More hits from the road, and shopping back at the ranch

Returned home to Philly on Wednesday. On Tuesday, enjoyed Lewisburg, WV. Visited the Wild Bean and the Bookstore and Edith's Store. The Wild Bean has a very nice menu.

I had the Healthy Wrap, which has greens, avocado, red onion, seeds, not sure what all else. Also had some of the chili you're seeing to the left. This was delicious. Sweet and hot and tomatoey. I was impressed that on the menu, in the description of the "Fakin' BLT," they note that their mayo is vegan. I didn't try the BLT, so I guess I have to go back someday. Oh, darn.

the "Healthy Wrap"

At Edith's Store, I bought a 2-oz. package of the sea vegetable Dulse, which I had never had before. It is red, and much softer and less chewy than the green varieties of seaweed I have tried. It tastes like bacon and sharp cheddar cheese. It has a sharp bite to it, and on the package they actually recommend crisping it in a pan in oil and using it to replace bacon on a BLT. It was so good as a raw snack that I ate most of it on the train the next day. The brand I bought is the same brand they carry at Weavers' Way Co-Op, but I don't remember if they had this variety or not. The brand is Maine Coast. Also bought some Celtic Sea Salt, some tea, and a mesh tea ball.


From a vegan-food-blogging perspective, my trip to W.Va. was a smashing success. It's so fun to go someplace I'm not usually and see what there is to eat. I can't believe I ever thought being vegan would be hard. Food is everywhere once you know what you're looking for. The Wild Bean and Edith's Store are not everywhere, but you remember my vegan Wal-Mart grocery list from the other day, right? The idea behind that was not to encourage vegans to shop at Wal-Mart (I don't recommend that to anyone); the idea was to show people who already shop at Wal-Mart that you can buy vegan foods in almost every aisle. Yeah, it's easier than you think. And remember, I also ate at a Mexican restaurant in Summersville in the same strip mall as Wal-Mart. Easy. Like fallin' off a log.

Got home Wednesday night and went to the farmers' market on Thursday to stock up. (I have no idea what Mark ate while I was gone. I'm not going to ask.) Went to the market this morning for a few more things.

Thursday Shopping List

1 bunch kale
1 bunch mustard greens
1 quart green beans
6 plum tomatoes
4 (bigger) red tomatoes
6 (big) yellow potatoes
1 pint blackberries
1 pint raspberries
(and at Milk & Honey Market)
1 avocado
1 loaf multigrain bread

Saturday Shopping List

1 quart okra
1 head red leaf lettuce
4 red shallots
1 golden zucchini
10 ears white sweet corn
2 portobello mushroom caps
1 oz. peppermint
1 oz. chamomile flowers
1/2 oz. lemon verbena
1 oz. sage
(and at Milk & Honey Market)
1 lb. unbleached wheat and barley flour
vanilla extract
1 lb. organic cane sugar

The chamomile flowers, peppermint, and lemon verbena are for tea, now that we have that mesh tea ball. Can't wait. Need to get cinnamon.

Oh, remember the vegan burger from the Amtrak train? On the way back, I got another one. It's actually not bad at all. You wouldn't want to eat it every day, but it's pretty tasty with ketchup and mustard. The bun is a Kaiser roll, and they microwave the whole thing in the package, but it doesn't get soggy somehow. A little chewy or stretchy, maybe, but tolerable.

After returning home from mom and dad's I am now inspired to make biscuits, hence the flour. And pancakes, hence the vanilla extract. Things we had to eat at mom and dad's included fried potatoes with peppers and onions, homemade biscuits with molasses, kale crisps (which I made and they loved), tomato-rice-bean soup, hummus & avocado sandwiches (both grilled and not grilled), fire-roasted corn on the cob, fire-baked potatoes, baked apples with walnuts and cinnamon crumbles, sweet potato fries, oatmeal, berry smoothies, and pancakes.



It was good to be home while I was there and good to be home now that I'm back. Wherever I go, some things don't change. More scenes from the Wild Bean....

Summersville Wal-Mart, WV State Fair, Bob Evans, Vegan Living

I'm visiting my family in W.Va. I count Summersville as my home town, although we lived all around it. They live in a different little town now. We spent the day at Summersville Lake today. I visited the site of the original Campfire 30. Campsite #30 at Battle Run Campground.

Wednesday night when my train got in, my parents and niece picked me up at the station and we ate at Bob Evans. I wasn't very hungry. The microwaved Amtrak vegan burger and Cliff Bars had ruined my appetite. I had a plate of sweet potato fries and a salad. Then we went grocery shopping at Wal-Mart in Lewisburg.

Vegan Burger on the menu in the Amtrak cafe car

At the State Fair of WV the next day, I ate corn on the cob roasted in the husk in a fire pit by the Shady Spring Future Farmers of America (a favorite snack from childhood state fairs), sweet potato fries with cinnamon and sugar, mashed potatoes, broccoli-cauliflower salad, garden salad, baked apples, and a baked potato. The "butter" the future farmers offered with their corn on the cob was vegan. It was Parkay Squeezable Margarine. (And yes, if you have that in your fridge right now, it does mean you are vegan and probably a Socialist and possibly gay.)

That night we had to drive to Beckley to reunite my niece with her mama, so the next morning, we had breakfast at Tamarack. I had a bagel with jelly, an English muffin with baked apples, and fried potatoes with onions and pepper, along with a really great cup of coffee.

Yesterday, we stayed home all day, made a fire, cooked on it/in it. Both sisters and one of their significant others and the other ones' kids came down. We roasted potatoes and corn. I made what I'm calling a campfire panini. It has a thin layer of Vegenaise (from Edith's Store in Lewisburg; you could also use margarine) on the outsides of the bread, then stuffed with hummus, tomato, onion, and dill seeds. Would have been great with avocado, but I forgot. It's grilled in this neat thing that we used to have a set of when we were living in the campground. Here, I'll post pictures.

This morning, we went out for brunch to Los Pescadores Mexican Restaurant in Summersville, on our way to the lake. This is in the same strip mall with Wal-Mart and the Dollar Tree. I had vegetable fajitas. Looking at the menu, I ordered it without sour cream (still had guacamole), and then after it came, I scraped the cheese off the beans. (They don't mention the cheese on the menu. Everyone would of course obviously want cheese on their beans.) The food was really good. The service was good. I had sopapillas for dessert.

After spending the day at the lake today, we picked up a few more groceries at the Wal-Mart in Summersville.

Vegan Grocery list from Wal-Mart

2 bunches kale

1 head green leaf lettuce

1 bunch asparagus

Big tub of hummus

Small tub of Earth Balance margarine

1/2 gallon of almond milk

2 things of Fig Newmans cookies

Arnold's Sandwich Thins (round sandwich bread)
Some kind of square bread from the deli

some other kinds of bread (cause my mom and dad like lots of different breads)
frozen berries
bananas

onions

potatoes

sweet potatoes

2 avocados

We didn't get any beans, pasta, rice, hot cereal, etc., but they have those things. You can certainly get your four vegan food groups at Wal-Mart. I know the vegetables might have been grown halfway around the world and have been sprayed with chemicals, but they're at least as good as anything else you're getting at Wal-Mart. Their selection of almond milks almost made me jealous.

At the house, I've been eating a lot of sandwiches, with hummus, avocado, etc., the things I usually eat at home. And toast with molasses, which I usually don't have. Mom usually makes fried potatoes in the mornings, and berry smoothies. Just bought the kale tonight; I'm going to roast a pan of it for mom and dad tomorrow. Dad made biscuits and brown gravy to go with the campfire foods last night. I brought some Bob's Red Mill muesli (cereal with uncooked rolled grains, nuts, raisins, dates, seeds) with me. Brought some Cliff Bars but haven't been eating them. They will be good for the train ride home. Can't believe it's already Sunday night.