Curried Dookie

My new favorite word is dookie. My fella refers to butts as dookies. I've always referred to poop as dookies. The conflation of the two meanings gets a bit confusing. When I shout, "Whatever, dookie" I mean "Whatever, poop" but in his head I'm not sure if it's being interpreted as "Whatever, butt." And though perhaps still an insult, "Whatever, poop" has a better ring. And alternately, when he pokes me and says, "Check out that girl's dookie," my head immediately reacts with horror at someone walking around with their poop out until I realize that I should be sneaking a peek at a mighty fine ass. See my dilemma here?

What does this have to do with food? Well, I've been eating a lot of things lately that look like dookie. In both senses of the word.

Surprising? No. What with my lengthy list of dookie/vomit-reminiscent foods of yore.

What IS surprising is that I think I'm starting to not like Indian food. *GASPS OF SHOCK AND HORROR* Thing is, I think it's only Indian food that *I* cook that I'm starting to not like though. A nice puff of naan and some spicy eggplant curry from the local Indian food restaurant sounds delectable to me right now. But the past couple weeks, when I whipped up two different Indian food dishes at home, they didn't make lunchtime too happy for the week. And the thing is, they weren't bad recipes. I just never found myself looking forward to actually EATING them at lunch.

The first Indian dish I whipped up was Georgia's Dahl with Eggplant and Spinach:



I ended up making lots of adjustments (cumin seeds to cumin powder, mustard seeds to mustard powder, chili paste to chili powder, etc.) mostly just because I didn't feel like going out and buying whole versions of things I already had in powdered form. And all in all it was a nice, tummy-warming recipe. And it made TONS--I had enough for like a small army. But it was so DENSE. (It looked nothing like the picture posted at Lady's Vegan Blog, as you can see.) Whenever I dipped a fork into it, I felt like a little kid playing with his mashed potatoes, 'cause I could've easily formed it into some huge edible sculpture, it was that thick. I ended up pawning off some of it on my friend P. She, in turn, I suspect ended up pawning it off on the garbage.

The other Indian food dish I made was Scrumpdilly's Spicy Red Lentil Dal:



This was UBER rich and decadent-tasting. And yet, for some reason, I felt like I was gonna die whenever I ate it for lunch. I could only get a part of the way through a portion before I just couldn't handle eating anymore. Which was weird because it really IS very yummy. But perhaps it was too heavy for lunch portions? I mean, all that coconut milk perhaps isn't something that's gonna leave you anything but sluggish for the rest of an afternoon. So again: this was actually a really tasty and simple recipe, but I just was like BLUH whenever I tried to eat this for lunch.

Perhaps I'm turning into an old fogey and no longer can handle spicy foods? Perhaps I'm turning into a palate curmudgeon? Perhaps I just need to make lighter lunches so I don't feel like I'm dragging around a belly the size of a house for the afternoon? Not sure.

Either which way, it saddens me, because Indian food used to be my favorite food. And now, well, I guess if it's going to drop that title, I'd really like to have something to enthusiastically take its place.

And not dookie.

Unless you're referring to the ass meaning.

In which case, PERHAPS I'd be amenable to that.

Uber Amazing Blog Award--And Then Tomorrow: A Recipe, Promise

So the delightful Chile Chews bestowed an Uber Amazing Blog Award upon me on her blog, stating that Lindy Loo (that's me!) "proves that vegans are not sucking the joy out of life like some loud-mouthed famous chefs claim. I wished I lived closer so I could crash her parties..." Awww shucks. *Making some more inappropriate genitalia cookies while blushing*

In turn, I'm supposed to nominate at least one other blogger for the same award. And as I'm currently obsessed with her blog, I'm nominating Kittee at Cake Maker to the Stars. If you haven't stopped by her blog, you must.

Her blog is bold and brilliant. It is damn near impossible to roam around on it without feeling suddenly cheery because of the bright and wonderful food pics. She's devilish and funny. She's weird and nutty (high compliments in my book). She dorkily photoshops and narrates her pics in ways that make me feel like I'm 8 again and thumbing through crazy-fun library books. She somehow defies the normal world of cooking and baking by creating things like Sushi Candy:



And Halloween Sushi:



She has some cute instructional videos up. She makes me laugh. She's got MAD style.

And seriously: she's just plain ol' super fricking adorable.



So if you haven't checked out her blog yet, hop to it. It's eye candy, the likes of which you've probably never seen before:

Cake Maker to the Stars

Now That's Election Night!

Wow. What a fricking night. I feel like an asshole even writing about it because no matter what I say, it's going to sound underwhelming in comparison to the joy welling up in so many people's hearts across the country right now. So instead of going on and on about what a great thing it is and how truly excited I am to have been alive for such a historical day (trite!), I'll instead yammer on excitedly about how I rung in Election Night: With vegan philly cheezsteak sandwiches, vegan mac n' cheez, and cheap vegan beer.

Take that, Republicans!

Yes, I started off last night at Now That's Class, a local bar that boasts a DELIGHTFUL variety of veganosities.



11213 Detroit Ave.
Cleveland, OH
216-221-8576

Tuesday Night they have $4 vegan philly cheese steaks, $2 vegan mac n' cheez, $2 vegan potato salad, and half-off Great Lakes beer during Happy Hour, which--holy crap--what a deal! And in case you didn't notice, all of those are VEGAN VEGAN VEGAN.

Throughout the week, they also offer up a variety of vegan Mexican foods as well, from enchiladas to tamales to empanadas.

And on Sunday, they have vegan breakfast for dinner, serving a variety of breakfast foods between 6 and 9pm for your vegan dining pleasure.




I heard about this place quite a while back--you may actually remember me posting about it here. But I somehow have managed to avoid actually getting my ass out there up until this point.

But finally: FINALLY!

And seriously: What a truly great place. They have a constant lineup of concerts, and a quite impressive space for their shows. Apparently they sometimes have a skateboarding ramp set up in their concert area when a show isn't going on. They have old school video game machines. They have a jukebox. And they have vegan grub grub grub.

So I was pleased to find myself there, glued to the television set, on election night.

As my friend Kevin said (and I take great liberties with my not-quite-so-verbatim quote), "When people ask what I was doing when I found out Obama was elected president, I can proudly say, 'I was eating vegan philly cheezsteak.'"

And eat philly cheezsteak we did. Having met up at 7:15, we realized that they didn't start serving philly cheezsteak until 9. So in the interim, we gorged on some chips & salsa, and a potato-spinach enchilada which I delightfully realized was made by the dude at the West Side Market whose Mexican food I've always dug. I was actually pretty stuffed after that, but at 9, once the smell of cheezsteak started wafting through the air, I could hardly resist ordering more, so P and I split a cheezsteak, and I also ordered a side of mac n' cheez. And seriously folks: This was really really good food. And not in that "well, it's not that great but it's vegan, so I'm gonna get excited about it anyways"-type way, but genuinely genuinely really fricking tasty. I was really really surprised. And for only $6. I mean, I felt like I was in on a secret being there--like I was a little bit conflicted between thinking "my god, how is it that more people don't know about this palce" and thinking "this is gonna be OUR little secret, lest it get overrun by the mainstream."

But because I love you, I'm letting the cat out of the bag. Get up there, ASAP. Preferably on a Tuesday night. And GORGE THE FUCK OUT OF YOURSELF.

The only thing I was slightly disillusioned with was people's utter lack of interest in the fact that it was election day and a momentous day in U.S. history. Which I found even MORE surprising 'cause when you head off to a bar that's pro-vegan, that has a Thursday Bike Night where if you ride your bike up there, your first beer is free, and where punk apparently still reigns, you kind of expect people to be a little bit invested in politics, even if it's bitterly or angrily or disgustedly. But when we first got there, as results were just rolling in, they had two tv's blazing with Two and a Half Men and nary an election result in sight. The bartender was a doll though and let us turn on another tv so that we could keep our eye on how things were going. So we spent the first part of the evening talking very minimally and craning our necks every five minutes to see what was going on.

Then, as the place filled up and more televisions were switched over to the news, we kind of expected everyone to be communally glued to the television. Instead, just two or three folks stood around gazing at the tv while everyone else milled about disinterestedly. And when we realized that Obama had taken Ohio and harriedly blurted out our excitement, the people at the table next to us ACTUALLY GAVE US THE ONCE OVER, as though they were too cool to be excited. The general air--dare I say it--was a little bit "Feigned Disinsterested Hipster-y," as though it wasn't "cool" to actually be engaged in the events of the evening.

So I must admit, with regard to Election Night, I was kind of happy when P and I finally left and trotted off to an Election Party instead, because the overwhelming indifference in the bar would've sapped all the excitement I felt upon hearing that Obama had won.

And I'm glad we DID trot off, because instead of cool hipster nonchalance, we got to ring in the election of our new president with excited cheers, tears, and musicians busting out Kool and the Gang's "Celebration" on piano while everyone threw hugs around, cheered, and sang along.

And here I probably should insert my thoughts and feelings about what it felt like to ring in our first African American president, but I'm thinking the majority of you are on the same page as me so I really don't have to say a word.

Other than: Hell yes.

Which is two words actually, but BITE ME--WE DID IT!