Wait, so, uh…should we cross? Everyone is shopping on this side.

Life, Random

I found this at the local dollar store. Boooo.

Life, Vegan

This is a post I wrote back in 2006, but never actually posted. I was just looking through old files and found it. I always joke about how we should be eating raw blocks of tofu while walking down the street, and that’s a reference to this horrible, horrible episode. Vegans are almost always portrayed badly on tv, since there’s apparently no reason to include them unless the episode is about them wanting meat, unfortunately. So here’s a partial transcript of the episode, with a few of my comments.

For anyone not familiar with this show, it is NOT a reality cooking show, it’s a fictional comedy.

—————————————

From “Kitchen Confidential” – episode “Rabbit Test.” There are a few storylines going at once, so here’s a partial summary (with spoilers) of the “vegan” stuff.

Vegan woman will be known simply as “vegan,” with quotes implied at all times.
“Chef” is the main character, the head chef.
“Cook” is any of the other guys from the kitchen.
“Woman chef” is the other head chef who just arrived, she knew Chef from culinary school.

Owner’s daughter comes into the kitchen and says, “Heads up guys, we’ve got a level 5 celery sucker out there.” All the cooks groan.
“What’s that?”
“A chef’s mortal enemy.”
“A vegan.”
“No meat no fish no fowl no fun, ever.”
Chef: “They don’t even eat eggs! Which means that they’re weak, and they can be frightened off with a large spoon.”
“Why wouldn’t someone want to eat meat?”
CUT TO vegan bitching to chef about how it’s poison, and murder, etc. She always speaks in a pissed off voice.

[Vegan Stereotype #1: Vegans are whiny people who won't shut up about how meat is murder, and talk about it everywhere they go, to everyone.] Why would we go to restaurants just to complain?

Waitress sets butter on the table.
Vegan (offended): “Could you take this butter away?!”
“Yes, I’ll be sure to give it a decent burial.”
Vegan (to chef): “Look, I’m serious about this.”

Chef: “So I’m evil? I’m evil because I eat meat.”
Vegan: “Yes, I would say that.”

AT A BAR – chef tells other cooks how he was impressed the vegan had such strong convictions.

[etc]

Cook: “Bottom line, vegans are scum, and dead animals are DELICIOUS.”
Vegan takes a picture of herself in the bath holding a “TRUCE?” sign, and sends it to Chef’s phone.
Chef (distracted): “Yeah…screw the vegans”
CUT TO chef rolling off of vegan in bed.

Meanwhile, the rabbits the chef had ordered for that day’s special just arrived. They are cute white rabbits, still alive in a cage.

Conversation about how chef is “selling out” because he’s sleeping with a vegan. Also, he doesn’t want to kill the bunnies, and he took the crab out of the crab salad.

Chef: “I’m not selling out! I’ve cooked thousands of animals far cuter than that. Now where’s my rabbit-stabbing knife?”

Scene with bunny on the table, with chef trying to kill it, but can’t.

Other cook now tries to kill it, but also can’t. He starts crying because it reminds him of a hamster he used to have.

Another cook tries to, but fakes a seizure instead.

Fourth cook also can’t.

(walking down the street together, eating BLOCKS of tofu)
Vegan: “So, who was wrong about tofu?”
Chef: “The guy who invented tofu.” (spits it out)

[Vegan Stereotype #2: Vegans only eat salad and tofu. We absolutely love eating raw blocks of plain tofu. Hell, I have some in my pocket right now!] Not a very good chef if he doesn’t even know how to cook tofu.

One of the cooks steals the rabbits and takes them home (with the female greeter, he likes her).

(just bought a meat pizza)
Chef: “Now, this is what I’m talking about.”
Vegan: “Why do you have to do that?”
Chef: “Because if we’re going back to your apartment I need energy.”
Vegan: “See now you have sausage breath.”
Chef: “Come on, it’s not that bad. Come here.” (wants to kiss her)
Vegan: “No, it’s DISGUSTING!”
Chef: “Kiss me. What’s gonna happen?”
(they kiss) She licks her lips.

CUT TO apartment, they bust through the door, he’s feeding her pizza.
Vegan: “Oh my god!”
Chef: “You like that, don’t you?”
Vegan: “It’s SO GOOD!”
Chef: “Eat it. You love it. You love a sausage.”
Vegan: “I do. I do love a sausage!”

Chef: “Do you want some more little girl?”
Vegan: “Oh I want some more!”
Chef: “Wait wait wait, what about the rainforests?”
(she pushes him down, and grabs pizza with both hands, shoving it in her mouth)

[Vegan Stereotype #3: Vegans desperately WANT to eat meat, and will instantly give up their principles from one taste of meat.] Um, very few people were born vegans. We know what meat tastes like.

IN KITCHEN chef says he was out to lunch with vegan, but she’s not vegan anymore.
“You turned her?”
Chef: “Was there ever any doubt?”
“All hail the vegan slayer!”
(they cheer)

They can’t find the rabbits, and know it was the greeter who took them. The guys act like they’re mad, but they obviously didn’t want to (and couldn’t) kill them, so they’re actually relieved.

(later) Greeter brings back the bunnies, and woman chef takes them.

Chef goes to vegan’s apartment, she’s throwing up in the bathroom.
Vegan: “It’s the meat! You’ve poisoned my body!”
Chef: “I feel terrible about this, I had no idea a little bit of sausage would…” (looks in toilet) “Is that bacon? I didn’t feed you bacon.”
Vegan: “No, but you fed me the sausage!” (crying) “Which led to the salami, which led to the bacon!”
Chef: “There’s salami?”
Vegan: “Yes and it’s your fault!”
Chef: “How’s that my fault?”
Vegan: “Because you’re the devil!”

KITCHEN – He tells woman chef that he broke up with vegan.

Woman chef: “Well good. I mean she abandons her principles, and then blames you? That’s not the kind of woman you need to be with.”
Chef: “Oh really? What kind of woman do I need to be with?”

Cook: “We need the rabbit special!”
Chef: “We don’t have the rabbit special.”
Woman Chef: “Sure we do!” (opens oven)
Chef: “Did you just…?”
Woman Chef: “It’s no big deal. I just picked them up” (picks up celery sticks) “and I said ‘nice rabbit, sweet rabbit…’ and then” (breaks celery sticks in half, and smiles)

Jim, one of the cooks, is shocked. (he had a crush on her throughout the episode and got “excited” whenever he was near her)
Woman Chef: “Problem, Jim?”
Jim: “Not anymore.” (walks away, angry) [this was the only good part of the episode, aside from the guys not wanting to kill the rabbits]

Chef: (looks at woman chef, amazed) “You’re incredible.”

Woman Chef: “Well, sometimes you’ve gotta stop pussyfooting around and just do what you’ve gotta do.”
(they smile at each other)

Chef voice over: “The truth is, most of us are barely even aware that there’s a connection between the animal, and the meat on our plate. It’s comforting to pretend that nothing had to die to sate our appetites. But it’s also a lie. And you have to admire someone who has the courage to look that part of themselves in the eye and not flinch. I know I do.”

CUT TO chef and woman chef in bed together. Song “There she goes” plays.

[WTF? Now bunny-killing is SEXY?]

The final, extremely confusing shot, shows them naked on the bed making out, and the camera pans down to show a cage of bunnies under the bed. [...WHAT?]

Television, Vegan

The city of Chicago is full of bars, clubs, theaters, and other interesting ways to spend your time and money. A few months ago, I paid a stranger from craigslist $70 for this:

If you can’t tell, that’s a badly photocopied piece of paper wrapped up in Scotch tape. Seventy. Dollars. He told me they’re worth $100 though, so I got a good deal, right? Let me start at the beginning.
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Life mst3k

My relatives were visiting this week, so I took the train out to the suburbs to see them. The next day they drove me back to Chicago, and during the car ride my aunt and uncle were discussing the difference between gregarious and loquacious.

I wish I could hang out with them all the time.

Life, Random

Yesterday was the Pride Parade in Chicago, and the day before that was Pride Fest. pliSkiNAKE had stuff to do nearby, so I walked around the Fest. I found it pretty boring, but I’m hardly the key demographic. There was lots of food I didn’t want, loud music I didn’t particularly like, and awful, awful t-shirts for sale*. They had nothing to do with GLBT pride, they were just white shirts with terrible airbrushed neon animals on them. What. The ’90s say hello.

So I gave up on walking around and instead stood on the corner and yo-yoed. Some people watched, and over the next ten minutes these things happened:

1. A black guy around my age asked if it was a Duncan, and I said no, it’s a YoYoJam. “YoYoJam! No way!” he exclaimed, saying they were great. I wasn’t sure if he was serious, or putting me on. He started telling me about how Duncans weren’t very good because they get knots a lot quicker. I told him I “didn’t think that was true.” He went on a rant about Yo-Yo Balls, and something about doing tricks with them. I told him they really weren’t made for tricks, and he walked away never to return. He seemed genuine.
2. A girl walked up and took my picture, and when I looked up she ran away. It was a terrible picture too, I had just messed up a trick. I wanted to tell her to take another, but she was gone.
3. An almost-skinhead guy walked up to me, inches from my face, and stared angrily at me. “What’s up?” I asked. He pointed devil horns at me with his left hand, nodded, and then walked away. It made exactly as much sense as you think it did. We had nothing in common that I could tell.

Weird day.

* There were some cool shirts in other booths, and I’m sure it was fun for most people. This post really isn’t about the Fest itself.

Life

I moved to Chicago a couple weeks ago, and a few days ago we bought a used pleather couch. It’s big. It’s difficult to get through doorways…

…but we make it:

The next problem is actually getting it up into our second floor apartment. We try carrying it up the back stairs, but it’s too big to fit. We have to use some other method, so we try pulling it up with a carabiner.

No good (as we expected).

It’s getting late, and we don’t have any pulleys, so we have to leave the couch outside until the next day.

We buy three pulleys and rig it up on the left side of the building. Here’s pliSkiNAKE on the second floor railing:

We have lift-off! Photo taken from the basement:

A little higher…

Close-up of the pulley system; the couch is as high as we can get it:

Long exposure from the ground:

Time to rig up something new in order to get it all the way up. Ratchet straps hold the couch up while we move the pulleys:

We release the straps while pulling it over the railing:

…and we’ve done it! (We don’t normally sit this close together. :P)

The final struggle is to get it through the doorway. Does this look like it’s too big to fit through? Because it totally is. But we made it fit.

We may have cuts and bruises, and the couch may have tears and scratches, but we triumphed!

Life

Here is an easy afternoon meal. It’s a cheddar cheese tofurky melt (like the title says). I use Follow Your Heart vegan cheese, Tofurky slices, bread, and your favorite sandwich condiments.

I made two sandwiches here, using four slices per sandwich. I shredded some vegan cheese and put it between each of the slices. Okay, I was lazy and just cut small slices of cheese. You caught me. Either way, it works. I put them into the toaster oven on the highest setting and kept them in there until the cheese was melting off the edge.

Waiting while cooking

While your tofurky is cooking, toast your bread (or you don’t have to if you don’t like toasted bread). Then spread Vegenaise on your bread and top with condiments of your choice. I used Daddy Sam’s BBQ sauce (which is DELICIOUS!), and different varieties of mustard. I also had some lettuce from the BLTs I had the other night so I threw some of that on there. Too bad I didn’t have tomatoes as well.

Note: Mixing together lots of delicious condiments does not always make a tasty sandwich (as I figured out).

Finished Product

After it is done cooking, put the tofurky onto the sandwich and enjoy.

drew (at) pliskinake (dot) com

Vegan

This is a new recipe I just tried out tonight. I guess it wasn’t a recipe before because I didn’t follow any. I just made it up as I went. What I used:

• 2 blocks of tofu — cut into small chunks
• 1 cup of white rice
• Sugar
• Teriyaki sauce
• Rice Vinegar
• Light Corn Syrup
• Sweet and Sour sauce
• Red Pepper Flakes
• Garlic Powder
• Flour
• Corn Starch
• Sunflower Oil
• Water

The amounts of everything I do not know as I was just adding as I saw fit. The sauce consisted of Light Corn Syrup, Sweet and Sour Sauce, Red Pepper Flakes, Garlic Powder, Rice Vinegar, Sugar, and Teriyaki Sauce. I put in the amount I thought I wanted, adding some more here and some more there. Then I set it aside for later as that was one of the last things needed.

Coating Tofu In Flour

I cut all my tofu up and put it in a large metal mixing bowl. In another smaller bowl, I mixed (approximately) 6 parts flour to 1 part corn starch. It was probably even less corn starch than that, but I am not certain. (I am not sure if the corn starch actually did much. I think I won’t use it next time.) I mixed it together and threw it on to the tofu. Then, I tossed the tofu around, making sure to not break up the chunks more than they already were.

Deep-Frying Tofu

Once the tofu chunks were all coated with flour I put about an inch of sunflower oil in the bottom of a wok and turned the heat up high. After it got up to temperature, I started putting tofu chunks in. I let them set in there for a while (3-4 minutes), turning them around occationally. Then I took them out and put in the next batch.

While cooking the tofu, I started cooking rice. Just follow the instructions on the bag (usually 2 cups water to 1 cup rice). Boil water, put rice in, lower heat and cover for 20 minutes. Remove from heat and simmer for 5 minutes.

Using The Sauce

After my tofu was done, I emptied out the oil (into a glass jar to be thrown away later). I put the tofu back into the pan and started up the heat again (to about medium). After a few minutes (to get the pan heated up, along with the tofu bits) I sturred up my sauce because it had separated. I threw the sauce in with the tofu and stirred it around, coating all the tofu pieces with the sauce. Let it sit a little, stirring occasionally so the sauce soaks into the tofu and breading you created from deep-frying.

The rice was done by now so I put some rice on a plate, put some tofu on a plate, and ate it. It turned out pretty good.

Notes

There are a few changes I would make next time though. I seem to never be able to cook rice correctly. This time I DID cook it correctly, BUT I made it too soon. The rice was done before I was even half done deep-frying my tofu. So in that time, the rice started to dry out. So, cook your rice towards the end. It takes time to deep-fry tofu.

I would also take a separate smaller pan and make another bowl of sauce. Put the sauce in the smaller pan and “cook” it. Just heat it up and stir it around until warm. Do this at the VERY end as well. Low heat! Since the sauce is mainly sugar-based (think about all the ingredients and how much sugar is in all of them), if it is a high heat you will burn the sauce. And even though I love the smell of burning sugar, I like eating food more.

Finally, I think I MIGHT deep-fry my tofu longer. It was good how I had it, but I like my tofu a little crispier than it was.

Let me know if you try this recipe out. What did you change? How did it turn out?

drew (at) pliskinake (dot) com

Vegan

** CONTAINS SPOILERS **
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