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“Cool.” “Close.” “Embrace.” “Satisfaction.” “Pleasure.”  “Getting your groove back.” “I’m still the good girl, trying to be a bad girl.”  These are words and phrases plastered on my vision board, a collage of images and words that capture what I am creating in 2012.  I made it on New Year’s Eve, and it hangs on the inside of my closet.  A large portion of it is dedicated to relationships.  I want Love in 2012 and beyond.  There I said it.  Pure. Simple.  Unapologetic.  I deserve it.  It has taken me all of four years of being divorced to own and name that desire.

For some reason this post is hard for me to write.  I’ve drafted and redrafted.  Started, deleted and started again.  It’s supposed to be short and sweet.  It’s supposed to be for Valentine’s Day, and I barely finished in time even though I started almost two weeks ago.  So here’s the raw, honest deal.  I have not really dated since 2008, but now I finally feel like myself again.  Beautiful, brilliant, spiritually-attuned, creative, energized.  I deserve the best.  I deserve it all.  I will be dating in 2012.

Though the one has not manifested before me, the process of putting together the vision board helped me clarify what I want.  I look at the board everyday.  I smile at it.  I like the words on it. I’m moved by the images on it.

There are pictures of four handsome men.  A cool, hip-hop artist, who is FINE and whose style, and most of all whose lyricism and artistry, I appreciate.  Another of a former pro athlete who is vegetarian.  He is there because I am vegan, and I love nurturing, welcoming and sharing life-affirming food with others.  My next love does not have to be vegan, but he does have to be open to experiencing this major part of me.  In the third picture, a man and a woman cook together.  He is at the cutting board, and she is behind him as if her arms were just around his waist.  In the fourth one, a man lies on a sofa admiring something.  In his smile, I see strength, confidence and affection.  He looks like he’s admiring something, perhaps the woman he loves.

Oh Yuk.  You are becoming one of those. . .a dreamy, hopeless, romantic.

The act of making a vision board is an affirmation in and of itself.  It’s the same as  my grandmother’s expression “Name it and Claim it. . .If there is something you want in life, tell God, expect it, move in the world like it’s already yours, and watch it show up.”  I have not been so confident about this in the love sector of my life.  Perhaps because where man woman love is concerned, I have not seen too many good models up close.  I am a child of divorced parents.  I am divorced myself.  I have been engaged in the healing process that is necessary behind the end of a relationship.  The vision board I created almost four years ago had nothing about relationships on it.  The board itself is down in the basement in a space that I pile junk in.  Junk that prevented me from even entering the room.  But it’s been four years of recovery and (re)discovery of who I am in the world.  To get here, I’ve been writing and writing and writing some more.  I’ve been cooking and writing about cooking and teaching about cooking and cooking some more.  I’ve been creating new surroundings in my home.  I’ve been purging physically, emotionally, and spiritually, things that don’t serve me, that don’t make me feel alive, creative and whole.  Although the one has yet to show up, I treat myself the way I want to be treated in the context of a relationship.  The way I want us to be when we are together.

Love is hard to write about when you doubt that you’ve truly experienced it or when what you were sure was love deteriorates into something else.  . .

So tonight I am dining at Vita’s Eatery, aka my dining room, in the comfort of workout clothes.  Esperanza Spalding serenades while playing her upright bass.  Even though it’s a Tuesday night and no one else is home, I decide to eat on china.  Not a chipped plate, not the plastic ones that the kids use and not the one they made one day after school.  I eat from my finest dishes.  Battered and fried tofu, garlic mashed potatoes, broccoli with garlic, herbs, and vegan butter and a glass of white wine in a crystal glass are what’s on the menu.  I light a candle.  I move the lily that I love the smell of from the guest bedroom to my placemat.  I breathe, take my time and savor the food.  I think about the peace of mind that I now have, and I consider what this experience would be like if shared. . .A half hour later I receive a text.  It’s an invitation to Mishas, a coffeehouse in Old Town, Alexandria.

I’m not big on coffee, but I can have tea or apple cider. . . I like Old Town and Mishas seems like a cool place. . . I considered myself to be in for the evening. . .It’s only 10 til 6. . . He’s a bit younger.  . .It’s just a cup of coffee, damn.

I laugh to myself, shower, get cute, and go.

“Spectacular” is another word on my vision board. . .I am taking relationship ruins and resurrecting something spectacular. 

Vita’s Battered and Fried Tofu

Marinade for tofu (in a medium bowl with a tightly fitting lid)

1/4 cup Bragg’s Liquid Aminos

1/2 teaspoon onion powder

1/2 teaspoon garlic powder

1/2 teaspoon ground ginger

1 block of extra-firm tofu (West Soy Extra Firm , Nasoya Super Firm, or bulk bin tofu are some of my favorites.)

Batter (in another medium bowl with a tightly fitting lid)

1/4 cup flour

1/4 cup nutritional yeast

1 tsp onion powder

1 tsp garlic powder

1/4 tsp ginger powder

1 tsp salt

1/8 tsp cayenne pepper

Directions:

Pour oil about an inch high into a cast-iron skillet.  Heat over medium high heat for at least 15 minutes or until the next steps are completed.  Cut the block of tofu into cubes of your desired size.

For the marinade: In a medium bowl with a tightly-fitting lid, combine the liquid amino acids, onion powder, garlic powder and ground ginger.  Add the cubes of tofu and seal the lid. Invert the bowl, turning it over gently a few times until the tofu is evenly coated. 

For the batter:  In another medium bowl with a tightly-fitting lid, combine all of the batter ingredients.  Working in batches, add the marinated tofu to the batter. Seal the lid, invert the bowl, turning it over gently until the tofu cubes are coated evenly with the flour mixture.  Add the chunks to the hot oil and fry, turning the cubes for 8 to 10 minutes or until a golden brown coating forms. Do not crowd the skillet.  Adjust the heat as necessary.  Cover a plate with a paper towel.  Transfer the fried tofu to the plate.  Repeat until all the tofu is fried. 

Serve with hot sauce.

Exams, Gifts, and Gratitude

Thoroughly review the following exam and find a link to a recipe by the end.

First Semester Exam

Directions:  Answer the following questions using complete sentences.  Be thoughtful and thorough.

1.  What is the most rewarding part of teaching?

2.  4x = 108.  Convert the answer into a word problem.

3.  Oh, do you know the muffin man,
The muffin man, the muffin man,
Oh, do you know the muffin man,
That lives on Drury Lane?

1.  What is the most rewarding part of teaching?

Answer:  If you ask me what is the most fulfilling part of teaching, I’d say something philosophical, lofty, but true, like finding creative ways to teach young people to be critical thinkers, and I’d say something seemingly shallow and materialistic but equally as true, like receiving gifts during the holiday season.  The latter is not just because I sometimes rack up on stuff, but it’s also because the holiday season is one of the few times of the year that parents and students have a built-in context to say “thank you” for a job that sometimes feels thankless.  And, more than that, I realize that in a short period of time, students, whom I often impel to pay attention, have been paying close attention to who I am outside of being their teacher.

I would argue that students’ gifts reflect how well we have come to know each other.  Sometimes this knowledge seems to have happened through osmosis, for I don’t remember sharing the intimate details about myself that their gifts sometimes reflect.  For example, this year I received a bar of organic, lavender soap.  I absolutely love lavender.  As a matter of fact, just a few days ago, I bought a bar of lavender goat’s milk soap, I buy lavender essential oil to make my own skin and body products, I use dried lavender to jazz up lemonade, and I have lavender in my herb garden that was planted a few years ago.  But, I don’t remember saying a word about lavender in class.  I also received a two-month Netflix subscription.  Simply put, I love movies and really need to catch up on watching some during the winter break.  I also received gift cards to Target, which I shop at all the time, and Barnes and Noble where I’d love to buy a fresh new journal, video, CD, or book. One student and his family even gave a donation to a charity on my behalf, something in theory I’d love to do but have never gotten around to in terms of time or finances.

I also received handmade gifts like earrings, ones that I can see myself wearing over and over again because they are unique and big, observations that my students make all the time about the earrings I wear daily.

Aside from teaching history and literature, many students and their parents have an inkling that I do work around food, and so they give me food.  Food in the form of gift cards to places like Starbucks, Panera Bread and Bertucci’s.  Teas and a beautifully wrapped jar of honey for sweetener.  Food I can use in creating amazing dishes of my own, like an assortment of salts combined with spices from around the world and a rosemary tree that I can’t wait to plant in my herb garden and use in sauces, breads, and gravies.  And, most precious of all, food made by their own 11 and 12 year-old hands, like cookies baked, decorated, and packaged in decorative or zip lock bags with simple notes written in magic marker, like “Thank you for being my teacher.”

2.  4x = 108.  Convert the answer into a word problem.

Answer:  We baked a hundred katrillion sweet potato muffins for my daughters’ teachers.  In the first marking period, my 7^th grader, Yetunde, had 11 teachers and 3 more people she wanted to thank, and my 5^th grader, Niara, had 8 teachers and 2 more people she wanted to thank.  That made 24 bags of 4 muffins each for a total of 96 muffins.  One batch didn’t come out so well, so we did it over, which made a total of 108 muffins in all that we baked.  For the packaging, we had some plastic, decorative bags with metallic twine from previous years and business cards that could easily become gift tags with the right font.  In each bag went 4 large muffins made with whole grain flour, cinnamon, nutmeg, and fresh steamed, mashed sweet potato.  We draped cloth napkins in the bottom of two large baskets to hold the packages of muffins as my daughters delivered them to their individual teachers. . .O.K. so a hundred katrillion muffins was a bit of a hyperbole, but that amount does convey the gratitude that they deserve, they being the group of people who touch my daughters’ lives in ways the two of them can’t fully explain but may be able to imagine because their mommy is a teacher.

3.  Oh, do you know the muffin man,
The muffin man, the muffin man,
Oh, do you know the muffin man,
That lives on Drury Lane?

Answer:  No, I don’t know the muffin man, and I have no idea where Drury Lane actually is.  But I do know a woman who has two daughters, who can bake over 100 muffins from scratch in like three hours in a regular oven, who lives on an uphill street in Washington, D.C., who loves being a teacher, adores her own students most of the time, and has mad love, respect and appreciation for her daughters’ teachers and all that they do. . .  Her Vegan Sweet Potato Muffins would make a great addition for holiday brunches!

Vita preparing vegan sweet potato muffins

vegan sweet potato muffins

packaged vegan sweet potato muffins

Vita’s Garlicky Kale

Hi Levita! It’s Erika from Maret. I was looking for a recipe for some meat-free kale, and came across the post written by your guest-blogger about the event at Saks. Reading about those delicious-sounding greens you prepared made my mouth start watering, and I was wondering if you might be willing to share the recipe? I’d like to prepare them for the next gathering of a book club I am in. Hope all is well — love reading your blog!
Erika

Thank you so much, Erika, for following Vita’s Vegan Ventures and for leaving this food question.  Your inquiry about that Garlicky Kale recipe is perfect because I had planned to blog about it for my Thanksgiving series.

Growing up down South in Memphis, Tennessee, I remember my grandmother picking greens, sometimes on the front porch or at the kitchen table with a tub at her feet.  Other times, she’d pick them right over a sink filled with water and a little vinegar for soaking.  Meanwhile, she’d boil a piece of fatback or ham hocks in a big pot of water for what seemed like half a day.   Then she’d add her picked greens and cook them for what seemed like the other half of the day.  By the time the greens were ready, their vibrant green color had transformed to brown(ish) and their tenderness to mush(iness).  Nevertheless, the greens were delicious and the pot liquor was perfect for some sopping up with warm, buttermilk cornbread.

However, since adopting a vegan diet, I have modified my grandmother’s recipe in favor of one that uses little, if any, water, relies on no meat for seasoning, and cooks in a fraction of the time–all of which helps to maintain the integrity of the various nutrients in kale.  Coming from the same family as cabbage, collard greens and brussel sprouts, kale is a great source of beta carotene, calcium, iron, Vitamin C, Vitamin E, and protein!  I’ve found that many foods, including kale, contain enough water to aid the cooking process, particularly when they are prepared in a pot with a tightly fitting lid.  I love using Bragg’s Liquid Amino’s, a non-fermented, soy-based vegetable protein, for salt in my greens and other dishes that I grew up seasoning with meat.  Another key to preparing a healthy, yet just-as-delicious-as-my-grandmother’s-pot-of-greens is chopping them finely and adding crushed red pepper flakes, or better yet, adding some slithers of smoked jalapeno, aka chipotle pepper, which results in a spicy kick and a hint of smokiness that traditionally comes from meat.

Photo taken by Jorge Bañales -- Three varieties of kale: red curly, dinosaur, green curly

While green curly kale is what we see most often in grocery stores, kale comes in many different varieties, including red curly and dinosaur, which is my absolute favorite.  I’ve only seen all three in Whole Foods.  The recipe below can be applied to all of them.

Vita’s Garlicky Kale

1  lb Kale (thoroughly washed)

3 Tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

4-6 cloves garlic, finely chopped

3 Tablespoons Braggs’s Liquid Aminos

2 Tablespoons Bragg’s Apple Cider Vinegar

2 teaspoons agave nectar or raw sugar

1/4 teaspoon pepper flakes or 1/2 of a dry chipotle pepper

Make sure the kale leaves are clean by rinsing them thoroughly and discarding yellow leaves.  Chop greens and stems finely.  Finely chop the garlic cloves.  In a large pot, heat the olive oil and sauté the garlic until fragrant.  Next, add liquid aminos, apple cider vinegar, agave, and pepper.  Whisk together.

A pot of Vita's Garlicky Kale

Add thoroughly rinsed, finely chopped kale to the pot and seal with a  tightly fitting lid.  Cook on medium heat for 5 minutes before stirring.  Gently stir after the kale has wilted.  Continue to cook until the kale is tender to your taste.  I suggest 10 – 15 minutes more of  cooking.

Enjoy!  Richly colored kale can be a delicious accompaniment to my Better Than Candied Yams.

Better Than Candied Yams

Thanksgiving is right around the corner, and I’d like to spend a few blog entries suggesting delicious, more life-affirming versions of some of my holiday favorites.  I’d also love to help you veganize your favorite recipes so leave me a Thanksgiving food question.

I fancy myself a blues musician in the kitchen using what is available to me, improvising on what was passed down, and creating something new and hopefully better in the process.  Particularly during the holiday season–Thanksgiving, Christmas, Kwanzaa, and New Years–, I find myself wanting the southern comfort, traditions and love evoked by Soul Food, but the blues artist in me wants to put her own, more life affirming spin on it.

And so it is with candied yams, the base of which is a root vegetable packed with  protein, fiber, potassium, iron, and antioxidants like Vitamin C and Vitamin A in the form of beta-carotene.  Candied yams is one of my absolute favorite Soul Food holiday dishes. I grew up eating it prepared with sweet potatoes that had been baked whole, sliced, covered with a syrupy glaze made with loads of butter and processed white sugar, and baked again.

Now I improvise by peeling, slicing, and steaming the sweet potatoes because steaming intensifies the potato’s vibrant orange color and is a faster cooking method than baking whole potatoes.  My modified version also calls for Sugar in the Raw in place of white sugar and Earth Balance Vegan Buttery Sticks instead of butter.  Earth Balance is a combination of palm fruit, canola, soybean, flax and olive oils that is vegan, gluten free, and GMO (Genetically Modified Organism) free.  Just as important, Earth Balance looks, acts, and tastes like butter.

Together these three things make for a healthier version of traditional candied yams, and I’m willing to guarantee that no one at your dinner table will notice and surely not mind once they savor a mouthful. For the vegan version below, I took the traditional recipe from Sheila Ferguson’s Soul Food: Classic Cuisine from the Deep South  and veganized it, demonstrating that knowledge of simple vegan substitutions can be practiced with all kinds of  cookbooks.

Enjoy and let me know how yours turn out!

Better Than Candied Yams

Ingredients (Note the short list of simple ingredients.)

my vegan candied yams, which I call Better Than Candied Yams

4 medium-sized sweet potatoes

½ cup Earth Balance Vegan Butter

1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

½ cup sugar in the raw

½ cup water

In a large pot with a tightly fitting lid, add water about an inch high.  Then add a steamer basket.  While the water is coming to a boil, peel and slice potatoes 1/3 to 1/2 inch thick.  Place sliced potatoes on top of the steamer basket.  Cover the pot with a tightly fitting lid.  While you do not want the water to come above the bottom of the steamer basket, be careful not to boil out all of the water by simply adding more if necessary.

While the potatoes are steaming, prepare the glaze by adding the remaining ingredients to a small sauce pan.  I like to melt the Earth Balance Vegan Butter over low heat first, then add the sugar, then add the water and lemon juice.  Whisk the ingredients together.  Once all of the ingredients are combined, turn the heat up high.  Let the glaze heat until it coats a spoon, a process that should take 3 to 5 minutes. By the time the glaze forms, the sweet potatoes should be tender enough for the next step.

Coat a 2 quart baking dish with canola oil cooking spray or with Earth Balance.  Layer the potatoes in the baking dish.  Pour the hot syrup over the sweet potatoes and bake uncovered for 25 to 35 minutes or until light golden.  Baste a couple of times during baking.

Enjoy with greens and other Soul Food!

Contradictions, Saks and Vegan Soul

By Featured Guest Blogger, Fia Curley

By now, most people are aware of the end-times weather plaguing the D.C. metro area. Earthquakes, hurricanes and flash flood warnings can be a little unnerving, but when you have the opportunity to guest blog for Levita “Vita” Mondie, somehow things seem right with the world and torrential downpours and standing water no longer seem so daunting.

Crazy, I know. But for a food lover—as in tuna-loving, meat eater with a passion for eggs who always orders the barbacoa burrito at Chipotle—being able to write on a vegan blog is a bit of a contradiction. The thought that I would enjoy greens that were cooked without meat, also seemed a little strange.

Now, I love to eat, to the point where my empty plate is usually greeted by questions of “where does all that go” or “how do you stay so skinny,” or the last one I got from a guy I went to lunch with, “oh, I forgot you said you can eat.” I’m still not sure if that was a compliment.

But for someone who’s grown up with gifted, Southern cooks in the family, good food, including soul food, was a staple for years. That all changed when one of my younger siblings was diagnosed with high cholesterol as a toddler, which sent my mother on a health crusade. Our meals of greasy, baked macaroni and cheese, meat loaf, creamy mashed potatoes and tasty green beans were avoided. Instead, we saw plates filled with more vegetables, and salads became an entire meal, with 2 percent milk as our “drink of choice.”

I remember it being a rough transition— especially the milk— but I realize, now, that my mom was right. And now I find it hard to drink whole milk—is it just me, or is that stuff as thick as egg nog?—and you can often find me eating a huge salad (with tuna) for lunch and doing my satisfied happy dance when I’m done. But being vegan never crossed my mind. It seemed like an extreme form of being a vegetarian and completely undoable to me. My one and only brief stint as a vegan was during a church-wide fast, but I would be lying if I said I didn’t occasionally find myself daydreaming about meat during that week.

So I was surprised to meet a very down-to-earth Levita Mondie, who didn’t look like she was wasting away due to her veganism.

My good fortune came about due to my work with the Office of Minority Health and their collaboration with Sak’s Fifth Avenue for Fashion’s Night Out… in Good Taste and Health event. The goal was to raise awareness about infant mortality, which is the death of a baby before the first birthday, and how it can affect any woman, regardless of the socioeconomic status, particularly in the black community.

As one of the chefs presenting at the event, Vita set up her station quickly, while educating Saks shoppers about the nutrients found in kale as they peered at samples in small white  cups. Sure it smelled good, but after the throng devolved into smacking, mmm’s and vigorous nodding, I had to take a sample.

Then I took a couple more.

I was slightly shocked when I tasted a sample of three different types of kale that not only had flavor, but actually tasted good, like she had let a smoked turkey wing soak for 30 minutes before arriving at Tysons Galleria.

Did I know there was anything other than good ol’ down home greens cooked with salt pork or fat back? I’d heard rumors but didn’t really believe them. But I learned that day at Saks that there is curly, dinosaur and red kale, which our chef and educator had displayed in the raw form along with her other ingredients so we could recognize them during our

Vita going over three types of kale, including dinosaur kale

next shopping trip.  And Vita even used the hard stem of the leaves instead of chopping them off and throwing them away.

Still somewhat skeptical, I followed Vita up to the third floor of Saks as she prepared for a cooking demo, keeping a watchful eye on her ingredients to make sure no necks, wings or feet slipped into the pot. As she prepped for the demo and country music blared through the store speakers, she took a moment to relay her own experience with veganism to Karen Onori, a Healthy Baby preconception peer educator and mother of a 7-year-old girl, who wanted to know how she could “get there,” too after making a decision to become healthier.

Last year Karen, now 39, had a little conversation with her nutritionist.

“I wanted to be healthier and I wanted to avoid diabetes and I had hypertension and wanted that gone,” she said. “The best example for a child is a parent, but we don’t think about how we need to take care of our bodies.”

Vita shared some of her “veganizing” tips, revealed her disgust for most vegan cheese and her experiences of cooking through trial and error.

By this time, a crowd had gathered, readying for the demo. The country crooning was switched out for a remixed and jilted Adele and Vita was mic’ed up and ready to go. Without a turkey wing or animal body part in sight, Vita heated freshly cut garlic and olive oil in a pot and began finely chopping curly green kale on her wooden cutting board. With a few douses of liquid aminos, agave nectar and apple cider vinegar in the pot, she told us about her beginnings in the vegan world of cooking, shared some of her favorite soul dishes and gave Tonya Lewis Lee, spokeswoman for the OMH Healthy Baby Begins with You campaign and fellow vegan, tips on being a master at substituting ingredients. Within minutes the vibrant green kale and smell of garlic had us salivating and the table was bum-rushed for more samples, particularly by the children.

After that demo and Vita’s quip about being able to make some good vegan buttermilk biscuits, I have to be honest and admit I’m intrigued. I can’t say I’m ready to throw myself into veganism and never look back, but her reasoning for becoming vegan—her mom and her health and the health of her family—did make me ponder my lunch of leftover Labor Day steak. She had a lot of great info about what it means to be vegan and how it could benefit you physically. So while I need to do some more research, I think I’ll try my hand at her garlicky kale recipe and hope it makes my mama proud and satisfies my family during Thanksgiving dinner this year. We’ll see.

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*Fia Curley is the Writer/Editor for the Office of Minority Health Resource Center, loves eating food, especially desserts, enjoys naps, good books, finishing a workout, spending time with family, taking adventures in far-flung and unexpected places, writing about life, health and family and learning new things so she can brainstorm solutions.

About that Bachelor Party. . .

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So I did my first bachelor party. . .no no no I don’t mean I was scantily clad “dancing” in front of a throng of men in a hotel suite raining dollar bills. . .the typical celebration of the doomed’s, I mean the groom’s, last night of freedom.  This was not that lewd, male ritual that wives, fiancés, girlfriends, and, even jump-off chicks want their men to stay away from.  In fact, most women I know would have begged their man to go, and even dressed them for and dropped them off at the bachelor party that I had the pleasure of doing for this was a cooking bachelor party.   

”We’ve been joking that in your house the big dilemma will be ‘To Beef or Not to Beef’ since Michelle doesn’t eat red meat,” the host, John, teased during his introduction to the evening. “Which is why I invited Levita here tonight, to do a cooking lesson so we, but especially you, Kofi, could learn something that you can use at home with the Mrs.”

“I would like to start by having each of you say your name, for my sake, and a word of  reflection about, insights on, or advice to Kofi about food, romance, love, and marriage. . . Who wants to go first?” 

“My fiancé and I really enjoy cooking together.  It is one of the most intimate things you can do with a person,” shared Tony, who is the most recently engaged of the four friends. Later, in the midst of making a delicious orange glaze for the sweet potato dish, Tony shared that his fiancé is someone he grew up with, someone whose family went to church with his family.  “Sometimes what you’re looking for has been right under your nose all along.”

“Well, I consider the kitchen my domain, and I don’t really want my wife in here with me. . .but I do see food as a way to feed a person’s spirit,” added John, the foodie and host, whose domain was a chef’s dream–two dish washers, an 8-burner Viking stove, two ovens, and a sub-zero refrigerator, granite counter tops, and an island that opens to guests in the family room, dining room, and porch dining area.  I can see why he’d want it all to himself.

The groom chimed in, “I knew things were serious with me and Michelle when I cooked a meal for her. . .I set up a table in my hallway and placed a gift under her chair.  It was when I gave her a key to my house.  What I was saying with the food and the key is ‘here, I am giving you access to all that I have.’”  O.K. I damn near lost my composure on that one. . .that was until, Arthur, perhaps the smoothest of the bunch, added the most insightful comment on food, romance, love, and marriage.

“I ain’t gonna  lie. . . when I was in college and funds were limited, I cooked as a prelude to . . .yawl know what I’m talking about.”

“And just how far did the Ramen noodles get you, man?” John asked, cracking us all up . 

“Something magical does happen when you cook for someone, but especially, when you do it with her,” I added.  “Bonding and connection takes place.  In the context of a family or a romantic relationship, when you feed someone, you are providing a potential source of healing.  What you prepare can set someone up for life and longevity or set her up for disease and degeneration. . . Treat meals like they are special, sacred even—a time to be present.  Cook together often, set the table, light a candle, put out some fresh flowers, and eat from your finest dishes, like the new ones you’ll receive as a wedding gift.  All of that will go a long long way. . .”

On that note, the men put on their aprons, went to their food stations, and began their cooking assignments.  John had chosen an extensive soul food menu, enough for each person to be responsible for two dishes.  Arthur was on the vegan mac and cheese, John on the garlicky kale, Tony on the barbeque tofu, and Kofi on the corn bread.  Then, in pairs, Kofi and Tony prepared the orange glazed sweet potatoes while Arthur and John prepared a peach cobbler that tasted as good as grandma’s but without the eggs or butter.  Arthur prepared the filling with sliced peaches that he decided to leave the skin on while John prepared the perfect, homemade crust. 

I tried hard to be a fly on the wall and stick to guiding these beautiful men through the preparation of the dishes.  Together we came up with some creative solutions like using a metal colander with holes instead of a sifter for the cornbread’s dry ingredients.  And when we didn’t have an egg substitute for the cornbread, Kofi suggested we use pureed pear since I had shared earlier that apple sauce is a great substitute for eggs in things like cookies, pancakes and cupcakes.  His instinct worked like a charm.  And in the absence of an actual rolling pin, I filled a bottle that was just emptied of refreshing, Italian soda with plain water, and John rolled away.

After he put the cobbler in the oven, he set the table on the outdoor porch, we joined hands, and, the groom said a heartfelt grace, thanking God for all that had taken place that evening.  The men fixed their plates and dined together.  Among other things, they reminisced about days at UVA and unforgettable moments since, debated about R. Kelly, and talked about wedding planning, “Listen closely, Tony, because you might learn something about why a destination wedding might be the way to go. . .there is a reason why you might not want to be uninvolved in the planning process,” John offered. 

By the time I joined them at the table with a pitcher of my hibiscus tea, the recipe for which is a well-guarded secret, the groom’s plate was clean, and his friends’ plates were headed in the same direction.  Each was proud of just how delicious his vegan, soul food dish turned out. 

I was witnessing (black) maleness at its finest. . .the sensuous way in which each man talked about food and love, the quiet power that each possessed, the competitiveness, but mostly creativity and camaraderie in the kitchen. . . There I go again losing my composure.

 

To see vegan recipes for the orange glazed sweet potatoes, barbeque tofu, cornbread and more, see the article “Vegan Soul Grows in Anacostia” from The Washington Post.

No Strangers at the Bottom of the Callaloo Bowl

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Sundays are oftentimes a busy day in our home.  Mainly because I tend to wake up inspired to cook something delicious and involved.  As impromptu as the meals themselves are the people who end up around our dinner table.  Sometimes I plan on one or two guests ahead of time, but most often, I start cooking and, in the midst of grating ginger or marinating tofu, I call or text a neighbor, my sister, or a family friend,  “I’m cooking callaloo, stop by if you wanna eat.” At least one somebody shows up, and almost always, one, two or even three other folks who  “just happen to be in the neighborhood” end up at the table too.  I never mind, though, because we always seem to have enough, and the combination of folks always seems just right.

And so it was one August Sunday when I was scheduled to go to brunch with my new friend Rebecca, a lovely woman from the Philippines by way of Oakland, California, whom my family hosted for two weeks at the end of July.  Since, as a teacher, I’m off during the summer, I had time and energy to cook even more than usual during Rebecca’s time with us.  She had a severe sinus headache when she first arrived, and I saw it as a culinary adventure to figure out what I could prepare to alleviate it.  “Let me make you some hibiscus tea.  The flowers are very high in vitamin C and, from my own experience, I know it helps with coughs, colds, and respiratory stuff.”  With the fresh lemon juice and pureed ginger root that I added to the tea, I was hopeful Rebecca would feel some relief, and she did, but was in need of much more.  The next day I made Ghanaian peanut stew, which included a base of tomatoes, garlic, ginger, peanut butter, and habanera pepper, one of the hottest peppers “in all God’s creation,” as my grandmama would say.  While only one pepper is necessary to give a kick to a whole pot of this stew, I added three of those bad boys to help relieve Rebecca’s congestion. . .and that worked.  Between the sweet potato, corn, and okra that were added to the spicy base, Rebecca’s sinus congestion was no more.  

About two weeks after Rebecca’s stay had ended, we bumped into each other at an area co-op and decided to have brunch the next day on the August Sunday that I was referring to.  But by mid-Sunday morning I had changed my mind and asked if she could come over for a dinner of sweet plantain, channa and callaloo instead.  I was anxious to try making callaloo since I had bought the ingredients a few days before.  I had gotten advice on how to make it from everyone, including a Trinidadian hospital attendant who provided care for a dear friend of mine during his stay in a D.C. hospital.  I asked him the two questions that almost always lead to unexpected but interesting places.  The first, “I hear an accent, where are you from?” and the second, “Do you know how to make. . .,” in this case, “callaloo?”  His accent immediately took me to some faraway, unfamiliar place, and brought to mind a set of spices and delectable Caribbean dishes. 

“You’ve got to get dasheen. . .you need the dasheen leaves.  Get you a bunch of those.  Then you get the okra.  Some thyme.  A bay leaf.  And you must have the coconut milk.”  He went on for a good 29 minutes with a few interjections from me, and, most fascinatingly, without ever giving an exact measurement.  “Do not kill it with the pepper.  Do not blend it.  Let it simmer down.”  I listened with wide-eyed, attention, and I just knew that receiving this Trinidadian recipe from a Trinidadian man in a Trinidadian accent meant that my callaloo was going to be authentic and delicious even though I had seen no parts of Trinidad. 

I later learned that dasheen is another name for the leaves of taro root and that the Trinidadian version I wanted to make was not the only version, for several different Caribbean countries have their unique spins on callaloo, including Haiti, Guyana, and Barbados.  When I asked my friend Takeyah, who is from Trinidad, about making it,  she expressed her preference for Jamaican callaloo, which she pointed out did not call for okra.   I also solicited insider advice from friends on Facebook.  My friend LaShonda, whose husband is Trinidadian, told me I must get the green seasonings, which I assumed were the green herbs like bay leaves and thyme called for in the Trini version.

Once I settled on a recipe by Chef Emeril that I found on the internet, Rebecca, who had arrived at our home about 40 minutes earlier, joined in the preparation.  “Can I chop something?. . .I have some salsa music on my phone. . .let’s play some and hook it up to these speakers.”  With salsa playing, she chopped onion, minced garlic, and sliced plantain.  We took turns taking pictures and even video taped our adventure in the kitchen.  Improvising was also a major part of our callaloo exploration.  Emeril’s version, which was based on the traditional Trinidadian dish, called for coconut milk, which I forgot to buy.  I substituted dried, unsweetened, baking coconut and almond milk instead.  Blended with the callaloo leaves, okra, thyme, and garlic, our coconut milk substitute worked like a charm. Rather than letting the okra and leaves simmer down as the hospital attendant advised, I cooked the dasheen until they were tender, turned off the stove, put the raw okra in the hot water with the leaves, and covered the pot with a tight fitting lid until the okra was just tender.  Using a slotted spoon, I transferred the leaves and the okra to the blender and pureed them with the dried coconut, almond milk, and thyme.  About that time the phone rang, and just like that two more guests were expected to stop by “just to say hi.’”  By the time the callaloo was pureed and in a pot with sautéed garlic and onions, the rice, channa, and fried plantain were also ready.  Shortly thereafter, the door bell rang.  It was Ellis and his friend, Marta, whom he’d wanted me to meet several times before to talk about vegan cooking classes.  She was an artist and, like me, an educator who grew up in Historic Anacostia, and her mom and dad still live in her childhood home around the corner. 

“Yawl hongry?. . .Ellis knew there was going to be food here. . .You need to always keep something to drink with you so you can bring it when you ‘just happen to be in the neighborhood,’”  I teased. 

They went outside to let the car windows up, and before they made it back into the house, our neighbor Chekesha poked her head in the living room window, “Hey there, Levita, I put some stuff in your compost.”

“Thank you, Che Che. . .You hongry?”

“No I just ate, but I smell the curry all the way to the sidewalk.”

The combination of folks on this particular Sunday ended up being a carpenter/master storyteller from Rocky Mountain, North Carolina, a Native Washingtonian/art curator/educator, a business woman from the Philippines, a 12 year-old artist, and a 10 year-old athlete, and me, a southern, vegan chef/educator.  As always, my daughters and I welcomed folks who may have seemed random at some point in time but by the bottom of our bowls of callaloo there were no strangers at our dinner table. 

 

The following recipe was my starting point.  I used it mainly to see the ingredients but improvised in several ways.  I omitted the butter and sweet potato, used a dried chipotle pepper to add some smokiness and heat and used dried coconut and almond milk in place of actual coconut milk. 

Callaloo Recipe

courtesy Emeril Lagasse, 2002

(from www.foodnetwork.com)

Prep Time: 20 min;  Cook Time: 15 min

Level: Easy;   Serves: 4 servings

Ingredients

• 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 1 cup chopped yellow onions
• 1 sweet potato, peeled and small diced
• 2 teaspoons minced garlic
• 1 to 1 1/2 teaspoons minced, seeded scotch bonnet pepper, depending upon taste
• 1 teaspoon chopped fresh thyme
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1 pound fresh callaloo leaves or spinach (about 8 cups of leaves), ribs/stems discarded, well rinsed, and chiffonaded
• 3/4 cup unsweetened coconut milk
• 3 cups water

Directions

In a large saute pan, melt the butter over medium-high heat. Add the onions and cook, stirring, for 4 minutes. Add the sweet potato, garlic, peppers, thyme, salt, and pepper, and cook stirring for 30 seconds. Add the greens and cook, stirring for 1 minute. Add the coconut milk and the water. Cook, stirring, until the leaves and sweet potatoes are tender and the liquid is slightly reduced, about 10 minutes. Remove from the heat and adjust the seasoning, to taste.

Serve hot or warm with rice and hot pepper sauce on the side.