Dear friends far and wide,

Greetings from Atlanta! I hate to start my first update off on such a low note, but things are looking grim here, weather-wise! We got a bunch of snow and ice Sunday night, but since GA doesn’t have the implements to deal with it, most of us have been home-bound since! Aid trucks as far away as Wisconsin and Illinois have come to help, but as of this morning, the ice on the interstate was so thick that the salt wasn’t making much of impact, and trucks were slipping and sliding. Our businesses, colleges and universities, and of course governmental offices and schools have been shut down since yesterday, and will continue to be closed through tomorrow, if not the weekend! The Governor issued a “state of emergency” Sunday night.

I’m writing with two aims – first, to let you know that Nate & I are doing just fine, and second, to see if you might be able to help out. Our warm apartment is just the right size, in a great location close to public transit and with good windows for the cats to enjoy their new view. Especially as we prepare to tuck into a hearty, warm dinner of vegan macaroni & cheeze, butterbeans, and biscuits (see below), I’m considering how this weather situation impacts some of the most vulnerable in our society, the homeless. No matter what your faith or philosophical background, we can all rally around a desire to help those suffering in freak storms. We’ve given to disaster relief far and near – and while this isn’t quite on scale with earthquakes or tsunamis – might you consider helping Atlanta’s poor?

I have in mind the Metro Atlanta Task Force for the Homeless. My college friend Sarah called them this morning only to learn that while there are tons of people in need–the shelter serves 1,000/day normally, way more in crisis–there’s currently “nobody & nothin’”. Anita, the Executive Director, said that the church groups who usually bring prepared foods (the shelter does not have a kitchen) have not been able to reach the shelter because of the ice. The men who have money walked to Public and bought white bread and bologna to share with the people there. While the shelter had some food on reserve for this kind of emergency, NO shelter is equipped with all of the materials and resources they need on a daily basis, much less in a state of emergency. This much is clear: the LARGEST shelter in the Southeast is currently very low on basic supplies.

Priority items for the shelter right now are food, toilet paper, and bottled water. Sarah is doing on-the-ground work now to gather these supplies from Atlanta-area sources and deliver them as soon as possible. While it’s not feasible for you to donate those items directly, you can donate money. At the website you’ll find a Paypal link to easily give: http://www.homelesstaskforce.org/donation&ourneeds.html

Your city has plenty of its own issues and good causes, I know, so I don’t want to ask for much. Even $5 would go a long way in helping the shelter. (Go here for a clever break-down of what $5 can mean: http://www.homelesstaskforce.org/fivedollars.htm) And of course, (if you do this), pray, pray, pray!

I’ll send another, cheerier update soon – for now, know that you are loved and appreciated!

In peace, and with great gratitude,

Adrienne

The first big meal in my new kitchen!

All vegan, all yumyum – mac & cheeze, biscuits, and a mixture of slow-cooked fordhook and speckled butterbeans.

January

• Started my final semester of graduate school and thesis-writing!
• Considering how I might embody the counter-cultural, anti-materialistic message of Jesus in one of the most insanely commercial times of the year, I hosted a free sale at my house… and provided suggestions for yours!
• More community-building: hosted the Super Happy Dev Night with Nate!
• Moderated a discussion of Jewish, Muslim, and Christian leaders on the topic “Sacred Sexuality: What do religious texts really say about sex & sexuality?” as part of the Religious Emphasis Week at Earlham College
• Did a lot of organizing, awareness- and fund-raising for Haiti relief, with an emphasis on groups that would be around for community-building after the dust settled (Life & Hope Haiti particularly)

February

• Hosted a free sale at Amigos, advocating giving directly for building community
• Fell in love with RuPaul’s Drag Race – hosted weekly viewing parties
• Began the Lenten journey with Global Women’s Project’s Calendar and Amy Ritchie’s “Thirsting for God”
• Celebrated one year with cat Unix
• Attended IFYC’s Stranger to Neighbor training at Earlham College
• Was inspired by Jocelyn Bell Burnell’s talk on astrophysics and poetry

March

• My birthday! Had a great dinner with Anna Lisa & Seth on the 10^th and a Wonka-themed party the weekend after
• Was super proud of my little brother for organizing protests around GA budget cuts targetting education
• Happy memory: One day, while working at the church, I noticed three young boys (mid-elementary) circling the Peace Pole outside of the entryway. I went out, explained the meaning, and pointed out how people of every language wish for peace. The best part was when I quizzed them on the languages (after explaining what they are & where they’re spoken, of course!) and one boy referred to Arabic as “Iraqic!” We straightened it out and he seemed very happy with his new knowledge of that gorgeous lettering. When the elderly crossing guard came over, she said “I’d always wondered about that thing! Tell me about it, too!” And, of course, I did. She patted the boy on the back and said “We learned something, didn’t we?!”
• Supported my mom as she started her new gig as accompanist at Aragon United Methodist Church!
• Attended my first Passover Seder at Earlham College, hosted by friend & Rabbinic intern Aaron! I didn’t find the afikomen but I did throw open the door for Elijah!

April

• I hosted two interfaith dinners to test instructions offered in my Master’s thesis. Building upon an understanding that interfaith dialogue is about relationship-building, I provided theoretical and practical reasons, as well as clear directions, for bringing young adults of differing faiths together around food. The dinners – on April 13 and 23 – offered an opportunity to test my guidelines! They were extraordinarily well-received by the Earlham community: the second event, a middle-eastern themed picnic, had over 75 attendees!
• Presented my thesis to the seminary community at Earlham School of Religion’s Common Meal
• Took a break from thesis-writing to go see xiu xiu at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Detroit
• Made seitan (that vegan staple) for the first time with Seth
• Defended my thesis on the 26^th – small crowd, but it was a great success!

May

• Submitted my thesis for approval! By the numbers: 150 pages; 43,495 words; 36,414 words in the body text; 20 words in the title; 2 inches – thickness in 100% cotton paper; 265 footnotes; 70 entries in the works cited section; 67 respondents to interfaith dinner questionnaire, results displayed in the appendix…
• Graduated from Earlham School of Religion on an unseasonably cold day!
• Happily moved from NW I Street to the sunny, if dilapidated, College Ave apartment
• Dumpstered at Earlham post-graduation and student move-out: recovered two car-loads worth of stuff for Goodwill and local charity. Discovered that students put actual trash, recyclables, and perfectly good items in the same trash bags. Opened dozens, sorting out the recyclables, removing what could be donated, and re-tying the actual trash. Full bottles of cleaning products, shampoos and conditioner, unused notebooks, a $22 SIGG water bottle, skullcandy headphones, multiple rugs, lamps, a pair of unopened contacts, several comforters, shelf-stable canned goods, unworn pairs of $100+ shoes … just a few of the treasures found.
• Helped worship-lead an incredible service at Richmond Church of the Brethren with Bob Hunter and Matt McKimmy – “Celebrating the Music of the African-American church” – ALL God’s children got shoes!
• Said goodbye to lots of friends as they left for new adventures – Seth & Jenny in Chicago, Jenna & Peter in Scotland, Benji, back to California, and all the other grads…

June

• Travelled to California for the first time – 2010 vacation!
• Ran into my interfaith hero Eboo Patel at Stanford!
• Served as a panelist at Richmond Church of the Brethren’s Faith and Food Panel Discussion

July

• Sustained my first accident as a bike commuter – a transfer truck ran me off the side of the road while on my way to work at the church! If I recall correctly, July was a month of bad/weird Thursday mornings…
• Went to see Jujubee in Columbus, Ohio with Nate and Michael!
• Visited Jina in Ann Arbor; went to see Lightning Bolt with Wolf Eyes at the MOCAD
• Served as a delegate to the South/Central Indiana District yearly meeting of the Church of the Brethren

August

• Moved into the most beautiful house in Richmond, 447 College (no offence, other Richmond houses :))
• Hosted a Perseid meteor shower party
• Briefly got really into making Perler crafts – hope to pick this up again soon!
• Focused on raising awareness and money for Pakistan flooding (at final count, a little over $200 one Sunday with a home-made bulletin board and short presentation before worship at RCoB) – the larger Church of the Brethren did well, too!
• Cooked a lot of yummy vegan food for Nate’s sister & brother-in-law, when they visited from New York
• Started volunteering at Earlham’s Office of Religious Life – first task, building Lady Gaga eyewear for the Director of Religious Life (a skit!)

September

• Successfully trained to drive a 12-passenger van at Earlham College!
• Inspired by my friend Tim Brauhn and his blog practicalraw.com, I bought a fancy-schmancy blender and an Ani Phyo cookbook and started doing more raw foods! (A little late in the season for Indiana, I know…)
• Participated in a moving interfaith vigil (in response to the Qu’ran burning controversy) – “Holding Our Holy Texts in the Light”
• Presented at Peace Forum, “From the Full Plate to the Wide World”
• Went to hear my dear friend Aaron give the Rosh Hashanah sermon at Temple Israel – Dayton !
• Attended Rosh Hashanah, Kol Nidre, and Yom Kippur services for the first time; drove Earlham students to these services
• Attended Eid services for the first time at the Islamic Society of North America in Plainfield, Indiana – drove students to this service, too!
• Helped build a sukkah for sukkot, the happy Jewish harvest festival!
• Volunteered and attended services for the International Day of Prayer for Peace in Richmond
• Because I went to a school that officially issued credit/no credit instead of letter grades, I had to petition my professors to convert their narrative evaluations of my work into letter grades. This takes some time. I was thrilled to finally learn that I made a 3.92 GPA in graduate school overall, and a 4.00 in my concentration! The A’s in Greek surprised me more than anything else…
• My cat Unix escaped and returned hours later covered in poison ivy, which she bestowed upon me – thus commencing my second-worst poison ivy attack

October

• Went to hear xiu xiu and deerhoof in Bloomington
• Went to hear xiu xiu and deerhoof in Columbus
• Helped friends Aaron and Mel move to Ithaca! :-(
• Started the second season of “Spiritual Snapshots”, a story-telling class I started with the help of Matt McKimmy at Richmond Church of the Brethren! Inspired by an Sunday class gathering at Atlanta Friends Meeting, I proposed we gather as a community before worship to hear stories – “snapshots” – from our journeys of faith. From October – Dec 2009 AND 2010, it provided a way to get to know folks in the congregation better and make new friends.
• Gave a great big Mario-themed birthday blow-out for my sweetie Nate
• Travelled to Chicago for Nate’s MongoDB conference, hung out with Jenny and got thrift plague
• Attended the American Academy of Religion annual conference in Atlanta
• Visited the BAPS Shri Swaminarayan mandir outside of Atlanta!
• Supported Nate as he started the application process with Amazon (which would culminate with an offer in early December)
• Helped spread awareness of the pernicious “vampire power” – when plugged in electronics continue to leach power, even when not in use – with a silly presentation at Richmond Church of the Brethren

November

• Celebrated two years with my darling Nate
• Celebrated a year with baby cat Perl
• Made enough home-made barbeque sauce to feed well over 100 people for Peace Forum’s Thanksgiving meal!
• Went to hear dear friend Aaron’s senior sermon at Hebrew Union in Cincinnati!
• Did all of the cooking for and helped host (with Charlotte-Anne M.) my third interfaith dinner, a benefit for Genesis of the YWCA and the kick-off to Earlham’s IFYC Better Together campaign. We fed over seventy people and raised $401 (not including material donations of food and household items) for Richmond’s only domestic violence outreach resource! Official video here.
• Flew back to Georgia for my brother’s beautiful wedding to Sarah
• Enjoyed a ridiculously delicious vegan Thanksgiving meal with Donnie and other Earlham vegan friends at Teetor House
• Travelled to Chicago to see Jenny and celebrate vegan ThanksLIVING at Chicago Diner

December

• Celebrated Hanukkah with my first kugel, latkes, applesauce, and home-made vegan dill sour crème!
• Trained my replacement at the church
• Enjoyed a great going-away at Richmond Church of the Brethren – so many sweet messages!
• Stayed with Elizabeth and Dustin Hartman and all their animals (cats and raccoons) while we searched for a new home in Atlanta. Super-awesome Elizabeth runs Tails from the Hart, a wildlife rescue outside of Atlanta.
• Squeezed in a trip to New York for Christmas between packing up in Richmond and moving to Atlanta with the gracious help of Nate’s parents!
• Applied for the Faiths Act Fellowship, an extraordinary opportunity funded by Interfaith Youth Core and the Tony Blair Faith Foundation that brings young adult bridge-builders together from all over the world to work on furthering the UN’s Millennium Development Goals (MDG).

Year-long

• Served as a study buddy mentor in Richmond Community Schools
• Involvement with Earlham Animal Advocates United, from hosting and cooking lots of dinners, co-op meals, Nathan Runkle presentation, helping prepare the debaters, promoting VegPledge, and much more!
• Served as Office Manager at Richmond Church of the Brethren, which included making weekly bulletins, monthly newsletters, the yearly directory, as well as serving as a central point of contact in the church and between the church and Richmond-area aid/outreach organizations.
• Continued to be involved in the campaign to save Richmond’s Human Rights Commission and, once it was cruelly defunded by the Common Council, supported the burgeoning Equality Richmond Group

What a wonderful year! Here’s to 2011!

Do you want to learn how to make light, fluffy, flaky, yummy buttermilk biscuits? Does this look like a little piece of paradise to you?

Well then, you have come to the right place. At long last, my biscuit tutorial is ready!

Biscuits are special to me because I grew up on ‘em. My mom has a Ph.D. in dough; every free morning she’d make a big pan of her famous “cat-head” biscuits. Don’t squeal! “Cat-head” refers to the size–they are humongous! Mine aren’t quite as big, but I think you’re going to like them all the same.

But what’s that? You’re nervous? You’ve heard… biscuit-making is hard?

I’m not going to tell you there’s not an art to it. I see it in my mom’s work. She can be half-awake, barely registering her first sips of Maxwell House, and still turn out an amazing pan. It’s in her blood. I have to be honest, years of watching her work made me doubt my ability. Nevertheless, I overcame my fear and you can too: this post will help you become a biscuit artist!

First! Ingredients:

It’s good to get into the practice of reading the entire recipe completely through before starting. Doing so means no surprises partway through. A+ for mise en place: measuring all the ingredients out beforehand.

Good Ol’ Vegan Biscuits: beginner’s delight*

2 cups all-purpose flour (unbleached, organic if possible)

4 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

6 tablespoons vegan shortening** (make sure it’s all vegetable, no lard! I like Spectrum organic.)

2 tablespoons vegan margarine (We love Earth Balance!)**

2/3 cup unsweetened soymilk

1 to 1.5 tablespoons apple cider vinegar (experiment with more if you like a sour, buttermilky flavor)

Pre-heat the oven to 450. Grease a sheet pan with shortening.

• *A slightly more advanced biscuit recipe may be addressed in a future post. For now, this is perfect.
• **EIGHT tablespoons of fat, you gasp? Well do you want fluffy biscuits or not? If you’re that worried about it, don’t eat ten at a time.

Step one: sift all your dry ingredients (2 cups of flour, 4 teaspoons baking powder, 1 teaspoon of salt) into a big bowl:

Step two: Cut the cold Earth Balance into small pieces and put into the flour. Same goes for the shortening, though it’ll be too soft to cut. Just toss it in the bowl.

Step three: Work the Earth Balance and shortening between your fingers and palms til it looks about like this:

Step four: Make your “buttermilk!” If you’ve never made vegan buttermilk before, this is a great trick to have up your sleeve. Simply add a small amount of apple cider vinegar (in this case, at least a tablespoon) to unsweetened soymilk, stir gently with a fork, and let it sit for a minute. Voilà! Vegan buttermilk.

Step five: Make a little well in the flour and pour your wet into the dry.

Step six: MIX! Depending on the humidity, your dough may be a little on the wet or dry side. Either way, don’t freak out! If it’s a little wet, just make sure your hands are well-floured. If it’s a little dry, it’s probably fine. This is a picture of some rather wet biscuit dough:

Step seven: Cut your biscuits. Now, my mom is such a pro that she shapes them perfectly in her hands. I prefer to use a small glass to make cut-outs. Take a look at the picture below. Dust your (extremely clean) countertop with some flour. Gently knead the dough into a ball and then roll it out about a half an inch thick. You can use a rolling pin or, if you don’t have one or like me, can’t find it, just use the side of a smooth glass.

Unfortunately, I was once accused of serving (HORROR OF HORRORS) canned biscuits because mine were so perfectly shaped. Good thing I forgot who made this blasphemous accusation.

Step eight: Lay the biscuits on your greased pan. It is important that the biscuits touch one another! I can’t tell you why because I took my mom’s word on faith. You should take mine similarly. Do not space your biscuits. Do not be afraid of them crowding. Permit them to nuzzle:

Step nine: Bake for 10-12 minutes or until the bottoms are lightly browned:

Lovely. Biscuits are so versatile! You can munch them plain or with some kind of jam; put them on top of a vegan pot pie:

Or, as we’ve seen, use them to make a true breakfast treat with tempeh bacon:

See? Biscuit-making is easy.

Let’s contrast it with building a sukkah. The highlight of my day was meeting up with folks at Earlham’s Jewish Cultural Center to construct the symbolic wilderness shelter of Sukkot, a joyous holiday which starts tomorrow and goes through next Wednesday. Sukkot has been described as a happy harvest festival, a time of leaving the comforts of home to join others in eating, living, and praying in the sukkah.

My friend Aaron Miller puts it thusly: Sukkahs are temporary structures with three walls (one wall has to be open to receive guests) and a roof left uncovered enough to see the stars at night. Sukkot is a fascinating holiday, so let’s turn to Rabbi Michael Strassfeld to find out more:

“The vision of universal brotherhood (ahem–and sisterhood) is reflected in the sukkah, whose door and roof are open to all. The sukkah, in turn, evokes a vision of God’s sukkah as a house of prayer for all nations. In that future, God will spread a sukkat shalom – a shelter covering made of peace and harmony.

And yet the sukkah, while evoking the image of God sheltering us in the future, raises another, opposing image: The sukkah as a temporary structure, open to the winds of autumn, cannot help but remind us of the Jewish people’s experience of the last 2000 years of exile and wandering. Are we not the prototypical alien – the wandering Jew? Are not the forty years in the desert- the period Sukkot commemorates – the archetype of our 2000 years of wandering?

The sukkah, then, evokes opposing sets of images: rootless and home, wandering and return, exposure and shelter. From exile to eternity and back again – this, too, is contained in the four walls of the sukkah.”

Awesome, eh? And I was lucky enough to get to help build one!

Collecting branches back campus.

After sawing, drilling, and doing a bit of affixing, we set the frame upright.

Sizing it up.

Reinforcing the frame.

Gazing upon it a bit more.

Laying boards across the top to support the branches; securing them with twine.

Throwing branches over the top.

The view from below. Will definitely be able to see stars.

Sorting out the sheets.

All done! Good work, friends.

Now go make some biscuits.

Shana Tova! Rosh Hashanah tashlikh – we tossed stale challah (symbolizing our sins) into the water outside Temple Israel Dayton. regretful of my wrongdoing in the past year, I scattered a big handful.

the geese were thrilled to eat our “sins”

searching for more trouble.

the view from the water

on the way back, we strolled past the community garden

Eid Mubarak! up bright & (too?) early for Eid prayers at the Islamic Society of North America in Plainfield, Indiana

such a blessing to spend my day with these wonderful friends.

quiet van en route home.

dozens of dark chocolate cookies with black raspberry centers for vegan pizza party & Eid celebration

ALL of this food is CRUELTY-FREE! thanks VEGFUND for helping us at Earlham Animal Advocates United throw an amazing pizza party for our community!

…and, of course, to master vegan chef Donnie for pulling it all off. (He’s real busy right now working on a fellowship app, but he may eventually surface & update his blog at blackveganism.wordpress.com) Look at that brilliant multi-tasking!

Donnie makes pizza like nobody’s biz. Thanks DAIYA for donating TWENTY POUNDS of your amazing cheeze! Folks went bonkers.

Eid Mubarak! Party at Russell house!

And an impromptu night ride with Jabani.

couldn’t ask for better.

Well, check out what David’s have become in just three days:

I’ve long thought that any honest pepper would change its spots with time: all colored bell peppers start out green, maturing to red, yellow, purple, even brown! But a quick check reminded me that there are some green bell varieties that will not turn. I wonder if the uniform specimens found in most grocery stores–genetically modified for perfection–have had the ability to become brilliant bred right out. Too bad: we lose not only aesthetic value, but nutrients as well: colored peppers can have double the vitamin C.

Colored peppers are more expensive because they require more care–they spend more time on the vine, after all! So if you want this at home, get a green pepper within hours of its being picked–say, from a farmer’s market. (If you get an old pepper that’s lived in a climate-controlled environment since the harvest, it’ll likely go soft [rot] from sitting out, thus undermining your whole experiment.) And if you happen to be growing your own, just let the “green” bell pepper sit on the vine and see what happens.

The peppers should be ready for use by tomorrow night, when I hope to pair them with tempeh. I’ve got a few blocks I need to use up before the fast-approaching expiration date; tonight I incorporated it into a simple rotini primavera:

Yesterday I made bhindi masala with the brilliant mango powder (amchoor) that arrived from the spice house. (Apparently they didn’t lose my order after all!) Amchoor powder is basically my favorite ingredient. And since four ounces is less than four dollars, you should get some and make your own. Here’s the recipe I’ve refined over many skillets-worth:

• prep, FROZEN: Steam 1lb whole frozen okra til it’s cooked through; rinse with cool water. Cut the stem-ends off; slice lengthwise in two.
• prep, FRESH: Steam 1lb okra til al dente; rinse; cut the stem-ends; slice lengthwise in two.
• Chop two or three small-to-medium tomatoes.
• Chop a white or vidalia onion or two, depending on how much you love onions
• Toss onion into a preheated, oiled, large cast iron skillet. I usually use 2 tbsp of olive or canola oil.
• Cook onions over medium to med-high heat til soft, a little brown, so long as they’re cooked; it’s really up to you.
• Add in a teaspoon of salt, two teaspoons of mango powder, 1/4-1/2 tsp cayenne, and 1/2-3/4tsp tumeric. Stir fry a minute or two.
• Add in the tomatoes, mix thoroughly with the spices.
• Add in the okra. If using fresh okra, mix thoroughly, put a lid on it, and let it steam of a while (now on medium heat). If using frozen, it’ll probably already be mostly cooked from the steaming, so you just need to mix thoroughly and let it simmer for a few minutes so that the flavors can mix.
• Serves two hungry folks; four or more if it’s being offered alongside other things.

Here’s what it should look like when you’re just adding the okra:

And here’s about what it looks like when it’s done: (using ripe green tomatoes; red will result in a different hue).

Lovely zebras.

This dish is my favorite thing to make for dinner because it’s naturally high in calcium (20% DV per serving) and low in calories. A pound of okra only has about 130 calories in it TOTAL, and a few fresh tomatoes, onions, and spices in the recipe don’t add many more. Just go easy on the oil and all that refined basmati rice you’re eating with it.

Finally, don’t forget to give to Pakistanis suffering the greatest natural disaster of our time.

You can text “SWAT” to 50555 from your phone to give $10 and help flood victims. Doctors Without Borders physicians are “working around the clock” to meet the needs of the displaced, focussing on providing clean water, treating diarrhea, and providing women’s health services–as amid the tragedy, babies continue to be born. Church World Servicecontinues to provide food and disaster supplies.

Though I was disheartened at the general lack of awareness of the tragedy, I was overwhelmed with support, love, prayers, and encouragement. We collected $197 towards Church World Service (a cooperative ministry of 35 Protestant, Orthodox, and Anglican denominations, providing sustainable self-help, development, disaster relief, and refugee assistance around the world). RCoB is definitely a place where, if you have a passion, people will support you. That’s how the charitable knitting group Loops of Love got such a strong following, and how the (computer) hardware co-op got started, too. I feel blessed to be a part of such a caring, service-oriented community.

I have a tendency to belittle myself & my accomplishments. I’m simultaneously great at lifting up others even as I tear myself down: for example, just today I took someone’s attempt at giving a meaningful compliment & turned it, in two sentences, into a paean to their awesomeness. So it was good to acknowledge that, had I not put this thing together, it would have been just my little $35 going towards the food package of rice, wheat flour, beans, sugar, cooking oil, tea and salt (basics for a family for a month). But because I had the courage to invite others in, $162 (and perhaps more) was also given. I hope I have the guts to do this sort of thing again in the future.

If you’re interested in giving to help repair lives caught in perhaps the single greatest natural disaster of our time (yes, more people affected than the South-East Asian tsunami & earthquakes in Kashmir & Haiti combined), I recommend Church World Service (obvies) or Doctors Without Borders. Either of those links go directly to the gift pages.

I made some fried green tomatoes to go with a lunch of left-overs:

Nope, not much to look at.

Some vegan mac-n-cheese, topped with Daiya:

In the afternoon Nate & I played Lord of the Rings Risk on the front lawn and drank my favorite Rogue, hazelnut brown nectar. Several friends passed by; it was nice to experience the ambient people noise, as there are generally very few opportunities for that sort of thing in Richmond.

For dinner I made another bhindi with perfect little green zebras.

A little while ago we went to see Nagini, our friend Patrick’s little lady lizard. Her name is actually Kudu and she’s a blue-tongued skink.

Under Nate’s skateboard at the old apartment:

I’m still too afraid to pick her up, but I ADORE her. I bring her watermelon (a seeming favorite) at every opportunity. Patrick’s aware of my ardor; he dropped off a key with a note saying he’d be out of town for a few days and that she wouldn’t really need to be checked on, but I might appreciate the key anyway.

Risk is kind of a long game so we had to finish up just before bed. I am the Risk master; Nate didn’t stand a chance. I did so well I had to start using the other “good” color pieces. Check out this army invading northward from Osgiliath:

Enough for now!

Pathetically, I haven’t yet come to terms with this fact. Now it’s not like I’m wandering in some delusional haze towards a non-existent Richmond Caltrain station, but I am still majorly wistful. It was just such a serene, paradisiacal place, where all my nasty stereotypes about California livin’ (erm, i.e.) were swept away as I was loved & well-fed in the company of friends & kind-hearted strangers alike. When I wept secretly on the connecting flight back from San Jose to Phoenix, it wasn’t, for the first time, because I was afraid the plane would fall out of the sky–it was because I was overcome with sorrow at leaving.

But ssshhh, let’s keep that our secret. As the sweetly-sleeping cats nearby remind me, it’s okay to dream of the next visit–but taking time to document the trip now means I’ll have a great resource for the future. Photoblogging the first day, shall we?

Landing in San Jose after a nearly four hour flight from Minneapolis.

Thinking the faraway green bits were maybe cacti, and overly worried I wouldn’t see any more of it, I snapped this shot.

Vegan tofu & corn soup at Garden Fresh‘s Palo Alto location, with the delightfully muggy consistency of egg drop soup.

Our dear, beloved friend Ben–who made our trip (and this first meal) possible! We are forever indebted.

The lady at Garden Fresh loves Ben, and it’s clear the feeling is mutual–she jotted down his standard starter, scallion pancake, before he’d even mentioned it! New to my scallion pancake experience was the thick, savoury black sauce that wedded the crispy sections of fried dough. Not to be missed.

Another one of Ben’s favorites, number 35: Orange Veggie Beef: Pressed shiitake mushroom beef, sautéed with Chef’s special orange sauce, served with broccoli

The hostess smiled approvingly upon Ben’s choice, but when Nate & I attempted to order, she clucked her tongue and ordered for us. If you are honored by the same treatment when you visit, roll with it–she knows what she’s doing. Here’s number 29, the Veggie Duck: Pressed shiitake mushrooms, tofu skin, onions and assorted vegetables with Chef’s special light sauce.

Her choice for me, 37: Basil tempura, arrived in a foil packet accompanied by a carved vegetable rose.

Tempura-style soy protein, red peppers, chili peppers and basil in Chef’s special sauce. Crispy on the outside, chewy on the inside, in a coat of many flavors (dominant: spicy). Fulfilled my need for FRIED!

After lunch we drove to the heart of Stanford’s campus and bumbled around. We discovered part of a bike wedged in a tree.

I took a lot of pictures of trees. Here, detail on some interesting, never-before-seen conifer.

Ben & Nate made like monkeys.

We ambled into Stanford’s free Cantor Arts Center, where I fell in love with Wu Changshuo’s Drunken Zhong Kui (above). Part of the “Tracing the Past, Drawing the Future: Master Ink Painters in 20th-Century China” exhibit running now through July 4, his accompanying placard read as follows:

Wu Changshuo, 1844-1927; Drunken Zhong Kui (1921), Ink and color on paper; Zhejiang Provincial Museum

In Chinese folklore, Zhong Kui is a mortal turned deity who expels ghosts and devils. An impoverished student from Mount Zhongnan in the early Tang Dynasty (618-907), Zhong Kui was honest and talented, but his repulisve facial features provoked the judges to invalidate his outstanding scores in the civil service examinations. Crazed with anger, Zhong Kui committed suicide by smashing his head into a pillar. The emperor appointed him Exorcist God posthumously and buried him according to the rituals reserved for the first-placed winner of the highest imperial examination (zhuangyan).

Wu Changshuo’s fondenss for Zhong Kui is expressed in his inscriptions on portraits of Zhong Kui by artists friends, as well as in his own paintings of the subject. We might have felt an affinity with Zhong Kui’s anger and disappointment, but he also likely identified with the folk deity as a figure who sought to save the world.

I also enjoyed this one, of vultures.

The outrageous foyer of the museum.

A presiding Buddha with hundreds of miniatures, tucked into a nook beside the lobby.

Tree appreciation outside Cantor.

Further tree appreciation. Palm trees! They are as impossible-looking in person as they are in print!

What a way to end our visit: walking across Stanford’s ostentatious heart to the car, I spied a familiar figure. Is that… is that…Eboo Patel? Is that Eboo Patel? Oh my goodness, that’s Eboo Patel! Having overheard my hyperventilating, he stopped & introduced himself with a flummoxed “Do we know each other?” We’d only spoken twice before, the first time in the fall of 2008 at Candler School of Theology’s fall conference on leadership, and again at Interfaith Youth Core’s 2009 Annual Conference in Evanston, so I didn’t expect him to remember me. (I also looked extremely busted from the fifteen hours of travel, which is why I’ve cropped myself from the photo–I’d like to think he didn’t recognize me.)

But who am I kidding. Eboo Patel, hero to thousands of interfaith youth activists, sees tons of bright young adult faces every day. He is my hero, and I unabashedly told him so–joking that a happenstance meeting, for me, is like the average person’s running into a major celebrity. (He cutely demurred to Nate & Ben, calling himself a “three”/ten.) But as founder & executive director of Chicago-based Interfaith Youth Core, he directly inspired my graduate work at Earlham, especially my 44,000-word magnum opus/Master’s thesis, ”From the full plate to the wide world: engaging young adult development through interfaith hospitality.” Indeed, an entire chapter is devoted to IFYC’s methodology. Since you’re probably not going to be checking out my thesis anytime soon, you must pick up his interfaith autobiography Acts of Faith: The Story of an American Muslim, the Struggle for the Soul of a Generation–it’s splendid.

He was at Stanford a day early to check some things out–he’d be giving the University’s baccalaureate address the next day. Noting Nate’s google shirt, he mentioned he’d just given a talk there that morning. Fawning all around.

Only in California!

I’m so grateful that the women of book club are remarkably, consistently accommodating & hospitable to vegans. The meal was, in fact, entirely vegan–from Hopi’s perfectly-cooked & seasoned green beans, to Karen’s savory chapatis and mind-blowing hummus (the secret is soy sauce!), Ellen’s salatat and Becky’s beautiful local salad with pecans, it was a joy to eat and share together.

For my part, I needed to use up some frozen local blueberries and half a bag of organic mixed berries from Kroger, so I threw together an old standby and friend, the so-called lazy woman’s cobbler. If you’re from the Southern US, or have ever seen Steel Magnolias, you may recognize it as “a cup-a cup-a cup/cuppa-cuppa-cup” recipe, so named because, apart from the fruit, it consists mostly of a cup of sugar, a cup of (soy)milk, and a cup of flour. It’s the easiest thing! As Truvy says:

(put on your Dolly Parton voice:)  “Oh hell, Clairee, you don’t need a recipe.  It’s just a cup of flour, a cup of sugar and a cup of fruit cocktail WITH the syrup, stir and bake in a hot oven ‘til golden brown and bubbly.  I serve it with ice cream to cut the sweetness.”

Feel free to try Truvy’s cuppa recipe, but I’ve preferred my own since I was a kid. (It’s actually the second recipe I learned by heart, after cornbread.) I’m pretty sure my mom passed it on to me after my little brother & I brought home some record-setting buckets of fruit from our field’s tangles of wild blackberry bushes. Here’s how I made it the other night:

cuppa-cuppa-cup or, lazy woman’s cobbler

Mix 1 cup of vegan white sugar with 1 cup of milk of choice (soy/rice/etc; I used the new So Delicious vanilla coconut milk); sift into this 1 cup of flour with 1 tbsp baking powder. Add some dashes of good-quality cinnamon and other warm spices–allspice & clove were on hand. Squeeze in some fresh lemon, or add a few tablespoons of lemon juice. Finally, gently fold in as many fresh or frozen black/blue/rasp/berries as you like. Gently now! Your batter may turn a bit pink-or-purplish depending on your berry, but that can hardly be avoided. Pour it all into a large greased glass pan and then dot with bits of Earth Balance (vegan margarine). Bake for 45min at 350!

A previous iteration of this (blackberry) cobbler, prepared from friends Jenna & Peter on the eve of their going-away:

The best part was getting to strap the casserole dish to my bike (with bathrobe belts):

Check out those sexy cleaned up handlebars, courtesy Mr. CC at Ike’s Bikes!

So much has happened since last we met here. I graduated with a Master of Arts in religion. I finished my 150-page, 43,000-word master’s thesis entitled “From the full plate to the wide world: engaging young adult development through interfaith hospitality.” It was excellent. I moved to a great new place, a little dilapidated, but full of sunlight and engulfed in verdancy (=much happier cats). I travelled to California (San Jose/Palo Alto/San Francisco) just last week and stayed with some amazing vegans who took me to all the best places. Other things happened too.

I also cooked a lot, though I’m trying to do more with less recently as I save up for whatever’s next. Richmond friends, don’t worry–no big ideas or plans yet, just dreams. Last night I made tempeh and sweet peas with broccoli in an authentic sweet Chinese bean sauce. It was, as Mr. Fox would say, superb. Look for pictures later. And of California…oh, oh, so many of those.

Be well!

Our shared Passover table. I sat next to longtime friend Benji and new friend Maurice; my partner Nate and seminary friends Dave and Lynne joined us.

You might notice the cut-out bone, rather than a real one, gracing our table. Real bones (representing that of the sacrifice the night before the Exodus) would have been messy and disturbing to our vegetarian friends! (This was an interfaith event.)

Breaking our matzoh, prior to the re-telling of the Passover story and the four questions!

Quinoa, a lovely vegan, Passover-approved main course!