If only I had some other reason to be in New York in May...

The first annual Veggie Pride Parade will take place in Greenwich Village, NY on Sunday, May 18th. Appropriately enough, it begins in the old "Meat Packing District." The parade will even have floats! At the conclusion there will be a rally in Washington Square Park with live music, speakers, exhibitors, and contests. It all sounds like great fun.

The parade sponsors will be hosting two contests -- a Poster Contest and a Costume Contest. There are many categories, but my favorites include: Best poster, bacterial-contamination theme; Best poster, manure theme; Most-things-hanging-off-it costume; Most convincing costume—enough to make the meat eaters go veg; Best edible costume.

There will even be a veggie wedding. Penelo Pea Pod, the Veggie Pride mascot, will be getting married at 4pm, after the rally. (Although I can't tell if this is a real wedding or a stunt.) They do ask you to bring rice to throw at the happy couple afterwards, something I'd long believed was taboo. But according to Snopes.com, the people who confirm or refute urban legends, throwing rice is safe for birds, but potentially harmful to people who might slip and injure themselves on the hard grains of rice. But I digress...

This looks to be a very fun way to educate and introduce a large number of people to a vegetarian way of life. If you're in the NYC region and would like to help out, the Veggie Pride people are looking for volunteers. This page has a listing of all the things you can do to help out. I'm looking forward to seeing the videos afterwards.

Let me preface this article by saying that Jane and I became vegans for health reasons. Over the course of learning about the benefits of a vegan diet, we've read literature on factory farming. And, as with most people, the more we read, the more appalled we become.

Today, watching our local CBS news affiliate, we were very disturbed by a story that was aired on animal cruelty at the Hallmark Meat Packing Company, a slaughterhouse in Chino, California. The Humane Society surreptitiously recorded the abuse of sick and injured cows, behavior designed to get the cows to walk to the slaughterhouse.

Federal and California laws have prohibited the slaughter of "downer" cattle since 1989. The term "downer" is applied to those cows that cannot stand or walk. Cattle categorized as "downer" are not allowed to enter the human food supply. This is intended to prevent both animal cruelty and the consumption of meat from unhealthy animals. "Downer" cattle are at heightened risk for infections ranging from mad cow disease, to E. coli, to salmonella.

The meat processed at Hallmark is distributed by Westland Meat Co., also based in Chino, California. According to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), Westland sold 27 million pounds of frozen meat last year to federal food and nutrition programs, including those that furnish meals to the poor and elderly across 36 states. Westland is also a major supplier of beef to the federal school lunch program.

The Humane Society is calling for quick action from our government to guarantee the most basic level of humane treatment for farm animals and to protect Americans from potentially dangerous food.

The two employees caught abusing cattle on the Humane Society video have been fired, and their supervisor suspended. The USDA is investigating potential violations of state and federal laws, and has indefinitely suspended Westland's participation in federal food and nutrition programs.

The video below is a segment of the footage that was shot by a Hallmark Meat Packing employee who was working undercover for the Humane Society in the fall of 2007. Warning: Do not watch the video below if you are at all squeamish.

This is just another one of the growing number of reasons why we don't eat meat these days.

For additional information on this video see:

• US Department of Agriculture-- Press Release
• Westland Meat Company -- Press Release
• CBS Evening News
• CNN
• Associated Press

Is this vegan thing becoming main-stream? There certainly seems to have been a proliferation of vegan cookbooks, blogs and even stars lately. I did a quick search on Amazon.com and found 9,743 entries under "vegan" books alone! Wow. I had no idea. I mean, the vegan population is only 1.4% of the total U.S. population according to a 2006 poll by the Vegetarian Resource Group. That's approximately 4.4 million of us here. It seems like a large number of books on a topic that might have a limited audience. Unless that audience is growing.

On Wednesday morning, January 23rd, we vegans will have a representative on The Today Show, and she is Ann Gentry. Ann is the founder of Real Food Daily (an excellent vegan restaurant with two locations here in Los Angeles), the Executive Chef of Vegetarian Times magazine, and host of the cooking show "Naturally Delicious" which airs on the Veria Network, which I don't get to see unfortunately. Ms. Gentry is also the author of one of Jane's absolute favorite vegan cookbooks, Real Food Daily Cookbook. (The Today Show airs on NBC in the 7am - 10am EST/PST time slot.) It appears she'll be on in the 9.30 segment, but I could only find that info here, and I'm not sure how valid that information is, so set your TiVos or VCRs for the full three hours if you don't want to miss her. I'm going to!

According to the RFD newsletter, she will be cooking up some delicious vegetarian fare. I'm hoping that means "vegan." If you miss the show, here's a link from an old interview with Ann that provides some valuable vegan cooking tips. Jane and I hope to record the episode, and we'll report on it later in the week, if we are successful.

It's a great to see vegans being represented in such a mainstream media source. Hopefully this is not a fad, but is indicative of a change in the way American's are eating and thinking about food.

For the last few years, it seems that "the obesity epidemic" has been one of those hot topic issues. You read about it everywhere and hear about it on the news with some regularity. And now that it's January again, it seems like you hear something new every day. I guess it's not so surprising after all. If you do any research on the matter, obesity health-related issues are problems facing most developed and developing countries. According to the World Health Organization there are One BILLION overweight people in the world, and at least 300 million of these are clinically obese. Overweight is defined here as having a Body Mass Index (BMI) over 25 and obesity is having a BMI over 30. Imagine that, 300 million clinically obese people... That's the equivalent of the entire population of the United States. (You can find a BMI Calculator here.)

The most effective way to combat obesity is to modify your diet and to begin an exercise regime. You know, common sense... eat fewer calories than you expend and you'll lose weight. But the global trend of wealthier and denser populations has lead to a change in the way we live. As humans, our diets are comprised of more refined foods, foods which are high in saturated fats, trans-fats, sugars, and over processed grains stripped of their nutrients. And food is omnipresent. There is food for purchase at almost any event you might attend, including plays on Broadway!

In addition to the dietary changes we have also experienced significant changes in the way we live over the last century. More and more labor saving devices allow us more leisure time, and more time to socialize - which is usually a food-centric event. It seems like home cooked meals are becoming a rarity. The computer, television, and electronic games have all but replaced the physical pursuits we used to participate in during our leisure time. Most of us spend our days behind a desk in front of a computer. All this adds up to a sedentary lifestyle, which coupled with the above mentioned dietary changes, has led to our ever expanding waistlines.

One of the ways to combat this problem is to shift to a vegan diet. Most doctors and health organizations recommend that people should increase their intake of fruits and vegetables while reducing their consumption of saturated fats. Saturated fats are primarily found in animal products (with the notable exception of coconut oil).

The major killers of Americans—heart disease, cancer, and stroke—have a dramatically lower incidence among people consuming primarily plant-based diets. Weight problems—a contributor to a host of health problems—can also be brought under control by following the New Four Food Group recommendations. -- The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine

Of course, being vegan doesn't guarantee that you will lose weight. If you eat nothing but potato chips or Soy Ice Cream, you'll most likely be eschewing animal product, but you won't lose weight. Generally vegan meals are less calorie dense than those centered around animal product. If you've been following this blog at all, you'll know that I've lost 20 pounds and my wife has lost 11 over a six month period. That may not sound like a lot if you're looking to lose 100 or so, but we haven't done anything else. We haven't stepped up our exercise; we haven't cut our consumption. We just changed what we were eating, for other reasons, and had this very nice byproduct. And we're not the only ones. Apparently, a veg*n diet will result in a 1 pound per week average weight loss, as reported in a study by Nutrition Reviews.

For further reading see:

• A New Food Guide for North American Vegetarians (pdf)
• Veganism: A Weapon to Fight The Obesity Epidemic -- John Livesey PhD, Scientific Officer, Department of Endocrinolog, Christchurch Hospital, New Zealand
• Health Benefits of a Vegetarian Diet

I was driving to work the other morning, listening to sports talk radio, and I heard the hosts talking about, of all things, nutrition. They were talking about 8 things that you should eat every day to be healthy. Sounds good. And, as I've mentioned before, I'm like a household pet.... I'm OK eating the same thing every day.

When I got home I googled "8 things to eat everyday" and found a number of interesting links. You can search yourself if you want to do further research. But this is the list below:

• Spinach
• Yogurt
• Tomatoes
• Carrots
• Blueberries
• Black Beans
• Walnuts
• Oats

As for the yogurt, soy yogurt is listed as an acceptable alternative. So, I'm looking at this list and thinking, hmmm, I could do this every day. Sort of. Maybe not every day, but most days.

But what I found most interesting is this little blurb I found on spinach:

"Protein makes up 30% of the calories from spinach and it's high in methionine, an essential amino acid that is somewhat lacking in many plant foods. Spinach is a good addition to your diet if you should not eat a lot of soy product."

One side note on the spinach... buy organic. The pesticide levels on spinach appear to be pretty high, at least from the reading that I've done online.

Happy eating.