One thing I’ve heard a lot since I’ve become vegetarian (and which I imagine others have as well) is the question: “Why would a vegetarian, who doesn’t eat meat, want to eat fake meat? There are so many of them in the stores.”

My answer is simple, and one I’m surprised I have to say so frequently. My choice to not eat meat wasn’t because I hated the taste of meat. In fact, I bet that almost every vegetarian liked the taste of meat when they gave it up for either ethical or health reasons. So, just because I don’t eat meat doesn’t mean that I miss the taste of a Big Mac or cheese-stuffed chicken on occasion, so that’s why I appreciate the meat alternatives, for when I’m in the mood for that taste. I’m just glad that products as versatile as the soy bean can be used to create such a close-tasting replica to the “real thing” without any animal suffering involved and with significant health benefits.

Some frightening survey results published in the New England Journal of Medicine: out of 200 random retail meat samples, 20% of them contained salmonella. Four out of every five of the infected samples contained a strain of salmonella that’s resistant to at least one antibiotic.

Usually my lunch is made up of leftovers from the previous night’s dinner, which works out well. But last week I felt more like going back to the every day sandwich routine. I bought some rolls (I want to know where you can find whole wheat sub rolls—do they even exist?), some Tofurkey peppered deli slices, and a pack of Tofutti American faux-cheese slices (which are vegan). I added some mustard or Nayonaise, tomato, and lettuce and had myself a nice vegan sub.

I was certainly impressed by the good flavor of the Tofurkey peppered deli slices (they even satisfied Huyen, who gets picky about my faux-meat products) but I was most impressed with how much better the Tofutti faux-cheese slices were versus the Veggie Slices I’m used to. Interestingly, though Veggie Slices have casein (a skim milk protein) to help get the cheese texture, I was more satisfied with Tofutti’s texture and flavor. Note that Tofutti slices have more saturated fat than the veggie slices, but for most healthy-eating vegetarians/vegans, this shouldn’t be a problem.

As mentioned below, the current issue of Organic Style (a new spinoff of Organic Gardening) has a brief feature on white tea (this link will likely disappear when the next issue hits the stands). As you may know, I’m a huge fan of white tea’s subtle flavor and find few things more relaxing than a cup of Sow Mee or Silver Needle. Interestingly, while green tea has always been touted for its health benefits, white tea has those same benefits, only amplified. The lower amount of caffeine is just a start.

“The newest health drink comes in a teacup, and this time, it’s not green. The antioxidants in green tea that safeguard cells from damage and prevent cancer, heart disease, and osteoporosis are also in white tea—in higher concentrations.”

One thing I didn’t know is that there is now a skin cream made from white tea by Origins called A Perfect World White Tea Skin Guardian. Whether or not it’s actually better for your skin, I don’t know, but it’s still pretty cool to see this rare tea being mentioned outside of tea enthusiast mailing lists.

From my letter to the editors of Organic Style magazine:

Thus far I’ve enjoyed the first two issues of Organic Style. Though it’s a little “slick” for my tastes, I’ve enjoyed most of the articles and applaud you for covering white tea in your Nov/Dec 2001 issue. White tea is my favorite kind for its subtle flavor alone, and its health benefits, even beyond green teas, are good to see in a publication of your scope.

One issue I feel I must bring up, though, is with your article “The Problem with Poultry.” While free-range chickens, or “organic” chickens may be slightly healthier, from an ethical standpoint they are really not much of an improvement over factory farmed poultry. The end result is the same: the chickens are killed for food and whether they’re allowed to walk around before they’re slaughtered is a way to make people feel less guilty about eating animals. If someone is truly concerned about ethics with regards to their eating habits (and, indeed, their health), then a vegetarian or vegan diet is the way to go.

Free-range farming isn’t for the welfare of the chickens: it’s just a poor way for humans to justify eating animals.

I have a cookbook of traditional Hungarian recipes at home that I’m itching to use. Most of them use meat, which can easily be substituted for, but the problem is that almost every dish calls for lard.

Can anyone recommend a good substitute for lard (and how much would be equal to x lbs. of lard)?

With all the other news of international importance recently, these blurbs have been easy to miss:

• [Oct 4] First Mad Cow case appears in Slovakia
• [Oct 1] A mad-cow like disease is appearing in deer in the western US
• [Sep 23] Mad Cow outbreak confirmed in Japan, which forced a hunt in the US for Japanese cows. In Japan, there’s a 20% decrease in beef consumption but a 20% increase in pork consumption.
• [Sep 19] Mad Cow found (possibly) in Sweden

Food Headlines and VegSource are good resources for current Mad Cow-related info.

Last night was chilly, chilly enough to turn on the gas fireplace, so I decided to start the “stew-making season” by trying out a new recipe from Moosewood Cooks at Home: Eggplant Mykonos.

The eggplant added a nice heartiness to the stew, but I liked the fact there was fennel, dill, and spinach mixed in as well. It also got a good response from my non-vegetarian wife, who seems to really dig these vegetarian stews. She said this was one of her “new favorites,” so it’ll be finding it’s way into a regular rotation. It warmed us up and filled our tummies quite nicely and didn’t take all that long to prepare and cook (a little over half-an-hour).

For dessert, we made up some incredibly good (but simple) orange creamsicle smoothies, based on the recipe from The Vegetarian 5-Ingredient Gourmet. Even better than Stewart’s Orange N Cream soda and similar to the ever-popular Orange Julius, this particular recipe didn’t even require a blender, though we used one to get that extra frothiness.

The other night I made a chicken salad-like recipe from The Vegetarian 5-Ingredient Gourmet that had crumbled tempeh mixed with curry, non-dairy mayo, and mustard. I had it with some crackers as a light dinner, but it would have also been a nice side dish for a more substantial meal.

While the PCRM’s request of the USDA to label all meat and poultry with a biohazard label is laughable, they do bring up an important issue: current factory farming practices can cause some serious illness due to fecal contamination.

A PCRM representative said on the radio today that every day 200,000 people become ill from food poisoning and in the majority of those cases, it’s due to fecal contamination of the meat or poultry that they’ve eaten. While it may sound like a scare tactic, it’s enough to perk my ears up.