another form of environmental pollution, are prius drivers aware of these facts?

If cows sheep and other animals were not mean't to be eaten they wouldn't be made of meat.

How did you travel on your holiday? Have you checked the impact of air travel?

Avoid lentils, they make you fart and you know methane is an atmoshere killer.

 

its relatively common knowledge that production of beef in factory farms uses 8 times more resources than an organic well managed pasture raised beef. couple that with local buying, (average distance store bought beef travels is 800 miles. for vegetables, its 2000 miles)

92 % of the country has locally grown produce available...americans eat locally grown produce about 16% of the time...(that figure has gone up quite a bit in recent years)

a book to read:

"An Omnivore's Dilemma" by Michael Pollan

 

Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.

Problem solved.

 

Most people with dietary caused medical problems (like diabetes) would rather die than go vegetarian.

They generally get their wish.

 

We had a thread about this subject, previously.

 

I am completely vegan, just as a personal choice.

Makes me feel good.

I don't diss on other people who eat meat usually. I do tease my sisters a little about it, but for the most part my conversion techniques just include cooking yummy animal free foods for people so they can see it can be done.

 

I did the vegetarian thing years back for health reasons. It didn't work for me. The one thing I could never give up is pepperoni on my pizza. Albeit I didn't have it very often.

However, we Americans eat WAY too much meat. Especially red meat I.E. cows. So while I do eat meat, I eat a lot LESS than the average American.

Rather than eating meat three times a day I eat meat maybe three times a week.

I don't eat ham or bacon at all.

I highly recommend Sunset Magazine's Vegetarian Cooking and International Vegetarian Cooking. Some really great recipes for all. For those that eat meat there are options to adding fish, shrimp, chicken, pork or beef to various recipes. I like the recipes as they are and have some standards I make. My favorite spinach feta quiche is from that book with an awesome whole wheat pie crust.

And I have a nice lentil and macaroni soup recipe from my Mother I make. Real nice for the crock pot. The recipe also works well for Hoppin' John with a substitution of black eyed peas for the lentils.

Lentil soup

 

ooh that recipe looks yummy, I'm totally going to try that out next week.

Thanks!

 

Sigh. If humans weren't meant to be eaten, they wouldn't be made of meat.

So this says, um, what about your diet?

 

That if we're not careful, we'll be eaten by lions, tigers or bears.

 

Oh My!

 

I only eat fish & eggs, no poultry, red or white meat

the amount of waste that chicken, hog, & cattle farms create is awful and its a serious threat to our fresh water supply

 

I really enjoyed the book as well.

To further your point read up on ecosystem food webs and energy pyramids. Eating lower on the food chain more often (eat phytosynthesising plants often) will help lessen the burden our species places on the planet. That being said there is nothing wrong with including meat in your diet but too much of it has health and ecological drawbacks. The best option is to eat a mixed diet but choose healthier foods grown both locally and as organic as possible.

Example of the 10% transfer of energy from one trophic level to another.

"
The Ecological Pyramid
We described in the previous sections how energy and organic compounds are passed from one trophic level to the next. What was not mentioned is the efficiency of the transfer. In a highly efficient transfer almost all of the energy would be transferred -- 80% or more. In a low efficiency transfer very little energy would be transferred -- less than 20%. In a typical food chain, not all animals or plants are eaten by the next trophic level. In addition, there are portions or materials (such as beaks, shells, bones, etc.) that are also not eaten. That is why the transfer of matter and energy from one trophic level to the next is not an efficient one.
One way to calculate the energy transfer is by measuring or sizing the energy at one trophic level and then at the next. Calorie is a unit of measure used for energy. The energy transfer from one trophic level to the next is about 10%. For example, if there are 10,000 calories at one level, only 1,000 are transferred to the next. This 10% energy and material transfer rule can be depicted with an ecological pyramid that looks like this:

​

 

They should stop eating refined carbohydrates. Meat is not the problem in this instance. A low fat, high carb (assuming the normal suspect, sugar and highly refined carbs like flour) diet will kill a diabetic a LOT faster than an all meat diet. You don't find diabetes in cultures that mostly eat meat (I should say "didn't", there aren't really many of those left anymore). You also don't see the high rates of heart disease and cancer, tooth decay. The chronic diseases of western culture are the result of diets that are high in refined carbs.