After pretty much giving up meat back in October, I figured it was worth writing a post about why and how. These are our rules and our reasons, which are rooted in health, sustainability, the environment and ethics. They may provide food for thought and discussion.
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A restaurant on the beach in Bali. 23rd October 2010. My last day in my twenties and the end of a long day of training for a workshop. I had a chicken curry, which was nice but the chutney and poppadoms were the most worthwhile part. Ken next to me had something veggie which looked better.
Periplus bookstore in Bali. 24th October 2010. First day of being thirty, a foggy head from a late night and I needed a book to read. I ended up picking
Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran-Foer. I loved
Everything is Illuminated, his debut novel, and found the idea of a factual book by him interesting. I was expecting a rant against the industrial farming industry, an updated
Fast Food Nation. Instead it was a beautifully written personal account of his relationship with meat. He looks into how it is produced. He explores the ethics and choices we make when eating animals. It was the final word the debate that has been going on in our heads for a while and so that day we decided to live a meat-less life.
Meat-less is not meat-free. We're not full-time vegetarians or vegans (though if all restaurants were as good as
Zula in Seminyak we could be). We just
made the decision to make decisions; to think more carefully about our choices and how they impact our health, our future and the world around us.
We made some rules, and for six months, so far, we have been good at sticking to them.
- Eat meat a couple of times a month, not every day. This gives us the freedom to enjoy food and to appreciate the efforts of people who entertain. When thinking about meals each day we think about what we will have, not what animal we will have.
- Avoid the junk and the cheapo valupacks. Soon after beginning, I had a hankering for a burger. I scratched that itch and didn't really enjoy it. Now if it's a meaty meal it has to be quality. As for extra-value meat packets: how can they afford to get so much flesh into a packet so cheaply?
- Don't think like a meat-eater. Trying to replace meat with meat-substitutes is a recipe for disappointment. Hesty is getting very good at making veggie dinners. Tonight she made me a fettucine and grilled-mushroom with pesto and courgette dish. It was good!
- Do think like a global citizen. Huge numbers of Indonesians eat delicious food which is not meat-heavy. Vegetarian Indian is by far the best choice on the plane. We have always had open-minded food tastes, which Hesty and I both attribute to our mothers. Both excellent cooks in their own styles, they raised us to be adventurous eaters. It is a gift and we will try to do the same for Anya and Sam. They will need to find their own niche in the world and as third culture kids are more likely to explore the planet and its cultures. Fussy eaters do not do well overseas. I joke in semi-seriousness that if Hesty had been a picky eater I would not have continued our relationship beyond the first dates.
- Stay balanced and get the right nutrition. Protein deficiency for vegetarians and the meat-less is a myth. We still eat eggs and drink milk. Indonesia and Japan are great for tofu, beans and vegetables. Without too much stress any privileged, well-fed person gets at least as much protein as they need.
- Don't go too hardcore. We're not pious and we're not preaching. We're simply making our own choice based on the knowledge we have. We take the time to read and to care, and the world is in a place where as many people as possible need to make sustainable choices. This is what we're comfortable with and for us it feels like the right thing to do.We don't force ourselves to completely give up meat, but our intake has dropped by at least ninety percent. Amazingly, it has not been difficult.
- Don't force it on the kids. Anya still eats meat on an almost-daily basis, but is not one for huge portions. She loves milk, eggs and veggies and is already a budding environmentalist. Sam loves dairy, but at the moment he only gets his milk from two reliable udders.
It took more than a book and a turning-thirty crisis to make the change. As a biology and health teacher, marine biologist, parent and someone who cares about the environment, it is the right choice to make.
More after the page jump...
