Meatless March

When I was supposed to be practicing mindfulness in my yoga class recently, I was actually thinking of how I took online yoga classes from my fourth-grade bestie, Becky, during the darkest days of the pandemic . Thinking about Becky led me to think about our fourth-grade teacher, Mrs. Hey: a short, no-nonsense woman with an intense Southern drawl. Then I remembered how one of Mrs. Hey's favorite expressions, delivered with severity, was "don't be cute," meaning "behave" or "be serious" or "you're not amusing, so shut up."  Mrs. Hey Remembering tiny but terrifying Mrs. Hey admonishing me not to be cute, I struggled not to laugh in the silence of yoga class, and then I thought about "Smoky Lentil Stew with Leeks and Potatoes" (NYT Cooking; subscription required). So much for mindfulness. But why, you ask, did I connect Mrs. Hey and this recipe? One of the recipe's flaws--and I take the position that there are several--is i...

"I am not looking to ban gas stoves," stated Consumer Product Safety Commission chair Alexander Hoehn-Saric last week. Ah, stoves. Who knew something so mundane could inspire such breathless political hysteria that the CPSC chair was compelled to comment? It is a depressing sign of the times. By now you have probably already learned that not only does cooking on a gas stove cause air indoor air pollution, but gas stoves can be a source of methane emissions even when they're turned off , so they're contributing to climate change. "Huh, that's a problem," you're probably thinking, and you're right. But that's not what most people are upset about! The hand-wringers are those who think the government is going to take their gas stoves away. Imagine if those people got as upset about the climate crisis as they did about the idea of cooking on an electric range, or if they protested genuine threats to democracy and obstacles to equality instead of i...

I witnessed a Hitchcockian moment in my yard yesterday when a swarm of grackles passed through.  Fantastic Tippi Hedren costume on Halloween a few years ago But you know what's scarier than "The Birds"? Climate change. Back in 1963 we worried about Tippi Hedren; today we worry about  climate tipping points . One way that individuals can fight climate change is by adopting a primarily plant-based diet, and " Winter Salad Hummus Bowls " (Epicurious) are a superb vegetarian meal choice. You need time to make each element--the eggs, the greens, the  seed topping , and the  hummus --but they don't all need to be ready at the same time, so you can make some or all of them in advance. It's delicious, healthy, and gorgeous. Even the kale is palatable! Vegetarian dishes like this are a simple choice to reduce your carbon footprint, given the disproportionate contribution to climate change of diets heavy in animal products, relative to plant-based diets. If you sk...

I once read about a funny, bot-generated list of the opening lines of blog posts, in which the blog authors had offered sincere excuses for why it had been so long since they last blogged. So I'm just going to move on without apology, acknowledging that the Earth's various environmental crises haven't somehow resolved themselves in the past six months. Therefore, you might still need motivation to eat less meat, because raising animals for food is environmentally problematic , and you want to be part of the solution. Oink Going forward, I will be offering you my thoughts on foods and recipes that are not only vegetarian and sometimes vegan, but also gluten-free. "Freedom" is an inspirational word, but achieving freedom from gluten is difficult and, frankly, often sad. Take cinnamon rolls, for example. Remember how I used to make cinnamon rolls that I described as GOOOOOOOOOOOOD ? I tried to make a non-yeast version with gluten-free (GF) flour to enjoy on Christma...