THE VEGAN NEWS THE VEGAN NEWS
The Vegan News is written and edited by P M Lloyd. Please e-mail your contributions to the editor at: paulinelloyd1@btinternet.com or fill in the form provided.
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Autumn RecipesYummy Fruit Salad
Ingredients
Method
Variation: Instead of the mango use other seasonal fruits such as peaches, grapes, strawberries or grapefruit pieces.
Serves 1 for a main meal.
Very Tasty Slaw
Ingredients
For the dressing:
Method
Serves 1-2
Variation: Instead of the tahini dressing use 1-2 tbsp of a ready-made vegan mayonnaise (e.g. Plamil).
Carrot and Apple Salad
Ingredients
Method
Serves 1
Note: All of the above recipes are delicious when eaten with a slice of Sunnyvale Organic Sprouted Wheatbread.
Covered with smooth dark chocolate, fruit and nut
clusters have a superb, rich, mellow and creamy filling. Containing whole, organic hazelnuts and the occasional organic raisin, I thought the crunchy nuts provided an
interesting contrast in texture to the smooth filling and that these chocolates really are, as their label suggests, truly scrumptious! Fruit and Nut Clusters come nicely
wrapped in 100 g see-through packages, tied up with a brightly coloured ribbon and in my opinion would make the perfect small gift, Christmas stocking filler, or they
could even be used as 'goody bags' for grown-ups to take home after their parties! Fruit and Nut Clusters cost £1.20 for a 100 g packet, plus £1.20 postage.
Also covered with an outer layer of smooth, dark
chocolate, coconut bombs have a desiccated coconut filling and resemble Bounty bars in taste. However, these dome-shaped, monster-sized chocolates can be quite difficult to get
your teeth into, if eaten straight from the fridge. So try to leave them to warm up for a while at room temperature - that is of course, if you can restrain
yourself from eating them for that long! Packaged in a similar way to fruit and nut clusters, a 100 g packet of Coconut Bombs also costs £1.20, plus £1.20 postage.
If you would like to order some of these vegan chocolates, then contact: Troody Skrumptious, P O Box 1691, Ilford, Essex, IG1 3WH. Tel: 0208 270 0924 or 07811 961388. E-mail: skrumptiouschocs@aol.com. All chocolates are made fresh to order. Truffles are also available in the following flavours: Plain, smooth hazelnut, smooth almond, lemon, orange, mint, coffee, coffee & walnut and fruit spice. The truffles are sold in 150 g bags and cost £3.00 each, plus postage. Mixtures of chocolates are also available in nice presentation boxes. Please contact Troody to discuss options available. Presentation boxes are ideal for special occasions such as weddings and prices start from £9.00 and include a gift card and first class postage. You can also find out more about Troody Skrumptious products on the Internet and incidentally, it is worth visiting the web site, if only to see the chocolates jumping around and to hear the sound effects!
What's
Happening in the Veganic Garden this Autumn?It is not too late in the year to be thinking about winter/early spring salads either. Grumolo Verde is a type of chicory that is suitable for sowing until the end of October and corn salad can be sown outside in September to give a winter harvest. Rocket is another useful winter salad vegetable. Sow it outside until the end of September, or grow some in a cold greenhouse or even in a pot on your window sill. Mizuna can be sown under cover in September and throughout the winter and also does well in a pot on a window sill. Use it in stir fry, or to add a slight mustard flavour to your salads. Sprouts are another good source of winter salad material. Buy a sprouter and try sprouting green lentils, mustard, alfalfa, red clover and broccoli seeds on your window sill. Or grow buckwheat or sunflowers in trays of compost indoors for a good supply of salad greens. These are really cheap to produce and much more nutritious than shop-bought lettuce!
All of the above seeds can be ordered from The Organic Gardening Catalogue, Riverdene Business Park, Molesey Road, Hersham, Surrey, KT12 4RG. Tel: 01932 253666 for a catalogue or visit their web site.
The lady's smock (cuckooflower) has done well in the marshy area beside the pond, where it flowered in April and I am hoping that it will seed itself and
spread. But as nature can be unreliable, I have taken the precaution of saving some of the seed in order to grow some new plants myself. The pond is also
surrounded by meadow buttercup, which seems to do well in the damp conditions here. And I have definitely got water fleas living in the pond. Thousands of them
- all swimming around like mad! They are in fact very difficult to catch, but I managed to scoop some out in a jam jar and inspect them in a good light.
Water fleas (Daphnia sp.) are incredibly small, varying between 0.5 mm and 6 mm in size and so I was not able to identify them without a microscope.
They swim using a pair of long antennae and most feed on planktonic algae. I have also seen quite a lot of mayfly larvae crawling around in the pond.
Mayfly nymphs are fairly easy to recogise with their three tail filaments. The nymphs feed on detritus and algae; the adults do not feed at all, living only for a short time
(just a few hours in some cases and maybe a few weeks in others).
If you don't wish to take a permaculture course, but would like to support the Ecoforest Project in another way - perhaps by making a donation, attending a nature holiday, or volunteering - you can find out more about how you can help at the Ecoforest website.
Changing our diet and lifestyle is the only way to create positive health in our body, mind and spirit. Changing our lifestyles, how we live and what
we do, where we direct our energy and money, is the only way to change the world, and create a more positively healthy and sustainable world. So do it!
Also, in the same way that you feel so much more healthy and alive eating in a more natural health-creating way, you also feel so much better living in a more natural,
environmentally-positive way.
One of the greatest environmental impacts of your lifestyle is the food you eat - particularly where it comes from originally (where it is grown), and who you buy it from.
Sorry, but organic fruit from the other side of the planet is not at all eco-friendly. Also buying organic foods and tropical fruit from supermarkets is a 'no-no' - because it
supports the agro-chemical, centralised, highly processed 'food' industry. Supermarkets may have what you like in them, but they mainly sell what you wouldn't even
consider food - so if you buy from them you are supporting the profits of disease and sickness.
The positive response is ideally to grow some of your own foods and/or buy from local suppliers (i.e. from organic farm shops, local organic box schemes, community supported agriculture, wholesalers and markets, etc.). Buy as
little as possible from supermarkets. Reduce your use of electrical appliances - do you really need to use a fridge or freezer?
Travel: a) how much you travel and b) your mode of transport.
Your home: make your home more efficient with good draught proofing and extra insulation; use efficient appliances for heating. Electricity (unless its from
renewable resources) is the least energy efficient, because power stations are very inefficient in changing fuels to energy, and transporting electricity through the
grid is also very inefficient.
Your work: think about the work you do - the travel effects, the pollution effects and energy use, and so on. Is the work you do helping to support the dominant
unsustainable, environmentally damaging ways of living and working? Can you change your work so that it helps support new, environmentally positive or health-creating,
wise ways of working?
You as a consumer: the addiction to buying consumer products (clothes, consumer gadgets, CDs, and so on) is ultimately as damaging to ourselves
as an addiction to a food or drug. The 'buy and throw away' society is like a form of consumer bulimia - we consume, consume, consume and then throw those things
up and out into the dustbin, the local charity shop or the car boot.
So most important is to stop buying things that you don't really need. Buy only things that give you
good soul nutrition - things that last, that are simple and buy second hand clothes and goods. Buy things that are made of organic and natural materials, such as wood,
hemp and clay. As much as you can, stop buying plastics. Break free of the consumer lifestyle, and the lifestyle where you are trapped by where you live and what you do.
Most jobs and mortgages provide us with security and shelter, yet at the same time they usually make us slaves to the system, feeling chained to our jobs and mortgages
... with little creativity, real pleasure or fulfilment in return. Gradually our lives are dripping away before our eyes, as we keep doing it for 'just another year' in the hope that
somehow next year we'll feel a little more secure than the last.
But it's like your health - unless you act now, and make real changes, you are only ever adding to
and building up the problems to face later in life. It's so much better to be adding to the creation of a much more healthy and fulfilling life for yourself, from this day
forward and for the rest of your life.
Allow yourself to be Free To Be Human - a great book by David Edwards (Green Books), by the way. Understand that you are at the
centre of an interconnected web of effects. That, quite simply, is what your life is - it is a continuous pulsing of effects that constantly build, shape and change both
your inner biological, mental and spiritual world, and the outer world of the environment, the society and the economy that you are part of.
Like your heart beat pumps blood, and oxygen and/or toxins in your blood around your body to every organ and extremity, so your every thought and action pumps its effects out through the veins,
organs and extremities of the global-to-local environment and economy that we are a part of.
An excellent site and a particularly good source of information
for the those who are new to veganism, or anyone who is thinking of going vegan. You can
now also shop or
become a member online.
A book of 50 quick and easily-prepared, vegan recipes. Order and download a copy of this e-cookery book by clicking on the banner.
Garden Pond Update
Well it is now about 18 months since I first created my small garden pond. You can read about how I made it from an old baby bath and how it was gradually colonised by various freshwater creatures in the Autumn 2001 issue.
This report is mainly to update you on the progress that has been made in the last year. In May, I was tidying up the undergrowth near the pond, when a large frog
suddenly leapt out at me. I gave a rather loud shriek of surprise and the frog (which I think got an even bigger surprise than I did!) landed in the pond,
where it remained lurking under a large stone for quite some time, too frightened to attempt to get out again. I am very pleased that the frogs have found
their pond at last, but unfortunately they decided not to spawn in it this spring. Perhaps it is simply too small for breeding purposes, at about 2 ft by 2 ft. But
who knows, I may be luckier next year! I have seen frogs by the pond on several occasions this summer, so they are certainly making good use of it. Some are quite
small, so I think they must be breeding nearby.
Meet Fred - one of my frogs!
Water Flea
I am keeping a close look out for damsel fly larvae, after spotting an adult damsel fly near the pond in June. Of course it may have just been looking for some
mayflies or mosquitoes to eat, rather than thinking of breeding there! Water beetles continue to thrive in the pond and there are usually plenty of adult beetles
dashing madly around. Sometimes I spot the occasional beetle larva as well. Water beetles are quite mobile creatures and often colonise new ponds fairly quickly.
To aid the pond in its development, last year I added a bottle of water, obtained from the lake in my local park. I think this must have contained some algal spores
because I now have two species of water weed, providing plant cover over about a quarter of the pond and helping to oxygenate the water. I haven't spotted any water snails, flatworms or leeches yet. It is much harder for flightless creatures like these to become established in new ponds, although they can sometimes be introduced accidentally if you add water weed to your pond. Incidentally, a good way of increasing your pond's diversity is to deliberately add a sample of mud or leaf litter, obtained from a well established pond, lake or canal. Invertebrate larvae, such as diving beetle or damsel fly larvae, can often be introduced in this way.
Organisation Review
The Ecoforest Garden Trust is an independent, non-profit-making organisation which is in the process of becoming registered as a UK charity. Its mission is
to 'create paradise gardens across the globe where volunteers can sustain themselves in a way which also sustains and enhances the environment for generations to
come.' These 'ecoforests' will be places where people can learn to live in harmony with each other and with nature. The first 'ecoforest', or forest garden, was set up in August 2000 and is situated in southern Spain, about 8 km from Coin. At the moment there are ten voluntary project workers, living on the three acre site and
developing the land. This is an exciting ecological project, providing people with the opportunity to learn about simple, natural and healthy, sustainable living. As well as
the project workers, the ecoforest community also accepts visitors and it is not unusual for visitors to stay for many months because Ecoforest provides the ideal
opportunity to escape from 'normal life' and learn how to live simply and how to simply live. Ecoforest is essentially a vegan, raw food community, which is run on vegan permacultural principles.
The main objectives of the Ecoforest Garden Trust can be described as follows:
Permaculture Courses:
If you want to find out more about permaculture's many benefits, then you will find a list of permacultural resources at the
Ecoforest website. And of course many good books have been written on this subject too.
But another way of learning more about permaculture is to take a course in it. Ecoforest offers a 2 day introductory course, a 1 week permaculture experience course and
a 2 week design certificate course or, if you are feeling really ambitious, they also run a 2 year permaculture diploma course. Courses are taught either in Spain or in the UK and may be available in other countries too, depending on numbers.
Costs: 2 week courses £250 / 400 Euro / $375 - subject to final confirmation.
1 week courses £150/240E/$225, 2 day courses £50/80E/$75. If you would like more information on any of these courses contact Steve Charter at: Ecoforest, Apdo. 29, Coin 29100, Málaga,
Spain. ( E-mail: info@ecoforest.org). You can also find out more (or book your place) by visiting the
Ecoforest website. The next courses will run between the 16-29 September 2002
and the 14-27 October 2002.
The following short article has been reprinted with permission from the Spring, 2002 issue of EcoForest, a newsletter produced by
The Ecoforest Garden Trust.Readers' Contributions
Why are the effects of our lifestyles on the environment so important ...? Because like the effects of what we eat, in time the effects show up directly, in the world around us.
And we have to face and suffer the environmental and physical sickness and diseases we have created in ourselves, and in the world - the environment, society and
the global economy.
Other
Interesting WebsitesThe
Vegan Society (UK)
Economadic Living
Dip into the EvoluLog and read the reports on the joys of economadic living. Visit the Library of Awareness, where you will find many interesting articles on topics such as raw food, gardening and natural farming, community living and veganism and animal rights.
An interesting site that is well worth checking out.
The Edible Wild Kitchen
A mine of information for anyone who is interested in edible wild plants. There are identification keys and book reviews, as well as plenty of
information on topics such as cooking weeds, edible wild flowers, saving seeds and harvesting and using herbs. Plus many excellent articles on wild plants. This site would be especially useful for anyone living in the USA.
Chat Veggie
The ideal place for veggies and vegans to swap ideas, recipes and gossip! There's also a news section and it's possible to shop for veggie books here too.Bowbridge Publishing
Autumn Book Reviews
Food for Free by Richard Mabey (Collins, 2001).
Many wild plants are considered to be great delicacies. So why not revive your hunter-gather instincts and go out and see what you can find?
Some wild delicacies to look out for include rock samphire, sea kale, dulse, chanterelles, field mushrooms, ceps, hazelnuts and sweet chestnuts. And of course many of the wild plants mentioned in this book will grow just as well and often even more vigorously in your garden, so you could simply sow some seeds purchased from a wildflower seed merchant, such as John Chambers, for even easier gathering!
Book price £16.99. ISBN 0-00-220159-3.
The Vegan Organic Grower's Guide to Beetles by Pauline Lloyd (Vegan Organic Trust, 2002).
Copies of The Vegan Organic Grower's Guide to Beetles can be obtained from the Vegan Organic Trust for £1.00. Alternatively, this booklet can be purchased as part of a set of seven information sheets for £4.00. Details of the other information sheets available in the series are given at the end of this month's article on
Butterfly Gardening.
When ordering please make cheques payable to 'The Vegan Organic Trust' and send payment to: Sue Fox, 30 Helvellyn Road, Wigan, Lancs WN5 9RV. Tel: 01942 214660.
Issues covered include: land ownership, the forest garden system, raising money to buy land and to fund projects, selecting a suitable site and meeting human needs sustainably. It also looks at the more spiritual and creative aspects of living in such a community and has a useful appendix which lists some of the eco-communities already in existence.
If you would like to help to turn this vision into a reality, you can purchase a copy of The Ecoforest Vision from: Steve Charter, Ecoforest, Apdo. 29, Coin 29100, Malaga, Spain for Eu. 15.
Food for Free is a practical guide to well over a hundred plants that can be gathered in the wild and used as a source of food. Nowadays, because
many of us buy our food neatly packaged in a supermarket, we are no longer able to find and confidently identify edible wild plants.
However, this new revised edition of Food for Free is fully illustrated with coloured photographs to aid identification and is divided into four parts, making it easier
to discover what is likely to be in season. 
Newly published, this eight-page information booklet describes the main types of beetles that you are likely to come across in your garden and on your allotment and
lists some simple things that you can do to encourage more beneficial beetles to live on your land. Also included is information on how to construct a beetle bank.
The Ecoforest Vision by Steve Charter (2001).
The Ecoforest Garden Trust aims to create a network of ecological forest gardening communities throughout the world. This 43-page information booklet provides background reading on the first ecoforest community, which was set up in southern Spain in 2000 and aims to stimulate discussion on the subject of sustainable eco-villages. This booklet would be of particular interest to anyone who is thinking of setting up a similar sort of community.
Copyright © Pauline Lloyd 2002