Meatless March

My gosh, what a world we live in. When the pandemic hit hard nine months ago and we all retreated into our homes, I honestly feared that I had already seen some of the elderly people I knew for the last time, prior to March, without even knowing it at the time. That horror, that sadness - it was crushing and unspeakable then. I'm voicing it now because I am blown away that my mom, who lives in a care home in London, got vaccinated today. It's a turning point. I can scarcely believe we got here, and I'm emotional. I'm going to try to let this be a moment to forget about the large swath of humanity that seemed to be working against keeping us going as a species since March: the people who were careless, clueless, or callous. I'm going to focus instead on the amazing GOODNESS that happened alongside the awfulness: the people who kept doing their jobs when society would have crumbled if they'd stopped; the people who arranged ways to safely cheer us all up with free...

We had about seven or eight inches of snow overnight, and since we've no place to go (for the past nine unholy months), let it snow, let it snow, let it snow, right? Despite the fact that our school district has been operating entirely remotely since March, nonetheless they declared a "snow day." So we took our cue and headed to the town's premier sledding hill. I was a little dismayed at how many people were there, but the vast majority of them were wearing masks, and we were never close to any particular person for more than a minute or so. Sledding is fun, no question, but today I decided that my very favorite part is seeing people literally leaping out of the way left and right as my sled veers erratically down the hill. I'm afraid I have no footage of that, but here's my backup dancer coasting down: A nice warming dinner after a sledding outing is "Fettucine with Artichoke Sauce," which I copied out of a cookbook sometime in the Paleolithic Age,...

My sister made " Wild Rice Stuffing Balls " (Wholehearted Eats) for Thanksgiving, and recommended the recipe. Stuffing fairly screams "Thanksgiving," but if you're looking for a special alternative to a meat entree for Hanukkah or Christmas or New Year's or Arbor Day or whatever the kids are celebrating nowadays, this could be it. Around these parts, we're prepping for Christmas.  We make gingerbread cookies every year. The Stuffing Balls are quite a lot of work, so don't be a fool like me, and make them on a random Monday. By the time I got all those darned ingredients mixed together, I was wholly unenthusiastic about shaping them into rather slimy balls. There should actually be a name for that point at the end of the cooking process when I've lost whatever positive spirit I started out with, and I become convinced that the final result won't even taste good.  But fear not, they really did turn out well! I served them with a vegan gravy th...

I just read a New Yorker piece that perfectly captured my current feelings about cooking. Helen Rosner wrote so beautifully about something I will put very bluntly: I am SICK OF COOKING. I would just give up altogether right now and eat cheese and crackers for every meal, if I wasn't responsible for nourishing a growing backup dancer. And a (mostly) vegetarian diet is limiting for a cook like me. It used to be so easy to plan delicious dishes when I was wasn't giving a second thought to meat as an ingredient. Obviously there are wonderful vegetarian dishes, but I have cut myself off to half the food options by reducing my meat consumption for the sake of the environment. I am committed to it, but it makes planning meals more fatiguing. We get takeout a couple days a week, and that's a relief, but I'm conscious that the takeout options that appeal to us aren't particularly healthy, and I also feel guilty about the billion plastic containers piling up in my cupboard....

There is a Thanksgiving episode of the TV show "Friends" in which Rachel attempts to make a "traditional English trifle," but she doesn't realize that two pages of her cookbook are stuck together. She's reading a combination of two unrelated recipes, and gamely adds a layer of meat to the dessert that is not supposed to be there. Then everyone pretends the result is not awful.   Googling taught me that plenty of people have recreated this dish with meat...yikes. But I came across a recipe (Bren Did) to make it LOOK like it has a meat layer, but really the "meat" is coconut coated in Nutella. I was intrigued, and Thanksgiving is coming, and things that would have sounded like a pointless amount of effort eight months ago have now started to sound amusing.  With time on my hands, the day before assembling the trifle, I made my own pound cake (NYT Cooking; subscription required). It came out great, but needed at least an hour and 45 minutes to ...

The song of the first leaf blower rang out clear and true at 7:51am this past Saturday in my neighborhood.  From The New Yorker Here in the suburbs, leaf blowers are...how shall I put this delicately?... they are over-used. On any given day between March and November, at any daylight hour, I can usually hear one or more of them whining (I can hear one right now). The worst offenders are the gas-powered models, which are unholy loud, stinky, and polluting, but even electric leaf blowers blow around a lot of debris that makes a person sneezy, and disturb the ecosystem on which pollinators depend . I'm selfish enough to enjoy my home's grass lawn and plenty of non-native plants, which aren't doing the Earth any favors, but I have instructed our paid lawn mowing service* not to use leaf blowers on our property. It's funny, by the way, that when I asked, the guy initially argued with me! He protested that they needed to clear off the lawn to mow it, and I said "surely y...

I'm always on the hunt for good alternatives to meat-based meals. As we know from yet another study , the global food system is a big contributor to climate change, and food from animals causes more environmental harm than plant-based foods. Yesterday, my hunt took me to the depths of my own freezer. I had two tubs of roasted butternut squash in the freezer, left over from previous recipes , and the moment had arrived to defrost the stuff and put it to good use. First, I adapted a NYT Cooking recipe, " Cheesy Baked Pumpkin Pasta With Kale " by Sarah Jampel. I seized the opportunity to use vegetables I had over-bought earlier this week: broccoli and bok choy. It was also a chance to use up some really dreamy ricotta (thank you Baker Street Market !) that was a day past its expiration date but still good. Very, very good indeed, actually! Cheesy Baked Butternut Pasta with Veggies (serves 3-4) 8oz pasta (shells, penne, etc) ~1.5 cups veggies - kale, bok choy, broccoli, etc -...

I love costumes and so I love Halloween , normally. This year, there was no way I going to waste weeks crafting costumes only to forsake festivities for the sake of safety. I was sad, of course, but what's new there? We all have been sad about basically everything since March. Such a sad eight months it has been. But we couldn't dash the annual sugar dreams of our eight-year-old backup dancer. We tossed out an idea: what if she trick-or-treated inside our house? We have plenty of rooms with doors! She was game, so that's what we did. We also had ghost pancakes for breakfast. Not done with scary yet? You're in luck, because now it's Election Day. You maybe want some comfort food, but you also want something to make you feel less guilty about all the Halloween candy you'll binge-eat while binge-watching the election returns. Here is your solution: " Creamy Mushroom Linguine " (Discover Delicious).* "Not helpful, Jaylbyrd," you're chiding me...

Backup Dancer #1: "What's for lunch?" Me: "Mac and cheese. But--" [sees look of wild excitement on Backup Dancer #1's face] "it's not the stuff from the box. It's...a different kind." Backup Dancer #2: "Any mac and cheese is good mac and cheese!" Me: [sweats nervously and dishes it out] ----- Before I tell you about vegan mac and cheese, allow me to point out a personal failing. Sometimes I get a little amnesia about why a largely plant-based diet is a good way for individuals to fight climate change. Sometimes (all the time, really) I desperately want a beef burger oozing with grease, topped with mayo and cheese (and a slice of perfectly ripe tomato, but the tomato is inoffensive). Sometimes I give in and eat that burger, and I savor every bite. I would eat one of those RIGHT NOW. Then I read something like a recent New York Times article, " Belching Cows and Endless Feedlots: Fixing Cattle’s Climate Issues ," and I re...

"Life's too short not to eat dessert first," wise people say, and I'm figuring that the parallel axiom is "life's too short not to blog about dessert first." Let me tell you about a drool-worthy apple pie. My backup dancer had the idea to top " Apple Pie by Grandma Ople " (AllRecipes) with stars, using a cookie cutter on the pastry, rather than making a latticework crust as suggested in the recipe. It turned out great.  You're wondering, of course, how I screwed up this recipe, and the answer is that I put the butter, flour, sugars, and water onto the stove all at the same time. Fortunately, it was perfectly fine, so go ahead: save yourself a couple minutes and make that mistake just like me. I have a persistent problem with apple pies that are too juicy. They overflow in the oven, and then they don't cut well, even though they taste great. Next time I make this, I would cut down on the sauce by at least a third, but if anyone has a bet...

I caught myself making a mistake almost as soon as I started cooking " Olive Oil Mashed Potatoes " (NYT Cooking; subscription required). I screw up recipes all the time, but usually it takes me a while to figure out that I have, for example, halved only SOME of the ingredients. Sometimes it takes until I sit down and put a bite in my mouth before I realize I have done something laughably wrong. But last night, as soon as I popped my potatoes and garlic into the pot of boiling water, I looked back at the recipe and realized the potatoes should have been not only diced, but also peeled. Whoops. My failure to dice just meant I'd need to cook them longer, which I did (I fished out the garlic after 15 minutes), and that was fine. But I was chagrined by those skins, as I watched the taters cook. I tried to reassure myself that even fancy restaurants sometimes offer skin-on mashed potatoes, albeit for unfathomable reasons. But when I started squeezing my cooked potatoes and garl...

Tonight's dinner used a recipe from a local woman who not only has a blog with very delicious-looking vegan recipes, but has just started a meal delivery business . It would be fun to meet her someday, if we ever get to meet people again. " Butternut Squash Miso Mac n’ Cheese " (The Colorful Kitchen) does not, of course, contain cheese. It is plenty tasty, though, thanks to the miso and nutritional yeast, which balance out the sweetness of the squash. While the recipe suggests liquid smoke, I turned instead to a favorite seasoning: smoked paprika. I could put that stuff on/in everything. Here we see the sauce before I blended it, staged in front of my attractive new collection of air plants: I have judged that the main things standing between me and emotional collapse this winter will be 1) heated gloves, and 2) houseplants. The gloves and plants are shouldering a heavy burden. I hope they will not let me down. Here's the pasta with the sauce before I threw in the ro...

Back in the Before Times, you'll recall, I observed Vegan Vednesdays . I recognize that dairy farming, in addition to meat farming, contributes to climate change, and despite my undying love of dairy, I wanted to do my part to move toward a more sustainable diet. It was always hard for me and I failed a LOT, but I felt good about my efforts. Maybe I even got some of you thinking about it, too. And then in March, the pandemic left all of us scrambling for comfort wherever we could find it--from cheese to cheesy TV shows--and faced with a sense of doom, some of us gave ourselves permission to make some dubious choices. What did it matter, if we were potentially all going to perish? I'm lookin' at you, empty bottles of alcohol But for the lucky lot of us who did not contract the virus (or at least, not yet), we're still muddling through, seven months later, and maybe it's time to stop using COVID-19 as an excuse for our waywardness, and embrace personal responsibility...