May 2010
Vegan wining, spiritual dining, the names of milk, the miracle of elephants and MORE in today's link-o-rama!
Have you entered our contest yet? You could WIN A SHIRT! Come on, son!
Vegan-style events for you!
Remember, the Women Entrepreneurs Showcase happens on Sunday in Berkeley, with a vegan catered lunch for only $4! Be at the David Brower Center at 2150 Allston Way from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.—lunch begins at noon.
The Recess Ends DVD release party is set for next Friday, May 7 at Medicine Agency, 1262 Mason St. at Jackson Street in San Francisco. The Recess Ends is a documentary about national unemployment—it sounds interesting, definitely worth a look. The screening starts at 8 p.m.
Miscellaneous items of varying importance!
Pajamactivism for the day: oppose the oil and gas leasing on the Outer Continental Shelf (via Defenders of Wildlife); ask Ahold to boycott Canadian seafood (via HSUS);’ Californians, contact members of the state Senate Appropriations Committee to express your opposition to SB 1345, which would legalize the importation and sale of kangaroo meat (via BAARN). “Pajamactivism”—y/n?
Aw you guys! CNN has the sweetest article about last weekend’s Worldwide Vegan Bakesale, with lots of photos of food you want to eat and people—and animals—you want to hug. San Francisco’s will happen next weekend, because of schedules, and whatever, you’ll get your desserts.
Baby activists: you could get scholarships for your awesome veg lifestyle! The Wall Street Journal finds it all a little silly—these children and their microloans, haven’t they money of their own?—but we say, go for it!
We’ve got all kinds of non-dairy milks made of all kinds of items, but we don’t have chickpea milk—yet. Israel does, though, and yes please we would like to try it.
The dairy industry, torturers of cows for profit (and fun?), would like the entire world to stop calling all non-animal milk “milk” and start calling it “imitation milk,” toute de suite. According to the National Milk Producers Federation, “soy milk” is a “bastardization of dairy terms.” Alternatively: “soy jism.” Yes, someone outside of a creepy Western romance novel full of rape and cattle-roping still uses that word.
Attention pescatarians: you may now ease your consciences by purchasing your fish at Target and Wal-Mart, two of the top five purveyors of sustainable seafood as rated by Greenpeace. We are thrilled for you.
An Antioch, Calif. animal shelter killed two pit bulls this week, in apparent violation of the Hayden Act and despite the hard work of animal advocates. Life is so awesome, you guys.
“Foodies” are vegans, by which I mean, “white, affluent cultural snobs” and “elitists” who “romanticize poverty” and are basically terrible jerks who love eating. Get it?
On that note: need vegan wine recommendations? The Chronicle has an article about making and pairing wine in a “meat two ways!” world.
Have you been reading Fed Up with Lunch blog? This week we got a guest blog about Meatless Mondays in the NYC public school system, and another from an organic farmer in Texas.
Let’s celebrate May Day with veal for a nickel! This doesn’t make me want to punch anyone in the stomach AT ALL. I’m also not at all irritated by the “Chicken wars” title of Michael Bauer’s little blog about all the delicious fried chicken choices in Southeast Kansas. “Chicken wars—whose tortured, murdered chicken has been prepared most tastily?” Man, fuck you guys.
OK, deep, cleansing breath: perhaps a visit to one of our fine city’s many cult-ish religion-run veg restaurants would help. Jackson West seemed to have a lovely time at all of them (I have been craving Golden Era for weeks, incidentally).
You can’t get Pizza Hut on military bases anymore, but you can get it in some prisons. Thanks, Aramark!
The down in your lovely soft comforter was most likely plucked from a living goose, which “constitutes torture.” Because you can only pluck a dead goose once, but you can pluck a living goose up to four times before you have to kill it! HA HA HA.
Letterman and his audience may find the idea of chicken activism high-larious, but after Ira Glass visited a rescued chicken farm, he went vegetarian. Fuck yeah Karen Davis!
The internet’s been all up in a bunch about discovering that chimpanzees grasp the concepts of “dying” and “death,” but I feel like Jane Goodall sort of already knew this 40 years ago? Regardless: if this leads to NEVER EXPERIMENTING ON THEM AGAIN, I’ll be happy; otherwise, science can shut the fuck up with its amazing animal discoveries and no heart.
You know what other animals are amazing? Elephants, duh! This week, an elephant in the Houston zoo made friends with a pit bull, which is apparently the only way a pit bull can be adopted in Houston, Texas. An elephant and dog in Tennessee are best friends, too, though that’s on an elephant sanctuary rather than a gross-out zoo. We also learned this week that elephants have a specific word meaning “let’s get out of here, there are bees around,” leading me to believe elephant language is rather like German.
April 2010
Financial District foraging: Stone Korean Kitchen!
You’ve probably seen it on the Yelp or the Groupon, but Stone is a semi-new Korean place in Four Embarcadero (right on Justin Herman Plaza by the fountain, and with outside seating, too) with a young-ish, hip-ish vibe. At least as compared with the gross-ish Japanese place that used to occupy the space.
Anyway, I dig it. They have a great happy hour (two for one giant bottles of Korean beer!) and some delectable snacks. Including these, the Duk Kochi (crispy rice cakes with spicy sauce and sesame seeds): they are like little savory fried rice marshmallows with hot sauce on them. Leave your depressing-ass office RIGHT NOW!
[photo by Megan Allison. Ed. note: check the flat, metal chopsticks—authentic Korean!]
Interview: Livia Stone!
Are you vegan for health, environmental, animal rights reasons, or a combination?
Initially I went veg because I realized I didn’t need to kill or exploit animals to live, but as I learned more—especially about the environmental impact of animal agriculture—I can’t believe anyone who is interested in going “green” doesn’t give up or at least reduce the amount of animal products they consume.
How long have you been vegan? Why did you become vegan?
I’ve been vegan for 10 years. I had been vegetarian already for several years, but that impulse was based entirely on compassion. When I started learning about the issues, I knew I needed to do more.
Definitely some crazy stories, usually on a daily basis. Rescuing an animal is often a transformative experience for people—and that’s very inspiring. I see a lot of cruelty and apathy, and so whenever people do the right thing for animals it gives me a little more energy to continue on. I remember one case where a man found an opossum in his garage. He reached into a box without looking, and promptly got bitten by a startled opossum who had found himself a nice place to sleep. The bite wasn’t serious, but the health department is very strict about mammal bites because of the risk of rabies, which is fatal in humans without treatment. Usually, we are forced to euthanize the animal to test for rabies, which drives us nuts because rabies is actually very rare in most species around here. But, of course it’s understandable that the health department wants to keep tabs because we could have an outbreak at any time. This opossum was clearly healthy and acting in normally, so we offered to quarantine as an alternative (which we always do) but since a human was bitten we didn’t have much hope. Going that route means you have to get rabies shots, because you don’t know if you’ve been exposed or not. But the man who was bitten called everyone he could and said he would do whatever it took—he didn’t want the opossum killed for his mistake! We’ve never had anyone do that before. So the opossum got free room and board for a month and was released because he never showed any signs of illness. [Ed.: That’s one of the best stories we’ve ever heard about humans. Usually we are THE WORST! Side note: Was this man cute? Single??]
Any tips on what we should do if we find wounded or sick wildlife?
In the Bay Area, you can always call WildCare and we can help you determine if it is indeed an emergency and who the nearest rehabilitator is: 415-456-SAVE (7283). Many times babies are “kidnapped” by well-meaning people! We can also determine if a reunite is possible in the case of babies.
Often the first impulse is to take an injured animal to a veterinarian, but there’s usually a charge and more importantly, most have no special training for wildlife. At WildCare, we have technicians and wildlife veterinarians who care for our wild patients.
If you find an animal that is obviously injured and you can capture them safely, keep them in a secure box or kennel with air holes. The things to remember are to keep the
Can just anyone foster wild animals? How do we go about doing that?
No. Rehabilitators have lots of permits and conditions that need to be met. It is illegal for members of the public to keep wildlife (you can rescue, though!). If you volunteer at a local wildlife center, you will be able to care for the animals under the center’s permit. Many centers offer training classes to prepare you for foster care.
Do you have any companion animals? Where are they from?
Do you have any super cute photos of animals to share with us?
You can check out WildCare’s website for videos and photos!
What is your favorite animal? I know, this one is REALLY TOUGH.
Every day I have a new favorite animal! But, I especially adore crows.
Favorite vegan cookbook?
I know you’ve been doing a lot of baking and cooking lately! What’s your favorite vegan dish to make? What about for a vegan bakesale?
Since I’ve discovered Daiya cheese I’ve been making a mean mac ‘n cheese casserole but generally I’m big on making soups from scratch, especially heirloom tomato soup. For bakesales, just about anything from my cupcake cookbook. The carrot cupcake with cream cheese frosting recipe is amazing!
Favorite vegan dish at a restaurant?
Cornmeal crusted oyster mushrooms at Millennium!
Favorite vegan restaurant?
You’re going to the Farm Sanctuary California Hoe Down THIS SATURDAY (EVERYONE GO!!!!), who are you most excited to pet/hang out with??
PIGS!!! Love me some pigs. Wilbur from Charlotte’s Web made me vegetarian.
Are you willing to have Vegansaurus over and cook us a vegan feast? If so, what day?
ANYTIME.
Our gift to Livia: A damned cute pig named Edgar from Pig Peace Sanctuary. Enjoy the cuteness!
*there are more awesome interviews on the site but our search is for shit and hopefully we can fix that soon but who knows, I’m only so good at my “job.”
Spill, baby, spill! →
nytimes.com
Courtesy of the New York Times comes this shocking infographic showing which species are now in peril from the spill. Want a sneak preview? “The Gulf of Mexico is the only spawning ground for the Western Atlantic population of the bluefish tuna, which is at the peak of spawning season.” America, FUCK YEAH!
The antidote to this shit is clean energy, like the offshore wind farm off Cape Cod that was approved this past week by Interior Secretary Ken Salazar. Unfortunately, groups are already suing to block its construction because they say the wind farm will block the views from their mansions endanger marine life and commerce. Because birds and fish are just choking in wind-slick from leaky wind turbines. Quick, someone call in the emergency windbreaker and visor crew! These feathers aren’t going to comb themselves back into place.
Yes, you can love cheese too much →
aolnews.com
Over 85 tons of cheese from the Lacteos Factory in Miami, Fla., which was imported from Nicaragua, turned out to be 1. worth $322,000; and 2. totally tainted with Staphylococcus aureus, a.k.a “golden staph,” a totally gross bacterium and the most common cause of staph infections. Whoops!
As it happens, the cheese was inspected and discovered to be full of staph, but instead of discarding it, Lacteos “developed an elaborate scheme to conceal the tainted cheese.” They sent back boxes labeled cheese refused by Customs; instead, upon inspection, Customs and Border Patrol “discovered that while the top layer of cartons on each pallet contained small bricks of cheese, as labeled, the bulk of the cargo in the lower tiers of boxes consisted only of buckets of wastewater.” Whoops, again!
Finally, it turns out this staph-full cheese had already been sold to over 30 customers in California, New York, and Texas. Triple-whoops!
Man it feels good to be a vegan.
Ubuntu's new chefs still creating "vegetable cuisine" →
napavalleyregister.com
Good news, everyone! Ubuntu is still open, and still making food without meat. Dairy, yes, but featuring vegetables, just like produce hero Jeremy Fox. No word on its quality as compared to the previous kitchen’s work, but chef Aaron London and pastry chef Carl Swanson trained under Jeremy and Deanie Fox, so the food should be in the same style. It sounds like the Napa Valley Register ate pretty well, anyway.
Your Vegansaurus was at Ubuntu on Saturday, though failed to take pictures because WHAT THE HELL, STEVE, and reports that although there were no chickpea fries (oh the humanity), “the food was excellent. Yes, some dairy, but most of the menu was vegan or can-be-vegan.” If any wonderful readers want to send us a report/photos/juicy gossip, please feel free!
Pro tip: if you happen to show up tipsy from your earlier wine-tasting, don’t tell the hostess!
SF Vegan Drinks is tomorrow night! Leave the house, lazies!
Tear yourself away from Veronica Mars reruns on iTunes tomorrow night (and by “tear yourself away” I mean “Steve. FFS. Tear yourself away from Veronica Mars reruns for JUST ONE NIGHT what the hell is your problem.” And while we’re on the subject, why no Veronica Mars on Instant Netflix? And why no Buffy seasons 3 through 7 on iTunes? What’s up, internet?) because Vegan Drinks is getting us ready for summer: $2 Tofurkey hot dogs, $5 poached pear martinis, and drinking way too much and stumbling home without a jacket because you left it at Martuni’s. Also warm-weather themed? Cutting and pasting press releases:
Just a heads-up that the April installment of Vegan Drinks is this Thursday at Martuni’s (Valencia @ Market Streets). Not only is this a fantastic chance to mingle with other interesting vegans while enjoying drink specials (this month: $5 Poached Pear Martinis) and a host of non-alcoholic beverage options, you can eat your share of vegan hot dogs!
This month, we’ll be cooking up some Tofurky hot dogs in honor of the warming weather! Hot dogs will cost $2, and buns, ketchup, and mustard will be included. Can’t wait to see you there!
Vegansaurus is an official sponsor of SF Vegan Drinks, so get down there early to line up for autograph-signing with your favorite Vegansaur/buying us Tofurkey dogs! It’s from 6 to 8 p.m. tomorrow! Tip your server! Don’t drink and drive! Etc.!
If god didn't want you to eat pangolin, why did he make them out of meat?
I don’t have a lot to say in response to this Huffington Post slide show of animals that are going extinct because people won’t stop eating them except this: what the fuck, meat eaters?
The striking thing about this list, really, is the diversity of the animals that are being threatened. Gorillas? Check. Giant salamanders? Check. Pangolins? Check. Mind boggled? Double-check.
[photo via the CBC]
One day we could all shit Clorox courtesy of SCIENCE!
Well it’s not actually bleach, that’s just some decorative language I added because I’m an artist and my new medium is lying. They want to make pigeons shit “biological soap” through the magic of synthetic biology. I looked up synthetic biology and in this case it means, “the re-design of existing, natural biological systems for useful purposes.” And since animals exist to make our lives easier, let’s biologically synthesize some damn pigeons already! Or as Tuur van Balen, the brains behind this, puts it, “add new functionality to what is by many seen as flying rats” (oh daaamn, are you rat-lovers going to take that?). This is awesome because while I already love pigeons, functional pigeons sound so much better! GOD I already can’t STAND all these dysfunctional pigeons I have to deal with everyday! With their drinking problems and abusive relationships—I’m over it!
So what’s the plan?! Well, they are going to feed pigeons a special bacteria with their food. Van Balen claims this bacteria is—get ready for this!—“as harmless to them as eating yoghurt is to us.” UM EARTH TO VAN BALEN! Dairy is the devil! DUH. But the bacteria will somehow change their metabolism and ta dah! Soap poop.
The article goes on to discuss the other implications this kind of thing could have. He’s working on synthetic immune systems where it’s totally tailored to your body. And guess what! The example he gives is for vegetarians! The synthetic immune system could monitor your B12 levels and produce some more if they are low. Hold up, that’s kind of BADASS. But the pigeon stuff, I don’t know. I don’t think we should go around fucking with animals just because we can. And when you add new things to the environment, there’s always potential for disaster. Like the salt we use to melt snow, now it’s all in the rivers and what not, screwing things up.
My final vote: Leave the damn pigeons alone. Freaks.
All your vegan comics are belong to Soy Fucker
… or something.
The only real rule is that comics artists and/or writers must be vegan. Other than that, pretty much anything goes. Comics don’t have to be about vegans or veganism. More details (including the format and size, etc.) can be found at soyfucker.tumblr.com.
Submit your scrawls to artwork@soyfucker.com and make the Soy Fucker mascot banana dog happy!
