UKH

There were a couple of good threads on here about 18 months ago after the David Attenborough program where many posters resolved to give up or cut down on meat. How's it been? Is a meat free diet now normal for most or did it prove to much of a struggle?

We're meat and fish free 5 days a week. It's rare that I look forward to meals during the week though

I've been going up and down from business as usual to low meat, to meat free and back again for several years.

My biggest concern is animal husbandry, every so often I convince myself that I can no longer support our poor standards of animal welfare in the industry and stop eating meat.

I'll start off being really careful about complimentary proteins in my diet, and everything will be fine for a few months, then I'll gradually let that slide. I like chick peas and beans, but it gets a bit samey using them to balance grains regularly and I've never really got on with any of the fake meat products I've tried. 

At some point down the line, my subconscious brain will realise it's not getting enough complete protein, and will tell me in no uncertain terms as I'm walking past a meat freezer in the supermarket what it wants.

For now I've gone back to salving my conscience by looking for ethical labels on meat and pretending "organic" means the animal lived an idyllic life in sunlit pastures in the Alps.

I admire and applaud your fortitude. I feel like buying you a Madhur Jaffrey cookery book for your Christmas.

I'm surprised you feel a meat free diet doesn't give you the nourishment you need. I agree that living off pulses must get a bit dreary, personally I eat quite a lot Quorn in the form of sausages and burgers. Fast food for energy rather than a special treat. 

Perfectly normal in our house. Has been for a few years now. I also went completely plant based in July and haven’t looked back. Never once missed meat, but do miss my croissants and cheese though...

(Edit: I have deviated slightly with a couple of milk stouts, but I’m not beating myself up about that!)

I'd be interested to hear what a typical weeks (or days!) menu would be for you? I achieved 3 months of veganism this time last year and probably the only reason I gave up was lack of inspiration in the kitchen for meals and snacks! (plus my family refused to cook a vegan xmas meal!)

I definitely lost weight and felt better but not sure that can be accounted to healthy eating or just not eating at times because I didn't know what to make!

I’m a massive fan of BIG hearty salads, an example being last night’s dinner of cauliflower rice, spinach, shallottes, sun dried tomatoes, olives, avocado, apple, cucumber with a dressing made of English mustard, sesame oil, olive oil and salt and pepper.

Roasted veg also plays a huge part, from carrots, white onions, cauliflower, broccoli, cabbage, parsnips etc. I often cook the night before then refrigerate for the day after when they’re really sweet. Jacket spuds (either sweet potato or regular spuds) and salad is another staple.

Make and freeze lots of highly seasoned chilli type dishes that I make up as I go along, but the bulk of is made up of grated carrot and mushrooms which provide a real solid base. 

Eat masses of fruit during the day and the quantity of peanut butter, raw nuts and dried fruit I eat is properly off the scale. 100% dark chocolate with a brew is my post luncheon treat too.

It’s not for everyone I acknowledge, but I absolutely love the diet I have, both cooking and eating it!

Tonight's dinner is a 'Caribbean' stew with sweet potatoes, kale,  okra, peanuts, tomatoes, onion, ginger, cinnamon will probably serve with rice. Cooked yesterday, looking forward to it all day!!

I eat fish once a week. Haven't eaten meat for over 5 years. It does help that the thought of eating it makes me physically sick. This is beacuse of animal welfare issues seen as part of my job. 

I think the key is to have a good selection of meal ideas or it can get a bit boring. I've bought a few good vegetarian cookbooks and tried most of the meals in them. I marked up my favourites and have about 20 different meals to choose from.

It does give me the nourishment I need, as long as I'm being careful to balance it out. I've gone since months or so without meat no problem.

Just laziness that causes me to fail really - if you're eating meat there's no need to consider the balance of essential amino acids, you're going to get enough meals with good amounts of all of them present.

*six months or so

I resolved not to buy meat in supermarkets, on the basis that the small hurdle of going to a butchers should be enough to motivate me to think of veggie meals. On this I have been reasonably successful for the entire 18 months, I do buy the occasional roast or pack of bacon but otherwise very little meat. I had a bit of a dip early in the year as I changed job and so had access to a work canteen. Naturally that stopped pretty sharply, and now they only offer sandwiches of which there is a good veggie selection.

The best thing is that I have slowly trained myself to like Quorn: "chicken" pieces in fajitas have a rather different but perfectly reasonable texture, mince in moussaka etc is indistinguishable. I did try some supermarket own brand mince which was vile. My reliance on cheese has shot up though which is not ideal healthwise. I am also paying attention to vegetable seasons as much as reasonably possible, would still like better signage for this in the shops.

I gave up (most) meat about 18 months ago. Not from the DA programme, but from a YouTube clip I'd seen of an abattoir treating animals awfully... I mean really, really badly!!! That was the point I decided I didn't want to be part of that industry, where I couldn't guarantee the ethical treatment of farmed animals.

The only meat I eat is venison. I know the deer stalker personally on the Estate that I work, and he shoots mature deer to keep the population under control. Also, he processes the meat through a local butcher if he can't do it himself. So, all very ethical, and I know the meat doesn't have any growth hormones etc. 

So personally, I've found it very easy. Still get a bit of red meat (albeit probably only once or twice a month), and with my partner already being vegetarian, it has actually made life simpler for cooking.

I like to go into a good greengrocers and pick a selection of stuff that looks good. Once I go home I stick the ingredients into Google and look for a recipe I fancy.

Very long term vegan here. I think everyone, whatever their diet, can fall into ruts and lulls in inspiration in their cooking. I don't think that's necessarily specific to meat free diets. A desire to experiment and to really enjoy cooking are important - I made two dishes I'd never tried before over the weekend. Mixed results but I enjoyed the process and trying to learn what I was doing. I will sometimes use meat alternatives but on the whole prefer exploring cuisines that have a natural appeal to me - there's a vast array of naturally vegan Greek recipes, for example. 

Anyone who says they can't get enough nutrition from a meat free diet must be training at unimaginable levels. 

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2260515-meat-free-diets-linked-with-gr...

Fair enough but the main risk was to vegans and even then the increase wasn't great.

I don't eat that much meat and even less fish but had considered trying to cut down further. (I don't think I could ever cut it out completely.) That was till I discovered that one fifth of all meat and fish farmed/caught in this country winds up as pet food. Decided not to have a dog instead. 

Good clickbait

“The overall level of risk to vegans was relatively small, equating to about an extra 20 bones broken per 1000 people over 10 years.”

Depends which bones!

Ha! True. Although, I’m working on the basis the broken bones were from one rather fragile person...

If you found that article insightful, perhaps you might find this excerpt from a study interesting. It was published by the same author/researcher: 

"In multi-variable adjusted (including body mass index (BMI)) Cox regression models corrected for multiple testing, a higher consumption of red and processed meat combined was associated with higher risks of ischaemic heart disease (HR per 70 g/day higher intake 1.14, 95% CI 1.06-1.22), pneumonia (1.28,1.15-1.41), diverticular disease (1.18,1.10-1.26), colon polyps (1.09,1.04-1.13), and diabetes (1.29,1.19-1.40), and a lower risk of iron deficiency anaemia (IDA), driven by a higher consumption of red meat (HR per 50g/day higher intake 0.77,0.69-0.86). Higher poultry meat intake was associated with higher risks of gastrooesophageal reflux disease (HR per 30g/day higher intake 1.14, 1.06-1.23), gastritis and duodenitis (1.10,1.04-1.16), diverticular disease (1.09,1.04-1.16), and diabetes (1.13,1.06- 1.20), and a lower risk of IDA (0.80,0.73-0.87)."

I know which I'd rather.

Unfortunately, most of them are vastly complimented by feta, which is one of the reasons I would find it extremely hard to go vegan, although I have done long stints of no meat in the past without any problems, mainly due to these lovely Greek dishes.

The Green Roasting Tin cookbook has been a revelation in our household. Virtually every recipe is mouth-wateringly delicious and simple to cook. It’s made switching to a predominately vegetarian diet easy. 

I hardly ever eat meat unless I pick it up very reduced for its sell by date (which is regularly). My staple is a tin of sardines most days (having switched last year from tuna) which is cheap, sustainable, healthy and, being at the bottom of the fishy food chain, free of mercury and stuff.

The big confounder with diet studies are that:

1. Vegetarianism & veganism is generally considered health-promoting, so the health conscious will adopt one if not the other.

2. I'd wager most smokers, heavy drinkers, obese, and people who don't give a toss about health will eat red meat.

The outcomes in the study you link to have to control for this.

Lol. I forsooth vegetarianism on the 4th day in Francaise. After a score minus a quarter of a score of vegetarianism, in that lonely hotel at the end of the end of that end of the NW end of France I partook of a salad. A salad of the freshest leaves, the localest of walnuts, the most delicious of delicious dressings, accompanied by lots of the most fabulous local red wine. A salad that also contained marinated duck gizzard, and tastiest of all, sliced smoked chicken hearts. It was a taste sensation that ended 15 years of vegetarianism. 

Which they have. I'm not sure what point you're trying to make?

Yes, as I'm neither Jewish, or suffered from phimosis as a child... 

Probably that these studies are rarely definitive and there are other opinions.....like this one:

The Carnivore Code Review (2020 UPDATED) By Paul Saladino (carnivorestyle.com)

Thanks for the recommendation. I too have tried hard to cut down on meat so have just bought this.

Far from necessarily so. Check out the wealth of recipes on this page: http://thegreekvegan.com - for the most part, these are not adaptations, just traditional Greek dishes. 

I changed significantly around then.  My motivation is climate and sustainability; not husbandry.  So I've been guided by the CO2/Kg chart for different foods.

I haven't flown for 2 years - and won't again.  I don't buy any obviously flown food.  It'd be lovely to be seasonal and local, but nettles and oilseed rape for summer only is a step too far.

I've eaten no lamb and beef once.  Pork perhaps half a dozen times (and it comes from pigs that I walk past from home); fish about the same; chicken once a week.

Decent cookbooks were a big part of the answer - Green Roasting Tin for example.  I've always planned a week's recipes ahead and shopped to that list, but new cookbooks give variety and inspiration.

Quorn meat-free mince is brilliant for lasagbes abd suchlike; been less impressed with other "substitutes".

It no longer feels like a change (it did at first).

Cheese still an issue though.  Also, when I cook dried beans I can't get the texture the same as tinned ones - they always seem slightly dry no matter how long they soak and boil.  Anybody know if a pressure cooker might make a difference?

I'm not sure they have, their conclusion ends with

"and additional research is needed to evaluate whether these differences in risk reflect causal relationships."

I've been eating wild Muntjac as my only meat source, except for the week before last where I weakened in my local co-op. I'm looking around online this week for as good deals as where I last bought it from.

Bookmarked, always happy to get more inspiration. I'm Greek, I have a huge number of Greek recipes to pick from already and quite a few cookbooks and that is always a source of inspiration when I cook vegan meals for my climbing club as well, although occassionally I will take the challenge of doing vegan versions of traditionally very non-vegan dishes.

Greek vegan dishes themselves are usually great. The problem is that they are lovelier with feta for me. Let's call it an addiction to sharp white crumbly cheese. Scrolling through that website, mouthwatering as those dishes are, I'd still want feta with a lot of them. You are a stronger man than me if you can resist.

PS: Anyone following such Greek recipes, a lot of them are from a category of dishes called "oily foods". That means that they should have rather a lot of oil. That is normal, do not cut down on it, most of the time it's the source of energy in the meal. Some western translations of these recipes have complete bullshit such as "use one tablespoon of olive oil". Disregard, they will both taste like the watery version that people have for Orthodox lent and you will be on quite the calorie deficit.

Thanks Alkis - and apologies, I didn't realise you're Greek and I definitely didn't mean to try and teach you about your own culture/cuisine. My wife is Greek-American and grew up visiting the generation that had emigrated, eating lots of "village food." She's passed on her love of the food to me. 

I only eat meat that I’ve caught/collected myself. In practice that means spearfishing and free diving for lobsters, crabs and shellfish. During summer I was eating meat 3-4 times a week, through winter probably once per week

Haven’t craved other meats at all, properly fresh fish is far superior to beef and lamb. Appreciate not everyone lives close enough to the coast or can hold their breath for long enough to catch anything though 

Haven't eaten meat for over 45 years. Never liked it, so no hardship there.

After a decade as a vegetarian (and at least 5 as a vegan), I moved back on to meat.

I wanted to move away from highly processed food - which most of the veg*n faux-meat and meat alternatives appear to be.

i also wanted to eat more seasonal foods to reduce my carbon footprint.

I now buy most meat from a local butcher who sources meat locally, and from farmers meeting high welfare & organic standards. This reduces my food air miles, carbon footprint, and supports biodiversity & native wildlife (unlike monocropped fields). I'm also putting money in to the local economy.

Eli Eli Lamb Sabachthani?

I wonder if my disliker has the bollocks to actually articulate his dislike?

vegetarian and dairy free for 10 years on environmental grounds. I noticed pretty quickly that once the powerful flavours of meat and dairy (cheese in particular) are removed the palate becomes aware of the complex flavours of plants. Adding in anchovies is my only vice.

I recommend finding some good vegan cookbooks. I use '15 minute vegan comfort food' by Katy Beskow for busy evenings and Aine Carlins The New Vegan when I've got more time. Vegan cooking, alongside avoiding harming animals makes widespread use of natural flavourings that explore the whole palate and also rolls in ingredients that complete all nutritional requirements.

I would avoid all meat substitutes as they play to the simplistic flavours and textures of meat. Eating vege sausages and burgers misses all the great flavours available to the meat avoiders.

And, to finish I really recommend finding a true vegan cafe or restaurant. Seeing vegan or vegetarian food cooked well by a chef who understands good vegetarian or vegan food  gives me inspiration as well as a fantastic evening out. Terre a Terre in Brighton is the best restaurant I have ever experienced but there are fantastic vegan cafes and restaurants elsewhere.

It wasn't me who disliked; but beef and lamb are climate monstrosities even if local

We made a conscious decision to only add one extra human being to the world's population and that alone helps me enjoy a lifetime of eating meat. My son seems to have made the same decision so I'd probably chuck in a fuel heavy V8 uber estate if I could afford one.

Respectfully, that is a clumsy analysis at best. I could respond equally broadly and point out the climate monstrosity of the Midwest dust bowl events of the 1930s and now threatening a return (https://onpasture.com/2020/10/19/is-a-second-dust-bowl-on-its-way/), caused by arable farming removing surface vegetation, exposing the soils to nutrient leaching and erosion.