a peek inside the fishbowl

I promise that the next 20 posts aren’t going to be all about what I’m eating, because that would be boring – for you and for me. I will update here and there when I have something to say, but if you are curious and want the daily menu update it is posted over here and will be updated as I go.

If you recall from yesterday’s post, I entered into this feeling determined yet woefully unprepared. No time. No list. No groceries. On Monday I had to go to the office early and wasn’t able to prepare a lunch. So, I dropped by Victory Caffe to see what was on the menu. It’s a different kind of place. Victory Caffe is actually a gym (the offer various fitness/boxing/coaching programs) and there are some food/coffee options/tables in the front part. Victory is actually my regular source for office coffee. They carry Happy Goat – locally roasted beans – and it’s always an excellent brew. There are always healthy items on the menu, and snacks too, and I knew I was in good hands if I asked The Question.

It was a little early for lunch, so I asked Anna, the owner, if she had any vegetarian and/or vegan options on the menu today, and then I told her about my 21-day vegetarian challenge. She asked when I was starting this challenge and I suspect my answer didn’t create much confidence.

“Er, today.”

Then she asked if I was eating eggs. I had no quick answer because honestly, I hadn’t thought about the exactly parameters of this particular challenge. And what about fish? Obviously, I still need to figure this out. Sigh.

We chatted about the importance of protein and macronutrients for women of, ahem, a certain age (Anna really knows her stuff) and we agreed that I’d come back at lunch hour for a beet ball sandwich. (Yes, you read that right. BEET. BALLS.)

I came back at 12:30 and we chatted some more. My sandwich was prepared and wrapped up in butcher paper and I happily went on my way.

Well, I wasn’t disappointed. It was FULL OF ALL THE FLAVOURS and I am drooling as I type this. Surprisingly, it didn’t taste very beety, even though it was a pretty major ingredient. It was all very nutty and fresh and crunch and savoury and filling. There was goat cheese in it too, and the whole thing was pressed between a couple of slices of really excellent bread.

I’d call that a successful lunch, but her menu changes so frequently that I don’t know if she’ll ever have that same sandwich again. (Oh well. Dare to dream!)

That was probably the highlight of my meals yesterday.

This may sound terribly obvious to some of you (or most of you!) but just because someone calls themselves a vegetarian or a vegan doesn’t mean they’re healthy. If I was a vegetarian I can still eat all kinds of things that aren’t good for me: french fries, ice cream, cake, fried foods etc. The same is true for vegans I suppose. Potato chips and Coke would be a perfectly vegan lunch, but it’s far from perfect, isn’t it? And then there’s the question of processed foods. I had a meeting today and stopped by Rainbow Foods on the way home to pick up some dairy-free yogurt to try and some tofu. I also picked up a vegan caesar salad dressing that looks interesting, but holy cow, there’s no shortage of food products that are chock full of ingredients I don’t recognize or like. For example, many brands of veggie burgers have caramel colour in them. (I guess to make them look like their BBQ’d beefy counterparts?) Anyway, it’s something else to think about as I sit down and plan a proper menu for the week. I have a feeling I will be eating out a few more times too. This challenge would be a cinch if someone just fed me every day! ;)

I haven’t written about this here, but awhile back my eldest decided she didn’t want to eat beef anymore, or at least, drastically reduce the amount she was eating. I was ok with this, because I didn’t really want to eat it anymore either. There are many reasons why reducing the amount of red meat we eat is probably a good idea. Here’s my top two:

1) The environmental argument
Factory farms are crap on the environment. (No pun intended.)

2) The “kindness to animals” argument
Factory farms are pretty awful places. As an animal lover who struggles to find her own place in the world sometimes, I am finding it harder and harder to ignore what happens in places like that. Once you get to know an animal, like a pet, it makes it harder to reconcile the fact that we are animal eaters. We were talking about it around the dinner table last night. I believe humans evolved to be omnivores, but does that give us the right to mistreat the animals that we eat? Creatures that feel love and joy? I don’t think so.

Mark Bittman, food journalist and author of many books about food including Food Matters, wrote a great piece about it in the New York Times aptly titled: Rethinking the Meat-Guzzler. The bottom line is that our increased meat consumption has created a number a very serious problems.

(I sense my mother rolling her eyes at this point. (Hi mom!) It may be worth noting that I am the daughter of Eastern European parents and there was meat on the table every night, no matter the season. So I’m bucking tradition here.)

I can’t honestly say that beef hasn’t passed my lips these last few months. It has once or twice, most recently in the form of a Chinese crispy beef dish that I can’t refuse, but I’m not eating nearly the same quantity that I used to. And by default, neither has my family, because I’ve simply replaced beef with fish and chicken when I’m planning our menus for the week. And you know what, I haven’t missed beef that much.

I touched upon a burger-related epiphany in this past post. I love food, and I suspect I’m not alone when I say that meals can represent a kind of comfort to me: like the happy feeling that comes with a family BBQ on a sunny day. But it’s the comfort and taste that is more important to me, the fact that beef is the primary ingredient in a given meal is less so. So I have no problem eating vegetarian versions of traditionally beefy foods like lasagna, tacos, and burgers if I’m still in that happy place. Does that make sense?

Soooo, that’s where this comes in:

I decided I wanted to challenge myself and cut meat out of my diet for 21 days. Confession: I spoke to a few people about it this past week, but in terms of a vegan challenge (no meat, no dairy, no eggs). I ultimately decided it’d be better if I eased into this as a vegetarian challenge, and not take such a huge leap right out of the gate. (That being said, I will try to make half of my total meals to be vegan meals too. We’ll see how that goes.)

I think I can do this, but today of all days, I am woefully unprepared to begin: a busy weekend, no meal plan, no groceries in the house, and looming work deadlines. I fear I’ve set myself up for failure before I’ve even started. Oh well. Onward and upwards! I’ll be writing about this here and there, and tracking my meals (with recipes if applicable, right here.)

p.s. I’ve issued these kinds of challenges before, but I’m afraid to ask anyone to join me on this one. It’s a biggie. That being said, if you DO want to join me and give it a shot, I’d love the company.

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— Hootsuite (@hootsuite) June 6, 2015

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• Inside the food industry: the surprising truth about what you eat, theguardian.com