Veggie Tales

Bro-cco-li, cel-ery, got-ta be...

What's it like to be a vegetarian in the midwest?...kinda tough.  While enthusiasm for low-meat and vegetarian diets is growing, many restaurants simply don't offer vegetarian options.  And if they do, how do you know they are really vegetarian.  Did they just cook my french fries with the fish?  Did that veggie burger get cooked on the same grill as the triple decker bacon cheeseburger?  Beyond restaurants, I get a lot of weird looks when I tell people I'm a vegetarian.  Many people automatically assume I'm a member of PETA, that I hate meat, meat eaters and will try to talk them into dropping that steak from their mouth. 

While I think PETA has some solid ideas, I don't think going after Obama for killing a fly is a high priority and I'm not always a fan of organizations that focus on that sort of thing.  Although that could be attributed to the media buzz (pun intended) created around the Obama fly homicide. 

I don't hate meat.  The truth is, I salivate everytime I walk by those rotisserie chickens in the grocery store.  I miss bacon and steak and shake cheeseburgers.  However, I don't miss them enough to go back to them.  The reason I am a vegetarian is because it's a form of activism.  A friend from WA once said she viewed growing a garden as a form of activism.  Giving up meat is similar in the regards that it makes me less reliant on an industry that I think is unethical and monopolizing.  There are sustainable ways to farm meat that don't involve pesticides, antibiotics, and thousands of cows or chickens crammed into tiny quarters.  Did you know that "free range" means chickens have access to grass.  It doesn't mean they can get there.  When there are 20,000 chickens crammed into a coop built for a 5,000 there isn't much room to walk around or get to the one door that leads to the grass.  Furthermore, I don't want my body pumped full of antibiotics that they have to give the cows just so they can survive long enough to be slaughtered.  The reason they give cows these antibiotics are because they get really sick.  They get really sick because they are eating corn instead of grasses.  Their stomachs are not made to process grass.  Similarly to the chickens, they are crammed into small spaces and like a co-ed college dorm, disease spreads like wildfire.  You may ask, why are they feeding them corn when it's so obvious they should be feeding them grass so they won't get so sick? That's a wonderful question.  The truth is, corn is cheaper.  Corn is the cheapest plant we have and there is such an abundance of it, that it seems like a logical thing to feed all animals.  But it's at the animals and our expense.  They don't just feed the cows corn. To make it easier for them to digest they mix it with fat.  Fat from chickens, pigs, and even other cows.  That's right our poor cows are sometimes eating their friends.  It's a sad reality that is often hidden from the general public.  I could go on about antibiotics and large-scale farming, but most of my information comes from Michael Pollans book "Omnivores Dillema" and another book called "From the Farm to the Table.  I highly suggest reading it if you are interested in knowing more. 

On a happy  note, there are farms that are doing it right!  Small scale, pasture grazed farm animals are available.  It's just that it's difficult to find.  And in this day and age, it's hard to know who to trust. 

Long story, long...
Being a veggie is hard whereever you are, but in the heart of the farmlands where it should be easy to find farms committed to doing the right thing for the Earth and their animals, it's proven to be a challenge.  Well, I've only been back two weeks and I'm going to keep trying to find options.  I'll post them on here if I do.  I'm still not going to be a meat eater because cutting meat out of your diet is one of the biggest things you can do to reduce your impact on the planet.  More on that another day.  I don't want to bore you with more veggie details today.  Plus I'm making dinner for the folks tonight.  Leading by example people, that's what it's all about (sorry hokey pokey but you lied to us). 

Peace, veggies, and namaste,
Courtney :)

P.S.  Vegans, Vegetarians, localvores unite!