Happy Veganniversary!

It is two year today since I ditched eating animals and went all vegan.

Best. Decision. Ever.

I feel better than I did before- no more bloating, constipation, or raw-chicken-phobia-inspired panic attacks. 

I do better than I did before - learning about veganism and factory farming made me more aware of other social issues in the world, not limited to those related to animal agriculture. Accepting that all living beings want the same basic things as humans, to live, makes me feel humble and more connected to others. It's also made me more willing to stand up for myself and speak my mind.

My friends and family continue to be incredibly supportive, going out of their way to make sure I am accommodated when we dine out. 

Never a rolled eye or a "get over it already". They are solid and I love them. Thank you for putting up with my vegangelizing! 

I've met a few new vegan friends who are totally ok with my vegangelizing. We sometimes hang out. It's all pretty normal, ya.

For today's veganniversary I was going to make something super fancy and spectacular and post it here, to illustrate how amazing vegan food can be. But then I got a freaking awful cold, and all I want is soup.

So I made this soup, which I call Potassium Soup. It has lots of potassium in it. I think it's probably good for you and stuff.

Ellen's Potassium Blast Veggie and Bean Soup

1 onion, diced
4 or 5 cloves garlic, minced
olive oil, 1 or 2 Tbs ( I use a little of the oil from the sundried tomatoes)
tomato paste, 1 of those small little tins - ya, the whole thing.
sundried tomatoes, oil packed, about 2 Tbs, or more if you like
thyme, rosemary, basil, and oregano. 1 Tbs each
6 C vegetable broth
carrots, 4 small slices
potato, 3 medium, diced
2 C cooked or canned white beans, 1.5 C cooked or canned red kidney beans
1 C cauliflower cut up very small

4 or 5 C chopped greens (I use a mix of spinach, kale and rainbow chard)
1 red pepper, diced

Saute the onion and garlic in the oil over medium heat until onion is soft. Be careful not to let the garlic burn or you'll be super sorry and the carnivores will win.
Add the sundries tomatoes and tomato paste and herbs and mix together.
Pour in the veggie broth, the potatoes and carrots.
Bring to a boil, reduce heat and cover. Let simmer for 10 minutes or until potatoes are soft but not mooooshy.
Add beans an cauliflower. Cook for another 5 or ten minutes.
Trun off heat. Add red pepper and chopped greens. I just put the greens on top of the soup and then put the lid on to let them slowly wilt. The red pepper will still be crunchy, but it's one of those foods that are more nutritious eaten raw, so adding it at the end saves a bit of the vitaminy goodness.

salt and pepper to taste.
I throw a couple croutons on top for crunch, because croutons are excellent.
Pour in a bowl, feel sorry for yourself because you have had a nasty cold for 6 straight days, and enjoy the surge of potassium the will make you... um.... potassiumy.

sorry for the poor photo quality. It's good, so just make it and eat it and shut up about it already.

So there you have it. Thanks to every who has been so wonderful to me as I continue to be super vegan and everything. You need to know I love you and that the images of sad animals that I post on Facebook, well, that's not going to stop.



PS. If you are considering transitioning to a vegan diet, or just want a few meatless recipes in your rotation, I highly, highly recommend the new cookbook by Angela Liddon, Oh She Glows. I've made about 15 recipes out of the 100 or so, and they are all winners.

Foodie Friday - Weight Watchers Like a Virgin

What do Weight Watchers and Madonna have in common? Both are over 50 and are in great shape.

michael lauglin photo

christof stache photo

Both come from humble beginnings. Both are highly successful businesses. Both must continually reinvent themselves in order to remain fresh and relevant.

While I’ve been on Weight Watchers 3 times (and I’ve only met one person who was on Madonna once), I gained 5 pounds each time. My friend gained an excellent party ice-breaker topic. Granted I gained weight because I didn’t follow the plan. It’s pretty sensible stuff. Healthy diet. Portion control. Moderate exercise. Nothing new here. Yet they come out with a new system every year! Calories, then points, then flex points. Soon it will be buttons.

I’ll bet Madonna is hungry, too. And instead of points of flexpoints or what have you, each year Madonna is New and Improved! Now with more Sinew. Next year it will be, Less Music, More Nipples.



new single cover. seriously?



Every January Weight Watchers has to be New Improved Fresh Shiny. With every new album, Madonna has to be sexier and more grizzly looking. But really, it’s the same old thing, isn’t it? What they really should do is jazz up the supports components of the program, which is, after all, really what makes Weight Watchers work, and what makes Weight Watchers so much money. Anyone can buy a diet book and be done with it. But it’s those meetings, those weekly talks and visits and the accountability (complete with victory dances or shame slumps) that makes the program a lasting affair. It’s why AA works for so many people. And church.

And Madonna should have a nice big sandwich. Looking the way she does at 50-something.... it’s just creepy. Don’t get me wrong. People need to eat right and exercise. But if I had to choose between looking like Madonna and being 10 pounds overweight... well, call me fatty and pass the stretch pants. I shouldn’t be critical because Madonna might very well say to me, “Ellen Reid, you should just not eat a sandwich and maybe get some exercise”, and she’d be quite right. But, in my humble opinion, in terms of aging, me thinks the lady doth protest too much.

I mean, what the hell will happen to her psyche when she can no longer hold herself together with bits of plastic and fishnet stockings and Kabala bracelets? Or is she still in to that? Can’t keep up. Stop, Madonna. Before you have your name used as a DSM diagnosis.

As this is a Foodie Friday, let’s talk about the food on Weight Watchers first, shall we?

Everyone has seen these things on the Internets, right? If not, here they are for your trip down diet memory lane:

My mom has made her Weight Watcher’s Soup ever since I can remember. She’s been very successful with the program. I think I probably went straight from breast milk to Weight watcher’s soup. And then off to Cheerios and then Vector. And then crack cocaine. So really, breast milk is a slippery slope, isn’t it?

The thing about the soup is that you could, according to the WW plan, have as much as you wanted. Weight Watchers clearly had not met with me and my appetite. When I was younger, mom made this soup, as per the recipe, with cabbage. I wasn’t having any of it. Later, mom capitulated and replaced the cabbage with more friendly vegetables like sugar snap peas. Anyway, blah bah blah. Here’s the recipe.

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Weight Watchers Garden Vegetable Soup, as made by Mickey "Gangsta Librarian" Reid

2/3 C slice carrots
1/2 C diced onion
2 garlic cloves, minced
3 C broth (Chicken or vegetable)
1and 1/2 C diced cabbage (or omit and use larger amounts of other veggies)
1/2 Cdiced celery
1 T tomato paste
1/2 tsp dried basil
1/4 tspdried oregano
1/4 tsp salt
1 red pepper chopped
1/2 C sugar snap peas
1/2 C diced zucchini
1/2 C frozen green beans
1 C chopped mushrooms
1/2 C frozen peas (optional)
1 can diced tomatoes (optional)
1 large can mixed beans (optional, 1 can adds 8 points to the recipe overall)


1. In a large saucepan sprayed with non-stick cooking spray, saute the carrot, onions and garlic over low heat until softened - about 5 minutes

2.Ad broth, cabbage (if using), celery, red pepper, sugar snap peas, green beans (if using fresh), tomato paste, herbs and salt. Bring to a boil. Lower heat and simmer, covered, for 15 minutes, or until vegetables are tender.

3. Stir in zucchini, tomatoes, frozen peas (if using) and mushrooms nad heat 3-4 minutes.

4. Serve hot.

* If using canned broth you might want to add a little extra water with some  dried boullion powder if you need more liquid.

Per serving: 42 calories; 0g total fat; 0mg cholesterol; 63 g sodium (if using low sodium broth); 8 g carbs; 2.4 g fibre; 3 g protein; 41 g calcium

0 POINTS

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On my most recent visit to see my Mom, she made a big batch of the soup using vegetable broth, to accommodate my recent adoption of a vegan diet. Isn’t she swell? I probably could even handle cabbage in it now, although I doubt anyone else would be able to handle the implications of feeding cabbage to me.

And just like the soup, you can have as much Madonna as you want, all day long. If she makes you dance, you can probably earn a few WW points.

SOUP IS GOOD FOOD!

Do you guys love soup?

I love soup. I’m not just saying that so you’ll like me, or because I love the movie “Best In Show”, either.

 I really love soup.

Soup is what I want to eat after I run, no matter how sweaty I am. I want soup.

I used to really like Baxter’s Winter Squash and Carrot soup, but when they “new and Improved” the recipe, I found it to be thin and tasting not unlike old vase water. They don’t even sell the new version any more. Silly Baxter’s!  So now I’m into Campbell’s V8 Broccoli soup.

I also really like Campbell’s Chunky Beef soup – you know, the soup that eats like a meal. And I eat the whole can - none of this one can makes 2 servings crap. My mom…. She’s so funny… she says to me “You don’t have to eat the whole can, sweetie”. Ha ha ha, mom. Yes. Yes I DO have to eat the whole can.  Seniors are so hilarious with the things they believe.

My Dad used to love Royal Cauliflower soup – Royal because it was from someone who used to cook for The Queen. (I don’t know where is appeared originally, but it is not my recipe. If I find out I’ll let you know).  It was mostly cream with a little cauliflower thrown in for manners. Here is the recipe:

Royal Cauliflower and Coriander Soup

4 T Butter

1 medium cauliflower

1 medium potato, cut up

1 medium onion, cut up

2 C chicken broth

2 C milk (probably full-fat milk)

1 t ground coriander

salt and pepper

cream

parsley

Melt butter in a large pot. Sweat vegetables in butter, covered, until soft – about 5 minutes. Add all other ingredients except for the milk and cook until very soft. Transfer mixture to blender and add milk. Puree. Add a swirl of cream and sprinkle with parsley. Serve hot or cold.

My Mom makes a Weight Watcher’s soup that you can eat by the vat full for no “points”. Still, she eats maybe 1 cup full at a time. I laugh at her small soup capacity. I’m my father’s girl.

I’ve tried all kinds of brands in my search for the perfect soup. Imagine’s Organic Butternut Squash soup is so awful that I poured it down the sink without taking a second spoonful. 

While living in London, I became addicted to New Covent Garden’s Carrot and Coriander soup. I bought their cookbook when I moved back to Canada, but it didn’t turn out the same. 

Tomato soup MUST have crackers. Campbell’s is fine, but I’m always in the market for a new tomato soup. Suggestions?

Brian likes Baxter’s Bacon and Lentil soup.

 He also likes Primo brand soups, which I have tried and find them to taste like old tomatoes pureed with old man sweat and pickled egg brine. Not nice. Brian and I are so different in our taste of soups. It’s a wonder we’re still married after 6 months. We do not speak of it.

A caveat, because there is always a caveat: I do not like fish soup. Every weekend Brian and I go to the same pub for our date night dinner and every time the soup of the day is clam chowder. I’ve complained. For years, people, of going there every week. Finally, this past week, they changed it to Spicy Black Bean and Chicken soup. I wasn’t in the mood for soup. Damn it.

My friend Jane likes fish soup. Eww. She’s weird. Likes children and art, too. Totally weird.

What kind of soup do you like?