Yet Another Meat Recall
It feels like there is something in the papers, almost weekly, to give me another reason to thank Jane for suggesting we change over to a vegan diet. On Saturday, May 3rd, Gourmet Boutique, LLC, announced a voluntary recall of 286,320 pounds of fresh and frozen beef, pork, and poultry products. That's more than a quarter MILLION pounds of meat. The reason: the recalled products may be contaminated with listeria monocytogenes which can cause listeriosis. Listeriosis is primarily of concern to newborn infants, the elderly, and the immunocompromised, where it can manifest as septicemia, meningitis, encephalitis, pneumonia, or gastrointestinal ailments among other diseases/conditions.
The USDA has three levels of recall, one being the most severe. This recall is a level one recall:
This is a health hazard situation where there is a reasonable probability that the use of the product will cause serious, adverse health consequences or death.
Frightening! Please make sure to pass this information along to all your meat eating friends and relatives. For additional information see the USDA Recall Release (PDF file), or you can call the company's recall hotline at (347) 887-0083.
– We're getting ready to close down our petition to Oprah asking her to do a piece on factory farming, if you haven't already signed, please consider doing so. We can all work together to make a difference.
PETA’s List of Animal By-Products
I stumbled across a list of animal ingredients and their alternatives as compiled by PETA. This list is a great reference point, and I wanted to share it with you, we've added it to our vegan resources page as well.
Animal ingredients are used not because they are better than vegetable-derived or synthetic ingredients, but because they are generally cheaper. Today’s slaughterhouses must dispose of the byproducts of the slaughter of billions of animals every year and have found an easy and profitable solution in selling them to food and cosmetics manufacturers.
Jane and I feel that avoiding these by-products is not nearly as important as avoiding the animal products from which they are derived. If the number of animals slaughtered is reduced, the availability of animal by-products will also be reduced, therefore driving up the price so other alternatives will be sought out by the manufacturers. In the meantime, they are everywhere. This list, while not comprehensive, provides some information for anyone confused about what they're reading on the labels of the products they're buying.
– If you haven’t signed our petition to Oprah asking her to do a piece on factory farming, please consider doing so. We can all work together to make a difference.
Pro-Choice
Lane and I were trying to figure out where to go for dinner tonight. We were having one of those dilemmas you sometimes have where one person is in the mood for a certain type of cuisine and the other person is in the mood for something entirely different.
We've been vegan for almost 10 months. In all this time, it really hasn't been much of an issue. The first few weeks were difficult and confusing; it's hard to rethink your old habits. But once we got into our new vegan habits, things got easier. I've got a list of staples I keep in my pantry; I've got a few "quick-fix" things in my freezer for those days when I cannot even bear to think about preparing food. I find I need to do a bit more planning before travel, and some of the foods I'm preparing these days requires a bit more prep time. But overall, it really hasn't been a difficult transition, other than the occasional pizza craving!
The biggest issue, for us, is often eating out. We're not afforded many options at most restaurants. So, if the restaurant of choice has one vegan entree, and one of us is not in the mood... it can be problematic. I know I shouldn't complain, we live in Los Angeles, and it's probably way easier to get vegan food here than elsewhere in the country (notable exceptions being Portland and New York), but I would really like to see veganism go mainstream. I'm tired of being offered a substandard veggie burger or portobello mushroom as my only option! Where are all the vegan meals? As an omnivore, I never went back to a restaurant that only had one acceptable item (to me) on their menu. I hate not having a lot of choice!
– If you haven’t signed our petition to Oprah asking her to do a piece on factory farming, please consider doing so. We can all work together to make a difference.
Vegan Nutella Recipe
When I was a kid, visiting some family friends, I discovered Nutella. It wasn't something my mom would ever buy... it was too expensive and too high in calories. But there was something about that chocolate hazelnut spread that I found amazingly good. It was kind of like a Peanut Butter Cup, but with hazelnuts instead of peanut butter. And, of course, it was spreadable. It was given to me on Wonder Bread, also something I didn't often have at home (no nutritional value).
I never bought the stuff as an adult. I think it might be like Spaghetti-O's. I always had the fondest memory of eating them as a child. Actually, I remember really liking them. Then, when I was living alone in my first apartment, I bought a can at the supermarket. With the greatest anticipation, I heated them up and put them in a bowl. And they were HORRIBLE! (The ingredient list would have been a clue, had I looked at it!) That experience taught me to be wary of foods I adored as a child. And it's borne out in things like Fruit Loops cereal and the like.
I'm afraid the Nutella would taste like that to me today. But then again, maybe not. I think it was marketed towards adults. Anyway, Lane and I have been poking around the internet looking at vegan recipes, and i stumbled across a message board thread with a recipe for Vegan Nutella. There are a few versions on the thread, I may have to try them all. Sometimes I'll make Lane an Almond Butter, Honey, and Banana sandwich for lunch. The nutella might make for a nice change from the almond butter on occasion.
– If you haven’t signed our petition to Oprah asking her to do a piece on factory farming, please consider doing so. We can all work together to make a difference.
