Today I ate a peanut butter sandwich for breakfast. Nothing complicated about that. Just a slice of bread with some seedless raspberry spread and a generous dollop of crunchy peanut butter. It occurred to me that, when in doubt, I turn to peanut butter often to satisfy that protein, rounded, dare I say, meaty, texture and full feeling during a hectic school day.
This reminds me of a conversation I had with a friend of mine, who really got me started on my vegetarian journey (she has been veg for over two years, and tried veganism for a few months). She told me that when she was vegan, she craved peanut butter all the time. Her mouth watered when she thought about that delicious spread: "I ate peanut butter so much when I was vegan. Mmmm, num num." Her lips lapped the plain air in hopes that maybe it would taste like her words. Or she was hung over. Or just plain hungry for our lunch break.
For whatever reason she waxed poetic on the subject of it, I noticed that I too craved peanut butter once I gave up meat as a stable food source. Peanut butter for breakfast, for lunch (the crunchy kind makes it seem more like a meal than a snack), sometimes for a poor-ass dinner; peanut butter with pretzels, with crackers, in your ramen, and on and on. Peta College Vegan Guide has an entire chapter devoted to George Washington Carver's love child, and there are whole books covering all modes of daily eating with a brown, sometimes crunchy spread of deliciousness.
In conclusion to my own waxing poetic on the subject, I think that like other "meaty" substitutes like mushrooms, peanut butter is one of the top foods that satisfy the veg/vegan mouth. And unlike meat, it tastes good with any flavor of jelly.
Monday, January 31, 2011
Sunday, January 30, 2011
In the beginning, there was a vegetarian...
...or am I? How 'bout a pesca-tarian, lacto-ovo vegetarian, or the moderate, I'll-try-anything-once 'flexitarian'?
I have only recently flirted with the idea that I could consider myself a vegetarian, but my over-active imagination and infinite possibilities of exceptional circumstances prevents me from settling to a label. And it could be a result of my stubborness to label myself as anything. Student? Sure, I go to school, that's nothing to be ashamed of. Person interested in food issues? Yeah, I'll take that one. Vegetarian? Well, I did eat that hot dog on Friday...but I felt bad about it later!
Thing is, no matter the label one has, that doesn't make that person's life easier. Especially if you decide to abstain from eating meat. If you live in a southern state, telling your parents you're a vegetarian is like telling them you're atheist. The standard reaction from parents and other adults I've been around who know I don't eat meat is that they brush it off as a phase in youth. I'm not sure how a young atheist feels about being told that his developing philosophy is a 'phase' and therefore not worthy of consideration, but from what I've experienced, it's kind of a let down from the grown-ups. Because you have decided to go through a change, your lifestyle is different from the 'norm' and could cause some unnecessary tension at the dinner table as grandma passes you a piece of Thanksgiving turkey. And what are you supposed to say to poor ol' grandma? "Sorry Grannie, but that turkey was probably molested by an unskilled worker before it bled to death and was boiled alive"?
If Grannie can hear at all (which she can't, as she refuses to get hearing aids--damn the pride of her surname), it would break her heart that you're not eating her turkey, which, by the way, she slaved for hours over since 4 a.m. to make it for the whole family to eat, yourself included. What do you say to that? Unfortunately, it often results in a concession for the new vegetarian.
The purpose of this blog (other than to force myself to write--what's a Creative Writing student without something to write?) is to show others how I'm coping with a change in lifestyle. And maybe if someone out there in the Internet galaxy learns something, it would be that it's never easy to change your life, but the attempt is worth all the trouble. Even if it's 'only a phase.'
I have only recently flirted with the idea that I could consider myself a vegetarian, but my over-active imagination and infinite possibilities of exceptional circumstances prevents me from settling to a label. And it could be a result of my stubborness to label myself as anything. Student? Sure, I go to school, that's nothing to be ashamed of. Person interested in food issues? Yeah, I'll take that one. Vegetarian? Well, I did eat that hot dog on Friday...but I felt bad about it later!
Thing is, no matter the label one has, that doesn't make that person's life easier. Especially if you decide to abstain from eating meat. If you live in a southern state, telling your parents you're a vegetarian is like telling them you're atheist. The standard reaction from parents and other adults I've been around who know I don't eat meat is that they brush it off as a phase in youth. I'm not sure how a young atheist feels about being told that his developing philosophy is a 'phase' and therefore not worthy of consideration, but from what I've experienced, it's kind of a let down from the grown-ups. Because you have decided to go through a change, your lifestyle is different from the 'norm' and could cause some unnecessary tension at the dinner table as grandma passes you a piece of Thanksgiving turkey. And what are you supposed to say to poor ol' grandma? "Sorry Grannie, but that turkey was probably molested by an unskilled worker before it bled to death and was boiled alive"?
If Grannie can hear at all (which she can't, as she refuses to get hearing aids--damn the pride of her surname), it would break her heart that you're not eating her turkey, which, by the way, she slaved for hours over since 4 a.m. to make it for the whole family to eat, yourself included. What do you say to that? Unfortunately, it often results in a concession for the new vegetarian.
The purpose of this blog (other than to force myself to write--what's a Creative Writing student without something to write?) is to show others how I'm coping with a change in lifestyle. And maybe if someone out there in the Internet galaxy learns something, it would be that it's never easy to change your life, but the attempt is worth all the trouble. Even if it's 'only a phase.'
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