Native Foods Blog

The Demographics of Candy: How to Maximize Your Yield, Time & Efficiency

by Holladay Allen    

Native Foods Cafe Tribe Member

 

So the big weekend has arrived… every child’s dream of collecting and devouring an obscene amount of sugar and processed “stuff” compacted into brightly colored, expertly marketed packaging may come true on Sunday night.  This, of course, depends on a well-planned-out route, size of bucket, or bag, used for candy collection and the quality of the costume.  First off, if you head into an upscale neighborhood where the houses are large and the incomes even bigger, you face a couple obstacles, if you will.  You are going to have to walk more for less.  The houses are larger, more spread apart, and you run a greater chance of encountering empty houses, as these people are more likely to be traveling, because they can afford it!  Also, I'm pretty sure there is some sort of evidence to back this up, moms in the fancier hoods tend to be focused a little bit more on healthier eating than the mid-income, 9-5 mom who just does not have a lot of time or help on her hands.  So chances of you winding up with a sack of apples, granola bars, and fruit leather are 75% greater in these neighborhoods.  My advice, skip the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air’s house and head over to the Brady Brunch’s pad.

 

Choose you bag or bucket wisely!  Large and easy to carry...

The mid-income neighborhood offers a few solid advantages.  To begin with, the houses are closer together, so you already have a higher yield coming your way.  Secondly, you are going to get a lot of variety.  From apples to Mambas, the mid-income neighbor houses the borderline-rich to the borderline-poor.  So you have the moms who fret over everything that enters their child’s mouth, to the moms who rely on frozen dinners and powdered chocolate milk.  The mid-income neighborhood also offers a certain level of safety, which is pretty important depending on the size of your group and level of supervision.  Now, if you are ready to eschew safety and well being for highest yield, best overall earnings, and the pure, raw ruckus of a rowdy Halloween, head straight to Roseanne’s neighborhood.  The candy is top-notch (in terms of desirability based on sugar-content and cool packaging), the houses are even closer together, and you can hit up ungated apartment complexes for maximum yield.  Front doors are mere feet from one another!  Also, there are going to be a lot more peeps hangin’ out in Roseanne’s hood! 

The better the costume, the more candy they will drop in your bag, cuz they'll be so distracted by your cool costume.  Guaranteed.

Just remember to keep your Native Foods Café Vegan Candy Guide on hand at all times to help you navigate through that sugar-coated haze of a night.  And don’t overdo it, even on the vegan candy!  Stomachaches are no fun and crashing from a sugar high is the pits. 

The more bright, crazy colors... the bigger the stomachache.  I'm just sayin'.

So where did these sugar bombs we call candy come from anyways?  Well, it all started with people eating honeycomb straight from the beehives to get their sugar fix. (And no, technically honey is NOT vegan, but that is another blog coming your way shortly…)  People then started rolling nuts and fruits in the honey, creating the first confections so to speak.  In the beginning, due to the high cost of manufacturing sugar, candy was very expensive, so it was a treat only enjoyed by the wealthy.  But eventually, the process became standardized and hard candy found its way into the open market at very reasonable prices.  Now there is a surplus of candy for all!  At least here in America.  So enjoy yourselves this Sunday and please be safe and courteous to all your fellow trick-or-treaters.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!  WE LOVE YOU!  BE SAFE!

 

 

Pumpkin Carving Contest... Look Here... Vote on Facebook!

by the Tempeh Spirit

Native Foods Cafe

The Halloween tradition of carving pumpkins into jack-o’-lanterns dates back many centuries, when the lanterns were actually hollowed out turnips or gourds rather than pumpkins.  Legend has it that a man by the name of Stingy Jack double-crossed the devil by tricking him into turning into a silver coin in order to pay for Jack’s drink (living up to his name!).  Instead of using the coin to pay for the drink, Jack slid it into his pocket next to a silver cross he had picked up earlier that day.  The powers of the cross prevented the devil from changing back into his original form.  Eventually Jack agreed to free the devil from his pocket only if the devil promised to never take Jack’s soul.  Through the course of his life, Jack played a few more tricks on the devil, which only angered the devil more.  When Jack finally died, God would not allow such shady soul into heaven; and the devil kept his promise to never let Jack into hell, so Jack was left with nowhere to go.  The devil sent Jack into the endless night with a lump of burning coal, which Jack put into a hollowed out turnip to create a makeshift lantern.  He then became known as Jack of the lantern which was later shortened to jack-o’-lantern.

So here is your chance to vote on these modern-day jack-o’-lanterns!  They were carved by Native Foods customers and we need help choosing some winners.  So pick your favorites for these three categories:

MOST CREATIVE

SCARIEST!!!!!

BEST OVERALL

Then post your selections on our Facebook wall!

http://www.facebook.com/NativeFoods

Pumpkin #1

 

Pumpkin #2

 

Pumpkin #3

 

Pumpkin #4

 

Pumpkin #5

 

 

Pumpkin #6

 

Pumpkin #7

 

Pumpkin #8

 

Pumpkin #9

 

 

Pumpkin #10

 

Pumpkin #11

 

 

Pumpkin #12

 

Pumpkin #13 (Lucky 13, that is!)

 

Pumpkin #14

 

Pumpkin #15

 

Pumpkin #16

Return to Facebook to cast your votes on our wall!

http://www.facebook.com/NativeFoods

Native Foods Cafe Opening 7th Location!

Holy cannoli!  We are so excited to be opening our seventh Native Foods Cafe in this historic Southern California city!  Where you ask?  Well, we can't give away all the secrets, just yet that is.  So head to our Facebook page and watch Chef Tanya's video clip for more hints and chances to win tickets to the opening party at our new location!  Party on Natives!   http://ow.ly/2Y2tz

Follow the yellow brick road to Native Foods Cafe!

The Many Colors of Corn

by Holladay Allen

Native Foods Cafe Tribe Member

Oh fresh sweet corn right off the cob and in to your pie hole…. conjures up images of summer, eh?  Well, as we head into fall, the beautiful colors of Indian corn will start to fill the autumn displays in grocery stores and pumpkin patches.  Many people only use Indian corn for décor based on old wives tales that it is inedible and poisonous.  Actually though, it is quite edible, only significantly harder in texture than its golden yellow and crisp white counterparts.  This is precisely why Native Americans and early Mesoamericans would grind it into flour and make tortillas, and other dishes with the finely ground corn flour, or masa (which is actually the four mixed with water to make a dough). 

Colorful Kernels of Indian Corn

The coloring of corn is really based solely on genetics. “Livestock feeders prefer vitamin-rich yellow kernels, Southerners like white kernels, and Native Americans favor blue. Years of deliberate selection, careful pollination, and storing of seeds produced these single-color corn ears.” http://www.wonderquest.com/IndianCorn.htm

 

Corn is America’s number one field crop and it is also grown on every continent except Antarctica.  It is quite a remarkable crop based on its variety of uses.  In America alone, a majority of corn produced goes toward feeding livestock, in other words those sweet little baby cows and pigs, and even chickens, that are raised commercially for food.  Imagine how many starving people could be fed with corn-based foods instead of inhumanely raising animals for food using that corn!  Mind-blowing, seriously.  A whole heck of a lot of corn is produced for starches, oil, and sweeteners in the US as well, so that means that almost all processed foods contain some element of corn. 

Corn Abundant!

Next time you are grocery shopping, check out how many packaged items contain modified food starch (corn!), citric acid (corn!), and many low-fat items are filled with different starches (corn!) to make them seem more satisfying.  I know, I know…  corn makes citric acid, I had know idea it was in the citrus family!  Just another weird way we’ve manipulated the food supply.  Corn is also used to produce fabrics, plastics, and chemicals!  No wonder Monsanto loves its corn!

 So lets talk about some cool and funny aspects of corn… enough with the frankenfood talk!  Corn on the cob, or the sale of it rather, is the actual precursor to the modern day food cart, hot-dog stand, fruit wagon, etc. Corn on the cob was hawked on the streets of early 19th-century New York City by poor, barefoot "Hot Corn Girls." 

Hot Corn Girls!

Corn has also gained some notoriety for its peculiar ability to pass through the body fully intact, no digestion required!  This is due to the fact that the outer wall of corn is made of cellulose, which is indigestible (for the most part) in humans.  No!  I am not going to provide a picture of this bodily wonder. I will leave you with this though...

Ahhhhh!!!! No GMOs!!!!!

Corn is cool!  Just make sure to buy organic, non-genetically modified corn!

 

 

October Newsletter from Chef Tanya

News, Events, Recipes and More from Native Foods Cafe!  Please click below...

October 2010 Native Foods Cafe Newsletter

Taking a Bite Out of Barcelona... Viva Espana!

by Chef Tanya Petrovna

Native Foods Cafe

Food is very, very meat centric in Barcelona, though it is still a lovely city. Bread and rice are the grain options in most restaurants, and the vegetables offered are often accompanied by meaty tidbits.

Barcelona Market Fare

 But hope was found at the giant market place in the Ramblas area!

Choices, choices, choices!

Fresh  juices abound as well as great produce.  

Coco y pitahaya

This juice was spawned from this fruit!

Dragons in Barcelona!

And I will have to say that I was not in Barcelona long enough to find the hidden places that serve some of these fabulous looking veggies.

Painted Potatoes!

Just don't look down!

But you can find a café bar easily enough that'll sauté up your market purchases while you relax! So a platter of wild mushrooms and baby artichokes are cooked up fresh in no time while you sip a little Spanish wine, cerveza or agua mineral.

A shroom for all your senses!

Art or choke. Or dinner?!

Crowd is way of life in these markets so be ready to wait and enjoy the sites, pick up a conversation with a local or tourist, and learn about their country while you wait. I struck it up with a lady from Chile that lives in Holland, a Japanese film crew (yes I mentioned Taiji!), a Russian and some expats from the Phillipines and Argentina.

I must warn you of one other thing: to see the beauty of the market, one must navigate through and around some of Spain’s “dead” culture which focuses heavily on the pig, or cerdo, or even puerco. The pig is highly regarded here for the wrong reasons! The Spanish call it ham and they are famous for it… so there are smoked pig legs dangling everywhere in addition to whole piglets in deli cases complete with facial muscles and eye sockets.  So be brave my friends, and remember the way to solve this is to only order vegetarian!

 

No words.

Here comes the good news! Right next to this case is the vegetarian take-out place! 

Organic is orgasmic!

Talk about yin and yang.

 

Autumn is a great time to come to Barcelona if you are a mushroom lover. The weekend is mushroom picking time.  The Delegation of Tourism has developed an extensive program of festivals and fairs in the world of "mycology" to raise awareness about the more than 60 species that inhabit the forests of the Catalonian capital.

Sea of Shrooms... Dive on in!

Morels, chanterelles, & wild cepes to name a few… and you can learn to identify them! There are even mushroom fairs, the first one commences at the end of September in La Pobla de l'llet and they run until the end of mushroom season. I'm coming back next year just for mushroom festivals! Interested? Go to http://www.diba.cat/turisme.

 The Catalonian Countryside

Though if you want to get ready for it Santa Cruz California has a fun(gi) one too.

 

The Circus is a Bizarre Place Indeed

by Holladay Allen

Native Foods Tribe Member

Upon arrival, the circus captivates all the senses; the sounds of fast tempo marches blaring through the speakers, children laughing and screaming, the smells of sweet cotton candy and salty popcorn wafting up through the old wooden bleachers, the bright colors of the old circus equipment and glaring lights, and the whimsical yet sad faces of the clowns running around.  And just as the sensors begin to overload, the lights dim and the drum roll summons the ringmaster to center stage.  The show begins.  The trapeze artists fly through the air and the acrobats contort their bodies into human origami.  The jugglers amaze with their fine-tuned motor skills and the daredevils catapult themselves across the arena in the form of a human cannonball.  Then the animals come out.  The lions, tigers and elephants follow their trainers to the spotlight and proceed to perform a series of tricks and stunts.  What appears to be a relationship of love and mutual respect in the limelight is quite the opposite behind those colorful curtains that separate the spectacle of the show from the dismal reality of the circus.  Trainers most often employ fear-based tactics to elicit performances from these animals, including the use of electric shock prods, whips, and hooks.

Painting by Sue Coe

When the show is over, after make-up is washed off and the costumes are put away, the animals are confined to incredibly small spaces until they are transported to the next venue.  

Elephant being forced in truck circa 1971

Just the other day, on October 2^nd, a lion attacked a trainer in the Ukraine after the trainer repeatedly kept prodding the feline with a stick.  I mean, for real?  Can you blame the lion?  He was probably already having a bad day, being forced to perform against his will and all, and then this arrogant, much weaker being, starts poking him with a foreign object.  You can read more here:

http://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2010/10/06/UPI-11791286371843/

Interestingly enough, the attack took place in the city of L’viv, which is also known as the “City of Lions.”

Ruby, a 46-year-old African elephant, endured nearly forty years of suffering as a performing animal.  She was taken from the wild as a baby and spent the first half of her life with Circus Vargas traveling around in less than par living conditions.  She was then shuffled back and forth between the Knoxville Zoo in Tennessee and the Los Angeles Zoo before finally making it to the rolling hills and open pastures of the PAWS Sanctuary in San Andreas, CA. 

Ruby at PAWS! So happy!

Annie has a similar story, as she was captured in India in 1954.  She lived in a small barn-like enclosure in the Milwaukee Zoo with her best friend Tamara.  After video footage leaked of their abusive training and beatings at the hands of zoo employees, the two were moved to a grassy oasis in Galt, CA.  After Tamara’s death in 2002, Annie was moved to San Andreas, where Ruby lives, in hopes that a change of location would help her overcome her grief from the loss of her BFF.  Despite suffering from arthritis and joint disease after years of abuse and being forced to stand on chains for extended periods of time, Annie enjoys an active life of grazing and mud-bathing at the PAWS Sanctuary. 

Can you see the skip in Annie's step?

PAWS (Performing Animal Welfare Society) is an AMAZING organization with three sanctuaries in California, dedicated to providing a peaceful, natural habitat for retired performing animals, as well as other victims of the exotic animal trade.  PAWS was founded in 1984 by former Hollywood animal trainer Pat Derby and her partner Ed Stewart. 

Pat & Ed taking a stroll with one of the residents.

During her time as an animal trainer in the entertainment industry, Derby was incredibly disturbed by the abusive practices used by most trainers.  Her training method had always been based in love and trust rather than fear and abuse, which she found to be the preferred technique used by most other trainers.  She and Stewart fought for legislation that would require better care for these captive creatures.  In addition to maintaining three sanctuaries and caring for their inhabitants, Derby and Stewart actively petition and protest for the release of animals still detained within the entertainment industry. You can learn more about PAWS and GET INVOLVED at www.pawsweb.org.

And don't forget about Billy!  He lives alone at the LA Zoo in solitary confinement and is exhibiting VERY worrisome behavior.  You can help him retire at the PAWS sanctuary.  Learn more here:

http://helpbilly.org/

 

Chef Tanya’s Tip for A Family Fun Weekend:  Skip the circus, and head up to PAWS Sanctuary to see elephants happy and roaming free, where they should be!

 

Oh the Danube! Oh no, the sludge!

by Chef Tanya Petrovna

Native Foods Cafe

The first landmark sight that I re-visit in my father’s birth country is the famous spot of where the Sava and Danube Rivers meet. The view is from the fortress that has kept Belgrade safe since the golden olden times.  The Danube supplies drinking water and all sorts of goodness to this fertile land.  It flows through Serbia to Bulgaria.

After such a nice day, I settle in and turn on the television to find BBC news talking about the toxic sludge from an aluminum production plant (an accident waiting to happen). And it happened! ... and was threatening to enter the Danube River.  Not much later, I hear it entered the Danube. Bummer, like a Hummer. It's kind of like a bad Halloween story with the red color and all, but it's true… this toxic sludge will shortly be hitting the confluence of the Danube and Sava, where I stood just yesterday.

 

Aluminum, coal, steel, and mining in general paints a picture in my mind as red as the color of the sludge. Add the BP spill to that picture and we have to seriously put some deadlines on the change we wish to see in the world!

 

In the meantime, go vegan.

 

Seitanic Serbia and Tofu Namaz... What what did you say?

Chef Tanya Petrovna

Native Foods Cafe

Let's start with what is Serbia. Well it used to be part of Yugoslavia, which translates to Southern Slavs. Many eons ago, Slavic tribes originated from somewhere in what is now Russia.  They migrated around and the southern tribes ended up in an area along the east side of the Adriatic Sea.  The northern section is called Serbia now. Unfortunately, most people remember the guy Milosevic when they think of Serbia, which leaves a bad taste in everyone's mouth. Serbia has been destroyed 46 times since the Turkish invasions, the last time being when US and NATO troops bombed the area. I'm still not sure why… it seems weird since I've been visiting my family here since I was three years old. There are still some bombed out remnants of that time. Belgrade is the capitol and is pretty central to everywhere in Europe.

 Belgrade by Night

Let's face it the best part about any country is the food!  Politics are always changing, but food always brings pleasure, and that's the taste I like to leave in my mouth.  That's why I'm here!

 This is my first investigation at the local conventional supermarket as it is connected to the hotel. I decided to see what they have in the vegan food department and this is what was found!

 

The seitan texture was ok but the flavor still needs development.

 

Looks like Uncle Rico's fave, veganized!

"Namaz" is like a spread and the vegetarian mix is something you can eat like a sauce or as is (it does have veggies in it). The ingredients were pretty simple and tofu based, nothing out of the ordinary. I'd just buy some tofu and whisk it up at home. The tofu is made here in Belgrade somewhere...I'll trek that place down next if I can find it.

 

The soy pudding is by a company called Alpro, a brand that is distributed in other countries as well. I thought the product was mild and tasty and not supersweet, though it does contain sugar.

I would love to change the name to something appetizing, but I still love their values. Europe is hip to the environment, even in Belgrade, Serbia!

 

Next, off to Barcelona!!!

Bitter for Sweet: Secrets of the Chocolate Trade

by Holladay Allen

Native Food Cafe Tribe Member

Can you imagine life without chocolate?  It would be strange, that’s for sure.  Whether you like it or not, there is no denying that chocolate has a steadfast presence all over the world, in a majority of modern cultures and societies.  Chocolate dates back to the Mayans and Aztecs in Mesoamerica (which extended from Central Mexico to Honduras, before the Spanish arrived). 

A Mayan chief forbids a person to touch a can of chocolate.

The Mayans would most often use the cacao to prepare a bitter drink mixed with water, chiles, and cornmeal.  Sugar was not a crop readily available at the time, so sweetening the cocoa not really an option.  The Aztecs adopted cacao beans from the Mayans and used it as a form of money and also as an offering to the gods.  The cocoa bean was serious business in the Aztec culture!  When the Spanish conquered Mexico in the 1500s, they saw how the Aztec culture revered the cacao plant, and soon began to export the seeds back home.  Because exporting cacao was expensive, chocolate was a beverage only enjoyed by Europe’s elite for the next 300 years.  The Spanish sweetened it up a bit and added some cinnamon and spice and soon enough the rest of Europe was on to Spain’s best kept secret. 

European Madame sipping her hot chocolate

To keep up with the rising demand, European companies established plantations to exclusively grow cacao and sugar.  Because of the labor-intensive nature of growing and harvesting these crops, the European producers often enlisted Mesoamerican and African slaves to do their dirty work.  Fast-forward through global modernization and industrialization, and here we are today; with chocolate readily available at all price points, varying levels of quality and purity, and a vast array of different flavors and forms.

Modern Day Chocolate Bonanza!

While the processing and manufacturing advancements of the Industrial Revolution greatly streamlined and enhanced the production and quality of chocolate, little has changed in the cocoa fields themselves.  A majority of cacao is still picked, fermented, cleaned and roasted by hand.  And more than 50% of the world’s cacao comes from the Ivory Coast in Africa.  Almost all of the world’s largest chocolate companies, including Nestle and Hershey’s, have plants nestled among the many cocoa plantations on the Ivory Coast.  And over the past decade, more and more information continues to leak out about children being forced to work these plantations against their will.  Child slavery puts the bitter back in chocolate.

 

Child laborer on cacao plantation

John Robbins, author and all-around-cool guy, mentioned to Chef Tanya about a documentary that had been recently released called The Dark Side of Chocolate.  He also wrote a very informative piece on his blog concerning the ever-present problem of child slavery in the chocolate trade:

http://www.johnrobbins.info/blog/is-there-slavery-in-your-chocolate/

As we’ve mentioned before, Chef Tanya, and the rest of the tribe, really want you to know what you are putting in your body, from the harvest to your mouth.  Where did it come from and how did it get here?  So upon hearing about this new documentary, and with Halloween around the corner, Chef Tanya could not think of a more fitting DVD to welcome in Native Days in October.  Once we realized that this DVD had not yet been distributed in the US, we immediately got in contact with the film’s creator, Miki Mistrati.  Miki expressed his primary concern was to get The Dark Side of Chocolate in as many hands as possible, spread the message everywhere, and bring an end to child slavery within the chocolate trade. 

So for the next two days (October 12^th & 13^th), we will be handing out a free DVD of The Dark Side of Chocolate to every third customer!  This is very exciting for all of us!  We will also be distributing Vegan Halloween Candy Guides with a Fair-Trade Chocolate section as well.  For more info on The Dark Side of Chocolate, check out:

http://www.thedarksideofchocolate.org

A big thanks to Miki and the rest of the crew of The Dark Side of Chocolate!