[Closed] Going Veggie

Fish don't count because they don't have feelings...

Fish don't count because they don't have fingers.

Yes they do. they're in my freezer.

the evolution thing is such a crap argument. what about the appendix?

My understanding is actually the opposite - that if the world went veggie overnight, there isn't sufficient unpopulated land to create the arable farmland we'd require.

what about all the arable farm land to feed the livestock that would essentially be freed up? (i don't know that answer to this but i think you are wrong??)

Yes they do. they're in my freezer.

Good point, well made.

roper it could be a huge jump, try and get a few meat free recipies under your belt before you give it up completely. luckily i went from a 50% meat free dinners house to vegitarian so i wasn't completely lost.

my favourite recipies

bean chilli w/ rice, wraps or tortillas
veggie jambalaya
srir fry
bean burgers w (sweet potato) chips
curry (vegetable koftes)
onion bargees (good in salad too)
salad

[url= http://jeenaskitchen.blogspot.com/ ]jeenas kitchen[/url] always a good idea or too.

anyone who is veggie find that they couldn't face white meat but red meat seems more appealing? i could go for bacon/ steak but chicken makes me feel funny.

Roper
[i]"I think my weakness will be sea food."[/i]. Then what you need is to go seaweed collecting! Believe me, get some Atlantic Dulse (the red frondy stuff), and drop that in a stir fry. The closest thing I could place it to is shrimps (I used to eat creatures ~35 years ago and I loved Suffolk shrimps). I'm quite addicted, and can't wait for my next Devon holiday to stock up again.
Who says veggies have a boring diet? Many meat eaters visiting our kitchen can't even identify what we have stored up in half the jars!

the evolution thing is such a crap argument. what about the appendix?

Screw the appendix, it's just a crap argument. What on Earth evolution has got to do with dietary [i]choice, [/i]I have no idea. As points for or against a veggie diet goes, it's up there with "you can't be vegetarian, you're wearing leather shoes!"

If "evolution" (for want of a better word) has given us anything, it's the luxury to have food in such plentiful supply and so readily available that we're at liberty to make these choices. Sadly, the choice many of us seem to be making is "fried breakfasts and cake."

Who says veggies have a boring diet?

the would be FIL says this a lot. he eats 7 meals a week. same meal each day of the week!

to give him his credit he does change the roast meat and accompaniments on a sunday.

Please explain why the idea of evolution is a poor argument?

It doesnt affect your choice as to whether to eat meat or not but it does affect what your body requires with regards to correct nutrition and so it is important to consider this. The modern diet of a typical person is very high in refined carbohydrates and our bodies are not able to deal with this hence the high amount of obesity and poor health around the world.

It is not an argument against being a vegetarian as many foods can be added to replace a large amount of the nutrients lost through cutting out meat. But to ignore what our bodies are designed to deal with is dangerous, but currently the greatest issue with modern diets are refined carbohydrates not whether you should eat meat or not. Meat would give you the more optimal nutrition but as proven by the numerous healthy people around the world who are vegetarians it can be done without meat as effectively.

[i]what about the appendix [/i].
The appendix is a repository for important gut microrgansisms. Especially useful in children who may flush them out with more regular bouts of diarrhoea, and the appendix can then help re-population. It shrinks in adults and is less useful, probably a result of them suffering said problems less readily. It's only modern Western medicine which incorrectly sees it as useless.

Please explain why the idea of evolution is a poor argument?

Because it's irrelevant? What difference does it make if our genetic ancestors were carnivores or herbivores? What's important is what we are now.

It doesnt affect your choice as to whether to eat meat or not but it does affect what your body requires with regards to correct nutrition and so it is important to consider this

No. See, the body doesn't require "meat" or "carrots," it requires things like protein, carbohydrates, vitamins. Our bodies are very flexible in the manner in which it'll accept those nutrients.

Has the nutritional requirement of our bodies changed significantly over the years due to evolution (as opposed to the invention of the Xbox and pies)? You said it yourself, "we don't evolve that quickly," that's why it's a poor argument.

currently the greatest issue with modern diets are refined carbohydrates

The greatest issue with modern diets is the amount of high sugar, high fat, high salt convenience food that's readily available. A shortage or an excess of anything is sub-optimal.

High fat is not a bad thing, and carbohydrate is sugar. The low fat myth is one of the greatest mistakes ever made.

Heres a nice article giving some information on what is now well known in the scientific community but has not filtered its way down to government guidelines

http://www.nytimes.com/2002/07/07/magazine/what-if-it-s-all-been-a-big-fat-lie.html
and a more scientific one
http://www.nutritionjrnl.com/article/PIIS0899900710002893/fulltext

And where does correct nutrition in my statements become meat or carrots? As I have stated I have nothing against someone going vegetarian but to argue it as being healthy against meat eating is wrong as eating meat is also healthy if the diet is done well. My point is the body is designed to require certain nutrients and it is optimally designed to get this from some sources over others. Doesn't make it wrong to get it from these other sources but it isn't optimal.

But Spain an veggie? I'd certainly do it, but it pretty much puts paid to eating out. (But that's a bonus in Spain he says..taking cover.

Used to be true, and may well still be true in coastal resorts like Torremolinos, but no longer the case in major cities.

Going back a bit,

what about all the arable farm land to feed the livestock that would essentially be freed up? (i don't know that answer to this but i think you are wrong??)

I was including this. My understanding is that it takes more land to sustain a veggie diet than it does to support the crops and fields required for a meat-based one (I think it's in the order of threefold more space required).

I'm basing this standpoint on an article I read in Wired a couple of years back, which looked into what would happen if we all went veggie (I think it was part of some wider 'green issue' or something).

I've no idea how accurate their research was or if it had been made up on the spot by the office junior, and I've forgotten half of it now, so I'm quite happy to be proved wrong.

High fat is not a bad thing, and carbohydrate is sugar. The low fat myth is one of the greatest mistakes ever made.

[i]Simple [/i]carbohydrate is sugar. The "low fat myth" probably perpetuates largely because people eat too much of the stuff. Too much fat is bad. Too much sugar is bad.

Well, actually, as I'm sure you're aware that's an oversimplification. Which is the problem, it's simply, ah, not that simple. There's different kinds of fats, different kinds of carbs etc etc, and they all interact in complex ways that we're still making new discoveries about. And people don't like complicated answers (which is why religion is still so popular) so bite-sized axioms like "eat less lard" prevail.

As I have stated I have nothing against someone going vegetarian but to argue it as being healthy against meat eating is wrong as eating meat is also healthy if the diet is done well

No arguments here.

My point is the body is designed to require certain nutrients and it is optimally designed to get this from some sources over others. Doesn't make it wrong to get it from these other sources but it isn't optimal.

Again, I completely agree. What are we arguing about, again? (-:

I have no idea :p

I will say though that yes nutrition is complex but the idea of eating less fat is a poor one, the only real bad fats are the refined fats such as vegetable oil or other things you find in mass manufactured products. Eating healthy fats is a very good thing, so long as the carbohydrates are not refined types (white pasta, bread etc) which spike insulin release in the body and insulin is the hormone that deals with storage so if it is spiked then the body is geared to store the food you eat rather than using it.

I was including this. My understanding is that it takes more land to sustain a veggie diet than it does to support the crops and fields required for a meat-based one (I think it's in the order of threefold more space required).

I'm basing this standpoint on an article I read in Wired a couple of years back, which looked into what would happen if we all went veggie (I think it was part of some wider 'green issue' or something).

I thought it was just the reverse of that:

Energy essentially comes from the sun via photosyntheseis in plants (of course nitrogen fixing etc also plays a part but without sunlight and warmth from sun it would all stop), and the more living things that energy passes through before it gets to your plate, the less 'efficient' it is.
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If you could survive eating that grain diet that mass-produced cows are fed, you would get far more energy from the grain direct than if you ate a cow that had eaten the same amount of grain.

Also sheep goats and chicken are ace, but a phenomenal amount of methane in the atmosphere is there because mankind has proliferated the poplulation of cows over the centuries.

Roper,
Lots of good recipes also on the BBC good food pages swell.

You can probably also get dehydrated soy mince in bulk quantities if you want to go down the meat sub route.

If I think of something else...

My understanding of it was: rearing animals requires more land than producing crops, but you can farm animals on land you cannot farm for crops.

I think youre right bit you still need to plant more crops to feed the animals.
I always look at pasture land and imagine if it was turned to forest how much cool singletrack could be built.

I think we've got row 5, column 3 well and truly covered, with a good go at row 3, column 2 as well.

[img] [/img]

With respect to the OP, I'm vegan in país vasco, meat eating capital of Spain?
Never had it so good, three veggie restaurants in town, one vegan. Herboristerías on every street selling veggie junk food if that's your bag. I struggle for stuff like curry spices but can pick them up when I'm in France or get a mate to post them from Barcelona. My experience of omni restaurants has been very good too, they seem more willing to help you out than their UK counterparts. For example I went to a wedding couple of weeks ago and with no warning the caterers knocked up five courses for me despite having 300 guests to feed. I don't think you will have any problems.

Fairly obviously if you eat 1 kg of grain you get all the energy. If you give it to an animal it wastes loads staying alive etc. More people can be fed with a veggie diet etc as to whether we should that is another question.
Graham fancy meeting you here Cochineal and whey free wafer biscuit for sir?
Shall we speak in code?
Redwood 😉

neither my wife or i have ever eaten fish or meat, do eat dairy though. we both grew up in vege households so we just know how to eat properly and how to cook. bummer going out but getting better(i dont like eating out much). we are fit and never over weight, this is not id say from being vege but the fact that it breeds an awareness of food/nutrition. tbh id be more worried about getting good home cooked balanced food in you, meat or not.

Eat what you want who cares. Meat makes nice landscapes, think peaks or dakes, lake district as opposed to linconshire. Was surprised by the amount of rubbish in some processed vegy food though. I don't care about the death bit of eating meat but I do worry about them chopping down the rain forests to grow soya to feed to animals, suppose it is also dairy though.

Well done for the op for telling us what his eating preferences are. I had veg lasagna tonight, tomorrow I was thinking of lamb shepherds pie, what else are people eating this week?

what else are people eating this week?

hello!

johnnie, i'll see your Redwood and raise you a Fry's...

Meat makes nice landscapes, think peaks or dakes, lake district as opposed to linconshire.

One way around these grain fed animals if your concerned about that is to look at sourcing from a butcher that gets its meat from grass fed organic farms. Also grass fed animals provide far healthier meat than those from grain fed "factory" reared animals.

Although obviously if everyone in the world did this it brings with it the same space issues.

With respect to the OP, I'm vegan in país vasco, meat eating capital of Spain?

Nah, my wife's from Extremadura, much worse!

To be honest, here in the arse end of Spain, in our small town, we still have horses tied up outside bars. Certainly no veggie or vegan restaurants,lol. We do have one which only serves meat and cheese but to be fair to them you do still get olives 🙂

A couple of colleagues have just 'discovered' corn fed chicken and grass-fed beef and are raving about it. "tastes like meat did when i was a kid" etc.

I think there would be an argument to say that you would be happy with a smaller amount of really good meat in a meal in a restaurant, rather than a large amount of bland cardboardy meat. In the same way that really good cheese is way more satisfying than three times that quantity of cathedral city, and one proper coffee if better than three nescafés (or an infinite quantity of 'mellow birds').

Linconshire and the like were a lot more beautiful, biodiverse and better environmentally when they had mixed farming, instead of monocrop deserts. I am pretty sure that mixed rotation farming is the most environmentally friendly in this country, problem is not what you eat, most of it is grown with oil anyway.

Roper, I think you should give it a try. Plus I don't see why you have to go the whole hog 😆 .....why not just give up the stuff that you think isn't good? You could still eat the fresh fish.

FWIW I was a psuedo veggie for many years. I always ate fish, but no other meats, and no farmed fish like trout and salmon, unless I knew who caught it and where. I even used to check the ingredients on packets of biscuits to see if they contained animal fat. I didn't eat meat because of the way it is reared. However, since I moved to France I started eating meat again. The difference being that I know exactly where the meat has come from and how it has been reared. I ride past it on my bike!!!! I think if it has been reared with respect, that's OK (I may be wrong).

Please let us know how you get on.

SB

Are you still here?

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

@spw3 - who you asking?