Vegan no more
 

Excellent blog entry about getting your head back together when you learn your beliefs aren't what they turned out to be.

Not the first time misguided ethics have hurt the individual, but at least she was only hurting herself... except for her vegan flatulence.

Many vegans live healthy lives, but I respect her in the same way I respect meat-lovers who become vegetarian for specific health issues. Admitting your diet is unhealthy and then doing something about it is always admirable. And something I aspire to...

Vegans don't exist in reality.

I have never been attacked by a vegan.
I have never eaten a vegan.
I have never stepped in vegan shit.
I have never had sex with a vegan.
Based on this info...vegans do not exist.

I've never stepped in vegan shit either.

I went to an event where a friend was speaking over the summer.

It was not just a vegan, but worse, a raw vegan dining club.

Instead of just kneeling over the lawn and nibbling on grasses, they has something like a pot luck. I was nearly cast out for not bringing my own bowl and sustainable cutlery.

I ended up going on the spur of the moment and didn't have anything to contribute for the meal, but ended up having some lovely roast chicken courtesy of another attendee there for the speaker who heard the "potluck" and "dining club" parts, but missed out on the "raw vegan." Or perhaps she didn't, and wanted to twist their heads around a little. I liked her a lot.

Most of the entrées looked like mud with slivered raw almonds scattered over them. I think I took a small stalk of broccoli to be polite. The only fruit offering had coconut all over it. Ick (and anaphyllactic shock). And a nice hunk of that chicken.

I also risked banishment by using insect spray instead of slapping and scratching. Fuck that shit. I didn't want malaria from the swamp in the backyard, since they apparently didn't believe in drainage.

Most of the raw vegan dining club members looked like aliens. Thin, wobbly on their stick-like legs, with big eyes and pale gray skin. At least one of them had a distended malnourished belly like the kids in the commercials with Sally Struthers. Totally.

Needless to say, my friend and I hit the first WaWa we came to on the way out of town.

I have known healthy vegans, but they were very careful to eat specific foods to make sure they got all the required nutrients, and took multi-vitamins as a backup.

And I saw via 2 or 3 degrees of separation on facebook, someone cancelling their raw food stall at a festival because of ... yup, you guessed it ... food poisoning. Sure, cooking may beat up a few vitamins, but it also kicks the crap out of E-coli.

I've been listening to phantom radio talk show host for 3 years now.

I was at Sugar Mom's one recent night (a Philly bar that offers vegan items on its menu), and overheard a girl asking if they had vegan cheese available for their vegan steak sandwich.

When told "no," she opted for Cheez Whiz, stating that she thought it was the closest cheese choice to vegan. Egad.

As a dairy product Cheez Whiz wouldn't even be close to being vegan.

There are vegan cheeses though, sometimes called 'sheese' around here, but any I've tried have been rather disappointing with the best of them tasting a bit like the cheapest of cheddars.

I've tried so-called veggie cheeses (which still contain milk products), and have been similarly disappointed. They aren't horrible, but really, there isn't any point to consuming these types of foods.

It just doesn't make any sense to me...cheese and meat are by definition animal products. If one is a vegan, why try to replace these types of things in your diet with fake substitutes?

I wouldn't want to guess at percentages but by far the majority of cheese sold in the UK is, nowadays, of the 'veggie' type.

I'm assuming folk know the difference.

To make cheese milk must be separated into curds and whey. Traditionally this has been done using rennet obtained from the stomach of a calf which is still being fed by its mother - a process which of course requires chopping the baby cow up into bits.

In veggie cheeses (and generally kosher/halal ones too) a substitute to rennet is used, usually fungi based.

Have a look on the ingredients next time you buy cheese, there's a good chance you are already eating a 'veggie' type at least some of the time without realising it.

After a quick 'Google' - it seems that around 90% of US made cheeses are 'veggie' types.

Rennet is a fascinating substance. It revolts me utterly, so I always check for it and avoid buying cheeses that use it.

It's one of those substances that shows the deep ingenuity of the human race; whilst at the same time ups the moral ante on animal consumption. It's the idea of it that I can't get past. First we take milk that's meant for the calf, then we the calf's stomache to partially 'digest' the milk. Bluergh. But brilliant.