Things that Stick, Now with 50% More Pasta Sauce!

It would be nice, sometime, to develop some productive habits, such as exercising, or writing regularly. I suppose I that if I try to do my aspirational habits and hobbies frequently enough they'll become actual habits and hobbies.

Some things I've been doing lately:

• Walking more. I got the Fitbit Flex and I find it highly motivational. I haven't really lost any weight, but I think I'm going to be stepping up my game soon, so hopefully that will change.
• Learning to crochet. Okay, "learning" might be a strong word here. Right now, I can produce a chain of stitches that are more or less the same size. I've watched some videos and read about single stitch, but I haven't actually tried it yet.
• Trying out Dr. Weil's anti-inflammation diet, modified for vegan me. Since obesity and diabetes and other wretched chronic illnesses run in my family, and since science is seeming to show more and more that inflammation is tied to these illnesses and inflammation is tied to diet, I figure it's worth a shot. Basically, the biggest change is reducing the amount of refined wheat and white potatoes I eat. I'm trying to have just one of each per day. It removed a lot of "convenience foods" but it's also helping me eat more variety. I haven't really experimented with alternative grains yet, but that's certainly on the way.
• I joined a mushroom club! We learn about mushrooms. I haven't gone mushroom hunting yet, but I would like to soon.
• I joined a cooking challenge! Which is what the rest of this post will be about.

The challenge is "52 Weeks of Vegan Cooking." I figure that by doing this challenge, I'll accomplish a variety of things, among them: cooking (which I love) more, trying tasty new things (which I also love), writing at least weekly (shocking), actually accomplishing something.

Tangent: I plan on calling my memoir "the Finisher." It ends with a cliff hanger.

The week one challenge is "Comfort Food." My comfort food is....

Pasta! 

Or more specifically, pasta sauce. Pasta sauce is the first thing that I ever learned how to make. It's easy and delicious.

I've been a vegetarian since I was three. My parents encouraged me to eat meat, but they never tried to make me. I've just never liked it. So since I wouldn't eat meat, my mother had quite the adventure trying to figure out how to feed me. On top of my meat-aversion, I was a fairly picky eater. Luckily the things that I liked to eat were relatively easy- raw vegetables, rice pilaf, pasta, salad, vegetable soup.

When I was around 10 or 11, I realized that the pasta sauce that my mom made at home was nothing like the pasta sauce I got in restaurants, which was far and away superior. My mother's recipe-I am not exaggerating in the slightest- was a can of Hunt's tomato sauce with a slice of Kraft American cheese melted into it. I decided to figure out how to make pasta sauce that actually tasted good. I started experimenting with herbs and onions and sauteing and blending and after a while I realized that I was a pretty darn good cook.  Pasta sauce was my gateway to cooking.

This is not the pasta sauce that I learned to make first, but this one is a delicious and actually pretty healthy sauce that fools a lot of people. It's very thick, and it tastes pretty creamy and cheesy. My secret ingredient? White beans.

Megs' Teetotaler, Cheese-totaler, Vegan Vodka Cream Sauce

(yes, I'm proud of myself for coming up with "cheese-totaler.")

1. Dice a small white onion and some garlic. I used a sweet onion, because that's what I had, and 5 cloves of garlic, because I don't care if my breath is offensive to the general public, who I find generally offensive.
2. Warm up a medium sauce pan over low heat. When it's warm, pour in some olive oil. I coated the bottom of the pan with olive oil, which is kind of a lot, but I kind of also don't give a shit.
3.  When the oil is warm, toss in the onion and garlic. You should probably sprinkle some kosher salt on there too. Saute until the onions are translucent and your house smells amazing.
4. Open a 24 ounce can of plain, low sodium tomato puree. Yes, puree. Plain, unadulterated sauce would be fine too. I used puree because it was going to expire before anything else in my cupboard. You don't want paste, or whole tomatoes in the can, or chopped or whatever, because you are going to be adding beans, and that is going to change everything.
5. Now is also probably a good time to add some spices. Go nuts with basil, put oregano all over the place, whatever. I used some mystery spice blend someone gave me (I think there's oregano and basil and thyme and god knows what else) and enough red pepper flake to give a mild burn at the end. Simmer this for a while so that all the flavors mingle and become besties.
6. Next up, beans. One 16 ounce can of cannellini beans, drained and rinse. Let that whole thing get nice and warm.
7. Finally, we blend! I used an immersion blender. You could use a real blender. You could go nuts and not blend at all, but I would question your life choices. Taste and season more if you want to.
8. Eat. Probably with pasta. Be proud.

Thanks for reading! I'll try for more pictures and crap next week.

The Deliberate Blog

It seems to me that "successful" blogs are those with purpose. Blogs that are dedicated to a specific point of view, such as food blogs, political blogs of any flavor, news blogs- basically, special interest blogs are successful blogs.

(I am, of course, defining "a successful" blog as a blog that people actually read and follow, not simply the ramblings of one person stranded in the Pacific Ocean desert shouting underwater to the fish, which is somewhat similar to writing on the internet. There's a different cliche saying, I think. Something about trees and mimes.)

Originally, this was going to be about eating vegan in an un-vegan world. I'm sure it still will be occasionally. Additionally, at one point I was going to be writing on a soup blog that Jen (my sister of anywhere from 4 days to 5 years, depending on your counting system) and I came up with. Perhaps I'll pick that one back up, or integrate it into here. I don't want this to be a blog in lieu of therapy, or whining about anything that vexes me personally, besides perhaps the driving habits of anonymous strangers or highly specific, contextualized logic fails.

This is not a blog about math, or space, though it might occasionally be a blog about tea and flowers. It is definitely a blog about my dog. I am sure I will write about food. I will likely also write about condoms. I will probably write about books. I may write about my therapist.

You see, I think this blog is in fact the blog I don't want it to be. I have had a long paralyzing...fear? Block? Disinterest? Phobia? whatever- of writing. It has stifled me academically and personally. Ultimately, this is a "therapy blog." However, this isn't going to be scads of posts about being emo or damaged or whatever else the indie bands are calling it these days.

Whippersnappers.

There is no purpose here. This isn't dedicated to vegan food, or mental health, or dog training, or working in medical device manufacturing or sexual health and education. There will be soup, and some books I'm sure. There may even be pictures. There wil probably be politics. I also enjoy puzzles. I have a very long backlog of crafts which seems to be growing larger daily.

Pressed to pick a purpose, I would probably propose...um...paliteration. Actually, I would choose exploration, or finding purpose or dedication or direction, or maybe it's just about creating.

So there. Now I'm taking my blog and going home.