Sunday, November 29, 2015

Hallmark Got it Wrong

                       
So this ad was promoted on a vegan website I visit, and they were elated about it. They saw it as a positive that we had 'made it" into a Hallmark commercial. I think anyone who has been reading this blog knows that I want nothing more than for vegan to become mainstream, and I loathe the exclusiveness of some vegans. I feel if you want to save animals, you can't want veganism to be an exclusive club, that makes zero sense. So, I don't know if I'm being one of "those" vegans who has a problem with everything, and has zero sense of humor, but I don't appreciate this commercial at all, and I see it as a setback to the movement, not a step forward. As a vegan, I would run for the hills with that old man if I went to someone's house, and they made a tofu brick with scallion wash(gag) and seaweed with lavender(help me) What in the actual hell were they thinking? Both of those sound gross, and I have looked at a TON of vegan cookbooks, recipes, blogs, what have you, and I have never in my life heard of seaweed and lavender served together. It infuriates me so much, because people who already know NOTHING about vegan food, but they do know it's "gross" are going to see this commercial and feel validated in their contempt of vegan food, and validated in their choice to continue to eat meat. "See I told you vegan food was gross" is what they're going to say to each other. I am sick of  all of the misrepresentations of what vegans eat, and how we act, and how we act towards food. I looked at Instagram ALOT on Thanksliving, and I did not see one seaweed salad, or tofu brick. I saw food that looked exactly like every other plate of food, minus the death, and cruelty. And I would like to remind everyone that yes, there are vegans who are obsessed with health, but guess what? There are non vegans who are obsessed with eating healthy too. And I would also say that seaweed is consumed by non vegans as well. As a matter of fact, the vegan police hand out tickets to vegans who eat seaweed, because some insist that fish get all in the mix when it's harvested, and so the fines are steep, and I heard the vegan judge is really one to fear. So, the whole seaweed thing is just wrong on so many levels. Sorry Hallmark, in my opinion this was a fail.
Now on to real vegan food and happenings, I made the white BBQ sauce from The Sexy Vegan's Happy Hour At Home. It's a vegan mayo based sauce, with horseradish and ACV with agave! It's zippy and tangy, and tasted great with some oven fries baked with a little cumin and curry powder.
It gets it's pinkish hue from smoked paprika. I love sauces, and I love dipping things, so this is a nice addition to my arsenal!  A lot of the recipes in this book are for entertaining groups of people, so some of the recipes are too big, and I don't always love the math of scaling down a recipe. This is of course not the book's fault, I'm just not the right demographic I guess. But for anyone having or going to holiday parties, this could be your best friend!
I snapped this picture of Chunk getting the kitchen faucet. He likes to take things apart, if he were a human he would be interested in cooking, and also construction, or engineering or something like that. He loves to take the drain out of the bathtub, and he feels it belongs in their water dish. He also likes to take apart my water filter, and I can only assume he wants to take apart the faucet, and put it where it really belongs.
What did you think of the commercial? Am I being a humorless vegan? Am I wrong about seaweed and lavender?


4 comments:

  1. I hate missrepresentation of vegans too. Or any type of food. I love the show Gavin and Stacy and they had the one character get obsessed with lifting and they had a scene where he was drinking spirulina and it was lime green and thick. I can tell you it would never look that way! Even if you blended it with banana. *sigh*

    "tofu brick with scallion wash(gag)" XD This makes me think about when I was making a tofu recipe from an Asian Vegan cookbook (it was kind-of awful and was clearly not written by a vegan) and it was really bland. I said I was never going to make it again and my husband was like "OMG WHY! IT IS SOO GOOD!" All he meant was that he liked the crunchy breaded outside. XD

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    1. I replied to your comment, and I have no idea where it went! So weird. They always make it look like a) all vegans eat is spirulina, wheatgrass, and barley, and b) they make the foods they think we eat look as weird as humanly possible!

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  2. I can see pros and cons on both sides of this, yes. I get pretty excited when I hear vegan, tho, so matter if it's run of the mill foods or 'off the wall ones' but I do get that eye roll started when I see the missrepresentation and/or weird stereotypes. One thing that made me laugh about this was that the old guy kept saying ' do you need money' which totally debunked the vegan lifestyle being stereotypically for the wealthy. I guess I do have a humor side if it is nicely done. With this...I'm torn because I can see both the pros and the cons and neither really out weight the other for me...so good and others bad...I guess...

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    1. I see both sides too, it's nice to see vegan as part of a huge ad campaign, like finally we've "made it", I just wish they would have shown a more laid back, less seaweed filled meal. But it's interesting to hear others opinions.

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