It's Easy... In Some Places

I'm home for Christmas, for a month, meaning that I have flown back to Utah to spend time with my parents, siblings, and nieces and nephews as well as my Utah friends. It is back to Mormonville, and more than one kind of culture shock. I almost wish I had a photo of the massive table covered in dutch-oven-cooked meat at the ward Christmas dinner last night.

I came with more confidence this time, considering that I actually know how to make some good food rather than subsisting mainly on homemade burritos, Amy's microwavable burritos and enchiladas, spaghetti, fruit smoothies, cheerios with soymilk, and sandwiches with Vegenaise. Not that those things aren't good, but they're hardly the way to impress upon one's loved ones that Vegan eating is full of exciting variety and homemade deliciousness.

My first impression after coming back was... man, I really took Bellingham for granted. You can get any ingredient you want at either the co-op, the asian store, or Trader Joe's or Haggen or something. The point is, if you want it, you can find it, and it will usually be good, and fresh, and maybe even local. But here, it's just not like that...you can't find some things anywhere. My sister Faith said she couldn't get fresh lemongrass or kaffir lime anywhere when she wanted to make good Thai food... she had to buy them on the internet. Now, that's definitely one option... I will have to start looking into that if certain missing things start to be essential.Thank goodness for the internet (without it, I would not know how to cook...). I am also wondering if there is anywhere within reasonable distance which might sell nutritional yeast. I'm thinking probably not... it's kind of an obscure thing.

So my main option right now is to try and adapt to my surroundings and make whatever recipes don't call for really exotic ingredients. Luckily that probably won't be too much of a problem... and we have an abundance of spices in our spice cabinet, which is great too. I did buy some turmeric and cumin though since Dad thought we probably didn't have any (we didn't).

Today was encouraging though... I decided to just make the usual Me-and-Danielle sized portion of the Creamy Lentil Soup (Dal Shorva) and let everybody have a little bit just to see if they liked it. Everybody did, although my youngest sister who is notoriously picky didn't like the onion topping or the cilantro. But the fact she liked the soup at all was amazing since she doesn't like tomatoes... she may not have realized there were any in there though, hahaha.

So I will be making that again sometime soon, in a larger quantity.

Next on the list... well... I have to go shopping. I am missing some important stuff which would be necessary to make the 10-ish recipes I have listed so far... I need to buy a ton of fresh garlic, some lemons and limes, CASHEWS, coconut milk, lots of LEEK, coriander, bread I can eat, some cooking sherry or wine, some sweet potatoes, possibly some squash, and vanilla extract... and couscous and fresh mint because me and Faith might make Tabbouleh... and more I'm sure if I actually look at the specific recipes I picked out...

To end I'd just like to say I've already been humbled in a few different ways.

One is... okay, for those of us who don't live in a super awesome granola-y town, being vegan, or just eating healthy in general, is not as easy. My hat is off to you... your job is harder than mine.

Secondly, it is definitely more difficult to feed a large family, especially when everybody has different likes and dislikes. I am amazed at how well my mom has managed to do it over the years. Somehow the thought of making a meal for a busy family is much more intimidating than making a meal to share with a busy fellow college student.