#going vegan gradually

[cjcooksvegan]

New To Veganism? Get Started With This Simple 7 Day Meal Plan

Ready to get started on your vegan journey? Below I’ve compiled a simple meal plan for 7 days of vegan breakfasts, lunches and dinners. Feel free to follow the plan to the letter, or pick and choose specific recipes and meal ideas you’d like to try. (more…) “”

[sidewalkchemistry]

Eating enough fiber per day is the best prevention against digestive & gut issues (IBS, SIBO, Crohn's, colon cancer, constipation, painful bloating, etc). Fiber is one of the major nutrients which people today are undernourished in. In fact, it's estimated that the average Westerner eats about 80% less fiber than early hunter-gatherers did. When we're spoiled for affordable & accessible choices in this day & age, it's very weird.

Reblog to remind your followers to get a delicious plant-based dish/snack in -- whether that's in the form of a curry, smoothie, soup, fruit salad, buddha bowl, even veggies & hummus

[incorrectbatfam]

If the batfam had tiktok what would they post? What would go the most viral?

Dick does duets where he remixes people who have bad takes. His most viewed one is turning Lex Luthor's corporate monologue into a dubstep track with beat drops every time Superman is mentioned. Equally popular is his mashup of Bruce's yawning with a Sam Smith song.

Jason makes cooking videos. The recipes are normal, but the voiceovers like, "today I'm making a realistic animal-themed vegan bento box 'cause I wanna torment my brother." His most popular video is of him shit-talking Batman while making a pot roast, but it gets deleted because he didn't say "unalive."

Tim does behind-the-scenes videos of his photoshoots where he makes it seem like a complex process with dimmed lights and glitter falling from a ceiling fan, then it cuts to a blurry iPhone pic of a pissed-off Jason with sparkly hair chasing him down a dark hallway.

Damian's is a mix of animal videos, art tutorials, Cheese Viking speedruns, and classical covers of anime intros. But his most popular one is recording his family's reaction to him saying the fuck-word for the first time. He also has a series where he asks people how babies are made to see whose response TikTok takes down first.

Duke posts subtle and wholesome pranks, like leaving Tooth Fairy money under the older batkids' pillows or gradually filling Kate's purse with Jolly Ranchers. His most popular series is when he slowly replaced Damian's furniture with increasingly smaller replicas until the 8th day when Damian finally notices.

Steph does a little bit of everything and often takes suggestions (re: dumb dares) from the comments. Her account started with her just sharing her favorite memes, but her most popular video is when she slept in a bathtub full of Mardi Gras necklaces after an audience poll.

Cass normally posts a mix of dance covers and sign language lessons, but occasionally there will be moments from her daily life that she captures at the right time. Her most viral video is at the grocery store when someone accidentally knocks a coconut onto the ground and she follows it as it rolls to the other end of the store.

Harper and Cullen do a lot of backyard science experiments where they take hypotheses from comments and test them out, like if they can cook steak with firecrackers or make a trampoline out of rubber bands. Their biggest project was turning an abandoned pool into a frog sanctuary.

Barbara keeps most of her daily videos private and her public ones are mainly book hauls, song recs, and computer tips. Her most popular video, even making news articles, is a video where she breaks down how planned obsolesce works and calling out big tech companies.

Bruce has a secret account that no one knows about. He doesn't post anything. He just lurks because he wants to be the first like and comment whenever his kids post.

[m00nsbaby]

Falling asleep on their shoulders.

A bunch of headcanons about how would they feel. :) (Moon system x reader.) Steven.

In a million years, he would never have accepted a work outing when he could be in his comfortable apartment with Gus, reading a new book.

Until he found out that you would be going.

He never imagined that an amusement park could be so much fun. He had never been to one before.

Or maybe he had, but he doesn't remember.

You separated from the group as soon as you arrived. Steven thought he would like to be as carefree as you when you took his hand and walked without a trace of nervousness or fear.

You talked all day, about anything and everything.

"You're very interesting, Steven." It was probably the sweetest thing he had ever heard. His blush made you feel satisfied.

For the rest of the day, you made sure he knew you were interested in him.

You also mentally noted how his lips brushed against your fingers when you offered him some of your cotton candy.

You held hands again when you rode the tallest roller coaster in the park.

Oh, and you kept the photograph.

"Shall we go see the Aqualoop?" "See it or...?" "Get splashed, I mean." He couldn't say no. Both of you were like a pair of children enjoying the day.

Adult life hadn't given you the chance to enjoy yourselves like this in a long time.

Both of you closed your eyes tightly as the water splashed over you, drenching you from head to toe. You both laughed until your stomach hurt, and Steven brushed a wet strand of hair from your face.

Having him so close made your heart skip a beat.

You spent the rest of the day dripping wet, enjoying the sun on your skin and the warm air drying your hair.

You shared food as the evening approached, and you discovered that vegan food was much better than you had imagined, while Steven ate half of your french fries.

As the park was about to close, you met up with the others at the exit.

Both of you insisted on declining the ride J.B. offered, as your clothes were still wet.

After 20 long minutes of arguing, you accepted on behalf of yourself and Steven.

Or Scotty, as J.B. had called him, making you struggle to hold back your laughter.

The space in the back seat was limited, and your body was squeezed between Steven and the car door, but you couldn't say you were uncomfortable.

His body emitted a delightful warmth.

A yawn escaped you.

"Are you tired?" Steven's whisper near you broke the complete silence in the car.

You silently nodded, rubbing one of your eyes with your hand.

If only he had the courage to tell you how adorable he thought you were.

Minutes of silence passed, your breathing became slower and heavier, and your head gradually leaned to the side as you began to fall asleep.

And it happened. Your cheek ended up against Steven's shoulder.

He almost vomited from excitement, not exaggerating. Needless to say, he was the type of person who simply assumed he would die of natural causes before moving or telling you that his shoulder had become tired.

After a few minutes, you shifted, slipping an arm underneath his and intertwining your fingers together, returning to your place on his shoulder after.

He allowed himself to finally smile.

And the hours it took him to gather the courage finally culminated in the best part of the night. He leaned in enough to kiss your forehead.

You smiled too, without opening your eyes.

Marc.

One day, you had to explode, and he knew it.

His plans were always thwarted because Khonshu interfered with his sudden missions that not only meant pausing whatever you were doing, but also meant that Marc would disappear completely from the radar for God knows how many days.

It was strange when he returned, too. It took him days to return to normal, if you were lucky enough he would tell you what had happened, only partially.

"It's always the same!" You finally screamed at your breaking point. Tears overflowed from your eyes as you quickly packed your clothes into your suitcase. You didn't care if the clothes became even more wrinkled.

"You knew it would be like this, I told you." Marc had the migraine of the century.

You shouted at each other for a while, and the maid looked at you as if you were crazy.

To be fair, you sounded like it.

The argument came to a close when Marc went too far with his words. You didn't argue often, but when you did, it always ended like this.

You cried the whole way to the bus station. And you almost started another argument when you pushed your boyfriend's hand away to prevent him from grabbing your suitcase.

If only he had the strength to set aside his pride for once, he would have apologized the moment the tip of your nose turned red.

You wished you could switch places with a stranger to avoid hours of travel with him.

But it didn't happen.

You felt like the thousand times you cried yourself to exhaustion as a child. You even let out a yawn within the first 15 minutes of the trip.

It didn't take long for you to succumb to physical and emotional exhaustion, thinking that sleeping would make time pass faster and you would be away from him sooner.

He was so focused on avoiding your gaze by looking out the window that he didn't even notice when you fell asleep.

Until your head landed on his shoulder with a sudden turn in the road.

Marc's body tensed. He was too stubborn to give in instantly, but at the same time, he was too in love to push you away.

He looked at you, and his chest tightened.

You looked so vulnerable. So tender and small. How could he hurt you if he loved you so much?

Unbeknownst to him, a barely noticeable pout formed on his lower lip.

"I love you," he whispered, more to himself than to you. He was almost consoling himself in the pain of having to carry the regret of his words.

"I love you with all my heart," he repeated.

It was futile, you were deeply asleep.

He made his decision and closed his eyes, leaning his head against yours to find comfort.

He would sleep by your side, feeling the warmth of your body, and when you woke up, he would apologize to you as many times as necessary.

Even if it meant having to make it up to you with other vacations.

Jake.

You never exchanged words unless it was necessary.

You knew his name, he knew yours, and that you were good at fighting together. Unfortunately, you didn't have a "magical" suit to help with that.

You stared out the window, suppressing the urge to moan in pain every time the taxi jolted on the road. You had survived worse things than a twisted ankle and a possible broken rib.

Jake didn't look at you, only when he heard you hiss or take a deep breath because of the discomfort you were in.

"We're close to the hotel," he reassured you, even though it was a lie. You were in the middle of nowhere, trusting that the driver had the correct directions.

You nodded silently, closing your eyes and resting your forehead against the cold window.

Five more minutes passed, and there were no signs of life on the road, but the pain became more bearable as exhaustion started clouding your perception.

Every time you were about to fall asleep, a tap of your forehead against the window would wake you up.

And you didn't even notice his gaze on you.

After the seventh hit, Jake lost his patience.

"Eso no va a funcionar, cariño." You didn't understand, and you couldn't be bothered to understand as you kept your eyes closed.

The last thing you felt was his body moving closer to yours.

You yielded, your body finally relaxing as you managed to fall asleep. It was easier for Jake to wrap his arm around your shoulders and gently push you against his, allowing you to rest.

Almost immediately, he regretted it.

Jake didn't have this kind of closeness with anyone. His interactions with other people always involved punches, sometimes harder, sometimes softer, but pain was always present.

Was it normal for his heart to race like this? He would investigate later.

You moved your head slightly to snuggle better against his shoulder as he held his breath, trying not to make the slightest movement that could wake you.

"¿Cuánto va a ser?" he asked in a low tone so that the driver would understand his concern about not disturbing you.

The driver pointed to the meter in silence. Well, he encountered someone even quieter than himself.

Jake lost count of how many times he whispered in your ear, "Shh, cariño." (although sometimes he changed the endearment to "cielo" or "corazón") as a way to lull you in his arms whenever you shifted in your seat.

When you arrived, he paid in silence, as usual.

He didn't wake you up, in fact, he did his best to be as stealthy as possible.

He slid one of his arms under your legs, wrapped the other around you, and lifted you up like a bride.

Jake was careful, but not so much that your reflexes didn't catch the movement.

You woke up, but never opened your eyes; you simply nestled closer to his chest and enjoyed his care.

Tomorrow you would both face whatever you had to face.

[homunculus-argument]

Post the fig cake/banana bread recipe please?

I used this banana bread recipe as a base with some adjustments, but since it's in finnish I'll write out the whole fig cake recipe here, as I made it:

240 grams of fig jam

150 grams of melted butter

2 dl of brown sugar

2 eggs

3 dl of wheat flour

2 dl of rolled oats/oat flakes

1 dl of crushed nuts (I used a mixture of pistachios and almonds, but either just almonds or just pistachios is probably fine too)

1 dl of raisins

2 teaspoons of vanilla sugar (vanillin sugar works just fine)

1 teaspoon of cinnamon

1 teaspoon of cardamom

1 teaspoon of baking soda

1 teaspoon of salt

(here, "teaspoon" is about 5 millilitres. For other measures and their imperial translations, you're on your own)

Mix the butter, fig jam, sugar and eggs together in a bowl until you reach an even consistency. It's going to be pretty solid, but don't be alarmed.

Mix the rest of the ingredients together in a separate bowl. Make sure that the raisins aren't all clumped together. I recommend mixing everything but the flour together first before finally adding in the flour, to ensure that it's all even.

Gradually mix the dry ingredients into the wet ingredient bowl, mixing the batter between each helping of flour mixture. I used a ladle for this.

Grease a caking pan/oven dish/whatever you are using with butter. You can use whatever oven-safe baking dish you want, for as long as it can handle 1 litre of cake. You should probably measure your baking dish before making the batter, to see if it fits.

Pour/ladle the batter into the greased baking dish. It's going to be pretty firm and solid at this point, not foamy or runny, and it will expand to roughly twice the size it is now as it bakes.

Heat the oven to 175 degrees celsius (you should probably have done that earlier, too, so that it would already be hot by the time the batter is in the pan), and put the cake in the oven for 55 minutes.

Let the cake cool before pouring it out of the dish. It should come out easily and just fall right off. Have a serving dish already ready and try to aim there - it's going to be a bitch to get the cake off the floor if you miss. (And if you have dogs, you will no longer have cake. Or a dog. Raisins are toxic to dogs and there's raisins in the cake. Do not drop the cake on the floor.)

Conclusion: Cake. If you want to try making a vegan, no-egg, no-dairy or gluten-free version, feel free to fuck around and let me know what you found out, substitutions of this sort are not my expertise. For a nut-free version, simply leave out the nuts.

[fi0den]

ur art is super cool oh me days

do u have anything about ur swap au? :o

i think its awesoememememe HEEEHHEE

Thank you sm, I’m so glad to hear ppl are still interested in these Swap AUs

Here’s a couple more!

Really tried to keep these as sketches to not burn myself out but still did in the end :/

It was still fun though to draw these ideas out!

Evil Exes Swap Below 👇

How They Broke Up

Knives Chau - Similar to the original, she was used as a rebound, but under different circumstances. After escaping Envy, he needed money for a ticket to America fast, causing him to take up a job as Knives's tutor. A month later, her boyfriend broke up with her the day before prom, prompting Mr. Chau to bribe Scott into going as her date. After defeating the other prom candidates, they were crowned King and Queen. However, during the drop-off, he dumped the truth on her then left for New York the same night. When the league formed she begged to be the first ex opponent.

Lisa Miller - Kinda the same situation with Lucas, but it ended more tragically. Scott ditched and forgot their first date in favour for Kim. She grows up to be a massive diva actress with a scarred heart.

Kim Pine - Without Lisa, Kim was never informed or got to say goodbye to Scott when he moved away, bringing their relationship to an abrupt and unresolved end. It left her bitter and closed off, she did managed to find another boyfriend with the new boy named Gordon. Nowadays she’s currently busy with being a rockstar drummer and vegan.

Wallace Wells - They were dorm roommates, and Scott’s bisexual awakening. He was a playboy on campus, but with Scott, he thought they would form a genuine relationship. They even got matching earrings together on a drunken late-night. One day, he came back to their dorm to find all of Scott’s stuff gone, leaving only a note behind. He’s now a swordsman carrying a large amount of angst on his back and a cool sword.

Sandra & Monique - When they discovered Scott was two timing them, the award-winning duo quickly became enemies, taking their heartbreak rage out on each other that lasted after university. Now, Canadian pop stars are competing to outshine each other while attempting to eliminate Ramona.

Envy Adams - She met Scott at a fancy cocktail party. She was drawn to him because he reminded her of her first love, a blonde boy from childhood. However, that infatuation gradually morphed into an obsession on changing Scott, such as dying his hair. After he departed, she went on a depressive rant on Craigslist about him.

[delulujuls]

fuck, marry, kill | lh44, gr63

hi! im sorry for not being on time but hey, no surprise to having the best ideas when its already too late. anyway please enjoy!

summary: the mercedes trio is getting ready for halloween party, lewis is being a total babygirl as always, georgie boy being unbothered king as always too

warnings: none, they are pure goofballs

pairing: lewis hamilton x fem!mercdriver x george russell

George scrunched his nose, feeling the first stamp of paint on his cheek.

"I already don't like this."

Y/N rolled her eyes, putting more paint onto the sponge.

"I've just started, so please cooperate and let me work."

He squeezed his eyelids as he felt his face gradually being covered in white color. The atmosphere at the Mercedes headquarters that afternoon was very exciting, all due to preparations for the evening Halloween party.

"Is it at least vegan?" George asked again, nervously adjusting himself in his place.

Lewis sitting next to them couldn't help but laugh, tearing his gaze away from his phone.

"Give me one reason why makeup paint wouldn't be vegan" he asked.

"I have no idea, that's why I'd rather make sure."

Y/N shook her head and returned to covering his face with paint.

"And you, Lewis, do you have any ideas yet?"

She asked, glancing at the man who had been searching for inspiration for his costume for the past few minutes.

"I'd advise against anything with white paint and it's not just because it could be seen as racist."

George chimed in, trying to scratch his nose for which he immediately received a tap on the hand.

"Men in Black? The Weeknd?" the man shook his head while scrolling through Pinterest. "Everything is too simple and obvious."

"We could have some matching costumes," Russell suggested, feeling relieved as the girl put down the paint and reached for powder. "I'd feel better knowing that you guys are going through this as well."

"That's actually not a bad idea," Y/N nodded, looking at her friends. "The only question is, what kind?"

Lewis exhaled and focused on his phone again. The trio remained silent for a moment until the man showed them a photo with an potential inspiration.

"I think I have a favorite."

Y/N furrowed her brows, looking at the photo he showed. It took her a moment to decipher what the trio of girls in the picture was dressed up as.

"Fuck, Marry, Kill! Oh God, that is brilliant!"

"Let me be 'Kill' because I might as well kill myself if I have to wash this off" George said, adjusting the headband holding his hair.

"I'm fine with that" the girl assured, taking a brush, black eyeshadow and starting to paint skull elements on his face. "And what about you, Lewis?"

"I can let you have the first choice."

The man replied, resting on his hand and watching as George's makeup slowly began to take shape.

"Everyone thinks 'Fuck' when they look at you, so I guess we know the answer."

The girl said, giving him a meaningful look.

Lewis looked a little flustered, trying to cover his reaction with laughter. The three of them had been friends for almost four years, but Lewis was very easy to embarrass, even in jokes.

"You'd look good as the groom though, but I'm sure that everyone would probably point out that Y/N is being objectified for letting her being "Fuck", what about woman rights and all the other shitty nonsense," George added "PR people would have a busy evening."

"Geez Georgie boy, just say that I'm not attractive and no one would want to fuck me," Y/N interjected with feigned seriousness, struggling to hold back her laughter.

"Don't provoke me into this conversation, especially not now when I'm not at my best," he replied, trying to remain still as she painted his eyes.

Lewis returned to browsing his phone, this time with a clear idea of what he was looking for. When he found a specific photo, he hesitated for a moment about presenting his idea.

"Do you have red lipstick, Y/N?" He asked uncertainly, glancing at his friend. She nodded, not breaking her concentration. However, when he didn't expand on the topic, she looked at him.

"But what do you need red lipstick for, exactly?"

Lewis wordlessly showed her his phone with a picture where a guy was covered in red lipstick kisses. Y/N raised her eyebrows in shock, while George nodded approvingly.

"The idea is great and I truly love you, but don't count me as the one to give you those kisses,"Russell replied.

Lewis looked at Y/N, unsure if this suggestion wasn't too much and could potentially offend her in any way. However, she didn't react negatively at all; instead, she nodded and smiled enthusiastically.

"People on Twitter are gonna shit themselves."

When George's makeup was ready, the rest of the preparations went smoothly. Even getting the wedding accessories for Y/N wasn't as problematic as keeping Russell in one place with his mouth shut for more than five minutes during his make up. When the girl was ready, she took the red lipstick, which was the highlight of the program and found Lewis, who was already dressed in his dark red suit pants, perfectly matching his shirt. The man smiled at the sight of his friend, who had done a great job finding her costume at the last minute.

"How do you feel about the party?" the girl asked, opening a small mirror and painting her lips.

"I'm okay, and you?" the man replied, nervously adjusting the cuffs of his shirt.

"Me too, I must admit I like these kinds of parties."

Y/N closed the mirror and glanced at her friend, signaling him to sit down. He followed her command, getting nervous almost as if it were his first interaction with a girl ever.

"Do you have any specific idea about how to arrange these kisses, or can I improvise?"

"I trust you completely."

The girl nodded and without thinking too much just leaned toward him. Just then George entered the room, also dressed and ready to go.

"Thank goodness I found you in time," he said, closing the door behind him. "Now no one can accuse you of deliberate kisses."

"You're definitely taking this too seriously," Y/N laughed and leaned toward Lewis, pressing her lips to his cheek. The man smiled involuntarily and looked at her, slightly taken aback when she moved away and examined her work.

"One down, about twenty-nine to go," George commented, sitting in a nearby chair. "Don't fall in love with each other during this time."

Lewis sat still, even trying not to breathe too loudly. Y/N left kisses on his cheek, neck and chest like stamps. When she finished, she nodded approvingly.

"It turned out better than I thought."

"We all look awesome, but now get rid of the evidence and let's go because I'm starving."

The girl wiped her lips clean and the three of them headed to the company's party. Y/N secured seats, Lewis went for drinks and George immediately greeted the snacks. Toto holding a champagne glass took a big sip when he noticed Lewis's rather original outfit.

"I guess you're not the author of those kisses."

The man stated more than he asked, when he approached George.

"Come on, boss, I used my best lipstick for this. Huda Beauty," George said with utmost seriousness and holding three plates of snacks he returned to his friends, ready for the next adventures of the Halloween night.

[nonagalleryart]

Drumroll, please! It's the beginning of a month-long shopping extravaganza as I kick off my shop update with SWEATERS! I've designed and created so many new goodies for you all and I am going to gradually reveal everything to you throughout September. So get ready to feast your eyes on brand-new products and designs! Today marks the start of the special announcements - now available on my online store in all colours and designs, sweaters! It is sweater season after all, and like my t-shirts and hoodies, my sweaters are crafted from 100% organic cotton, fairtrade and vegan certified, so they're extra cosy.

But wait, there's more! This is just the beginning of a month filled with surprises, so stay tuned for more exciting updates and exclusive releases!

Shop My Sweaters Here

[horsesarecreatures]

Hey, uhm, about that „horse riding is harmful – but they need exercise!“ thread: what is never talked about in these discussions (this is my impression) is how priviliged it is that we can even abstain from using horses for transportation and farming.

And while our lifes have become much more comfortable since machines have replaced horses in these fields, I would argue that this shift has been very bad for nature as a whole. Even if someone does not believe in climate change, they could still see how it was bad that we built (and are building) asphalt streets and railroad tracks through wildlife habitats. And big machinery driving over soil compresses the earth unnecessarily, which makes it more difficult for plants to regrow. This would not be a problem if we still used horses.

I’m also wondering what people who are against horse owning would say to people who live in circumstances where they are still dependent on their animals. People who maybe live somewhere were the infrastructure needed in order to be able to use fossil fueled vehicles is not yet present. Or people who are just poor. Should they also stop riding and driving horses?

All of that being said, let’s imagine the consequences of gradually stopping all horse ownership. All horses currently living with humans as pets will stay with their owners and be cared for until they die, procreation will be prevented. (The alternative would of course be to release them into the wild, but deciding on WHERE to do so is very difficult and let’s just not do that in this scenario, as to not disturb already established ecosystems). Horse breeds which have been living with humans for the past thousands of years will go extinct. All the knowledge about how to feed horses, about horse behaviour and how to interact with them and about how to safely train them to be driven and ridden in a sustainable way will only exist in books within a hundred years. We are talking about skills that, at the end of the day, are more efficiently learned if there are teachers whom actually are practicing the craft. Humanity as a whole lives a bit more removed from nature – although, that is just how I see it.

I hope it’s okay for me to unload my thoughts on this onto you – I’m too shy to write under the post directly, but I really want to get this out of my head.

I live in germany by the way and I own a little pony mare. I don’t actually know her breed, it must have not been documented when she was born. She probably is a german riding pony with a healthy dose of arabian blood in her. I’ve riden and worked with horses for 14 years now and owned my mare for 5. I bought her when she was 11 years old and noone had really cared for her for two years. She spend that time on a pasture with other horses and was slightly malnourished and apathetic then. These days her fur is sparkling and her muscles have developed nicely and she expresses more happiness overall.

Hey, I don't know about the original poster as I don't follow them, but @acti-veg actually addresses your first point quite frequently. There are many people who cannot afford to not eat meat, abstain from medications that have been tested on animals, use horses for farming or transportation, etc. But the definition of veganism is, "a way of living which seeks to exclude, as far as is possible and practicable, all forms of exploitation of, and cruelty to, animals for food, clothing or any other purpose.” If a person cannot avoid some form of animal exploitation because of their health or inability to make an alternative living, this does not preclude them from being a vegan as long as they do their best to limit their reliance on animals in other areas.

I agree that industrialization has led to many advancements in society at the detriment of nature and biodiversity. But I would also point out that if people switched back to horses today, at our current population, that would also not be sustainable. There is not enough land to keep them properly without adding more to deforestation, and plowing with horses is less precise and worse for the soil than some up and coming alternatives, like laser weeding and using robotic seed planting, which can eliminate the need to plowing entirely.

You are right that if people stopped breeding horses many breeds would go extinct and knowledge in how to care for them would be lost. This is a downside that has to be balanced against the upsides, like no more halter horse monstrosities, no more horses being dumped & shipped to slaughter, and the potential for farmland to be re-wilded which would increase biodiversity.

It's totally ok to share your thoughts here, and your pony sounds super cute!

[droughtofapathy]

"Welcome to the Theatre": Diary of a Broadway Baby

The Roommate

September 5, 2024 | Broadway | Booth Theatre | Evening | Play | Original | 1H 40M

I entered the theatre with no expectations. I laughed, I cried, I had such a visceral experience that I had to come right back home and write out this review instead of putting it off for a week. All I knew beforehand was that Patti LuPone played a vegan lesbian in a Stockard Channing wig. Let me give you a rundown: Robyn (Patti) moves out to Iowa from The Bronx to live with a roommate she's never met named Sharon (Mia Farrow). Turns out, Robyn may or may not have a criminal past. Just your average scammer, con artist, soft drug dealer. Y'know, the usual. But she's leaving it all behind to start anew in Iowa. Well, stick-in-the-mud Sharon has nothing else going on in her dull little life, and she's very eager to learn the trade. Soon, these two roommates who have nothing in common are running a cute little business selling pot brownies to Sharon's book club. And it's all fun and games until Sharon suddenly has her gay awakening. And I mean, c'mon, who wouldn't fall for a mean criminal lesbian?

So, this is an early preview. The show doesn't officially open until next week, and there are still definitely some kinks that need ironing out. I actually think Patti was the weaker link here. She started off pretty stiff and gradually got better, but she has room for a lot of improvement. I don't really believe her as a lesbian, and I'd be curious to know if she has any queer female friends. I know she's got plenty of gay men in her circle as all Broadway Divas do, but what about the women she could model off of? As for Sharon, I didn't expect to be so charmed by Mia Farrow's character. She's really endearing, and just great in the role. Her character arc is catering to me specifically. A woman in her sixties abruptly discovering her latent homosexuality? Sign me the fuck up. Plotwise, it's just fun. There are a few lines here and there that come off awkwardly, but that might improve with time. It's not a play that's going to change the world, but it's one that I need to see again and again.

Oh, and by the way, I watched Patti LuPone and Mia Farrow slow-dance and kiss in a kitchen. And yeah, I'm kind of giddy about it.

Verdict: You Can Pry This Show Out of My Cold Dead Hands

A Note on Ratings

[rachelscookierecipe]

Vegan & Gluten Free Brownie Cookies

by Rachel (sort of)

Adapted myself from the ingredients of my favourite vegan & gluten free brownies, and my favourite brownie cookies. Credits at the end.

Ingredients (makes 35-40 21g cookies)

250g gluten free flour (I use Doves Farm/Freee brand, #notspon)

180g golden or light brown sugar

30g cocoa powder

¾ teaspoon baking powder

¼ teaspoon salt (a small pinch)

150g dark chocolate (I use dark cooking chocolate from Tesco that is soy based and dairy-free)

100ml vegetable oil

100ml milk

1 teaspoon lemon juice

Coarse/flaky salt for sprinkling (optional, so damn good)

Tools (and I don’t mean the one writing this)

Large mixing bowl

Medium bowl for dry ingredients

Smaller bowl for melting chocolate

A saucepan of similar size to your small bowl if melting chocolate on the hob

Wooden spoon (or if you have one of those fancy silicone spatulas, they’re perfect)

Dinner plate

Baking tray + baking paper

A few teaspoons for scoopin’

Measuring spoons (optional but very helpful for accuracy)

Recipe

So when I was a lad… just kidding. I do have stories about how I learned to bake, but this is my own recipe, so those stories are pretty irrelevant here.

Step 0: Don’t preheat your oven.

I usually don’t preheat my oven until shortly before I’m ready to bake, I don’t know why recipes always start with that.

We will not be baking anything for at least an hour, as the cookie dough requires chilling for at least 45 minutes once mixed, ideally longer. This helps prevent spread on the baking tray, and makes it easier to form into dough balls.

Step 1: Measure your dry ingredients.

I am very inclined to forget one as I go, so here’s a checklist:

Flour: 250g

Cocoa: 30g

Sugar: 180g

Salt: ¼ teaspoon

Baking powder: ¾ teaspoon

Add all the dry ingredients, except the sugar, to the medium bowl. Pop the sugar into the large bowl. I’m bolding those because I tried following my own instructions and I messed it up.

Step 2: Vegan buttermilk. Wait, that’s not an instruction!

We’re going to curdle some ‘milk’, for chemistry reasons I don’t really understand. Add 100ml of soy milk to the large bowl, then add 1 teaspoon of lemon juice. The milk should ‘split’, and look gross! If it doesn’t, that’s fine too.

Add the vegetable oil, and observe hydrophobicity in action.

Step 3: Melt the chocolate.

I like to do this in a ‘double boiler’, which is a fancy way to say melting it in a bowl over a pan of simmering water. Feel free to do this in a microwave. If you do, be careful not to overheat it, do it in bursts until the chocolate has a silky consistency.

It’s harder to get wrong with the double boiler, for physics reasons, but it should only take a few minutes with a steady simmer. Once a knife can be pushed through the chocolate with no resistance, turn the heat off and stir the chocolate to ensure it has melted all the way through. Add the melted chocolate to the large bowl, and stir until combined.

Note: This is the one time before baking that we are adding heat to the mix. Before baking, I highly recommend the dough is cooled completely, so the hotter the chocolate is at this stage, the longer the mixture will need to cool.

Step 4: Add the dry ingredients and mix.

Shake or spoon in the dry ingredients gradually, stirring a couple times between each addition to avoid making a dust cloud. Once you’ve added them in, stir to combine, taking pains to scrape down the sides of the mixing bowl and incorporate large lumps of flour/cocoa powder. Small lumps (smaller than a pea) will bake out, so don’t worry about those. Your dough should be smooth, firm, and probably looking the way the cookies will look a day after you eat them. Sorry.

Step 5: Chill out.

Cover the bowl and stick it in the fridge. 45 minutes is the absolute minimum I would suggest, but if you can give it an hour or two, or overnight, even better. The next step is to scoop the dough into little balls, and that will be less messy and less of a f***ing nightmare if you just chill it for a while. Pro tip: Put your dinner plate in the fridge with the bowl. I wished I had done this every single time.

Step 6: Okay, I lied to you. The next step is actually to preheat the oven.

180°C conventional, 160°C fan. I don’t know what that is for gas ovens, sorry.

Step 7: Balls.

Using a spoon, maybe two, and your hands (unless you’re a magic space wizard who can do this with just the spoons), scoop a lump of the cookie dough out of the bowl and weigh it. My control weight for this recipe is 21g, but you could go larger if you wanted to. This makes a cookie of approximately- where’s my ruler? 5.5 cm diameter. I weighed each ball, because I’m a really fun person, but you can just weigh one and make the rest about the same size. Or weigh none of them, and guess the baking time adjustment! You feeling lucky, punk? If it’s taking you a while to get through this, and it probably will, I suggest covering the balls and returning them to the fridge for a few minutes before baking, as they’ve probably warmed considerably from being handled. Tee-hee.

Step 8: Prepare for baking.

Cover your baking tray with parchment. Put your balls on the tray, spaced 3-4 cm apart to avoid creating a colossal, all-consuming cookie mon- uh, beast. Unless you want that. I did this by mistake once, and don’t recommend it. Squish the balls down slightly into pucks, maybe 1.5 cm tall but I didn’t measure, this just makes it easier to sprinkle some coarse, crunchy salt flakes on top. Yum yum! I don’t know if I need to say this, but don’t overcrowd your tray. If you have more balls than you can fit on the tray, use another tray or wait until the first batch are baked and reuse this one.

Step 9: Bake.

Stick that mofo in the oven, for 8 minutes if you made them 21g like I said, or longer if you made them bigger. They’re done when they’ve spread out and the tops have dried up and cracked, revealing a darker, cakey interior. I’m drooling right now. If you poke them at this stage (careful, they’re hot, duh), they should give with little to no resistance. This is good! If they’re completely solid straight out of the oven they’re overcooked, and will be rocks by the time they have cooled down. I’m sorry if this happened to you! Take the next batch out just a little bit sooner. Let the cookies cool on the tray until the tray is cool enough to touch. This will take longer if your tray is thicker, but I promise you it’s worth the wait. Once the tray is warm but not hot, the cookies should be solid enough to transfer to a cooling rack. If you’re nervous, use a metal fish slice or a fork, slid underneath each cookie to avoid breaking them up.

Step 10: There were no more steps. This is the end.

You can eat them now! Alternatively, allow to cool and eat within… okay I don’t know what the shelf life is, but they’re cookies, they shouldn’t last very long. Anecdotally, when I did my last batch, I had some in the tin from three months ago, and they tasted fine, but I don’t recommend eating three-month-old baked goods!

And now: pictures.

Captions (and alt text) in the alt text.

Credits

Do recipes have credits? Not in my experience. This recipe however borrows heavily from:

Alison Andrews at Loving It Vegan: https://lovingitvegan.com/vegan-gluten-free-brownies

Janine Ratcliffe at Olive Magazine: https://www.olivemagazine.com/recipes/baking-and-desserts/classic-chocolate-brownies

/u/dundundah at reddit dot com: https://reddit.com/r/Baking/comments/97ag96/brownie_cookies/e46zinq

I’m Rachel. That’s as much detail as you’re going to get about me. K bye!

[cjcooksvegan]

6 Tips For New Vegans (Beginner's Guide To Going Vegan)

6 tips for beginners to #veganism #veganuary #govegan #plantbased

[the-stardust-shard]

What's it really like? How are the people in there? If you wanna answer I've always been curious cause Ive been told I should be in there

Honestly, it depends on your local laws / culture / country / region, but i’m in france so i’ll focus on my experience related to how it works here (incl. laws and such).

For reference, as of now i’ve done 2 stays, both of which were done in a private hospital and not a public one (which makes the experience itself vastly better by default, but still), and before my first stay in a private ward i’ve spent a bit of time in a local public one for single appointments (so no full-time admission but same grounds).

> What's it really like?

Boring. Mind-numbingly boring.

Your entire time schedule is strictly programmed so you spend most of your time stuck to it, waiting and waiting and waiting and waiting. i included below a photo of the schedule for here to show how much stuff there is inside.

A way i follow it to make it less grating is by noting down the “closing time” for each of those items, so i know when to come to arrive at the last minute when there’s little to no one left waiting, so i have the rest of my time free for myself or activities or whatever, but even then you’ll still have a nurse coming to check on you every so often and coming to berate you if you’re a bit late, so you’re always stuck to this stupid timetable.

time becomes so abstract that if you don’t have a personal watch / personal schedule for yourself, you always lose track of time or of the day. when on my first stay, i actually didn’t come with a watch (because my watch needs to be charged regularly and that’s done with a long power cable which is always confiscated) and until a friend brought one i spent my worst time completely lost and disconnected; i started noting down the day it was and how many days i was in on my hand to keep track of that.

that boredom always brings the worst, aka addictions to cope with that. cigarettes, soda, other binge snacking, and worse. if you’re in a group of people, you’ll often hear someone prompt for a smoke break. i didn’t smoke thanks to my husband bringing me my nicotine-free vape so i can have something to stim with, but i still drank around 100 cans (i have the number due to having collected all the caps) in less than 3 months.

a good thing is that it’s places with easy access to lots of other medical tools, so i’ve been able to see a few therapists, social workers, sports coaches, and that’s overall cool because it’s usually covered by the hospital where it would’ve been paid if i went to meet them outside.

A lot less waiting time and paperwork too, it’s handled for you, so it makes things less annoying to get going, especially if like me you struggle with paperwork and administrative bullshit.

as for the downtime between appointments / activities, it was filled with reading, listening to music, drawing, trading goods and services with other patients (yes, it’s one of the core components of psych ward), and once i felt safe enough to bring my laptop and such, watching series, playing games with other patients, etc.

my first stay gradually became better before the breakdown, but my second stay has been very isolated due to not finding anyone or any activity, so i’ve spent my entire stay reading books and listening to music in my room after having traded some snacks with some people who were going outside for the day.

the worst aspect for me was the food (an issue common with every stay tbf). as a vegan/vegetarian with allergies, i always got the most shitty and bland food possible (idk why in france they put meat in literally everything at every meal of the day), and that was actually what allowed me to leave the ward from my first stay; in less than 3 months i’ve lost 16kgs~ even with the snacking and the sport i did every day and i’ve been in tears at more than one meal due to how bad it was >> at this point i got used to not eating but it’s horribly bad and kinda scary for a medical site.

> how are the people here?

If i’m talking about other patients, the experience will be overall better imho. especially if you can find yourself a group of people in your age range or with similar experiences as you. it just feels.. a lot less judgemental and pressuring than outside. everyone’s fucked up in some way and nobody cares, we’re just here for the same reason and so we just hang out together and support each other when we can/want but even not doing that will not bring any judgement on you.

Staff is more awkward and uncomfortable, especially doctors and such (aka the ones with legal power over you) or administrative staff (aka the ones with power over the doctors and everyone else, but they’re so far up their asses in their comfy desk that they’re all always completely disconnected from reality, which makes their rare appearances very awkward and uncomfortable). On my first ward, i did find a few nurses that were pretty cool and with whom i’ve been able to have interesting or fun talk, but in the current ward i found no one, so the divide between them and us is really uncomfortable to handle.

in the public ward i went a few times for appointments (which was structured like an underground prison, full bars and all) though the med. staff was openly insulting of patients and such… i did witness and fight some shitty staff in the first ward too.

overall the staff is the most grating group, the one who can easily make the stay hellish and traumatize you even more if you’re not lucky.

still, among other patients i’ve been able to meet great friends with whom i’ve been able to spend a lot of good time even after my stay (one of those friends regularly comes to watch movies which we started on our stay, and the other is practicing tattooing with me, some others i’m still chatting with but don’t see as often though. these two specific people were pillars of mutual support during my stay)

you’ll note on the timetable below that it doesn’t even contain everything we need to keep track of in a day..

[acti-veg]

Hello, I would like genuine advice because my situation is often seen as taboo by some vegans but I would still like to try my best in the position I'm in.

I have been a vegetarian for 3 years now and was planning to go vegan gradually, I often learned vegan recipes, went to vegan cafes and restaurants, participated in veganuary, followed vegan activists...etc

The problem is even while still eating eggs and dairy (as well as lots of red beans, chickpeas, lentils, tofu, leafy greens + vitamin C to help absorption) my iron levels keep plummeting. I have been trying to take iron supplements for a year now but never managed to stop being anemic. I also have to say my period is quite heavy which doesn't help much.

I'm now feeling so tired I'm considering going pescetarian for a while to see if I manage to get my iron levels back up this year. I feel very disappointed because I had planned to consume less animal products, not more but alas it looks like my body can't follow.

I would like to know if you have any advice to lower animal suffering both in my diet and in my day to day life while being pescetarian for health-related reasons ?

The trouble with fish is that it really isn’t very high in iron compared with the plant sources you’re eating now. Tuna is the one people often cite for iron, but even that is only about 1.6 grams per 100 grams, compared to say tofu which you’re already eating, which is 5.4 grams per 100 grams. The iron in fish is heme iron which may be easier to absorb, but with much less of it available it’s unlikely to raise your iron levels at the rate you need.

I think that your focus should really be on your health above everything else right now. Have you been to a nutritionist at this stage? That would be my immediate recommendation, infusing iron is an option for people with long-term anaemia and would get your iron up far quicker than eating fish would, and lower the risk of any health complications. You need to know if there is some sort of underlying absorption issue before you can know what you need to eat to deal with it.

Focus on getting yourself healthy again, don’t make any further dietary changes until you’ve seen a doctor and talked through options with a nutritionist. Only once you’ve got a handle on things and understand what is going on should you start thinking about any further dietary changes to shift towards veganism, and in the meantime you can still be vegan in every other aspect of your life.

[butts-bouncing-on-the-beltway]

I'm feeling exhausted and fragile today so I'm going to make a vegan wild rice soup with some flaxseed crackers, and since I feel the need to yell into the void, yall are getting a recipe about it.

Flaxseed Crackers (vegetarian, gluten-free, dairy-free, vegan)

Ingredients:

¼ Ground flaxseed meal

1-2 tablespoons Cracked peppercorn oil (cracked peppercorns that have been kept in olive oil for at least 24hrs)

1 cup Whole flax and sesame (or preferred/available) seeds

Aqua faba from 2 cans (liquid from canned chickpeas)

Sundried tomatos, minced/blended

Herbs and spices to taste (in my case, salt, toasted cumin seed, caraway seed, dill seed, fresh rosemary, a dried allium mix, and baby pigweed leaves)

Recipe:

Good news, this is the least labor intensive recipe you'll ever make as long as you have some kind of blender (even those shitty little 1serving smoothie blenders) and any convection oven (counter or whole appliance), but you could probably pull it off on a hotplate and pan if needed.

Preheat a convection oven to 350°F (if using a toaster oven, set to medium-high, if cooking in a pan, use 300°F or medium or 4-5 on the dial)

Crack open your canned chickpeas (if you don't have a Thing you're doing with them, you can just dump it in chickpeas and all, but I'm also making soup) and pour the liquid into your blender. Add no more than a cup of sundried tomatoes (i get them in 1lb vavuum sealed plastic bags and just gradually use em up lmao, but if you grow or have tomatoes you can make your own, or substitute with tomato paste and a little veggie bouillon - this is esp useful if you lack a blender), and blend until chopped or paste as you prefer.

In a container, mix the blended ingredients with your peppercorn oil, flaxseed meal, and whole seeds into a fun and gross lump of seed paste. Smash that bad boy onto a solid, flat surface (things like wax paper or tinfoil are a big help, but you can also use ziplock bags to smash out your cracker forms by putting a small amount inside, sealing without any air, and smoothing into a flat layer) and roll/smoosh it out.

Go ahead and lay your seed paste sheet on it's baking surface (tinfoil in a toaster, oven rack/cookie sheet, whatever) and cook for 15-20 min or until you can crack em apart real snappy like. Check on them at the 10 and 15min mark to confirm your cook time time.

Once cooked, let them cool, and then have fun shattering and crunching your sheets up into wretched little crackers.

If you're me, dump them into soup or hummus or something else savory

Creamy wild rice soup (vegetarian, vegan, dairy-free, gluten free)

Ingredients:

3 cups Chickpeas (2 cans)

2 tablespoons Tahini sauce

½ cup cracked peppercorn oil x2

¼ cup veggie bouillon

2 large onions (I use yellow and red, but it's up to you)

1 whole bulb of garlic (peeled/depapered)

2 cups garden greens (in my case, young pigweed leaves, beet leaves, parsley, and turnip greens, but you can use and leafy green you like)

1 cup wild rice

1 cup of your preferred soft bean (I like white beans like navy or cranberry, but I've had good luck with large pink beans in the past too)

Herbs and spices to taste (I'll be using fennel seed, cumin seed, caraway seed, cardamom, chili flakes, nasturtium seed, and sesame seeds)

8-10 cups boiling water

Recipe

This is a great one pot soup if you have a blender, and fairly low intensity, but you'll need a decent blender to get it creamy. The good news is that the unblended non-crey version is still delicious! So if you don't want to (or can't) worry about using a blender, you don't have to! That makes it useful for cooking up all in one big bowl in the microwave, all in one large pot on the stovetop/hotplate, or in a large oven safe crockpot, whichever works best for you.

Peel and quarter your onions, and peel your garlic cloves, then toss them all along with your spices (save any dried or fresh herbs for the next stage) into the cooking container with ½ cup oil x1. I'll be making mine in an oven safe crock, so see alterations/substitutions below.

Preheat your oven to 350°F, and let your oil, allium, and spice mix (covered) heat to temp along with the oven, then roast for 5-10min or until aromatic before removing your crockpot and keeping the oven at temp.

Add your chickpeas, bouillon, your other half cup of oil, water, beans, no less than ½ tablespoon salt, tahini, and greens/herbs to the crock at this point. If you plan to make creamy soup, DO NOT ADD the wild rice now. If you aren't worrying about that, go right ahead and add the rice now so you'll have less cook time. Return to the oven and let roast uncovered for 90-120 minutes.

If you're not worrying about that, congratulations! Your soup is just done now.

If you are making creamy soup, remove when beans are tender, blend until smooth (add more oil as necessary for consistency), and then add the wild rice and return to the oven for another 45-60min. Then your soup is done!

Go forth and consume lots of nutrition in a package that doesn't suck.

[cantsayidont]

Horror haterating hollerating:

EATING MISS CAMPBELL (2022): Scattershot, self-consciously edgy Troma pastiche/parody of HEATHERS, JAWBREAKER, and GINGER SNAPS, about a sardonic, fourth-wall-breaking Goth British vegan lesbian teen (Lyndsey Craine), whose attraction to her new American English teacher (Lala Barlow) coincides with her discovery of a powerful appetite for human flesh, and with a deranged new high school contest whose winner will receive a handgun and the opportunity to turn it on either their classmates or themselves. One of those comedies that's so determined to offend that the best response is to just roll your eyes, it would probably work better if it were at least a little bit coherent and less cluttered with unfunny private jokes. Nonetheless, Craine's bitchy snark is kind of fun, and the script takes potshots at so many satiric targets that it does occasionally hit one or two. CONTAINS LESBIANS? The protagonist and the titular Miss Campbell are both gay, but note that the double entendre title is meant very literally in both senses. VERDICT: Depending on your tolerance for sophomoric edgelord bullshit and jokes about school shootings, CSA, and teen suicide (not to mention the cannibalism!), you might find this either mildly amusing or the worst thing you've ever seen; fans of the CHUCKY show may appreciate its brand of glib, self-aware ghoulishness.

VENUS (2022): Occasionally creepy but ultimately rather routine horror movie about a nightclub dancer named Lucía (Ester Expósito), who seeks refuge with her estranged sister Rocío (Ángela Cremonte) after stealing a bag of drugs from her employers and ends up acting in loco parentis for her young niece Alba (Inés Fernández) after Rocío unexpectedly flees in terror of an old woman downstairs (Magüi Mira), who Alba says has the power to enter other people's dreams. Allegedly based on the H.P. Lovecraft story "The Dreams in the Witch House" (WEIRD TALES, July 1933), although the resemblance is very slight, the story's gradual segue from gritty drama to horror is interesting, but the disparate pieces never quite gel and the eventual explanation of what's going on is ho-hum. Expósito is very good at this sort of thing, and she has a nice rapport with Fernández — excellent as a little girl who doesn't yet understand when she should be afraid — but the supernatural elements never attain a really Lovecraftian sense of dread, and pale next to grislier but more mundane moments like a memorably gruesome scene where Lucía tries to patch herself up after being stabbed. CONTAINS LESBIANS? No. VERDICT: Not bad of its type, but it could have used more Lovecraft and less ROSEMARY'S BABY.