Temptations Everywhere

I work at Cafe Carolina and Bakery in Meadowmont, and today I worked from 8-6. I was completely surrounded by cupcakes, brownies, gooey butter cakes (my favorite, even though they are so bad for you), muffins, cookies, etc. So yes, it was ten straight hours of torture.  Thankfully, I stayed busy and didn't really have a chance to think about all the delicious non-vegan foods around me, but it was still harder than the previous days.  It was definitely strange for me to resist taking random bites out of various baked goods, but I liked the challenge. Plus, I got more work done which is good because if you ask anyone that I work with they will tell you I work at a slug's pace.  My one guilty pleasure at the Cafe is a soy latte. Even before this vegan diet I always made a latte with soy milk, so I'm glad I can continue to have this drink.  I'm excited to see how work continues to treat me, and I'm hoping that the temptations go away or at least ease up.

My sister, Hayley, picked me up from work because she borrowed my car for the weekend, and on the way home she told me about her afternoon with my mom which I thought I would share. So, my mom is extremely supportive of me being vegan, and Hayley was telling me how she was excited to make a dinner that the whole family would like, and have it also vegan for me. She decided to make a big pot of hominy which is a puffed corn.  Hominy tastes starchy so it's a very filling dish. Anyway, Hayley was explaining how they were going to make one batch with vegetable stock, celery, and carrots, which I would eat, and then for the rest of the family, they would just add sausage.  Basically everything was cooked and my mom was extremely satisfied when she took a taste and stated that it "tasted too buttery".  Apparently, she turned around panicked, looked at Hayley, and said something not very characteristic of my mom. Hayley, confused, didn't know how to react until my mom explained how vegans can' eat butter and this huge pot of "vegan" hominy had so much butter in it. When Hayley and I got home, I saw the big buttery pot, and then on the other burner I saw a small skillet of hominy that Hayley said my mom cooked separately for me.  This story not only made me laugh, but it made realize how easy it is to cook a meal and accidentally forget about using non-animal products. 
I wanted to thank you, Mom, for a wonderful hominy dinner, and all the hard work that you put into it. I know you easily could have lied and pretended that there was actually no butter in it, and honestly I probably wouldn't have ever known, but it means a lot that you didn't.

Successful weekend,
Maggie