The Things They Can Do With Soy These Days!

It truly is astonishing. Soy ink on compostable cups, food for people and animals, a renewable source of energy... pretty soon the world will be entirely free of waste all because of a little bean! Dream on, Marisa... anyways, even more of a wow-factor than the whole soy ink thing (though I know you are all mind-blown by that) is the striking resemblance it can have to meat. I mean, like the taste or not, there's no denying that bologna and Tofurky look as similar as Katy Perry and Zooey Deschanel.

There is more to this post than comparing the similar textures and appearances of lunch meat and their faux counterparts. My inability to tell real meat from my dear friend soy-based meat got me into quite a bind the other day. So memorize these pictures well if you are a vegetarian so you can avoid a similar distasteful (get it? It's a pun...disTASTEful... man I'm witty) situation.

Tofurkey or bologna??

Tofurkey or bologna? Maybe they are both bologna... you'll never know!

Katy or Zooey??

So back in North Carolina where BBQ reigns supreme, the amount of vegetarian and even vegan options came as a surprise. Not a surprise like when you wake up and find that your roommate shaved your head (which I hear immature college freshmen do to each other- maybe it's better to be a loner as a male in that stage of life), but the kind when you find a crisp twenty-dollar-bill you had no clue existed in your coat pocket. Ok, back to the story...

My friend and I popped into a restaurant serving empanadas when hunger pains struck after attending an art festival. I had a crisp twenty surprise when I spotted the "vegan chorizo" empanada at the bottom of the list. Bam. Decision made. That has always been an easy aspect of following a dairy-free vegetarian diet- menu decision-making tends to be a heck of a lot easier than those that will chow down anything that is placed in front of them. Just thinking of that vegan chorizo initiated a very unladylike waterfall of drool out of the corner of my mouth and caused my stomach grumble unpleasantly to the point where I would be embarrassed had it been a date. "Um... yeah... indigestion...awkward...sorry..." (you don't get asked out again after that). But it wasn't a date so I just let my stomach do its thang. 

Finally the crisp empanada shrouded in an inviting aroma arrived on a ceramic plate bearing its name: vegan chorizo. I cut into it and was greeted by another surprise (not quite to the level of a crisp twenty: maybe a crisp five). The soy meat looked amazingly, almost incredulously, authentic. "Wow, I can't believe how much soy can look like meat!" I wondered aloud (I can't believe I just used that phrase- wondered aloud. That always used to drive me crazy). I took a bite. "Wow...I can't believe how much this tastes like meat..." Crap. The crisp five surprise quickly morphed into a roommate-shaving-my-head-surprise. This was pork. I handed a forkful to my friend to verify, and she immediately broke down laughing. "Yeah, Marisa, that is pork."

I was horrified, and not even horrified where I could assure myself that this would be funny later. Simply horrified. I rushed my plate urgently to the waitress, holding it as if it were an envelope full of anthrax. I could barely spit out a complete sentence- "This... not... vegan?!" She looked almost as horrified as I felt. "Oh no... are you a vegetarian?!" she asked, and all I could do was nod in desperation in response. Her face went from zero to pale in two seconds as she quickly uttered an awkward apology and assured me I would be brought the proper empanada. She probably thought I was going to sue. When I returned to my table still bearing the expression of a helpless, lost child, my friend was still crippled in her seat cackling. Real mature. 

In a few minutes, the waitress returned with empanada in hand and store manager at her side. He walked up to me with one of those intense walks that signifies the walker is headed somewhere VERY important. Like a missile silo. Or a conference about missile silos that the President plans on attending.

"Are you the vegetarian who ate the meat?" (What an oxymoron). I nodded and probably looked like I was going to cry. Now future Marisa looks back at past Marisa and laughs in her face because it really is a comical story (future Marisa tends to bully past Marisa... we are trying to initiate an intervention). Anyways, in the end I won because they paid for my entire meal. Score!