My name is Pamela and I'm a cookbook whore

We still have a bunch of posts waiting to be finished (sorry for the delay). Hopefully, I'll be having some more time at work to finish them.


Anyway, to tie you all over, I thought I'd post picture of my cookbook collection. I've sort of turned into a cookbook whore since becoming vegan and I use any chance to get books sent over here. I used some birthday money awhile back to make a large increase in my collection. It no longer fits on the shelf, which is mostly ok, because I usually have at least one of them out all the time. I don't think hardly a day goes by without me at least flipping through them. I love just looking at them and reading and dreaming.

This is my tiny shelf. A few of them aren't vegan. The Japanese ones (except the one on the far right) are all omni. Recently, cookbooks geared for people with allergies have become popular (like the one Sarah gave me for my birthday), the ones I have are just regular omni ones. One is a macrobiotic book, two are diet cookbooks (which tend to have more veggie options), and one is a book of vegetable side dishes (most of which include meat). I think most of you can read the English ones.

These are the books on top. Most of these are part of the new editions to my collection (thus why they are on top). Glad I finally got Yellow Rose, especially after all the talk. Veganomicon is just too tall for my shelf.All of these zines were part of my new birthday money (I totally spent over what I got).


Show your collections! Let's see how about I add a few survey type questions to this...

1. What are your top three? (You know I couldn't choose just 1.)

My top three would have to be Eat, Drink, and Be Vegan, Vegan with a Vengeance, and Vive Le Vegan.

2. Which one gets the most use?

Probably Vegan with a Vengeance or Eat, Drink, and Be Vegan. I think I pick up E, D, and BV everyday, but I don't necessarily make things from it. I just fantasize about it. I always seem to be out of a key ingredient. Vegan with a Vengeance was the first vegan cookbook I bought and I've made a lot and tend to go back to some old favorites. I keep meaning to flip through it again to discover a recipe I've probably forgotten about.

3. Which one do you wish you used more?

I wish I used the zines more, but some of them are hard to use in Japan. Also, they don't have indices and I like to look up an ingredient I want to use or need to use up and then work from there when I'm cooking. Also, Asian Vegan Kitchen. Everything I've made from there has been amazing! Seriously, the tonkatsu is one of my favorite foods. But the book calls for lots of spices and things that are either a little difficult for me to get here or just intimidate me.

4. Is there one you regret buying?

Heart of the Home (middle picture). I bought it on a whim since I was buying other books, but it has honey in it and just a weird layout that annoys me, so I haven't opened it since I first got it. I should try and make myself.

5. What are the most important elements of a good cookbook (besides the recipes)?

I really like a good and well labeled index. I also like the table of contents to include the names of all the recipes. Good photos are also nice. I appreciate cookbooks that have lots of helpful tips and notes too.

6. What cookbook do you have your eyes on next?

Just the Burgers coming soon from Joni Newman. I have her Cozy Inside book and really like that.

Feel free to take on the challenge. Let us know if you do!

--Pamela

Let's Start the Revolution, Ladies!

We live in the 98th ranked country in terms of the gender gap. Out of 130 countries! Japan is the only country most people would refer to as 'developed' outside of the top 30. While I know women's rights and equality in Japan are bismal at best. I was still sort of shocked by the actual number. Japan's overall score and ranking from 2007 also dropped.

I think between Sarah and I we could surprise lots of our readers about the discrimination that we have either witnessed first hand or have had happen to us.

I was talking to my boyfriend (who is Japanese) about this list and he told me about a still common way for men to propose marriage to women. They say 'Will you please make miso soup for me everyday?' I mean WTF!?!? My boyfriend knows he'd get a straight punch to the face if he ever said that to me. However, I can't even tell you the number of times I've heard 'oh, Ume's so lucky you like to cook, you'll make a great wife'! And I've heard this by people my age and younger. When his sister said that to me, I laughed and she was like 'don't American people say things like that?' I responded, 'yeah, 30 years ago'.

Granted I know the US is still far behind where it should be and is nowhere near perfect, I'm not meaning to imply that. I just want to give you some examples.

About 2 years ago, while at a school function in the gym (of all Japanese people, except 2 of us) we were sitting on the floor. My coworker next to me (the only other non-Japanese person) was sitting with her legs straight out in front of her like several of the male coworkers around us. Our boss came up to her and told her she had to sit holding her knees or with her knees under her (seiza). He said nothing to the other teachers. Then when we go back to the staff room, he announced to the whole staff that the women teacher's have to be careful how they sit and that only those 2 positions are acceptable. My friend was mortified.

At several of the school's I've taught at, all the boys are listed alphabetically first. Then all the girls are listed.

Not to mention the now famous 'maid' cafes where girls dress like maids and refer to the all male clientele as 'master'. I've also recently heard about cafes where the girls where short skirts and the customers are encouraged to look up their skirts!

There are lots of other small examples I could give you like: my coworker who laughed at another coworker when she said her husband makes her lunch, or the girl I know who allowed her breasts to be grabbed by the 'winner' of a game she wasn't even playing, or how pretty much the only jobs women get to do are secretarial, or the blatant and laughed about sexual harassment that goes on in the work place, or dear god the porn industry,....it goes on and on...

I didn't really have anywhere I wanted to go with this, I just needed to rant. I may be back for more.

Sorry there are a lot of run-on sentences in this that I'm not going to fix.

--Pamela

レニュアル

Yesterday, since it was Culture Day, me and Pam both had the day off work. So we decided to hang out, do some shopping and eating and we finally got a new picture for the blog!

Hope you like it!

-- Sarah

Mofo Wrap Up

お疲れ～！

Today is the last day of the mofo. And now I have about 800 posts in my google reader to catch up on. I'm really glad we joined it. I've found lots of new and interesting blogs. And others have come to ours and hopefully are enjoying it. The month went rather fast and we still have several ideas of things we couldn't get to, so I hope you won't stop reading just because the mofo has ended. We will be blogging more regularly, so stay tuned. Thanks for all the comments and support.

--Pamela

Yeah, I second all of that! I've been feeling the pressure a little bit this month trying to post enough but I think we did a pretty good job and I hope you have enjoyed a little insight into our lives and eating habits in Japan. There are a bunch of posts that I didn't get around to writing up so be on the look out for some info about Japanese sweets, a frying pan apple crumble recipe, and a rhapsody about stew and dumplings :)

Thanks to my fellow blogger Pamela for motivating me to do this, thanks to all the other MOFOers out there for your inspiration, and thanks to everyone who read our posts and everyone who left comments for us. And most of all, thank YOU for being vegan (or at least interested enough in the lifestyle to read our crappy blog). You rock!

P.S. this is dedicated to all of you, haha

-- Sarah

Bentos!

I think we would be commiting some sort of blogging offence if we didn't talk about bentos. There are about a billion resources out there for making fancy bentos.

That's not our picture. I found it here, where you can find many NOT vegan bento pictures. Yikes how long do people spend making these? The meaty ones make me sick, dressing up all the food to look like animals. There could probably be a whole thesis written about the cognitive dissonance involved in bento making.

Anyway, we're here to talk about some bentos we've made and show you some crazy bento gear. There is literally a section in stores devoted to just bento goods.

This is the section at Loft. I couldn't actually fit it all in the shot, but you get the idea.

Look at the assortment of bento boxes! I wish I had such a cool looking one. I have one more for practicality than cuteness. (All the 'cute' ones seem so small, so I always end up buying the dude themed ones. I wish Japanese women weren't always on a dieat and ate a normal sized lunch rather than kid portions.)

The accessories section! I don't even know how to use half this stuff.
Close-up on some accessories. These little things are used to stab food like fruit, so you don't get your hands sticky and they look cute sticking up out of the bento.

Now I'm ashamed to admit, I often make rather boring bentos. Apparently, there are 5 principles to making a good bento. They are: the bento includes the 5 colors, the 5 methods, the 5 flavors, the 5 senses, and gokan no mon (which is a Buddhist state of mindfulness while eating). Wow, this is getting really technical. I just try to use different colors and I guess different flavors.

Really, I think you can put anything in a bento. Don't let all the rules scare you. The bento Nazis won't come after you if you don't dress your tofu up like little bears or put happy faces on your rice. Let me show you some of my rather shameful bentos.



See, I didn't use any cute dividers or plastic pictures. It's just lunch.


Oh yeah, this one's fancy.

Major FAIL! This ones almost all beige. Damn it, I suck...

The main priniciple to bento making is to just make a bunch of different foods, each one featuring one vegetable or two. I'll try to put up a bento's worth of recipes in the next few weeks.

I have one tip for making your bentos. It is a very UN-Japanese tip.

• Make about 4 or 5 seperate foods. For example, fried mushrooms, broccolli with a tofu mayonaise sauce, freeze dried tofu, tempuraed sweet potatoes, boiled carrots, sliced veggies, etc. Put them all into containers in the fridge and then portion them out into your bento each morning. Japanese housewives the country over are crying over the fact that I don't wake up at 5 each morning to make each dish fresh and with love.

So now that you have learned, just because we live in Japan does not mean we are bento masters...go out there and make your own bentos! It's really not as hard or scary as that Hello Kitty on steriods one is at the top.

--Pamela

Pam's right, you don't have to go crazy and wake up at stupid o'clock to make some elaborate character bento. Some of the nicest looking and tastiest bentos are quite simple. I think successful bento making just requires a little thought and forward planning. I've only recently become interested in bento making (much to the delight of the Japanese staff I work with who like to talk about what a great wife and mother I will be.... urgh) but am still very much in the same camp as Pamela when it comes to preparing things the night before.

Anyway, here are some pictures of the bentos and accessories I own:

Here's a bento I made for work last week. It's not all that exciting but it was tasty! This one contained spicy sauteed slices of eggplants, sundried tomato hummus, a veggie burger, spinach, cherry tomatoes and sliced green and red peppers. And the letters were cut from cucumber slices. I also had a seperate tupperware with slices of cornmeal pancake, raisins and mochi.

And since it is Halloween today and I love The Nightmare Before Christmas, I'll leave you with this picture of a bento (that I did not make and is sadly NOT VEGAN!). Seriously, I don't know how Japanese mothers have time for this!...


-- Sarah

Veganism is Logical

There's been a post about veganism rolling around in my head. I didn't know if or how to even begin it. And I thought I would have to write some very long essay rambling on and on about vegansim with all kinds of sources and numbers, but really it just hit me the other day. It's totally not necessary. My (our) veganism is simple and logical.


We are abolitionists. Meaning I acknowledge that animals are sentient and entitled to their own livelihood. Therefore, it is immoral to use animals for human needs. Period. Full stop. End of story.

To these ends I do not believe in supporting anything that does not meet these ends, it just doesn't make any sense to me. And would be speciesist to do so.

See it's simple.

That's why I can't support something like California's Prop 2 that is giving legitimacy to the use of animals.

And what welfarists don't undestand when they say abolitionists are divisive, is that we are not even working on the same cause. You will not reach abolition by supporting things that are not abolitionist. We all need to be out there promoting veganism in whatever way we can.

Abolitionist veganism is simple and logical: it's not ok to use animals AT ALL.


Things that have helped me to come to this conclusion:

Abolitionist Approach

Peaceful Prairie Sanctuary's Letter

Food Room 101

If you've ever read 1984 or watched the movie then you will be familiar with the idea of Room 101. Or if you were born in 1984 like me then you will probably have grown up with people going "Ooooh, Big Brother is watching you...." or "oh, better not be bad Sarah or you'll get sent to Room 101."

Anyway, skipping gently on....

Room 101 (for those of you who sat in the back in English class) is the room where THE WORST THING IN THE WORLD IS. So whatever your deepest, darkest fear is, it will be in Room 101 waiting for you. Creepy! This idea captured people's imaginations obviously and there was (and still is???) a long running TV show in the UK called Room 101 where celebrities could submit a few items that they want vanquished to Room 101, never to return. People tried to appeal to the host of the show to let their item go in. Some examples of nominated items include the Welsh, ventriloquists, jellyfish, the British countryside, the rules of golf, cheese, annoying noises, Britney Spears, campfire songs etc etc. When I was young I always thought about the thing that I would like sent to Room 101 and so I decided, inspired by the vegan MoFo, it would be a fun post to think about the food items that I'd like "disappeared" from the face of the planet.

My nomination for your appraisal:
The Most Evil Food Known to Man - Spaghetti Hoops

I seriously, fucking loath this disgusting monstrosity of a food item. Since I was a child, this is the one food that I will not tolerate near me. Even one whiff of the bright bordering-on-radioactive orange "tomato" sauce is enough to make me puke in my mouth. Probably because it smells like vomit already. I have a horrifying memory of being given a plate of this on toast at my grandparents house and having to choke it down while simultaneously trying my hardest to not regurgitate all over the kitchen table. Urgh. Also, these things are just freakish and unnatural. And what happens to the middle bits of the hoops?
Basically , they look like crap, they taste like crap, they are full of crap - ergo they should not be allowed to exist anymore.

I'm sure I have some things that I'd like vanquished but that's definetely the one food that I just can't tolerate at all. How about you? What food do you really hate? I'm interested so leave a comment and let me know!

-- Sarah

Easy Rainy Day Cornmeal Pancakes

Today in Osaka is a depressing grey drizzly kind of a day and since it's a Sunday (i.e. day of nothing interesting ever happening) I elected to have a cooking and cleaning day. I cleaned my stove, washed all the dishes and began sorting through the dry ingredients tucked away in my meager storage space. That's when I found the unopened bag of cornmeal that has been sitting in my cupboard for a couple of months now. Finally , today I decreed it to be Official Cornmeal Bag Opening Day (quite catchy, no?)
Anyway, I originally bought it to make some pumpkin cornmeal waffles but had to give the waffle maker back to my friend before I got round to it. So instead I decided to make flat waffles - otherwise known as pancakes. I couldn't find a recipe that I had enough ingredients for so I cobbled this one together from a few of them. I was very pleased with the results and decided to share it with you. These pancakes were a little crunchy and reminded me of a sweet taquito thus I decided to fold them over and eat them like tacos.

Anyway, here you go:

"It's a Crappy Sunday Afternoon" Cornmeal Pancakes

You will need:

1 1/2 cups soy milk
1 1/2 tblspoons lemon juice (I think vinegar would work too)

2 tblspoons oil (I used canola), plus some for greasing the frying pan

1 1/3 cups cornmeal

2/3 cup flour (I used all-purpose white)

1/3 cup brown sugar (optional)
1/2 tspoon salt
1/2 tspoon baking soda
2 tblspoons maple syrup

1 tspoon vanilla extract

Directions:

1) Stir the lemon juice into the soy milk in a measuring cup or jug. Set aside for a couple of minutes to let the milk curdle.

2) Mix the cornmeal, flour, sugar (if using), salt and baking soda together in a large bowl.

3) Stir the oil, vanilla extract and maple syrup into the milk mixture.

4) Gradually add the wet ingredients to the dry, stirring gently and being careful not to over mix.

5) Drizzle a little oil into a non-stick frying pan and heat to medium heat.

6) When the pan is heated sufficiently, add about 1/4 cup batter and spread the it out evenly using a spatula.

7) Turn the pancake over when bubbles form on the surface and the batter begins to look "set."

N.B. I found these pancakes to be incredibly easy to flip and didn't break a single one so don't worry if you are nervous about that.

8) Continue to cook on either side until a nice golden brown colour is achieved.

9) Serve immediately with the topping of your choice!

I ate mine with brown sugar and cinnamon sprinkled on the inside. I dusted the tops with icing sugar and a little cocoa powder and served them with a cup of Yogi Tea Thai Sweet Delight.

Other toppings that I think would be good are soyatoo/vegan whipped cream, banana slices, grated dark chocolate, strawberries, raspberries and maple syrup. They are very adapatable so you could also try adding other things to the batter.

These really hit the spot!

-- Sarah