Dear Best Friend!

First of all I just want to say, OMG. Some of you have been so aggitated that I have not blogged in so long. To that I say. AWWWWW. Finally someone who cares! Yessssss! Well Suckas I am back. With so much incredible knowledge and wisdom to impart! Let's do this!

So where to begin. Meredith and I left Alicia Silverstone's house shortly after the gorgeous GIGANTIC family of rats left her house.  PS. We were mind boggled as to how on earth they were getting in.  Here's a tip. If you live in the canyons of Los Angeles and you DON'T want rats to come into your house. Don't leave the door open after say 4pm. Yep that's how they came in. Through the front door. I am a genius.

But I digress.

Where are we now? You might ask? Well. We had kind of special needs in that we have 2 giant kind of scary looking dogs, a rottie mix Ellie and a pit bull mix Sunny, two very nice girls*. So we needed a back yard. Because there is no way I am living with 2 giant dogs in an apartment. Mostly because I have no desire to get up and put on pants to let them out.**

Special need #2- we don't have a lot of dough since Meredith is but a new college graduate and I am broke, bad with money, and paying for half a geodome in Montana. Sooo we looked on craigslist and found this tiny house with a gorgeous backyard with lots of tropical plants, an illegal bonfire and the worlds most disgusting outdoor futon. It is HEAVEN. Really. It also comes with an extremely green pagan landlord who lets us babysit his alpha pit bull Tony*** all day! Party! 

When they are not lazing in the sunshine, the dogs, and meredith, are usually lazing on my bed. tho my bedroom is the size of most of your closets, it has a door to the garden which is incredible. So at any given time, every living being in the house is IN it.

And the kitchen. OMG. the counter tops are concrete. So manly. So cool and since we are broke, all we do is cook. Meredith is not quite vegan. Lets be honest neither am I, I have been eating fish. But its a process. And Alicia says its ok. Be nice to yourself. I adore her. And I try to only eat the wild caught stuff and only once in a while. Dont judge me.

then we scoop them into the tortillas and finish off with hot sauce and slices of avocado. Then we go and sit in the sunshine and eat them on the picnic table in the back yard and drink lots of coffee and talk about how cool we think the other is. 

Apparently paper towels, which have so lovingly cleaned the shit off our counters, cabinets and dirty kitchen floors are controversial! Who knew? I knew Alicia didn't use them. She has a drawer of old rags she uses instead but she's Alicia Silverstone. Kind of the Jesus of the conservation movement. I thought everybody else still used them!

So when we were at her house, we snuck some in that we got from trader Joes, the 100 percent recycled kind, mind you. But we did try to hide them from her assistant. On top of the fridge, roll laying discreetly on its side.

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What to do...? Well. since we Pyle's never shy from a challenge.. 

the new challenge for Meredith and I, is to use rags and old shirt scraps for the entire month of January. We will see how it goes. And let you know. Ps. Meredith is furious about this.***** But we are doing this for you and for the planet and for our eminent fake vegan fame. 

pss. i thought since we are always looking a little rough in these blogs, kind of like we just woke up, which we usually did, and one of us did NOT take off her makeup the night before.******

I thought I would leave you with a picture of us having had our hair and makeup professionally done for the LA premiere of The Artist which I am in.

psss. Please go see it. Its a beautiful silent film. Ironically the biggest movie I have ever been a part of. One in which I am only in for like 10 minutes******* and where I don't make a sound. 

Alas. Life can be weird. 

But not as weird as you. 

Until the next time. think about cutting up some old shirts and using them as paper towels. or making our sexy morning hash. 

WE LOVE YOU

xox

Missi and Meredith

* They are mostly nice except when Ellie tries to kill Sunny because she is younger and has real legs.

**I am wearing pants right now. Don't worry.********

***Tony is actually an incredible dog. He likes to howl along when there are sirens, which is almost every day because we live deep in the hood in echo park.  And we LOVE having him around. But not as much as Sunny. They hump all day. Actually, its pretty gross. 

****he's actually cool. for a pagan and inspiring and gets shit done. so woo hoo. i guess right?

*****well i haven't told her yet. but she WILL be furious when she reads this. hehe.

******i'll give you a hint. its usually the one of us who is laying in bed with 3 dogs and a nice glass of pinot noir.

*******its actually more like 10 seconds. but who cares! go see it. pretty please!

********i'm lying. 

The thing about being a vegan is, everybody has an opinion about it. Especially the bartender, at The Buggy Whip. Who incidentally is not only a bartender but also a professional nutritionist and architect with his very own clothing line. Hmmm. I guess business must be slow. or he just bartends on the side for funzies. Anyhoo. I was waiting for Megan and Meredith at the bar and looking over the menu for something vegan to eat. They had broccoli sauteed in garlic. yum. and a beet salad. I told the bartender, Fred, that I'd like both but that I was a vegan and just wanted to make sure both dishes were, you know vegan. 

fred looked at me and shook his head. "being a vegan is not healthy." wow. thank you so much for your opionion fred. tell me more. "i am a nutritionist, a professional nutritionist and if you don't have dairy from a cow you can't get enough calcium and will get osteoporosis and weak bones." and shrivel up and die? ok, i get it. again, thank you for your opinion. I'd still like to have the broccoli and the salad. fred stared me down cold and hard like john wayne in some vintage western. i thought maybe he'd draw his pistol on me. but no. he just tore the ticket off his ticket order pad, slowly turned, glared at me one more time and walked into the kitchen.

wowzers! while fred was gone. i decided to do a little googling about this whole cows milk- osteoporosis thing. on my iphone. (sigh rip steve jobs... you will be eternally missed) Turns out there are an ass load of other ways to get calcium. Broccoli being one of them. suck on that fred! and look at all these other vegan foods that have calcium:

i have no idea what blackstrap molasses is. it sounds painful. but dang theres a lot of options. 

when fred came back he brought me my broccoli which was sauteed in olive oil and an extraordinary amount of garlic. awesome. and my beet salad covered in cheese. i just looked at him. "really fred?" do you not remember the conversation we had 5 minutes ago? is this why all your other businesses are in the shitter? fred again looked at me like i was the dumbest a hole on the planet and said. "well i guess the cook might make you another one." amazing. 

he brought me back the salad with beets this time with no cheese and no salad dressing. i guess to teach me a lesson? and simply walked away.  then meredith and megan arrived. meredith ate most of my broccoli. she is so cute, i didn't mind. then we slammed a glass of vegan wine and took megan to the airport. which incidentally is right around the corner from the Buggy Whip. We did not take a buggy to get there.

alas. i wondered if you, my best friend have thoughts on the calcium vegan conundrum. maybe you wanna share them with me? so i can go give fred the what for the next time i see him

that's for fred. not you

until then 

in the words of steve jobs...

stay hungry, stay foolish

ps. steve jobs gives this speech to the graduates of stamford. it is the most inspiring speech i've ever heard. I think i've listened to it at least a dozen times. it gives me hope when my heart feels heavy and i feel, you know, hopeless.  if you have 10 minutes check it out. 

http://www.ted.com/talks/steve_jobs_how_to_live_before_you_die.html

Hello best friends. This is Meredith in for Missi.  Missi got a job, woo hoo, filming “The Mentalist” this week…which has made her incredibly helpful and handy in the kitchen.

Uhhh….not.  And, since Missi constantly reminds me that her brain is old and how I am young and how I make her feel one-hundred and seven, I thought I’d allow her to use what little brain power the old fart has left to memorize her lines rather than help me in the kitchen.  (Sorry Miss, but the getting old comments are getting….well…OLD.)

Glad I got that off my chest. So, this week…I took over the blog, the kitchen, and the menu for this week’s Vegan adventures in Lost Angeles.

Side Note: Since I’m already here and all…I thought it might be nice for you to hear my side of the story. I drove from Texas to Los Angeles, with father Frank, who still doesn’t know where he is, to come and live with my sister. Upon arriving, Missi announced that she was going to try Veganism during our stint in Alicia’s house, which BTDubs is amazeballs! Being that I had just spent two days in the car with Frank, learning all about Southwest vegetation and overdrive buttons, my defenses were down and I agreed to join her in her Vegan quest. I did this without remembering that my last meal was a truck stop Subway and I had yet to get my California ritual: Animal Style Double Double. That I hadn’t tasted in years. Well…crap.

Side Side Note:  Okay I’m from Texas.  I talk like it.  And I eat like it.  I come from cattle ranchers on one side of the family and dairy farmers on the other. So to say it hasn’t been easy is an understatement. 

Now, I know I haven’t been a non-meat eater for long…but I have learned a few very important lessons this month.

Number 1. NOT ALL MEAT SUBSTITUES ARE EQUAL.

Number 2. Tofurkey is: NO way I’m eating it-furkey and

Number 3. If you see “Chicken-less” just turn and walk away.

So what is a meat lover like me to do??  If at first you don’t succeed…fry fry a hen. Just kidding.  Kinda.  Or you can take a tip from Miss Silverstone and go straight to the “meat” a.k.a. “proteins” section of The Kind Diet for a solution. And boy did I find it. Tex-Mex style. Not only did I find a meat that tasted good, but it actually tasted like MEAT!  Woo.  Party.  It’s the Chorizo found in Alicia’s Chorizo Tacos found on pg. 157 from The Kind Diet by Alicia Silverstone.

Meat AND Mexican?? Done. Yum. 

First, I started by prepping all the Taco fixin’s. (That’s Texan for fixings). 

Side Side Side Note (last one, honest):  Before starting this recipe, I searched endlessly for Tofutti Sour Cream and according to Carlos at Trader Jose’s it is discontinued!! How dare they!  I’ve basically been LIVING on the Tofutti Cutie Faux-Ice cream sandwiches.  So I had to improvise and replace Guacamole for sour cream to provide the creamy texture and appropriately give it some ‘ole Tex-Mex flare!

I started with making the guacamole. As you can imagine, guacamole in Texas is a religion, everyone has their own recipe, which they swear by.  And I’m no different.  I use avocado, red onion, lime and cilantro. Mash up the avocado, dice the onion, add the cilantro and lime, a heapin’ of salt, and there you have it. Tex-mex guacamole. And here’s a fun serving tip, take the avocado shells you just scraped clean and put your mixed guacamole inside. Fiesta on a plate. Olé.

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Yes, this blog also features the very funny, very helpful, and young-brained Megan Park. She also has a job and had to work the next day but she learned her lines easily AND could also help in the kitchen. Youth is Amazing.

After you make the guacamole, assemble more chopped onions, shredded lettuce, chopped tomato, cilantro, and Vegan cheddar cheese, and any other fixin’s you may desire.

 And now for the meat.  Soy chorizo is the way to go.  It comes in a tubey like concoction which is really gross and has to be squeezed into the frying pan in a bit of oil.   

Cook the chorizo for about 5 minutes and bring it to the table.  I will say, the great thing about faux-meat is that it doesn’t require serious cooking.  Just browning or warming. Hooray.

The final result provided a beautiful display of colors and choices.  While Megan and I made Tacos, Missi opted for a Tostada.

So, if you’re a Texan and you find yourself hankerin’ for some meat, remember that a great Tex-Mex meal can quickly and easily be made Vegan (by careful faux-meat selection), without losing the taste and memories that remind you of home.

“I’m a beagle….Olé!”

You'd think cutting out a lot of animal product from your diet would make you svelt and bodilicous. Well. Not if you are me. You see. It's not like there aren't a lot of options to choose from. It's just that A. I don't even know what most of them are- Umebochi*? What the hell is that? Miso paste? Do you brush your teeth with it? Kobacha? Whatcha? And legumes. Ok I get it. Fancy word for BEANS. But you literally have to soak them over night. And B. I am such a ridiculous procrastinator, I don't usually think about what I am going to eat until it is already half way down my esophagus. 

I tend to just go for the same not so scary vegan food that is on the counter all the time. potato chips. pita chips and hummos. corn chips and hummos. corn chips and salsa. corn chips and guacamole and hot fake cheese. Bread and pasta and more hot fake cheese and more corn chips.

And when you are out at a restaurant, like the not so vegan one at jfk, and you are starving, and where literally the ONLY vegan thing on the menu is waffle fries. And its almost midnight and you've already had 2 glasses of wine, you eat the waffle fries. 

Hence the Vegan 15... and matching muffin top.

It was in the quest for something delicious, not scary, and not muffin top-able that I came across this recipe.

Naughty Vegan Polenta & Seitan Casserole.

http://www.thekindlife.com/user/recipe/naughty-vegan-polenta-seitan-casserole

Seitan you are asking?? What the hell is Seitan?** Well other than being naughty, obviously, it's basically wheat gluten. Or wheat meat. And its consistency is pretty dang close to that of say ground beef in a recipe.  Fake Ground beef? That doesn't sound too scary. But is it good? 

Well. Wait and see grasshopper. 

First you coat the bottom of a casserole dish with most of 1 qt of Marinara sauce. (preferably home made. wow. really? no. we did not do that. we let someone over at whole foods make it. Then put it in a jar. shh..)

Then you cook 1 package of polenta (about 2 cups)

and add a layer of it about 1/- 1/2 inch thick. just use half for first layer.  we kind of crumbled ours on there. which was hard on our fingers because it was hot and we are mildly retarded.

Then you spread half a package of seitan (store bought. whew) and spread evenly over the polenta. 

then another layer of polenta and the rest of the seitan.  You put the rest of the marinara on top. Then spread a nice layer of Daiya Mozzerella fake cheese on the top top. Garnish with oregano, sea salt, pepper, evoo.

Bake at 350 for 30-40 minutes.

open a nice bottle of red to keep you company while you wait.

Before you take this seitan dish out of the oven. Punish it for being so naughty by broiling the top for a few minutes to brown the "cheese".

Then wait for it to cool. Which is hard for us because Frank taught us waiting is for pussies.  

Then you put some in a bowl

Then ask her what she thought.

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Listen. Blogging is hard to keep up with. Especially when you have to drink red wine while watching back to back episodes of Dexter or are laying in bed playing Angry Birds and  have to wait a full hour for the falcon to come back and get you out of a tricky level on your Iphone.

Or if, only on day 3 or 4 of being a vegan, you wake up in the middle of the night and, while standing in front of Alicia's open refrigerator, in your underwear, you find yourself with a fork digging into the non vegan chocolate pie your sister evilly brought home last night, and put on the middle shelf, which is eye level, with no cover and homemade non vegan whipped creme dolloped lovingly on the top. 

Oh the shame.

I caved. I didn't mean to. It all happened so fast. I almost thought it was a dream until I woke up the next day with crusty chocolate on the pillow where my mouth had gently pressed during the night. I felt guilty. The wallowy kind. I mean what kind of an example am I to you? My devoted fans?

But listen, I am an actor and the one thing i have learned as an actor is you can't wallow. I am constantly being rejected for the "greatest job of my life" and sit moping around all day in my underwear*. But, the thing I learned about the "greatest job in your life", is, there will always be another one that comes along with shiny opportunity to make you believe again and go put your clothes back on and go out and audition. with the hope that this time, you can stay out of your underwear for good... I mean in pants over your underwear...

it was in this hope, that i woke yesterday morning and decided to make the greatest funnest most delicious recipe in Alicia's vegan book, The Kind Diet. One that would be so yummy, I would never cheat again. I found it on page 207

Cheesy Oozy Guacamole bean Dip.

http://www.thekindlife.com/post/cheesy-oozy-guacamole-bean-dip

As frank would say, Yum. Or I'm a beagle or both.**

The recipe starts with you mashing up 3 ripe avocados while wearing a long flowy dress in Alicia Silverstone's kitchen.

Then you have Meredith, who was non apologetic about her pie because she had gotten it from the people at the Leno Show***, squeeze the juice of one whole lime on the top.

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Then you spread a layer of refried beans on the bottom of an 8 x 8 inch glass baking dish. You spread the avocado lime concoction over the top of the beans. Then you stir together 2,  8 ounce containers of non dairy sour cream with a packet of cruelty free taco seasoning and spread over the avocado. 

We only had one container of sour cream because I don't believe in writing down actual quantities while making a grocery list. Oh well, In the end it wasn't a problem. 

Then we sprinkled a can of diced green mild chiles (drained) over the sour cream and layered on top of that 1/2 cup of sliced black olives.  Then we added 3 chopped tomatoes. (1 big ass yellow one from Alicia's garden and 2 normal sized red ones from a pack we got at trader joe's.)

While we waited for the oven to heat, my friend Megan Park came over to sample our hopefully extremely tasty vegan dish. Megan is a ridiculously talented actress who played my daughter in A Cinderella Story, Once Upon a  Song, my opus, and who plays a virginal 16 year old on ABC family's Secret Life of the American Teenager. She also happens to be my writing partner. (we are writing the worlds greatest, funniest, raunchiest most heart felt female comedy of all time)****

she got here just in time to put the dish in the oven and open up some wine. She's not really 16. I hope. I wasn't sure what flavor of wine goes well with vegan bean dip so, just to be safe I opened both a red and a white.

After 30 minutes, we took out our bean dip and sat down to eat with a bag of organic corn chips. We were just about to dig in when Megan, who is severely lactose intolerant asked if there was milk protein in the soy cheese. I said slightly condescendingly, "Uh no way Megan its SOY cheese." But she told me in a very non condescending tone because she is really the adult in our relationship, apparently just because it says its soy cheese doesn't mean they don't get all sneaky and put in casein.

WHAT???? Who would do something like that????? 

I guess you have to read the labels. 

This vegan Daiya cheese does not! IE TOTALLY VEGAN!!

So we just pulled back the not so fake fake mozzerella for Megan and she ate the yummy goodness below.

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It was a truly awesome dish. We were going to make an entree but we got too full on the chips we ate with the bean dip and the ass load of chips we ate before while the bean dip was in the oven. 

In conclusion I say this is a great recipe for anyone who is a cheater like me and wants to make something delicious to redeem themselves. 

I give it two "yums" up.

And will try to hold steadfast and not let you, my best friends down ever again.

*i am not ALWAYS in my underwear. just USUALLY.

** watch the video from blog 2. The beagle comment will make more sense

*** Meredith is assisting a very fancy actress named Octavia Spencer who was in the Help and was on Late Night with Jay Leno the other night. She made a pie made of poop in the Help so they gave her a pie not made of poop for being on the show. Meredith took one home because it was from Jay Leno. He doesn't like it when you turn him down. Or so I've heard....

****other than bridesmaids. sigh.

my father, who thinks tofu is a japanese couch that turns into a hard bed that no one should ever sleep on, had his first ever vegan meal the other night at Real Food Daily. He had the tofu salisbury steak. He is going deaf and missing half a toe. So its hard to say how he really felt about it. He ate most of it and shrugged his shoulders. He then tasted my tahini dressing. he swished it around in his mouth a few times, gross, then simply said. "yum"

promising!

the next day meredith and i decided to venture into alicias cookbook. knowing we had frank as our only real taste tester. we decided on something that could invoke yet another of his signature yum's-  waffle sausage and cheese paninis. because we knew at least the waffles would be actual waffles.

we had a side salad of collard greens and pine nuts and raisins

frank sat and sweated while we got our vegan cooking on

first we fried the soy sausages, put them on a cutting board, cut them up, gave some to Lacey, the 14 year old vegan dog, Then we stirred together some vegenaise, yummy apricot jam, thyme and pepper. We toasted the waffles, put the jaminaise sauce on them, added the fake sausage, sundried tomatoes, arugula, and fake mozzarella. the flavor was actually insanely good even with the fake mozzarella. which i am not sure i have fallen in love with just yet.

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meredith and i took a few bites and thought it was super yummy.  but the true test would be to see what frank had to say 

this is what we got...

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We are not sure our father has any idea where he is ever.  But he birthed us. And we are grateful for that. And the meal was pretty darn delicious. we made it 2 whole days. only 28 left to go.

woo hoo. easy right? 

we shall see.....

these 2 recipes, are from alicia's book, The Kind Diet

Sicilian collard Greens with Pine Nuts and Raisins is on p. 176

Waffle Sausage and Cheese Panini is on p. 153

or go to thekindlife.com

bon (vegan) apetit!

i sold my beachwood canyon bungalow in la and moved to montana last year. to make a family with a bear man in a geodome on 20 beautiful acres.  i had high hopes. but my ovaries have not cooperated and now i am close to broke. after 11 months of failing at trying to get acting jobs by putting myself on digital video with my flip camera, propped up on 2 end tables and a foot stool in the living room of said geodome, wearing nothing but my blue "business" suit jacket and underwear, and sending said video to my agent in la via the satellite internet which, i think, is run by a team of oxen, ie. its slow, i have decided i might need to move back to la to get a job.*

so when my friend alicia silverstone, who is beyond lovely, one of the greatest famous people i know, really listens and is genuine and a good friend, asked me if i wanted to move into her place in the hills while i look for a place, probably not in the hills, while she shoots a movie in nyc, i said,YES!. she lives in a beautiful 2 story house with hard wood floors, a heated pool and at least a half acre of woodsy madness. its like alicia in wonderland.**

anyway. my little sister meredith who is 25 and a recent  graduate of ocu in the masters musical theatre department, decided she wanted to move to la to follow her dreams. so I, a recent graduate of getting the hell out of los angeles, have moved back to los angeles  with my younger, skinnier, less bitter half sister into alicia's vegan home.

i am not a vegan. 

i have always wanted to be a vegan. when i dine with alicia i eat vegan and chose not to wear my favorite calf length brown leather boots i've had resoled 3 times, and secretly hope we drive her prius with the cloth seats and not my vintage 06 lexus with the grey again, leather, seats.

so when i moved into her house last month with my little sister who practically grew up on a cattle farm, i asked her if she wanted to be vegan with me while we stay here and cook recipes from alicias vegan cook book. she thought it sounded like a fun adventure. we are pyles. we love adventure.  so here we go. on our vegan adventures in wonderland!

Stay tuned!

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*that was the longest sentence in the history of sentences. i am sorry. and you are welcome.

**with some very fat vegan mice who apparently sublet at night. we'll get to them later.

Don

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a song i wrote with a couple of nice ladies.  I hope you like it. As much as I like you...

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