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See below for Providence Journal Interview with cofounder of this museum
Vegetarian Thanksgiving: Yesterday and Today by Michael and Karen Iacobbo
Vegetarians have a different perspective on American culinary culture than their
meat-eating friends. For example, Thanksgiving for meat-abstainers is not
synonymous with turkey on the table. What is Thanksgiving to a vegetarian? That
depends upon the vegetarian; however, for some the holiday means bringing an
entrée – perhaps a stuffed squash, lentil loaf, vegan lasagna, Unturkey, or
Tofurkey – to the family dinner table. Other vegetarians remember the turkeys on
Thanksgiving Day, but as friends and not as a leg, wishbone, or white meat. As
friends of turkeys, vegetarians might adopt one, either literally or by sending
a donation to a sanctuary that cares for the feathered flocks.
What do vegetarians have in common with other Americans on Thanksgiving?
Thankfulness that we live in a free country, and that we have food to eat, comes
to
mind.
This holiday vegetarians across America may participate in one of the hundreds
of Thanksgiving dinners held by grassroots organizations. Sharing a meal with
other vegetarians, usually a multi-course meal prepared by volunteers and served
in a church basment on the Sunday before the holiday, is a tradition in America
that dates to at least as early as the 19th Century.
For not a few vegetarians, feasting on the actual day of Thanksgiving takes
special effort. People who don’t eat turkey might have a problem finding
something festive to eat if dining at a restaurant. On a typical day, many
restaurants offer at least one vegetarian entrée on the menu; however, for
Thanksgiving Day most chefs have yet to meet the challenge of a meat-free feast.
A huge demand exists, however, because a significant percentage of restaurant
patrons – vegetarians or not -- would order a delicious and nutritious ‘veggie’
entrée if it was offered. Think of all the people on diets, or who have
allergies, or who just want to try something different to eat this holiday
season. Accommodating chefs might provide a simple pasta & cheese dish, and for
vegans a Portabella mushroom for the holiday entrée. Yet American chefs are so
talented and creative that surely they can do so much more to please their
non-meat-eating patrons. Just like other Americans, a large percentage of
vegetarians would like to indulge and eat a gourmet meal to celebrate the
holiday. This is difficult when even side dishes contain chicken stock.
Foods from the plant kingdom are economical and nutritious, and what is more,
vegetables, grains or legumes are the perfect foundation for a chef to build
creative and delicious entrée and side dishes. Therefore, chefs: how about
preparing a chestnut or other nut-based loaf with a luscious sauce, or an
out-of-the-ordinary potpie, and or a bean or vegetable-based pate’ wrapped in
pastry? Make these dishes vegan style (no animal ingredients), and just might
multiply the number of patrons who will try your creations. Prepared entirely
from foods of the garden or orchard, these types of dishes will attract not only
the vegans, and the vegetarians, but quite a few meat-eating patrons as well.
This Thanksgiving, we would hope restaurants offer tasty treats for vegetarians
and vegans (--and that those treats are cooked on a grill and with utensils not
used for meat, eggs, or dairy.) One positive sign in this direction: this year
Rhode Island Vegan Awareness (RIVA) holds its holiday dinner at the Radisson
Airport Hotel Providence, a Johnson and Wales University educational facility.
That's quite a step up from the typical church basment. However, this is not the
first time vegetarians have been indulged with fancy fare on Thanksgiving Day,
as the menu below indicates.
Chefs and restauranteurs: Vegetarians and vegans want to spend money at
restaurants! Indulge us!
Here is the menu from yesteryear:
Dinner menu created by the vegetarian/ anti-vivisection organization The
Millenium
Guild, whose founder was socialite and cookbook author Emarel Sharpe (later
Freshel). This dinner was served for Thanksgiving in 1913 at the famous and
grand Copley Hotel in Boston, Massachusetts.
mushroom cocktail
Vegex (vegetable extract. We assume this was either used as a soup or sauce
base)
consomme'
coeur de palm (heart of palm, roasted and likely stuffed)
cranberry punch
Golden Rule roast (this could have been anything- perhaps mashed beans or ground
nuts mixed with minced vegetables, bread crumbs, and herbs? )
crepes bordelaise (vegan style)
--- Here is another Thanksgiving menu, entirely vegetarian, from The Golden-Rule Cookbook,
published 1910, by M.R.L. Sharpe a.k.a. Emarel Sharpe (Freshel).
The recipe for Michaelmas Loaf is below the menu.
Fresh Mushroom Cocktail
Pimolas
Celery
Cream of Artichokes
Crackers
Radishes
Asparagus in Dutch Butter
Michaelmas Loaf
Mashed Potatoes
Roast Sweet Potatoes
Cranberry Sauce
Tomato Salad with Mayonnaise
Frozen Cranberry Punch
Mince Pie
Pumpkin Pie
Nuts and Raisins
Fruit
Coffee
Note: to change recipe for vegans to also enjoy, substitute for eggs and dairy.
Egg replacer, soy butter, and vegan mayonnaise are available at natural food
stores.
Michaelmas Loaf
Mix 1 cup finely ground walnuts (or other nuts), 1 cup of finely ground roasted
peanuts, 1 teaspoon salt, 1 saltspoon pepper, 2-1/2 cups of fine bread crumbs, 1
tablespoon of mixed sweet herbs (thyme, sage, and summer savory), and 1 large
onion or 2 small ones chopped fine. When well blended bind together with 2 eggs
which have been slightly beaten, mould with the hands into a loaf, place in a
well-buttered roasting tin, and let it cook for ten minutes in a moderately hot
oven; then add 1 tablespoon of butter and 1 cup of hot water, and baste
frequently during an hour's cooking. The loaf should be well browned and
carefully removed to a hot platter. Make a brown sauce in the pan in which the
loaf cooked, and serve with this and cold apple sauce.
Enjoy and Happy Thanksgiving! Michael and Karen Iacobbo of
www.vegetarianmuseum.com would love to hear from you. They are the authors of
Vegetarian America: A History (Praeger 2004) and Vegetarians and Vegans in
America Today (Praeger 2006). Contact: vegusa@cox.net or kiacobbo@cox.net
http://www.projo.com/news/content/projo_20061120_veg.3216b8c.html
At this holiday dinner, hold the turkey
The annual Compassionate Thanksgiving dinner, sponsored by Rhode Island Vegan Awareness, promotes vegetarianism for reasons of animal rights, improving the environment and nonviolence.
01:00 AM EST on Monday, November 20, 2006
By Michelle J. Lee
Journal Environment Writer
WARWICK -- Paul Dumont, a piano tuner from Lincoln, celebrated Thanksgiving early yesterday at the Radisson Airport Hotel with a feast of butternut bisque, stuffing and potatoes with gravy.
What was missing from his plate was the turkey. Instead, he ate seitan, a meat substitute made of wheat gluten.
Dumont became a vegan in 1997 when his older brother sent him a box of books on animal rights and health. The books persuaded Dumont to give up meat, dairy and other animal-based foods so he and his twin sons can prevent such problems as heart disease and high cholesterol.
"It made my life have meaning, not hurting animals and making my children healthy," he said. "There's a lot of positive things from it. It makes my life fuller."
Dumont was one of 110 people who attended the sixth annual Compassionate Thanksgiving held by Rhode Island Vegan Awareness, a group that promotes a vegan diet for animal rights, improving the environment and nonviolence.
Elana Kirshenbaum, the president and cofounder of the organization, held the Thanksgiving event at her house in 2001.
She noted some vegans and vegetarians might face confrontation when celebrating with family members who eat meat. "Thanksgiving can be a stressful time because their ethics aren't understood, their values, whatever [reason] they chose to be vegetarian," she said. "Sometimes they feel misunderstood and they can feel trivialized."
It is difficult to count the number of America vegetarians. One national poll this year by the Vegetarian Resource Group estimated about 4.7 million adults over 18, roughly 2.3 percent of the population, said they never eat meat, fish and poultry.
There are a number of reasons people embrace a vegetarian diet. Some believe in animal rights, others choose it for aesthetic or religious reasons. Still others choose vegetarianism for environmental reasons because industrial farms use tons of grains, thousands of acres and millions of gallons of water to raise animals. The farms can produce tons of waste, leading to air, water and land pollution.
While some may view vegetarianism as a lifestyle, it is more of a "philosophy and practice of living in harmony with animals and nature," said Karen Iacobbo, a Glocester journalist, cofounder of the online Vegetarian Museum and coauthor of two vegetarian books with her husband, Michael.
"Vegetarians had a remarkable influence on society that the community isn't aware of," Karen said. She noted that vegetarians were early champions of ideas such as preventive medicine, exercise, eating fruits and vegetables, and abstaining from drugs and alcohol.
Vegetarianism has been practiced for thousands of years in religions such as Buddhism and Jainism. Notable figures such as philosophers Plato and Pythagoras were vegetarians.
One of the first famous American vegetarians was Benjamin Franklin, who gave up meat for humanitarian reasons and even served a vegetarian meal to George Washington, Iacobbo said. However, during a fishing trip off Block Island, Franklin was tempted by cod and reverted.
Vegetarians also played a strong role in how Americans eat today. The man considered the "father" of American vegetarianism, the Rev. Sylvester Graham, promoted "natural hygiene" and advocated using whole wheat in the 1830s. In the 1870s, Dr. John Harvey Kellogg proved Americans didn't need to eat ham or sausage for breakfast and developed cereals, Iacobbo said.
Vegetarian food festivals in America date to the 1840s and meat-free Thanksgivings can be traced to 1895, according to Iacobbos' book .
Nowadays, vegetarianism is more accepted by Americans and even meat eaters are willing to try the occasional vegetarian meal. Robert Yaffe, owner of the vegetarian Garden Grill Restaurant, in Pawtucket, said about 60 to 70 percent of his customers aren't vegetarian. "My customers are primarily into eating healthy, natural foods, but [are] not necessarily vegetarian," he said.
The restaurant has offered five-course vegetarian Thanksgiving dinners since 2003. Last year, the dinner drew 75 people. Yaffe, who worked in the natural foods business for 36 years, opened the restaurant partly for environmental reasons and to cater to a special niche.
Meatless Thanksgiving can provide a sense of community for vegans such as Barry and Chris Brown, of Warren. While the couple celebrate Thanksgiving with their own family, which includes vegetarians, they have attended the RIVA event since 2003 to show solidarity and meet other vegans.
Being vegan made a huge difference for the Browns, who became vegetarians in 1991 when Barry was diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma, a type of cancer. In 1993, they became vegans after watching a film about a chicken farm.
Barry said his cancer has been in remission since 2002, and he credits his diet. And Chris changed her career from layout artist to natural foods educator in 1997.
Chris Brown said events such as Compassion Thanksgiving "brings people together and introduces them to healthy eating and changes their minds on what vegan food tastes like."
The other benefit of a vegan diet is not worrying about hormones and food-borne diseases in meat, Barry said. "There's no such thing as mad tofu disease," he joked.
For more information about Rhode Island Vegan Awareness, visit www.veganawareness.org. For more information about the Vegetarian Museum, visit www.vegetarianmuseum.com.
-- Michelle J. Lee is a fellow with the Metcalf Institute for Marine and Environmental Reporting.
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