Mark sent me his photos from the St. Patrick's Day festivities along with one from L's performance. I have a lot on my mind, but it's been a rough day, and I don't have the energy to "chat". L carved the little soap dog during their soap carving. She initially had little soap legs, too, but they were too thin and broke; thus the toothpick replacement. 
I'm going to share some of the fantastic recipes I've tried lately that are available on the Internet. Many of the recipes have come from my vegan cookbooks, and I'm not going to share propietary intellectual material (at least from the vegan community), but these I can share.
This cashew gravy is, hands-down, my family's favorite gravy now. L eats it and rarely eats any other type of gravy--she doesn't generally like gravies/sauces. I liked the spice level a lot, but if you're spice sensitive, you may want to halve the amount of cayenne pepper. Top Secret Cashew Gravy
Dej and I both made both of these recipes. They were both delicious, healthy, and hits with our family members. Chickpea Ratatouille and Brazilian Rice and Beans
A few healthy bedtime snack recipes can be found at Brendan Brazier's site here: Healthy Bedtime Snacks. I frequently make the tart cherry balls and oat bites, which perfectly satisfy my sweet tooth. I also make the basic kale chips, which are easy, good, and satisfy my salty/crunchy cravings. **Don't forget to pit the dates. I forgot to pit them for a batch, and it was very unpleasant to bite into a rock-hard date pit!
I've enjoyed experimenting with the seasonings/flavorings of the kale chips. L & I both love them, so we go through lots. I made this recipe: Spicy Tahini Kale Chips, and I really liked them, but L wasn't crazy about the tahini flavor. I did some experimenting and came up with a variation that we both loved and are now completely addicted to. I use the following ingredients (mix together, then add to kale and mix well to coat kale evenly--I mix with my hands.):
(The 12-year old boy who lives inside me is giggling about the double meaning of the title. And just in case you don't have an immature child living inside you, I had to point that out so you don't miss it.)
My journey to eliminate/reduce plastic has sent me down many related rabbit holes, and I'm really enjoying the process as well as the ensuing lifestyle changes.
My initial effort to identify the big plastic offenders and eliminate the products that I could and find substitutes for those that couldn't be eliminated. Food-related items are a big source of plastic (even metal cans are plastic lined, as are the paper packets that contain food and spices), and so I've focused a lot of my time and effort there.
Though I have dried beans/legumes/lentils, etc. stored in glass jars, I use them typically on weekends when I have the extra time to pressure cook them. I have lazily relied on canned products for weekday cooking, as an extra hour to pressure cook the chickpeas, followed by another hour to make the meal, is just not a feasible option on work nights. I also use a lot of canned tomato products--just convenience and laziness again. Other offenders included spice packets (taco seasoning, etc.). Not only were these bad habits I had acquired generating unnecessary plastic waste but non-plastic waste as well as the resources used to make these containers.
This was a whole genre of waste I could eliminate with establishing better habits. It is simple to pressure cook a large batch of chickpeas, black beans, etc., portion into 15.5 ounce servings (about two cups--the size of a can) and freeze them. I now have several "cans" of chickpeas, black beans, adzuki beans, and kidney beans in the freezer for weekday meals. I keep them replenished by cooking up a batch every couple of weeks. I let these cook while doing other household chores on the weekends, and the only time expenditure is about a total of ten minutes (filling the pressure cooker, then scooping the finished food into containers). I'm using plastic containers right now, as I have a ton of them, and it makes no sense to throw them away. I'll use those until they fall apart and then switch to glass storage.
I've also done something similar with tomatoes. It takes a total of 15 minutes or so to boil water, drop the tomatoes in for a minute or two, remove from water, and remove the skin. The tomatoes can then be frozen whole or diced and frozen. I have several jars of whole and diced tomatoes in the freezer ready to go.
As I finish my nut butter jars, I've been washing, saving, and reusing those very nice 16-oz glass jars for my frozen food storage. Of course I could go out and buy a nice matching set of mason jars and be all set, but there's no challenge in that. I'm also working very hard to reduce consumerism and buy only what's absolutely necessary. Eventually, I'll have quite a nice collection, thanks to my nut butter habit (my favorite bedtime snack is some kind of fruit with either almond butter, cashew butter, or both.
Since I was on a roll, I also sliced up some red peppers (we use a lot of those, too) and froze a couple of jars of those.
The next step was to replace the various spice packets with my own mixes, made from the spices that I buy in bulk and store in glass jars. This was so simple and quick, that I'm horribly embarrassed that I was too lazy to have thought of/done this before!
Another product that I we use a ton of is hummus. I have been unable to find this in non-plastic containers and this is definitely not a product that we can eliminate. I've made hummus before and knew how easy it was, so there really isn't a justification for why I've been lazy and just purchased it rather than making my own. I'm now making my own (my favorite flavor is roasted-red pepper), and it's ridiculously easy and so much tastier than my favorite brand of roasted-red pepper hummus. It took me about five minutes--probably less--to measure the ingredients, throw them in the blender and push the button. I did clean-up and put-away while the hummus was blending. When it finished, I dumped it into a container, stuck it in the 'fridge, and that was it. The only time expenditure here was for the roasted red peppers. I let the peppers roast while I was doing other cleaning chores, and threw the hummus together when the peppers finished.
I am definitely spending more time in the kitchen than I was before. I do not love kitchen work, but I don't hate it as badly as I used to. I'm making almost everything from scratch, and it is delicious! I am loving food so much more this way, and the family is pretty happy with it also. I feel so much better about living this way--both for the Earth/environment and for my family's health, but I'm feeling horrible guilt about all the years I knew better and took the easy way instead.
Other smaller changes include trying to fix things when possible instead of replacing or tossing. One of the cats' favorite toys is this little cat that hangs on our closet door. The elastic band rotates, dropping the colorful string which they try to catch. When they catch it, they pull it, and this finally stretched the white elastic band so much that it wouldn't rotate anymore. I actually took it off the door with the idea that I would toss it and replace next time I went to MadCats. Then I happened to think that even though they really love that toy, the same thing would happen if I got another. I decided to fix it instead. It was a 10-15 minute process (probably less for someone with working hands). All I had to do was cut about 1.5 inches of the white elastic out and sew it back together. The cats are thrilled to have their toy back, I saved a $20 replacement cost, and there is one less piece of plastic in the landfill.
I also tried to fix my blender when it died a few weeks ago. I took it apart and didn't see anything burned or broken, so I assumed that I could just get and replace the motor. I found that while a handful of parts could be ordered to repair the blender, I could not find a replacement motor. I found a blueprint of the blender components online and thought perhaps I could figure it out on my own, but I could not. I haven't yet tossed it. It's in a box in my basement, because maybe if I look at it again over the summer, it will make more sense to me. Probably not, but I'm giving it one more try.
L & I just finished The Scarlet Letter tonight. It's been so long since I had read it that I couldn't remember how it ended anymore. We've had some really good discussions throughout the book about history (in general), American-British relations during that time period versus now, attitudes and values of the Puritans toward women, sex, children, Native Americans, marriage/adultery, witches, etc. I wasn't sure if she would be into it when we started and mentally resolved that if she didn't seem engaged within the first five chapters I would give it up, but it turned out to be a good read and a great educational opportunity. Now I have to come up with another bedtime book. Hmmmm...
A cautionary tale of the dangers of going to the bathroom before grading:
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