Book Review and Give Away- The Market Vegan

Vegan cuisine is too often associated with 20-something hipsters sporting asymmetrical hair-do's, pierced by the dozen and half-sleeve tattoos or crunchy moms who reek of patchouli oil, shop only at Whole Foods Market and speak to non-vegan people as if they are unenlightened, animal-slaughtering, hate-mongers who house moldy colons and poisonous blood.  This is really a shame and so often makes non-vegan people feel as though vegan food is catered to a club that they don't belong to.  But, as proven by Laura Gesin in her book The Market Vegan, plant based food is for everyone.

Even if you're not vegan, you'll love Laura Gesin's new cookbook, The Market Vegan.  It is a cookbook packed with 33 vegan recipes and helpful hints, such as what vegan alternatives to keep on hand in order to make cooking easier and how to decipher vegan beer and wine from non-vegan beer and wine.  (Though as a personal only-semi-related side-note, Gesin seems to show some preference toward Toffutti products, which I don't love.  I much, much prefer the Follow Your Heart products for excellence in taste and texture).

My family is not vegan, however, my daughter Bunny is allergic to casein and out of respect for her we don't have any casein in our home (aside from the coffee creamer that I keep hidden on the top shelf of my fridge, of course).  Having a casein-free home is harder than you may think.  Often, it's much easier to just grab something that says "vegan," rather than standing in the middle of the market, trying to decode a list of ingredients.  For this reason, we eat a lot of vegan food and I do a lot of vegan cooking.  I usually tell people that everything in our house is vegan but the meat.

My favorite aspect of this book is its' very foundation.  The recipes are built on simple ingredients that most people use alread.  The vegan substitutes required to make each recipe can be found in most markets.  Any Whole Foods carries them and most health food stores will as well.  I am in Florida, on vacation and staying with my parents.  I was able to find all of the necessary ingredients in their local Publix, which was an unexpected surprise!

I'd easily recommend this book to someone who is transitioning into vegetarianism or who is newly vegan.  The recipes are accessible.  Vegan food is often categorized as "rabbit food" by non-vegan people, but I am pleased to say that these recipes are filling, healthy, rich and delicious.  They are great for people who don't have a whole lot of time to cook and meals that taste like they took hours to make, actually took less than 30 minutes (cook time included).

This review will critique The Market Vegan using three guidelines.  1.) Organization  2.) Creativity and 3.) Recipe ease and user friendliness.

The way a cookbook is organized can really make or break it.  They are sort of like mixed cd's that way.  It's important for me to be able to look through it and plan a linear meal.   I need all similar things to be organized in chapters like Salads, Soups, Starters, Main Courses and Desserts.  Or, I don't mind if things are labeled by genre.  Having Chapters in a cookbook is important to my experience when I am reading it.  I don't typically throw my astrological sign around when explaining myself, but this may be the perfect time to tell you  that I am a Virgo.  The Market Vegan isn't organized in a way that is comfortable for me and it threw me off of my game a bit.  Perhaps I am old-fashioned and used to working with cookbooks in their paper form.  I can't rule out the fact that I might be out of date and behind the times.  Truthfully, because I had my ipad, it was easy to go back to the table of contents and tap a recipe and so the table of contents became my "go-to" instead of the pages with the ingredients and pictures.

That said, once I found something that I wanted to make, I found the recipes to be conversational and very easy to follow.  The author's voice came through in the book and her recipes show a lot of heart.  At times the ingredients are not listed in the order that you use them, but the lists of ingredients were generally few enough that this didn't create too big of a problem for me.

All in all, the way that The Market Vegan was organized was not my favorite thing about it, but truthfully, it's the only negative critique that I have of the book... so I'm glad that I got it out of the way because I have so many other things to say that are positive.  And of course, the most important thing about a cookbook is THE FOOD.  So, let's get too the beef (no pun intended) of this review.

Honestly, I can't rave about the creativity in these recipes enough.  I made the Potato Leek Soup, the Vegan Chili, the Eggplant and Italian Bread "Lasagna," the Peanut Butter Pie and the White Wine Sangria.  I was also supposed to make the stuffed mushrooms but between our vacation activities and my general forgetfulness, I forgot while making my shopping list and when I realized what happened I was all cooked out!  This is really self-sabotage because it was what I was most looking forward to eating.

Each recipe was more creative than the next.  Gesin  has a very good grasp on texture and is delightfully playful with the textures in her foods.  I was most impressed by the textures and flavors in the Eggplant and Italian Bread Lasagna.   As I said in my pre-review-blog-post, I make my own eggplant lasagna and I make my own sauce.  These are family favorites and I am proud (with a capital "P") of them.  My recipe is radically different than the recipe in The Market Vegan and it sure as s%&t doesn't include scallions, celery or carrots.  Admittedly, as I was eyeing the ingredient list the New Jersey Italian California Irishwoman in me raised her skinny little eyebrow in said "Oh-kaaaay" with the edge of condescension in her voice.  But oh-my-god and ooohlala, was I surprised by how delicious this was!  I would never have used these vegetables and was thrilled by the result.  The Italian bread was layered with seasoned Eggplant and a light tomato sauce (recipe incorporated in the lasagna recipe). The result was marvelous.  The vegetables remained slightly crisp in the sauce and when layered with the eggplant the bread took on a somewhat meaty texture.  It was seriously DELICIOUS.  It was masterpiece good and wonderfully simple to make.

My only criticism of this recipe is that I will add baby bella mushrooms to it when I make it in the future.  I guess that's not so much a critique as a personal preference, however.  It was quite good without the mushrooms as well.

Believe it or not, the Eggplant and Italian Bread Lasagna wasn't even my favorite thing.  My favorite was, without a doubt, the vegan chili.  This chili was wildly easy to make.  It's the sort of thing that you put in the crock pot and walk away from and it just magically turns into something wonderful and delicious.  Truth of truths, I ate two bowls of it for dinner and later that night had to will myself not to go and eat another one.  Bunny even had a bowl this morning for BREAKFAST.

We enjoyed this chili with a sprinkling of daiya cheddar cheese and a dollop of vegan sour cream.  But it is also scrumptious when naked.

By far, the most creative recipe that I tried was the Peanut Butter Pie.  Having a daughter with a food allergy has been hard.  Frequently she is faced with sweet treats that she can't eat and vegan alternatives usually taste like cardboard (with the exception of the Sweet Freedom bakery in Philadelphia.)  This pie uses tofu and vegan cream cheese, which initially sparked my interest. Previous to making this recipe I thought that it could go either way.  It might be delicious and it might be a soy-disaster. I am here to promise you that you could not taste the soy in this pie at all.  I am so excited to make different variations of it in the future.  It's going to be a base recipe for my family from now on.  Upon eating a slice, I compiled a list of all the vegan people I know and when I can have them over to my house and serve this to them.  It's beyond impressive.  It's pure genius.  I could never have come up with this recipe on my own.  It took moxy and talent together and was crazily easy to make.   The texture was perfect.  The flavor was perfect!  The pie was perfect!

The photo was taken immediately after pouring the pie filling into the crust.

 This photo was taken after the pie rested in the freezer for about 2 hours.

 I also loved Gesin's recipe for White Sangria.  I consider myself a sangria connoisseur and if it wouldn't be a health hazard and death wish, I'd absolutely drink it morning, noon and night, every day.  When it comes to beverages, Sangria is my favorite thing.

What I loved the most about this white sangria is that it was light and citrusy, rather than tasting overwhelmingly sweet.  Many people do a white sangria with peach schnapps, and instead this recipe called for limoncello and vodka.  It had a really nice combination of citrus flavors and no added sugar, which I love.  

The last recipe that I experimented with is The Market Vegan's Potato Leek soup.  I normally make chunky soups and most of my thicker soups are made using a roux.  This recipe calls for the use of an immersion mixer to puree all of the chunks and create a much healthier, thicker soup.  The texture of this is amazing and I envision making it often when our Northern California days cool down .  I will likely cut back on the dried rosemary in this recipe, as by girls would prefer less.  It takes 2 tbsp of dried rosemary and I'd be more receptive to 2 tsps.  Of course, things like that can always be changed according to preference and the other flavors in the soup were perfect.

This is a picture of the potato leek soup simmering in the pot.

And here it is after being pureed. 

The Market Vegan is full of easy recipes that are user-friendly without being dumbed down.  Laura Gesin truly crafted a book of recipes that anyone can make.  New vegans who do not cook and experienced vegans who know their way around a health food store will benefit from  and savor this food.  The recipes in The Market Vegan are diverse, flavorful, filling and delicious.  They are quick and helpful to anyone who wants to put together an easy, healthy meal in a pinch or with limited time.  

I absolutely recommend that everyone get a copy of this cookbook.  Vegan or non-vegan, it's just good food.  I am itching to get home so that I can recreate a few of these recipes for my husband and friends and try out the rest.  If everything is as exceptional as what I made while vacationing, these will certainly become family favorites! You can purchase The Market Vegan on Laura Gesin's website for just $12.99!

On August 16th I'll be hosting a giveaway of The Market Vegan by Laura Gesin.  If you'd like to enter to win a free electronic copy of this cookbook, leave a comment under this post (or my review preview) that says, "I want it!"  Or, just tell me anything that you like about vegan food!  All comments will be entered and you can enter as many times as you care to.  

I will announce a winner on August 16th.  

50 Shades Review

***SPOILER ALERT***
Do not read this post if you want to read 50 Shades of Grey, 50 Shades Darker or 50 Shades Freed by E.L James or see this movie and value an element of surprise.  


Anyone who has gotten to know me knows that I am fascinated by pop culture.  When something explodes into the mainstream and wraps all of America around its metaphorical finger, I'm unable to stay away.  I'm like a moth to a light, a fly to a burger and stay-at-home-mom to a Whole Foods Market.  For this reason, I vote every Wednesday for our next American Idol (go Phil Phillips), and I shop Etsy first.  I buy my clothes from Free People and I have read every Twilight book (even the non-published, half-written, online book from Edwards perspective).  I know all of the "Real Housewives" cast members by first AND last name, feel like Emily Maynard and Courtney Robertson are old friends of mine AND have every lyric to both "Jar of Hearts" and "Firework" memorized.

As you can imagine, I could not resist the Fifty Shades of Grey trilogy.  Reportedly, these books have changed the lives of women far and wide.  They've saved marriages and my friend Laura even knows someone who has read them THREE TIMES (which disturbs me).

Confession:  I couldn't make it through, though I gave it a valiant effort.

I read Fifty Shades of Grey one night last week.  I read Fifty Shades Darker the following night.  I have been unsuccessfully struggling to choke Fifty Shades Freed down my throat ever since.  I am not one to abandon a book.  Books are like cd's.  How can you possibly know if it's any good if you haven't listened to the whole thing?  But friends, I.  CAN.  NOT.  DO.  IT.  I have tried.  I have popped my eye lids up with toothpicks and forced them to take in the monotonous drivel of E.L James for two hundred pages of the final book in this trilogy... but no more.  I surrender.  My brain can no longer endure the absolute stupidity of these novels and I simply can not make it through.  I just can't read about Christian Grey "cupping"  Anastasia Steele-Grey's "sex" anymore.  I just can't read about her having an orgasm at the very sight of his clothed erection or using the word "please" interchangeably with, oh idunno, every other world that means "I want to get it on right this second."  Even typing about it makes me want to kick Mrs. Grey in the face.

That said, I have an awful lot of respect for E.L James.  I imagine her to be a chubby mum, snuggled into the overstuffed, floral patterned chair in her English cottage, eating scones with clotted cream and sipping tea, thinking- "I've always wanted to write a novel.  Bloody Hell, I'll start straight away."  And after a little contemplation and a Monday Twilight movie marathon, she decided to write about what Edward and Bella would be if they were rated XXX.  E.L James pulled out her Microsoft Word and online thesaurus and went to town.  No research.  No understanding of convention.  She poured her imagination all over the page and the whole western world ate it up.

And just look at her now! E.L James is taking her fan fiction all the way to the box office.  It's mind boggling.  I understand a lot of things that I don't necessarily like.  I get Britney Spears.  I get skinny jeans.  I get Dancing With The Stars.  I get facial tattoos.  I get paying $800 for a pair of shoes whose  claim to fame is it's red sole.  I do not get Nickleback.  And I do not get 50 Shades of Grey.

That said, each 50 Shades book is about 700 pages on my iPad.  I'm not sure how that translates into real pages.  Let me tell you how the book gets it's name.  Christian Grey says, at one point that he is "50 Shades of Fucked Up" and Anasatia starts referring to him as "50 Shades."  Anastasia has a lot of contrived, stupid, non-clever nicknames for other characters in the book.

Okay, so Fifty Shades of Grey begins with its heroine, Ana Steele driving from Oregon to Seattle so that she can interview the Billionare businessman who donates money to her college's agriculture department for her wannabe journalist, sick roommate Kate.  She meets gorgeous, nerve wracking Christian Grey.  He is a stoic, stone-cold business man who doesn't have time for anyone, but is immediately smitten by how awkward, dumb, clumsy and rude Ana is.  She asks him a bunch of boring, unimaginative questions and marks him as the first man she has ever been attracted to in her life.  She asks him if he's gay and this is apparently very scandalous and a terribly big deal.  We later find out that not only is Christian a self-made billionaire, but he's only 26 years old and makes $100,000 an hour and is a Harvard dropout.  Ana is about to graduate from college.  She's a bookworm and a virgin who has never been interested in a man, but is now ready to shake her chastity belt free for Christian Grey.  She also doesn't care about money at all.  She neither struggles with money or appreciates money or shows that it has any impact on her quality of life at all.  She lives practically for free, mooching off of her roommate's wealthy family while working part time at a hardware store.

Christian was adopted when he was four years old by the pediatrician who found him at the scene of his birth mom's suicide.  His birth mom is consistently referred to as "the crack whore" throughout the entire story.  He was physically abused by his mother's pimp, neglected and left alone with his mom's rotting body for four days.  He did not speak for two years after being adopted.

I am not certain what happened to Ana's biological dad.  I think that he died.  I don't remember this being stated specifically (though it probably was), but on Ana's wedding day, her mother says that she wishes her father was there to see it.  In any event, Ana was given the name of one of her mom's other husbands, Ray.  He is also the man that Christian speaks to when he wants permission to marry Ana.  Her mother lives in Georgia with her current husband Bob and clearly is attracted to men with three letter names.  Her next husband will likely be Joe.  They are flighty weirdos with no sense of responsibility.  Her mother didn't go to her graduation because Bob broke or sprained some random bone conveniently.  So dumb.

So, it's reasonable to assume that Christian's difficult start in life left him with a few pesky issues that he works on with his therapist (who oddly is invited to all of their family events and bid on Ana for a dance when she was spontaneously auctioned off and sold for $100,000.)  Christian's life was further complicated when a friend of his parents began beating and sleeping with him at the age of 15.  Her name is Elena, but Ana consistently refers to her as Mrs. Robinson.  So dumb.

Mrs. Robinson quickly taught Christian about the world of BDSM and 11 years later he's moved on from his relationship with her and acts as the "dominant" partner in contractual relationships with subservient women.  These women are all small with brown hair and resemble his birth mother.  He likes to beat them and then have intercourse with them.  This oedipal undertone is sprung on us like it's a twist, when it was painfully obvious.  So dumb.

Christian approaches Ana in respect to his penchant for sadomascochism, giving her a list of rules like, here's what you can and can't eat and here's when you can and can't eat. You have to come to my house every Friday through Sunday. You have to let me do anything to you sexually.  You only speak when spoken to and must call me master or sir.  You have to only wear the clothes I buy for you.  You have to be polished and waxed from head to toe.  Of course, he has a "play room" full of torture devices in his penthouse and he can terminate the arrangement whenever he wants.  Because Christian explains to Ana that he is not able to be available to her in any other way, and that the only relationship that he is willing to have is an abusive, sexual, controlling, dominant relationship, she figures that she'll take what she can get and cries a lot.  She also struggles with anorexia that is explained but never really addressed.  If anything, it's exploited and glamorized.

Christian has had a few long term "subs" who have agreed to be his weekend maid, chef, baby, mother and sex slave.  They have done things like tortured cats and been scratched up by them, been suspended from the ceiling, been whipped and flogged and had any number of objects shoved into any orifice.   But Christian had to end these relationships when they women became too emotionally attached to him and wanted "more."  The word "more" is used in the first two books as if it were some deep vehicle for complicated introspection.  The way E. L James overuses it but never defines it is maddening.  It makes these characters feel incredibly juvenile.

Of course, Ana learns all of this and immediately drops her panties.  She does not, however, sign Christian's contract but decided to dabble in S&M anyway.  She does agree to participate in a completely unhealthy relationship because she evidently  hates herself.  I could sum this story up by saying that there were two people who hated themselves and were obsessed with each other.  And everyday they just said, "Baby.  Don't hate yourself.  I love you.  No.  I love you.  No. I love you.  YOU ARE MINE," over and over and over and over and over again. When Christian finds out that Ana's a virgin and that she's never masturbated or had an orgasm and wholly the most non-sexual person ever, he decides to have what he calls "vanilla sex" with her.

And here's where the trilogy goes entirely downhill.

Ana loses her virginity and engages in poorly written sex on every page or so for the rest of the next two and a half books.  For someone who has never been at all interested in sex, she has full-on vaginal orgasms when Christian touches her nipple, says "You are mine," licks his tips AND she's even woken up by one once.  (It was at this point that I turned on the internet to see if E.L James was a.) a man or b.) a virgin.)  Luckily for Christian, Ana is always ready to go and can have an orgasm on command.  I mean, literally, he'll tell her to hurry up and she'll just go ahead and do it and usually at the exact same time that he is. Especially if he says, "You are mine."  Miracle of miracles.

The sex scenes in this book are terribly written and mostly driven by Christian saying cheesy things and repeating the phrase "oh baby,  I want to take you now" over and over and Ana saying, "Please" and nothing more.  As the books wore on, these sex scenes became sooooo over the top cheesy that by the end of 50 Shades Darker I was laughing at them.  By the time I hit my midway point in 50 Shades Freed I was  just skimming the sex paragraphs to find their end so that I could start reading again.

When Ana and Christian aren't in the playroom or tangled up in his vanilla sex bed, they are becoming  obsessed with and falling in love with each other.  Somehow, this is possible, though they have only had a few (in any) conversations.  Their relationship is horrible and laden with conflict and a struggle for power and control.  They fight all of the time and only feel secure when they are assured that they each possess each other.

Ana and Christian's families entirely accept their relationship and each other.   Christian's parents give Ana 100% credit for Christian being/becoming human.  Oddly, they attribute his strides in mental health to HER and not to the therapist he sees for hours every week.  Repeatedly, Christian will do something surprising- like sing or survive a helicopter crash or bail out of work for the day- and as a result, his mother will sweep Ana into her arms, thanking her for existing.

Ana's friend Kate doesn't like Christian because he's made Ana feel like a sperm receptacle, but she sure likes his brother.  And no worries.  When Kate becomes an obstacle that E.L James isn't savvy enough to cleverly overcome, she just sends Kate out of the country for awhile.  Fortunately, Kate's parents have bought an apartment in Seattle where Ana is able to live.  After about five weeks of knowing each other, Christian and Ana decided to get married.  Everyone is overjoyed for them and of course, he insists on not having a prenuptial agreement.

But let me backtrack just a few steps.  Rewind to Christian and Ana's pre-wedding, falling in love week.

Here's where things get really bad for me.

Christian spanks Ana a little too hard and they break up.

Ana graduates from college and quickly gets an internship at a local, small publishing company.  Her boss is a sleaze bag who, naturally, wants to sleep with her.  Christian and Ana get back together.  He buys the publishing company in order to have control over Ana.  But things take a real turn for the worse when Ana's boss predictably sexually harasses her in the office while Christian and his security team are waiting in the car downstairs.  Christian has Ana's boss fired.

(And here is where I was completely lost and unable to suspend my disbelief further.)

When Ana goes into work, the company has decided that in the week that she's been there she's done such a great job, that they are going to promote her from being an INTERN to taking her boss' old job as a chief editor.   They insist that her "notes" have been seriously impressive and have gotten her this job.  Further, though all you see Ana do at work is email Christian, apparently she has built sustainable, strong relationships with all of her boss's clients.  Again, this was all established in ONE week.  When she decided to leave for a month on a honeymoon, it's no problem.  They just hold the promotion for her.  And when she comes home from the honeymoon she has her own assistant.  And Christian is giving the company to her and promoting her to being the president of it.  And renaming is Grey's Publishing.

In the meantime, Ana's old boss tries to kill Christian a few times.  There are even car chases followed by parking lot, adrenaline induced sex.  Oh, and Christian buys Ana a giant house.

And that's as far as I got.  Now that I'm writing about it, maybe I will continue reading.  This is possibly the worst book that I've ever read in my life.  I can not even reconcile how terrible it is, never mind how it's possible for so many people to love it.  But can I really just not finish it?  Jesus.  I don't know.  It just has no depth.  No soul.  Barely any storyline.  Shallow, flat-as-a-pancake character development... there is just NOTHING good about this trilogy.  I honestly worry for any young person reading this book.  I worry that they'll find this unhealthy relationship model romantic and I further worry that they'll think there's something wrong with them when they fail to have an orgasm when their significant other suggests it verbally.

The fact that I hear that women are reading these books and getting all hot and bothered for their husbands troubles me deeply.

Has anyone else read this?

From The Yard

Each weekend I pick a fresh bouquet of flowers from my yard to display on my kitchen table.  As I've previously expressed, fresh, real, colorful, beautiful flowers are one of my simplest joys in life.  I just love walking around my yard on Saturday morning, clipping whatever catches my eye, arranging and enjoy it for the week.  

This week, I decided to keep my flowers outside!  I have a feeling that we'll be spending more time out there than we will at our kitchen table and I love the way they look in the sunlight!

I have so much lavender.  I LOVE lavender oil.  I wonder how hard it is to make it.  I imagine that it's quite the process, but I'm thinking about researching it more.  There's a cupcake shop in Philly called the Flying Monkey Bakery that makes lavender cupcakes.  I feel inspiration possessing me!  

For the time being, it's just a fragrant addition to my flower arrangement!

I'm going to get back to my lazy Saturday at home.  

I think that I'm going to put on a swimsuit and lay outside.  I need to finish up the TERRIBLE book that I've been reading so that I can blog about the trilogy.  The first two books were terrible in something of a good way (kind of like Britney Spears is) but this last book has been unbearable and I'm struggling to finish it.  

Ugh... What a Night

Last night I had a tough time sleeping.  Mostly because I finished Mocking Jay and though it was tied up in a tidy little bow, I felt unsettled and emotionally exhausted from the journey.  Maybe I shouldn't have read those books so quickly?  Maybe I should have savored them.

I tried to start Charlene Harris's new book Deadlocked, but I wasn't ready to sink into it yet.

During the night I kept waking up, freaked out.  The dogs would bark and I'd wake up to see our motion lights flicked on.  Even though I know it was just the neighborhood cats, my heart still stops a little and I worry just the tiniest bit that there's a serial killer waiting in the shadows, waiting for his opportunity to come and and torture my family.

At one point I woke up because I heard gagging and opened my eyes only to make the most unpleasant discovery.  Pandora was puking on my pillow.  So, I took the pillow to the laundry room and saw that it was about 4 am.  When I got to the laundry room I discovered Sidney, peeing on the floor.  Seriously?

I woke up to find Lila sobbing.  She did not get the gift that she so badly wanted from the Tooth Fairy.  As a matter of fact, as she was going to sleep she asked the tooth fairy to bring her ANYTHING other than a pack of make-up.  Unfortunately, this opposes what she said when her tooth first showed signs of loosening and the tooth fairy brought her a little pack of lip glosses and eye shadows to play with.  She was so disappointed.  She cried and cried and cried.  Sometimes I feel like things never go Lila's way.  I decided to keep her home with me today.  We're going to make a cake and lay out in the sun and just enjoy a quiet mental health day together.

TumbleBook

Every so often our elementary school sends home a link to something awesome.

This week, the school sent home a link to an online library of animated story books (which theoretically seems similar to TV, but in practice is not). It's called the TumbleBook Library and it rocks my universe. There are endless books on this site and my children LOVE it. Because we've recently lost all of our books (heartbreak) I also swoon a bit for this site.

I really like that the sentences are highlighted as they are read and the narration is a throw-back to "Free To Be You And Me," which I tend to go a little crazy for.

You have to put in a user name and password which I'd love to post here but am too much of a clucker to do. That said, if you ask me for it... I'll tell you what it is. Also, I think that they offer a free trial of thirty days too. If you've got kids and love books, I recommend giving this a shot.

UPDATE:

After investigating further I discovered that only schools can sign up for this. So, write to me at annapholler (at) gmail (dot) com and I'll tell you the secrets of the universe.