Stomachs on legs are proud to present

Whiteness and Farmers Markets: Performances, Perpetuations … Contestations?

Alison Hope Alkon1, Christie Grace McCullen

Academics and activists highlight the potential for alternative agrifood movements to contribute to the evolving coalescence of justice and sustainability. This potential, however, is constrained by what scholars have identified as the prevalent whiteness of such movements. This paper uses ethnographic research at two northern California farmers markets to investigate how whiteness is performed and perpetuated through the movements’ discourses and practices. We found that many managers, vendors and customers hold notions of what farmers and community members should be that both reflect and inform an affluent, liberal habitus of whiteness. Although whiteness pervades these spaces, we have also witnessed individual discourses and acts of solidarity and anti-racism, as well as fledgling institutional efforts to contest white cultural dominance. We conclude by discussing the potential of farmers markets to create an anti-racist politics of food.

available at: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-8330.2010.00818.x/abstract

I've been arguing this point at Friday drinks for a while now. And finally a brave American rancher has been boldly published in the NYT.

So what is the real story of meat’s connection to global warming? Answering the question requires examining the individual greenhouse gases involved: carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxides.

Carbon dioxide makes up the majority of agriculture-related greenhouse emissions. In American farming, most carbon dioxide emissions come from fuel burned to operate vehicles and equipment. World agricultural carbon emissions, on the other hand, result primarily from the clearing of woods for crop growing and livestock grazing. During the 1990s, tropical deforestation in Brazil, India, Indonesia, Sudan and other developing countries caused 15 percent to 35 percent of annual global fossil fuel emissions.

Much Brazilian deforestation is connected to soybean cultivation. As much as 70 percent of areas newly cleared for agriculture in Mato Grosso State in Brazil is being used to grow soybeans. Over half of Brazil’s soy harvest is controlled by a handful of international agribusiness companies, which ship it all over the world for animal feed and food products, causing emissions in the process.

Be wary kids of any flat world opinion that tells you that there is only one good way to live. It should always be predicated on..."it depends"

Actors, designers, pop stars have all got behind the hot new ethical campaign: food. From saving species to investigating conditions for pigs, star quality is pushing it to the foreground. The use of celebrity skin to push an ethical issue is nothing new, of course. In the 1990s, Peta - People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals - convinced a bunch of supermodels, including Naomi Campbell, to appear in the buff under the legend "I'd rather go nude than wear fur". But fur is just so passé. And, in any case, Campbell proved just how fickle the modern celebrity can be by soon deciding that actually, come to think of it, she would much rather wear fur than go nude, and did so on the catwalk in Milan.

Where celebrities are concerned, it seems, food is the new fur. The current set of images featuring Scacchi alongside actress Emilia Fox, director Terry Gilliam and actor Richard E Grant, were launched to back the cinematic release of The End Of The Line, a film about the threat of overfishing - but they are only a part of it. Tomorrow, Paul McCartney and his daughters Stella and Mary are launching a campaign to convince the public to go meat-free for one day a week. Another movie, Food Inc, which looks at the excesses and foul side-effects of industrial food production has just been released in the US and will shortly arrive here. Plus there is a major investigation by environmental campaigner Tracy Worcester into the dark underbelly of the global pig-rearing business which is about to be screened on digital channel More4. Food, and more importantly, really bad food, is hot.

Link

While this may compel some of us at gut feelings to stop blogging now, I think I can speak for all of us when I say, "where have you been all this time?"

What to expect from the celebrification (yes new word) of food as a cause: over simplifications, annoying ignorance, no body actually caring

As an appetizer before our sweet potato pie yesterday, we ate a salad, and bread smeared with.... 'plant-based onion fat'. Only in Germany would you find an organic vegetarian version of the savoury, toasty pork fat that a lot of people like to smear on bread.

In my opinion mashed potatoes are sad and forlorn without a spot of gravy.

In case you feel that way too, here are two handy gravy recipes that are easy to whip up any time. They don't rely on your having a roasting tray swirling with meat juices at hand.

Both of these recipes - which should more correctly be titled in parentheses as 'gravy', or 'tasty miso-based sauces' – have deep flavour. One (pictured above) is garlicky, rich and tangy.

The other is more like traditional gravy: warm & silky, with a mellow savouriness from the powdered garlic & inactive yeast. The latter two ingredients are worthwhile keeping in the pantry (as well as miso in the fridge of course), in order to jazz up potatoes at a moment's notice.

Miso Gravy by Ani Phyo
Serves four

1/4 cup miso
1 tbsp cider vinegar
1 clove garlic
1/2 orange, peeled & seeded
1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil
2 tbsp pitted dates

Blend until smooth - will keep for four days in the fridge. Tastes excellent with mashed sweet potato.


Miso Gravy by Fresh, Toronto
Serves four

4 & 1/2 tbsp flour
1/2 tsp garlic powder
3/4 cup inactive yeast (I use Naturata Würz Hefeflocken)
1 & 1/2 cups stock or water (I use store-bought goose stock)
1/3 cup sunflower oil
1 & 1/2 tsp hot dijon mustard
3 tbsp miso paste, light or dark
3/4 tsp salt

1. Put dry ingredients except salt in a saucepan over low heat. Whisk in the stock to make a paste. Let this come to a boil & simmer for 30 sec.
2. Add oil, mustard, miso & salt to the saucepan, whisk until thickened & velveteen. Serve hot!



Perhaps the ultimate beige food?



Served with pan-fried tofu steaks (marinated beforehand in half cup each tamari & water plus a teaspoon each of coriander powder & garlic powder); a pile of mashed potatoes with a little cream & nutmeg; and the New York Times' apple-mustard coleslaw to which we added a little extra apple sauce & grated radish, and smoked almonds instead of walnuts, thereby making the slaw kick even more butt than before.


A rapper named Gravy:



A song called Gravy by Bun B & UKG (it's all about the chorus):

And now for something slightly more trivial: a smoothie recipe.

It's not often I can claim to have invented something, but here is a smoothie that I created, which I am sure would be a panacea for Americans who have been overeating all Thanksgiving weekend.

It contains cranberries, which as my fellow members of womankind know, are not only tasty and tangy, but have certain curative powers.
Locavores beware, these come from Canada - as the label says, "straight from the bog". "Straight" here meaning out of the bog, into packaging, thence into a crate and a truck and then a plane or ship I presume and then a truck again and then finally at some point arriving at my local Rewe supermarket. For some reason the supermarkets in Germany are stocking plenty of them.

The smoothie also contains whole, raw oats. According to herbal medicine type people, oats have calming properties, but I've always assumed that any such properties would not remain once the oats have been steam-rolled and cooked into a mush. In any case, whole oats have cholesterol-lowering properties. They're also quite popular with horses.

Whole oats are called 'Nackt-hafer' in German ("naked oats"), which doesn't make too much sense since they are more clothed than the hulled and rolled variety.
I think I might be the only dirty-minded person who's thought of another reason for the name, concerning their feminine, 'fertile' appearance.

Soaking the grains and seeds aids their digestibility and blendability. Raw food fans claim it also aids the development of living enzymes, however nutritionists dispute the benefits of this. London-based nutritionist Bridget Naisbitt told the Guardian that "any enzymes you eat are broken down in your gut before they're digested and what you actually absorb are amino acids anyway ... we specifically evolved our own enzymes to fulfil the individual processes that take place in the human body, and an enzyme in a sprouting chickpea is unlikely to be able to fulfil that role."

Anyway, the soaking is necessary to make the oats softer, and the smoothie is much nicer to drink than milk-based smoothies: it doesn't leave you feeling bloated.

The smoothie has loads of fibre, and a creaminess from the seeds and oats which really offsets the tangy cranberry very well.

To quote a certain NYC-based hip hop producer in a group mail he sent us on Thursday, it might even give you "a very thankful BONER
On this Puritan turkey day!"

RUDE HOLIDAY SMOOTHIE

Soak a small handful of whole oats, a few tablespoons of linseeds/flax seeds, and one tablespoon of some other nut or seed of your choice (e.g. hazelnuts, pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds) overnight in cold water.

Rinse well and either use right away or put in the fridge for a day or two, until needed.

Chuck into the blender with a handful of cranberries, 3-4 chopped dates and half of a smoothie-glass full of water (the smoothie should be very thick and creamy). Blend until it is a pleasant uniform pink shade (or as close as you can get with all those little bits of nuts).

Sirflank cooked at 58 C for 1 hour (you could go for a lower temp but this worked well for my diners, flank part on the bottom half). Finished with high heat in a wok.

Fear not my vegeterian friends. I just finished working on a ricotta dish using Activa TG-K (this binds dairy products) and have started on a tofu dish using Activa-TI for I do not want to leave out my vegan pals either.

Why did I not use Activa YG for my ricotta dish? (I new you would ask that)

Well I'll let AJINOMOTO CO.,INC explain. (somehow I became a German Chef but anyway)

Dear XXXX san,
First, I’d like to confirm that already received samples from you. Thank you very much.
Next, I just got request from customer.
This customer is German Chef; he got information of ACTIVA YG from their friend in EU.
He interested in ACTIVA YG for cheese product, and asks for the information of this product.
I am not sure whether ACTIVA YG is produced in Japan or France, could you check please?
In case that customer would like to test ACTIVA YG, how can I get ACTIVA YG sample?
Thank you very much
Best regards,
Khun xxxx

...........

Khun xxxx
ACTIVA YG is produced in France only.
Regarding sampling of YG to your customer, I don't recomend now. As you know, we don't have approval of YG in Thai-FDA.
I explain background of YG development for reference shortly. We have sold another product (ACTIVA MP) for dairy produts in EU about ten years ago.
But we had a problem. ACTIVA MP does not work well when our customer use non, low or high-temperature pasteurization milk. According to our reseach, non or low-temperature pasteurization milk has inhibitory substance. After that, we developed new application that can control inhibitor. This new application is ACTIVA YG. ACTIVA YG uses reducing agent against inhibitor. If your customer use ultla high-temperature pasteurization milk, you can use ACTIVA TG-K as alternatives of YG. ACTIVA TG-K and MP are same function basically.
I will send ACTIVA YG brochure. Would you please confirm attached file. You can check the basic function of YG.
YG and TG-K are same about usage, dosage.

Bset regards,
xxxx-san

...........

Dear xxxx san,
Good morning.
Thank you very much for your explanation, I understand.
I agree with you that we do not want to pass YG sample to customer because of no Thai FDA approval.
So I will discuss with customer about their application and condition to find out the possibility to apply TG-K.
Thank you very much
Best regards,
Khun xxxx

So I may have quibbled in the past with the general precepts of veganism.

In my view its moral philosophy, claims to ecological superiority and overall social value remain contentious.

But I sure do love their shoes....introducing the "Vegan" wrap around boot from Tom's Ethical Shoe Store




Not loving the dried pig ear bracelet so much

Getting back to the hyper explosive topic of the social life of vegans the New Zealand Herald writes

A recent survey found vegans prefer partners who steer clear of meat or any animal products, vastly cutting the number of potential dates.

A University of Canterbury "Cruelty-Free Consumption in New Zealand" survey labelled people who choose not to be sexually intimate with non-vegans as "vegansexuals".

One vegansexual in the survey said: "I would not want to be intimate with someone whose body is literally made up from the bodies of others who have died for their sustenance. Non-vegetarian bodies smell different to me - they are, after all, sustained through carcasses - the murdered flesh of others."

The Northern Advocate scoured Northland for vegans and found a Kaitaia woman who was indeed struggling to find love.

"Apart from veganism I do have very high standards, but being a vegan has a lot to do with why I'm single," she said.

The divorced woman said she was being pursued by a meat-eating admirer but wasn't keen - especially as he once threatened to eat her pet pig.

"I know it's quite rare for vegans to date meat-eaters because being a vegan is about having a strong set of principles. I personally wouldn't want to get physical or make love with someone that had hurt or had a part in hurting an animal," she said.

"I cannot bear the thought of pain being inflicted on animals that have emotions."

Vegans are stricter than the average vegetarian, choosing not to consume, use or wear any products made of animals or containing animal byproducts. Banned products include eggs, milk, leather shoes, furs and even honey.

Safe animal welfare campaigner Hans Kriek is happily married to fellow vegan Nichola.

"When choosing a partner you tend to choose someone with the same set of values as you and being a vegan is a clear life choice. If you're a committed vegan it would be pretty hard to feel comfortable and adapt to living with a meat-eater," he said.

But Edward van Son, who lives at a vegan retreat in Victoria Valley, south of Kaitaia, said he had never had trouble finding love. Mr van Son said the girls who moved in his social circles tended not to be the types who ate only burgers.

"I find people who are into health, are creative and artistic, usually take an interest in healthy eating."

He also offered another reason for preferring vegans: "They definitely taste a lot better."

link

The last quote kinda grosses me out the most, and makes me wonder about all the linkages between sex and consumption, granted animals that only eat vegetables taste better, that's why dog has never tempted me, but is it really necessary to extend this taste perception to sex....does vegan muff really taste better.....blind taste test anyone....eeeeewwwwwwww

You either eat honey or you don't; to debate the question in public only makes the vegan movement seem silly and dogmatic

"The Great Vegan Honey Debate" IS HONEY THE DAIRY OF THE INSECT WORLD? By Daniel Engber

Slate

Ok, so now I'm about to establish that I'm one of those people that just can't leave well enough alone

As if you didn't know that already.

And since my my tongue in cheek sabre rattling blog style has essentially left me stranded with the label of "hack" (no one finds vegan zombies amusing but me it seems)

I thought I'd leave it to some peer reviewed academics to argue my case for me, mainly the work of Kathryn Paxton George, Department of Philosophy, University of Idaho

But just a reminded to those who didn't quite understand my intent at the outset of the previous furore. The purpose of this post is to speak generally about veganism and vegetarianism not about specific vegans or vegetarians. It is not a personal attack and I'd prefer it if you didn't read it as so.


Paxton George, K., 1994, "Discrimination and bias in the vegan ideal", Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics, 7, 1, 1187-7863.

Abstract

The vegan ideal is entailed by arguments for ethical veganism based on traditional moral theory (rights and/or utilitarianism) extended to animals. The most ideal lifestyle would abjure the use of animals or their products for food since animals suffer and have rights not to be killed. The ideal is discriminatory because the arguments presuppose a male physiological norm that gives a privileged position to adult, middle-class males living in industrialized countries. Women, children, the aged, and others have substantially different nutritional requirements and would bear a greater burden on vegetarian and vegan diets with respect to health and economic risks, than do these males. The poor and many persons in Third World nations live in circumstances that make the obligatory adoption of such diets, where they are not already a matter of sheer necessity, even more risky.

Traditional moral theorists (such as Evelyn Pluhar and Gary Varner whose essays appear in this issue) argue that those who are at risk would be excused from a duty to attain the virtue associated with ethical vegan lifestyles. The routine excuse of nearly everyone in the world besides adult, middle-class males in industrialized countries suggests bias in the perspective from which traditional arguments for animal rights and (utilitarian) animal welfare are formulated.

This is key to what I was trying to argue in the last post. For example, mal-nourishment and even starvation still plagues many people in the Third World and from my own personal experience in Cambodia, I can attest that in the main wet season, while the rice is still growing and the fields are inundated with water, vegetables rot and there is often little else to eat aside from fish, amphibians and insects. This matter of ecology imposes such limits on diet that even monks in this part of the world are mostly only semi-vegetarian. Should western vegans in the industrialised world be seen to inhabit a moral high ground because of the luxury that access to plentiful vegan foodstuffs provide? It seems to me just another way in which the over-privileged manage to lay claim to moral superiority, as if the aid industry weren't enough in itself.

Indeed, one of the key things that struck me when I was researching for this post was how out of touch the debate on the morality of veganism or vegetarianism is with the practicalities of survival for the majority of the world's inhabitants. The enormity of research on nutrition for vegans analysed the risks associated and how to manage them including the need for extensive supplements which are expensive. In some extreme cases vegans have ended up in hospital. Veganism and vegetarianism, at least in the part of the world I live in are thus associated with people of higher class and privileged backgrounds, those that can manage the risks, afford health care and supplements. Thus as Paxton argues, veganism or vegetarianism cannot be seen as a universal moral code but merely relegated to a cultural quirk often associated with wealth, education and class.

Mosy on over to page 216 "A feminist critique of vegetarianism" in The Animal Ethics Reader and read further....some of the pages are not there but you'll be able to get the gist of her debate

Finally, Kathryn also has a book published on the subject, Animal, Vegetable, Woman, Feminist, Vegetarianism

Of which the amazon reviewer says:

Kathryn Paxton George challenges the view held by noted philosophers Tom Regan and Peter Singer and ecofeminists Carol Adams and Deane Curtin who assume the Principle of Equality to argue that no one should eat meat or animal products. She shows how these renowned individuals also violate the Principle of Equality, because they place women, children, adolescents, the elderly, and many others in a subordinate position. She reviews the principal arguments of these major ethical thinkers, offers a detailed examination of the nutritional literature on vegetarianism, and shows how this inconsistency arises and why it recurs in every major argument for ethical vegetarianism. Included is her own view about what we should eat, which she calls "feminist aesthetic semi-vegetarianism." "George has presented original, often compelling, arguments against ethical vegetarianism. Relying on well-researched evidence of nutritional and material differences among humans based on age, gender, race, class, and cultural location, George shows respects in which current arguments for vegetarianism falsely presuppose a male physiological norm and ideal. This book is necessary reading for animal rights advocates, feminists, ethicists, or anyone else interested in interconnected health and ethical issues concerning vegetarianism." - Karen J. Warren, author of Ecofeminist Philosophy: A Western Perspective on What It Is and Why It Matters

"This broadly provocative book should be controversial, worthy of being attacked on several fronts. It is central to two large topics: feminist philosophy and the moral status of animals. It will not be the last word on any of the controversial issues that it touches upon, but it is unequivocally the next word."

- Paul B. Thompson, author of Food Biotechnology in Ethical Perspective

And no my freezer isn't stuffed with meat and no I don't enjoy torturing kittens. I do however get annoyed when I can't get a point across well enough and blogging isn't always the perfect forum. I'm hoping that this post will at least release the angsty tension I seem to get under circumstances of miscommunication and I won't have to spend another afternoon running out my annoyance at the gym

In the week or two after the wedding we managed to stretch out the left-overs quite well. Boy, I enjoyed them!
Above is fresh soft goat cheese from France, coated in dried petals. Thanks to Alice, John and Mayuko for the endless cheese feast!

I'm not really an expert on cheese, especially not French cheese. If visiting Holland I would often try to bring back some aged Amsterdam gouda; and in London, there are nice hard English cheese like Wensleydale. But when it comes to the softer, riper genre of French cheeses, I'm a bit in the dark.

It turns out that French cheeses really are all that – and you don't even have to go for the really smelly stuff. I loved the St. Dominin lavender goat's cheese below, just spread on toast, I ate in about 2 days all by myself! A sort of honey vibe to the lavender, and the perfect balance of yielding crust and subtle melting vibe. Almost porno. I am definitely going to go back to Manufactum for this!





The dog's breakfast you can see above is what remained of a Peanut butter-almond-chocolate pie from the Fresh cookbook. I scooped it into a bowl to take up less space in the fridge. This decadent treat tastes a bit like Reeses Pieces - but you can sort of trick yourself that it might be healthy because it contains a few spoonfuls of tofu. It has a really good texture between pumpkin pie and toffee.

It's quite easy to make. Line a pie-dish or tart dish with crumbled dark chocolate cookies. Here is the recipe for vegan cookies (it's very easy).

Fresh's Double Choc Cookies

Combine 2 1/2 cups of maple syrup (or Agave cactus syrup, which is a lot cheaper, I got a gallon for 10 euros or something), a cup of oil and 1 1/2 cups dark chocolate chips. Combine 2 1/2 cups of dark cocoa with 5 cups of wholemeal flour and add to the wet stuff. Add a pinch of salt, and 2 tsp vanilla extract or to taste.

Scoop the batter in teaspoons onto a waxed cookie sheet, bake for about 20 minutes at 200 degrees.

Peanut-butter Choc Almond Pie

Combine cookie crumbs with 1 tbsp oil and 1/4 cup syrup (maple or Agave), don't mix too much, but don't worry too much if it turns into a paste. Line your dish and bake at 220 degrees for 10 minutes.

In a food processor, blend 3/4 cup smooth peanut butter, 1/4 cup raw sugar, 1/4 cup syrup, just over half a cup of firm silken tofu, just over 1/4 cup soy milk, and a pinch of salt.
Pour into crust and bake for 15 minutes.
When it has cooled, top with more crushed dark chocolate and almonds (optionally toasted/chopped), then refrigerate for at least 2 hours.

You can also freeze it without damage for a few nights.



I am not usually the type of person to buy ingredients without an idea of what I'm going to do with them, so I am not usually the type of person to search around online for a recipe idea. But I wanted to make sure we did something yummy with the Roquefort Carles blue cheese from the wedding, before it went to waste. I wanted something fresh, but a blue cheese and pear salad sounded too healthy. I found a great recipe from Mark Bittman online where you blanch a mixture of veges in boiling water (we used green beans, fennel and zucchini) - put into a flat dish, season, sprinkle with 2 bread-slices worth of bread crumbs and then 1/4 cup of crumbled or grated blue cheese. Then bake! Awwwwwwwesome.



Follow with several bottles of left over pink wedding champagne and a game of Shithead.

For the last few months, I've been semi-hitched to my 'verlobte' (fiancee) Erik. Last week I finally became a 'Braut', which is not, as it sounds, a type of white salad vegetable grown in the dark, but indeed a bride.

When my dear ex-room mate from Tokyo arrived in Cologne last week she said with a look of concern on her face "I didn't know you were self-catering," and I hastily reassured her that we weren't – which was mostly true.

Most well-meaning friends were nervous that I might repeat certain entertaining follies of my early twenties. Such as my 22nd birthday, where I installed low trestle tables around the edges of my bedroom, with cushions, for a kind of cross-legged banquet. There was a long piece of sirloin sitting in the bath-tub. There were also fish & vegetarian options. But I was very ill-prepared and although an event-management friend saved the night with military-style command in the kitchen, the guests ended up eating at midnight . I should add that everyone got really drunk and it was a damn good party.

A good friend who was present for such debacles, wrote that she was haunted by the idea of me roasting vegetables in my wedding dress. So she offered to contribute towards catering and became quite taken with the idea of providing cheese for the party as a wedding gift. This reached a summit of inspiration when it turned out that Neal's Yard Dairy in London does cheese wheels stacked and decorated like a wedding cake. A cheese 'cake' was not meant to be, though. Mad Cow Disease reappeared in the UK.

In the end we weren't too over the top with our wedding plans. We had a deal where we could use the secret modernist disco basement of our favourite local cafe for free, including a friendly bartender named Bisrat, (of course we had to pay the bar tab). We ordered six quiches and 2 salads (one with puy lentils, the other beet & carrot) from an organic cafe called Metzgerei Schmitz. Paying 60 euros for a bowl of grated root vegetables made me feel a bit sick, but when guests are coming from out of town, ......you can't serve them oranges with pieces of cheese on toothpicks.......or can you?

We ordered vegan sushi from a place called Bento Box: 60 inari, 100 cucumber maki, 100 avocado&rocket/arugula maki, 78 inside-out sesame-coated capsicum, avocado & cucumber maki.

Erik's sister kindly offered to make several platters of vitello tonnato (a classic Italian dish of thin sliced veal with a tuna sauce), and a potato salad, and Erik's aunt, who lives in the village Rinnen, made platters of pumpkin-seed topped sourdough bread.

Then there was the desserts and wedding cake, the type of thing I generally prefer when they are made with raw sugar, whole grain spelt flour, fruit, tofu or all of the above.

Despite the continued protests, I really felt like the food - as much as the clothes, the eBay shoes, or the simple rings - had to reflect something of us and our tastes even more than our budget. So that meant I needed to make some of the food offered at our party myself (with the help of my brother, and a friend Ruth). Somehow I wanted the food to have at least a few drops of our own toil & effort poured into it (I was sure the saltiness would add to the flavour). The fact of wanting to provide vegan/vegetarian options was a convenient excuse. And it turned out to be a saving grace.



The days and nights leading to the wedding were hectic. We drove to Ikea and bought salad bowls, napkins, and cheap glasses en masse for the 2 hours post wedding and pre-afterparty, when we planned to serve champagne, and 'Bombay crushed' kumquat cocktails, at our house. We drive to the villages of Urft and Rinnen to borrow linen, platters and salad servers.
I bought new chopping boards from Habitat. We went to work by day. I felt quite panicked about the idea of making sure everyone had a good time at the party, and the idea of fulfilling the role of 'bride' well enough that everyone got their money's worth of proper wedding vibes. People asked if I had cold feet. But this question confused me - the weather was very warm and sunny. If anything, my feet were sweaty.

In the end the only thing that calmed me down in the nights leading to the wedding was to focus on baking, wrapping and freezing. When I exited the kitchen and went to bed my heart would start pounding and I'd be back to making mental lists and feeling nervous about looking ridiculous. And there were only going to be 50 people there, who'd all been warned there would be no speeches, waltz or lace veils. It's not like we were planning the Kentucky derby.

Wednesday night, we drove out to the wholesale supermarket Metro, then I made vegan chocolate cookies with a gallon ofagave syrup, and Dutch cocoa, and we ate some of them while playing mah jong.
Thursday night, Erik's friend Danny Breaks arrived from England, and I drank red wine and baked vegan strawberry-lavendar muffins while the guys played the card game 'Shithead' in the living room and drank Hennesy.



Friday night, my brother Tim helped me to make sweet potato money bags with spring roll wrappers, most of which we froze, ready to bake in the oven on the wedding day. Tim let me issue instructions in making a peanut-butter-chocolate-almond pie, which was also frozen without harm for a couple of nights. Both these dishes were vegan.



Saturday, I baked one layer of the chocolate-orange wedding cake, we drove out to Metro wholesalers again, and bought trays of fine apricots, fennel, edible flowers, blueberries, stachelberries, Johannisberries, more sweet potatoes (to roast), quark, a crate of orange& ginger-flavoured 'Bionade' softdrinks for the non-drinkers, and some pre-sliced chorizo and mortadella and small hazelnut-studded salamis to snack over the next day or two. (We'd been warned that we would forget to eat in the days leading to the wedding, which against all odds and my unfailing appetite, turned out to be true).



That afternoon, overseas visitors arrived, and we decided it would be more relaxing to hang out at our house. We had thin sliced fennel & orange salad with poppy seeds, then fresh quark with berries, lavendar stems and mint leaves in parfait glasses, and drank Verve Cliquot, and watched a bad wedding movie with Owen Wilson (after trying unsuccessfully to find John Hughes or The Way We Were) during which everybody fell asleep. The Will Ferrell cameos were really good though.

The next morning me & Ruth staked out the kitchen once more.



I made a dipping sauce from garlic, raw sugar, lemon grass and hot sauce, then another from fresh tomato, olive oil, sun dried tomatoes and a couple of dates. This one rocks. Try it at home. Ruth made 2 more layers of the cake, and a tofu 'cream' with shitloads of Agave syrup and vanilla and a little soy milk. We made a creamy dressing from wasabi, more tofu, mustard, vinegar etc for the green salad the next day.

Then we went for dinner with seven of our overseas guests at this great restaurant called Bagutta, had the 3-course menu including a perfectly cooked pink-fleshed fish that the waitress swore was not salmon or trout but didn't know the english name, and a nice white wine made from red grapes. Then we stopped by a beer-garden in the park strung with coloured lights, and caught the end of the Champion's League football final (Germany lost).

When we got home Erik chopped up the sweet potatoes, fennel and tomato and laid them on trays ready to be roasted (by him) the next day. It had been a beautiful warm evening and the kitchen was full of the fresh smell of cut fennel. I felt that domesticity should always be as simple as the smell of fennel, a summer evening, and someone beside you who's good at chopping things.



The morning of the wedding, I was busy having my hair done (very basic) while simultaneously painting my own toe nails. So Ruth (took care of decorating the wedding cake (with melted dark chocolate, lavendar, johannis berries, blueberries and a blue ribbon) and it looked so perfect. We bought the flowers (thistles, wisteria, and greenish roses) and she also assembled the bouquets beautifully. Tim roasted the money-bags. Alice (the other bridesmaid), John and Mayuko laid out a beautiful selection of cheese which they had bought from Brot & Butter at Manufactum.





Then we headed to the old town hall for the ceremony (the building below), most of which I did not understand, but the tears in the eyes of Erik's aunts and everyone kitted out so nicely made the whole thing feel very special and serious.



The weather was gorgeous, and it was so lovely to see everybody - from Mina von Sneakerberg and Danny from den Haag, to Gerd Janson and Max Cole and Yannick 'Monkey Sausage', to Marco Passarani from Rome, Vladimir & Marcus from Düsseldorf, Mark de Clive Lowe, my brother, our colleagues all looking very smart in suits like the cast of the Sopranos, and the surprise karaoke set that was rolled out later on in the evening alongside a round of Jaegermeister. (Big respekt to Lars Dorsch for being the perfect wedding DJ and playing all the Lover's Hits from Minnie Riperton to Steely Dan and some classic Chicago house)

Somehow the food stretched - it was actually more than enough - and the cake was very yummy and moist, packed with orange zest and dark chocolate chips and layered with the tofu 'cream'. (Wulf's girlfriend Dagmar did comment that this 'NZ-style' cake was a lot heavier than German cake - and a piece took her half an hour to eat! But I loved it). I drank a lot of vodka with cloudy apple juice and sang 'These Boots Are Made for Walking' with Mayuko, although I wasn't sure how appropriate a choice it was as a new bride.





It feels very good to have joined the wedding cult ...... and I'll never forget how smart Erik looked that day, with his new suit and bright white sneakers.

You know those Sundays when you wake up and suddenly spring seems to have come and the trees are all green and wavy and the sun is glinting off the train tracks - and that one train with the 'Neil Young' graffiti that never moves is sitting there all rusty and sun baked - and warm light and green currents of air are flooding through the window.

Then you just have, repeat, have to bake muffins. To a soundtrack of birdsong and imperceptible leaf rustling.

Muffins, a banal has-been fad of kiwi baking, written off long ago as cake repackaged, are somewhat foreign and exotic in Germany so you can pawn them off on your friends if you, like me, are prone to eat six in one day if they're just lying around all forlorn and unwanted.

But you don't need to feel too guilty since these particular muffins are chewy and soft with wholegrain spelt flour, soy milk, maple syrup, and raw sugar (which imparts a slightly malty, caramelised flavour) - infused with lavendar and studded with pinky-red chunks of organic strawberry.

Think of them as 'Laura Ashley vegan'.



Good with a Chinese green tea from the Parisian tea company Mariages Freres, fresh cut flowers and an open window.



Inevitably, having done this cheerful morning baking, you remember that you have got work to catch up on, and you end up chained to the laptop munching on muffins in your pajamas while all the other kids are playing outside.
Just a typical Sunday, I guess! Not quite so Laura Ashley though. I'm sure she would at least put on some pink lipstick.



Strawberry Lavender Muffins adapted from the 'Fresh at Home' cookbook, which in turn are based on a recipe from a Toronto baking company named Sweets of the Earth.

1& 1/4 cups soya milk
3/4 cup Grade c or D maple syrup
2 tbsp lavender
1 cup apple sauce/apfelmus
4 cups spelt flour (ideally a mix of light and medium wholegrain)
1/2 cup raw,unrefined sugar
1 tbsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
2 cups roughly chopped strawberries
1/4 cup sunflower, canola or olive oil

1. Grease the muffin tins
2. Heat soya milk, maple syrup and lavender in a saucepan and bring to a boil over medium heat (don't worry that it curdles)
3. Remove from heat, cover and infuse for ten minutes. Strain through a fine sieve and add applesauce. Set aside and cool completely.
4. Combine flour, sugar, baking powder and baking soda in a mixing bowl.
5. Add strawberries and toss.
6. Add liquid and oil. Mix gently until mixture just comes together.
7. Scoop into muffin pans
8. Bake at 180 degrees for anywhere from 30 minutes to 50 minutes depending on your oven. Make sure to test one - better to have them on the deep brown side than undercooked.