International Hummus Day- May 13

Hummus is an ancient Middle Eastern dish that in recent years has become well known in Western countries.

Hummus is a dip that can be eaten with tahini, olive oil, lemon juice, salt and garlic.  

There are many ancient sources that link hummus to ancient periods and famous historical figures such as Saladin. Indeed, its ingredients: chickpeas, sesame, lemon and garlic were eaten in the area for a thousand years.  

The hummus can be eaten as a hot granule, or a cold granulated salad, but it is most popular to eat it as a cold spread, served on a plate or in a pita, with all kinds of additives such as beans, egg, tahini, chips, salad, and more...

 

In the United States you can buy chocolate-flavored hummus in food stores:

Simply Enjoy- Twisted Chocolate Hummus

Did you know? Hummus is a legume and is an excellent source of protein for vegans. You can make hummus at home, you don't have to buy it, and you can make healthy vegan hummus.

Hummus salad

In honor of the hummus day, you have a good reason to wipe hummus, at home or in one of the many good hummuses restaurants around.

Image courtesy of KEKO64 at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

May 13 is also Apple Pie Day

Oreo cookies Birthday - March 6

Oreo cookies are among the most delicious cookies that exist. Although they have a lot of calories, fat and sugar, there is almost no one who can resist them.

The first day Oreo cookies were sold was 109 years ago, on March 6, 1912, and in the first hundred years since, more than 500,000,000,000 cookies have been sold!

Every day, 95 million Oreo cookies are sold worldwide, which means that far, far more than 500 billion cookies have been sold so far.

In honor of the sweet birthday of Oreo cookies, here are some interesting facts about them:

About half of the people who eat Oreo cookies separate their two biscuits first.

If you make a tower out of all the Oreo cookies sold in a day, you will reach the tower 136 times Everest.

Making an Oreo cookie takes exactly 59 minutes - from mixing the ingredients to packing.

Oreo is considered the best-selling cookie in the world. It is available in more than 100 countries.

Oreo cookies, in their original version at least, are vegan. They do not contain eggs, milk and anything animal.

Oreo cookies are very tasty, and everyone has their own method of eating them. There are those who dip in milk, there are those who like to peel the white cream and eat it separately, there are those who like to eat only the cream and leave the biscuits naked alone.

Food artist Tisha Cherry decided to give Oreo cookies a special creative treatment: she uploaded to her Instagram page pictures of Oreo cookies she sculpted from their white cream all sorts of things like the head of the jellyfish monster from Greek mythology, the Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci, Football and more. Besides, she has lots of other beautiful creations in food, which you can see on her Instagram page: Tisha Cherry 

In the summer of 2013, Oreo released a limited edition version of watermelon flavored cookies. You can also get them now on Amazon.

If you like to dip your Oreo cookies in milk or tea, and do not want to dip your fingers in the way, you can use this cookie dip that fits basically all sandwich cookies in two layers.

Link to dip cookies in coffee, tea or milk

An Oreo advertisement from 1950

Advertisement for Oreo from 1940 (Source)

If you have not yet decided what to wear on Purim, you can dress up as an Oreo cookie and a glass of milk:

Double costume: Oreo and milk (Link)

And quite by chance (probably), March 6 is also Dentists' Day ... and Frozen Food Day

Cashew Day - November 23

Cashew is a fun nut to snack on all year round, and November 23rd is his holiday.

The cashew nut we love so much is the fruit of the cashew tree, which develops from the fruit pimple, where the cashew flower comes out. The fruit cannot be eaten without processing because its peel contains resin that can cause the body to react to poisoning. That is why cashews are sold after they have undergone a process of heating and peeling. Cashews have great nutritional value. It contains lots of antioxidants, vitamin B and minerals like iron, zinc, potassium, phosphorus, magnesium and calcium. It is recommended to buy it as natural as possible and without added salt.

The cashew tree also has an edible fruit, called a "cashew apple" and is pear-shaped, edible and has a soft and sweet texture. The cashew apple is coated with a delicate peel and contains no seeds.

The cashew apple

Cashews on the tree

The cashew tree originates in northeastern Brazil. Today it is grown in extensive areas of South America. Cashews also reached Africa and Southeast Asia by the Portuguese between the 15th and 17th centuries, when they were a colonial empire and their merchants would roam and discover the world. Today, cashews are grown commercially in 32 countries around the world that have tropical and subtropical climates, mainly in Vietnam, Nigeria, Ghana, Ivory Coast, India, Brazil and Indonesia.

The cashew tree has a convoluted trunk like a spiral and a texture reminiscent of leather, and it reaches a height of 12 meters. Its flowers are small, at first they have a light green color and then they turn red, with each of them having five thin and sharp petals.

The largest cashew tree in the world is the Cashew of Pirangi which covers about 7,525 square meters and is located in Natal, Rio Grande do Norte, Brazil. Its size is like 70 cashews together, and when you walk where it is, you feel Who walk in a whole forest of cashew trees, when in fact it is only one tree

From the cashews it is possible to make a drink that resembles milk and also vegetable cheese. Cashew cheese is rich in unsaturated fat that is good for heart health. From the cashew cheese you can make a vegan cheesecake, vegan pizza, vegan macaroni and cheese and actually use it as a cheese substitute in any dish that contains cow's milk cheese.

A simple and easy recipe for cashew cheese:

Soak 1 cup of fresh cashews overnight in cold water.

In a food processor or blender, grind the nuts with a little water until you get the desired texture, juice of half a lemon, 1 tablespoon of quality raw tahini (optional) and 1 clove of garlic (optional) and a little salt.

The cheese is ready when a uniform and smooth paste is obtained. The cheese can be kept for a week in the refrigerator in a closed container.

If you want, you can also add herbs you like, brewer's yeast or pine nuts.

In Latin America, cashew apple fruit is also made into a drink.

Cashews cause fewer allergic reactions than nuts or other peanuts.

The cashew nut first came to Goa, India, by the Portuguese, between 1560 and 1565. From Goa it spread throughout Southeast Asia, and eventually, reached Africa as well.

There is also cashew oil which is a delicious addition to a salad or sauce.

Many parts of the plant are used for medicinal purposes.

The cashews we eat also have a dark side: the cashews industry in backward countries uses people who peel the nuts with bare hands and are harmed by the toxins in its shell. Besides, their working conditions are poor and wages are meager. In recent years, the struggle of European activists for fair trade in cashews and the provision of working conditions and job security for people working in the cashew industry has intensified. When buying cashews, you should find out where it came from and buy from countries where there is fair trade.

How to celebrate Cashew Day?

There are so many snacks that contain cashews. You can savor them today, just you should check that they are as little processed and salted as possible to enjoy the health benefits of cashews. You can enrich your salads with cashews. It is today to make cashew cheese which is a great and healthy substitute for regular cheese. Instead of cow's milk, you can try a cashew drink today, which, as we mentioned earlier, is very rich in minerals and vitamins from plants.

November 23 is also Fibonacci Day

World Vegan Day- 1 November

World Vegan Day is an event celebrated every year on November 1 by vegans around the world. The day was created in 1994 by Louise Ellis, then President and Chairman of the Vegan Society of Britain, to celebrate 50 years of existence, and also 70 years for the existence of the term "veganism".

Every day, more and more people around the world become vegans for reasons of morality, environment, health or all the reasons together.

On this day there are festivals and exhibitions around the world organized by vegans. There are also events such as vegan food stands, lectures and demonstrations.

Veganism is a term coined by Donald Watson in 1951. The reason for choosing naturalism is the ideology of protecting the rights of animals to live a good life without suffering and preserving the environment.

Veganism is a lifestyle of avoiding consumption of products that come from animals:

Avoiding food from the animal world: meat, eggs, milk and bees honey. 

Avoiding the use of products made of animal skins (including fur, wool and feathers) for clothing, footwear, textiles and furniture. Avoiding the use of products whose manufacturing process caused animal suffering like silk threads. Many of the vegans also object to the exploitation of animals for other purposes (such as transportation, circus entertainment) that directly or indirectly cause damage and even suffering to live and use products that have been tested on animals and caused them great harm. Unfortunately, there is almost no product category in the world whose manufacturing process has not caused animal suffering, and it is difficult to find products that will be clean from it. 

How to celebrate World Vegan Day?

Open your ears and heart and listen, learn about the subject without fear.

Listen to one of the most famouse lecture in the world: Best Speech You Will Ever Hear - Gary Yourofsky:

  

Go to a vegan restaurant.

Go to a vegan event

Make a clean day, a day when you will not eat animals: no meat, no milk, no fish and no eggs.

Wear a Go Vegan shirt.

Go Vegan.

 November 1 is also Day of the Dead and Go Cook For Your Pets Day

National Mac and Cheese Day- July 14th

 How much we love food days, especially food days that contain macaroni and cheese 😊.

Macaroni and cheese, or "Mac & Cheese", is a dish that contains cooked macaroni and cheese sauce, usually cheddar cheese. The dish can contain additional ingredients like meat, vegetables and bread crumbs but the necessary ingredient is the cheese sauce.

Originally, the macaroni and cheese were prepared as an oven-baked pastry. But you can also cook or get the Mac & Cheese as a packaged dish, fry in a pan or heat in a saucepan.

The sauce that accompanies the macaroni is the Mornay Sauce (French: Sauce Mornay), which is a  béchamel sauce in which shredded or grated cheese is added. Add salt and spices such as black pepper and nutmeg to the sauce.

Mac & Cheese is considered in the United States and Canada as a comfort food, a food that usually contains a high amount of carbohydrates and fats that are eaten to encourage mentally.

The history of the Mac and Cheese

As early as the 14th century there is a record of pasta dishes with cheese in the Italian cookbook, Liber de Coquina, where a dish of pasta and parmesan was presented. In the Middle Ages, a dish of fresh, hand-cut pasta appeared that was incorporated into a mixture of melted butter and cheese in the English cookbook The Forme of Cury.

The first modern recipe for macaroni and cheese is included in Elizabeth Raffald book from 1770, The Experienced English Housekeeper. Raffald's recipe is for Béchamel sauce with cheddar cheese - a French-cooked Mornay sauce - mixed with macaroni, with scattered parmesan baked until bubbling and golden.

The Experienced English Housekeeper

Macaroni and cheese became a popular dish in Britain during the 1920s in both fast food and upscale restaurants.

In the United States, President Thomas Jefferson and his slave chef, James Hemings, met macaroni and cheese in Paris and returned with the recipe to Monticello, Jefferson's mansion. Jefferson was so fond of the pasta with the cheese, that he made detailed notes on the preparation process. In 1793 he asked the US Ambassador to France William Short to buy him a pasta machine but apparently the machine did not fit, as he later imported both macaroni and Parmesan cheese to Monticello. In 1802 Jefferson served "macaroni pie" at a state dinner Since then, baked macaroni and cheese have become a popular dish in the US among the upper class.

In the mid-1980s, Western U.S. cookbooks included recipes for macaroni and cheese dishes. Factory production of the main ingredients made the dish affordable, and the recipes made it accessible. But as mac and cheese became a popular dish in popular cuisine, it lost the attraction of the upper class.

Mac & cheese came to Canada by British immigrants who came from other parts of the British Empire. Mac and cheeses are very popular in contemporary Canada. The most popular brand of macaroni and cheese packages is Kraft Dinner. Mac & Cheese is seen as the national dish of Canada, before Poutine (a dish of potatoes, cheese and sauce found in Quebec). It is said that Canadians eat more mac and cheese than anywhere else in the world.

How to celebrate Mac & Cheese Day?

Of course the way to celebrate Mac & Cheese is to eat a good meal of macaroni with cheese. You can make your own recipe from home or make it from a package.

A pack of Mac & Cheese - just warm and serve! (source)

If you're vegan, no problem - there's also a pack of vegan Mac & Cheese on the iHerb website that Vegans recommend at.

Vegan Mac & Cheese (link)

July 14 is also SpongeBob's Birthday

Jack Fruit Day - July 4th

The jack fruit is a species of tree from the mulberry family, which grows in tropical lowlands in South and Southeast Asia.

Jackfruit fruit is an excellent substitute for meat, both because of the taste and because it contains a large amount of protein and is rich in nutritional values such as vitamin A, beta carotene, vitamin C, lutein, vitamins from the B vitamin group and dietary fiber. Jackfruit also contains lycopene about 70 times that of tomatoes and beta carotene 10 times that of carrots.

The roots of the Jack Prut tree are also attributed many medicinal properties such as asthma treatment, diarrhea and more.

Jack Fruit Day was created by Jackfruitday.com to raise awareness for the existence of this fruit, which is a superfood - both because of its nutritional values and because of the help it provides to the planet by being able to replace meat.

Jack fruit is considered the national fruit of Bangladesh. The fruits of the Jack Fruit are huge and the weight of a single fruit can reach 35 kg and even more. The Jack fruit tree likes a hot and humid climate and is very tough - it can produce 250 fruits! Each fruit has up to 500 seeds so if You have fresh fruit jack fruit, you have real treasure in hand.

The fruit of the jackfruit is peeled

The fruit of the jackfruit is pruned on the tree

The reason that July 4 is Jack Fruit Day is that this date is also US Independence Day, a day when many Americans tend to have a barbecue and as a correction this is also a meat-free day and Jack fruit is a great substitute for meat! Vegetable burgers, patties, chunks of stir-fry in a tortilla or bun, etc. It is suitable for both savory and sweet recipes.