There’s a pot of beef stew on my stove right now. It smells delicious.

We did it!

(Specifically, Beth at Del. Jennifer McClellan’s office did it.)

Yesterday I called my delegate and spoke to her legislative aide. The aide took my concerns seriously and took up the cause right away. Within 24 hours, she called me back to report that she had spoken to several policy analysts and determined that, in fact, I am entitled to a provisional ballot on Election Day. I have her assurance that I will have no problems at the polls.

Hip hip hooray! I’m so excited I hardly even know what to say. But I do know I will be sending Beth a card as soon as I stop shaking with joy.

Apparently, there are new regulations concerning provisional ballots in Virginia, and SBE staff weren’t adequately trained on them. Because I spoke up, and because you all gave me the strength and courage to keep talking, SBE and other election staff will be taught the proper procedures for absentee ballots. We have saved at least one vote, and maybe hundreds.

So thank you, invisible friends (you know who you are), visible friends, and complete strangers. I hope you’ll all forgive me for going into retirement to enjoy my I VOTED sticker in peace.

Update!

Just a quick note to say thank you thank you thank you everyone for the signal boosts, the advice, and the kind words.

Special thanks to Drew, my invisible friends on the internet, and the awesome people at 866-OUR-VOTE. My original post was retweeted by my local NPR affiliate, which will help it to reach other people in Richmond who may also have been affected.

Though I don’t expect much in the way of progress on a weekend, every step, every tweet, every email, every Facebook post, counts. Team #lethervote lives on, not just for me, but for every person who’s ever been disenfranchised at the polls.

With any luck, the next time I post it’ll be to say that we’ve won.

Voting Rights

I apologize for going way, way off-topic on a food and cooking blog, but there’s been something going on the for last few days that I need to address in a longer form than a tweet, so here we go.

My rights as a voter in the Commonwealth of Virginia are being violated, and I won’t stand for it.

Over the summer, knowing that I was scheduled to attend a conference out of town on Election Day, I registered to vote absentee. My ballot came postmarked September 21st. By that point I had lost my job and would no longer be at that conference. I prefer to vote in person, and so I decided to mail my ballot back untouched, per instructions on the ballot, in order to vote at my precinct.

Look at Paragraph 1. If you can’t read it, here it is verbatim. All capitalization and emphasis in the original.

BEFORE VOTING: 1. IF YOU DECIDE NOT TO VOTE BY ABSENTEE BALLOT, do NOT open Envelope A [BALLOT WITHIN]. Return it unopened in the pre-addressed envelope to be received by the Secretary of the Electoral Board on or before election day. You will not be eligible to vote at your precinct polling place unless your unused ballot has been returned by election day.

I did this, exactly, one day last week. Another piece of paper (which I have since lost, or perhaps mailed back with the ballot), advised me to call to make sure my ballot was received. On Wednesday I called the Virginia State Board of Elections to do this. They told me to call my local board. For me, this is the Office of the General Registrar for the City of Richmond. I called this office Thursday and was told by two different staffers that because I had mailed my ballot back, I could no longer vote in person. It did not matter that my ballot was blank, because they would not be able to look at it until Election Day. Both of these women told me that I had lost my opportunity to vote. I ended that phone call shaking with rage.

On the advice of a friend, I contacted the Richmond Times-Dispatch and a lawyer with Organizing for America yesterday. (Neither of these has panned out yet.) I called my Congressman, Rep. Bobby Scott, whose office deferred to the State Board of Elections. I called the SBE again. This time I was told that while I had mailed my ballot back correctly, the only way I could vote was with that ballot, so I needed to “work with” the General Registrar. No advice was given on how to work with them. I was specifically and repeatedly denied access to a provisional ballot. I called the General Registrar and spoke to a Ms. Russell. I read her the instructions from the absentee ballot and was told I “misunderstood” them. Ms. Russell told me I would be able to vote, but the only way I could do so was by going to her office and voting in person. When I pointed out that this violates my right not to be forced into missing work to vote, she did not have an answer for me. I am currently waiting for a call from a Ms. Alice Calhoun at the General Registrar to sort this out further.

Here’s the thing. The information I received in writing from the SBE is one hundred percent correct. The information I received by phone from both the SBE and the General Registrar is false and in violation of the Code of Virginia. Period. End of story.

The Code of Virginia states the following with regard to absentee ballots (emphasis mine):

 If for any reason a person, who has applied for and received a ballot, decides not to vote absentee, he shall return the ballot unopened, in the sealed envelope in which it was sent to him, to the electoral board, on or before the day of the election in which the ballot was intended to be used.

The electoral board shall note on the absentee voter applicant list, opposite the name of the person returning the ballot, the fact that the ballot was returned unused and the date of the return. The electoral board shall carefully preserve all ballots returned unused and deliver them, together with other returned ballots, to the officers of election on election day. A voter who has returned his unused ballot as provided herein shall be entitled to cast a provisional ballot pursuant to § 24.2-653.1 in person on election day at his proper polling place or at a central absentee voter precinct established by the governing body of the county or city where the person is registered to vote. However, a voter who returns his unused ballot to his proper polling place or central absentee voter precinct on election day shall be entitled to vote a regular ballot, and his unused ballot shall be preserved with other unused ballots.

Source: http://leg1.state.va.us/cgi-bin/legp504.exe?000+cod+24.2-708

I am entitled to cast a provisional ballot at my usual and correct polling place on Tuesday, November 6. This is my one and only demand, and I will settle for nothing less. I call upon Representative Bobby Scott, US Senators Mark Warner and Jim Webb, Delegate Jennifer McClellan, and State Senator Don McEachin to support me in this endeavor, and for the State Board of Elections and the Richmond General Registrar to allow me my provisional ballot.

I will continue to reach out to local and national media to bring attention to this egregious error. I need to emphasize that I DO NOT want to do this. I like my own little dark quiet corner of the world and I want nothing more than to hang out with my friends, watch my nephews grow up, become a social worker, and nurture a lovely new relationship that’s just come into my life. But I will not let my voting rights be cast aside. I’m the daughter and great-granddaughter of immigrants. My family have always been fighters. And now, I am too.

Some of my friends have begun a Twitter campaign to get some national attention. Follow us at #lethervote. And Maddow, if you’re listening? Call me.

(PS: To get ahold of me, tweet me @bugpaste. Or email that handle at gmail dot com.)

Graham crackers and Nutella

 

(The graham crackers are homemade; the Nutella is not.)

Fried Okra

The other day my roommate and I went to the farmer’s market, where 5 oz of okra was part of my farm share. I’ve never had okra before, to my knowledge, but my roommate is from Tennessee and waxed poetic about fried okra. So, with plenty of time on my hands, I decided to try it.

I was very pleasantly surprised by the taste and texture. With my eyes closed it could have been fried zucchini. (My roommate just came home, tasted one, and said, “Good job.” High praise from someone who’s been eating her mama’s recipe her whole life.)

I used this recipe from Allrecipes, and I would definitely do it again. My one complaint is that there was more than half the cornmeal mix left over once all the veggies were in the skillet. Next time I’ll throw in some other vegetables for good measure.

 The okra, just begging to be eaten.

Since there was so much leftover batter, I made what my mom calls pancakes but are secretly fritters. When I was a kid, my oldest sister was a vegetarian for several years. She loved my mom’s chicken schnitzel but couldn’t eat it. So my mom would take leftover batter and cook it up with the chicken. Pancakes! Basically all I did was take the cornmeal (there was maybe 3/5ths of a cup), add a beaten egg and a couple tablespoons milk, and fry in the leftover oil.

 Eat me.

Everything came out delicious, but it doesn’t take much to realize these are gut bombs, and therefore, sometimes foods. I look forward to the next sometimes.

Life got in the way

I meant to write all about last week’s dinner party and the wonderful things I made. However, I lost my job very suddenly Friday afternoon and I’ve been focusing on that instead. I will say this: the pop-tarts were fantastic.

Since I have the time, I’ve been doing a fair bit of cooking this week. Last night I made my first attempt at eggplant Parmesan. For all that I don’t much care for eggplant, it was pretty good! Later I will made some fried okra and decimate the house’s insane basil crop with pesto. I also have some winter squash to use up – perhaps I will stuff them with barley and other assorted goodies. But first priority right now is finding an income source. Argh.

Catching up

I’ve been so bad about posting. I’ve also been bad about cooking, so I guess it makes sense. Last week I went on a much-anticipated and much-needed vacation to California, so I could visit family and watch two very close friends get married. While I was there, I got some impromptu cooking lessons from my friend Maddy, who is trying to start her own catering company. (San Francisco Bay Area readers, take note, and find her at The Barbarian Gourmet.) Her task for the wedding was to make all the food for the bachelorette party, which took the two of us a couple of days, in between all the other wedding-related tasks. But we did it, and I still dream of her Israeli couscous salad.

Also while I was out there, I visited my cousin and her (very) soon-to-be husband. They own a beautiful 3/4-acre lot filled to the brim with over 200 trees and vines. Very nearly our entire dinner came from their garden. I really enjoyed talking with both of them about growing seasons and living sustainably. While most of their plans are far, far out of my reach, I’m definitely more motivated to start a garden than ever before.

This Friday, I’m having the first of what I hope will be monthly dinner parties. The theme is breakfast and I’ll be prepping for it all week. My hope is to post on everything I make, either as they come out or next weekend. So keep an eye out for

• Challah (and Challah French toast)
• Yogurt
• Cottage cheese
• Pop Tarts (really!)
• Crustless quiche
• Hashbrown waffles
• Potato-leek soup (not for the party, but because I got a lot of potatoes and leeks in my CSA box this week)
• Black bean cakes (need something protein-filled to go with the soup)

Tomato Pie

Tomorrow I’m going to an outdoor play with a bunch of people, and even though it wasn’t strictly necessary to bring a meal to share, I decided I would anyway. Coincidentally I had a lot of tomatoes to use up. I queried my social networks and ended up getting talked into tomato pie.

Now, I am not a Southerner. Tomato pie is a distinctly Southern food that I’ve never even eaten, let alone thought about making. But it looked easy, so I decided to go for it. Looking at the mayonnaise content, though, nearly gave me a heart attack. Luckily, my CSA recently posted a recipe for homemade mayo that made me feel better about slathering a pie in 3/4 cup of it.

So the first step was making the mayo.

You need: eggs, a lemon, canola oil, olive oil, salt, and mustard.

The eggs, lemon juice, mustard, and salt went into my trusty stick blender.

After mixing in the oil, I poured it into a jar, and this is the final product. It’s delicious and rich. Like store mayo but ten times better. I find the consistency a little thin, but that can be improved with more oil, and probably with extended refrigeration.

Important tips: the eggs are raw. There’s no way around that. If you’re not keen on eating raw eggs, you shouldn’t use this recipe. But you can avoid getting sick if you use safe eggs (know your source), keep it in the fridge, and don’t use it in recipes that will be left out all day. Once you’ve made it, use it inside of a week.

Even though about half this batch went into the pie, there’s a bunch left. I foresee many sandwiches this week.

Next, it was onto the pie.

(Yes, it’s a pre-fab pie crust. Shh.)

In the crust: a whole yellow onion, chopped; a jalapeno, chopped, for a little kick; 6 or 7 roughly chopped and seeded tomatoes.

Topped with 3/4 cup mayo mixed with 1/3rd cup Parmesan and a little more than that in mozzarella.

And 35ish minutes later…

Can’t wait to cut this up tomorrow!

Link

Zucchini crust pizza

Sorry for the lack of pictures – I was more focused on getting dinner on the table/in my belly than being artsy.

Seriously good pizza. It stuck to the pan quite a bit, so next time I’m definitely going to use parchment paper. And I will be making this again. The crust came out light and crispy, and the zucchini was undetectable. (I like zucchini, but if you’re making this for someone who doesn’t, now you know.) A friend of mine wants to turn this recipe into breadsticks, which I think is a brilliant idea.

Next time you have a ton of summer squash to get rid of, try this!