Coconut Quinoa with Harissa-Roasted Sweet Potatoes

I recently cooked with harissa for the first time, and that dish was good, but then I was stuck with a jar of harissa that was still almost full. I hopped around the internet, looking for recipes to help me use it up, and that's how I came to try "Coconut Quinoa with Harissa-Roasted Sweet Potatoes" (AllRecipes).

I substituted veggie stock for chicken stock, because animal agriculture is more of a driver of global warming than plant agriculture, so I minimize my meat consumption. Don't blame that substitution for the fact that this meal was a little bland. My harissa was mild, so I think it just needed a smidge of heat. I dosed it with some hot sauce. I like heat in my food, not heat trapped in the atmosphere by greenhouse gases.

After almost five years of being mostly vegetarian, choosing meatless options when I cook is automatic, but I don't think anyone needs to be overly rigid about it to make an impact. If you minimize your meat intake, you're acting against climate change, and you can still enjoy meat as an occasional treat, as far as I'm concerned. 

But don't we all wish for solutions to life's problems that don't involve any change in behavior? It would be so nice to get six-pack abs without going to the gym, or to learn new information without putting in the time to study. I still wish I could blithely eat burgers without contributing to a global catastrophe, and so I have been as excited as anyone about the possibilities of lab-grown meat. 

I was sad, then, to read a long but very interesting opinion piece by journalist Joe Fasser on this topic, in the New York Times. Despite the hype, Fasser reported, science and engineering have not advanced far enough that cultivated meat will be a market-ready option anytime soon. Sigh.

So I save my enjoyment of those burgers for rare occasions, and take comfort in the many excellent vegetarian options for meals. Scroll back through this blog for ideas. Twice-baked potatoes, anyone? Red lentil soup? Vegan jambalaya? Tonight, I left the cooking to someone else: I enjoyed al-pastor-style mushroom tacos from a great new local restaurant, Jus' Tacos, and they're so good that I didn't think twice about what wasn't in them--meat!