Vegan for a Week:

This post was written by a good friend and former colleague of mine, Daphne. I (Hungry Sam) am clearly not a vegan, nor do I aspire to be, and yet there remains the question of ethical, healthy eating, as well as the implicit challenge: Could I even do it? Daphne, who, as you will read, has experience with a restricted diet, takes this challenge. Read on!
 
(Also, I can tell you from experience, Daphne is right: Sitting down and eating a pound of baby carrots is an express train to one unfun stomach ache.)

Google Images "Vegan." Odd.

I am generally mindful of what I eat.  As an observant Jew, I don't mix milk and meat, I don't eat pork or shellfish, and I choose food that is certified kosher.  As someone who is relatively health conscious, I try to maintain a balanced diet and to make healthier choices about the foods that I eat.  And because I do my best to be an ethical consumer, I've been spending more time exploring local, organic, and other ethical and sustainable food options.  When it comes to food, I'm often thinking about how I can do better. 

I started thinking again about some of these questions - and the relationship among these concerns - after I heard Rabbi Yoffie deliver his 2009 Biennial Sermon, launching the URJ's Shulhan Yarok, Shulhan Tzedek (Green Table, Just Table) initiative. Rabbi Yoffie inspired a room of 3,000 Jews to think critically about how they eat and what foods they buy, and how these decisions impact our own health, the strength of our communities, and our global environment.  There are valuable lessons to be learned from this initiative, and synagogues and individuals continue to explore the various changes they can incorporate into their lifestyles (find out what leading synagogues are up to and what you can do on the Green Table, Just Table program bank).

Then, a couple of weeks ago, Oprah Winfrey caught my attention when she challenged her 378 person staff to embrace a vegan diet for a whole week.  Rabbi Yoffie had encouraged us to reduce our red meat intake, but Oprah was going further - no meat, chicken, fish, eggs or dairy.  Her staff took the challenge, and the testimonials about their "vegan week" experiences were entertaining, encouraging and inspiring.  The next day, I mentioned to a Rabbi David Saperstein how interested I was by the show. As I was describing the episode, I thought that experimenting with a vegan diet could be an interesting way to bring together all of my dietary requirements - kosher, healthy and ethical.  So he and I decided to challenge ourselves and to become vegan for one week too. 

Initially I found myself stressing over what the next week might look like: with my limited food choices, I might be hungry all the time, or fall into the French fry/cracker/potato chip trap.  So I decided to think about food a little more creatively, and made the conscious decision to eat as many whole/non-processed foods as possible.  I pureed my own hummus, made 2 different vegetable-based soups (zucchini and butternut squash-pear) and baked enough chocolate fudgy brownies to hold me through the week. (Feel free to ask me for my recipes.) I carried lots of nuts, fruits and vegetables to snack on.

To my surprise, I felt pretty good!  I wasn't hungry for a moment - probably because I was better prepared for meals than usual.  I felt (ahem) cleansed.  I felt healthy.   I discovered which fruits and vegetables worked for me, and which worked against me.  (Note to self, it's never a good idea to eat a pound of baby carrots in a single sitting.)  And as an added bonus, at the end of the week, I discovered that I lost four lbs. 

Don't get me wrong, I'm not looking to become vegan.  This week-long experiment may have worked, but it wasn't easy. I avoided restaurants so I wouldn't be tempted by meat, and so that I wouldn't feel deprived as I coveted my friend's meal. I missed having milk in my cereal and in my coffee (neither soy nor almond milk did the trick for me).  I missed sharing a pizza with my kids.  I missed eating chili on Super Bowl Sunday.  I missed nibbling on the milk chocolate kisses that sit on my desk.  Even so, after eating vegan for a week, I am giving serious thought to changing some of my eating habits for the long-term -- maybe taking on a "Meatless Monday" and/or a "Tofu Tuesday." I can be an omnivore and still continue to be thoughtful about what I buy, how my food is prepared, and what I eat.

I have a newfound understanding of vegans and veganism - of the challenges of a restricted diet and the rewards of being more thoughtful and intentional about my food choices. I'll carry this week-long lesson with me for a long time to come.  How about you?  What changes have you considered making to your dietary lifestyle, and what motivates those changes?

This entry was originally posted at RACBlog.

Mini-post: Homemade Crepes

Why do crepes feel like such a treat? Why do so many people whip up epic quantities of pancakes on Sunday morning but haven't thought of making crepes? As Jen and I discovered this weekend, it's as easy as making pancakes, healthier, and the opportunities for creative genius in fillings are endless. And it's fun in pretty much the same way making your own pizza is fun.

Ham, apple, swiss cheese, and honey crepe.

Inspired by my favorite cooking magazine, Everyday Food, we whipped up a half-batch of crepe batter -- enough for four crepes. The key here was pureeing the batter to ensure even blending of the ingredients, and I added a little cinnamon because I like cinnamon. Nutmeg would be interesting too. You should also allow the batter to sit once blended, apparently in order to let bubbles dissipate.

We did a sweet (Nutella and banana; boring but delicious) and a savory/sweet (ham, apple, swiss, and honey). The genesis of the latter came in me wandering Whole Foods, in my own mischievous and hungry little world, as Jen trailed behind making sure I was actually picking the right things off the shelf. She's used to this sort of thing. It's probably a lot like babysitting.

I have to say, making the crepes, stuffing them, and baking them was A LOT of fun. I fully intend to host a build-your-own-crepe brunch at my house (takers?) and do a far more in-depth post about crepe-ing at that time, but for now, awesome and easy dinner. 

Holidays in Maine Means Lobster and Tree-Shaped Cake

Without addressing the theological and cultural implications of a Jewish person doing Christmas -- I do Christmas.

Rather, my family does (and always has); my mother is Christian and doing Christmas (having a tree, exchanging presents, eating special dishes) is one of the many ways we have integrated the traditions and memories with which my mom grew up into our family's life. Plus, Chanukah is kind of a stupid holiday.

BUT that's not the point of this post. The point of this post is that Jen and I hit up my home in Maine for Christmas. A total of five cancelled flights led to two extra days in Maine for me and four for Jen -- and a number of extra meals with the family.

Highlights!

My mom made her EPIC lobster stew on Christmas Eve. This is truly epic -- NUMEROUS lobsters, picked and cooked in a rich but loose tinned milk-based stew. My mom's famous for this stuff -- just don't ask her about the time TWO consecutive batches were ruined due to the tendency of regular milk to curdle when interacting with the residue from the rubber bands around lobster claws. Don't ask my dad, either; he was the one who picked all those damn lobsters. Now, however, my parents have perfected the process; the result is a tangy, savory stew bursting with claw and tail meat.

SO MUCH LOBSTER MEAT!

My mom also whipped up a pretty super roasted beet, walnut, and goat cheese salad with the meal, one totally worth mentioning:

That morning, we feasted on an incredible french toast souffle, one which had sat and soaked in its batter in the fridge overnight. It souffled so much that we couldn't get it out of the oven without the peaks scraping the heating elements on the oven's roof -- and though this photo came after the souffle began to fall, I think it captures how buttery and airy the dish finished. It looks a little weird, but at the end of the day, this is the fluffiest, well-spiced, mouth-wateringest french toast EVAH.

Finally, the last few years I've been the one to make our family's traditional Christmas tree coffee cake. You roll out your refrigerated-rised pastry dough into a 10" by 16" rectangle and cover it in a mixture of pecans, dates, sugar, melted butter, and cinnamon. The dough is then rolled (hotdog direction) and cut into 16 even rolls. These are then arranged on a cookie sheet in the shape of an evergreen tree, painted with a little more butter, and are allowed to rise for a while before baking. We always frost with a little green vanilla frosting, like so:

This is a coffee cake in only the loosest of senses, for in truth, it's essentially an arrangement of sticky buns with a Christmas flair. So damn good.

In my house, Christmas isn't a religious event -- after all, my brothers and I are Jewish. But the Christmas foods are a touchstone, one that helps to make Christmas real and traditional and meaningful for my mother. Giving my mom the chance to be drawn back into wonderful memories from her childhood and to continue to make memories with her family (and this time around, with Jen too) is what it's all about.

Do any of you have interesting Christmas/holiday traditions and foods? Share in the comments section!

Chocolate Destruction!

I have...destructive...tendancies. My brothers and I would build then, more importantly, destroy Lego cities; I have a weird unconscious habit of tearing apart my dinner napkins and shredding paper in my hands; and I have the same fascination with knives, axes, fire, and small- to mid- range explosives as do many boys.

Given all this, the thought of a food the preparation of which entails a little physical violence inspires in me no small amount of glee.

Faced with this prospect, I may have overdone the chocolate orange.

I have, for years, seen Ferrara Chocolate Oranges in stores and chocolate shops, yet never have I tried one. So when my parents threw one into my Christmas stocking, I was delighted. Here was chocolate that didn't just benefit from, but straight-up required, the application of directed force.

Yet when the time came, and I slammed it once -- twice -- three times -- four times into surfaces of increasing hardness (wood to granite) -- the orange, wrapped in its foil, barely seemed to feel it.

Then I opened it -- I'd shattered half into tiny slivers and chunks, and maybe half had split into the desired wedges. Good enough!

Coming soon: Marination clarification and pictures/recipe for my family's Christmas Tree Coffee Cake!

I Love Chipotle and Other Thoughts

I received a poorly spelled anonymous comment on my last post about what happens when I go grocery shopping hungry:

"i aspect a food blaggor too be eatign the fansy stakes nd potaytoes nd vegatabels not the leen packest and soops why do yo thnk yo are a godo food blaggor if yo eet these bad fodos." 

Translated into English, the comment reads:

"How dare you, sir, call yourself a food blogger! This sacred art is sullied by your boxed-rice buying proclivities, your preference for pre-made bread crumbs, and your insistence upon purchasing peanut butter! It is unacceptable that you should have anything in your freezer at all, in fact. I deride you and your affront in the strongest of terms!"

Now, I assume this is one of my wonderful friends having a little fun. (Because God help us all if public schooling has failed some poor soul so thoroughly). But a good point is raised -- isn't the point of food blogging to share exotic recipes and demonstrate a thoroughly epicurean lifestyle?

I say no. At least not at Hungry Sam. I eat like a normal person. Sure, maybe I have an absurd food-oriented enthusiasm streak, and maybe I do cook more than the average 24 year-old D.C. professional, and maybe I'm a tad adventurous (I ate alligator last week!) -- but ultimately, it's silly to think even foodies never eat a frozen pre-made meal.

The fact is, this blog is not about food elitism. If that's what it means to be a food blogger, I don't want any of it. My sole purpose is to share my love of food and the enjoyment I get from it, whether I'm roasting a chicken with some exotic technique, grilling a bizarre meat like buffalo, or chomping on a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

I'm an advocate for cooking food from scratch because I think it's a good, healthy way to enrich a part of life that so many people see as a chore. But fatigue hits us all, snowstorms spank Districts of Columbia and having some frozen or easy-to make mixes in the pantry is smart.

So, anonymous commenter, prepare to be outraged by today's food fun: I love Chipotle burritos.

Stolen from somewhere.

I've been sick and in a lousy mood, so I went out and bought a fast food burrito for lunch. AND IT WAS AWESOME. It was perhaps the best thing I could have done for my mental health. From the bland, luke-warm tortilla to the greasy yet savory chicken chunks to the diced up lettuce (iceberg!), this burrito was exactly what I wanted to eat and it made me happy and full. I believe in healthy food, home-cooking, and the benefit of kitchen creativity, and yet sometime, you just want a fast food Chipotle burrito.

Frying Potatoes, Sustainably

Latke's sizzling away...

Latkes. Delicious, greasy, fried potatoes smothered in sour cream and/or (definitely and) apple sauce. Runs contrary to the Hungry Sam healthy mentality, no? Well, yes, insofar as that mentality is absolute. It's not; treats are an important part of living a healthy lifestyle -- as long as they're infrequent indulgences and not an everyday thing.

But this post isn't about treats, it's about diving, spoons and graters first, into latke making with my ninth grade religious school class last night.

But wait, you ask. What sort of awesome curriculum has room for latke cooking?

The sustainability sort! See, my fellow teachers and I have been teaching our students all about sustainability this semester, how choices can be made to promote a future and a world that can sustain our children and children's children. 

The idea in doing a sustainable cooking program was this: Making the sustainable choice for all of our meals all of the time is hard. But making it SOMETIMES is easy, and doesn't necessarily impact flavor or price of the dish you're making.

Furthermore, cooking is a basic skill that facilitates making sustainable choices. When you're doing the cooking (as opposed to eating out or buying pre-made), you can control the ingredients, you know where they come from, how they've been prepared, what sort of carbon footprint they have, or at least you're more able to determine that information. (There are other good reasons to cook, outlined in Hungry Sam's new "Why Cook? A Guide" page.)

When you don't have a Cuisinart...

So, in order to inject some competition into all of this (of course), I picked up three sets of ingredients: a regular, non-organic set, an organic set, and a farm stand set. My challenge was to buy approximately the same quantities of each set of ingredients for about the same price. I did so -- at least in this case, buying ingredients from a variety of sources didn't need to impact the budget. For their part, three teams of students were to cook the best latkes possible, and our judges (the rabbis and high school program director) were to both select the best-tasting latke and try to guess the ingredients' source.

I have to hand it to them, my guys threw themselves into this, grating, peeling, and frying their way to crispy goodness. Some of our students had solid cooking experience, others had little or none, but the energy was absolutely there -- which of course, as a food enthusiast, I appreciated. These young adults wanted those latkes, and the victory.

In the judging process, our three judges each tried the latkes with their toppings of choice. Only one judge correctly determined the source of the winning batch, the organic latkes, but the judge's decision underscored our very unscientific conclusion: if organic is at all a more sustainable choice, it doesn't need to mean a more expensive or less tasty latke.

A photograph of the winning latkes, one which CERTAINLY fails to do them justice:

The "recipe" we used:
-Some amount of potatoes, like 2 lbs.-ish
-Half an onion
-An eggs worth of egg whites
-Two pinches of flour

Mix, make little latke patties, squish 'em flat and dry, then fry.

Delicious.

Sliders: Yes They [Blackfinn] Can

I'd written a mildly scathing post about Blackfinn American Saloon, where my colleagues and I lunched today. I decided to start over, though, and give you something a bit more positive. It's not that the food or service was terrible, it was just bewildering. I don't feel the need to harp; I'm not unhappy. It was just weird, watery split pea soup (which is, if I'm not crazy, normally luxuriously thick and velvety) and an odd and ultimately unfulfilling skewer experience (my fellow staff had mixed bags, themselves).

But these two lunch fails were bookended with decisive lunch victories. The boss ordered some mix'n'match slider apps, and although the beef patty sliders were mundane, the pulled pork alternatives were EXCELLENT. Tender and juicy, neither too sweet nor too fatty, and well stuffed for the minute vehicle of their little buns. Hungry Sam stamp of approval.

On the flip side, the end of the meal brought sliders of another variety. Ice cream on warm cookies!!! Now, being a Portland Sea Dogs fan (wooo AA baseball!), I know these to be knockoffs of our own Sea Dog Biscuits. But these were pretty legit -- the warm cookie got the ice cream melting just enough and the cup you see in the center is filled with hot fudge.

All in all? Blackfinn, I'm worried at your inconsistency and perplexed at some odd choices. If you don't do it well, keep it off the menu. But definitely continue making sliders of all varieties.

Please.