I’ve gone the semi-vegetarian route for this recipe…while I don’t fathom 100% giving up red meat, or any meat, for that matter, this recipe really does tempt me! Today we have a two-egg omelet served over Oz’s Beanilicious and garnished with cilantro along with Sriracha (Thai hot sauce). You could do this for breakfast…lunch…or dinner! For this, all you need is:

Oz’s Beanilicious
2 medium cloves garlic, chopped
1 can black beans, rinsed & drained
handful cilantro
1 tsp. olive oil
1-2 tsp. ground pepper, to taste
1 tsp. salt
2 “laps” of Sriracha
juice of 1-2 limes, to taste

2 eggs
1/2 cup soy milk
handful cilantro
3 mushrooms, diced
4 slices Smart Bacon, diced
2 slices Soy Cheese, diced
1 scallion, chopped
1 roma tomato, diced

To do the Beanilicious, take your beans, herd ‘em into a food processor, hit it with the garlic, salt and lime juice. While the beans are being processed, pour in the olive oil and add the cilantro. Taste the mixture–you should be able to taste a hint of everything–sometimes it may be a bit thick, in this case, add some lime water (literally, water and lime juice)–in 1/4 cup increments until a smooth consistency develops. Then, run the Sriracha 2 “laps” around the processor, and push that lever one more time. Beanilicious!

For the huevos, get out your favorite knife (I have a 9″santoku that I use for pretty much everything) and hit the mushrooms, Smart Bacon, Soy Cheese, scallion & tomato, set aside. A tip for dicing tomatoes–cut off the tip, and squeeze out the pulp–this will enable you to chop through the tomato without having it go all over your chopping board/counter. Heat up a griddle or frying pan, get everybody except the “cheese” and cilantro in and sauté 2-3 minutes.
Meanwhile, crack open the eggs, whisk with a fork in a bowl; add soy milk to fluff up the mixture (works just as good as real milk!). Add to the pan & season with salt/pepper to taste. You can even throw in some adobo if you like!

Once the eggs have firmed up, flip ‘er over and add the “cheese” on one half; fold. I cheat a little bit–instead of risking making a big mess and trying to act all Food Network-y by flipping an omelet, I halve the omelet and gently turn it over before adding the “cheese” and folding it :)

Plating: Pour some of that yummy Beanilicious , set up the omelet however you like atop the beans, garnish with cilantro and Sriracha, some cracked pepper…buen provecho!

challenge. the word itself makes me think of obstacles, barriers, mountains, literal or figurative. i perceive challenges as a means to self-actualization through introspection. challenges force you to take a look inwards and realize the possibilities within yourself. are you up to the task? are you too ensconced within the friendly confines of security and your familiar environment? the realization of challenges can make you feel ALIVE or weary. accepting challenges can be thrilling…or defeating.

i look at challenges in a way that they do not defeat me. they make me stronger, and each challenge i endure physically, mentally, socially or spiritually brings out a newer self within me, one that i take time to reacquaint with each layer of my soul that is peeled, much in the same way you turn pages within a book, each page brings a newer concept, a step further along on the path…

“Planetwalker” is the story of a man–john francis–who went through the first quarter of his life like many of us, surrounded in the miasma of the world that we call life. on a day in the early ’70s he learns of a massive oil spill in tomales bay, california. this spill and its impact on the surrounding natural environment brings john to the realization that something must be done. shortly thereafter, he decides to stop using motorized transportation completely and rely on walking.

walking is something that is natural for most of us–something that we likely take for granted everyday, especially in an increasingly fast-paced world rife with demands of all sorts. we do not often take time out of our lives, or our days to just be in the moment, to think, to observe the environment around us, and to just…be.

in “Planetwalker” john tells readers about a pilgrimage he took, all on foot–and in silence. john francis walked from california to oregon and back, then from california…to new jersey. on foot, and in complete silence, championing a personal cause for the environment. he decided to suspend two day-to-day conveniences, motorized vehicles and his speech, instead using mime, gestures, written communication, and sign language to communicate with the world around him. it is a pilgrimage that he embarks on, not using motorized transportation for 22 years, and for 17 of those 22 years, he is silent. he also earns a b.a., m.a. and ph.d all the while in silence. there also is mention of gallaudet, and john’s pilgrimage bringing him to kendall green around the time of the 1988 deaf president now movement.

“Planetwalker” shows us that through silence, we notice more. we observe more. we learn more. about ourselves, about people around us, about the environment we find ourselves within. even more poignant is the fact that john walked for 22 years. he gave himself the time to cover a nation on foot, in silence, taking in his own experiences in his own way, for his own belief.

he sparked a national following through the media, various communities that he reached, spent time with, and moved past on his pilgrimage. after 22 years, the pilgrimage continues on a consistently expanding scale, covering north and south america, the caribbean, with goals to continue until it becomes global.

there is much more within the book that i do not want to deprive prospective readers the pleasure of discovering. the book has made me take a look at myself, my life, my environment, and it has made me think: is there a cause, a belief, a raison d’etre–out there, that would drive me to pursue a similar pilgrimage to john’s?

Planetwalk is also a non-profit organization established in 1982, to increase the awareness of our natural resources, mankind’s commercial exploitation of those natural resources–take a look at the site for more information.

the final version of the book will be published by national geographic and released to the public in april 2008.

challenges–for me, since i am deaf, i already live in a silent world. i wonder, could i take on the challenge of not signing? relying instead on gestures, written communication, to connect with the community around me? that would be a challenge, to say the least.

“Planetwalker” has definitely gotten me to stop and think…it shows me that one man, one person, one being, CAN make a difference in the world, one step at a time.

would you be up to the challenge?

Last week was a week of sorts. For one, 6 March marked the five-year anniversary of the passing of my father at just 74 years of age. I was rummaging through some odds and ends in an attempt to mimic absentminded cleaning–I’m sure y’all can relate to moments like that.

So, below are two short stories that I put together some time ago when I was thinking of him:

Dad’s Bag

He carried in his weathered hands supported by lithe, tanned arms speckled with an array of earned scars, bags that were too small to be called bags, too big to be knapsacks, but nevertheless I call them bags for lack of another word.

These bags were the same size as a gentleman’s shaving kit, although encased in the finest, softest leather–perhaps from an Argentinean Brahma that had given its side skin to produce such a bag of creamy texture.

These bags my father carried with the style of a gentleman and the substance of an officer; they had a leathery strap attached to one side, producing a loop through which one could slide his forearm.

Along the top line, railroad tracks meshed, interlocked and only unlocking with the clicking feel of a zipper as a fastener or a looser.

On the port side, there rested two pouches, big enough for a wallet or a pack of Camels; the pouches sighed with exhausted airs each time my father’s thin, cappuccino toned fingers freed their clasps to retrieve a possession.

The two pouches had identical fasteners, their buttontops blending almost imperceptibly, save for their glossy finishes, into the dark hues of the Argentinean Brahma.

The starboard side featured a cragged and oblong verse of intertwined teeth that opened at the pull of a worn zipper whose finer days had shown deep and rich luster amidst a proud shine.

In this pouch, he kept his keys, tablets and sunglasses.

He carried his bag atop his sinewy and muscular forearms, in the style that befit a gentleman, with the substance of a former United States Navy enlisted man.

Dinnertime

Father always came to the kitchen for dinner on his own time. He would park his slim 5′10 frame in the master bedroom after work, freshening up with a shave and his usual dollop of Aramis.

Every time I see or smell Aramis, its unique endearing odor compels me to think of a rolling prairie meadow that lets the wind rustle the long grasses in the waning hours of summer days, coupled with bold arboreal fragrances and laundry detergent; a lingering thought always remains in my mind.

He would sit in front of the mirror, call back to his wife of 20 years, and with a furtive “I’ll be there” in the middle of stretching his chin upwards, shaving off the remnants of Gillette Shaving Cream with his double-insert razor.

Daddy would wink at my reflection in the mirror and tell me to go help my mother get the table set. His olive skin looked radiant on this particular summer evening–I left as he was daubing that Aramis on his cheeks with his slender hands.

Mama and I would sit at the table, all the aromas of her cooking wafting through the air and into my nose–she would sigh with exasperation and eye the wall-mounted grandfather clock, its long hands watching over the pendulum that marked each passing second, bringing the spindly hands closer to the next Roman Numeral.

Just when Mama was about to throw in the towel and tell me to start eating, I would see Daddy come down the hallway, through the kitchen doorway, across the living room and its arch, to the hallway that led to our bedrooms.

I would say, “Daddy’s coming!” and Father would disappear just briefly as he crossed the space on the other side of the living room wall, and reappear with a comically amazed look on his face, begetting childish laughter that left my lips, announcing his arrival, taking in the sights and smells of Mama’s daily feast.

He would come down and sit in his usual space, off to my right, with Mama directly across from him, at my left, and say:

“Wow, what a meal! Let’s see how it tastes!”

—-All in his own time.

Dad–thank you for those memories, for being there, and for being the best father you could be. See you one of these days–I know you’re enjoying the all-you-can-eat Italian buffet laid out up there! Save me a couple pieces of antipasti!

One afternoon my wife Tamara and I were watching the Food Network on TV and we came across an episode of Bobby Flay’s “Throwdown“, where the chef will challenge randomly selected cooks/bakers. Bobby will take on an imitation of the challenger’s signature dish, and both dishes are tested by judges whose tongues will decide the victor of the day.

This afternoon’s episode was a donut episode, with Bobby taking on a donut-maker in New York City.

Naturally, this sparked a debate between Tamara and I—on whose donuts in our area reign supreme: those from the bakery of Shopper’s Food Warehouse (SFW), Krispy Kreme (KK) or Dunkin’ Donuts (DD).

It’s no secret that Tamara has a sweet tooth—I’d be inclined to say she has a full mouth of sweet teeth rather than just the one! I grew up with Dunkin’ Donuts—I have vivid memories of their Munchkins in the early mornings before school, or a yummy powdered Bavarian Kreme—whatever the mood called for!

Tamara maintained that SFW had the best donuts, with me picking DD. So, we decided to collect specimens and do a taste test to determine whose donuts reign supreme!

We included Krispy Kreme because, well, you can’t have a Donut War and just ignore KK. It’d be like Star Wars without Darth Vader.

The contestants were a glazed, a crème-filled, and a double-chocolate donut from each store. The Mrs. and I agreed on criteria:

Presentation, texture/consistency, taste, and size. Naturally we also factored in another variable—cost.

However—this Donut War was more about the taste, so we agreed to cleanse our palates (and minds) of any bias and sample with equal discrimination.

Battle 1: The Field of Chocolate Donut with Glaze

We sank our teeth into SFW’s donut, followed by KK and then DD. To our surprise, KK stole the show. The SFW and DD samples were too dry while KK was just right—good consistency and a light, fluffy texture filled with the warm comfort of CHOCOLATE!

Battle 2: Regular Glaze Attack

Next up were the samples of regular glazed donuts…Once again, KK took top billing with the right touch of glaze vs. donut and leaving me with a darn-it-why-didn’t-i-get-more-of-this-stuff feeling. To my chagrin, my lifelong satisfaction of a DD donut was quietly shelved without any fanfare. For Tamara, SFW topped out because of its size—they make their Colossal Glazed Donut (enough said!) in a way that it towers over the other donuts on our plate. Think of a 777 jumbo jet pulling up next to a VW Beetle.

Battle 3: Crème de la Crème!

Because I love crème-filled donuts, I added this element to the War. SFW topped out with their Bavarian Kreme which had just the perfect balance of harmony between the crème itself and the donut. The donut itself had plenty of powdered sugar which offset the moist taste of the crème—try putting a spoonful of powdered sugar in your mouth, and you’ll appreciate a moist touch to help it go down! DD saved some face by beating KK out for 2nd place in this battle. While KK may have won the first two battles, they need to work on their fillings. The glaze, frosting and crème didn’t really mix too well for me—too many flavors overwhelmed it. On top of that, KK doesn’t carry a Bavarian Kreme, so I had to settle for a chocolate frosted, custard-filled sample.

Overall, Tamara and I were blindsided by the entry of KK into our donut-debate. We both suffered the brutal reality of our memories in our respective donuterias being slashed by KK! However, Tamara noted that if KK does it the SFW way, they’ll really up their business by increasing the size of their donut. Free advice for the head honchos at KK—don’t forget us when it’s time to do bonus payouts!

Cost-wise, SFW goes at 98 cents, with KK at 89 and we forgot to check DD, so we leave it to you to be your own judge.

After all, taste is what counts, right?

“Wars begin where you will but they do not end where you please.” A quote by Machiavelli–it’s at the end of the movie “Home of the Brave” about Iraq veterans who try to cope with life after a tour of duty.

The war our country has found itself embroiled in a world away has had devastating effects—not only felt on the far confines of that world far away. The ripples of war have also hit home here, in the hearts, minds and souls of our soldiers that come home and try to make sense of a “normal” and “routine” life.

Things like getting up to go to work, getting dressed, talking about your family, friends, work experiences…going to the grocery store, watching a movie, taking a nap—all of these things tie to a semblance of routine, everyday life. This is the life that most of us civilians know.

One can only imagine what a soldier who has grown up in our society sees once they set foot on that dusty desert floor in Iraq. One can only imagine what a soldier sees when their convoy gets hit by a roadside bomb that’s set off by a kid they just saw passing by. One can only imagine the feeling of seeing a lifelong friend lose a life, from bullets fired by insurgents, hell-bent on their individual maxim of freedom. There are so many more scenarios that a civilian mind could not even begin to fathom—and our soldiers have to live through the brutal reality of these unfathomable experiences.

It becomes harder to understand why we send these soldiers to a faraway world, especially when our leaders appear to be the ones nestled safely in their offices, behind bunkers and a plethora of security. They espouse “accurate” reports on intelligence, on strategy, on an end goal. Our politicians speak of missions, a plan, a vision for the betterment of the world we live in. How, then, is it feasible for a reasonable person to submit another individual to such experiences, such horrors in the name of ideals?

These soldiers, more often than not, come back changed people. The upstanding young man next door, the kid that wants to get away from a life of crime enlists, the daughter of a hard-working family feels it is her patriotic duty to serve her country…they come back to their families with a sense of wanting to belong. Does war better prepare them for life outsize the hot zone?

Or, does war unleash the primal animal that nestles deep within our psyches? Does war bring out the real souls within our bodies?

It is a sad day when a civilian tries to make sense of a war that, with an increasing amount of daily news shows that our country was misguided and led into a war that it had no place joining to begin with.

Who takes care of the soldiers, then? Who truly recognizes what they have gone through to protect our daily way of life? Who stops and says “thank you” not to act as if they understand what the soldier went through, but to simply appreciate their monumental sacrifice?

The soldiers of our armed forces volunteered. They enlisted—they left the safe confines of the world they knew, to go to another world and try to pass on ideals of a free country.

Who thanks them? A government that seems to uncover more errors as it tries to make sense of itself? It hardly seems the right way to thank our soldiers.

Take a moment—forget about politics, forget about our government…to think of those soldiers who are fighting to preserve the ideals that this country was founded upon.

They’re paying the ultimate price.

I recently came across an interesting situation at the Bank of America ATM the other day. I had already requested the amount of money for withdrawal, and my hand was at the ready, right under the cash dispensing slot, awaiting the friendly and welcoming feel of Mr. Andrew Jackson and his quintuplets. After receiving said bills and sighing in relief, I also noticed something else in my hand…My brows furred as my eyes fell upon a foreign object that should NOT have come out of the cash dispensing slot…a Chevy Chase ATM/checkcard, in the name of one Ernesto WhoseLastNameIHaveForgotten. I looked over my shoulder, around me, up and down…half expecting Ashton to jump out and say Spend, Spend, Spend (rather than Punk’d!)

It boiled down to this: What do I do with Ernesto’s checkcard? Read on.

The timeless question is often posited…what came first, the chicken or the egg? While the answer may invoke an age-old battle between Darwinism and Creationism, it has an indirect link to another question that has been debated since Aristotlean times (or further back): What is the essence of our actions, its driving force, and what are the implications of their repercussions? Does an infinitesimal amount of rights justify the action of a single, solitary…wrong?

It’s never been more evident than these current times in where rights and wrongs are portrayed within our media…perhaps more so on the latter, for that stirs up drama, debauchery, or the simple pleasure of saying: “AHA! GOTCHA! YOU’RE NO BETTER!” and glorifying in the toppling of a seemingly ne’er-do-wrong icon.

Case in point: Sports, and Bill Belichick, the coach of the New England Patriots. This season for the Patriots (pun intended) has begun flirting with history. No NFL team, since the ’70s has gotten through a season undefeated, and the Pats are making headway since their biggest challenger (the Indianapolis Colts and one P. Manning) fell at their feet. The Pats stand tall at 9-0, seven games away from matching the Dolphins’ 16-0…with the odds in their favor in the remaining weeks.

In the face of historic sports moments, another one is constantly surrounded by shadows: One Mr. Barry Bonds. This man has shattered a baseball milestone–the home run record held by Hank Aaron (755 career homers), hitting the 756th and continuing to extend the record until the Giants went home in September…questions loom about whether or not 755, or perhaps 762 (Mr. Bond’s grand total) of those baseballs were belted out of ballparks behind juiced up arms, begging for the insert of a monolithic *.

It seems that we are running out of professional sports in which our supposed role models are depending on the “X Factor” to either help them perform better or deal with the pressures of stardom. Bicycling’s Floyd Landis, tennis’ Martina Hingis, basketball’s The NBA Referee Scandal of 2006, the list goes on…

All of these incidents involve a deeper sense of right vs. wrong. Belichick’s moment when his hand was caught in the cookie jar as investigations unveiled stolen signs off “illegal” tapes probably was the crowning moment for this writer. How pervasive is the need to perform at your best? How far does one need to go to attain that sense of satisfaction, knowing that one has reached the apex of success and left their mark? Where is the challenge of it all if success is attained through illicit means? We all have our answers–this writer questions the motive behind those decisions of our media-plucked role models. Do they not realize that their actions reflect on their organization, families, and more importantly–themselves?

Perhaps they do, and they don’t care. Perhaps they feel safe in the confines of fame-as-buffer. Untouchable. Laws, rules, constraints, boundaries do not apply to them because they.are.f-a-m-o-u-s and self-proven.

Or, they feel they cannot perform without the aid of something. Take your pick.

Life sure looks good when you have an edge, doesn’t it?

After all, despite the brouhaha, Belichick is 9-0.

Think about it.

And, I passed the checkcard on to my wife for her happy use. No, really. Yes.

Ok, she’s a Chevy Chase bank member too and has returned the card to a Chevy Chase bank. So, Ernesto WhoseLastNameIHaveForgotten, if you’re reading this, I SWEAR that I have nothing to do with all those Las Vegas charges. Really.

I was trying to figure out what to do for lunch, so I looked around my fridge to see what I had to work with. I knew I was in the mood for something Frenchy, thanks to the Food 911 episode I just saw with Tyler Florence, courtesy of the Food Network. He helped an on-screen viewer re-create her girls-week-out trip to Paris with a yummy mussels & frites dish…so, I decided to do a twist on the classic Niçoise salad, which has tuna, hard-boiled eggs and vegetables within a bed of greens. Hence, Saladé Oscar!

There’s three parts to this salad: Pasta, Tuna and Plating!

And, naturally, the ingredients:

Cayenne pepper: a pinch
½ head of garlic
Mayonnaise: two liberal tablespoons
Mozzarella cheese: a handful
Horseradish: one teaspoon
Elbow macaroni: 1.5 cup
Baby spinach & red leaves: a handful
Cilantro: a pinch (fresh is better, but dried will do too)
Tomato: one, quartered
Eggs: two large, hard-boiled & sliced
Sour cream: two dollops (a bit more than liberal tablespoons!)
White vinegar: ¼ cup
Lemon juice: ½ a lemon
Tuna: one can

(click on the photo for a larger and better image–I’m not a digital photographer by trade, so you’ll have to excuse the quality!)

1: Pasta & dressing

Boil according to the box instructions or experience (you can use leftovers too)

Boil eggs—for large ones, approximately 12-15 minutes. Cool over cold tap water, de-shell and slice.

Split a ½ head of garlic with your knife across the middle (you should see the garlic on both sides of your knife)

Place the ½ head in foil, with the lemon juice and a pinch of cayenne pepper. Roast in the oven for 15 minutes at 375. Roasting the garlic sweetens it and removes its naturally bitter, or strong odor.

Once all ingredients are ready, combine the eggs, roasted garlic, sour cream and mozzarella cheese. In a food processor, run the blade until the ingredients reach a thick, creamy consistency. Then, while the blade is running, emulsify the mix with a ¼ cup of vinegar—as Rachael Ray would say, “just eyeball” it!

Mix the pasta & dressing, set aside.

2: Tuna

De-can it, drain the water & set in a mixing bowl. Add the mayo, salt/pepper mix, and horseradish; mix well. Season with S&P to taste. Set aside.

3: Plating!

On a regular plate, take a handful of the greens, place in the center…spoon about two spoonfuls of the pasta mix atop the greens, also centered…layer the pasta mix with about a spoonish of the tuna mix…take three (or more!) quartered slices of tomato, stand on the pasta mix, around the tuna…sprinkle tuna with cilantro.

Then, grab a fork and dig in!

I loved the burst of flavors—the sweetened garlic within the creamy sauce from the pasta mix, the tartness of the tuna due to the horseradish—it was a sweet/sour infusion for me, and the greens acted as a buffer in between, with the quartered tomatoes being the “juicy” element. If you do try this, let me know what you think!

Also, if you’re making this for yourself, expect leftovers. You can add or subtract from the ingredients, depending on the size of your party.

Bon Appétit!

If you’re looking for a yummy, savory, summery dinner or afternoon BBQ nosh, look no further! I’ve played around with the ingredients to get the tastes right, and tonight it looks like I hit the mother lode!

Grilled Surf n’ Turf Kabobs with Pineapple
Garlic Ginger Shrimp Marinade
Olive Oil Steak Marinade
**vegetarians, follow the asterisks!

Ingredients:
one package diced beef tenderloin (about six large cubes, you will dice them)
one pound jumbo or large shrimp
one head fresh cilantro leaves
one small ginger root (about the size of your fist)
fresh garlic cloves (about 6, use more or less to taste)
bunch green onions (scallions)
one pineapple
6 baby onions (size of a half-dollar or smaller)
package vine-ripened cherry tomatoes
blend of green, red & yellow bell peppers
2 handfuls shiitake or cremini mushrooms
ground black pepper
worcestershire sauce
soy sauce
3 limes

Fill an oblong baking pan or casserole dish until the water level hits approximately the 1/2 inch mark; soak wooden kabob skewers so they won’t burn and splinter your food while on the grill. Doing this will also help you remove the skewered food with ease.

Steak Marinade:
To already diced beef cubes (about 24 pieces), add about 1/2 cup of olive oil, roughly chopped fresh garlic, juice of one lime, three teaspoons ground black pepper, mix in a bowl and let sit at least 20 minutes uncovered in the refrigerator (room temperature also works, but I find better consistency with a cold marinade).

Shrimp marinade:
One pound of large shrimp, peeled and deveined. Julienne green onions, and put in a food processor. Add freshly diced ginger root (about half of a root that is the size of your fist), three tablespoons soy sauce to the green onions; run the processor and add four tablespoons olive oil, 2-3 tablespoons worcestershire sauce, juice of 2 limes, half a head of cilantro. Process until the consistency is thick (about 30 seconds altogether while adding the above ingredients) and color is a dark brown-green. Mix with shrimp, and set aside in refrigerator about 20 minutes.

Using a pineapple corer, remove the insides of a fresh pineapple and quarter the slices. Set aside.

Prepare vine-ripened cherry tomatoes in a bowl, set aside.

Cut baby onions (about the size of a half-dollar) in half, remove skins, set in bowl and place them with the pineapple quarters & cherry tomatoes.

Take out either Shiitake or Cremini mushrooms (your preference, I like Shiitake better grilled) and leave them whole, depending on the size. If they’re big, halve them.

You can add cut, squared green, red or yellow peppers for more color and a better taste blend. Fire up the grill–if you use charcoal, allow about 15-20 minutes for the briquets to whiten, depending on the type you purchase. For convenience, I like Kingsford’s Match Light, they’re almost always ready to go within 15 minutes.

Remove the steak & shrimp from the refrigerator, and begin to assemble the kabobs, using your preferred combination (steak/onion/pepper/tomato/shrimp) or (pineapple/shrimp/tomato/onion/pineapple/shrimp) or (steak/mushroom/onion/shrimp/mushroom/steak), let your creative juices dictate the flow!

Set aside excess marinade (option: you can use a basting brush and dab the ginger shrimp marinade onto the shrimp while grilling–same with the steak marinade, onto the steak–keeping the seafood/meat moist will allow for a tender consistency)

Over direct heat (spreading the briquets evenly after they’ve whitened), cover-grill the kabobs–about three minutes per side, and place on a serving dish, cover to keep warm. Once all the skewers have been cooked, grab a frosty Corona (a sweet Riesling or a fruity Cabernet Sauvignon have worked wonders for my palate in the past, but there’s no substitute for a light beer with this meal!)

and simply enjoy! Generous portions more than enough for 2, should comfortably serve 3-4 people.

You can vary the recipe to your tastes; each time I make the ginger shrimp marinade, my friends have found it tasty, and I’ve never exactly prepared it the same way each time. I recently added the pineapple to this recipe, and I found that its naturally sweet taste brings a good balance to the sometimes tart taste of the garlic ginger marinade, and it complements the tenderness of the beef.

**For vegetarians, you can remove the meat and seafood, the grilled pineapple really balances out the acidity of the onions and the plumpness of the grilled tomatoes.

Bon Appétit!

In the latest issue of The New Yorker (21 May), Anthony Gottlieb provides a review of Christopher Hitchens’ “Atheists with Attitude” in where the author posits the question of the existence of religion. He sets his main premise around the concept that if there were no religion in the first place, would the world be as it is today? The strife and tribulations that are rampant in the news, violence, hate crimes, an apparent lack of moral conscience in everyday actions—would these happenings be the frame in which we see today’s world exist if religion never came to be?

In the Second Century, A.D. (After the Death of Christ), the Christians, who along with Islam and Buddhists, head up the trifecta of faith-based practices, were actually persecuted as atheists. They did not bow to a material God, as pagans and other disciples bowed at the feet of gold statues, symbols of a prevalent, visible and plausible deity. Instead, they worshiped God and the Holy Trinity, both of which are transparent concepts and not necessarily physical. Because of their chosen God, the Christians were not a part of the idol-worshiping majority and thus subject to persecution, based on the societal practices and beliefs of the time.

Gottlieb outlines Voltaire, the preeminent French atheist of his time and his Candide in which Voltaire “…attacks the idea that all is for the best in a world closely watched over by a benevolent God…” amongst other thinkers in history (David Hume, Denis Diderot, Baron D’Holbach). Hume questioned the brevity of religion, of God as deity, although he never broke down barriers, always choosing to tread carefully and apparently justify different schools of thought—God may not exist, but it’s OK to have a faith-based life—or such similar ideas.

The burning question, though, lies within the idea of thinking about eliminating religion from the tomes of history, and taking a look at our lives, our societies, cultures, beliefs and thinking about whether or not they are in some way affected by religion or a subsidiary of it. Then, we consciously make the collective decision to discredit all precepts of religion in the idea that a world without religion would be a world without conflict, IF religion is deemed the main reason for all the conflicts we see today.

Take Islam, for example. The fundamentalist groups (Al Qaeda, Hezbollah, etc.) are so immersed in their religious practices that they believe the outside world is one of debauchery, immorality and all non-believers of the Koran drink in the pungent vapors of the River Hades. Terrorist groups ransack our daily lives based on a variation of those fundamentalist beliefs, wreaking carnage, death and havoc.

The spate of events in this decade—the current and continuing situation in Iraq, 9-11, Katrina, the bombings in Indonesia, Spain, and the world over, could be attributed to the acts of a vengeful God that seeks revenge upon those who do not believe or live life in His eyes as it should be. Prominent icons, such as the late Jerry Falwell, who then took his original commentary back, presented this point.

If God is indeed benevolent, how is He able to abide these actions? How can we continue to question our own morality, values, beliefs and actions, while maintaining degrees of respect for those in our community that may think otherwise?
If God was taken out of the equation, would our world be a better place? It may be difficult to fathom, especially when we marvel at the world itself, its simple nature of just being, much like we admire a work of art, we naturally begin to wonder who created it. We think about why it was created, and why we have come to appreciate it so much. Would a Godless world then be one of peace, happiness, intellectual and social prosperity, because there would be no existing reason for conflicts to arise?

According to Gottlieb, the fourth largest “denomination” or following behind Christianity, Islam and Buddhism is what is now being termed as “unbelief”. It’s not explicitly the presupposition of no God at all, but subscribing to a different notion of believing in the fact that someone or something else created the world—possibly Darwin’s natural evolution, the mass collection of trillions upon trillions of particles forming together to create Earth and its mystical wonders. Polls conducted worldwide have estimated that the number of people that unbelieve ranges between 500 and 750 million. Gottlieb notes that this persuasion is also the youngest of them all, with no apparent trace in the West before the eighteenth century. He questions what life will be once unbelieving has “enjoyed the same past as that of Islam’s, let alone that of Christianity”—it makes this writer think, too.

At what price are we paying for all the trials and tribulations we suffer daily? Are we giving up our passkey to the pearly gates by continuing to be silent observers, or are we fools for deluding ourselves about our fears of not knowing what may come after our last breaths have been expelled?

It should come as no surprise that the inevitable is unfolding. Commercialization of our commodities continues to proliferate, from clothes manufacturers’ ploys to hook us into a particular brand, to grocers pushing for a particular food that is loaded with the latest look-there’s-absolutely-no-fat-in-this-product displays as we hurry through aisles in order to get dinner on the table, to entertainment venues (sporting, music, the arts) vying for the golden buck that lines our pockets. While I haven’t listed everything that is marketable, there also is the battle of the telecommunications world, with relay companies springing up left and right, hoping to retain us as exclusive users to boost their ratings and revenue, let’s not forget about the only two juggernaut competitors in the satellite radio business, XM and Sirius:

They announced plans (on the 19th) of merging both companies into one, with one CEO becoming executive officer and the other a chairman (the Karmazin/Parsons entity). To me, it is the cataclysmic sign of the apocalypse–where is enough enough? When does the infinite search for top dollar finally recede? When the Martians have invaded, and all that is left are our eight-legged creatures to wonder at what happened to those funny-looking two-pronged humanoids that always chased them around with a can of combustive chemicals, does the buck finally come to a restive halt then?

Back on track–is there nothing that cannot be compressed, packaged, and sold? Forget the space around us; real estate and commercial developers are gunning that down as we speak…ditto for cyberspace, vast juggernauts (Google) are rising from the dust and sending sentinels out to seize, market, control and advertise. Water? The commodity we have the most supply of–just take a look at any map–somewhere, a corporate soul is tucked away in a dark, dank state-of-the-art laboratory, hatching a plan that will be the “future of tomorrow!” and figuring out how they can turn abundance into a marketable commodity (aquatic real estate’s starting to sell like hot potatoes). It should not figure that satellite and our radio waves would fall into the same black hole.

While some may laud the XMSIRIUS merger as the next messianic coming, this blogger is not so convinced. The FCC will also investigate, to ensure that a monopoly is averted (probably so that it can continue taxing TWO entities rather than losing money and taxing only ONE); after the dust settles, the point still remains:

Where does the line start getting crossed? Are we expected to end up chucking our mores and ethics for the next fastest line in the rat race? I can see the coming boom of ethics marketing: we pay for people to tell us what we should do in certain situations (Note: Listen to your gut feeling! It almost never fails you!).

The XMSIRIUS merger may help both companies utilize their resources, Howard Stern, Oprah Winfrey, professional sports, music, and so forth, to provide subscribers with more options. Although, as the good Doctor Faustus pondered the Devil’s deal, what is the catch? Will prices rise, forcing us to debate whether we should give up this addictive convenience, when maybe we should never have bought into it in the first place?

Will the pooling of collective energies result in a greater return on investment, generating excess dollars that will be poured back into the community to provide leadership, support, homes, a bolstering of our economy and eventually a chip away from the largest deficit known in history (trillions of dollars and counting)?

Or will the not-yet-born dollars just go right back into the already-fat coffers of the richest, leaving the peons to toil away while they lavish themselves with million-dollar birthday parties?

In a parallel universe, the fat-cats would turn into Robin Hoods and send the Pied Piper off into the sunset with all the stumbling and bumbling corporate officers in tow, to the impending doom of being cast into limbo for eternity.