Vegan Soul Chef Bryant Terry talks the new Afro-Vegan cookbook

Photo: Paige Green

Chef, author, educator, and 'food activist' Bryant Terry's delectable follow up to groundbreaking cookbooks Vegan Soul Kitchen and The Inspired Vegan, launches next week. With an emphasis on bold flavors and fresh ingredients, Afro-Vegan, brings tastes from every corner of the Pan-African pan. From Atlanta to Jamaica, Senegal to South Carolina, he's left no yam unturned. We caught up with man himself to chat books, food and tunes. 

Bestselling cook book, Vegan Soul Kitchen, is full of influences from southern and creole cuisine. And Inspired Vegan has lots of family focused stories and feasts. For your latest book, 'Afro Vegan', you've pulled inspiration from throughout Africa, the Americans and the Caribbean. Where have you found the richest flavors?

In the book I illuminate many of the similar food traditions seen throughout the African Diaspora, for example my Coconut Rice Pudding with Nectarines is a nod to dishes of rice cooked in milk on the African continent, in South America, and the American South (i.e., gossi from Senegal, arroz de viuva of northeastern Brazil, and the rice pudding that my maternal grandmother used to make). Afro-Vegan is a celebration of the rich flavors in many of the places that our African Ancestors touched throughout the globe.

So is plant based cuisine something that is new to these communities?

These are the communities that originated “farm-fresh” and “plant-centered” cooking. While animal products are eaten throughout the African diaspora, there are clear patterns of diverse diets centered around nutrient-dense leafy green vegetables, tubers, fruits, whole grains, legumes, seeds, and nuts. I’m simply trying to help everyone remember.

Courtesy of Ten Speed Press

You've been campaigning for food justice for more than 10 years now with community gardening projects, educational programs like Nourish Life and on this year's 'Afro Vegan World Tour.' How have the challenges changed since you began this work?

I first started working around health, food, and farming issues around 2002, and things have dramatically shifted since then. Before I started writing books, I founded an initiative in New York City called b-healthy; it used cooking as a way to politicize young people from the lower economic strata of the five boroughs around food issues. It was such a struggle back then to convince funders of the importance of this work. 

Nowadays, everyone is talking about food issues - from the grassroots to the White House. It is also so exciting to see so many people open to moving meat to the margins of their plates and consuming more fresh, whole, seasonal, and local plant-based foods. 

What role does a plant based diet have to play in tackling these issues?

One of the most important lessons that I try to impart is that we need to listen to our bodies. There is no one size fits all diet or panacea; when contemplating the best diet, I encourage people to consider a number of factors: age, bodily constitution, health status, ancestral foods, season (eating seasonally is so important), and the like. That being said, more mainstream medical institutions have been acknowledging that the over consumption of animal protein puts people at increased risk of preventable, diet-related illnesses such as heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and hypertension. So I see plant-centered diets as another tool for addressing the public health crisis among the communities most impacted by preventable, diet-related illnesses.

After the food of course, the playlists peppered throughout are one of my favorite ingredients in your books - nothing like a little Al Green with your collard greens - do you feel that music and food are particularly connected?

I want my books to facilitate multi-sensory experiences. I have always understood the power of food as a means of building deep connections among people. So I encourage people to not only eat together, but also to make meals together - all while listening to good music, drinking, and talking to each other. 

Finally, is this a book that you'll be able to enjoy even if you don't have an organic veg patch in your back yard?

I emphasize fresh, local, ingredients in all my cooking, and I encourage people to support small farms by shopping at farmers’ markets and joining Community Supported Agriculture (CSA). And if people have the space, I encourage them to grow their own food. I actually invited my colleague Michael W. Twitty to provide tips in a section called “Think Like You Grow.” But I understand the barriers that many people have to growing food and getting locally grown food in many communities. So I try to craft most of my recipes to work for folks who might only have a conventional supermarket as their only option. I also encourage people to use my recipes as a guide and modify them to suit their needs. So if a recipe calls for collard greens and one is growing swiss chard in their garden, it only makes sense to use that leafy green instead.

Bryant Terry's 'Afro-Vegan: Farm-Fresh African, Caribbean and Southern Flavors Remixed' (Ten Speed Press) hits the shelves on 8 April.

3 Questions for Sistah Vegan Conference speaker Pilar Harris

Souce: Pilarinmotion.com 

Today the Sistah Vegan project is bringing together black vegan women from all over the interweb to discuss race, gender, veganism, nutrition, yoga and more in the 1st annual Sistah Vegan Conference on 'Embodied and Critical Perspectives on Veganism by Black Women and Allies'. This ground breaking event has been months in the making and has a host of speakers sharing ideas within a vegan activist frame of mind. I caught up with blogger, Pilar Harris, of Pilar In Motion, to ask what she's looking forward to from the conference.

What inspired you to take part in the Sistah Vegan Conference? 

I was really just excited about the prospect of an open forum to critically discuss some of the things I have been experiencing since I became a vegetarian eight months ago. I find that in my family and even in my community, veganism is still considered sort of taboo. When I found out about the conference, I felt inspired to join in and see what other women of color are going through -- to see how the lifestyle impacts each of us in a way that is special and interesting.

You'll be speaking on notions of beauty, how does this topic connect to experiences for women of color?

When I think of beauty and all the issues that stem from it, I'm considering what it means to be a woman as well as all of the ideas, rituals, tools, and products that are a part of how we treat our bodies. For me, beauty is about being at home in the body. As women of color, it's important to be aware of how, historically, we have been cast outside the mainstream notion of what it is to be beautiful. In my discussion, I will cover some of the ways we are marginalized in terms of access to quality, cruelty-free, vegan body care products. I'm very excited to get into this topic because I think many of us take personal care for granted. I know I do!

There are lots of interesting topics being explored at the conference, along with your own, which speakers are you most looking forward to?

This is one of those days that I'm going to be glued to my laptop all day long. I am so looking forward to everything! Some highlights on the roster, for me, are Sari Leigh and Kayla Bitten's discussion of Yoga and Radical Self Care for young girls. One of my favorite vegans, Russell Simmons, has written about yoga as a tool to reduce the stresses that urban youth experience. The topic, in general, is one that I'd love to pass along, maybe in my own community.

 

I'm also looking forward to the open discussion titled "Why I Relinquished the Gospel Bird and Became Vegan." It's nice to hear about the paths women take toward this lifestyle.

-

If you're interested in the Sistah Vegan Conference, you can get copies of the recordings after the conference finishes. For more information visit SistahVegan.com.

3 Black Vegan Chefs that are Changing the Game

From best-selling books to Oscar worthy horderves, and everywhere in between, a generation of black vegan chefs are coming into their own and blowing the game wide open. Classically trained, ambitious, inventive and full of flavor, they are working with high profile black celebrity vegans to share their love of food and spread the word on the plant based diet in the community.

Lauren Von Der Pool

Source: Vonderpoolgourmet.com

Lauren Von Der Pool, is the celebrity chef behind raw vegan athletes Venus & Serena Williams and vegetarian rapper Common. She's been bringing vegan food to black folks since she was 15 years old, when she started her first business selling vegan food to students at Howard University. Today she travels the globe as a Cordon Bleu trained celebrity chef, soaking up recipes, meeting fellow chefs and generally being fabulous. When she's stateside, she works to combat the food deserts that plague urban centers by teaching high school kids about nutrition in her home town of DC and has become a spokesperson for Michelle Obama's Let's Move campaign against obesity. She is inspired and inspiring as an author, advocate,chef and entrepreneur with a genuine passion for plant based cuisine.

Ayinde Howell

Source: ieatgrass.com

Chef Ayinde Howell has many strings to his bow. Not only is he a successful chef who has mastered the art of the mac n' yease, but he is also a poet, actor, writer, musician and czar of his own vegan web mecca, I Eat Grass. Growing up in a vegan household, he's been practicing his skills for years and he's made lots of friends along the way. His Hillside Quickies Sandwich Shop was favorite with Def Jam vegan Russell Simmons and his first e-book venture, 10 Ways to Get Your Protein, includes a foreword by vegan songstress India Arie. And his Kickstarter funded, Wildflower Pop-Up Vegan Restaurant, was the talk of 2012 in towns like New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco. His passion for food and drive adventure definitely make him one to watch.

Bryant Terry

Source: The Nail That Sticks Up

Bryant Terry is probably the best known chef on this list. His bestselling book, Vegan Soul Kitchen lays out a blueprint for how to cook the food that you grew up on, without the flesh, and has helped him spread the word on ham-hock free collard greens on television, at universities, and online. He describes himself as a 'food activist' and works tirelessly against obesity and food injustice that causes what he calls a 'quasi apartheid in the food system' in America. With his most recent book, The Inspired Vegan, he took an interest in gardening and became a spokesperson for urban farms with food education initiative Nourish Life. There is much anticipation around his upcoming title, Afro Vegan, and with Terry's track record it's sure to be a next level read.

Call for papers for the first annual Sistah Vegan Conference

Dr. Breeze Harper, editor and mastermind of black female vegan anthology, Sistah Vegan, is hosting the  first annual Sistah Vegan Conference this fall, on September 14, 2013. It will be an online interactive conference, meaning presenters can use webcams, audio, and PowerPoint which will be fully experienced by the audience.

At the end of each talk, audience members will be able to engage in Q&A with the presenter. The entire conference talks will be video recorded and accessible after the event, to ensure that this valuable information will not be lost; it also ensures that those with internet access who could not attend will be able to access this information.

They are specifically looking for critical perspectives on veganism, animal compassion work, and self-care from the epistemological standpoint/embodied experiences of people identified women of African descent. We seek presentation that address

• sizeism
• ableism
• lgbtq experience and challenges in heteronormative spaces
• intersecting antiracism and animal compassion
• how racist micro aggressions in predominantly white spaces affect our health, and why self care is a needed aspect of ‘social justice’ for Black women and girls
• critical perspectives on Afrocentric or Afrikan holistic health movement
• parenting as a black vegan

Topics need not be limited to these above, however, the above are more of a priority, due to their near invisibility in most vegan and animal compassion spaces. This is open to all women and girls of African descent regardless of ‘formal’ education background or writing/artistic style. We encourage academic and non academic presentations.

Should your presentation be accepted, you are invited to submit it to be part of the first Sistah Vegan journal issue, scheduled for a January 2014 release.

Please send proposals by July 10, 2013 which should include your name, institutional affiliation (if you have none, that is fine too), presentation title and 150 word abstract. Talks should be about 20 minutes long, with 15 minutes for Q and A. Email to breezeharper at gmail dot com.

Possible keynote speakers have already been sent invitations. Once their participation is confirmed, Dr. Harper will post their presentation titles.

As part of the Go Fund Me campaign to raise money for the Sistah Vegan Project , those who can help are asked to donate to see this conference happen. Dr Harper will be offering honorariums for keynote speakers and hopes to offer scholarships for those who cannot pay registration fees. Why registration fees? Though it is online, there is a need to pay for the internet conferencing service and a plan that can host one hundred or more people. All are welcomed to register and attend as audience members.

For more information visit Sistah Vegan.

Sister goes vegan: Tia Mowry's New Vegan Photoshoot for PETA

Tia Mowry's Vegan Photo shoot for PETA

Tia Mowry, one half of twin stars of 90s American TV show Sister Sister and former star of BETs The Game, has teamed up with PETA for a campaign to promote her new found veganism. She looks amazing in the photo shoot wearing nothing but a gorgeous apron made of live veggies—specially designed by costumer Mia Gyzander. Tia was ecstatic at the press launch on Monday.

Tia announced that she and her husband Cory Hardrict had become vegan earlier this year. Tia adopted a vegan diet for better for health, to boost energy, and cleanse mind and body. While she was welcomed by some, she was also met with a bit of bullying from others on twitter.

Any vegans out there? Do you get bullied for being vegan? I sure am...
— Tia Mowry (@TiaMowry) March 21, 2013

She bounced back with a frank and endearing Google Hangout and this brand new campaign. Tia was especially moved to advocate vegan eating to her friends and the African American Community as some of her family members have suffered from diet and lifestyle-related health ailments.

Tia joins a number of black celebrity women who are embracing a meat free lifestyle in order to keep fit and combat illness like heart disease which affects black women at a rate that is twice as high as white women. According to the Black Women's Health Imperative, Black women die from heart disease more often than all other Americans. Vegan and vegetarian diets have been proven to reduce the rate of heart disease by as much as a third so Tia is sending a welcome message.

Check out the behind-the-scenes footage from Tia's tantalizing photo shoot and her interview with PETA about how going vegan has changed her life!