Giving Thanks

I didn't keep my son home from school on Thanksgiving, as there were a few special things going on that he wanted to be there for-- although he would have happily stayed home too! My husband was also working and so it just seemed a bit pointless to try and make a holiday out of it. Seeing my disappointment I think, my husband suggested we celebrate on Sunday when we can all relax and have a big meal. So that's what we did yesterday. I decided on a less traditional dinner, with gratin potatoes with cheese and onions instead of roasted or mash, and some roasted chestnuts. That's our vegetarian Quorn roast, potatoes, sage and onion stuffing and veggies. It's a scaled down version of most Thanksgiving dinners of course, since there's only four of us. In fact it was more like an English sunday roast (well, except that its vegetarian of course), which now that its winter, we are getting more regular at doing.

I have encountered this quote several times over the past few days, maybe because its that time of year, but it's good to think about at any time of year. So I'm passing it along here:

“Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow.” -Melody Beattie

Vegetarian is earth friendly!

Being a vegetarian is also earth friendly. Farmed animals produce more greenhouse gas emissions than the world's entire transport systems. It also takes less water to grow vegetarian food than it does to produce meat. Livestock production is responsible for 70% of the Amazon deforestation in Latin America where the rainforest has been cleared to create new pastures supplying meat (including fast food giants) around the world.
Read more detailed info on the Vegetarian Society page here: http://www.vegsoc.org/vegweek/reasons.html

This post is written as part of National Vegetarian Week here in the UK.

Vegetarian Family

My husband and I have been veggie for about 12 years, if not longer. I can recall my early tries at giving up meat about 15 years ago. I was vegan for about five years, including during my first pregnancy. Both my children are being raised vegetarian and it is indeed not only possible, but also easy once you get the hang of it.

Yesterday my 16 month old daughter ate homemade chili with lentils, aduki beans, onions, tomatoes and served with bulgar wheat. It wasn't spicey hot. The same goes for my six year old. Both eat tofu, broccoli, brown bread and brown rice.. all essential building blocks for health. I've heard many parents complain that their kids won't touch veggies, but to me, you have to start as you mean to go on. It seems if you start young, from the start, then there's no reason they shouldn't eat them. Brown bread from the start, becomes the only bread there is! Of course they may grow up and detest lentils, but by then, it will be their choice and I will know at least they have had healthy foundations. There's also plenty of processed vegetarian stuff around, not like the 70's! The trick is not to give up if they don't eat it the first time, just re-introduce it again later, and again, this has worked well for daughter especially.

My son seems to be the only vegetarian that we know of at his school, but the school caters for veggies in the school dinners-- sometimes. They still need guidance in that Fish, is not vegetarian! But we pack lunch. If you are thinking about going veggie, or need some info about it, the vegetarian society has some useful tips. You can read seven tips to getting started here: http://www.vegsoc.org/newveg/fft/seven.html .

"What could be better than enjoying great tasting food that is not only good for your health, but also far better for the planet and the creatures that live with us upon it?" Sir Paul McCartney, Vegetarian Society Patron

The Roots of Vegetarianism

Where are the roots of the vegetarian way of life? Sites like The International Vegetarian Union and The Vegetarian Society provide some useful info.

Beginning in England in the late 18th and early 19th centuries due to the industrial revolution, large factories were being established and more and more people found themselves crammed into close city quarters, working long hours on poor diets. An interest in animal welfare and improving one's health was developing in certain areas, with Manchester being at the center. A minister called William Cowherd from Salford, near Manchester, converted his entire congregation to vegetarianism.

As the interest grew in the vegetarian movement, around 1817 some of Cowherd's congregation left England for the United States, where they settled in Philadelphia and set up a vegetarian group, which is considered to be the start of the American vegetarian movement. The interest in Britain spread beyond Manchester to other parts of the country, and in Ramsgate Kent a health resort/vegetarian hospital was developed. A group of vegetarians organized a meeting there on 30 September 1847 and formed the Vegetarian Society, with James Simpson, its first president. Joseph Bratherton, a then Member of Parliament, was an ardent vegetarian, and his wife produced what is widely believed to be the first vegetarian cookbook in 1810. In 1848 they held the first Annual General Meeting of the Society in Manchester and since 1849 the society has been publishing a magazine.

National Vegetarian Week

It's the 15th national vegetarian week and I couldn't be happier! I'm definitely not a proselytizing veggie, but I can't ignore a whole week dedicated to spreading the info! At my son's school on Thursday they are having a special lunch with four options all prepared using Quorn, which is a mycoprotein derived from mushrooms, and very very tasty. It resembles chicken and so substitutes well in those recipes especially. I'm thinking of ways to share the love on here, which may result in a post a day..

Last week Mars company, makers of Mars Bars , Milky Way, Bounty, Snickers, Galaxy, Twix and Maltesers and others, decided to start adding animal rennet to all of their candy production. Why? you may ask, well its simply left over industry waste from meat production that they need to get rid of! As a veggie, one would expect it to show up in non-veg cheese production, and one looks out for gelatin (another animal by-product) in certain sweets and items, but rennet in chocolate?? just digusting. {Rennet; the lining membrane of the fourth stomach of a calf or of the stomach of certain other young animals.}

Having received some 6,000 complaints plus a petition from the Vegetarian Society, Mars have reversed their unpopular rennet decision. But be warned, Maltesers are the last on the list to be revised.

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/skynews/20070520/tuk-vegetarians-win-battle-of-the-mars-b-45dbed5.html

Better veggie news concerns India-based MDLR airlines, which has chosen to serve completely vegetarian cuisine onboard as of May 2007 -read about it here: http://www.expresstravelworld.com/200704/aviationworld06.shtml