To be eating meat ...

[scarlets]

... after 20+ years of half-hearted vegetarianism?

I haven't consumed meat since I was an "anti cruelty" kid in 1991 but I have eaten some fish and was never strict about gelatine, gravy etc. I wear leather shoes. My children eat meat which I sometimes cook for them.

A new friend asked me this week why I'm veggie. I don't know why. I can't justify why I don't eat bacon sandwiches but do eat Haribo.

[Hassled]

Most of us are omnivores - completely fair enough to change your diet if you want to. What you can do is try to make sure the meat you do eat is reared humanely, etc.

[MrsTerryPratchett]

Because gravy is a 'by-product' and during my 8 years of vegetarianism you would have had to pry it from my cold, dead hands. In this house, gravy is a beverage.

Seriously, though. You are theoretically reducing the demand for meat so you are reducing the supply (raising meat). I don't think people would raise herds for gravy or Haribo.

[TTWK]

If we weren't meant to eat meat, animals wouldn't be made of it!

[lunalelle]

I think a lot of people like to make goady comments to vegetarians and vegans. For example, I was having dinner with DH and some friends of his, and one of them began telling me that I wasn't a 'true believer' because I will prepare meat for him.

Obviously I would prefer not to, but at the same time I feel people should make their own choices. Doing what you can - doing something - is always better than nothing and you don't need to justify your choices.

[Theknacktoflying]

As Hassled suggested - look for meat that is humanely reared

[Pipnposy]

I did this. After being obsessed with the vegetarian society as a 10 year old and being a 'bad veggie' (no chicken but ate fish and gelatine etc) for 18 years I decided to eat meat again when I went travelling and found it very hard to eat without meat. It was a habit more than an ethical reason at that stage and once I'd got past the mental barrier there was no looking back. Just had a rare steak for dinner. These days I see more logic in veganism but couldn't live without cheese...

[CakeNinja]

Just eat what you want.
Being vegetarian is a label. You weren't really one, you ate what you wanted and avoided what you didn't.
You're just choosing to expand the things you do eat.
Why feel bad?

[Andrewofgg]

Do what you want and don't let anyone make you feel bad about it. As is commonly said on another subject: It's your body, it's your choice.

[mumofboyo]

I'm thinking this too.

I want to eat meat properly again - I became vegetarian aged 11 but after a few years decided I liked fish. I then started eating other things that I knew had animal products in, such as Worcester sauce, and using beef stock in stews, chillies and the like; but there's something stopping me from putting actual meat in my mouth (a steak for example, or real chicken instead of Quorn pieces).

I've recently heard some scary things about Quorn - how it's produced, what it's made of, how it can inhibit vitamin and mineral absorption etc; this is making me want to eat meat properly even more but it's like there's a sticking point that I just can't explain.

I think that part of the reason is that other people, who have known me a long time and have always been very vocal about my diet, finding out about my change of heart and using it as another reason to have a go at me and crow about how they had had a part in me changing my opinion.

I'm not explaining myself very well but, in short, yanbu to want to eat meat!

[ltk]

I'm veggie and have no desire to eat meat. Or Quorn. But if you do, then go for it. If most people on the planet gave it up for as long as you have, the environmental benefit would be huge.

[lightgreenglass]

I eat meat but I eat far less than I used to and as I am the cook, the whole family does, and that is a good compromise for me at the moment. Maybe later on in life I will change my mind but I am reducing the demand for meat so see that as positive. I doubt I'll ever truly give up. My son doesn't seem overly fussed by meat so I don't encourage it, loves his milk though.

[lightgreenglass]

I have a friend who likes to guilt trip me about my meat consumption and I just nod my head so she feels she is getting her own way.

[thenightsky]

Link to the quorn scare thing please. We eat tons of it in this house, but I'm lapsing back to real chicken when DH isn't looking.

[ThreeQuartersEmpty]

What's this about Quorn limiting absorption?

[mumofboyo]

I did a bit of Googling the other day after my mil, who works in the food industry, said there have been some health scares and controversies in America regarding the origins, ingredients and use of Quorn.

These are some of the websites I found (quite a few of them are based on little more than anecdotal evidence so I don't know how much to believe):

articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2014/09/11/quorn-brand-meat-substitute.aspx

www.manchesterconfidential.co.uk/food-and-drink/vegetarian/quorn-should-i-be-eating-it-2013

www.cspinet.org/new/201009231.html

www.clubonehundred.com/2012/02/23/10-reasons-not-to-eat-meat-alternatives/

Google is full of sites similar to this. After dh's conversation with his mum the other day, I realised that I actually had no idea what Quorn is, how it's produced and whether it's worse than the meat it's substituting.

[mumofboyo]

Like I said, I don't know how much of the links that I have posted are true and how many of them are scaremongering.
I think the vitamin thing is more to do with soy than with Quorn, sorry.

[70isaLimitNotaTarget]

I have been vegetarian for 35 years and people still say to me "Oh, I bet you'd love some of this" wafting roast chicken past me.

If I wanted to, I would.
There's nothing stopping me except ME.

Not upbringing
Not God.
Not allergy.

My choice.

FIL was a particularly tiresome player in the "Oh , I bet if I left the room, you'd clear my plate" game.

"Oh yes. Hold me back. Because after all these years, the one thing I really, really want is a plate of stewed mince" ]hmm]

[samsam123]

if you can kill skin, and cut up the dead cow then you can eat meat if you cant then you shouldn't eat meat. Can you look into the eyes of the lamb and then slit its throat if you couldn't then you shouldn't eat it.

[TTWK]

if you can kill skin, and cut up the dead cow then you can eat meat if you cant then you shouldn't eat meat. Can you look into the eyes of the lamb and then slit its throat if you couldn't then you shouldn't eat it.

But that's what butchers are for! Should you not use the toilet unless you are prepared to be a sewage worker? Or live in a house unless you are prepared to tile your own roof?

[Andrewofgg]

samsam123 Come off it. Every time you eat vegetable produce you are depriving sentient animals of their dinner or their habitat. So how about this:

If you couldn't look the field mouse in the eye they you shouldn't eat the bread made from the wheat it eats and lives in

(and vary the animal to suit the vegetable).

What is the difference between being starved because the humans have eaten your habitat - or the vegetable you would have eaten - and being killed directly by the human? Or what difference does it make whether the human which kills you is the one which eats you or not?

The worst advert for the vegetarian (and still more the vegan) way of life is the self-righteous guilt-tripppery of some of its adherents.

[howabout]

My local area has sheep and cows in the fields and hills. Not sure the land would work very productively on a vegetarian basis. I eat meat and take the kids out and about to meet their dinner being reared.
Each to their preference but make up your mind as I have loads of vegetarian / vegan / pescetarian relatives. Nothing more irritating than making an effort for them only to be told their eating habits have changed again.

[Branleuse]

im on and off with vegetarianism.

I hardly ever eat meat or dairy, but as soon as i ban myself from it or decide to go veggie properly, I get cravings, so now im just ok with eating it sometimes.

Flexitarian :)

[Topseyt]

I am edging towards a vegetarian diet.

I am uncomfortable with the way a lot of the meat industry is run - animals being mass produced, intensive farming methods etc.

I won't give up cheese and eggs, but I do insist on buying free range eggs. Hens should never be made to live in tiny cages they can hardly stand up in, sharing with three or four others and almost never seeing the light of day. That is barbaric.

[GiddyOnZackHunt]

Every choice is imperfect. Very few people carry a principle through to perfection. So if you choose to eat a little meat now then the Veggie Police won't knock at your door. I am a pretty strict veggie but I'm a lone voice in my family. /Don't beat yourself up.

[GobblersKnob]

Andrewofgg if I had a pound for every time someone had tripped out that old chestnut, has to be literally THE most unimaginative thing you can say to a non meat eater.

How about we stop feeding feeding all the huge amounts of food we feed each year to animals raised for their flesh who in turn yield only a tiny amount (by comparison) of food in return, and use all that food to feed the world many times over, (which it would).

Field mice, lolz.