THE VEGAN NEWS
THE VEGAN NEWS
JUNE
1997
In This Month's Issue:
- Recipes
- Plus June Extra - Some Simple Recipes for New Vegans.
- This Month's Article - Important Information For New Vegans
- Readers' Contributions
- Vegan Product Review
- Green Cleaning Tips - Stain Removal
- In The Veganic Garden
- Vegan Websites
- Book Review(s)
- The Wildlife Database
Recipe of the Month
Tofu Omelette
Ingredients
- 1 x 8 ounce cake of tofu
- 3 tbsp nutritional yeast
- 1 tbsp tamari
- 1/4 tsp turmeric
- 2 tbsp oil
Method
Mash the tofu in a bowl. Mix in the remaining ingredients. Lightly oil the skillet. Place on a medium heat. Place batter in skillet and press into an omelette shape. Fry until brown on one side, then flip over and brown on the other side.
Variation: Add 1 finely diced onion, or 1/2 a finely diced, sweet red pepper. Saute onion and pepper first. Add to batter before frying.The above recipe was taken from Vegan Nutrition: Pure and Simple by Michael Klaper, M.D.
Recipe Serves 1-2
The June Issue Extra - A selection of easy snack and meal ideas which are especially suitable for new vegans.
Readers' Contributions
Try this summer recipe. Sent in by Patt Stewart from Johannesburg, South Africa.
Refreshing Summer Fruit Platter
Cut all summer fruits and arrange on glass platter. Arrange so colours compliment each other. Lightly cover all fruit with orange juice and sprinkle a mixture of sugar and cinnamon on top. Eat chilled. Can be served with fried tofu sticks or non-dairy ice-cream and flaked/chopped nuts.
June Product Review
Montagne Jeunesse Beauty Products
It is not always easy to find suitable vegan toiletries. If you are really stuck, then the The Animal Free Shopper devotes a whole chapter to cosmetics and toiletries, many of which can be obtained by mail order if you can't find them locally. Most of the cosmetics and toiletries produced by Montagne Jeunesse are suitable for vegans. So this month, I am going to introduce you to some of them. They can be purchased from many health food shops.I tested three of their products. First of all, I tried a small 50 ml bottle of Apricot & Almond Handcream. It had rather a nice smell and wasn't very greasy. Their Evening Primrose Body Moisturiser was also quite useful as a handcream. The small 60 ml bottle of Chamomille & Jojoba Shampoo had a pleasant smell and was ideal for taking away for a weekend break, althoughit was not very good for greasy hair.
A comprehensive list of the Montagne Jeunesse products, which are suitable for vegans, can be found in The Animal Free Shopper. I have listed some of the products which are suitable below:
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- Hand Lotions - Coconut Oil Rose, Apricot & Almond
- Lipsticks - Orange Lip Gloss Balm
- Shampoo - All
- Conditioners - All
- Skin Care Products - Apricot Body Oil, Evening Primrose Oil, Evening Primrose Cleansing Lotion, Moisturiser, Day Cream, Night Cream, Skin Toner. Avocado & Pineapple Clay Face Mask, Seaweed & Mineral Mud Face Mask, Vitamin E Hypo-Allergenic Products including: Cleansing Lotion, Night Cream, Toning Gel.
- Soaps - Evening Primrose Oil, Vitamin E, Orchid Oil, Purest Glycerine, Seaweed & Mineral, Passion Fruit Purest Vegetable.
Green Cleaning Tips
Stain Removal!
Did you know that it is not always necessary to buy special stain removers? Try out some of the following common household ingredients first:
- Salt - can be used to remove wine, beetroot and fruit stains.
- Salt & Lemon Juice - use a combination of these on rust stains.
- Borax - is suitable for use on many stains. Well worth a try.
- Washing Soda - use on grease, blood, ink, tea & coffee stains.
- Eucalyptus Oil - can be used on tar, oil and grass stains.
What's Happening in the Veganic Garden This Month?
Sowing and Planting
Tomato plants, should be planted outside sometime between the end of May and the middle of June when all frost danger has passed. Tomatoes usually like a sunny, sheltered position, although I have grown tomatoes successfully in partial shade for many years. Add plenty of wood ash and leaf-mould to the soil before planting. Plants should be planted about eighteen inches apart and staked and watered immediately after planting. About two to three weeks after planting, when the plants are well established, I usually put a compost mulch on top of the soil around each tomato. Alternatively, you can put a handful of compost in each planting hole when you first put the plants outside.Tomatoes need quite a bit of attention. Water regularly, particularly when the fruits are forming. Comfrey solution makes an excellent feed for both tomatoes and peppers and can be purchased from the Organic Gardening Catalogue. This catalogue aslo sells comfrey plants, which you can use to make your own comfrey solution.
Basil is a excellent companion plant for tomatoes, so plant a few rows of Basil nearby. Basil is in fact a very useful herb to have in the veganic garden. Use it to make your own vegan pesto sauce, sprinkle it on top of tomato or mediterranean type salads, or add it to a tomato sauce to pour over your pasta.
At the end of May/beginning of June, indoor grown runner bean plants can be put outside, or the seeds can be sown directly into the soil. Indoor raised peppers can also be planted in a sunny bed or trough, in the South of England, this month. Further north, they should be grown on a sunny windowsill or in a green house, instead.
On a recent trip to a garden centre, I was pleased to discover a hulless type of pumpkin seed called Baby Bear. It is packaged by Mr Fothergill and although rather expensive should hopefully provide me with a good supply of edible home-grown pumpkin seeds! It is also worthwhile growing your own sunflowers. The seed heads can either be used on the bird table in the winter, or you can remove the seeds, sprout them and eat them yourself.
This month you should also make sowings of spring cabbage, carrots, parsley and further sowings of lettuce and salad onions.
Other Jobs To Do In the Garden
Don't forget to protect soft fruit such as strawberries and raspberries from the birds! See the May issue for some ideas of how to do this. If the ground is dry, you will probably need to do quite a lot of watering this month too, particularly when cucumbers, courgettes etc. are starting to swell up.
Crop Picking
Anybody, who followed my advice earlier and planted seeds, should now have quite a few crops that are ready for picking. Peas, broad beans, lettuce, spring onion, spinach, radish, gooseberries, strawberries and rhubarb, are just some of the delicious, pesticide-free crops which are available from the veganic garden at this time of year!
In The Wildlife Garden
Bee Plants
Bees and hoverflies should be attracted into the veganic garden whenever possible. Encourage these hard-working creatures to pollinate your fruit and vegetables for you and you will be well rewarded. For example you could plant poached egg plants around the edge of your vegetable patch, basil in your tomato patch, or sunflowers amongst your sweetcorn. The following plants are particularly popular with bees and should be included in the veganic garden:
HERBS WHICH ARE VERY ATTRACTIVE TO BEES Basil Bergamot Chives Fennel Hyssop Lavender Lemon Balm Mint Oregano Thyme Wild Angelica
FLOWERS/SHRUBS WHICH ARE ATTRACTIVE TO BEES Alyssum Aubretia Clover Foxglove Heather Honeysuckle Ivy Lilac Love-In-A-Mist Poached Egg Plant Sunflower Thrift
More details on the above plants can be obtained from the The WildLife Database. Many of them are also listed in the Wildlife Plants Index.If you want to attract wildlife into your garden then do not be in too much of a hurry to get rid of all your dandelions! I left some small patches of dandelions in my garden recently and was very pleased to see a pair of Bullfinches eating the seed heads.
Other Interesting Vegan Websites.
The Vegan Society (UK)
An excellent site and a particularly good starting point for obtaining information for the new or intending vegan. It is also possible to buy many useful books covering various aspects of veganism here.This section was updated in March 2009 and all redundant links were removed.
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June Book Review