Valentines is Coming!

Valentines Day is Monday! I am not big on celebrating this holiday, and one year tried to convince my kids that it was an unimportant holiday. We had recently become vegan, I didn't really think about getting vegan chocolates, and I was in a very idealistic place, not wanting to contribute to a "Hallmark holiday", encourage the kids to consume junk, etc. BIG FREAKING MISTAKE. Though we had talked about it, my kids were devastated when they woke up that morning and there was no candy and trinkets - I am a bad mom, so I didn't even make a card. It was tears and "don't you love us?" all morning! Talk about feeling like crap.

Lesson learned. Here is their gift this year:

Above: Go Max Go Jokerz Bar 

Sjaaks Chocolate Heart of Cherry, Peanut Butter Bites, and solid Dark Chocolate Heart 

Go Max Go bars come in four flavors! 

All Go Max Go candy bars are covered in our signature-recipe rice-milk chocolatey coating. Light and lovely, it makes dairy-milk chocolate positively passé.

When your idea of the perfect candy bar is all about peanutty goodness, then we've got you covered. If layers of dry roasted peanuts, buttery-tasting caramel, and rich peanut nougat, sweetly wrapped in a delicious chocolatey coating sounds like a little slice of heaven, then smile, the Jokerz™ bar is for you!

How does a rich, fluffy, chocolatey nougat covered in a creamy chocolatey coating sound right about now? If you can't answer because desire is consuming you… aye matey, 'tis aBuccaneer™ bar for you!

Now imagine that rich, fluffy, chocolatey nougat topped with a layer of thick, buttery-tasting caramel all wrapped up in our very own creamy, rice-milk chocolatey coating. If this gives you sweet dreams of good taste, then the Twilight™ bar is for you!

If you crave a gently sweetened coconut candy bar topped with three whole dry roasted almonds and covered in a luscious chocolatey coating… hang loose, the Mahalo™ bar is for you!

Yeah.... YUM!! 

They are carried at most Whole Foods stores, and here is a list of other locations: 

http://www.gomaxgofoods.com/where.htm

TOTALLY WORTH IT!! 

Sajjaks makes various vegan chocolates, and they are DE-LISH! Chocolate and PB? Yes, please! They have seasonal treats, and a bunch of vegan options. Watch out though, because not all their products are vegan (I thought they were, and ended up buying treats for my office).

They can be purchased at some Whole Foods, and many natural foods stores and Co-ops. If your local stores don't carry them, they have a request form available. Of course, they can also be purchased online! 

xo's and chocolate,

Sarah

Kids Perspective - a follow up to Have a Heart

I recently wrote about our struggle with dissection in school: http://growingvegans.blogspot.com/2011/01/have-heart.html

The outcome was that my son decided to observe the dissection. I bit my nails all day at work, anxiously awaiting for his report on the lesson. When I picked him up, he said "WOW! That was the coolest and most disgusting thing I have ever seen!!" Hmmm... not so much the reaction I was expecting. What was I expecting? Remorse. Horror. Scarring. But you know what? He's 11. Things like this are cool when you're 11. As ethical and thoughtful and empathetic as he is, he's still a kid.

We talked about his feelings about participating - he felt bad for the animal, but didn't feel terrible about participating. I asked him if he thought he learned more, less, or the same than if we had decided to learn about it at home, online, and by making a model. His answer? "Way more mom, because everyone was excited to learn 'cause that was cool".

So when he wrote this a few days later, I was somewhat surprised. I asked him why the change of heart (pun intended) and he looked downcast, saying "I don't want to talk about it. I just feel really bad about what I did".

When this comes up again (it will next year), I think I will handle it the same way. It's not perfect, but it's true to who we are. It's my job to help him make good decisions, but at his age, it's up to him to carry them through. I'll have him re-read what he wrote, encourage him to remember why we're vegan, and let him make his own decision.

Here is his post:
www.growingvegan.blogspot.com

Dissection

OK one thing every vegan on earth worries about dissections at school. We did that in class a week ago, I had a raging battle inside my conscience over it but in the end I did it. I will NEVER do that again. Next time I might walk out of the classroom if I have to. anyways I wish I hadn't done it.

-Dylan

xo,

Sarah

Find us on Facebook!

Under "Growing Vegans".

xo,

Sarah

Have a heart!

Dylan, my 5th grader, informed me yesterday that he would be missing class today. "Really?" I responded.  "Why's that?"

"They're going to dissect a pigs heart, mom."

Damn. I knew this would come one day, but not today! He'd mentioned it earlier in the year, but I blew it off as something we'd deal with "when the time came". Well... the time is here! Lesson learned.

My first instinct was to conform. "It's part of the curriculum; part of your education." I told him that he did  not have to participate, but that he could observe. Yes, I asked my son to be a passive bystander in the mutilation of an animal. "Mom - no way. I will walk out of class; I don't care if I get suspended!"

I was feeling really conflicted, and luckily for us, we were at my BFF and fellow blogger, Tami's house. I asked her opinion, since she's often more thoughtful about these things than I am. "Really?" she said skeptically. "You know there are alternatives, right?" I looked it up, and she was right!

"If you’re in grades kindergarten through 12 and attend public school in the following states, just say “no” to dissection: California, Florida, Illinois, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Virginia. These states have dissection choice laws or policies in place. Private schools, colleges, and universities are not covered by those laws, but you can still get an alternative.

So into the car we went, driving to the school to speak with his teacher about this. It was a while after school, and she'd gone home for the day. Luckily, our school Principal was there. She's awesome, very thoughtful, and there are rumors that she's vegetarian :-)

She sat down with us as we explained that Dylan was "highly uncomfortable" with the lesson. She listened to our concerns, and then reviewed the requirements for 5th grade California standards, which read "Students know how blood circulates through the heart chambers, lungs, and body and how carbon dioxide (CO2) and oxygen (O2) are exchanged in the lungs and tissues". http://www.cde.ca.gov/be/st/ss/documents/sciencestnd.pdf

The key word, she explained, was the students "know". There are many ways to know something, so she was supportive of us seeking an alternate lesson. She did encourage him to observe, and mentioned that at some point, he may have to in school. She explained the value of research on animals has provided, which, while in agreement, allowed me to use my new favorite argument. "You're right," I said. "Science has gained a lot from using animals, but I think at a student level, it's unnecessary. I hear what you're saying, that it's a good way to learn, but he feels it's unethical. I hope one day we can teach the information learned, rather than replicate the experiments; kind of like we do since they found the Milgram and Stanford Prison experiments unethical?" (Argument stolen from the  amazing Megan Rascal of Vegansaurus - check out her rebuttal to animal experiments here: http://vegansaurus.com/post/2814951409/animal-testing-no-really-its-awful)

I let the principal know that we'd research and come up with something that night. When we got home, I explained to Dylan that, while I would support his decision, we had lots of work to do. We made a list of pros and cons. It was about equal, but the cons included staying true to our ethics., and a notable pro was when Dylan said "I won't get made fun of like last time".

I didn't want him to look at this as an easy way to get out of an assignment, so I had him watch a video of a pig heart dissection on YouTube, and we looked up alternative lessons online. I decided we'd make a clay model of the heart,  and have him write a paper on why he chose to do an alternative assignment, and demonstrate what he'd learned.

That's when he said....."Mom? Maybe I'll just observe and see how it goes."

Oy vey! Was it because it seemed easier than doing all the extra work? Probably. Is there value to letting him participate? Yes... and no. Did I make the wrong decision, choose the easy way out? Probably; I should have been more on top of this, and supported his original decision more.  Am I a good parent? Who knows! Did I just allow my child to be scarred for life? I guess I'll find out tonight how it went, and be able to make a more informed decision next time. Damn, this parenting stuff is hard!

Here are some resources we looked at:
http://www.peta.org/issues/Animals-Used-for-Experimentation/dissection-lessons-in-cruelty.aspx
http://www.dissectionalternatives.org/
http://www.dissectionalternatives.org/concerned.cfm
http://www.dissectionalternatives.org/concerned/dissection_comparative_studies.pdf
http://www.petakids.com/dissection_alternatives.asp
http://www.aavs.org/eduDissection.html

Thoughts?

xo,
Sarah

VEGAN PIZZA DAY IS COMING!

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Happy New Year!

The holiday hiatus is officially over, and both my butt and my liver are thankful for it :-) Yes, even vegans overindulge in the good stuff! Hope you and yours had a fabulous holiday!

I want to mention that my son, Dylan, has started his own blog! You can find him and his thoughts at: http://growingvegan.blogspot.com/

Dylan is 11, and super-duper awesome. He recently played the lead role in the school play, as hero Chuck Wagon - Wagon Master. it was a western, with corresponding costumes.

One day I'm at the school during rehearsals, and I overhear the costume designing team talking about Chuck's costume. Basically was, "nope, can't use this. Nope, can't use that". I peeked my head in, and saw all kinds of cool costumes hanging around. "How about this one?" I butted my way in, grabbing the most traditional looking one.

Some of the mom's started laughing, and said "okay Sarah, YOU try to get you son in that!" Apparently, my amazing, compassionate, awesomely-cool kid had vetoed anything that used to be someone else's skin. He may have been more politically correct than me, saying NO to leather. How awesome is that?! I checked in to make sure he had been polite about it, which he had. Our awesome costume team then made him one out of synthetic materials! Cool, right??

xo,

Sarah

Goooey gooooey goodness - We love Dandies!

Soooo, any of ya'll who regularly read this blog might have realized that I am a teensy, weensy bit obsessed with baseball and the San Francisco Giants. And, as you might well expect, I am a little insane over their ummm.....

WORLD SERIES CHAMPIONSHIP!

(I sincerely apologize to any of my readers who are fans of teams that suck. )

Anyways, when I am stressed, I eat. And I want the ultimate comfort food - CHOCOLATE! So, while the boys were battling into first place, and I was pacing, bitting nails and not breathing, I decided to bake. Well - to not bake. 

A while back, I mentioned Dandies. For those of you still living in the pre-vegalicious age, Dandies are AMAZING-MAKE-YOU-BOW-DOWN-TO-THE-SOY-DAIRY-GODS-SQUISHY-MELTY- GOOEYNESS that does not contain the collagen of animals skin and bones! Yes, boys and girls,  I speak of the holy grail of veganess..... MARSHMALLOWS! (Those of us who remember the Great Marshmallow Fiasco of 2007 are especially appreciative).

I had been playing with ideas for a while, but had tons of trouble coming up with an recipe  idea worthy enough to give these babies justice. The stress eating finally took over, and I just did it! The recipe is to follow, but the verdict is VEGAN MARSHMALLOWS! There is no way to go wrong!


I've said it before, and I'm gonna say it again - I am not a brilliant chef. My food is UGLY. But it always tastes good! That being the truth, I'm going to show you the end product first:

I'm the Queen of Ease - I love being in the kitchen, sometimes. World Series game 5 was not one of those times. I chose to make do with what I had in the kitchen and could put together quickly!

Here are the ingredients:

Yes! That's it! 

* Original graham crackers, vegan chocolate chips, Dandies! * 

And again.... I make UGLY food. Thank goodness for me, Dandies taste great no matter how hard you try to screw them up! Please, please, please don't judge me based on the below, please! 

Step 1. Place graham crackers in baking dish 

 Step 2. Melt the chocolate

 

Step3. Quickly stir in Dandies vegan marshmallows 

 Step 4. Try to spread it over the graham crackers. I ended up using a piece of foil to pay over it and smooth. (Waxed paper would have worked better.)

Step 5. Refrigerate for 30 min.

Step 6. Cut into squares 

Voilà!!

(Not so ugly, right?!) 

Thank you, thank you, thank you to Chicago SoyDairy for this phenomenal product! Trust me, go get your Dandies today! I will be making these again for sure! Hope you enjoy! 

xo,

Sarah