First, a healthy vegan diet is the MOST LOVING thing we can do for ourselves. We create physical health and avoid most of the heart disease, cancer, diabetes, obesity, inflammation in our joints, digestive issues, and dementia that destroy the quality of life for most people eating the Standard American Diet.  And if that was ALL we accomplished with a healthy vegan diet, that would be enough. 

​Eating this way is the most loving thing we can do for our family and friends.  Now, this may cause a bit of head scratching, as I know many people think they are causing an inconvenience to others by eating differently.

However, if you have ever had a family member or close friend suffer, and possibly die, from cancer, diabetes, heart disease, stroke, or the other common lifestyle diseases, you know that YOU ALSO suffer with them! My father died of cancer when I was 15, leaving my young widowed mother and three teenage children.

Taking care of ourselves is never a selfish act. Our lack of self-care always ends up affecting others as well.

​Preparing and sharing healthy meals with our family is also an act of love. Of course, we don’t want to browbeat them into eating this way, but by making delicious food that entices them to eat healthfully, you are saving them a lot of unnecessary health problems as well.

We, as a nation, have done a terrible disservice to our children by feeding them in such a way that they are now experiencing increasing obesity and health problems such as Type 2 diabetes that used to only occur in adults.  Adults have a responsibility to do our best to keep our children safe, and to teach them what they need to know to have rewarding, successful lives. And for some reason, we have ignored the importance of healthy food in our care of our children.

So when people ask me if I have any “kid friendly” recipes, I tell them that all the foods that are healthy for them, as parents, are healthy for their kids. And that’s what kids should be learning to eat as kids so that they learn to like them and know how to take care of their own health as adults. What is friendly about feeding kids foods that are making them fat and sick?  Or that will guarantee that their arteries will be clogged and inflamed by their 40’s? Teaching our kids how to have long, healthy lives is truly an act of love!

The animals who share this planet with us deserve to live their own lives.  There have been times and places where human survival depended upon eating animals, and there are probably some places where that is still true. However, that is definitely NOT the case for most humans now. So respecting the rights of other animals to live their own, natural lives is an act of love on our part.  

Factory farms are the epitome of disregarding the needs of other beings. By choosing not to eat animals, we are choosing not to support an industry that causes terrible, unnecessary suffering to billions of other sentient beings. 

Animal agriculture causes more greenhouse gases than all forms of transportation, combined. It is polluting  the air and ground water. The runoff of herbicides and pesticides flows into rivers and to our oceans, creating huge dead zones, where lack of oxygen doesn’t allow anything to live. Forests are cut down to grow feed crops for animals, removing the habitat where a great number of other animals and plants were living.

So choosing to eat a healthy vegan diet is an act of love for not only the animals we choose not to eat, but the other animals as well. It is an act of love for our air, water, soil, and ocean.

By making the simple choice to eat only plants, we are having a positive influence on every one of these problems. We are not powerless. In fact, we are incredibly powerful! We, as consumers, are choosing which products and practices we want to have in this world. Every time we pay for meat, dairy products and eggs, we are supporting an industry that is causing great harm and suffering.  But every time we choose to buy plants, ideally grown organically, we are supporting businesses and practices that collectively are making our world healthier, safer, and kinder.

But if we’re committed to eating only healthy plant-based foods, we could have a big problem.

What’s wrong with regular pumpkin pie? ? ?   

Well, it has eggs, (not vegan.)  It has lots of sugar, and the crust is loaded with butter, shortening or oil mixed with white flour, (not healthy.) ​That’s a lot of stuff that doesn’t belong in a healthy vegan diet!

But never fear . . . we can fix it.  All of it!  And still have a completely delicious dessert that says autumn and THANKSGIVING!

So how do we go about “veganizing” and “healthifying” the old, unhealthy, non-vegan version?

​It was 60 years ago today — July 4, 1957 — that my family and I arrived in Palmer, AK. in our old school bus, painted white. This was the “RV” that brought us over the long, long road from Louisiana. 

There were six of us at the time. My parents, John and Lucille, and my 9 year old sister, Cynthia, my 8 year old brother, Morton, my little 5 year old brother, Charles, and me — 6 years old.

Arriving on July 4th, my mother was determined to find a store where we could buy watermelon. “You can’t have the 4th of July without watermelon!”   I imagine Palmer was the first town they found with much of a grocery store after crossing the border from Canada into Alaska.

People always ask what brought us to Alaska.  The military?  Some other job?

​I’ve lived in Alaska most of the past 60 years, with a few years in northern New York, 4 years in North Carolina, and a year in California.   Every place I’ve lived has had it’s own kind of beauty, but when I came back to visit my mother in 1991, I knew I wanted to live here again. So I did what my parents had done in 1957 — packed up my things and moved to Alaska. But of course, for me, it wasn’t like moving to a completely unknown place with 4 kids under 10!

I’ve shared some photos of the garden by the lake where I now live. My parents bought this property in 1961. We came here to swim and have picnics on the large raft we built. But there was no house until my mother decided to have one built in 1986. 

Charlie joined me when we married in 1997 and we have now moved upstairs into the main house, even though we continue to be “the gardeners.”  We now share the apartment with visitors from around the world who find us on AirBNB.com. In fact, it was one of our guests who brought this 60th anniversary to my attention 2 days ago when we were chatting about how long I’d lived in Alaska.

So if you’d like to enjoy a night or weekend in our vegan B&B, walk barefoot in the gardens, and paddle around the lake, we would welcome you at Lakeside Gardens.
I hope your 4th of July was complete with watermelon today!​

As you can see — I have a LOT of rhubarb. 

If you have some rhubarb in your yard, you know how amazingly fast it grows. Around the first of May, all we see are little red nubs sticking out of the ground. And in about a month, it’s at least 2 feet tall.

Everyone who visits in the summer asks, “What do you do with ALL THAT RHUBARB?!”

Well, first of all, I love looking at it — I think it’s beautiful! So I have no intention of harvesting all of it.

I also love the tangy taste of it -- so I definitely want to eat some of it.

Instructions:

1. Soak dates in water, just to cover, for about 10 minutes
2. Simmer rhubarb in water for a few minutes. It will begin to fall apart and make rhubarb sauce.
3. Drain dates and put in blender or food processor with rhubarb sauce
4. Process until as smooth as you like.

Enjoy this “jam” on toast, or add more water to make it a sweet/tangy topping for pancakes or waffles.

I recommend storing this ”jam” in small jars and keeping some in the freezer until ready to use. It will keep in the frig for about a week.

Note: Rhubarb leaves cannot be eaten, unfortunately. They are very high in oxalic acid and contain some other compounds which make the leaves toxic to eat. But touching the leaves doesn’t hurt you, and it is safe to compost the leaves.