Steaks being prepped for the Marchetti family reunion at Redfish Lake, Idaho -- not vegan! Photo by: John Katsilometes
There would be no doubt, there could be no doubt, about the most challenging experience during My Vegan Summer.
It would not be dining at Yardhouse, where an order of Mac+Cheese Squared would be disallowed. It wouldn't be ignoring the bowtie pasta-with-chicken lunch special at Claim Jumper, or recoiling at the Messy Sundae at Sammy's Woodfired Pizza.
No, it would be negotiating foodstuffs with my grandmother.
Grandma, who at 89 still makes a mean platter of homemade ravioli stuffed with ground beef and Italian sausage, has no idea what a vegetarian looks like. Vegan? She's barely heard the word. When I told her a couple of months ago during a phone chat that I would be going vegan for the summer, her exact words to me were, "That's like a vegetarian, right?"
"It's like vegetarian," I explained, "But more pronounced. It's a greater vegetarian. It's like a Vegetarian ZX."
There was a pause as I considered where to begin the description of a vegan diet. Then, Grandma cut in.
"I heard your cousin Marcus is a vegetarian," she said, her voice dropping to a whisper as she spoke of my cousin Marcus Eaton, who happens to be her sixth-oldest grandchild and also a great singer/songwriter/musician.
I didn't know Marcus was a vegetarian.
"You heard this about Marcus?" I asked? "Where? From the gossip column in the family newsletter?"
"There's no family newsletter, John," she said, sternly, clearly not appreciating the shtick. So we switched to the weather. The vegan conversation would have to wait.
But I knew we were going to have to face my new dietary restrictions during the visit I was to make to the family in Boise earlier this month. There was to be a reunion party at Redfish Lake near Stanley, and as you can imagine any reunion party at a vast body of water in Idaho must be fueled by red meat — grilled or otherwise.
It's the law.
The afternoon before we were to embark on the three-hour tote from Boise to Stanley, I visited my grandparent's house at (and I'm not kidding) Shenandoah Estates. I was prepared for what I would be met with, which is what I've always been met with every time I've walked into my grandparents' home in Pocatello or in Boise: A feeding frenzy.
Grandma had been prepped, somewhat, for the change in menu.
"You can't have red meat," she reasoned. "No meatballs."
"Right," I said.
"Hummus! You can have the hummus and some sliced vegetables!"
"Yes!"
"We have some! ... Wait. No we don't. We had company yesterday and they ate all of it."
I found banana and a bag of mixed nuts on the kitchen table and ventured into the living room to watch "Let's Make a Deal" with Grandpa.
"I'm fine with the nuts and this banana!" I called out, but I could hear Grandma still rummaging around the fridge and in the pantry.
Doors were being slammed, drawers shut with audible force in her mounting frustration.
"Yogurt!"
"No, Grandma — dairy. No dairy. I'm fine with the nuts ..."
"What about an egg! Can you have an egg!"
"No!"
"Chicken!"
"Can't. No meat, no chicken ..."
"I have some frozen fish sticks, but they're pretty old ..."
"No fish. No dairy. No meat," I said, suddenly sliding into a mild depression at my self-shackled lifestyle. "No chicken. No fun, Grandma. No fun at all."
On the game show, a guy summoned by Wayne Brady was dressed as a chicken.
"No chicken!" I reminded.
"Will you guys knock it off!" Grandpa said.
At this point Grandma had about lost her patience with me. She was mumbling, I think, the Lord's Prayer. I'd not seen her so frustrated at me since I was 17, when I borrowed their Chrysler New Yorker to go cruisin' and left the garage door open all night.
I heard more rattling around in the kitchen, then the microwave hummed for a few seconds.
"Here!" she said, dropping a dish of peas plucked from her garden, sprinkled with a little olive oil, down in front of me.
"Now we're talking!" I said. "I can eat anything out of the garden. I can eat the dirt."
She dove back in once more, and a few minutes later produced two halved pears in a ceramic bowl.
"What's this!" I said, genuinely surprised. "Where have these been? You've been bogarting the pears!"
"I was saving them for Grandpa!"
"But he can eat anything!"
"Quiet!"
So I finished the peas and the pears. It was nuts, I tell you. Customarily, Grandma had the last word.
"When I have trouble sleeping, I make myself a cup of milk with a little spoonful of honey," she said. "I warm it up for a few seconds, and I fall right asleep."
Even in the vegan culture, there is no substitute.
Follow John Katsilometes on Twitter at twitter.com/JohnnyKats.