 1000 Chapel Street New Haven, CT (203) 562-3888 |
"A Vegetarian Restaurant Since 1975"
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What does Vegan Mean, by Claire Criscuolo, RN
What does Vegan mean? That question has been posed to me so many
times in the past few months, both in and out of the restaurant, I
thought I should devote some time to define the word Vegan, and how it
differs from vegetarian.
Let's start with the word vegetarian because a vegan diet came after
the vegetarian diet. According to the American Heritage College
Dictionary, Vegetarianism is the practice of subsisting on a diet
composed of vegetables, grains, fruits, nuts, and seeds, with or without
eggs and dairy products. That all sounds so undesirable to me,
subsisting and all, as though you are relying on foods that are barely
sufficient, which I know is not at all the case in a vegetarian diet,
one that is filled with the beautiful colors, flavors, and textures of
the plant kingdom to provide enjoyment and proper nutrition. And, today
we know full well that this way of eating might just be the healthiest,
too. The rules of good nutrition are the same for vegetarians, vegans,
and meat-eaters alike; you need good protein, complex carbohydrates,
good fats, vitamins, and minerals each day. Eat a variety of fruits and
vegetables, beans (try to include soybeans, too) and whole grains every
day.
The same dictionary describes Vegan as A vegetarian whose diet
consists of plant products only. Basically, Vegan diets exclude all
products from an animal including honey from bees, eggs, and all dairy
products. Those who live the Vegan lifestyle also avoid wearing leather
and of course, fur, too.
Since the beginning of recorded time, many religions have included
abstinence of meat in their practices, the actual movement toward a
vegetarian diet, for nonreligious principles developed from the animal's
rights movements, although both health and moral issues were at the
forefront of this new way of eating. This movement began in England
during the late 1800's. Vegetarian societies were formed and its members
were asked to spread the word by writing to local papers, writing mainly
about the cruelties of the livestock from Ireland and England.
Word continued to spread and in 1971 with the release of Frances
Moore Lappe's bestseller Diet for a Small Planet, the vegetarian
movement in the US was launched and continues to grow. Her book brought
attention to world hunger issues and the enormous waste of our natural
resources that it took to raise meat (it takes more than 10 times the
amount of grain to feed cattle than the amount of meat you get) and the
water and other energy needed to process the meat makes it a most
inefficient way of eating.
That book changed the way Americans thought about what they ate, although her theory of "protein combining" which she described as eating beans with grains at the same meal, rather than what science later proved to be not necessary to achieve a balanced diet, made it difficult to actually eat that way for many would-be vegetarians. In her 1981,edition of Diet for a Small Planet, she explained her theory of "protein combining" to be incorrect, making it easier to eat a vegetarian diet just by including a wide variety of fruits and vegetables, beans and grains, nuts and seeds in your diet each day.
By the late 1980's and early 1990's, doctors weighed in on the
vegetarian movement with overwhelming medical evidence published in
books like the one from Dr. John McDougall in his McDougall Program,
and another famous book, Dr. Dean Ornish's Program for Reversing Heart
Disease, by Dr. Dean Ornish. Both books promoted low-fat and vegetarian,
mostly vegan diets. Later, in the 1900's, the US government even
dropped the four food groups that prominently included meat, and
replaced it with the Food Pyramid, showing that Americans should eat
mostly beans and grains, fruits and vegetables.
It was the book written in 1991 by John Robbins, Diet for A New
America that forever changed my way of thinking about food, and
ultimately my way of eating. That book documented the process by which
our food is raised and grown and how our decisions at the table can and
do affect our health and the health of our planet.
Whether you eat a vegetarian diet that excludes meat, and fish, but
includes eggs and dairy, or a vegan diet that excludes all products
derived from an animal, or even if you include meat in your diet, I
encourage you to ask questions about your food, where it came from, how
it was grown or raised, and how the animals were raised and treated, and
how the people who grow or raise your food are treated and compensated
for their work. It all matters. They are our neighbors, and it's our
earth, and it's our future. And it's your body, so treat it like it's
the only one you've got, because it is.
Ways to Make a Recipe Vegan: Many of your favorite recipes will work just fine if you substitute vegetarian or vegan ingredients. Experiment and have fun.
• Substitute organic soymilk, or almond, or rice milk, for dairy
milk
• substitute Ener-g (a vegan egg replacer, in powder form, you can
buy in most health foods stores, in place of dairy eggs in most recipes
• Substitute vegetarian, vegetable protein for animal protein, like tofu and other soy based "meats" all found in the refrigerated cases in the produce section at the supermarkets, and enjoy beans and whole grains to meet your protein needs. • Substitute soy-based "cheeses" for ones made using animal rennet; read the labels because some of these "cheeses" contain milk protein or other non-vegan ingredients, but will fit a vegetarian diet that allows for dairy products |