This was our first road trip along this route as vegans. Until this past January, we still ate dairy so finding food on the trip was not as much of an issue. But once we left the Willamette Valley as non meat and dairy eating persons, a new food adventure began.
We ate at home just before we left and since we generally plan for two meals a day plus a snack or two, it was not until we reached Baker City that we had to think seriously about food.
We pulled into a Mexican Restaurant and took a look at the menu. Everything had either meat, cheese or eggs - and often all three. On the side menu there were separate listings for rice, beans, guacamole and other items. We asked the waitress if the beans were made with or without lard, and she went to ask the cook. The refried beans were cooked with lard but they had whole beans that were not so we ordered sides of rice, beans and guacamole to go with the chips and salsa served at the table. It was a good nourishing dinner even it there were fewer vegetables than we are used to at home.
The next day in Boise we went out with family for our first meal of the day. We ended up at a Mexican restaurant. We looked carefully at the regular menu and were prepared to order sides of rice, beans and guacamole when we saw a second specials menu that offered the newly popular "bowls." One of the bowls featured rice, beans, assorted vegetables, cheese and salsa. We asked if they could hold the cheese and we were ready to eat. The bowls were very yummy.
For dinner that evening our hostess graciously prepared a vegan meal she had discovered on the forksoverknives.org website. Having never prepared a vegan meal she was nonetheless happy to experiment. And prepared a delicious meal of tortilla casserole and potato salad with an avacado dressing.
As a hostess gift, we had brought a basket full of foods from our garden: tomatoes, beans, basil, sweet green peppers, a jalapeno and a handful of ground cherries too. (It is always fun to bring foods that people have never heard of before, like ground cherries pictured below, which are very good to eat and contain an abundance of Niacin, and vitamins A and C.)
The next day we got up late and had to leave before eating. By the time we reached Ontario Oregon we were ready to stop at the first cafe we could find. It turned out to be a Mexican Restaurant but it was all Tex-Mex style which meant there were no vegetarian beans ... or vegetarian anything let alone vegan. So we politely left after asking where another cafe might be found. We were directed next door which turned out to be another Mexican Restaurant which gratefully did have lard free beans which we ate with chips, salsa, guacamole and rice of course.
It was not until hours later when we arrived in Hood River that we began to look for another restaurant. After walking along the main street and looking at menus that seemed to feature meat with meat or cheese with more meat, I spied some young people who looked like they might be locals and asked them if they could direct us to a place where we could find some non meat-dairy food. Lucky for us they knew how to send us to the heights of Hood River where there was, just as they thought, a Thai Restaurant where we ordered some very nice sauteed vegetables, rice, and spring rolls without pork (although it cost $2 more to substitute the pork with tofu).
We are very grateful that Mexican food is so versatile- and so readily available. We are also grateful that the young people of Hood River were wise enough regarding food to direct us to a place where we could actually eat. I think young people are getting the picture about food, health, animals and climate.
I recently read that Portland was the number one city in the world for being able to comfortably eat an "alternative diet." Portland was followed by Denver followed by London then Paris and I forget the rest. But number one was pretty surprising. I hope and pray all the time that my fellow countrymen and women are becoming more educated regarding the negative effects of meat and dairy on their own health, the health of the planet, the animals and all who work in the industry, but alas. I live mostly in a food awareness bubble. I guess that means it is all the more important to keep trying to help people to learn what they need to know in order to make healthier choices. The food industry giants along with advertisers are clearly not at all concerned.
Food connects us to Creation, keeps us alive, and when we eat right it helps us to maintain our own health while assisting other creatures in having a good life too.
VIVA LA COMIDA!
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