ehuffnsd said:

I heard soy carries the female hormone estrogen.

I doubt it's going to shrink ehuff.

JasmineFire said:

except men should avoid soy products.

A vegetarian diet will tend to be healthier than your average American diet, but you can certainly fuck it up! Pepsi and potato chips are totally vegan! If you live off spaghetti and peanut butter sandwiches, you're also not doing yourself any great favors. Eat a varied diet that includes lots of vegetables, fruit, whole grains (the "whole" part is important), and beans (including soy, if you like it). Don't live off of starch/sugar and processed foods. If you can manage that, you'll be eating a healthy diet that will reduce your risk of cardiovascular disease and certain cancers. You'll probably also feel good. If you don't, listen to your body.

Wade in slowly, read books (Animal Liberation, by Peter Singer, is a good place to start with the ethical side of things). Try new foods; don't just take things out of your diet, find new things that you like. Browse vegetarian cookbooks and learn to cook. If you live in or near a major city, there are probably vegetarian restaurants nearby, so that can be fun to check out.

For the record, I don't think it's wrong to kill (killing to eat is part of life; all animals kill SOMEthing to survive). I think it's wrong to cause suffering in massive factory farms that torture animals, destroy the environment, and produce "food" that is full of chemicals and unhealthy fats. A person can source animal products that come from humane, organic farms (FYI, "humane" and "organic" are not synonymous), or a person can be vegan. I'm lazy and opt for the latter.

Oh, and I can tell you from experience that you'll save yourself a lot of time and energy if you skip the self-righteous veg evangelist phase and go straight to not giving a fuck what your friends/family eat and just being proud of yourself for making a choice that you're happy with.

If you own a meat eating pet like a cat or dog you'll either need to put them to sleep or wait until they die. Otherwise, you won't be a true vegan/vegitarian.


At least I think that's how it works. Others will offer spirited rebukes of my post but it's desperation and guilt that's driving those responses.


Good luck my friend

Imago said:

i love you and everything, but this is just

evenstar3 said:

That's just desperation and guilt talking there honey!

Imago said:

i'm not a vegetarian, though

JasmineFire said:

except men should avoid soy products.

ehuffnsd said:

it's true. i've been eating soy products for 20 years and i've grown a fully formed vagina.

All I know is that tofu is rubbish. What a waste of time! No flavour, so it only works hidden in kimchi or in miso soup of something with a strong flavour. Ok, so I'm not vegetarian, but it's in food quite often here and I can't see any benefit to eating it at all, so I don't. It feels like a waste of using my jaw muscles. Fried it's just like an oily flavourless jelly soaking in fat, and boiled it's just a non-entity. If I were veggie I'd take it out of vegetarian dishes and replace it with mushroom or something else worthwhile and tasty. There are loads of delicious vegetables out there. I could easily live on just vegetables if I had to. I just want them AND meat, is all.

Please, somebody tell me the point of tofu. I don't get it.

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[Edited 10/27/08 5:46am]

Fauxie said:

most of what you're getting is probably made with soft or silken tofu, which is slimy and gross. i only cook with extra firm tofu, because it has a much more solid texture and consistency and it doesn't have that gelatinous nonsense going on. cube up a pound of extra firm tofu and fry it up in some flavored oil (or fry it in plain oil and season it with curry powder and cracked black pepper) and you've got yourself a treat.

i'll defend extra firm tofu to my dying day, but you're totally right about that silken crap. it gives good tofu dishes a bad rep.

Fauxie said:

most of what you're getting is probably made with soft or silken tofu, which is slimy and gross. i only cook with extra firm tofu, because it has a much more solid texture and consistency and it doesn't have that gelatinous nonsense going on. cube up a pound of extra firm tofu and fry it up in some flavored oil (or fry it in plain oil and season it with curry powder and cracked black pepper) and you've got yourself a treat.

i'll defend extra firm tofu to my dying day, but you're totally right about that silken crap. it gives good tofu dishes a bad rep.

Anxiety said:

thats it? i love fried tofu and i thought there was some special secret to making it.

There's nothing like a nice rare steak. If god wanted us to be vegetarians, he wouldn't have created canine and incisor teeth. Meatloaf. Shredded beef and broccoli. Hamburger. Steak. Steak Tartar. I'm all about meat!

Anxiety said:

If yall keep ignoring me I'm just going to get more annoying

I'm about to be 19, and ive been thinking about becoming a Vegeterian for some time now. I wanted to know , what do vegeterians eat and how are Vegeterians healthier than people who eat meat. I eat meat but im willing to give it up, cuz I always thought it was wrong for an animal to be killed just so man could eat.

Imago said:

sounds about right.

Fauxie said:

most of what you're getting is probably made with soft or silken tofu, which is slimy and gross. i only cook with extra firm tofu, because it has a much more solid texture and consistency and it doesn't have that gelatinous nonsense going on. cube up a pound of extra firm tofu and fry it up in some flavored oil (or fry it in plain oil and season it with curry powder and cracked black pepper) and you've got yourself a treat.

i'll defend extra firm tofu to my dying day, but you're totally right about that silken crap. it gives good tofu dishes a bad rep.

darkknight10 said:

May I ask why you think it's wrong to kill and eat animals? If you think it'll start too much drama, nevermind. Just curious as to your philosophy.

Anxiety said:

Oh, yeah, I know what you're talking about. Yes, I bought that one time from Tesco as it was really good value. Definitely better consistency-wise than the stuff in my miso soup at 'Fuji', but still, the taste. It's telling that you mentioned flavoured oil (and then the other even more flavoursome stuff). That's basically agreeing that by itself it has no flavour, so my point was what is the point of eating it? If you seasoned cardboard with curry powder and cracked black pepper it would be passable, just as tofu is in already great kimchi, but when could it ever not be substituted with something (vegetarian) that isn't more tasty? Never, I say. I thought there would be some nutrition-based argument, like they artificially inject a billion essential vitamins and minerals into the stuff and this is how vegetarians are going to take over the world, and yet, I've found that in most cases tofu doesn't in fact contain all that much of anything particularly spectacular. Forgive, I've no wish to bash in any way. I just don't get it. Is tofu a substitute for something? If it's not amazingly good for you and doesn't taste of much, why not just use mushrooms instead? I keep harping on about mushrooms because to me they're like a kind of meaty-esque vegetable that works in many Thai dishes instead of meat and where tofu is sometimes used instead. Talk tofu with me some more, Chris. I feel like we're connecting here. Look how much I've written about tofu. That has to tell you something.

p.s. Funnily enough I actually really like tofu milk from the market. Without sugar and with some black sesame seeds in tiny jelly pods floating around inside.

Anxiety said:

Fauxie said:

well...saying tofu is gross because it has no flavor is like saying water or flour is gross because they have no flavor. are you disappointed because you're not able to bring home a block of tofu and eat it raw?

i just think of tofu as an ingredient. i mean, curry powder has tons of fantastic flavor, but i'm not gonna sit in front of the tv and eat curry
powder straight from the jar with a spoon. no, that's what i do with strawberry quik powder.

wait, what are we talking about again?

oh. tofu. yeah. actually, i'm kind of sick because i LIKE the taste of raw tofu, but not enough to eat a whole big block of the stuff. i'll eat a little raw cube of tofu while i'm cooking with it.

i like the fact that tofu has a neutral taste and can take on the flavor of whatever you cook it with. for me, it just adds texture and makes the dish fuller. if it's all veggies, it can get a little too crunch-happy.

though last night, we baked a big tray of butternut squash cubes and i think perhaps i could eat those every day for the rest of my life.

what do i have to do to make you accept tofu, fauxie? you seem so close. so, so close.

Tofu is rich in high-quality protein. It is also a good source of B-vitamins and iron. When the curdling agent used to make tofu is calcium salt, the tofu is an excellent source of calcium. While 50 percent of the calories in tofu come from fat, a 4-ounce serving of tofu contains just 6 grams of fat. It is low in saturated fat and contains no cholesterol. Generally, the softer the tofu, the lower the fat content. Tofu is also very low in sodium, making it a perfect food for people on sodium-restricted diets.

Fauxie said:

well...saying tofu is gross because it has no flavor is like saying water or flour is gross because they have no flavor. are you disappointed because you're not able to bring home a block of tofu and eat it raw?

i just think of tofu as an ingredient. i mean, curry powder has tons of fantastic flavor, but i'm not gonna sit in front of the tv and eat curry
powder straight from the jar with a spoon. no, that's what i do with strawberry quik powder.

wait, what are we talking about again?

oh. tofu. yeah. actually, i'm kind of sick because i LIKE the taste of raw tofu, but not enough to eat a whole big block of the stuff. i'll eat a little raw cube of tofu while i'm cooking with it.

i like the fact that tofu has a neutral taste and can take on the flavor of whatever you cook it with. for me, it just adds texture and makes the dish fuller. if it's all veggies, it can get a little too crunch-happy.

though last night, we baked a big tray of butternut squash cubes and i think perhaps i could eat those every day for the rest of my life.

what do i have to do to make you accept tofu, fauxie? you seem so close. so, so close.

orgnote me if you want some valuable information.

All of the folks posting here own meat eating pets.


thanks.

Anxiety said:

I just can't get there, Chris. I just can't quite get there. I mean, I eat squid. I like squid. Squid doesn't have that much flavour, but when barbecued without any seasoning nor sauce to dip in it still pleases me. Not so with jellyfish. Not so with tofu. Plain pasta's alright, isn't it? Doesn't bowl you over, but it has something, even without sauce. So it's a texture thing. Again, I'm so close, but it slips away. Off my spoon and back on to my plate. It doesn't want to be eaten. It would rather be somewhere else. It knows the mushroom should be in the game. The mushroom, eagerly: "Put me in the game, Coach Anx!" but Coach Anx has learnt that lesson. He was successful before, on top of the world even. Winning, flavoursome dishes were all that mattered. Carrots, mushrooms, potatoes, they were the stars. They had to be in the game, it's a results business. The pressure! Alcoholism followed. A far-fetched set of circumstances and a demotion to only working with second string vegetarian food. But you know what? After his initial aloof attitude and inflated sense of status, Coach Anx found his way back to his roots, back to why he became a vegetarian in the first place, and gosh darn it if he didn't find a way to have fun with it, and wasn't that the whole point? To cap it all off, in spite (or maybe because of ) his carefree disregard for results, Coach Anx ended up with winning, flavoursome dishes with all vegetarian foodstuffs, including tofu, contributing equally.

All that and: