Dogblogging by DocDufresne

This weekend was pretty fun. Saturday was beautiful and Sunday was um...well, an opportunity to cook dinner while Amanda was attending the annual Cares4Pets board meeting. We took Emerson to Laurel Hill cemetery on Saturday to take some pictures. Andy loves the cemetery also, but taking them both at once doesn't leave any free hands for pictures, so we left Andy to defend the apartment from the mail person.

Emerson playing with his mommy.

I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.

Tonight I made the Hearts of Palm Moqueca from Horizons: New Vegan Cuisine, a birthday gift for Amanda from Ladybeth. Delish! The recipe, like others from the book, is relatively simple, which makes it perfect for me. I highly recommend the book, as well as eating at the restaurant in Philadelphia.

Laundry Detergent: make your own & more than you ever needed to know on the subject

Vegan Homemade Laundry Detergent

Well folks, I've decided to delve into the art of laundry soap making. I've done quite a bit of research to find out about cruelty-free and environmentally-friendly products. It sure helps to have a "chemically knowledgeable" consultant at home. No, I don't mean Emerson.

Here's the scoop:


No, really, here's the scoop:
If you've been thinking about making your own laundry detergent to save money, limit the chemicals you use, and/or save the environment, hopefully this'll help. I calculated that you can spend less than $0.06 per load of laundry and depending on how many loads of laundry you do in your home and how much you usually spend on detergent, save roughly 20 bucks a year. (That was my guesstimate for a family of four, doing an average of three loads per week.)

What you need:
Sodium carbonate (soda ash)
Borax
Bar Soap
Hand grater


The vegan way (about the ingredients):

Sun Oxygen Cleaner= sodium carbonate (soda ash)
I spent the most time researching this product. Straight up soda ash is easy to find, if you don't mind purchasing from Arm and Hammer...I do. I checked a few other options including purchasing it online, but decided against it when shipping charges were factored in. DocDufresne found a brand, Jacquard, sold at craft stores used for tie-dying. I thought this could be a good route. A small company; probably doesn't test, right? Wrong! Then I started thinking about things that contain sodium carbonate, like Oxiclean. When owned only be Orange Glo, Oxiclean was not tested on animals. Now it's owned by Church and Dwight and if it isn't tested on animals, I didn't find a label. Then I stumbled upon Sun Products and oh my goodness, yay! This entire company is cruelty-free!!! And guess what? If after this blog post you're not motivated to save money by making your own laundry detergent, that's okay! Sun Products include All, Snuggle, Wisk, and more! Doc checked the ingredients in All for eco-friendliness and while many of them are vague, he said there wasn't anything that alarmed him. Sun is super cheap and apparently is effective.

Borax
20-Mule Team Borax is a natural product that has been around for over 100 years. The company did not test on animals. However, it is now owned by the Dial Corporation, which does. I contemplated over the Borax issue. Basically, I came up with the following argument, which leaves me settled, but I certainly would prefer supporting a completely animal-friendly company. I likened purchasing a cruelty-free product (i.e. one not tested on animals) from a company that has purchased the product and DOES test to ordering a vegan meal from a restaurant that serves meat. Number one: It's not totally feasible to eat ONLY at vegan restaurants. Number two: Perhaps you're promoting the company's usage of vegan options and are therefore influencing their product focus.

With that being said, Tom's of Maine Toothpaste? Love the stuff. The company's now owned by Colgate. Do I totally dismiss the product? No, but I don't know when the last time I bought it was. TJ's fennel toothpaste is where it's at anyway.

Chandrika
In my research I found several recipes for laundry soap that mentioned a soap called "Fels Naptha." Further research discovered this soap contains pig fat- yuck! According to this laundry recipe, you can use any bar soap. I think Dr. Bronner's is a fine choice and I'll probably switch up the soaps I use. I actually plan to purchase essential/ fragrance oils to add to my laundry soap, but I thought I would try it with a strong-smelling bar soap first. To me, the way a detergent leaves my clothes smelling is just as important as how well it cleans.

The cost:
$5 (+ $0.40 tax) for 6 lbs of Sun Oxygen Cleaner
$4.34 (on Amazon- I already had some on hand, so I had to look up the $) for 76 oz of 20-Mule Team Borax**
$0.99 for 1 bar Chandrika soap

A container of Sun Oxygen Cleaner will yield approximately 9 cups ($0.60 per cup)
A box of Borax will yield approximately seven cups ($0.62 per cup)

Make a batch of detergent by mixing 1 cup Oxygen Cleaner, 1 cup Borax, and 1 grated bar of soap. This yields about 2.5 cups of laundry detergent. My sources say this should be enough for 36 loads of laundry**.

= 6 cents per load!!!!

The detergent worked really well and my clothes came out smelling fresh and like Chandrika! However, I don't know how worth it it is to make laundry soap myself.

Bottom line: This detergent is great if you can find all these ingredients super cheap, especially the soap. It would also make great gifts since you can customize the scent based on the recipient. I'll probably continue to use it intermittently with others.

**I guess I use A LOT more detergent than others do, but I like the smell to stick to my clothes. I also load the machine up pretty full. I estimate this amount will actually yield 16 extra large loads for me.

I still love Method. I wish their Water Lilly detergent would come back.

I could keep going with this post, but I'll stop here. Questions? I might know the answer. I did A LOT of research.

A Candle Review

Anyone who knows me probably knows how big of a fanatic I am when it comes to good smelling things. Naturally, I love candles. I shouldn't say that. I don't love just any old candles. Recently, I've been doing a bit of research and decided for the most part, I'm going to lay off the parafin stuff. My all time favorite candles are from a local Philadelphia company called Duross and Langel, which you may have heard about here. They make awesome personal care and home products, most of which are vegan. (I have a soap addiction too...)

Today, however, I'd like to talk about a company that I've very recently heard about, thanks to Molly over at It's a Vegan Dog's Life. Her post, aptly named "Soy Candles by Phebes", included info on how to receive a free candle when you order three from this vegan and eco-friendly company. Needless to say, I was pretty excited. I decided to order "Coconut Lime Verbena," "Sunday Morning," "Cranberry Cobbler," and "Christmas Tree." Mike from Soy Candles by Phebes emailed me right away and said that he'd throw in a surprise candle. How awesome! This one was another holiday scent, "Twinkle."

When the package arrived (and boy, did it arrive soon after I placed the order!), I took a big whiff of each candle. Scrumptious!

Right now I have the Coconut Lime Verbena burning and it's a lovely, mild scent. I wouldn't say the entire apartment is awash in the fragrance, but it's doing a great job of filling the living room with the tropical aroma, which is actually quite perfect as DocDufresne and I sit down to watch the last season of Lost on DVD.

Life is good when you have a candle alight and a partner plus two warm pups to cuddle up with.

Sushi Night

It was Sushi Night in our home the other night. I decided it might be a good idea to document the steps involved in making sushi for those of you that might not have tried it. DocDufresne shot the footage.

What you'll need:
Sushi Mat
Large Sharp Knife
Clean Kitchen Cloth (to wipe your knife and hands)

Ingredients:
Rice (you don't really need sushi rice)
Nori
Rice Vinegar
Sugar
Any combination of fillings (veggies, tempeh, pickles...you name it)
Dipping sauce (soy sauce, spicy mayo...)


Step 1: Prepare the rice
Cook a couple of cups of rice, as usual. When most of the water has been absorbed, remove from heat. Add a few splashes of rice vinegar and about 1/2 tbsp sugar. Combine. Refrigerate, covered for at least an hour.

Step 2: Assemble the fillings
Slice veggies and other fillings and have them ready-to-go on your cutting board. In our sushi, we used combinations of carrot, cucumber, avocado, bell pepper, baked tempeh, and pickles (try it, you'll like it!).

Step 3: Toast the nori
If you have a gas stove top, gently toast each nori sheet above the flame.

Step 4: Spread the rice
Place a nori sheet on your sushi mat. Don't use a ton of rice, or other fillings for that matter. Our tendency seems to be to over-fill. Use just enough rice so that you can spread it thinly over 3/4 of the nori sheet.

Step 5: Spread the fillings
Create a line across the rice with your veggies and other fillings. Remember not to go overboard, or it will be difficult to roll. The line should be about 2" from the bottom of the nori sheet.

Step 6: Roll it up
Carefully work the sushi mat and filled nori into a roll. Try to keep it as tight as possible. This takes some practice.

Step 7: Cut the roll
First cut off the edges of the roll. Vegan dogs are happy to assist with the disposal of the ends. If the nori seems too dry or brittle, apply a little bit of water to the roll with your hands. You'll probably need to wipe your knife off with a clean kitchen rag every few cuts.

Step 8 (optional): Top with toasted sesame seeds
Line the bottom of a small bowl with toasted sesame seeds. Dip the sushi segments in.

Step 9: Enjoy!
Enjoy with your favorite soy sauce, wasabi, pickled ginger, or spicy mayo. If you'd like to make spicy mayo, it's very simple! Just mix Vegenaise with hot pepper oil. Oolong is quite a nice accompaniment.

It may be mean to make them pose for these photos, but that's what you've gotta do to get sushi at our place!

Seattlegiving 2009

Last week I returned from a wonderful trip to Seattle, where I met up with friends that I went to school with in Gainesville, FL. We were all part of an animal activist group at UF and have remained good friends since. Three of the group moved to Seattle recently and were gracious enough to take turns hosting the out-of-towners. Thanks, Shivels and A and J! TCat, Ladybeth, Nowheydude, and I traveled from all points in the country for this reunion. What fun!

We ate lots of wonderful vegan food (some of it too exciting to wait and take a photo of!), spent a good deal of time traipsing around Seattle, and best of all: catching up.

GoMaxGo bars are abundant in Seattle. Our first stop the morning after TCat and I arrived was at a UW bookstore that Shivels took us to. Why? GoMaxGo bars, of course! We even waited outside the store for several minutes until they opened! My favorite is the Jokerz (Snickers). TCat (who is well-featured in photos from this trip), poses with our early morning find.

In between thrifting and site seeing, we ate brunch on Day 1 at Silence Heat Nest.

Next stop was the outdoor market in Fremont, which was full of great finds and delicious treats like the truffles found below:

And the site-seeing continues:

TCat with her three (nesting) vintage suitcases acquired at the market.

The troll under the bridge.





No photos of the delicious pizza at Juliano's, but here's one of hemp ice cream at Healeo.

Day 2: Filled with wonderful thrifting, and walking around Seattle, was not picture heavy!

We ate from the superb Vegan Thai buffet at Araya's for lunch. Afterward, TCat and I spontaneously decided to get our noses pierced. (If ever she decides to post her photos from the trip on FB, I'll post some more here!) Dinner was a low-key meal at A and J's.
Day 3: "Tuna melt" at Cyberdogs

A brussel sprout-loving iguana spotted at Pike Place Market

Shots from inside the AWESOME main library.


Dinner at Teapot was meh. Apparently there were better items we could have ordered. Oh well!

Day 4: After volunteering at A's work, TCat, A, and I met up with Shivels at Wayward Cafe.




Next, we hit up Sidecar for Pigs Peace, also meeting up with J, and headed to Mighty O Donuts. When we got there, TCat and I were crestfallen with the selection of plain cake donuts they had left for the day. Suddenly, from out of nowhere, a tray appeared with all sorts of wonderful delights, all at half-price. I bought half a dozen of donuts to take home with me. I ended up taking 3.5 home to Philly, which were devoured the next day.

Yay! I'm in a photo, and just look at that double vegan whammy!

This doesn't completely capture our ecstasy!
I was even able to meet up with a middle/high school friend that has also recently moved to Seattle!

Day 5: Thanksgiving!
Wonderful, wonderful J made delicious "sausage" with biscuits for breakfast. (I liked them so much, I made them for breakfast this morning!)

Then we headed over to Shivels' house to start preparing the meal. So many vegan cooks in the kitchen was great. It helped that her kitchen was so large! Unfortunately, I didn't take any preparation photos.


TCat posing with her namesake.

The meal (ALL VEGAN!):

Cranberry Orange muffins (Vegan Brunch) made my J

Cinnamon Rolls made by Ladybeth (and transported from FL)

Herbed Stuffing with cranberries, pomegranate, and celery made by A

Kale Slaw made by Shivels

Creamy Herbed Potatoes made by Ladybeth's friend Raf

Tofu Turkey (vegweb) with Miso Gravy (VWAV) and stuffing made by me

Cranberry Pineapple sauce made by me

Cornbread made by Shivels

Brussel Sprouts with Root Vegetables made by Ladybeth (and transported from FL)

Cashew Nutloaf (or casserole) (port wine sauce not pictured) made by TCat- The favorite of the night

Pumpkin Cheesecake made by Shivels

Pumpkin Pie made by J's friend Babs

Pumpkin Pie made by J

J and A....and Shivels deomonstrating how full we all felt after the meal.

Playing Telephone Pictionary

I would be remiss if I neglected to mention that while I was off galavanting with my friends, DocDufresne had daddy duty and took Andy and Emerson to his parents' home for Thanksgiving. I just had to include these photos of Emerson sleeping on his great grandfather's lap, taken by Doc's brother.