Me a vegan? Realy?

So I went to the doctors and recommended to stop eating/devouring dairy products. What can I say, I love cheese, and butter...and ice cream. Like I have said in the past, I love food. I just love it pretty much no matter what it is I will eat it, except olives, like I have said before. So I have been a "vegaquariam" for about 6 months now and decided, well why not take the next step. I will stop eating the seafood, cheese, butter, eggs, and become...duh da duh...a VEGAN. Yup I said it, meat and potatoes sauteed in bacon bits with a side of mayo Andy became a Vegan. Which means no butter, no eggs, no sauteed in bacon bits and NO mayo...Veganaisse just doesn't cut it. Easy I thought, I love veggies, fruits, whole grains, I can do this. Piece of cake. Now I need to worry if I am eating enough calories, or getting the right nutrients I need. I also need to worry about what is for dinner. Gone are the "lets through some chicken or fish on the grill and eat it with rice or whatever. Now its what veggies can I grill with Tofu, Can I grill Tofu, what is Tempeh? do I have a suitable substitution for chicken? To all these questions I say YES I CAN/DO! Protein is easy now that I have discovered Lentils, Tofu, Garden Protein, Tempeh (cooked right,) and some other suitable proteins. I have found delicious vegan chocolate and have made dessert with it! Soy Yogurt instead of real yogurt, granola in the morning and lots of fresh fruit. Like I said I love food, it works for me, and I am good cook so win win. Jeremy can still have his meat, but I will keep my potatoes...sauteed in EVOO or water...

The Garden in three parts.

Part 1: The Good:
I love my garden, it is a little small but perfect for what I need, it gives me fruit and I can eat everything that comes out of it. So far this season I have harvested my tomatoes, tiny heads of broccoli, some herbs, 5 beans, some lettuce, and well that is it so far. I am glad I endeavored on this journey and have learned a little about planting, next year I will have one additional bed and space the plants a little more. I will also not be as impatient and plants according to charts and what not. Even though it is hot doesn't mean I should plant. Anyways I got a load of tomatoes, enough to make a salad and some salsa, and to have as part of a dinner and it made me rethink my Subway sandwich for the time I was eating it. I looked at the pink tasteless ones on my sandwich removed them and put on the juicy red ones from my garden. The colors of summer truly came out but soon I would find out, some colors you do not want in your garden.

Part 2: The Bad:
This is broccoli, this is about how big it got, broccoli likes cold, broccoli does not like HOT. The temperature has reached just about 101 for a few days, poor broccoli. This is the unpredictable weather I have been dealing with. Of course I rushed and planted everything together. I could rip them up and plant new ones, then I would get some nice heads in early September. Maybe I will. This is the bad I have been dealing with, but just remember there is always next year so we shall see what next year brings, I will be armed with the knowledge of the weather and will plant a little better next time. Of course I will have some nice compost also which I started this summer. One thing I was not prepared for (but of course was warned against) was a not so nice little creature who haunts my nightmares and is the reason I don't sleep at night.

Part 3: The Ugly:
Why me I ask, why when I look at this critter do I convulse with fear and cringe in anguish. Why am I so afraid of one little 5 inch worm. Why would this little critter bring a 200 pound man to his knees crying and wanting to throw up. This critter is gross, give me spiders, snakes, creepy crawly gross hissing cockroaches any day, but this caterpillar or Tomato Hornworm grosses me out and makes me sick. This thing I realize is a living being and this thing I realize needs nourishment itself, but it looks like a fantasy creature out of the likeness of Dr. Who or Star Trek. It ATE of my plants, one of my plants of course being 4 feet tall and full of small cherry tomatoes, I caught it before it could do more damage BUT STILL!! I saw it screamed a little on the inside, took a picture of it and proceeded to find the longest stick and put it in a bowl of soapy water, it's demise was the spoils of war but you know what...IT ATE MY PLANTS! Damn little thing I don't need humongoid moths flying around my house, YUCK. Lesson learned, I just need parasidic wasps to get rid of them, good.

Fruits or Veg of my labors...or lack there of

Being the pretty hands-off type of guy I tend to be (let nature take it's course) I decided to let my garden do it's thing this year, and see what happens. A lot has happened, but I am sure a lot more could have happened. Here is an example. I did not follow the "gardening rules" by planting my broccoli 12 inches apart, or whatever I was suppose to do because well, I didn't have that much space, instead I did some kind of French gardening method where I kinda of bunched them all together. Look at that, broccoli. The same with the tomatoes. I bought four different plants hoping you know maybe one will grow, what do you know I have fruit on all four of the plants. I crowded my garden, so what, I have a yield, maybe it's not the best yield, but I did it and I put minimal effort into it. I made the beds, added the soil, added the plants and gave it water when it didn't rain, presto, fruits and veg.
I am pretty proud of the fact that anything grew. I didn't really do much. What didn't grow was the carrots, beets (one is left), and corn. The reasons are because they got eaten when they were little. The carrot tops all got eaten by a neighborhood cat (I know because one day they were all gone and I saw a cat in my garden.) The beets, well maybe when the beans are gone and other plants are gone I will have a late beet season, we shall see. For now I am happy with my tomatoes and broccoli. Later in the season I should expect everything else to come up. The B-sprouts and cauliflower is doing fairly well. I have beans that I can pick in a few days as well as a tiny bit of leaf lettuce. Well that is all for now.

Veg has exploded...

SO I love looking at my garden and thinking, I helped do this. I planted these plants (some seeds) gave them the water they needed, positioned them so they got 6 hours of sun light and everyday when I got home from work talked to them, gave words of encouragement and words of thanks and now...FRUIT!
As a child I remember my dad always in the garden, as I have said in previous posts, but never really appreciated the fact that all that work yielded the prize. It takes patience and time, you are growing something from a tiny seed and then it gives you it's yield. This year was my first year for many things, first house, first garden, first year brewing my own hard cider, etc. I am finding it more and more satisfying knowing that my hands had a part in the growing of these plants, and the food me and my family will be consuming. I always knew it was hard work and I knew you needed to do a lot for these plants, but it was the satisfaction I did not know about. I am glad I am doing this, I am glad I am a part of a world where I can take part in giving life to something for my nourishment. I would love to have a bigger plot to do even more with but there just isn't space, next year I will add another 4X4 plot so I will have space to grow more different plants, I will also take a lesson from this year and not crowd like I did. I read it was okay because of the way the area is set up you CAN crowd a little, and since I am already yielding tomatoes I am assuming it is working fine. We shall see in the next few months what I yield. So far neighborhood cats have eaten the tops off of my carrots as well as most of the beets. now I have empty space which will be taken up by either the cucumber plant or I may plant one eggplant in the next few weeks. But again it feel wicked good to know I had a part in this growing of veggies! Thanks Earth for giving my what I need to live.

...being Veg...again...for the fifth time...

Hi all, not many people read my posts but you know it's nice for me to have a place to put down my thoughts and if people want to read then so be it. This post is about my choosing to become a vegetarian, or at least a compromised version. When I graduated high school for a while I was a vegetarian, but quickly realized in college you ate salad, cheese pizza, and veggie burgers. There was not much else of a choice. I also didn't have much money to spend on food so I had to choose whatever the cafeteria had to offer. So I started eating chicken and then just ate whatever. A few years later down the road I geared myself up again and quickly dropped meat, but again I was hit with the staunch reality of limited food, limited knowledge of what was out there and a general laziness. I mean I really did not like eating salads for 2 meals a day and eggs or cereal in the morning. It was my own fault for not gaining the knowledge I could at the time. Really I didn't think to seek anything about being vegetarian, I just knew what I knew and went from there.
I wasn't armed with much ethnic food, Chinese food was fried chicken fingers, chow mein and fried rice. Italian food was pizza, pasta with red sauce, and typically the "italian" sandwiches we would get from the store. In Maine an Italian consists of meat (usually ham), American cheese, long cut dill pickles, white onions, tomatoes, and green peppers covered in salad oil all on a 12 inch or so white italian roll. They are good, everyone in Maine knows when you say Italian, you want this sandwich. Outside of Maine I realize they have many names: Hoagie, Grinder, Hero, Sub. The difference is the oil, the pickles, and the meat. Veggies always came from the ground and were mostly whatever came out of our garden. We never really strayed from the veggies we could grow. Typically (and I have written about this) they consisted of Peas, beans, beets, corn, carrots, broccoli, cauliflower, tomatoes, cukes, potatoes squash, and zucchini. Most of these were cooked in the typical fashion, steamed with butter, salt and pepper. We ate meat with every meal, ham, hamburger in some form, or chicken. So this is what I knew. In Maine being a vegetarian typically meant you ate chicken and fish. It is a meat and potatoes state, almost literally since their big crop is well, potatoes. I knew I was a daring eater and always liked trying new foods, so I decided again to not eat meat and not eating meat isn't cheap, you would think it is since you aren't paying for the meat, but fresh produce is expensive for some reason, reasons which I have since learned.
I have read a lot of books and I have seen a lot of documentaries about the farmers in America and also where food comes from. I have watched Food Inc and King Corn all about the food in America. Also have read Omnivores Dilemma and Animal, Vegetable, Mineral. They all provided me with good info that I could arm myself with and what not. I have also read a lot of diet books and have read about different diets. They all seem to say the same thing, eat small meals with lots of whole foods. I mean its true. Veggies and fruits are good for you, and it doesn't matter how much you eat of them. Obviously the fruit sugar can add up but a balance is good. The meat on the other hand just seems a little out of place. I know where it comes from, I know how they are treated or can be treated. I have just come to the conclusion that I am over meat. I am over the fact of how the meat is treated and preserved. I feel that if I can shoot or kill my own animals I would eat them because then I would have been a part of that animals life. If I could raise and kill my own food I would, but until then, I will stick with raising veggies and learning how to do things that will help me survive if I need to. I know how to cook, fish, garden (we'll see,) knit, crochet, sew, make cheese, and other stuff.
So I guess my whole point was this time I am sticking to it, I am eating vegetarian with the exception of fish and unless I kill that deer or moose or raise my own chickens, I will let everyone else eat them.

Garden today

SO here is the most recent pictures of the garden. These were taken today May 14th 2010. This one shows all the plants at their present state. In front there is cauliflower and to the right is the Brussels sprouts. In the back of the Cauliflower is the broccoli to the right is the beans, beets and carrots. In the back are the tomatoes and my little garden gnome. So far so good, I am hoping not to use any pesticides on plants. I have been told by a few people to watch out for bugs and worms and grossness on the Broccoli. I will look out and I will look out for other things on the other plants too,

Here is a some of my herbs, here is the Oregano that I am growing I am hoping that it stays and grows back next year as a perennial. Right now it is in a pot but eventually it will either make it to a big pot or in another 4x4 raised bed like the one I have here. I can kitty corner another one to this bed and then have even more veggies, well maybe this bed would be the herb bed. Then instead of
having them on the side of the steps in little pots. What I would really like is a bed full of herbs. I would love to have a lot of basil so that I can make my own pesto and freeze it to have available in the winter when the basil is all dead. The other herbs I have here are dill and flat parsley. I also have a plant of Thyme but that is in a pot next to the garden. I ran out of room in the garden for now, so I will have to eventually get a bigger pot. Like I said I may put a new bed in down the line somewhere. I am hoping for a bountiful harvest, but we shall see when everything comes! Look for more pictures as I post them!

2 weeks or so?

Here is the garden, well the picture was taken on May 7, 2010. As you can see some plants are up. These plants are the seedlings but THEY DIDN'T DIE! I think that is the important part, to me anyways. My father put some seedlings in so I am trying to do a little bit of both. Some seeds, some seedlings. I have been writing in a little journal about the weather lately which has been off and on raining. April was really a pretty nice month but not much rain. The thing about these raised beds are apparently they warm up faster in such a small space. Also the drainage is pretty good. I planted the seeds for the beets and carrots and they came up pretty quickly. The beets came up within a few days, and the carrots took about 10 days. I cleaned up the carrots so hopefully we will get a bountiful harvest. The other good thing about the small raised bed is that I can plant seeds once I harvest. The broccoli is growing quickly so I can then replace it with other plants. I have herbs not planted in the bed, but I have them on the steps, I am excited for some delicious fresh herbs and not spend a bunch of money on them. Will post more pictures as the garden progresses!