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Considering going vegan or at least mostly vegetarian.

I've a number of friends who are vegetarian, and they all have one thing in common - they were never big fans of the taste of meat to begin with. I'm unfortunately the opposite, and every time I try to stay vegetarian I never manage to last longer than a week or two. Really wish I could stick to it (planet, animal welfare, etc.), but at this point I think my best hope is artificial meat.
 
Michael P said:
I've a number of friends who are vegetarian, and they all have one thing in common - they were never big fans of the taste of meat to begin with. I'm unfortunately the opposite, and every time I try to stay vegetarian I never manage to last longer than a week or two. Really wish I could stick to it (planet, animal welfare, etc.), but at this point I think my best hope is artificial meat.
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Ooh no I liked meat. And barbecued meat smells incredible, so much so I try to avoid BBQs!

With a bit of thought you can make somewhat tasty vegetarian meals though. Stock, lentils, wine, spices, seasoning are your friend and can be introduced in a lot of dishes. Red lentils work quite well as a thickener for sauces, they tend to break down. And for big protein there are nuts and seeds (for me must be toasted in the oven!), fried tofu and a lot of meat-free products have improved. Eggs and cheese as part of a balanced diet.

For those who miss chicken katsu curry from Wagamama ... they do "vegatsu" now. Not bad. This has seitan not tofu.
 
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stevec67 said:
Why so? Most fish is wild caught so is a different concern to farmed animals. In addition chickens can be produced in very low intensity regimes, in which no food fit for humans is consumed. This is why they are so popular in developing countries - the birds forage in hedge bottoms and compost heaps and produce eggs and meat basically for free. I don't want to live on a handful of maize every day, a few worms and half a dozen woodlice, so if a chicken does then good luck to it.
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IIRC it was you are still eating animal muscle whether that was beef, chicken or fish. And that fish is usually at the end of a food chain of small to larger fish that concentrate toxins. Anyway many types of fish will be all fished out over the next 30 years. The programme was 1 1/2 hours long and covered most aspects of what/why. I am not at all sure how far I can go along the vegetarian route, but I am convinced that the further you can go the better your (and the planet) health would be.
 
I've been vegan for over thirty years (vegetarian since I was 14). As Tony L will attest, I'm not a skinny guy!

This is probably because you can get vegan food an Nando's, Pizza Express, Gourmet Burger, Beefeaters, Wagamammas and pretty much everywhere these days.

I eat well and exercise. My blood work shows no deficiencies of any kind. I did take Omega 3 supplements for a while, but stopping made no difference at all.

Very often people become veggie or vegan by just giving up meat, so their health suffers.

Just make sure you get a varied diet and a bit of sun and you'll be fine.

Stephen
 
wacko said:
IIRC it was you are still eating animal muscle whether that was beef, chicken or fish. And that fish is usually at the end of a food chain of small to larger fish that concentrate toxins.
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Yes, we all know about Minimata bay. However I'm happy to eat wild fish, it may have concentrated toxins but 10 x bugger all is still bugger all.

Anyway many types of fish will be all fished out over the next 30 years.
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That's a very glib statement and a gross oversimplification of the truth. Cod stocks in the NE Atlantic are actually increasing due to extensive management. So too are Pacific salmon in the N Pacific. Industrial scale fishing in the Pacific is being steered towards Alaskan Pollock as the stocks are high and being sustained. The excesses of the first 3/4 of the 20th century are (slowly) being corrected, in the developed nations of the N hemisphere at least.[/quote]
 
On the verge of going veggie for years I finally went after getting my first dogs.
Wouldn't eat them so why eat other animals.
Dairy intake diminished and is virtually gone from my diet and feel better for it.

After seeing this I will go vegan
 
JensenHealey said:
When I worked in a cafe in the 1970s much waste was collected and taken to a pig unit. I thought that this still happened!
I get the 'no meat' bit, but surely pigs would love waste veg and peelings?
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The great foot and mouth outbreak led to it being made illegal.
 
wacko said:
After watching Food Choices on Netflix.
On a personal scale it solves personal health/weight issues.
On a UK scale if the majority went vegetarian it would solve NHS issues.
On a global scale if the majority went vegetarian it would solve hunger and global warming.
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I’ve been vegetarian or pescatarian (it has varied) since I started meditating in 1972. Although I’m quite fit and of lean build, I noticed that by my late 50s - I’m now 66 - my weight was starting to drift up towards the 80kg mark. Two years ago, my daughter became vegan, so I switched to buying 95% vegan for the household diet. I also, as Tony has mentioned, took care not to eat too much bread & potatoes, although I eat a lot of pasta.

Since then, with no effort at all, my weight has drifted down and stabilised around 76kg (I’m 6ft tall, so BMI good). My daughter is super-healthy, although I insisted she takes a high quality B12 supplement at least once a week.

Btw, the two things I missed most when giving up meat were toasted bacon sandwiches and steak tartar !
 
One more thing, concerning the global benefits : supposing research showed that we could solve all vehicle and energy pollution simply by changing to a diet that is already followed by millions ? It would be a no brainer.

And yet the idea of giving up meat inc dairy to solve a similar issue brings up such huge resistance and self-justification in so many otherwise sensible people ! I understand if you’re an Eskimo... but putting all humanitarian issues aside, we’re talking about the easiest possible fix to many serious global issues.
 
mikemusic said:
On the verge of going veggie for years I finally went after getting my first dogs.
Wouldn't eat them so why eat other animals.
Dairy intake diminished and is virtually gone from my diet and feel better for it.

After seeing this I will go vegan
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I think this is was the trigger for our son who is already a vegan with occasional lapses.
 
Wife is 90% veggie, but will eat a little fish. I am 90% carnivore but love my veg, adore fish and worship. We get along fine. Neither of us gets ill much, both a reasonably fit and healthy and not too fat, approaching 70.
Most importantly, both of us are happy.
The happy bit will keep us alive ages. A few extra vitamins won't.
 
I had been vegetarian since the mid-eighties when I started going out with my now wife. She’d been veggie for a few years prior to that.

We became Pescatarian when our son was weening as we felt we had no right to force vegetarianism on him, and research seemed to suggest that such a diet, especially if oily fish was consumed might well be one of the healthiest.

In recent years we’ve fallen off the wagon, eating meat occasionally - mostly when out at restaurants where good beef is served, and very occasionally at home*. Hopefully enough to top up B12. We do also take vitamin tablets, but interested in some of the comments up-thread that this may be insufficient.

My/our reasons for vegetarianism were based both on animal welfare (which is why, for example, I don’t never eat meat at any fast food outlet), but also increasingly due to sustainability issues. If the whole world went 90% vegetarian I believe it would be good for all of us.

*its steak and chips, not bacon, that vegetarians crave!
 
stevec67 said:
If the animal has a decent life up to slaughter and you can see it is well looked after and humanely slaughtered, then it's let a better life than most.
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..with the added benefit that if you're kind to them, and give them a gentle, loving death, they'll taste better. I could give up meat if it was necessary, and enjoy good vegetarian fare as well as fish & other seafood, but I do enjoy meat and really cannot see any reason why I should give it up. A vegan diet's not a very healthy one.
 
Suffolk Tony said:
..with the added benefit that if you're kind to them, and give them a gentle, loving death, they'll taste better.
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Certainly the case with pork. I've written here before about PSE meat, which is a real problem if pigs are stressed. That's why we go to great lengths to rest them after transport and, yes, give them toys. Seriously. It's in the rules. Pigs are disturbingly intelligent, I can't be bothered with poultry because they are too damn stupid to work out what the hell is going on, but pigs are smart and i really don't want them catching on to what's happening.
 
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