So, I’m a vegetarian. Many of you have asked in the comments or via email about why I am a vegetarian and so I am going to explain why I gave up meat, eggs, and, to a large extent, dairy.
I’ve avoided writing about this in any meeaningful way for a number of reasons, but mainly because people have a tendency to (1) insistently defend their own habits or (2) explain why I shouldn’t be a vegetarian, both of which are completely unnecessary.
The thing you have to know is: I am not judging anyone who chooses to eat certain foods. I could care less if you eat steaks or chicken nuggets or pork loin for dinner. You can eat Twinkies every night for dinner, if you want, and we can still totally be friends. Seriously. During high school my diet consisted of two things: Sour Cream and Cheddar Ruffles and Dr. Pepper. If you eat meat, cool. If you don't eat meat, cool.
Also: I have a nutritionist. No need to explain how being a vegetarian means that I am not getting enough calcium or protein or B-12 or whatever. I can assure I am getting all those things in ample supply.
Alrighty then.
Here's the lowdown:
+ I do not eat meat of any variety
+ I eat eggs only when they are baked, in small quantities, into something else (breads, pastas). We do not have eggs in our home (when a recipe calls for an egg, we actually use flax, which is still really strange even though we've been doing it for a year)
+ I almost never purchase dairy products for our home, but will pretty freely eat dairy when at a restaurant or a friend’s house (or an ice cream parlor) (if you invite me to your wine and cheese party, not only will I eat the cheese, I will appreciate that cheese like nobody else)
Here’s why we went vegetarian:
Last July, Will and I decided to give up meat for a week. Will, who has long had problems with his shoulder, an old baseball injury, read an article on ESPN about vegetarian athletes and their seeming ability to heal faster after injury. This spurred the week-long hiatus, a sort of experiment in vegetarianism.
During that time, Will brought home a book, The China Study, about the most comprehensive study on nutrition ever conducted. The findings?
People who ate the most animal-based foods got the most chronic disease … People who ate the most plant-based foods were the healthiest and tended to avoid chronic disease.
The book is pretty persuasive and we decided not to go back to eating meat. That simple. And, soon enough, we cut out eggs and dairy products, to a large extent, too.
Look, I know that studies should be viewed critically and that there are about one billion studies about nutrition, all of which contradict one another in various ways (eat carbs! don't eat carbs! eat eggs! don't eat eggs!). However, the study was long-term and strikingly comprehensive, not to mention that the findings have been validated time and time again.
And, I believe in a plant-based diet for one really good reason: I feel so much better. It could be because I eat less animal-products; it could be because I largely replaced animal-products, by necessity, with more fruits, vegetables, and grains. Either way, it’s working for me.
Last July we agreed on a free day--one day a month that we were free to eat meat. I haven’t used any of my free days since last July at Michael Mina (a night which involved tuna tartare, caviar, and foie gras--if you do it, do it right) and, honestly, I don’t really feel any desire to eat meat. That doesn’t mean that I don’t completely reserve the right to eat a fat juicy BLT one of these days.
Leave comments if you have questions that need addressing and I’ll put together a follow-up post.
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