Bread winners!

Okay! I have done some serious thinking (seriously, this is important to me) and I have picked 2 bread ideas that I am working on developing. All of the suggestions were overwhelming if not instantly drool-inducing. Some of the ideas thrown out are ones that I already have in the book, either as breads or muffins so I imagine that will be a pleasent surprise ("garden" muffins with zucchini and carrots, blueberry muffins, banana bread, lemon bread...) Other people commented on disliking "debris" in their food. I run into this from time to time and although I can't fathom why someone wouldn't love a cookie swimming with nuts, I understand that this is a malady that I must cater to. :) Jim also isn't a fan of things in his food, so I'm seasoned in this department.

The first bread idea that I liked and ran with was the idea of the pumpkin bread. This idea was brought up by Mindy and Cheryl. I really liked it, but I liked it even more when I combined that idea with Laura Faye's cinnamon swirl bread idea. I got to play with that this week and here was the result:



This is a picture of the heel, so it's not the best part to have photographed, but what can I say? I'm a putz. Anyway, the first test of this deemed it delicious. Jim isn't normally very interested in pumpkin but wanted me to immediately bake another loaf.

The next kind of bread, which I will be working on soon, is the apple pie bread suggested by Caroline. I love the idea of such a homestyle smell coming from a bread and being so much more manageable, and healthier, to eat.

I thank you all, with much sincerity, for all of your help and enthusiasm. Working on a book is very difficult work and it's easy to feel overwhelmed but having such a creative and responsive community of people is very inspiring and gives me a lot of motivation. So, Caroline, Mindy, Laura Faye and Cheryl, please be sure I have your addresses to get copies of the book to you when it's done. My email is squirrelsvegankitchen@gmail.com.

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Okay, now on another note. I hope you all had a wonderful Sunday. It was beautiful here today. I'm not really sure what the temperature was (one of the downfalls of not owning a television: I never bother to find out what the weather will be like. It wasn't an issue in AZ, but I'll have to start looking into it here), but it was gorgeous. I was up late finishing a wonderful book I was reading, The Devil in the White City which is about the 1893 World's Fair in Chicago, so I slept in this morning. Then we rode down to the farmer's market with our bikes and indulged in a bounty of freshly farmed bargains. We bought 1 1/2 pounds of cherries, Bing and Rainier combined, at $1 a pound (my eyes nearly fell out of my head), some zucchini, sugar snap peas, new potatoes and onions. We then cruised over to a local coffee house and enjoyed some sorbetto. After that we came home and I have no idea where the afternoon went, but this evening we did something that was long overdue. We went to see Al Gore's movie An Inconvenient Truth.

Now, I normally try to keep this blog lighthearted, but I feel very strongly about this movie and the reaction that I've been hearing from the vegan community, so here I am, to state my opinion on the matter. The main complaints about this movie that I have been hearing are that 1.) "it's not going to make a difference anyway" and 2.) "he doesn't bring up the effects of animal agriculture on the environment". Here are my thoughts:

For the people who are saying 1.), what are you doing to help the situation? Here is a man that has politics and celebrity on his side and is using that make a film (which is an accessible media for people of many classes) about one of the biggest topics that we are facing. If you are looking for some almighty person to say and do what you think you would do, were you in his shoes, go talk to your god. He is giving bigger visibility to this topic than has ever happened before and I think that pretty damn big.

For those in the 2.) camp, well, you aren't going to like what I'm going to say. This movie was not created to point fingers are certain industries. He certainly has many opprotunites to do that and he does not. What this movie tries to do is break down and explain global warming in the most accessible way possible, discuss it and get people feeling passionate about it. He does lightly touch on energy uses, or wastes as it may be, but the movie never claims to be a guide that condemns the evil industries and praises the good. And there is a moment when our vegan utopia must be punctured to look at reality. Even if Al Gore himself was vegan, the reality of it is that if he wants to continue to be taken seriously in the political arena he cannot make that a platform or really discuss animal rights period. Clearly it doesn't make me happy to say that, but it's the truth, he would get lumped in with other "earthy hippy" hypes (and that is meant with no offense, as I'm in that catagory myself) and he would be written off by the idiots that are in power. It's easy to think that he could be the one to make a difference, but if no one is taking his global warming campaign seriously no one is going to look at the animal agriculture industry. It's one of those "sad but true" things.

I personally have been a Gore lover for years. I was very young during the first Clinton administration, so my adoration was actually my first political crush, but as I got older and understood the amazing affects of the Clinton-Gore years, the lowest unemployment rate in 30 years, paying off, not just down but off, the national debt and creating a surplus and all the good that they did towards the civil rights of our citizens, well, I couldn't help but love him. I'm sure there are other candidates out there that I would identify with even more strongly that I'm unaware of, but the fact remains that Al Gore is one of the gutsiest politians that I can actually say I admire. I think that Paul Wellstone (RIP) is looking down on him with a tired smile of an equally challenged ally.


So there is my little spiel. I hope I didn't offend anyone too badly. I am not a very tolerant person of those who feel like it's okay to knock people who are trying to make a difference. I know it's easier to complain than give someone credit. It may not be perfect in some people's eyes, but damn it, they are doing something and that's a lot more than most people.

On a lighter note, I ventured into the scary world of homemade jams and canning this weekend, which I will post about, which picture documentation, tomorrow. Yay!