Teamkin Family Dinner

Teamkin Family Dinner was an overwhelming success. Mrs. Teamkin was kind enough to keep my veganation in mind, she made sure we had yummies like hummus, carrots, grapes... Off to a good start, the only problem was that the hummus was right smack next to the brie. I think I may have heard someone say it was the best brie they'd ever had. Or was that the cheesecake? My friends kept the taunting down to only the really really delicious dishes. Like the chicken.





Then, after a traditionally dizzying night on the town with my peeps, the next morning my best friend found it in her heart to stop at the store and get me a unbelievably-perfect-considering-the-Jameson turkey and cheese on a hero, with mayo (mmmm, tortured as I type alert). For a split second, I forgot. Face lit up, went in for a BFF hug and suddenly felt the life force drain out of me. I can't eat that.



Can't can't can't! AHHHHHGODDAMMITTT!!

A Man Undone

I think I hit the wall sometime three nights ago when I decided to hit up a local vegan place in my continuing quest for the perfect vegan lunch. As usual, I didn't know what the fuck I was doing, so rather than make a rational decision based on observation and past experience, I went for the "gimme everything you got" approach. It has served me well in the past. I mean, the odds should have been in my favor. It shouldn't be any problem to find at least one dish to enjoy among a sampler of 12 vegan meals.

I was wrong. Way wrong.

To my horror, this sampler basically contained 12 different types of coleslaw. Nasty, bitter greens that had no business being served as food. It was the first time in a long time that I ate angrily, grinding my teeth past the gums and into the marrow of my jaw bone.

But I would not be defeated. I decided to treat myself to a special dinner to make up for my earlier failure. Fried BBQ tofu sounded easy enough, and close enough to the real thing to get me through the night. I worked diligently to create the perfect bridge between my world and the vegan world, gently frying each tender cube of tofu until a perfect golden brown, before slathering it with a hot and tangy vegan BBQ sauce of my own design. I assumed my reward for all the hard work would be that first, hard-earned bite.

According to my buddy Wikipedia, tofu is "a food of Chinese origin, made by coagulating soy milk, and then pressing the resulting curds into blocks." But it might as well be donkey shit of ass origin made by coagulating feces, and then pressing the resulting shit into blocks. Even covered in sauce, there was no denying the true nature of the beast.

There are only three reasons I didn't die in the days following this disaster.

1. I discovered the magic of Whole Foods, a supermarket with a large selection of vegan products and a food bar overflowing with vegan mainstays like indian food and veggie burgers.

2. Pride. I am literally too proud to die.

3. Kiri's aunt gazed upon my fragile husk and showed me mercy. On Saturday she invited Kiri, Stef, and I over for a vegan feast and it pretty much saved my life. A night before, I had stooped so low as to try to use the tofu drippings from the BBQ night to flavor some vegan bacon I'd bought on my first night as a vegan. The results were nightmarish. I have nothing but the highest praise for Miss Jewell and her kin and thank them from the bottom of my meaty heart for hosting our decent into madness.

Tonight is the end of this experiment and, as promised, I will be spending it at fette sau. If you happen to be walking in Brooklyn and you hear the vile laughter of a devil unleashed by carnal desire and raucous gluttony, know that I have finallly found peace.

Please

Just give me some cheese. One slice of delicious goodness. This may be one of the silliest things I've ever done. WTF NATHAN!


Tonight is the Teamkin Family Dinner. My co-worker Rachel is having our whole office over to her family's house for dinner. We've been counting down and looking forward to it for a long time. I'm literally shaking my head right now. Unbelievable. It's only going to get worse.

"Jesus, these chips are like crack."

...and you got me a bag cuz you know how much I like em! Thanks!

Too bad they're riddled with Blue Cheese, Cheddar Cheese, Non-Fat Milk solids, Sour Cream (oh sweet yum), and Buttermilk solids.

I'll have tofu.

This I Swear

Fette Sau is a place right up the street from me that specializes in thick meaty bricks of pork, chicken, and beef wrapped in the kind of fatty lovehandles that brought even the mighty Oprah Winfrey to her bloated, hamhocked knees.

When this experiment is over, I'm going to walk, bare-chested, up to their counter, shout "DELIVER ME YOUR MEATS!", close my eyes and just start biting into anything stupid enough to get in my way.

The next day's headlines will read, "Disgusting Meat Giant Devours Man and Animal Alike!" And poor Fette Sau will be nowhere to be found.

Vodka is Vegan

Day 3 and I still haven't prepared. Meal to meal I'm wondering what could possibly be next, and repeat. Ugh, this takes like actual shopping. Went to three stores for soy milk on my way home. Ok fine, so one was Duane Reade and another was Rite Aid, but still, they all had regular milk. I'm not bitching, just making an observation. This shit ain't easy, and with no actual conviction to save animals from my stomach, it makes things that much suckier.

Yesterday for lunch I had a veggie burger, delicious-ish, but not really.

After a martini pit-stop (hope vodka is vegan, otherwise oops), I found something wonderful for dinner. General Tso's Tofu from a local vegan place. It was damn good. I thought about taking a photo to post. But then I'd eaten it and the opportunity was gone. I will say that when I found the vegan menu, I got so excited that I ordered $50 worth of food. So the good news is that at this very moment, I have two slices of chocolate cake (don't ask me how they do it, I don't care), pad thai and papaya salad in my fridge. Score.

Lentil For Lunch

At about 2pm today, I was saved by a lentil. Actually, I was saved by a shitload of lentils flowing in sweet spoonfuls down my throat and into the meatless bottom of my stomach, never to be seen again. Sad thing is, I'm not even sure what a lentil is.

I texted that asshole, Mr. Internet who in turn called our mutual pal Wikipedia to tell me that a lentil is, "a bushy annual plant of the legume family, grown for its lens-shaped seeds." Apparently, lentils also, "have the third highest level of protein from any plant-based food after soybeans and hemp, and is an important part of the diet in many parts of the world, " which, now that I think about it, is probably why I didn't starve to death after I ate them. They are for the eating. Go figure.

Eating at home has become easier now that I have plenty of fruits to snack on and portabella mushrooms to grill, but I've officially run out of work lunch options. I don't even know what to look for. In the hood, that's what they call being "fucked+1."

It's time to ask for help. I think I'll let some of my co-workers in on the experiment and see if they can point me in the right direction. More likely, they will mock me as so many others have. And rightfully so. The life of a vegan is comedic theater, filled with awkward silences, skinny arms, pale skin, and frequent bowel movements.

Chocolate is not vegan

...even at night.

What have I done?!

I've made a horrible, horrible error.

It took me about 10 seconds into the Key Foods to regret the entire thing. The vegan section was filled with vegan this and veggie that and as I saw my destiny, I fell to my knees and openly wept into the fresh produce. No one stopped to help me up. It was not the first time they'd seen a man brought down by hubris. So, I continued to weep, all the while wondering how my life could have gone so terribly wrong.

Vegans are stupid. Why would a person willingly do this to themselves? I asked my friend Mr. Internet, and he told me: "Health benefits are one of the primary reasons people become vegan... Abstaining from the consumption of animals products discourages the industry and shows your support for proper animal treatment...Last but not least are the religious reasons to become vegan. Many religious support healthy eating, including Seventh-Day Adventists, Buddhists, Jews, and Muslims." "Fair enough," I told Mr. Internet, "but why must there be so much pain." He looked at me and smiled. Then he whispered, "To hope is to risk pain. To try is to risk failure, but risk must be taken because the greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing.” Mr. Internet is always right. It's part of the reason I hate him so much.

For around $70 I bought a crazy amount of vegan products, all of which look completely nasty save for some portabella mushrooms I'll be eating tonight. After that, there's no telling what'll come next....I'd wager death.

Vegan-ation.

Yeah yeah, two Old Fashioneds in and look what happened. Our stomachs are eating our spines. But honestly, I'm happy to suffer as long as Nathan suffers more. (Is that wrong? Whatever.)

Soy milk in my coffee, cool, I can dig it. Skipped breakfast, I usually have cereal or eggs or something delishy. No time to think up an alternate plan, so pass. Lunch. Fuck. Hmm what's everybody getting, oh, Lenny's? Oh they have my favorite Cheeesy Chicken Tortilla soup that they never have? Oh awesome. I'll have the ONE vegan meal on the menu. Avocado and tomato sandwich, threw some basil on which definitely saved the day. The sammy was alright, we'll just say it tasted better than it looked. Still a lil bitter about the soup though, since they never have it and I made a special request last week, pre our date with the Old Fashioneds. Sigh.

Dinner was easy. I love me a good falafel sandwich. Mmmm.

Tomorrow, oh tomorrow, going to put some thought into this whole vegan thing. Maybe even cook something myself. A packed lunch perhaps?

Super Awesome Mega Fun Mission #1: Go Vegan!

As is often the case with these things, the idea of becoming vegan appeared somewhere around my second old fashioned.

Basically, Kiri and I were looking for a new creative outlet and felt like becoming vegans would be the perfect way to inject some excitement into our week. From there, the concept grew into something more substantial. I can't speak for Kiri, (I don't have that power...yet) but I've come to see this blog as a place for us to challenge ourselves and try new things. Of course, if we have the time, we'll document our social experiments so that the public can delight in our mishaps. Most likely, no one will be paying attention, which is fine. However, if you happen upon this modest page, please leave a comment, because your attention will nurture us, allowing our egos to grow big and strong.

Quick confession: I don't know what the fuck a vegan is. According to my friend wikipedia, veganism is: "a diet and lifestyle that seeks to exclude the use of animals for food, clothing, or any other purpose." I really like my clothes, so for the purposes of this experiment, we'll limit our vegan definition to our eating choices. The experiment will last a seven-day week starting today and ending next monday.

I'm not going to lie... this shit is going to be crazy difficult for me because I eat animal every day. When I'm not eating a charred animal, I am thinking about eating a charred animal. At night when I sleep, I dream only of dead things and how I can cook and eat them. To commit to something like this, if even only for a week, is something of a personal nightmare come to life, especially since I actively make fun of vegans and am known to convert vegans into vicious, meat craving zombies. This week will be the ultimate test. But I am strong and confident that my strength will see me through.

Well, I'm off to the market to buy my first vegan meal. Kiri sent me this handy guide, and I'm going to follow it the best I can as I hit up the vegan section of my local Key Foods. Pray for me. I suspect I'll have to kill a pig on the way there, just to bring the universe into balance.