Tuesday Night Take Out / Pineapple Strawberry Smoothie

I hope everyone has had a great Wednesday. I am so looking forward to the long weekend ahead! I had an errand to run after work yesterday, so I knew it would be too late to stand in the kitchen and cook dinner when I got home. So, we had Chinese take out from a small Chinese restaurant called No. 1 Chinese. I ordered a dish with mixed vegetables, tofu, and white rice. I also got a veggie spring roll....YUM! They give you enough food to feed two or three people. What I have on my plate in the picture below, was only a third of the food that they gave me. Needless to say, you can pretty much guess what I had for lunch today. And, there is this much more food in the refrigerator for another time. Maybe I will have it for my lunch again tomorrow. :o)

This morning was of course.... another smoothie. Most mornings, I have my smoothie drank by 8:30, so I usually begin to get hungry around 10:30. Not today though. I think putting a little oatmeal in it this morning made the difference. I wasn't starved by lunch this time. Don't get me wrong, I was still ready to eat at lunch time. Here's what this mornings smoothie consisted of.

1 cup frozen pineapple

1/2 cup frozen strawberries

1/2 frozen banana

1 tablespoon of chia seeds

1/4 teaspoon ginger powder (thank you Ali...I'm loving the ginger in my smoothie)

1/4 teaspoon cinnamon (Yay, I remembered it this morning)

3 tablespoons oats (another thing I got from Ali)

1 tablespoon hemp seeds

1 tablespoon of honey (yes, I used honey)

rice milk (enough to blend everything together in the blender)

As you see, I used honey this morning. I normally don't use honey, but for some reason I did this morning. Why exactly don't vegans eat honey? I was curious about this, so I looked it up and found this. It starts with a core understanding of what it means for most people to be a vegan. "Veganism is a way of living which excludes all forms of exploitation of, and cruelty to, the animal kingdom, and includes a reverence for life," writes Jo Stepaniak. Well, as detailed by PETA, "Like other factory-farmed animals, honeybees are victims of unnatural living conditions, genetic manipulation, and stressful transportation ... Profiting from honey requires the manipulation and exploitation of the insects' desire to live and protect their hive." To which, Stepaniak adds: "Even the most careful keeper cannot help but squash or otherwise kill many of the bees in the process. During unproductive months, some beekeepers may starve their bees to death or burn the hive to avoid complex maintenance. I read a lot more, but this is the short explanation. I thought I would share it just in case there are others out there like me who didn't know this. I do promise to never eat honey again! I wish I had looked this question up this morning, before I plopped the honey into my blender. All I can say is that I'm still learning, and probably will be for a long time. Oh, I will also look at honey bees in a totally different way now.

~Peace~