Tyler Fabeck 04/26/85 - 04/20/08

It has been an emotional week. Tyler Fabeck the principal videographer for “Vegan Cooking”,  was hit by a car around 1am on Sunday the 20th.  A close friend, co-worker, and collaborator of hair-brain schemes, I’m having a hard time explaining his loss to myself and others.

 

One thing that needs to be said. If I never met Tyler I would have probably never started the DVD. (Sorry Matt.)  I met Tyler when I transfered to the North Michigan Apple Store, in Chicago.  He looked like a dirty hippy or a crust-punk, my kinda guy.  One day in the break room, i was telling him how a friend of mine wanted me to put together a vegan cooking show. Two days go by and Tyler comes in to work and tells me, ” I was talking to my roommate Mike, and we want to help you do this cooking DVD. So maybe we can start shooting in next week.” 

“Tyler, this is a no budget thing, so i don’t have money to pay you.” 

“Oh we don’t care, it sounds fun. So we’re down to help”

And thats basically how it happened.  Tyler and Mike brought all the equipment,  borrowed from our friend Andrew.  I bought the food, prepped and made them all dinner while on camera.  After what was usually a four-five hour shoot we would head to the roof and eat. The two of them would take home anything we didn’t eat, and Tyler would bring anything else left over to work the next day.  

 

We rode bikes together on a few occasions. A few critical masses, and two weeks ago a ride to Veggie Bite after work where we talked about shooting the next DVD.   He road a black steel frame road bike, free-wheel and then fixed. I always told him he made me nervous on the fixed gear, but he never ceased to amaze me with his control.   I have tried to not focus on the irreversible details and speculation of his accident, the newspapers seem to be misleading or protecting the driver so the facts may never be known.    I know that Tyler was not a reckless bicyclist at the same time I could never think of him as a victim. Shit happens sometimes to the best people you know and all the anger i feel can’t bring him back. 

 

I can’t really think many positive thoughts on all of this. We watched his cremated remains buried on friday. Saturday night we celebrated his 23rd birthday as if he was still here.  Tonight our store payed tribute  with wristbands and an iphoto slide show.   I know Tyler was happy with himself and where he was going in life. He had just cut off his dreads, trimmed his beard, and beat me to the quarterly bath/shower. I’d like to think that his last moments in that intersection he was jazzed on life and excited for tomorrow as the early morning breeze blew through his fresh cut hair. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Denver VegFest Round Up

 

Not to shabby a photo for an iphone, eh?    

I got back from Denver late Saturday night and jumped right back into my grueling work week, but I have to give a quick shout out and thank you to everyone in Denver.  I met loads of awesome people, and sold a nice bit of Halo8 DVDs.   

Dan Hanley did an amazing job putting together an all Vegan gathering of AR people, loads of Food vendors and some sweet non-food merch.    Unfortunately i was flying solo so i didn’t get a chance to check out all the tables,  check out the Denver VegFest site for a list.    I was sitting right across from the Tofurkey table and scored a metal Tofukey Lunchbox.   How punk rock is that?  

I’ve got to give a big thanks to Amanda, Talitha, Veronica, and some dude trying to sell me an Alarm Clock to improve my che.  Amanda made sure i did’t spring a leak, and Talitha brought me some sweet food from the Leaf Restaurant booth.  

I finally met a hero of mine, Sarah Kramer . This shortie can cook and has an awesome new travel sized cookbook on the way, Vegan A Go-Go. Check this shit, she is the OG punk Rock Cheftist.  So just drop all your canadian hate people.   I’m pretty sure they have souls too. 

Formally met Josh Hooten from Herbivore Magazine    Super nice guy. Why do all these folks live so far west of the Mississippi? 

I’m just going to start telling everyone that Chicago is the new Pacific NorthWest.  

 

 

WTF is a Kneydl Soup?

Thats a Matzah Ball for all my Goyem peeps out there!   

Chicago weather has been as fickle as, well Chicago Weather.  Two days ago perfect,  yesterday the rain was a pouring and so far today all you need is a light hoodie.   With  Paseh only a week away and the rain pounding down I had to brake out some old skool Vegan Kneydl.

If the Picture above is not clear, let me explain to the super-goy
what a matzah ball is, and how to make a matzah ball soup.

First can we talk Kneydl? This my friend is a big ball of matzah meal, spices and traditionally egg. But in the year 5768, we are all Vegan and use Ener-G Egg Replacer So enough about the egg already. Matzah can not be mentioned with out talking about Moses. 

This guy was a Total A-Hole. Thank Juda he finally kicked it.  Moses made all the jewish people walk around in the desert with sand up their hoo-hoo and wouldn’t even let the challah bread rise. Every year we remember Mr. Chuckle-Nuts and the sand in are ass, by cutting out the carbs of biblical times; leaven bread.  So instead of bagels and Better then Cream Cheese. We have a 12″ x 12″ cracker with some vegan schmaltz.   The Matzah Ball is a made up of ground up crumbs, because with a cracker so big what did you expect?  And me waste, never. 

Second part,  Oy Vey. This is going on to long. Soup. The second part is chicken soup with a nosh of carrots, celery, onion, and my favorite bitter herb parsley.  Very easy to make a chicken style broth. Use a TON of Poultry Seasoning when sauteing the veggies, or buy bouillion

IF i have enticed you, here is what you need and how to do it.

Kneydl Balls
-2 Boxes of Matza Meal or 1 Box of Matza Crackers Crushed to Dust. you need 3 Cups of dust.
-EnerG Egg replacer to replace the Eggs in the Matza balls
-2t poulty seasoning
-Vegtable Oil (NOT OLIVE) use Saflower or Ghetto ass blends yo
-1 1/2 tp 2 cups warm water.

You can A follow the rules on the box, or B follow how i make a nice Kneydl.

In a large bowl mix up Nine Ener-G Eggs with HOT Water, Mix in 6 TB of Oil. and beat it till frothy. If using a bouillon cup this is the time to added it.
If using poultry seasoning ( which is mainly Sage ) then sift the seasoning with the 3 Cups of matzah meal before adding to egg/oil mix.
After the Matzah and egg are all mixed up they might be a bit crumbly. Thats good. Slowly add the warm water, get your hands dirty. Feels Good right? When the Matzah is like a play-dough type consistency, roll out into balls. Big small, you think I care what you do with your life? Place the balls in the Fridge for at least 15min.

Soup
4-8 TB of Earth Balance Butter
1 HUGE White onion Diced ( or a few Medium sized Onions ) About 3 Cups when Diced
1Bulb of Galrlic peeled and minced
4 Carrots Diced
1/2 Bunch of Celery Diced (5 stalks)
1TB Salt
4 TB of Vegan Bullion (prep it with water, or use a paste)
1TB Marjorm
1TB Thyme
2t black pepper ground
4 -6 Cups Water

Dice those Veggies. Get a HUGE pot hot ( i roll with a 14qt ) then grease that sucker up with the Earth Balance. EB burns so have the Veggies prepped first. Toss the onion in, followed by the carrots, and celery. Then the salt and cover the lid for about 2 full minutes. Add the spices next, BUT NOT the Bouillon.

Stir up everything and cover for a full 3 Minutes. Remove the lid and if you have a pool of liquid under the veggies its time to add the Bouillon.

the longer you simmer the stronger it gets. that means cover it up and wait at least 10 minutes. I like to do about a 40 minute simmer. When you bring in the water to reconstitute the stock do it slowly. Add to much and its watered down. Too little and you’ll turn into a Mormon and move to SLC.

Water is in, so lets get a nice boil on. Turn up the stove and get those Knooydls out of the fridge. When the boil is going, drop those suckers in and close the lid. 15 minutes is plenty, but the longer you hold out the fluffier those things get.

This should take you an hour and can feed about 6 hungry Rabbi. That being said, you might want to check with your local Yeshiva if Ener-G Egg Replacer is kosher for Passover. During the week of hell on earth new and unwieldy kosher laws go into effect. Some of which include binge eating all the cereal the night before Passover so one does not have to toss out perfectly good food.

Just for the record, kosher laws and all that whoee, not my cup of tea. But you know, Tradition.
 

I LOVE SOY DAIRY !

in the last few days ive come down with a raging cases of strep  throat.  and while waiting for a doctors  appointment i’ve been doing a little self medicating with my favorite local Vegan Ice Cream,  Temptation Depending on how long you’ve been a vegan or eating non-dairy ice creams, you may have tried a view of the existing alternatives. Toffuttie, So Delicious (formerly Soy Delicious), Rice Dream etc. All of which are quite nice to find at the local store in bumble-fuck no-where Most often Tofuttie would be a common find followed by the aforementioned. Any of which can not come close to the amazing creamy smoothness of Temptations. Something to be appreciated when your throat feels like a razor-blade suitcase.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         Recently these fine entrepreneurs at Chicago Soy Dairy ventured into the Vegan Cheese racket. Considering the specter of casein any vegan cheese is hard find. Tofuttie, undeniably one the oldest melts like plastic which does not taste like cheese, follow by Veganrella (venerably one of the most hated, but i LOVED that shit. so back off. Can’t make a pizza to save its own life. I think Rella went out of business anyhow) and more recent Vegan Gourmet.They seemed to all fit the niche of diet food.                                                                                                                                                                                             If there is one thing i AM NOT a Vegan for, its to diet.  Ethical veganism is something seen more and more in small business start ups. At the end of the summer interviewed master ice cream makers Dan and Ryan for what might have been bonus footage for Vegan Cooking For Animal Lovers aka HardCore Chef.  I think its safe to say these dudes are down with the AR movement.  Anyone remotely familiar with Hardline or Straight-Edge will get these guys. I remember how pysched is was when i say the back of T-shirt these guys made, paying homage to a forgotten Vegan Straight-Edge band, RAID.   enough shameless promotion these guys can speak for themselves.  I’m going to get back to eating some Peach Cobbler.     

Question #1: “What is the biggest hurdle you faced making your first film, and how did you overcome it?”

… Getting it right the First Time…The camera cut, and we had multiple angles which left a margin for error, but this was a razor thin line that on a few occasions we crossed. The picture above was from a particularly good night. I set out to shoot 4 dishes Southern Fried ToFu Will Rise Again, WTF is a Canadle Soup, Mosh-Pit-Tatoes, and Vegetable Medley of HxCx Gaiety plus my favorite party drink Straight Edge Revenge Sangria. All of them came out fucking perfect. Now if that night the technical side had worked as well, then we truly would have shined.Vegan Cooking was shot in 5 nights over a series of weeks in May and June. IF you’ve never been to chicago when its not freezing, or you don’t know shit and are still out on that whole global warming thing, May and June can get sweltering as balls in chicago. Thats when your not in a tight kitchen with a few 1000W lights shining down on you with 4 gas burners going and an oven set at 500 degrees. This makes for an antsy all volunteer crew.Every night we shot was a juggling act, because all the dishes that are featured in the DVD have at least three parts,1.) Prep and show the ingredients2.) Putting all together3.) Final Dish.If we had broken down the lights and cameras to shoot each dish straight, then we would be there all night. Instead, everything was made more or less at the same time. That meant, prep the Tofu, prep the Potatoes, Matza balls ( thats a fucking Canadle you Goey ), and what ever the hell else had to be done on the kitchen counter. I had some tables and stools under the island and would just move the ingredients out of shot. We then set up for anything at the stove top, and adjust lights and cameras. This is when shit got hectic. When you have a HOT pan of oil, next to a steaming pot of soup and $3k borrowed cameras, shit gets real. The oven is also blazing with Mosh-Pit-atoes, and I’ve got just about 15 minutes to shoot three other dishes, or we have to start over. Did i mention Straight Edge Revenge Sangria?Everything came together and we finish each dish on camera. It all comes together as its own little segmented bite-size episode of Vegan Cooking For Animal Lovers.. with The Hardcore Chef… Fucking brilliant… What essentially will take you 5-15 minutes to watch, took a great deal move time, but thats Television for ya right.? Maybe. My Hero and Inspiration ( though be it in a very specific sense) is The French Chef herself, Julia Childs. She might have been an enemy of animals, but her specific charm that i admire is 100% Punk Rock. This bitch basically invented cooking for a remote audience, and on Public Broadcasting no less…Each week, Julia did it up in one-take, two cameras, cuts only from one camera to the other… On an early episode she’s making a Potato Pancake, ( this was no Latke, Hershel ). She flips it in her pan, and the whole thing busts open like a hand grenade in mid-flight. The thing goes everywhere, all over the kitchen, all over her, even gets the camera. “What the Fuck Was That?” she laughs out. And then she slams a bottle of cheri and says, ” Screw this I’ll be in my trailer, get Jim Henson out here, see if i give a fuck.” I wish. She keeps, no apologies. She put the potatoes back together in the pan with the advice if this happens to you fix it and if your snooty ass bridge partner doesn’t like it cut the bitches throat like Mekkie did in Threat.