A Vegan Crunk tester, and activists vs. mall cops!

Oh man, is it a sweet deal to be a recipe tester! The pickin's are pretty slim for cajun and southern foods, let alone vegan-style, here in Portland. So it was quite a treat to have tempeh gumbo for dinner last night! Nice job, Bianca!

Tempeh Gumbo and whole wheat french bread

Newsflash!

Remember a few months ago when the Radical Cheerleaders for Animal Rights were cheering about puppy mills in front of Scamp's in Lloyd Center? And as they were leaving a fellow activist was thrown to the ground and arrested? Well, Lloyd Center has dropped it's charges against Matt Rossell and lifted his 4 year ban from the premises in exchange for his promise not to sue. But there's an even bigger victory! Scamp's has closed all of it's doors! Check out this write-up in the Oregonian http://www.oregonlive.com/news/index.ssf/2009/08/animal_rights_protester_makes.html

Creamy corn chowder

I had a major craving for some corn chowder yesterday, and after sadly discovering that I was missing like 5 ingredients for the VWAV version, I decided to scour the internets for another one. Behold! I found a recipe for Creamy Vegan Corn Chowder on Allrecipes, and I had ALL of the ingredients! Woohoo! This chowdah was super tasty, and was even better the next day! It didn't seem to be thickening up as much as it should, so I doubled the flour, and of course I used a lot more herbs and a lot of extra garlic :) This was a really satisfying winter-time dinner served with whole wheat garlic bread.

Radical Cheerleaders for AR News!

If you're in Portland, you know you want to come kick it with me and the rest of the squad at this badass fundraiser! See you there!

I've always wanted an afro wig...

Zippin' around in my Zipcar

Have you heard of Zipcar? It's a pay by the hour car sharing service, and I'm kinda in love with it. I haven't had a car in years (I had a car for a year when I was 18), and while I can walk, bike, or take public transportation pretty much anywhere I need to go, there are some places I just don't make it out to. Like Bagby Hot Springs, one of my favorite places in the world. Or my friend's Asian grocery store in Hillsboro. Or New Seasons. I've been putting it off for a long time (I was worried it would cost too much), but I finally got around to getting a Zipcar membership last month! My plan is to only let myself use it twice a month, so it won't really affect my monthly budget, and so far I've used the pickup parked .19 miles from me to pick up a cat tree, and used the hybrid .17 miles from me to pick up Jesse from work and get some takeout way out on 82nd (more on that later). I rarely get to drive, so I always get a little excited when I get the chance. Driving the pickup wasn't too exciting other than being up high off the ground and having a sweet sound system, but driving the hybrid was AWESOME! It makes no noise when you start it, and everything lights up in this badass neon blue, and I just totally felt like I was driving a race car even though I wasn't speeding at all!

Yeah, I'm all that.

So, I saw a post on the PPK about the outer SE vegan Vietnamese restaurant Nhut Quang, and that the business had really slowed and they need some love from the Portland vegan community. It's located on 82nd (one of those far-away places I never make it out to), so I decided to get a Zipcar and go get some takeout. After driving around the block only one time, we found it! We were all excited until we noticed the closed sign in the window. It was 6:30 on Sunday, and they're supposed to be open until 8:00. Of course Jesse started laughing at my lack of planning skills (I did only look up hours on the internet and didn't call), until I told him to take the bus home if he was gonna be mean! haha Then I remembered that there's another veg Vietnamese place up 82nd and Division I've been wanting to try, so we headed over there. After driving around in circles for like 15 minutes and almost giving up, I finally spied it on 84th and Division. Woohoo!

Van Hahn is a tiny little restaurant operated by Buddhist nuns. As such, the service is slow (it took 10 minutes for someone to come out of the back and give us menus), but the food is cheap and tasty! We ordered steam buns, dumplings, spare ribs, yellow noodles with tofu, and the broccoli combo (comes with an assortment of fake meats). Honestly, we both agreed that next time we'll just order a ton of dumplings and steam buns because they were the tastiest by far! Everything else was good, just not great. Jesse really liked the fake beef, though.

the tasties before plates

close up of the entrees

In other news, there is now a Radical Cheerleaders for Animal Rights blog! We just started it so there isn't much there, but check it out and subscribe to it! We'll post events coming up, and photos of old events, and keep you in the loop on all things radical and AR in Ptown. Woot!

A very tasty Thanksgiving

So, I didn't end up making those cookies... I got lazy and roasted my veggies in the morning instead of the night before so the oven would be free for baking - but that was ok! I still had plenty to eat!

Field Roast, mashed taters and mushroom gravy, stuffing, roasted veggies, candied yams, dinneroll with jam, and there was pumpkin pie on the other plate :)

The next day I woke up bright and early for Fur Free Friday! It's a worldwide event, and the march here in Portland attracted around 200 people! We had a bloody fashion show, lots of Radical Cheerleading, a march route that stopped at places that sell fur as well as a few places that have stopped (!), cake at the end, and then a smaller group of us went to do a demo at Ungar Furs (the last exclusive fur store in Portland).

Some of the crowd

Radical Cheerleaders for AR (that's me on the left)

Two of the fur hags and me in the middle

Good job, Portland!

March for Farm Animals!

This morning the Radical Cheerleaders for AR performed and kept everybody cheering and chanting during the annual March for Farm Animals! It was really fun and there was a great turnout - I'd guess 75-100 people marching. Yay for Farm Sanctuary! Marching is always a fun change of pace for us because we get to do different cheers than usual (more chanty than movementy), like this one:
One and one, we're havin' some fun
and march on, all day and all of the night
Two and two, we wear vegan shoes
and march on, all day and all of the night
Three and three, eat at Sweetpea
and march on, all day and all of the night
Four and four, kick cruelty out the door
and march on, all day and all of the night
Five and five, shop at Food Fight
and march on, all day and all of the night
Six and six, eat carrot sticks
and march on, all day and all of the night
Seven and seven, vegans go to heaven
and march on, all day and all of the night
Eight and eight, LIBERATE!
and march on, all day and all of the night
Nine and nine, vegans are fine
and march on, all day and all of the night
Ten and ten, never eat meat again!
and march on, all day and all of the night!

Woo! I didn't get many pictures because I was busy jumping around and cheering and all, but here's two. I didn't get one of myself!

2 cheerleaders and a bunch of marchers

Cheerleaders in between chants...
and lots more marchers behind!

And here's my dinner...

Edited Oct. 27 - I found a bunch of pics online of the march that were just uploaded, here's a couple :)

"My name is Vavoom, and you know what I got?"

The whole group - 120 strong!

"I'm too sexy to eat meat, too sexy to eat meat, so sexy and sweet!
I'm too sexy to wear fur, too sexy to wear fur, rather go naked - brrr!
"Well I'm a cheerleader, green vegan machine! And I'll fight for animal liberation!"

So many signs!