Oh! Deer! Chocolates

Happy New Year! I’m so excited to kick off a new year with a new facility to receive donations through sales of my ebook on Etsy.

In 2012 I was able to donate $234.41 to Maryland’s Wildlife Rescue, Inc.’s Deer Sterilization Program through my $5 raw vegan dessert ebook! Thank you to everyone who helped support their amazing work by purchasing my ebook.

For 2013 I will be donating all wildlife ebook sales to Wild Things Sanctuary in Ithaca, NY. I was inspired by the founders story of shaving all of her hair off to drum up publicity and donations to be able to open and run this fantastic facility.

I’ve been away for a long time due to a last minute move back up north. Unfortunately that move held up my latest project longer than I had hoped but I’m finally somewhat settled and back on track. 

Around three months ago I met with the Piedmont Farm Animal Refuge to discuss ways I could help them continue to build up capital to officially open their doors to farm animals in need. The Refuge is the first one in the middle of the state of North Carolina (where I sadly just moved from after many wonderful years). The surrounding towns are full of factory farms which of course means many animals in need of love and care in the immediate area.  Just two hours away is the Butterball Turkey facility exposed by Mercy For Animals in 2011 (two employees from the undercover video have now been sentenced to jail time due to their horrific mistreatment of the poor turkeys). 

Clearly North Carolina, home to Smithfield-the largest pork producer, is a state that has a long way to go with regards to farm animal mistreatment (plus puppy mills and hunting). We need to support the members of the community that are going against the grain and standing up for animals in states like NC such as the Piedmont Farm Animal Refuge. 

Luckily, with an ebook I can live anywhere and still help so I have just launched a second listing on Etsy. This is my original ebook but all profits from this listing will go to benefit the Piedmont Farm Animal Refuge.  

The book is only $5 and includes over 20 vegan raw chocolate recipes including over 6 different types of truffles, chocolate bars, caramels, cookie sandwiches, and more.  If you would like to help the compassionate goal of this group please consider purchasing the book.

The Refuge seeks to:
● provide lifelong sanctuary for farm animals in need of a safe and natural environment
● educate people about the cruelties of factory farming
● de-mystify veganism by providing education and exposure to vegan food

*On the cover: Original founder of Piedmont Farm Animal Refuge hugging an adorable sheep during her Farm Sanctuary internship in Watkins Glen, NY. 

On a side note: BIG THANK YOU to Our Hen House for their amazing post about my Wildlife Rescue ebook. 

I’m still traveling but wanted to pop on to ask you all to send an email to Land of Nod/Crate & Barrel (customerservice@landofnod.com) to please stop using animal cruelty images on their products for young children. As I was flipping through their latest catalogue the other week I realized they have a circus line of bedding that shows animals including elephants and tigers performing tricks along with a ring master. 

This sends such an incredibly bad message to young impressionable children that animals performing for us in unnatural ways is fun, funky, and modern when we all know it is unnecessary, cruel, and outdated.

Thank you!

antihunting:

The city of Solon, Ohio spends more than $750,000 annually on deer culling, a practice in which about 300 animals are killed in an effort to control the population.  Aside from the obvious ethical issues associated with this practice, the reason that deer culling occurs annually is that it is simply not an effective means of population control.  Solon itself is a city with large roadways and a high population; however, it is located amid smaller towns and countryside where deer culling does not occur. Because these animals roam, there is, in fact, no way to control their numbers without some sort of reproductive suppressant.  Deer also have the biological ability to regenerate themselves under hunted conditions, meaning that doe will often attempt to reproduce in numbers equivalent to that of the community death toll.

Killing innocent animals so that humans can feel more comfortable driving their cars and planting their gardens is a disgrace.  Cities that conduct deer culling often attribute the high populations to a “lack of predation” and measure their numbers by square kilometers of inhabitable land. However, the reason that whitetail deer populations are unsustainable is because human beings have taken away their natural predators and have developed to such an extent that there is no longer a natural environment for the deer to live in. To add insult to injury, we murder hundreds of the animals a year and say we do it “for their own good” and so that they “don’t starve.”

The hypocrisy of this practice, of pretending to care about the well being of the deer and of the well-being of their ecosystems, is a convenient cover-up for the fact that deer are inconvenient to humans living in this area.  However, that does not justify the killing of hundreds of animals a year.  Sign this petition and tell the city of Solon, Ohio to stop the cruel and ineffective culling of local whitetail deer.

SIGN THE PETITION AND CONTACT THE CITY DIRECTLY HERE!

Contact the Mayor

Contact the Mayor and/or City Council

You can say something along the lines of:

Dear Sir/Madam,

Deer culling has proven itself to be an inhumane and ineffective method of dealing with whitetail deer populations and must be stopped. Each year the city spends exorbitant amounts of money on the killing of these innocent animals, and each year the population remains constant.  While deer certainly are an inconvenience, maybe even a danger to us as human beings, it is not our role to systematically murder animals that, like us, are trying to survive.

There is no justification for saying that managing deer populations is good for the species and the ecosystem. If the city really cared about the ecosystem, it would work to ensure environmental protections of green land that deer can subsist on.  We are the reason that these animals have no natural predators, no food to eat, and no land on which to live. Stop culling these poor creatures and find sustainable and ethical ways to coexist with the whitetail deer population.

Thank you.

Sincerely,

(Your name here)

PLEASE SHARE!

(via animalfreak11)

I’ll be travelling for a bit so I’m not sure how often I’ll be able to post. I wanted to send out a new recipe before I leave.

I thought these were going to be a major fail when I first started concocting them so I was very pleasantly surprised that they not only worked out but are delicious. I was in the mood for something minty this week but have not bought a new mint plant. I did however have dried mint in my cabinet from Frontier (I actually bought this in the bulk tea section so the mint pieces are larger than the standard prepackaged dry mint). The inside of the cookie will be a nice green. I rarely make anything chewy so this was a nice change up.

Peppermint Chew Filling:

• 1 cup raw cashews
• 8 Tablespoons dry peppermint leaves
• 2 Tablespoons raw coconut butter (I use Artisana)
• 5 medjool dates (pitted)
• 2 Tablespoons water

Grind cashews in processor until powdery. Add remaining ingredients and blend to practically smooth but not so much so that the cashews begin to release their natural oils.

Scoop the filling out and roll into ball (scoop around 1 1/2 Tablespoons for each cookie). Flatten the balls so you have a nice thick round circle. Place all cookies onto a parchment paper lined plate or baking sheet and set in freezer to harden.

Chocolate Coating:

• 1/4 cup plus 2 Tablespoons raw cacao butter (shaved as small as possible)
• 1/4 cup raw cacao paste (shaved as small as possible)

Boil water in a pot. Place boiled water in a large bowl. Place the cacao butter and paste into a smaller bowl and then set that into the larger bowl making sure water does not get into the bowl with the cacao. Stir until smooth and melted.

Finale:

Take the frozen peppermint filling out of the freezer and dip into the melted chocolate with a fork (so that you do not get finger prints or blotches). The chocolate will harden right away. You should have enough to double dip some or most of the cookies (depending on how big you actually made them). 

I like to keep these stored in the freezer for a cold chewy summer treat but you can keep them in the refrigerator as well.

You should end up with about 16 cookies.