If you are a Federal government employee, you can support The Vegetarian Resource Group through the Combined Federal Campaign (CFC). Look for us under Health & Medical Research Charities of America.

New for 2018 COMBINED FEDERAL CAMPAIGN (CFC)
Retired military service members AND retired federal employees can now support our work through contributions from their pensions. This is a brand new program, so help spread the word. Go to cfcgiving.opm.gov to sign up.

Please also remember The Vegetarian Resource Group in other workplace fund drives, matching gifts, etc. See http://www.vrg.org/support.htm for other ways you can donate to VRG.

Thanks so much for your support!

I happened to be passing near my ancestral home and found a great brand new vegan restaurant in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, called Umami Gorilla. It opened this month and the mother and son owners were as friendly and interesting as could be. The food was fantastic and so was the dessert (chocolate cake). The restaurant is 100% Vegan and it’s at 811 Scott St. in Wilkes-Barre, PA. Their website is https://www.facebook.com/Umamigorilla/
-Jerry S, PA

If in Northeastern Pennsylvania, you may also want to visit Eden up the road from WB in Scranton, PA. See: https://www.facebook.com/edenavegancafe

For information about other vegetarian and vegan restaurants, see:
VRG Online Veggie Restaurant Guide

We recently tasted Barukas, nuts grown in South America. They have a unique look and taste fantastic! They are grown on Baruzerio trees in the wild in Brazil. The goal of the company selling these nuts is to make the trees valuable thus reducing deforestation for cattle ranching. It will allow indigenous people to make a sustainable living off the land.

You can order these nuts online here:
https://barukas.com/products/baruka-nuts

Recent discussion topics include:
What will you hand out for the trick-or-treaters this year and how will you handle the non-vegan candy your children get in their Halloween buckets?
Vegan Halloween events in New Jersey and Maryland
Are there any vegan educators & school teachers here?
How do you empower your child to embrace the vegan lifestyle?
Plus more!

VRG’s Parents and Kids Facebook Group is intended to be a group that offers support for families raising children on vegan diets and for vegan kids. We envision it as a place to get advice about a wide-variety of topics: pregnancy, birthday parties, school lunches, Halloween, non-leather apparel, cruelty-free products, summer camps, and more. Please use it as a place to share your wisdom, seek advice, or just find a sympathetic ear. The goal is to offer support.

Consequently, any profane, defamatory, offensive, or violent language will be removed. Feel free to disagree, but do so respectfully. Hateful or discriminatory comments regarding race, ethnicity, religion, gender, disability, sexual orientation, or political beliefs will not be tolerated. We expect that posts should relate to vegan diets and lifestyles. The Vegetarian Resource Group reserves the right to monitor all content and ban any user who posts in violation of the above rules, any law or regulation, SPAM, or anything otherwise off topic.

Please share this information with any veggie families that you know! Thanks.

Earls restaurant chain in Canada and the USA lists these items as vegan:

Vegan Field Greens Salad: grape tomatoes, cucumber, toasted pumpkin seeds, champagne shallot vinaigrette

Vegan Hunan Kung Pao: Ginger soy sauce, wok fried vegetables, rice and peanuts.

Vegan Roll with avocado, yam, mango, cucumber, sriracha

Vegan Korean Bibimbap: Hot stone rice bowl, sesame chili sauce, with carrots, mushrooms and zucchini

Vegan Quinoa + Avocado Powerbowl: Roasted squash, beets, toasted pumpkin seeds, crispy chickpeas

Note that for several items they said there can be cross contamination from fryer or from supplier.

See: https://storage.googleapis.com/earls-public/earls.ca/nutritional_info/Earls-Nutrition-info.pdf

For locations: https://earls.ca/locations

Because the standard deduction has been raised to $12,000 for
individuals and $24,000 for married couples filing jointly, some people
may lose the advantage of deducting charitable donations, since their
itemized deductions won’t exceed those amounts.

So for donors who are over 70 1/2 years old, they may want to use the
charitable IRA rollover. The charitable IRA rollover is a distribution
from an individual retirement account directly to a charity. The
distribution from the plan administrator directly to the charity counts
toward the donor’s required minimum distribution for the year, but the
charitable donation is not included in the donor’s adjusted gross
income.

Others may use a donor-advised fund. Donor-advised funds (DAFs) are
accounts where the donors can advise on where and when to distribute
funds. Donors claim the charitable deduction in the year the money is
transferred to the DAF even though the funds have not been given
to the final specific charities. This allows donors to consolidate several
years of charitable gifts into one year for their income tax returns.
For example, married donors who usually give $3,000 per year to their
favorite charitable organization can create a Donor-Advised fund,
deposit $21,000 in it for a current year tax deduction, and then
distribute $3,000 per year as annual gifts in future years. For example,
here is information about a few Donor Advised Funds.
https://www.fidelitycharitable.org/philanthropy/what-is-a-donor-advised-fund.shtml
https://www.schwabcharitable.org/public/charitable/donor_advised_funds
http://programforgiving.org/charitable/pages/home.jsp

This is not legal or tax advice. You should speak to your legal or tax
advisor.

Today is World Vegan Day. Enjoy!

Are you looking for some alternatives to Turkey this Thanksgiving? Fortunately, there are many options today.

Field Roast offers three choices:
1. Celebration Roast with Traditional Bread Stuffing and Gravy – made with fresh onions, celery, cranberries and butternut squash.
2. Hazelnut Cranberry Roast en Croute – a rich, hazelnut-infused grain meat stuffed with Field Roast sausages, crystallized ginger, cranberries and apples – wrapped in a savory puff pastry. It’s even Toaster Oven friendly!
3. Smokey Forager’s Roast – mushrooms, wild huckleberries, and rice stuffing wrapped in a rich smokey tomato grain meat seasoned with spices.
See: http://fieldroast.com/product-family/roasts-loaves/

Tofurky offers Tofurky Roast and Gravy. The Roast includes stuffing. They also have a Ham Style Roast. For details see: http://www.tofurky.com/what-we-make/holiday/feast/

Gardein sells a Savory Stuffed ‘Turkey,’ a Holiday Roast, and Turk’y Cutlet. For more information see: https://www.gardein.com/product-type/holiday/

Vegetarian Plus offers a Vegan Whole Turk’y with Gravy and Stuffing. They also have a Vegan Turkey Roll. For details see: http://vegetarian-plus.com/product/all-natural-vegan-whole-turkey/ and: http://vegetarian-plus.com/product/vegan-turkey-roll/

If you are attending Eat Well Stay Well 2018 in Columbia, Maryland, be sure to stop by The Vegetarian Resource Group and say hello.

Details on this event can be found here:
http://eatwell-staywell.com/event/eat-well-stay-well-2018-one-day-immersion/

According to CNN, China has been facing a potential soybean shortage after it put a new 25% tariff on importing them from the United States in July, as part of the trade war between the two countries.

China is the world’s biggest buyer of soybeans, using them as feed for livestock such as pigs and chickens. More than a third of its supply comes from the United States. According to CNN, solutions for less reliance on U.S. soybeans could mean halting all imports of United States soybeans. It seems this would fit into the vegan agenda in the United States of growing less food for animals and preserving more U.S. resources.

See: https://www.cnn.com/2018/10/24/economy/china-soybeans-trade-war/index.html