• Global Warming. It’s the real thing.
  Greenpeace’s parody of the holiday Coke polar bear commercials, focused on the effects of global warming.
  (tags: environment parody coke greenpeace polarbears extinction video)
• Last hope for abandoned pets
  Noah’s Ark hits Singapore.
  (tags: noahsark companionanimals news singapore)
• Prison for spin wash cat killer
  (via JHoward)
  (tags: news animalcruelty)
• Bees can recognize human faces, study finds
  (tags: bees)

This is a veganized version of my mom’s recipe, though when she told me the original source, I was a bit surprised (no, I’m not telling). Everyone that’s tried this has said it’s the best pumpkin bread they’ve ever tried, and I’d be hard-pressed to disagree.

Yes, it’s a lot of sugar, but trust me… it’s worth it.

Ingredients

• 3 1/3 c. sifted all-purpose flour
• Replacement for 4 eggs (Ener-G works fine and applesauce might work well, too)
• 2 tsp. baking soda
• 1 1/2 tsp. salt
• 1 tsp. cinnamon
• 1 tsp. nutmeg
• 3 c. sugar
• 1 1/2 c. canned pumpkin
• 1 cup salad oil (canola, though we accidentally used olive once it was
  OK)
• 2/3 c. water

Topping:

• 2 Tbsp. melted Earth Balance
• 2 Tbsp. sugar
• 1/2 tsp. cinnamon

Directions

Sift dry ingredients into large mixing bowl. Quickly add all remaining liquid ingredients. Mix only until dry ingredients are mositened. Bake in 2 greased 9″x5″x3″ pans in pre-heated 350 degree oven for one hour. Let stand 5 minutes. Remove from pans and cool on wire rack.

While warm, brush with Earth Balance and sprinkle with cinnamon-sugar mixture.

Source: Mommy Veg Blog

• Vegan Pregnancy: Nutritious recipes to keep mom-to-be healthy on meat-free diet
  A very pro-veg pregnancy article. These things are becoming more and more common, thank goodness.
  (tags: vegan vegetarian pregnancy news)

So get this: the Veg Blog is one of 31 finalists for the Feedster’s Feed of the Year Award! Apparently, the Veg Blog was also the Feed of the Day on February 19th of this year.

Since this award is being judged independently, this isn’t one of those awards that requires me to beg for you to go vote for me. Thank your lucky stars for that because, you know, I’m not beyond begging.

(It’s kind of funny that the screenshot they feature is from last week when I was moving servers, so the “We’ll be back soon” message is prominently displayed.)

Here at the Veg Blog, I get a lot of strange things to review. One time, a company sent me a bottle of grape juice (hm… I never did actually review that… after all, what do you say about grape juice? “It tastes… like good tasting grapes!”). Another interesting item that crossed my desk was the Tupperware FridgeSmart container. This line has a pretty interesting design: the bottom of the container is ridged, which helps to keep fruits and vegetables raised above the surface to prevent contact with any liquid or juices that may leak and cause premature spoilage. In addition, they have pluggable vents that let you allow a certain amount of air into the container based on the types of foods you’re trying to keep fresh.

While I haven’t done any side-by-side comparisons of, say, a cucumber in the FridgeSmart and a cucumber in the open air, it seems to do a good job at keeping vegetables fresh for what seems to be longer than their normal fridge lifespan. Good stuff, especially for those of us with a tendency to keep vegetables a little too long before using them.

Thanks to sales rep Ric Faust for sending a FridgeSmart along for me to try out.

I had heard earlier this year that Delicious Choices would be shutting down at the end of the year. Delicious Choices makes what’s been reported to be some of the best vegan cheesecakes in existence. I never had a chance to try one, but I’ve heard raves from a number of people about them. Well, now the recipes for all of the cheesecakes are being offered in a PDF file for $10. I plunked down my cash, took a look, and can assure you: you’ll want to check these out.

I’ve been thoroughly impressed by every vegan cheesecake I’ve tried. The Chicago Diner makes a killer one and the Oreo one I bought from Red Bamboo was phenomenal. I’ve even made my own a few times and had omnis coming back for seconds, so I look forward to trying these out. Honestly, a good vegan cheesecake is every bit as good as–and actually probably better than–its lacto counterpart.

Thanks to Erik for pointing this link out on his podcast.

This weekend was Cookie Weekend around our house. We baked three batches yesterday from three different recipes.

First was a Pumpkin Oatmeal cookie recipe from Vegan With a Vengeance and as with everything else we’ve made from Isa’s book, they were awesome. The pumpkin flavor is a great twist on the standard oatmeal cookie.

Next, we made Coconut Lime cookies from Dreena Burton’s Vive La Vegan and even though we didn’t use the coconut extract that it called for (forgot to pick it up when we were at the store), they came out wonderfully. I’m a sucker for lime (get it? sucker! har!). Throw in a subtle coconut flavor and it’s all over. These are really, really tasty.

Lastly, we made this sugar cookie recipe. They came out OK, but were kind of bland. I’m going to read through the comments more thoroughly and see if anyone’s come up with better variations because this recipe was incredibly easy and would be a great go-to recipe for the holidays.

The Cookie Monster in me was satiated this weekend.

It feels weird to have been away from the site for so long, but we’re back and running smoothly (I think). I had some issues with my previous web host, so I moved 11 of my domains to a new host with more space, more bandwidth, and better offerings. Unfortunately, their support squad is a bit swamped, so the actual transition of the domains took longer than I would have liked.

But, things should be back to normal. No more annoying errors when you post a comment and hopefully no more stretches of downtime.

Regular posting will resume today.

In a really frustrating turn of events, Erik Marcus‘ Erik’s Diner podcast has been hijacked. I had to re-read the description of what happened a couple of times to get it, but boy is it a doozy. The idiot that did this is right down there in the same social caste as spammers.

Bottom line: if you’ve subscribed to Erik’s podcast through Itunes, the most current episode won’t be his when you download it. You can go to vegan.com to get the real episode. Until Apple/Itunes straightens their directory up, you may want to unsubscribe from his feed on Itunes and sign up for Erik’s reminder e-mail list to be notified of new shows.

I best the podcast hijacker eats meat.