Another dog food recipe, again suitable both for dog-kids and their human parents. My husband loves this dish (even with the watered-down tahini dressing) – and I love how the dishwasher smells when filled with tahini-soaked dishes. Win!

Tahini Tofu Salad (for dogs & their people)

Ingredients

For the salad:

1 16 ounce bag of dried navy beans OR 6 cups cooked navy beans OR 3 pounds cooked navy beans OR 4 16 ounce cans of navy beans
4 bricks of tofu
2 cups mixed vegetables (I used frozen carrots, corn, green beans and peas)
2 cups broccoli
2 cups unsalted peanuts
1 cup raw sunflower seeds

For the tahini dressing:

1 cup tahini
1 cup apple cider vinegar
2 tablespoons lemon juice
6 cloves garlic
4 tablespoons dried parsley
1 tablespoon sugar
1 cup oil
2 cups water

(Adapted from Tahini “Goddess” Dressing at About.com.)

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Back in June, I raved about Green Porno, a subversive (and delightfully cheesy!) documentary series starring Isabella Rossellini (whom I’ve had a massive girl-crush on ever since her turn as Katya Derevko in Alias). Green Porno examines the sex lives of nonhuman animals – which, oftentimes, are far from “conventional.” To this end, the show has great potential to change how humans view “others”: women, homosexuals, transgendered persons, gender nonconformists – and even nonhuman animals.

To this, I’d like to add that, in addition to their anti-sexist, anti-homophobic, anti-transphobic, anti-anti-sex thrust (pun most definitely intended), these shows are anti-speciesist as well.

While [the] disavowal of animal homosexuality and sexual variety serves to justify and reinforce “isms” directed at humans (homophobia, transphobia, misogyny, etc.), it at also functions at another level. In denying non-human animals the full range of their behavioral, emotional and sexual expression, we rob them of their complexity, their personality – for lack of a better term, their humanity.

Like us, non-human animals can be complicated creatures, driven by a range of goals and desires. Animals, humans included, aren’t just about reproduction; our sole purpose in life isn’t simply to spread our DNA and produce as much offspring as possible. Sometimes we have sex, mate and form bonds because it’s fulfilling in other ways. Nor do we only nurture and protect our own genetic material: sometimes we act with altruism and compassion rather than selfishness and narcissism.

By insisting that animals only copulate in order to introduce sperm to egg, we simplify trillions of sentient beings, taking from them characteristics which make them seem that much more human.

Ironically, in so doing, we also reduce the human species to a caricature, a boring, two-dimensional model which scarcely resembles h. spaiens, in all its diverse, eccentric, animalistic magnificence.

Watching animal sex play out amidst kindergarten construction paper cutouts and human-sized bodysuits, the viewer (hopefully) comes to see nonhumans as the unique individuals they really are. When one ceases to regard a group of beings as a single, undifferentiated mass of “stuff,” othering them – based on species, sex, sexuality, race, breed or whatnot – becomes a difficult, twisted task indeed.

Season 1 focused on bugs (spiders, flies, earthworms), Season 2 on ocean dwellers (barnacles, whales, starfish). Both Wiki and I had thought Season 3 would shift focus to farmed animals such as pigs and cows, but it looks Season 3 will continue to examine marine animals. In a subtle shift from Season 2, however, Rossellini’s attention turns to ocean dwellers whom we commonly kill and eat (and oftentimes “farm” as well).

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A while back, I purchased a few boxes/bags each of the Sweet & Sara and Dandies vegan marshmallows, with plans to pit them against one another in a vegan marshmallow cage match. True to form, though, I’ve proven agave nectar-slow to testing them under similar circumstances. Since I’ve already shared my marshmallow-laden Chocolate Coffee Marshmallow Swirl recipe, though, I think the time has come (and nearly gone), preparedness be damned.

v.

Aesthetics

Whereas the pillowy shape of Dandies resembles that of traditional, gelatin-based marshmallows, Sweet & Saras are square, squat and dense.

Winner: Dandies are cuter, but I’m loathe to endorse lookism. Tie.

Flavors

Sweet & Saras come in three flavors: vanilla, vanilla coated in toasted coconut flakes, and strawberry. In addition to marshmallows, the company also sells S’Mores (both “plain” and peanut butter flavored) and Rocky Road bark. I can vouch for the yumminess of all, save for the strawberry marshmallows, which were not available when I placed an order.

Dandies are, as of this writing, only available in one flavor: vanilla. Give ‘em time, though, they’re still noobs.

Winner: The point goes to Sweet & Sara for creativity.

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At summer’s start, I picked up a copy of Wheeler del Torro’s The Vegan Scoop to go with the shiny new ice cream maker my mother had gifted me for FSMas. Though it’s been nearly four months, I’ve only tried a handful of recipes. Blame a freezer full of the store-bought stuff, along with plenty of free, searchable recipes from A Vegan Ice Cream Paradise! Probably I won’t get around to reviewing the book until next year, but unless every recipe I have yet to try turns out to be dreadful (an unlikely possibility), I foresee a five-star review and enthusiastic (read: borderline orgasmic) recommendation. Seriously, if you have an ice cream machine, you need this book.

Since acquiring an ice cream machine and discovering Sweet & Sara and Dandies vegan marshmallows, I’ve been itching to try a homemade version of Tofutti’s Coffee Marshmallow Swirl. As long as I’ve been eating vegan ice cream – and, given that I have a lifelong milk allergy, my love affair with vegan ice cream stretches back to the early ’80s – Tofutti Coffee Marshmallow Swirl has been my absolute fave. Unfortunately, with the advent of all these newfangled gourmet vegan gourmet brands, Tofutti has all but disappeared from the shelves. Bye, bye Coffee Marshmallow and Chocolate Almond (but hello, Blueberry Cheesecake and Cookie Dough!).

So I was a wee bit disappointed to discover that The Vegan Scoop does not include a Coffee Marshmallow recipe. It does, however, have a recipe for Coffee ice cream (page 58). Using this recipe as a starting point, I created my own special blend, Chocolate Coffee Marshmallow Swirl. Unlike the inspiration Tofutti flavor, my creation includes chocolate; what can I say, I just couldn’t resist! The coffee and chocolate compete with one another a bit, so I added a little extra coffee to balance out the chocolate; as a result, the flavor is very intense and rich. If you’d like something more subtle – or closer to Tofutti’s Coffee Marshmallow Swirl – I’ve included a few variations below.

Most, if not all, of the ice cream recipes in The Vegan Scoop use a 1 part-to-2 parts combination of soy milk and soy creamer (though del Torro encourages readers to experiment with different non-dairy milks and creamers, such as almond and coconut), along with arrowroot as a thickening agent. This is similar to the base found in many of the recipes at A Vegan Ice Cream Paradise. Once you’ve got a nicely working base recipe down, it’s easier to experiment with flavors and such. Use the basics below to develop your own unique vegan ice cream blend!

Chocolate Coffee Marshmallow Swirl

Ingredients

1 cup chocolate chips
10 Sweet & Sara’s marshmallows (or 13 Dandies)
1 cup soy milk (plain or vanilla), divided (see below)
2 cups soy creamer (plain or vanilla)
2 tablespoons arrowroot powder
3/4 cup fresh, strong coffee (instant is fine)
1/2 cup sugar
1 tablespoon vanilla extract

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FYI: the polls are open on Technorati’s State of the Blogosphere Survey!

Over the years, Technorati has been tracking the State of the Blogosphere. Our annual study investigates how blogging is growing and changing, as well as its impacts on current events and the bottom lines of businesses and bloggers. Please share your perspective by participating in our survey.

We think you’ll find the survey interesting. It should take just 15 minutes of your time, and of course your answers will be completely confidential. Please feel free to send this link to other bloggers you know. And be sure to check back on Technorati in October for a summary of the results.

Please take a minute – okay, ten or fifteen – to complete the survey. Vegan bloggers represent!

Also, Molly of It’s A Vegan Dog’s Life has launched a sister blog, It’s A Vegan Dog’s World, in order to

show others that it’s possible for dogs to live happy, healthy vegan lives while giving your dog a chance to be in the spotlight.

If you know a vegan dog, share your friend’s story here.

Action Alerts: Animal & Environmental Advocacy

Campaign for America’s Wilderness: Ask Sec. Vilsack to Uphold Roadless Rule

Center for Biological Diversity: Tell the Bureau of Land Management: No More Coal

DawnWatch: “Killing Wolves for Fun” — fun NY Times columns 9/9/09

DawnWatch: Wolves, elephants and glorious dolphin news 9/4/09

Defenders of Wildlife: Help Save Sea Otters and Other Wildlife from Dirty Drilling

Dogs Deserve Better (DDB): Finally! A Chained Dog Abuse Case in Pennsylvania Goes as it Should when Dogs Deserve Better and Pennsylvania SPCA Team Up to Save Four Neglected Chained and Penned Dogs near Tyrone, PA

Dogs Deserve Better (DDB): Billboard Campaign

Earthjustice: No Drilling in America’s Arctic!

Ecological Internet / The Rainforest Portal: Questioning World Bank Palm Oil Funding and Forest Carbon Finance in Indonesia

Ecological Internet / The Rainforest Portal: Join Borneo’s Penan Indigenous Peoples in Standing up to Malaysian Rainforest Destruction

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I’ve been too busy to so much as think about blogging lately, but I have been cooking up a storm. Here’s a dish I made for the dogs a few weeks back: rice, beans and veggies with a cheezy sauce, adapted from a recipe at the PPK. Yummy for dogs and their peoples! (The Mr. was seriously jealous, I tell you what.)

I’m trying to get more creative with the recipes I make for the dog-kids. It’s fun, low stress, and I know they’ll love whatever I come up with. Fussy, they’re not. Appreciative, you betcha. Anyhow, look for more “dog food” recipes in the future.

FYI: I tend to make the dogs’ dishes with a lot of extra gravy/sauce/dressing/whathaveyou. I mix their homemade food with kibble about 50/50, and a near-soup like consistency in the homemade food helps to counterbalance the dry store-bought stuff, resulting in five very happy dogs. Adjust the sauce serving size accordingly!

Rice & Beans with Cheezy Sauce (for dogs & their people)

Ingredients

2 16 ounce bags of dried beans OR 12 cups cooked beans OR 6 pounds cooked beans OR 8 16 ounce cans of beans (I used dried red beans)
1 cups uncooked brown rice
4 cups vegetables (I used broccoli); optional

For the cheezy sauce:

6 cups water
2 cups nutritional yeast
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 teaspoon cumin

(Adapted from Vegan Cheese Sauce at the PPK.)

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Much like The Colbert Report, I’m beginning to suspect that there’s an animal sympathizer working for The Onion. (See, for example, Exhibits A, B and C.)

In this piece of bizarre hilarity, the talking heads at The Onion explore whether nonhuman animals are doing enough in the fight for animal rights:
 

 
While most of this is an over-the-top caricature of the misconceptions people have about the animal rights movement, I think The Onion is spot-on when they suggest that we should drop certain “problem animals” if we’re to ever secure rights for nonhuman animals. Might I suggest the entire corporate cadre of PETA in place of the noble water buffalo? I doubt that the latter would ever be so insensitive as to don a white hood and parade around the streets of NYC or mock women for their eating disorders. Just a thought.

By the way, I apologize if this video is old hat; I stumbled upon it while clicking through to “Facebook, Twitter Revolutionizing How Parents Stalk Their College-Aged Kids” from “Next Tarantino Movie An Homage To Beloved Tarantino Movies Of Director’s Youth.” Next up: “Ex-Pedophile Shares Tips On How To Make Your Kids Less Attractive.” Labor Day: not so laborious.

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I haven’t been able to find this alert on IDA’s website in order to link to it, and seeing as the deadline for taking action is this Wednesday, September 9, I’ve copied it below in its entirety.

For more on the case, search for “Dennis Zeglin” on Google news or at www.pet-abuse.com.

In particular, I find this snippet from the Bleacher Report extremely disturbing:

Mikey the parrot was instead autopsied by a local veterinarian. His owner was then charged with several counts of animal cruelty.

Since the filing of the charges, Zeglin has gone into counseling for his drinking problem. His attorney has also applied for Morris County’s Pre-Trial Intervention Program, which offers probation for first time offenders.

Zeglin is due back in court on Sept. 9.

Until that time, the local police have advised him that the next time another family pet, like his Labrador Retriever, or a family member bothers him during a NASCAR race, he should call animal control or the police instead of reaching again for his BB gun.

After brutally slaughtering the family’s “pet” bird, the local authorities left another “pet,” a dog, in Zeglin’s care, with advice to “call animal control” the next time he’s drinking, angry, and in possession of firearms. Jeez, officers, you’re beginning to make me feel as though you don’t take animal abuse seriously. I mean, WTF!?

While it’s great that Zeglin has sought counseling for alcoholism, animal abuse should preclude him from “owning” nonhuman animals, at least in the near future. Should Zeglin relapse, who will bear the brunt of his rage the next time around?

Zeglin, by the by, is from Morris County, New Jersey; methinks the local police need to be schooled about animal abuse as well.

———- Forwarded message ———-
From: In Defense of Animals – idainfo [at] idausa.org
Date: Fri, Sep 4, 2009 at 1:16 PM
Subject: Man Shoots and Kills Companion Parrot – Your Calls Needed!

YOUR CALLS ARE URGENTLY NEEDED or Mikey’s cruel killer may get away with murder!

While Watching TV, New Jersey Man Shoots and Kills Companion Parrot.

Terrified Mikey who was isolated in a cage and had no way to escape, was Zeglin’s innocent target.

On June 7th 2009, 67 year old Dennis Zeglin brutally shot and killed his family’s African Grey parrot with a Daisy Powerline Model 93 C02-powered BB gun. His wife called police and animal control officers were summoned to investigate.

Dennis Zeglin admitted to animal control officers that he shot Mikey in his cage because the bird “irritated” him while he was watching the NASCAR races on TV. According to reports, Zeglin had been drinking and was intoxicated when he fired the three shots that killed Mikey. Since the animal cruelty charges were filed, Zeglin has been undergoing counseling for his alcoholism according to Zeglin’s Defense Attorney, Stephen Fletcher. Fletcher also claims that Zeglin is a first time offender and has applied for an Intervention Probationary Program. This may suggest that Mikey’s cruel assailant may get nothing more than a slap on the wrist for brutally murdering an innocent, and highly intelligent creature.

Undisputed, scientifically proven evidence supports the link between violence to humans and violence to animals and we believe that Zeglin’s violent act could have easily been directed toward a human family member or their family dog.

Every year millions of captive birds suffer from abuse and neglect like Mikey. It is estimated that the majority of captive birds suffer and die prematurely, secretly and silently behind closed doors, from horrendous abuse, malnutrition, and starvation, and live in deplorable conditions, with no hope for rescue. It is also estimated that the majority of captive birds who do survive, suffer an entire lifetime of agony and loneliness.

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I’m a little late in forwarding this alert from Kinship Circle, and in the interim, there’s been a development in the case. Not surprisingly, it hasn’t resulted in justice for the animals killed by veterinarian Marcy Miranov (and Dr. John Edwards, as well).

Reports The Times-Picayune:

Raw emotions and poor record-keeping triggered whirling accusations of animal cruelty at Jefferson Parish’s animal shelters, according to the results of an independent study released today.

But no laws were broken when 51 cats and dogs were euthanized on Aug. 13 at the parish’s Elmwood facility, the Louisiana Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals discovered. [...]

“Our report is not a glowing report about what’s going on in interoperation,” said Ana Zorrilla, chief executive officer of the state SPCA. “We certainly hope that it’s well received and we certainly hope that the public reads parts and pieces of it, that it’s really seen as an opportunity to improve those operations, not just as criticism or critique of what’s been going on there.”

The SPCA’s representatives worked in an atmosphere already emotionally charged by the abrupt resignation of the shelters’ director, Lee Ann Matherne. She quit the day before the animals were put down.

The most glaring problem appeared to be shoddy record-keeping and lackluster policy management, Zorrilla said. The shelters have four different written policies governing euthanasia. Each one says a different set of people need to approve each procedure.

As far as the SPCA could tell, none of them were being followed. But since none were being implemented, no policies were broken, Zorrilla said.

The SPCA report, however, dispelled several rumors that arose from that incident. Dr. Marci Miranov, the parish’s senior veterinarian in Marrero, had clearance to work at the Elmwood shelter, Zorrilla said. Her colleague, Dr. John Edwards, did not stop her from euthanizing the animals on Aug. 13, as some animal activists suspected. Rather, he assisted her in her work.

The cats put down that day had been sedated, Zorrilla said, contrary to reports that Miranov was lethally injecting the animals without killing the pain first.

The report also found the number of animals put down that day were average. Euthanasia sessions don’t occur daily, which accounts for larger numbers when one is conducted, officials said.

Zorrilla did say that the SPCA found that some of the animals killed that day were adoptable.

“Some were sick, some were feral, but some were strictly space conditions,” she said.

Parish President Aaron Broussard said he would be asking the Parish Council to enact several ordinances Wednesday that would go a long way to cleaning up the poor conditions at the shelters. Broussard has asked that the parish hire the American SPCA to take over the shelters for 90 days, that his administration begin searching for an outside group that could permanently run the facilities and that he enter negotiations to transfer the Marrero shelter to a new site – a former West Jefferson Medical Center clinic near the Oakwood Mall.

(Background here.)

If you choose to act on this alert, please take the SPCA’s findings and recommendations into account. In addition to turning control of the parish shelters over to an outside organization, please urge Jefferson Parish to work in concert with local animal rescue organizations in order to make NOLA a no-kill city. By “no-kill,” I mean truly no-kill – this goes for “feral” and “less adoptable” cats and dogs, too. While shelters may not have the time or resources to rehab animals with medical or behavioral problems, some rescue groups do; some even specialize in these cases.

Whether any human law was violated or not, this slaughter needn’t have happened. Judging from ARNO’s comments, little-to-no effort was made to place these animals in rescue groups prior to killing them – and this is simply unacceptable.

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Here’s the latest on SHARK’s ongoing campaign against Cheyenne Frontier Days Rodeo. You can find out more on the group’s website (a search for “Cheyenne Frontier Days” turns up 190 results, so grab a cup of tea and some cruelty-free patries before digging in) and view SHARK’s investigative footage on its YouTube channel.

The Chief is Leaving, But Let’s Keep Investigation Going

As you will recall, earlier this month, I contacted Cheyenne Police Chief Robert Fecht and requested an investigation of Cheyenne Frontier Days Rodeo for criminal neglect. SHARK’s documentation shows dozens of animals injured, while CFD claims only seven received care. See the first two of four videos showing many of the animal injuries.

2009 Cheyenne Animal Injuries, Part 1:
 

 
2009 Cheyenne Animal Injuries, Part 2:
 

 
This is in stark contrast to what is stated on CFD’s website about their care for the animals in the rodeo:

We recognize that animals, as well as humans, may be injured in these events. Any injured animal is accorded immediate veterinary medical attention, and is isolated from further harm. Every attempt is made to make injured animals comfortable, and offer them opportunity to recover. Injured animals are not used again.

Read the entire “Animal Care” statement here.

While Chief Fecht has been investigating the matter, he is retiring and his last day is today. It is now up to the Mayor of Cheyenne, Mayor Rick Kaysen and the acting Chief of Police Jeff Schulz to continue this investigation.

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