Numero Uno

Hello Blog O' Sphere -

 This is the oh so official first post of this blog...super exciting stuff here. I really just created this blog for not only my random musings (which there may be a lot of), but also for recipes and reviews. I love to cook and make mostly vegan/vegetarian fare, but I do warn you - I am a pescatarian. Originally a vegan for quite some time, I took a trip that led me to another part of the world (and by this I mean I was "voluntold" that I was deploying to Iraq), which changed the way I eat. I lived off of kidney beans, rice, and salsa for three months. And I do mean LIVED off of it...because really, that's all there was for me to eat. Yes, there were the occasional canned green beans or corn to choose from...wait, no - not that either, as our DFAC (or dining facility for all you non-military people out there) decidedly put some pork product in pretty much everything (cause bacon makes everything taste better right?) I do mean everything...Christmas and Thanksgiving was a NIGHTMARE for me!! There was pork in things that you wouldn't even think to put pork in. (I even think there was bacon in the pork) "How about a nice salad" you may say...but if you tasted that "fresh" produce we had...you wouldn't eat it either - yuck. Eventually that kind of wore on me (naturally)...so I started slowly by maybe adding sour cream to my bean mix occasionally. It was delicious...oh how I had missed sour cream. There are very few things dairy I missed as a vegan, but sour cream...mmmm, sour cream. I'm sorry, but the Tofutti "Better Than Sour Cream" was not so much better...or really even slightly close. The "Better Than Cream Cheese" IS pretty tasty though. Not quite the same as the regular, but good none-the-less. AH, but I digress...so the sour cream was tasty...yes, a nice change to an otherwise boring meal. Then it happened...I changed bases...and went down to Baghdad. Now I maybe can't tell you where I was located, but I can definitely tell you about the food. OH, the food. SO, SO much better than my previous location. The first night I was there they made a spicy stir fried eggplant dish that was HEAVENLY (I mean, maybe...it's been so long without real food anything would have tasted that delicious.) They served hummus regularly (a major plus in my book) and also had REALLY good fresh fruit. BUT, if they have all this tasty vegan food, why the change in diet you wonder...well, this was only the first night. I came to find out that every Friday was seafood night. ONLY seafood...just like every Saturday was steak night (oh, and fried shrimp). Well...after a month I admit, I broke down. I had those tasty little seafood morsels staring at me, wishing for me to eat them. So...it happened. I gave in to temptation and indulged. I admit, I love seafood. Always have. Even as a vegetarian and then vegan and then back to vegetarian...I always craved seafood. There is just something about sushi that calls to me.
I was back and forth about the whole seafood thing for awhile...I finally gave in to my pescatarian calling when I was convinced that seafood lacks the same nervous system as land dwellers and it would be okay to eat it (Thanks Chris!!). Honestly, while I do consider myself a pescatarian, I still abstain from eating a lot of seafood. Don't get me wrong, I do eat it...but not all the time. You'll notice most of the recipes I'll post are vegetarian, some even vegan. I still don't cook seafood of any type. I'll indulge when I eat out, mainly sushi, but I don't make it at home.
All in all...that's my (psuedo) journey of how I got to where I am. Until next time...peace out bitches!