sweet ’n’ spicy punch, these crunchy seeds have a whole lot of complex yum power. Though they’re an incredible “by the handful” snack, also try tossing them on top of salads, roasted vegetables, or as a soup garnish.

Makes about 2 cups

teaspoon cumin seeds

teaspoon pumpkin pie spice

teaspoon chipotle powder

1 tablespoon coconut sugar

teaspoon sea salt

1 tablespoon coconut oil

1 cup raw pumpkin seeds

cup flaxseeds

2 tablespoons maple syrup

teaspoon spirulina powder

1. To a sauté pan over medium heat, add cumin seeds and toast until fragrant—about 2 to 3 minutes. Use a mortar and pestle (or spice grinder) to crush the cumin seeds into a powder. In a small bowl, mix together cumin powder, pumpkin pie spice, chipotle powder, coconut sugar, and salt.

2. In the same pan, warm coconut oil over medium heat. Add pumpkin seeds and stir to coat with oil. Add spice mix, stirring to distribute. Toast seeds for 3 to 4 minutes or until seeds swell slightly and begin to pop. Stir in flaxseeds and toast for 30 seconds longer. Remove pan from heat and stir in maple syrup. Once the syrup has stopped sizzling, sprinkle in spirulina and stir very well.

3.Transfer the contents onto two large ceramic plates and use the back of a spatula to spread out thinly in a flat layer. Let seeds cool for a minimum of 20 minutes—they will be sticky at first but will harden as they cool. The seeds may be stored at room temperature for several weeks.

Julie Morris cooks with superfoods and racks up running mileage in Los Angeles.

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Pear-ingA Perfect

When cheesecake meets crumb cake, it’s love at first bite.By Hannah Kaminsky

RoastedPearCheesecakeServes 10 to 12

Crumb Topping:

cup all-purpose flour

cup dark brown sugar, firmly packed

cup hazelnuts, coarsely chopped

teaspoon sea salt

cup vegan margarine, melted

Graham Cracker Crust:

1 cups graham cracker crumbs (15 rectangles)

5 tablespoons vegan margarine, melted

1 tablespoon water

Roasted Pear Filling:

2 firm but ripe pears, peeled, cored, and diced

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 tablespoon lemon juice

teaspoon ground cinnamon

2 (8-ounce) packages vegan cream cheese

cup granulated sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla

teaspoon sea salt

AUTUMN’S VERY FIRST BREATH OF COOL AIR pushes out thoughts of frozen treats, sending in a flurry of cravings for heartier fare, warm spices, and comforting tastes to take their place. Apples automatically get top billing in everything from pies to cakes, but there’s so much more the fall harvest has to offer, barely even an orchard away. Pears are the great unsung heroes of the season; a perfect pear is unparalleled in its luxurious flavor. Juicy, buttery, and honeyed in a lightly floral perfume, each variety has its own unique characteristics, and every one of them is worth taking a bite out of.

The only thing better than a perfectly ripe, tender pear is that very same pear baked into a decadent dessert. Inspired by a favorite crumb cake bearing a thick layer of crisp topping, sprinkled with warmly toasted hazelnuts, pears were almost an afterthought in that original rendition. Forgoing the traditional base and bringing the fruit into sharper focus, this cheesecake combines substantial chunks of roasted pears with a smooth purée woven into the creamy cake itself. Slow-roasting the pears concentrates the natural sweetness and intensifies their irresistible flavor. No matter what variety you choose, you can’t go wrong; as long as they’re fresh and in season, every last one is a winner here.


1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees and lightly grease a 9-inch round springform pan.2. For the crumb topping, place flour, sugar, chopped nuts, and salt in a medium-sized bowl. Stir everything together with a fork to evenly distribute before slowly drizzling in the melted margarine, all while mixing. Mix until large clumps form and the liquid has been thoroughly incorporated; set aside.

3. For the graham cracker crust, stir the finely ground cookie crumbs with the margarine and water until a cohesive but loose dough is formed. Transfer into the prepared springform pan and use your hands to press evenly across the bottom. You may want to lightly moisten your hands to prevent them from sticking.

4. For the roast pear filling, inally, to begin addressing the filling, toss the diced pears with olive oil, lemon juice, and cinnamon and spread them out in one layer inside a baking dish. The size of the dish isn’t important, as long as it has high sides to contain the juices. Roast in your preheated oven for 30 to 35 minutes, until the pieces are fork tender and just beginning to brown around the edges.

5. Scoop half of the pear pieces into the bowl of your food processor or blender, reserving the other half for later. Add in the cream cheese, sugar, vanilla, and salt and thoroughly puree. Pause to scrape down the sides of the bowl as needed, ensuring that all pieces are thoroughly incorporated.

6. Once the filling is perfectly smooth, fold in the remaining pear chunks by hand to keep them intact. Pour over the graham cracker crust, using a spatula to smooth out the top. Tap the whole pan gently on the counter a few times to knock out any air bubbles that might be trapped inside.

7. Sprinkle the crumb mixture all over the top, piling it on high. It might seem like a lot, but trust me, no one ever complains about getting too much crumb topping!

8. Bake for 45 to 55 minutes, until golden brown on top and set around the sides. The center should still seem slightly wobbly, since it will continue to firm up as it cools. Let the cheesecake come to room temperature before moving into the refridgerator, chilling for at least 4 hours before slicing and serving.

Hannah Kaminsky (BitterSweetBlog.com), author of Easy as Vegan Pie, relishes the opportunity to savor a perfect pear any time of the year.

An autumnal surplus of apples and squash find a delicous pairing, and the smell of cinnamon wafting from your oven makes this recipe a feast for all the senses.By David Hanley

SeasonalSimplicity


5-IngredientMeals

Appl

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October 11 & 1210:00 a.m. to 6:30 p.m.Inside Golden Gate Park

9th Avenue & Lincoln Way$10 per person Free for Children, Students & Seniors

Outstanding SpeakersVegan Demos & SamplingChildren’s Corner

415.273.5481

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Exhibitors contact sfvs [email protected]

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AppleStuffedAcornSquashServes 4

2 acorn or kabocha squash 4 medium apples

cup maple syrup 1 tablespoon vanilla 1 teaspoon cinnamon, divided

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

2. Halve the squash and scoop out the seeds.

3. Core apples and place 2 of them in a blender or food processor. Add maple syrup, vanilla, and teaspoon cinnamon, then blend, adding a small amount of water to achieve a consistency thin enough to pour into cereal.

4. Dice the remaining 2 apples into bite-sized chunks. Set aside.

5. Fill the 4 squash halves with the apple chunks, then pour the apple-maple-cinnamon purée into the squash so it runs between the apple pieces.

6. Sprinkle the remaining of the cinnamon evenly over the top of the acorn squash.

7. Place the squash on a baking sheet and bake for 30 to 35 minutes. Remove and let cool before serving. You’re done!

David Hanley is a reformed couch potato who has used a vegan diet to help mold himself into a World Top 100 stairclimber.

Like other fall squashes, acorn squash is more nutrient dense than all varieties of summer squash. It is particularly high in vitamin C, potassium, and magnesium. The flavonoids, antioxidants, and polyphenols in apples complement each other in ways we don’t yet completely understand to provide much more nutrition and protection against disease than their individual numbers would suggest. Cinnamon helps to modulate blood sugar and is an antioxidant that fights both inflammation and harmful bacteria. Vanilla has been used for centuries as a natural mental and physical stimulant.

TWO FOODS THAT REACH THEIR PERFECTION during the fall harvest season are squash and apples, so it’s an ideal time to combine the two at the peak of ripeness for a nutritious autumnal treat. Fall (and winter) squash is one of the richest sources of plant-based anti-inflammatory nutrients such as omega 3s and beta-carotene, which are important for a strong immune system to help protect against seasonal colds and flu.Cinnamon is a winning complement to the flavors of fall, and the sweetness of maple syrup and vanilla round out this five-ingredient recipe!

By Katherine Sazdanoff

RestaurantReview

Life AliveUrban Oasis & Café

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CAMBRIDGE, MA’S LIFE ALIVE URBAN OASIS & Organic Café has all of the qualities of a popular neighborhood café. The décor is eclectic with leafy plants and colorful artwork, and there’s a steady stream of fun, rhythmic music—sometimes live. The patrons are a mix of mat-toting yogis, chatty university students, young families, and neighborhood regulars.

Here, though, is where the predictable café setting ends and something much more exciting and inspiring begins. You see, Life Alive isn’t your everyday café. Founder Heidi Feinstein has made sure of it. Her mission is to feed the vitality of the world one meal at a time. It’s not just a lofty goal, but a work in progress. As Feinstein describes it, Life Alive Cafés (there are three in the Boston area) act as an oasis for busy people to be nurtured and inspired by loving service and whole, therapeutic, and delicious foods.

In practice, Feinstein’s mission translates into a restaurant that exudes positive, healing energy accented by a friendly staff serving slow-cooked, simple, and organic meals. The menu is vegetarian with whole-grain and veggie-

based entrées, grilled wraps, salads, soups, and juices. Vegans feel at home, too, with only a few items to avoid (mainly organic raw cheddar and free-range eggs).

As a neighborhood regular at the Life Alive in Cambridge, I know the café’s fare well. Though I tend to change my order from time to time, I always start with a bowl of soup. Made fresh “with love daily,” soups such as the Shitake Ginger Sesame Soy Sensation and Vegan Corn Chowdah are flavorful, sometimes even rich, and undeniably satisfying. Amply sized, soups can easily become an inexpensive, nutritious meal on the go, too.

My favorite entrée, The Goddess, is a hearty mixture of rice and steamed veggies including magenta-colored beets, broccoli, and leafy kale, complemented by a house-made Ginger Nama Shoyu Sauce. It warms the soul. If I’m feeling particularly ravenous, I order The Lover, a savory, filling blend of shitake mushrooms and multicolored veggies on a bed of rice or quinoa.

When my husband joins for dinner, he opts for one of the creative salad mixtures that are

By Katherine Sazdanoff

DestinationDetailsLife Alive Urban Oasis & Organic Café has three locations in the Boston area:

> 765 Mass Ave., Cambridge; 617-354-5433

> 194 Middle St., Lowell; 978-453-1311

> 281 Essex St., Salem; 978-594-4644

lifealive.com


chockfull of nourishing veggies, fruits, and nuts accented with house-made dressings. To steal the words out of his mouth, the Mystic Mountain Salad, which adds roasted lemon garlic parsley hummus to a plate of crisp cucumbers, shredded carrots, beets, sweet corn, and sour Granny Smith apples, may just be the “world’s best salad.” I wouldn’t doubt it.

Desserts come in the form of smoothies such as the Elvis Alive, a sweet concoction of thick peanut butter, rich cocoa, banana, coconut-based ice cream, and rice milk. For something less sweet, opt for one of the Jubilant Juices or a shot of rejuvenating wheatgrass. No need to wait until dessert to order smoothies and fruit juices though; the drink bar is open all day.

After a multicourse, wholesome feast at the Life Alive Urban Oasis & Organic Café, I leave with a full belly, a happy heart, and a peaceful mind. Step into this unique, wholesome place, and you surely will, too.

Blogger and vegetarian Katherine Sazdanoff (katherinesazdanoff.com) is a freelance travel writer who chronicles her wanderlust travel and food adventures on her website.


Vegpicks

CheezPleaseDidn’t you love those little bright-orange-cheesy square crackers as a kid? We did, too, so we’re thrilled that Earth Balance has made a vegan version that is not only tastier than the original, but is also non-GMO and has zero trans fat! Vegan Cheddar Flavored Squares are so popular that Earth Balance is struggling to keep up with demand—but trust us, these squares are worth the wait!

> earthbalancenatural.com

LipServiceThe VegNews staff adores Ellovi! We were already fans of their amazing handmade, six-ingredient body butter, so we are ecstatic that they’ve released a portable version just for lips. Ellovi Lip Butter contains only Hawaiian coconut, sunflower, hemp, macadamia, Ghanaian marula, and shea. It goes on smoothly and makes lips feel great! It is vegan, cruelty-free, and provides SPF protection.

> ellovi.com

GetSaucy!We’ve found our new favorite teriyaki sauce. One of Organicville’s 11 new, internationally inspired sauces, Sky Valley Teriyaki Sauce is sweet—with a little spicy kick. As good on veggies as it is on faux meats, it is certified organic, gluten-free, vegan—and delicious! A portion of all sales of Sky Valley international sauces are donated to Uhuru Child, which seeks to eliminate poverty in developing communities through employment and education.

> organicvillefoods.com

ToonaTimeIf you enjoyed tuna salad sandwiches in your pre-veg days, you have to try the newest product from Sophie’s Kitchen. Toona is available in two tasty varieties: Sea Salt and Black Pepper. We recommend Sea Salt for tuna salad with vegan mayo. Black Pepper is great in casseroles. Both are gluten-free—and Sea Salt is soy-free too!

> sophieskitchen.net

MakeADifference Imagine how great it would be if 50 percent of the net proceeds from all those nutrition bars you buy every week were donated to animal rescue organizations. When you buy an Animal Rescue Bar, you’re doing just that and helping nonprofit organizations that rescue, rehabilitate, and release injured, abused, exploited, and abandoned animals. These bars are not only great for you, they’re great for animals, too!

> animalrescuebar.com

All products we recommend have been tested by our staff.

We search for the best new vegan products

and share only those we would use or consume.


ItalianInspiredPopArtWe love popcorn! We also love the classic Mediterranean flavors of rosemary and Italian black summer truffles. The geniuses at Pop Art combined these ingredients to make this truly sophisticated popcorn treat. Rosemary Truffle Gourmet Popcorn elevates our favorite snack food to something you may want to savor with a robust vegan red wine while dreaming of the Italian Riviera.

> popartsnacks.com

LittleLinksBigTasteOne of our favorite grain-meat companies is Field Roast. It’s been around since 1997 and their products are consistently amazing. The latest addition to their line is Apple Maple Breakfast Sausages, the perfect complement to scrambles, breakfast burritos, pancakes, and waffles. These plant-based links are perfect for autumn, seasoned with a hint of real maple syrup and apples.

> fieldroast.com

SmallIndulgencesWhat could be more scrumptious than creamy, vegan coconut-milk caramels? JJ’s Chocolate-covered Cocomels, of course! Hand-dipped in premium Fair Trade organic dark chocolate, these new caramels deliver an experience like no other. If you are a caramel or chocolate fanatic, a vegan sweets devotee, or just looking for a healthier way to appease your sweet tooth, you should definitely indulge. We are obsessed.

> jjssweets.com

SodaLiciousHere at the VegNews HQ, we were searching for a healthier soda and came across these tasty, organic sodas from Veri. They come in four great flavors: Cola, Ginger Ale, Lemon Lime, and Orange and at just 60 calories, they have 65 percent fewer calories than most sodas. And because there are no artificial ingredients or additives, they are our new faves.

> verisoda.com

GreasyGoodnessIf you are a fan of American Southern cooking or really authentic-tasting Mexican food, you will agree that the vegan gods have smiled upon us. Behold the world’s first all-vegan, 100 percent animal-friendly alternative to bacon lard. Magic Vegan Bacon Grease can be used to make bacon-y collard greens, beans, biscuits, tortillas—you name it! The new coconut-based formula is non-GMO and has no hydrogenated oils.

> veganmagic.cc


Q: Should I be avoiding leafy greens because of their high oxalate content?

A: A recent point of contention celebritized in the blogosphere is the idea that

we should avoid leafy greens because they contain oxalates. Fear mongering has been bestowed upon leafy greens—such as sweet Swiss chard, boisterous beet greens, and sympathetic spinach—just for having higher levels of these compounds. In fact, oxalates are found in multiple types of foods (not limited to greens) and are also produced naturally within our bodies. The concern associated with these antinutrients is their ability to decrease absorption of calcium (despite high levels contained within leafy greens) and the possibility of developing kidney stones due to their consumption. However, these fabulous foods can still supply suitable amounts of calcium, and they can also provide other nutrients necessary for a sensible diet, such as carotenoids, folate, and vitamin K. High-oxalate foods do not cause nutrient deficiency simply by being included as a part of a whole foods, plant-based diet. There are a few rare conditions that require restriction of oxalates, such as hyperparathyroidism, primary hyperoxaluria, or absorptive hypercalciuria. For those with, or at risk for, kidney stones, the research is unclear on whether consuming high amounts of oxalates will cause stone formation. Instead, there are strong links between kidney stones and inadequate calcium consumption, high intake of sodium, chronic dehydration, and the inclusion of

animal protein in the diet. If you are concerned, however, you can mix up the high-oxalate with the lower-oxalate greens, and stick with moderation—a tactic that will always reign supreme. Low-oxalate greens include bok choy, broccoli rabe, cabbage, kohlrabi, lettuce, pea greens, and watercress. And to end on a wonderful side note for us vegans, a recent study shows that vegetarians (and vegans) do not have an increased risk for kidney stones when compared to meat eaters, despite the higher consumption of foods high in oxalates.

Q: I always thought kale was a super healthful food and I eat it regularly, but

I keep hearing lately that it is dangerous for the thyroid. How is that possible?

A: Recent hype in the media has brought to the forefront a concern that kale—

along with other cruciferous vegetables, soy products, and environmental compounds—can negatively impact the thyroid, due to its goitrogen content. Goitrogens are substances that can contribute to the development of a goiter, or an enlarged thyroid gland. Most frequently, goiters are caused by an iodine deficiency. Selenium is also required in thyroid function and a deficiency can increase risk for goiters and thyroid problems, particularly when coupled with iodine deficiency. Both iodine and selenium are essential minerals found sparsely and inconsistently in the food supply and both are required by the body for thyroid hormone metabolism. Tyrosine, an amino acid found in legumes, nuts, and seeds,

is iodinated to produce thyroid hormones and then is stored in the thyroid to use as needed. When the body does not have adequate iodine to meet thyroid hormone production needs, the pituitary gland releases hormones that cause the thyroid gland to enlarge in a compensatory response. This increases surface area, helping to increase blood supply in search of more iodine from dietary sources, causing a goiter to appear. So what does kale have to do with all of this? Kale and other cruciferous vegetables contain phytochemicals called glucosinolates. These nutrients convert into isothiocyanates, particularly when consumed in their raw form, via the enzyme myrosinase. Isothiocyanates have been found to help detoxify, fight cancer cell growth, and act as antioxidants, so they are incredibly healthful. However, the metabolites of these compounds compete with iodine for uptake into the thyroid. Thus, excessive intakes of isothiocyanates have been associated with a potential risk to thyroid function, especially in the presence of an iodine or selenium deficiency. When I say “excessive,” I am referring to extremely excessive, such as eating pounds of raw cruciferous vegetables a day, something most people do not tend to do. Regular, daily consumption of kale and other cruciferous vegetables is perfectly safe for the majority of people with a healthfully functioning thyroid and adequate iodine and selenium intake. Further, it is important to note that isothiocyanates are sensitive to heat and are mostly deactivated with cooking.

Oxalates, goitrogens, and phytates: don’t be afraid...

Antipathy Antinutrient

Resident nutrient know-it-all Julieanna Hever, RD, offers natural prescriptions for all your health needs.

PlantBasedDietitian


Cruciferous vegetables are extraordinarily health promoting and have been shown to exert powerful anti-inflammatory and antioxidant effects, reducing risk for many chronic diseases and supporting immune health. For those with thyroid issues, consult with your health care practitioner, but it is possible to still consume cruciferous veggies safely and gain their benefits. So enjoy your kale, both raw and cooked—but stay on top of your iodine intake. Adults aged 14 and older require 150 micrograms a day, and this can be found in sea vegetables, iodized salt (which is not as commonly used these days), and in supplement form.

Q: Many low-carb diet experts claim that eating whole grains and legumes

is dangerous because of the presence of phytates. Whole grains and legumes are the foundation of a vegan diet. Do I need to worry about these compounds and avoid foods that contain them?

A: Phytates, or phytic acid, are phosphorus-containing compounds that are found

not only in whole grains and legumes, but also in nuts and seeds. And you raise a critical point: they are the crux of a vegan diet, substantiating the abundant fruit and vegetable component of a well-rounded, whole foods, plant-based plan. Phytates bind with certain minerals, including iron, calcium, magnesium, and zinc, forming bonds that inhibit their absorption. However, certain preparation methods can help reduce the amount of phytates found in these foods. Soaking, sprouting, blending, juicing, fermenting, and leavening all reduce phytate content in plant foods. It would be a vast disservice to limit these foods from your diet, as phytates are phytochemicals that also happen to have massive health benefits! Phytates have been found to reduce the risk for cancer, osteoporosis, kidney disease, insulin resistance, and cardiovascular disease. Including these foods and alternating methods of their preparation, along with sustaining variety in a balanced diet, will ensure the healthiest possible nourishment.

Julieanna Hever (plantbaseddietitian.com) is not afraid of antinutrients and thoroughly enjoys whole grains, legumes, and leafy greens as the basis of her vegan diet.

AlternativeMedicine


With this issue, we are pleased to welcome Los Angeles-based acupuncturist Heather Lounsbury, along with our new Alternative Medicine column. Lounsbury is a multi-media dynamo: she hosts a weekly radio show, creates YouTube videos, writes a popular blog, and this year authored the excellent book Fix Your Mood With Food. She is also the face of the Live Natural, Live Well brand. We know VegNews readers will be as excited to discover her drug-free alternatives to healing as we are to present them. Welcome, Heather!

VEGANISM AND CHINESE MEDICINE. HUH? Most likely you haven’t heard those two words together. They could be considered strange bedfellows. But many vegans are on the path to total wellness and looking for alternatives to Western medicine. We want natural solutions to our health issues—instead of taking drugs that are tested on animals, full of chemicals, and can lead to other medical complaints. The beauty of Chinese medicine and nutrition is that they’re completely natural, highly effective, and there are no negative side effects if done right. Plus, they can easily be done cruelty-free.

There’s a misconception that Chinese

medicine isn’t suitable for vegans or can’t be vegan friendly. Even Moby once commented that he didn’t realize it was possible. And he receives acupuncture treatments. It’s a myth that all acupuncturists prescribe awful-tasting teas made from bear bile and rhinoceros horn; most of the herbs that aren’t vegetarian are illegal, anyway. Chinese herbs are completely safe when taken properly and most of them derive from plant sources such as bark, berries, flowers, leaves, roots, and stems.

Some of you may have been told by an acupuncturist (or an MD) that you have to eat meat. Most acupuncturists receive only about 40 hours of nutritional training in their formal education. Hence, their knowledge about nutrition is very limited. Unfortunately, acupuncture schools teach that everyone needs to eat meat. So, if you’ve been given this advice, ignore it.

You probably have heard at least once from a medical professional: “If you would just eat meat, your problem(s) would go away.” Many years ago, I was told by a highly respected acupuncturist to eat meat for a minor issue I’d had since I was a small child. She said my vegetarianism was the root cause of my problem. It was an issue that started when

Why Chinese medicine and plant-based diets are a great fit.By Heather Lounsbury

Acupuncture& Vegans


I was eating animal products every single day at every meal. My complaint eventually went away with a combination of herbs, homeopathy, acupuncture, and a few dietary tweaks. I still haven’t figured out her logic.

Chinese nutrition is very unique in that it takes into account your physical and emotional history to give you optimum health results. Getting all the nutrients you need is imperative, of course. Looking at how you live your life, past experiences, and how you process stress are also important to figure out the right foods for you. Some fine-tuning to your already healthy diet might be all you need to be your healthiest and happiest.

If you’ve recently gone vegan or are trying to clean up after years of eating junk food, the immediate improvement in your health and state of mind can be amazing. But you can also experience some discomfort at the beginning. Cravings for dairy, sugar, or mom’s cooking can be pretty intense. Switching to whole foods from highly processed vegan food is still challenging, because even vegan junk food is highly addictive.

Detoxification symptoms such as acne, body odor, fatigue, and nausea may also arise, because your body is used to the Standard American Diet (SAD). The liver and kidneys will start flushing out toxins right away and

the whole process could take several weeks. Acupuncture will ease symptoms and quicken the process.

I have treated dozens of vegans and vegetarians who’ve benefited from this ancient medicine. Here are two case studies (with names and minor details changed) that prove how powerful the medicine really is.

Monica, 28, a vegetarian her whole life, came to see me for PMS. She became a raging lunatic for one week out of every month. Monica tried Western options such as anti-anxiety medications and birth control pills. Medications either did nothing or made her feel worse in other ways. With weekly acupuncture, Chinese herbs, and saying goodbye to sugar and dairy, her symptoms lessened within a month. Four months later, Monica was completely rid of her PMS.

Steve, 53, had major issues with his digestion. He went vegan eight years before coming to see me and his digestion still didn’t improve. Tests showed no food allergies or infections. Steve was ready to give up. Luckily, acupuncture finally did the trick. Steve’s metabolism was running smoothly in just a matter of weeks.

There are some acupuncturists and herbalists who understand and promote plant-based nutrition. They’ll warn you when capsules are made with gelatin. More and more of us are questioning what we learn in school. Seek them out. Some acupuncturists, myself included, offer phone consultations for herbs and nutrition to people all over the world. You can always ask when setting up your first appointment if they’ve ever worked with vegans.

I’ve treated couch potatoes, stay-at-home moms, CEOs, 3-year-olds, rock stars, and Olympic athletes. Chinese medicine and moving toward plant-based eating have improved everyone’s quality of life. Isn’t it time you gave it a try?

Live natural. Live well.

Heather Lounsbury, L.Ac, is the author of Fix Your Mood with Food: The “Live Natural, Live Well” Approach to Whole Body Health.

AcupunctureBenefits of Chinese medicine and nutrition:• Improve immunity• Increase endurance and strength• Prevent injuries and illness• Reduce stress, anxiety, and worry• Aid in digestion, leading to better absorption of nutrients • Quicken recovery time for an illness or injury• Release trauma caused by seeing graphic film, photos, or real life abuse of animals

NYC Vegan Vacations

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•Fine dining•Gluten-free + raw options•Broadway shows

•3 Manhattan hotel nights •Sightseeing•Vegan shoe shopping

3 day WeekendGetaways!

By Rich Lysloff

Gift of Love

VegFamily


BY NOW THE BENEFITS OF BEING VEGAN—saving the lives of countless animals, preserving the environment, and eating healthier foods—have become widely known. Every day more people are realizing that “vegan” is not some passing fad but a movement of conscious people that could have a major effect on our future as a civilization. Embracing a vegan lifestyle is like giving a gift of love to yourself, your family, the animals, and the planet we all call home. And there is really nothing you have to do to become vegan. Only something to not do: eat or wear animals or contribute to their needless suffering through animal testing or entertainment.

My wife and I became full-on vegan in 2007. Shortly after, I noticed some amazing health benefits: more energy, weight loss, clearer thinking, and more stamina. And I wasn’t the only one who noticed—my parents, my wife, and my brothers did as well. They immediately became interested in this way of eating when they saw my positive changes. Within a few months, and after doing some research by

reading The China Study and books by Dr. Gabriel Cousins, among others (my dad likes to get the scientific facts), most of them followed suit and went vegan, too. To this day, they have remained vegan or vegetarian.

I think many people believe that eating a vegan diet is lacking in some way and that they won’t get all their nutrients. That’s why I feel it’s important for vegans to eat right with lots of fresh fruits and veggies and to avoid too much of the processed junk foods so they can be shining examples of how healthy this lifestyle can be. Veganism is not a diet, but diet plays a huge role in it and in order to spark interest in others to go vegan we should show them how healthy and sustainable it really is.

Not only do our bodies feel healthier and our minds more focused, but our conscience is clearer and our hearts lighter as well. Knowing that we no longer contribute to animal cruelty and slaughter is such a great feeling. We love animals and don’t want to be the cause of their suffering and death for the sake of eating a “food”—which quite frankly is not very healthy

Rich Lysloff’s expert observations on a sustainable vegan family life.

Teaching a child not to step on a caterpillar is as valuable to the child as it is to the caterpillar. —Bradley Miller


for us. We believe that animals are here with us on this planet, not for us. If we don’t need to eat them, wear them, or harm them in any way, why should we? There are other, better ways to live that don’t require us to be cruel and kill animals. It’s unnecessary, especially in today’s modern world, when we have so many cruelty-free options available to us.

One year ago our daughter, Kalia, was born. During her pregnancy, my wife ate a very healthy, plant-based diet and delivered our baby naturally, without any drugs! The foods she craved and ate a lot of were green leafy vegetables, broccoli, fruits, veggies, legumes, grains, nuts, and seeds. And wouldn’t you know it, these are the same foods that our baby girl loves now that she’s eating solids. We get such a kick out of feeding her almond butter, bok choy, broccoli, hemp tofu, kale, and quinoa polenta. There’s also avocado pudding, banana hemp milk smoothies, blueberries dipped in walnut butter, and buckwheat cereal. The possibilities are endless and the nutrition she receives is off the charts. These are foods I had never even heard of, much less tried, until I was well into my adulthood—and she’s growing up on them! And she is a strong, happy, and glowing baby.

When she gets a little older we will teach her all about why we live how we do—as opposed to why the majority of people live how they do. We’ll enjoy many trips to farmed-animal sanctuaries so she gets to see that farm animals are no different from her beloved dog, Toby, and they should be treated with the same respect and kindness that he is. She’ll learn by our example that living a healthy, cruelty-free life in which we care for the earth and all its inhabitants is a wonderful purpose worth striving for. All life has value and all beings want and deserve to live their lives. It really is just about love. And this is our gift of love to our daughter. May she live a healthy and happy life and be an inspiration to others.

Rich Lysloff lives in the San Francisco Bay Area. He is passionate about sharing experiences and insights into raising vegan children. Look for his “VegFamily” page on Facebook.

I truly have a Veg Family!Eating a whole foods, plant-based diet has literally changed my life and the lives of my family. My stepfather (who was starting to show that paunch that many men get as they get older) now weighs what he did when he was back in high school and my mother has never looked or felt better. My wife, a few months after giving birth to our daughter, lost all her pregnancy weight easily. And my two older brothers and their wives look and feel amazing as well. We are convinced it’s the ultimate healthy way to eat.

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Kindred BeingsWhat Seventy-Three

Chimpanzees Taught Me about Life, Love, and Connection

By Sheri Speede

When Vegans (Almost) Rule the World And Other Hopeful

Projections from the Vegan Feminist Agitator

By Marla Rose

Defiant Daughters21 Women on Art, Activism, Animals,

and The Sexual Politics of MeatEdited by Kara Davis

and Wendy Lee

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IF YOU FOLLOW MARLA ROSE’S VEGAN Feminist Agitator blog, then you will be delighted to have When Vegans (Almost) Rule the World, a portable compendium of her 32 wittiest and funniest essays to carry around, just in case you don’t have Wi-Fi. Whether you’re a vegan newbie or long-entrenched activist, you will LOL at her acerbic intellect and humor. At times, she evokes Stephen Colbert—but instead of satirizing the ultraconservative GOP, she mimics the angst of an omnivore. At other times, she is simply Marla, shrewdly pointing out common hypocrisies and inaccuracies of omnivore arguments against veganism.

Many of the essays are humorous, while some are more serious and poignant, including introspective details of Rose’s personal struggles. Several hit home with the situations that vegans encounter with those who haven’t crossed over to the good side. Among the varied topics she covers are insights and opinions about feminism and veganism, happy meat, and locavore Pollanized culture; she also lists 20 things that she would rather do than hear an omnivore talk about eating paleo. Each essay brings a surprise, and it is guaranteed that more than a few will make you chuckle. She is

the older sister who’s seen it all, who navigates you through the hallways on your first day of high school. She provides you with the verbal armamentarium to do battle with those who agitate vegans. Repeated reading of Rose’s words may be necessary because they’re just too funny: you’re still laughing at the last thing she said and can’t quite pay attention to the next witticism. You’ll agree on so many levels with her, you’ll just wish you could have said it as cleverly yourself.

Simply put: Kindred Beings is a beautifully and lovingly written memoir by veterinarian Sheri Speede about the Sanaga-Yong Chimpanzee Rescue Center in Cameroon. The introduction describes the famous National Geographic photo of chimpanzees standing together at a fence to grieve over one of their departed. At publication, it caused a stir around the world, startling those who didn’t yet comprehend that nonhuman beings could mourn the death of a loved one. Speede writes with passion and clarity as she documents the political and geographic landscape of Cameroon, where she founded her sanctuary. She introduces the chimpanzees, detailing their imprisonment at hotel tourist attractions, medical laboratories, or as victims

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of the African bush-meat trade. Many of the imprisoned chimpanzees have been chained and separated from one another, suffering years of boredom and loneliness, enough to drive any of them insane. She battles with tribal chiefs, unaccustomed to strong, educated—much less foreign—women. She recalls those who helped to build the sanctuary and the surrounding villagers’ changing attitudes toward chimpanzees.

This is a loving tribute to the sanctuary’s first few chimpanzees: Becky, Dorothy, Jacky, Nama, and Pepe. Their stories are deeply moving, showcasing their spirit and resilience. Speede humbly acknowledges these extraordinary individuals and their contribution to her world, and hopes that you will find the same spirit in them as she does.

Carol J. Adams, who needs no introduction, happily describes her seminal work The Sexual Politics of Meat: A Feminist-Vegetarian Critical Theory as a “classic,” colloquially defined as “a book you are expected to know about but no longer are expected to read.” In Defiant Daughters, a compilation of thought-provoking essays, 21 women recall the influence of Adams’ book on their veganism and feminism. The authors range from a high school senior to a 40-something professor. All of the essays are engaging and autobiographical, offering a view into how TSPOM changed or supported their views on injustice against women and animals. The “absent referent,” Adams’ hallmark concept, is discussed throughout, weaving together the commonality of experience. Many of the authors are brave in revealing their individual struggles battling discrimination for their views on feminism and veganism, and provide startling personal details regarding drug abuse, sexual assault, and eating disorders. A few acknowledge that their activism is still a work in progress, with hope for the future. Some authors you will recognize, such as the above-reviewed Marla Rose, whose essay is a letter to her son Justice, describing how she became a vegan feminist.

It is clear in this collection of essays how TSPOM has influenced these women to push for social justice for both humans and nonhumans alike. These strong voices, from many generations and professions, are uniquely tied together through Defiant Daughters, and perhaps will inspire readers to work toward justice for all.


medialounge

FOR MANY, “VEGAN” EVOKES AN IMAGE OF A $10-smoothie-drinking, yoga-retreating, holier-than-thou foodie who won’t consume any food unless it’s organic, local, seasonal, farm-to-table, and hand-picked by angels, then posted on Instagram.

F*ck that sh*t. These three cookbooks keep it real and prove that “vegan” can be inexpensive, accessible, and damn tasty.

It is such delicious irony that Gwyneth Paltrow, of all people, is an out-and-proud fan of the blog Thug Kitchen (no disrespect, Gwyneth): “This might be my favorite thing ever.” Her elitist public persona and rarefied social stratum seem to be everything the blog rails against: “You don’t have to be some uptown [expletive] just to pay attention to what you eat.” But that just shows that she and over half a million Facebook fans are on to some sh*t, so now comes Thug Kitchen: Eat Like You Give a F*ck. The anonymous bloggers want you to get your sorry ass healthy, and they drop enough nutritional knowledge and guidance for the noob in the kitchen to get you there. If you worry that the recipes in the cookbook are just the same old sh*t from the blog, fear not: behold a “f*ckton” of new dishes, from Mixed-Berry Grits to Roasted Beer and Lime Cauliflower Tacos to Pozole Rojo. And this isn’t just some lazy-ass Instagram-filtered bullsh*t: this beautiful color food photography rivals any James Beard sh*t. Respect.

If none of this next-level sh*t gets you to buy the damn book already, Thug Kitchen suggests you “do it for your [colon]; you guys have always been close.” Trust.

Vegans love to fight (ferociously) about who is and is not a true vegan. This acrimony is only exceeded by the debate over who is and is not punk rock. Combine the two and you might have a battle for ideological purity and exclusion that makes Game of Thrones look like a pony ride—but not in This Ain’t No Picnic: Your Punk Rock Vegan Cookbook.

Authored by traveling vegan chef and “all-

around awesome punk” Joshua Ploeg, and named after the punk rock anthem by The Minutemen, This Ain’t No Picnic is guided by the inclusive, DIY spirit of punk: use what you have, wherever you find yourself, and make it work. These recipes may be inspired by punk songs, fashion, and lifestyle—but they are decidedly not crusty (surely Vegan Escargot and Black Quinoa Caviar is the most refined anything Jello Biafra ever inspired). And once you’ve mastered Dashboard Kale Chips, Zippo S’mores, and Engine Block Casserole (yes, the cooking methodology is exactly what you imagine) you’ll feel like you can MacGyver any damn thing. But don’t be too punk rock: before you do some chopping with a credit card, wash it first…

Ploeg writes that his book aims to be “...random, kinda fun, and moderately useful.” Any broke college student, backpacker, car camper, or road-tripping musician will appreciate these recipes and techniques, punk or not (and if you don’t know what a “crusty” or a “Siouxsie” is, just Urban Dictionary that sh*t).

The DIY spirit continues in The Vegan Zombie Cook & Survive Cookbook, crowdfunded by fans of the popular Vegan

Zombie YouTube show. On The Walking Dead, arguably the most-watched show on TV, the cause of zombie-fication is yet unknown; here authors Cooney and Tedd create a world in which consumption of animal products damns one to the ranks of the undead. Only vegans survive! The Pentagon has a training plan for the zombie apocalypse (fact): shouldn’t you? Many recipes, such as Salt Potatoes and Grilled Asparagus, are somewhat minimalist—but that’s just what you need on the lam from a bloodthirsty horde of walkers. Once your group sets up camp in a prison, you’ll have time for such luxurious fare as Pumpkin Stew and Post-Apocalyptic Pot Pie. And with Autumn Spiced Poached Pears and Raw Blueberry Cheesecake, who knew the post-ZA world would be so decadent? Cooney and Tedd even have your dog’s back with recipes for vegan dog food and biscuits. According to the Centers for Disease Control, “If you are generally well-equipped to deal with a zombie apocalypse, you will be prepared for an earthquake, hurricane, pandemic, or terrorist attack.” Buy this cookbook today: it just might save your life tomorrow.

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Plant Power Transform Your Kitchen,

Plate, and Life with More Than 150 Fresh and Flavorful Vegan Recipes

By Nava Atlas

Paleo Vegan Plant-Based Primal Recipes

By Ellen Jaffe JonesRecipes by Alan Roettinger

Straight From the Earth Irresistible Vegan

Recipes for EveryoneBy Myra Goodman

and Marea Goodman

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THERE’S NOTHING EARTHIER THAN A PLANT-based diet, as three brand new cookbooks amply demonstrate. Plant Power, the latest offering by Nava Atlas, author of more than 20 cookbooks and founder of VegKitchen.com, is destined to be a classic. This substantial but very approachable and beautifully designed volume first lays the groundwork for vegan cooking: reasons to go vegan, nutrition basics, setting up a pantry, shopping, meal planning, and social/logistical challenges. It then provides a storehouse of basic but fresh and up-to-date vegan recipes, with emphasis on accessible and easy-to-love categories including bowls, pasta, pizza, and wraps. This makes the book a great gift for that on-the-fence relative or friend who needs a boost in order to try vegan. For the experienced vegan with many cookbooks on the shelf, there are plenty of adventurous flavor pairings to make this one worth adding. How about Coconut Cream of Orange Vegetables Soup? Every recipe has a “Complete the Meal” sidebar that helps you with menu planning. Many of the recipes are presented as general approaches to cooking a food (greens, roasted veggies) with multiple variations, giving you the chance to “think beyond the recipe” and create your

own, working with what you have or what your family likes. This is a versatile cookbook that will help you be a confident vegan cook in your own right.

Consider going back in time as well as back to the earth with Paleo Vegan, by Ellen Jaffe Jones with recipes by Alan Roettinger. Paleo is all the rage, and several aspects of paleo (avoiding processed foods, increasing consumption of vegetables and fruits) constitute good dietary advice. The main sticking point with adopting a paleo diet for vegans is not that it emphasizes meat (we could just leave that out), but that it excludes beans and grains, on the grounds that they were not available to our ancient ancestors. Jaffe Jones looks at several popular paleo plans and finds that they all allow for some flexibility and “cheating” (e.g., some allow the use of dairy products). She then presents legumes and grains as “desirable cheats” which allow a vegan to follow a paleo diet and also provide the protein that other paleo adherents are getting from meat. The other reason paleo authors exclude beans and grains—that they contain so-called toxins—is easily overcome by the use of traditional preparation techniques such as soaking, sprouting, fermenting and,

Back totheEarth

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well, cooking—techniques which neutralize toxins and make nutrients accessible. Paleo Vegan makes paleo principles achievable on a vegan diet and gives vegans access to the benefits of a paleo regimen. It’s a great book if you have pesky associates who insist that paleo and vegan are mutually exclusive, and it would be useful to any vegan who wants to try this new path. Recipes including Cucumbers and Peppers with Chipotle Vinaigrette and Quinoa with Leeks and White Truffle Oil certainly make it inviting.

Straight From the Earth comes from the family that founded Earthbound Farm, the large organic farm in Northern California that has supplied so many of us with organic veggies over the years. This book is a feast for the eyes as well as for the palate, pairing a beautifully produced photograph with almost every recipe. The authors, mother Myra Goodman and daughter Marea Goodman, are not vegan, but they love cooking with produce—and they certainly have ample fruit and vegetables at their disposal! Their voyage of discovery—finding that vegan food can be completely satisfying, and that they often prefer vegan versions of favorite dishes—could be encouraging to non-vegans or novice vegans using this book. And eaters of any stripe can enjoy the recipes, with surprises in store for veteran vegan cooks. You may think you know how to make Tofu-Veggie Scramble, but try this version using chipotle powder, dried ginger, kale, and toasted sesame oil. For every thing there’s a season: Spicy Heirloom Tomato Sauce for summer, and for cold winter evenings, Slow-Simmered Beans with Tuscan Kale on Bulgur. Myra Goodman writes that veganism is following the trajectory of “organic,” which used to be fringe and now is mainstream. Let’s hope she’s right; the book she’s written with her daughter will certainly help make it so.

Any one of these delicious new cookbooks can take you back to your roots!


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After much discussion around the conference room table, these eight cookbook authors are VN editors’ fantasy candidates to open a vegan restaurant.

Will they be featured in Restaurants vs. Cookbooks, Part II? It’s delicious to dream.


Chloe Coscarelli shot to fame on the Food Network’s Cupcake Wars in 2010 as the first vegan chef to win a televised

culinary competition.

At Chef Chloe’s Italian Restaurant, we’d order Butternut Squash, Caramelized

Onion, and Apple Pizza. Because pizza.

Bryant Terry is an author, chef, educator, food justice activist,

and public speaker.

Terry’s Oakland, CA restaurant would be one of the hottest in the

country, thanks to dishes like Crispy Teff and Grit Cakes with Eggplant,

Tomatoes, and Peanuts.

Robin Robertson left her chef and cooking instructor jobs in the 80s to write more than twenty cookbooks. VegNews

readers know her from our popular Global Vegan column.

Robertson’s menu always expands our culinary boundaries: Za’atar Roasted

Cauliflower should do the trick on our next (imaginary) visit!

Fran Costigan is a culinary instructor, author of dessert cookbooks—and above

all, “The Queen of Vegan Desserts.”

We would happily put birthday candles on a Brooklyn Blackout Layer Cake.

Miyoko Schinner is a modern Renaissance woman: author, entrepreneur,

TV show host, and founder of the newly launched artisan cheese company,

Miyoko’s Kitchen.

After work, we’d race over to Schinner’s for a glass of wine and a decadent vegan cheese plate.

Del Sroufe is co-owner and executive chef of Wellness Forum Foods, a plant-

based meal delivery and catering service in Columbus, OH.

We’d stick to hearty, Heartland fare at Chef Del’s: Lentil Shepherd’s Pie

with Rustic Parsnip Crust.

Angela Liddon is best known for writing the award-winning blog Oh She Glows, complete with stunning

photography and personal anecdotes.

We wish Liddon’s restaurant was around the corner from the VNHQ, where we’d order the Protein Power Goddess Bowl

on our lunch break.

Brian Patton is a vegan author and chef living in Los Angeles. He runs the

good-natured blog, The Sexy Vegan, which he describes as “mostly recipes” with “occasional nonsense.”

Patton’s restaurant would be our choice for a first

date, starting with drinks: we’ll toast to a Nashtini and

Bloody Vulcan.

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