2 new children, brothers and friends!

    Meh, I just noticed I haven't made any post on the two new guys who share my home! I adopted them from Arzignano's shelter, around 3 months ago, which is a long time without putting something about them on my blog :) !

    Povia is the biggest of the two. I'm so sorry it was given such a nasty name in the shelter, but that's it, he is used to it, so I kept it, even if he is Anakin for me (you know, black, missing a limb, somehow self centered and possessive/protective). He is a beautiful belgian shepherd who was hit by a car during his life on the road, and had his left front leg amputee. Neverthless he still is a force of nature: he runs like a bullet, fast like the wind and jump without a problem to great heights; sure, he become tired and winded quickly, but the athletic prowess he shows, even with the handicap, always leav me breathless. He search cuddle and contact alot, and always try to keep attention on him, especially when you try to give it to the other dogs. It's a pity my other two furred babies are a bit scared from his size compared to their, while playing, so Povia is often left a bit aside during games, and he suffer for this, even if I play with him. When he jumps on you, giving his only frontal leg to attract attention, or just sit doing the same, he is absolutely irresistible :)

    Cedric is much smaller. Smaller than Ennoia, in fact. He is stocky and strong, a little bit chubby, with short legs and massive feet which face outward. He is clumsy and not athletic at all, but has a lot of strength and loves to play with Ennoia. He also play with Povia often, but gets tired quickly, since Povia mouth is bigger than his head, so there is little to do ;). I kept the name he was given at the shelter, too, although he is Obi-Wan for me (brown and white, good-hearted, positive attitude and pretty quiet, but always ready for action). You can't say he is beautiful to look at, but is incredibly nice and fun, and has a set of attitudes (as he sit down, how he looks at you, how he search for cuddling) that can not steal some smiles.

    So, they're my two new joys, even if now I spend a capital for food, veterinary and the like and al the three of them can become quite an hurricane in the moments of maximum activity :)

Goodbay 2013, welcome 2014?

    Whoa, the last month has been pretty intense!

    The new year has brought a lot of new features and changes, some good, some bad. My parents are breaking up, unfortunately, after many years of marriage, and the question is not solving easily. Inevitably, I'm also catched into this affair, as a member of the family. This event has blocked my move, as the house where I had to relocate will instead be occupied by my mother, and I'll move in to the one where she lives today (which is much larger and more beautiful, to be honest ...!). She also decided to stop working at our store for some time, which made job more complicated for those who remained.

    I also bought a new car. Oh well, my first car to tell the truth :). Some photos soon in a separate post!

    Moreover, I'm partecipating to a very cool project in the RPGs world, as translation revisionist for the Italian version of FATE Core. Additional info in a future post.

Vegan Salami

    So, even 2013 is gone. This year I spent a rather quiet New Year's Eve, along with my girlfriend and all our beasts. We have finally begun to keep Enny, Kiro, Nobu and Giget
ta in the same rooms, finding that they bear each other better than we expected. Apart from a few sporadic attacks from Gigetta, some typical feline romp here and there and canine mutterings by Enny, cohabitation seems quite possible!

    We had dinner with the simple vegan dishes you can see in the pictures. To drink, sparkling wine Ferrari for her and beer for me!

Kiro + Nobu + Enny

Ferrari + Beer

Pie

My VegeChristmas

Grandmother's Nativity.
She is very religious

    And so the Christmas lunch is over.

    As announced, it was completely based on vegan cooking. To tell you the truth, my kindred used cheese on pasta and eggs and milk for the dessert, but they were very attentive on all the other dishes. Still, between vegan and vegetarian recipes, it was a very cruelty-free oriented event. Even, at some point, one of my aunts, while eating a soy-based dish, exclaimed: "This stew is very tasty! This meat is so tender!". Se was really convinced that it was a real meat stew!

Cousin and aunt
at work in the kitchen

    The menu was quite varied, and included salt pies as appetizers, along with a common millet salad, a very tasty risotto with mushrooms, a special soybean stew with peperoni, some chicory, and fruits in quantity.

    It's been an ejoyable lunch for everyone, even for the ones most skeptical about the absence of meat. My cousin actually has not resisted to taste a meat roulade prepared by my grandmother for tomorrow, but it was a single, isolated, case.

    I am proud of my family. At least for today ;).

Photo of the table

Salt pies

Soyabean stew

May the Christmas be with you!

    So, Christmas has arrived. This month has been tough, in my shop. Despite the business does not shine because of the general crisis that harass Italy, keep open every day is stressful and demanding. I 'm looking forward to spending a few days in total relaxation!

    With the start of the new year, my new apartment will be ready, and I will then proceed to move in. I hope such operation will be quick and painless. I will also need a trip to Ikea to buy some furniture to fill the new rooms, as the new house is much bigger than previous one :D!

    The PS4 is proving to be a great console: quick and agile, although you can clearly see that it is still raw in the operating system, and plagued by some major technical problems. For example, I have not received two trophies for what I have met the requirements: I'll be forced to replay a large piece of the related game in order to conquer my 34th Platinum :/ .

    Assassin 's Creed 4 is really an impressive title, both from the technical point of view and for the fun it provides. The pirate's life is a dream, and the game manages to well convey the feeling of piloting a ship and boarding others! Now I really want to see inFamous: Second Son!

    I managed to convince my family to have a vegetarian Christmas (if not vegan), and tomorrow will be a pleasure to eat at a table not laden with pieces of the corpses of creatures born and lived in suffering! Truly a wonderful gift!

    Well , I hope to publish soon something more interesting than this post: I have in mind an article for additional tips on how to defeat the Legendary Ships of AC4 ( the official guide does not help enough, imho) and a new hook story for Star Wars - Edge of the Empire: Star Wars and the Raiders of the Lost Ark!

    Well, May the Christmas Be With You and Han Claus brings you a Millenium Falcon full of beautiful gifts : D!

    Oh, by the way, Chuck wanna wish you the best of things, too ;) (see the video!).

Vegan Recipe: Penne with Brussels sprouts

    One other simple but delicious recipe, especially if you like pasta and Brussels sprouts!

    It is quite fast to prepare, as it requires almost only the time of a common pasta (so, around 20 minutes).

Penne with Brussels sprouts

Ingredients

    about 1 pound of pasta per person
    3-4 Brussels sprouts per person
    2 tablespoons of olive oil
    2 pieces of garlic
    A cup of tomato sauce
    chilli
    oregano
    salt

Preparation

    1) Fill a pot with plenty of water, in which you will cook the pasta (regulate the amount based on how much pasta you use). Put the brussel sprouts into the water, after cleaning them a bit. Bring the water to a boil, keeping the pot covered.


    2) In the meantime, prepare a smaller pot to cook the Brussel sprouts with tomato sauce. Put a couple of tablespoons of oil in the bottom of this pot, together with the finely chopped garlic.

    3) When the water for the pasta begins to boil, remove sprouts, let them cool a bit and cut or break them in order to get leaves and small pieces. Fry the garlic until it darkens, then add the brussel sprouts, letting them absorb the oil, and add a bit of salt and chilli. When the oil is well dried, add the tomato and let it cook on low heat, keeping the pot covered and stirring occasionally.

    4) Add salt to the boiling water and throw pasta in. Wait until it is ready, constantly checking the brussels sprouts sauce. If it becomes too dry, add a tablespoon of water.

    5) When the pasta is ready, drip it and add the brussel sprouts all together into the pot, along with a bit of fresh oregano.

    6) Serve and eat !

Home made Half-Bread

    Today, my girlfriend has prepared a home-made bread.

     To tell the truth, she started yesterday, using a process longer and more complicated than usual, finishing cooking it today.

     It is a bread made with a mix of normal and wholemeal flours. The final product was excellent, despite the interior resulted a little too dense than she expected!

    As for me, I was not impressed by the first sample, but I must admit that, by eating more, it is not bad at all!

Instruments of torture

    If you are a researcher, even at the dawn of 2014, you can safely choose your favorite instruments of torture while sitting comfortably on your house sofa.

     Companies like Ugo Basile provide a comprehensive range of tools designed to coerce, frighten, blanching, drugging, electrocute or disorient a wide variety of animals, from rats to small birds and dogs. All provided with every kind of measuring instrument capable of recording the level of torture you are applying to the creature!

     For those who still believe in the fact that laboratory animals are treated with respect and care, I recommend you to browse through the following link, which bring you to Ugo Basile catalog:

     http://www.ugobasile.com/media/pdf/Catalogue.pdf

     Try to understand the nefarious ways in which these tools can be used.

     Necessary evil or lucrative business? As a good Veg, I strongly lean for the latter.

Vegan Recipe: Vegetables & Tofu Stew

Seitan variant

    Today I'm sharing an easy but quite mouthwatering vegan recipe!

    People who tasted this dish were really happy and striken by the result, even if much depends if you like tofu or seitan.

    The very simple idea behind this is to create something similar to a peperonate, adding tofu and/or seitan and keeping the cooking time a bit shorter. You can experiment by using other vegetables, as the cooking procedure is always the same. For example, I use peas or beans, sometimes.

    It requires about 40 minutes to serve, including the preparation of ingredients and the cooking phase.

Vegetables and Tofu* Stew

Ingredients (for 2-3 people, according to appetite!)

    1x zucchini
    1x Small eggplant (or 1/2 of a large one)
    1x carrot
    1x Pepperoni (red, yellow or green, as you prefer)
    1/2x red onion
    3x cloves of garlic
    1/2 jar of mushrooms
    1/2 bottle of tomato juice
    200g of tofu*
    Oil
    Salt
    Chilli
    Oregano and/or basilic
    Flour

Variant with tofu and peas, but no pepperoni

Preparation

    1. Cut zucchini, eggplant, carrot, pepperoni, garlic and tofu into cubes (around 1cm is ok; garlic should be smaller); cut the onion into half moons.

    2. Fill the bottom of a high pot with a layer of oil (a bit less of 1cm is ok), put garlic and onion inside and brown them at slow fire.

    3. Add zucchini, eggplant, carrot and pepperoni, and simmer them for about 5 minutes, until the base made of oil is well absorbed. Add spices (salt and chilli) during this stage, in order for them to be absorbed by the vegetables.

    4. Add tomato juice. Cook everything for about 10-15 minutes (use the carrots as a hint: when they become soft, it's time to go to the next point!), keeping the pot covered and stirring occasionally to prevent the mixture from sticking to the bottom.

    5. Add mushrooms and tofu*. Cook the whole for another 5-10 minutes, always at low fire, stirring frequently. Around the end of this stage, add a tablespoon of flour to create a bit of creaminess (the level of creaminess depends alot upon what kind of tomato juice you used).

    6. Add oregano or basilic just one minute before removing the dish from fire.

    7. Serve with bread and beer!

*= Tofu can be replaced with seitan, but in this case, you should cook it a bit longer after you added it to the mixture (point 5). Still, seitan is pure gluten, so tofu is a healthier choice.