How happy I am to have met my major sewing goal of 2009 – sewing 2 warm, organic winter coats for my husband and myself. This was a big project, but not beyond the capabilities of anyone who knows how to use a sewing machine. Coats are one of those items of clothing you may assume you just have to buy ready-made, but when you’re stuck with that belief, your chances of finding an organic coat are pretty limited. If cruelty-free is also on your garment checklist, your choices for store-bought winter coats are even slimmer. By deciding to sew your own organic men’s or women’s coat, you’ve taken the power of choice and ability back into your own hands, and I hope this latest article in the Reskills column of VeganReader will help to inspire you to take total charge of your winter wardrobe!

Why Would You Want An Organic Coat?
There are three good arguments for opting for organic clothing whenever you can.

Organic For You
The pesticides, sizing chemicals and other toxins applied to conventional fabric and garments are terrible for your health. In the wintertime, our immune systems are working their hardest to fight off the colds and flu bugs of the cold season. The last thing your body needs is to be further burdened with trying to fight off poisoning every time you put your winter coat on. By choosing organic clothing, you are reducing the toxins you are inhaling and that are being absorbed by your body’s largest organ – your skin.

Organic For Farmers And Weavers
Conventional cotton fields use 10 times the amount of pesticides used in conventional culture of food crops. Farmworkers die every year from pesticide exposure. The deadly cycle of exposure continues through fabric mills and garment assembly factories where workers are poisoned by the pesticide residues on the cotton, as well as toxic treatments applied to fabrics to make them wrinkle-proof, fire-resistant, etc. By choosing to buy organic cloth or clothing, you are protecting innocent, hardworking people from disease and death. Of prime importance is the fact that choosing organic means saying NO! to GMO cotton. Genetically modified cotton (also called BT cotton) has been forced upon the poorest farmers in some of the poorest places in the world (India, South America, etc.) by the multinational GMO corporation, Monsanto. Epidemics of farmer suicide have resulted wherever BT Cotton has been foisted on the farmers who become the indentured servants of the corporation, forbidden to save seed from the crops they grow, legally bound to pay for new seed each year, in total opposition to the traditions of seed saving that help farm families survive. GMO crops contaminate Organic crops, causing them to mutate into things never before seen on Earth. If for no other reason than this, choosing organic fabrics and garments is important to the future of us all.

Organic For Your Habitat
Pesticides and chemical fertilizers ruin your water, foul your air and are associated with a host of diseases…everything from Autism to Cancer. The toxic practices of conventional agriculture poison and kill wildlife and make our habitat a place of suffering rather than a hub of life. It’s up to us to make the change back to the organic growing practices that have reigned since the dawn of agriculture and up until the time when the first chemicals were put on our precious lands in the 20th century. By choosing organic fabric and clothing, we can be the change we need to see in the world, in hopes of keeping our world a healthy blue and green planet.

Why Would You Want A Vegan Coat?

Far be it from me to say a word against the ancestors and the modern indigenous people who have traditionally used the skin, hair and fur of animals to make clothing for themselves. I would never criticize the lifeways of others. But living in America means having a choice…a choice not to make animals give up their lives or their autonomy for our benefit. Animals suffer and die in the system that uses them for wool, fur and leather clothing and their lives are ruled by imprisonment. They have not consented to be used in this way by Americans and those seeking to lead lives of compassion can make the choice to opt out of a system that does not recognize the rights of our fellow beings to live their lives as they see fit, without having to show a profit to mankind.

Once you make this choice, the choice vegans make not to wear animal products, you are confronted with a dilemma. Cruelty- free summer clothing is no problem. You can make all the dresses, shirts and pants you need out of organic cotton calico or linen and be perfectly comfortable. But vegan winter clothing? That’s a tougher nut to crack. You may be tempted to turn to synthetics like polar fleece for layers of warmth, but most synthetics are very unpleasant to wear and many are based on the fossil fuels (oil) which we are all trying to move away from. So, how can you sew a winter coat that is truly warm, but meets your ethical requirements for both compassion and organic culture?

How I Made These Organic Coats
I took two approaches – one for the men’s coat and one for the women’s coat and both have yielded really warm garments.

My handmade organic men’s coat consists of 2 layers. The outer layer was made of an organic cotton sateen sheet. The inner layer (which you can see on the collar and cuffs) is an organic cotton blanket. The coat is actually reversible, with a shawl collar and two buttons. The overall style is along the lines of a raincoat, but that thick, organic woven cotton blanket makes it really cozy and my husband loves it.

For the organic women’s coat, three layers were used. The outer later is the same organic cotton sateen sheet material used in the men’s coat and the innermost layer is an organic cotton flannel sheet in taupe. These 2 layers enclose a layer of quilt batting. I assembled ’sandwiches’ of these three fabrics for each of the main pieces of the coat – the fronts, back and sleeves and then quilted them before assembling the coat. I then quilted the coat in double rows of horizontal stripes and used scraps from the same organic cotton blanket to give the collar and cuffs that ‘wooly’ barn jacket look. I did the quilting on my sewing machine. I used another quilting technique to finish the hem, applying bias stripping to bind the edge of it. It’s a mid-calf length coat with four buttons. I decided I wanted to add an extra bit of design to my coat, and sewed two strips of blue and white organic cotton sateen (taken from the gift bag my sheets and blanket came in) together and then applied them to the coat a few inches above the hem. Finally, I appliqued two pelicans to the coat, turning my design elements into an image of sea birds circling above the ocean and surf. I think this gives a totally unique, seaworthy look to this special organic coat. It’s warm, comfortable and wonderful to wear!

I want to make special mention of the buttons I used on these coats. I buy American-made products whenever possible and I was totally thrilled to discover WoodButtons.com – a domestic company that has been making gorgeous buttons and toggles in Brooklyn, NY since 1939. These buttons are really something special and the customer service I encountered at WoodButtons.com was incredibly helpful, personable and friendly. If you love to sew, you are going to love the wide selection of beautiful wooden buttons these folks offer and the lovely, chevron design on the buttons I ordered adds such a fine finishing touch to my 2 organic coats.

My organic sheets and blanket for the project were purchased from another company I enjoy supporting: Coyuchi. Their cotton sateen and flannel sheets are fabulous for sewing with, their slightly glossy sheen lending that polished look to a project that you readily associate with coats, jackets and windbreakers. I really appreciate that this company gives me an option for buying large pieces of organic fabric to work with and I thought the ‘espresso’ color line used in this project resulted in really professional, classy looking coats.

For my husband’s coat, I attempted to work with a coat pattern. I wasn’t happy with the pattern, so I won’t link to it here. I ended up having to come up with my own solutions for it. For my own coat, I worked loosely with a large men’s shirt pattern, but making up a lot of it as I went along. If you are handy with sewing, chances are you can turn a shirt pattern you already own into a coat, if you remember that coats need to be much roomier than shirts in order to provide the ease of movement that makes a coat comfortable to wear. If you are just getting into sewing, you will be best off working with an actual coat pattern and following the directions carefully.

The Pride Of Gaining Skills
How much harder is it to sew a coat than it is to sew a shirt? Just a little bit. It takes some extra thought and planning to figure out how you will handle the layers of fabric you’ll be working with to get the desired warmth. How long did it take to make these coats? The Organic Men’s Coat took me 3 days to complete (three afternoons and evenings of sewing). The Organic Women’s Coat took 4 days. My husband helped me with the cutting of the fabrics – he’s a master with a rotary cutter!

How about the cost? I calculate that I spent about $150 on each coat. Is that a good deal? When I consider that I’ve got 2 organic, vegan coats that are not hurting my planet, farmers, weavers or myself and that my family will be wearing these coats for the next 10 years, I think I’ve gotten a great deal. And, when I look at the few mass-manufactured organic coats out there that are likely of inferior quality and see that they are selling for as much as $300 each or more, the deal looks even better. Finally, when I consider that I not only got to put my love into the project, but came out of it with the confidence that I have the skills to clothe my loved ones with coats that will offer real protection from winter cold, I am totally pleased.

You can gain these skills! Don’t let anyone tell you that you can’t sew a coat. In just a week, I made two of them and I’m by no means a professional seamstress. As human beings, we are dependent on clothing for our survival in the winter, but that doesn’t mean we have to be dependent on Macy’s. We can learn to depend on ourselves for these basic needs of life and we can take real pride in the discovery that, with a little work and love, we can provide for our families abundantly!

The Lytton Band of Pomo Indians would like to make a home west of the town of Windsor in Sonoma County in Northern California. They would like to build 147 homes for their people, as well as a beautiful roundhouse for their spiritual devotions, a community center and a medical clinic. Their very simple wish to make a good home for their loved ones has been met with a self-satisfied, self-entitled, smug and racist reaction from the governor of California, the local government and local people, in keeping with the tune of California’s historical response to Indian people. Opponents are using every trick in the book, from questioning the federal legitimacy of the Lytton People to refusing to let them use local water. I find this so despicable and shameful that I can’t think of a better thing to spend my time writing about in a publication that concerns itself with peace and justice.

The local newspaper, The Press Democrat, has published several articles regarding the situation in Windsor, giving space on their pages to the ire of local officials and the outrageous behavior of the governor who is questioning whether the Lytton Band should be recognized and whether they have a right to build a home for themselves in California:

Press Democrat Article 1

Press Democrat Article 2

Press Democrat Article 3

Here are two telling comments on the Press Democrat articles that offer a disturbing gauge of public sentiment:

“You mean, allowed to carve out chunks of the USA to form their own independent nations and suck up all sorts of tax-free money from visitors? To collect American money by selling to Americans but not to pay a portion back to the US economy in the manner other Americans do?”

“Special rights for people whose long dead ancestors were mistreated by long dead immigrants.”

The first comment encapsulates the tone of accusatory resentment Indian People are often the subject of and the second comment demands a response.

Genocide In This Land In Our Times

The children and grandchildren whose parents and grandparents were killed at Wounded Knee in the Great Plains are still alive. When the majority of Chief Bigfoot’s people were massacred by soldiers on a snowy winter day in 1890, those who escaped with their lives told their story to their children and grandchildren, and those people are still alive. This is not ancient history. It is not something that happened 5000 years ago. It is your grandmother telling you how she ran for her life to a ravine and her mother was shot down right on top of her. It is your grandfather telling you that he was the last survivor of his family, and that he never understood why the soldiers came and butchered everyone, when all of your relatives were just trying to make it through the snow to Pine Ridge Reservation so that Chief Bigfoot could help mediate a problem that was going on there. It is your own family telling you that the gunfire sounded like someone slowly tearing a piece of canvas as it ripped into the huddled crowd of men, women and children. It is your own family telling you how the snow was drenched with your family’s blood, and how the government paid a man 2 dollars a body to dump all of your dead relatives into a mass grave.

Perhaps you’ve heard of Wounded Knee and the killing of 200 innocent travelers. Maybe you have heard mention of the Sand Creek Massacre and the murder of some 130 defenseless Cheyenne and Arapaho People, or of some of the other better-known attacks on Indian People by the U.S. government and private citizens that have occurred within just the last century-and-a-half. These things are not ancient history. They are very, very recent, making it small wonder if you have heard of them. But chances are, even if you live in California, you have never heard of the California Genocide that exterminated some 90% of California’s earlier inhabitants. If you manage to find and read the right books, you will quickly learn that even the devastation suffered by the early Peoples of the East Coast, the Great Plains and the Southwest cannot compare to what happened here in California. When you know the truth about California’s recent history, hateful attitudes like those being expressed by the people of Windsor who are attempting to shun and outlaw the Lytton Band make your stomach turn over. You look at the attitudes of precedence and entitlement and you just want to cry.

Terrible times came to the land called California with the Spanish Army and Franciscan missionaries in the 18th century. They kidnapped, enslaved, tortured and murdered the west coast people, all out of greed and a psychopathic interpretation of Christianity that had literally no relationship to the teachings of Jesus Christ. There is no doubt in my mind that if the actual person, Jesus, had gotten to spend time with Native American Peoples, he would have loved them. The intense sense of gratitude for life, the beautiful appreciation of the natural world, the inherent practice of service to one another and respect to higher powers that are the hallmarks of many Native American lifeways are so evolved and splendid that they would earn respect and admiration from any person of goodwill. But the deranged Spanish friars were tragically blind to the spectacular spirituality of Native Peoples and, in their maniacal quest for power, turned the once-joyful inhabitants of California into the tattered and miserable remnant of a people.

Those California Indians who managed, somehow, to survive the disease, enslavement and death brought to the region by the Spaniards then had to face the murderous Americans who poured into the newly-acquired state in the mid-1800s…very recent times. John Sutter, whose name is still given macabre honor in Gold Country towns and place names, kept California Indian male and female slaves locked in a large room at night to keep them from escaping slavery in his gold mines. Frankly, this is the least of the evil things that have happened in recent California history.

The state and federal governments subsidized the murder of California Indians. That is the bottom line. Insane with the self-serving nonsense of Manifest Destiny, those newly arrived in California during the Gold Rush felt entitled to exterminate all Native Peoples in order to make room for ‘civilization’. And the government paid for them to do so. A group of white men would arm themselves and set upon Indian villages, murdering all whom they found living there, and then would be paid by the head for the victims of their killing sprees. These attacks on innocent and defenseless people were documented without a shred of remorse or conscience in California’s newspapers:

“We hope that the Government will render such aid as will enable the citizens of the north to carry on a war of extermination until the last redskin of these tribes has been killed. Extermination is no longer a question of time–the time has arrived, the work has commenced and let the first man who says treaty or peace be regarded as a traitor.”
- Yreka Herald, 1853

I will never forget an account I read of Native Peoples being rounded up onto boats in Northern California, taken out to sea and drowned in the ocean, en masse. Such peoples who were not massacred were enslaved by the newcomers and the kidnapping and enslavement of Indian children was common practice during these times, just a couple of generations ago. It is so important to me to repeat that 90% of the early inhabitants of California were murdered by the invading Americans. It is so important for all people now living in California to understand that this is the history of the ground we are now walking on, just the blink of an eye later.

Moving toward the turn of the century, the kidnapping of Indian children continued to be seen as the necessary work of ‘civilization’. Now, they were stolen from their families by force and sent to industrial boarding schools where they were abused and forbidden to express their culture. As I write this, I am thinking of a wonderful elder of the Karok People, Charlie Thom, and his account of being the last child left in his tribe on the rivers of Northern California. The last child.

Meanwhile, the trail of Government interference continued into the 20th century as ‘officials’ took it upon themselves to decide which Native peoples would be federally recognized and which wouldn’t; who could have a reservation and who couldn’t. As if it were up to them. Set against the backdrop of the wholesale murder, the theft of nearly all land once cherished by Indian Peoples and the trail of broken treaties, the spectacle of the U.S. government making decisions about Indians makes me sick, plain and simple.

And this is the setting for my total disgust over what is happening right now, in 2009, in Windsor, California. If you are a Native person whose family has lived here for just a few generations, chances are, your family members were murdered, kidnapped and enslaved. If you are a person of European descent whose family has lived here for just a few generations, chances are, your relatives either participated in the California Genocide or, at the very least, read about it in the newspapers while eating breakfast. And, if you are like me, with both Native and European ancestry, and your family has been in California for a few generations, you look at the whole situation with horror and terrible shame.

The Bottom Line
The local government and misguided citizens of Windsor who are trying to keep the Lytton Band from making a home for themselves need to be publicly condemned for their racist attitudes, in no uncertain fashion. I don’t care if the Lytton people are federally recognized. As Native Peoples, their roots in this land go back so far before George Washington that it is simply ludicrous for this to be an argument of any kind. I don’t care if Windsor’s zoning laws say that the Lytton Band wants to build too many houses for the area. I say, thank God! Thank God there are enough survivors of the California Genocide to build a wonderful new place to live in 2009. I wish there were 100 times that many Lytton Band folks.

I don’t care if the Lytton People want to chop down trees to build their houses. We are all living in Indian Country, whether we want to recognize that or not, and what gets done with the land is best decided by Indian People. It is absurd that anyone living in Windsor, where that giant and practically empty downtown section was recently built overnight, would put up a fuss about a housing development. Absurd. It is incredibly repugnant to read of a refusal of water to the Lytton Band. That Americans would refuse the once-clear waters that they have so polluted over the past 150 years…well, it’s just unbelievable to me. Additionally, I am in absolutely no mood to hear worries that the Lytton Band might build a casino in their housing development. Indian gaming is such an old pastime, I don’t think anyone knows when it started and it certainly isn’t up to newcomers to dictate what kinds of games the older inhabitants of California can play. I personally don’t care for casinos, but frankly, if the Native People wanted to build a nuclear power plant in Windsor, it wouldn’t be up to me to tell them they couldn’t. This is their land. No one, and I mean no one, should be walking around in a frame of mind thinking they can tell Indian people what to do in this land known as ‘America’.

And therein, I believe, lies the crux of this utterly frustrating problem. If you think of this land as America, and you attach that idea to this being the province of the U.S. government and your reality excludes the fact that this part of the continent is inhabited by many, many sovereign, independent nations that have absolutely nothing to do with the recent invention of the U.S. government, you are not seeing the picture of what is going on here correctly. If belonging to the Windsor City Council has given you the notion that you can have votes and make laws and govern the lives of Peoples who have called this land ‘home’ since time immemorial, your sense of your own importance in the grand scheme of things is disturbingly distorted.

It is the newcomers who should be petitioning the Native Peoples for permission when they want to build a housing development. It is the ‘Americans’ who ought to have been asking, from day one, if there was room here to share the land and to realize dreams of life and liberty without getting in the way of the already-resident Peoples. Judging by the overwhelming display of generosity and brotherly love exhibited by first-contact peoples towards anyone who showed up on this continent without murder on the mind, my guess is that the people we call ‘Indians’ would have made room for us with kindly hearts. But it didn’t happen that way. The Americans came to California and got it into their smug heads that it would be acceptable to kill every last Native inhabitant of the state…and the U.S. Government paid them to carry out this plan that sits in evil company with the genocidal schemes of Nazi Germany.

This is not ancient history. The assault on and discrimination against California Indians is what has been happening since the Americans first showed up here, and the pettiness, the embarrassing sense of ownership, the belief that racist attitudes will be winked at when it comes to Indian Peoples…these things being evinced by the governor, the local government and the angry citizens of Windsor must not go unchecked. These people should be on their knees, begging the Lytton Band to please come build a home alongside them. They should be pleading with fate to give them a second chance to treat Indian Peoples with the heartfelt respect and admiration they so abundantly merit. They should be asking if they can lend a hand in the building, if they can help at the medical clinic, if they can do anything, anything at all to help the Lytton Band find a peaceful and good home where they can live without threat of violence and dishonor.

Think of those grandmothers and grandfathers, their hearts torn to shreds with the loss of loved ones, their eyes filled with tears for the loss of homes in beautiful forests, on high mountains, on windy sea coasts. Think of them wandering California, the victims of hatred and evil, unbefriended by neighbors, uncherished, uncelebrated. Think of them coming home, at last, in Windsor. Think of how right that would be.

———————-

For further reading on the California Genocide, I recommend this introductory document. It’s never too late to learn.

Yannick Phillips, a Sonoma County woman who has dedicated herself to stopping the LBAM spray program, has sent me the following update and list of actions Californians can take to continue to fight this unconstitutional and immoral toxic assault:

————————————

Thank you again for signing the petition to Stop the Spray. This was an unprecedented victory; there may not have been any other aerial spray program that has ever been stopped by citizen action.

But the program hasn’t ended, nor has the aerial spray component been done away with. Aerial spraying is still in the plan for forested and rural areas — terms which have never been defined. And by its own measures, the California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA) has documented that spray can drift for miles and miles. In most of California, no one lives very far from open space, farms, or fields.

What’s worse, the LBAM eradication program is now on track for most of the state of California, excluding only a few areas like Death Valley.

Aside from the aerial spray component, the LBAM eradication program includes ground treatments which are known to be harmful to people, pets, wildlife, pollinators, and waterways. These poisons will be used where people live and not just on farms. In addition, millions of irradiated dyed moths are to be released in Napa and Sonoma this October as part of an LBAM eradication program pilot project. No one knows what environmental havoc might result from doing so; if the program isn’t stopped, more of these moths will then be released all over California, regardless of what their impact turns out to have been in Napa and Sonoma.

Like government waste? Almost $100 million of United States Department of Agriculture (USDA)/CDFA money was spent in 2008 on the program; the program is on track to spend millions more in 2009 and beyond.

LBAM has caused no documented crop or environmental damage in California.

The LBAM eradication program harms farmers and growers, because it inflicts harsh and destructive quarantines (along with onerous record-keeping and forced compliance measures) on them. The program is particularly hard on small business people.

USDA/CDFA’s LBAM eradication program has tried to place a wedge between farmers and growers and those who benefit from what farmers and growers produce. This is wrong.

Since June 2008, many people have continued to dedicate themselves to stopping the program altogether — and there are signs of progress. For one, California State Senator Dean Florez, the senate majority leader, is an outspoken opponent of the program. For another, the National Academy of Science basically said the USDA has no sound science to justify its program.

So while progress is being made, there is still work to be done. We did it before, we can do it again with your help.

What you can do:

1. Come to an event demonstrating against the LBAM eradication program/showing support for farmers at the Tuesday Sonoma Farmers’ Market (Plaza on the Square, intersection of Broadway and Main streets) on October 20, from 5:00 p.m. to 6:15 pm. Tabling and leafleting throughout the Plaza will also be going on…

Signs and banners will be provided, but feel free to bring your own. Please RSVP if you need a sign at yphillips@comcast.net

As an added incentive for making the trip to Sonoma, world-famous sustainable agriculture advocate Vandana Shiva will be speaking that evening nearby at 8:00 p.m., as part of the Economics of Peace conference.
http://www.care2.com/go/z/e/AFQna/zJV3/AErkx

2. Politely call all these members of the government to tell them you want 1) funding for LBAM eradication program to be cut, 2) quarantines lifted, and 3) LBAM-associated trade agreements to be worked out:
* Cathy Neville, Sonoma County commissioner of agriculture
(707) 565-2371 in Sonoma
* Congressman Mike Thompson (St. Helena), member of the House Ways and Means Committee (international trade policy)
(707) 226-9898 in his Napa district office
* Congressman Sam Farr (Carmel), member of both the House Appropriations Committee and the Subcommittee on Agriculture
(202) 225-2861 in Washington D.C.

For more information on the LBAM eradication program, check out www.stopthespray.org
Contact info. Yannick A. Phillips yphillips@comcast.net

Whether you love to munch organic sunflowers seeds or treat your backyard birds to them, if you have a sunny spot, you can grow your own sunflowers every year and will find real joy in doing so. Our variety of choice is the Tarahumara Sunflower – an heirloom plant with really special qualities and a most interesting conjectured history.

Sunflowers are a Native American food and have been cultivated in the Americas for at least 3000 years. It is believed that the strain of sunflowers (Helianthus annuus) being sold as Tarahumara Sunflower Seed were native sunflowers which eventually came to be grown in the care of Mennonite peoples in Canada before making their way south to the Tarahumara people of Northern Mexico where they have now been cultivated for several generations. Like most Native American food crops, good seed has traveled from Peru to Ontario, from Pennsylvania to New Mexico, adapting to new terrains, changing slowly into new strains via natural hybridization and coming to be a staple in widely separated regions of the continents. Sunflowers are truly a gift to us and were so important to the early Incas and Aztecs that they were used to symbolize solar gods in works of religious art. Best of all for today’s home farmers, sunflowers are truly a snap to grow and provide valuable, nutritious food for our families.

What’s Special About Tarahumara Sunflower Seeds?
First of all, the shells are white! This is really striking to the eye at harvest time, and though the seeds of our Tarahumara Sunflowers are somewhat smaller than what you may be used to seeing in commercial and conventional sunflower seeds, their flavor is exceptionally fresh, sweet and tasty.

The leaves are a bright spring green and the stalks reach about 7′-8′ in height on our farm. Each stalk produces a single seed head. The seed heads end up being about 8 inches across, densely packed with seeds. These are smaller flowers than those mammoth disks you may think of when you envision edible sunflower seed plants. They look a bit more like the ornamental hybrids (which, frankly, I find a less-than-great development away from the real sunflowers which so generously produce food for humans and birds) and their petals are an exquisite bright gold against the blue summer sky.

I can certainly understand why the Tarahumara people love this variety of sunflowers and it adds to my happiness in growing them when I think of those wonderful mountain people who think nothing of running a hundred miles at a stretch in bare feet. They are very special people and this is a really special crop for the home farmer to grow.

How To Plant And Grow Tarahumara Sunflowers
After the last danger of frost has passed in the spring, find a spot in the garden or on the family farm with good sunlight. At least 3/4 of a day of sunlight is optimal for their growth. Hoe up the earth to soften it and work in some organic compost. Remember, you are going to be eating these seeds so do not use chemical fertilizers, herbicides, pesticides or anything else artificial or toxic in your garden or on your farm. It is not necessary to do this if you are taking good care of your land and by growing your food organically, you can be sure you are serving up health and not sickness to yourself and your family.

Make a little hill of earth and poke three holes in it – the depth of the second joint of a woman’s finger or about 1 inch – and put a seed in each hole. Because not all the seeds will sprout in most cases, you are planting 3 to ensure that at least one sunflower comes up in each hill. This is the teaching of the Hidatsa Indians as described in Buffalo Bird Woman’s Garden, one of the finest books ever published on the subject of Native American farming. Make your hills about 1 foot apart. Cover over the seeds and water thoroughly.

In about 1-2 weeks you should see lovely green sprouts coming up. One of the super things about Tarahumara Sunflowers is that, unlike some varieties, they are not water hogs. They are considered fairly drought tolerant. Keep their hills evenly moist until they sprout and are a couple inches tall. Then, you can water less. I would say that once the plants are established, we water ours every few weeks during the heat of summer in Northern California and once the petals fall, we stop watering all together to let the seeds dry.

Tarahumara Sunflowers have slender stalks but should need no staking unless you live in a really windy place. They really take care of themselves if you have provided good soil and good sun. How nice!

When To Harvest Tarahumara Sunflowers
I find it a little confusing that the seed packets I’ve seen for Tarahumara Sunflowers give a days-to-maturity estimate of 85-100 days. I think this is intended to describe when the plants are in bloom, not when they are ready for harvest. In our experience, if you plant your sunflowers in early-mid April, they will be ready for harvest in late September or early October. This is more like 175 days or something between 5-6 months from sowing time to harvest time.

You will know when your sunflower seeds are ready to harvest when all the petals have dropped, the heads are hanging forward and the backs of the heads have turned yellowish. Simply cut off each head with a few inches of stem.

Some people find that they don’t get to reap what they sow when it comes to sunflowers because their feathered friends come early to the feast and quickly clean the seed heads out. It is good to plant extra so that you can help support our dwindling wild bird populations, but you can also reserve as many heads as your family needs by loosely tying a piece of bird netting over each head once the petals have fallen. This will keep the seeds safe for you.

How To Dry The Sunflower Seeds After Harvest
This is very easy. The method described in Buffalo Bird Woman involved setting the sunflowers face-down on the roof of the house for 4 days and nights, unprotected in any way. If a storm was coming, they would be brought inside, but otherwise they were just left out to dry a bit. Unfortunately, our roofs have toxic chemicals on them in most parts of the country and drying our seed on the ground was out because we get heavy sea mists and dew on the grass here. My method involves setting all the heads face down on a wood table in front of a window I keep open during all hours except for when our family is asleep. Within a week, the heads are nice and dry and ready to thresh.

How To Thresh The Sunflower Seeds
If you are dealing with a really large harvest, you may need to do this outside, beating the heads with a stick and using winnowing baskets to separate the seeds from the chaff. Our farm and family is small and the threshing can be done more simply. My husband and I sit down at either end of a cookie sheet. I take each sunflower seed head and bend it backward to loosen the seed and then use my fingers to push the seeds from their bed in the seed head, onto the cookie sheet. There, my husband works to separate the beautiful white seeds from the golden brown husks and other chaff that falls as I loosen the seed. We gather up the ‘debris’ to be added to the compost pile. Once the heads have all been threshed, we pick through all the seeds a second time, removing anything that shouldn’t be there and making sure there are no moldy seeds or anything unwanted. Each head yields about 1/2 cup of seed or more and your finished seeds will look like this:

How To Roast And Store The Sunflower Seeds
Raw sunflower seeds are exceptionally good and can be eaten out of hand. If you’re only familiar with pre-cracked sunflower seeds, the way you crack a sunflower seed’s shell is to place it sideways between your top and bottom front teeth. Come down lightly with your teeth and the shell will pop open so you can pry out the seed meat. That’s how the birds do it, too! Raw sunflower seeds are a wonderful addition to salads, granola, trail mix, baked goods and can even be blended up into sunflower seed butter – like peanut butter but with a really different flavor.

Roasted sunflower seeds are another satisfying snack. Gentle toasting brings out their nuttiness but it’s really important not to over-toast them and this can happen in the blink of an eye if you get distracted. Preheat your oven to 300 degrees. Spread sunflower seeds (in their shells) on a baking sheet. Toast for about 5 minutes. Take them out and sample one. The shells should still be white. Are the grey seeds inside turning just barely golden? If so, they are done. If not, put them back in for a couple more minutes and sample again. If your seeds turn brown or black, they are burnt and should be thrown in the compost pile. Eating burnt seeds is bad for your health. This is why it is so important to devote seed-roasting time solely to that task so that you can pull the seeds out of the oven at just the right moment. You can sprinkle them with a little salt if you like.

Whether raw or roasted, in the shell or out of the shell, sunflower seeds store best if refrigerated. I’m a big fan of the luxury of refrigeration for all seeds and nuts as this cuts down the chance of the harvest going rancid. Eating rancid seeds and nuts is even worse for you than eating burnt ones. I like to store my sunflower seeds in glass mason jars in the fridge. Roasted seeds should be eaten within a couple of months if kept refrigerated. Raw ones will keep much longer. Make sure your jars and lids are utterly clean and utterly dry. Moisture can cause the seeds to rot. If you ever discover that your seeds taste off, bitter or strange, they have gone rancid and should be put in the compost pile – not eaten.

The Nutritional Gifts Of Sunflower Seeds
Sunflower Seeds are a wonderful source of protein, vitamins E, B1 and B5, zinc, magnesium, fiber and healthy fats. These are things that scientists tell us, but I rely more on the wisdom of thousands of years of my American Indian ancestors growing sunflowers as a healthful and satisfying staple crop. It’s good to understand both ways of looking at the foods we eat, but I will always trust long tradition over modern scientific data when it comes to staple household foods for my family.

One fact you need to know: the nutritious content of any crop you grow is largely dependent on the care you give to the plants. Good, organic soil and traditional, chemical-free farming methods will produce more nutritious foods than the chemically-dependent agribusiness tactics of trying to substitute lab chemicals for time-honored growing practices. Numerous studies have proven this, no matter what the FDA may say about all foods being the same, no matter how they are grown. Take care of the land and the plants that grow on it will take care of your needs.

Don’t forget to save some of the seed you harvest for next year’s planting! Store in a dry, dark place until next spring and honor your Tarahumara Sunflowers of this year by ensuring that their descendants can grow again next year. This is why it is so important to plant heirloom seed wherever you can. The Tarahumara Sunflower is an heirloom plant and, unlike commercial hybrids or the wicked scandal of genetically modified seeds, the seeds you harvest from heirloom plants will produce more of the same plants next year. Saving seeds is a powerful way to keep heritage crops alive and to improve the self-sufficiency of your family farm.

What Else Can You Do With Tarahumara Sunflowers?
On our farm, our plants are our friends. We spend time with them every day, watching them grow, singing to them, asking them to reach for the sky, thanking them for providing us with such delicious, healthy food. I see proofs of the loving element of life on earth in the fact that I can plant just 1 sunflower seed and come away with my cup half-full of them. Noticing this makes me feel loved by this world and helps me to see how the plants take care not only of me, but of so many other kinds of animals. We treat our plants with the respect we sense they merit, and their final resting place is in our compost pile, where the husks of their spirits can slowly feed the future. It keeps them within the circle of life and I sense that they appreciate this consideration.

While I am so joyful at harvest time, I confess I feel sad seeing crops end their growing phase and sometimes I like to prolong my celebration of them by beautifying my home with them before they eventually make their way to the compost pile. Pictured here is a little harvest decoration I made of a stalk and ear of our corn, a dried Tarahumara Sunflower seed head and a remnant of orange fabric. It’s just a simple thing, showing that I am glad that fall is here and that I appreciate my plants and this is a nice way to keep home good and cozy in a natural, pleasant way. You could find other nice ways to use your finished sunflowers in dried arrangements, wreaths and special touches that bring warmth to the house and celebrate the harvest. My mother told me she recently saw a craft store selling miniature bales of hay for $10 each. Take a look around your farm and you will see that ‘designer home decor’ for fall is free for the taking and feels a lot more personal because you grew it yourself.

In addition to decorating with and composting the finished sunflower plants, fresh sunflower petals can be eaten in salads or used to make a lovely yellow watercolor paint or a dye for fabric. Seed can be collected and used to fill birdfeeders with the highest quality, organic birdseed you could possibly acquire.

While they are growing, Tarahumara Sunflowers create a living screen, providing shade and privacy on the homestead. Eat your lunch outdoors at their feet. They draw honeybees and other vital insects to the farm and they add great beauty to the landscape. They can be interplanted with other food crops or with flowers and their presence in your garden connects you with thousands of years of American history. A nutritional powerhouse and a joy to grow – sunflowers deserve a place of honor on our family farms. We really appreciate them, and would love to hear any sunflower stories, tips or recipes you’d like to share. We value your knowledge.

If you want one more reason why Californians must defeat the LBAM spray program, you will find it in this video:

I’m sure you heard what I did. Three times in this video, Professor Thomas Kerns states that the Central Coast of California and the SF Bay Area are the first places he has ever heard of where an aerial spray has been stopped. Knowing, as we do, that aerial spraying is a constant across our country, that aerial spraying is a common, accepted practice of both our government and conventional agriculture, we can begin to see why Professor Kerns reiterates his point in a tone of wonder and, even, awe.

To be clear, we did not stop the spray, but we did temporarily halt it and are still standing and fighting the LBAM program in all of its forms. Just think, for a minute, what it could mean to America and to the world, if we ultimately succeed – if we ultimately defeat just one of our government’s pesticide contracts. Think of the sickened and overwhelmed families of the East Coast, the Deep South, the industrial corn belt and the Great Lakes region, learning for the first time that you can overturn policies of environmental destruction and slow genocide. You can cause change to happen and you can win.

Because it isn’t just California and it isn’t just the Light Brown Apple Moth, of course. It is all of the states and all of the insects and all of the years of backward, pesticide-based mentality and greed that creates these programs of sickness and death for the people of America. Think with me of the day when a new mentality can arise from this Californian origin in which we no longer have to fear government or agriculture because we, as a nation, no longer view the use of killer chemicals as an acceptable suggestion to make within any sane community. Think with me of the day when our public servants serve our people and know, in the depths of each of their beings, that a turn in public office is no longer an opportunity to aggrandize one’s self through the robbery, misery and abuse of others. Think with me of that day.

So much is happening right now on the LBAM front. The National Academy of Sciences’ National Research Council has issued a groundbreaking report that calls into question the USDA’s lack of scientific data. Roy Upton cites this report as a, “pretty strong rebuke” of the USDA and adds that he feels the next step will be a lawsuit against this agency. It is hard to express our gratitude toward men like Roy Upton for the time and spirit he has put into this terrible struggle.

Meanwhile, as we wait for each new piece of news regarding the LBAM scandal, we see the traps for LBAM, Gypsy Moths and Glassy Winged Sharp Shooters littering our rural region and our hopes and prayers are pinned not just on the defeat of this one inhumane government program, but the defeat of all such toxic assaults on our people. To everyone who is working and battling the LBAM spray program right now, keep going so beautifully strong, and keep thinking of what we can do if we overturn just this one dreadful plan. There are all of the other programs, all of the other insects, all of the other pesticides which are being used as as deceptive tools to capture hoards of wealth while sickening and killing our families. The LBAM battle is making us strong, and I believe it is only our first.

Here in the Reskills column of VeganReader, I am advocating that men and women consider learning to sew some of their own clothes. Sewing for yourself or your loved ones is not only a very pleasant way to spend time, it also increases your sense of being an able person – someone who knows how to clothe people, rather than being wholly dependent upon designated, faraway ‘experts’ for this matter of survival.

Today, I’m sharing my latest sewing project with you – a quilted organic vest that is vegan and extremely warm for the chilly fall and winter days that have suddenly arrived here. I’d like to spend a moment addressing an issue that can be really problematic for vegans, whether they are trying to sew or simply purchase warm clothing. I hope to help you learn to dress in a way that is both toasty warm and cruelty free.

As you know, humans living in cold regions historically wore the skins of animals to protect them from the elements. Our species has evolved as though all of us live in some temperate zone at a pleasant 70 degrees year-round, regardless of the fact that humans have become naturalized in nearly every type of climate and terrain the world has to offer. Humans took the fur, feathers and hides of more appropriately-garbed creatures in order to survive in cold places, and eventually, they domesticated sheep in order to have a constant and reliable source of insulating animal wool.

Vegans eschew the practice of wearing animal products. This rules out leather, silk and wool. This choice is made out of compassionate beliefs that do not support a system which takes control of animal lives in order to benefit man. Vegans believe that animals should be free to live out their own lives without needing to show a profit to people. In addition to this, some people cannot wear wool because they are allergic to it.

So, where do these philosophies and allergies leave people who live in places where fall and winter are chilly? Generally, they end up purchasing synthetic fiber warm clothing. Textiles like acrylic, nylon, rayon and polar fleece make up the majority of the materials you will find used in non-wool sweaters, vests, coats, hats, scarves and pants in American department stores. Synthetic textiles tend to make up the majority of most fabric stores’ inventory, too.

What’s Wrong With Synthetic Fabrics?
From an ecological standpoint, the fact that many synthetic fabrics are made of petroleum and plastics does not make them winners. When it comes to personal comfort, synthetic fabrics are really unpleasant to wear. They aren’t nice to touch and they don’t let our skin breathe, often causing excessive perspiration. The rubbery-ness of lycra pants and uncomfortable fuzziness of acrylic sweaters really make my skin crawl and the fact that these types of textiles make up the bulk of what is available in the U.S. is one of the main reasons I decided to learn to sew.

Just as my decision to go vegan 20 years ago taught me that the Earth lavishly provides for everything I could need to eat, without my having to steal from or kill other animals, my quest for a natural fiber wardrobe has shown me that plants can take care of my needs for both coverage and warmth. My new organic vest is a really good example of this.

How I Made This Vegan, Organic Vest

My vest is made of 2 layers of organic cotton sateen with cotton quilt batting between them. I have sewn all of my family’s quits and simple quilting is a super secret you can discover if you are looking for vegan and eco-friendly ways to make warm winter clothing.

Quilting is an ancient art, believed to have originated in China, and it’s simply the practice of putting a layer of warm fiber between two layers of fabric and then stitching through the three layers in order to make them cushion-y and thick.

You can take any button up shirt pattern and make a warm winter vest like this from it. The only alteration you’ll need to make is to make the armholes a little bit bigger/deeper so that shirt or sweater sleeves can fit through them comfortably when you wear the vest. I would also suggest that you make the vest 1 to 2 sizes larger than your normal shirt size so that it can accommodate whatever layers you are wearing underneath it.

Cut each pattern piece in the shirt/vest 3 times – twice out of your fabric and once out of your cotton quilt batting. Most shirts consist of 3 main parts – the back piece and the two front pieces that button together. I created each of the 3 pieces separately, sewing the fabric layers and quilting layer together around the edges. I then quilted each of the 3 main pieces in a simple diamond pattern on my sewing machine (I don’t have a fancy quilting machine) before joining the 3 pieces together into the finished garment.

My shirt pattern came with a rounded collar. I sewed this last, quilted it in smaller diamonds and attached it to the shirt. Finally, I hand sewed the button holes and sewed on some simple wooden buttons I happened to have in my sewing box.

The Organic Fabrics I Used
Organic fabrics remain few and far between, despite how much so many of us would love to sew with them exclusively. My solution was to purchase an organic, cotton, sateen bed sheet from Coyuchi – a noteworthy company that vends organic bedding and baby garments.

Expensive? Kind of, but I look at it this way. I not only made a whole vest out of a single sheet, but I have fabric left over that I will definitely be putting to use for other projects. The sheet cost about $50. I would certainly pay that much for a store-bought organic vest that will last me for decades and I certainly couldn’t find one with this kind of handmade quality.

And if I think beyond my own clothing budget to the fact that Coyuchi’s organic bed sheets not only protect my health but the health of the people who grow and weave the cotton, that price tag takes on an even more appealing shine. It takes so much work to farm cotton, harvest it, make it into thread and then cloth. If I can make a truly warm basic piece for my winter wardrobe out of this and even have remnants left over for future projects, I think I’m coming out of the deal rather well. Do you agree?

The organic cotton sateen has the sheen to it you may associate with quilted vests and jackets, but it comes from natural cotton – not viscose or nylon or some other uncomfortable synthetic fiber. The finished garment has a subtle, handsome glow to it.

The Design Of My Vest

In addition to making the plain vest out of a single brown organic sheet from Coyuchi, I used the organic gift bags my purchase came in to create a beautiful design on the vest. I had purchased a couple of items when I visited a Coyuchi outlet and one came with a celadon and white bag and the other came with a raspberry and white bag.

From these small pieces of fabric, I created my own added design element for the vest. I sewed together three stripes of the fabric, applied them to the outside front pieces of the vest (before I had attached them to the batting or backing) and then I appliqued two additional pieces onto this: the bear and the mountain. This mountain shape is a Pan-Indian symbol and bears are very important animals to me. I call this design “Bears Go To Mountains”. Once I had done the applique work, which simply means sewing around the raw edges of the bear and the mountain so that they don’t fray, I was ready to layer the fabrics and batting for the three main pieces, stitch them together, quilt them and then assemble the vest.

That Sounds Like A Lot Of Work
This project took me two evenings of sewing. My husband, who wields a rotary cutter like no one else in the world, assisted me. We had a very sociable, happy time together making this warm winter garment for me. Just 2 evenings of enjoyment have resulted in a vest that I will be wearing for years to come.

You Can Sew A Vest Like This
While I wouldn’t recommend this as your very first sewing project, I believe that anyone with a bit of sewing experience could easily make a vest like this. There is nothing complicated about it and chances are, you can make it from a shirt pattern you already have on hand if you have some sewing patterns at home. If not, you could buy a pattern specifically meant for a vest, or just buy any simple button-up shirt pattern and make the 2 adjustments I’ve outlined above.

I cannot believe how wonderfully warm this vest is over a long sleeved shirt or sweater. It provides an added layer of insulation over the chest while leaving the arms very free to move about. I think this is a really perfect fall garment and will be great under a coat when the snow starts falling.

You could make your vest even warmer by finding a source for organic cotton flannel, organic cotton corduroy or organic cotton velvet. All of these fabrics would be warmer than simple sateen, and could certainly produce a very fine garment.

What I Love Most About This Vest

• It’s organic
• It’s made out of a bed sheet – how creative is that?
• I got to create my own design for it that has a special meaning to me
• It’s vegan and cruelty-free
• It’s really warm

Sewing for yourself or your dear ones says a lot about the importance you give to human health, comfort and happiness. When you find a way to sew organic garments, you are making an even more powerful declaration of care for yourself, your family, farmers and the planet. This is a wonderful, positive thing to do and it’s my hope that we will be seeing more organic fabric choices in the coming years.

I hope you have enjoyed this article about my latest sewing project and that it has inspired you to sew something great. My next goal is to sew organic winter coats for my family. I’m assembling my materials right now. This is going to be a really big, exciting project. Please check back soon!

If you grew up drinking cow’s milk and are perhaps are looking for an Almond Milk Recipe right now because you or a loved one has been diagnosed with an allergy, or because you are building a more ecologically-sound and compassionate diet, you are going to love almond milk. We use rice milk for an every day milk. But almond milk is special. It is the cream of the non-dairy milks…incredibly rich with healthy fats and so sweet and good to taste.

Why Make Your Own Almond Milk
Almond milk is sold commercially, but it cannot compare in taste or freshness to homemade and because only a few nuts are needed to make a small recipe of almond milk, making your own almond milk will represent a financial savings for most families. Best of all, you will have the satisfaction of knowing you’ve achieved something really vital – the skills you need to do for yourself and your loved ones. That’s an accomplishment that no one can put a price tag on.

In making almond milk, please do use only organic almonds. In your quest for satisfying recipes that give you a chance to improve your self-sufficiency, you don’t want the deadly pesticides in your glass that are sprayed on conventional almond orchards. Nothing appetizing about that! By choosing to make organic almond milk, you will know that you are serving up health, and not sickness, to your loved ones.

The making of nut milks is neither new nor faddish. Nut milks have been beloved in Europe, Asia and the Americas for centuries, and I always think of a passage I once read in a history of New England in which some very thirsty travelers are given a glass of hickory nut milk by a woodsman. The author claims he had never tasted anything so delicious in his life and I can certainly believe him. So, just remember, though the National Dairy Council may have spent billions of dollars over the past century trying to convince Americans that the only milk on the planet comes from cows, history points at a much more diverse take on the tasty milks humans can enjoy and make themselves, right in their own kitchens.

My Almond Milk Recipe For The Creamiest Milk In The World!

It’s important that I preface this with a note that our family only makes almond milk on demand. Unlike rice milk, which we make a week’s supply of at a time, we make almond milk only when we want it, for special recipes. The following recipe makes 2 cups of milk, but if you’d like to make more, you can double or triple the recipe. If the milk isn’t to be consumed right away, you must refrigerate it. I wouldn’t advise keeping the milk for more than a week, but to be honest, because of the way we instantly consume every last drop of almond milk we make here on the farm, I do not know the exact amount of time a larger batch of almond milk would remain good-tasting in the fridge. You can experiment and see what works for your family.

Almond Milk Ingredients and Equipment

• 1/3 C. Raw Organic Almonds
• 2 C. Water
• A pot
• A blender
• A mesh strainer

And that’s it!

Step 1 – Blanching The Almonds
You can make almond milk without this step if you’re really in a rush, but the skins of the nuts will give a slightly bitter, strong taste to the finished almond milk that isn’t totally pleasing. Blanching only takes a couple of minutes, and the end result will be a very white milk with a pure, sweet taste.

Bring about 1 cup of water to a boil in your pot. Drop in your almonds. Let them boil for about 3 minutes and then pour everything through your metal mesh strainer so that the water pours out and you’re left with just the almonds. Pour the almonds out onto a plate and let them rest for a few minutes until they are cool enough to touch with your hands.

Once the almonds have cooled a bit, simply rub off their papery skins and discard the skins. That’s all there is to blanching and the end result is the lovely, creamy nut meats, ready to be turned into almond milk.

Step 2 – Making Almond Milk
Put the blanched nuts and 2 cups of fresh water into your electric blender. *Make sure you put the lid on. Blend them until you’ve crushed as many of the nuts as you can and the milk is creamy white and thick. You may have to stop and start the blender, picking it up off the base and shaking it from time to time, as the nuts can get stuck under the blades.

I want to note here that if you use more water/less water or more nuts/less nuts, you can control the exact creaminess of the milk. A higher proportion of water produces a thinner milk, and a higher proportion of nuts produces a thicker one. My proportions in this almond milk recipe results in a milk that I feel is just about right, but you can experiment. The truth is, I no longer measure the nuts and water when I make almond milk. I just make as much as I need at the moment.

What you end up with is the pulverized almonds at the bottom of the blender and the water having been turned into a rich milk. *You don’t have to throw the nuts out. We’ll return to this in a minute.

Step 3 – Straining The Almond Milk
Holding your metal mesh strainer over a receptacle – a jar, a bowl or wide-mouthed container of some kind, simply pour the milk through the strainer. Set the pulverized nuts aside. You can strain the milk twice if you want to be sure you’ve gotten out all of the little particles of nuts, but I only strain once. There are fancy bags and other devices for straining nut milks, but we don’t have these around our house and any fine-gauge mesh strainer seems to do the job just fine.

And that’s it. You now have homemade almond milk! It could hardly be easier to make.

What Is This Almond Milk Recipe Good For?
Almond milk is delicious in hot beverages like tea and makes an exceptionally rich cup of hot chocolate. It is wonderful over hot or cold cereals. Using almond milk in pudding and baked goods recipes results in really superior dishes and it adds a subtle, but certainly not overpowering, taste of nuttiness to any recipe in which it’s included. And, of course, almond milk is quite tasty plain, just as it is, but it’s because of its richness that I tend to use it as an ingredient in other recipes rather than as my typical daily beverage.

I know that many of our readers are very conscientious about waste. They will try this recipe and then find themselves with a lovely batch of almond milk…but also with the leftover chopped up nuts. What can be done with those wet, pulverized nuts? In order to answer that question, I’d like to share with you another simple recipe that is so exquisitely good, you’d think it came from some fancy, gourmet restaurant, to the tune of $15 a plate! I hope you’ll give this a try the next time you’re making almond milk and your family would like something sweet after supper.

Blackberry Almond Cobbler with Ginger Lime Almond Milk Ice Cream
I’m sorry I don’t have a photo of this elegant and super easy dessert to share. The blackberries are just finishing up in the back field and my family always gobbles this treat up before I think to photograph it. Just follow the instructions and it’s bound to turn out right. And it uses up both the milk and the nuts in the almond milk recipe, so this a no-waste dessert you can feel very good about. The following recipe is not only vegan, but it is also gluten-free. This serves 2. Increase the recipe for a larger family.

Ingredients
- A batch of the almond milk recipe above.
- 1 C. Organic Rice Flour
- 2 C. Blackberries (or blueberries, strawberries, raspberries, whatever you have)
- 1/3 C. Maple Syrup for the berry mixture
- 1/4 C. Maple Syrup for the ice cream
- Juice of 1 organic lime
- 1/2 T. dried ginger powder
- 1 T. Organic Sunflower Oil
- Shake of salt
- Ice

Step 1 – Making the Almond Milk Ice Cream
Take your finished almond milk and put it in the blender with the 1/4 Maple Syrup, the lime juice, ginger, a tiny sprinkle of salt and the organic sunflower oil. Add 4-5 ice cubes. Blend until the ice is crushed. Taste. If it’s not quite citrus-y enough you can add a little lemon juice for an even more refreshing taste. I like to do this, but it isn’t essential if you don’t have a lemon. If it’s not sweet enough, blend in a little more syrup. You don’t want it too sweet. It’s supposed to be light and snappy to contrast with the syrupy fruit.

Pour the blended mixture into a wide-mouthed, shallow container. I like to use a glass pie dish but you could use a wide shallow bowl or a rimmed platter. *Do not use a metal receptacle or it may react badly with the citrus juice. Glass or ceramic is best. Set it in the freezer.

While you are doing the other steps in this recipe, return to the freezer every 15 minutes or so to see if the ice cream has formed crystals. When it has, use a spoon and stir the mixture in a circular motion so that you keep it granular and so that it doesn’t simply harden into one big flat lump. The stirring also keeps the juice from separating from the milk. If you’ve ever eaten a granita, snow cone or shaved ice, you will know what the granular texture is that you’re looking for here. It’s not smooth like traditional ice cream. It’s much icier than that, and it is so good! Keep stirring the mixture from time to time while you make the rest of the dessert.

Step 2 – Baking the Cobbler Biscuits
Mix the wet, pulverized almonds (left over from making almond milk) with the cup of rice flour. Add a sprinkle of salt and gently stir the mixture together. Plop out onto a baking sheet in rough circles about 3 inches in diameter. Bake in the oven at 375 degrees until the bottoms are turning golden brown. The tops will still be pale. Remove from the oven and set aside.

Step 3 – Making the Berry Filling
While your cobbler biscuits are baking, wash your berries and put them in a pot with a couple of drops of water and the 1/3 C. maple syrup. If you are using strawberries, do slice them. But, any other berry can be cooked whole. Bring almost to a boil and then turn down to simmer. Stir frequently until the berries have disintegrated in the syrup and the mixture has thickened slightly. What you are doing is cooking off the excess water in the berries. This tends to take no more than about 10-15 minutes over low heat. Don’t forget to stir!

Assembling Your Dessert
Spoon the berry mixture equally into the bowls. Lay the biscuits on top of this. Is the ice cream all icy and ready? Put a big scoop on top of each dessert. For real gourmet flair, add a sprig of fresh spearmint to the top of each. Beautiful! Serve.

You will love the nutty pastry that is made with the leftover almonds from the milk, and the bright taste of the granita-like ice cream. This dessert provides a wonderful contrast to a meal that is heavy or starchy. It’s so light and fruity and fresh tasting. And, it’s truly a fine way to use up the almonds. This dessert contains no gluten, no animal products and no unhealthy fats. It’s simply natural goodness and one of the loveliest ways I know of to celebrate summer berries.

Reskilling Feels So Good
The Reskills section of Vegan Reader aims to help you reclaim the living skills that your people all had in previous generations. Whether you want to sew your own clothes, grow your own food or cook nutritionally superior meals from scratch, we absolutely believe that you can acquire the skills you need for a more able, powerful life. Something as simple as trying an Almond Milk Recipe can be your first act of taking pride in doing for yourself. It really feels good to know you can make your own delicious milk whenever you want it!

I hope you will give our Almond Milk Recipe a try and that it serves your family well as a healthy beverage and as an ingredient in inspired homemade dishes. Please let me know how it works for you!

There are children in America who have never held a piece of whole fruit in their hands. There are families in America who spend nearly all or all of their food budget money on boxes, cans and jars – processed foods filled with additives, preservatives, fragrances, colors, pesticides, genetically modified ingredients and precious little nutritious food.

There are so many people in the United States who are now too many generations removed from the preparation of simple foods and a wholesome diet that they are living without the survival skills of knowing what to eat to satisfy hunger and nourish the body. This deficiency is astounding. Americans overeat their way to obesity, desperately seeking the satisfaction of a good, full feeling that they cannot get from processed foods and nearly all American authority has been given away regarding the foods our families eat. In cities and rural areas alike, our people are no longer growing or cooking their own whole foods. We have designated ‘experts’, living ’somewhere else’, to produce the sustenance on which our lives depend and our spirits, minds and bodies are paying the price of depression, ignorance and weakness for this trade.

On the continents of North and South America, with our soil, our water, our weather and our relative liberty, we should be enjoying the best eating in the world. Each of us should possess powerful, intimate knowledge about how to find or grow and prepare the most wonderful, healthful and delicious meals. We live in the midst of potential abundance that is ours for the taking if we only have the knowledge we need.

The cultivated forests, gardens and orchards of North, Central and South America were once the glory of these lands. The people who came to be called ‘Indians’ bred and cultured the key foods that have become some of the most popular and famous around the globe and it is my belief that knowledge and understanding of these exceptional foods is the secret to creating the best possible diet for the modern inhabitants of the Americas. With gratitude, we can come to know these whole foods that have supported life here for thousands and thousands of years. This article aims to be your introduction to the fabulous basic foods which can form the base of an eco-friendly, people-friendly diet for your family now and forever.

The Agricultural Line
For a moment, try to clear your mind of thoughts of modern cities, states, countries and borders. Picture the continents as mere land masses and imagine a line running diagonally roughly from what is now New England to what is now Baja California. Though there are exceptions to this idea, it is evident that for thousands of years, the people dwelling north of the line lived mainly by foraging and hunting.

This does not mean they didn’t work with the landscape. On the contrary, their hunting and forestry practices were extremely complex and skilled, ensuring that the woodlands had the best trees for their needs and that the wild animals were most abundant in the most convenient places. The people’s knowledge of terrain, weather and plants was so far beyond ours in modern times, it is baffling to realize what was lost as a result of the genocide…both lives and millennia of knowledge about how to live in America were destroyed. The people of America, both Indian and Non-Indian, have yet to recover from this loss of survival skills.

South of the line, we have the greatest horticulturists the world may ever have known. Generations of skilled farmers coaxed into existence the crops which have become the staples of civilizations the world over. The Italians could hardly imagine life without polenta, just as the Irish would be lost without potatoes and they owe it all to the early Americans who carefully selected and cultivated strains of these nutritional powerhouse plants over hundreds and thousands of years.

Because of the dense population of the United States and the concept of private ownership of lands, it is very difficult to live in modern times by hunting and gathering. The grains, greens, nuts, roots and seeds we might want are all behind fences. The eating traditions of the North are beyond most of us to replicate. South of the line, however, we can look for a sustainable lifestyle that absolutely works in the 21st century. We can look to places like ancient Mexico, Peru and New England for a model diet and a planet-friendly way of feeding ourselves. It worked for almost countless ages. It can work for us again.

Meet The Milpa
Milpa farming revolves around planting a mix of crops in combination. Maize rises toward the sun while beans entwine its strong stalks, filling the ground with much-needed nitrogen, and fast-growing squash vines thrive in the dappled spaces in between. Depending on the region, other crops such as sunflowers, avocados or tomatoes are planted. This brilliant method of farming made such excellent use of space and provided such complete nutrition that the concept of growing food this way came to be practiced nearly everywhere south of the line on our map. For thousands of years, milpa farms fed people and they can be planted today with equal success and equal benefits for human beings.

I do not believe that Americans can find a more healthful or incredibly delicious set of foods to locate, grow or cook than the key crops in the milpa and the greatest agricultural achievements of the earliest and wisest inhabitants of these lands. Now, we’re ready to take a new look at these incredible foods.

Maize (Corn)
So central to the diet and beliefs of American people is this plant that the Indians of Mexico often refer to themselves as corn walking. For early Americans in North, Central and South America, maize was the staff of life – the grain that enabled them to see a return of as much as 800 kernels for every kernel planted. At least 30 times more productive than most grain crops of non-Native-American origin, and capable of growing in nearly every type of soil and climate, maize has been the anchor of Native American diets since it was first cultivated some 12,000 or more years ago.

In Central and South America, myriad varieties of maize are still grown for flour, for the making of tortillas, tamales, porridges, stews, beverages and snacks. But, in the United States and Canada, the majority of corn is grown for factory animal feed and the manufacture of industrial products. Even when small farms or families grow corn, they are most likely to grow sweet corn instead of dent or flour corn because the skills of milling and processing these most nutritious corns into useful grain products have been lost. I believe that the day local mills reopen their doors would be one of the happiest days in America. Sweet corn is a wonderful treat, but the dishes you can make from corn flour, masa, polenta-milled corn can form the basis of a vibrant diet of almost unlimited variety.

From tacos, to tamale pie, to jonny cakes and puddings, maize is a blessing for which we can’t be thankful enough and it is so sacred to many Native peoples that it is an integral part of both cultural identity and spiritual practices. But corn is under attack now on these continents as a result of corporate desecration of the genes of corn. The spread of genetically modified corn is destroying our ancient maize landraces and making a new substance that is unfit for human beings or animals to eat. Wild geese will not settle in GMO corn fields and scientific literature cites this GMO corn as a carcinogen…corn that causes cancer instead of giving life.

All people who love corn must become educated about GMO contamination of this staple food source on which our health is so dependent and I urge you to purchase and grow only organic corn that is being protected from biotechnology by means of testing. For farm families wishing to grow either sweet or flour maize, I would suggest buying your seed from Fedco. Fedco is working to supply safe seed to people and I support them in this vital work, and I beg all American people to fight and ban genetic modification of our vital Native American Foods.

Beans
Human beings need protein to live, and there is no better or kinder source of it than dry beans. Take your pick of pinto beans, Anasazi beans, black beans, kidney beans, red beans and you will be drawing from a tradition that is thousands of years old. Evidence of bean cultivation in Peru dates back to at least 6500 BC and other evidence points to another ancient legacy of bean cultivation in Mexico. There are 4000 varieties of beans on record in the United States, alone, and your dinners will only be limited by the extent of your creativity when your meals include beans.

Our family’s favorite bean dish is the simple refritos – refried beans. We eat these almost every day, but we also love to incorporate beans into soups, stews and casseroles. Baked beans are a classic and if you mash them up cold the next day, they make a very toothsome sandwich spread. Some onion, some salt, some herbs – just a little imagination can turn plain beans into a feast for a hungry family.

I am always surprised by the needless trouble cookbooks make about cooking beans from scratch. If you can boil water, you can make beans. Some cooks insist that pre-soaking beans, draining off soaking water and other methods make beans more digestible. I have never really understood this, but it may be our family’s ancestry that prevents us having any little side effects from eating beans. All we do is wash them really well, sautee some onion in our big pot, put in the beans and water, cook them for a few hours and then eat them.

None of these other steps are necessary, as far as our own experience goes, but if, for some reason, you have experienced trouble with beans, I would suggest that you make a small pot of them and eat just a spoonful for the first few days…then eat at few spoonfuls. Work your way up to being able to enjoy a full serving of beans by giving your body time to get used to them. And, if these give you a little gas now and then, why should you worry? Everyone has some gas sometimes. That is certainly no reason to bar yourself from enjoying this superior source of protein and culinary joy!

Squash
If I believed in former lives, I would think I had once lived as a squash. No other vegetable seems to shine to me with such warmth and friendliness. When you grow squash, they are like little friends, getting bigger every day in the garden. Their colors and shapes make them like priceless works of art and their delicious, nutritious flesh adds such goodness to meals. Some researchers believe that squashes were the first plants ever cultivated by humankind in the Americas and signs of their presence date back at least 10,000 years in Mesoamerica. The squash has been a friend to man for time beyond recall.

In the United States, we can enjoy two main types of squash. Summer squashes like pattypans and crooknecks are so tender if they are picked when small that they need only a minute of sauteeing them to turn them into little slices of succulent flavor. I greet the arrival of the first summer squash each year with absolute rapture. Once again, I can make stir fries, soups, casseroles, savory pies and marinated dishes with the hearty substance that only squash can provide.

Grown all summer and picked in the fall, winter squash take care of us through the cold months of the year. Their storage qualities are exceptional and in the story of Buffalo Bird Woman great detail is given as to how the Hidatsa people dried rings of winter squash to feed their villages throughout the long winter days. Many Native Peoples extracted a rich, green oil from squash seeds…a favorite at the court of Montezuma.

Winter squashes come in a stunning variety. Try Lakotah squash, buttercup, acorn, pumpkin….each one’s flesh is different in texture and taste. Many cooks feel that winter squashes make a tastier pie than pumpkins do. My family’s favorite way to eat them is baked and either stuffed with a savory stuffing or dressed with my gingerbread dressing. I plan to post the recipe for that in the future and I think your family will stand up and cheer if they taste it!

Scientists and nutritionists praise squashes for their vitamin content, but for millenia, Native peoples have loved squashes simply for the good, full feeling of energy and satisfaction they provide when eaten.

Maize, beans and squash. These are the Native American triad of a healthy diet and our family eats them daily, in some exciting form our other. But this is not all. This base of three Native American Foods can be added to in all kinds of wonderful and delicious ways. Consider how you can enjoy the following:

Potatoes
In Scandinavia, it is said that the people don’t feel they’ve eaten a meal unless it included potatoes. They owe their appreciation for this mealy, steaming, filling happiness to the people of Peru who first cultivated some wild tubers at least 10,000 years ago and turned them into the potatoes countless nations love today. By the time of the Inca’s were ruling Peru in the middle of the 1st millenium A.D., the Andes were ingeniously planted with nutritious potatoes on slopes that look too steep to even walk on.

Our family eats potatoes daily, in stews and soups, baked, boiled, hashed, fried. There is no comparable experience that I know of to eating the first, new potatoes of the year, boiled for mere minutes and simply dressed with a little oil, salt, pepper and parsley just seconds after being dug out of the earth. Potatoes are so easy to grow, I wish everyone could have this unforgettable experience, and the rest of the year, potatoes help us to feel healthy and strong by adding their mineral-rich, starchy bulk to our diet.

Sweet Potatoes (sometimes called Yams) are another blessing from the tropical regions of South America where they have been cultivated for at least 5000 years. We love to make a sweet sauce of peanuts and maple syrup (both Native American Foods), salt, pepper and warming spices to dress our baked sweet potatoes with. Prepared this way, they are almost like dessert but they make a very nutritious side dish to a meal. With some frijoles and a cup of really good homemade soup, you have a dinner fit to serve the most special company.

Sunflowers
This is a picture of the Tarahumara sunflowers we grew this year on our family farm. They are almost ready to harvest now and they have unusual white shells covering the nutritious, oily seeds. Buffalo Bird Woman, referenced above, tells of how the Hidatsa people of earlier times would make balls of ground sunflower meal to take along with them on journeys or out to the fields while working. If they began to feel fatigued, they would nibble their sunflower seed ball and feel wonderfully restored.

Scientists praise sunflower seeds for their oils and proteins. At least 3000 years ago, sunflowers were being cultivated in Mexico and were so beloved that they were used to represent solar gods in both Aztec and Inca art.

You can enjoy sunflowers raw or roasted. They can be added to stir fries, salads, and baked goods or ground into sunflower butter. When you look at beautiful yellow sunflowers, picture the sustaining energy contained in these good plants and how their seeds can help to feed your family in a healthy way.

Avocados
A good avocado is so delicious, it almost defies my powers of description. So rich, so creamy, so dense and filling and luxurious, an avocado is a unique gift to all American people. Avocados of many varieties grow wild in both Central and South America, but no one really knows when early peoples first began cultivating the trees. Pre-Inca pottery was made in the shapes of avocados to celebrate them and this teaches us how important these fruits have been for a very long time.

In the destruction caused by the arrival of the brutal conquistadores in the Americas from Europe, the traditional diet of Native Peoples was forever altered by the introduction of lard from pigs. Instead of relying on the squash seeds, sunflower seeds, avocados and other plants for healthy fats, inhabitants of North, Central and South America began eating more animal fats, a change scientists now see as an unhealthy one. If you are currently working towards a family diet with less unhealthy fats, consider these good plant sources as an ancient, time-tested alternative.

In addition to the guacamole most modern Americans know, avocados are traditionally used in soups, corn-based dishes like tacos, in salads and on sandwiches and even whipped up into desserts! USA-produced organic avocados are available between March-September every year and they are a truly valuable and incredibly sumptuous Native American food.

Tomatoes
Considering that this fruit is so widely used, it is surprising how little is know about the tomato’s origin. Small, green wild relations of the tomato grow in Peru and Aztec recipes for various kinds of tomato salsas indicate the provenance of this special Native American food, but it seems no one is quite sure who first began cultivating and hybridizing tomatoes in ancient times.

Tomatoes add a unique juiciness and tang to otherwise dry dishes and they are a beloved addition to stews, soups, sauces, salads, sandwiches and even desserts. Tomatoes are so easy to grow that I wish every family could have the experience of a fresh-picked tomato from the garden. It is nothing like the taste of tomatoes from supermarkets. Even natural foods stores have bland, mediocre tomatoes. If you can’t grow tomatoes yourself, buy them from the nearest farmer you can find, and make sure you buy only organic tomatoes.

During the summer and fall, our family eats tomatoes every day, and we like to freeze some for winter use. When you think of just how many world cuisines incorporate the tomato – Asian, Arabic, European, African – it is very important to remember that the fruits we enjoy came to us through the work of early peoples.

But, wait! There are even more Native American Foods
With corn, beans, squash, potatoes, tomatoes, avocados and sunflower seeds, the bounty on our tables is already almost embarrassing. Literally hundreds and hundreds of delicious meals can be based on these ingredients, alone. But there is more to come! Consider how much extra appeal can be added to your meals when they include some of these delicious and traditional Native American Foods:

Sunchokes
Also called Sunroots or Jerusalem Artichokes, these interesting little tubers are native to North America. Likened to a potato in texture, sunchokes can be eaten cooked but I like them best thrown into a stir fry at just the last minute to warm them. If you would like a Native American substitute for the canned water chestnuts used in Chinese American cuisine, sunchokes are going to thrill you. I make dishes of snow peas and sunchoke ‘water chestnuts’ when the peas get ripe in the spring and they are so delicious. Sunchokes are only one of the hundreds of roots and tubers cultivated and picked wild by Native Americans as a staple food source.

Greens
I don’t feel well if I have to go too long without eating some kind of greens, whether fresh or briefly cooked. Early Americans harvested the leaves of too many kinds of plants to count in order to enjoy something good and green to eat. Wild spinaches like goosefoot are still greatly prized by many Native Peoples today. Whether you are picking wild greens or eating cultivated ones, you will enjoy the fresh, energetic feeling you get from including them frequently in your meals.

Grains, Nuts & Seeds
Amaranth and Quinoa have recently been making big news in health magazines as miracle grains. They have certainly been a staple for generations. Chia seeds are just beginning to catch on, too. And don’t forget hazelnuts, hickory nuts, walnuts and pinenuts – wonderful, delicious sources of proteins and fats. Most modern people do not have the knowledge needed to turn acorns into good food, but these skills can also be learned if you like. And don’t forget the peanuts! The peanut butter in your sandwich is a Native American food very familiar to most people in the United States today.

Fruits
Almost every region in the United States has its berries – blackberries, blueberries, cranberries, etc. When you add to this the native plums, persimmons, bananas, wild strawberries, grapes, prickly pears…the list of Native American foods really starts to get long!

Herbs & Others
I am always coming across American Indians singing nostalgic praises of wild onions. It’s easy to understand why. Truly, onions are an unsurpassed gift to cooking, whether they are wild or cultivated. Dishes often do not taste right without a little onion and you can use them liberally. There are Native American herbs, too, like Epazote, which is not well known outside the regions where it is grown. Using herbs in cooking brings out new flavors and adds to the subtlety and goodness of dishes. Beans and squash can become whole new kinds of foods, just by using different seasonings. Maybe you have also tried the delicious little green tomatillos in their papery husks that make the piquant salsa verde you love on Mexican restaurant food. Then there are all of the peppers – both hot ones and sweet ones that can bring incredible flavor to meals. I’m getting hungry now. How about you?

Well, don’t forget the maple syrup, the agave, the chocolate. Now you’ve got dinner and dessert, too!

Why A Native American Foods-based Diet Makes Sense For All Americans

I love homemade Chinese food and delight in an occasional Middle Eastern meal. With things like citrus fruits, garbanzo beans and sesame seeds being cultivated on the American continents, I see no reason not to enjoy these fine foods whenever I’d like to. One non-Native-American food – rice – has definitely become a staple in our home.

But, as much as I enjoy these other noble cuisines, nothing is so satisfying for me, walking on American soil, as eating the foods that are native to this piece of land. Native American foods require the smallest efforts and inputs to grown them because they are meant to grow here. Native American Foods require less transport than processed foods shipped into us from China or other countries outside the Americas. Native American Foods can be fit together like the pieces of a puzzle to create a diet that is always nutritious and always balanced.

In the United States, historians and other researchers have a bad habit of making it sound like Native Americans have vanished from the earth, tragically killed off by European invaders. While it is true that every part of North, Central and South America suffered incalculable loss of life due to unintentional disease and utterly intentional murder, indigenous peoples are very much alive today, whether they live in Montreal, San Francisco, Oaxaca or Lima. In some places, native traditions have not survived the genocide, but in others, the people called ‘Indians’ are still living and farming as they have for thousands of years. The American continents are blessed with a tremendous diversity of Native Peoples, but the history of these lands since the time of the conquistadores has been one of violence instead of one of learning how to love the lands.

Even now, Native Peoples on both continents are being disregarded, abused and killed by latecomers. When you do your research about GMOs, you will see farmers in Mexico, Ecuador and Peru talking with fear and pain in their eyes about ‘multinationals’ and ‘global trade’…much as I imagine the Iroquois sounded when they spoke of George Washington whom they called, ‘destroyer of towns.’

Rather than learning from America’s oldest inhabitants, latecomers ride roughshod over the gardens, the managed forests, the orchards and fields of the very people who know how to farm and eat best in this part of the world.

With so much talk of ecology and the green movement, maybe this is the time that our history will turn in a new direction. Maybe, instead of greed and hatred ruling the day, exchanges of knowledge can take precedent. Maybe, instead of an insane lust for gold, for uranium, for plastic, for oil, for whatever is the latest thing, all Americans can realize that food is the most important thing to know how to acquire and prepare. We can live without shiny metals. We cannot live without eating and if we want to be very green, we can look around the plot of continental rock on which we live for the foods that love to grow here.

On our farm, we sing to our plants. We dance around them when their first fruits are ready to be harvested. We ask their permission to take some of their goodness into ourselves. And, they always answer, “yes.” We are as happy as small children, every time we feel the love these plants show for us, especially when we think of the thousands of years of history spanning the growth of plants and people, side by side. We can be corn walking. We can be squash and beans and berries walking. We can have all these fine things without causing harm to ourselves, our fellow beings or our planet. We have it that good.

In future, I will be continuing to share some of my best recipes here on VeganReader, most of which are based largely on Native American ingredients. Just as Native Peoples have not disappeared, neither has the need to create disappeared. We are not limited to preparing foods exactly as our early peoples did. Traditional dishes are irreplaceable treasures, but we are alive, right now, with all of these terrific foods around us and can create new dishes that become classics in our families and may be passed along to future generations.

We can keep the celebration of these Native American Foods going strong by continuing to let them pass through our hands to nourish our dear ones in so many different ways. Don’t ever think that the celebration isn’t important. It was the way of life for the earliest inhabitants of this continent, and if we want health and happiness, it can be our way of life, too. Surely, the Earth will feel glad in our gladness.

The truth is, the little girl won’t be hurt by a light brown apple moth, a gypsy moth, a glassy winged sharp shooter. She won’t be devoured by lady bugs or butterflies. But, she just may develop an autoimmune disease, Autism or cancer from walking in orchards and vineyards, parks or forests that the California Department of Food and Agriculture has flooded with endocrine-disrupting, carcinogenic herbicides and pesticides. With the exception of a very sick mosquito or tick, little bugs don’t kill little children – just think of the millennia during which Native American children played across the fields, beaches and woods of California, learning to love all of the diverse insects present here, and certainly not being killed by them.

What’s Really Happening In California?

The narration of this ghastly ad campaign warns that “California’s environment and agriculture are under attack,” and truer words were never spoken. Since the end of World War II, when the toxic leftovers of the war were put to use in agriculture as a money-making scheme, California’s air, water, soil, plants and inhabitants have been under attack by the deadly pesticides, herbicides and fungicides being sprayed daily by state and federal agencies and conventional farmers across the state. The honeybees, bats, frogs, oysters, fish, birds and butterflies are being shoved toward extinction and the human beings are losing their health and their lives because state and federal agencies turned the need to get rid of leftover toxins from the Second World War into a full-time job, an industry and a tremendous way to make vast sums of money.

And now, our state economy has collapsed. Our DMV and post offices may have to be closed several days a week. The governor has threatened to close 80% of our state parks. Funding for all kinds of human-interest programs has been taken away. Unemployment is skyrocketing while foreclosures dot the land with empty houses. And the California Department of Food and Agriculture is scared. Scared of losing their jobs because they cannot prove that they are essential to California’s bureaucratic structure.

Just recently, I watched Senator Dean Florez grilling CDFA reps at a hearing in which CDFA was being asked to justify the millions of dollars they wish to be given to continue their scandalous Light Brown Apple Moth (LBAM) program – a program which has been condemned by scientists, doctors, local government leaders and the public as unnecessary, unsafe and unwanted. California has no money, and it was very interesting watching the CDFA reps grasping for those dollars, attempting to use their well-documented scare tactics which insinuate that California will be devoured by insects unless we all pay into the pockets of this agency.

What’s really happening in California is that state and federal agencies have pushed their chemical-based control programs to the limit, killing off the healthy, natural balances and checks that keep eco-systems diverse and well. They now want to be given more money to use more herbicides and pesticides to ‘fix’ the situation and they are low enough to show a little girl being demolished in order to make a grab for the money. These agencies are immoral. Their 2007 aerial spraying of Santa Cruz and Monterey counties put children in the hospital and killed thousands of sea birds, honey bees, wild birds and domestic animals. Those counties awoke after the night of the spraying to a world devoid of bird song. This is the truth about CDFA/USDA’s methods of ‘managing’ agriculture and the natural world and they do not deserve money, trust or respect.

The USDA Uses Social Media To Get Their Dark Message Out There

Social media is a form of marketing that encompasses blogging, video distribution and the use of platforms like Twitter, Facebook and Flickr. It can be used to promote good and worthy causes and it can be used to influence the public for ill. The HungryPests campaign has launched a blog at hungrypests.com (no link from me, but go see it) and they are posting their manipulative videos here on YouTube. The purpose of social media is to create buzz and draw public comment. The USDA/CDFA has just put their message out there. Please, go right ahead and start leaving your comments and let these unwanted agencies know what you think about organizations that use images of children disintegrating in order to scare people and make money. Tell them exactly what you think about that. That’s what social media is for.

And, should you attempt to post comments that mysteriously disappear, please, copy those comments into a document on your computer and feel free to paste them in here in the comments field on this blog post. We will gladly publish them.

VeganReader has been covering the CDFA’s LBAM program for over a year now, and in that time, I have heard from the people, the doctors and scientists who have been harmed and scandalized by the practices and tactics of this agency. If you’ve not been following the LBAM disaster, this post will serve as your crash course, and it is an accurate representation not only of the course of the Light Brown Apple Moth campaign, but all of CDFA’s ‘eradication’ programs. The bottom line is the the USDA/CDFA want to continue drowning the state and the nation in deadly herbicides and pesticides and simply will not make the vital change over to organic farming and forestry practices that create a strong and healthy environment with the power to balance itself.

Here is our planet, beginning to feel the effects of global warming while our children drop one by one into chemically-induced states of mental and physical illness, our honeybees which are responsible for nearly all of the food we eat are being exterminated and our water is so polluted, it is unfit for human consumption. Here we are with incredible numbers of human beings experiencing such reproductive dysfunction that they end up in doctors offices trying to figure out why they are unable to fulfill biological functions. Here we are with our mothers, sisters, aunts and daughters dying of cancer and our uncles, brothers, fathers and sons going to prison because of random acts of psychotic and possibly chemically-induced violence. Here we are with our markets purveying genetically modified substances that are no longer food and which the government will not label in case people wouldn’t buy them. Here we are with corporations owning our government and our nation’s first people dying in poverty on reservations hidden behind our national monuments.

Yes, there is all kinds of terrible, bad stuff happening right now in America. The last thing we need to add to this is further funding from our empty pockets for state and federal agencies who think that deadly chemicals are such a wonderful idea that they have sprayed them directly onto human beings, up and down the state and across the nation, under the guise of ‘invasive’ insect eradication. We don’t accept this. We don’t support this and we will not be fooled into thinking that our current economic or ecological peril has been brought about by butterflies!

We know that pesticides kill. We know that like suicide, regicide, homicide and genocide, words ending with ‘cide’ mean a dreadful death. We reject substances that cause death to insects, death to birds, to fish, to animals and people and we reject this wicked TV ad campaign, designed to brainwash the public by means of fearmongering and deception.

If you, too, reject the tactics and practices of the USDA and CDFA, please comment here and on their hungrypests.com blog and YouTube videos. By putting their message out there, these agencies are now open for your comments. What do you have to say about the HungryPests campaign?

The Unappetizing Truth About Store Bought Pickles
Where we live, there are only a couple of organic pickles available at the local natural foods stores and both of them contain that dreaded ingredient – natural flavors. Natural flavors are chemicals added to foods to trick your taste buds into thinking a food is tasty and ‘fresh’. IFF, International Flavors and Fragrances, is America’s biggest taste and smell chemical manufacturer. In their huge laboratory off the New Jersey Turnpike, the lab workers create the flavors and scents that are packed into everything from oven cleaner to pickle relish. The only difference between a natural flavor and an artificial flavor is that the ‘natural’ one must have, at some point, derived from a food, whereas the ‘artificial’ one can be from a purely chemical origin. There are no health benefits to eating chemical additives, but the inclusion of them in processed foods enables food corporations to mask the tastelessness of old, low quality food, fooling Americans into thinking that what they are eating is delicious.

Whole foods taste great naturally when they are grown with care and freshly prepared. No chemical additives required. It’s a huge disappointment to see Whole Foods 365 Brand Organic Pickles and Cascadian Farms Organic Pickles and Relishes resorting to the use of chemicals instead of quality ingredients in their pickle offerings and our family will not buy them. We prefer to make our own, anyway, and you’ll never have a crisper more flavorsome pickle than the one you’ve made yourself.

Quick Pickles Are A Cinch And A Super Summer Idea
Pickling was invented as a method of preserving foods through the cold winter months when fewer fresh choices are available, and the art of safe long-term pickling is a smart one for self-sufficient families to learn. There’s another type of pickle, however, that is meant to put pickles on the table just hours after picking the cucumbers off the vine or bringing them home from the farmers market. It’s hard to beat the refreshing iciness of fresh sliced cucumber, but for some meals, you absolutely yearn for the salty tang of pickles and if you know you’re going to be making such a meal that night, you can throw together a quick pickle recipe earlier in the day and have the pickles ready by the time the family is saying grace that evening! This is a summertime recipe meant to make the most of your local cucumber harvest and to be enjoyed right now. I hope you will try this quick pickle recipe and tell me how you like it.

My Scrumptious, Crisp Quick Pickle Recipe

Choosing Your Cucumbers
Loyal Vegan Reader readers will not be surprised to hear me saying that home-grown cucumbers of any variety are going to make the very best pickles, but your next best choice are the cucumbers grown by local farmers. Visit farm stands and farmers markets in the summer months and take your pick of the best of what’s in season. Cucumbers must be firm and unwrinkled. Don’t be afraid to ask the farmer when the cucumbers were picked. You will make the best pickles from cucumbers that were picked this morning, or at the very least, within the last 2-3 days.

Commercially-produced pickles are typically made with a single type of cucumber, but when you make quick pickles, you can use any type of cucumber you fancy.

Pickling Cucumbers

These are the relatively small, bumpy pickles typically used in commercial pickle production as well as home pickling. They have dense flesh and small seeds but yield a very juicy pickle. When pickled whole, these are the cucumbers that create the classic Kosher Dill, but in the quick pickling process, you’ll be slicing these into thin slices, more like bread and butter pickles. Pickling cucumbers are most people’s top choice for pickle recipes.

Lemon Cucumbers

While I love the bumpy little pickling cucumbers, lemon cucumbers are my favorite all-around cuke. About the size of a tennis ball, lemon cucumbers are an heirloom variety with a beautiful yellow skin and very high water content. The seeds are larger than those of the pickling cucumber. In terms of flavor, they are quite similar to any other type of cucumber, but their moist flesh makes them the most refreshing of them all, in my opinion. By thinly slicing lemon cucumbers in uniform rounds, you can make some truly great quick pickles.

Slicing Cucumbers

Slicers are the variety you are most likely to see in regular supermarkets. Oblong, large and with a dark green, smooth skin, slicing cucumbers are the ones you encounter at salad bars. Due to globalization of America’s food system, conventional supermarkets carry these fruits year-round, but they are simply not worth buying out of season. They have a nasty, bitter skin and not much else in their favor. During the summer months, however, slicing cucumbers are quite refreshing. Their flesh has a lower water content than that of the lemon and pickling cucumbers and they make nice large pickle slices in a quick pickle recipe. They are my 3rd choice for pickle making, but if all you can find are slicers, they will make fine quick pickles for dinner tonight.

In addition to this, there are the pale green Armenian cucumbers which look like flowers when sliced and there are European varieties, too. Don’t get stuck in a cucumber rut! It’s worth pickling just about any cucumber you can find.

Of Herbs and Spices
You can make quick pickles with nothing fancier than vinegar and salt, but a few extra touches will take your quick pickles from fine to fantastic. Our family votes for garlic dill pickles as best of all pickle varieties. Our typical pickle recipe includes a bunch of fresh dill, a few cloves of garlic, salt, black pepper and vinegar, but you can experiment with mustard seed, capers, chopped hot or sweet peppers and other spices. When you make your own pickles, it’s all up to you!

Choosing Vinegar For Quick Pickles
Pickles that are canned to last for many months have very specific requirements when it comes to the acidity of the vinegar needed to keep pickles safe and prevent bacteria from growing. With quick pickles, however, you have more leeway because they are eaten up quickly and the refrigerator keeps them safe. We like to experiment with our vinegars. You can try rice vinegar, apple cider vinegar and white vinegar to discover which one yields the type of acidity and flavor you prefer in your pickles.

What You Need
Winter storage pickle recipes call for large quantities of pickles, but because quick pickles are meant to be eaten within about 10 days, you really only need a few pickles to make enough for a family feast or two. Our recipe here has been ultra-simplified to provide a single 1 pint mason jar of pickles. You can scale the recipe up for more pickles if you’re feeding a crowd.

Do Buy Organic
The majority of pickles produced in the United States are so laden with pesticides, they ought to have skulls and cross bones on their labels. Don’t put poison on the family table. Buy organic cucumbers and make sure the vinegar, herbs and spices you use are organic, too. Where we live, even the commercial organic pickles don’t cut the mustard for us because of the addition of ‘natural flavors’. We want safe, chemical-free food to eat. What we don’t produce on our farm, we buy from our neighbors who are also committed to farming organically. Food is life, and we don’t know of anything more important to spend our time and money on than quality, safe food.

Basic Ingredients
The freshest cucumbers you can find (1 large slicer, 2 lemon cucumbers or 3 pickling cucumbers)
1 pint of vinegar
1 small bunch fresh dill
3 cloves coarsely chopped garlic
2 Tablespoons salt
A shake of black pepper

*Feel free to add your own secret ingredients.

5 Quick Steps To Quick Pickles
1. Take your largest pot and fill with water. Bring it to a boil.
2. Drop the mason jar and lid into the water and let boil for about 30 seconds. Remove.
3. Thoroughly wash the exterior of your cucumbers. Slice into uniform, thin rounds.
4. Places your dill, garlic, salt, pepper and any other herbs or spices in the jar. Put in cucumbers.
5. Pour vinegar in to cover the pickles and seal up with your lid.

That’s all there is to it! In about 4 hours, the pickles will be ready to eat and they just get better after a few days, too. We often consume a whole batch at a single dinner, but the pickles will stay good in the refrigerator for about 10 days if you’d like to make them last longer and aren’t quite as voracious about pickles as we are!

The Main Difference Between Quick Pickles And Traditional Pickle Recipes
Because traditional pickles sit for months or years in jars, their color tends to turn to that familiar olive green. They are perfectly safe if they’ve been canned in a sanitary manner, but their appearance is different than that of quick pickles. The skin of quick pickles retains its fresh green (or yellow in the case of lemon cucumber pickles) color and the flesh of each pickle will still be fairly white instead of olive hued. The taste is fresher and more immediate in its appeal, and we think of quick pickles more as a special type of marinated vegetable than an item meant for winter storage. Cucumbers are simply so succulent that they deserve to be enjoyed in as many ways as possible during their glorious summer season, don’t you think?

Please, give our quick pickle recipe a try. You’re about to discover that ‘natural flavors’ are simply not needed when the ingredients are fresh and the food is prepared with care and a good intention of providing something that is truly wholesome to eat. Feel great that you aren’t paying for a fancy label, gasoline-guzzling long range shipping and the deceptive tricks of commercially processed foods that have separated our society from the real taste of natural goodness.

Serving Suggestions
*Take your homemade refrigerator pickles on a picnic in the cooler. A snappy condiment for all to enjoy in the great outdoors.
*These quick pickles are a sublime addition to potato salad.
*Layer these crisp pickle slices on a vegan cheese sandwich for an incredible lunch.
*Make a real Southern supper with baked beans, sweet potatoes, greens, jonny cakes and a scintillating side dish of homemade pickles. They lend just the right sharp note to the menu!

Enjoy!

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Flickr Photo Credit For Slicing Cucumber Image